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In 1886 Robert Louis Stevenson wrote The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde.  The story is about a respectable doctor who experiments with the idea that people have both a good and evil self. He hopes to isolate them in hope of ridding himself of his evil side. The experiment is partially successful, but he is unable to rid himself of his evil side, the villainous Mr. Hyde, who in fact grows stronger and stronger finally becoming the dominant personality. It was known as a "shilling shocker", the Victorian equivalent of a Stephen King novel. The story was born in Stevenson's own nightmares in which he dreamed that by day he worked as a respectable doctor but by night roamed the back alleys of Edinburgh. The book was an instant success, read even by Queen Victoria. Stevenson's wife found the manuscript and was so offended by it she burned it in the fireplace. But the story was so burned into his mind that Stevenson quickly rewrote it in a matter of days

I got a delightful email card in yesterday's mail from a friend, announcing that it was National Chocolate Ice Cream Day and sending me the most scrumptious-looking virtual chocolate ice cream sundae you've ever seen. No calories--it LOOKED delicious! If you missed Chocolate Day yesterday, you've got my permission to take off work or doing the laundry or running the corporation TODAY, and run out right now and get yourself some REAL chocolate! If you've got kids, better take them with you!

I spent today on a job, doing things I haven't done in years. I haven't worked at a public job since my oldest child was 15 mos, because I chose to have my own business at home, and tend to my children at the same time. So, I found myself a little "rusty" at the skills it takes to be very fluent on the job. Oh, I have no insecurities, no doubt that I will be able to handle the job, but how much nicer it would have been to have had a little up-to-date training before being left half a day on a job I had never done, without anyone to assist me. :-) But those things happen in the 'real world'.

My brother held the picture up and asked, “What do you see?” It didn’t take me long to answer. “Two faces looking at each other,” I said, confidant that the answer was obvious. “Look again,” Terry said. I stared at the picture for a long time. Just as I was about to give up in exasperation, my brother traced the outline of one face with his finger and told me to look at the space between the two objects. A shape emerged and formed into a chalice. The faces blurred into the background.