L'aventure américaine

Step 1. Find a group of friends who are not easily grossed out, are not vegetarians, are hard workers, and have a penchant for the ridiculous. Step 2. Find someone who is willing to raise 100 (or 175) baby chicks for slaughter. Step 3. Wait 6 weeks or just until these heart-attack prone chickens keel over before setting the kill date. Step 4. Provide coffee the morning of the kill. Step 5. Nail two nails the diameter of a chicken neck apart in a stump and sharpen your machete. Next, assign someone with adequate upper arm strength and good aim* to free the chicken of his head. (*This point can be critical, as tested through trial and error.) Step 6. Jam the chicken in an upside milk jug with the bottom lopped off to let "Chicken-with-its-head-cut-off Syndrome" subside and to keep the blood in a localized area. Step 7. Dip the beheaded chicken in scalding water to help remove the feathers. Note that the temperature of this water is very important and workers further along th...

I forgot to log out of a computer and someone posted a comment on my blog as me, 'kj'. I'm assuming that it was Mom. But, it comes on the same day when Katherine Jochim (of San Diego, CA) requested me as a Facebook friend. Maybe I have an subconscious computer alterego.

Sometimes things don't go, after all, from bad to worse. Some years, muscadel faces down frost; green thrives; the crops don't fail, sometimes a man aims high, and all goes well. A people sometimes will step back from war; elect an honest man; decide they care enough, that they can't leave some stranger poor. Some men become what they were born for. Sometimes our best efforts do not go amiss; sometimes we do as we meant to. The sun will sometimes melt a field of sorrow that seemed hard frozen: may it happen for you. Sometimes -Sheenagh Pugh I have kept this poem near my desk for nearly a month now. It has helped and so has my cousin . Her care package made my day. I think that spring is finally here and 2009 is turning around. Welcome tulips and Pig Cats alike.

My tomato starters.

Spring break is over. Some highlights included: The finished West Baden Springs Hote l. Whew! It's beautiful!! Playing euchre with my parents... That is, my dad and my mom's two personalities. Mom and I won. It helps to have three people on the team (Mom, Mom's voice in her head, me). Heading to Fort Wayne: Art Boy and my vacation destination... This includes watching Art Boy's bow staff skills, getting into a $3 theatre for free (I offered to pay, but the concession stand girl said that there wasn't anyone to take our money) and enjoying the theatre to ourselves. Also, "Defiance" was fantastic. Cindy's Diner... yum. Cable, giant television, more cable. Chocolate chip cookies. Going to work and having a patient with extremely low phosphorus refuse to allow me to empty a drainage bag because the contents were evidence to the fact that I was trying to poison him. And then after hooking him up to an IV (and giving him Ativan... yes...) with ...

At Ethan's funeral yesterday, the minister talked of the waves of grief that people feel to which I've been a testament these past few weeks. But today, I just feel very lucky to have known both KT and Ethan. They both left the world a better place and I'm so grateful that I have been able to witness such impressive lives. An article about KT . An article about Ethan.

There are a few things that I watch to make myself laugh. "The Office" being the main one. If there's a time crunch, then I watch "The Office" bloopers. And if I'm in a real time crunch, I watch this GI Joe PSA. 43 seconds of politically incorrect hilarity.