Time Flies!

Wow, November 11.  Go figure.  I got a little note from Merry Mom asking how I’d been and realized I hadn’t posted in TWO MONTHS.  YIKES.  I guess I’m due for an update!

All is well here.  BUSY.  Like, crazy busy.  As usual.

So, the big news is I survived my organization of information class.  I really had a VERY hard time with it.  I felt stupid the whole semester and was so glad it was my only class.  I somehow managed to get an A, and when I tell you it was a miracle and in no small part due to my partners in the small group project, I am not lying.  Not even a little bit.  I had a lot of help from our local friends too, who attempted to teach me XML and database building, and thanks to my husband who took lots of time off so I could get caught up and get homework done and whatnot.

I am registered for 2 classes this semester:  Ethics for Library and Information Professionals and Introduction to Archives.  I’m excited about it, neither class seems too hard core and both seem interesting, more importantly.  Classes start Wednesday.  I’ve gotten a volunteer job at a local archives, so I should get some hands on learning, which should help with a paper I have to write for the archives class!  I hope the archives class and volunteer experience helps me decide once and for all if that’s the direction I want to go in.

AFS kept me busy.  There were some problems with Kristin and her new family and their other student, so I wound up doing an intervention, which is not really what I think I’m good at, but I did it and got the family to stay together for a little so I was proud of that accomplishment.

Thanksgiving was a lot of fun.  We did the Turkey Trot in the morning—my goal was to do it in less than an hour and I accomplished that goal, which made me happy.  My dad was here and made the turkey, but we were all tired from walking and running so I can’t say as we did very much.  We had a little birthday party for my niece that weekend, and I really can’t believe she turned 3.  The time is just flying by!

December was a whirlwind!  Emily and I went to see Diane Keaton in November and decided to go back and see Michael Ian Black on December 1.  He was HILARIOUS—we were at 6th and I Synagogue and he started a joke that mentioned Anne Frank (it wasn’t a joke about Anne Frank) and he looked up at the stained glass window waiting for lightning to strike and said, “Well, if it’s gonna happen, it’s gonna happen now!” and everyone was just laughing hysterically.  It’s the second time I’ve seen him, the first time doing a solo act, and he was really great.

We took Kristin and fellow student Ilaria to Wolf Trap for the annual holiday sing-a-long and for pizza afterwards.  They had a lot of fun and I enjoyed having them along for the tradition.  The following weekend we spent some time at my sister’s and then went to our friends Paul and Kris’s house and church for their annual Christmas pageant and dinner.  It was really lovely, and wouldn’t seem like Christmas if we didn’t go.

Unfortunately, I was in a minor car accident the following week, and my car was in the shop until after Christmas.  I was driving to meet some friends for dinner and a kitten ran in the road.  I stopped and the person coming towards me stopped, but the guy behind me didn’t stop and hit me.  At first glance, it didn’t look so bad, but ultimately cost Allstate somewhere in the neighborhood of $6000 when all was said and done.  They did give me a rental, and I was pleased about that since I put almost 800 miles on it in just over a week’s time.

The following weekend was my Christmas concert.  This is my second year with the Stafford Regional Choral Society and in November I was elected to the board of directors.  I really thought that this Christmas concert would be the best concert I’d ever sung in, and I dare say I was correct.  I did a lot of rehearsing at home with the on line tracks, and managed to sing without my music, which made me happy since I didn’t have to lug a bunch of books around!  The choir chairman was nice enough to give me rides to rehearsals and the concert since my car was out of commission and I hadn’t gotten my rental yet.

The following day, Monday, my dad and his girlfriend decided to make a big turkey pre-Christmas dinner, and since I was still eating turkey from Thanksgiving, I decided to go ahead and invite some people over.  We had about 15 people who came to eat turkey and still had plenty of leftovers!  Leah had a ball.  Our neighbors came and brought her gifts and some other friends came and brought us fresh eggs from their chickens.  It was great!

Tuesday, for their first Christmas present, I took Dad and Linda to see ICE! at the Gaylord National Resort.  Mike’s and my theme for Christmas this year was cherishing old memories and making new ones.  To that end, we made a conscious decision not to buy “stuff” that people wouldn’t want or wear, and instead to either make things or make memories.  A few years ago, we bought tickets for the whole family to go see ICE! but couldn’t afford it this year, so I just took Dad and Linda (Leah got in free).  We had lunch with my sister beforehand and then went to the show, which was really lovely—it had a Madagascar theme, which didn’t mean much to the rest of us, but I enjoyed it anyway.  It was a really nice afternoon.  Midway through, I got a text from my mom that she was coming up early, so I prepared myself for her arrival as well!

Wednesday, Mom came and Mike and I went down to Richmond to pick up Penny’s brother Mickey at the airport.  He is in boarding school out in Kentucky (Or Cuh-cucky as Leah calls it) and needed a place to go when the school closed for 2 weeks for Christmas.  He took one look at us when he saw us at the gate and kept on walking and when I stopped him to ask if he was Mickey, he said he had to get his bags and took off to the baggage claim.  That was essentially the high point of his visit.  He was a rude little bugger. 

Thursday, Mom came back to our house to stay for a week plus.  She and my sister started arguing and at this point I can’t say who’s wrong or who’s right, I just really wish it hadn’t happened.  My goal for this Christmas was for everyone to get along, no fighting, and to have a peaceful and calm time.  It didn’t happen.  By Christmas Day, I had a nervous breakdown.  There were SO MANY people and SO MUCH was going on, it was crazy!!!  Friday, my buddy Joe arrived and Saturday we went to my sister’s for Christmas Eve. 

Christmas Day was here, my sister brought a stray with her, so if you’re keeping count, there were 13 people here.  Judy’s stray wanted to make wassail for everyone and the crockpot wouldn’t hold it all, so we had to do it on the stove, which he fretted over literally all day.  The present situation, even though we all scaled back, was again totally crazy out of control—even if you only buy each person 1 thing, that’s 13 presents for 13 people (for a total of 169), and you know that no one bought ONLY one thing for each of the kids.  So it was pandemonium.

For our part, Mike and I made each family member (Mom, Dad, Judy, Lucas, and Joe) a scrapbook of memories of our times together.  It was a special moment for everyone and there were a lot of tears flowing as everyone looked through their pictures and swapped books and traded stories.  We also made a photo collage of all of us making funny faces (mostly unintentionally).

And framed them. Everyone got one of those.  So it helped lighten the mood a bit from all the other crying.

Dinner was the traditional roast beef and Yorkshire pudding.  Mickey announced the first night he was here that he wasn’t eating a thing I cooked, all he wanted to eat was beef ramen noodles, despite the fact that he doesn’t eat beef.  He informed me that the noodles are only beef flavored.  I asked him where the beef flavoring came from and he couldn’t tell me.  I read the package and sure enough they contain beef, but I didn’t give a damn and didn’t tell him.  And I also let him eat Yorkshire pudding, despite it having beef “flavoring” in it. :-)

Dad and I did our traditional trip to Richmond to see the Ginter Gardens Festival of Lights, which was beautiful, as was the weather!  It wasn’t warm, but it was far warmer than usual when I had to stand by the bonfire for an hour mid-way through.  They expanded their repertoire slightly so we got to see some new lights and of course, we got crapped on at our favorite awful Burger King, where we ALWAYS get lousy service.  It was a fun night!

Post-Christmas was similarly busy.  Our “memory” present to Mom was a trip to the Melting Pot, so I took her out one night for that.  Joe decided I needed to start watching Ghost Adventures and Ancient Aliens, and we invented a drinking game to correspond with those (every time someone yelled “DUDE!” in Ghost Adventures or said “Aliens” or “extra terrestrials” or some variant there of in Ancient Aliens, we took a drink).  By the time we were done, (and let me be clear here, we were drinking Mike’s Hard Lemonades, this was not serious alcohol!  But I haven’t had a drink in probably 5 or 6 years and Joe is a real lightweight when it comes to alcohol so this was never going to end well), I was sitting on the floor convinced I could understand every word some German guy was saying, and Joe was moaning about a headache, which took him most of the next day to get rid of. 

We spent one day with Andy and Melissa bowling and taking Mickey to Coldstone Creamery, since he wanted ice cream.  Mike took the whole week off, which was nice for me to have a break! 

I took Mickey on my famous nighttime tour of DC in an effort to get him to spend some portion of the day either not watching TV or playing around on the computer and to interact with some member of our family.  I think he enjoyed it once we left, although he put up a bit of a fight about going.  I was excited to see the new Martin Luther King Jr Memorial, which I hadn’t seen yet and somehow almost drove past.  You can’t believe how big that thing is.  The pictures I’ve seen of it do it no justice at all.  It is literally massive.

We essentially did nothing to celebrate New Year’s Eve.  We forced Mickey away from the computer 10 seconds before the ball dropped on Times Square so at least he could say he saw it, although he wasn’t much impressed.  Mike went back to work on the 3rd, so I tried to come up with things to do with Mickey every day.  We went and saw a 3D movie—my first one ever, The Adventures of TinTin, which was OK, went to the mall, and had lots of Thai food, which is in short supply in rural KY.  Friday we started getting ready for our 3 Kings party, which was seriously scaled back this year—half what it was last year.  I didn’t want to have a huge crowd and be exhausted, so I decided just to have a few people and call it a night.  Mickey announced the beef stroganoff smelled terrible and that he was going to sit in the kitchen so he could leave, and then after watching me cook, clean, and set up for 2 days, just as we were ready to sit down, he asked if he could make ramen noodles.  I should have told him what he could do with his ramen noodles, but held my temper and told him no as politely as I could.  When I sat down to dinner on the other end of the table, my friend asked me what was wrong, that I looked like I was ready to commit murder.  Haha.

We dropped him at the airport yesterday and spent the rest of the day tidying up.  I had a nice evening last night, preparing English tea and watching the Downton Abbey premiere on PBS.

So that brings us to January.  Leah is in dance lessons—has been doing it for over a month now and LOVES it.  She is particularly fond of tap dancing and although she is the tiniest and youngest girl in her class, she is doing just great and learning a lot.  We have started back to Toddlin’ Time on Tuesdays and now are on the hunt for pre-school.  I am touring one place tomorrow which is probably the one that is farthest from my house and at the far end of where I am willing to go.  I start school on Wednesday.  We are going to my dad’s for a week next week, but Mike is staying home again to have some peace and quiet. 

Otherwise, I am watching lots of Quantum Leap on NetFlix, trying to keep up with housework (a losing battle), and trying to make good on my New Year’s resolution of cutting back and doing less while making it mean more.  I would like to get back into Weight Watchers, but every time I say that, I go for 3 weeks and quit again.  I need to find the motivation I had in 2008.

So I’ll probably write again in another 2 months when Merry says “WAKE UP!” :) 

2AM!

Yup, it’s almost 2AM and here I sit, wide awake.  *SIGH!*  We had a crazy day yesterday starting when Leah woke up at 4AM.  I never quite got it right thereafter.  I tried going back to sleep around 9AM only to have company arrive 20 minutes later.  I tried going to sleep around 1:30, only to have the contractor show up and start banging like hell and running an air compressor!.  He left and I finally feel asleep around 2 and slept for 3 solid hours.  So of course, now I CAN’T sleep and I’m due to leave for Woodbridge in 6 hours.  AUGH!  On the plus side, Leah will be with Melissa tomorrow, so I can sleep and get lots of other things done.

I have continued weeding things out around here.  I managed to eliminate an entire cabinet of DVD’s—placing the ones I was keeping on 2 shelves of the cabinet the TV now sits on, and the few (like 5) others I’m not keeping are going to Goodwill.  We are conflicted about what to do with the cabinet.  We’ve owned it since we first moved in together.  We bought it so I would have something in which to store my clothes and it has also been used to store pantry items and DVD’s in its history.  I am reluctant to part with it, so part of tomorrow’s task will be to empty the crawlspace and see if we can find a spot and a use for it in there.  I had another cabinet downstairs with glass doors that Leah was forever trying to break into, and I decided I should get rid of that.  Tonight while I was watching the documentary Winnebago Man (highly recommend it, by the way!), I cleared it off and moved it out, but felt the space left behind was too empty.  So I took the glass doors off it and filled it with Leah’s toys.  I like it better than having something of a pile by the rear door, and hopefully it will inspire both her and me to keep her toys picked up.

I started Christmas shopping this weekend.  Compared to last year, I have a very small list—we really went overboard last year and I don’t want to do that this year.  We are hosting Christmas and hopefully my sister will host Christmas Eve, so some of the pressure will be off a little bit.  As I think I said before, Penny’s brother will be with us for the holidays and I’m trying to consider what I can do to keep him entertained.  I’m sure it’ll be an entirely different experience having a boy around.  But I wonder if he’ll be anything like Penny!  I am considering a day trip to Philadelphia, but it would be easier with a second driver, and also depends on if Mike is planning to work or not during the week before Christmas and New Year’s.  He often does.

This week will be busy—I have my end of the year book club party Wednesday and meeting up with a classmate and then seeing Diane Keaton Thursday.  I have been busily working on my NaNo book, and it’s coming along nicely.  I decided to erase stuff from the white board when I finish that chapter or section, and it helps me see the progress I am making.  I need to find out when registration opens for the spring semester and get registered for next semester’s classes.  There is one I want to take that is only open once a year, so it’s important I get it in now to try and determine if it’s a direction I want to go in!

Well, I guess I’d best TRY to get some sleep!!!!  Talk to you all later!

Bloggety, Blog, Blog, Blog

The last time I blogged was on 9/11 and little did I know that all hell would continue to break loose around here.  We got our basement fixed up beautifully—I’m happy to say you would never know anything happened.  There is one less couch and there is a lot of extra lighting now, which is awesome, but other than that, life is back to normal downstairs!

In the meantime, the car needed new brakes and I needed glasses, which added up to a lot of money!!!!!  Thankfully we were able to get both done and finish paying off the credit card bills, because things just kept getting crazier!

Unfortunately, just as we were preparing to go to NY for my dad’s 60th, my mom called to say her long time companion Jim had collapsed after having suffered a massive heart attack.  He passed away on September 28th.  Having been a big part of our lives for a number of our years, this was a really sad loss for the family.  I was thus in Florida for almost 3 weeks.  During this time, Kristin from Iceland moved out.  I was disappointed in a way, but I think it was probably for the best and since I am still working with her new family’s other student, I will see her here and there.  I very much doubt we will host next year although I said that this year, so who knows, but I’m excited to say that Penny’s brother Mickey is coming to spend Christmas with us this year, so it’ll be kind of like celebrating with an exchange student anyway and we’ll get 2 weeks of fun before sending him on his way.

Florida was a good time, despite the circumstances.  I found things for Leah to do in and around Vero Beach and we went to the Brevard Zoo, SeaWorld, and Lion Country Safari.  I do believe the kid knows more about animals than any other 2 year old around!  Her particular favorites were the sharks and penguins at SeaWorld.  I also took her to see the movie A Dolphin Tale, which she loved and went around telling everyone she could find that the dolphin broke its tail.  We came home from SeaWorld with a 3 foot long Shamu, and just recently Leah ripped all the stuffing from ‘Mu’s tail and has informed me that Mu has a broken tail like the dolphin.  When I re-stuff Mu, we shall remedy his broken tail with a band-aid!  We also paid some extra money to go pet a rhinoceros, which was a pretty awesome experience that I won’t soon forget!  Leah liked taking a scrub brush to him and tickling him.  Whenever I ask her about the rhino, she says, “BRUSH!” (you can kind of see the rhino behind my mom in the picture above)  So we did a lot of things we might not otherwise have gotten to do and I got to go to the beach (even if it wasn’t Myrtle Beach) and just chill out and help out my mom as needed.  We kind of tossed around the idea of Disney World, I think more because Mom and I wanted to go than we really wanted to take Leah, but cooler heads prevailed—she really is still too young and we want her to remember that first time forever.  Another couple of years!

This class I am taking is really kicking my butt.  For 3 weeks, I basically did nothing, as the professor told me not to worry about it, so I’ve been playing catch up ever since.  We have group projects to do, and I’m happy to say I have great group members who really picked up the slack for me, and so I am now going to work doubly hard to make up for the work I didn’t do on Assignment 2.  Only 36 days till the class is over, THANK GOD, and let us hope I never take a class about organizing data and information EVER AGAIN!  Next semester I hope to take Introduction to Archiving so I can see if I really want to pursue that as a career option like I’ve been thinking I might.

I had fun in October going to the Kennedy Center to see Les Mis with some members of my choir, and then spending that evening answering phones for WAMU at their annual member drive.  We had a recordbreaking night, getting $35,000 in 3 hours, which is pretty incredible.  I love volunteering during The Big Broadcast—the most interesting mix of people volunteer and we had  fun table.  It was nice to unwind and let my hair down after the stress of Jim’s death and the classwork piling up.  The production of Les Mis was spellbinding—literally I wept many times and it was just a great performance. 

Leah and I have been having a lot of fun getting ready for Halloween.  We’ve been doing little projects now, like baking bread and making pumpkin-shaped jello and pumpkin-shaped crayons from all the crayons she broke to bits.  I went over to the local teacher supply store and bought a few charts for the walls so we are learning our colors and taking little scavenger hunts.  We talk about the weather and count the days on the calendar.  We went to the pumpkin patch and carved pumpkins today.  It’s fun and keeps her engaged.  I am looking forward to getting her into preschool, but am not in any rush.  We are keeping busy with a music class and MOPS and various and sundry other activities and are looking into gymnastics.  She’s a fun kid and able to do so much more.  Even though I miss snuggling with a newborn, I do enjoy these toddler days!  I like being crafty and even little things turn into a lot of fun for her, so I try to come up with something to keep her interested and teach her something new, while allowing me to stretch my creative muscles and keep from getting cranky!

Hopefully our bathroom project will get underway soon.  We finally got our loan approved and got the money to pay the contractor, so we’re ready to go.  We picked a design and that’s that!  It’s hard to believe it’s been nearly 3 months since the Great Flood, and while it had unintended consequences, it’s fun to think of the positives of the situation and how we’re going to come out of it.  We also paid off our car this month, ahead of schedule, which loosens up our budget some to do some other things.  It’s the first time in 6 years we don’t have a car payment.  We nearly got hit today by the local ne’er-do-well on our way out to get pumpkins to carve, and I thought, “Wouldn’t that just be my luck!?” but thankfully he got back on his side of the road with about 6 inches to spare before he hit us.

Joe and I went and saw the MST3K live show, Cinematic Titanic, again on Thursday night.  It’s a fun way for him and I to celebrate our frienshipversary—this year being #17.  It won’t be long now before I’ve known him more than half my life, which I find mindboggling.  We had our traditional Bertucci’s dinner and then walked around DC for a couple of hours before the show started.  Afterwards, we got on line for the signing and I got myself a poster to have signed.  We also discovered Joel was allowing people to take pictures, so of course, we took full advantage.  I like that all of us are modeling sexy eyewear! :-D  My next big celebrity trip will be in November to see Diane Keaton at 6th and I Synagogue, which should be quite interesting.  I enjoy watching her, and she seems like she’d just be a really nice and down to earth person, so I’m looking forward to meeting her!  I wonder if she’s going to wear something crazy or just dress casually.

In general, I’m just feeling quite content with life.  I seem to have made friends with some exceptionally kind and low key people—just last week I was able to go out to dinner with 3 new girlfriends and we all sat around and laughed and chattered until before we knew it, 2+ hours had gone by.  I’ve joined a new book club here in town, which is fun, and my NoVa book club seems to have gotten back on track, surviving the 7 year itch.  I’ve become very friendly with a wonderful couple down the street and their daughter, all of whom think Leah is the best kid in the universe (and of course, I quite agree!). 

I’m keeping busy, busy, busy and keep telling Mike, “I promise, I’m going to calm down…after this week”.  Fortunately he’s been patient with what has been a ridiculous autumn!

There have been a lot of fun little things going on and I always think, “Oh, I should blog about that!” but usually I am too tired!  It’s a shame—Leah says some damned cute stuff that I’d like to remember and we have a lot of fun and do a lot of things, but time just keeps on slipping away…  I really can’t believe tomorrow is Halloween!  Then it’s November, and I do debate doing NaNoWriMo just so I can get this damned whiteboard down from my bulletin board and finish my book!  And then in a few short weeks, it will be Thanksgiving.  Mike and I have been debating what to do in April for our 10th wedding anniversary, and yet it seems like just yesterday we were getting married.  I feel too young to be this old and too old at the same time. 

I’ll close here and who knows when I’ll blog again!  The new Facebook sucks, but it doesn’t seem to keep me from using it, so of course, you can get my updates there if I don’t update here :)  Ta ta!

9/11 Remembered

It’s hard to believe it’s 9/11 for the 10th time.  I usually don’t tune in and watch the TV coverage—it was a day that I will never forget.  However, I suppose this year being the 10th anniversary of it happening, I decided to get up this morning and watch some of it.  Leah soon joined me and together we watched and she patted my cheeks and dried my tears.  Facebook is abuzz with where everyone was and how everyone felt, and I have thought about it all week, but don’t have enough space in a mere status update to post everything I would want to about that day.

Mike and I were fairly newly engaged and planning to attend three weddings that fall.  It was a happy and loving time.  That morning, I had to report to the office where I worked in Boston—as an itinerant teacher, typically I would be on the road 4 days a week, but not that day.  I was in my office doing something and a co-worker came in and said, “A plane just hit the World Trade Center.”  I thought he was joking, but then I thought back to other people flying little prop planes into things like the Kremlin and figured ok, maybe it did, but maybe it wasn’t such a big deal.

Working in an office dedicated to the blind, there was no TV that had any cable or any kind of reception.  Consequently, we had to rely only on what we could get from the radio.  That day’s volunteer receptionist flipped on WBZ and we heard about the plane and the WTC being on fire and started to think maybe there was something more to this than just a simple accident.  And just a few minutes later, the second plane hit.  We all just stood there, trying to figure out in our confusion what the hell was going on, and not being able to see it.

The woman who ran our small store there managed to find one of those handheld portable transistor-type televisions and all of us crowded around it to watch the drama unfold on about a 4 inch TV screen.  We tried using a TV screen magnifier for the supply closet, but the picture became blurry and distorted.  We moved into the conference room and held the TV up to the window, where the reception came in the best and just stood there.  There was a phone, and since the planes had left from Boston, we were all calling our loved ones as the drama unfolded.

I called Mike and was so relieved to hear his voice.  I asked him where he was and he said they were all leaving early and he was going to try to get to me.  Because I didn’t work in a T-accessible location, I told him to go home to our apartment and I would meet him there. 

Just moments later, the first tower collapsed.  I will never forget the look on my co-worker Robert’s face.  He heard the news on the radio back in his studio and came running in to join the rest of us, and just stood there, stock still with his jaw dropped open.  There was a sense that what we were seeing wasn’t really happening, and of course the reports from the Pentagon started rolling in, and suddenly there were reports that there were 50 planes in the air unaccounted for, and the combination of total fear and confusion and disbelief and grief settled into my chest with a chilling numbness that I will never, ever forget to my dying day.

The second tower collapsed, and I went home.  For some reason, I had an aerial antenna stored in our laundry room—something I had brought with me from Arkansas where a friend had given it to me. I collected Mike and we went back to my office and plugged the aerial antenna into the conference room TV and miraculously got a picture to come in by setting the whole thing in front of the window.  Our whole office came through and we all sat at the conference table and watched it together.  There were a lot of hugs, lots of crying, and just a sense of togetherness.  The word came down from on high that we should take the time to deal with this in whatever way any of us saw fit, so I decided to go home, and I took a couple of days off.

In that intervening time, my sister called and said, “Did you hear about Shannon Adams"?”  I hadn’t, but was stunned to hear that a boy I played with as a child in his grandmother’s yard and behind the Baptist church had perished in those towers.  I called my mother and her reaction was “What was she doing there?”  I said “not she, Mom, he, Shannon Adams” and her reaction was “Holy shit.”  Neither of us could speak.  Shannon was an amazing guy—he was literally friendly and nice to everyone and you would NEVER see him without a smile on his face.  It was a blow to all of us to believe he was gone—his family hadn’t heard from him at all in the aftermath, and to this day, his body has never been recovered.

When I think of those early days, the word that comes to me most is fear.  There were rumors swirling like crazy about “what was next” and what we needed to do to prepare ourselves for whatever hell was going to be unleashed on us next.  The general feeling among the people I was with was that now they had our attention and the real terror was about to begin.  I remember getting a phone call that all our paper and water supplies were going to be tainted and that we should go buy as much bottled water and toilet paper and paper towels as we could get our hands on.  For probably the only time in my life, I had a decent emergency supply kit with flashlights, water, batteries, canned goods, and more, stocked up in the sunroom of our apartment.  Being that these were pre-Facebook days, and in fact, there wasn’t much on the internet to speak of, we spent hours on the phone with family members and friends, pledging our love to each other, and made silent oaths to cherish each day as it came, since there were suddenly no guarantees that something crazy wouldn’t happen out of the blue.

The past ten years have been challenging for our country, no doubt about it.  I think the nation in many ways is far more divided than it ever was.  I have had times in the past ten years when I have gotten very, very politically active, and one of the best times of my life was going with my sister to meet Cindy Sheehan and march on Washington with her crowd. 

This week I’ve given a lot of thought to how I want to be as a person and how I wish our country was.  I think back to September 10, when there was a freedom from care and worry about security and I could have walked into the Smithsonian without a bag search, or gotten on a plane and had my husband walk right up to the gate with me.

I have concluded one thing:  I never, ever want to live in that state of fear again.  The constant fear and panic and what-if thinking was exhausting and debilitating. 

I also don’t want to contribute any more to the division.  I have a lot of opinions about the current state of affairs, how we got here, what we need to do to get out of it, but a recent interaction with a friend who has widely divergent views from mine led me to conclude “Why bother?”  There is nothing you can say to anyone who believes anything totally different than you that will make them change their minds—believe me, I’ve tried.  And it is tempting to jump on the bandwagon of those who do tend to agree with you, to form an “us versus them” mentality, but that’s not going to accomplish much either.  So from here out, I’m just going to keep my mouth shut, smile politely, perhaps on the inside think, “This guy is a real f***ing idiot!” and move on with my day.  I am going to form my own opinions, not just parrot the opinions of the popular ideologues and talking heads on any side of the equation, and my present opinion was formed by 9/11 and it was this:

What matters most is people.  And whatever we can do to make everyone’s lives better is what we should do.  And if something isn’t going to make our lives better, then we should not.

That’s what I learned from a bunch of guys flying planes into important places in the United States.  Maybe it’s not the lesson they wanted me to learn, but I’ve learned it through non-judgement, forgiveness, compassion, and love.  And for that goodness to come out of something so horrific, I think it’s a pretty good legacy for all of us, but especially for me.

GAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

When I say this summer has been the craziest summer ever, I mean that quite literally.  Not one thing has happened that we planned on, and everything is just going crazy all at once.

Mid-July I was trolling the “Hosting with AFS” Facebook board and feeling all nostalgic when a post popped up from a mom in New Zealand who was looking for a host family for her daughter.  I spoke with AFS about the possibility of being a welcome family for that girl, and was told she had a placement in the works but that if we wanted to be a welcome family, we should contact our area team.  So we did and were immediately fast tracked to be a welcome family.  It took a couple of weeks and we were initially matched with a girl from Finland but they found her a permanent home, so then it was a whirlwind of who we would choose to take.  It finally came down to Hong Kong and Iceland as the two countries we’d host from and, deciding to take a break from Asia, we chose the girl from Iceland.  We were told she’d be a late arrival since we started everything so late in the summer, but surprise, surprise, it was all approved and we had roughly one week between when we were allowed to contact Kristin and when we had to pick her up.  She arrived on August 12 and starts school on September 6th.  More on her time here to follow.  But first…

In the middle of the matching, interviewing, and applications process for that, I flew to Tucson for 10 days to start my library degree.  It was the most stressful 10 days of school I’ve ever endured, not to mention the two weeks leading up to it, which was a “reading period” that involved reading a couple thousand pages of information and attempting to synthesize it before 8 straight days of classes, group projects, paper research and writing, library tours, and computer projects.  By day 2, I ran from the classroom and hid in the bathroom and cried.  It was hot, I had jetlag, I missed my baby, I was stressed, and I was staying in a dorm I dubbed “The Pit”.  As a bit of a reward for my survival, Mike let me book my last night in a swanky hotel near the airport and a friend gave me a ride so I didn’t have to pay a cab.  The morning I was due to leave, the flight was oversold, and so I offered to give up my seat, which got me a $300 travel voucher for future travel.  Since the AFS host moms from last year are planning on a trip to Las Vegas this fall, I can probably travel basically free, which is a good thing, since…

The day after Kristin arrived, I went to brunch with friends.  I got home to find Mike and our neighbor frantically running up and down the stairs.  The toilet upstairs had overflowed, and Mike and Kristin had been unable to shut it off.  The resulting flood swept into our basement and I called the fire department, not really knowing what else to do, which resulted in giant holes being knocked in the ceiling to drain out the water.  Two days later, the cleaning company and insurance company arrived, and we’ve been ceiling-less ever since.  Our carpet looks practically brand new however!  Work begins tomorrow—an electrician is coming to install some new lights downstairs so it won’t be so dark, and then the contractor will come and do the dry wall, mud, paint, etc. 

Unfortunately, when the cleaning company ripped up the bathroom floor, they discovered black mold!  OF COURSE THEY DID!  So, now we have to get that cleaned up.  They talked about the clean up process and how basically we will need to take out the vanity and get that replaced, as well as the floor.  In looking over our options, we’ve decided to have the bathroom replaced.  Everything in there is kind of basic grade, not very nice stuff, so if we’re going to do it, we’re going to do it right and not half-ass it. 

So then came the crazy weather phenomena, like the earthquake and then a crazy thunderstorm from hell that knocked over Mike’s radio antenna.  That now has to be either repaired and re-installed or replaced.  Then came Hurricane Irene, which caused our power to go out for about 12 hours.  When it came back on, the air conditioning no longer worked.  Believing it to be an a/c problem, we called the emergency service line of our heating and air contractor, but when they came out, they discovered that a blower inside the furnace had burned out, and in putting in a new one, the entire system was off balance and making all kinds of crazy noise.  The air conditioner itself is just fine and dandy, but because the furnace controls the movement of the air, it has to be dealt with as part of the air conditioning system. 

They came out this morning to quote us the price for repairing and for replacing the furnace, and we are going to go ahead and replace the damned thing.  It’s 11 years old and we would probably be piece-mealing it for the next few years till it reached the end of its natural life cycle, so we might as well just take care of it and be done with it.  They are coming to work on Thursday. 

Just as a reminder, in case you’ve forgotten, we’ve had a 17 year old from Iceland here through this entire venture.

So upon discovering all this, I had myself a 30 minute nervous breakdown, walked around the block, called my dad, tossed a couple of rocks, and now I’m ready to roll.  We’ve been wanting to a lot of these repairs for a while now, and this is kind of the impetus we need and the opportunity to do things that we would have liked to do for some time.  I have decided to turn into an eternal optimist as a result of all this.  My opinion now is “Better the furnace died in August than in December and we freeze half to death!”

I will call the insurance company again tonight and see what’s what.  Hopefully they’ll cover some of it, but I have my doubts.  I was talking with my neighbor yesterday and suggested that he sprinkle holy water between our two plots of land.  He thought I was kidding till he heard about the furnace, but now I’m sure he’s thinking about it. :) 

Hello, Old Friend

It’s been a while!  I think I say that every time I update the blog, as I should, since my best intentions to regularly update don’t seem to happen.  Well…  Here we are.  It’s July.  July.  JULY!?  Jeez!  I can’t hardly believe it ;0D

So much has changed since the last post.  Penny is gone.  She has returned to Thailand.  She misses us, doubtless, and we miss her too.  It was an extremely challenging year for all of us, and I’m glad it’s over, but also quite proud of our family and how we pushed through.  The last month was a whirlwind—we did a lot of sightseeing and traveling.  She got to go to Luray to see the caverns, we took her up to Baltimore, and of course the big NYC trip.  It was a blast.  We had a good-bye party for her the last weekend she was here and at least she got to see everyone one last time and know that so many people cared about her, whether she accepted their love and care or not.

I’ve busily put my grad school career back on track.  I did everything on the checklist pre-departure, and the class went live last week, so I’ve been busting my @ss, doing readings and homework and tons of writing.  The message board is all abuzz with travelers and locals swapping tips, and last night I sat down and printed out maps and bus schedules and watched a video about the dorm I’ll be staying in.  It has free laundry facilities, and is right next door to a student union with a convenience store, so at least I can run over and get about 5000000000000 gallons of water every day.  I also participated in an on-line advisement session and “met” my advisor, Tom, who seems like a nice guy.  I hope he’s a nice grader.  Haha  I’m learning new words like crazy, and am committed to doing as much as I can in terms of getting the readings done and being prepared.  With this type of kamikaze class, 2 weeks reading, 1 week in Tucson, and 1 week post-class busting my @ss to finish projects and whatnot, I’m so glad that I’ll be on a semester schedule afterwards.  Mike and I splurged and got a new laptop to take with me, although he isn’t yet done perfecting it, so I’ve only touched it to take it out of the box and not been able to use it since.  Supposedly tonight he and Andy will finish it up, and hopefully I’ll be able to use it!  I stole the desk from Penny’s room and have set up what I call the LIS Command Center in the empty corner of our bedroom, and would like to have the laptop up there, since there are far fewer distractions.

But I’m basically very excited about going and learning and meeting all these new people.  My dad will be here minding Leah and taking orders from Mike, so while I’m not sure exactly how this battle of wills is going to turn out, I’m pleased I won’t be here to witness it!  The three of them are so stubborn and they all like to have things their own way immediately, so it should be interesting.

On the Leah front, things are going very well.  She is in and out of potty training, does it when she feels like and not when she doesn’t.  She knows WHAT to do, but doesn’t always feel like it, and often says, “Potty!” just because she enjoys watching us jump around and get her on the toilet, only to find out she doesn’t actually have to go.  She seems especially fond of this little trick when she either doesn’t want to do something (sit at the dinner table) or is bored of her current endeavor (going to the grocery store) and wants to mix it up a bit.  Her favorite movies at the moment are Tangled and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (the Johnny Depp version) and she is obsessed with her cousin Dot Dot.

On the horizon is meeting up with a fellow AFS family and trans-racial adoptive family (weird I met someone on Facebook who hosted a girl from Thailand AND adopted an AA baby too!  Go figure!) from this past year in early August, AFS host moms camp out in Las Vegas in the fall (Hooray!  Can’t wait to go back to Vegas and to meet these awesome ladies!), my dad’s 60th birthday coming up in September, starting my work as an AFS liaison this fall (I will be sponsoring girls from Italy and Turkey), and continuing my many writing projects.  I recently wrote a guest mini-series for my friend Elizabeth’s adoption blog Adoptivity, I’ve been hired by my choir to write a regular column in the newsletter, and I am still busily busting out articles for Yahoo News as the occasion permits.  I am really enjoying all of the writing—it’s given me a focus for my brain that doesn’t involve Oompah-Loompahs or giant purple dinosaurs.  I’ve got a book club that I’ve been going to here in Fredericksburg and of course the NoVa one, so that keeps me busy.  I took the summer off for the chorus, but will go back to it in October—I’m happy to say 3 choir members have let me know they miss me.  Hooray!  I’m loved and missed. :)

Mike and I have been busily tightening up our budgets some.  The last couple months from March to June were a total drain on our finances, and so we’ve been taking little opportunities as they come to make some changes.  We dropped a big chunk of our cable, saving us $300 per year.  The young lady who cut our grass decided not to do it this year, so we spent $15 on parts, got our lawn mower repaired, and I am now mowing, saving us roughly $200 per year.  I no longer have a cell phone, saving us $600 per year.  We switched to a different trash service, saving us $120 per year.  We bought an electric clipper so I can buzz Mike’s hair, saving us $150 per year.  On their own, these things might not seem like a big deal, but add it up and it comes to a total savings per year of over $1300.  We’ve also totally quit going out for meals unless there’s a really, really, really good reason (laziness is not a good reason), which is a huge savings.

I’ve also instituted “Not going anywhere one day a week” in which I am totally car-free.  It’s been Sundays, although that will have to change because I will have choir practice on Sundays this fall, but one day per week, I flatly refuse to get in the car for any reason.  It has been a success.  We spend a good bit more family time together, I am forced to make good decisions about how to schedule my time during the week to accomplish our goal, and I really do feel my blood pressure going down as I stop running around so much.  This past Saturday, I was at Giant and the car’s battery died.  Getting stranded SUCKED, getting stranded without a phone SUCKED HARD, but we survived, fortunately we had a friend visiting who came and jumped the car for us, got a new battery, and all’s well.  As a bonus:  if that had happened a month ago, I’d have been raiding the savings account and panicking.  Now I can afford to take it in stride a bit!

Well, ok, I’ll probably see you in a couple of months. I would like to think I’ll be able to blog from Arizona, but our professor said we should get some sleep before we come, which does not bode well!  So if not, I’ll update with how it was.  Wish me luck!  TTFN!

Updates from Susan-Land

It’s been a busy few weeks.  It’s hard to believe we have less than 40 days now until Penny leaves us.  There were times we never thought this time would come, and now here we are in many ways dreading the fact that she has to leave at all!  It will be an interesting summer, though, and we have a lot planned, so I think we’ll have some fun.

The big news this past few weeks has been that we had to have our beloved little bunny, TomTom, put to sleep.  He started acting a little punky and out of it and then just started smelling really bad, and finally had a hard time moving at all.  I took him to the vet last week and she said that he was having kidney issues and they could try to nurse him through it, but there were no guarantees and it would be kinder just to let him go.  For all the kidding around we’ve done in recent years about waiting for him to die so we could install bookshelves in his spot downstairs, it was incredibly sad and painful to bid him farewell.  This picture was taken when he was about 4 months old, and he lived to be 6, so he had a good, long life.  I know living in his pen in the basement wasn’t his favorite place to be, but we did the best we could by him, and I think as long as we gave him carrots and whatnot, he was happy.

I am busy now with two major goals, the first of which is finishing off everything I need to do in order to start school this summer.  This includes completing a checklist of things they have on the school website for the summer course I’m taking, as well as the nuts and bolts, like applying for a loan, making travel arrangements, getting the text book, getting tested for immunity to measles, and making arrangements for where I’m going to stay.  I’ve got an email address set up now for my school stuff, so I can say I’m official, and now that the bill is in, I guess I’m really going.  The worst part of it has been dealing with my doctor’s office, trying to figure out about how I can get tested for a measles immunity.  Despite my repeated phone calls, they haven’t called back, so finally I called the clinic in Central Park here in Fredericksburg and they can do the test and have the papers ready in 2 days.  I should have gone there 3 weeks ago!

The other major thing is working on getting Leah potty trained.  She has indicated a readiness and willingness for the task, as for the past couple of months, she’s gotten very upset when her diaper is wet or dirty, and tries to get it off.  If she can’t, she screams and cries pitifully.  We’ve been at it almost 2 weeks now, and she’s definitely getting the hang of it.  She likes earning little rewards and she loves wearing underpants instead of a diaper.  So I think we’re making good progress.

Last weekend, Paul Burrell, Princess Diana’s butler, came into Fredericksburg to help raise funds for the new children’s museum they are hoping to build here.  Of course I jumped at the chance to go meet him and brought Penny along as her opportunity to meet a celebrity.  We had a great time—he got right on the floor with Leah, and Penny was so happy that I talked her into going back and getting herself a book signed and asking him about the royal wedding.

Penny has developed an interest in the British Royal family thanks to my tutelage, so it was kind of special to share in that after we watched the Royal Wedding together and I taught her some tea sandwiches and scones to make English tea, which we did for both the Royal Wedding and for Mother’s Day.

Today we rolled down to Westmoreland Berry Patch to pick berries and play with goats.  She LOVED it this year, as opposed to last year when she really wanted nothing to do with it.  She sat in the mud happily mashing and eating berries and then we fed the goats and had lunch.  They give you a handful of corn or a handful of goat feed for a quarter, and she was determined that the goat was not getting more than one niblet at a time, and even then he’d have to pry it from her fingers, but the goat was quite patient and happily ate whatever she was willing to give without biting.

I have been penpalling a lot lately, and have new penpals from England, Australia, New Zealand, Portugal, and Switzerland.  It’s a lot of fun and very interesting, and helping me travel vicariously, since I’m not likely to go too many places between now and who knows when!  One of my Australian penpals friended me on Facebook and it is hilarious to see her snow pictures while I’m gearing up to roast off a few pounds here with summer kicking off.

Otherwise, we’ve been sticking close to home.  Gas prices being what they are, I’ve canceled our summer travel plans and am now making plans for things we can do locally.  This past week I only used one tank of gas, which for me is astounding, since I was going through 2 a week.  We are enjoying Toddlin’ Time and MOPS, and at the MOPS event on Sunday, they were talking to me about putting Leah in pre-school this fall, which I am still thinking about.  I’ve been leaning away from doing it, but at the same time, it would give me a couple of days a week to get schoolwork done, as well as allowing her the chance to socialize and learn some things…  So we’ll see.  I would like to take her to the Richmond Zoo and Ginter Gardens this summer, and we’ll go up to DC to Mike’s new office and to meet his co-workers.  My old office is having a party next week and I’m going to go to that.  My book clubs are still going strong, and I’m enjoying them both.  Zipping around a lot with Penny now that she’s gotten more involved in school and friends.  She really enjoyed the prom last weekend, and this weekend is having Korean food with friends, volunteering at a local 5K, and wants to go see Pirates of the Caribbean.  Monday night, Mike will be out visiting some friends from RI who are coming to town, so we girls are going to have a little girls’ night, and I know she also wants to go to Charlottesville again, as well as go berry picking.  Last night was her last choir concert, tonight she has to go to an improv show for her school.  So it’s a busy time for all of us!

This summer, I’m going to go enjoy my first concert at Celebrate Virginia Live, when Barenaked Ladies roll into town.  I’m also hoping to get to see Hello Dolly over at Riverside.  I’m really excited to go to Tucson, and also to swim, spend time with friends, and start planning my dad’s 60th in September.

That’s all for now!  The fun never ends! :-D