It is hunting season in Utah which for our family means family and fun.  This year everything is being thrown off course by the H1N1 flu.  Yesterday, my nephew tested positive. So now he along with all of his siblings along with two cousins are quarantined at my sister-in-law’s house.  My first reaction was I am not going.  Bill is already there.  After some thought, I am going up there tomorrow.  We will be staying a motel. We may quarantine ourselves in the motel until Saturday which is the real reason I am going up there. My niece is being blessed that day.  She is a miracle baby and plus I haven’t seen her yet.  I know we will be okay.  I did call everywhere to see where the vaccine was available, but it’s not in New Mexico yet.  The Air Force clinic where we get our care won’t have the vaccine until November.  Which makes me wonder if the government really knows what is going on.  Of course, the answer is no.  The CDC is warning everyone to get the vaccine, but there aren’t any to be had.  My sister in law in Salt Lake City tried to get one this morning.  They had 1400 vaccines and 3000 to 4000 people showed up.  This leads me to another question, are we all going a little crazy over this? I know I have.   It’s the unknown.  This is a new strain and nobody seems to know anything about it.  They do have a vaccine so that’s good.  It’s scary for me because my kids are more susceptible to getting it.  As we age, we get some immunity.  That’s why people over the age of 65 are not going to be given the vaccine until those who are in the “danger zones” get it.  From everything I have read, it is considered to be mild once you get it.  Of course it’s no fun being sick, but the majority of people who do get sick will start feeling better in a few days.  So when the vaccine is available, my family will be in line.  But until then the H1N1 is never from my mind.

Saturday Night Live did it! They made fun of Obama. I haven’t watched the show in a long time, but I give them thumbs up on this one.  Below is the link. Enjoy!

http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/clips/obama-address/1163263/

(You’ll have to cut and paste into your browser and it should work. I tried to do a live link, but it wouldn’t come up. Sorry.)

Lately, I have been watching a lot of news and now I think I am all news’d out.  I am so done with the healthcare debate.  I admit I still catch a peek just to see what’s going on, but I need to move on.  I was thinking about what I could post as random thoughts are floating in my head.  So in no order things that you probably don’t care about or maybe don’t even want to know. 

1. I recently had a colonoscopy because of my Crohn’s disease.  It was very painful. It took me about a week to recover. 

2. Because of said colonoscopy, I am currently on Prednisone (a steroid).  It makes me achy, but it also makes me hungry! The cravings are very strange.  Usually I crave something sweet. Lately, I have been craving bologna and cheese sandwiches.  I haven’t had a bologna and cheese sandwich in years.  Now all of a sudden, it’s my lunch every day.  All thanks to Prednisone. 

3. I really like living here in New Mexico and especially the little town we live in.  I do miss not having Target right down the street or Kohl’s a hop, skip and a jump away.  I am surviving though and probably saving money, too.

4. I often times feel that I need to be teaching Baden more, but am learning that through every day interactions he is learning.  Kids are amazing.

5. I think everybody should read Glenn Beck’s book, Common Sense.  I will be doing another blog post about this because it is that good. 

6. I subscribe to the National Review and the Weekly Standard. They are both political magazines with a conservative bend.  I also get Reader’s Digest and a  cooking magazine which I really enjoy reading, but I needed something entertaining so I am now a subscriber to Entertainment Weekly.  

7. I decided to start subscribing to EW when I went to the movies last weekend and realized I had no idea what was coming out and I felt so out of it. 

8. I was recently called to be the assistant den leader in Cub Scouts at church.  I also received a second calling as a Relief Society teacher.  I am not sure about Cub Scouts, but am way excited about RS.

9. If I ever get to build a house, I want radiant floor heating.  We have tile flooring in our house and the tooties get chilly really fast.

10. I am excited about the upcoming BallonFest in ABQ.

11. I am really looking forward to spending Thanksgiving with Bill’s sister and her family.

12. I am ultra excited to be spending Christmas with my parents for the first time in many, many years.  

13. We have a ton of toys up in the loft, but the boys always want to play downstairs. 

14. I am seriously considering making freezer meals so I don’t have to worry about what to cook each night. I really hate cooking dinner.  Peanut butter and jelly, anyone?

15. I wish I was a better organizer.

16. I like Facebook mainly because of Bejeweled Blitz, but love blogging more.  It’s my electronic journal.

17. Really need to be doing my transcribing work, but always find something better to do.

18. I am really proud of Jessica and all of her accomplishments. She is really growing at BYU.

19. Hopes that if my mother in law reads this, that she can make me some more dish towels that are so cute. hint, hint. 

20. Really need to get back to work.

9/11.  What does that mean to you?  Most people remember exactly what they were doing when they heard or saw the attacks on September 11th.  It is like that with most major events in a person’s life.  People from my parents’ generation remember what they were doing and where they were when they found out JFK had been assassinated.  So you remember the who, where and how, but do you really remember.  Every day that I read or hear about the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan, I think of 9/11.  Despite what the pundits say and how we shouldn’t be there, our military is fighting for those that lost their lives on 9/11.  There is no other way around it.  Every time I go through airport security or board an airplane, I think of 9/11.  When I look at the Pentagon, I think of  9/11.  When I see the empty New York City skyline without the Twin Towers, I think of 9/11. When I see an empty field, I think of 9/11.  When I see a blue sky without a cloud in it, I think of 9/11.  When I see firefighters or police officers, I think of 9/11.  9/11 is never far from my mind.  It should be on the mind of every citizen of the United States.  It is not a day we like to think about it or certainly relive, but we can never forget.  We must remember.

Yesterday, President Obama held a townhall meeting in New Hampshire.  This was by far the most tame townhall, but it is to be expected.  There were plants in the audience asking questions and people just weren’t going to risk being frisked by the Secret Service.  The best quote from the meeting came from President Obama.

“UPS and FedEx are doing just fine. It’s the Post Office that’s always having problems.”

Hmmm… isn’t the Post Office run by the government? Maybe he gets it.  Private companies (i.e. private insurance) are doing good, but the government run agencies like the Post Office are losing money.  It makes you stop and think.

I have never been a big fan of Dick Cheney, but now I like him. His likability numbers have gone way up in my book.  Pres. Obama recently approved sensitive CIA papers documenting ‘enhanced interrogation’ to be released to the public.  Finally a Republican called him on it and that man would be Dick Cheney. I always thought that the Bush administration should have defended itself, but they never did. Now, Dick Cheney and Karl Rove are out there saying wait a minute, this is what happened and why. I wonder if this would have happened before, would we have someone different in the White House?   Yesterday, both the President and Dick Cheney spoke.  Below is what they had to say about enhanced interrogation techniques and the release of classified information.

President Obama:
“I banned the use of so-called enhanced interrogation techniques by the United States of America. I know some have argued that brutal methods like water-boarding were necessary to keep us safe. I could not disagree more. As commander-in-chief, I see the intelligence, I bear responsibility for keeping this country safe and I reject the assertion that these are the most effective means of interrogation. What’s more, they undermine the rule of law. 

“They alienate us in the world. They serve as a recruitment tool for terrorists, and increase the will of our enemies to fight us, while decreasing the will of others to work with America. They risk the lives of our troops by making it less likely that others will surrender to them in battle and more likely that Americans will be mistreated if they are captured. In short, they did not advance our war and counter-terrorism efforts — they undermined them, and that is why I ended them once and for all.”

Former Vice President Dick Cheney:
 “I was and remain a strong proponent of our enhanced interrogation program. The interrogations were used on hardened terrorists after other efforts failed. They were legal, essential, justified, successful and the right thing to do. The intelligence officers who questioned the terrorists can be proud of their work and proud of the results, because they prevented the violent death of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of innocent people.

“Another term out there that slipped into the discussion is the notion that American interrogation practices were a “recruitment tool” for the enemy. On this theory, by the tough questioning of killers, we have supposedly fallen short of our own values. This recruitment-tool theory has become something of a mantra lately, including from the President himself. And after a familiar fashion, it excuses the violent and blames America for the evil that others do. It’s another version of that same old refrain from the Left, “We brought it on ourselves.”

“It is much closer to the truth that terrorists hate this country precisely because of the values we profess and seek to live by, not by some alleged failure to do so. Nor are terrorists or those who see them as victims exactly the best judges of America’s moral standards, one way or the other.”

The Release of Classified Information

President Obama:
“The argument that somehow by releasing those memos, we are providing terrorists with information about how they will be interrogated is unfounded — we will not be interrogating terrorists using that approach, because that approach is now prohibited. In short, I released these memos because there was no overriding reason to protect them. And the ensuing debate has helped the American people better understand how these interrogation methods came to be authorized and used.

Former Vice President Cheney:
“Somehow, when the soul-searching was done and the veil was lifted on the policies of the Bush administration, the public was given less than half the truth. The released memos were carefully redacted to leave out references to what our government learned through the methods in question. Other memos, laying out specific terrorist plots that were averted, apparently were not even considered for release. For reasons the administration has yet to explain, they believe the public has a right to know the method of the questions, but not the content of the answers.”

 I am so glad that finally someone has stood up and said enough is enough. Get the facts straight.  We need more people blowing the whistle on this administration and stop the fawning that continues to happen in the media. Go, Cheney, Go!

Read more: “Full transcript: Dick Cheney’s speech to the American Enterprise Institute – Politico Staff – POLITICO.com” – http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0509/22823_Page4.html#ixzz0GFscB6XS&A

I have been avoiding Facebook like the plague or swine flu to be more current.  Facebook was to me like It’s a Wonderful Life is to my husband.  He will not watch the movie and vows he never will.  I have tried many times, but he won’t succumb to the pressure.  My friend, Sharon was here for a few days visiting.  We have been friends for six years.  She moved last year to Kansas and is now moving to Hawaii.  She is on Facebook.  I didn’t join.  Then when I saw her this week, we were talking about Facebook.  She was talking about photos and videos of her kids.  I thought I really want to see this stuff.  What a great way to keep in touch with her.  So, last night we set up a Facebook account.  Granted this account is really for me and my husband.  We now get to see pictures of his best friend’s girlfriend and will be able to keep up with him while he is in Iraq.  So all of this is really cool.  But I still think I am over my head. I love my blogs. I love to write so they are perfect. Facebook is little snippets.  That’s not me.  Practically all of my husband’s family is on Facebook.  None of mine are.  Boo hoo. By the way, my husband got a call from his sister about us being on Facebook.  But she has yet to accept our invitation.  Hmmm……..     Then I looked for high school friends and couldn’t find any.  How sad is that? I don’t remember any college friends so no big deal there.  I have a feeling Facebook can become a time sucker and I just don’t have time right now.  But I think it will become part of my routine. Check blogs and Facebook.