Kim’s Comments (group member since Sep 17, 2008)

Kim’s comments from the Runs with scissors group.

My mom took her car to our mechanic last week to have an oil change and to have him look her car over because it was making a stange noise.

She thought he was kidding when he handed her the bill and she saw his note of evidence of varmints in her air in-take box. He showed her what he had found. Evidently, chipmunks had been trying to make a nest in her engine. Jake found acorn caps and nesting materials. He said there was no way of telling how long this had been there. We know that they get in our garage and that there is very little you can do to stop them. We figure that all of the snow we have has kept them from their normal tunnel entrances.

Let this be a lesson. Check your engine! You never know what may be living in it.

Today I am 36. I am celebrating my birthday by delivering cookies to the library staff. Yes, I made them cookies for my birthday. I like to bake and I love to create recipes, so there you go. I made Cherry Crisps...(the recipe can be found in the other group I moderate "Cookies".)

I am now 4 years away from 40. I don't know how I feel about that. I had a hard time with 30. I am beginning to find a stray gray hair here and there, nothing to cover up yet, but I dread that day. (My hair hangs below my waist. I can almost sit on it.) I decided a long time ago, that I would not fall into the trap of hair dying that my mother did. Nor am I going to grow old with grace. I plan on going my way.

Pink.

Yep, I'm going to dye it pink when the time comes. It's my favorite color and the color of my favorite cause.

I have never done anything like it before in my life, but I figure, what the heck, you only grow old once. Maybe I'll be like Mrs. Slocombe and do a different color each week, or maybe I go neon colors....

Well, I have several years to plan.

Happy bithday to me....wheee!

Thank you sweetie! :)

This weekend, Narzain and I went to the movies as part of his birthday present. (His was about a week ago, mine is a week from today). We went to a matinee at a bargain theatre and we knew that there would be kids because we were seeing "Percy Jackson and the Olympians".

We were subjected to talking during the movie,some person in front of us playing with her cell phone (thankfully it did NOT ring) and all around rudeness.

Now, I have been noticing this trend for a while. Could you please tell me why, when you have paid good money for a movie, does this translate into have a conversation time? If you want to go out and talk, it's called a restaurant!

As for cell phones, if you are that important, what are you doing at the movies in the first place?

Please explain this terrrible breach in common sense and mannners!

We unexpectedly lost one of our pet mice on Tuesday. Tara was my other mouse, along with Willow. Narzain said that he was concerned before he went to bed because he hadn't seen her. We only had her 2 months and she did not show any signs of being ill like her predecessors have. We are in shock. Yumi and Willow will miss her.

O.K. then. Our next book will be Cather in the Rye. I think it will be late March then. I would like to have our discussion abuot Wrinkle wrapped up before we move onto the next one.

I think that it has stood up to time for me both as a younger reader (when I first read the book) to now as an adult, when I have re-read the books several times. I loved it as a kid, and still do.

Shall I create a poll, or do we want to read that for our next read? Any other suggestions?

Narzain, where are you?

O.K. majority rules and our poll says no to reading in a theme for our next group reading. I am taking suggestions, as always for our next read. I will keep an ongoing list of what we would like to read and then we can vote on it if need be. I would like to nominate "Inherit the Wind" or "Cather in the Rye".

Narain sent me this and I originaly thought it was a scam. I checked it out on snopes.com and found out that it IS on the up and up. Go to www.thebreastcancersite.com and click on the pink box that says click here to donte a mamogram. Site sponsors will donate based on the number of clicks. 1 click/person/day. No sign in/up required.

I am just puting a holding spot for when our discussion begins. Please rember that there is no swearing, no spoilers, and Narzain will head our discussion soon.

Grandma is being released on Saturday.

My aunt's surgery did NOT go well. 1 valve could not be repaired, her veins are too small for a by-pass,and she unexpectedly threw a clot during surgery. I am hoping that since I have not heard anymore yet, that it is a good thing.

My aunt will be going in for surgery tomorrow. She will be having open heart to repair 2 leaky valves, 3-4 by-passes, and something else I can't spell or pronounce. She is 78 and my cousin who left the message did not sound all that confident even though she tried to sound up-beat.

You are not being annoying! Don't worry about when you get your copy. All discussions are open ended and with Narzain starting his new job today, we may be running a little behind anyway. (When we originally made the date we didn't know he would have a job to go to.) Take your time and just join in when you can. :)

An article appeared in the Cleveland Plain Dealer the other day about the Police Headquarters building buit in 1976. It seems that the building will be getting light switches this week. Not new ones, but for the first time. Yes, you read that correctly, for the first time. It apparently, the light switches were never put in, so the city is now spending $794,000 to re-wire the 1st and 2nd floors. It is estimated that the city has paid about $500,000/year on electricity (since 1976 mind you) because they couldn't shut off the lights.

I know that our next group read is next week, but I am looking to the next one for March/April. Should we go with a theme, or would you like to continue with just posting ideas? I will set up a hidden poll, and the results will be posted here when it close.

My aunt "Bootsie" is in the hospital because her doctor is an idiot. She apparently has a leaking heart valve that he has been treating as asthma for the last 6 months since he did not listen to her when she described her symptoms. After my cousins insisted she be looked at a pulmonary specialist,who is the one who declared her problem to be her heart. Now, she is looking at either a quadruple bypass or open heart surgery. We will know by Thursday.

I can now officialy say that Narzain is going to be working for Joseph-Beth, which is an independent book store on the East side of Cleveland. They are now running the gift shop at the Cleveland Clinic. Narzain will now be working in at the gift shop, which we have heard may be an idea expanded to other area clinic system hospitals. (I wasn't allowed to say anything, but he was offered the job at Christmas, pending the end of his current job.)

Yesterday marked the end of an era for me and the end of employment for Narzain. As of yesterday, Waldenbooks closed it's doors for good. Borders, the parent company, made this a few months ago in order to save money, and generate capital to start their own e-book division. CEO Ron Marshall stepped down from his position to go to another retail company. Forbes.com gave Borders a 50/50 chance of surving by the end of 2010.

For me, this has been a hard thing to deal with. The Waldenbooks store that Narzain worked at has been in business since 1976. I have been going to that store for it's entire run. My dad was a vast reader. Everytime we went to the mall, he had to go to the book store, later on, I would also have to go the bood store when I would go to the mall.

Narzain has spent 5 years at this location, and his acting manager has spent 25 years of her life with the company. I would like to rail and say what I would like to say, but I will honor a request from Narz not to say anything until he is completely severed from Borders.

I will say this. I feel, as a customer, Borders droped the ball with P.R. The only communication I was given regarding the closing of the store was a very lame e-mail, telling me that the store was closing, so come on in and save ______%! now while I can. When leaving the store itself, a sign cheerfully stated that "see you at Borders.com!".

Where was the thank you for being a customer? Where was the anything resembling respect for the customer you may have just alienated? There was nothing. For a company in such financial staights, you would think that they could and should have handled this better. All I know is that the nearest store is not as conveniently located or does it have decent parking, as the mall location did. I will be using my gift cards A.S.A.P. so I don't get caught with worthless plastic, and I will be much more cautious about dealing with Borders in the future should they survive 2010.

A good note to all of this is that Narzain does have a job to go to as of next week. More details will follow on that one soon.