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Again??? January 6, 2007

Posted by spacemom in : Depression , 6 comments

It happened. Sometime between 10 and 11 this morning. I was doing great and then it was as if someone put a large blanket of ick over me. The depression settled in. I am in a black hole of emotion.

Jay pointed out that this was the week we expected this. I know, but I still feel terrible. The whole  voice in my head screaming loser is there. I feel soft, lazy, tired and a waste of cells, oxygen and space.

We took a walk and ended up at a play ground. I watched the girls play and Jay play with them. I am the luckiest woman in the world. The girls are amazingly beautiful, intelligent, almost have common sense, and love each other, Yet, my soul is empty.

I see my doctor on Tuesday. Let’ s hope we find a solution. I did increase my dose today, reluctantly…

Packing my bags….in 2007 January 5, 2007

Posted by spacemom in : Seeing the World Through Astronomy, Travel , 3 comments

The year 2007 is going to be a busy one!  We recently discussed our travel schedule…

  1. In Feb, Soleil and I are going to Florida to a gathering of my refuge friends (a group spawned from a fertility web board)
  2. I may visit Buffalo in March
  3. Passover? Cleveland
  4. The weekend after Passover? NYC. We have been SUMMONED to come (shakes head at Keith-BIL)
  5. May, Hawai’i. With the kids? Maybe. The original plan was yes, but since mom and dad were going to take care of the kids 4 hours a day and now mom is afraid to fly given her illness in November, I don’t know. But we have a meeting there.
  6. August. Bar Mitzvah for Keith’s eldest. This is very exciting. Seattle, here we come!
  7. Thanksgiving? Probably Cleveland. In-laws are celebrating their 50th anniversary this year.
  8. Buffalo in late December.
  9. Oh yeah, Luna and I are supposed to visit my parents for a weekend too…

Busy busy busy year. Oh- And Soleil STARTS KINDERGARTEN this year! EEK!

Clouds on the Horizon January 4, 2007

Posted by spacemom in : She Blinded me with Science , 3 comments

I am trying to remember the last warm year. I know we had one about 7 years ago. And we all worried about global climate change (aka global warming). This is a warm year as well, and Soleil constantly asks about where the snow is. I miss it too.

Friends and family often ask how I feel about the Global Warming Debate. To be honest, it is clear that humans are affecting the natural cycle of warming and cooling. We are emitting many more greenhouse gases than the Earth can contain. We are carnivores and instead of eating the meat already here, we grow more meat to satisfy our desires. These animals contribute more to the greenhouse grasses.

We destroy flora, which helps balance out the gas equation without planting enough in return. I cringe whenever I see an evergreen on the side of the street waiting for pick up. At least my town will mulch
them for town projects and residents can also purchase the mulch.

I want to do more. I try.

We recycle what we can. We reuse items many times. I recycle the girls toys to other kids if I can. I keep the "junk" in our house to the minimum. I debate items like florescent bulbs. Are the lower energy
costs worth the flickering that cause migraines? Are they worth the amounts of mercury that are in the bulbs that eventually end up in our streams and ground? (this coming from the girl who got to PLAY with mercury in 3rd and 4th grade, but in 5th they took it away…It was so cool to play with mercury in your hands.)

The fireplace insert I mentioned yesterday is part of this. The efficiency of the insert is 75%. The efficiency of our heater is closer to 50%. So we would be more efficient to use the fireplace insert to heat the upstairs instead of the heater. In addition, the exhaust from the insert is much cleaner than the heater. They both use
a non-renewable resource, natural gas, but hopefully, we will see our gas usage go down this winter.

We got a high efficiency front loading washing machine. Our water usage has dropped by 1/3 since we started using it. My car is not a hybrid, but since I do most of my driving on non-city streets, I can get some
very nice mileage out of it. On our recent trip to Buffalo, I got 33MPG for the highway sections. Not bad for a family sedan.

We carpool to work and daycare. The four of us go in together. We tried public transportation when we first moved here, but it is not time efficient.

What do you do to help reduce our impact on the Earth? What do you think about when you purchase items and think about tossing something?

How can we help more?

I also need to work on getting our town to change to more efficient street lights. Have you ever noticed how much light the traditional street lights put up in the sky? Why waste the electricity? You can install fixtures that direct the light ON THE GROUND which illuminate the roads just as well and reduces the amount of energy you need to use AND prevents light pollution….

New Year? New Start? January 3, 2007

Posted by spacemom in : She Blinded me with Science , add a comment

I am at work today. Yippie! Sad, I know, but after a while, I do miss my work. Plus Luna is being a total pain in the ass lately and I am trying very hard not to strangle her (yes, I love her, no I am not a child abuser, yes, every two year old is a royal pain in the ass at times and she’s in one of those phases).

I spent 1/2 hour cleaning my desk, removing the 2006 day of the year calendar and replacing it with the 2007 one. I bought in my descaled and cleaned coffee machine, my news pens. I recycled a small tree and then attacked my email, which I had not cleaned up since September.

There is something quite cathartic about a new year. It happens at a dead time in the natural cycle, but allows for hope of new and exciting things. I have a piece of software that I am completely revamping. I am printing out the 1500 lines of code  (yes, one program, can you say Spaghetti code?) and starting the redesign today. I am rewriting several cron jobs into daemons and I am cleaning my work station so I can start anew!

This makes me very happy to start fresh.

In other news: the plumber came to our house this morning. The gas lines are being plumbed for the  fireplace insert. We are having both the upstairs and down stairs fireplaces plumbed, but we are only doing the upstairs fireplace with an insert right now. By the end of the month, we will have a gas insert upstairs and we will be able to turn on the fire with a flick of a switch. Very excited by this. It is cleaner than the furnace and we can set it on a thermostat so we can have it come on by itself to warm the upstairs before we come home from work…Nice…

Daily pleasures January 2, 2007

Posted by spacemom in : Nance , 3 comments

What is it about the warmth of a bed that prevents you from getting out from under the covers in the morning? Is it that you have been surrounded by the thermal emissions of your loved one? Or that your body has an inertia and just wishes to stay as is? Either way, I was very tired this morning, but managed to climb out of bed and into the shower.

I spent most of today on the couch; my back was pressed against the armrest, my knees up, a book resting on the slant. I was forced to take a break for lunch, but I got through the book around 3pm, when I started to get ready to get the girls from daycare.

The guilty pleasures of a person off of work….

Wishing you a wonderful 2007 January 1, 2007

Posted by spacemom in : Life...otherwise , 5 comments

Newyear