Lauren took Dylan to his pediatrician today for a checkup. He's been a lot more cranky than normal, and he is not usually cranky at all. Turns out, he's cutting some jaw teeth. No wonder he's out of sorts. He also had to have five shots. Poor little guy. He held up really well for the first three, but by the last two, he was crying. Lauren held him and comforted him, and she was really wonderful with him. She also played with him before the doctor came into the exam room. (all of this is per Grampy's account; Grammy had to stay at home and work.

Lauren told me that when the doctor finished, she didn't want to agitate Dylan further by trying to re-dress him, so when they arrived here, he was only wearing his diaper. By then, his smile was firmly back in place. He is so well bonded to his mother, and it's a joy to see. I'm glad she is sensitive to his needs.

I told her I was proud of her for the way she is caring for him. She seemed genuinely puzzeled, but I just think she needed to hear me say I'm proud of her. And it's true. She is a good mommy. Dylan is very happy when he's with her.

Neil Diamond is coming to San Antonio on October 9. I'm hoping that Jay and I can go to the concert, and possibly take Lauren with us, since she did not get to go the last time he was here. San Antonio is about a 90 minute drive from here. I have enjoyed Neil just about forever. I haven't seen him in concert for three years or so.

A note about my template: Today is May 24. I began this blog in it's original (former) incarnation in August 2004, and at that time, I knew nothing at all about editing my template. Then, I started reading different blogs, and viewing source code, and lights started going off in my mind. Thanks to bloggerforum, a wonderful blogging resource with some incredibly patient and helpful members, I recently began learning to edit my template to personalize my blogs. A member and moderator of the forum, RedRyder52, created this black and white 3 column template, and has assisted me with setting it up so that it works as it should. I affectionately call it "Classic Basic Black with Pearls." I may experiment with the colors at times, but the template is a gem. I enjoy the dual sidebars! Thank you very much, RedRyder, for so generously sharing the fruits of your labor.

Jay's birthday is May 28, so yesterday, I treated him (and myself) to an early birthday present. We went to see Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith. It is a very "busy" movie; I had to pay pretty close attention to keep from getting lost at first. The photography took my breath away more than once. I was not overly impressed with Hayden Christianson's portrayal of Anakin much of the time, because he seemed to be straining somehow; his emotional and psychological struggle seemed hollow. During the fight scene between Anakin and Obi Wan, Ewan McGregor was far more genuine in expressing his love for Anakin.

Speaking of that fight, the whole time they were surrounded by the fires, I kept thinking of Gehenna. Still, the movie does, for me, explain how the sweet little boy Anakin was grew up to be Big, Bad and Ugly Darth Vader. I would have liked to hear more about Obi Wan and Qui-Gon, per the training that Yoda assigned Obi Wan at the end of the film.

I did find what I think is a blooper. In Return of the Jedi, Leya asked Luke if he remembered their mother. Since Padawan died in childbirth or shortly after giving birth, how could either of them remember her?

Jay said he wished Lucas had flashed forward a bit, closer to the time of the original (1977) Star Wars film, but to me it was not a big deal. Also, one wonders about Jar Jar Binks. Did he return to his homeworld? One can hope.

~~ -- ~~ * ~~ -- ~~

We had take out barbecue for supper, and I woke up not feeling too great today...par for the course, but it's not happening as often as it used to. During dinner, we were watching television, and there was a commericial for this. Shame on you, Wendy's! No wonder many Americans struggle with their weight. I couldn't even hold that sandwich, much less eat it all. THere's enough for at least two meals, for me. What I find really ironic is that the Wendy's site actually has a nutrition guide so you can mix and match your food choices to get the most nutrition from them. Excuse me? This is fast food, remember? I can hear my arteries hardening... Besides, I think homemande hamburgers are the best. At least I don't need a forklift to lift them with.

Today, Lauren took Dylan to get his hair cut for the first time. It was just to trim the ends, but he really looked cute when he came to visit afterward. She said he sat in the chair and didn't cry at all; he fidgeted just a little, but he was really cool with it. She brought me a card with a lock of his hair to keep. And, today, he gave me a kiss on my cheek. When he got ready to go, Lauren was holding him, and he blew me a kiss, which surprised her and made her laugh. How good it is to see the two of them together! (He also likes dill pickles!)

I was working today, and one of the supervisors IM'ed me to ask if I was interested in working extra, so of course I jumped at the chance. I got an extra hour in today, and tomorrow, I'm going to start two hours early, then do a few hours Saturday morning. That will be a huge help, since I was out for two days this week.

I put together a tutorial on how to get an e mail button and place it on a blog and included some other information as well.I did this for a new blogger I know, but I thought maybe others could also use it:

I've written a step by step tutorial for a couple of blogger topics that you may find helpful. Please read through this thoroughly before you begin. You can create a new blog for experimentation, rather than using an existing one; this will protect your existing blog from loss or corruption. You may want to bookmark the links I've included, for future use.

To put an e mail button in your blog:

1) Open the Template, and decide where you want the button to appear. Scroll to that location in the template and click the mouse. (If this step doesn't "stick", just scroll back down to where you want your button when you come back to the Edit Template tab in a moment.) Open a new tab in your browser. (If you aren't using a tabbed browser, just go to step 2.)

2) Go to http://www.dynamicdrive.com/emailriddler/ . The purpose of this step is to genetate code that will encrypt your e mail address, making it harder for bots to find your e mail address. This will reduce the possibility of getting spam in your e mail inbox, so don't skip this step. Put your e mail address in the first text box. You can enter whatever you like in the second Text box, but I usually just leave the second and third text boxes empty. When you've put your e mail address in, click the "encrypt e mail" button. The code will appear in the "Generate Script" box. When the code appears, click the "select all" link at the top of the box. The code will highlight. Right click your mouse in the generated script box with the code highlighted, and choose "Copy." This step copies the script to your clipboard in Windows.

3) Return to the tab that has your Template editor. Find the place where you want your e mail button to appear, and click your mouse if necessary (see step 1). When you have the desired location, just click Control+V, to copy the script code to your template.

There will be a line in the script that begins, "document.write(... Immediately after the > following the string of numbers in the link is where you want to put the code for your e mail button. First you need to generate that code.

4) Open a new tab if you need to, keeping your Edit Template tab open. Go to
http://www.nhacks.com/email/index.php . This is the E-Mail Icon Generator. It works for G Mail, and many other e mail clients, including SBC. you can open the list box to choose one if you don't want the G Mail button. Put your e mail address (everything before the " @ " sign in the first text box. Select your e mail client (G Mail, Yahoo, SBC, etc) from the second box, and the correct extension from the third. For my Gmail, I enter my G Mail account name "AngelSong214" (which is the way I want the text to appear on the button); @ "Gmail" and (dot)com from the third box. Then click 'generate.' The button will appear. Now it gets a bit tricky.

There is a url displayed that is a direct link to Nhack. You may or may not be able to use this link, because it's a "hot link". Some sites frown on hot linking. You could also choose to use the second URL. Or, you could just choose to save the button to your hard drive, which is also what I've done.

If you save the button to your hard drive (recommended), you will need to upload it to use it. There are any number of upload sites you can use; one that I like is http://www.ripway.com/ . Note that on Ripway (like most of these sites) you will need to register first. So enter your registration info, and just follow through. On Ripway, there are some nag screens; you can just cancel out of those and it will still work; even if you have to select an offer to proceed, you can always cancel later. When you've registered, log in to Ripway. It will say, "click here to view your files." You don't (of course) have any files yet. So click the Upload button.
Browse to where you saved the e mail button on your hard drive. I just saved mine on my desktop so that it's quick to find. When you've got it located, click "open". the path will appear in the text box to the left of the browse button. Click the upload button on the right at the bottom of the window. When it's finished uploading, you can view the file. Once again, you will see a direct link and an alternate link. Choose either of these links, and copy it. Then return to your Edit Template tab.

On that "document.write" line in the encrypt script, go to the > at the end of the line, just before the close anchor tag. Put your cursor immediately after the >, and click the mouse. Now, you will need to put an image source tag in there, so just type, < img src =" followed by the link to your image, and without the space between the < and the img. Now paste the link that you copied from Nhack. This is going to be an open tag; no close is needed for it. Immediately after the " in the image source tag you just opened, click Control+V to copy the URL for your uploaded button image at Ripway. Put a " after the .png, in front of the close anchor tag. Now hit the Preview button on the Edit Template window. When your blog loads you should see your new e mail button, and you can click it to ensure that it's "live." If so, go back and hit Save Template Changes on your Edit Template Window. Republish your blog.

Make a Backup!!! of your Blogger Template...

You may want to also make a backup of the code (links, 'stuff'...whatever) that you've added to your template. To do this:

Open the Template tab. Scroll down to the section(s) where you've placed your edits. Highlight and copy each of your edits, one at a time or in a group. Open Notepad, Word Pad, or whatever text editor you are using. I use NoteTab Pro. NOw paste (Control+V) each of your edits (or the group) into a new, blank document in the text editor. Save the file to your hard drive. That's it. Now, you can just copy and paste the file back to any template you like if you need to change your template. As you update your links in your blog, repeat this process so that everything is current. You can also copy the entire template by copying everything in the Edit Template window and saving it to a text file. Comes in handy if you muck up your template.

...and this one is special, because Lauren is home. She says the next two weeks is going to be hectic for her (I don't doubt it for a minute.) I invited her and Dylan to viist whenever they can, so they probably will.

There is a bee in my bonnet right now on a whole different subject. What is it about the internet that makes people think they can be rude and hateful to perfect strangers? I grew up with the old saying, "if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything." I learned that when I was in first grade, and I've never forgotten it. Nor have I intentionally been rude to anyone that I know of. Some people think sitting in front of a monitor and being invisible gives them license to say whatever they please, however they choose. I try to remember that there is a person with feelings on the other side of my words, and I do believe words are powerful, and I respect that power and do not knowingly misuse it. I wish some people would put their minds in gear before they put their typing fingers into overdrive.

Happy Mother's Day
To: My mom; my daughter (it's your second!), my sister, my mother-in-law (I'm still glad you are a Mom! and my friends, including Amy, Susan and Kat.

I'm chuckling over this:

The Obedient Wife

There was a man who had worked all of his life, had saved all of his money, and was a real miser when it came to spending his money.

Just before he died, he said to his wife, "When I die, I want you to take all my money and put it in the casket with me. I want to take my money to the after life with me."

And so he got his wife to promise him with all of her heart that when he died, she would put all of the money in the casket with him.

Well, he died. He was stretched out in the casket, his wife was sitting there in black, and her friend was sitting next to her.

When they finished the ceremony, just before the undertakers got ready to close the casket, the wife said, "Wait just a minute!"

She had a box with her, she came over with the box and put it in the casket. Then the undertakers locked the casket down, and they rolled it away. So her friend said, "Girl, I know you weren't fool enough to put all that money in there with your husband."

The loyal wife replied, "Listen, I'm a Christian . I can't go back on my word. I promised him that I was going to put that money in that casket with him."

" You mean to tell me you put that money in the casket with him!!!!!?"

"I sure did," said the wife. "I got it all together, put it into my
account and wrote him a check. If he can cash it, he can spend it."

What is it about having pets that makes even an apartment seem more like a home? Our "girls", Duchess and Darla, are two year old sisters who have been part of our family since they were 8 weeks old. They do not know they are cats, apparently; they act more like dogs. If one of them is closed in a room, the other will go sit and wait (sometimes impatiently) for one of us to go open the door and let her out. When we go out, we usually return to find them sitting in the window, watching for us, and they meet us at the door. Most cats could not be bothered. They are not allowed outside, unless they are in their carrier. When they were kittens, each of them got outside in the grass for less than 5 minutes, and we fought fleas for the next six weeks. We finally made a trip to PetsMart for flea collars that didn't help much, and to the vet for Advantage, which worked. Then we needed worm pills.

I don't know what we did before we had these girls. They are more fun to watch than television. I wanted two cats because they keep each other company, and they are much more playful longer than single cats usually are. I won't say they are less mischievous, because that isn't the case; Darla, especially, is a curious sort who has to have her nose into everything. She will climb the bathroom door, and sit atop it, looking down on us . . . but she only does this at night. She also likes to try to open cabinet doors, but she can't open the bottom ones because they have child latches inside them. She has learned to open the top cabinets, and has climbed inside them...so we actually taped them shut.

Duchess, on the other hand, is much more laid back. Both of them are affectionate, but they are not "lap cats." They don't have much patience with being held, although Duchess will allow us to cradle her in our arms like a baby sometimes.

I don't think there's anything much nicer than waking up to find two cats sleeping nose-to-nose, at my feet, or curled up between us when it's cold and wet outside. Somehow, it just seems more "homey."

I've been adding links to my blog, and I'm really happy with the way it's turned out. I've also created two additional blogs. What fun! I've foound a wealth of very handy and helpful resources for blogging. I've always enjoyed writing, and now it's even more fun. Doesn't get much better!!!

I'm really glad I took this weekend off. I didn't know how much I needed the down time. My feet are stil swollen; I slept with them elevated last night, and they weren't quite as bad this morning.

My Aunt Doris and her twin sister are 75 years old. Man, that's hard to believe. She is still working part time and doing well, which is a blessing. She's always been more of a mother to me than my own mother is or was. She always takes time to listen if I need to talk, and if I need prayer, she's right there, too.

Received in my e mail:

A few minutes before the church services started, the congregation was sitting in their pews and talking. Suddenly, Satan appeared at the front of the church. Everyone started screaming and running for the front entrance, trampling each other in a frantic effort to get away from evil incarnate.

Soon the church was empty except for one elderly gentleman who sat calmly in his pew without moving, seemingly oblivious to the fact that God's ultimate enemy was in his presence.

So Satan walked up to the man and said, "Do you know who I am?"

The man replied, "Yep, sure do."

"Aren't you afraid of me?" Satan asked.

"Nope, sure ain't," said the man.

"Don't you realize I can kill you with one word?" asked Satan.

"Don't doubt it for a minute," returned the old man, in an even tone.

"Did you know that I can cause you profound, horrifying agony for all eternity?" persisted Satan.

"Yep," was the calm reply.

"And you are still not afraid?" asked Satan.
"Nope," said the old man.

More than a little perturbed, Satan asked, "Why aren't you afraid of me?"
The old man calmly replied, "Been married to your sister for 48 years."

I've been adding links to my blog, and I'm really happy with the way it's turned out. I've also created two additional blogs. What fun! I've linked with Link2blogs.com, and I'm finding a wealth of very handy and helpful resources for blogging. I've always enjoyed writing, and now it's even more fun. Doesn't get much better!!!

I'm really glad I took this weekend off. I didn't know how much I needed the down time.

My feet are stil swollen; I slept with them elevated last night, and they weren't quite as bad this morning.

My Aunt Doris and her twin sister are 75 years old. Man, that's hard to believe. She is still working part time and doing well, which is a blessing. She's always been more of a mother to me than my own mother is or was. She always takes time to listen if I need to talk, and if I need prayer, she's right there, too.

Received in my e mail:

A few minutes before the church services started, the congregation was sitting in their pews and talking. Suddenly, Satan appeared at the front of the church. Everyone started screaming and running for the front entrance, trampling each other in a frantic effort to get away from evil incarnate.

Soon the church was empty except for one elderly gentleman who sat calmly in his pew without moving, seemingly oblivious to the fact that God's ultimate enemy was in his presence.

So Satan walked up to the man and said, "Do you know who I am?"

The man replied, "Yep, sure do."

"Aren't you afraid of me?" Satan asked.

"Nope, sure ain't," said the man.

"Don't you realize I can kill you with one word?" asked Satan.

"Don't doubt it for a minute," returned the old man, in an even tone.

"Did you know that I can cause you profound, horrifying agony for all eternity?" persisted Satan.

"Yep," was the calm reply.

"And you are still not afraid?" asked Satan.
"Nope," said the old man.

More than a little perturbed, Satan asked, "Why aren't you afraid of me?"
The old man calmly replied, "Been married to your sister for 48 years."