Last year, my mom and sister took a bunch of the photos from 2009, assembled them into calendars and sent them out as Christmas presents.  They were surprisingly popular - apparently folks have asked if we'd do the same this year, so Coral sent me digging for pictures to contribute.

Thing is, I'm kind of bad at photojournalism.  My camera's sort ( Read more... )

Vacation was great, and hopefully the bugbites will fade with the sunburn ( Read more... )

This year's Trip Up North falls significantly less North than usual.  The window between the end of Nick's summer teaching duties and the beginning of Katherine's autumn ones is just too small to justify a trip to the UP.  So.  We're gonna visit my mom, instead.  Preliminary plans involve some light hiking, a cabin-camping trip and lots of being ( Read more... )

My mother sent a package to my office.  Hilarious mistake, or intentional disruption?  I don't know, but it contained a keychain, a small packet of photos, a t-shirt and the following article:

Bodies by Bill

That's my grandpa, and if he's not as badass as he once was, at least people still remember him that way.

How was my Thanksgiving, you ask?


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As some of you may know, my aunt has a rare, pretty horrific condition called moyamoya.  When she was 26, she worked for a conglomerate of doctors, and one day one of them noticed something wonky about her eyes.  If he hadn't, she might have died of a stroke before she turned 30.  There's strong evidence that moyamoya is hereditary, so I decided to ( Read more... )

I had a good time at Nick's-Second-Cousin's-Wedding this weekend, though I admit that I went into it as though gearing up for battle.  When your boyfriend says, "Look, the great aunts are going to be gossiping about meeting you until something bigger comes along," you have a wardrobe choice: do you play it sweet and demure, or sexy and capable?   ( Read more... )

I find that I have a tendency to do vacation-y things (Michigan, Dad visit) and then spend so much time recovering from them that there's almost no point in recapping.  Being around people for extended periods of time is stressful, people.  I just want to sleep and be a hermit and not have to deal with anyone else's schedule or needs for, like, a ( Read more... )

We'd planned to make a day-trip out to the Asheboro Zoo today, only to be derailed by a blowout ( Read more... )

Kitten - Alex is in much better health. The eye drops have mostly cleared up her goo, though she's still sniffly. Nick was alarmed to notice a little bit of blood coming from her nostrils, but that's not unusual with a cold. Just like people, excessive sneezing can dry out/wear out your nose, leading to some minor bleeding. But she's playing, ( Read more... )