Lauren's Prom

Before

After

To view all the "Prom 2007" pictures, click here.

Priceless

PROM DRESS $ 400

HAIR $ 70

LIMO $ 120

PROM TIX $ 50

Seeing your baby dressed up like a princess: PRICELESS

I Kid You Not

I went to lunch with some of the girls yesterday. My friend Pat works for a local hospital and was telling us about some of the doctors. Dr. Slaughter, cardiac surgeon. (This guy actually did Rick's dad's open heart surgery years ago. I vividly recall having a "family conference" with the doctor and not hearing a word he spoke because I was too caught up in the fact that his name was SLAUGHTER!) Dr. Bush, gynecologist. And so on. When it was mentioned that Dr. Bush worked with Dr. Grabber all I could think of was calling that office for an appointment. The receptionist would answer the phone saying, "Grabber Bush. Can I help you?" C'mon. Change your name for Christ's sake!

Today's happenings:

Lauren's prom and 20+ kids and their dates, parents, grandparents, etc. taking pictures at our house this afternoon. If you want to witness this fiasco, come around 5. Should make for some good blogging.

And a great big HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Justin! Party on dude!

Mr. Coffee for ADD Sufferers

A while back I purchased a new Mr. Coffee coffee maker. I suppose I could have bought a $100 grind and brew Krups but, cheap ass that I am, I bought the $40 Mr. Coffee. I so wish I would have bought the Krups. The Mr. Coffee makes delicious coffee but that is it. The coffee maker beeps, not once, not twice, but five fricking times when the coffee is finished brewing! Keep in mind that it has a feature that you can remove the coffee pot to pour a cup while the coffee is still brewing. Why, I ask you, do you need the five beeps? It must be for people with ADD who forgot that only three fricking minutes ago they started the coffee brewing! That's not the least of it. It also has an automatic shut off that turns the coffee maker off after 2 hours. When that happens, you guessed it, more fricking beeping! It also features an incredibly bright green analog clock that could quite possibly blind me in my "good eye." At one point, the clock was bothering me so much that Rick rigged a cover for the clock so I couldn't see it. That worked fine for awhile but in one of my wiping frenzies the cover fell off. So we tried to break the clock. First with the all-purpose household tool, the butter knife, then the potato peeler. No luck. Once again the clock is exposed and I am stalked by the bright green light. No cup of coffee is that good that one should have to tolerate this piece of shit coffee maker. Death to Mr. Coffee and all the assholes that tested this coffee maker. I am no longer amazed that there is a Starbuck's on every corner.

I Love This Man

Honestly, he will never grow up and that's a good thing. Every time we go for a walk in the woods its like he's 5 years old again. He will always come home muddy and/or bloody. We have lived here for 14 years and I have only fallen in the creek once. Jeanne remembers. Rick on the other hand falls in on a regular basis. And yes, it happened again yesterday. All I can do is laugh and be thankful I had my camera so I can share.

Rick and I have talked at great lengths recently of selling the HG house and downsizing. Lauren is leaving soon and it is a lot of house for two people. But whenever we get close to actually doing it, we're just not ready to let go of all of this.

Is that not the Taj Mahal of beaver dens or what?!!

Only One More

Now that the "Top Ten Percent" dinner is over we only have one more school function to attend. Graduation on June 2nd. If I had a dime for every school/sporting event we have attended for Lauren, I'm sure it would be enough for at least a semester at U. of I. In the words of Ronnie Milsap, "I wouldn't have missed it for the world!"

Another First

Our baby is all grown up. Yesterday she voted in her very first election and came home proudly displaying her "I Voted" sticker. When she arrived at the polling place and entered the building she was perplexed as to what to do next. One of the election judges asked her if they could help her and she said, "It's my first time." In an instant all the election judges jumped to their feet and swarmed her. They carefully walked her through the process and even offered her pizza! (Pizza? I really need to start voting later in the day since they don't seem to have pizza at 8 in the morning.) We are very proud of her especially when she informed us that none of her other 18 year old classmates had voted and she researched the candidates on the Internet and went to the polls with a list of the people she wanted to vote for. She, like us, voted yes for the school referendum but the rest of the hillbillies in the HG did not. They never vote for the schools or the library. My favorite are the assholes who live in the million dollar homes with the "Vote No" to the school referendum signs in their front yard. Don't they realize that nobody wants to pay a million dollars for a house with a shitty school district? They're so stupid. They've probably never been to the library!

Brothers Make You Bad

Call me crazy but I actually ventured out to shop yesterday with Debbie and Sophia. The parking lots were insane with traffic due to the Good Friday holiday. I was holding my own and keeping my cool when this bitch in this little Honda hocks the parking space I was waiting for. I did what any girl who grew up with 4 older brothers would do. I called her a few choice expletives (not good, since Sophia was with us) and parked in a space much further away. On my journey into the store, and conveniently past her car, I took a small detour to her driver's side window, worked up a big ass hocker and let it rip right at the top of her window. The location was primo. The perfect spot for it to ooze it's way down. I like having the last word, uh, hocker.

The Dreaded Call From School

I'm busy cleaning my house yesterday, happily minding my own business, when the phone rings. I see on the caller ID that its the high school. Any parent knows this is never good. Lauren could be sick, she could have gotten in trouble, she could be hurt, any number of things. But we all know that they aren't calling me to thank me for sending Lauren to school today! Turns out they wanted to know if we had sent our money in for the top 10% dinner. Yea, idiot, like three weeks ago. Of course I did not say idiot, but oh how I wanted to. Then she goes on to say, "Oh, here you are. Yes, I see you have already paid." I hung up the phone and realized she probably doesn't have kids, at least not in high school, or she would have checked, rechecked and checked that list again before making that call.

Its Official

Lauren will be attending University of Illinois-Champaign/Urbana beginning August 18th. That would be 144 days from now. Not that we're counting or anything. She is very excited as are we. She came home from school yesterday and told me that they were done learning for the year. She proceeded on with this long diatribe about why she wouldn't be learning anything the rest of the year. When Rick came home and I told him this, he was like, "What?" I simply pointed to Lauren and had her explain to Rick. I'm relatively sure she had this speech rehearsed since she repeated to Rick, almost verbatim, what she told me. Who cares. She's in at U. of I. and that's all we care about, now. Congratulations to the newest Illini as she joins a long list of family and friends, including Bobby, Michael, Carolyn and Debbie. LONG LIVE THE CHIEF!!

Time for a Change

So as not to ever get in a rut, I have given the blog a whole new look. The new blog allows me to add and delete items much easier than the old blog. No more HTML code crap with this blog. Although, I have to say, I was getting pretty adept at that HTML crap. But it is crap and I won't miss it. And a big thanks to Jeanne for hooking me up yet again!