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Expanding the Family

Yesterday (well, technically two days ago, but I haven't gone to bed yet, so it's still Saturday) we got to meet up with a second cousin of my dad's who I discovered online while doing some genealogy research. We had a great time, stopped and met yet another second cousin, and saw some cool pictures.

So tonight I was inspired to do more research, and discovered some interesting things. I'd found out yesterday that my grandfather grew up in Granite Falls, and as I was tracking down census forms I found out that his father and his grandfather, when they lived in Minnesota, lived near a town called Granite Falls! So I wonder if a whole group of them moved out from Minnesota together and named the town after their home town.

Then I spent a LOT of time inputting a whole bunch of information into my family tree project. I was beginning to get dizzy trying to figure out what, exactly, was the relationship between me and some of these names I was typing. Plus, it took me a while because I would reguarly stop and google people's names. I think I found some of them, and I found one obituary, which was cool.

I also got my house all cleaned up today. We tried a new cleaning method, which worked quite well. We all cleaned like crazy for a half-hour, then had some sort of reward as well as a generous break, as in an hour and a half for a break! Amazingly enough, it only took three half-hour cleaning sessions to get the house clean. I was quite surprised, and also pleased. I have been working a ton this week and my house was certainly showing it. So it was nice to mostly ignore work today and get caught up on the housework.

Tomorrow I think we will go see a movie. I go on-call Monday morning, and am not sure that moviegoing is the best activity when my pager could go off at any moment, so best to see the movie now!

Because I bailed on the chocolate cake I was supposed to make Thursday night, I still had the ingredients to make ganoche, so I made some after dinner (Almost boil 1 cup cream, pour over 1+ cup chocolate chips, stir well, let cool. Yum.) and we dipped graham crackers in it for dessert. I wasn't paying a lot of attention to how much the girls were having, and I think they went through a whole package of graham crackers. It is good stuff!

The cats seem to be enjoying the laundry on the bed. Molly is perched on top of the stack of rugs and blankets, in her king of the jungle pose, and YumYum is snuggled up between a bunch of different piles, all curled up. I suppose it's time to unpile the laundry and go to bed!

Happy Fun Times at the DMV

This morning at approximately 11:30, I was leisurely showering and planning my day. It included many exciting items, such as figuring out what to take to the girl scout potluck, countless loads of laundry, and finishing up some work.

Then, I realized with a shock that I had to go to the DMV today and get my name on my driver's license changed. That sounded even less fun than doing many loads of laundry, but it could not be put off any longer.

So I went to the DMV and it was completely packed, which was expected, as it was Saturday. I entertained myself by reading my book on how to write a novel, and watched the guy sitting in front of me attempt to joke with the DMV employees behind the counter. He thought he was funny, but I'm not sure anyone else did.

I was pleased that the numbers seemed to be moving along fairly quickly, and it wasn't more than a half-hour before they called me up. I was all prepared, with all the appropriate paperwork in a nice neat pile, so I knew I would get out of there quickly.

The woman who was helping me was very nice, and we whizzed through everything, I paid my $10, and was feeling very pleased that I was going to be in and out in 45 minutes. Not bad for a Saturday morning!

But.

(There's always a but, isn't there?)

The computer didn't like my name change, and it popped up with my old driver's license, and wanted to know if it was me, or if I was an imposter. I assured the nice lady that it was, indeed me, and that seemed to cause even more problems. After about ten minutes of consulting with other people about my driver's license change, they came to the conclusion that they needed to call Olympia and have them somehow merge my various licenses into one person. (Apparently the state of Washington doesn't officially recognize multiple personalities.)

So it was back to the waiting area, where I sat for a while and watched all the people who were not causing so much trouble get in and out quickly. Finally, someone different called me back up to the counter (by my real name! That was quite a thrill!) and I got to pay my $10 once again (she'd given it back to me before) and then got my picture taken, and my paper license was finally in my hot little hand.

Now there's just the social security office (although I have my old SS card, and am tempted to just use that, but somehow, I think that could cause more problems further down the road) and getting things fixed up at work. (My boss doesn't pronounce my former last name correctly, so this will be a nice change.)

After the DMV, I rewarded myself with a mocha and a chocolate chip cookie. I've had almost no sugar this week, so I was only able to eat about half of the cookie before I was overloaded on sugar.

I also picked up the ingredients for Jennifer's Famous Ravioli Lasagna. This is a very easy, very tasty dish that's perfect for bringing to potlucks, and while earlier I had been considering making more labor intensive dishes, such as baking rolls or making macaroni and cheese, I thankfully came to my senses about how much time I wanted to spend in the kitchen today before I bought anything. So I will spend ten minutes putting the lasagna together, and five minutes cutting up the loaves of french bread I bought, and then I will be all potluck-enabled.

This will give me more time to play Rocket Mania while avoiding doing the laundry.

Kitties in the House

A couple of weeks ago, we got two cats, who are sisters. They came declawed and quite friendly, and we've been having fun having pets.

They have their little quirks, though, and one of them is liking to get in the bathtub after someone's had a bath or shower. (Yes, they do have a full water dish -- they're not just trying to find any scrap of water to quench their parched kitty tongues!)

Here's YumYum, posing in the bathtub:

The other one is white with black and grey patches, and her name is Molly.

This morning, I went in to take a shower, turned on the water, and then remembered I had one more thing to do before I showered, so I went and did it, then I went back in the bathroom, about 10 minutes later, and turned the water on again.

A few seconds later, I heard loud noises in the tub, and wondered if my shampoo bottles had all fallen down. Then I saw a streak of grey kitty go dashing out of the bathroom, to retire to the relative safety under the bed!

I laughed and laughed at her, and I think she was offended.

I wonder how long before she jumps in the tub again?

No More Eight-Year-Olds!

There's no more eight-year-olds in the house, after this weekend. They've all turned nine!

I must go to bed soon (even though I'm not feeling very tired after I took a sudafed for the drive home from Bellingham!) but here are a couple of pictures from over the weekend.

Songs

The other day I recorded the girls singing. They started this on the way back from Bellingham a couple of weeks ago, and they way they improvised just cracked me up. So I had to record it for posterity!

Flesh Wounds:

The Insult Rap:

Abby sings 'I Will Survive':

If the ActiveX versions don't work, you can try downloading the mp3's, instead. Right click, then select 'save target as'.

The Insult Rap
Flesh Wounds
I Will Survive

I have many, many pictures to post too, from the house tour and other assorted pictures. Maybe during K's slumber party tonight I can hide in my room and upload like crazy!