39 things I would do if I won $390 million

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  1. Hire someone to repaint the outside of my house and fix the shingles.
  2. Finish doing over all the rooms in our house.
  3. Buy new cars. A Ford Escape Hybrid either in Vista Blue or Kiwi Green for me.
  4. Buy a new car for my sister and each of our parents.
  5. Buy the most high-end Macbook available.
  6. Give a large donation to my church.
  7. Give a large donation to my college.
  8. Buy a theater curtain set for the high school auditorium.
  9. Pay for a really nice wedding for my sister.
  10. Get braces on my bottom teeth.
  11. Make a scholarship for Star Island in honor of my old friend Sarah.
  12. Make a scholarship for a girl, from our high school, going to a women’s college in honor of same friend Sarah.
  13. Hire a personal trainer and a nutritionist.
  14. Fix the steeple on our church.
  15. Buy a new house.
  16. Adopt.
  17. Buy a house for my sister.
  18. Invest.
  19. Hire a personal masseuse.
  20. Have a chef (to work with my nutritionist) and housekeeper.
  21. Completely rebuild the outdoor stage at the park.
  22. Do over the computer lab at my school.
  23. Make Girls on the Run free for girls in WSESU.
  24. Endow a really nice birthing room at the hospital.
  25. Pay off my parents’ house and apartments.
  26. Rehab the entire downstairs and Sunday School wing at church.
  27. Help Star Island with the electrical and fire improvements.
  28. Locate the two “Little Sisters” I had at Tye River and send them to college.
  29. Buy a radio station and hire John Ashley to play nothing but oldies and do contests.
  30. Boob job (smaller and higher).
  31. Buy a house on a loch in Scotland.
  32. Open a yarn shop.
  33. Buy a new building for the Drop in Center.
  34. Rehab and add onto the Morningside Shelter.
  35. Rehab and add onto the Women’s Crisis center.
  36. Repaint the Grange and get new lights and curtains.
  37. Help out the Nursery Schools and Childcare centers in our area.
  38. Give money to my town to fix up the town offices.
  39. Retire and travel the world.

2007 – United States lottery Mega Millions set a new world record for the highest jackpot ever offered of US$390 million.

Movies I can watch again and again

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Last year I participated in a March Movie Madness game.  This year’s game will be played with comedies.  My husband and I will be choosing the movies together (he may not know that yet).  I hope I do better this year than last.  I think I was in the bottom 3.

In no particular order (except the one I thought of them in):

  1. The Muppet Movie
  2. Say Anything
  3. A Fish Called Wanda
  4. Two Brothers
  5. Gosford Park
  6. Romeo + Juliet
  7. Mulan
  8. Shrek
  9. Finding Nemo
  10. Monty Python’s Holy Grail
  11. Sweet Home Alabama
  12. Princess Diaries
  13. Legally Blonde

1944: First televised Academy Awards

A dozen things about Vermont

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    1. Vermont does not allow billboard advertising. I love that. It is so nice to drive on the interstate (91 and 89) and not be faced with advertising every 10 feet. It is so obvious when you cross over into New York or Mass.
    2. John Deere was born in Rutland, Vermont. Who knew?
    3. Montpelier is the smallest state capital. It isn’t really a very exciting town either.
    4. Also, Montpelier is the only state capital without a McDonalds. What a claim to fame!
    5. The state tree is the Sugar Maple. Yummy.
    6. Brigham Young and Joseph Smith were both born in Vermont. So, Vermont caused Mormonism.
    7. The first postage stamp issued in the US was made in Brattleboro, Vermont, in 1846. I don’t have a pithy comment for this one.
    8. On July 2, 1777, Vermont became the first state to abolish slavery. How does that explain our nearly complete lack of blacks?
    9. Vermont was, at various times, claimed by both New Hampshire and New York.  And now?  Everyone thinks we are a city in Massachusetts.
    10. Vermont is the largest producer of maple syrup in the U.S., producing over 500,000 gallons a year.  I will only eat real maple syrup.  My wedding cake was maple flavored and the wedding favor was maple candy.
    11. Until recently, the only way a Vermonter could get a photo driver’s license was to drive to Montpelier.  Seriously, my permit (1992) was a thin piece of plastic coated paper.  Only in the last 10 years could you get a photo license locally.
    12. Vermont was the first state admitted to the union after the first 13 colonies.

      1791 – Vermont is admitted as the 14th U.S. state.

      Funeral Blues

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      I am going to a funeral today.

      No one likes going to funerals. No one enjoys them. No one looks forward to them. You are saying goodbye to someone you knew. Cared about. Loved.

      I am going to a funeral of a child today.

      I didn’t actually know Brady. His mom is the younger sister of a friend of mine from high school. My sister is friendly with Brady’s mom.

      Brady was 3 and a half. His death was an accident. A sad, horrible accident.

      He leaves an older brother and a brother to be born next month; his mom and dad; several aunts and uncles and cousins; grandparents on both sides and even great-grandparents. He was cute and lively and a little bit devilish.

      I am going to a funeral today.

      Funeral Blues 

      Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He is Dead.
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun,
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the woods;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

    -- W.H. Auden

      Places I want to visit in my life

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      1. Prince Edward Island
      2. San Francisco 
      3. Portland 
      4. Seattle 
      5. Sacramento 
      6. Las Vegas
      7. Toronto
      8. Australia
      9. Alaska 
      10. Highland
      11. Egypt 
      12. Wales 
      13. The Great Pyramid of Giza
      14. Athens 
      15. Jamaica 
      16. South Africa
      17. Iceland 
      18. al-Q?hirah (Cairo) 
      19. Hawai’i 
      20. Italy
      21. New Zealand 
      22. Brazil
      23. Dominican Republic
      24. Molokini 
      25. Belize
      26. Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre
      27. Denver 
      28. Chicago
      29. Montana
      30. Turkey 
      31. Germany
      32. Berlin 
      33. Ireland 
      34. Mississippi 
      35. Paris 
      36. Pompeii
      37. Islas Galápagos
      38. Fiji
      39. Boring
      40. Arizona
      41. Llanfair
      42. Grand Canyon
      43. British Columbia

      1949 – The first automatic street light was installed in New Milford, Conn..

      A list of things about me right now

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      1. I have been married 5 1/2 years.
      2. I don’t have any children…yet.
      3. I have a cat named Orlando.
      4. I teach computer skills and reading to elementary school kids.
      5. I live in the town I grew up in.
      6. I like to knit dishcloths.
      7. I teach Sunday School.
      8. I love LOST, Heros, and Big Brother.
      9. I am overweight.
      10. I am sick and tired of snow.

      On March 1, 1873 – E. Remington and Sons in Ilion, New York begins production of the first practical typewriter.