I have loved rock and roll since I was smaller than Pumpkin. I remember watching MTV back when it was the next big thing, and listening to The Cars on the radio and dancing around with pom-poms. Oops, I just revealed my age somewhat.

I still love rock and roll, but I’m more into the old stuff now. I love the Stones, Aerosmith, Led Zeppelin… Sure, most of them have partied their brains out and been through drug treatment more often than I change my socks, but they ROCK!

I’m not much of a partier myself any more, but I still love good old-fashioned rock and roll. I guess it’s in my blood. Over the years I’ve gained an appreciation for a wide range of music, but rock always has been and always will be my favorite. So if you meet me when I’m 95 years old and I’ve got the music blaring so I can hear it without my hearing aid, please don’t turn it down. Just indulge an old lady.

A couple of days ago I was raving about the lovely rain we are getting that we’ve needed so badly. But I’m just about over it.

The rain has still hardly let up. I know we need all we can get, but it’s starting to get on my nerves. It all started a couple of days into it, when Hubby and Pumpkin came home from visiting his grandpa and decided to knock on the door and run for laughs. I went to the door, saw no one, and started to walk away when I heard Pumpkin. I went back and opened the door to find her covered in mud. She had fallen. She didn’t get hurt though, so I just put her in the tub and washed her clothes and continued to be happy about the rain.

Yesterday morning I was getting Pumpkin ready for school when I heard noise coming from my office. I came in here to find the ceiling leaking. It wasn’t a terribly bad leak, and it was far enough from my computer equipment that I didn’t have to worry about damaging it. But it makes me worry that another leak could surface in a place where it could cause trouble.

Then yesterday afternoon it was still raining, and I decided to pull my truck to the end of the driveway and wait for Pumpkin to get off of the bus so she wouldn’t get soaked. I put on my shoes, stepped out the door, started down the steps, and my foot flew out from under me. The boatloads of rain had left the steps slick, and I ended up on the ground, covered in mud and howling in pain.

Hubby came to check on me and went out to wait for Pumpkin. I ended up with a fist-sized skinned spot on my back, and some slight skinning and a couple of nasty bruises on my arm. It could have been worse, but I’m pretty sore from the deal.

Today, I got up and went with Hubby to have one of his tests done. They scheduled him for yet another one as a result, but we still don’t know what’s wrong. Anyway, my complaint today is that all of this rain is making my sinuses go haywire. I’ve been sleepy all day so far, my head feels all funny, my throat is a little sore, and at times when I make sudden movements I get dizzy. I hoped I was over all of this when I had my sinus surgery last year, but I guess not.

So I’m ready for the rain to stop any time now. But it’s not going to stop until it’s good and ready, so I guess I’ll just have to deal with it.

Back when I was working at the restaurant, they had a banquet to celebrate the record year they had last year. I didn’t get to go, but they saved me a goodie bag from it. The bag was a cute little beach tote, and inside it were some pens, cups, and other promotional stuff that companies had donated. There was one item that I couldn’t quite figure out at first glance, and it turned out to be a safety utility knife.

At first I considered giving it to Hubby, because I don’t use things like that very often. But one day I needed to make some price tags for some yard sale stuff, and it popped into my head.

I went and got it, and cutting up those spare labels was a breeze. It has a shield on it that covers the blade at all times except when you pull the trigger and press down on it, so I didn’t have to worry about getting cut when I put it down to do something else. I also don’t have to worry about accidentally leaving it laying around and Pumpkin getting ahold of it.

Now I use my knife every chance I get. I would love it if they came out with something like that for the kitchen…

With all of the stress I’ve been under lately, it has been hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Some days it just seems that there is nothing in life that is going right. But I’ve come up with something that I hope will put things into perspective at bit.

I don’t know exactly how often I’ll get around to doing this, but I’m going to write some posts about some of my favorite things. I’m going to aim for daily, but forgive me if I don’t quite make it.

There are a lot of things in the world that I like, it’s just easy to forget about them when there are so many negative things on my mind. Maybe this will force me to think about them.

As you may know from reading recent posts, Hubby has not been in good health. They’ve been saying that he has gastritis, but now that we’ve got some insurance they have decided to look into it further.

He has to go tomorrow for an ultrasound, and next week he has to have a couple of more invasive procedures done. Nothing serious, but he’s never had surgery before so he’s pretty nervous.

We just got back from going to the hospital and getting him registered for the stuff he has to have done next week. I’m trying to be there for him, but he’s making it really difficult. You see, when he gets nervous like this, he starts acting differently. It’s hard to explain, but in short he starts rubbing me the wrong way and pushing my buttons in every possible way. I’m at the point that I’m thinking seriously about checking on some travel insurance and taking a nice, long trip to anywhere but here.

I’ve made it crystal clear that he’s getting on my nerves, and I think he’s genuinely sorry. But he just won’t stop. As soon as we got home and ate lunch, he went back out to take some stuff to his parents. He even said he was going to go out so we wouldn’t get into a fight. I guess that’s the best thing that could have happened.

I’ll be glad when it’s over and done with. I have a feeling I’m in for a rough few days.

Precipitation has been so utterly lacking here for so long, I nearly forgot what it looked like. But as I type, we are experiencing our third rainy day in a row. It’s about time.

This summer was so dry that nothing grew like it should have. There are a bunch of apple trees a short walk from our house, and we usually go up there late in the summer and pick apples. But there were no apples to pick this year. We live a little over a mile from the river, and for the past few months there have been numerous places in it that were dry as a bone.

The rain we’re getting now is exactly the kind we need. It’s substantial, but not a hard rain. And it has been almost constant since it started on Monday. The forecast is calling for it to continue through Saturday. Normally all of these rainy days in a row would be depressing, but this time I don’t mind a bit.

I just posted my first article on eHow. It’s about how to avoid burnout when you work at home. Sometimes I realize that I should be taking my own advice on that. But at least I know what works.

I’ll be doing several more eHows between now and Tuesday. If all goes well, it could lead to more work. That would rock.

Where have I been, you ask? Right here in front of my computer, for the most part. I just have been so overwhelmed with work that I have gotten to do very little blogging. And we’ve all been under the weather at some point during the past week at my house, so that has taken up most of the rest of my time.

I took Pumpkin to the doc yesterday, and she had strep. I didn’t see that one coming. She’s had a cough every since she finished the antibiotics for her bout with bronchitis and a sinus infection, but I thought that the meds just hadn’t completely done their job on that. I still think that might have been part of the problem. But the doctor decided to do a strep test because she said her throat had felt tickly, and lo and behold it came back positive.

Hubby is still feeling poorly. He goes next week to have a light run down his throat. The new medicine the doctor put him on has helped somewhat, but he is still in serious pain at times. I’ll be glad when they get him taken care of.

And I spent most of this past Sunday in bed. My stomach was not a happy camper. That didn’t last too long, thank goodness. But now I think I may need to go get checked for strep too.

I’m still working on that big project I got a couple of weeks ago. It looks like it’s going to keep me busy until doomsday. But I’m working on some other stuff this weekend, because I’m just getting too burned out to concentrate on the big one. Maybe after doing something different for a while I can go back to it refreshed and get it done.

I just heard about another school shooting. It’s sad and tragic that these things are no longer uncommon. My heart goes out to everyone affected by this.

Here is the latest news on the situation.

I got my grubby little paws on one of the new Lexmark Wi-Fi printers late last week. I’ve been extremely busy, and didn’t even get to try it out until a couple of days after I got it. But is it ever awesome!

I’ve always had trouble getting things set up on my computer desk the way I want them. It’s actually pretty roomy, but I prefer to keep my office supplies close at hand and printers and stuff on the upper shelves. Unfortunately, that usually doesn’t work out well because the USB cables are never long enough to reach that high. But if there is no USB cable, I don’t have to worry about it.

The model I’ve got is the Z1420. It prints quickly and superbly, just like every other Lexmark I’ve ever owned. And when the day comes that I can get a laptop, I’ll be able to print from both my PC and the laptop without having to hook anything up. I could have my laptop outside, enjoying the sunshine while I work, and if I need to print anything I won’t even have to come in. Rock and roll!