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Part 37
Sunday, February 1, 2004: It's already February?!
The FrontPage extensions are still not working up on our web hosting, so I am uploading things with FileZilla still. Changes (that I can remember): I've been joining some webrings;
the Bakery now has alt tags on the image map of the
baked-goods case so you can navigate better (hee! sorry I didn't think of
that before!); I have added a couple ribbons in the Causes
section (mostly because of my brother, who was a teen
suicide); there's a lot of new stuff in My Treasures,
but I can't remember which is newer, so just go look at all of it ::grin::
; I made a new page but it's ::sshhhh!:: secret! Well, a certain person is not
supposed to look at it yet, so I am not linking here to it until later. :-)
[EDIT Feb. 10th: I can link to it now.
As to the guestbook idea: the one FrontPage makes is very clunky and ugly (I tried, but aauugh!), so Cat'r said he's going to look for something for me. I don't know java or perl or anything, so that's where his expertise comes in. I want to have something that is run as part of my site and that I have total control over, plus can archive the entries. 7:03pm: Instead of doing things I need to do around the house, I have been working on my webpages again! I added some things to the second page in CountryMouse's Magickal Household [EDIT: this section is no longer there]. And on that page is a link to Pixie Wiccans Celebrate! [EDIT: this page is also no longer there] Oh, and there are a couple more Pixies on my Faeries & Angels page too.
Monday, February 2, 2004: Pretty! My Weather Pixie apparently has a nice wardrobe! Right now she is wearing some kind of rust-coloured coat that has a brown (faux?) fur collar and jeans. All I had seen her wearing the last couple days or so was a pale-grey parka (and jeans or black pants or something)! I can't wait to see what *else* she spends her clothing money on! :-P 9:03pm: I finally have a guestbook again! Cat'r found a free one, written in Perl, and configured it for me. It's very simple and plain, but I needed one quickly. So now I am going through my entire site, finding the places I should be putting guestbook buttons! Still lots more to do, but I'm sooooo tired. Been losing sleep a lot of nights in a row.
Tuesday, February 3,
2004: I will tell you why I have a special interest in supporting the What I haven't done still is totally accept that I had cancer, that I am now a survivor (unless you have to be five years out to use that term, I am not sure). How I dealt with the whole thing was by not thinking about it when I didn't have to, which worked for me, but didn't help me to "own" what was happening/what had happened to me, how my life was changed. That's why there was a big gap in my entries here in CM's Diary during that time, during the actual surgery phase of things (I had two biopsies, then a re-excision/partial mastectomy). I didn't want to write if I couldn't write something funny and light. I just didn't have the heart. And we had the whole 9/11 thing happen then, which overshadowed personal problems... Incidentally, that's why I didn't create my 9/11 Memorial Page until the next year--I just wasn't dealing well with everything. On 9/11, my birthday, I was scheduled to see a new surgeon. I was not really in synch with the one I had. I cancelled my appointment that day--things were so scary, we really didn't know what kind or how many targets were being hit. The entire day was beyond belief, as I am sure you all remember. I did reschedule and went on to change to this new surgeon that my Primary Care Physician had recommended. It was a good decision on my part. You need to feel confident in and comfortable with your doctors. By the time I got to November of 2001, I was ready for radiation. I have a wonderful, sweet radiation oncologist (I just saw him for a checkup last week), and all the people at the radiation oncology dept. at the hospital where I go were/are just gems. So though I was tired a lot and slept a LOT during that time, I was back here in CM's Diary because I felt I was through the really scary part and fighting with optimism. :-) I am going to look at my LiveJournal entries from that time and see it if would be worthwhile to anyone else if I make them public. There is not a whole lot of agonizing there, since I did most of my crying offline. Teddy bears are wonderfully supportive. And watching "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood" in the early morning, holding Christopher, helped on days when I was in limbo about treatment options. So I would say this to all you ladies: get your mammograms! That's how they found mine, which was DCIS, Stage 0, non-invasive, totally treatable. The earlier they can catch it, the better! And if you do have breast cancer, get into a good support group, learn as much as you can, know that there are lots of others out here that understand what you are going through--you are not alone. Here are a few resources on my Causes page. The Y-Me National Breast Cancer Organization was very helpful when I felt I had no one to talk to! And I would also suggest you go to Yahoo! groups and join the bosombuds group. They are very helpful and supportive! Wednesday, February 4, 2004:
It occurred to me that what I wrote yesterday is pretty well buried down
here in my diary/journal. So I plan on writing it up, essentially in the
form it is now, as a little one-page article in a writing section I decided
to do. The writing section is there now: it's called The
View From Here. However the only thing that's there so far is a little
something in the Etc. section.
8:37pm: I've only had my Weather Pixie here for a few days, but something is seriously up with her. I don't know if she's exceeded bandwidth or what. So that's why the image is broken up on my top page. This is one instance where you cannot save the image to your own hard drive because the pixie keeps changing according to the stats that come in. Urgh, I do hate having broken images. I will give it a few more days, then I may have to say farewell to the Weather Pixie for a while if things don't improve on her end.
Friday, February 6, 2004: Oh my, so much excitement! I got accepted into The Garden of Friendship! Woohoo! See my welcome gifts here [EDIT Dec. 2004: no longer there--I left the GOF]! I got some purty fountain pen inks on sale at Pendemonium: various shades of red and pink and purple, in honour of Valentine's Day coming soon! Cat'r and Bunnicula are finding a few other inks for me downtown right now: Sheaffer NOS Jet Black and Omas New Red! W00t! AND: coming in summer: Tamagotchi Plus!!! Here is the CNN article about it! I thought I wasn't really as interested in virtual pets anymore (although Bunnicula said he'd like me to get Mutsu out again and put its little aquarium on top of the stereo in the living room). But I want to get this new Tamagotchi when it comes out! Well, two of them--Cat'r and I can raise them together. :-) Oh, and Bunnicula and I both have new (matching) printers! Our one-and-only other printer died, so we got these Epson Stylus C64 printers--nice! and for a nice price! I love the clarity and depth of the colours, how fast it prints, and how quiet it is!
Monday, February 9, 2004:
Well, the mouse has been at it again! I now have a seasonal
splash/opening page! I hope to be able to change
this easily (*knock on wood!*) as the year rolls along.
I also joined a bazillion webrings yesterday! Some are still pending, but a lot of them are already approved! Woo! I've been putting things up in The View From Here, so go see some (possibly bad) poetry, a couple concert reviews, etc. Oh, and I added some (very primitive) watercolours to the article on breast cancer that I did. Woohoo! Pendom happiness! I am getting the FIRST of Richard Binder's customized Waterman Phileas pens, being sent out today! It's a green swirly marble-ized pen with a custom-ground (Binderized) cursive italic nib. I can't wait! I've already tried one of his oblique cursive italic nibs for Pelikan pens, and it writes like a dream! I have a red Waterman Phileas with a fine nib and a blue Waterman Phileas with a medium nib, so this green one will be a wonderful addition, especially with the cool nib! I'm sure I'm forgetting something...well, I've been doing a lot with my site, so look around. There are webrings, for instance, where you might not expect to find them! Hee! I've been getting acclimated to The Garden of Friendship--such wonderful people! They are so sweet and welcoming! There is so much neat stuff to see and do there! 8:56am: Well, the Weather Pixie is toast. Something went seriously wrong at her end, either with her account or her service provider. So I have now gone with Weather Underground. I have a cute little functional Weather Sticker up on my top page. :-) 10:55am: Wellll, after some complaints from customers at the Bakery, that they couldn't see what was what in the case of goodies, I thought I'd better put some little signs in there! Check it out!
Tuesday, February 10, 2004: Cat'r
wasn't feeling well this morning, so I showed him his special page (remarked
upon Feb. 1st) early. Here it is, a Valentine
for my Sweetie. I wanna go play TOONTOWN! Oh yeah, Toontown Central!, the fan site, has a new look! Go check it out!
Wednesday, February 11, 2004: I've added a couple links to the Places to Go, People To See section, down in the Places of Interest part. They are teddy bear links! :-) Do go visit them -- they are sooo cute! (no affiliation, etc.--just found them whilst surfing) [oops, see below--they've been moved] 6:37am: Oookay, Teddy said it was time to make a separate page for Fuzzy Links, so click on that word and you'll go there! Cool things! More to come!
Thursday, February 12, 2004: Okay, since I am being more open about my life here: I had a nice visit with my social worker from Cancer Family Care this morning. She said she is proud of me for talking about the cancer online (my Breast Cancer and Me page), that even if it helps one person, it will have done good. Also she's happy I've gotten into such a nice supportive caring community, The Garden of Friendship. :-) Speaking of which, yesterday I did two more pages: My Garden of Friendship Dedication page [EDIT Dec. 2004: no longer there] and Gifts from Earth Angel.
Saturday, February 14, 2004:
There are new and fun and wonderful links on the Fuzzy Links page! And a new poem in The Poet's Corner. It's about being a mouse. I should probably try to write a more positive one about mouseness at some point. :-P There *are* positive points to being a mouse...I just wasn't feeling that this morning. I probably just need a nap. :-D
Sunday, February 15, 2004: Yes.
For further comment, here is what I said in my LiveJournal. 11:21pm: Woo, an influx of bears! (click the photo to see them larger!) Sorry for the off-kilter photo--it's late. Yeah, that's my excuse. :-D Yesterday afternoon I went to my favourite bookstore with Cat'r. I was thinking that someone there was calling me, from a distance, even before we got there. I'm not sure if he was The One, but Cat'r *did* say he was looking right AT him. He's a little Classic Pooh bear. His fur feels like chamois! He came home with us. :-)
Then today, when Bunnicula was going to the bookstore, he asked if he should be on the lookout for anything. I said, "Oh bears and mice." He asked, "In what format?" And I said, "Stuffed or books or anything." He came home with a lovely pale peach angel bear named Saint. He's a TY Classic bear. He has a soft mooshable halo and soft furry wings! He's very huggable. :-) You can never have too many bears. :-)
Monday, February 16, 2004: Nostalgia creeps up and grabs Mousie! I'm gonna get the PalmPix back to play with! I know, I know, I have a much much better digital camera (my Nikon Coolpix 2500), but there are some instances when carrying what DOESN'T look like a camera can be a Good Thing. I have a very soft spot in my heart for this little gadget. So I'm hoping that by the end of the day, I will have gotten a couple photos with my new/old friend. :-) If you look at my photos, be sure to check both the Coolpix section and the PalmPix section now! 2:46pm: Some new/old (from last summer) little photos in My Animal Crossing Diary. 3:41pm: Photos from last Lammas Day, as Mousie struggles to remember the complexities of fiddly stuff in Photo Gallery thingee. 9:02pm: More photos in the Coolpix section. I don't know how many more I will do tonight. Still no PalmPix tonight. We are awaiting a code or something via email so that Cat'r can get some software needed to run the Palm IIIc.
Tuesday, February 17, 2004: Okay, don't laugh at my first attempts, but I made some gold buttons to go on a new page: Fuzzy Fotos. I just got Paint Shop Pro 8 last week (I have been using PSP 5 for years). Anyway, no photos there yet, but there will be, as I sort through my Coolpix photos and such. Still no software for my Palm IIIc. Waiting is.
Wednesday, February 18, 2004: Well, I redid my Garden of Friendship Dedication page [EDIT Dec. 2004: no longer there]. I made my own graphics, totally. This is my first entire webset (or is it? ::think think::). Not as fancy as what I had before, but I guess it's okay. I wanted it to be something I had handmade, not borrowed from someone else. I was kind-of horrified to see how the colours came out, viewed on Bunnicula's monitor. Eek! I mean them to be a dark green...and that's how it looks on Cat'r's and my monitors. I hope it looks that way on the majority of screens. 10:50pm: There are now lots of photos in the Fuzzy Fotos section! And the PalmPix is up and running. Woohoo! Here are the first few photos. Remember, the PalmPix has NO flash and is not good at low light. But...it's fun.
Friday, February 20, 2004: More silly little fiddly changes: I have been playing with mouse rollovers--no, not ME! the computer mouse! I don't think I will be doing it to ALL my pages, but a lot will have something happen when you put the mouse pointer over it. Hehehehe. 6:54pm: Ooo, quizzy goodness! What's your Inner Faerie?
Saturday, February 21, 2004, 12:43am: I added some music to my Earth Angel section. I hope you like it. I wanted to create the feeling of peace that her presence gave me; and the peace that I feel when I go down that path in The Garden of Friendship. I finally learned how to put a little QuickTime player on the page so that you can adjust the sound or turn it off, repeat the song, etc. I also put this little player on my St. Patrick's Day page. There has always been lively music there; but now you can adjust it, turn it off, etc. I personally find this particular midi too loud, but I do love the music. Anyway, enjoy. :-) 7:26pm: Bunnicula's dad passed away sometime in the wee-to-early morning hours. We found out about it about 9:15am. He had had quadruple bypass surgery back in the middle of December, then spent an entire month in hospital because of complications, including pneumonia. Then he went to a "step-down" unit at a nursing home. He was back in the hospital again soon after because the pneumonia was still causing problems. He was supposed to go back to the nursing home and to a program of physical therapy either this weekend or Monday. He seemed better...The funeral will be small and will be on Monday. His dad was 79.
Sunday, February 22, 2004: I remade my Mother's Day page totally. The only thing that carried over from the old one was the webring. Grrr. I am in a mood. I added music to a lot of pages, and I have no idea what is causing a "stuttering" in the sound. Sometimes it happens if you scroll the page; sometimes there seems to be NO cause. If anyone reading this knows why it's doing that, please PLEASE email me or sign my guestbook with helpful hints! Pages that seem particularly troublesome are the Wicca Pixies and the Final Transformation. Other pages with music: Garden of Friendship Dedication; Earth Angel pages; Father's Day; Sept. 11th memorial; Snow Pictures pages; Mouse Tea Party; Where Springtime Lives; Princess Diana memorial [EDIT Jan. 14, 2008: no longer there]; Kent's page.
Monday, February 23, 2004, 2:43am:
Sooo sleepy, but just wanted to say that there's a new section,
part of my Garden of Friendship section. It's Gifts
from GrammyJ.
10:44am: Bunnicula and Cat'r are getting ready to leave for the funeral in about 15 minutes. I do not travel well (to put it mildly), so I am not going. They are hand-carrying a note from me to B.'s stepmother about why I am not there and including my condolences. I need to get all caught up and STAY caught up on my photography pages by May--that's when we're going to get the massive invasion of the 17-year "locusts" (cicadas)!! I can't wait to take photos of these funny-looking LOUD and EVERYwhere bugs! They don't hurt anyone human, just the trees (over time). The cicadas remind me of wide-bodied late-50's automobiles. :-P I would love to find out how to do a .wav file of their sound or something! Anyone have tips? I have a cassette recording I did during their LAST visit!
Tuesday, February 24, 2004: The flowers that Bunnicula's company sent for his dad's funeral arrived a day late. They came here to the house this morning. So since they don't look funereal but more like a gift basket, we decided to keep them ourselves. They are nice for Bunnicula, since they are in by his computer, so he can see them easily. :-) I will get a picture up at some point in the Coolpix section. There are new pages yet again.
I need more music! And I want to do a quilt! Not a fabric quilt, but a quilt online. So many ideas runnin' around the mousie brain!
Wednesday, February 25, 2004, 1:23am: New photos up (here and following). Sleepy. To bed now.
Friday, February 27, 2004, 3:14am:
More photos up, past the last link up there ^. Well, I always use linkware for my websets. I have never purchased graphics (except for a CD of clipart years and years ago, when I was at a nearby MediaPlay and had money burning a hole in my pocket!). But yesterday I saw the cutest little mouse webset that I just HAD to have. So I plunked down my money via PayPal. Now all I have to do is figure out which upcoming page is gonna HAVE this set! LOL! It's a mouse family living in a cute pink teapot house! Go see this lady's graphics--they are so cute! It's Susannes Grafik. I found some linkware that she had also that I really like! Oh, I also have a little mini-calendar of hers up on my main index page. Okay, I give: what is the twin witches? I know there are some really good young adult novels and series about wicca/witchcraft out there, but I don't know what someone was referring to about the twin witches.......For some reviews of various young adult novels, check out Dark Childe's reviews! BTW, if you want me to get back in touch with you, please be sure to leave me your email address and/or your website URL in my guestbook. :-)
Saturday, February 28, 2004, 3:25am: Tired tired mousie. Okay, new things: there are TWO new splash pages! Go see both, but don't throw rocks at me. ::grin:: There's music. Heh. Also my house on the main page is now snow-free, and the adjacent tree is sprouting leaves! It's mild here too IRL, so it's appropriate I change over to Spring things now. AND, I found a good use for that webset I bought! I have built my fledgling online quilting hobby around it! Please go visit CountryMouse's House of Quilts! I still have to put together my mousie quilt. I have at least six squares for *that* one. :-) Okay, SLEEP!
Sunday, February 29, 2004: Aren't you glad tomorrow you won't have to scroll down so far on the page? heh. :-P Besides the lovely webset I used for CountryMouse's House of Quilts, I also bought/adopted My Teapot House. See it in all its full-size glory! And now my quilts are growing and looking really pretty! Go see all of them--angels, mice, and St. Patrick's Day--at the aforementioned quilting place! Well, you will be able to see all this eventually, I hope. Our web hosting has been more down than up this weekend. Grrrr. 5:44pm: We're back in business! Okay, also there are new photos up, some of which are not very good, but which I like because they bring back fond memories. They are definitely more on the snapshot level. heh. See Page 11 and Page 12 in the Coolpix section.
Photo of three
bears copyright 2004-2008 Joanna M. Phillips |
Background by Eos Development |
Green buttons by |
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Eek, I have to
take down the Christmas decorations TODAY! If they are still up tomorrow, it's
bad luck!
]
fight against breast cancer, why we need to find a cure: I didn't write
about it here at the time, but from June 2001-January 2002 I was actively
fighting breast cancer myself. I wrote some about it during that time in
my LiveJournal [all entries now archived at
It's linked
to via 
Ooo, blinkies. :-D Happy Valentine's Day, everyone! 
