Past few days summarized!!!

Annette left to Puerto Rico on Thursday, my first day of class, and Steven and I had so many days off in a row. On Friday, we decided to go get a kitten. We woke up with that mission in mind and we were not giving up until it was accomplished. We searched in the paper and in the internet and after visiting one home to no avail, the second one proved to be stinky but successful. We knocked on the door and the smell was almost as strong as the reaction. We were surprised to see dozens of cats and two dogs running around the cat pee soaked home. We chose the kitten and hawled ass. We named her Claire Fisher (from the character from Six Feet Under.) She's a red head, and that was the inspiration... When we walked into the house, Salsa went on a hissing fit and Vicky couldn't get enough of Claire. She sniffed her til her nose swolled up, literally... (We have the reaction on videotape, it's hilarious...) You can see more pictures of Claire at www.citywithoutwalls8.blogspot.com

Saturday came and went fairly uneventfully. Salsa is still not used to Claire so before we went out, we decided to lock him up in the Laundry room. We went to the theatre and decided to watch some movies. They were soo good. First, we watched War of the Worlds, which has been out for the longest time and we still hadn't seen it. After that, we sneaked in to see The 40-Year-Old Virgin. It was sooo funny. I never stopped laughing throughout the entire movie. The scene in which they were waxing him was the best part, or maybe when he's telling his friend to put a leash on his bitch, or maybe the part in which he is giving himself a hard time for saying that boobs felt like sand bags. It was just too much...Saturday, we decided to go to mom's house and do a BBQ. We ended up cooking, serving, taking kids home (whom we didn't know but still ended up taking them home because mom didn't get there until the kids were gone and our bellies were full). As I was driving back, I realized that Steven was upset with me because I'd taken those boys home when it wasn't my responsability. I was afraid that he was going to say something to mom and when I got there, they were just acting like they were mad at each other just to see my reaction... NOT FUNNY!!! Anyways, we stayed there until late and watched the MTV Video Music Awards. I was rooting for My Chemical Romance's video "Helena" ( http://www.ifilm.com/ifilmdetail/2665489 ) would sweep the awards but Green Day was the one who was chosen for almost all the things it was nominated for. Mom straightened my hair and I straightened hers but not before Steven and I played a good game of Euchre against mom and Jose. They thought the game was fun. I can't wait until November so Steven and I can take on his mom and dad. Bring it on Burketts!!! Before we left, I decided to check my email and I saw that Francisco and Elsita had taken Adriana to take some Pictures for her First Birthday. You can see the rest of them at www.citywithoutwalls4.blogspot.com

Monday morning, Vicky's nose looked a little better. We don't know what happenned to her but we drugged her up all night long with Benadryl and the swelling went down. After redoing my hair, Steven and I were on our way to get our pictures taken. We were very excited... We got there and the process was fairly painless, until they asked Steven to take his shoes off so he could look more relaxed and he refused. I convinced him of course, but he was very hesitant to do so because of his "big toe," whatever that means! Anyways, they are posted below in order of best to not so great. The one below was my favorite one!This one is Steven's favorite. He likes how relaxed he looks, sitting in the floor!Anyways, yesterday, Tuesday, August 30th, I went back to school and Steven went back to clinicals. He doesn't start school until this Friday. I found out about the beach house we'll be staying in when we go to Puerto Rico next month and Steven aprooved. I'm very excited. After school, I went for an interview at Sand Lake Hospital, part of the Orlando Regional Hospitals. I was given a twenty-five cent tour of the facility and from what it looks like, he liked me. Now, I have to go for a Peer-Interview, and then, Night-Shift here I come. I can't wait to get medical insurance... I wonder why?... Leave it to the imagination I guess... Annette came back from Puerto Rico yesterday and Steven and I picked her up at the airport and dropped her off at her apartment complex. We saw Naomi in her Karate uniform and she was as cute as always. Anyways, today I am working at LRMC and Loverico is with me, loving it... Hurricaine Katrina supposedly did a lot of damage in the Gulf Coast and especially in New Orleans. Looters are everywhere and even a police officer was shot in the head by looters but he is expected to recover. Today in the Orlando Sentinel, there was a story on the Florida teacher that wrote the very hateful letter against puertorricans a couple of weeks back. She was asked to resign as a teacher by the Board of Education. I called mom right away and celebrated... You can read the story yourself at

http://www.endiorlando.com/historia_vingles.asp

or in

http://blog.vdare.com/archives/2005/08/18/511/

For those of you who understand spanish and are reading this, this is what the letter actually said:

Estimado congresista,

Creo que debemos cerrar la puerta a todos los extranjeros hasta que nuestra economía y nuestras escuelas vuelvan a ser lo que eran antes. Como profesora por más de 28 años en el estado de la Florida, sé que los extranjeros son los principales consumidores del dinero de los contribuyentes.

Los extranjeros están llevándose todos los trabajos que los americanos pobres y con poca educación podrían tener. Mucha gente está siendo remunerada por debajo de la mesa y, por lo tanto, no están pagando los impuestos que les corresponden.

Las escuelas están enfrentando demasiados problemas que se originan en las diferencias de idioma y nuestros niños americanos, cuyos padres sí pagan impuestos, pierden mucho tiempo de enseñanza por esta razón.

Veo que el dinero se dirige a las entidades caritativas, a inmigrantes mexicanos, haitianos, y del Medio Oriente, en vez de que se dirija a los norteamericanos pobres.

La escuela donde enseño, Sadler Elementary, tiene un 92% de estudiantes puertorriqueños. Por favor considere cambiar las leyes para que esta gente no venga aquí y se quede en Puerto Rico. Ellos destruyen Orlando.

Estos niños puertorriqueños están retrasando académicamente a los estudiante norteamericanos. Y los maestros puertorriqueños siguen consiguiendo extensiones en sus certificados de enseñanza temporal, con lo cual se les permite continuar enseñando sin la capacitación debida.

Puedo decir, honestamente, que los maestros puertorriqueños de mi escuela me piden continuamente ayuda con matemáticas, porque su educación en Puerto Rico apenas llega al equivalente de un quinto grado en los Estados Unidos. Tampoco saben álgebra y se apoyan en el sistema para sobrevivir.

Encuentro que los niños haitianos son más agresivos en la clase y se nota que no han asistido a la escuela con regularidad previamente. Su pobre conducta es un serio problema.

En Winter Haven, un área donde se cultivan naranjas, los trabajadores son en su mayoría mexicanos y se llevan los trabajos que solían realizar los blancos y negros pobres. Muchos de estos mexicanos, según me dicen, también traen drogas y enfermedades incurables, como la tuberculosis.

Sé que la solución es difícil, pero otros países protegen sus fronteras y no permiten que los extranjeros se queden con los trabajos de sus ciudadanos.

Por favor, no permita que los criminales se queden en el país, y se apoderen de los empleos en la Florida.

Sinceramente,
Jan P. Hall

Alias (Bitch extraordinare)

Vacation so far...

Today, Friday, August 27, 2005. It is 12:51am and I am laying in bed thinking about this past week. I have done many things after getting back from a great weekend in Miami. The not so awesome things include work and getting to work. I actually started school this week and I'm feeling all smart and all. I am taking really hard classes so it's kind of gonna be a pain in my behind, but I can lick it. I am taking Pre-Calculus, Statistics, and American Literature. I am taking the Lit class online that way I don't have to waste my time with some Shakesperian wannabe trying to tell me how I should organize my thoughts. I've gotten enough of that with all the years of required english classes I've had to take with all the money making BullS$%# skeems at every Florida College that's ever existed. I hate it. All the prerequisites are sure to put a hole in your pocket and maybe even one in your head after I blow it off with a shotgun with all the headaches. Today I took an excemption exam for Computer Proficiency and I failed it by three points. Now, I have to pay three-hundred dollars just to take the stupid class. My brother Junito FINALLY passed his driver's test and he was able to drive to work by himself. We spent the day painting his room, which will soon be a guest bedroom when he goes into the Marines of the Fricking United States of Fricking America. He's gonna get killed and I'm gonne drive down to the White House personally and tell the president off personally. Swear it on my life! Anyways, What would Buddha do? like my friend Loverico says... We visited him at his new job today and were tempted to sing a couple of karaoke songs at the lounge. We signed up for a song and ran like hell, afraid of the rejection from all the confederate flag whores that were present. We sat, looking at all the drunkards and thought:"What a mess..." Those white people get drunk and you can predict what's gonna happen in the dance floor.

Anyways, finally drove home and figured I should go down to JJ Whispers but without Annette it's no fun...

Loving the vacation so far... Nudist beach tomorrow? Maybe!!! Can't wait til College Football season starts (This Thursday!!!) and NFL starts on Thursday, September 8th, at 8pm. WOOOOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOO!!!

Til Next time...

BUSSINESS AS USUAL!!

Well, the mini vacation was fun, but now it's bussiness as usual. Life goes on!!!

The final episode of Six Feet Under...EVER!

This finale is not without tears, four-letter words, dark humor and (naturally) death. The Fishers wouldn’t have it any other way.

At the start of the episode, everyone seems to be going nuts. Small wonder. Life has been awfully punishing of late.

Nate Fisher, the conflicted man-boy, died three episodes ago from a brain hemorrhage. Now his younger brother David, sister Claire and mother Ruth, as well as his estranged wife Brenda (who gives birth prematurely to their child) sink further into gloom.

Meanwhile, Nate continues his post-mortem haunts, in this episode initially berating Brenda for causing their infant daughter’s possible brain damage.

Rebellious artist Claire is panicked about moving from Los Angeles and launching her career.

Ruth, whose husband died in the series’ debut, has now buried her first-born and faces losing her daughter.

And what about David, the dutiful son who ran the funeral home and served as the moral center of the series? During its run, he has confronted his homosexuality, formed a lasting relationship and adopted two boys. But now, grief-stricken, he has hit a wall.

For five rocky seasons, the Fishers and everyone who shared their orbit have taken it on the chin. They have waged war with themselves, one another and an unforgiving universe.
Smart, self-absorbed, unsettled, all too human — to us, these people were fascinating and often relatable. But not always easy to deal with. They could really try our patience. They were overdue for fixing.

Good news: By the end of the 75-minute finale, we can leave them secure in knowing their recovery has begun. And thanks to the wondrously fitting postscript, we will know a great deal more.

Even at the end, “Six Feet Under” doesn’t go soft. But it takes its leave with its affairs in order. It can rest, at last, in peace.

“Six Feet Under” thought a lot about death, and about death’s impact on the survivors. After all, it viewed death through the eyes of a family that runs a funeral home.

In its premiere four years ago, its tone was quickly established: The patriarch, Nathaniel Fisher, was killed while fiddling with his cigarette when a bus smacked into the hearse he was driving.

But he never went away; he engaged in an active afterlife throughout the series’ run.

Now, on the finale, he reappears to bully his son David into saving himself. Later in the episode, he and son Nate jointly offer Brenda a much-needed blessing.

On “Six Feet Under,” ghostly presences are skilled at saying what needs to be said, as when Nate gives Claire a pep talk about moving to New York to pursue her photography.
“You want to know a secret?” he counsels. “I spent my whole life being scared: of not being ready, of not being right, of not being who I should be. And where did it get me?”

Then, in the show’s closing minutes, as Claire gathers the people she loves most for a farewell photo before she drives away, Nate, looking on, says a curious thing.
“You can’t take a picture of this,” he tells her. “It’s already gone.”

In this richly satisfying finish to a series like none other, we understand what he means. We see these characters as we have never seen them before. But as we realize how much we cared for them, we understand they’re not there. “Six Feet Under” is over. So the pictures that count will reside inside us. Long after it has gone.

TRIP TO MIAMI WITH ANNETTE

Steven took this picture of me. Consider it the B E F O R E...
This is the A F T E R ... The pre-Miami trip hair do!

We were in a silly mood after our long drive to Miami. We didn't get to go out because we arrived at the hotel at 3:45am...Next day, early morning, I arrive at the beach. Picture time!!!Can anyone buy a burger for this poor woman? Spell A.N.O.R.E.X.I.A.Topless sunbathing is tolerated in Miami beaches!!!We did it too, only that nobody saw our fronts!!! Made you look!

It rained so hard that I thought I was going to lose my life. It later became sunny once again...

FOR MORE PICTURES CHECK THE LINK BELOW:

www.onedayinmiami.blogspot.com

Devil Rays vs. The Yankees

Sunday, August 14th, 2005

Pretty slow this Sunday, but what do you expect? It's Sunday. Since church gatherings are over and the breakfast crowd is out of the way, Steven and I decided to give the mall a little visit.
It was around 5pm, after I had taken a nap thinking I had to work night shift in Tavares and being abruptly awoken by none other than the king with the good news of my call off, that we decided to make a run for it. We were going to the movies. I had been very excited to see The Skeleton Key, that, by the way, is not worth the money. The Skeleton Key was not going to start until 7pm, therefore, we bought the tickets for it anyway, ate some nasty chinese food at the food court, and went inside to see The Dukes of Hazzard.
Steven had told me all kinds of things about the series from the 70's but I had never seen it myself. I figured it's gonna be a comedy at least. So, we went in and loved the stupidity of the story line. Steven told me all about Boss Hogg and the crooked cop, the sherriff, and Daisy, and even the story about the confederate flag on top of General Lee. It was pretty cool for a comedy. I liked the scene with the oncampus cops trying to arrest them on their little golf carts. "Mother of God," they used the same line and the same cop from the movie "Super Troopers."
Check the following link for "Super Troopers" clips: http://www.ifilm.com/ifilmdetail/2402062
I love that stupid movie. Anyways, loved the movies, loved my Sunday, loved not working.

Abuela's day out!!!

We arrived at abuela's house to pick her up at around 2pm. She was dressed up and ready to go. We ended up at the Olive Garden parking lot thinking, this sounds good! We were soooo hungry! We look a couple of pictures with our new camera out in the parking lot and we went inside!
Grandma loves that Steven!!!

We could tell that abuela was very happy to be with us. She smiled the whole time!
After ordering a glass of white wine for her, we went on and ordered

some dipping sauces for our breadsticks and we stuffed our faces

in it and the complimentary salad!!!

I ordered Shrimp Alfredo because after abuela said she wanted that I kind of craved it also!!!! After a quick break to the ladies, we arrived back at the table. Not more than two minutes passed and the waiter arrived with a singing entourage. We had told them it was abuela's birthday just so we could see her face. We recorded the whole thing with our camera. It was adorable!!!

We were pretty proud of ourselves by now!!! Abuela loved the cake. She even asked if she could take the rest of it home with her. I don't think she can eat the whole thing, but she asked, and it is her "birthday"!!!

After all the eating and pretend birthdays, we decided to drop her off at her house. It was fun!

Afterwards, Annette and I went out. We went to Studio 58. It was OK.