Who are you?

I just noticed that there are still like 120 people that visit this blog daily. DAILY! Who are you people? This blog is deader than dead. WHO HAS TIME FOR FUNNY STORIES ABOUT BEING NAKED AT THE CHIROPRACTOR? Not me.

I had another kid. I have two kids now. Two kids is more than one. I am one person. There are more kids than there are me. This seems like a bad ratio.

life goes on, indeed.

Man, I used to be one hell of a funny bitch. What happened??? It's like I hit 30 and suddenly was no fun anymore. Maychance (perbe?) I'll start posting again, even though I've lost all my followers and friends. Sob. I was once a not-really-big deal in the blogosphere!

But. I have a kid now. I grew a little human and she came out of me and now she sits up and eats and poops like a real person. Her name is Carys and she's amazing.

Whoa. I'm a mom. Weird.

life goes on. ?.

In the time since I last posted, I found out I was pregnant. December 29, 2009.

2009 turned into 2010.

We celebrated Valentine's Day by telling my family we were having a baby.

We had an ultrasound and saw our perfect baby.

March turned into April, and we were oh-so-close to the halfway point of the pregnancy, April 20.

On April 12, far too early, we had our son, Caleb Anthony. He lived for 20 minutes.

On April 14, we're hanging in there. Barely.

I have a new blog about our new life.

border patrol? thank you for protecting us!

One of my friends is a Canadian citizen who recently had to go through the US on her way to Mexico. She just emailed me these snippets from her conversations with the border guards and I can't stop laughing.

Him: Why does your friend live in Seattle if he's Canadian?
K: He works for Amazon.com.
Him: Why?
K: I don't know... because they hired him??
Him: How long has he worked there?
K: Almost 9 years. he has a visa, but he applied for a green card a couple years ago.
Hhim: Well, he's not gonna get it, I'll tell you that right now.
K: ...ok....

---------------

Him: Where are you going?
K: Mexico.
Him: Have you been to Mexico before?
K: No.
Him: Where in Mexico?
K: Puerto Vallarta. The resort is called Velas Vallarta.
Him: You're being pretty vague...where are you staying specifically?
K: Like I said, it's called Velas Vallarta, in Puerto Vallarta.
Him: Is it in Nuevo Vallarta?
K: No, it's in Puerto Vallarta.
Him: Yeah, but where is it?
K: I don't know...it's on the water.
Him: There are over 200 hotels on the water there, where is this one?
K: I don't know the address!

-----------------

Him: Have you ever been arrested?
K: No.
Him: You sure?
K: Yes, I'm sure I've never been arrested.
Him: I don't believe you.
K: Well, you have my passport, can't you see that on your computer that I've never been arrested?
Him: Well, I'm gonna let you go, but know I don't believe you.

---------------------

Him: Who booked the trip, you or your friend?
K: My friend.
Him: Why didn't you?
K: Well, only one of us was going to book it, since we were going together. So it was 50/50 odds.

-----------------------

Him, while searching my purse: What's this?
K: Just some mail I picked up on my way out the door.
Him: I'm going to open your bank statement.
K: Um...ok... (while thinking, "What, are you expecting to see 'DEPOSIT FROM TERRORIST ORGANIZATION: $2,000,000'????????????")

-----------------------

She also overheard the same guard asking another woman from their bus questions in another WTF interview.

Him: Are you going to work in the States?
Her: No, I'm going to visit my daughter.
Him: Well, does she live here illegally?
Her: No, she's a professor at the university and has been for 25 years.
Him: You come down here a lot.
Her: Yes, she's my daughter.
Him: Well, you shouldn't visit her so much.

Remembering Peter Alexander Bielfeld

This post was written as part of Project 2996.

Firefighter Peter Bielfeld
Originally uploaded by elswatchoboracho

When he was five, little Petey had a tooth extracted. He was so upset that his father took him to a toy store and let him pick out any toy he wanted. Petey picked a big, red, shiny firetruck, which he kept for years afterward. “All he wanted to be was a fireman,” his father Ernest recalled.

Though his first job was working with his father as a paper handler at The Daily News, he did grow up and achieved his dream. By 2001, he had been a firefighter for over 19 years. He was known in the neighborhood for standing Ladder Company 42 in the Bronx smoking a cigar or walking around with his daughter.


On September 8, he suffered injuries fighting a fire in the Bronx. Three days later, he was in the FDNY’s medical office in Brooklyn when the call went out – planes had crashed into the World Trade Center buildings, they were burning, and people were dying. He borrowed a colleague's gear, and rushed to do what he had wanted to do since the age of five – fight fires and rescue people.

His brother Roger knew it. "This is what he wanted to do," said Roger. "You couldn't keep him out of there if you chained him up."

His father agreed. "I guess it was just meant to be," Ernest said. "You can't run away from what was meant to be."


After he died, it took nearly a year to locate his remains. In that time, a mural honoring him was painted in the Bronx. When his funeral was held on September 10, 2002, the fire truck bearing his coffin drove past the artwork. The college where he played football at retired his jersey, number 42 – ironically the same number of his ladder company.

Peter wasn’t just a firefighter, and he wasn’t just a hero – though that’s how he is remembered today. Perhaps more importantly, he was a son, a father, a brother, a brother-in-law, a cousin, an uncle. It’s difficult to remember at times that these were real people who had real lives that were cut short so quickly, and that real people miss them every day – that he wasn’t just one of the thousands that died. That’s why it’s so important to remember each victim individually, and I’m honored to have been chosen to remember Peter Alexander Bielfeld.





Sources:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/elswatchoboracho/2719675618/
http://www.fdnyc.mobi/346/BIELFE.gif
http://www.nyjnews.com/9/11/Firefighters
http://www.legacy.com/Sept11/Story.aspx?PersonID=132596
http://tnchick.com/archives/782
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2008/05/28/2008-05-28_the_news_puts_up_5g_to_catch_vandal_who_.html#ixzz0QXKWMNRo