my mom called today... i guess my brother is heading back down to georgia sometime soon. riley's back in the hospital (pneumonia again), has been unresponsive for a few days, they took him off the bipap machine(which helps him breathe) for less than an hour and his oxygen levels, etc dropped 50% which is really really bad. he's not officially on life support though. the machine just does some of the work for his breathing. so he's back on that now and his kidneys are failing. they have a neurologist coming to check on him tomorrow i think just to make sure they're not missing anything else. (like that it's not induced by any of the many meds he's on) but it doesn't look good. please pray especially for jeremy and brandy- i can't even imagine what they're going through. thanks...

so i have weird dreams

i'm sure most of you have heard some of my weird dreams at some point...(including the one where melissa snubbed me as a friend recently)

so recently i had a dream where i was smoking. like chain smoking. and thinking the whole time athat norm was going to be upset with me cuz he hates smoking. so i had this dream and then never thought about it.

until today. i had a doctor's appt and they asked me if i smoked. i hesistated (almost said yes!) cuz i had such a strong image/memory of me smoking. then said no. the doctor looked at me funny and then asked me again, like he thought i was lying! then he asked if i did any street drugs.

i'm such a freak.

we got three new fish (as if the hamilton zoo isn't crowded enough). they're called pea puffers! hehehe.

ps. i think the squirrel is still in there, i heard the noise again yesterday. or he comes in and out. they haven't taken the pipe thingy apart yet to look.

and here we are...

so yep, i'm not feelin inspired to write much on the whole holland experience. so let's just say that it was an...experience. holland itself was great even though the weather was wet and dreary. amsterdam is awesome and i absolutely love it there. i've even picked out my new house. [see below] and am taking applications for renters for those who'd like to live communally in my mansion. it's right between the hard rock cafe and the rijksmuseum...golden! going on a trip of that sort with a 3 yr old and an 86 yr old was quite the ordeal as i've probably mentioned before. we had to lug around a lot of junk and we got lost quite a bit, which isn't too hard when all the directions your given do not include street names. ("turn left, go through three round-abouts, left at a stop sign, right at the second set of lights...")

and i decided to make the trip even more exciting because it turns out i have kidney stones. so i spent a day in serious pain, puking, and at the hospital but then after that, i felt great! except now that i'm home i have to get bloodwork, ultrasounds...etc. super...

it was really cool however, to go to church where norm's oma got married like 60 years ago (sadly the church has been bought by the airport and is being torn down) and where she lived and where her own grandparents lived. it's awesome to be in a place with so much history...

anyways, just thought i'd give a little snippet of our trip. i'd love to go again, maybe when there are actually tulips in bloom tho...

randomness...(naomi, don't read this!)

so i'm at work yesterday in my little basementy office all by my lonesome when i hear this intense rustling sound coming from the laundry room/storage side of the basement. now, if you remember we have had mouse issues before so i thought, super, a giant mouse is scrounging for food.

i ignored it for a long time, but it was getting louder (and kinda freakin me out, but don't tell anybody!) so being the brave, adventurous soul that i am, i decided to have a look. i grabbed a flashlight and a broom then ventured toward the door. opened it slowly... reached for the light...
all quiet... i waited... the noise started again and i determined that it was coming from a metal tube/pipe thing over top of a water heater or gas thingy (i dunno my basement lingo ok?).

i whacked the pipe with my broom and i thought i saw a little nose stick out. i stood there for a bit and watched to see if the mouse came out but it didn't so i got bored, left, and shut the door behind me.

when my boss came back i mentioned that there was a mouse there and she said she'd get a mouse trap later. then she left again.

a while later, i heard the banging again. only LOUDER. so, in i went. this time without the broom and flashlight, cuz seriously, it's a teeny mouse right?

so i'm in there, watching the pipe move around when suddenly a GIANT BLACK HAIRY ARM stretched out of the pipe! now, maybe "giant" isn't the appropriate word, but when you're expecting a teeny little mouse arm and something significantly bigger comes out, it's a little alarming.

my conclusion: it's a squirrel. i considered reaching in and trying to "unstuck" it, but honestly, it'd probably bite my hand off and even if i got it out, what was i going to do with it? it'd probably jump out of my hand and then i'd have a loose squirrel in the house. no, that would not be good. so i left it.

my boss came back and i told her my developing news. so she goes in and whacks on the pipe and this horrible groaning noise came out. something was seriously stuck in that pipe. and it was no little mouse. she decided to wait til her husband came back to get it out.

so this morning i came into work and asked if they'd gotten the squirrel out. the answer i received was "no, but it's quiet now." um...maybe cuz now it's dead....? perhaps? great...

the guy that's doing renovations on the house is coming over later and they said he'd get it out. so i'll let ya know if my squirrel theory is correct or if we've found a really fat mouse. :D

no matter how great a hotel room is, there's still no place like home

home at last, home at last, thank God almighty, i'm home at last. our holland trip was full of trials and tribulations but there were also many good times, fits of hysterical laughter, and incredible sight-seeing. i'll give more details later, not really in the writin mood at the moment. but i promise i'll bring ya'll up to speed eventually. maybe even tonight. but for now, i'll leave you with this:

dank u vel

i'm attempting to say "thank you" in dutch. no, i don't know how to spell it.

so we're here in zwolle this weekend, tomorrow we had to amsterdam for the rest of the week. ryan goes to school here so we went to meet his host family today and went to a church service all in dutch. a 1 1/2 hour service seems like 5 hours when you can't understand it! (i've never heard the *f* word off the pulpit before! but apparently it means something completely different in this language! and yes, there were immature snickers, chortles, giggles and snorts coming from my chair...)

anyways, we're just hanging out at our hotel (bored) cuz it's cold and rainy and there isn't anything to do in zwolle. we went for a walk earlier and the city's way cute but we got soppin wet.

ps. there's a street called "pannekookendijk" (again, i can't spell it but it means pancake street!) and i get a tremendous amount of glee out of all the seemingly random vowels in the words... like if you take out every other letter, you'd still be able to successfully pronounce the words!) anyways, maybe by the end of the week i'll have a better appreciation.

pss. i had bread and hagelslach for breakfast. ooh and chocolate fla is my new favorite food. and gouda cheese, and bread, and...

dooie!! (no, i can't spell ok!?!)

fly away...

so tomorrow we're off on another hamilton adventure! to holland! me= so excited!

so let's review the dutch words i know:
dookie
hagelslach(sp?)
dats nice hey? (not really dutch)
hazella(ch) (no idea on the spelling on that one or if it's even dutch)

sweet. wonder how far that'll get me...

klompen anyone?

ps. random girl-ness...and i'm sure i've said this before but...why are "female" doctors so purely EVIL??? like for real, you can put someone on the freakin moon but you can't find a better way to tell if there's cancer "down/in there"?? come on... and on that note: have a lovely day! :P

ok so my brother is back home (from georgia) and as of yesterday my nephew was doing ok and heading home soon. he had a viral pneumonia and didn't have enough oxygen in his blood. i guess things are stabilized ok enough now for him to go home. he's been on a feeding tube for awhile now(almost a year?) at home and they think that there might be water/spit getting into his lungs which could've caused the pneumonia. i think they're gonna do some more tests once/if he recovers from this. in any case, it's good that he's getting out of the hospital. so we shall see.

He's got the whole world...

so my mom called last night to tell me that my nephew is in the hospital and that my brother flew down there. he has pneumonia, had some blood transfusions, and is on a breathing machine. all this on top of the other problems he has every day. they recently up-ped his anti-seizure meds, he's still on heart medication, and is heavily sedated. he's also 3 and 1/2 yrs old. if you're going to pray, please pray that he wouldn't suffer, no matter what the end result may be. he may not be able to run around and play and laugh here on earth, but there is Somewhere else where that IS possible.

ever heard of a hairdresser who didn't know how to cut bangs? well, me neither til tonight. i was getting my hair cut (have i mentioned that i LOVE getting my hair cut?) and this lady came in with her daughter. all she wanted was to have her daughter's bangs cut. and the other guy hairdresser didn't know how.
um....?????

dude, it's just the same as other hair...

i need answers!

1) why are people of middle eastern, jewish, greek(etc.) heritage referred to as having "olive" complexions? olives are green and black aren't they?

2) the hubby thinks that girls (in general) have a higher "love" for lasagna than guys do. i think he's being randomly sexist. so i'm taking a poll! please comment on the following:

1. i am male/female
2. i rate my affection for lasagna as: a) "ew gross!" b) "meh, ok" c) "like it, don't love it" or d) "love it, i'd eat it for breakfast."
3. additional comments

***i do realize that the results may not be completely accurate as my blog readership is mostly female (or non-existent) but what the heck, we'll see what happens.

the earth is the Lord's...

and all it's fullness, the earth and those that dwell therein...

so at church today we learned that there are 300,000 different species of beetles! and that there are 1.5 million different species of living things. if you lined them all up, every fifth one would be a beetle!

conclusion: God must really like beetles.

ps. happy cadets' sunday;)

ok it's january 28th and it's gorgeous outside! like we're talking slurpee weather! we just got back from a long walk with the dog. (n bought him one of those retractable leashes and two new toys! he must love his puppy dog!)

in other news, i had blood taken today and the bandaid totally ripped off my skin when i took it off! i now have a hot pink welt/blood blister in the shape of a bandaid on my inner elbow. sweet.

oh and this [see below] appeared in my mailbox on thursday. whoohoo! the gifter better get her west coast heineken over here so i don't have to drink "wild drinks" by myself!

the big 2-4

and no, not of beer. of life.

yup, today's my birthday- thanks for all the emails, phone calls, cards (and blogs)!

we went to the mandarin for dinner and my fortune cookie said, "a good friend is your greatest treasure." i guess i have lots of treasures then!

go red knight!

so mom and the bro-ster were up this weekend (and the bob-ster and the bro-ster's "friend"-ster too) to visit for my b-day. we went to medieval times in toronto for some dragon's blood(pepsi), dragon's meat stew(soup) and other goodies. so you eat without any silverware and wear a cardboard crown on your head and get to watch cheezy duels and jousting. good times. good medieval times.

the vicious hunter

my mom gave darcy the cutest stuffed gingerbread squeaky toy for christmas. within 5 hours the squeaker, all the stuffing, it's cute little scarf had been removed and its FACE WAS EATEN OFF! it now looks like this:


i should've taken a 'before' picture...

mahalo!!

yup, that's right, it's definitely me dead center doing a hula dance at a luau at disney. yay for having a birthday in january and for having TEN people who made sure they pointed me out.

and then...

and then your dog (who is well over the age of being potty trained) poops and pees on the floor.

and then he barfs in his crate.

and then he sleeps in his barf so that his ear is crusty and you have to bathe him.

and then he soaks you, your hubby, and the bathroom.

and then he rolls around on the floor getting all dirty again.

do you think...

do you think someone could be so emotionally shut down that they want to cry but can't? i do.

do you think someone could be so lazy that they don't want to emote? i am.

do you think someone could have everything and think they're so completely without? i am.

do you think the scariest time of the day is when someone's alone with their own thoughts? i do.

do you think someone can disgust themselves enough to make them physically ill? i do.

do you think someone could be so unloveable that even God doesn't care? i don't.

do you think that someone could know that God does care and still feel like shit? i do.

do you think a phone call from someone who says "i love you" makes all the difference even when you're being an ass? i do.

we're baaaaack!

after two weeks away at my dad's and then with the hamilton's in florida, it's good to be home! it was a great trip but now it's back to the real world of work, laundry, and dishes! (and manually flushing toilets!)