Today's big decision is whether to sing or dance tonight. My Tuesday night Tap & Jazz class has been moved to Monday night for this week only, the same night as Lutheran Choir of Chicago rehearsal. On the one hand, it's easier for me to learn to sing something than it is for me to learn a dance step. On the other hand, we can only have two absences from the rehearsals for this next concert, and I've already used up one the week I went to Martinique.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if all decisions were this inconsequential?

A nice young man from College Works Painting came by today to give us an estimate on the much-needed painting that needs to be done on the outside of the house. I had been considering getting aluminum soffit and fascia, but I really don't want to lose the scrollwork that gives our house character, so I'm going to go with painting it. He promised they would do a good job of the prep work, something that was lacking on the last paint job we had done. They will scrape, sand, and prime. And they will put on two coats of paint. Now all I have to do is figure out how to pay for it. Maybe I should do my taxes and see if I'm getting anything back this year.

Everything is relative. After spending several hours sorting, folding and hanging piles of clothing at the Rummage Sale yesterday, my own laundry doesn't seem like such an insurmountable task.

This is getting more and more expensive. The gas valve on the furnace is leaking and must be replaced, and also the circuit board. Well, the furnace is 17 years old and hasn't been looked at, as far as I know, in ten years, so I suppose it is due.

This reminds me of the skydiver joke. A guy jumps out of an airplane, and his chute won't open. As he's wondering what to do, he sees a guy coming up towards him. He yells, "Hey, do you know anything about parachutes?" The other guy yells, "No! Do you know anything about gas furnaces?"

Well, the guy was right on time, and already it's going to cost about $200.00 to replace some parts in the air conditioner. Oh, well, better to find out now than on the first 95 degree day.

It's a good thing I was home today, because Ziggy came by. Ziggy works for the company that replaced our driveway and sidewalks last year, and we had agreed last fall that he would do a small side job for us when he got a chance. He is Polish, and his English is very broken and hard to understand, so we communicate with a lot of gestures. He is very pleasant, though. He's going to start the job on Monday.

The dentist wasn't too bad yesterday. The whole process took about 20 minutes, most of which was spent waiting for the novacaine to take effect. In an effort to make sure I don't procrastinate for six years again, I made an appointment for September. Then I got to come home and try to eat take-out Chinese with one side of my face numb.

I'm taking a day off from work today, because the heating/air-conditioning guy is going to do a tune-up on our furnace and A/C, and then I might go and help Joanie with the Rummage Sale for awhile. This will be my first time doing that.

It looks like I'll be singing in the Good Friday service at Norwood Park Lutheran Church again this year. Their choir director called me the other night and said they were "buying sopranos". I didn't tell her I'd be glad to do it for free, because a little extra cash is always welcome.

Yesterday's mail brought Douglas's first issue of The Echo, our church newsletter. I had been publishing it for the last two years, and I'm really glad someone came forward to take it off my hands. Doug did a great job, and he seems to enjoy doing it.

I have a dentist appointment after work to take care of a cavity found two weeks ago at my first dental appointment in six years. I was really nervous after putting it off so long, and having to start with a new dentist. But he actually complimented me on the care I've been taking of my teeth without professional assistance. The cleaning wasn't so bad, but not nearly as much fun as when I used to get nitrous oxide. This guy is a real comedian. He said he was 28 years old. I said I didn't know how old he was, but he was older than 28. He said, "I have some very sharp instruments that I'm getting ready to put in your mouth. Now, how old do I look?"

I'm not sure a lot of people understand what war means. No, I haven't heard anything from my son. He is not in anyplace where he can communicate. In the unlikely event that he gets to a telephone, he wouldn't call me, he would call Donna, which is as it should be. If I haven't seen him on television or gotten a phone call to the contrary, I must assume he is ok. Certainly I must, for my own sanity.

Everybody is extremely nice to me. Loretta makes a point of coming to my desk every day to ask how I'm doing, and even George, Loretta's boss, checks up on me now and then. Last night at LCC rehearsal, Floyd told Lois about Will being over there somewhere, and Will was in our closing prayer.

I just spoke to Donna, my daughter-in-law, in Germany. She says she heard from Will about three weeks ago. She and the girls are doing fine. She impresses me with how level-headed she is. She doesn't turn on the television, which is just as well, because German television broadcast footage of our soldiers being shot in the head. She doesn't listen to what the other wives have to say. If she doesn't hear it from someone in uniform, she doesn't believe it. There are frequent meetings to keep the families informed, and she told me that if I hear anything that I think might have involved Will I should call and not worry about what time it is there, because the families would have already been told what happened and who it involved.

Friday night I ordered a service banner to display in our window to show that we have a loved one serving in the armed forces. We also ordered lapel pins. Chuck got the plain service flag pin, and I got the one that shows the American flag as well.

I had to work Saturday. It was a pretty boring thing to do on a beautiful Saturday, but all that time-and-a-half will be nice in my next paycheck.

Sunday was the Soup Luncheon at church after services. Someone please remind me to stick with the chicken soup next year and not put butter on the bread. I was miserable all afternoon. But at least I did get to take my first walk in the woods of the year. Jim and I went, and I took along the wide-angle binoculars he gave me for Christmas. They aren't as powerful as his, but I'm better able to actually spot what I want to look at. We saw a few cardinals and a song-sparrow.

Chuck made a great beef roast for dinner, and then we watched the Oscars. I was pleased that there were not a lot of political speeches and people seemed to confine their remarks to something like "let's pray for peace."

Back in October I mentioned that I got some bad news in a 3:00 a.m. phone call. My husband instructed me NOT to talk about it on the Internet, and I have complied. But now that prohibition has been lifted. My son Will has been in Kuwait since October, and we haven't heard from him since Christmas.

Oh, joy. I just sat through an hour of "harassment in the workplace" training. I really resent being required to be trained in courtesy and common sense.

I exercised amazing restraint at the Scout Auction yesterday. My portion of our bill was only 13.00-----10.00 for a set of very pretty etched wineglasses and 3.00 for a 50's style formica "boomerang" table for the basement. It's called that because of its shape.

Chuck was allowed to place the winning bid on the ceramic puma (see my description of the auction of a year ago for an explanation). This year it brought $510.00.

Well, it's official! I've been blogging for one year as of yesterday!

Someone at the Church Cabinet meeting last night asked if the newsletter could come out on a more regular basis. A legitimate question, I suppose, but it really upset me. First of all, publishing the newsletter isn't in the job description of the Church Clerk, and I never would have agreed to be Church Clerk if I had thought it were. I have, however, ended up doing the newsletter anyway for the last three years because our church secretary is computer-phobic. In most other churches I know of, it is the paid church secretary, not the volunteer Church Clerk who is responsible for publishing the newsletter.

In response to the question, I said that nobody had given me anything to put in the newsletter. Granted, there are lots of events coming up in the near future of which I am fully aware. But why should I have to compose all the articles in addition to putting the thing together? I said I was really ready to give the job up.

At that point one of the newer members of the church, a high school student who is really into computers, volunteered to take on the responsibility. What a load off my shoulders. I hope he meets with a little more cooperation than I have.

Boy, time sure flies. So, what have I been doing for the last week? Saturday, March 1 we hosted a "Christmas Party" for Lutheran Choir of Chicago. (Nobody had any time around Christmas, they finally settled on a date that was before the beginning of Lent, and when they needed a place to have it Chuck volunteered our house). The house was in pretty good shape, thanks to the FLYLady system that I've been using ever since Chuck made me fire the cleaning service. But it's still amazing how much time I can spend nit-picking to make it look just a little better. And really, by the time you get so many people in the house nobody notices anyway. It turned out to be a pretty good party, but not as many of the new people showed up as we had hoped.

Sunday, March 2 was the first day for our new minister at church. Of course there was an extended coffee hour that included extra snacks like chicken nuggets, mini egg-rolls, veggie tray, etc. It seems that eating is what our church does best. It is nice to have a permanent full-time minister again, after 2-1/2 years.

Things have been pretty uneventful at work, except for the error I found in our chargeback letters. Even after all the testing and checking they did before the new system was implemented, they missed the fact that the line on the chargeback letter that should read "Quantity not Satisfied" actually read "Quality not Satisfied". I e-mailed the pertinent people, and pointed out that while we may indeed have some quality issues, that is the responsibility of another department. That error was fixed the same day I pointed it out.

I've been working on the pictures from my vacation in Martinique, making a sort of scrapbook in Adobe PageMaker. Since I now have a digital camera and didn't have to worry about the cost of film and developing, I took a lot of pictures. And surprisingly, there aren't that many throw-aways. I'll eventually find a way to share some of them with my vast readership. I've been having trouble uploading them to my aol homepage, and I haven't gotten around to upgrading to the Blogger service that gives you space for that sort of thing.