It was nice to spend time with the family at my Aunt's house. It was weird to not be able to stuff myself full or eat chocolate or nuts but I am thankful that I could at least eat when some people don't even have food. So basically, what I am trying to say is that I didn't take pictures of the food. I think I am going to just stop with that.

I miss (e:terry) - I can't wait for him to come home.



My cousin Christina now had a fourth child named Nathan. He is really cute. That is Santa Claus in the back with my Aunt, their Grandmother. I wonder how my cousin does it - it must be so hectic having four little kids. She always seems so put together as do the kids. Her husband had nine brothers and sisters so I guess it is doable. I guess my grandparents both had a large amount of brothers and sisters too but they both kind of lived the farm life with lots of work to do and lots of space to do it on - which is a little different

I didn't get (e:mike) the name you own star thing because everyone thinks it is a scam and I agree. One astronomer said, "Its like selling name your own air particle." No one really owns it. Then I thought why not start a site to sell other things you can't really buy and give people fancy certificates. I am kind of thinking it might be worth it. What about a piece of elmwoodstrip in a test tube like they did with the Berlin wall. Just fill it up with some street rubble from elmwood? I think I have a winner!

Paul

I was reading on Buffalo Rising that the Elmwood Farmers market found a winter home in the presbyterian church on Elmwood. Isn't that Drew's church?

I am happy to announce that many of the vendors from the Elmwood-Bidwell Farmers Market, along with a few others, will kick off the opening of the Wintermarket on Elmwood on January 13th. Located inside the Presbyterian Church at the corner of Lafayette and Elmwood, it will be open on Sundays from 1 - 4PM until the Elmwood-Bidwell Market re-opens in May.

I was reading this site about some Christmas urban legend which later told of some real holiday trivia from Japanese adoption of western holidays. The Buffalo News is even featured as a source on this article in snopes.

As you'd expect in a country where less than 1% of the population is Christian (the rest is primarily Shinto or Buddhist), Christmas is a purely secular occasion, with shops and businesses remaining open for the day ... The elimination of the religious aspects of Christmas and its hyper-commercialization have led to some unique (and, to us, bizarre) ways of celebrating it ... What we do find unusual is a custom of young couples exchanging presents of expensive jewelry, heading out to high-priced hotels, and being directed by scantily-clad female elves to rooms complete with Christmas trees, where the lovebirds spend their Christmas Eve in romantic bliss. The co-optation of familiar Christmas figures - both secular and religious - in the service of mass merchandising has produced some rather curious blendings: Colonel Sanders dressed in a Santa suit (as KFC tried strenuously to promote fried chicken as the "traditional" Christmas meal) ... Santa in a graveyard accompanied by the Virgin Mary on broomstick, elves plastered on sake, and a Christmas revue featuring "stripping nuns and three lecherous Wise Men."

I slept though it pretty much the whole thing. I just thought if I kept on sleeping I wouldnt have to deal with he stomach drama, which kind of, a tiny bit, improved.

Bye bye, little tooth part
Then this morning I woke up after a 20 hour nap because my back was starting to hurt from sleeping and was brushing my teeth when a part of my tooth fell out on a sunday. Now there is a hole in the tooth and new
little pieces keep falling out.



I just hope it can hold off until tomorrow before it really falls apart because no dentist seems to be open today. You can see from the picture that not much of the tooth is real. Most of it is the white filling. I had all my amalgam metal fillings taken out and replaced with the white ones in 1997 in Canada. They said it had a 5-10 year life span so I guess I am about to have a dental emergency considering I had 12 fillings replaced at that time. Maybe I should have just kept the freakin metal ones but I couldn't get over the idea of mercury getting into my body.



It's all my fault for the amount of candy I ate as a child. Like I used to (pre-stomach thing) eat a lot of candy as an adult - but it was way worse as a child.

Where should the chemicals go?
What does everyone else do with all their chemicals? When we bought the house we inherited tons of chemicals, half empty, rusted crap, etc. I tried to put them all together in two places of the garage and basement but really it seems dangerous. Especially the one in the garage, I took them all and put them in two plastic totes.

I kept meaning to deal with it. Once we actually brought them with us to the dump but they didn't take them there. So I searched and found this erie county government site that isn't very up to date. Apparently, the next scheduled drop off day is Sept 8th, 2007. I am going to call tomorrow and find out about the next one.

Radon Gas
While I was on the site I found info about radon . I am uploading their education video to youtube so that it is a badnwidth friendly more acessible version instead of the 85Mb mpeg on the erie county site. I will post it here when it is done.

Did you know that radon is common in NYS and in Western New York.



It is an odorless, colorless gas that comes out of the soil and into your house. Luckily, in the city it looks like it isn't much of a problem but way out in some suburbs and rural areas it looks dangerous. Especially, marilla - I mean I wouldn't even want to live in East Aurora.