This just in

Today we got up early and trekked to a TV station for a private tour with the morning news anchor. The tour was a gift, (someone else won it at an auction but gave it to my son).

It was fun; we got there just before 8 A.M., and Phil (Mr. Anchor) let us listen while he discussed the curent status of various news stories with his producer (for the five minute local headline cut-ins during the Today show) and he showed my son D how he edits the script and so on. I hadn't realized he wrote his own scripts for those cut-ins. He was really nice and spoke at my son's level because he has a son of his own; he made it all very cool and interesting to D.

The one funny thing was that there are multiple nicknames for my daughter's full given name; there is one version that NO ONE ever calls her, and Phil pulled that out of thin air for some reason and called her that consistently the whole time we were there. (She didn't mind. Whew~!)

Anyway, then we went into the studio and watched them actually doing one of the cut ins, and the local weather. D got a chance later to stand in front of the green screen and wave his arms around and watch himself on the monitor. The weather guy was pretty cool too, and spent time talking to us as well. He showed D the worn out spot on the floor where he always stands, and the right angle to stand so that you can watch yourself on the monitor (to point to the right part of the green screen) and look pretty convincing from home -- look as though you're looking "at" the map, when you're watching the monitor really, and without moving you can shift your gaze to appear to be speaking to people at home.

Later we went to the production room where they control all of the feeds and so on, and can do special effects like splitting the screen and overlaying different sources. That part was fun for me because it was a computer geek.

I took a bunch of pictures - except I forgot to take one with Mr. Anchor!! Unbelievable. Oh well. I did get a photo of D and the weather guy. So maybe someday he'll be a meteorologist. Because that's all it takes, right? Having a picture of yourself pretending that you are doing a job, and you are qualified.

The rain is back for a few days, and it's making me very melancholy, but I am fighting it. I have been playing Israel Kamakawiwo'ole's version of Somewhere Over the Rainbow, and wishing I could fly over the rainbow myself. (OK, so that's not helping. I'm stopping that now.) There's some significant crap going on with school, and it is really bringing me down.

My friend spent some time today trying to convince me to add a gas fireplace to our family room and put the tv on the wall over that (um, don't have pesos for a flat screen tv now!) - she pointed out that we should at least put the CAT 5 cable in for now. Also I figured out that my "just put linoleum out there" option won't work for the screen porch...since it won't be heated... so tile it is. Cha ching. So I'm already worried about blowing too much money on this!

Long busy weekend coming up. I'm tired.