Archive, 1st half of 2008

06/27/2008:
It has not been a terribly good week. I was feeling ill on Monday, and didn't go to work. Tuesday, everything was looking up. I was feeling better, and I worked a full day with no trouble. Wednesday morning, I woke up at 6:45 am with terrible back pain. My first thought: my kidney stones have returned. *sigh* I was correct. I spent from that time until about 3 pm in moderate to excruciating pain. I drank a lot of water, and took a lot of pain medication (in the proper dose and timing; oxycodone in the morning, then tylenol 3 from then on). Eventually, the stone moved on a bit, and the pain subsided somewhat. Needless to say, I did not go to work that day. I almost called 911 a few times, but I didn't want to pay for the trip to the ER. Insurance would cover the bulk of the visit, but the copay for the ER and the cost of the ambulance would fall to me (I was definitely in no shape to drive -- I didn't leave the chair for 8 hours, except to pee).

So I suffered through it, because I knew I could make it. The pain was intense, though; I was definitely passing into delirium at times. Joanna was always there for me; she sat next to me for the entire trial, and I was very grateful to her for doing so. After 3 PM, when I was conscious and more coherent, I called my doctor's office. He was out, but I got an appointment for the following morning (Thursday) with one of his associates. The rest of the evening passed without too much incident. I kept taking the pain medication, because I still hurt, and I went to bed decently early, as I was very tired. I went to see the doctor on Thursday, and was there for about 3 hours. I got checked out, had my urine tested, and they ran a CT scan, which showed several stones in my right kidney, and also a stone on its way from my right kidney down towards the only exit available :-/. As far as I know, my left kidney is clear of stones. While I was at the doctor's my pain started to come back pretty intensely, but I had brought my medication, so I took another Tylenol 3 to dull the pain. I would have taken two, but I had to drive home, and I wanted to be coherent. The doctor recommended I see my urologist asap, so he could review the CT scan results and determine the best course of action. After the doctor's appointment, I was still in pain, and exhausted, so I determined going to work was not in my best interest, and I called out again.

This morning, I planned on going to work. I woke with a little pain, and tired, but overall much improved from the previous day (and much, much better than Wednesday). I got up, showered, prepared my lunch, dressed, and got on my way. I hadn't even reached the highway when the urologist's office called, to report I had an appointment scheduled for the afternoon today. They want to get me in before the weekend, to check my condition, rather than risking something bad happening over the weekend. I can understand that, and I do want to get checked out...but I had really hoped to go to work today, since I have only worked 1 day out of the previous 4. But, since the appointment is in the early afternoon, going to work seems almost silly. Either I go in for a couple of hours in the morning or a couple of hours in the evening. Either way, it seems silly to drive 70 miles round trip for a couple hours of work, so I called my manager and let him know I wouldn't be in today, either, even though I wanted to be. I explained the situation, and told him I'd see him Monday. I did leave my number in case he needs to reach me. I am going to talk to him next week about getting a company laptop with VPN access, so I can do some work from home in times like these. I could have gotten a few hours of work done yesterday, and probably more done today, had I been able to do such work from home. It may even mean I could get some overtime in at other times, over a slow weekend or something, when we are busy with projects and registration tasks at work, like we are now.

*sigh*. Just want to feel better. Damn stones. I thought I was rid of them. A year ago, I had a CT scan, and there was no sign of any stones at all, on either side. I have been drinking water; my fluid intake is at least double what it was a year ago. Still not enough, it seems. I have determined I am going to get some stuff done around the house today, since I am not able to go to work. Little things; nothing too strenuous, as I still feel a little fragile, and tire easily. Probably no yard work, but maybe I can put up another shelf or two in the library, and we can get that more organized. Maybe I can clean out the closet in there, too. I guess at least I now have the full weekend to recover. We are hopefully going to see Wall-E tomorrow, at the movie theater, with Sean, Sarah, Ian and Mckenzie. Should be a low-stress, low-key weekend. Maybe post more later, with the urologist's verdict.


06/17/2008:
Happy two year anniversary to us :) Two happy years, with many more to come!

Page Updates:
-archived journal entries from 2007


06/16/2008:
I had a bit of technical trouble with my site last week, and it wasn't my host's fault this time. I thought my domain registration expired in September, but it apparently expired on 6/10. I found this out on Friday, after making the last post, and was quite surprised. As you can see, the problem has been resolved (yay). I really like having my own domain. It's my own little place, and I can do with it what I want. Nice place for a journal, a list of favorite web links, and even a few (outdated) pictures. Still need to get pictures up from the England trip...

My weekend was enjoyable. Got some errands done, got the lawn mowed (it needed it badly), and picked up all the large sticks from the yard (they all blew down during the big storm we had last week). Spent a lot of time relaxing, which was nice. Joanna and I played some Magic, and a quite a bit of DotA. It was a fun time :)


06/12/2008:
Christ on a crutch. Not sure why that's an expression, or why it is funny, but it is, on both counts. Work has been hellishly busy these past couple of weeks. We seem to be getting hammered left and right with our current work, plus additional tasks we are now taking on. It does not look like it is going to let up anytime soon (we still have 85 requests in our queue just from today, as I type this, but they can wait a couple of minutes while I update -- thankfully, our turn around time is 3 days, and we always hit that (we are usually under it, by a day, sometimes even 2).

Cheese came through his surgery fine, and he is recovering very well. The tumor the vet removed was quite large, so he required stronger stitches than Flower. Hers dissolved under her skin; his, they need to remove, so we'll be taking him in next week for that. Most likely another round of sedation for that, but it should be minor. He is on antibiotics right now, and he is by far the most difficult rat we've had so far, as taking medicine goes. He fights and squeaks and pushes the syringe away, but he always takes it in the end (it is liquid; I hold him while Joanna shoves the plastic syringe into his mouth and squirts the medicine down). Thankfully, we only have two more days of medicating him. He is eager to get back to his brothers; he is lonely by himself, but he seems to be doing OK. We have him out in the living room, where he can at least see and smell his brothers. Soon enough, he can rejoin the mischief.

Over the past couple of weeks, Joanna has been getting the young girls (Ashes and her 4 daughters) used to each others' scent by swapping their cage placement every day or two. Ashes and her two furred daughters were living together, and the two hairless girls were living together, separate from Ashes. Now that we have the larger, nicer ferret nation cage, we decided it would be best if they could live together, so Joanna prepped them through scent, and on Wednesday, we introduced them all to each other. The meeting was a success; in less than an hour they were playing and exploring together. They have been living all in the same cage since then, and they have been doing fine. There have been the expected scuffles and squeaks, as dominance is asserted, but the change has been a good one. They all seem more social and playful, now that there are 5 in one cage, instead of 3 and 2.

Joanna and I both caught some sort of unpleasant stomach bug this week. I started feeling ill Tuesday night, and ended up leaving work early on Wednesday. Thankfully, it seems short lived, and we are both feeling better now. I still feel a little queasy on occassion, but much better than earlier. Hopefully I'll be fully recovered after a nice weekend. The weather is supposed to be beautiful, so I'm hoping to spend some quality time outside.

Last weekend, we finally were able to remove our nasty couch-bed from the basement. If we had known how old it was, we would not have had the previous owners leave it. It smelled of old, and of mice. We have wanted to remove it since we moved in, but just hadn't gotten to it. I unbolted the metal bed frame from it, and Roland helped me move that upstairs and into the garage on Saturday. We then tried to move the wooden couch frame, only to discover that it didn't fit out the door. As best as we can tell, they must have built the room around the couch, because there was no way they carried it in through the doorway. So I took my trusty saw and cut the couch in half. This is the second couch that saw has cut in half (the first was the couch we had in the apartment; rather than carry it down three flights, it was easier to cut it in half and carry it that way; we were just throwing it away anyway). I should write a letter to the saw manufacturer -- cut two couches in half, and still as good as new! :)

I'm sure there's other news, but I need to get back to work. Hopefully another update soon. I know...I say that every time. I'm going to try and take a little time out each day or couple of days to update, even if I don't have much to say. Saves keeping it all for a massive post that some people may not want to even take the time to read :)


05/29/2008:
I had hoped to have time for more frequent updates, but things have been crazily busy at work, and I often don't think to update when I am home. We've been straight-out, non-stop at work for the past couple of weeks. At first, it was catching up on work that had stacked up while I was out. My other teammates had some scattered time off after I got back, so it was even more difficult, but we finally got all caught up with that stuff, but there seems to be piles of more work at every turn. Thankfully, it has slowed down a little bit this week, so we are doing better, but it is still a fairly heavy workload. I am starting to consider asking my manager if he would consider adding a 4th member to our team, but I am not yet sure we require one. Will see what the next couple of weeks bring, and then make my suggestion, if one is needed.

Non-work news: one of our rats, Cheese, is going in for surgery next Thursday. He has developed a tumor on his left front leg. It feels hard under the fingers, and not firmly attached, so hopefully it will be an easy removal. While he is sedated, we are having the vet neuter him, as well. He has grown more aggressive as time has gone on. He is not as agressive as Chips was before we had him neutered, but he is still the most aggressive, by far, of all the boys, and he has started getting "nippy". We believe neutering is the best option for him. Hopefully, he will be able to be re-entered back into the group more easily than Chips was (I'll post about that, later, if I think of it). We do not think it will be as much of a problem.

Time for me to wrap up at work, here. Hopefully I can update again soon.


05/14/2008:
We have returned from England, safe and sound :) It was a very nice vacation, from everything. The flight out was a pain in the ass, but everything else went well. Our flight was supposed to leave at 9 am. We got on the plane, sat for 30 minutes, and then they declared a maintenance emergency, and cancelled the flight. We were rebooked on a 2 pm flight to Chicago, so we flew there, then from there back over to England. We were originally supposed to arrive at Heathrow at 8:30 pm Thursday night; we didn't arrive until 7:00 am Friday morning, very exhausted. Uncle Jeff picked us up at the airport and drove us to his house, where we slept for 5 hours or so, and woke feeling slightly refreshed. After that night's sleep, we felt a little better (on Saturday).

Most of our time in England was spent in Leigh on Sea, which is on the east side of England, right on the water. It was really beautiful the whole time we were there; the weather was very un-English. It was partially sunny to fully sunny every day, mid-60's to low 70's in temperature.

My parents were also over in England while we were there; Dad had a business show earlier in the week, and my parents stayed over afterward to vacation. This was great, because we got to see them, and they got to meet all of Joanna's family, too. There was a BBQ at Uncle Jeff's on Sunday, where we met a lot of the family; some, Joanna had not seen in 20+ years, or ever. We were staying with Jeff, his wife Linda, and their daughter Natasha. At the BBQ, we saw Aunt Gwen, who came to our wedding. We met her husband, Peter, and her helper dog Elli. I also got to meet Uncle Gwyn, and his girlfriend Judy. I also met cousins Danielle and Gareth. There were a few others there, too, of the friend and family persuasion. It was a very good time, all around.

Traveling around England, we did visit several castles. I cannot remember where the first one was, but the second was in Rochester. We also visited an awesome cathedral in Rochester, as well as some nice little shops on the main street. We took many pictures; hopefully I can get some up here on the site soon. We also toured London for a day. We took one of the bus tours, with a live guide who was able to tell us interesting things about what we were seeing. We saw Buckingham Palace (from a distance), St. Paul's Cathedral, and the Tower of London. We saw all these buildings from the outside. We had wanted to go inside St. Paul's and the Tower of London, but we did not get to them until later in the day, and they were closing in less than an hour (10 minutes for St. Paul's). We have vowed that we will go inside both of them the next time we are in London. We would love to go back; hopefully in the next 2 or 3 years.

The flight home was much better than the one out. It was straight-through, with no hassles. We were back to our house by 4 PM on Friday afternoon, then had the whole weekend to catch up on things around the house, relax, and get used to the 5-hour time difference. I am still feeling a little off on the time, but not so bad as I was. I imagine by the end of the week, I will be feeling back to normal.


04/24/2008:
Another long week. I haven't been feeling very well this week. My stomach has been bothering me, which adds to my stress, which bothers my stomach... I felt very ill on Monday, but better the rest of the days. It is still upset, but I'm trying to be more relaxed about it. I think the change in the weather this week has affected it. It has been unseasonably warm on most days; almost early-summer temperatures, with humidity. I like Spring weather, but I'm not ready for Summer yet. Hopefully the weekend will help relax me.

My vacation is coming up, and I am looking forward to it. Some good friends will be taking care of Lynx and our fish while we are gone. We will stock the rats and hamster up on food and water, and they'll be fine on their own. All rodents, they are natural hoarders and survivors (though how hamsters survive in the wild, I will never understand). I have some of my usual anxiety about the trip, but not as much as I thought I might. I am looking forward to getting away from work for the time, and being able to spend that time with Joanna. I am looking forward to meeting some of her other family members, over in England. Plus, my parents will be over there, too, so it should be a great deal of fun :)

Joanna and I have been trying to reintroduce Chips to his brothers this week, and it has not been going very well. He still looks like Chips, but he doesn't act like he used to, or smell like he used to (without testosterone, he doesn't produce his "male scent" anymore). Dip and Coal are curious about him, but accepting. Char and Cheese have not been very accepting at all, unfortunately :( They were just curious at first, sniffing and such, but then they started getting agressive. They were wrestling a bit, Cheese and Chips, then Char and Chips, and we thought it was just brotherly fighting, but they started getting too agressive, biting and actually fighting, instead of play-fighting. We had them all out together 2 nights in a row. Last night, things seemed to be getting better, but suddenly there was a big scuffle and my finger got bitten hard, by Cheese, when I was separating them. We determined at that point that we'll be looking at other options for Chips. He just doesn't fit in with his brothers like he used to. Sad, but we will figure something out. We are going to introduce him to Flower tonight; Chips is more docile, and Flower has become more outgoing and happy, so hopefully they will get along. If not, there is still the option of having one of the accepting brothers (probably Coal) live with Chips, instead. We do have options. Whichever option we go with, we will need another larger cage, to house Chips and whomever he lives with. We are going to get a Ferret Nation cage, which is split-level with adjustable levels. We could have the top and bottom be separate cages; one for Flower the loner, one for Chips the loner, or open it up so they can live together. It will give us more options, now and in the future, for our inevitable continuing rodent population.


04/17/2008:
This week has felt long and tiring, but it is nearly over. I was up early Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday for various appointments, and, to add to that, my sleep has not been as restful this week. I have been sleeping ok, and my dreams have not been too tiring...I just wake feeling like I could easily sleep another hour or two and be fine with it. I will hopefully be able to sleep late on both Saturday and Sunday this weekend. I do like sleeping in :)

Chips had his surgery on Tuesday. We wanted to get him in as soon as possible, to make sure we could care for all his needs before we leave on vacation at the beginning of next month. The rats all have cloth bedding, but Chips needs to stay on shredded newspaper bedding (vet's orders) for 10 days after surgery, so he'll have to stay in a cage by himself for that time. The cage is not very small; he is just very lonely, as he is used to being with 4 brothers all the time. He is recovering well, though. He does not seem to be in much pain now, though we will still give him the pain medication until it is gone (2 more days to go, on that). He is much gentler already than he was, but we are still careful, using gloves when picking him up, but petting his back bare-handed. We think his gentleness is in part due to his vet visit and surgery, and not yet due to a lessening of testosterone; we know it takes about a week for the extra testosterone to work its way out of his body. He will be in the cage alone for that time, anyway, so when we put him back with his brothers, everything will hopefully be OK all around.


04/11/2008:
Last weekend was a productive one. Saturday, Joanna and I did some shopping. We picked up some top soil, fertilizer, and grass seed at a garden center, and also purchased a new light for our bathroom, which I later installed. The old one had burned out (looked to be a grounding problem; I think the grounding wire on the light fixture became disconnected from the one in the wall). I got it installed without too much trouble, and it looks good, and provides much brighter light than the old one.

On Saturday, I was an electrician, and on Sunday, a plumber. We purchased a new faucet to replace the one in our bathroom, because it was old, and it had started dripping when the taps were off. We got a nice new brass one, which will match our planned decor for the bathroom (the new light we got is also a brass fixture). While I was under the sink, I decided that I wanted to replace the cold water feed. I had replaced the hot water feed back during the winter, when it started leaking, and had purchased parts to replace the cold water side, in the event it, too, started leaking, or whenever I got to it. I turned off the water to the house, took the cold water side apart...and then found out that I was missing some parts. Apparently, I missed a few things when buying "double parts". Annoying, but it happens. I ended up going to Home Depot twice during the course of my little project. The first time, to get the parts I should have gotten before; the 2nd time to get the parts I really needed, since the drain pipe was in the way of my piping, and I had to buy elbows to get around it. But I got it fixed, and it looks much neater, now, and more solid. We've been using it since Sunday, and it hasn't started spraying water everywhere or anything. I did leave a little towel under there, just in case. Plus, the hot and cold water can now be turned off, individually, to the taps, if needed. That wasn't possible before, because the fittings were so old they had seized up. Now they are nice and new. The whole thing took me longer than I expected, but it was worth it. Shouldn't have to mess with it any more :) The new brass faucet looks really nice, too. I didn't replace the drain portion yet; I don't have any putty, and I thought one potential leak was better than two. The faucet is working without leaks, so I will plan to finish it up by replacing the drain portion, maybe this weekend.

While I was curled up in our bathroom cabinet for several hours, Joanna was outside, working on our garden. I had planned to help after I was done with the bathroom, but I didn't end up helping much this time. I did help pick up all the branches and clumps of plants she extracted from the beds, and stuffed them in yard waste bags. She has been working on it all week, and everything is nice and clean, now. All the extra "junk" plants have been cleaned out of the beds, and the dirt has been raked smooth. It looks much, much better than it did before, even bare. She transplanted some of the daffodils into other spots around the yard, too, which looks good :)

We have decided that one of our boy rats, Chips, needs to be neutered. We had planned on it, earlier, after he was getting upset for no reason and attacking his brothers, but he had calmed significantly over the past couple of weeks, and we hoped he was past that "stage". However, last night, he got really angry again, and wouldn't calm down. He was playing with his brothers, and seemed fine, then suddenly lost it and started attacking Coal. Joanna got Chips into her lap, but didn't trust him enough to pick him up without her fingers protected. I put on the leather work gloves we keep near the rat cages for this reason, and picked him up. He was pacing back and forth on my shoulders and puffing, then stopping and bruxing angrily. He didn't attack me, but he did nip at Joanna's fingers a little later, and also nipped at the gloves I had on. We are pretty sure it's a testosterone overdose that is causing this issue, and the neutering will fix that. Until then, he is going to have to live on his own, in the temporary cage. He is scheduled for his surgery on Tuesday of next week. It will take 3 or 4 days for him to heal from the surgery, and probably a week before the overdose of testosterone has worked its way out of his system. We only want to keep him alone for as long as he has to be. He is not happy that way, but we don't want to risk him seriously injuring one of his brothers. We are keeping him alone in the office, with both doors shut, for a few hours each day, then bringing him out and putting him near the boys' cage, so he can smell them and they can smell him, and all can be assured the other is there and OK. We are going to get him out on his own later tonight, which will hopefully calm him some, as he will be out of his small cage for awhile. Unfortunately, we will have to wear gloves. Better to be safe than injured. Poor boy :(


03/27/2008:
Work has been fairly slow this week. We are moderately busy, but I have been finding I have more free time than usual. I have been using this time to work on updating some information here at work, but I have also been using it to increase my knowledge and understanding, mainly on metaphysical / mystic subjects. I found a new message board awhile back, called the Free Spirits of Project X. Many of the people who frequent this board are aware of the things that exist outside of this physical world. I am in good company there. I have posted a little bit, but mostly I have been reading and learning. There is a lot of knowledge on the board, and it will take me awhile to get through it. As I read, I post questions, to try and gather a better understanding of some of the material I am reading. I have found, as is the case with most message boards, that some people are more helpful than others. Some of the posters seem to easily take offense; others are calm and willing to give others some leeway in their words, willing to discuss an issue rather than just show their disapproval.

While browsing the Free Spirits board, I have been thinking of my own path, and where I would like it to go. I am having trouble deciding which branch in my path I wish to travel down next, but I am nearing a decision. I would like to become stronger in my ability to walk the dream worlds, especially when it comes to controlling what I am doing there, and remembering what I have done. I also read about shielding on the board, and it reminded me that, since Starwood and even before that, I have been interested in increasing the sturdiness of my shields, to offer me better protection from the overabundance of input my body (and mind and spirit) receive and filter every day. I think I am going to start with some meditations for increasing the power of my shields, which will be a good base for other work, since protection is always important, no matter what else I am doing.

Joanna and I have been discussing our plans for the house for the coming Spring and Summer. We have decided our focus this year will be on the front and sides of the house, on the lawn and the flower gardens there. Joanna has done some extensive planning for the flower gardens: we measured the length and width of each section, and she arranged it out on graph paper, indicating what will be planted where. For the lawn, we considered tilling the whole thing and reseeding it, but that is a large chore, and we will not be able to do it this year. My Dad suggested just seeding it down this year and seeing what it does. If it responds well to the seeding, we will not have to tear it all up. That would be ideal. We will be removing the pine tree from the front yard, as well. It just does not look good where it is, and we already have a lot of other trees on the property. We plan to just cut it down and dig out the stump. That corner will eventually become a small flower garden. Not sure yet what we'll do with the wood from the tree. At the very least, we can let it dry, and burn it in the fireplace next winter.


03/18/2008:
My feelings of illness turned out to be an actual cold. It hit me pretty hard, and put me out of work for 2 and 1/2 days a couple of weeks ago. I got sick on a Wednesday, and it was good that I also took the weekend to recover, as I was pretty bad on that Saturday, too. I still have some residual sniffles and occasionally a runny nose, but I am feeling much better than I was then. I have been feeling tired this week, but I think that is more due to lack of sleep than any continuing illness. Unfortunately, I think Joanna caught my cold. Or someone's cold. She was pretty sick yesterday, but after a good night's rest, is feeling better this morning. I am hoping we both feel well for this weekend. We are planning a trip up to VT to visit my parents for Easter weekend, and we are both looking forward to the trip :)

We have some exciting vacation news: we are going to England! My Dad has a business show over there, and he and my Mom are planning to spend some time vacationing after the show. They have invited Joanna and I to join them. We are very excited :) I will hopefully get to meet all of Joanna's English relatives while we are there. We are planning to stay with them, at their invitation.

This will be my first trip to England. I have wanted to go for a long time, and I am looking forward to the trip. I do, of course, have the usual amount of travel anxiety, though I did learn the flight is only 6 hours long or so, straight through to Heathrow from Boston, so that alleviates the anxiety a bit. I used to really like flying. I still enjoy the convenience of it, but my body does not enjoy the landings much anymore. I am looking forward to meeting more of Joanna's family. I met her Uncle Jeff and Aunt Gwen when they came over for our wedding, but have only heard of the others :) I also look forward to seeing some of the sights in England. I truthfully do not know what exactly I'd like to see; we are going to talk about where we'd like to go when we visit my parents this weekend. I do think seeing a real castle would be cool, if we can make the time for it, and of course I'd love to see some of the stone circles (Stonehenge or similar). Whatever we end up doing, I have no doubt it will be fun and memorable :)


03/04/2008:
I have a sore throat today. I am hoping it is just the change in weather that is throwing me off a bit. I felt fine earlier, but during the last hour or so, I have been feeling worse and worse. I am hoping that it levels out, and I can finish out my day here, at least, then go home and rest.

Had a bit of a plumbing problem at the house yesterday, but nothing too major. Needed to be fixed, but we didn't have a flood, thankfully. Everything was fine all weekend, of course, then yesterday morning, the toilet tank feed line started leaking. I had a meeting I had to attend at work in the morning, or I would have taken care of it before work. Joanna was able to get the feed line removed, but we didn't have the parts to fix it. I took a 1/2 day from work, and we took a trip to Home Depot to get the proper part (we picked up an extra while we were there), then went home and got it fixed up. It is nice to have a shiny new line on it. Makes me want to finish up under the bathroom sink..then move onto the kitchen sink... Must wait until warmer weather, and when we can allocate funds for new items. In the meantime, we'll go with fixing what's broken, and leave the updating for later. Really looking forward to that updating, though...

The weekend was very good. Saturday, Joanna and Kris had their first contract signing, yay! They have a client, who is paying them to work! It's great! There is much excitement :) After this excitement, friends came over and we played D&D (Pete's campaign). We actually got some stuff done, including some much-needed combat excitement. We are now back to being stumped on what we are supposed to do next. Hopefully some questioning of the natives during the next session will yield some answers. Sunday was our "errands day". We got those done in a matter of a few hours, and then had some relaxation time :) While we were out, we purchased 2 goldfish to add to our little tank. We have a betta in a small bowl in the kitchen, and a second betta in a larger plastic tank in the living room. We added the goldfish to the plastic tank. All the fish seem to be getting along well. We got 1 small orange goldfish (aptly named Crazy, as he swims about at crazy speeds, and often bumps the sides of the tank, as if "attacking the other fish that looks just like him"), and one very small white goldfish (aptly named "Teenie"). I like having fish, as does Joanna. Later on, we would like to get a larger tank, with some freshwater tropical fish.

I started playing Paper Mario on a particularly lazy Sunday, 2 weekends ago. I think my other Gamecube games will probably be on hold until I finish playing it. It is really fun, and Joanna really enjoys watching me play it. We have gathered 4 Crystal Stars so far, and are now on Keelhaul Key, searching for the 5th. The humor in the game is sometimes more adult-oriented than I expect from a Mario game. Such as the computer that states it has been "having strange feelings" after watching Princess Peach take a shower... Odd, but humorous, and presented in a fairly innocent manner. The writers did a pretty good job, in my opinion. I look forward to playing more... probably tonight :)


02/25/2008:
We laid Ninlin to her final rest on Friday. It was a difficult decision, but it was the right decision. Her health had continued to degrade throughout the week; we were feeding her heavy foods 3 times a day, and it may have been helping to prolong her a bit, but her health was not improving at all. I cried for her, and when the vet took her away, I wanted to open the door and tell her to bring her back...but it was not to be. We could not keep her alive; the thing inside her was killing her, and it was better to let her go peacefully, and save her any pain. I don't want any of my loved ones to go in pain, and I don't want them living on, hanging, when it is obvious that recovery is impossible.

I am more broken up about Ninlin's death than I have been about any rats to date. Toffee and Isis' passing affected me, of course, but Joanna is right: Ninlin and Flower are the first rats that are ours, together. I grew to love Isis and Toffee, but I was able to be with Ninlin through her entire life, as I will be with Flower and all our other rats going forward.

Flower is still healing up very well from her surgery. It looks like she may have removed a stitch or two herself...but she is not falling apart, and is not in pain, so it's OK. The doctor will take a look at her on Thursday of this week, assess her progress, and remove any remaining stitches. We expect the verdict will be a good one.

Since Ninlin's passing, Flower has been staying in a smaller cage than the one she shared with her sister (and Isis and Toffee). The cage is in our room, on a table next to the bed. Often, at night, we close the bedroom door and open the cage, and Flower gets to roam for the evening. She actually spends much of her time in her cage, anyway. She goes to the bathroom there, and runs in her wheel, as well. Every so often, during the night, she'll get up on the bed and check on us, usually roaming on top of the blankets for awhile, then under them, stopping to clean our toes or fingers occasionally. The past couple of nights, she has snuggled down between us and slept for awhile before returning to her cage. She is such a well-behaved rat :) So sweet, and shows more caring than I ever would have expected from a rodent, if you had asked me a few years ago. How perceptions change with experience! :)


02/20/2008:
I am very worried about Ninlin. Her condition has not improved; it is getting worse. She has lost most of her gripping power with her back feet, and her ability to grip with her front feet is growing worse, as well. And she seems to be getting thinner, even though we have been feeding her a mixture that contains a lot of calories. We have been feeding her by hand, with syringes, since the middle of last week. She won't eat much on her own; even tasty oatmeal mixed with chocolate is mostly overlooked. She takes a few nibbles and leaves the rest. She also hasn't been drinking much water; though that may be because she gets so much liquid as part of her daily feeding (the mixture is one of heavy cream, chocolate syrup, and calorie paste). She looks tired and confused a lot of the time...but she still likes to explore, and she has bursts of energy that give us hope..though now it is hope that she will live just a little longer. The chances of her living a lot longer are slim at best. We are sure she has a brain tumor. I weep for her inside. I wish I could shed real, salty tears.

Her sister, Flower, is doing very well. She is bright-eyed and very much alive. Her incision is healing very well. She goes back to get her stitches removed a week from tomorrow. Flower and Ninlin are still living in separate cages. We were worried that Ninlin may pull the stitches out, but that doesn't worry me much anymore. I am wondering if it would help Ninlin's condition any to be back with her sister. We got them out together a few nights ago, expecting a bit of reunion excitement...but they didn't really seem to notice each other. I still think they are happier together than apart; it doesn't make sense to me any other way. Maybe we could put them back together soon. I will talk with Joanna and see what she thinks about it.

Our weekend in VT was good, but too short, as always. Ninlin and Flower did not seem to mind the trip at all. Both were walking around their cages for some of it, nibbling on food or trying to get comfortable. They both slept most of the time. The trip up was uneventful for us. The road was rough in places, with all the frost heaves and bits of snow and sand, but it was a smooth ride otherwise. The time seemed to fly by while we were there. Dad and I spent most of Saturday with our snowmobiles -- getting them tuned up during the afternoon, and riding during the evening. We rode for about 3 hours, and it was fun. We hit some really nice, soft snow in places; other places were muddy and rough, where too many snowmobiles had come through before us. Dad bought a 2000 Arctic Cat 600 snomobile for this season, so he rode that, and I rode his Arctic Cat 440 (Jag). The night was cold, so the machines ran well. We were bundled and mostly comfortable, though my toes did get pretty cold for awhile. I was able to get them warmed up again, though, so there was no trouble there, and my handwarmers were working, so my hands were as warm as I could want them :) On Sunday, we just hung out, and got headed home around 4. It was rainy and cold on the way home, and the roads were slippery, which was unpleasant, but we got home safe and it didn't take much longer than usual. We were both tired by then, so we did what we had to do: got our stuff put away and our animals fed, then had dinner, relaxed in front of the TV for a little while, then headed to bed early. It was a good weekend, but felt too short.


02/15/2008:
Yesterday was long and tiring, but everything turned out well in the end.

Flower had her surgery, and everything went well. When we brought her home, we were concerned about her chewing on her stitches. We spent some time with her, and then put her in a small cage in a dark room, where she promptly made a bed out of cloth and fell asleep :) This morning, she was all wide awake and happy to see me when I came to check on her. Joanna and I gave her some pain medication and a bit of food and water, and put her back in her cage to rest. Her incision looks much cleaner and healthier today. Joanna had her out this afternoon, and reports she has been licking her stitches, but not pulling on them, so it appears she is well on the mend :)

We also took Ninlin to the vet yesterday. She was checked out, and prescribed antibiotics and steroids. The antibiotics to kill whatever infection she may have inside her; the steroids to provide a little boost in her energy, which will hopefully allow her to eat more, and put some weight back on. She will be on the medication for 10 days. She doesn't like the taste of the stuff, but she takes it. Her energy seems to be improved a little already, and she certainly seems happy when she is awake.

Joanna and I did manage to prepare and eat our Valentine's Day dinner yesterday, tired as we were. We had breaded haddock, fresh from the market, cole slaw, peas, and french fries. The haddock was excellent. I am not much of a fish fan, usually, but it tasted great :) We got 2 fillets at the market, but only cooked one. The other is in the freezer, and I expect we will be consuming it soon :)

Joanna and I are headed up to VT this weekend. We are really looking forward to it. We are taking Flower and Ninlin with us, as they both need daily medication. Plus, they have to be caged separately while Flower's incision heals, so we will be their companions until they can share a cage again. They have grown more relaxed as they have gotten older, so I think they will enjoy the car ride more than they may have when they were younger. I hope this to be the case :) My parents report they got a lot of snow during the past few storms, so Dad and I are looking forward to some snowmobiling. Maybe we can get some good old fashioned sledding in, too :)


02/11/2008:
We have made our decision: Flower will be going in for surgery this coming Thursday, to have the lump near her rear leg removed. We weighed the pros and the cons, and decided the surgery was the best option, as it will improve both her quality of life and (hopefully) the length of her life. Aside from the lump, she is still healthy (though she is a bit overweight -- we are hoping to promote some loss of weight for her), and we are hoping she is not even 1/2 way through her life yet (she will be 2 years old in July). There is always a chance she will develop another lump, but it is a chance we are going to take. We will bring her to the Vet on Thursday, and leave her there for the day, for the surgery. We are not yet sure if she will have to spend the night there, as well, or if we will be able to bring her home Thursday night.

Something is wrong with Flower's sister, Ninlin :( She has been acting confused lately, and her balance is off. Also, she seems to have lost strength in her hindquarters. Joanna thinks she may have had a stroke. Poor little girl. We're going to have the Vet look at her on Thursday, so we can get a professional opinion. She is still friendly and energetic, which is good, though she has been losing a lot of weight, which is not as good. We are hoping to get her to eat some food with a higher fat content (while apart from Flower, who has enough fat content already).

My weekend was enjoyable. I headed down to NJ after work on Friday, to spend the weekend with a group of my college friends. We held an informal sealed-deck Magic tournament on Saturday, which was a lot of fun. I didn't win any prizes, but I also did not do as bad as I did at the last tournament (I won 4 games this time, as opposed to my single win during the last one). Everyone had fun, which is what it was really about. The prizes were just a bonus to those who did really well (congrats Chris, Mark, Wills, and Donna). Aside from the Magic, we also played some video games: DotA, WoW, Heavenly Sword, Devil May Cry 4, and Guitar Hero III all made an appearance. I also tried out Dementium on the Nintendo DS. Quite creepy! In addition to the games, we also watched Ocean's Thirteen on Saturday night. I enjoyed the movie; it was much better than Ocean's Twelve, and more true to the style of Ocean's Eleven. Everyone else seemed to enjoy it, as well.

While I was down there, I also traded in some Gamecube games. I returned Zelda: The Windwaker to Mark, and Darkened Skye to Chris. Mark lent me Paper Mario and an RPG that I cannot remember the name of right now. Wills lent me Pikmin and Blood Omen 2. I tried out both Pikmin and Blood Omen 2 last night. Pikmin is a lot of fun. Once I figured out how to get the little critters to to do what I wanted, I was able to move along better. I still end up leaving them scattered around the map sometimes, but I am getting better at controlling them. My wife has dubbed me "Pikmin-murderer", because I did have a habit last night of killing my Pikmin needlessly. They have been eaten by monsters, eaten by clams, drowned, and blown up (twice). I'm sure I can find more ways to kill them as the game goes on... I am still learning, and I have been losing less in combat every time I have sent them into battle, though, so I am hoping to keep the needless deaths to a minimum.

Blood Omen 2 is a dark, violent game. I play as a vampire named Kain, and I kill everyone I see. I need to keep my blood pool full, and that means killing and draining blood from every human I meet. Draining blood also provides me with "lore". As I gather lore, Kain grows more powerful. My life meter has been increasing in size, and I expect I will also be learning other abilities (known as "Dark Gifts") as the game goes on. The combat is direct and brutal. I can attack with my claws, or wield melee weapons. So far, I have only found clubs and knives, but I know there are other types of weapons I will be wielding in the future. I can also pick opponents up and strangle them, throw them, or stab / crush them with my current weapon, while holding them helpless. I can assume a "mist form" to sneak up on opponents and kill them with one crushing blow, sometimes separating their head from their body in the process. The blood drain is probably one of the most gruesome aspects of the game, because Kain can drain blood at a distance. The victim needs to be dead or otherwise helpless (my first victim was chained to a wall). I target the body, and Kain will draw the blood from them, in a red stream from the body to his mouth, sometimes at a distance of 5 feet or more. It is always disturbing and creepy to watch, yet cool at the same time. I look forward to playing more of both games, and trying out the other two, as well.


02/05/2008:
My weekend was very good. Joanna and I got a lot of things done, in and out of the house, and still got a lot of relaxing in, as well. We moved the boy rats into the big cage for the 3rd time on Saturday, then sat down on the floor for a few hours and played games while we kept an eye on them. The first 2 times we put them in the cage, they were too small, and one was able to escape within 20 minutes. This time, they explored around enthusiastically, then set about trying to get through the bars, and, much to our satisfaction, they are much too big to do so :) So the boys now have their new home, and they are loving it. Lots of room to run around and wrestle and play. And they are now in the living room, where they will get the most attention. They favor attention more than the girls, so it is a good place for them to be.

Once we made sure the boys were not getting out of their cage, we started on our 2nd and 3rd rat-related task of the day. Our 2nd was a total cleaning of the cage the boys had been using up until that day. We sprayed it down with vinegar and scrubbed it clean. It came out very nice, I think. Our 3rd task was the joining of Flower, Ninlin, Lily, and Silver in a single cage, rather then a pair per cage, as they were. Unfortunately, this did not go as well as we had hoped. We knew there would be fights for dominance, as each pair has their dominant one, so of the four, one would want to be dominant. However, what happened was Flower decided the 2 smaller rats (Lily and Silver) were not allowed in the bottom of the cage, at all. They were ok on the top and middle shelves, but if one came down to the bottom, Flower bristled and attacked the smaller rat until she fled back to the top. This being an unacceptable state of affairs, we decided that we will just keep them in separate cages, as they seem quite happy that way: Flower and Ninlin have their old cage back, and Silver and Lily will remain in the smaller cage, until such time as we can move them to something slightly larger (they are growing, slowly).

On Sunday, we both had things to do during the day; Joanna went out for awhile, to attend a knitting event, and I stayed home, did a bunch of things I had been wanting to do around the house, then got in a few games of Warcraft III with some friends. Later that evening, we had a tasty dinner of homemade tacos while we watched the Super Bowl. We are not big football fans, but it was a really great game to watch, and we were glad we chose to :) After dinner and football, there was homemade chocolate cake for dessert. Mmmmmm. My wife is such a wonderful cook :) After football, there was some more gaming, in the form of Zelda: The Windwaker, which I did finally finish yesterday. I really enjoyed playing it :)

Yesterday was not such a good day. We took Flower to the vet in the morning, because she has developed a lump. The vet examined it and said they can remove it. However, the cost of removal is more than we anticipated, so now we have a tough decision to make, on whether to take her in for the surgery or not. I have been thinking about it since then, and I haven't come to much of a decision either way. Hopefully in the next few days I can come up with something more solid.

Joanna wasn't feeling well in the morning,
Blood Omen 2 is a dark, violent game. I play as a vampire named Kain, and I kill everyone I see. I need to keep my blood pool full, and that means killing and draining blood from every human I meet. Draining blood also provides me with "lore". As I gather lore, Kain grows more powerful. My life meter has been increasing in size, and I expect I will also be learning other abilities (known as "Dark Gifts") as the game goes on. The combat is direct and brutal. I can attack with my claws, or wield melee weapons. So far, I have only found clubs and knives, but I know there are other types of weapons I will be wielding in the future. I can also pick opponents up and strangle them, throw them, or stab / crush them with my current weapon, while holding them helpless. I can assume a "mist form" to sneak up on opponents and kill them with one crushing blow, sometimes separating their head from their body in the process. The blood drain is probably one of the most gruesome aspects of the game, because Kain can drain blood at a distance. The victim needs to be dead or otherwise helpless (my first victim was chained to a wall). I target the body, and Kain will draw the blood from them, in a red stream from the body to his mouth, sometimes at a distance of 5 feet or more away. It is always disturbing and creepy to watch, yet cool at the same time. I think I will continue to enjoy playing both of these games, and I look forward to trying the other two soon, as well.


02/05/2008:
My weekend was very good. Joanna and I got a lot of things done, in and out of the house, and still got a lot of relaxing in, as well. We moved the boy rats into the big cage for the 3rd time on Saturday, then sat down on the floor for a few hours and played games while we kept an eye on them. The first 2 times we put them in the cage, they were too small, and one was able to escape within 20 minutes. This time, they explored around enthusiastically, then set about trying to get through the bars, and, much to our satisfaction, they are much too big to do so :) So the boys now have their new home, and they are loving it. Lots of room to run around and wrestle and play. And they are now in the living room, where they will get the most attention. They favor attention more than the girls, so it is a good place for them to be.

Once we made sure the boys were not getting out of their cage, we started on our 2nd and 3rd rat-related task of the day. Our 2nd was a total cleaning of the cage the boys had been using up until that day. We sprayed it down with vinegar and scrubbed it clean. It came out very nice, I think. Our 3rd task was the joining of Flower, Ninlin, Lily, and Silver in a single cage, rather then a pair per cage, as they were. Unfortunately, this did not go as well as we had hoped. We knew there would be fights for dominance, as each pair has their dominant one, so of the four, one would want to be dominant. However, what happened was Flower decided the 2 smaller rats (Lily and Silver) were not allowed in the bottom of the cage, at all. They were ok on the top and middle shelves, but if one came down to the bottom, Flower bristled and attacked the smaller rat until she fled back to the top. This being an unacceptable state of affairs, we decided that we will just keep them in separate cages, as they seem quite happy that way: Flower and Ninlin have their old cage back, and Silver and Lily will remain in the smaller cage, until such time as we can move them to something slightly larger (they are growing, slowly).

On Sunday, we both had things to do during the day; Joanna went out for awhile, to attend a knitting event, and I stayed home, did a bunch of things I had been wanting to do around the house, then got in a few games of Warcraft III with some friends. Later that evening, we had a tasty dinner of homemade tacos while we watched the Super Bowl. We are not big football fans, but it was a really great game to watch, and we were glad we chose to :) After dinner and football, there was homemade chocolate cake for dessert. Mmmmmm. My wife is such a wonderful cook :) After football, there was some more gaming, in the form of Zelda: The Windwaker, which I did finally finish yesterday. I really enjoyed playing it :)

Yesterday was not such a good day. We took Flower to the vet in the morning, because she has developed a lump. The vet examined it and said they can remove it. However, the cost of removal is more than we anticipated, so now we have a tough decision to make, on whether to take her in for the surgery or not. I have been thinking about it since then, and I haven't come to much of a decision either way. Hopefully in the next few days I can come up with something more solid.

Joanna wasn't feeling well in the morning, so I called the doctor before we went to the vet's. I called at 8:30, and waited on hold for 10 minutes before anyone picked up. I asked for their earliest appointment that day, and they gave it to me...for 1:45 pm. I couldn't very well leave Joanna to suffer, so I called work and told them I would be later than expected, but should be in for 3, which would amount to a 1/2 day for me. Well, of course, being an afternoon doctor's appointment, it took longer to get in and get out, then we had to get medication at the pharmacy, which was more waiting. In the end, I did not go to work. It would have been an hour and a half of driving for about 3 hours of work. Seemed silly to me. By that time, I was feeling tired already from a day that felt quite odd, for whatever reason. My schedule did get thrown off quite a bit, so I attribute it to that. As the evening went on, I started feeling unwell, too. I was glad I stayed home to be with Joanna, so I could start today off on a better note, which I did, and it has been better today than yesterday.

And with that, it is about time to go home, do some stretching, and then get the boys out for some play time :)


01/30/2008:
I haven't been very enthused about work this week. My days have felt monotonous, and even though I have not been feeling very tired, I have felt weary with my work. Today, things were better; there were some access issues for me to investigate, and some research to do, so I did not feel it was as much of the "same old, same old", as I did Monday and Tuesday. I am still looking forward to going home, however. We're doing our weekly grocery shopping tonight, and then getting our boy rats out for some play time :) Maybe I can make some time for The Windwaker, too. I picked it up again last night, after not playing for over a month. I do enjoy the game; other things just have a habit of drawing me away from it, sometimes for extended periods of time.


01/22/2008:
I attended our semi-annual Slobfest this past weekend, and had a lot of fun, as always. We spent most of the weekend playing games, engaging in good conversation, and eating good food, though some of us did get out on Saturday for some exercise.

Rob, Anne, Sean, and myself took a nice hike up in the woods behind the house on Saturday. It was a good day for a hike; cold, but not bitter. It was refreshing, really, especially on the way up the hill. We hiked across a large field, then made our way up a trail into the woods, making for a cave that we wanted to see. We took our time, and reached the cave after 45 minutes or so. It was a nice cave :) It had a large entrance, and I estimate the main chamber was maybe 10 feet wide, and 20 feet deep. There were some passages branching off from the main chamber, as well. One was high and narrow; if the weather was warmer and more dry, I may have climbed up there a little ways, but it was cold, and the surfaces were wet, so I chose not to. Another passage went down to the right, but it was mostly filled with large pieces of stone. A third passage went down to the left, and we decided to explore that one. It was narrow at the entrance, a little wider in the middle, and then narrow again at the end. Sean had the foresight to bring several flashlights, so we each took one, then went down to take a look around. We ended up finding more wildlife than I expected. We discovered a horde of crickets at the far end of the cave; they were large and yellowish, with black stripes. There were also several spiders: daddy-long-legs and larger black ones, cold but alive. We also found a group of bats, apparently hibernating in the cave. Leah had lent us her camera earlier in the day, for the express purpose of taking some pictures of the cave, and so we did :) The pictures are here.

After marveling at the cave, we hiked back down the hill to the house. The wind had picked up by this time, and the air had grown colder and more bitter. Only a couple of hours had passed, but our 2nd trip across the field found the air about 15 degrees colder than when we had come across it the first time. We did make a few stops in the woods on the way down, to clear the trail of brush and fallen trees. Sean had brought several knives with him, so of course we had to use them :) The knives made the clearing of the trail much quicker, and soon we were back in the blessed warmth of the house, again playing games, chatting, and eating good food :) Rob's parents treated us to a fantastic dinner that evening, consisting of turkey, gravy, corn, green beans, sweet potato, and pumpkin-nut bread. We always seem to eat well at Slobfest :) After dinner, a few of us watched Stardust, which I found to be very entertaining and interesting. Claire Danes is beautiful.

We usually play D&D at Slobfest, but this year, since no one had a campaign prepared, we decided to play other games, instead, as we have quite a large number of them. Some games that were brought were not even played, since we had so many. Here is a list of the games we did play:
Settlers of Catan
Fluxx
Zombie Fluxx
Last Night on Earth
Illuminati
Munchkin
BattleLore
Guillotine

Much fun was had by all. We are looking forward to our next gathering, be it Slobfest or otherwise :)

We left around 1:45 on Sunday, which allowed me to get home around 3:45, after dropping off Sean and Roland at their respective homes. I then spent the rest of the afternoon and evening with Joanna, snuggling in the chair and eating good food. A great end to a great weekend :)


01/15/2008:
The year marches on. It has been mostly a good one so far. My health has still been up and down, but I am continuing to live a healthier lifestyle, which can only help me in the end. I have been continuing with my nightly routine of stretching, relaxing, and stress reduction. I have introduced some increased physical activity into my routine, in the hopes of building some muscle mass on this skinny body of mine, hopefully adding some much-needed weight, and a better appetite as well.

I ended up taking a 1/2 day on Friday, because I was feeling quite ill. My stomach was very upset, and I was getting the shakes and cold sweats. Just not pleasant. So I went home, where I felt a little better. My stomach issues continued throughout the weekend, but not as severe as on Friday, and definitely better this week. The weekend was otherwise very enjoyable. I played a lot of video games on Friday and Saturday night. Joanna and I did some shopping on Saturday, which was fun, and we spent most of Sunday relaxing together. We even got out the chessboard and played a few games. It had been years since either of us had played, and neither of us could remember much for strategy, but we had a great time just playing. I look forward to future games.

My headache returned with a vengeance yesterday, but I managed to subdue it. I have added some anti-migraine medication to the stock that I carry in my backpack, just in case I get another one. I'd prefer to be able to stay at work and work, rather than stay at work and suffer, or leave and go home. I'd like to save my time off for scheduled time, rather than sick time.

I am continuing my search for others who navigate the dream realms. I have found numerous sites online, including several message boards, which I plan to explore further in the coming weeks. Time moves ever forward; I want to be prepared for what is coming, and I want others to be as prepared as I can help them be. I hope to update the Dragon-Rider main site more, as well, to help explain what it is we do. I am seeking assistance from friends in putting things into words that others will understand. It is not easy, but once it is posted, I can then refer people there, and then back to me for additional questions, of course.

Joanna and I were talking about going to Starwood this year. I think it would be a lot of fun. I just hope she would enjoy it as much as I. She said she will, so I must believe her :) More news on that as we make our plans.


01/08/2008:
I haven't been feeling very well this week. Yesterday, I got a migraine around 11:45 am or so, and it persisted until late into the evening. I rarely get headaches lately, and I can usually get rid of them fairly quickly by stretching my neck a bit and taking an Aleve if it's particularly bad, but this one just wouldn't quit, even after two Aleve. Plus, the bright lights and huge CRT monitor here at work were not helping any. I ended up leaving an hour early, at 6, because I was feeling pretty awful. Once I was away from the lights and computer, I started feeling better. After that, I was just tired. I spent most of the evening relaxing in our comfy chair with Joanna and Lynx, and watching Terminator 2, one of many movies I received as gifts for Christmas.

I was feeling ill again today, off and on, and just plain tired, but I am feeling a little better now. And now it is time to go home. Yay :)


01/04/2008:
It has been another tiring week. I seem to feel tired a lot of the time, lately. I was very exhausted last night. After some good sleep, I felt better. This morning was rough, but once I got moving I was better. It is now about 5:30, and I am feeling quite tired again. Thankfully, I have the weekend coming up, and I plan for it to be a relaxing one. I have a few things I have to do, and some tentative plans, but nothing too strenuous.

Our New Years Eve was nice and relaxing. Joanna and I were invited out, but we chose to stay in, and enjoy the company of each other and our various pets :) We just hung out, and played video games until the new year came :) I am working through F.E.A.R., again, and have finally made it up past where I got before, into new territory!

Our young rats are growing quickly. The boys and two of the girls are as big as their mother now, or nearly so. Silver and Lily, the two hairless girls, are still very small, but we have learned that they grow much slower than their furred brethren, and may not get much larger than they are currently. That is no problem; we have plenty of smaller cages for them to live in, and their smaller size makes them easier to transport :) They have been the "ambassador rats" of their family so far; we took them to VT with us when we went up for Christmas, and they did not seem to mind the trip at all. After the first 20 or 30 minutes of stillness, they were jumping around the cage and playing, just as if they were home. Any time we have traveled with rats before, they have been fairly scared, and generally just sit still and look frightened. Joanna made a good choice, choosing Silver and Lily to bring with us for that trip :)

Page Updates:
- main page:
-- Reordered the sidebar.
-- In the sidebar, renamed "Who Are We?" to "Who We Are".
-- In the sidebar, renamed "Planar Travel" to "Realms".
-- Updated "Happenings".
-- Updated newly-renamed "Realms", to include a brief explanation of the Dream Realms.