Learning Joy

Saturday, Jeff was able to go to an anti-protest protest. A group of people said they were going to protest the recruiting office at the Tacoma Mall. They wanted to shut down the whole mall and in doing so make the recruiting office be thrown out of the mall (funny how they don’t seem to understand free enterprise and other such terms).
Jeff felt like he should go, being a veteran and all. So he dropped the kids and I off at Freighthouse Square and went to the mall.
He found about 50 protesters, and about 100 anti-protesters. The protesters didn’t even get one entrance of the mall closed! here’s a link to some pictures Jeff took of the event – http://s252.photobucket.com/albums/hh28/29Victor_photos/Tacoma%20Recruiting%20Center%20Protest%203-15-2008/?albumview=slideshow
enjoy.

I’ve been a fan of Knight Rider since I was little (well, 10 or 11). This new show looks promising! Here’s the movie – enjoy!!

Well we’re going to be busy the next few days!
Tomorrow we get to go to Olympia and see Laser Vaudeville. We’ve been going to these plays that the Olympia Junior Program puts on, and they have been good. This one is different, though. I’ll let you know how it turns out.
Friday we have co-op, and I feel like there is something else that day.
Saturday is our busiest day. I work in the morning (7-9), Jeff has a men’s breakfast (8:30), I’m supposed to help with flowers (10:30), there’s a shindig at Freighthouse Square where you can get all-you-can-eat chili for $5/person (all day, I think – at least ’til 5), and Jeff wants to go to the mall because Code Pink or some group is going to try and shut down the mall for the day to get the recruiting office out of the mall. These people don’t realize that the whole reason they can assemble and do these things is because our soldiers are out there protecting those rights. Check out this story – http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=163653&title=marines-in-berkeley
Make sure you watch until the very end – it’s priceless!

So far, I’m batting 0 for 3. Hopefully the “Bee Movie” is good!
I remembered my parents watching “Stand by Me” when I was about 11. So I thought, “I should watch that movie, and see if I like it.” (don’t watch it) I rented it from Blockbuster online and set about to watch it Monday night while doing dishes (the kids were in bed, thank God.). That movie has a lot of swearing! I was uncomfortable, because it was kids swearing and because they seemed to use the words as everyday language. While I am not the most prim person when it comes to language, I usually save the really big ones for when they’re necessary (if they ever are!). I tend to not watch movies with a lot of swearing because then those words get stuck in my head. Jeff came into the kitchen and asked why I was watching this, when he could tell I didn’t like it. I didn’t know, so he recommended shutting it off. Shutting off a movie is something I dislike. I always want to know how things turn out. It’s the same with books – I’ll read a book through really quick so I can see how it ends, then reread it to get all the nuances. But, I disliked the movie enough that I shut it off. Zero for 1.
After I came home from work on Tuesday, Jeff & I sat down to watch a movie. It was called “Plan B” and it starred Diane Keaton. I think the movie was going for the quirky side of things, but they kind of missed. The male star liked swearing, and especially liked using the F-word and Jesus’ name. I’m pretty sure he didn’t know Jesus. Diane’s character was klutzy and silly and I didn’t care for her- although she was the only funny thing. We watched about a half hour of the movie before turning the stupid thing off. Too much swearing. Zero for 2.
Today, while the laundry was washing at the laundromat, I stopped by Blockbuster to return some things and pick up two movies. Someone had mentioned “Becoming Jane” to me, and I had declined to see it in the theatre. Jane’s sister destroyed all the letters Jane wrote her, so her life is a mystery. No one knows why Jane never married, or whether or not she ever had a love, or fallen in love, or anything. Her life is sealed tight. So the movie is based on pure speculation. It did star Ann Hathaway, though, so I thought we could watch it. It wasn’t bad, per se, it was just speculative. And it fell into the trap of making the Victorian age out to be less stoic than it was. They didn’t do too bad on that end, but still. And the whole premise of why she doesn’t marry is just silly. Zero for 3.

Now we have to see if the “Bee Movie” is any good. Someone warn me if it isn’t, because I can’t take another failure.

Okay, Mrs. Obama really needs some lessons in money management. In this article (http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/opinion/s_556214.html), she complains, “The salaries don’t keep up with the cost of paying off the debt,” she said, referring to the student loans, “so you’re in your 40s, still paying off your debt at a time when you have to save for your kids.”
The article reports, “All told, the total income declared by the Obama household on the couple’s 2006 income tax return, figuring his Senate salary, book royalties and her compensation from sitting on corporate boards, was $991,296.”
How on earth is she not able to manage to pay of her debt with that kind of money??! She has complained about the cost of dance, piano and other lessons for her daughters. What?!
Now I am not the best money manager, I do like to spend money, but good grief! With that kind of money, we’d be able to pay everything off, buy a house, buy a car, save for the kids’ colleges and save for our retirement. I’ll bet I’d even have money left over to spend indiscriminately.
Someone should really tell Mrs. Obama to quit talking, she’s ruining her husband’s campaign. Seriously, if he’s supposed to “save” us, his life sure doesn’t show us how.

That’s my two cents. Now I am going to earn my two cents – as part of the “helping industry”. 🙂

Be my rock of refuge, to which I can always go; give the command to save me, for you are my rock & my fortress.

Marilyn Monroe

You sometimes play all sweet and innocent, and even a little ditzy. You can get any guy you want with your big, beautiful eyes, not to mention other parts of you. 😉

Do you ever think of the other side of things? Jeff is good at this. I am not.
Today in church, Pastor talked about the new birth & how we have nothing to do with it, just like being born physically. This week on my mommy group online, we’ve been praying for a little girl named Leila. She was born on 2/19/08, and was unresponsive when the parents woke up on 2/22/08. She’s been in the hospital and things have been touch and go. She’s finally doing better, to the point of being moved down the hall from the PICUto the PEDS ward. Today at church, we heard about a little boy who is struggling to live because he needs a new kidney (I think). He is also very young – only months old.
I hear these things and I think, “Why are there people out there with babies who have so many problems and my perfect baby (we did find out there was nothing wrong with her) died?” It’s almost like a personal attack to me. Jeff sees these people and thinks, “those poor people are probably wondering why their child was born with all these problems.”
We talked today, because I got sad again in church. I still have a hard time talking about babies, seeing babies, even looking at pregnant women. I miss my baby dearly. I keep wishing she could come back. I feel empty a lot. So Jeff and I talked. Who am I to judge these people? they are probably just as miserable as me. And who knows what is going to happen to these babies? God knows. God has a plan. He knew our baby wasn’t going to live. He had something better in mind (although I cannot fathom anything better than welcoming a precious baby girl into our lives). I guess my job is to trust Him. To rest in the knowledge that He knows what’s best & His ways are not my ways, His ways are higher than my ways – that’s what Isaiah 55:8-9 says. Romans 11:33 says, “Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out!”
Sometimes it is hard, though, because I am so sad. God is good, though, and He always lifts me up. He is my strength & my song.

Today I went to the mall. It was the first time in a long time. I used to love to go to the mall. Mom & I used to love to go to the mall – we’d do a lot of people watching. When I got to college, I found that most people didn’t want to go to the mall just for the fun of it. A lot of my friends either had to have money to spend there or some purpose for going. So my mall-going style changed. Now I am mom to three boys. When they were little, I would go because the mall was somewhere dry they could play. Now they are too big for the play place.
Today was nice. The mall was practically empty, since we were there at 2 in the afternoon. It was nice to look around and the boys were good. They didn’t complain too much. 🙂
My voice is gone … hopefully it will come back tomorrow. We have co-op in the morning. Jeff likes the quiet, though, I think. 🙂
Tonight we watched two interesting movies. The first was “Mr. Magorium’s Magic Emporium”. It was okay, but it seemed to be long (the boys got bored) and was too predictable. Jeff thought the movie was trying too hard to be something special. I didn’t really get the whole thing – it seemed disjointed.
After the kids went to bed, Jeff & I watched “Pillow Talk” starring Doris Day and Rock Hudson. I don’t think I’ve seen too many of Rock Hudson’s films. He seems like he should be a certain kind of actor, but then he comes off as something else. In this movie the part he played would have been better suited to Cary Grant, Gregory Peck or Spencer Tracy … Jimmy Stewart would have even done well in this part – better than Rock Hudson. Jeff got bored, so he started looking up things on Rock Hudson. Rock Hudson was gay, and was one of the first Hollywood men to die of AIDS. Apparently he knew he had it and still slept with his partner. His partner sued Rock Hudson’s estate after he died because of this. I don’t understand that. I don’t understand why we haven’t quarantined people with AIDS. I understand that it isn’t “catchy” – you can’t get it through casual contact, but still. If people weren’t so selfish, we’d have less of an epidemic on our hands. And if it had been contained earlier on, we’d have even less of an epidemic than that!!! Anyways, I digress.
“Pillow Talk” was touted (on the Blockbuster site) as being a more modern “Shop Around the Corner” (because it was filmed before “You’ve Got Mail” 🙂 ). Rock Hudson’s character was mean and I ended up not wanting them to get together. It would have been more reasonable for Doris Day’s character to fall in love with Tony Randall’s character after seeing who Rock Hudson really was & what he was like. And Tony Randall helped Rock Hudson win Doris Day back! That didn’t make any sense, either. So we didn’t really like the movie. You all should watch it and then comment. 🙂
Yesterday I found out Barak Obama & his wife manage to squeak by (and are just recently out of debt) on 1.6 million a year. She just got a raise from 100K a year to 300K a year. But they are just middle class like you and me.
Oh and one other thing – Jeff sent me a link to this article. I liked the article. It is about a man who went to Iraq to fight in the war and was wounded. I especially liked this quote –
“His bloody watch sits on the table, but there isn’t much to say about it. The war is always there between the father and the son, sometimes in the form of silence and sometimes as an argument …
The father ends up saying: ‘I am in favor of peace.’ To which Jeff responds: ‘But someone has to achieve that peace.’ The father repeats: ‘I am in favor of peace.’
This only upsets Jeff … he raises his voice, his body tenses up and his words become deliberately hurtful: ‘And what are you doing so that we can have peace? How much longer do you think you’d be sitting around drinking coffee in fancy Berlin cafés if people like me didn’t exist? If there was nobody to make sure you could live in peace? If there was nobody to fight terrorism?'”
Amen, brother. If only other people would listen to Jeff.