Daffodil Lane: May 2006 Archives

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May 31, 2006

World No Tobacco Day

Just in case you didn't know, today is World No Tobacco Day! This alliance is a world wide effort to rid the world of tobacco and its negative effects on people's health! We here at Daffodil Lane salute you and your noble vision! I dream of the day I can go out in public without having to walk through a toxic cloud of death to enter a building! Keep up the good work!

Posted by Dianne at 5:41 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Republican push for vote suppression

The Maryland Republicans are mirror images of the corruption that has come to define the Republican party as a whole. Right now they are going around the state desperately trying to force suppression in a futile attempt to keep their crazy leader in office. It's unbelievable that such an obvious political ploy is being allow to continue, but that's what you get when Republican party runs things in your state...Corruption. Basically to get around the overcrowding at polling places, the Democrats allowed early voting. The Republicans which depend on causing problems at Democratic leaning polling places to keep vote counts low have decided to try and keep the law from going into effect. Right now the only way that they have a chance after the terrible job done by Ehrlich and his cronies like Dwyer in Annapolis is to keep the vote count extremely low this election. Unfortunately the national wave against the extremists policies of the crazies in the Republican party has sort of left them terrified. They have to suppress the vote at all costs to win. So the Republicans are spending large sums of money to send people door to door to collect signatures. If only they tried to take care of the people of this country with the same zeal as they do trying to take away their right to vote. But that's Republicans for you, nothing but hate for America and her people.

Area schools dismiss early due to heat

Let me get this straight...there are still schools in the county that I live currently that don't have Air Conditioning?? I forget, I live in a red part of the state, so they don't believe in Global Warming. I'm sure they are just going to chalk it up to wimpy kids are something. How freaking lame! There shouldn't be a school in this state without at minimum Geo-thermal heating and cooling. I don't care who you are, the hotter you get the less your brain works. You can't educate kids under those kinds of conditions, it's just impossible. It's time to raise some taxes and get this situation fixed immediately, because it's only going to get worse every year. And with the school years lengthening every couple of years, we've really got no choice put to step up.

Fairy Princess

Posted by Dianne at 3:56 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Grant rule waived for firehouse in Arbutus

Speaking of corrupt Republicans, it looks like our worthless Governor is up to no good again. He's taking money set aside for small business to buy firehouses for his home town. Most likely an obscene attempt to carry favor. I have nothing against firehouses, what's offensive is that there were very strict rules in place because the money was set aside for small businesses. So how did the Republicans get around the rule? Well they put a Republican in charge of course. Criminality is the norm for Republicans, so when asked to break the rules they happily do it. When it's found out that the rules were broken, you just change the rules and claim nothing is wrong. This is the heart of the "culture of corruption" that has come to define every Republican in the political sphere. Corrupt and evil to their core, they do everything in their power to steal and misuse positions of power to meet their own personal agendas no matter the cost to the people. I'll bet if the traditional media bothered to dig a little bit, they'd probably find that the building contractor is a major political contributor to the Republican party and I'll bet a good portion of the money that gets donated to Ehrlich campaign this year will have come from this kinds of illicit dealings. Using the taxpayers money to crush them with more years of destructive Republican leadership. They are all a disgrace to this nation!

Republicans work to steal another Trillion from America

It's always hard for me to wrap my mind around a trillion dollars, but Republicans have no problem trying to steal that much from hard working Americans. Their hate for this country and her people is unfathomable by mere mortals. See their rich campaign contributors see the writing on the wall and they are desperate to squeeze the every last drop of Americans future away from the working people of this country before the Republicans are washed out of power. I'm sure the brain dead Republicans reading this will scream that it's the Rich people's money and they deserve to keep it. Actually they will come out with some lame excuse about small business owners losing their farms and business because of estate taxes. It's a load of crap! The number of people being effected by these taxes are insignificant by normal standards. The Republicans are really only looking out for the super wealthy, there are perfectly legal ways for small business people and farmers to transfer wealth without any significant cost if they actually try, but the Republicans are grand masters at creating the notion of a "crisis" where none exists. Instead they want to help the poor billionaires pass along their fortunes unfettered by the cost those fortunes bring upon the American people. I've explained it before, but there is a cost of infrastructure in this country. It costs money to allow people to get rich and those people should have shoulder some of the burden for allowing them the opportunity to become fabulously wealthy. Instead the Republicans demand that my child's future should be sacrificed so that they can guarantee their greedy campaign contributors fortunes can be protected. It's sickening, but it represents what the Republican party has always been about. 10 Trillion dollars worth of debt ceiling now, with this it will probably have to go to 11 Trillion. This is the best that the Republican party has to offer folks, it's time for a change.

[via America Blog]

Dear God...

It appears to have bathed and maybe it got a hair cut! Good lord...the Apocalypse is upon us! But don't be fooled Britney...It's still a mooching dirt nugget and you're better off without it!!

Found via PINK Is The New BLOG!

We now return you your regularly scheduled Daffodil Lane!

Posted by Dianne at 3:37 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack

CA-50: NRCC in panic mode; McCain abandons Bilbray

This is actually an amusing turn of events. As you probably know the immigration issue is a massive issue among Republicans in California. They split quite nicely into two groups, the business type Republicans who want cheap labor and the xenophobic bigots type Republicans that hate everyone that isn't white and would be happy to kill them all. Bilbray has been desperately trying to get voter turn out up for the election since he beat out the xenophobic bigot candidate in the election by barely a percentage point. So to play to the radical extremists he's had to attack McCain's slightly more humane plan to march them all into economic slavery. Well evidently the Bilbary attacks got so bad that it finally offended McCain to the point that he cancelled his visit to a Bilbary fundraiser. So a week before the election, Bilbary has managed to alienate a big name Republican.

I don't know how this will effect the election. I've been surprised by how well Busby is polling right now, even with all the negative campaign ads that the desperate NRCC has been running against her. Amusingly, the NRCC assumed that this was going to be an easy win, so they didn't buy in ad time on local television. The DCCC bought all their ad time in advance, so they paid half as much. That's a real good use of money by the Democrats. But the Republicans have an unlimited supply of corrupt K Street funds from dishonest legislation they paid for to draw upon, so we really aren't any better off. Ultimately it's going to be decided on June 6th. I think we win no matter how the election turns out.

The Swiftboating of Gore

It's been pretty obvious that the radical right and the Republican party have been working overtime to attack Gore's new movie. Why would they care you might ask? Well it's an attack on the path America is on right now. The Republican Big Oil campaign contributors demand that nothing change unless it gets them more money. The Republicans have worked night and day to serve their greedy masters and they've got the legislation to show for it. Now Big Oil is under attack for the obvious failures of their way of life by Al Gore, so the GOP is galvanized in support of the destruction of the movie and the book. They are horrified that Gore has managed to refine his message down to a point now that it's actually clear and concise and so to the point that even a layman can understand how the Republican party is destroying not only this country, but the entire planet with their ignorance and greed. The Republicans can't allow something like that to happen on their watch. They are desperate to hold power at any cost, so they've rolled out the right wing media smear machine. This is probably just being used as a trial run for what they've got planned for the 2006 and 2008 election cycle, so you should probably prepare yourselves for this kind of insanity 24/7 for the next couple of years.

Gore for his part has been completely unconcerned by the Republican desperate efforts. Like the massive bunch of incompetent fools they are, they are using a sledge hammer to try to strike a fly. Sure it could work, but you have to be able to aim all that mass of hate and ignorance. And at this point the Republican noise machine is disorganized. The traditional media has jumped into action working to fill the void of the attack machine, but even they've pretty much lost all credibility with the American people. So get out to see the movie and pick up the book, it will drive your local Republican nuts and that's always its own reward.

Watch the video on the attacks on Crooks and Liars.

Posted by Jamison at 2:33 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Republicans tell residents to prepare for their incompetence

Well I've been telling people this for months, but it's good that the Republican administrations are now doing the same thing. Mind you in a few months they'll start saying that helping people isn't the role of government and then propose privatizing the disaster response section of the US government to Haliburton or some other Republican front company. It's so disgusting how blatant the Republicans are in their hate for the people of this nation. There is nothing more vile than a greedy America hating Republican trying to steal more money from America. If you're the praying sort, you'd better start now because tomorrow begins the Atlantic Hurricane season for 2006 and this is the plan that the Republicans have in place. It's suppose to be "very" active season, big surprise there. Tomorrow is the first day of the Hurricane season, but you need to review your Disaster Plans and check over your Disaster Kits today. I'd double all the listed durations given that the Republicans would rather you die than get a chance to vote in the next election.

Dixie Chicks New Album Debuts At #1

I can't say I didn't see this one coming! It's an excellent album and who really gives a flying cow what country radio thinks about anything??!!?! Congrats to the Dixie Chicks! You ladies more than deserve the honor! Thank you for standing up and speaking out! You rock!! :O)

Posted by Dianne at 11:15 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Memorial Day Parade Picture

Mr. Johnson is on the firetruck behind the marchers and as you can see not only is Jamison walking in the parade, he's SMILING too! The Apocolypse I tell you! ;o)

I've been reading up on Mr. Johnson as of late and I must say I'm extremely pleased with his concern over local water ways. Because of that he gets my vote as well!

Posted by Dianne at 9:52 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Morning Cuteness

Posted by Dianne at 8:31 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Cucumber Blooms!

Posted by Dianne at 8:28 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

May 30, 2006

Clover Flower Fun At Sunset With The Magic Marker Princess

Posted by Dianne at 7:23 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Sunset Garden Inspection

Posted by Dianne at 7:17 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

HBO Original Films: Elizabeth I

If you have HBO or any of the other HBO channels and you get a chance you should check out Elizabeth I! Helen Mirren is EXCELLENT! She puts forth a very feisty, very smart Elizabeth. She really has outdone herself with the performance! Definitely 5 stars out of 5! Check it out if you get a chance!

Posted by Dianne at 5:08 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

CA-42 - We have a write in candidate!

Woo Hoo!! We can have a sweep in California. A gentlemen named Mark Hull-Richter has stepped up to run a write in campaign so we can challenge the California seat. One problem is that it's 5 days until the election and you have to find everyone and tell them there is someone on the ground to vote for. It's going to have to be a totally organized effort to actually work out at all. He's got to get about 2200 votes to make it on the ballot for the general election. So if you live in the CA-42 and you're tired of the Republican oppression of this country, it's time to step up and help get Mark on the ballot! I threw in some suggestions for Mark to get on ActBlue and some write-in campaign ideas. I'm excited, now if we could just hear something from the Virginia folks who I still not have heard about candidates for their races (VA-4 and VA-6). The key to the fifty state strategy is to make the Republicans pay everywhere at once. Just yesterday Republicans were forced to pour 3.1 million dollars into the CA-50 race in a district that's 60% Republican in a desperate attempt to beat back Busby. That's 1/8 of the Republican House's re-election committee's budget folks to win a Republican district. That race is also decided on the same day folks. We've got to take the battle to the Republicans everywhere folks. Evil only triumphs were good people do nothing. It's time to fight!! Let's get Mark on the ballot in the CA-42!

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.

Edmund Burke wrote these words and they've are probably one of the most significant observations of the human society that have ever been made. All through human history the failure of human society has always been that good men do nothing and let evil triumph.

So why bring this up now? A quote from Ratzinger over the weekend "Where was God in those days? Why was he silent? How could he permit this endless slaughter, this triumph of evil?" He was speaking about the Holocaust, one of the most vile moments in human history, where evil was given unfettered reign over our planet because of the apathy and fear of good men. Humanity has paid a terrible price for this moment of profound weakness of character, but this can not be blamed on God. The notion that the head of the Catholic Church would dare blame God in such a public setting is beyond offensive. God doesn't fail men, period, end of story, end transmission! We fail God. It's just the nature of the beast so to speak. Evil only triumphs in the absence of action by good men.

Ratzinger should take a harsher look at his predecessor Pope Pius XII and his actions during the time of the Holocaust. There is more than enough blood on the hands of the Catholic Church to explain the failure of good men to serve the will of God. Ratzinger speaks as a man with no understanding of the universe, casting dispersions like a child. Perhaps it's time for him to remove the timber from his own eyes and notice that he is repeating the mistakes of Pius XII in America today by supporting the radical right wing in this country. Extremists always lead humanity to the brink and the role of the Church is to mitigate the zeal with love and understanding. Ratzinger's unwavering support of the extremists shows him unworthy of his position.

[via Majikthise]

Portfolio Update

I vaguely remembered this morning that I was supposed to be keeping up with the portfolio status for everyone. The market is on a tear as everyone knows. My weekly percentages are staying relatively stable given the overall weakness in the market. I'm still not seeing the relatively large upward swing that Fidelity and every Republican with a dream of stealing my future has promised. It's trending upward, but not significantly enough to matter. I've redone some of the numbers on my 401k projects with this kind of growth rate going forward and I consider that to be remote if the Republican remain in power in this country. I'd like to see some double digit growth and that can never happen under the current regime.

Anyway given this currently level of growth (around 3.5%) and assuming that I get certain level of pay increases, it's still only looking like I'm going to get about 1.5 million in the bank if I work until I'm 70. And considering I can get 4.15% in a savings account right now (which would give me 1.8 million), I'm not seeing the advantages of the 401k system at all, other than it fills the pockets of greedy Fidelity executives. I'm so disgusted with the entire system so much, I'm just going to keep ignoring it.

This Weeks Actual Percentage: +3.212%
Last Weeks Actual Percentage: +3.702%
Best weekly percentage: +7.437%

Personal Rate of Return according to Fidelity for This Week: 3.6% (0.7% YTD)
Personal Rate of Return according to Fidelity Last Week: 4.2% (1.3% YTD)

Current Asset Allocation:
23.74% Stock
74.71% Bond
01.55% Savings

Posted by Jamison at 2:57 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Toyota recalls more than 565,000 cars

"Subject to the recall are a total of 565,756 vehicles manufactured under the Wish, Isis, Prius, Corolla, Corolla Runx, Corolla Fielder, Corolla Spacio, Allex and Ractis brands between September 2002 and November 2005, according to the statement."

I was over at Hybrid Cars Blog and they had this up. I imagine before the afternoon is over that the right wing nutjobs will make this into a Hybrid only recall. The key thing is that it's only a bad part in the steering column, it has nothing to do with the hybrid part of the car. It's caused no accidents, Toyota just doesn't like the performance so they are stepping up and replacing it to be safe. The vast majority of the cars effected are the Toyota Wish, but the Prius is the next largest block of cars effected. So if you have one from the date range, you need to take it by your Toyota dealer to get it replaced.

Battlefield Triage

I had an interesting epiphany last night. I was helping out with some homework with Amber and one of her friends, American history which is one of my favorites, and I was asked why I'm not a teacher. That's a tough question for me. For those of you that don't know, I've had all the classes up to my student teaching to do elementary education, I was a tutor for Upward Bound, and Counselor at Space Camp. But my first tutoring assignment to start my student teaching almost killed me and haunts me to this day. Which is how the title applies.

Teachers like soldiers have to make decisions on the battlefield for the greatest good of the whole unit. They make calculated sacrifices to save the futures of as many kids under their care as possible. Which means they must also be able to accept the inevitable losses of those decisions. Unfortunately I don't like to lose at all. If I take responsibility for something, I will keep fighting until I win. It's fundamental to my personality, it's what makes me so annoying and what makes me so successful. But teachers don't get the luxury of the guarantee of victory, which I learned very quickly in my first attempt. I was tutoring a little boy who had never had any sort of mental stimulation in his entire life from all I could tell. He had almost no language skills and his understanding of even the most basic concepts was troublesome for him. I poured my energy into reaching him in our sessions, trying to find some common ground to work up from. Something that interested him, some way to trigger the curiosity and excitement that has pumped through my veins for my entire existence. And there was nothing, everything I tried failed. I stopped all my other classes and pushed myself harder to succeed. In the end, I achieved nothing at all. The soldier/teacher in me knew I'd done all that could be done, but the idealist in me wasn't able to take such a failure. It was a profound experience in my life and changed dramatically how I looked at the world at large.

I'm good at teahcing because I have little fear that I couldn't make the tough decisions that needed to made at a moment's notice. What keeps me up at night is that I could actually make the decisions and therefore have to live with each lost life for the rest of my life. I have a great deal of respect for anyone that can do it and I'm quite willing to give them a wide berth on whatever they say they need to do their jobs. And it's also why I fight so hard against those that give them grief about the decisions they make. Until you've stood there with the world on your shoulders deciding the future of this country, you really have no room to talk about those that make the decisions daily. Battlefield triage is not for the faint of heart or arm chair quarterbacks, but it's critical work that has to be done by those on the ground at the time. Anyway, that had been bothering me all night and I needed to get it out of my head.

Posted by Jamison at 11:57 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

Garden Update: A Few New Plants and Some More Bamboo Poles!

When I went outside this morning to take pictures of the zucchini blossoms I realized that the tomato cages alone just weren't going to cut it this year for the tomatoes! They are growing like gang busters and I'm not sure if it's the Turbo Tomato Mulch, the organic Tomatoes Alive or a little of both, but they are really fantastic this year! So Alexis and I headed off to Home Depot this morning to get some more Bamboo sticks.

Not only are the plants growing tall, they are bushing out as well, so Alexis and I added 3 Bamboo poles to each tomato cage to allow them more room to grow out not only upward, but outward.

Click on the extended entry to see some new additions to the garden today as well.

They finally had yellow squash plants today so we added one of those.

They also finally had some more cucumbers so we added a few more of those as well. Counting the two we had, and the one that actually sprouted from seed that gives us 6 total.

I added some lavender back to my flowerbed with my roses, because for some reason it didn't make it back this spring. I also planted another rosemary plant on the end of this bed, because you can just never have too much rosemary!

We also replaced a tomato plant we lost, but I didn't end up with a picture of that one. Maybe I'll take one later when my camera battery is recharged.

Overall things are still going well in the Daffodil Lane garden, but I reiterate...WE NEED SOME RAIN!!

Posted by Dianne at 11:00 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Time Out...Again!

Posted by Dianne at 10:58 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack

More Blossoms and Some Spearmint

The zucchini plant is moving right along in the blossom department and put on two new blooms overnight. Also I've been looking for spearmint without much luck the past few years and it turns out that Bonnie had some so she brought me some spearmint to plant and I gave her some peppermint!

I guess I've had a couple of garden updates sooner than I had thought! That's the thing with gardens...They are an ever changing entity of life.

Posted by Dianne at 9:12 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

May 29, 2006

Happy Memorial Day!

Take a little time today to remember all those who have valiantly served our country! Say a prayer especially for those men and women entrenched in Iraq, that they might be home safely with their families one day soon, instead of having to fight a war that is not worthy of their sacrifice, brought on by the greed of a bunch of hot headed oil men! Also don't forget our oft overlooked men and women in Afghanistan and remember them as well.

If you know someone who has served or is serving our country now, make sure and tell them how much you appreciate their service. We here at Daffodil Lane would like to send a big warm thought in Jamison's dad's direction. All of these men and women, whether you know them or not, deserve our honor, not only today, but everyday.

I hope everyone has a most pleasant Memorial Day holiday!

Posted by Dianne at 11:49 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Lovely Dinner

This evening we had our neighbors across the street over for dinner and had a lovely time. Their air conditioning system has gone out will be replaced later this week. With the temperatures in the high 80's I couldn't bear the thought of them having to heat up their house even more to cook, so I thought it would be fun to have them over for dinner. It also gave me an excuse to break out the old Memorial Day recipes! Potato salad, baked beans, BBQ chicken, steak and homemade vanilla ice cream with homemade hot fudge sauce! It brought me back to my childhood when we used to spend Memorial Day out at the lake! Overall it was a very good evening, right up until the part where some yahoo shot off some fireworks and it woke up Alexis so I had to go upstairs to settle her down. Everyone left before I made it back downstairs with Alexis in tow. Alexis is currently watching Veggie Tales and then it's back to bed for her (hopefully!)

I hope you all had a wonderful Memorial Day too! :o)

Posted by Dianne at 8:49 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Lake Shore Volunteer Fire Department Memorial Day Parade

I know it's impossible to believe that I was marching in a parade, so I'm not even going to blog about that part of the experience until there are some pictures to help dispel some people's disbelief. I showed up early, as I do with all these things, which always gives me a chance to get the lay of the land and figure out what I'm suppose to do. I guess I should start at the beginning...Thursday night I got an invite from the George Johnson campaign to show up to march in the parade. Actually I know several people on his staff through Young Democrats, so he didn't have to ask hard. Actually on the way to the parade I thought of a really cool campaign slogan for George, I'm going to pass it along to the campaign and if they don't want it I'll talk about it on here.

Anyway, I forget that these kinds of events are public and therefore includes godless Republican candidates. So I had to watch my wallet continuously and kept going back to check on Dianne's Highlander, because you never know what kind of criminality is going to happen when you get a bunch of dishonest Republicans in the same place. Also you always have the long moment when you walk by a Republican that you've been exposing as the corrupt monster they are and wondering will they recognize you and try to shank you on principal.

But it wasn't all negative actually. There were a lot of good Democrats there, some from races that I haven't been following for whatever reason. I finally got to meet Craig Reynolds after I missed him at the Jefferson Jackson dinner a couple of weeks ago. Well I saw him there, but I never made it into his campaigning circle to say hello. I'm pretty sure I saw Ron Batesman's folks lining up, but I didn't get a chance to get over there to introduce myself.

As for the parade itself, it was kind of interesting from my point of view. The first thing that surprised me was that there were more people in the parade than watching the parade. Let me repeat that...There were more people IN the parade than WATCHING the parade! There were literally enough of us people marching, that we could have at least tag teamed everyone that was watching and had enough of us left over to triple team the bigger folks. Secondly, I wasn't prepared for all the non-partisan atmosphere that the parade seemed to generate. The candidates were talking to each other like they were old buddies. Some of these Republicans are card carrying members of the destruction to America club and yet there was peace and civility all around. I'm baffled how people who work so hard to undermine the American way of life can pretend to be decent hardworking people. It's just not believable and yet they try to pull it off. Given how fake and transparent they were I have little doubt that victory will be sweeping in the fall. There wasn't a decent Republican in the bunch. No surprise really.

Posted by Jamison at 1:48 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Monthly Young Democrats Meeting

I missed the last Young Democrats meeting because I was sick, so it was good to be back in the hallowed halls again. I talk to them a lot on email, actually it's closer to I harassing them via email, but they seem to be willing ignore that fact for now. It was a good meeting, though most of it isn't for public consumption because of course we were doing the business of getting ourselves organized to fight the Republican scourge. So beyond telling it was a lot of fun, there isn't much I can add.

One thing they did was give a good sized segment of the meeting to Oz Bengur to speak about his campaign. So yes, I can add another Maryland 3rd Congressional District candidate to my list of people I've actually met and heard speak. When the Democratic party says their cups runeth over with great candidates, they aren't joking in the least! I'm stunned that the Republican party even exists in this state most of the time. Then I remember how much lower standards Republican voters have compared to Democrats, they prefer their candidates to be unqualified and dim witted. They can actually be hardly motivated to vote for a candidate that doesn't show a horrifying lack of ability. But that's just Republicans for you, no surprises there.

Anyway back to Oz. He's a powerful speaker with an extremely impressive resume. His work in the state of Maine definitely raises the bar for what we should be expecting from our elected officials. I have some reservations about his positive comments about Republicans, definitely the wrong crowd to try the non-partisan approach with, but other than that I liked what he had to say.

On the webpage front, no blog, but other than that it's definitely on par with the other candidates in the campaign so far. I don't know much about NGP, but they appear to have a suite of political products that I've seen several campaigns using. As long as it works and the third party in the middle isn't scaming any of the data it makes me happy. I really think the Democratic party should take over this function, but that's an entirely different rant for another day. If you like him, I can't find any logical reason not to vote for him. Of course, he's not in my district so I don't have a horse in that race so to speak.

Look What Popped Up Overnight!

One of the zucchini buds blossomed overnight!

I love the way zucchini and squash blossoms look! When we have more room I'll grow extra sqaush plants just for the blossoms. They are delicious!

Posted by Dianne at 8:34 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

May 28, 2006

'Breakfast Club' principal Gleason dies

BURBANK, Calif. - Paul Gleason, who played the go-to bad guy in "Trading Places" and the angry high school principal in "The Breakfast Club," has died. He was 67.
Gleason died at a local hospital Saturday of mesothelioma, a rare form of lung cancer linked to asbestos, said his wife, Susan Gleason.

"Whenever you were with Paul, there was never a dull moment," his wife said. "He was awesome."

A native of Miami, Gleason was an avid athlete. Before becoming an actor, he played Triple-A minor league baseball for a handful of clubs in the late 1950s.

Gleason honed his acting skills with his mentor Lee Strasberg, whom he studied with at the Actors Studio beginning in the mid-1960s, family members said.

Through his career, Gleason appeared in over 60 movies that included "Die Hard," "Johnny Be Good," and "National Lampoon's Van Wilder." Most recently, Gleason made a handful of television appearances in hit shows such as "Friends" and "Seinfeld."

Gleason's passions went beyond acting. He had recently published a book of poetry.

"He was an athlete, an actor and a poet," said his daughter, Shannon Gleason-Grossman. "He gave me and my sister a love that is beyond description that will be with us and keep us strong for the rest of our lives."

Very sad indeed! I always liked him when I saw him in a movie. He was very good at what he did. Our thoughts and prayers go out to his family.

Found via Yahoo! News.

Posted by Dianne at 8:37 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Nanny McPhee

If you haven't seen Nanny McPhee you should! It's a very cute little story! And as far as I'm concerned anything with not only Colin Firth (Oh my!), but also Emma Thompson is more than worth watching!

Posted by Dianne at 8:29 PM | Comments (8) | TrackBack

Now That's More Like An Outdoor Kitchen!

I want one! Of course we'll have to win the lottery first, given that it costs more than Jamison's car, but that's beside the point! Sweet!

Check it out for yourself!

Posted by Dianne at 8:21 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Guerrilla Gardening

Now this is neat! Jamison heard about it on NPR and sent me a link to the story the other day. With everything that has been going on around here lately it took me a little while to get around to reading up on the subject. The Guerrilla Gardeners plant public areas that have been ignored and plant them with beautiful indigenous plants! It's happening all over Europe! There are before and after pictures and it's just a very fascinating concept! They are beautifying neighborhoods one abandoned planted area at a time!

Check out Guerrilla Gardening...It's a really neat project!

Posted by Dianne at 7:52 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack

You Aren't Going to Believe This One...

Jamison actually not only attended the Memorial Day Parade here in town he MARCHED in it for George Johnson who is running for County Executive. Yes you read that right...My hermit husband, the man who would rather lick your shoes that leave the house, actuallyMARCHED in a parade! My mom asked where he was earlier when Alexis and I were talking to her on the phone and when we told her she said "No really...Where is he?" Supposedly there are pictures and supposedly they are going to be e-mailed. When they are I will most definitely post a picture of Jamison, not only out in public, but MARCHING in a parade! That just might be a sign of the Apocalypse! ;o)

Posted by Dianne at 6:34 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Thinking

You know they've actually got the potty training thing down pat when they actually ask to get out of the swimming pool to go to the bathroom! That's my girl! :o)

Posted by Dianne at 5:51 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

It's Pool Time!

Click on the extended entry below to see more Pool Time fun! :o)

Posted by Dianne at 4:59 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Recipe For Disaster

The Redneck neighbors have rented one of those huge blow up water dealies and are letting the little Redneck children play unsupervised on the stupid thing. Yeah that's smart! That's a recipe for disaster if I ever saw one! Oh wait, they just came out to yell at them for a few minutes. Bet that won't last long. They have margaritas in their hands that are bigger than Alexis' head! It's so going to be a long night!!

(Update 1: 4:50 pm) They paid $300 to rent that thing! You've got to be effing kidding me!!!!

(Update 2: 5:00 pm) Now the drunken adults have joined in the mix on the water dealie...Oh my!

(Update 3: 5:20 pm) It just became apparent by listening to their "conversation" as they yell (apparently this is how they talk to each other ALL the time!) that they are trying to impress their Redneck guests by saying over and over how much they paid for the thing and how it cost more to rent it than a lesser model. Their Redneck friends are less than impressed, but the neighbors seem to be too drunk to notice. Or maybe their guests are too drunk to be impressed? Who knows? Did I mention it was going to be a long night?

(Update 4: 5:33 pm) One of kids names is Cher and apparently she is not "sharing"...I kid you not! You can't make this stuff up!

(Update 5: 5:38 pm) Now the horrible, loud music is starting. And I see smoke rising so that can only mean one thing...They've fired up the grill!! I'm really glad Alexis took a good nap today, because we'd really be out of luck if she hadn't!

Posted by Dianne at 4:43 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Slide!

Posted by Dianne at 1:34 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

I Want One of These!!

This ingenious planter takes the toil out of tomatoes by elevating the planting bed so vines grow downward. Hanging vines need almost no attention as tomatoes ripen in the air (not on the ground) where they wont rot. Complementary plants like basil, parsley, rosemary, and peppers can be planted on top, which holds up to 80 lbs. of topsoil. The compact planter can fit in any space with ample sunlight, even condominium balconies. A hollow base filled with sand (not included) keeps it stable and upright. The plastic planting bed, supported by galvanized steel and PVC pipes, has openings for four tomato plants underneath, with pop-out perforations for four additional openings.

I want this! Jamison thinks it's lame, but what does he know? Maybe the birthday fairy or Santa will bring me one...or two...or maybe even three! ;o)

Check it out here.

Posted by Dianne at 1:10 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack

Garden Update

I've received several requests for a garden update and I always aim to please so here is an update of what's going on in the Daffodil Lane Garden as of this morning. Alexis and I even found a lady bug to look at on our eggplant!

Click on the extended entry below to see all the details and pictures.

Overall everything is growing right along!

The hanging herb pots are growing great! One is next to the house on the deck and the other is hanging from one of the trees in our yard.

The basil growing with the tomatoes is really taking off. This is one of the many plants growing along aside the different types of tomatoes we have planted.

Alexis' Big Mama Lima Beans have finally started doing their thing.

The carrots are sprouting. I grow my carrots differently than everyone else. I don't worry about spacing. I just grow them all bunched up. They turn out fine and it keeps you from having to separate out a bunch of tiny seeds. We have three different types of carrots growing, including those that are purple.

The chickpeas have sprouted.

The corn salad has sprouted.

The cucumbers have started to climb up the teepees.

The dill is looking good.

The eggplant is attracting ladybugs and it's always a good thing when you see good bugs in your garden!

The green beans have really started to grow!

We've got more strawberries!

The oregano and onions are taking off!

The peas are starting to move toward moving up their teepee as well!

Even though the pineapple sage was moved from the garden to the flower bed, and I thought it might slow it down a bit, it's growing like wild!

The sage and peppers are doing well!

We lost a few sunflowers to lack of rain and a few more to stupid squirrels, but we've still got a nice little line across the back of the flower bed in front of the fence. There are 6-8 of them growing well.

We have more tomatoes growing!

And the zucchini plant is full of blooms!

And now for the deck boxes.

Herbs

Salad Mix

Purslane

Spinach

Cherry Tomato

And last but not least...The roses! They have been so beautiful this spring!

Overall everything is growing well. I'll post another update in a few weeks.

Posted by Dianne at 11:52 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

May 27, 2006

Saturn VUE Green Line Hybrid

I'm a little divided on the new hybrid Saturn. For those of you that don't know, there are basically three kinds of parallel hybrids in the world. First is like the Toyota version of the technology that Dianne has, which is a full hybrid. Second is like my Honda, which is called an assist hybrid. And Saturn is using the third type which is called a mild hybrid. Now for most people, a hybrid is a hybrid sort of thing, but there are some very distinct differences between them. Dianne's Hybrid Highlander can run only on the electric motors if it were configured properly, the same with the Prius and Camry hybrids. The Gasoline and Electric motors are both fairly powerful and can be used in concert or each by themselves using the transmission to actually get their provided energy to the wheels. My Honda uses older technology, which means it uses a much weaker electric motor that only helps out during acceleration and to restart the gasoline motor when it's needed. The mild hybrids only have an electric motor strong enough to restart the gasoline motor it provides nothing in the way of real power to the system. Basically, the differences in these systems are approximately a 30%, 20%, and 10% improvement in overall fuel economy on each step up in technology (these are very rough, performance hybrids get almost no fuel savings at all). Now the step up in price a lot more than that, so three versions have come into existence.

Which brings me back to the new VUE, it has the mild hybrid system and then they did a bunch of restyling of the body of the vehicle to get another 10% increase in fuel economy, giving the final product a 20% increase in fuel economy. This is a very common trick, by reducing weight and improving aerodynamics of a car, you can tweak a few percentage points more fuel economy out of the system and this gives the VUE a fuel economy of 27/32 for an average fuel economy of 29 miles per gallon. Now the first thing you'll notice is that it's highway mileage is higher than it's city mileage unlike most hybrids where it's the exact opposite. See starting a car moving is always a massive expenditure of energy. Now if you split that between a gasoline engine and an electric motor, you can get a lot better fuel economy during that massive amount of energy time in the driving cycle, which tweaks the fuel economy for hybrids to give you better fuel economy in the city.

Now to my concerns...American automakers are notorious for making barely hybrid models and then pointing to them as a complete failure when they claim there is no market for them. American automakers are practically demanding that Americans be forced to sell our country to the middle eastern oil interests that hold us hostage today, because they are too lazy to actually move the technology we need forward. So when I hear about one of them putting out a mild hybrid it makes me worried. The argument that GM is making with the VUE is that this technology is cheap to produce, because it's really only an electric motor added on to a belt drive and it uses a very small battery compared to a normal hybrid. So basically it gives you the start/stop features of a hybrid. You don't waste gas sitting at stop lights and traffic jams.

The other argument that GM is making is that since the system is so simple to produce and add to existing product lines that it's the way to mainstream hybrid technology, which is patently untrue. This is a way to give some of the biggest fuel savings advantages of hybrids without investing in the serious infrastructure of the hybrid technology. I don't think this will lead to more hybrids, if anything it will lead to a lot fewer hybrids, because the technology hybrids need long life batteries and more powerful electric motors don't get developed.

I know what you're thinking...isn't it a better choice to have a cheap 20% increase in fuel economy with existing technology than a similar 30% to 50% improvement with the more advanced technology? The short answer is that the 30% to 50% improvement technology actually represents a stepping stone to the future of automotive technology. The more powerful electric motors and the long life batteries will become the foundation of the plug-in hybrids, which will be the foundation of the flex fuel hybrids, which will be the foundation of the serial hybrids, which will be the foundation of the fuel cell vehicles of the future. We must not allow the American Automakers to stifle the growth of hybrid technology because they want to avoid contributing to the future of the American people like they are planning.

Read more over at Green Car Congress and Wikipedia.

Posted by ManDrake at 3:03 PM | Comments (18) | TrackBack

Play!

Rob, Patty and Sam came over for lunch today and Alexis and Sam had a lot of fun playing together! Rob and Jamison work together, although in different offices, in different states even, but we're all in the DC metro area so nothing is that far away in the grand scheme of things. I didn't get any pictures of the kids playing together inside, but I did get a few of them outside.

Sam is too cute! And he has the most adorable little laugh! They had a lot of fun and we adults did too! :o)

Posted by Dianne at 1:56 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

First Strawberry of 2006

It was just the right mix of sweet, with just a touch of tart! It was yummy!

Posted by Dianne at 1:52 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Rose Bowl

"I'm going to channel Martha Stewart for a minute..."

"OK..."

"There is something very satisfying about going into your own back yard to get flowers for the table centerpiece..."

"That's so lame!"

"I told you!" *laugh*

But there is something very satisfying about the whole thing, I don't care how much Jamison teases me about it! ;o)

Posted by Dianne at 1:46 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

May 26, 2006

Which Classic Female Literary Character Are you?

Which Classic Female Literary Character Are you?

You're Marianne Dashwood from Sense and Sensibilty by Jane Austen!
Take this quiz!

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Posted by Dianne at 5:52 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

NRA and Republicans up to no good in Georgia

It's never surprising to hear of a Republican breaking some sort of law or rule. And their puppet organizations like the NRA are usually a front for these kinds of activities. I got message from my dad saying the NRA is calling all the gun owners in Georgia and t would appear they are telling them that Hillary is going to be trying to take away their guns when she becomes President. You know that they have to be getting scared of her if that's the tack they are using. And I guess if you are completely uninformed and the NRA tells you something, you might believe it. Of course, my dad was a wee bit rude to the godless NRA folks, so I'm sure they'll put him on the maybe list to be called back. What idiots...but what do I expect from a bunch of Republicans!

Posted by ManDrake at 2:57 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

MoveOn members endorse Lamont

I have to say, I'm extremely surprised that the numbers where this high. 85-14 win for Lamont is much greater than I would have expected. I'm not sure if Lieberman really comprehends how angry he's made the people of Connecticut with his anti-America Republican hate ideology. I would have expected it to be closer to a 70-30 split. But it appears that Lieberman's lashing out at the Democrats has finally gone so far beyond the realm of acceptable behavior that he's permanently damaged his credibility. I think this has caused people to suddenly realize that they don't have to put up with incompetent and foolish representation in the Democratic party anymore. I think a Lamont victory will send a shock wave through the Establishment Democrats across the country. They've failed to stand up for Americans and now Americans are going to stand up for themselves and if necessary on the dust of the Establishment Democrats. I think it's going to spread across the entire Northeast. DFA managed to raise quite a bit of money for Lamont after their endorsement for him. And Markos mentions that everywhere he goes on his Crashing the Gates book tour people ask about the Lamont campaign. People are ready for change and I think it starts with Lieberman. It's going to be a tough fight, but when a 50,000 person organization gives 85% of it's support to a candidate, then you know change is coming. All I can say is its about freaking time!