Greetings from Kansas, where there’s no place like home! After sloshing around in wet snow, ice and windy conditions in St. Paul, Minnesota last weekend, I arrived home last night in time to rock a couple of girls before bed. The roads were a bit scary around St. Paul, but not bad after I was halfway to Des Moines.

Steph and I had a wonderful time. We slept in on Saturday and then spent all afternoon at Caribou coffee, eating bagels, drinking lattes and doing our respective work. She read the Bible in ancient Greek; I struggled with the ATN database and wrote donor... more

I’m on my way to Minnesota this morning to spend the weekend with Stephanie. Her 21st birthday is December 4th. My hubby will be managing things at home, which includes therapy for Dora today and Beth’s Division II Championship swim meet both days this weekend. I hate to miss the meet, but I want to spend the weekend with Steph and I have yet to figure out how to be two places at once.

I can’t believe it has been 21 years since Steph made her appearance. My birthday is three weeks after hers … I was almost 30 when she was born. Not too hard to do the math, is... more

Continuing with my interview with Mike O’Connor, author of Crisis, Pursued by Disaster, Followed Closely by Catastrophe: A Memoir of Life on the Run., my next question was:

How do you relate trust and love? How does lack of trust affect a loving relationship?

For me personally, it would kill it. Some relationships are built on lack of trust. For... more

I mentioned in this post how I managed to find a few hours one weekend to read a book. The book I read was Crisis, Pursued by Disaster, Followed Closely by Catastrophe: A Memoir of Life on the Run. I blogged about it shortly after I finished reading it.

Imagine my surprise to receive an email from the... more

I called Julie tonight to talk about ATN and blog-related stuff. There is a pattern to our phone conversations. Not a pattern familiar to anyone who operates in any kind of normal sphere … but a pattern nevertheless. Here is a snippet of tonight’s dialog …

Julie: So we were at the doc’s office today and she really thinks there may be an autoimmune component to … Lulu, brush your teeth … what is happening with her GI tract … Brush … Your... more

Beth and I fluffed up and headed downtown for my television interview this morning, and Dora started her day a little earlier by hanging out with a neighbor. For someone who used to wear mascara to go do middle-of-the-night colic checks while in vet school (least anyone see me with “no eyes”), I have come a long way, baby! Putting make-up on these days is a real chore. But I managed …

The interview went well, I think, but you can form your own opinion by checking... more

My folks left this morning … I had them at the airport two hours before their flight! The older they get (they are 84 and nearly 84) the more stressed they get about missing their flight. Our local airport is the easiest place ever to go in and out of, so no doubt they sat there for an hour and 45 minutes … but they were happy! We had a fabulous time and as I hugged them good-bye, I was so thankful for another holiday to share with them.

I picked up Dora’s Penney’s pictures on the way home from the airport. When I showed her the 8 X 10, she said, “My eyes look sad.” Yes, they do. We picked out a pose with... more

Interestingly enough, my son and daughter continue to post on this site. One reader speculated several days ago—before the most recent posts by Anchulee and Tony—that they might actually enjoy the publicity. Regardless, their comments almost beg for responses …

Anchulee stated in a recent comment that I had told her once that she was my “guinea pig.” If one Googles “guinea pig”, one of the definitions... more

A couple of you have suggested I take a blogging break. I may do that in December, just submitting my minimum 20 blogs and focusing more on the holidays. I could use the extra time, but I’m afraid it won’t necessarily shut my mind down to the “other stuff” that swirls around me in some form or another much of the time.

As one reader commented recently, I have a PTSD response to making pork on the grill. I hadn’t really looked at it that way, but it’s... more

Well, I hardly know where to begin. Seems I never have a lack of blog material these days. I’m my usual comatose self at nearly 11 PM, aggravated by the fact that I was up with one of the dogs at 4 AM and couldn’t go back to sleep because of the horrible stomach issues I am still addressing. Tomorrow I’m calling the doc and getting a different antibiotic … I don’t think I can hang in there another five days with this one.

Steph and her boyfriend were here for the weekend, although they weren’t here on Thursday for Thanksgiving. My folks don’t leave until... more