April 27, 2004--oy

Gad, you have no idea how glad I will be when this month is over. It has sucked majorly. The fire was awful, we ran out of food, the phone is shut off and I'm tired of being depressed and having no transportation. We have a new roommate! Jeremy's friend Chauncy has been homeless, so he's been staying here. Of course it drained what little resources we had, but I couldn't have him out on the street. He's hard of hearing and on SSI. He's 19 and he hasn't been getting his SSI since he turned 18. We all went to Youngstown to the Social Security office and I interpeted for him so now he will have his money. Since he's respectful, clean and very nice, I asked him if he wanted to live with us and he was so happy he said yes. It has to suck not knowing where you're going to sleep or eat every night. I will manage the bills and they will each give me $200 a month. I am amazed at how much the deaf here don't know about paying bills, managing money and getting things done. Nobody has taken the time to teach them these things us hearing people take for granted. Chauncy didn't know he could get his money by himself by just going to the Social Security office! Jeremy's SSI was a mess too before he moved in. I think I'm a lousy interpeter, but I seem to do well enough to help out my friends. The cost of living is cheap here thank god. Both boys want to get jobs as soon as possible. I told them I would help them fill out the paperwork and whatnot and keep their savings so they can get a car. I'm going over the budget with them every month so they can learn how to do it themselves and so they can see where the money is going. They in turn are teaching me to be more fluent in sign language. We all help each other and it works! =)
Ok, I'm off to scrub my floors to get all the workman's footprints cleaned up. Have a happy *hump* day kittens! xoxoxo

pondered at 10:45 pm Tuesday

April 24, 2004--ta daa!



pondered at 2:37 am Saturday

April 22, 2004--pink and pluggage and man flesh ^_^

Greetings kittens! Hope everyone is ok and reasonably content. Welcome back Reesa! Methinks some pluggage is in order:
Jen (for a lovely blog), Aile (for mastering tables), Kat (cuz she rocks), Friday (cuz she is awesome), Karrie (cuz she's back online! woohoo!), Liz (stunning blog), OdsGirl (my fav blinkie maker), Otto (for a shiny happy cheery blog), and Kelly (for sweet web sets). Now wasn't that fun?!
I can't wait for the weekend, my house will be free of workmen and my pc will not be shrouded. *lol* I am so behind in my internet stuff, I haven't really caught up since the fire last month. I am very lucky I didn't lose any possessions like my neighbors did. I was actually able to find my oven and bake them a casserole this week, I feel so bad for them. They assured me that they and the landlady have insurance, but some things are just irreplaceble. The fright of having a fire is itself mind boggling. Yikes. I now have 4 smoke detectors and I keep my fire extinguisher very handy. Gad, I hope I never have to go through this again.
My blog is pretty n' pink! Never in my wildest cyber dreams did I ever think I would make a pink layout. It still makes me laugh at myself. But I saw the set and it grabbed me and seemed fitting so here it is. Poor Aragorn, he was only here 8 days I think. Now if he could only be here in the flesh...*sigh*
Speaking of man flesh, May 14 "Troy" with Brad Pitt hits the theaters. I am sooo there! *drool* In June, the new Harry Potter movie comes out and I am going to see it as a birthday present from the Puppy Couple. ^_^ I may not want a man in my life right now, but I sure don't mind looking at them! Some of them are very easy on the eyes and twitter pate the heart. *bats eyes*
Ok! *lol* I have many things planned for Paulina's Playground, so I am off to play. FYI-Two Smart Girls Magazine is closed for circumstances beyond my control. Go ahead and remove your links. =( I will be recycling many pages to the Playground so all that work won't be lost. You win some, you lose some. Oh well, it's all good.
Later kittens!

pondered at 10:25 pm Thursday

April 21, 2004--new layout--pink

Don't ask.

pondered at 6:39 pm Wednesday

April 20, 2004--mini hiatus?

Just a quick update to say I'm fine, my apt is being repaired so my pc is mostly under a drop cloth. I hope everyone is well and I'm sorry I haven't visited my dailies lately, but with all the dust and paint and clumsy workman it's been crazy. I'm so afraid someone is going to drop a beam or something on my pc. Oy. >_<

pondered at 10:10 pm Tuesday

April 15, 2004--this & that

I'm up in the morning! Not necessarily coherent, but I'm up. I have a houseful of deaf people as 3 friends from Columbus showed up at 10am and two spent the night. I'm learning the difference between hard of hearing people and the deaf. Somehow I thought they were alike but they are not. The deaf use sign and whatever speech they have and the hard of hearing use sign and their voice unless they are talking to profoundly deaf people, then they don't use their voice, it's more of a whisper of the words. I feel very excluded, not because of them, but because I am not deaf. It's the same as sitting in a roomfull of French people, I'm lost. True, I can sign, but I am no where as proficent as the deaf are. So, I've just wandered over here to my computer and you, kittens. They are conversing and laughing, then watching as one person tells a story and then signing their reactions. I catch some of it, but sometimes they sign so fast, I lose the thread of the conversation. And my stupid fingers get tangled up when I try to finger spell a word. They didn't used to. They are sooo patient with me and they are teaching me more signs everyday. Of course, I am learning the regional slang of Columbus and Cleveland. Some signs would be different in New York or Philedelphia. In other countries, signing is vastly diifferent. What does one do if one can't sign French, let alone speak it?
Ah, the things I ponder. I think it's time to go play with html and create something beautiful. I already have a page in mind for Paulina's Playground in honor of The Brat Pack. See ya.

pondered at 12:38 pm Thursday

April 13, 2004--Aragon & blue

Good morning kittens! New layout! I told you the white wouldn't be up much longer. I've been watching a lot of LOTR lately. Since Aragon is just my type, (the gorgeous rough-around-the-edges tragic loner), and since I'm single and celibate, I thought I'd put up a bit of man flesh. ^^ It was a pleasant 3 hours or so. I even made my own graphics. I always have to make my graphics in Adobe PS7 then finish and optimize in PSP8. I just can't figure out how to do it all in one program. I recently joined on online PSP workshop, but I'm in way over my head. I might just back out of that and do something else. There are plenty of graphic designers out there that make beautiful linkware for someone like me who is *cough* graphically challenged. I just made this layout because I couldn't find any pre-made ones I wanted to use. I went for blue instead of black, but I'm sure the next layout will be darker. Hope you like.
Oy, I've been online since 2:30 pm yesterday, so I'm going to bed. Have a great Tuesday kittens!

pondered at 5:38 am Tuesday

April 12, 2004--Monday, Monday

Hi kittens. I hope everyone had a nice Easter. I spent the weekend with my deaf friends and had a wonderful time. I even met some new people. =) It was nice to just relax and not think about life, but of course, it's the new week and all the crap is still there. Ah well.
Hope everyone has a good week. xoxo

pondered at 12:53 am Monday

April 8, 2004--craptacular day

Hello kittens. I have not been blogging for I have been lost in my Playground, busily avoiding the fact that life sucks and then you die. Real life is kicking me in the butt right now and I'm reeling. I'm so depressed it's not funny, and working on the Playground helps me forget all that. *sigh* I just committed myself to some causes that will require me to be online everyday, which I usually am anyway. But today my landlady informed me there are more repairs scheduled on the house the last two weeks of the month. The Fire Marshall says I need to stay somewhere else during the repairs (from the fire). Well, the only place I can stay is the Puppy Couple's house, and they have no internet. Plus, everything that can go wrong is going wrong twice and I'm very stressed right now. I never talk about my personal life in my blog, it's usually happy go lucky because this is my sanctuary where I am ~Mel and all is well. =)
Never underestimate the power of denial.

pondered at 9:30 pm Thursday

April 4, 2004--I'm pooped

Hello kittens. Hope everyone had a great weekend, I spent mine searing my eyeballs to the monitor by making 2 new sections for Paulina's Playground. I have to rest my eyeballs now. But The Playground has a bunch of new stuff and it's so pretty!

pondered at 9:30 pm Sunday

April 2, 2004--just a thinkin'

Two posts in one day! ^_^ I've had a semi busy day. Gio, Jeremy's friend, ran me around in his new bright yellow car and I got everything done. This month is Christy's 25th birthday and I found a beautiful Golden Labrador Retriever statue that she will love to death. She has a whole collection of doggie statues. I had gotten her a German Shepard before, her favorite dog, but I hadn't seen a Lab (her second favorite) statue I liked till now. I'm going to need a pretty box to put it in, I'm so happy I found the perfect gift for a very specail person. I don't know what Jeremy, her brother, is getting her, but I'll find out at the party. We always have cake and balloons and streamers on loved ones birthdays, I love it. heh I'm just a kid at heart. =)
Since Gio is deaf like Jeremy I started thinking. Then I went to Diane's site and read an entry that got me thinking even more. It would suck to be deaf and not like to be touched. Sometimes you can get a deaf person's attention my stamping on the floor and they feel the vibrations and turn around to see what you want. Or you can flick the lights and that works too. But many times you have to touch them, either by tapping them or by gentle pressure to move them out of the way. The deaf I know are very sweet, polite and a little shy. But they always touch and that is what Diane's post was about, how touching is important to her to express feelings. Since the deaf talk with their hands, it seems to be very physical to be deaf. When a deaf person is upset, the signing becomes bigger and more agitated. I have seen hearing people grab a hurt deaf women's hands when she was trying to sign. Wrong! If you hold their hands they can't talk, it's the equivelant of us being gagged while we are in distress. No one would like that. I am so glad when I can help a deaf person communicate. They even have there own "slang". The have different signs for the same thing as you move around different areas. American Sign Language is different from Signing Exact English (which the deaf I know dislike with a passion and don't use). It all just makes the world a more interesting place. I love my deaf friends and they love me and it's all good.
Ok, I'm done. *lol* I'm off to do my daily voting duties at Paulina's Playground. Later kitttens!

pondered at 4:25 pm Friday

ho hum

Greetings kittens! It's Friday, time to do a happy dance! *demonstrates* Anyway! I just gave heart-stricken.net a facelift and new name, Paulina's Pages. That layout is too pretty! I wanted to put it here because this white is killing my eyes. I know you all love this layout, but it might just disappear soon if I "accidentely" find a web set I like. *poof* Ah, one never knows...
The comment from Diane in the tagboard got me to thinking about having or trying to have an MT blog again. Lizzy-Poo has graciously volunteered to re-install it for me. I bow to her superior wisdom and knowlege. (Thanks chica, you rock hard core.) So...I'm going to email her (yes, I've been stalling, shhhhhhhh) and give her all the necessary info and see what she can do. Comments again. My my.
I'm rambling. (Am I rambling?!) I'm off to surf the cyber waves and crash into a cyber god or two. Have a great weekend kittens, I love you!

pondered at 1:02 pm Friday

April 1, 2004--it's April Fool's Day!

heh Someone emailed me and asked if the fire was an April Fool's joke! Erm, no. It was scary and awful, my cat was freaking. The people downstairs had 6 cats to get out and then keep calm. It was nuts. I grabbed the cat, my purse and ran. I stayed with the Puppy Couple for a few days, they rock so much. But it's over now and I am frazzled but fine. Since everyone was safely out of the building all I could think was "Please don't let me lose my computer!!!" Oy, kittens.
My email is caught up, I voted for everyone I'm supposed to vote for and now I can relax and just play with html. I never got a new layout for my Two Smart Girls Magazine and it hasn't been updated either. Oh well. It's on my to do list. Have a great night kittens, I'll be around here, happy to have my computer back and relaxing with you. Toodles!

pondered at 8:00 pm Thursday

I felt the heat...

Whew, I'm back. We had a house fire and everything has been crazy for almost 2 weeks. My roommate wasn't here, but I and the cat are ok. I just got back in my apt today, so here I am. Gad, it was scary, but it's over now. Thank god my pc wasn't damaged. Most of it was the apt downstairs, I got mostly smoke damage and singed walls. Eeep. But never fear kittens, ~Mel is back! I've got much to catch up on, my email especially, so I will be working on that today and hopefully all will be in order by this weekend. Have a great Thursday! I missed you guys! *mwah*

pondered at 11:56 am Thursday