Prayer Request

For all of you who are inclined to do so I would appreciate some prayers sent. My father in law is in the hospital and being transferred to a "better equipped" hospital - they think his kidneys have shut down on him. We're all scared shitless, as he is nearly 85 years old and one of the sweetest men in the world. Any good wishes or prayers would be appreciated. I will update this as I know more.

Baseball Player Quits - Says He's Not Earning His Keep

Wow! I've never heard of such a thing!

Okay, Gil Meche hasn't been great since signing a big contract with the Kasas City Royals. But not many players would feel so badly about their perforace that they would walk away from a guaranteed $12 million.

Meche announced last week he will retire, giving up the payday due on the la last year of his deal. Meche has always been known for his integrity, according to The New York Times, but this move left the baseball world stunned. Meche said he just didn't like the idea of not earning his keep.

“When I signed my contract, my main goal was to earn it,” Meche told the paper from his temporary home in Lafayette, La. “Once I started to realize I wasn’t earning my money, I felt bad. I was making a crazy amount of money for not even pitching. Honestly, I didn’t feel like I deserved it. I didn’t want to have those feelings again.”

Read the rest here.
Simply incredible.

Happy Birthday Wiggleworm!!!!!

To my beautiful Grandson.

I can't believe that you're a year old. It seems like just yesterday I was announcing your birth to the world! Now you're running around, laughing, singing and dancing. You have brought me unspeakable joy, as have your mommy and daddy. No matter what goes on around me, it only takes a peek at your face to make me smile. Though it kills me that you are so far away from me, your mommy and daddy do a GREAT job of keeping me up to date and letting us get to know each other on Skype, and for that I am grateful.

Now, I want you to get real close and listen - you take REAL good care of your mommy while daddy is off protecting us from the bad guys, y'hear? And don't be afraid little one - your daddy is one tough soldier, and he'll be back before you know it. (And while you're at it, tell mommy to stop yelling at me for sending y'all stuff - it's what grandmas do!)

I can't WAIT for the day I can hold you in my arms again, whenever that might be. In the meantime, have a super-duper happy birthday!

With all the love a heart can hold,
Crazy Grandma

Who Does This???

Cowardly bastards!!!

NEW YORK (CBS/AP) – New York City police said an 81-year-old man and his wife were severely beaten during a robbery in the lobby of their apartment building.

Joseph and Linda Naimo of Staten Island had just closed up their store and had walked over to their apartment building next door when they were attacked Sunday night.

Police said Naimo’s 75-year-old wife suffered a broken nose, broken jaw and fractured skull. She was in stable but critical condition.

Naimo suffered cuts and bruises. He had celebrated his birthday earlier in the day. The couple’s 49-year-old son was also hurt in the attack, after suffering a gash above his left eye, which was also blackened from a blow by the thieves.

So, we have a couple of thugs who decide to beat up on an elderly couple. Nice. And for what???

The robbers got away with Naimo’s wallet, which contained $18.

$18. These low-life cowards beat the hell out of an 81 year old man and 75 year old woman for $18 measly dollars. If there is any justice in the world, these two will get a taste of their own medicine. In fact, I'd be more than happy to volunteer for the task.

Time to Pay Up

I issued a challenge to Bears and Packer fans in this post. Many of you took me up on the challenge in the comments and on my facebook page. Well kids - time to pay up. Regardless of how you feel about the outcome of the game (IT SUCKED!!!), I hope you follow through. To recap, Packer fans who got on board will be donating 21 food items to a local food pantry and Bears fans will be donating 14 food items. And you really don't have to limit it to that - more is always welcome!!

Feel free to take a pic of your donations and send 'em to me...I'll publish them here if you want.

Congratulations to the Packers - now go kick some Pittsburgh ASS!!!

James T. - Up Close and Personal

I've mentioned my buddy James T. Harris in the past...dude ROCKS!!! Anyway, there's a great Q&A on allaccess.com with James...here's a snippet...

1. What led you into talk radio? Why radio?

It was never my plan to be a radio talk show host. I was a public school teacher and a professional public speaker. But from the very first day I heard Rush Limbaugh on the air, I became a fan. That was in 1991. Over the years I became a caller to the local talk shows in Milwaukee and, in time, I became known as "James from Sherman Park" or "James on the West Side."

There were people who suggested that I host my own show, but I can honestly tell you that I never even entertained the thought until I was asked by a PD at 620 WTMJ to sit in with him and co-host a talk show at the station. As a frequent caller over the years, I had made an impression on the station management, and they thought I had potential. That's how I got into the business.

I will just add that, at the end of the day, I'm a person who loves ideas. Talk radio is a business, but it's also a vehicle for me to satisfy my insatiable curiosity for knowledge and interact with fascinating people who all have their own story to tell.

Go on - read the rest! Dude is awesome (for a Packer fan)!!! Seriously, if you want to get a glimpse into what makes James T. tick, go read it!!!

The Whole Story

In a follow up to this post, I bring you this. This is the 281 page grand jury report detailing every bone-chilling aspect of this so-called clinic, the sadistic doctor and the employees for whose actions I can find no words. But I warn you my friends, this is incredibly disturbing. I will not even post any excerpts from this hellacious tome. It is graphic and it contains a few photos as well. I made the mistake of reading this last night. Suffice it to say that when I was finally able to fall asleep, horrible dreams were abundant. I honestly think this report would give Stephen King nightmares.

Folks, I am a news junkie. I read, I watch, I devour the news. I see heart warming stories, I see tragic stories, I see stories that baffle me. I can honestly tell you that I can't remember anything which has affected me like this. It is so completely void of any measure of human decency that it's difficult to believe it's not fiction.

I won't even get into the complete and total breakdown of all the regulatory/oversight boards that allowed this paid murderer to continue his trade for years on end. It's just too much.

Or the employees who not only stood by, but assisted in the torture, maiming and murder of women and children. That, too, is beyond my comprehension.

I can think of absolutely no words to describe the total and complete disregard shown for these women and their babies. It's breathtaking. I can't even muster up any anger. I'm numb. Whatever happens to these people will never be punishment enough for what was allowed to take place for years and years. And I hold all of the people who SHOULD have looked into the complaints and goings on just as responsible as the people who carried out such actions.

Friends, it's here if you want to read it, but do so at your own risk. I warned you.

UPDATE: I asked in the comments where the outrage is. I guess someone heard me.

UPDATE: Michelle Malkin weighs in

Too Horrific for Words

Utterly appalling
(WARNING - GRAPHIC)

A doctor who ran a "house of horrors" abortion clinic has been charged in the deaths of one woman and seven babies who prosecutors say were born alive then killed with scissors.

Dr. Kermit Gosnell, who treated mostly poor and immigrant women, was arrested Wednesday along with nine employees from his West Philadelphia Women's Medical Society - among them a high school student who performed medial treatments with no license.

Gosnell, 69, raked in millions over 30 years performing illegal and late-term abortions, prosecutors said.

Officials described his squalid clinic like something out of a horror movie

"There were bags and bottles holding aborted fetuses were scattered throughout the building," said Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams. "There were jars, lining shelves, with severed feet that he kept for no medical purpose."

Gosnell has been named in at least 10 malpractice suits, but Williams said state regulators ignored complaints about his clinic and that the office hadn't been inspected since 1993.

Patients endured barbaric procedures at the hands of the twisted doctor, officials charged.

Gosnell "induced labor, forced the live birth of viable babies in the sixth, seventh, eighth month of pregnancy and then killed those babies by cutting into the back of the neck with scissors and severing their spinal cord," Williams said.

Police stumbled into the grisly scene at Gosnell's clinic last year after responding to a drug-related complaint.

His medical license was then suspended and the clinic shut down.

If you want to see the personification of true evil, click the link above. I've seen and heard a lot of things that I consider evil, but this really has to take the cake. There is no punishment severe enough for this monster. Regardless of whether you're pro-life or pro-choice, I can't think of a single soul who could possibly think defending this disgusting waste of genetic material's actions.

This...this...oh hell - person is too good a word for him - WHATEVER he is can surely give Satan a run for his money.

Bears/Packers Playoff Challenge

As you've probably heard by now, there's a kinda big football game happening this weekend. ;)

Now, I'm not going to bet on the game - in my screwy little brain that creates bad karma. But my friend Wendy has a great idea.

MADISON - Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn have made an unusual bet over Sunday’s NFC Championship Game between the Green Bay Packers and Chicago Bears.

Walker’s office said the governor of the losing team’s state would volunteer at a food pantry in the winning team’s state, wearing a T-shirt featuring the winning team.

How about we go one step further? I’m going to donate 1 food item to an area food pantry for every point the Packers score. I challenge you to do the same. I bet Packer fans can donate more than Bears fans, what do you think?

I have committed to donating a food item for each point the Bears score.

No matter who wins the game, the real winners will be the food pantries who are in desperate need of food these days. So c'mon - ya with me?

GAME ON!!

My friends - this is EPIC!!!! And event that hasn't taken place since December 14, 1941. A matchup 70 years in the making!

As many of you know, I am a Bears fan while my husband is a Packer fan. And we are not what you would call passive fans. We're the jump up, scream and yell kinda fans. Throughout the years, we have had a respectful rivalry in our household. Civil discourse, you might say. No hateful rhetoric. Well folks, that all changed yesterday. Since we both tend to get a little...intense, we decided that it would be best if we not watch the game in the same room. Or house. Or state. So I will be in Illinois watching the game with my fellow Bears fans - fans as rabid and vocal as I am.

Now, I'm not gonna pretend that living in Wisconsin in the upcoming week will be easy, but fortunately I can still get Chicago news on the radio and TV. Regardless of the outcome of the game, the Superbowl will be anticlimactic. Friends - THIS is the Superbowl!

I hope you all enjoy the week leading up to the game, and I suspect most of you will be parked in front of a TV somewhere next Sunday.

Oh yeah - and  GO BEARS!!!!!!

Comprehensive List of Obamacare Tax Hikes

I found this quite illuminating...

Next week, the U.S. House of Representatives will be voting on an historic repeal of the Obamacare law. While there are many reasons to oppose this flawed government health insurance law, it is important to remember that Obamacare is also one of the largest tax increases in American history. Below is a comprehensive list of the two dozen new or higher taxes that pay for Obamcare’s expansion of government spending and interference between doctors and patients.

Employer Mandate Tax(Jan 2014): If an employer does not offer health coverage, and at least one employee qualifies for a health tax credit, the employer must pay an additional non-deductible tax of $2000 for all full-time employees. This provision applies to all employers with 50 or more employees. If any employee actually receives coverage through the exchange, the penalty on the employer for that employee rises to $3000. If the employer requires a waiting period to enroll in coverage of 30-60 days, there is a $400 tax per employee ($600 if the period is 60 days or longer).

Combined score of individual and employer mandate tax penalty: $65 billion/10 years

Medicine Cabinet Tax($5 bil/Jan 2011): Americans no longer able to use health savings account (HSA), flexible spending account (FSA), or health reimbursement (HRA) pre-tax dollars to purchase non-prescription, over-the-counter medicines (except insulin)

HSA Withdrawal Tax Hike($1.4 bil/Jan 2011): Increases additional tax on non-medical early withdrawals from an HSA from 10 to 20 percent, disadvantaging them relative to IRAs and other tax-advantaged accounts, which remain at 10 percent.

Flexible Spending Account Cap – aka“Special Needs Kids Tax”($13 bil/Jan 2013): Imposes cap of $2500 (Indexed to inflation after 2013) on FSAs (now unlimited). . There is one group of FSA owners for whom this new cap will be particularly cruel and onerous: parents of special needs children. There are thousands of families with special needs children in the United States, and many of them use FSAs to pay for special needs education. Tuition rates at one leading school that teaches special needs children in Washington, D.C. (National Child Research Center) can easily exceed $14,000 per year. Under tax rules, FSA dollars can be used to pay for this type of special needs education.

Tax on Medical Device Manufacturers($20 bil/Jan 2013): Medical device manufacturers employ 360,000 people in 6000 plants across the country. This law imposes a new 2.3% excise tax. Exemptions include items retailing for less than $100.

Read the rest here. But prepare yourself - it's not pretty.

Reince Priebus - New RNC Chairman!!!

WASHINGTON --Reince Priebus was elected chairman of the Republican National Committee on Friday after Michael Steeledropped his bid to stay atop the party for another two years.
...
Priebus will oversee the 2012 election cycle, in which Republicans, who now control the House, hope to capture the Senate and the White House. But Priebus must also retire an RNC debt of about $22 million owed to vendors and banks, as well as lure back demoralized donors who have been so frustrated with Steele's management that they sent their dollars elsewhere or didn't open their wallets at all last year. The party had only about $1 million cash on hand at year's end.

Priebus also will have to figure out how to navigate a GOP civil war in which conservatives and Tea Party disciples are trying to pull the Republican Party even further to the right, to the chagrin of moderates and some longtime establishment leaders.

Read the rest here.

Congratulations Reince - I'm counting on you to make Wisconsin proud!!!

System Breakdown = Dead Child

This has me seething...

A Milwaukee mother of seven who let her 7-month-old daughter starve to death in 2006 was sentenced Thursday to a year in jail but could go to prison for five years if she fails to meet conditions of probation.

Melody Cole, 31, was not charged in the case until January 2009 and pleaded guilty in November to neglecting a child, causing death.
…
Circuit Judge Dennis Cimpl told Cole that while she has no criminal record, she does appear to have an alcohol problem and other issues that have left her unable to care for any of her children, who have been adopted, are in foster care or are living with a relative in Mississippi.

"The child's dead and - there's no way to sugarcoat it Ms. Cole - it's your fault," Cimpl said.

Cimpl sentenced Cole to a year at the House of Correction with no work-release privileges. He ordered her to get a mental health and substance abuse evaluation, maintain strict sobriety and complete 100 hours of community service over the next five years. He allowed her to begin her incarceration in two weeks.
…
Layunnia Lewis was born April 1, 2006, 14 weeks premature and suffering from herpes. She weighed 4¾ pounds when she was released from the hospital on June 22, and only 5½ pounds when she died Nov. 28, 2006. She had a broken leg, bruises on her head and abrasions on her genitals. The baby's father, who has not been charged, found Layunnia's body beside her mother, who was sleeping on a mattress on the floor of the couple's living room.

Cole told police she had fed the baby earlier that evening. According to the criminal complaint, police found no baby food in the house, just an empty can of infant formula. Although Cole received support from W-2, food stamps and SSI, the infant's father told police the couple spent as much as $500 a month on gambling. She and the child's father spent the day after Layunnia died at Potawatomi Bingo Casino.
…
Layunnia died even as child welfare workers repeatedly visited the family's filthy, roach-infested home to check on an abused older sibling, according to investigative reports. And though various agencies were attempting to provide Layunnia with medical and safety services, it does not appear welfare workers involved with the older sibling's case were aware of those efforts.

There is SO much wrong with this story that I don’t know where to begin. Let’s take a closer look, shall we? First of all, you have a 31 year old woman who is a mother of 7. And she’s such a model mother that at least some of her kids have been removed from her care. And given the fact that she’s on government assistance, it’s obvious that she can’t afford children. Never mind the fact that she is spending said government assistance on GAMBLING!!!!

This child was born prematurely – but no cause is given. Given that my son was born prematurely for no known reason, I won’t speculate on whether alcohol or drugs could have played a part in this particular premature birth. We don’t know. We do know, however, that the child was born with herpes.

Moving on – when the child was found DEAD from STARVATION, she also had a broken leg, bruises on her head and abrasions on her genitals. I don’t know about you, but to me that indicates significant child abuse. Where are those charges? Was that even investigated?

Oh wait – we had a child welfare worker visiting the “filthy, roach-infested home” to check on an abused older sibling. Wait. What??? So a child welfare worker is visiting this disgusting home because an older child was abused, and never noticed that there was a starving abused infant also residing there?? What’s with that?

"At the heart of the circumstances that impeded the effectiveness of intervention in this child's case is a failure by the agencies involved to share information both within organizations and between organizations," according to a report by the Milwaukee Child Welfare Partnership Council's Independent Review Panel.

Sorry – that’s no excuse. I cannot fathom how anyone can investigate that home and not see the threat to the children, shared information or not. If there was a worker in the home and noticed the conditions, she had an obligation to report it, to check on it, whatever. This whole nonsense of the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing is bullshit. If that’s the case, something needs to be done post haste. Children are dying.

Last but not least, the judge sentenced her to one year in jail. Not prison, jail. Is that the worth of a human life? ONE YEAR??? This woman should be put away for a helluva lot longer than one stinking year. And where was the father in all of this? Was he involved in the abuse? If not, how could he not be aware? Why in HELL wasn’t he charged? An innocent defenseless child is DEAD here folks – where is the accountability?

In a brief, tearful statement to the court Cole said simply, "I love my kids."

Yeah – you “loved” one to death. Bitch.

Human Compassion Still Exists

I heard this story on the news on my way to work, and yes, I did get a bit choked up.

An Arizona family is praising a Southwest Airlines pilot who held a Tucson-bound plane in Los Angeles for 12 minutes to wait for a passenger trying to get to a hospital to say his goodbyes to his 2½ -year-old grandson, who was about to be taken off life support.
...
Mark, an engineer with Northrop Grumman, had been on a business trip in Los Angeles when he got word his grandson was to be removed from life support that night. He already had a flight booked back to Tuscon and booked a connecting flight to Denver.

He arrived at LAX two hours early, but had to check in his suitcase, which took an hour, and then encountered a security line that was "out the door and down the sidewalk," Nancy says.

She says he advised Southwest and TSA workers of his urgent need to make the Tuscon flight and why, but could not convince them to help.

"God bless TSA. They are really there for us," Nancy says.

Mark, on the verge of tears, ended up just grabbing his computer, belt and shoes as they came through security screening and running shoeless to the plane, knowing the minutes were ticking by.

At the gate, the pilot of the Southwest plane and ticketing agent were both waiting for him.

"Are you Mark? We held the plane for you and we're so sorry about the loss of your grandson," they said.

Nancy says she and Mark are not sure when or how Southwest got the word, but she is grateful they did. The plane was originally supposed to take off at 11:50; Mark arrived at 12:02 p.m.

"It was the pilot's call to make. We are grateful that he felt comfortable in making that call," Nancy says.

Mark was able to get to Denver to say goodbye to his grandson and be with his daughter.

Kudos to that pilot. Although this was a tragedy, because of human compassion that we see all too rarely, a family was able to be together in their time of need. Well done, sir

Breaking the Silence

I’ve recently had quite a few folks wondering about my silence with respect to all that’s been happening lately. Between the shooting in Arizona, and the disgusting fallout immediately thereafter, one would think I’d be all over that! And I would have been, but for the fact that a family member reached out for help, and I was kind of buried up to my neck in that effort for the last week.

And ya know what? I’m kind of glad. What would have happened is that I would have been as caught up as everybody and been ranting and raving along with the rest of ‘em. Now, while I enjoy ranting and raving as much if not more than most (you know – throwing out that hateful right wing rhetoric), the absence from society as a whole has given me an opportunity to consider the coverage, whether it be the MSM, the blogs, the TV, what have you. And I think that’s a good thing. For instance, Kate sent me an article yesterday that made my head want to explode. Had I not been busy at work, I would have been ranting about it on this here little blog. However, upon further reflection, I realized that the clear intention of the cretin who wrote this incendiary piece was to get a reaction. And I, for one, will not give these attention seekers any more “air space” than they’re worth.

Frankly, what I’ve seen disgusts me, although it’s not all that surprising. The level of vitriol contained in some of these reports is astonishing. Within mere hours of this horrific tragedy, everyone from the Tea Party to Sara Palin to Rush Limbaugh was being blamed. Seriously? Some nutjob starts playing shoot ‘em up in a crowd, and you honestly want to blame the so-called rhetoric? And this was playing out before the bodies even assumed room temperature!!! And facts? Pfffft – who needs facts? We knew nothing – N O T H I N G – about the asswipe that used a town hall type meeting for a shooting gallery, yet the left presume it’s because of “hateful rhetoric” from the right???

I will add here that it concerns me that a teacher at the Boy’s middle school decided to get in on the action. I learned yesterday from a friend of his that one of the teachers at the school said “Honestly, I blame Fox News for the shooting. They put out fake information,and turn people into extreme conservative freaks. Which I believe caused this tragedy." I asked the friend for a direct quote, and he said it was something VERY close to that. I plan to investigate this and will definitely be filing a complaint if that is indeed the case, and I have no reason NOT to believe this kid. Middle school is NOT the place to spout mis-informed opinions - it is a place of learning.

And the hypocrisy shown by the left is simply breathtaking. When a muslim extremist shot up an army base, the MSM told us to hold off and not jump to conclusions. Now, this person’s beliefs had been causing alarm for quite some time, but never mind about that. After a while, according to the MSM, this individual felt ridiculed, felt isolated, felt discriminated against. Is THAT any reason to open fire on our country’s bravest??? Yet in the wake of the Arizona shooting, they decided that the reason behind this is the hateful right wing rhetoric? Pot, meet kettle.

As far as hateful rhetoric, the internet is full of examples of the hypocrisy. I won’t bother to reiterate them here. There is one example that, to my knowledge, hasn’t been widely disseminated and is a perfect look at the duplicity of the left. Ex-Rep. Paul Kanjorski, D-Pa, wrote in the New York Times:

We all lose an element of freedom when security considerations distance public officials from the people. Therefore, it is incumbent on all Americans to create an atmosphere of civility and respect in which political discourse can flow freely, without fear of violent confrontation.

Great sentiment. I agree wholeheartedly. However, Mr. Kanjorski might want to remember what he said about Florida Governor Rick Scott on October 23:

"That Scott down there that's running for governor of Florida," Mr. Kanjorski said. "Instead of running for governor of Florida, they ought to have him and shoot him. Put him against the wall and shoot him. He stole billions of dollars from the United States government and he's running for governor of Florida. He's a millionaire and a billionaire. He's no hero. He's a damn crook. It's just we don't prosecute big crooks."

Ummm – is that what you call civility and respect Mr. Kanjorski?

I see two tragedies here. One is obvious – the senseless massacre of innocent people. The irrational wounding of so many others. And the permanent harm this is likely to do to the psyche of all who were there.

The second tragedy is that we’ve gotten to a point in this country where rather than mourning the dead, praying for the wounded, celebrating the miraculous recovery that Congresswoman Giffords seems to be making, instead it’s turned into a political game. Name calling, baseless accusations, defending baseless accusations and flat out ignoring the fact that there are very sick, deranged people out there who can do something like this with no other reason but the reasons in his head.

It's really quite disheartening.

Arizona Shootings

Because I've been so out of touch, which I will elaborate on later, I've just now learned of what happened in Arizona today. I just want to say that my prayers are with the families of those who lost their lives to this senseless crime, particularly the nine year old little girl, and prayers are being sent to the injured who are fighting for thier lives. And also to all those who were in attendance and had to witness this horrific crime. My thoughts on the bastard who committed these crimes will be forthcoming.

Bears v. Packers

Yesterday I had the pleasure of attending the annual Drinking Right Christmas party at Papa’s Social Club. As usual, I had a great time surrounded by friends, some of who are the best bloggers Southeastern Wisconsin has to offer. I will not attempt to list them, as I’m certain I’ll forget someone. There were a few folks notably missing, and they were missed.

Of course yesterday was also the Bears/Packers game, so I got decked out in one of my many Bears jerseys, and even wore a special hat to mark the occasion!

During the course of the afternoon and into the evening, I made a few observations.

First, I’m not particularly fond of having a DR gathering during a Bears game. This is not, however, because I am the lone Bears fan amongst our group. Of course there was a LOT of good natured joking around, but it never really moved from having fun to real jackassery. No – the reason is because when I watch football, I. Watch. Football. I am focused on the game practically to the exclusion of everything else. Naturally, this made it difficult to socialize with everyone. Fortunately, we have our monthly DR coming up in a little over a week, and I’ll be able to catch up with everyone then.

On the way home from the party, I was listening to Milwaukee radio. I heard the talking heads, the callers, and even later on my own husband say how they respected Lovie Smith for playing the game hard. We didn’t lay down. We didn’t hand it to the Pack. We respected the rivalry. Blah, blah, blah. While I understand all that, let’s put the shoe on the other foot for a moment, shall we? If the Packers had clinched the division and were playoff bound, would you have the same respect for Mike McCarthy had he left the starters in the whole game? Would you appreciate the decision to take a chance on injuring the quarterback prior to the playoffs, ESPECIALLY if there was someone like Clay Matthews taking aim? To just about a person, the Bears fans I talked to were as pissed off as I was about keeping Cutler in the entire 60 minutes. And he did get knocked around, but fortunately, nothing serious. Coach Smith is lucky in that respect.

Lastly, as some of you know, I’ve recently been suffering from lower back problems. While this last observation may seem patently obvious, keep in mind this is a rather new phenomenon for me. When one suffers from lower back problems, it is never, EVER a good idea to stand for hours on end wearing high heeled boots. If you do, you too can be up at 2:30 a.m. writing a blog post while waiting for painkillers to kick in. *facepalm*

I hope everyone had a safe and happy new year, and here’s to a fantastic 2011!!