Hash #8

Alright, I'm back I think. Life's challenges forced me to take a little sabbatical for a while. I'm just going to post some pictures from the last hash, which we hosted Saturday evening. I think it was the best hash yet, because of the trail, the weather, the company, and the good times. Click on each picture for a closer view.


Luke (and Holden), Brandi, Jason, Jackie, James, Naomi, Stephen, Alan, & Richard


Alan and Naomi


Jason and Jackie in the parking garage


We were kind of tired at this point. That's Luke, me, Jason, and Jackie.


Some of the trail symbols.

I is educated

I've spent the past couple of days playing musical chairs in what I thought was a class for adults. You know, if you want teachers to feel like professionals, don't treat them like children. I don't need to pretend I'm a statue, build anything with paper plates and cups, or sit in a circle and talk about my feelings, but I've done more than my share of that over the summer. Just hand me the book and let me go teach. I got it, thanks.

Nevermind

Recently I've been thinking I should get my hair cut short again, and then I go back through pictures and see this:

YOWZA! I'm thinking, NO.

The girls

I suppose it's another mom thing, but there's just something about seeing your kids together, like this, that makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. When you have more than one child, you essentially are giving them the irreplacable gift of each other. Yeah, it's a little melodramatic, but true!

A much needed manicure

Most of our weekend consisted of yard work, and we'd let so many things go that there was a ton to do. Between the potato vine explosion and the passion vine that intrudes on anything in its path, it was like Little Shop of Horrors in the backyard. This is the potato vine "under control," but that's a relative term:



We also replaced the mulch in all the flower beds, both front and back, which ended up being two trips to Home Depot and 15 bags of mulch. I'm going to pass on telling about my Home Depot experience, for now. Anyway, I like the new dark brown:



But sometimes the best things in nature are those that happen naturally. We inherited this old chair when we bought the house, but I had nothing to do with the Morning Glory that popped up this year and made its claim:



Sweet!

My Chandler

If you've seen every episode of Friends like I have (and several more than once), then surely you know the one where Chandler and Monica try to have engagement pictures taken, but Chandler can't for the life of him take a decent picture. His smile was always contorted, or he smiled at the completely wrong time, or he just couldn't smile period. Well it seems Alan has developed what we call "The Chandler Syndrome." Used to, Alan smiled so much in every picture that it looked more like he was laughing. So we were kind enough to make him feel really self-conscious about it, and now he's thinking way too hard about what to do!









You should see the ones I deleted on the spot.

Graced with his presence

Been kind of busy with work this week, so today's another picture day. I snapped this photo yesterday, because it's rare that Junior will lie this close to anyone for more than 30 seconds, and this lasted maybe 15 minutes.

Inventory

It might be time to reevaluate how much cereal we eat. OR, not let Alan go to the grocery store by himself. I'm leaning towards the latter. We have thirteen boxes for three people. And I've been so busy eating my senior-citizen-high-fiber cereal, that I've lost track of how old that box of Frosted Flakes is.

Check it off!

Haven't you made that list in your head of the things you must do before you die? You're lying if you say you haven't. Well for me, going to a Braves game in Atlanta was on my list, so I felt pretty fortunate this weekend to be spending two days at Turner Field. It was awesome!

They played the Brewers, which meant we got to see Prince Fielder hit three homeruns and C.C. Sabathia pitch nearly nine innings on Saturday. Which really means nothing if you're not a baseball fan.



My partner in crime...wouldn't have been the same going with anyone other than Alan:



We put some time into making these signs and never made it on the Game Vision board! Seriously, I could write a whole post on the making of the signs. We planned, argued, debated, analyzed, argued some more, and finally compromised. Our seats on this day were nowhere near a camera man, which made all the difference. We tried to get the FOX camera guy to see us, but oh well...Alan still had fun showing our sign to any and EVERYONE throughout the day.



Good ole Bobby Cox!

Jeff Francoeur's not having his best season right now, but he's still awesome to watch in the outfield:

And lastly, my hero, Chipper Jones (that's him facing the camera). Did I mention that I didn't want to wait this late in the season to go to a game, soley because I WAS AFRAID CHIPPER WOULD GET HURT? Going in August was Alan's idea. THANKS.



It was a great trip, and the scenery wasn't too bad either (I spied a tree or two.) Something else interesting about being there was that we were definitely minorities, ethnically speaking. And you know, that's kind of a cool thing to experience. However, that one brief period when we were lost in the hood and could only think of all those episodes of The First 48 that were filmed IN ATLANTA...yeah, that was a little uncomfortable.

Hopefully it wasn't our last trip to Atlanta for a game, but at least now I can die peacefully. :-)

Almost time

I realize my excitement may be corny, but I've been having a good time getting my FIRST room ready for the new school year. Despite the miserable heat (no a/c in the summer at most schools - poor custodians!), it's been fun to make the room my own, as simple a room as it is. I still need to do my door and a little more organizing, but I'm getting there.

DeeBee found some quotes about reading for me (I'm primarily a Reading teacher this year), so I put several throughout the room. Aaaww...look at my cute little Reading Center!



I need some more pillows (and need to toss that dirty one - gross!), but it's coming along. And I know my excitement will dwindle, but I hope it's a while before that happens...

Disabled

Saturday, while Alan recovered from a hangover, I spent the whole morning getting our hotel and rental car lined up for this weekend. Being the big Braves fans that we are, we've been anticipating this trip for quite a while. So who gets hurt a few days ago? Oh just our favorite player, Chipper Jones. He's unlikely to be ready by this weekend, and we purposely chose third base tickets just to be near him! There are other favorite players of course, like Brian McCann, the catcher. But nooooo! Brian McCann suffered a concussion in last night's game. I can tell you five players I'd really like to see, and everyone of them are hurt.

Did you notice how Alan's hangover had absolutely nothing to do with anything? Yeah, I just wanted to mention it. :-)

Unsettling

Something disturbing happened this week, and I'll just tell you this is not leading up to something funny. On my lunch break Wednesday I was driving behind a black SUV, and I saw something hanging from the vehicle, underneath the chassis in the center. It was almost dragging the ground, so I was curious and wanted to take a better look. As I got closer, I could see the legs of a cat - a gray tabby cat with white paws, much like Junior, only this cat was so small. I was horrified! It was clearly dead. Or was it even real? I thought maybe it was some kind of sick joke, some stuffed toy tied to the car for the shock value of passing drivers. But it was very, very realistic.

In retrospect, I'm embarrassed to say I didn't follow the car. I was in a hurry, running Bailey on an errand on my lunch break, and I'll admit I often have an unrealistic obsession with being on time to EVERYTHING. So rather than follow the car to find out if it was real or staged, I stayed on schedule to make it back to class on time. If I hadn't been in a hurry, I would've followed that car to its destination and either been the bearer of bad news or one pissed off maniac. (This is the part where Alan will cringe because he knows of my propensity or at least my desire to chase people down and have a come-to-Jesus-meeting.)

I can't shake the idea that it might have been a joke. For now, I won't be able to drive around without looking for that SUV.

Happy Day!

What kind of a mom am I? I not only forgot to sing Happy Birthday to Bailey and have her blow out the candles, I also forgot to post anything about it being her birthday on Tuesday. PLUS I have no pictures of her 15th birthday, because my camera is broken. A new camera just replaced everything else at the top of the must-haves list.

And just as I was about to post this, I picked up my camera again, turned it on, angrily messed with all the buttons, took a picture, and it works just fine. I'm relieved and mad at the same time. But mostly relieved.

Old School

I was out of coffee this morning, so I rode the bike to 7-11 and bought some. After going for a ride yesterday morning and then getting back on today, I quickly discovered a new butt-friendly seat is in order. Ouch.

Work already?

I'm in a workshop the next four days, and I'll be depressed about it until I get there. It better be worth my time, because I hate sitting in a class all day getting nothing from it, when I could be AT HOME loving life. This is where I'm happy.

Yes, I'm talking about the hash again.

I've started a new blogsite for our hash group, so I just thought I'd link to it this first time. I don't plan to reference this site in the future, but I thought I would for the initial post. Plus, it gives a little more indication of WHAT WENT DOWN LAST NIGHT! It's sort of thrown together and not aesthetically pleasing, but perhaps that's fitting.

The horrendous hash

I'm not sure what all I want to say about last night's hash. But I will say this. It was simultaneously the worst and funniest party we've ever had. We had some visitors from a nearby hash show up that none of us knew, and the entertainment value from the trash talking to their faces and behind their backs was almost worth putting up with them eating all our food and drinking all our beer. It would have made for some good reality TV.

What she said

I could post about our trip to Oklahoma, but DeeBee did a much better job, plus she had pictures. So click here.

Back from Oklahoma

What is wrong with me not taking pictures all week?! I think my problem when I'm at DeeBee's, is that I'm just so darn relaxed that I don't want to do much of anything that requires effort. The plan was to chill, and chill we did. Tomorrow's going to be a busy day since we're hosting another hash, but I'll try to post more later from the trip. In the meantime, here's a pic from the poolside...

My idea of the good life

I've been slow to post because I'm in the midst of my chillin'. We're hanging out by the pool, watching scary movies, shopping, and tonight we roasted marshmallows and hotdogs. I've found I'm pretty good at the whole vacation thing. Wish you were here, Alan!

Celebrating free enterprise

Whew! Finally a night's sleep with no headache and no headache so far today. I was able to get a couple errands run that I couldn't do the past few days. Plus I finally got my haircut, because I FOUND MY HAIRCUTTING LADY! I'm not sure what you're supposed to call them, but I don't think "haircutting lady" is it. Perhaps hair stylist? That sounds a little less white trash. Anyway, she left a major salon chain, which I won't give the name but it sort of rhymes with Duperduts.

They wouldn't tell anyone where she went, but I used my detective skills that I learned from The First 48 and Crime 360 and The FBI Files and found her! You don't know her and therefore it's probably not interesting, but I'm just proud of her for taking the plunge and opening her own business. She's a single mom with two kids, and she opened a classy salon without the classy fees. Awesome.

And now I'm going to go plop on the couch for a little while, read my book, and wait for Alan to get home and cook dinner! He wants to grill, and grilling means I'm not cooking. Although I did clean and prepare the corn cobs for the grill. Yep, I'm done for the day.

On the Road Again

Next week Bailey and I will be in Oklahoma at DeeBee's. The plan is to just completely c-h-i-l-l while DeeBee cooks and keeps the pool clean (ha!). I'm about to start a long series of workshops when I get back, so I consider next week to be the end of my summer vacation. <sigh> So in order to really relax, I'm getting my lesson plans completed this week. I have nearly the entire first semester planned and on paper!

Unfortunately there are a lot of things I haven't done to get ready for the school year, not that I'll bore you with the details. But the point of summer break is to BREAK, which I've done pretty well. Speaking of breaking, the last real summer hurrah is coming up in three weeks when Alan and I will use these:


I just like looking at them. And I will hug them and squeeze them and call them George.

Late night rant

WHAT-THE-HELL??

Let's review: I have made a concerted effort over the last few months to eat more of the good things and cut out more of the bad. I've also managed portions, I've gotten some (okay, a little) exercise, and more importantly I've passed up some pretty yummy snacks at about 2:30 in the afternoon and 10:00 at night. Those are difficult times of the day! And so because of these things that they say you're supposed to do, I was expecting some good news on my blood work. In fact, I'm the one who requested that additional blood work be done at my yearly visit (before I knew that my old age would require it anyway) because 1) I find it interesting, and 2) I figured at the very least my cholesterol numbers would be awesome. And okay, maybe 3) I was hoping my thyroid would have been a little out of whack, and therefore they'd give me a magic pill to get it back in shape and wipe away a handful of pounds in the process.

But, noooo! I get a call from the nurse wanting to "discuss" my cholesterol level of 221, which is about 21 points higher than they would like to see! So I've a got a message for they: Screw it! I'd say something else but Daddy reads my blog, and I don't think he wants to hear his daughter use such words.

Alas, I have nothing to show for my efforts. Zippo. Even on vacation, do you know what I bought myself to snack on in the condo for the week? A tray of veggies and some watermelon. And yeah, maybe a little cheese, but I WAS ON VACATION! I didn't touch the ice cream or the soda, plus I made an effort to find the new Egg Beaters at the grocery store (to no avail). I had a mere handful of Cheetos at the beach. I'm telling you, that's will power, baby. And okay, there was that one day that I had four Krispy Kreme donuts, but I WAS ON VACATION! And did I mention the fact that we walked who knows how many miles over the course of the week? I'm surprised my $3.00 Old Navy flip-flops don't have holes in them.

Yet it gets me nowhere, so here I am up very late with a headache, and I absolutely WILL go in that kitchen and get something satisfying to eat. I seem to recall some double stuffed oreos that Leigh bought while he was housesitting for us. Heck, I might as well drink the whole milk he bought to wash them down!

Oh well

It's always nice to be back in your own home, but I still wasn't ready to leave Florida. I've decided I need to live near the water, because I will really miss the sight and sound and smell of this:

Back to Daytona

Possibly the most boring sport to watch on TV is auto racing. It ranks higher than women's golf only because you get to see an occasional crash. So I could understand (but was still annoyed by) Bailey's frustration in being dragged to the race last night. And then we got there. And it was just COOL. And even teenage girls had fun.

But the texting stops for nothing and noone:



Oops, I stand corrected. I guess this lady was bored:

Alligators, Shopping, & Racing

I didn't want to carry my camera yesterday at Universal, so no pictures today!

When you go to Universal, you have a choice of two parks - Universal Studios or Islands of Adventure. We chose Islands of Adventure because it seemed to have more thrill rides. After going to Disney World, I was wondering how anyone could top Disney World, as far as the aesthetics of the park. Oh yeah, they CAN. Islands of Adventure was very cool, and I think that was their goal - to be cool. You don't walk around feeling like a kid saying things like, "aaaw, how cute!" - instead you say, "coooool!" Even the music blasting out from who knows where was very cool, very hip. It was more our speed and more entertaining for Bailey and Taylor. They definitely got their roller coaster fix, and even Alan and I manned up and rode one.

We got so wet, as in soaking, just-out-of-the-shower wet on the first three rides, that parts of our clothes were still damp hours later when we left the park. So when the clouds came in and it started lightly raining in the afternoon, we were actually cold. In Florida. In the summer.

Today we had planned to go to Gatorland for a couple hours and then go shopping, but we've had a slight change of plans. Yesterday while in line for a ride, Alan and I started talking to a couple next to us. Of course, if you know Alan, you know that it was mostly Alan doing the talking. I don't need to talk to strangers, don't need to know where they're from, and don't need to know what they do for a living. I don't need to talk to people on elevators, in the grocery store checkout line, or even when I'm stuck with them in line for a malfunctioning ride for a solid hour. But Alan does and so he does.

So anyway, long story short....this couple is here in Orlando to get married, and part of the travel package they purchased included a whole weekend of race tickets at Daytona. They're not going to use the tickets today because they have this little wedding to attend, so we got their tickets for tonight's race AT DAYTONA. When we drove by the speedway the other day on the way to beach, I said and I quote, "I'm not a racing fan, but I would want to go just to see this speedway." (I guess sometimes it pays to speak to your fellow man - thanks, Alan!) The race is called the Brumos Porsche 250 and is on the Speed channel tonight. I'm sure you'll see us in the nosebleed sections.

I'm not sure how the girls will feel about going, but I think they'll enjoy it once they're there, much like the other things we've "made" them do. Maybe we'll still fit everything in today (for sure, the shopping), but how could this not be fun:

I'm so ready to "people watch" all the rednecks and white trash!

Bailey and Taylor

Just throwing in a quick picture from dinner last night at the House of Blues. They're too cute not to share.

Winter Garden

I'm posting early today because tomorrow will be an early start. This morning we drove to Winter Garden to ride bikes on the West Orange Trail. We started out around noon and rode 5 miles into the actual town of Winter Garden for lunch (in other words, a much needed break for our burning muscles). For you experienced riders out there, this would have been a walk in the park. And then there's the rest of us. 10 miles was a nice little workout, but still fun. The trail was green and lush and shady...again, we lucked out.






Above: As soon as we started out, Bailey and Taylor started texting.



And then we skipped the planned afternoon of shopping and came back to hang out at the pool. It was nice to have a relaxing day, but then....there's tomorrow! We'll be at Universal Studios (or as Bailey has been calling it - Orlando Studios), and I'll probably be scared out of my mind most of the day. Can't wait!

Daytona

(Although the blog is showing I posted this Monday night, I didn't actually finish it and post until this morning - Tuesday. Blogger is weird that way.)

It's hard to believe yesterday was only Day Three of our vacation. It seems we've already done a lot, and we still have several days left. We headed out in the morning for Daytona Beach, and little did I know we were going to drive right by the Daytona Speedway where, of course, the Daytona 500 takes place. The racetrack is so close to the street we were driving down, that we really got a sense for how ENORMOUS it is! I've seen professional stadiums and arenas but nothing comparable to the size of this place. This picture won't do it justice (and I'll forewarn you that my camera lens was dirty ALL day yesterday):

A few miles down from the speedway, we arrived at the beach and showed Bailey and Taylor a picture of what we were about to do - parasailing! It's been fun to not tell them what we're doing until we get somewhere, but this was the one activity that I was a little worried about how they might react. It was really awesome though, and they loved it! As soon as you take flight and start ascending, you notice how quiet everything gets. Alan and I saw a dolphin swimming beneath us during our flight. I'll admit I was a little scared and holding on pretty tight for the first few minutes because I'm a little afraid of heights, but I'm so glad we did this!

Daytona Beach was very clean and free from seaweed and visible jellyfish (Bailey and I think we felt a couple stings though). But really, it was just a perfect day at the beach.

After we got back to Orlando, we got cleaned up and went to a dinner theater called "Capones." It was a pretty cute show and just something different to do. However, when we arrived back at our condo, we discovered we were still having a/c problems (and have been since we got here Friday night). So around 10:30 p.m., we started packing up and moving to a new unit. That's been the one glitch in our stay.

This morning everyone will have a chance to sleep in a bit before we go bike riding, followed by some afternoon shopping at the Mall of the Millenia. The girls have been really good sports about everything so far, so I hope the bike riding doesn't get bad reviews. Disney World and parasailing are hard acts to follow!

Weekend pics

Yesterday on the airboat:

We only saw one alligator surface briefly, but it was still pretty cool to be cruising along in 3 feet of water knowing that there are swarms of them around you. The coolest part of the airboat ride, however, was when we rode down this creek of Cypress trees. This is what I picture when I think of the Everglades:

I can't say enough about Disney World. There's something about that place that makes you feel like a kid again.

And who didn't grow up with a few Disney characters they loved? Though at first I wasn't interested in going to the parade, I'm so glad we got "stuck" watching it anyway. I think Taylor summed it up perfectly when she said, "this is my entire childhood" (passing by us):

Addison, this picture of Mary Poppins is for you!

It's alright here, I suppose.

Just kidding - we are loving Orlando and have been here less than 12 hours (we arrived around midnight, but thanks to the efficiency of Avis, we got to the hotel around 2:00 a.m.). Here's a picture of the property, which doesn't do justice to the amount of greenery surrounding it.



All the buildings are different colors and the individual units are HUGE - complete with two bedrooms, full-size kitchen, living room, two bathrooms, big walk-in closets, and three t.v.s. And on the way to your car, you get to pass things like this:



I can't remember if I've ever seen a Bird of Paradise in person. Cool!

Goodbye, Texas!

Hello, Florida!

No time for subtleties

Yesterday I went to the doctor for my annual visit. Yeah, you know the appointment I'm talking about. And throughout the entire visit I was reminded of my age.

"Let's see...now that YOU'RE FORTY, we do this additional exam."

"Well, since YOU'RE FORTY, you'll need to keep an eye on this."

"When women reach FORTY, LIKE YOU, they also have to have this done."

Basically what I learned is there'll be much more poking, prodding, and pinching now that I'M FORTY.

Poof!

Remember this episode of Friends? They all go to Barbados and Monica gets "humid hair." It's one of my favorite episodes and the first time I'd ever seen a show or movie acknowledge humid hair. I can totally relate! Junior high was a difficult two years anyway, but walking to school and/or waiting outside for the bus was enough exposure to the moisture to give me a sizable helmet head every morning, which didn't do wonders for the self esteem. So this episode had me rolling, especially when Monica remedies the situation by getting corn rows and beads ("it's a treat for the eyes AND the ears!") I'm not one of lucky ones whose hair falls silky and smooth on humid days, so I'm preparing myself for some pretty bad hair days in Florida. I'm packing an arsenal of ponytail holders, headbands, and bobby pins and am assuming I'll be having too much fun to care!

CONvert

Although I'm eating a little healthier, I am in no way a health food nut. I like flavor, which usually means adding some butter, salt, and yeah, the occasional pat of bacon grease. And I'll admit it, I tend to make fun of people who are health food nuts. You're not like me, i.e., you're kinda weird.

However, I decided to try the new Egg Beaters with yolk and was pulled a little further over to the dark side where those people who do good things for their bodies live. If someone had scrambled up and served these "eggs" to me with a little salt and pepper - I would have never known they weren't the real thing. And when you compare the nutrition numbers, it's so worth it.

If only I had a label maker

I feel like a kid before Christmas waiting for our vacation to get here. Alan and I spent yesterday morning planning more things to do (even though I vowed not to overplan), and now I'm thinking eight days is not enough! Sometimes Alan makes fun of me for being like Monika from "Friends"....I don't know what he's talking about. Doesn't everyone put together a folder containing printouts of all the travel and trip information, neatly hole-punched and organized with dividers and tabs? Life is just better when you're prepared. I would have made an excellent boyscout.

Salmonella be damned!

I don't care. I went as long as I could without tomatoes. It was slim pickins' at the grocery store, but I managed to come up with enough tomatoes to make a batch of salsa. (We only go so long in this household without salsa.) So I made a batch Wednesday night, and the next day I had a dentist appointment. That meant I couldn't have chips and salsa for breakfast Thursday morning because come on, you can't have onion breath when you go to the dentist.

So far, I seem to be feeling fine. I am not, in any way however, encouraging the rest of the world to take such chances with their health. I just have needs and had to satisfy my salsa addiction.

Birdwatching

Man, he's purty. And check out those whiskers! I wonder if they get on his nerves. I bet in the cat world his whiskers are likened to the eyebrows of Andy Rooney. Little over the top.

There's a lot of concentration going into watching those birds, because let me tell you - he does NOT like that camera pointing at him. I wasn't able to snap many shots before I got "the look." By the way, I've been doing a little research on his poor behavior and found that a possible "cat whisperer" show is in the works (although it won't legally get to be called that). I already know I'll be a regular viewer.

Emo

Three shows made me teary today:

Evan Almighty
The Dog Whisperer
Jon and Kate plus 8

No idea what's going on with the waterworks, but I think it's clear I had a couch potato day. I feel it was well-deserved since I first mowed and weedeated the front and back lawns with our wonderful Sears mower whose self-propel mechanism went out. And then there's our weedeater. Oh, the expletives the neighbors must hear when I'm weedeating! Probably got it from Sears, too.

Maybe I'll make tomorrow a reading day. Actually that still means spending an excessive amount of time on the couch, but in a few short months I won't remember what a lazy day felt like.