The Jedi Council

This day was busy and exhausting all at once.  It just didn’t seem to end and I never thought I would actually ever get to the house for good to actually relax.  It started off this morning with all of the kids and I getting ready for school and going about our usual business.  Heather had to take me to school today as she was going to the OB to talk about getting her tubes tied with him.  I got let off at school and she took off with the kids.  I later found out that her morning was pretty busy as well.  She got home with the kids and went to put them on the bus when the dentist office called and said that they had a problem.  Evidently the cast they made of Ruth’s mouth yesterday to make her mouthpiece for the tooth that is still in her mouth in the wrong spot, broke.  So, Heather quick grabbed the kids and went to the dentist’s office and had Ruth in there to have another cast made.  She was still able to get the kids to school on time even with all of this.  She then went to work.

School was okay today.  My students seemed to behave okay and we seemed to get quite a bit done today.  For some reason, I was exhausted today, though.  I don’t know if it’s trying to get back to the “grind” or if my sleep pattern has simply changed.  Heather showed up at school during fifth period today, so she observed my class while we finished the period.  When we got done, she mentioned that she forgot about the drama that occurs at the middle school level.  I laughed and said that every middle school teacher is well aware of the drama in their classroom.  She then talked about some other options other than getting her tubes tied.  So, we have some decisions to make in the next month or two.  The scary thing is that none of these surgeries or procedures will be 100% effective.  Wha?  Really?  That’s right, some females have had their tubes tied or cut, and they grew back!!  Really!!  Okay, so I guess there is no way to stop God.  If he wants you to be pregnant, then he’ll simply change the rules of science and nature and make it happen.  Anyway, we got done and Heather went down to talk to the Family and Consumer Science teacher in my building about her overlock machine, while I went back to lunch with my lunch bunch group.

Finished the day and had to go to a staff meeting after school.  This one was about the IB visit, which is supposed to happen soon.  I guess anyone from IB could ask us any questions about the program anywhere within the building or may even bring us in to a room for questioning.  I feel like it’s almost like the Spanish Inquisition.  Anyway, got done with the meeting and called Heather to come pick me up.  In the meanwhile, Ruth had been doing a favor for me, and cooking butterscotch/oatmeal cookies for our school luncheon tomorrow.  Anyway, the kids and Heather came and picked me up and we headed for Wendy’s.  The kids ate dinner and I had a small fry as my meeting tonight was supposed to have food at it.   We ate and talked together for a little bit and then Heather had to go to work while I headed home quick.  I got to the house and ran downstairs to set the VCR to tape “American Idol” and the kids got their homework and some toys and we headed for my Vestal Marching Band meeting.

We got to the director’s house and I made a CD for the director of music ideas that we could use for next year’s show.  We talked a lot about last year and then looked ahead to the future and what we’re going to do for next year’s show.  We ate some pizza and wings for dinner and had a good meeting, but a long one as well.  We started at six and ended the meeting at nine.  We got done with the meeting and I called Heather to let her know we were coming.  We got to Wendy’s and picked her up and went home.  Got the kids to bed right away and Heather had to get right back to work.  She worked till two in the morning and I went downstairs and watched a little T.V. before bed.

Okay, so let’s talk about Part 4 of Chapter 9 in “Star Wars:Republic Commandos - Hard Contact” by Karen Traviss…..

Chapter 9 (Part 4):  Darman started to give a rough, out of sclae mop on the ground where he marked the three RV’s, the droid base, and Uthan’s lab; Etain helped him mark Lik Ankkit’s house and Imbraani and Teklet.  Etain asked why they were doing this in the dirt and Darman said Skirata didn’t like holos, too tranparent.  Suddenly, Jinart came dashing in telling them they had to go, as the enemy was burning the fields to the East to take away their cover.  Jinart said they would have to disguise themselves as farmers now.  Etain had no problem with this, but Darman said he needed alll his gear.  He has the ordonance to blow up the research facility.  Jinart told him to put it all in a cart, including his armor, and take it with him adn got to a safe house.  Jinart told him he would find his squad and let them know what’s going on.  Even out of armor, Darman didn’t look like a farmer, though.  He was tall, strong, adn didn’t look like he worked a day in his life.  As they took a step outside, it appeared as if it was going to rain, so they had no problem covering up their gear with tarps.  Darman noted that there was at least a million dollars in Barq going up in smoke.  Darman told Etain that she needed  to remove her Jedi braid and she hesitated.  She believed her beliefs in her power were wrapped in that barid and by removing it, she felt as if she was admittting that she really wasn’t a good Jedi.  She told Darman that he probably wouldn’t think she would run from a fight, but Darman referred to it as Escape and Evasion.  Etain apologized for losing it earlier and Darman said that we all have to loose it sometime, or we’ll never know where our breaking point is.  Etain found Darman more endearing than Master Fulier, but couldn’t help but think that she was saving clones from viruses only to see them die by blaster fire.  She didn’t like the idea of having to kill someone…..

What a Monday.  It was time to get back to the grind and time to get back to work.  It started off with a small amount of snow on the ground.  Not enough to stop me from getting to work on time though.  When we got up, the kids went outside to shovel snow and I joined them for a little while, then went inside and took my shower.  Heather had to take me to work today because she needed to take the car so she could take Ruth to the dentist today.  Tomorrow she needs the car again as she needs to go see and OBGYN to talk about getting her tubes tied.  Anyway, I got into the building and things seemed normal till I got the the second floor and noticed that the ceiling tiles on one end of the halway were completely missing.  Huh, they don’t do that for any old particular reason.  So, I asked someone what was going on and I got kind of a negative shrug.  Later that morning I found out that a water main had broke in the building on the fourth floor and managed to bring water from the fourth floor all the way down to the ground.  Even the outside of the building managed to have a thick layer of ice on it.  I felt bad for those teachers and didn’t know how any of us could even help.  Anyway, my classes went alright today.  They seemed to get right back into the swing of things pretty easily.  I did have a few students who seemed tired today, but I’m sure they’ll be on top of their game tomorrow.  Classes went pretty well, although the one class I’m struggling with was right back at it again today.  They just keep testing the waters.

I got done with school and Heather was pretty prompt with picking me up.  We got in the car and headed home.  Once we got there, all of our new computer equipment arrived from Heather’s uncle.  It was pretty awesome.  We had a memory stick for the desktop (512 MB), a connection for the extended hard drive and the network from Linksys, and a Sony external DVD-RW.  So, we got all the stuff unpacked and got to work.  I now have an external hard drive connected to my network that has 300 GB on it.  We were also able to double the speed of the desktop computer with the RAM installed and I was able to at least install the information for the external DVD drive on the laptop.  Needless to say, I’m now technologically hooked up at my house which is pretty cool!!

So, I got done installing all that stuff tonight just in time to eat dinner with the family.  When we finished with dinner, Austin and I shoved right off to Scouts and then came home.  I then joined Heather downstairs and we watched our usual Monday night shows together and went to bed.

Okay, let’s talk about Part 3 of Chapter 9 of “Star Wars:Republic Commandos - Hard Contact” by Karen Traviss…..

Chapter 9 (Part 3):  RV Gamma @ Nightfall:  Niner asked Atin how he felt now and Atin responded saying much better.  Niner then copied his old sergeant Scarata and asked him if he wanted dry rations or dry rations for dinner.  Atin told him that his unit was trained by Walon Vau although he heard of Skirata.  He said Vau taught them to plan for the worst and using your technology to it’s maximum potential.  Atin said he heard Skirata was a good instructor, and Niner said he was because he cared.  Niner decided that since Fi was on watch, he could sleep a little.  So, he put his helmet on and fell asleep.  Fi woke him up to let him know there was a contact forty klicks to the East near Imbraani.  What they picked up was red hot, but it wasn’t an explosion.  They watched as smoke billowed and Fi said they wouldn’t burn garbage at nigth, they’ve found something.  They all feared tha they found Darman and were trying to flush him out.  Niner took it as good news, because this meant that Darman survived.  The next plan was to search the entire area from Teklet to Imbraani looking for Darman…..

Okay, so it was Sunday and quite honestly I was still exhausted from yesterday.  Heather and I had a discussion last night and we decided to not head to church this morning for a few reasons.  First off, Austin and I are both still exhausted from yesterday.  It was a lot of running around and I had a whole bunch of eight year olds to keep track of while we were running around two.  Some of which had a whole mess of energy.  So, Heather and I got up fairly late this morning, by sleeping in today until nine o’clock.  God, I remember when sleeping in meant sleeping till eleven o’clock and it may only be a two hour difference, but two hours is a big deal when it comes to sleep.  We went downstairs as a family to watch the movie “R.V.”.  That was a hysterical movie!!  Even my kids found it funny and I highly recommend it to anyone who hasn’t seen it.  It stars Robin Williams and Jeff Daniels and has a funny running story throughout the movie.  It reminds me of a mix of “Dumb and Dumber” and “Road Trip” and if you’ve seen either movies, then you will probably enjoy “R.V.”.  We got done with that and I continued to work on painting my nerf gun.  I was extremely disappointed earlier this week as I had put on the first coat on my helmet and it came out great.  Then, three days later (on Friday), I put on the second coat and it started to bubble up on portions of the helmet.  Today I started to play with it and found out the Krylon primer either didn’t dry or didn’t adhere to the helmet.  So, I used my rotary tool and took those portions of the helmet down to the original helmet and then sanded and tonight I painted on a new coat of primer using “American Tradition” primer.  I just hope I can build the paint back up to the right level of paint, otherwise I’ll have apparent gauges in the helmet.  I painted that and put the first layer of Red paint on my nerf gun and took that upstairs to dry.  I think that the humidity in the basement is having an effect on the paint drying, so all my paint will dry upstairs now, where there is less humidity and more heat.

While I was doing all of that, Austin and I watched the Nascar race in California.  It was an interesting race and his favorite driver, Robby Gordon, ended up coming in 23^rd place.  It doesn’t seem impressive, but Robby’s had a good start to the season when he placed 15^th in Daytona and 23^rd in California.  If you compare it to last year, 35^th and then a “no finish”, then Robby’s doing pretty well.  I then ate dinner with the family and got things together for school which starts back up tomorrow.  It’s hard to believe that vacation is over tomorrow.  So, after I got things together, we went downstairs to watch T.V.  In a vain effort to avoid the Academy Awards, we watched “Amazing Race” and taped “Grease, You’re the One That I Want” and tried not to watch the Academy Awards.  We watched a small portion of the awards (the performance of Beyone) but managed to miss the rest.  I really hate the Academy Awards, and I won’t go into that whole rant again, but I am pissed off that Al Gore is getting an award this year!!  Gee, that wouldn’t have anything to do with the Democrats wanting to win the next presidential race and how they need money from Hollywood to back them up, would it?!!  (Note the massive amount of sarcasm in my voice)

Okay, enough of my talking about the Academy Awards, it’s time to talk about a subject near and dear to my heart.  Star Wars!!! Let’s cover Chapter 9, Part 2 of “Star Wars:Republic Commandos - Hard Contact” by Karen Traviss…..

Chapter 9 (Part 2):  Jinart then informed Darman that she is in communication with another Gurlanin on the planet acting as “comlinks” for the soldiers.  Then Jinart tells Darman that Ghez Hokan is in charge of security and knows that his comrades are after Uthan.  She also tells him that his comrades are leaving behind a pretty conspicuous trail of parts and bodies to track down.  Etain probed inot whether she could trust Jinart and how Jinart could have information to such info from Hokan.  Jinart told her that she makes a convincing old man and an excellent grandmother.  Jinart said Darman’s comrades are in a hopeless situation and that he’ll need to go find them and direct them to a safe spot.  Darman didn’t know what to do and turned to Etain and asked his commander what to do; to which she said she was not a commander adn that he was the soldier, so he needs to come up with a plan.  Darman did as commanded and agreed, but Jinart told him he needed to go outside while they talked.  Once Darman stepped out, Jinart got nasty and got in Etain’s face.  She told her that she needs to pull it together because these Commandos are the only ones that are keeping the Seperatists from taking over the galaxy.  She told Etain to lead or step aside.  Jinart told Etain that she can doubt herself, but those men don’t doubt her for one second.  Jinart also told her that if she weren’t a Jedi, he would have killed her days ago.  She left the room, leaving behind a kneeling, and bewildered Jedi.  Darman comes back into the room and tries to explain to Etain about a plan where he would split the squad as a diversion to make Hokan think they have fallen for the trap.  Darman then asks her what she thinks of him and she said she sees him as a man bred to obey.  Darman says he has a choice in his ability to interpret orders.  Etain then talked to him about Jedi and Darman showed confidence in her abilities.  He was the first person to do so in a long time.  Etain gave him strict orders taht he was to think of her as a commander in training and that he needs to stop her if anything she does or says will jeopardize their mission.  She then told Darman to go on with the explanation of his plan…..

What a Saturday!! I was exhausted by the end of the day and could barely keep my eyes open to even write this blog!!  Austin and I got up around six thirty this morning and got ready to go to the church to get in with our Scout Master’s van and go to Albany.  While we were going to Albany, my two daughters were doing something with their Girl Scout troop today as well.  We all met at the church around eight o’clock and got going.  We drove up to Albany and it took about two and a half hours.  The Scout leader and I got to know each other very well on our way up and back.  We talked about everything from polotics to teaching (as he is a teacher too) to being a father that cares about what our kids are doing.  We got to Albany around quarter to eleven just in time to meet the lady who was to do the tour for the capital building.  Except, she wasn’t there.  And, the door read “Mon-Fri 11 a.m. - 7 p.m.”.  This made his Scout leader nervous.  Were we wrong about the day and time?  Well, we waited for a little and a security guard came by and told us that the guide is normally a little late on the weekend.  Sure enough, five after eleven, she showed up. 

So, we took an amazing tour of the capital building.  It was a beautiful building, made of sandstone, marble, gold, and all sorts of expensive building materials.  Man, now I know where all my tax dollars are going!!  They’re doing all sorts of rennovations, upgrades, and cleaning that seems like it would be massively expensive to undertake.  But, I have to say the building is magnificent and I can understand why we’re called the Empire State.  We build our buildings like we’re the Roman Empire.  Austin thought everything was pretty awesome.  Right down to the giant Gargoyle that sits outside the Governor’s office that’s there to protect him from bad “vibes”.  We got done with our tour and headed over to the New York State Museum, had to pay $6 to get in, and headed up to the fourth floor and ate lunch at “Subway” by about one o’clock.  We got done with that and headed to the “tower” in Albany and went up to the observation deck where we looked over the city.  Honestly, for a state capital, Albany is small.  We got some great views from up there and had a bunch of fun looking at the sites.  We got done and went back to the New York museum.  Austin wanted to go to the 9-11 section with me, so we went in.  He really wanted to understand more about that day and what happened.  So, I walked him through what had happened and showed him the timeline of events.  He really wanted to understand the “why” of it all, and I tried to tell him that there are just evil people in this world that hate our country because we represent everything that is right and good in this world.

We met our leader at about three o’clock and headed for home in Binghamton.  We had some other great discussion talking about everything from football to what we had learned today about the history of New York State.  We got home just in time for Heather to go to work.  So, we pretty much passed each other at the door.  We ate dinner together and the kids watched some T.V. with me before we all went to bed out of sheer exhaustion.

Okay, let’s talk about “Star Wars:Republic Commandos - Hard Contact”, Chapter 9, Part 1 by Karen Traviss…..

Chapter 9 (Part 1):  “They look, walk, talk, and act like soldiers.  But they have no love, family, or happy memories.  When they get killed, I weep fro them more than any normal life.” - Jedi General Ki-Adi-Mundi. - Darman had Jinart against the wall with his blaster in her face.  Jinart said she meant no harm and Etain yelled to let her go because she’s a Jedi too, but Jinart interjected and stated she was not a Jedi, and asked Darman if he was willing to kill an old woman.  Darman said he would shot her because the enemy comes in all shapes and sizes.  Jinart looked at Eatin and said he was dependable then commented on his us of the DC-17.  Etain told Jinart that there are four of the Commandos and Jinart said she knew because she had been tracking them herself.  Darman asked if they were okay and Jinart said they were heading north and Darman said that would be RV Gamma and that’s when Jinart revealed that she was having a really hard time tracking the Commandos.  Jinart then turned into black marble textured goo adn Etain reached for her lightsaber as Darman remarked that they weren’t told taht the Gurlanin would be on this mission.  Jinart told him that she’s not Valaquil, but his consort.  Jinart turned into a four-legged, furry mammal.  Etain said she sensed The Force in Jinart and Jinart said that all Gurlanins are telepaths.  Jinart then explained that as telepaths, Gurlanins can only communicate with each other.  So Darman and Etain commented that they heard Jinart talking to them without seeing her and she responded saying that she can make a pretty convincing tree…..

Okay, so for me, today was the last day of vacation.  Tomorrow I would be going to Albany and Sunday would be spent cleaning up from the week and seeing what we could do to prepare for the week.  I got up fairly late this morning and watched Dr. Phil.  I then worked on some notes for the next TJCS episode and realized that I hadn’t interviewed Jeff Roney all week long as I had planned and Jeff hadn’t answered any of my emails.  So, I headed over to the Galactic Senate message boards and discovered that he was going through his own crisis.  With that in mind, I decided that I would make Ian my primary interview for the next episode.  However, this means that my next episode will definetly not be out on time.  First off, I’m behind on interviews, notes, and recording.  Second, March 1st is my anniversary and not only is it my anniversary, but it’s my 10th anniversary, so there’s no way I’m going to get it out that night.  I’ve decided to delay the release of TJCS #9 until the 15th of March.

Anyway, I got done doing some notes for the show, when I decided now was the time to try and figure out why I can’t finish Star Wars Legos.  Then I discovered that I don’t have all the parts to the Tantive IV and then I started working on the game.  I got done with figuring out some of the levels and then went upstairs and got some lunch with the kids.  Heather joined us downstairs as we watched some T.V. together and then the kids begged me to watch some Star Trek again.  So, we started “Star Trek:Inssurection” at about three o’clock and Heather made a “mobile” dinner which we brought downstairs and watched “Star Trek:Nemesis” while we ate dinner.  And that, was that.  The kids went upstairs to watch “The Lizzy Maguire Movie” while I watched “Saw II” downstairs and freaked myself out!!!  I loved it!!  Anyway, got done with the movie and went to bed as I knew tomorrow was going to be a long day spent with young Boy Scouts all day long in Albany.

Time to talk about Part 3 of Chapter 8 of “Star Wars:Republic Commandos - Hard Contact” by Karen Traviss…..

Chapter 8 (Part 3):  Etain then asked Darman how many clones were on the planet and Darman told her four.  She couldn’t believe there were only four of them, and in her mind she couldn’t understand how four ten year olds were even going to come close to the Uthan complex.  Darman told her that he was cloned from Jengo Fett and has gone through intense training and that they all fight very differently.  Etain then offered him some bland food from the planet of Qiilura and Darmand was excited.  He then gave her a ration cube to show her what he’s been eating up until now.  Etain felt they were being treated like farm animals and asked what he liked to do in his free time to which Darman said study.  As he continued to eat, Etain dried and cleaned herself off.  Having a female in he room almost put Darman in a state of fear.  Darman says he needs to get to his RV point ASAP as he’s been out of contact with his squad for almost two days.  Etain makes an off-color comment about there only being one fighter on the planet now and Darman says there’s actually two, citing her.  Etain said to not count on her as she wasn’t exactly the best Jedi.  She then asked him to point out on the map where his RV point was.  Darman pointed out the RV using his coordinates and explained to her why they have rally points.  Then she sees coordinates for a building and asks what it is.  Darman says it’s their primary target, the Uthan complex.  Etain says they’re wrong and shows him that it’s actually the Seperatist garrison adn that his squad is heading towards a hundred battle droids or more.  Now they HAD to find his squad.  Then a woman snuck into the room and informed them that the droids were heading for Imbraani as Darman pulled out his blaster and aimed it at her head.

Okay, it’s Thursday and for Heather it was “stress day” for her.  She had an apointment at Lourdes Hospital to get her chest checked out since she had the pains she had been having last week.  They are going to take a chest C.T. there at the hospital and they said a specialist should tell her anything of importance on the spot.  That made her feel better as she felt that this may give her some answers.  Her apponintment was at eleven-thirty this morning, so we slept in a little.  We slept in till nine this morning and then we got together and ate breakfast together as a family.  We got done with that and started to get ready to go to the hospital.  I told each of the kids to grab one book to read at the hospital.  Even Tara has started to read.  She’s starting to be able to read most of the Dr. Seuss books with some help.  I’m so proud of her.  She’s able to read some basic books and she’s only in Kindergarten.  Of course, this frustrates Austin all the more.  Anyway, we then headed off to the hospital.  I never realized just how much hospitals are their own little cities until I was in one with Heather today.  We went with her to support her and make her feel like she has a family that stands behind her.  She said she wanted me there in case there was bad news, I think she just wanted me there in general.  The kids behaved wonderfully and there were a few people in the waiting room and they all said they were very impressed with how well behaved our kids were.  Heather got done and told me that the doctors took the scan and found nothing.  It didn’t make her feel any better and it didn’t make her feel any worse either.

The good news is that there isn’t any bad news.  The bad news is that we’re no longer anywhere further along than we were a week ago.  The specialist said he would pass the scan and photos back to doctor Paul and see where he wanted to go from there.  Heather then had to go to work to get some things done quickly, so we went to Wendy’s when I told Heather that we should do something for the kids since they behaved so well in the hospital.  Then we remembered that we got a coupon for a free lunch for Tara’s birthday to Applebees.  So, as a treat, we took the kids to Applebees for a late lunch.  When we were done with that we came home and while Heather took a nap again, the kids and I went downstairs and watched “Star Trek:First Contact” and then watched two episodes of Star Trek Voyager.  Ironically it’s the episodes that introduced Seven of Nine of the Borg faction (which is what “First Contact” is all about).  This made Ruth even more interested in Star Trek and every time they see it on the guide for cable, they ask me to switch to it.  I’ve created a monster with this, in a way, and it’s only going to get worse if Star Wars goes to T.V.

We ate dinner together and Heather and I went downstairs and worked on various projects.  I am currently putting the second coat of black on my nerf blasters and am waiting for the first coat of paint to dry on my Mando helmet before putting on my second coat.  We just ordered my second jumpsuit yesterday and it should be here fairly soon.  That means that I’m then onto the phase of putting the two jumpsuits together, making the vest and then it’s onto working with Sintra.  I may actually be able to get this Mando cotuming done sooner than I thought.  I thought it would take three or four years, when in reality it may only take a year or two.  Awesome!  After doing some work, we watched our usual Thursday night shows (“Survivor”, “C.S.I.”, and then watched some “Everybody Loves Raymond”).

Okay, let’s talk about Part two of Chapter eight of “Star Wars:Republic Commandos - Hard Contact” by Karen Traviss…..

Chapter 8 (Part 2):  Darman looked around the barn for emergency escapes and found loose boards that would work in a pinch.  He slumped down on bales of hay.  Etain asked Darman what was wrong with him as she sensed his distress.  Darman told her that he broke his leg when he free fell from a vessel and that he was now hungry from his thus long journey.  Etain then asked the clone to call her Etain and not “commander” and then asked Darman to take off his helmet.  Etain then pulled out her holoshpere of the plans of all the Seperatist and Neimoidian structures on the planet.  Right down to the materials and building styles.  Darman couldn’t believe his eyes, this padawan held the man that could make achieving their objective very easy.  Etain asked him what thier mission was.  Darman told her they were here to abduct Ovolot Qail Uthan, destroy her clone-killing nanovirus, and blow up the facility.  Then Darman explained to her that he was one of millions of clones who are being commanded by Jedi Generals all over the galaxy.  Darman was distracted while they were talking as he realized he was seeing his first female in close contact since his conception.  Etain commented that there were millions like him, but Darman corrected her and said that the Commandos Division is looked upon as being eccentric.  Etain told him that her master gaver here the information cube and that an old woman told her that he was coming…..

Okay, so it’s Wednesday and you would think that I would have the ability to say taht I’ve gotten a lot of time to myself and that break has been great.  But honestly, looking back upon this break, things have been rushed and it just didn’t seem like much of a break yet.  I had to get up fairly early this morning as Austin and I had to go tour 98.1 “The Hawk” radio station this morning.  We had a good time and not only did we get a chance to tour the radio station, but Austin made his broadcast debut this morning.  AND, they sent me a copy, so you can all look forward to hearing that in my next podcast.  Let’s just say, I became a very proud dad as my son told the D.J. that he was using a program that was just like daddy’s podcasting program and proceeded to tell the guy how the program worked.  The D.J. at the station was pretty impressed and told Austin he should consider becoming a future disc jockey.  We got done with that and came home in time to see that Ruth was going to be going to the dentist.  So, we went with her.  It was Ruth’s “dreaded day”.  She’s had a front tooth that she’s refused to pull out (even though it’s been loose for a year) and the tooth behind it has already grown in and is now out of place.  So, today the dentist pulled the tooth.  Next week we’ll go in and get her a retainer that will help to force the second tooth forward since it formed behind where it was supposed to come in.  So, Ruth learned about the dentist’s tools and learned about what novacaine can do to your mouth.  She was none too happy with any of that and was a grump pretty much the rest of the day and tonight. 

We left the dentist’s office and went to Circuit City to get “Star Trek: Nemesis” on DVD.  When we got there, I was shocked to find out that they didn’t have ANY Star Trek movies on DVD.  When I asked the cashier what was going on, she said they don’t sell Star Trek at all, so they dumped the concept all together.  Good news, they have plenty of Star Wars DVD’s that also aren’t selling either.  So, Heather looked at me and said, “where do we go now?”  My response was simple, Bartles and James (our pet name for Barnes and Nobles).  We got to Barnes and Nobles and I went to the Sci-Fi section and NOTHING.  No Star Trek at all!!  I couldn’t believe my eyes.  Yet again, not looking good.  So, I went to the register to see if I could at least order it, when I noticed they had all their Star Trek right there by the counter.  Interesting concept here, Star Trek is forty years old this year, where Star Wars is only thirty.  Yet, you can barely find Star Trek movies anywhere, but Star Wars movies are all over the place!!  Maybe Star Wars is the dominant Sci-Fi.  Heather then asked if we could go to Wal Mart to get some groceries and I agreed.  So, we headed to the opposite end of the plaza and shopped at Wally World and came home.  That afternoon, while Heather slept, the kids and I watched “Star Trek Generations”.  We got done watching it and it was time for dinner.  We ate dinner together and then did our usual T.V. watching tonight, including watching “American Idol”.

Okay, so it’s time to talk about the first part of Chapter 8 of “Star Wars:Republic Commandos - Hard Contact” by Karen Traviss…..

Chapter 8 (Part 1):  “Only one percent of civilians are prepared to kill, and less than a quarter of ordinary human soldiers, even under fire.” - Sergeant Kal Skirata - A droid kept blasting a door as Dr. Ovolot Q’ail Uthan yelled at it to stop because there were biohazards beyond that door.  Hokan said it was a test and the door held up nicely.  Uthan ahured Hokan that the building was buitl to the highest specs.  Hokan even tested the door with Fulier’s lightsaber but was unable to breach the door.  Uthan insisted that this could wait till tommorow till Hokan informed her that she needed to be relocated.  Uthan asked why and Hokan told her that troops have landed on the planet and that it seems they are after her project.  Uthan felt that Hokan had security under control, which he felt he did.  But he insisted on moving the facility till he had a better idea of the enemy they face and why they’re here.  Hokan then asked how long she needed to move and Uthan said she would need six hours.  Hokan asked her if the material was dangerous and Uthan said only to clones.  Hokan then walked outside and noted that winter was coming, which would make it easier to track his opponents.  Hokan convinced himself that the Republic would not send clones to take care of a virus that attacks clones specifically.  Hokan put his helmet on, formed the droids up acrossed the entrance of the facility and then told the brainless sentients that war was about courage…..

Tuesday and another busy day for me.  I got up fairly early to get to SMASH.  I got everything together including my laptop, my digital camera, my new shoes, my SMASH shirt, and all my stuff for SMASH.  Got to rehearsal and we got going right away.  We were able to rehearse most of the morning from ten o’clock till about quarter after noon.  Then we broke for about a half hour for lunch break (pizza) and then took a group picture for the photo for the posters.  We got done with that and then practiced till two o’clock.  I came home and looked at my Nerf guns and decided I needed to put on another coat of primer on them.  This means I’ll have to wait until tommorrow to paint them.  But, I was able to finish cutting out my flames out of the tape and spray paint my Mando helmet with it’s first layer of red paint.  It’s going to look pretty awesome if I can pull it off correctly.  Heather got going to work after a while as they wanted her in early tonight.  The kids and I made dinner and then had it (hot dogs and mac and cheese - their favorite).  We then went downstairs and started to watch “Star Trek VI:The Undiscovered Country” when I discovered that I have “Undiscovered Country” in my house.  I never bought “Star Trek:Nemesis”.  I called Heather and she promised that tomorrow she would go out and buy it for me from Circuit City on DVD.  That’s significant considering that the only advanced version of Star Trek that I have is “Undiscovered Country” on Laserdisc.  I guess it’s time to upgrade all my Star Trek to DVD.  Anyway, the kids were upset with me when I had to turn off the movie so I could tape “American Idol” for my classes since we’re reviewing Season Six with my sixth grade classes.  I promised them we would watch the rest of it tomorrow.  They headed to bed and I watched “American Idol” and “Law and Order:Criminal Intent” and then went to bed.

Okay, let’s talk about Part 8 of Chapter 7 of “Star Wars:Republic Commandos - Hard Contact” by Karen Traviss…..

Chapter 7 (Part 8):  Ghez Hokan observed the scrap heap that had been bested by snipers and only two grenade rounds.  He wondered if these experts were working alone or in platoon.  Lieutenant Cuvin came back saying there was no sign of a camp, just troops lying in a prone position.  Second Lieutenant Hurati was excited to find a second pile of droid parts, but this time they were arranged.  One of the stumps near the pile held up a droid that looked up, almost like an alter.  Hokan felt he was being mocked.  He put a curfew on all vehicles.  Hurati pointed out that the farmers rely on transports to get their crops to Teklet for shipping.  Ghez Hokan suggested they use hand carts.  Hokan go on his bike and headed for his new base of operations, all the while contemplating his new enemy.  Quick, precise, and small; not the type of war he was used to.  I fhe didn’t know any better he would swear he was fighting Jengo Fett himself.

Well, this Monday started off very slow and lazy and ended in some personal stress for me.  Heather and I actually slept in this morning until nine o’clock and then got up and decided to be lazy and watch “Dr. Phil” downstairs.  We actually didn’t like the episode and ended up switching to a rerun of “Frasier”.  It wasn’t long before I was on the computer today and just goofing around and checking things out and searching random stuff about Star Wars and Star Trek.  As I did that, I realized that I hadn’t reloaded AIM on my computer and decided to put it on my computer again.  As I did this, the kids wandered downstairs and asked if they could watch Star Trek.  So, Heather let us watch “Star Trek IV:The Voyage Home” and “Star Trek V:The Final Frontier”.  I feel lucky that Heather was willing to put up with it, but she seemed alright with the idea.  While we watched the movies, I IM’ed with Josh and Scott and had a good time catching up with everyone for a little bit.  I don’t get a chance to do that very often, so it was nice to be able to do.  It was fun to be able to talk to my friends and find out how they are doing.  As I talked to Josh, I began to realize that my life this week wasn’t really a vacation.  I won’t have a vacation thanks to Scouts and SMASH.  In some ways, I’m okay with that, and in other ways I think it’s sad that I don’t get any time to me.  But, that’s the life of being a music teacher and a father.  We got done with the two movies and our morning and afternoon were done with the movies.  That’s when the personal stress kicked in for me.  Also while watching the movies, I taped up my Mando helmet and had put on my second coat of red paint on my Nerf guns yesterday.  I finished with that and followed the directions I read and waited twelve hours and started to work on putting the gun back together around three o’clock or so.  Well, as I started to put it together, I left behind fingerprints and then, the paint began to smudge and peel.  That’s when I went back to the can and read the fine print (at the bottom of the directions and warnings) that read “for maximum adhesion, it’s suggested that the paint sit for 72 hours between coats”.  72 hours!!  Three days!!!  Okay, massive mistake.  So, in the process of trying to steel wool off all the paint, I broke the gun.  CRAP!!!!  Now I’m back to square one and things weren’t looking good.  Heather made a suggestion at dinner.  She had to go to JoAnn’s to use her coupons she got in the mail.  So, why not stop at Target and get another Nerf gun to work with (they were only seven dollars each), get some stuff at Lowes and come home.  So, we did exactly that.  We went to JoAnn’s and we got materials for her Star Wars dress, including beads and then stopped at Target, got my Nerf gun, and then went to Lowes, got some more spray paint, and some Dremel sand spindals.  We got home and I sanded the guns down and sprayed on the first layer of primer while we watched our usual T.V. shows (“How I Met Your Mother”, “The Class”, “Three and a Half Men”, “Rules of Engagement”, and “C.S.I. Miami”.  Of course, I taped “Heroes” and we watched that after our typical line up.

Okay, enough of my day, let’s talk about Part 7 of Chapter 7 of “Star Wars:Republic Commandos - Hard Contact” by Karen Traviss…..

  Chapter 7 (Part 7):  By the time the two clones were within visual range of Atin, there was already one smoking droid and the others were forming up and going towards Atin’s position.  Fi let Niner know that he had the Aqualish captain in his sniper scope sites.  Niner told him to take him when he could.  As Niner put on the grenade launcher to his gun, Fi killed the captain with his sniper rifle.  This caused the droids to  pause for a moment, but afterwards, they kept advancing.  Three of the droids came towards their position until Niner shot at all seven remaining droids with two shots from his grenade launcher and incapacitated them all.  Fi asked Atin if he was okay and he said he didn’t loose anything that he couldn’t put back on.  Once Niner and Fi got to Atin’s position, Atin complained that his chest hurt and that he was having a hard time breathing.  Fi took Atin’s helmet off and noted that he wasn’t bleeding and wasn’t in shock.  Then he took his chest armor off and looked under his body suit when they both discovered the massive bruise from his chest all the way down his sturnam.  They weren’t sure if it was a bruise or fractured ribs, but sprayed him with Bacta spray anyway and put his bodysuit and armor back on him.  Niner suggested they skip RV Beta and keep going, but to leave some debris behind for Darman to let him know they had been there.  Atin suggested that maybe he shold be left behind, but Niner said he wasn’t getting out of this mission that easy.  Atin said he’s been the last man standing in two squads and he now suffers from survivor’s guilt.  Niner commented that it’s a shame they didn’t remove that from their programming…..

Well, it’s Sunday.  We, as a family, had every intention of making it to church today.  But, yet again, Heather got in late from work last night.  She didn’t get in until almost three-thirty this morning.  Her crew worked terrible for her and just took forever closing the store.  She didn’t have her typical crew and things did not go well.  That, and I think she was exhausted from having to work three closes in a row this week in order to try and have Tuesday night off for Ruth’s concert, which of course was postponed to Thursday night anyway.  So, when the alarm went off this morning, we just didn’t hear it well and Heather unplugged the alarm clock.  So, once we got up around nine-thirty, it was too late to try and make it to church.  So, we slept in a little more and around ten o’clock, the kids came in and asked me if we could watch Star Trek.  So, I took them downstairs and we watched “Star Trek III:The Search For Spock”.  Ruth was enthralled.  She couldn’t believe that Spock lived because his photon torpedo tube landed on the Genesis planet.  That totally blew her mind!  She was so excited, she wanted to watch the next Star Trek movie, but I told her I couldn’t do that to her brother as the Daytonna 500 was going to come on in an hour and I promised Austin I would watch the race with him.  So, Austin and I watched Daytonna together.  It was an interesting race and things got tight before the end.  The kind of race I like to see to start off the Nascar season.  We ate dinner while watching the race (for those of you that don’t know, the race takes up the entire afternoon).  I did that because I knew I would be getting a call from Nathan Butler around seven o’clock for an interview for Chronoradio.  So, we got done with dinner around six-thirty and then Nathan called around seven.  He had a really great discussion about how Star Wars will go down in history.  If you want to know more about it, you’ll have to check out the last regular episode of Chronoradio, set to be released later this year.  Anyway, I finished a good interview that I had fun with and then headed downstairs and joined Heather in watching T.V.  We taped “Amazing Race” while we watched “Grease:You’re The One That I Want” and “The Apprentice” and then watched the tape and then went to bed.

Before I go to bed, let’s talk about “Star Wars:Republic Commandos - Hard Contact” Chapter 7, Part 6 by Karen Traviss…..

Chapter 7 (Part 6):  When Niner, Fi, and Atin got to RV Beta, they quickly realized that there was no cover of trees to be found.  They decided they needed to find the nearest visual point and watch for Darman to show up.  Fi pointed out that it was Autumn and that farmers were likely to log this hill for the wood for the winter, and that’s what their intel doesn’t line up.  Fi sighed under his helmet and the others sensed his distress even though they couldn’t see his eyes.  Fi said he wasn’t afraid to die, but thought all of this was done so inefficiently.  Fi also quoted his seargeant who thought the clones should get out and live life more.  Yes, Kal Skirata called them all sorts of names while on duty, but when he was off duty, he would smuggle thme foods and Mandalorian books.  Niner quoted the seargeant too whe he was interrupted by a warning light on his HUD display.  Atin was able to confirm a contact, ten droids and one captain.  Then a hard blast was heard and Atin redfined them as a hard contact.  Fi and Niner didn’t skip a beat, they made a B-line back to Atin’s position with blasters ready…..