I am trying to start a 999 List for next year. I have posted about it on my blog and put a poll on there to see if there is any interest. I would start a blog page for people to get info on the list and it would be a twist from this year's list.......... Check it out and let me know what you think http://redefiningparadise.blogspot.com/2008/11/poll-of-sorts.html

Well there are a few things I only tell certain people...don't want it to get around. 1. I watch Three and a Half Men when everyone is asleep 2. I sleep on our couch (our mattress is terrible and I have major back problems, but I still hate to admit that to anyone) 3. I eat frosting out of the can (chocolate only of course)

Thanks for letting me know about the graphics, I did cut back on the book covers it shows as I thought it was too much as well. I was wondering how the Olympics widget would work...........I'd like to keep it, but maybe if I cut down on some other things it will load quicker. Thank you so much for checking it out for me and for the great feedback!

I'd love to be linked to your blog..........and will reciprocate. Love, LOVE your blog title quote.........my son was Rapunzel's prince in Into The Woods this spring...............AGONY!!!! Rachel

and see how the load times are and let me know if it looks okay...I changed to a 3 column template and added some graphic links and I'm worried it might be too crowded. Please tell me whatya think. Redefining Paradise

Jean especially for the reading schedule..........very helpful!

I got a 20 and I'm 38 1/2..........guess my mind isn't as fried as I thought :)

pray for the patients and employees. We evacuated the critical patients earlier, so now we are evacuating the rest of the hospital. I'm sure you can imagine that this is no small undertaking.........I've only been home 2 hours but am being called back in. My bags are packed by my own front door, ready to go. Technically we should be gone already........but we are holding off for the cop with the bullhorn up and down the street telling folks to leave..........:) dangermom.......thank you for the offer of help, I am taking your phone # with me "just in case"

Unbelievable...........I am at the hospital ER working right now while my family is packing up the house AGAIN We are diverting patients from the hospital and we have 12 ambulances sitting out front as we are transferring ER and ICU patients to outlying hospitals........ Craziness. Prayers for my community, this is really bad..........Nor Cal fires just keep coming back with a vengence. And, it is over 100 degrees and the smoke is thick as fog and ash is falling like snow.......... Yes, and my fridge died so all my stuff is defrosted and warm and how do you schedule a delivery when you don't know when you'll be able to go back home??? Deep breaths, deep breaths

My son is going into 10th grade. He did no history for 9th grade (lots of extra curric activities) He needs American History and World History to graduate I own Human Odyssey with study guide and Western Civ both by Spielvogel. My son is not a big reader (he must have been switched at birth with my real child) and is more science oriented so I'm trying to not make this too complicated. I have TOG but realized that for this child it would be way too complicated for him. He seems to prefer and do better with texts. So, would Human Odyssey be an appropriate text for 10th grade if I'm not necessarily trying to stretch him too much??? Also would both of these texts be considered "World History" on a transcript?? Any and all suggestions or ideas are welcome.......

I can do that! Thank you for the ideas.........

I slacked on my garden in the spring........I have a bunch of green tomatoes out there and that's it. So am I outta luck......or can I still plant?? What should I plant???

for a pipe bomb. And no, I don't live in a big city.........I live in a "town".....we don't even have enough people to qualify as a city and just recently retained town status.......20,000 people and the nearest "city" is a half hour away. One street up (which here is about 200 feet) there was a pipe bomb in the middle of the road. I have 9 teenagers at my house for a 4th party........we were going to go to the races tonight and my husband is trying to get home but they won't let anyone through. So, I now have 9 teenagers staying indefinitely at my home on the 4th of July.........no races............no husband This is on the heels of being evacuated for 3 days because of the fires in Nor Cal Brother!!!!! This certainly qualifies as the worst summer ever.

but we really like MarioKart, Guitar Hero, Smash Bros. Brawl, WiiSports, Zelda, MySims We bought ours at K-mart in a small town when everyone else was sold out........no one seems to remember its here..we bought it Thanksgiving morning

Yes I heard that many of the smaller fires will need to burn themselves out while they work on the bigger, structure-endangering fires. It really is crazy and I can't imagine living in this smoke for several more weeks. It literally smells better inside my car and house than it does in the stores. You walk in the library or the supermarket and it is overwhelming.....I'm not sure if its bad circulation or just that it gets trapped indoors. I really am hoping it ends soon.........my poor DH has asthma and it seems the longer it goes on the more problems he is having.......accumalitve effect I suppose.

We have started out with Math and English..... Be very careful of classes that open the door for political/religious/ethical ideology being taught by a professor. If you are a Christian they can seriously undermine your teaching and confuse a young teen. Even if you aren't a Christian it could still be more than a young teen can handle early on. My friend even tried a drama class at the CC and came up with this problem.........all of my science classes I've taken over the last year are VERY evolution oriented and have had multiple political statements made by teachers (don't know why??) So be careful.........also always, always, ALWAYS..check out ratemyprofessors.com and check out the individual teachers........you'll find out about their style, how good a teacher students think they are and you can ususally find out if they use their position to push their own political agendas.........

I live in Paradise (we were the ones evacuated 2 weeks ago) and its awful up here. I work in the Emergency Room at the hospital and we are getting respiratory problems all the time. We have to keep all the windows and doors closed all the time and run the air conditioning all the time. Someone mentioned all the elderly up here and yes they are having a heck of a time. A lot of folks don't have air conditioning up here and you can't run a swamp cooler in this smoky environment so they are really up a creek The bad thing.............we have more evacuations now, several fires that are 5% or less contained and more dry lightning coming this weekend It stinks!!! Literally and figuratively I just don't want to get evacuated again........but let's just say that I'm way more prepared this time than I was two weeks ago just throwing things in my car.

I've tried over and over again to like that group.........I sign up, I unsubscribe........over and over again. I always leave for the same reasons .....too much cliqueyness (that is SO not a word) .....I find unless you are "in" you don't always get your questions answered .....there is very little about TOG discussed on this board .....the moderators are very biased and not good at moderating and determining appropriate vs inappropriate posting I would really prefer a group that was ON TOPIC ONLY!!!! I, like many others have stated, come here for chatting......on a TOG list I want to talk TOG.........period!

Thank you for thinking of us Liz We finally are back in our home but it sure has been a stressful week. Our home was saved but a few of our friends and co-workers lost their homes. 70 homes in all were burned. They just reopened the college today so my son is back to summer school.....much to his dismay :) Work (at the hospital ER) has been CRAZY busy with folks with respiratory problems, anxiety attacks, etc..... I am certainly going to be rethinking how I store my important papers and photos after tearing apart my house looking for stuff to throw in the car. Also with 5 cats I've determined one cat carrier is not enough. The fire is 100% contained as of late last night.......so thank you for the prayers..........very scary time......

So we were able to find a motel room...........thank you Lord!! It looks like we can go home soon as they are starting to open up the road up the mountain to our town. A friend of ours called and they checked on our house and so far so good.........again thank you Lord! Visited the dogs and cats at the shelter.......it is almost 100 degrees so they are all getting hosed down regularly but seem to be doing okay. They were so glad to see us though. It has to be so scary for them. My other 2 kids came home from camp yesterday so we are all together as a family now........although the logistics in a hotel room are slightly more cramped.........LOL Hope to go home soon.

Due to the fire in Northern California. It has been crazy. We were able to get most of our animals, although we had to leave 3 of our cats, and they are now in a shelter at Search & Rescue. We stayed at one of she shelters, but had to sleep in our car because they were full. 2 of our friends have lost their homes Prayers for our whole area please!!! Paradise, California

Finally! She said she's been super busy and is having a great time. And..............and......................that she misses me. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh..I can sleep now. That soooo made my day! Can you tell how excited I am?

He leaves at 7:30am and doesn't get home until about 2pm.....4 days a week for the next 6 weeks. There is a cafeteria but it is really expensive and they don't have many choices during the summer. So, I need suggestions for stuff he can take with him to eat.....suggestions???

I live in Northern California and it is cheaper than the rest of CA and we are 3 hours from the ocean or the ski scene. We are in the foothills so get less of the heat in summer than the valley and have mild winters with snow that sticks for a few days at a time but isn't ongoing. We live in Paradise, CA which is next to Chico where there is a college and shopping........but we are a small town "up the hill" I would love to live in Colorado........Anchorage, AK or Pacific Northwest. Check out Find Your Spot it is very cool........it asks you questions about things you would like in a community........from crime to homeschooling to politics to climate and it gives you a top 20 list of places and then gives you city demographics about each spot and cost of living comparisons. I LOVE this site.........

These are our absolute favorites..........we have 4 of them and we play bumper cars with them and they are a blast........we bought ours at Longs Drugs here in California