I just updated my Kids BackWash column. I had a new idea, based on a series of books I read as a kid: Choose your Own Adventure. They were challenging. Partly to resist the temptation to read ahead and find out where each choice would lead you. Partly because you could never really tell where each choice would lead you, into treasure or peril. I see those books now and then, in the used bin at a second hand store like Goodwill or a little retailer. I don't know if anyone still publishes them. I remember they became popular enough to have some copycats back then.

I've wanted a scanner for a long time. Mostly for clip art to use on my personal websites. There is only so much I can do with ASCII art and HerPlanet isn't even all that keen on me using it at all. So far that is my only disappointment with the HerPlanet network.

Anyway, today Todd wanted to go to WalMart so I wandered around looking at this and that: magazines, sewing stuff, purses, greeting cards and the computer section. I saw the HP Photo Scanner 1000, a small scanner geared to people who want to exchange pictures (4x6) over the net. I think its perfect for what I want. It was $78.64 at WalMart, I see it online for $80 to $100.00. Online would also charge shipping and handling so WalMart would be the better choice. But, I will wait to get it when I am in Ontario rather than find out its only waranteed in the US. That is what happened with the IBM computer I bought myself just before I moved to the US and married Todd. Getting it fixed was a time consuming, frustrating process. I ended up taking it back to Ontario to be fixed. I think it was a dead motherboard. They never did tell me.

CNet has a review of the HP scanner. They give it 7 out of 10.

We have a mouse. At least one, I think it's safe to assume it's not alone. It came out last night just as I was thinking to go to bed. As usually happens with mice, toads and other creepy jumpy creatures, I saw it out of the corner of my eye and then turned just in time to see it scamper under some of the boxes all over the apartment. So my packing is benefitting the rodent population. Todd called it Disneyland for Mice.

I talked to my Mom yesterday, she says she will bring the truck down, leaving Monday, if Graham hasn't already come down by then. Graham, my brother, is involved in a real estate deal he needs to finish before he can leave. But he does want to come down. Mom says he is looking forward to some time away from Liz, his current girlfriend. Sad to hear that, we all were hoping this would be his big break away from psycho Cheryl, the one who likes to give us death threats and come over to the house and attack people when she isn't stealing Mom's antiques. Cheryl should be locked up in an insane asylum, she was for awhile but Graham sponsored her and they let her out again. We don't know why he keeps going back for more. They fight and beat each other and she just hangs on like a blood sucking leech.

I have a lot of paper to sort through and hopefully trash more than I keep. I am always making notes for myself with URL, quotes, ideas, etc. Here are some quotes which I am typing into my blog before I throw out the paper they are scribbled on.

"If you have built castles in the air your work need not be lost. That is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them." Henry David Thoreau

"It is never too late to become what you might have been." George Eliot

"The history of all times, and of today especially, teaches that... women will be forgotten if they forget to think about themselves." Louis Otto-Peters

"What no wife of a writer can ever understand is that a writer is working when he's staring out the window." Rudolph Erich Rascoe

"A ratio of failures is built into the process of writing. The waste basket has evolved for a reason." Margaret Atwood

"There are days when the result is so bad that no fewer than five revisions are required. In contrast, when I'm greatly inspired, only four revisions are needed." John Kenneth Galbraith

"I get a warm feeling when I'm doing well, but that pleasure is pretty much negated by the pain of getting started each day. Let's face it, writing is hell." William Stryon

Taken from a placemat from our favourite Chinese buffet in town.

Chinese Zodiac

According to traditional Chinese legend, ages ago Buddha summoned all of the animals and honored those who came by naming a year for them; each animal in turn gave its characteristics to people born in this year.

Note: I'm not typing all of the animal signs. My sign is the dragon, the only mythical animal among them and I think the most powerful, mystical and wise. But, of course, I'm biased. ;)

Dragon: 1904, 1916, 1928, 1940, 1952, 1964, 1976, 1988, 2000, 2012 Passionate and soft-hearted, but somewhat stubborn, very healthy and energetic. You are well-suited to the rat, serpent, and monkey, but ill-suited to the dog.

I've always thought I would do well with a rat sign. My almost ex-husband is a serpent sign. My Mother is a monkey sign and my sister, the one I clash with the most, is a dog. My little sister is a rat sign and my only brother is a horse sign. Oddly, my Dad is both a monkey sign and a Sagittarius (also my sign in western astrology) and we never get along, he has always been emotionally abusive.

It's interesting how the fortune cookie crumbles.

We may be going to a kid's birthday party today. Still haven't heard from anyone about a time. Its a bit of a drive so it would be nice to know. It's almost 4:30, getting kind of late. I don't know why the ex doesn't phone and find out. He isn't keen on going but its a place to get out and have free conversation and food. Birthday cake too. Besides, each time I have seen this kid at a party she has managed to dive into the cake, pretty funny. She is only 2. It's the ex husband's family so it isn't likely I will see any of them again after I move.

I used to have dozens of pen pals. That was a long time ago. These days I can't keep up with anyone's life, barely even my own.

Today I'm looking over the pen pal letters. I've kept them all in a bag. Most are from the 80's. I tried to get postcards from my pen pals so I could see how things looked where they were. Some would send coins too, just local currency. It cost more for the stamps to send them than the coins were worth.

As I'm going through the letters I've been pulling the stamps off all the envelopes. I have never been a stamp collector. My Dad has a stamp collection that's been in limbo for at least 30 years. But someday I might find someone to donate all these stamps too. I doubt any are really valuable but someone might as well have them. It seems a shame to just toss them all out. I am keeping all my postcards and coins though. I don't have a good place to put them and now that I'm packing its all just one more job and one more box. But, I'm not ready to toss them this move at least.

I considered starting pen paling again a few months ago. But even the couple I found interesting I never wrote back to more than once. I have plenty of nice stationery left over from the last bout of letter writing. I just don't have anything settled right now and I do need to get some kind of focus back, a routine would probably be a good thing too.

It sounds like my Mom will drive down on Monday. I hope so. Things are not bad here but not good either. I'm definitely ready to leave and work on whatever comes next. I'm really looking forward to seeing Zack, my nephew.

Anyway, this is enough blabbling for now. I was looking at college courses online but they are too far away, too expensive or too many hours (months, years). Maybe I will find something yet. All I really want is some clue about CGI, Perl and CSS.

"If my doctor told me I had only six months to live, I wouldn't brood. I'd type a little faster." Isaac Asimov

I'm having a coffee problem today. This morning Todd drank all the milk and finished the last of my coffee cream. So, when I made coffee this morning there was a lovely pot of steaming coffee but no milk to put into it. I just can't drink it black. So, there is a whole lovely pot of coffee now cold on the kitchen counter. I managed to gag down some oatmeal without milk but it was like eating rubber. One good thing in the coffee situation was that new Starbucks double shot which Todd brought home from Pepsi last night. I had forgotten about it in the fridge so I had that for coffee this morning. Its ok, I still would have liked a hot coffee to sit beside me while I work and be stone cold by the time I'm way finished it. Some day I will get smarter about the coffee idea and use a smaller cup. I don't really like stone cold coffee.

Found in a blog:

We work in the dark We do what we can We give what we have Our doubt is our passion, and our passion is our task The rest is the madness of art.

-- Henry James