We figured out that the Sirus radio receiver then transmits so strongly that if we place it in the kitchen, we can still pick it up on our shower radio in the bathroom! Cool!

My husband is still not happy about working at a bill collection agency...but he brought home a spreadsheet a few nights ago showing he was the top collector on his team of about 10 ! He's had customers tell him that although several bill collectors have called their homes, they're paying him rather than the others, because he is pleasant to them on the phone, and the others are not! We both think it's funny that he's doing so well at this job, since he doens't want it and is still looking.

Due to the unusual hours at my husbands new job, for the first time in 6 months, our son has had to enroll at his school's before-school YMCA day care, 3 days a week. He wasn't happy about going back, especially since it involves getting up earlier than he has been, and this is the first time since last July that we've had to pay anything at all for day care. Luckily it's very reasonable. But I think it was good for him that we've been able to care for him at home all this time since last July. He's been happier.

I wore a suit I haven't even tried on for months, today. I sat down at my desk, then noticed that a row of stitching has been pulled apart, along the outside of my right thigh! I went to the locker room in the basement and weighed myself. I've gained 3 pounds since the last time I weighed myself, a few months ago! Dang, I am doing something wrong! Good thing these pants have 2 rows of stitches!

Norweigan language class has started again on Saturday mornings. It's soooo fun! I think it is the highlight of my week right now!

We're so high tech!

I got my husband a Sirius radio receiver for Christmas. I meant for him to listen to it in his car, but he has it set up in the kitchen for now, instead! It's so great to be able to listen to all-Comedy radio, All-Gay radio, Radio Ireland, a channel of old time radio series, and all kinds of other formats !

Then just this week end, I figured out that as AOL subscribers, we can listen to all the XM radio channels over the internet. Even though we're on a modem, all the XM radio channels come over perfectly, with no breaks. I've listened to the All Bollywood musical channel, the Japanese pop music channel, and the All TV theme song channel.

Plus this week end I got a scanner! I scanned a bunch of old family photographs and sent them to my dad's two second-cousins in Bergen Norway that I've been emailing, and I got a reply from one with more pictures from Bergen. It's so awesome!


Tuesday Jan 3 sucked, by the way.
Two days ago, Tuesday, I came home from work, and found my daughter was locked out of the house! She was crying and had been outside for 1/2 hour. And since I last gave her MY house key, I didn't have one. Negligent as we've been in the past, we really had locked all our doors this time. My daughtter's guitar lesson was scheduled in less than one hour, and her guitar was in our house.

I put us all in my car, and drove 20 minutes to my husband's new job, to ask for his key. Luckily I've driven past there before so I know where it is. Otherwise I guess I would have taken us all to the shopping mall to hang out until my husband came home from work late at night. I don't know what we would have done. We were probably stuck in their reception area for another 20 minutes or so because they're huge, and my husband is so new there that the front desk receptionist "sorry, don't normally sit up here," didn't know how to find him. Finally she paged him over head by name. He came to the lobby, gave me his key.

I didn't have my cell phone. I borrowed their phone and a phone book in their lobby, and called the music store, that we would be late. I was anxious not to entirely miss the lesson...because last week Tuesday morning my car died in my driveway, and we put so much effort in to trying to restart it, then having it towed and repaired, that we forgot the music lesson. Back when I didn't have a car, I always hated people who let themselves get carried away by car drama, but that's exactly what I did last week. And I didn't want the poor guy waiting for us a second week. We drove home, I got the guitar, and we got to the music store where my daughter takes her lesson so late that the next student's lesson had started. The receptionist was kind enough to schedule us 1 hour later, because there was an opening. I took us all to Arby's so my blood pressure could go down, and my kids could eat something. We came back, I paid for last week's missed lesson as well as for this weeks lesson.

The good news is that Saturn got my car restarted last week for only $55, they said the engine was flooded. The bad news is he could hear that my timing chain is rattling around in the engine and could just break off at any moment. I'd just fix it for the $600+, and the loud muffler for $200+ but so much else is ready to go wrong to my 1994 150,000 mile Saturn Sedan I think I need to admit defeat. Plus oh by the way I don't have $600 to $1,000 laying around at the moment. If I did, I'd use it as a down payment for a more reliable car.

Today I had numerous copies made of our one remaining house key.

My husband's new job in the professional collections call center is a total electronic sweatshop. He can't even email me or call me from his desk . He' s seen sick coworkers denied their requests to go home sick. In their orientation class they were told they can only use the bathroom during breaks or lunch. The only health insurance plan offered has a $1,000 per person annual deductible. Still, he works mornings some days and evenings on others so he can keep looking AND bring home a paycheck for a while.