November 2004 Archives

After two years having nothing done about my leg ulcer and two months at the wound clinic at the hospital; I can say that my leg is healed. I found out this morning and I don"t have to go back. This is good news!! Thanks for all of yor support! :O)

You may notice something different about comments from me and maybe some others. I’ve enabled gravatars on this site. If you have a gravatar, it will be displayed above your comment. This feature was added mainly for fun. Gravatars need not necessarily be a picture of you. They can be any kind of image. More about that here. It’s a free service. I like free. You can bet mine will be changed soon.

Hello everyone and Happy Thanksgiving! This is the first day in the last three months that I been able to sleep in! Well, I got up at 6a.m. instead of my usual 4a.m. - I call that sleeping in. I have been reading the blog daily but I have not had time to respond. My classes and teaching have left me with absolutely no time for anything else. I think my family is ready to throw me out.
Omar and Hyder are in India. Hyder is trying to drum up some business contacts and Omar needed a break. They were to see the Taj Mahal yesterday - with a full moon it is a amazing sight. Today they will attend a family wedding and then I understand Omar is going on a safari and hunting trip with his uncles. I haven't been able to talk to them yet. With the time difference and all of their travelling it's hard to pin them down. I hope they haven't gotten sick!
We have a sprinkling of snow on the ground today (I think we're suppose to get about three inches) - bah humbug! I'm getting to old for this weather, but the kids love it.
Today will be a family day - I'll let the kids decide what they want to do since I haven't been able to spend time with them. Happy days to you'all.

I took the picture above yesterday on my lunch break. It’s the south seawall of Lake Ponchartrain not far from where I work. I had the whole beach to myself for about 20 minutes. It was cool and breezy. Hated to leave.

One of the perfect bike paths near CrabAppleLane. Don’t let the gentle roll of these hilly roads fool you. They are a good workout for someone as out of shape as me.

This flock of Canadian Geese flew by as I was on my return home. This was the best composition I could manage on my wobbly legs.

Patsy's got stuffed mirlitons going in the kitchen right now. The aroma is making me crazy. I think I have to get out of the house again. Soon.

After many days of agonizing over what to do with my computer, I finally called Dell for the name of a service place to take my computer. They instead, walked me through deleting my entire virus infected system and re-loading the operating system. They are amazing. They told me it would take about an hour to load one particular part and that they would call me back in an hour to continue loading the rest of the system. Exactly as the program finished loading, I got a phone call from Dell to complete the re-boot of my system. How wonderful is that?!!

Now, the boys can play their games without the computer crawling through the game and we can get online and surf the web with no porn whatsoever to look at! And it didn't cost me a thing. Mom's computer on the other hand is on the blink. It won't turn on. We have tried everything, unplugging, powering down, computer dance, prayers to the computer gods, but nothing is working. The computer is only 3 years old. It's not time for a new one already?

I am thankful that my computer is running so smoothly again.

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Here's the rundown: I've got the turkey, peas, pumpkin pie, and a homemade cranberry cocktail which has a medley of fruit and chopped nuts in it made by a friend. Mom and Christina have cauliflower au gratin and sweet potatoes. I have some 2-liters here left over from the fish fry. David's got the mashed potatoes; I shot down his offer of green bean casserole. He called last night to offer them. I told him we (all Mangunos) would not eat them. Mushrooms are nasty. He said his kids wouldn't touch them either and then he talked himself out of the offer. Are you coming Robbie and Patsy? We will miss the Soule's this year, but happy they will be with Scott's family in Florida. It will seem like a small crowd without them and Sue's family. Angela too. She and Joey will be sharing thanksgiving with Joey's family. I have to talk with Katie and then we will be all set.

Added a new feature to the website. It's a photo gallery. As of right now, it contains almost all of the pictures in our archives. I don't know if this is useful but I guess it is if people like it. It seems to have found a lot of pictures I've never seen. I suspect that is a result of earlier, unsuccessful efforts to upload pictures. They've been saved after all.

Here's the link. It's also on the side.

I bought this painting from a starving artist ( That’s what she said ) outside of Jackson Square in the French Quarter in New Orleans. This was on the day we went to Muriels. Mom had to lend me $10 to buy it. It cost me twice as much to frame it as it did to purchase it. I know zero about art. I just liked the colors.

I went to the Bike Zone with a figure in mind. It ended up being just about twice what I expected. See why here.

Haven't we all said, " If we had money, we build a new house. "? These guys came into some money and did just that.

I have more pictures, but it is taking too long to upload them and then I got a navigation error a couple of times. I know to stop now before I accidentally pull up porn.

Here are a few pictures from our wonderful dinner last Saturday night.

Angela & Joey - November 13, 2004

Christina & Sue - November 13, 2004

Elizabeth & Scott - November 13, 2004

Mom's Birthday Dinner Party - November 13, 2004

Katie & Kevin - November 13, 2004

Picture of Mama and Janine lost. Sorry - Rob.

Robbie & Patsy - November 13, 2004

To celebrate Mom’s birthday, we reserved a dining room at Annadele’s Plantation Saturday night. Mom’s birthday on November 13 is also Katie and Kevin’s anniversary. There seemed to be some doubt about how many years those two have been married. I bow to Christina’s wisdom on restaurant dinner matters. I thought it would be a 60-90 minute dinner event. We were there for almost 4 hours. Patsy took some pictures but they didn’t turn out so well.

Sue surprised or didn’t surprise Mom when she flew in for the dinner. Christina and Sue both think there were enough clues left for Mom to pick up on the surprise plan.

Anyway, the place is gorgeous and the food was excellent. When I dine there again, I will make a reservation for just before sunset. The grounds are very nice also and I think they should be taken in whilst you dine there. For what it’s worth, that was the best gumbo I’ve ever had in my life. That’s no small statement. I have taken in my share of gumbo in my 47 years.

Great evening. Happy Birthday, Mom.

Also, Happy 22nd, 23rd, 24th, whatever to Kevin and Katie.

Big PS - I've made a few changes to the blog commenting system. When you post a comment now, you'll have to preview it first. No, I'm not a grammar/spelling NAZI. It's an anti-spam measure.

One major kink and two minor kinks to work out and I’m done here on the new server. It is a bit bumpier transition than I thought it would be yesterday. I need Fred’s Ronco Day-Stretcher.

One of the issues is the blacklist. Until I get it working again, I'll have to approve comments before they're posted. If I don't do that, we'll get way too much spam. This measure should be temporary.

Happy Birthday, Mom. 39 again? The twins are catching up.

See you tonight.

Love,

I finally got around to viewing the pictures you took in Minnesota, Robbie. They were very good, and also fun to look at. I saw the rest of the scene from that picture you cut me out of to post on the blog months ago. There were a handful of people sitting at a table that I was conversing with. They all looked better than me, yet there I was on the blog. Funky chicken. (really, I don't care.)

CrabAppleLane is changing servers over the next few days out of necessity. The server company where it is currently stored is going out of business on the 1st of the year but I don’t want to wait until then. This is a major upgrade for the site but it is also a major hassle for me. Things may get a little wonky here while I fix things that are broken in the move. Once the move starts, I’ll take the blog offline to prevent damage and loss of data until the move is complete and I have everything working again. At most, it shouldn’t be down any longer than 24-48 hours.

More here if you’re interested.

Your patience is greatly appreciated.

There was never any doubt that the cats would like this new addition to our living room. Two cats, one new house doesn't work, though. We'll have to get another one. Despite the dour look on Casey's face ( She's not always wild about the camera ), she is ecstatic to be in there. Crispin doesn't know about it yet. He'll get her out of there if he finds out. Shhh! Don't tell him, please.

OK, now who doesn't want one of these?

We had a great time at Elizabeth and Scott's house last night. Their neighborhood rocks as far as the junk they distribute to trick-or-treaters. Aaron, Jimmy, and a neighbor were on their own and came home with a huge load of stuff. I am working on it now. Julia, too, had much to be coveted. We never dreamed of getting bags of Cheetos, peanuts, and rubber frogs in our bags of goodies. People used to be chintzy with their orange and black wrapped candies, what were they made of?

You can barely tell who is in this picture. I am going to be so good when I learn what I am doing with this camera. Julia is on the end of this picture, Joe is Yugi-oh, Mary Catherine is surrounded by friends - Haley and Marlee, Jackson was a Ninja dude (I think), Jacob was Superman, and Polina was Cinderella. We missed having Lars and Amy this year.

Grandma Mimi's dress was very comfortable. The wand completed the ensemble to make me a decent Fairy Godmother. I had glitter all over me too. It came out in the wash. I was just a fairy at our church RE party, but as we were trick-or-treating, I followed Polina to the door of one house where two guys said how cute that was that Cinderella had her fairy godmother with her.