Yesterday I had the opportunity to take some photos of the damage in our area. I am amazed that even after clean-up, there was still a mess of trees around.

I will get pictures up shortly, but in the meantime, here are some links to satisfy your appetite:

The majority of these pictures are actually within a few hundred feet of where we live. Pictures 2 and 20 are of trees that are right outside of our patio window.

http://www.wlfi.com/dpp/lifestyles/photo_galleries/photos-damage-from-saturday-storm

Here is the first blog post from the meteorologist:

http://blogs.wlfi.com/2010/07/18/july-17-2010-west-lafayettelafayette-microburst/

Here is the second post:

http://blogs.wlfi.com/2010/07/19/looks-like-macroburst-not-microburst-hit-w-laflaf/

I did have an adventure a couple of weeks ago that I would love to tell you about, so here it goes:

A friend of mine (T) is a pilot, and as some of you may know, I’ve had piloting aspirations my entire life. Every once in a while, he has offered to take me on some of his flights, but usually I have been unavailable. Finally, a couple of weeks ago, our schedules aligned and I was able to come with him on a maintenance flight.

This was most certainly a new experience for me for multiple reasons: I’ve only flown an ultralight before, and I’ve only been behind the cockpit of a single prop plane. T professionally flies a King Air B200, I believe. Now, for those of you who do not know what kind of plane this is, it is a double prop plane, and a souped up beauty at that.

When I first got there, T was waiting for me outside the hangar. We walked inside and T told me what this maintenance flight was: cabin air pressure check. “I hope your sinuses are clear or you’re gonna feel it.” Once I heard what they were doing, I admit that I became nervous. They basically let the cabin pressure drop and check the leak rate of the plane, as well as see if the oxygen masks fall as they should. And do you know why they have oxygen masks? Because if you get into high altitude without cabin pressure or an oxygen mask, you get hypoxic. So, I was not really looking forward to seeing how that would feel.

Then we started the pre-flight check. This is something that you have to do every time you fly. I’ve never done one before since the pilot of any plane/ultralight I have been on before did it for me. T showed me all of the neat instrumentation on the plane and let me listen into the radio while he was requesting take-off status.

Once the pre-flight was taken care of, the co-pilot came on and we prepared for take-off.

I got to sit back in a nice comfy leather seat during take-off. We flew up to about 16,000 feet before we reached cruising altitude. T turned around and gave me a thumbs-up. Time to let the pressure drop! I sat in the chair, not feeling anything at first. Then my heart began beating quickly. Then my hands and feet turned blue. Then I felt very light-headed and a little high. I just kept taking deep breaths and my body began to normalize itself with the changes. Once they got to their intended pressure to let the masks fall, I was only feeling light-headed and having a slightly fast heartbeat. The masks fell and I heard them say they were repressurizing the cabin. T then left the cockpit to do the rest of the maintenance check while I hopped into the co-pilot’s seat. I then got to see the man in action.

I got to then fly for about a minute, with some help. I was then told we were ready to go back to land. As we flew back to the airport, I got to help steer the plane, drop the landing gears and apply the breaks. There is nothing like breaking through the clouds and seeing the runway below and head down to land. I loved it.

Hopefully I can soon fly again. T will be giving me flying lessons (in trade for my own services), but I first have to get the funding to do so. Buying my own (used) plane is definitely the cheaper and more economical route to take, but it is finding the money to put up front to do it. For the type of plane that I want to buy, it would cost me less than what we paid for our car. There are definitely some upkeep and hangar costs, however, they are not quite as large as you may think, as you are able to factor those costs into your hourly rate.

So hears to hoping and more flying fun in the future.

-A

Anyway, back to my story!

This last week the shop owner posted on her facebook that a chipmunk had happened its way into the shop. There were lots of jokes and talk about how to get rid of the chipmunk. I, of course, assumed that the chipmunk had been “taken care of” when I arrived to open shop on Saturday morning.

However, as I approached the shop, I noticed a rather large crowd gathered around the right side gallery window. They were pointing and laughing and shouting “Oh!” and “How cute!”

Once the crowd saw that I was there to open the shop doors, I was alerted to the small brown mammalian creature nibbling on a Nutragrain (!) bar, sitting on one of the art stands in the window.

I giggled and said “Oh!” and “Well, I guess the little guy got a chance to stay.”

As I opened the doors, a few people came in behind me to get a look at the creature. All of the commotion must have scared it away because out of the corner of my eye, I saw it jump into some bags hanging on a coat rack and then flee across the floor at my feet into the back room.

After the people left (and after lots of “cute” talk about chipmunks), I went on the lookout for Mr. Chipmunk. I also decided to do some damage control.

I noticed the Nutragrain bar wrapper on the couch, tore open by ravenous teeth and a trail of tiny little chipmunk poo on the couch. Yeah. That was gross.

So I went about cleaning up the mess when I found that the chipmunk had also decided to get into some raisins and what seemed to be remnants of some kind of nuts.

Then I found a banana with bite marks in it. Apparently the banana peel was too much for the feisty Mr. Chipmunk.

So after all that cleaning, I had a good group of customers coming in to see if they could get a peek at the chipmunk in the shop. Unfortunately, nobody saw him. Perhaps he boosted some of my sales, though.

When the time came to close the shop, I decided to do some damage control. I took out all the trash, placed the non-hampered fruit in the refrigerator, and ensured there were no other little things Mr. Chipmunk could get into that would cause a mess.

Hopefully when the shop opens tomorrow, there isn’t a huge chipmunk mess everywhere and he isn’t dying of thirst/hunger. Well, he has toilet water if he gets desperate.

And so then the question comes to mind: Did the chipmunk enjoy that Nutragrain bar?

I’ve also uploaded a couple more shots of the rainbow to the flickr account.

I just love post-T-storm rainbows.

Yesterday I received my final paycheck in the mail. I open it and come to find out that it is not complete. The company did not pay me for the total amount on my invoice. Why? Because they felt like me charging them the late fees and overdraft fees I incurred from their previous late payment was not “fair” or “within policy”.

You know, when you get your paycheck 10 days LATE and you incur, I don’t know, say, $150 in late fees/overdraft fees, and your contract stipulates you get paid within 15 days from invoice date, you’d think you’d be within your right to, I don’t know, ask for that money. Right?

So when I call B up to ask her about it, she tells me how she fought tooth and nail to get those payments approved for me, and in the end, lost. She didn’t think it was fair, and in the end, only adds to her bitterness as the company is also screwing her over.

Apparently the company’s accounting system had me in as Net 30 pay, which is incorrect. B argued with them over the phone about how my contract stipulates Net 15 pay, but the company kept arguing that their system says Net 30. Well instead of changing it to be correct, they just keep saying, “Well the system says…” I feel like we’re working with a bunch of monkeys. Or crooks. Either way, this does not look too well on their end.

Anyway, one part of me wants to let it go. I want to be done with the trouble. I don’t want to create more trouble. But the other part of me wants to fight tooth and nail to get my money back. This is not the first paycheck that has been late, either. Maybe I’m basing a decision to take action solely on principles, or maybe on bitterness? I don’t know. But the truth of the matter is that I’m not the only one they have done this to, nor is this the first time this has happened to me. Maybe I should try to do something about it so that the next guy doesn’t get screwed over? That maybe the company will realize that what they are doing is terrible business practice and WRONG?

*sigh*

Silly company.

And just to end this on a good note: I am very thankful that I had the opportunity to produce something tangible and (hopefully) of economic value for the company. I am thankful that I was able to meet some great people at that company. If I hadn’t worked there, who knows if I would have met the people that I now have very close relationships to. And now I am thankful for the opportunity to move on to bigger and better things. A new “adventure”, if you will.

“And we’ll all float on OK.”

Jonah asked about every other week from Christmas until April, when we finally told him that the weather was now appropriate to do so.

We ordered the caterpillars online from the catalogue and they came a few weeks later.

We watched the caterpillars grow and eat in their jar and form their chrysalises.  Once safely inside their chrysalides, we moved them to the butterfly keeper.  We waited patiently for the butterflies to hatch out.

One morning, in May, Jonah came running into our bedroom, “Hey Mommy!  Mommy!  MOMMY!  I saw the chrysalis moving in the butterfly garden!”  So up we went to take a look.  We saw that a few of the chrysalises were moving and about an hour later the first butterfly began to peek out!

After a few days, we had four out of the five butterflies fluttering in the habitat.  We decided to release them when the weather was warm and the sun was shining.  So, for about a week, we kept them inside and fed them fresh flowers and sugar water.  (It rained for about a week straight.)

Then, one morning, the sun was shining and the weather was beautiful!  We let two of the butterflies go before daycare and then waited a couple of days and released the other two.

Jonah and Lucy were blessed enough to have the butterflies land on their fingers as we released them into the wild.

I was blessed enough to get a photograph of one of them before it flew out into the wild blue yonder. 

Enjoy!

P.S. We hope to do this soon again. This was such a positive learning experience for all of us that we will hopefully be ordering more larvae in the near future.

You should see me, seriously trying to concentrate on the movement of the actors’ lips as the trailer is playing, desperately trying to understand what they are saying. They are saying something to me and I can’t hear it!

Oh, Harry Potter, why did thou suckest me in???

Edited to add: I fixed the sound myself. I couldn’t stand it. Plus, I like listening to my Pandora station while I am working about the house.

Whew!

This was fun, using fondant to make submarines.  I tried to make the icing look wavy water.  I am not sure if it came across correctly, but I tried.  They were still fun to make and, apparently, still delicious to eat. 

Baby Shower Cake

I made this cake for the baby shower that I helped organize for the mom’s group I belong to.  Again, delicious.  The filling was cookies and cream and it was half yellow/half chocolate cake.

Please note that the bunny, bear, and baby chocolate designs were not part of my artistry.  I used a template from the Whimsical Bakehouse book.  However, I did make umbrellas, diaper pins, and dots with my own hand.  Those were fun. 

Rose-Hulman Cake

Andy asked me to make an RH cake for a barbeque that we were attending.  These were guys that are buddies he made in college.  A rather appropriate cake if you ask me.  I made a cookies and cream filling with this one, too.  (Can you tell I really, really like the cookies and cream filling??)

Note:  The black fondant and I were on speaking terms.  The red fondant and I, apparently, have yet to be good friends.  White fondant and I are doing well. 

Oh, and there was a cut in the cake because I wanted to eat cake and then realized I hadn’t yet photographed it.  Whoops.  You still get the idea. 

You can find more cake photos of these three cakes on my flickr, too.

-Amber

As much as I would have thought I would be complaining here about all the bulls*it that was told to me, I fell immensely at peace and calm.  No, I don’t think what was done to me was right, but this was an answer to a prayer, and for that I am thankful.