Lindsey
10/31/05
Well Ryan, I like your costume :-)! You guys all look cool, but where's Sasha and Pete's costumes? Great job on your pumpkins too. We didn't carve any this year but we painted a few. Not doing much for Halloween this year, my Mom had to go out of town for work and had to leave this morning, wasn't very happy about that. Other than that haven't been doing much other than school and dance. We do get today and tomorrow off though so that makes a nice long weekend.

Happy Halloween!!

Olivia, what is your costume this year?

It's a simple life for these dogs. Because they are
strays, they never got along. They run a lot, they roam free,
they don't have a home you see.
They sleep in garbage cans, barrels, and run down cars,
sometimes even under the stars.
They would chase a dove, for just some love,
and if you give them care, it's like hugging a teddy bear.
Adopt a dog, and give them a home,
for them to call a place their own.

So what do you all think? Good? Talk to you all later!!!

Yeah, it's weird. I had reminded myself about it several times this past week, and we even talked about on Saturday night... and I still forgot. Got up this morning and reacted just like y'all did. Sorry everybody! --Gary

Stay tuned to the news today, y'all. Fitzgerald (the Special Prosecutor) is making an announcement at 1 pm our time (I think), and he is expected -- though no one knows yet, it's all rumors! -- to indict Scooter Libby, and not to indict Karl Rove. All the Republican spinners are going to say this is a victory for the White House, etc etc, but the fact is it only takes one indictment for this to go to court -- and in court the whole story can be presented. Plus, Fitz is expected to announce that Rove is still under investigation. It ain't over yet, folks. Those of us who can remember Watergate know that it can take months for all the pieces to fall into place.

But there's one thing we can be sure of: The White House will try to distract the media's attention. Oh, did I mention that Bush is giving a "major speech" on Terror in just a few hours...? :-)

Good luck with your debate tomorrow, Emily!

Hey, it's Halloween! :-) --Gary

1. What kind of clothing does a house wear?
CLICK FOR ANSWER Address

2. What has ten legs and drools?
CLICK FOR ANSWER Five babies

3. Why do witches fly on broomsticks?
CLICK FOR ANSWER Because the vacuum cleaner cord isn't long enough

Woohoo!

I guess that's okay... Her nomination already has done as much damage to Bush as it would ever do. Still, it would have been fun to watch the Senate hearings. :-) So who does Bush nominate now? (Or rather, Laura, as I understand Mier's nomination was her idea...) A real Bible-toter that even the right-wing "Christian" lunatics can get behind? Or someone more moderate seeing as how Bush's political capital has all but dried up? Should be interesting! --Gary

I took yesterday off, and among other errands I took my car in for an oil change. A well-dressed late-middle-aged guy in a shiny new SUV pulled in behind my car as the shop guys worked on it. After a few minutes he got out and walked over to me. "Is that your Chrysler?" he asked. Based on nothing more than his apparent money, I pegged him as a Republican and figured he wanted to take issue with my "Impeach Bush" magnet. I said, "Yeah." He jerked his head toward my car and asked, "Where'd you get that magnet?" I kinda braced myself and said, "I made it." He nodded and said, "You got any more with you?" :-) I didn't have (maybe I should start!), but I wrote down my website (http://www.cafepress.com/333666/) and gave it to him. I can't really quit my day job yet, but I am selling a few! All thanks, of course, to the incompetence and lies of George Bush. Thank you, Dub!

love,Tristen

My hands are sparklin blue.
I have no clue
why my hands are sparking blue.
I think I wiped them in glue.

love, Tristen

On the surface, it looks like an attempt to distance Bush from the whole thing: When Our Leader found out about this awful thing two years ago, he was very angry, etc etc. But what it is really saying is: At the very least Bush knew about it, Bush lied about it (remember when he said that anyone involved in this would be fired immediately?), and Bush has obstructed justice in not reporting a crime. When this all comes into light, it will almost certainly connect Bush directly to the conspiracy.

And even more interesting: Where did this story come from? Not from Fitzgerald, who is leak-proof to the point of being legendary. No, it had to come from somebody involved, and it came out on purpose, for a reason. For weeks we've been hearing about battles within the White House, with Bush, Cheney, and Rove all turning on and attacking each other. Most of the recent leaked "rumors" have had Cheney as their target: "Cheney is the focus of the investigation," "Libby's story doesn't add up," "Cheney aide flips," etc. Today's story -- on the surface, as I said, looking pro-Bush -- is actually aimed directly at him. As someone on the internet said today, "Folks, we're witnessing nuclear war in the White House."

I know I keep talking about indictments... They are expected any time now. This Grand Jury is supposed to have everything wrapped up by October 28, so the indictments will come no later than that. Unless Fitzgerald asks for an extension, which is possible. It's also possible, I think, that he's purposely holding back with the indictments, letting the tension work in hopes that others will come forward with evidence or testimony. Rumors so far suggest that not one but two people have come forth to testify, both Cheney aides. I say again, interesting times!

And also, I just saw that Hurricane Wilma has not only been upgraded to a Category 5 storm, but is now officially "the most intense storm ever recorded in the Atlantic." Yeesh. Florida could really get pasted by this one.

And of course, it would also be wise to expect another terror-alert from the Feds, to distract the press from all of the above.... Interesting times! :-)

So, for now. I am here & doing OK. No problems since last week. Having the surgery on Wednesday gives me time to go to my pre employment testing tomorrow, so hopefully I am ready to start by November 1st.

The laparoscopy, as you and I have already discussed on the phone, is a breeze. And after that, no more painful "attacks." It's all good! --Gary

Yeah, I understand FEMA has officially stopped counting, even though bodies are still being discovered. (There was a story a few days ago of someone returning to their house in New Orleans, which had supposedly been checked by FEMA and had the big "all clear" sign painted on it -- yet he discovered his grandmother's body inside....) And there are still thousands of people, mostly kids, listed as "missing" -- but who may in fact be separated from their families in different cities. The thinking, I guess, is that the lower the numbers, the less inept FEMA/Bush look; but I would think that ship has sailed. --Gary

Well, I only have pictures of the tickets for home games (scanned). This is our first away game of the season, so no ticket image. Last year I used the picture of T&t for away games and would have done so again this year, but Thursday -- when I had to make up the page -- I was home sick, and all my football graphics (including that picture) were on my work computer, not my home one. So...the weekend page was something I threw together from home. More than y'all wanted to know, right? :-) --Gary

Rest in peace, Oreo! --Gary

Amanda when you mentioned Sean loved biscuits and gravy, do you remember the restraunt he wanted to open? I do! Hope you get to feeling better though, that doesn't sound fun. I think you need a Juice Stop with the wellness blend to feel better!!

Dang, feel better everybody! --Gary

Emily, I've been home for two days too, but not with the flu. Mine is all in my head -- literally. A kind of headache/earache thing -- feels like the pressure thing you get in an airplane, just before your ears "pop." I'm heading for the drugstore soon to see if the pharmacist can recommend anything off-the-shelf. --Gary

(This is actually a prank, made possible by "googlebombing." On the Google page, click on "Why these results" on the right side for an explanation. Still funny though!)

Feel better, Emily! --Gary

Great minds think alike! --Gary

Be sure to watch Keith Olbermann tomorrow night (7 pm Wednesday on MSNBC). He's going to do the whole hour (I think) on the "coincidence" that terror-alerts always seem to happen when the White House needs to distract the media's attention. Olbermann is one of the few reporters in America who would dare tackle a subject like this. Should be good! --Gary

I just got back from a field trip! Whenever we finish one of our book projects here at work, we take a day-trip as a group as a sort of little celebration. (It's a nod to the original publisher of our book and his wife who used to go on a photo safari to Africa whenever they finished one.) So today we went to the SAC Museum and then had lunch at Mahoney State Park. Very nice!

Speaking of which, I am going to wash my car and do homework!!

Nice pictures of the parade. Erika, did you have fun? Okay, anyone else ever been in a parade before? Not me.

Karen, I like the idea of getting the kids involved but I gotta say that sounds nasty. Maybe Sean will buy some. Apple butter always reminds me of Sean. ;-)

This just in: pictures of the parade! --Gary

New polls: Bush's numbers are dropping faster than Michael Jackson's record sales. A CBS poll yesterday, after Bush's "major speech" on terror, put his approval rating at a new low: 37%. In the same poll, 69% said they thought the country was headed in the wrong direction, which is the highest that number has been since CBS started asking that question (in 1983). Also -- I think these are Wall Street Journal numbers, I forget -- the Democratic candidates are polling ahead of Republicans in almost every Senate seat open in 2006. That election is still thirteen months away, but still....

Sorry sorry sorry for the long long post, but yesterday was a big big day!

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Karen
10/6/05
I kept having a feeling that yesterdays date was important too. Finally realized what it was last night, but I think it was 13 years, just before Erika was born. Chilly (almost cold) here today, I think our high was about 45 and windy. I actually enjoyed it. Finally beginning to get some fall weather. Erika marches in the parade tomorrow. I think Brent will try to get a few pictures. They march right in front of his office, so he may get them from there. Then tomorrow night she plays at the game, she will need to bundle up. Supposed to get to 25 tonight. Brent brought a few plants in last night and will need to bring in the rest tonight. Oh, we got DSL this week. So much faster, but it confuses Emily when the phone rings while she is on the internet :)

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Gary
10/6/05
Well, no further indictments today -- delayed because of some last-minute testimony by Karl Rove. Maybe trying to cut a deal...? We will know soon. So nice to see these two criminals (Rove and Tom DeLay) in trouble at last in their two separate cases. Some great articles by Doug Thompson of Capitol Hill Blue if you have time to read them: "Rats Jumping off a Sinking Ship Called Bush," "A Cardboard Cowboy," and "A Sick, Dying Elephant." The tide is turning, at long last. Just today there was an interesting vote in the Senate. John McCain authored a bill requiring humane treatment of prisoners of war -- which is to say, no more Abu Ghraib-like torture by U.S. troops allowed. Well, Dick Cheney didn't like that -- thus going on record as being openly pro-torture -- and vowed to block it. But when the Senate voted on it, it passed 90-9. Meaning Democrats and Republicans were united against it, and against the White House. That hasn't happened in a long long time. And the Repubs are fixin' to turn on Bush over his Supreme Court choice, too; even his old pals are shocked that he would pick his "work wife" to be a Supreme Court Justice. Must suck to be a Republican right now. :-)

Beautiful fall day here today, and yesterday too. Anyone who drives through the campus right now would see all the Homecoming displays being worked on. Now that feels like fall!

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Donna
10/5/05
You know I hadn't paid attention to the date until this afternoon when someone mentioned it and I realized this is the anniversary of Dad's death--fourteen years ago today, right? Boy, it doesn't seem like it could be that long ago.

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Gary
10/5/05
Cool, Emily, that you are next in line for Mayor! :-) There's a rumor going around in my subversive Democrat circles that as many as 12 more indictments could be handed down tomorrow to people implicated in "Plame-gate" (the CIA agent whose name was maliciously leaked by Karl Rove) -- so, if that happens, and they all get jailed/impeached/whatever, that moves you 12 steps closer to the Presidency! Are you ready to take over?

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Emily
10/5/05
Hey everybody! Today was a fun day, I love spirit days!! I think I was lookin pretty wacky today, I am hoping I win again this year! I will know tomorrow, so I will be sure to keep you all posted. I even got called out of class to get my picture taken for the yearbook for "wacky day"! Tomorrow is class color day. Juniors are lime green and orange, so once again thanks to old dance costumes, I have got a pretty good outfit all planned out!
So, other than all of that fun stuff going on with school, not a whole lot intresting going on with me. I did have a Mayor's Youth Executive meeting on Monday night. Our regular mayor was gone, so since I am next in command I got to be the mayor, so that was fun!

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Karen
10/5/05
I remember that cookbook too. I think we all had at least one birthday cake made from it.
Cool day here, had heavy, heavy rains last night. Emily and I got caught in the rain and were soaked before we made it to the car.

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Grandma
10/5/05
Yes, Gary, that book is really familiar, it was free with "Baker's Coconut" and had a different cut up cake for each month of the year, I made lots of Birthday cakes from there, as well as Ruth Taylor who made one for each one of you guys and brought them over on your birthdays. I think one of them was a little train. Maybe it is still in a drawer someplace, or maybe not [the book].
Emily and Erika, you look like you are going Halloweening instead of school, bet it was a fun day. It is a cool day here, Marsha, is it still raining there? I hope you didn't get the 10 inches, that would make the river rise, especially with all the recent rain you've had.
Sean, you just keep coming up with new ideas, is there no end to your talent?

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Donna
10/5/05
I remember that cookbook or at least thought some of the pages looked familiar. They may look a little cheesy now but I remember thinking then that those cakes were so neat.

E&E, you guys look hilarious! I hope you have a fun day today.

Erika, do you think your teacher will come back to school? I hope we'll get to see pictures of you marching Friday. That is really cool!

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Gary
10/5/05
Attention Mom: Does today's cool site look familiar to you? Or to Marsha, Paul, and perhaps Donna and Karen? It does to me, because I think you used to have this particular item. I remember looking through this book when I was a kid, and I remember that you made several cakes from it. I'm pretty sure you made the Dandy-Lion cake for my birthday. Ring any bells...?

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Karen
10/5/05
Today is Wacky Wednesday for Emily and Erika. This is how they looked when they went to school!

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Erika
10/5/05
Donna my teacher was late 30ish I think, and all the school told us was she was sick and in the hospital and having the surgery we found out all the details in the newspaper.

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Lindsey
10/4/05
Wow Sean, you've been busy! Dad told me about your paper that you have to give about something about you and your welding mask, sounds cool.

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Donna
10/4/05
Erika, how old is your teacher? I don't know why but that sounds like something out of The Simpson's. You guys were given too much information about her health. I had a teacher that had a nervous breakdown because the students were so mean to him. I wasn't mean of course, but others were and he just couldn't take it. But it was middle school and middle school kids are meaner than grade school kids--they're even meaner than high school kids, I don't know why, but they are.

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Donna
10/4/05
Sean, I have been looking for replacements for my window well covers for years. They are impossible to find for older houses. I would love to buy some from you, if you're interested. Have your people call my people.

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Gary
10/4/05
Sean has been busy! He sent in not one but TWO projects for the projects page.

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Erika
10/4/05
Hi Everybody Today at school is twin day for school spirt day So i'm dressing up like some of my friends tomorrow is wacky wendsday I'm going to wear parts of old dance costumes. At school I've had a sub for a long time at school because my teacher Mrs. Yeager is in the hospital because she had a flu and got some medicane for it but killed the good bacteria in her colon and the bad bacteria made it basiclly explode so she went to the hospital and had surgery and her foot didn't get enough surclation and her foot got amputated and during the surgery she had two strokes. On Fri. I march in West homecoming then watch the game with my friends!!!

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Gary
10/2/05
Hey, here's the answer to that paragraph puzzle below. The most common letter in the English language is "E" -- and if you go back and re-read the paragraph you will see that "e" doesn't occur even once. That's it! And if you think that's no big deal, try taking one of your previous posts on this page and re-writing it so it contains no "e" anywhere. Not so easy!

There is an amazing novel called "Gadsby" (by Ernest Vincent Wright) that -- even though it is something like 50,000 words long -- does not contain one "E" anywhere. Check it out!

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Lindsey
10/2/05
Well, pretty good Husker game yesterday. They looked a lot better and Taylor even broke a school record for passing yards, by a lot actually. Double overtime and Ross scored both touchdowns. Pretty exciting game to watch!

I agree, Lindsey, that was a great game and lots of fun to watch. They looked like a completely different team from two weeks ago. How?? Anyway, like you said, it was exciting! --Gary

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Gary
10/1/05
Erika, you're becoming the Mother Teresa of the kitty world -- getting up out of your own sickbed to make sure the cats were warm. :-)

I guess the paragraph thing is kind of hard. I didn't mean for anyone to blow any brain-cells over it! So here's a hint: It has nothing to do with numbers. You might be able to find the answer in a shop or a mall, but not in a department store; you could buy the answer on amazon.com, but not on eBay; you might find it in a cupboard, but not in the refrigerator....

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Emily
10/1/05
Yeah, Gary, that was a pretty interesting case I had last week. But, it actually turned out all right for me, one of the kids could kind of speak English. I'm just hoping its better next time!
Not a whole lot going on with us this weekend. Dad and I were planning on going up to Wausa tomorrow, but we have both caught Erika's cold. So, we won't be going anywhere this weekend.
So, did anyone figure out what was ususual about the paragraph Gary put up?? We sure couldn't!
Its starting to feel like fall around here too. Its pretty nice today in the upper 70s. But all last week we were in the 60s for the most part, we actually had a little bit of frost in some areas on Friday. We went outside that morning and the kittens were shivering, so Erika has been looking for some old blankets to put in the condo for them.
Congrats to Ryan on your Award! & Hope Sam is feeling better!

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