Joey had his Halloween parade today at school. It was pretty darn cute. All the kids looked adorable, and he came home with way too many treats. His favorite was the witches "hand" (food service glove) stuffed with popcorn and those yucky candy corns for nails. He thought they were great. Being the Julia Child sort myself, what do you think I brought? Halloween napkins. Cheap and easy. ;o)

Had my one week follow-up appointment with the eye doctor today. He put some plugs in my tear ducts that will hopefully help with my eyes being kind of dry. I'm doing really well. My night vision is really good and that was probably one of my biggest concerns. I have more haloing now and minor starbursting, but nothing major at all. Yea! Now I go back in 3 weeks for my one month follow up. My vision has gotten even better over the past two days. My eyes aren't quite as dry when I wake up in the morning. And best of all, I don't have to wear those clear plastic lenses taped to my face at night anymore. Yea!!!!

The other night, Bob found out (much to his annoyance) that I can quote probably 90% of the movie Top Gun. I guess I've watched the movie one too many times. I love it. I know it's cheesy, but it brings me back to the time I was 16 and my very first boyfriend was joining the Air Force. I was heartbroken. When Goose died...oh my, my little teenage heart broke KNOWING that my beloved would meet the same fate and I'd be Meg Ryan without my Goose. He never did wind up joining the Air Force. I think he's a Snap-On-Tools rep now.

So now I'm leaving you with a list of movies I could watch over and over (and over) again, in no particular order:

Princess Bride (ok, so this one is the #1 movie I can watch a gozillion times) (Inconceivable!)
Moonstruck (Snap out of it!)
Top Gun (I feel the need, the need for speed.)
Sixteen Candles (Ohhh sexy girlfriend!)
The English Patient (It is a very plum plum.)
The Breakfast Club (Does Barry Manilow know that you raid his wardrobe?)
Heart and Souls
Better Off Dead (Tentacles. NT. Big difference.)

Wierd events from yesterday....

Wierd event #1: I went to the DMV to renew my drivers license and was in and out within 20 minutes. Unheard of in the state of New Jersey. I did, however, have THE most unattractive picture taken EVER. It's hideous. Really.

Wierd event #2: Scene from The Birds. We were sitting in the living room when we noticed all these black birds dive-bombing into our backyard. We went outside and there were probably 500-600 birds spread between our house and 5 of our neighbors. It was unbelievable. The racket was incredible. It was one of the wierdest things I've ever seen.

I made a kick a$$ dinner last night from my new cookbook. Tonight we're having the Chicken Valdastano from the book. Here's the recipe from last night:

Mostaccioli with Fresh Basil and Mozzarella

3 tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling over the finished pasta if you like
2 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced
35 oz. can italian plum tomatoes, with their liquid, seeded and crushed
1/2 tsp. crushed hot red pepper (I used more)
1 pound mostaccioli or other penne pasta
1 pound bocconcini (bite size fresh mozzarella), cut in half
1 cup freshly grated parmigiano-reggiano cheese
1 cup shredded fresh basil leaves

Makes 6 servings


Bring 6 quarts of salted water to a boil in an 8 qt. pot over high heat.

Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Scatter the garlic over the oil and cook, shaking the pan, until golden brown, about 2 minutes. Stir in the tomatoes and crushed red pepper. Season lightly with salt, bring to a boil then lower the heat so the sauce is at a lively simmer. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the sauce is lightly reduced, about 10 minutes.

While the sauce is simmering, stir the penne into the boiling water. Return to a boil, stirring frequently. Cook the pasta, semi-covered, stirring occasionally until done, 10 to 12 minutes.

If the skillet is large enough to accommodate the sauce and pasta, fish the pasta out of the boiling water with a large wire skimmer and drop it directly into the sauce in the skillet. If not, drain the pasta, return it to the pot and pour in the sauce. Bring the sauce and pasta to a boil, stirring to coat the pasta with the sauce. Check the seasoning, adding salt and crushed red pepper if necessary.

Remoe the pot from the heat, and stir in the mozzarella, grated cheese and basil. Serve immediately in warm bowls.

Yummy.

Ready for all the gory details of the surgery?

Biggie B took me to the train station Wednesday morning and because she's the best friend in the whole wide world, she stayed with me so I wouldn't be alone with my panicky thoughts. The train finally came and I took my first train ride into New York City. It arrived in Penn Station and I walked out and hailed a cab. I arrived at the center about 45 minutes before my appointment.

I spent a lot of time in between tests. The first thing they did was take a picture of my eye. As soon as I walked in the room I felt my heart in my throat. I was much more nervous than I thought I would be. After that I sat and waited a while. Then they did some other tests, topographies and whatnot. And then I waited some more. They then brought me in to see the patient consultant who instructed me on what I needed to do after the surgery, when I could wear make up, when to use the drops, when to shower, etc. She put drops in my eyes to dialate them. She also provided me with a valium. I really liked her. ;o)

I then was brought back and put "on deck". They geared me up in the lunch lady hair net thing and the surgical booties. They made sure my eyes had dialated and then the surgeon came back and walked me through what I could expect.

He brought me into the laser suite and I laid down on the table. The first thing they did was clean the outside of my eyes and tape my eyelashes out of the way. They also had taped my other eye closed. Then they inserted this thing to keep me from blinking and then swabbed my eye. Then they put this suction thing down on my eye, it's to hold the eye in place. All I felt was downward pressure. They then turned the vaccuum on and my vision went all swirly. He had told me it would probably grey or black out, neither of which happened, but the end result was I couldn't see. This is the point where they create the flap. Once that was done, it was time for the laser to do its job. That was probably the worst part for me, I was so concerned about moving that I don't think I breathed through the entire time the laser was on. It also smelled funny (which he did warn me about), and all I could think was that smell was my eyeball burning (turns out it wasn't, it's the smell from the laser). Once the laser did its job (about a minute and a half), he floated the flap back into place, made sure it was smooth, had me blink a few times and that eye was done. He moved onto the other eye.

The whole procedure probably took about 15 minutes for both eyes. One of the things I thought was cool was that they turned on music right before they got ready to start, and it was my kind of music. At first it was some light reggae and then some R&B.

Once they were done I got up and I could immediately see a difference in my vision. It was blurry, but not as blurry as I saw without my glasses or contacts. I could see where I was going. They brought me back into a dark room with big recliners and had me rest for about a half hour. The only time I experienced any pain or discomfort was then. After the anisthetic (sp?) wore off my eyes started to feel really irritated and hurt a little. They teared a lot. It wasn't unbearable, just uncomfortable.

He then brought me back in the exam room to take a look. He put some more anisthetic drops in and I immediately felt better. He warned me it would wear off and it did, but it wasn't as bad. He taped these bug-like lenses over my face and then put the big yucky sunglasses on me. Then they sent me on my way!

It took us 10 minutes to walk to the parking garage and I could read things along the way. I kept my eyes closed the whole way home (good thing, NYC rush hour traffic isn't pretty). By the time we made it across town and to the Lincoln Tunnel, my eyes had quit hurting completely.

I was able to drive myself to my appointement the next day, and at 1:00 p.m. that afternoon I was seeing 20/20. Right now my eyes feel tired. I keep feeling like I've had my contacts in too long and I need to take them out. I probably should be using the drops more. My vision goes in and out a little bit. It gets a little worse, then it'll get better. They told me this was perfectly normal and it'll even out.

The drops are yucky, they get into my sinuses and then I taste them. Blech.

So that's my LASIK story, in painful detail! It blows my mind that I can see things and I don't have my contacts in. I'm still not used to it!

Well Happy Birthday to me!

I woke up to some really cute hand made cards from the kids. All my friends have called to wish me a happy birthday today, and Bob's mom even called. Pretty impressive considering she didn't even call Bob or Lauren on their birthdays. We're all going out to dinner tonight. Joey's suggestion is Friendly's, LOL. I'm sure it'll be kid friendly but probably slightly more upscale, LOL.

My best friend came over and had lunch with me (side note, girlfriend eats some seriously yucky stuff). And she came bearing birthday gifts too. As soon as I log off of here I'm heading downstairs to look through my new copy of Lidia's Italian American Kitchen cookbook. This is by far my new favorite cookbook. It seems like every recipe in it is something I really enjoy. I enjoy cooking italian food more than anything, and I can't wait to start cooking some of these things. She also brought me another gift that is much appreciated, but THE BOOK WOULD HAVE BEEN MORE THAN ENOUGH!!!! (did you get that Biggie?).

I have some last minute things to do for tomorrow. I'm pretty nervous, moreso than I thought I would be. Wish me luck!

I am the queen of freebies. Tonight I put my babies to bed and headed out to see Sweet Home Alabama. With my free movie certificate. That rocks. So did the movie. Two big thumbs up. Cute, romantic, funny. I even shed a tear which, if you know me at all, it doesn't take much, sap that I am. It was a spur of the moment thing, and I'm so glad I went. Except for the guy who decided to answer his cell phone and talk for 5 minutes near the door. I guess it would have been too much to ask for him to move OUTSIDE the door so we wouldn't have to listen to him, but no. I even got up and shushed him but he was clueless. Another girl got up and shushed him too which was really funny considering she and the group she was with talked through the whole movie. As did the people behind me. I'll never understand why people are willing to pay $9 NOT to watch a movie????

They showed a trailer for a new moving coming out in December (I believe). It's called Maid in Manhattan, and I'll be dragging any willing person with me to go see it. It stars J-Lo, but I'm still going to see it anyway. Because it also stars Ralph Fiennes, and I LOOOOOOOOVE Ralph Fiennes. And that's pronounced Rafe, not Ralf. It's a romantic comedy and I can't wait to see it since he's normally in dramatic, dark and disturbing movies (like my beloved English Patient). Right now he's in Red Dragon (the other Silence of the Lambs movie) but I just can't bring myself to go see it. I'd probably have nightmares for weeks. I'm a big chicken. They also showed a trailer for a new Sandra Bullock movie that looks like it's going to be pretty funny.

I mailed my ex-boyfriend and his fiancee an engagement card today. That was really wierd

Don't mind my half-finished half-spackled dining room. It'll get done one of these years.

Lauren's answers to everything lately is either "yups" or "nopes". She's so cute.

5 days down, 5 more to go. I can't wait to get rid of these freaking glasses. Today I drove to the train station the next town over to see about taking the train into NYC for the surgery. I'm really not looking forward to going into Manhattan to have it done but I know it's safer for me to have it done on the laser there. The train will get me into Penn Station in about 30 minutes and then I'll take a cab (probably another 30 minutes!) over to the center.

The laser center called at 3:00 p.m. today to tell me that they just realized they never scheduled my pre-op and could I please come down at 3:30 p.m. Lucky for them I'm so NICE (hush up Biggie) and I told them it wouldn't be any problem at all. But I was thinking evil thoughts in my head.

I asked TWO people there if they were sure I'd be able to drive home after having my eyes dialated, both said yes. Holy Mother of God. Thank goodness they gave me those big 'ol cataract glasses or I wouldn't have been able to drive home. The sunlight was unbearable, even through the sunglasses. I still can't read unless I take off my glasses and you can barely see I have brown eyes. I'm just one big black pupil. I look like I'm baked.

I bought a pumpkin carving kit yesterday and there was NO way Joey was going to let that sit around. We wound up carving one tonight. I say "we" but what I really mean is "Bob". It looks really cool, but I'm sure that by next week it will be a moldy, mushy mess. It's a spider holding a jack o' lantern. I wanted a silly face but Joey wanted something evil. He says it so funny. "I want something eeeee-vill mommy". He makes me laugh. I took a picture of the kids with it once it was all done. I'll probably post it tomorrow, as I'm too lazy to haul my fat butt downstairs and get my camera.

I also ordered tickets to see Les Miserables on Broadway again. I've seen it many, many times and the show is closing March 15, 2003. It's my favorite play, and I really wanted to see it one more time before it closed. On the spur of the moment, I changed my mind and ordered tickets for the night of our anniversary. I was planning on going with my SIL, as she's as big a Les Mis freak as I am, but I thought it would be nice to go on our anniversary. I will probably still go with SIL too. I *heart* Les Mis.

I couldn't let the cow/weather thing go so I did some Googling and it appears I'm not making this stuff up. There are other people out there who believe that cows can predict rain. If my skeptical DH wasn't sleeping, I'd be making him read these things right now. And I don't know why I didn't think of it, I have a friend who has cows, I can ask her what her cows do!

I have an honest question here, but it's making me giggle every time I think of it. If you're say, sitting down and eating dinner, and one of your dinner companions um, releases gas, rather strikingly and loudly (and accidentally) during conversation....what exactly are you supposed to do? Say, "you're excused" when they say "excuse me!". Ignore it? Pretend it didn't happen? I'm just glad it wasn't me. I don't even pass gas in front of DH, I think I would have fallen off my chair and died right there if I did it in front of other people. And before you go telling me I need to stop being so anal, don't waste your breath. I'm wierd about bodily functions.

This is only day 2 of wearing my glasses and I'm tired of it already. There's something about them, they make me feel tired and give me headaches. Not to mention having to shower blind. Only 8 more days.

We're back from Lancaster, and it feels so good to be home. We had a really great but tiring weekend, which I'll probably go into way too much detail about. As I mentioned, we were originally supposed to stay at the Red Caboose Motel. We wound up staying at the Historic Strasburg Inn which despite its name and appearance, is not *actually* historic. It was a really nice place, not worth the $214 a night we paid, but still very nice. The grounds were lovely and the place was tastefully decorated in colonial style, which I'm not very fond of but suited the inn. We found out that for an extra fee and a non-refundable deposit, we can even bring our dog. I didn't sleep very well here because the inn conveniently provided candles in every room and that just wreaked havoc with my OCD fire obsessions. All I could imagine was careless people lighting the candles and then forgetting about them. So sleep didn't come easy!

It took us a little over 4 hours to get there on Friday night. I honestly thought we'd never get there. After checking in, we went back out and had dinner. I had a really neat (Oh my gosh, how corny am I, I said *neat*. I guess I'm really corny since I said gosh and corny too. Geez I'm getting old)....anyway, I had a really neat experience at the restaurant. I had been doing some discreet people watching. The Amish fascinate me, and I was watching a young Amish family, noting how drastically different we were. Anyway, there was a young Amish mother there who had her hands full with her little one and her plate. And there I was, juggling Lauren and a plate. We wound up helping each other get food on the plates and it suddenly hit me that as incredibly different as we were, we were still just two young mothers juggling kids and food. And we were the same. Typing this out it doesn't sound so strange, but to me it was.

Saturday morning we woke up, had breakfast and headed out to Cherry Crest Farms. We were only in the corn maze for an hour before the kids pooped out but we managed to find 5 of the map pieces in that time. We finally came around to the entrance and snuck out that way. After that we went on a wagon ride, 10 or so little red wagons pulled by a guy driving a tractor. The kids rode ponies, slung pumpkins and had their faces painted. They have some animals on the farm and they had some pigs that were playing. Maybe I haven't seen a lot, but I've never seen pigs actually jump around and play with each other before. We also saw some cows running and Bob commented that he'd never seen cows running before (and neither had I). Obviously we've not spent a lot of time around farm animals. :o) Speaking of cows, they were laying down and I told Bob they were doing that because it was going to rain. Someone, somewhere long ago told me that cows would lay down when it was going to rain so I just believed it to be true. Until my husband told me it wasn't. But what does he know?

Anyway, I actually walked up this huge hill and went down this slide with Lauren. Joey went down and he went so slooooow. Bob went down with Lauren first and they didn't appear to go fast either. So I didn't expect to slide down it at the speed of light. Apparently when you're packing the pounds you book on these things. All I could picture while coming down was sliding completely off the end of the "safety" area.

We then rode on the steam train which was nice and very welcome after all that walking.

We went to dinner and then went back to the hotel and went swimming. I also spent about 10 minutes in the jacuzzi and it was heaven.

Sunday we did all things train...the Toy Train Museum and the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania which was impressive but stunk to the high heavens of coal and other yucky stuff.

Fortunately our trip home was only about 2 1/2 hours and the kids slept for all but about 10 minutes of that so it was a nice, quiet ride.

Some pictures for your enjoyment.

Bob and Lauren on the slide at Cherry Crest:



Joey on the pony ride:



Lauren on the pony ride. I felt bad after taking this picture. I know the Amish don't like their picture taken but I didn't even think about it at the time. This little boy was so polite and sweet with the most impish grin I've ever seen. He was such a cutie.



Joey in the hay:



Lauren in the wagon:

LASIK stands for Laser-In-Situ Keratomileusis and it's a type of laser vision correction. It can correct nearsightedness and farsightedness. My hope is that my vision will go from 20/400 (about where it is now, or -6.0 in my right eye and -5.5 in my left) to hopefully 20/20 or better. 12 days and counting!

Rain, rain go away.

I'm here. My computer was up and running and then died again. Joey and I are still hacking (I think it may be bronchitis) and Lauren is coming down with a cold now.

The owner of the place we were supposed to stay in Pennsylvania called to tell us that they were shut down and we couldn't stay there. I probably called 50 hotels before I found one that had availability for one night only. I booked it, and then tried calling one more place this morning and they have availability for both nights. We have to switch rooms, but it's in the same town we were supposed to stay in and it's a room. At this point we couldn't be picky. I had no idea Lancaster was such a hot spot in the Fall. The downside is the cost. It's costing us approximately $250 MORE than the original place. For two nights. Unfreakingbelievable. The worst part was breaking it to Joey. I booked these reservations probably 4 or 5 months ago. We've all been talking about it. I requested a red caboose, per his request. He was SO brave when I told him. He said, with lip quivering, "That's ok mommy, maybe we can stay there another time". OMG, I love him so much.

I feel so wiped right now.

Oh, and Freddie our fish died. He's been dying a slow and torturous death since about 3 days after we got him last year (he was in the centerpiece at SIL's wedding and I "won" him because I had the closest birthday...which, if you're keeping track, is October 22 so mark your calendars). It's been awful and his death is a blessing to me. I wanted to flush him and put him out of his misery long ago but DH wouldn't let me. But he's finally gone, and his blood isn't on my hands.

Two weeks until my LASIK surgery.

I really believe in the Karmic Boomerang. I've also been hit by the Karmic Boomerang, and it's not fun.

My step-dad has been after my mom to get another job. She interviewed for a part-time job and really wanted it. He hemmed and hawed and kept telling her they were going to have to tighten their belts and she should really be looking for a full-time job (oh, and did I mention he's loaded so it's not like they're not going to be able to pay the mortgage/put food on the table). My mom is still at my gram's side roughly 8-12 hours a day. There IS no one else. She's so depressed about having put her in this nursing home, and has been really down lately. I told her she needed to tell him that now was the time for him to be supportive, not trying to convince her to take a job she will surely lose the second things get dire again with my grandma. She finally had it out with him and he apologized (he really is a wonderful guy, he's just so freaking frugal!).

Well guess whose father fell and broke his hip yesterday? I think now SD will understand a little more of what my mom has been going through, to some degree at least.

I'm off....hopefully my computer doesn't blow up and I'll be back tomorrow.

Our good friend is coming over tomorrow to fix my computer which dies on me roughly every 18 minutes. And all I have to do is cook him a steak dinner. Cool.

Hopefully all will go well and I will blog Monday on my new and improved computer.

Our trip to Lancaster, PA is coming up and I'm really looking forward to it. I really hope the weather cools down. We won't be seeing any foliage, we've had so little rain and it's been so warm that the trees haven't even begun to change colors. We went the same time last year and it was beautiful. We were walking around in turtlenecks and drinking apple cider...if this keeps up will be picking pumpkins in tank tops and drinking lemonade.

The day we come home will be the last day I wear my contact lenses in preparation for the surgery. They strongly suggested I keep mine out for 10 days (norm is 3 -7) because I have some blood vessels growing over my cornea. I don't get quite enough oxygen to my eyes with the contacts which is why I have that. The doctor said that keeping them out 10 days will allow them to shrink considerably. I'm not looking forward to wearing my glasses for 10 days straight, but I'll do what I need to do.

This cough is so bad. My chest hurts. And every time I cough I pee my pants. I took a bath before and put on a clean pair of undies. Had them on probably 90 seconds before I coughed and wet them. Not that it takes much. I cough, I wet my pants. I laugh too hard, I wet my pants. Bob tickles me, I wet my pants. I sneeze, I wet my pants. Enough already. I better start doing those Kegels again.

I don't have a whole lot to say, so I'll sum up:

I feel like crap, I have a nasty cough and it HURTS.
My grandmother is doing really poorly.
My mother is depressed over it and I don't know what to do for her.
I just found out today that my first love, who is still my good friend, is getting engaged. I talked to him two weeks ago and he let me know it was coming, but it's still a little hard to swallow for some reason.
I made my LASIK appointment for October 23 in Manhattan. I'm nervous and excited.
I'm tired and hope I make it through Survivor/Friends/CSI tonight.

And that's all I have to say about that.