Family

As I mentioned before, I think that I'm closer to most of my extended family than a lot of people these days. One of these days, I need to work on a family tree because some of the extended family names are confusing. I have had some luck researching my Mother's side of the family. But my Dad's has been more difficult - his parents have a different name because they chose to change their sons names at a young age. It has to do with trying to shed your Polish heritage in Chicago to get a good job - but even knowing their birth name hasn't brought me much luck.

There's only one relation we occasionally see - my Mom's sister in Texas. She has two sons (both grown and married; one has three kids). This spring both sons came within weeks of each other. One of them was mayor of New Braunsfels, TX and running for re-election against a tough opponent. I will not explain why we don't stay as close (I don't want it to be a soap opera story), but I hadn't heard anything since I saw him in April. Unfortunately, my cousin Adam Cork did not get re-elected.

It's weird - I'm not sure if I should try and call him, or send a note. I don't even know if the address I have for him is still good. The election was over a month ago, and I don't know if I'd be rubbing salt into an old wound.

While I know why some of my Mom's family does not keep close with her sister, I don't think it's fair for her children to be shunned because of what happened. I'll have to think about what the thoughtful thing to do is.

Score another for the big developer

I just read this article, and feel as if it deserves a mention. Fulton Homes pays $3,000 fine; Chandler will pay more. In short, Fulton Homes (one of the valley's big subdivision builders) built a new subdivision across the street from a landfill. Homeowners were told that they landfill was full, it will be closed, and a park built on top. They forgot to mention that Chandler was planning on expanding said facility to a garbage transfer station.

Well, once the homeowners found out, they cried foul. Fulton Homes admitted that it should have discolsed the future plans, and paid the maximum fine of $3,000. The city of Chandler had to scrap its plans for the transfer station, and the residents will now have to pay more in garbage fees to transport their trash to another facility.

*shakes head* And we're supposed to trust that property developers have our best interests in mind.....

Reality is here...

Before I go into work, I just wanted to babble. First of all, the cats took turns waking me up; my Chicago cold would alternate between the cats in also waking me up. Thank goodness for coffee!

I know that things are not going well in my lab when I get an email from the postdoc who sent out an e-mail to suggest a meeting to "boost morale". I did get a nice supportive e-mail from the collaborator I work with who is trying to arrange a trip to Tucson to meet. It's kind of one of those things like when you meet someone on the internet - we've talked on the phone, lots of e-mails, and now we may meet face to face.

Well, no more stalling...let's get this day over with. So that I can call my family and tell them what happened. I'll discuss this more later, but having a caring and supportive family at a time like this is nice.