Stupid Thieves

I think that is an oxymoron. It is never an intelligent thing to steal. I get a kick out of stories that tell of the low IQ of thieves.
Today's example: A few days ago I read a story on CNN of 2 men finding treasure buried in their yard. During some yard work (three weeks ago), Barry Billcliff, 27, and Timothy Crebase, 22, were digging up a tree and hit a wooden box containing bank notes and bills dated back to the early 1900's. After having a local coin shop appraise the find, they were ecstatic to discover it was worth $50-75 thousand dollars. The story was no big thriller, just caught my eye and generated a, "Cool." Who wouldn't want to find a lost, buried treasure in their back yard? But I went on with my life and never would have thought of the event again except a headline caught my eye this morning.
"Men who claimed to find buried treasure arrested"
I guess they couldn't get their story straight, and police got interested. Turns out they supposedly stole the bank notes from a house they were roofing. CNN reports:
The men's stories, though, prompted some suspicions because of discrepancies. The depth of the buried crate, for example, ranged from 9 inches to 2 feet.
The men also gave conflicting reasons for digging in the yard of the house Crebase rents.
They told one reporter they were digging a hole to plant a tree.
In other reports, they said they were trying to remove a small tree or dig up the roots of a shrub that was damaging the home's foundation.
How hard would it be to talk for 60 seconds and decide what the story was going to be? Planting a tree or digging one up - simple choice, but very different options. Just pick one!
Stupid!

Powerless

There is nothing that makes me feel more out of control than when a child is sick with some illness that includes vomiting. It is this great unknown, unseen, waiting to pounce evil that nothing can control.
When Becca (now 3 yrs and 8 months) was 2 yrs and 7 months, we were on a vacation to St. Louis to visit friends when she threw up all over the blocks at the Magic House (children's science museum). We surmise now that it was food poisoning, but in any case, for the following 8 or 9 hours, she vomited every hour or so. We were staying in a hotel and soon went through all the towels and linens provided in the room plus a few more the staff kindly supplied. It was a long, sleepless night [Did I mention that I was 7 months pregnant at the time?]. My husband found the laundry facility and ran a few loads including her light-up tennis shoes that never lit up after their vomit bath that day. We left for home the next morning even though our vacation was only half over.
It really is a sad and painful memory today. But the absolutely worst part was that each time she began to throw up and we rushed her sagging little body to the toilet, she somehow thought that we were causing her to vomit. She would push the bowl away and say, "No, I don't want to throw up again!!" In her mind, being put over the toilet caused the retching. I have never felt so powerless to help my baby in my life. Her weak little protests just tore at my heart.
So, Becca is again sick and threw up last night. A kind of terror seizes me and makes me feel powerless. I'm so sorry, Baby!

Modern day Titanic

A cruise ship just reached New York City after being hit by a 70-foot wave in the middle of the night on its way back from the Bahamas. It flooded cabins, broke windows, tossed furniture, knocked hot tubs overboard. Wow!!
You would never get me back on a cruise ship.
http://www.cnn.com/2005/TRAVEL/04/18/ship.diverted.ap/index.html

Chartreuse pee update

Ok, so this game continues. It isn't having any great impact - Becca wets her pants more than she makes it to the toilet dry, but that is a different issue. Today, we learned how three-yr-old games can backfire on you.
We were eating dinner at Olive Garden and my husband Dan needed to use the restroom. He asked Becca if she needed to pee (we offer, send, beg, carry her to the potty whenever an opportunity is presented to us). She said no, but she would come along and call out characters for him. He declined, but she was insistent.
The men's room was empty when they arrived, and Dan breathed a sigh of relief. Too soon. Just as he was finishing and Becca announced, "You peed on Joey!" the door opened and in came others needing the restroom. Dan was very embarrassed. Ok, he is correcting me - that should read a little embarrassed.

Now he is trying to convince me to rewrite that. ;-)