randomly chaotic and frequently mundane

I decided to do 3 pictures of the week this week. I’m probably a little late, and I’m sorry about that if you’re keeping score. These are Gage and my niece Kalina playing with the dogs. The dogs are Tonka and Shelby — my Aunt Kathy and Uncle Mark’s dogs. Tonka is a Lab/Husky mix and Shelby is a Lab/Doberman mix and they are gorgeous. When they came over, Gage and Kalina went wild. They were in hog heaven, running around chasing the dogs and playing with them. Gage laid down with them several times and just cuddled.  I almost got a picture of the two of them trying to “herd” the dogs out of the foyer one night, but just missed it.  Imagine if you will though… These kids aren’t tall.  2 1/2 to 3 feet or so tall and the dogs are pretty damn tall themselves.  It was a funny site.  Kalina is cuddling with Tonka in the one picture, and the dog in the foreground of one of the others is Shelby.

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Gage has been doing pretty good in school, he’s enjoying going in and seems to like his teacher and his class.  I’ve talked to his teacher and she seems great.  The class focuses on the applied behavior analysis technique, which I’ve heard a lot of good things about.  As a matter of fact, I remember seeing a kid interviewed on The View earlier this year who had been treated using that technique and was living a very normal life.  I think it’ll help Gage quite a bit.  He’s already said a few more words and done more repeating — Joe asked him “how are you?” last night and he repeated it and when Joe said “I am good.” Gage said “Are you good?” followed by “I am good.”  It seems like there’s already been some progress, which is nice.  He’s sleeping good and seems to be getting accustomed to the new people.  He even stopped pushing Kalina, although Tammy was told by someone who works with Autistic kids that that’s often a way of acknowledging other peoples presence and showing affection.  But he does still pat her on the back and sit with her when they watch a movie together.

Joe is gonna help me get some computer stuff as far as job training goes.  Licensing certification and stuff like that, which he says I could quite easily do and make a good amount of money at.  Some other training, too, like share point and some other stuff that I forget the name of.

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I’ve always been a big fan of natural medicine. In my experience there are fewer side effects and bad flavors from natural or alternative medicine. Personally, I’ve used it to treat bronchial issues, colds, and stuff like that. But it can be used to treat more serious conditions – I know people who use natural medicine to help control their diabetes or to help ensure that they’re getting good nutrition. Natmedtalk.com is a nice place for those who are fond of natural medicine – it’s an alternative medicine forum where you can discuss alternative medicine options and information. There are a number of forums on the site, categorized by whatever it is that you want to discuss on the subject. A good set up for finding the information you want or getting advice from people who have tried and true natural medicine remedies and techniques. Checking out the site, I found a lot of good information that I didn’t know before, I even think that some of the stuff on the forum could help me control my hypoglycemia. So if you’re interested in learning more or giving natural medicine a try, it’s worth the time to check out the forum and asking a few questions.

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Gage has pink eye, so he didnt’ go to school today.  He watched Mulan and is playing with mom’s Christmas thingies.  It’s cold as hell outside.  Not snowing cold, but cold nonetheless.  I wrapped all of the stuff that still needed wrapped.  Finally finished the cross stitch project I was doing for Mimi and Mike last night, so I wrapped that.  Mom said to take my time with hers… good.  It’s going to take awhile.  It’s more complicated than anything I’ve ever done.  It should be interesting, to say the least.

I was playing with Lucky earlier.  He’s definitely slowed down a bit.  He’s gotten older… getting old I guess.  He’s about 12 years old these days.  Not sure what to make of Gage, either.  He seems to like him, but Gage scares him from time to time by trying to jump or sit on him.  It’s ok, Lucky will get used to it.  He loves to play, and once Gage starts playing with him the way he likes to play, he’ll adore him and put up with more stuffs.  Gage has to learn not to bother his feet, too.  Lucky is not fond of his feet being touched for some reason.  I noticed that yesterday, when it was wet, Lucky was limping around a little bit.  I guess he’s got a touch of the arthritis.  It’s sad to see, but I guess it happens.

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I’ve had a lot of people ask me about web hosting. Perhaps it’s because I’ve had a personal website for over 10 years, and in the past 3 or 4 years I’ve had it on my own domain. That takes hosting, to be sure. The thing is, my host might not be the best host for you. I tend to recommend sites like http://www.webhostingchoice.com. They allow a person to search for a host based on the space/bandwidth needs they anticipate along with the set up cost and monthly fees they can afford to pay. Choosing the right web host is like choosing the right car — it has to meet your needs or it was a bad purchase. Sites like this make it easy for people to choose the right host for their website (personal or business) or blog.

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It’s been awhile, but I’m back in the saddle.  Now that I have batteries for the regular digital camera, and I have more stuff to take pictures of.  Since we decorated the Christmas tree at mom’s yesterday, I was going to just post a picture of the tree.  But then Gage took notice of the tree.  He spent a couple of hours yesterday just sitting in that chair and looking at the tree.  He hasnt’ tried to take anything off of it, or to pull it down or anything.  He’s just fascinated with looking at it.  It does sparkle oh so prettily.  Everytime we move that chair away from the tree, he puts it right back where it was and climbs up and looks.  I’ve never seen him quite so fascinated with the tree, but then, he’s never seen a tree quite like this.  There are all kinds of ornaments, the few glass ornaments we put on it are at the top so small hands can’t pull them off.  There are also a few moving ornaments on the tree (the kind that plug into the light string).  It’s a cute picture though.  I would have liked a little more light, just enough to help the camera focus on Gage but not wash out the lights.  I used the “available light” setting on the camera.  The only problem with that setting is that the camera and the subject must remain perfectly still.

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When I was with my ex, my credit was pretty much destroyed. It’s not entirely his fault, I was a bit of a pushover then, and I let him convince me (often) that I should just charge whatever it was he wanted. Even when I couldn’t afford it. Of course, when it came time to pay those credit card bills and stuff, he had nothing to contribute or they weren’t his responsibility. It wasn’t a good situation and almost 10 years later I’m still hearing from those bill collectors, because I still haven’t landed entirely on my feet in that regard. I’m working on rebuilding my credit though. I got a few credit cards that cater to people with bad credit, and I’m getting info on bad credit loans to help me pay off a few things and get back on the right track financially speaking. It’s important, I want to own a house and buy a new car someday. I’m not very likely to get financing with bad credit, so we rebuild.

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Well, we got the tree up.  It’s pretty.  I did my tinsel-butt chicken walk.  I haven’t done it in years… but it’s always good for a laugh.  It started when we lived in California.  I started doing this chicken walk all around, with my butt sticking out.  Apparently, there was tinsel on my butt.  It cracked everyone up.  So I ceremoniously stick a bit of tinsel on my butt and did the walk.  It was fun.  Gage wasn’t interested in helping, but he does like looking at the tree now that it’s up.  Kalina helped put a few ornaments and added tinsel.  She kept calling it happy.  So we started calling it happy.  I got some on my feet and said “look, happy feet!”  I also tossed a bunch of tinsel on Sisser.  I was trying to make her happy.  It didn’t work, she’s still grouchy.

We also baked chocolate chip and lekvare cookies.  We need to get an extra extension chord so we can plug the record player back in.  The record player is necessary for playing the Elvis, Brenda Lee, Conway Twitty and Chipmunk Christmas albums.  They’re necessary.

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Eventually, when I have a house of my own, I’m going to be one of those people who spend half of November setting up Christmas lights and doing the big display in the yard. Why not? I’ve always loved looking at the Christmas displays around town, especially the ones that take a lot of effort. I’ll definitely have to invest in some LED rope light for various light sculptures and trims. It might be a higher expense up front, but the savings in electricity (they use about 1/12 the power that regular incandescent ropes use) and the fact that they last much longer makes them well worth the price.

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It’s interesting seeing how Gage handles all the Christmas decorations.  Mom has quite a few things that light up, play music or dance around.  He’s figured out how to activate most of them.  There are a few that he hasn’t figured out and that he’s learning that he’s not allowed to touch — although he can look all he wants.  We bought the tree today, and we’ll probably decorate it tomorrow.  That’ll be interesting.  I wonder if Gage will take decorations off as fast as we can put them on… or maybe he’ll help out.  He’s never helped decorate a Christmas tree before.

The people across the street have lights in their yard.  it’s a pretty set up, although I’m not a big fan of mixing solid white and multicolored lights.  It doesn’t often look right.  This display isn’t too bad.  The mulitcolored lights could have been done better, that’s for sure.  Gage likes to sit on the couch and look out the window at them.  Sometime next week or next weekend, Sisser and I are going to get the kids in the car and take a drive around and look at the lights in the area.  Grammy (my mom) might come with us.  It’ll be lots of fun, that’s for sure.

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All of my life, I’ve had a love of good period clothing. Particularly, medieval clothing, to be perfectly honest. It’s not just for Faires and SCA events, either. There’s nothing like dressing up in period garb and going out to dinner with your friends, the whole gang in period clothing. I’ve done it a number of times — some friends and I got all dressed up and went to a nice Italian restaurant for dinner. I think medieval clothing works best in situations like that. Sure, you get a few stares, but you also get compliments. Especially when you get your clothing at Renstore.com. They’ve got some really gorgeous period garb, and the stuff I’ve been able to get from them has been really well made. As much as I love making it myself, I have to say that they make it easy to say “Oh I think I’ll just buy it.”

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Gage and Kalina seem to be getting along better.  They shared Stun Runner earlier.  They gave each other a hug or two.  Although Kalina bit Gage last night for some reason.  He might have been pushing her though, we didn’t see it.  There was just this sudden burst of crying.  No doubt Gage hit Kalina for biting him (can’t blame him there), because she cried right afterward, too. 

Looking into a web design program for training and all of that good stuff.  I figure I’ve got the basics, and I can do it from pretty much anywhere.  It’s something I’ve been thinking about for awhile, and Joe has looked into some programs for me already.  I’m guessing that he’d like me to do the website for their business.

I’ve been working on the cross stitch thing for my older sisters Christmas present.  I’m not gonna have mom’s finished before Christmas, but I’ll have it started.  I also had “built in” presents for Kalina and Madison — stuff from Noah’s Ark Animal Workshop that I already had on hand.  I just have to figure out something for Michael.  Sisser says she doesn’t want me to get her anything because she can’t afford to get me anything.  So really I’m just shopping for something for Michael and some stuff for Gage.  Woo hoo, and stuff.

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I have asthma. That’s not a big deal, it’s actually quite mild, but I’m also a smoker and I have pollen allergies. Most days I’m fine, I don’t smoke 2 packs a day, in fact there are often days that I barely smoke a third of a pack. There are no real issues with breathing or asthma problems. Then there are those days when there’s so much stuff in the air — pollen, dust and so many other unpleasant things that make it difficult to breathe. That’s where air purifiers come in handy. Along with the Whirlpool Air Purifier comes the Whirlpool air filter. Some of them even remove odors in the air, which is nice since I love to deep fry some foods, but I can’t stand the smell it leaves behind. A purifier and a good filter would certainly help eliminate that faster than spraying a bottle of air freshener.

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or…

Unless they offer a REALLy good discount, I’ll never fly Frontier again.

So we get on the plane and everything is cool.  Gage sits in his seat and gets buckled in and everything is great.  It was a Frontier flight, and we were in the front row.  The flight attendants were aware that Gage is autistic and offered to swipe a card so that Gage could watch cartoons during the flight on the tv on the back of the seat in front of him.  I thought that was nice.  Then Gage freaks out.  Unbuckles his seat belt because, let’s face it, it doesn’t take much to figure out THOSE complex devices.  I’m trying to get Gage into his seat and buckled in; he’s kicking, screaming and punching at me.  The flight attendant throws ME and attitude and says “I don’t think that violence is called for here.”  What???? Ok, tell him then.  I’m putting him in his seat and buckling his seat belt.  HE’s the one behaving “violently,” I’m the recipient of the “violence” what the fuck are you telling ME that there’s no need for violence for????  Ok, so all this happens in about a minute.  While Gage was freaking out, they’ve closed the door to the plane.  Then the flight attendant tells me I have 1 minute to get him under control and in his seat or we’ll be removed from the flight.  I informed them that if they did, they would be making other arrangements for me and I would NOT be responsible for any additional costs.  We were removed from the Frontier flight, arrangements were made with US Airways.

During the hour and a half that we had to wait, I decided to get Gage something to eat and give him a dose of Tylenol, since it usually knocks him out.  We get some spaghetti, which he eats a little of.  I should have gone to the McDonalds and got him some fries — he ALWAYS eats those, but I was so frustrated I wasn’t thinking completely clearly.  I got the spaghetti, refilled his cup and dropped in 2 Tylenol meltaways (he won’t eat them for some reason).  The full dose for his age and weight is 3, so I figured I’d add the 3rd closer to the actual flight.  A little while before we have to board, I find one of those “news stand” places that are in just about every airport I’ve ever been in.  Gage immediately grabs a bag of pretzels and I grab him a bag of skittles (at this point, I also added the 3rd Tylenol to his drink).  He’s munching on pretzels as we board the plane.  I give him a little handful of skittles and he’s a happy camper.  He sits in his seat, looks out the window, munches away, sips his ”spiked” kool-aid and cuddles with Roo… before we even taxi out, he was asleep.  He was asleep during the emergency instructions and the de-icing process which took at least 10 minutes.  Slept through the takeoff (whew, we got off the ground) and he slept at least 20 minutes into the flight.  He woke up when they announced they’d be passing out headphones for the movie for $5 each.  When he woke up, he cuddled in my lap for awhile then noticed the clouds going by out the window.  So he sat in his seat and watched the clouds.

Eventually, it got dark, so he couldn’t see the clouds anymore.  At this point he had a total meltdown.  He was done, he wanted to get off the plane.  Seriously, he took me up the aisle in search of the door!  The flight attendants were very nice though.  The head flight attendant took us to the front galley (in front of first class) and offered Gage anything he wanted from that snack basket they offer the first class passengers (you know… all the good stuff that us coach passengers never get, LOL).  We sat in the flight attendants seat where it was a little cooler than the rest of the plane and he was nice and calm.  When we started making significant descent to land (I believe we were about 15 minutes from touchdown at that point), we went back to our seat, and after a few moments of freak out, I got him to notice the lights on the ground.  He was fascinated and watched out the window, calmly, until we landed.  He did freak a bit after we landed because he wanted to go as soon as possible.  I waited till most of the people were off the plane before getting up though.  Didn’t want to run anyone over.

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All across the country, the capitals and “special buildings” have set up their holiday light displays. I’ve seen footage on lightings in Colorado and here, and there’s one thing that has impressed me tremendously about both. They both switched to LED Xmas lights. Not just in the displays around capital buildings and major attractions, but the street displays that you see in shopping districts and such. All of the lights that are bought, put up and powered by the city. They’ve switched to Outdoor LED Christmas lights. I thought that was pretty cool. I can certainly understand the appeal. For starters, they last longer and use less power. That’s a great way to reduce the cost of the lights, which enables them to do more elaborate displays if they want to. The fact that they’re much more weather resistant than standard incandescent lights is also a great asset. They even handle moisture much better. Again, making them last longer no matter what weather they endure and reducing the final cost. They also don’t get nearly as warm, so they reduce any risk of fire. Of course LEDs aren’t just for outdoor displays or city projects. They’d be a great addition to anyone’s holiday display. Personally, I’d love to get some LED Christmas tree lights myself. Not to mention some of the outdoor lights and some strands for inside the windows.

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