The mystery illness has been identified as "winter vomiting."

Mystery illness hits British troops in Afghanistan

Everything seems to be working O. K., except for the archives. I'll work on that.

I am experimenting with a new template. Please bear with me. Thank you.

Today, I bought two pair of Rockport "Halton" shoes: one pair of black and one pair of "sport white," i. e., light gray. Thanks to my Mom! I used the money that she gave me on my birthday.

As a follow on to yesterday: I prepared my Mom's lunch and supper and washed the dishes after each meal. My brother telephoned her from Georgia. I think that she had a nice day.

Pakistan reluctant to pursue al Qaeda

I must have tried a dozen application launchers, but I have finally found one that seems just right: not too simple and not too complicated, and it is freeware, to boot! You can download it from the program's home page.

Today is Easter Sunday, and His Holiness the Pope addressed his Easter Message (Urbi et Orbi) to "Men and women of the third millennium!"

The widow of one of my first cousins had quintuple bypass heart surgery last month. She lives in a town about three and a half hours away. I couldn't get in touch with her Thursday or Friday, and I was becoming concerned about her. After getting no answer this morning and this afternoon, I finally got through to her this evening. She said that she was fine and had been out running errands. Whew! What a relief.

This morning, Mother and I went to the cemetery to change out the flowers on Father's and my sister's graves. The last time that we put new flowers out was several months ago. I got together a lot of old newspapers, some twine, a pocket knife, a folding chair, two plastic bags, and a large wrench. Then, we drove to the cemetery. When we got there, Mother sat in the folding chair and arranged the flowers. I tied the stems together with twine, using the pocket knife to cut the twine. Then I wrapped the stem-bunch with newspapers, to make a snug fit in each vase, which is a part of the bronze marker. Wrapping the stem-bunch with newspapers was something that my Father used to do, when he and Mother would put flowers on my sister's grave. Making the flowers fit down snugly into the vase keeps them from blowing out when it is windy. It was windy today, so I used the large wrench to weigh down the newspapers, to keep them from blowing away. The two plastic bags were for the old flowers, until I could get to a wastebasket at the cemetery. When we were finished, the vases were filled with new flowers and looked much better. I am so glad that we went.

I can't remember where I happed upon it, but I found a commenting system that I'm going to try out. Also, a web counter, which will track the number of visitors, and other statistics.

Apparently, it's not very active, though.

This is just to make it known that this blog is, now, officially active, again.

I just learned two new words, gastrulation and totipotentiality, by reading "The Too-Weak Rule," by William Saletan, at slate.com.

The ‘airlift of evil’

Talks collapse; rebels attack Kunduz

Pentagon Wants AC-130s in Uzbekistan

According to the Associated Press, Syed Tayyab Agha, a Taliban spokesman, said that the U. S. "should forget the 11 September attacks,'' because "The attacks have taken place in America and the people who performed and did the attacks, they were in America, so this is not something connecting with Afghanistan.'' That drew a sharp response from U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. "I can assure them we will not forget about Sept. 11,'' Wolfowitz said in Washington. "We are moving on, and I think before long the world will forget about the Taliban.''

There is a long article from "The Wall Street Journal" on MSNBC about CIA covert operations. Since I have to go to work now, I don't have time to read it, but I'm putting up a link here so as not to let it get away from me. After I read it, if I don't think it is newsworthy, I'll delete this post. CIA-backed team used brutal means to break up terrorist cell in Albania