havocandmayhem.com

My erratic connection early last week kept me off and showed me just how irritated I was with the incessant political tweets . It was nice not to have them. I don't want to unfollow anyone because it's just that time of year when politics is the dominant topic. I understand that. I just find the snide comments, the links to negative stories, the misinformation, the gloating over the problems of others and the all around spite I'm seeing on both side to suck the enjoyment right out of my Twitter experience. It's just gotten so mean that I don't want to deal with it. The sheer lack of common decency is shocking & the excuse is "well, they did it first" which doesn't fly when my 5 year old says it & is even less convincing when a 35 year old says it.  It'll all be over in a couple of days hopefully & I'll get back on twitter. I miss the chatting. Go vote tomorrow! Remember, you are not required to fill in every blank on the ballot....

Some highlights of the week. We went to a wedding last Sunday. "He did it!" A giant jack o lantern A tiny jack o lantern "MY jack o lantern" Library videos We have a bit of a spider infestation. The bandit and the pirate The best decorated yard for Halloween

National Blog Posting Month begins today and I almost missed it! Fortunately I was reading Sci-Fi Dad's blog , and he mentioned it so I am going to get a post up today despite my absentmindedness. I'd love to include Halloween photos in this post but my Olympus POS camera has heard it is being replaced this week with a D40 and is now refusing to download photos in protest. I'm hoping to beat or beg it into submission tonight. It's done this before. There were some questions about Silent Supper. Silent Supper is something we do on Samhain to honor those who have passed over to the other side. There are 2 ways to do it. Both involve setting a place (or places) at the table for loved ones who have died in the past year (or for everyone you love who has passed). The first way has the whole meal silent. Everyone eats their meal in silence while remembering to themselves or trying to reach out to those they have lost. This way is impossible with small children. I...

Do the ghosts look worried to you? Havoc is off at school in is PJs for their party. Mayhem keeps changing his mind about what he wants to wear for his class party. He is currently insisting on a skeleton. He's going as either a pirate or a bandit because that is the costume we have. These last minute changes just don't work around here. We haven't decided whether to do trunk or treat tonight at one of the churches in the town or wait until tomorrow and do the one at the county high school. We'll do silent supper on whichever evening we don't trick or treat. Tomorrow is the school fall carnival. Apparently they are going to have a forest of bounce houses for the kids and lots of food and crafts. I suspect I am not going to be very interested in doing ToT tomorrow after that. I finally got my CT stuff downloaded.  Be sure to check out SSD and CGEssentials for DSD tomorrow. They have some great stuff coming out.

Lack of a consistent internet connection is giving me lots of spare time. I cold be scrapping but I'm just not feeling it right now, which is a pity because I have some great stuff from Kim Hill to play with it.  But I want to do something productive so I decided it was time for a purge, followed by a reorganization. So far I have purged 3GBs of scrapping stuff I never use, another 4GBs of audiobooks I have already listened too (backed up onto DVD in case I want to listen again), numerous blurry photos of tops of trees, the ground, random body parts and pictures that were supposed to be of my kids but somehow ended up being of other people's kids. I also backed up and then deleted a bunch of music I never listen to anymore. I feel lighter! Then I tackled my bookmarks, which fortunately can be accessed off line. I have things I bookmarked back in 2004 in there. Info I no longer need, items I have already purchased, etc. I deleted all the useless stuff and reorganized the res...

My kids go to public school here in our underpopulated (meaning poor in tax money), rural, conservative, nearly entirely Baptist, county. The county only has one of each kind of school -elementary, middle, junior & high school and to say they are underfunded is putting it mildly. The richer, more populated counties in the area spend more on high school sports than we do on the entire elementary school. They have a computer lab with 6 computers in it, for about 250 students. They only do one bus run per area. All the kids from all the schools on a road get on the same bus, and the bus stops at the various schools. So my 5 year old is riding home sitting in front of 16 year olds. This is bad from a "what might they hear and pick up" standpoint, but could be good from a 'need a babysitter' standpoint. So far neither has happened. I went to Catholic for grades 1-12 and before that I was in Montessori school from ages 2-5, so I'm not familiar with how public ...

has been canceled due to high winds. I get my broadband internet from an antenna, that due to the location and configuration of my house, is mounted at the top of a 50 foot pole. Picture a giant weather vane. It's tied down and can withstand most wind. But not really high gusty winds so strong they blow the front door open. My front door has been blown open twice now and is currently deadbolted in the hopes that will keep it shut. My weather vane, er, antenna, is currently pointed due south. Which is nice. But my signal comes from the east. I'm getting intermittent signal.  It's horrible. I've actually cleaned the house and made granola bars Pray for me.