HA! I am still here! The party was terrific. The DJ was fab and played 2 of my requests before the kids arrived to get me in the mood to party. I danced a few times and the teens all laughed at my "80's style" dancing. WHAT? The kids had pizza, pop, cake, and they played a lot of pool and danced. The house was easy to put back together and DH is calm once again. His buddy came by in the middle of the party and took him away for beers, so he was very mellow when he got home and the party guests were gone. Besh, I received STUFF from Amazon Marketplace Music. Love it. Thanks for the suggestion! Did you get the picture trail link from anyone yet?????? I'm listening right now to the Pushing Tin sound rack. It's good. I love the song "He Pushes Tin" -- reminds me of flying! I could watch the air traffic sequences from that movie all day long! Am I geekish or not? Tonight, we're watching the "English Patient" for about the 5th or 6th time. Love it. NHSuzanne~ Your shopping spree sounds like fun! I like to shop alone. And I rarely go. I keep thinking I'll go when I'm a size amaller - but it ain't happenin'. Tikanas~ Did you get your winter garden planted?????? Did DS help???? Well, I sculpted a foot slipping into a turkish slipper today. I think I'll make it into a pencil holder-the ankle part being the holder. Only 6 more hours of class to go, and I'm finally getting the hang of it. LOL! Lynn~ Thanks for filling out the questionaire. I am going to use it! Joanne and Patti! HAVE FUN! It's good to hear from both of you---now, don't be strangers to us! We want a report and pictures from you guys! Raeanne, dear one, yes, I am doing laundry---TONS of it! I absolutely have to get my laundry room in order. It's got too much bedding stored in it. I keep asking the family to go through the stash and help me get rid of blankets, comforters, etc, but other things come up all the time. I have been getting rid of old clothes, and other stuff. DH is pretty darn thrilled about that, as you can imagine. If you and your DH decide to go to Alaska, build in a few days in Seattle for fun at my place! Amy~ I am going to email you about a card or print I need. Are you still painting and/or photo-shopping on a regular basis? I hope, hope, hope so! Okay, now, MONDAY. Back to the idiot-proof diet and drinking water! And I am going to get on a regular exercise program, blocking out time for it this time. My in-laws are ALL coming for Christmas and I want to be able to wear what I want and feel fine about it. I have a month. Plus, the doc wants to check on me again this month. I might have that procedure I was talking about done at spring break. All for me, nighty night!

I'm still here and appreciate all of your comments. Jemdandy, I do those things. I offer to help regularly, but she is unhappy with the quality of my cleaning, so she prefers to do it herself (which creates more stress on her). Yes, there is definitely a lot of stress due to my father and the remodeling. Then, pile on the stress from my wife's job and it becomes very very stressful. We are hoping the stress level will drop when the remodeling is finished. I am not completely clueless. On Tuesday, my wife was under a lot of stress and I seemed to deal with it farily well. At least, she was not upset at me and I think she actually felt better after talking to me. However, yesterday was worse, and she felt worse after talking to me. I listened, I care, I felt for her, but I did not give her the empathy in terms of verbal feedback she is looking for. I thought I was, but in fact I did not. Generally, the problems start after work when either I walk in the door (if she is home first), or when she walks in the door (if I am home first). If she says, "I am on overload" this is my clue to watch out, that there are problems, it will be a rough evening, and I need to do my very best to try to empathize with her. She wants me to demonstrably say things which exhibit empathy, like, "no wonder you are overwhelemed, anyone would be with what you are going through." Or, "It is amazing what you have to deal with. I am really impressed with how well you handled that situation." Sometimes I say these things and sometimes I don't. Also, I need to communicate absolutely everything, which I still have not gotten used to. For example, last night, after our blow-up, we went to bed. She seemed to be calming down. It was late, I had just gone to bed and she was in the master bathroom getting ready to come to bed. There was a loud noise. She came out and asked me if I heard a loud noise coming from the guest bathroom. She was concerned that my father was in there and perhaps had fallen down. I said I didn't hear any noise. (In retrospect I did hear a noise but I thought it was coming from the master bath, not the guest bath). I get up, take a quick look in the guest bath, realize my father wasn't in there, and came back to bed. This morning she told me she was very unhappy with me about this behavior. Do you know why? I do in retrospect. I didn't communicate! Before I got out of bed, I should have said to her, "I'll go check it out." Then, when I came back to bed, I should have said, "I took a quick look but my dad wasn't in there." I was tired and I just wasn't thinking. Her response to this is that I obviously think so little of her that I can't even be bothered with telling her what I am doing or what I find out. As though it isn't important for her to know. No, I did not, do not, think along the lines she alledges. I was trying to respond to her concerns as best I could. Mostly, I just didn't think at all. It must have been around 11:30 p.m. and my brain was shutting down for the night. While I should have been a better communicator, I did the best I could do. That was a good example as to how I get in trouble and why my wife is unhappy with me and may just leave me.

Wow! Sure a lot of people showed up for roll call. Good thing I decided to come back to visit after being absent for a few weeks. Please add me to your (ever-growing) list. Using the tv weathermen's lingo, I'm from SoCal. Thanks Minnie for undertaking this huge task. Kat

I've lost the lttle copy utility I had on my computer If anyone wants o update t he list go ahead