I accepted the 4th grade sub job late Sunday night, momentarily forgetting what had happened on Friday. On Monday morning the realization struck, and for a second I thought about cancelling. I didn't want to face a room of children who might have questions. What do I know? What could I say?
But then, sadly, I realized that if there were questions, I'd probably be better equiped to answer them than a recent college grad who might get assigned the sub job if I cancelled. I've never had to answer questions about twenty kindergarteners dying in their classrooms, but I've answered questions about similar slaughters in other schools. And malls. And churches. And movie theaters.
I don't know what's happening in America. All I know is that things have changed since I first walked into a classroom in 1997. Even before Friday, safety has been on my mind as a sub. Every day I'm in a different classroom, and honestly I often look around and wonder about the what-ifs. We used to do fire drills and tornado drills -- now schools do lockdown drills. When I did a long-term sub job this fall, we had both an external lockdown drill and an internal lockdown drill. For the first, the teacher simply locked the door and kept teaching, but for the internal drill, everyone had to crouch and huddle in the back of the room, absolutely silent in the dark. You can't help but do a mental replay of all the school shootings you've heard about over the last fifteen years. What if, what if, what if . . .
I don't know what the answer is. For four days now we've been ambushed with a wide range of opinions on everything from gun control to mental health to religious revival. And school safety. So many opinions. Do I want to walk through a metal detector every morning as I come into school? Get patted down like I do at the airport? Get trained in how to use a gun so I can defend a classroom? I don't know. I don't know if anything will keep evil out.
All I know is that when I was a fourth grader, my biggest worry was whether or not I'd get invited to someone's birthday party. Maybe I got anxious about tests or wondered if the boy I liked didn't like me back because I wore glasses. But never in my wildest dreams did I enter my classroom with a quivering lower lip and teary eyes, trying to put on a brave face while secretly wondering if today would be the day someone would come into my classroom and start shooting. Never. And I am so sad that this is the new reality for kids.
Tuesday, December 18, 2012
Sunday, December 16, 2012
52 New Things
While we were in Miami a couple of weeks ago, I got a little bummed when I realized we have no other trips on our horizon. India and Miami were both pretty inexpensive since they were connected to Kevin's work, but now we've got to focus on saving more than spending. I did one of those deep, woe-is-me sighs, thinking I had nothing to look forward to . . . and then we drove past a cemetery.
I know cemeteries creep some people out, but I've never really felt that way. Cemeteries, to me, are always a good wake-up call. Everyone lying under the ground in a cemetery was once a living, breathing person. They may have had a lot of years or not enough. They might have died full of happiness or full of regret. I don't know all their stories, but I do know the story of one person who will join them one day. I'm writing that story every day. Every day, I have options. Choices. Decisions. Altogether, they add up, and one day I'll either go to the grave feeling blessed or bitter. It's my choice.
So as we cruised through Miami, I wondered why I'd let the lack of vacation plans get me down. Why live from vacation to vacation? Shouldn't life itself be an adventure? Why settle for the mundane? I decided my New Year's Resolution for 2013 would be to do something new every day. Live it up.
In the two weeks since then, I've rethought that a bit. A new thing every day isn't going to work. For one thing, this Carpe Diem idea isn't new to me. I've kind of been living it up for most of my life and done a lot of stuff. To try to come up with 365 new things to do would be a lot of work. And second, who has time for that? I mean, if I'm focusing on positivity and living life to the fullest, I don't want my goal to become a burden.
So I've modified my plan a little. One new thing every week in 2013.
That's still 52 new things, though, and when I brainstormed a bit yesterday, I could only come up with 31 ideas. Can you help me out? Is there something you've done that I should try? Or something you've always wanted to do that we could try together? Keep in mind that we're not made of money, so while "vacation in Fiji" sounds awesome, it's not going to make the cut.
Here are some ideas to get you started:
I know cemeteries creep some people out, but I've never really felt that way. Cemeteries, to me, are always a good wake-up call. Everyone lying under the ground in a cemetery was once a living, breathing person. They may have had a lot of years or not enough. They might have died full of happiness or full of regret. I don't know all their stories, but I do know the story of one person who will join them one day. I'm writing that story every day. Every day, I have options. Choices. Decisions. Altogether, they add up, and one day I'll either go to the grave feeling blessed or bitter. It's my choice.
So as we cruised through Miami, I wondered why I'd let the lack of vacation plans get me down. Why live from vacation to vacation? Shouldn't life itself be an adventure? Why settle for the mundane? I decided my New Year's Resolution for 2013 would be to do something new every day. Live it up.
In the two weeks since then, I've rethought that a bit. A new thing every day isn't going to work. For one thing, this Carpe Diem idea isn't new to me. I've kind of been living it up for most of my life and done a lot of stuff. To try to come up with 365 new things to do would be a lot of work. And second, who has time for that? I mean, if I'm focusing on positivity and living life to the fullest, I don't want my goal to become a burden.
So I've modified my plan a little. One new thing every week in 2013.
That's still 52 new things, though, and when I brainstormed a bit yesterday, I could only come up with 31 ideas. Can you help me out? Is there something you've done that I should try? Or something you've always wanted to do that we could try together? Keep in mind that we're not made of money, so while "vacation in Fiji" sounds awesome, it's not going to make the cut.
Here are some ideas to get you started:
- make creme brulee with one of those torch thingies
- learn to drive a tractor (I know! I'm a farm girl and I don't already know this? Come on!)
- drink a cup of coffee (I'm throwing up in my mouth a little just imagining it.)
- try ski blades
- eat something I grew myself
Monday, November 19, 2012
Incredible India
I subbed at an elementary school over in La Crosse today, so on my way home I stopped for a little stroll around a park along the Mississippi River. I couldn't help but be struck by how different it was than my surroundings last week. Here's a brief compare and contrast:
People:
Pettibone Park: In half an hour, I saw three frisbee golfers and two walkers. Five people in half an hour.
India: Where do I begin? As I told our driver after one particularly busy stop, it's hard to find a quiet spot in India. There are people everywhere. Some made us feel like rock stars (in a good way), asking to take pictures with us. Seriously. We must be on so many people's Facebook pages right now. Others made us feel like rock stars in a bad way, as in "you're rich so give me some money." That was the worst part of the trip for me, that everyone assumed we were wealthy and got mad when we left the same tips we'd leave in America. But then we saw MTV's Punk'd on TV one morning, and Justin Bieber blew up a yacht to punk Taylor Swift and had someone drive a car through a restaurant window to punk Sean Kingston . . . so yeah, I can see where Indians get the idea that Americans have money to blow. Thanks, entertainment industry. Add in monkeys, dogs, and lots of meandering cows . . . it's a busy place.
Traffic:
Pettibone Park: I walked past one parked car. One truck drove past me.
India: Holy crap, I thought for sure someone was gonna die. I was praying it wouldn't be me, but I didn't really want to see someone else killed either. The traffic in India is insane. I thought I'd seen it all in Ghana, but India was even more chaotic. Giant trucks and buses, little cars, tuk-tuks (auto rickshaws), motor bikes, bicycles, and people pushing carts -- the streets are full all day every day. And lane lines? Mere suggestions. People use their horns not out of annoyance but as a "hey, I'm coming at you" courtesy blare. And then they pretty much just pull out in front of anyone and hope they stop and let you in. From what I could tell, the biggest vehicle usually won: cars yielded to buses, tuk tuks to cars, and bikes were pretty much the biggest loser every time. I sat in the back seat, grimacing and praying, fearing we'd get nailed by a bus or we'd run over someone on a bike. It was seriously scary. When Raj, our driver, dropped us off at the airport, I thanked him for not letting us die and handed him a fat tip. You couldn't pay me to get behind the wheel in India . . . certain death!
Environment:
Pettibone Park: Fresh, clean air with the sweet smell of fallen leaves, the mighty Mississippi rolling by, and lots of big, tall trees. And quiet. Blissful quiet.
India: The triple crown of smells: sewage, car exhaust, and smoke. The air quality is shockingly bad. I kept commenting to Kevin that people had to die earlier in India because of it. I just looked it up and found American male life expectancy is ten years longer than Indian males. For women, it's twelve years. I had to cover my face sometimes, but what can you expect when 1.2 billion people are crammed into a country that's only 1/3 the size of the U.S.? (And we've only got 312 million or so people living here.) Too many cars, nowhere to put garbage or human waste, and lots of people who depend on fires for warmth and cooking make for polluted air and earth. We were also there during a festival called Diwali, a celebration featuring fireworks and firecrackers . . . at one point we made a fake war correspondent video on the balcony of our hotel with the constant popping and booming in the background. It sounded like we were under attack! Add in the never-ending sound of car horns as mentioned above . . . it was a loud, loud week. And if you've ever seen the Mississippi and thought it was polluted, you don't want to see the water Indians were bathing and washing clothes in.
Raj kept repeating the phrase "Incredible India," which I gathered was the country's tourism campaign. Despite the bad stuff, it really is an amazing country with so much to see. We marveled at the architecture of their monuments and historic sites. We just don't have the history in America that India does . . . I mean, many of their monuments are older than our country. The Taj Mahal? Built in 1653. America wasn't even America yet. The fact that their builders and artisans were that advanced that early on is really impressive.
But man, it makes me glad I was born here. Much like my trips to Africa, visiting India reminded me that I won the geographic lottery. The things I take for granted every day -- water when I turn on the faucet, waste that gets flushed into a sewer system, food I can cook on a stove, traffic rules that are enforced, work that isn't demeaning -- aren't so easy to come by in India.
It was nice to visit but it was even nicer to come home.
People:
Pettibone Park: In half an hour, I saw three frisbee golfers and two walkers. Five people in half an hour.
India: Where do I begin? As I told our driver after one particularly busy stop, it's hard to find a quiet spot in India. There are people everywhere. Some made us feel like rock stars (in a good way), asking to take pictures with us. Seriously. We must be on so many people's Facebook pages right now. Others made us feel like rock stars in a bad way, as in "you're rich so give me some money." That was the worst part of the trip for me, that everyone assumed we were wealthy and got mad when we left the same tips we'd leave in America. But then we saw MTV's Punk'd on TV one morning, and Justin Bieber blew up a yacht to punk Taylor Swift and had someone drive a car through a restaurant window to punk Sean Kingston . . . so yeah, I can see where Indians get the idea that Americans have money to blow. Thanks, entertainment industry. Add in monkeys, dogs, and lots of meandering cows . . . it's a busy place.
 |
| I just covered my eyes and prayed a lot . . . |
Pettibone Park: I walked past one parked car. One truck drove past me.
India: Holy crap, I thought for sure someone was gonna die. I was praying it wouldn't be me, but I didn't really want to see someone else killed either. The traffic in India is insane. I thought I'd seen it all in Ghana, but India was even more chaotic. Giant trucks and buses, little cars, tuk-tuks (auto rickshaws), motor bikes, bicycles, and people pushing carts -- the streets are full all day every day. And lane lines? Mere suggestions. People use their horns not out of annoyance but as a "hey, I'm coming at you" courtesy blare. And then they pretty much just pull out in front of anyone and hope they stop and let you in. From what I could tell, the biggest vehicle usually won: cars yielded to buses, tuk tuks to cars, and bikes were pretty much the biggest loser every time. I sat in the back seat, grimacing and praying, fearing we'd get nailed by a bus or we'd run over someone on a bike. It was seriously scary. When Raj, our driver, dropped us off at the airport, I thanked him for not letting us die and handed him a fat tip. You couldn't pay me to get behind the wheel in India . . . certain death!
Environment:
Pettibone Park: Fresh, clean air with the sweet smell of fallen leaves, the mighty Mississippi rolling by, and lots of big, tall trees. And quiet. Blissful quiet.
India: The triple crown of smells: sewage, car exhaust, and smoke. The air quality is shockingly bad. I kept commenting to Kevin that people had to die earlier in India because of it. I just looked it up and found American male life expectancy is ten years longer than Indian males. For women, it's twelve years. I had to cover my face sometimes, but what can you expect when 1.2 billion people are crammed into a country that's only 1/3 the size of the U.S.? (And we've only got 312 million or so people living here.) Too many cars, nowhere to put garbage or human waste, and lots of people who depend on fires for warmth and cooking make for polluted air and earth. We were also there during a festival called Diwali, a celebration featuring fireworks and firecrackers . . . at one point we made a fake war correspondent video on the balcony of our hotel with the constant popping and booming in the background. It sounded like we were under attack! Add in the never-ending sound of car horns as mentioned above . . . it was a loud, loud week. And if you've ever seen the Mississippi and thought it was polluted, you don't want to see the water Indians were bathing and washing clothes in.
 |
| Seriously stunning . . . |
Raj kept repeating the phrase "Incredible India," which I gathered was the country's tourism campaign. Despite the bad stuff, it really is an amazing country with so much to see. We marveled at the architecture of their monuments and historic sites. We just don't have the history in America that India does . . . I mean, many of their monuments are older than our country. The Taj Mahal? Built in 1653. America wasn't even America yet. The fact that their builders and artisans were that advanced that early on is really impressive.
 |
| Women in India walk an average of 3.7 miles, morning & night, for water. |
It was nice to visit but it was even nicer to come home.
Wednesday, November 7, 2012
Too Legit to Quit
There's a reason I still own a VCR.
I still have all the classics -- Pretty in Pink, The Princess Bride, Dirty Dancing, etc. -- on VHS, so if I threw out my VCR, how would I watch them?
I know what you're thinking: enter the new era of technology, Tiffany! You're two trends behind!
I probably wouldn't even have a DVD player if it hadn't been given to me as a gift. I hate the idea of throwing out and replacing my stuff just because someone came up with something "better." If I had replaced my VHS collection with DVDs, then I would have had to throw all of them out and replace them with Blue Ray discs, right? What a waste. And you know something better will come out in the next couple of years to replace these Blue Ray things.
I'm obviously not big into technology.
Up until one month ago, the only cell phones I ever owned were the ones that came free with the Verizon plan. I didn't even own a cell phone for a long time. I bucked the trend, telling people that if I was at work, they could call me at work, and if I was at home, they could call me at home; if I wasn't in either of those places, then I was probably doing something fun and didn't want you calling me anyway.
I caved and bought a big blue brick of a phone that I only got because it made my mom feel better when I drove from Colorado home to Iowa (not that I got any service through most of Nebraska anyway . . . ).
And then after several years I upgraded to what I think they call a flip phone. It folded in half. Snazzy. Way better than the brick, but still bad enough for the kids I worked with to make fun of me.
But you know what? I could have cared less about the "coolness" of my phone.
And then I married Kevin.
Kevin bought an iPhone right before we got married. Suddenly my free phone seemed really crappy. He could do all sorts of fun things with his phone, and all mine could do was call or text people. How boring is that?
So I caved. I bought an older model of the iPhone, too. (They were on sale super cheap after those iPhone 5's came out . . . you were thinking I bought the new kind? I haven't totally lost my frugal mind.)
Now, of course, I am completely addicted to the thing. I haven't slept well for a month, staying up past 10PM challenging friends in SongPop and Words With Friends. I'm looking into 12-step programs.
My new phone also contributed to a rather embarrassing moment yesterday. I was subbing for a teacher at the high school who has a student teacher this semester. That meant that my job for the day was basically to sit in the back of the classroom and observe the college kid to make sure he didn't do anything stupid. It wasn't exactly rocket science.
The morning classes were pretty exciting with freshmen debating hot topics in the election and then mock voting. In the afternoon, the juniors had a test. I watched 'em like a hawk for cheating, but it was pretty dull. Most of them finished quickly and then worked quietly on an assignment, waiting for the last three kids in the room to get done with their tests.
So I got bored and snuck a quick peek at Facebook. And then I played a move in Words With Friends. And then I checked out the world clock to see what time it was in India, where my hubby is this week.
I pocketed my phone and walked over to the computer to check on something. It was then that I heard a quiet but definitely audible sound, like someone's ringtone going off.
I looked around to see who the culprit was. Phones in class are definitely a no-no.
No one was grabbing for their pockets, though. I listened more intently . . . it sounded like a muffled MC Hammer . . . coming from my left . . . where there was nothing but a wall . . .
What the heck?? MC Hammer was playing in my pants! I turned toward the wall and whipped out my iPhone, jabbing at buttons.
Was that President Obama's face I saw on my screen??
The ringer was off. I'd turned it to vibrate. I'm not that stupid. But still MC Hammer was streaming out of it somehow.
I frantically turned the volume all the way down, continuing to jab at buttons and wondering if I had somehow gotten a virus on my new iPhone. MC Hammer and President Obama? Was this some sort of Election Day prank?
Quiet now, I shoved it back in my pocket. I turned around to see how many kids had caught me, but they were all working on the assignment.
Good thing kids generally don't give a rip about the sub.
After school, I asked the student teacher if he'd heard my phone. I explained the situation and my virus concerns.
"Are you sure you didn't hit Pandora?" he asked.
"I don't think so," I said, touching the Pandora button.
And there he was. A "Vote Obama" ad filled my screen.
And underneath the advertisement? Pandora was paused on MC Hammer's "Turn This Mutha Out."
Lesson learned? Put my phone in my purse, not my pocket. I'd heard of pocket dialing, but not pocket Pandora-ing. Geesh.
Also? Turning off the ringer does not completely silence the phone. Hmmmm.
Now please excuse me while I go try to figure out how to delete the MC Hammer station from my Pandora playlist . . .
I still have all the classics -- Pretty in Pink, The Princess Bride, Dirty Dancing, etc. -- on VHS, so if I threw out my VCR, how would I watch them?
I know what you're thinking: enter the new era of technology, Tiffany! You're two trends behind!
I probably wouldn't even have a DVD player if it hadn't been given to me as a gift. I hate the idea of throwing out and replacing my stuff just because someone came up with something "better." If I had replaced my VHS collection with DVDs, then I would have had to throw all of them out and replace them with Blue Ray discs, right? What a waste. And you know something better will come out in the next couple of years to replace these Blue Ray things.
I'm obviously not big into technology.
Up until one month ago, the only cell phones I ever owned were the ones that came free with the Verizon plan. I didn't even own a cell phone for a long time. I bucked the trend, telling people that if I was at work, they could call me at work, and if I was at home, they could call me at home; if I wasn't in either of those places, then I was probably doing something fun and didn't want you calling me anyway.
I caved and bought a big blue brick of a phone that I only got because it made my mom feel better when I drove from Colorado home to Iowa (not that I got any service through most of Nebraska anyway . . . ).
And then after several years I upgraded to what I think they call a flip phone. It folded in half. Snazzy. Way better than the brick, but still bad enough for the kids I worked with to make fun of me.
But you know what? I could have cared less about the "coolness" of my phone.
And then I married Kevin.
Kevin bought an iPhone right before we got married. Suddenly my free phone seemed really crappy. He could do all sorts of fun things with his phone, and all mine could do was call or text people. How boring is that?
So I caved. I bought an older model of the iPhone, too. (They were on sale super cheap after those iPhone 5's came out . . . you were thinking I bought the new kind? I haven't totally lost my frugal mind.)
Now, of course, I am completely addicted to the thing. I haven't slept well for a month, staying up past 10PM challenging friends in SongPop and Words With Friends. I'm looking into 12-step programs.
My new phone also contributed to a rather embarrassing moment yesterday. I was subbing for a teacher at the high school who has a student teacher this semester. That meant that my job for the day was basically to sit in the back of the classroom and observe the college kid to make sure he didn't do anything stupid. It wasn't exactly rocket science.
The morning classes were pretty exciting with freshmen debating hot topics in the election and then mock voting. In the afternoon, the juniors had a test. I watched 'em like a hawk for cheating, but it was pretty dull. Most of them finished quickly and then worked quietly on an assignment, waiting for the last three kids in the room to get done with their tests.
So I got bored and snuck a quick peek at Facebook. And then I played a move in Words With Friends. And then I checked out the world clock to see what time it was in India, where my hubby is this week.
I pocketed my phone and walked over to the computer to check on something. It was then that I heard a quiet but definitely audible sound, like someone's ringtone going off.
I looked around to see who the culprit was. Phones in class are definitely a no-no.
No one was grabbing for their pockets, though. I listened more intently . . . it sounded like a muffled MC Hammer . . . coming from my left . . . where there was nothing but a wall . . .
What the heck?? MC Hammer was playing in my pants! I turned toward the wall and whipped out my iPhone, jabbing at buttons.
Was that President Obama's face I saw on my screen??
The ringer was off. I'd turned it to vibrate. I'm not that stupid. But still MC Hammer was streaming out of it somehow.
I frantically turned the volume all the way down, continuing to jab at buttons and wondering if I had somehow gotten a virus on my new iPhone. MC Hammer and President Obama? Was this some sort of Election Day prank?
Quiet now, I shoved it back in my pocket. I turned around to see how many kids had caught me, but they were all working on the assignment.
Good thing kids generally don't give a rip about the sub.
After school, I asked the student teacher if he'd heard my phone. I explained the situation and my virus concerns.
"Are you sure you didn't hit Pandora?" he asked.
"I don't think so," I said, touching the Pandora button.
And there he was. A "Vote Obama" ad filled my screen.
And underneath the advertisement? Pandora was paused on MC Hammer's "Turn This Mutha Out."
Lesson learned? Put my phone in my purse, not my pocket. I'd heard of pocket dialing, but not pocket Pandora-ing. Geesh.
Also? Turning off the ringer does not completely silence the phone. Hmmmm.
Now please excuse me while I go try to figure out how to delete the MC Hammer station from my Pandora playlist . . .
Sunday, October 21, 2012
A Walking Hazard
After an incident today that we shall get to in just a bit, I was reminded of something my old high school friend Holly said to me a couple of years ago. It was during my fifty dates trip, and while sitting in Central Park in NYC, munching on hot dogs and enjoying the view, a bird flew over and pooped on my arm.
"Is it just me, or do things like this happen more to you than to everyone else?" she asked, knowing my penchant for strange luck.
My visit to St. Olaf College today wasn't that bad. I mean, there was no poop at least. But some days I seriously wonder how I make it through the day without hurting myself.
I was at St. Olaf to see Ryana, an awesome girl who used to be in my youth group in Colorado. I met her at the chapel for Sunday morning worship (sidenote: it was awesome!).
Faux pas numero uno: When the time came for the offering, a basket was passed down the aisle. I took it from Ryana's friend next to me and promptly dropped it. Luckily I caught it with my knee before it hit the floor. I was surprised and winced a little, because although it looked like a lightweight wicker basket, turns out it had a WOOD bottom. Warn me about these things, people! The good news is college kids have no money, so despite the fact that it had been passed down a couple of rows before getting to me, there was absolutely nothing in it. Had some kid emptied his pockets of loose change, I would have been mortified.
Faux pas numero dos: Either the pews aren't bolted to the floor or the one in front of me was loose, because when I sat down after a hymn, I wrenched that bad boy right off the tile floor and made a nice, loud thud when I let go. Ryana did the same thing ten minutes later, so I didn't feel so bad. At the time, though, I'm pretty sure her friends were wondering who this freak show was that she'd brought to church.
And faux pas numero tres: The granddaddy of the day, my piece de resistance, if you will, happened while Ryana was showing me around the campus. We were in the science building and walked into the greenhouse. It made me a little sad, because the smell and humidity reminded me of going to the Lincoln Park Conservatory in Chicago with Kevin, which made me think about how far away he was . . . and maybe I just wasn't focused on where I was going, because my leg brushed a hose that was on this hose-holder thingie, and it somehow pressed the trigger against a bar on the holder thingie. Before I even realized what was happening, the entire right leg of my jeans was soaked. And maybe a bit of the left. And somehow my belt buckle. It was pretty obvious.
In a demonstration of what a great kid she is, Ryana continued to walk beside me instead of pretending not to know me. She's pretty awesome.
So that's my exciting story about my day at St. Olaf. I'm going to head for bed now and see if I can avoid drooling toothpaste on myself, flushing an item of clothing down the toilet, or missing the bed when I lay down on it. Lots of hazards could rear their ugly heads at any moment . . .
"Is it just me, or do things like this happen more to you than to everyone else?" she asked, knowing my penchant for strange luck.
My visit to St. Olaf College today wasn't that bad. I mean, there was no poop at least. But some days I seriously wonder how I make it through the day without hurting myself.
I was at St. Olaf to see Ryana, an awesome girl who used to be in my youth group in Colorado. I met her at the chapel for Sunday morning worship (sidenote: it was awesome!).
Faux pas numero uno: When the time came for the offering, a basket was passed down the aisle. I took it from Ryana's friend next to me and promptly dropped it. Luckily I caught it with my knee before it hit the floor. I was surprised and winced a little, because although it looked like a lightweight wicker basket, turns out it had a WOOD bottom. Warn me about these things, people! The good news is college kids have no money, so despite the fact that it had been passed down a couple of rows before getting to me, there was absolutely nothing in it. Had some kid emptied his pockets of loose change, I would have been mortified.
Faux pas numero dos: Either the pews aren't bolted to the floor or the one in front of me was loose, because when I sat down after a hymn, I wrenched that bad boy right off the tile floor and made a nice, loud thud when I let go. Ryana did the same thing ten minutes later, so I didn't feel so bad. At the time, though, I'm pretty sure her friends were wondering who this freak show was that she'd brought to church.
And faux pas numero tres: The granddaddy of the day, my piece de resistance, if you will, happened while Ryana was showing me around the campus. We were in the science building and walked into the greenhouse. It made me a little sad, because the smell and humidity reminded me of going to the Lincoln Park Conservatory in Chicago with Kevin, which made me think about how far away he was . . . and maybe I just wasn't focused on where I was going, because my leg brushed a hose that was on this hose-holder thingie, and it somehow pressed the trigger against a bar on the holder thingie. Before I even realized what was happening, the entire right leg of my jeans was soaked. And maybe a bit of the left. And somehow my belt buckle. It was pretty obvious.
In a demonstration of what a great kid she is, Ryana continued to walk beside me instead of pretending not to know me. She's pretty awesome.
So that's my exciting story about my day at St. Olaf. I'm going to head for bed now and see if I can avoid drooling toothpaste on myself, flushing an item of clothing down the toilet, or missing the bed when I lay down on it. Lots of hazards could rear their ugly heads at any moment . . .
Tuesday, October 16, 2012
Teenage Girls
Confession time. I am addicted to a show for teenagers: Pretty Little Liars. If you've never heard of it, it's probably because you're not 15. And no, I'm not watching it as some sort of glimpse into the lives of the teenagers I work with. Just something I found on Netflix. Just free, cheap entertainment that totally wastes my time. Just a guilty pleasure. I watched one episode and suddenly I can't stop until I find out who killed Ali!
It's like a repeat of Twin Peaks, twenty years later.
There are many things that make me inwardly shake my head while watching these teenagers on screen (like the fact that they are all close to 30 in real life . . . ), but the thing that gets me the most is the fact that they are ALWAYS dressed to the nines. Going to school? Let me put on a dress and enough make-up for five people! Going to a slumber party at a friend's house? I'll put on my casual sweater/miniskirt/jacket combo! Traipsing through the woods at night searching for clues to my best friend's killer? I've got some designer boots with three-inch heels that are perfect for mystery-solving hikes!
Seriously.
I was looking at kids in the hallway today between classes, and I didn't see a single girl dressed like the teens on TV. Rather than looking like they just stepped off a fashion show runway, the girls at my school more often look like they just rolled out of bed. Our halls are full of t-shirts, shorts, jeans, sweats, and leggings. Lots of ponytails. Very little make-up.
And you know what? I prefer our girls to the TV girls. I like the slightly awkward frumpy girls who look comfortable. I like the kids who don't feel like they have to put on airs. I like that these young women are real, not some Hollywood producer's idea of what young women should look like.
Friends who are raising girls, bless you. It's a hard road. The girls they see on TV look nothing like the girls they see in the mirror. Hug 'em tonight.
And remind them that those fakers are really 27 and had breakouts and bad hair in high school, too. :)
It's like a repeat of Twin Peaks, twenty years later.
 |
| Just your average sixteen-year-olds? Right. |
Seriously.
I was looking at kids in the hallway today between classes, and I didn't see a single girl dressed like the teens on TV. Rather than looking like they just stepped off a fashion show runway, the girls at my school more often look like they just rolled out of bed. Our halls are full of t-shirts, shorts, jeans, sweats, and leggings. Lots of ponytails. Very little make-up.
And you know what? I prefer our girls to the TV girls. I like the slightly awkward frumpy girls who look comfortable. I like the kids who don't feel like they have to put on airs. I like that these young women are real, not some Hollywood producer's idea of what young women should look like.
Friends who are raising girls, bless you. It's a hard road. The girls they see on TV look nothing like the girls they see in the mirror. Hug 'em tonight.
And remind them that those fakers are really 27 and had breakouts and bad hair in high school, too. :)
Tuesday, October 2, 2012
Church Ladies
In yet another attempt to meet some people in our new area, I thought I'd check out the women's Bible study tonight at the church we're leaning towards. I almost walked into an AA meeting taking place in the fellowship hall until someone steered me away and into the church library. I joined five women around a table. All of them were at least twenty years older than me.
But you know what? I'm fine with that. Here's why.
I moved to Colorado when I was 24. Not long after starting my job at the church, some women found me one Sunday morning and dragged me over to the table where they were registering women for the annual church women's retreat. Looking at the list of women signed up, I saw some mothers of the teenagers I worked with, some empty nesters, and a few grandmas. No one in their twenties was signed up. I figured I'd have no one to hang out with. I had zero interest in attending.
I said I was too busy to go. They said I could take a weekend off.
I said I couldn't afford it (which was true, but really just an excuse to get out of going). They paid my way.
I was stuck.
I packed my backpack and my sleeping bag, telling myself to just endure it. How bad could it be? Boring probably, but not awful.
I ended up having an AMAZING weekend. So much so that I looked forward to the church women's retreat every fall for the ten years I worked at the church.
We laughed so hard. We played games and they didn't mind that I was insanely competitive. We sang songs, told stories, ate junk food, and although a few women snored loudly enough to rattle the bunk beds, we had the best time together.
But looking back on those ten weekend retreats over ten years, the thing that strikes me the most is how thankful I am for those women and their influence on my life. Those are the women who made me realize how much I need other women, and not just women my age, but women who have already been through all the things I have yet to experience.
I learned so much from those women -- to thank God in the good times and to cling to God in the hard times. I heard stories that made me wonder how they'd found the strength to make it through tragedies. I saw how much they depended on each other for support, and sometimes just for sanity. I saw seventy-year-old women giggle like seven year olds.
I learned that I have so much to learn.
And so, as we try to find a new church, my standards are high. Yes, we want a church with great preaching and great music and lots of opportunities to serve . . . but I'm also looking for women like my old church friends, who are willing to mentor and guide me through all the things to come.
And I'm at an age where I can reach out to twenty-four-years olds and assure them they won't be eating Tuna Helper alone every night for the rest of their lives.
I want a community.
It's a tall order.
Kevin and I talked a bit after church this weekend about expectations and settling. It's impossible to find the perfect church, I know, and if we did find it, we wouldn't qualify for membership. But at what point do you stop "shopping" and just pick one? If the preaching is good but the music isn't, do you call it good, settle in, and integrate yourself in that community? How long do you try to build those relationships before giving up and starting the church hunt over again? I'd love to hear from others who've had to look for a new place to worship.
And to those beautiful women of Ascension -- you know who you are! -- thank you. Sincerely. Tears were streaming down my face as I wrote about those women's retreats. You've influenced me more than you know and I can never thank you enough. I love you. Keep dragging new young women into your circle and doing the same for them!
But you know what? I'm fine with that. Here's why.
I moved to Colorado when I was 24. Not long after starting my job at the church, some women found me one Sunday morning and dragged me over to the table where they were registering women for the annual church women's retreat. Looking at the list of women signed up, I saw some mothers of the teenagers I worked with, some empty nesters, and a few grandmas. No one in their twenties was signed up. I figured I'd have no one to hang out with. I had zero interest in attending.
I said I was too busy to go. They said I could take a weekend off.
I said I couldn't afford it (which was true, but really just an excuse to get out of going). They paid my way.
I was stuck.
I packed my backpack and my sleeping bag, telling myself to just endure it. How bad could it be? Boring probably, but not awful.
I ended up having an AMAZING weekend. So much so that I looked forward to the church women's retreat every fall for the ten years I worked at the church.
We laughed so hard. We played games and they didn't mind that I was insanely competitive. We sang songs, told stories, ate junk food, and although a few women snored loudly enough to rattle the bunk beds, we had the best time together.
But looking back on those ten weekend retreats over ten years, the thing that strikes me the most is how thankful I am for those women and their influence on my life. Those are the women who made me realize how much I need other women, and not just women my age, but women who have already been through all the things I have yet to experience.
I learned so much from those women -- to thank God in the good times and to cling to God in the hard times. I heard stories that made me wonder how they'd found the strength to make it through tragedies. I saw how much they depended on each other for support, and sometimes just for sanity. I saw seventy-year-old women giggle like seven year olds.
I learned that I have so much to learn.
And so, as we try to find a new church, my standards are high. Yes, we want a church with great preaching and great music and lots of opportunities to serve . . . but I'm also looking for women like my old church friends, who are willing to mentor and guide me through all the things to come.
And I'm at an age where I can reach out to twenty-four-years olds and assure them they won't be eating Tuna Helper alone every night for the rest of their lives.
I want a community.
It's a tall order.
Kevin and I talked a bit after church this weekend about expectations and settling. It's impossible to find the perfect church, I know, and if we did find it, we wouldn't qualify for membership. But at what point do you stop "shopping" and just pick one? If the preaching is good but the music isn't, do you call it good, settle in, and integrate yourself in that community? How long do you try to build those relationships before giving up and starting the church hunt over again? I'd love to hear from others who've had to look for a new place to worship.
And to those beautiful women of Ascension -- you know who you are! -- thank you. Sincerely. Tears were streaming down my face as I wrote about those women's retreats. You've influenced me more than you know and I can never thank you enough. I love you. Keep dragging new young women into your circle and doing the same for them!
Sunday, September 23, 2012
My Kids Will Be Amazing (at least in my head)
My friend Elyse wrote an interesting blog this week at The Jacobson Journey on how her expectations for having kids often turned out to be different from the reality of having kids.
I thought . . . well . . . I don't really have a lot of expectations for my future children . . . I mean, for a long time, I wasn't even sure I'd have kids. And when I met Kevin, he told me early on that having low expectations would mean I'd be less likely to be disappointed with him (such a romantic!), so the same would probably be true for having kids.
But in church this morning, I realized that maybe I subconsciously have BIG expectations for those phantom children. Here's the situation. For the children's sermon, the leader held up a jar of money and asked the kids what they'd like to buy with it.
The kids shouted out typical things like, "Toys!" and "Cars!"
Then she asked, "What do you think God would like you to buy with money?"
There were a lot of blank stares and furrowed brows as kids tried to decipher the right answer. With a little prompting, she helped them figure out that maybe God would be happy if we bought food for people who were hungry.
That got a little guy thinking, and he raised his hand and said, "Blankets for people who have to sleep outside." Good answer.
MY kid, I thought smugly, would raise his hand and say, "Mosquito nets to help prevent malaria in third world countries!"
What? Expecting too much?
I thought . . . well . . . I don't really have a lot of expectations for my future children . . . I mean, for a long time, I wasn't even sure I'd have kids. And when I met Kevin, he told me early on that having low expectations would mean I'd be less likely to be disappointed with him (such a romantic!), so the same would probably be true for having kids.
But in church this morning, I realized that maybe I subconsciously have BIG expectations for those phantom children. Here's the situation. For the children's sermon, the leader held up a jar of money and asked the kids what they'd like to buy with it.
The kids shouted out typical things like, "Toys!" and "Cars!"
Then she asked, "What do you think God would like you to buy with money?"
There were a lot of blank stares and furrowed brows as kids tried to decipher the right answer. With a little prompting, she helped them figure out that maybe God would be happy if we bought food for people who were hungry.
That got a little guy thinking, and he raised his hand and said, "Blankets for people who have to sleep outside." Good answer.
MY kid, I thought smugly, would raise his hand and say, "Mosquito nets to help prevent malaria in third world countries!"
What? Expecting too much?
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
Poor Cherry Cherry :(
Cherry Cherry has been violated.
I am sickened. Angry. Disgusted. Distraught. A plethora of negative verbs!
(Cherry Cherry is my car, by the way. She's the sweet little 2007 Toyota Corolla that carried me across the country with nary a flat tire or engine hiccup. She's my girl. So the fact that something bad has happened to her makes me feel awful.)
I first sensed trouble on Sunday. When we packed up to leave the cabin, I saw shredded kleenex on the back seat floor. That's where I keep the tissue box . . . and something small had definitely been clawing at it.
When Kevin came out, I gave him a big hug.
"If we die a fiery death on the way home, I want you to know that I love you," I said. He pulled back and gave me a strange look.
"It appears a small creature has been inside my car," I explained, "and if, by chance, it's still in there and runs up my leg while I'm driving, there's a good chance I'll run off the road and into a billboard post or a bridge underpass or something."
"Did we leave a door open?" he asked.
"Well, I didn't," I replied, leaving the insinuation hanging between us. He just rolled his eyes.
More than once, growing up on the farm, I heard the story about Grandma Sump putting on her overalls, going out to do chores, and making it halfway across the yard before feeling something crawling up the inside of her pants leg. Living in the country with no one around has its perks, like when you suddenly rip your pants off outside the privacy of your own home. We were taught at a young age to shake out our boots, pants, etc., before putting them on, just in case. I wasn't sure trying to rip my pants off while driving could end well.
We made it home uneventfully, though, and I didn't think anything of it 'til I was out running errands the next day. I came out of B.A. Burritos (my first visit -- definitely not as good as Chipotle, Qdoba, or Pancheros -- quite disappointing, actually, but that's another blog on another day) and saw something flutter across the passenger side floor. At first I thought maybe a piece of gray paper was being blown by the wind, but leaning in for a closer look, I saw four legs and a tail.
Ughuhuhuhuh.
I kept calm. I walked over to the passenger door, opened it up, and tried using a newspaper to shoo the little mouse out the door and back into nature. Instead, the little bugger scurried up behind the dashboard.
Dang it! Where was my killer instinct?! I should have rolled up the paper and swatted the thing to death when I had the chance!
Now I wasn't so calm. There was a mouse -- an alive, scampering mouse -- inside the car. I had to drive the car to get anywhere other than the strip-mall parking lot, which I definitely couldn't just hang around in all day, waiting for the mouse to kindly take its leave.
I cringingly slid into Cherry Cherry and drove around the backside of the building to the grocery store parking lot, next stop on my list. I envied the days when tight-rolled jeans were all the rage, because I was now seriously afraid that a mouse would crawl up my pant leg while I was driving, causing me to freak out, lose control of my car, and careen into one of the hundreds of other vehicles in this parking lot.
I parked without incident, jumped out of my car, and did what any girl would do. I called my dad.
"Dad! It's Tiffany!" I said when he answered. Long silence.
"What?"
"It's Tiffany!" I shouted. I understand why he was confused. He rarely uses his cell phone, and the only people who call him on it are people he works with out at the farm. I skipped the small talk and cut to the chase.
"Dad, I need help! There's a mouse in my car!" He chuckled.
"Have you seen it?"
"Yeah, I saw it! I tried to shoo it out but it ran up behind the dashboard."
"Oh, no."
"And it shredded a bunch of Kleenex in the back," I continued.
"Sounds like it's building a nest. Probably a mama about to have babies."
My heebie-jeebie factor skyrocketed. A whole family of mice taking up residence in my beloved Cherry Cherry??
"What do I do? If I put out rat poison, won't it die somewhere in my car and stink the whole thing up?"
"Well," my dad calmly said, "I think you'll want to use glue traps so you can throw them out once you catch them."
My dad's a freakin' genius!
Without further ado, I went inside to get my groceries and my mouse traps. Unfortunately, they didn't have mousetraps in the grocery store. Also unfortunately, it had started raining pretty hard while I was buying food, and because I'd pretty much catapulted myself out of my car once I parked it, I wandered around the lot for a while trying to find my poor mouse-infested Cherry Cherry, getting soaked but also rather dreading getting inside once I found it.
There's a K-Mart right across the street from the grocery store, but the two minutes it took to get there seemed like forever, wondering when the mouse was going to crawl up my pant leg. If it weren't pouring rain, I probably would have walked over to save myself the freak out.
The store had a fine selection of mouse traps, including two- and four-packs of glue traps. I went for the four, just in case there was an entire mouse colony settling in for the winter. You never know.
I ran through the rain back out to the car and ripped open the box. I put two on the passenger-side floor, where I'd seen the pesky invader, and one under each seat. Then, in preparation for what would be the longest fifteen-minute ride home of my life, I pulled my pant legs up over my knees. The thought of careening off the bridge and into the Mississippi River after a mouse crawled up my pants seemed like a very real possibility. I wasn't taking any chances.
I made it home without trauma and sent Kevin to check the traps when he got home from work a few hours later.
"If there's something trapped but it's still alive, kill it. That's the humane thing to do," I said. I was a lot more sensitive to the feelings of the mouse when I was nowhere near it.
Pretty soon there was a tap on the window. I could see Kevin holding something up in the semi-darkness, but I didn't look. I was cooking dinner, and I have a very sensitive gag reflex.
"Two!" he announced. Shiver. Gross.
This morning? Another freaking mouse in another glue trap. And Kevin had already gone to work, so I had to get rid of it myself.
Next time we're taking his car to the cabin.
I am sickened. Angry. Disgusted. Distraught. A plethora of negative verbs!
(Cherry Cherry is my car, by the way. She's the sweet little 2007 Toyota Corolla that carried me across the country with nary a flat tire or engine hiccup. She's my girl. So the fact that something bad has happened to her makes me feel awful.)
I first sensed trouble on Sunday. When we packed up to leave the cabin, I saw shredded kleenex on the back seat floor. That's where I keep the tissue box . . . and something small had definitely been clawing at it.
When Kevin came out, I gave him a big hug.
"If we die a fiery death on the way home, I want you to know that I love you," I said. He pulled back and gave me a strange look.
"It appears a small creature has been inside my car," I explained, "and if, by chance, it's still in there and runs up my leg while I'm driving, there's a good chance I'll run off the road and into a billboard post or a bridge underpass or something."
"Did we leave a door open?" he asked.
"Well, I didn't," I replied, leaving the insinuation hanging between us. He just rolled his eyes.
More than once, growing up on the farm, I heard the story about Grandma Sump putting on her overalls, going out to do chores, and making it halfway across the yard before feeling something crawling up the inside of her pants leg. Living in the country with no one around has its perks, like when you suddenly rip your pants off outside the privacy of your own home. We were taught at a young age to shake out our boots, pants, etc., before putting them on, just in case. I wasn't sure trying to rip my pants off while driving could end well.
We made it home uneventfully, though, and I didn't think anything of it 'til I was out running errands the next day. I came out of B.A. Burritos (my first visit -- definitely not as good as Chipotle, Qdoba, or Pancheros -- quite disappointing, actually, but that's another blog on another day) and saw something flutter across the passenger side floor. At first I thought maybe a piece of gray paper was being blown by the wind, but leaning in for a closer look, I saw four legs and a tail.
Ughuhuhuhuh.
I kept calm. I walked over to the passenger door, opened it up, and tried using a newspaper to shoo the little mouse out the door and back into nature. Instead, the little bugger scurried up behind the dashboard.
Dang it! Where was my killer instinct?! I should have rolled up the paper and swatted the thing to death when I had the chance!
Now I wasn't so calm. There was a mouse -- an alive, scampering mouse -- inside the car. I had to drive the car to get anywhere other than the strip-mall parking lot, which I definitely couldn't just hang around in all day, waiting for the mouse to kindly take its leave.
I cringingly slid into Cherry Cherry and drove around the backside of the building to the grocery store parking lot, next stop on my list. I envied the days when tight-rolled jeans were all the rage, because I was now seriously afraid that a mouse would crawl up my pant leg while I was driving, causing me to freak out, lose control of my car, and careen into one of the hundreds of other vehicles in this parking lot.
I parked without incident, jumped out of my car, and did what any girl would do. I called my dad.
"Dad! It's Tiffany!" I said when he answered. Long silence.
"What?"
"It's Tiffany!" I shouted. I understand why he was confused. He rarely uses his cell phone, and the only people who call him on it are people he works with out at the farm. I skipped the small talk and cut to the chase.
"Dad, I need help! There's a mouse in my car!" He chuckled.
"Have you seen it?"
"Yeah, I saw it! I tried to shoo it out but it ran up behind the dashboard."
"Oh, no."
"And it shredded a bunch of Kleenex in the back," I continued.
"Sounds like it's building a nest. Probably a mama about to have babies."
My heebie-jeebie factor skyrocketed. A whole family of mice taking up residence in my beloved Cherry Cherry??
"What do I do? If I put out rat poison, won't it die somewhere in my car and stink the whole thing up?"
"Well," my dad calmly said, "I think you'll want to use glue traps so you can throw them out once you catch them."
My dad's a freakin' genius!
Without further ado, I went inside to get my groceries and my mouse traps. Unfortunately, they didn't have mousetraps in the grocery store. Also unfortunately, it had started raining pretty hard while I was buying food, and because I'd pretty much catapulted myself out of my car once I parked it, I wandered around the lot for a while trying to find my poor mouse-infested Cherry Cherry, getting soaked but also rather dreading getting inside once I found it.
There's a K-Mart right across the street from the grocery store, but the two minutes it took to get there seemed like forever, wondering when the mouse was going to crawl up my pant leg. If it weren't pouring rain, I probably would have walked over to save myself the freak out.
The store had a fine selection of mouse traps, including two- and four-packs of glue traps. I went for the four, just in case there was an entire mouse colony settling in for the winter. You never know.
 | |
| Taken at a stoplight . . . |
I made it home without trauma and sent Kevin to check the traps when he got home from work a few hours later.
"If there's something trapped but it's still alive, kill it. That's the humane thing to do," I said. I was a lot more sensitive to the feelings of the mouse when I was nowhere near it.
Pretty soon there was a tap on the window. I could see Kevin holding something up in the semi-darkness, but I didn't look. I was cooking dinner, and I have a very sensitive gag reflex.
"Two!" he announced. Shiver. Gross.
This morning? Another freaking mouse in another glue trap. And Kevin had already gone to work, so I had to get rid of it myself.
Next time we're taking his car to the cabin.
Sunday, September 16, 2012
Hello, I'm Tiffany and I'm a Talker . . .
I'm kind of a social person.
Not a shocker, you say?
Yeah, I know . . . but a few things happened this week that made me realize how isolated I felt this summer.
First, I had to go to the doctor's office. I didn't actually see a doctor, just played twenty questions with the nurse. As new patients, Kevin took his turn a few weeks back and I went in this week. Between answering her bazillion questions about everything from any history of seizures, blood clots, etc., to family health history as far back as my grandparents, I was talking the poor woman's ear off.
Even more evidence that I'm a fan of gabbing? She had a college student shadowing her for the day. You can take the youth director out of the church, but . . . well, let's just say I engaged in caring conversation with this young person. I asked about her nursing program, what she's liked about rotations so far, and twenty other things that I'm sure drove the nurse trying to put together a file for me absolutely insane. Somewhere in the middle of my story about how I wanted to be a brain surgeon when I was in sixth grade, but then almost fainted during the movie about the human heart, seeing all that blood . . . well, I realized that there were probably other patients waiting to be seen and I should maybe shut up and stick to the matter at hand.
Yep. It was like I'd been living in a cabin in the woods for three months.
We also had couch surfers this week, which I LOVE. If you've got a spare couch or a guest room and you love to meet people, I highly recommend signing up at couchsurfing.org. I used the site to find places to sleep as I made my way across America, and now that I'm settled with a spare bed, I'm loving that I finally get to pay it forward. The couple we hosted Thursday night were a cute pair of sixty-somethings from New Mexico. They retired this spring and are meandering from Minneapolis (where her brother lives) to Muscatine (where an old college friend lives) on a tandem bike. How cool is that? I made dinner, we heard about their adventures, and then we wandered down by the river for a while. As they pedaled away the next morning, I realized these were people I never would have met had it not been for this crazy people-connecting website. I love it!
But probably the biggest, most exciting thing of last week -- I went back to school. I've got a long-term sub job lined up for a woman going on maternity leave any day now. I shadowed her for two days last week, and it was so refreshing . . . to be in the classroom again, to have conversations over lunch in the teachers' lounge, and, frankly, just to get out of our apartment.
I guess overall it really hit me last week how lonely and isolated I'd felt this summer. Poor Kevin has had to endure my needy side who couldn't wait for someone to talk to at the end of every day.
It's hard to make friends as grown ups, don't you think? I read a book recently that said most adults feel that way. If you don't keep your college friends close, you pretty much have to wait 'til you have kids so you can elbow your way into a Mommy-and-Me group and make some new ones. We're not there yet, so that won't work for me.
And here's the thing that worries me: Kevin's leaving for Asia in a couple of weeks. He's going to be recruiting in several countries and gone for six weeks. SIX WEEKS. If I went a bit batty with only him for company this summer, what am I going to be like when left completely alone in this town where I know hardly anyone?
So here's the advice I need, friends: how do I pull on my big girl panties and make some new local buddies? What has worked for you? It seems so awkward at this age. I'd love to know how you've stepped out, taken a chance, or just fallen into a friendship if you were lucky. Give me tips or at least give me hope!
Maybe I should bring cupcakes to the teachers' lounge. That might be a start. ;)
Not a shocker, you say?
Yeah, I know . . . but a few things happened this week that made me realize how isolated I felt this summer.
First, I had to go to the doctor's office. I didn't actually see a doctor, just played twenty questions with the nurse. As new patients, Kevin took his turn a few weeks back and I went in this week. Between answering her bazillion questions about everything from any history of seizures, blood clots, etc., to family health history as far back as my grandparents, I was talking the poor woman's ear off.
Even more evidence that I'm a fan of gabbing? She had a college student shadowing her for the day. You can take the youth director out of the church, but . . . well, let's just say I engaged in caring conversation with this young person. I asked about her nursing program, what she's liked about rotations so far, and twenty other things that I'm sure drove the nurse trying to put together a file for me absolutely insane. Somewhere in the middle of my story about how I wanted to be a brain surgeon when I was in sixth grade, but then almost fainted during the movie about the human heart, seeing all that blood . . . well, I realized that there were probably other patients waiting to be seen and I should maybe shut up and stick to the matter at hand.
Yep. It was like I'd been living in a cabin in the woods for three months.
But probably the biggest, most exciting thing of last week -- I went back to school. I've got a long-term sub job lined up for a woman going on maternity leave any day now. I shadowed her for two days last week, and it was so refreshing . . . to be in the classroom again, to have conversations over lunch in the teachers' lounge, and, frankly, just to get out of our apartment.
I guess overall it really hit me last week how lonely and isolated I'd felt this summer. Poor Kevin has had to endure my needy side who couldn't wait for someone to talk to at the end of every day.
It's hard to make friends as grown ups, don't you think? I read a book recently that said most adults feel that way. If you don't keep your college friends close, you pretty much have to wait 'til you have kids so you can elbow your way into a Mommy-and-Me group and make some new ones. We're not there yet, so that won't work for me.
And here's the thing that worries me: Kevin's leaving for Asia in a couple of weeks. He's going to be recruiting in several countries and gone for six weeks. SIX WEEKS. If I went a bit batty with only him for company this summer, what am I going to be like when left completely alone in this town where I know hardly anyone?
So here's the advice I need, friends: how do I pull on my big girl panties and make some new local buddies? What has worked for you? It seems so awkward at this age. I'd love to know how you've stepped out, taken a chance, or just fallen into a friendship if you were lucky. Give me tips or at least give me hope!
Maybe I should bring cupcakes to the teachers' lounge. That might be a start. ;)
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Unconditional Love (for the most part)
Since getting engaged & married, Kevin & I have had several conversations about how crazy this unconditional love thing is . . . as in, you know not just the good in me, but the bad stuff, too, and somehow you can get past that and still love me. It's pretty amazing to find someone like that.
Not that it's easy all the time. Kevin tends to be a bit messy, and I tend to put his shoes in the closet, his keys on the key rack, his hairbrush in the cabinet, etc. I get annoyed that he leaves crap everywhere. He gets annoyed that I'm OCD about it. But we still think the other is pretty awesome overall.
Here's something I've learned, though, in our two short months of marriage. Even if he loves me unconditionally, if I want to hear "you're beautiful" or "you look so pretty" or some variation on my appearance being appealing, I must shower.
I never thought I'd slide so quickly into, "He loves me, therefore I can look any way I want." I mean, I always thought women who went from long, flowing hair to a pixie cut a month after the wedding were kind of pulling a bait-and-switch on their men. Or the friend who said, "Dye your hair to cover the grays until you're married. Then you can let it go natural." That seemed wrong, too. I mean, just because you get hitched doesn't mean you should stop caring about your appearance, right? Right!
So imagine my shock when, a month into our marriage, Kevin made a comment along the lines of, "You're wearing those sweatpants today . . . again?"
Sigh.
It just happened so easily. I mean, here I am, no job, no friends nearby, and not much to do. These capri sweats are super comfy, perfect for sitting around the house doing nothing.
And since we're renting a cheap apartment until we decide where we want to live, I have to carry laundry outside, around the building, and down a flight of stairs to get to the washing machine. It's not like the capri sweats get dirty while I'm sitting around the apartment reading a book, so why increase the amount of laundry I have to do when I could wear them another day? Or a third day? I'm being resourceful. Right? Somebody back me up.
And although he never says anything about my ponytails or buns, I'm not stupid. When I shower and blow out my hair, he says, "You're so pretty!" When he comes home and sees a messy up-do, I'm sure he still loves me . . . but I can't expect compliments.
I figure things will get better once school starts. I always shower before going out in public, so he'll have a wife who looks like the woman he dated again.
Until then, I get a few more days in my capri sweats, T's, and ponytails. Sorry 'bout the bait-and-switch, Babe. Didn't mean to let it happen, but now that you've seen me like this . . . well, you still love me, right?
Not that it's easy all the time. Kevin tends to be a bit messy, and I tend to put his shoes in the closet, his keys on the key rack, his hairbrush in the cabinet, etc. I get annoyed that he leaves crap everywhere. He gets annoyed that I'm OCD about it. But we still think the other is pretty awesome overall.
Here's something I've learned, though, in our two short months of marriage. Even if he loves me unconditionally, if I want to hear "you're beautiful" or "you look so pretty" or some variation on my appearance being appealing, I must shower.
I never thought I'd slide so quickly into, "He loves me, therefore I can look any way I want." I mean, I always thought women who went from long, flowing hair to a pixie cut a month after the wedding were kind of pulling a bait-and-switch on their men. Or the friend who said, "Dye your hair to cover the grays until you're married. Then you can let it go natural." That seemed wrong, too. I mean, just because you get hitched doesn't mean you should stop caring about your appearance, right? Right!
 | ||
| See? I'm not the only one who goes with the natural look sometimes. |
Sigh.
It just happened so easily. I mean, here I am, no job, no friends nearby, and not much to do. These capri sweats are super comfy, perfect for sitting around the house doing nothing.
And since we're renting a cheap apartment until we decide where we want to live, I have to carry laundry outside, around the building, and down a flight of stairs to get to the washing machine. It's not like the capri sweats get dirty while I'm sitting around the apartment reading a book, so why increase the amount of laundry I have to do when I could wear them another day? Or a third day? I'm being resourceful. Right? Somebody back me up.
And although he never says anything about my ponytails or buns, I'm not stupid. When I shower and blow out my hair, he says, "You're so pretty!" When he comes home and sees a messy up-do, I'm sure he still loves me . . . but I can't expect compliments.
I figure things will get better once school starts. I always shower before going out in public, so he'll have a wife who looks like the woman he dated again.
Until then, I get a few more days in my capri sweats, T's, and ponytails. Sorry 'bout the bait-and-switch, Babe. Didn't mean to let it happen, but now that you've seen me like this . . . well, you still love me, right?
Wednesday, August 22, 2012
Garbage Truck Stalking
Wednesday.
Garbage day.
No big deal, right?
Not this summer. On garbage day, I turn into a crazy woman.
See, when we moved here to La Crescent, we were given two green recycling bins. We threw recyclable stuff in there and garbage in a garbage bag. On garbage day, we put it all out.
And the garbage man threw it all in the same bin.
It reminded me of the time my friend Russ and I sat in a meeting at the Synod office. It was obviously garbage day, because while we sat facing the windows looking out at the alley, we watched employees from all the businesses housed inside the building take out recycling and garbage, dumping them into the appropriately labeled twin dumpsters outside the window.
That afternoon, the garbage truck rolled in. It shoved its two prongs under the garbage dumpster, hoisted it up, and dumped the contents into the back. Then - beep, beep, beep -- it backed up . . . and then did the exact same thing with the recycling dumpster.
Russ and I looked at each other -- one of those, "Did you just see what I just saw?" looks. The recycling dumpster was clearly marked with big recycling labels. One poor woman had struggled that morning to lift an obviously heavy box of paper up to dump it in. All that work and everything went into the same dumpster?
So that's kind of what I was thinking as I saw the garbage man throw everything into the same bin. Seriously? I separated that stuff for a reason, dude!
(And yes, I've had a lot of time on my hands this summer. Plenty of time to stalk the garbage man.)
The next week I tried to be more obvious. Living in an apartment, garbage from six apartments gets set on the curb on Wednesdays, so I set my garbage by everyone else's and then put the recycling bin three feet away.
When the truck pulled up in front of the apartment building that afternoon, I spied on him through my blinds. All the neighbors garbage went in . . . our garbage went in . . . and then my recyclables went in. Everything in the same bin once again. What the heck?
The next week was the same except one of the green bins got dumped into a separate bin. Gasp! Someone broke the recycling secret code! What was I doing wrong?
I missed a week of stalking, so I don't know what happened that time.
The next week, I super-sorted. I went above and beyond. I put plastics in one bag, paper in another, and glass in another. I didn't put out the green bin at all, but lined up my three bags, three feet away from the garbage bags.
Success! My little bags were emptied into a separate bin from the general garbage bin!
I wasn't super fond of the system, though. Our kitchen is pretty small. How was I going to keep up this four-bag system?
A month into my garbage/recycling debacle, the game changed. Same truck . . . different garbage man. He looked through the vast collection on the curb, threw some of it in the bin, and left most of it behind.
Say what?
I thought maybe this guy was more serious about recycling. Maybe he separated things better and another truck would be coming later for the rest?
Nope. Twenty-four hours later, four garbage bags were still sitting on the curb.
I looked up the city's number on the internet and gave "the man" a ringy-dingy.
I explained the situation. I got told to call someone else. I called that person. They said to call someone else. Finally the third person seemed interested in helping.
"What kind of garbage bags did you use?" she asked.
That seemed like an odd question. I felt a brief pang of wrongdoing. I was using generic, store-brand garbage bags. Had they been deemed not strong enough? The woman on the phone continued before I got a chance to say more.
"Were you using City of La Crescent garbage bags?" she pressed.
Uh, what?
"The city has garbage bags?" I asked.
"You can buy them at the grocery store, or the gas station, or the recycling center," she said. "No bags of trash get picked up unless they're city bags."
"Well, for a month I've been putting our garbage out in non-city bags and they got taken," I tried to explain.
"Well, unless they're in city garbage bags, they're not supposed to be picked up," she said.
"What about recycling?"
"Recycling goes in the green bins. Do you have one?"
"We have two! But the garbage man usually dumps everything in the same bin. He only took it when I sorted everything out in separate bags."
"Well you don't have to do that," she said. "You have to put your paper and cardboard into a paper bag, but all other recyclables can go in the green bins."
Ah, there was my problem. I'd thrown it all in the bin together before my multi-bag experiment.
I sent Kevin to the gas station to get the special bags. $30 for 30 bags. We filled 'em up with the garbage that had been left behind the week before. Well, the two bags that were ours. The others sat on the curb the entire week.
The next week I set out the green bin of plastics, tin, and glass. I set out the bag of paper. Finally, I set out our new City of La Crescent garbage bags.
I considered going around to each apartment in our building and explaining the system, not wanting everyone's garbage to be rejected again.
And I was feeling a little smug, finally knowing the system.
And then the first garbage man came by and took everything, city bag or no city bag.
Seriously?
Well, at least he put my recyclables in separate bins from the garbage.
So every week on Wednesday, when I hear anything that sounds like a garbage truck, I jump up and run to the front window. Every week the guy takes everything, city bag or no city bag. I don't get it.
And I know I'm neurotic.
But I guess as long as they take our garbage, that's the important thing, right?
Garbage day.
No big deal, right?
Not this summer. On garbage day, I turn into a crazy woman.
See, when we moved here to La Crescent, we were given two green recycling bins. We threw recyclable stuff in there and garbage in a garbage bag. On garbage day, we put it all out.
And the garbage man threw it all in the same bin.
It reminded me of the time my friend Russ and I sat in a meeting at the Synod office. It was obviously garbage day, because while we sat facing the windows looking out at the alley, we watched employees from all the businesses housed inside the building take out recycling and garbage, dumping them into the appropriately labeled twin dumpsters outside the window.
That afternoon, the garbage truck rolled in. It shoved its two prongs under the garbage dumpster, hoisted it up, and dumped the contents into the back. Then - beep, beep, beep -- it backed up . . . and then did the exact same thing with the recycling dumpster.
Russ and I looked at each other -- one of those, "Did you just see what I just saw?" looks. The recycling dumpster was clearly marked with big recycling labels. One poor woman had struggled that morning to lift an obviously heavy box of paper up to dump it in. All that work and everything went into the same dumpster?
So that's kind of what I was thinking as I saw the garbage man throw everything into the same bin. Seriously? I separated that stuff for a reason, dude!
(And yes, I've had a lot of time on my hands this summer. Plenty of time to stalk the garbage man.)
The next week I tried to be more obvious. Living in an apartment, garbage from six apartments gets set on the curb on Wednesdays, so I set my garbage by everyone else's and then put the recycling bin three feet away.
When the truck pulled up in front of the apartment building that afternoon, I spied on him through my blinds. All the neighbors garbage went in . . . our garbage went in . . . and then my recyclables went in. Everything in the same bin once again. What the heck?
The next week was the same except one of the green bins got dumped into a separate bin. Gasp! Someone broke the recycling secret code! What was I doing wrong?
I missed a week of stalking, so I don't know what happened that time.
The next week, I super-sorted. I went above and beyond. I put plastics in one bag, paper in another, and glass in another. I didn't put out the green bin at all, but lined up my three bags, three feet away from the garbage bags.
Success! My little bags were emptied into a separate bin from the general garbage bin!
I wasn't super fond of the system, though. Our kitchen is pretty small. How was I going to keep up this four-bag system?
A month into my garbage/recycling debacle, the game changed. Same truck . . . different garbage man. He looked through the vast collection on the curb, threw some of it in the bin, and left most of it behind.
Say what?
I thought maybe this guy was more serious about recycling. Maybe he separated things better and another truck would be coming later for the rest?
Nope. Twenty-four hours later, four garbage bags were still sitting on the curb.
I looked up the city's number on the internet and gave "the man" a ringy-dingy.
I explained the situation. I got told to call someone else. I called that person. They said to call someone else. Finally the third person seemed interested in helping.
"What kind of garbage bags did you use?" she asked.
That seemed like an odd question. I felt a brief pang of wrongdoing. I was using generic, store-brand garbage bags. Had they been deemed not strong enough? The woman on the phone continued before I got a chance to say more.
"Were you using City of La Crescent garbage bags?" she pressed.
Uh, what?
"The city has garbage bags?" I asked.
"You can buy them at the grocery store, or the gas station, or the recycling center," she said. "No bags of trash get picked up unless they're city bags."
"Well, for a month I've been putting our garbage out in non-city bags and they got taken," I tried to explain.
"Well, unless they're in city garbage bags, they're not supposed to be picked up," she said.
"What about recycling?"
"Recycling goes in the green bins. Do you have one?"
"We have two! But the garbage man usually dumps everything in the same bin. He only took it when I sorted everything out in separate bags."
"Well you don't have to do that," she said. "You have to put your paper and cardboard into a paper bag, but all other recyclables can go in the green bins."
Ah, there was my problem. I'd thrown it all in the bin together before my multi-bag experiment.
I sent Kevin to the gas station to get the special bags. $30 for 30 bags. We filled 'em up with the garbage that had been left behind the week before. Well, the two bags that were ours. The others sat on the curb the entire week.
The next week I set out the green bin of plastics, tin, and glass. I set out the bag of paper. Finally, I set out our new City of La Crescent garbage bags.
I considered going around to each apartment in our building and explaining the system, not wanting everyone's garbage to be rejected again.
And I was feeling a little smug, finally knowing the system.
And then the first garbage man came by and took everything, city bag or no city bag.
Seriously?
Well, at least he put my recyclables in separate bins from the garbage.
So every week on Wednesday, when I hear anything that sounds like a garbage truck, I jump up and run to the front window. Every week the guy takes everything, city bag or no city bag. I don't get it.
And I know I'm neurotic.
But I guess as long as they take our garbage, that's the important thing, right?
Friday, August 17, 2012
Demo Derby Drama
Kevin and I have gotten into a rut. Yes, already. Our weekday evenings generally consist of three elements: dinner, light exercise, and mindless DVD screening. He'd never seen all three seasons of Arrested Development, so I checked them out at the library. Every night for the past month, we've eaten dinner, gone for a bike ride or a walk, and then watched a few episodes. Boring, I know.
So when I saw that the Houston County Fair was going on, I announced we were going. We set out last night for the half hour drive down to Caledonia and toured the exhibit halls, petting zoo, livestock barns, and tractor displays, all within about an hour. We ate corn dogs and sweet potato fries, then joined the rest of the county at what was obviously the main event of the night: the demolition derby!
Kevin, taking in the scene, quickly realized that he was the only person there wearing Birkenstocks. ("Hippie," I chided.) The stands were packed. People were climbing over each other and splitting their families into three rows just to find a place for everyone.
"This is a great model of intergenerationalism," Kevin noted, taking in the kids, teens, adults, and senior citizens surrounding us. I rolled my eyes. If he thought wearing Birkenstocks made him stand out from the rest of the crowd, using the word "intergenerationalism" wasn't going to help any.
Engines revved and in came the first round of cars.
"Wanna make a wager?" I asked.
"Money?"
"No, I was thinking that if the car I pick wins, you unload the dishwasher for once," I replied.
"Ugh."
"What do you want if your car wins?"
"A massage," Kevin said. "No wait, a foot massage!"
"Gross."
"That's what I want."
"Fine," I pouted, "but you'll have to wear socks. I'm not touching your feet. And clean socks. Fresh out of the drawer."
"Deal."
So off the cars went, slamming into each other and making the crowd roar. I was alternately laughing and wincing. I couldn't remember the last time I'd been to a demo derby. High school?
Neither of our cars won the first round. I was shocked, though, when the winners came up to get their trophies -- they were old guys! The first round had been the 50 & older competition. Holy crap! Here I thought only crazy 20-something men were wild enough to ram their cars into each other. Nope! They were all smiling like kids in a candy store.
The next round we changed the rules of our wager a little bit. If neither of our cars had won in the first round, when there were only six cars, it wasn't likely either of us were going to win round two. It was the "compact" division, and there were a lot of cars in that tiny space. We decided that whoever outlasted the other would be the winner.
I chose the car I called "Pretty in Pink." It was the only pink one. Kevin chose a little green one. I was pretty confident in my guy at first. He was like a little spider monkey out there, speeding around and slamming into people. But then his car died or something. He just sat there, banging his wheel with his hands. I refocused my attention on Kevin's car. That guy wasn't as fast as my guy had been, but he seemed to be doing well for himself. There were crashes all over the place, and more and more cars were dying. About half were still ramming each other in the midst of all the junkers when I noticed one was smoking.
And then it burst into flames.
The whole crowd gasped. Men who'd been standing closest to the action jumped over the wall and tried to get to the car. The fire spread to the dry grass around it, and the men hoping to rescue the driver got pushed back by the flames. Firefighters came running with a hose . . . and a trickle of water came out. They signaled for the men at the truck to give them more pressure. The men closest to the car were screaming and signaling at the fire truck. More water! More water! The guys at the truck were trying, but nothing seemed to be coming out. People in the stands were screaming. More men jumped out of the stands and went running to the car on fire with the driver still in it.
Oh God, Oh God, Oh God, Oh God . . . the spirit intercedes for us, right? Words weren't coming. I looked over at Kevin. His head was in his hand, eyes squeezed tightly shut. I hoped he was finding the words I wasn't.
The announcer made a crack about it being hotter than a jalepeno out there. I was surprised no one threw a beer bottle at his head. Really? This was not the time.
I never saw how, but somehow the driver was on the ground, surrounded by firefighters. Fire extinguishers were produced to do the job the hose couldn't seem to. The little girl behind us was whimpering, worried and confused. Her mom told her not to worry. Kevin shook his head at me.
Burning alive. I can't think of a worse way to die.
Everyone sat there, stunned. The crazy, rowdy atmosphere two minutes ago had completely deflated. I felt like throwing up. All I'd wanted was to get us out of the apartment for the night, to break us out of our dull routine, and I'd brought my husband here for us to witness a man die.
And then there he was. The driver. Walking himself over to the ambulance.
The crowd gasped again. Then they cheered. How did this man get out alive, let alone well enough to walk away?
"I think I'm going to throw up," I announced.
"I need a beer," Kevin said. He looked shellshocked.
"Get me something fruity and strong," I replied.
After they brought in another fire truck and hosed down the arena, they finished the round. The next round was trucks, and my pick outlasted Kevin's, but it just wasn't really fun anymore after what we'd seen. At one point I jumped and yelled because I saw flames . . . but they were supposed to be coming out of the smoke pipes on the truck.
My nerves were shot. I suggested we go home.
Walking to the car, I asked Kevin if he wanted a foot massage when we got home, or if he wanted our wins to cancel each other out so he didn't have to empty the dishwasher.
"Cancel each other," he immediately shot back. Worked for me. I'll take emptying the dishwasher over touching his gross feet any day.
All in all, stressful night. I searced the web this morning, trying to find an update on the guy, but nothing. I still feel sick to my stomach just thinking about it. We just wanted to join in the redneck fun . . . I hadn't planned on developing an ulcer!!
So when I saw that the Houston County Fair was going on, I announced we were going. We set out last night for the half hour drive down to Caledonia and toured the exhibit halls, petting zoo, livestock barns, and tractor displays, all within about an hour. We ate corn dogs and sweet potato fries, then joined the rest of the county at what was obviously the main event of the night: the demolition derby!
Kevin, taking in the scene, quickly realized that he was the only person there wearing Birkenstocks. ("Hippie," I chided.) The stands were packed. People were climbing over each other and splitting their families into three rows just to find a place for everyone.
"This is a great model of intergenerationalism," Kevin noted, taking in the kids, teens, adults, and senior citizens surrounding us. I rolled my eyes. If he thought wearing Birkenstocks made him stand out from the rest of the crowd, using the word "intergenerationalism" wasn't going to help any.
Engines revved and in came the first round of cars.
"Wanna make a wager?" I asked.
"Money?"
"No, I was thinking that if the car I pick wins, you unload the dishwasher for once," I replied.
"Ugh."
"What do you want if your car wins?"
"A massage," Kevin said. "No wait, a foot massage!"
"Gross."
"That's what I want."
"Fine," I pouted, "but you'll have to wear socks. I'm not touching your feet. And clean socks. Fresh out of the drawer."
"Deal."
So off the cars went, slamming into each other and making the crowd roar. I was alternately laughing and wincing. I couldn't remember the last time I'd been to a demo derby. High school?
Neither of our cars won the first round. I was shocked, though, when the winners came up to get their trophies -- they were old guys! The first round had been the 50 & older competition. Holy crap! Here I thought only crazy 20-something men were wild enough to ram their cars into each other. Nope! They were all smiling like kids in a candy store.
The next round we changed the rules of our wager a little bit. If neither of our cars had won in the first round, when there were only six cars, it wasn't likely either of us were going to win round two. It was the "compact" division, and there were a lot of cars in that tiny space. We decided that whoever outlasted the other would be the winner.
I chose the car I called "Pretty in Pink." It was the only pink one. Kevin chose a little green one. I was pretty confident in my guy at first. He was like a little spider monkey out there, speeding around and slamming into people. But then his car died or something. He just sat there, banging his wheel with his hands. I refocused my attention on Kevin's car. That guy wasn't as fast as my guy had been, but he seemed to be doing well for himself. There were crashes all over the place, and more and more cars were dying. About half were still ramming each other in the midst of all the junkers when I noticed one was smoking.
And then it burst into flames.
The whole crowd gasped. Men who'd been standing closest to the action jumped over the wall and tried to get to the car. The fire spread to the dry grass around it, and the men hoping to rescue the driver got pushed back by the flames. Firefighters came running with a hose . . . and a trickle of water came out. They signaled for the men at the truck to give them more pressure. The men closest to the car were screaming and signaling at the fire truck. More water! More water! The guys at the truck were trying, but nothing seemed to be coming out. People in the stands were screaming. More men jumped out of the stands and went running to the car on fire with the driver still in it.
Oh God, Oh God, Oh God, Oh God . . . the spirit intercedes for us, right? Words weren't coming. I looked over at Kevin. His head was in his hand, eyes squeezed tightly shut. I hoped he was finding the words I wasn't.
The announcer made a crack about it being hotter than a jalepeno out there. I was surprised no one threw a beer bottle at his head. Really? This was not the time.
I never saw how, but somehow the driver was on the ground, surrounded by firefighters. Fire extinguishers were produced to do the job the hose couldn't seem to. The little girl behind us was whimpering, worried and confused. Her mom told her not to worry. Kevin shook his head at me.
Burning alive. I can't think of a worse way to die.
Everyone sat there, stunned. The crazy, rowdy atmosphere two minutes ago had completely deflated. I felt like throwing up. All I'd wanted was to get us out of the apartment for the night, to break us out of our dull routine, and I'd brought my husband here for us to witness a man die.
And then there he was. The driver. Walking himself over to the ambulance.
The crowd gasped again. Then they cheered. How did this man get out alive, let alone well enough to walk away?
"I think I'm going to throw up," I announced.
"I need a beer," Kevin said. He looked shellshocked.
"Get me something fruity and strong," I replied.
After they brought in another fire truck and hosed down the arena, they finished the round. The next round was trucks, and my pick outlasted Kevin's, but it just wasn't really fun anymore after what we'd seen. At one point I jumped and yelled because I saw flames . . . but they were supposed to be coming out of the smoke pipes on the truck.
My nerves were shot. I suggested we go home.
Walking to the car, I asked Kevin if he wanted a foot massage when we got home, or if he wanted our wins to cancel each other out so he didn't have to empty the dishwasher.
"Cancel each other," he immediately shot back. Worked for me. I'll take emptying the dishwasher over touching his gross feet any day.
All in all, stressful night. I searced the web this morning, trying to find an update on the guy, but nothing. I still feel sick to my stomach just thinking about it. We just wanted to join in the redneck fun . . . I hadn't planned on developing an ulcer!!
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
Recipes Galore
I've been doing LOTS of cooking and baking lately, and I've promised recipes to several people. Rather than type 'em all out in individual emails, I thought I'd just share them here in case other people are interested in trying something new. :)
First up, Chocolate Chip Cookies. I've been making these since elementary school, and I found a new fan in my new niece Emma! She tried them for the first time about a month ago and I was afraid she'd throw up from eating so many of them! She requested them again when we met up at the cabin this weekend. Last time I used almond flavoring and this time I went with vanilla. I don't think she noticed the difference, which leads me to believe she would probably accept any chocolate chip cookie I offered! :) My mom perfected the recipe before passing it on to me, so I'll credit her.
Judy's Classic Chocolate Chip Cookies
Ingredients:
1 C butter
1/2 C sugar
1 C brown sugar
2 eggs
1 t. vanilla or almond flavoring
2 1/2 C flour
1/2 t salt
1 t. baking soda
12 oz pkg chocolate chips (I like milk chocolate!)
Cream together butter, sugars, eggs, and flavoring. In another bowl, combine flour, salt, baking soda; blend into creamed mixture. Stir in chocolate chips
Drop by teaspoonful onto greased baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes.
Makes 3-4 dozen cookies.
Next up, a tasty little treat I made this weekend. I got the recipe at Camp Elim in Colorado, and it's a pretty amazing breakfast treat. It says to serve it with maple syrup, but we ate it just the way it was -- the toffee pieces and cream cheese were all the "syrup" we needed!
Toffee Apple French Toast
Ingredients:
8 C French bread, cut into 1" cubes
2 medium Granny Smith apples
8oz cream cheese, softened
3/4 C brown sugar
1/2 C sugar, divided
1 3/4 C milk, divided
2 t. vanilla, divided
2 t. cinnamon, divided
1/2 C English toffee bits
5 eggs
Place half of the bread chunks in a greased 9x13 pan. Top with apples. In a separate bowl, mix cream cheese, brown sugar, 1/4 C sugar, 1/4 C milk, 1 t. vanilla, and 1 t. cinnamon until smooth. Spread over apples. Sprinkle with toffee bits. Top with remaining bread chunks.
In another bowl, beat the eggs and 1 1/2 C milk, then add 1 t. vanilla, 1 t. cinnamon, and 1/4 C sugar. Pour over the bread. Cover and refrigerate overnight.
Remove from refrigerator 30 minutes before baking. Bake uncovered at 325 degrees for 45-60 minutes or until a knife comes out clean. Serve with warm maple syrup.
Serves 8.
If you would have told me five years ago that squash would become one of my favorite summer foods, I would have thought you were crazy. Lo and behold, I've overcome my fear of trying new foods and now pick up squash every week at the farmer's market. Here are a couple of my favorite recipes for using squash.
Chicken Tortilla Soup
Ingredients:
4 corn tortillas, halved, then cut in narrow strips
2 cans (14.5oz each) chicken broth
1 medium zucchini, cut in 3/4in-thick rounds
1 medium yellow summer squash, cut in 3/4in-thick rounds
1/2 t. minced garlic
1/2 t. ground cumin
1 C corn
16oz can red kidney beans, rinsed
1 1/2 C shredded cooked chicken
1 large ripe tomato, cut into 1in chunks
1/4 C chopped cilantro
Coat a 5 or 6 quart pot with nonstick spray. Heat over medium. Add tortilla strips and cook 5 minutes, turning occasionally, until lightly toasted. Remove to a plate. Add broth, zucchini, squash, garlic, and cumin to pot. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer 3 minutes or until squash is crisp-tender.
Stir in corn and beans; continue to simmer 2 minutes. Stir in remaining ingredients. Heat through. Top with tortilla strips.
Serves 4.
Colorful Veggie Coins
Ingredients:
4 medium carrots, thinly sliced
2 medium yellow summer squash, sliced
2 medium zucchini, sliced
2 garlic cloves, minced
4 T butter, divided
1 C chicken broth
1 t. salt
1/2 t. pepper
Place veggies in a shallow 3-qt. baking dish. In a small saucepan, saute garlic in 2 T butter for 2-3 minutes. Stir in the broth, salt & pepper. Pour over vegetables; dot with remaining butter. Cover and bake at 350 degrees for 50 minutes or until vegetables are tender.
Yield: 8 servings
First up, Chocolate Chip Cookies. I've been making these since elementary school, and I found a new fan in my new niece Emma! She tried them for the first time about a month ago and I was afraid she'd throw up from eating so many of them! She requested them again when we met up at the cabin this weekend. Last time I used almond flavoring and this time I went with vanilla. I don't think she noticed the difference, which leads me to believe she would probably accept any chocolate chip cookie I offered! :) My mom perfected the recipe before passing it on to me, so I'll credit her.
Judy's Classic Chocolate Chip Cookies
Ingredients:
1 C butter
1/2 C sugar
1 C brown sugar
2 eggs
1 t. vanilla or almond flavoring
2 1/2 C flour
1/2 t salt
1 t. baking soda
12 oz pkg chocolate chips (I like milk chocolate!)
Cream together butter, sugars, eggs, and flavoring. In another bowl, combine flour, salt, baking soda; blend into creamed mixture. Stir in chocolate chips
Drop by teaspoonful onto greased baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes.
Makes 3-4 dozen cookies.
Next up, a tasty little treat I made this weekend. I got the recipe at Camp Elim in Colorado, and it's a pretty amazing breakfast treat. It says to serve it with maple syrup, but we ate it just the way it was -- the toffee pieces and cream cheese were all the "syrup" we needed!
Toffee Apple French Toast
Ingredients:
8 C French bread, cut into 1" cubes
2 medium Granny Smith apples
8oz cream cheese, softened
3/4 C brown sugar
1/2 C sugar, divided
1 3/4 C milk, divided
2 t. vanilla, divided
2 t. cinnamon, divided
1/2 C English toffee bits
5 eggs
Place half of the bread chunks in a greased 9x13 pan. Top with apples. In a separate bowl, mix cream cheese, brown sugar, 1/4 C sugar, 1/4 C milk, 1 t. vanilla, and 1 t. cinnamon until smooth. Spread over apples. Sprinkle with toffee bits. Top with remaining bread chunks.
In another bowl, beat the eggs and 1 1/2 C milk, then add 1 t. vanilla, 1 t. cinnamon, and 1/4 C sugar. Pour over the bread. Cover and refrigerate overnight.
Remove from refrigerator 30 minutes before baking. Bake uncovered at 325 degrees for 45-60 minutes or until a knife comes out clean. Serve with warm maple syrup.
Serves 8.
If you would have told me five years ago that squash would become one of my favorite summer foods, I would have thought you were crazy. Lo and behold, I've overcome my fear of trying new foods and now pick up squash every week at the farmer's market. Here are a couple of my favorite recipes for using squash.
Chicken Tortilla Soup
Ingredients:
4 corn tortillas, halved, then cut in narrow strips
2 cans (14.5oz each) chicken broth
1 medium zucchini, cut in 3/4in-thick rounds
1 medium yellow summer squash, cut in 3/4in-thick rounds
1/2 t. minced garlic
1/2 t. ground cumin
1 C corn
16oz can red kidney beans, rinsed
1 1/2 C shredded cooked chicken
1 large ripe tomato, cut into 1in chunks
1/4 C chopped cilantro
Coat a 5 or 6 quart pot with nonstick spray. Heat over medium. Add tortilla strips and cook 5 minutes, turning occasionally, until lightly toasted. Remove to a plate. Add broth, zucchini, squash, garlic, and cumin to pot. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer 3 minutes or until squash is crisp-tender.
Stir in corn and beans; continue to simmer 2 minutes. Stir in remaining ingredients. Heat through. Top with tortilla strips.
Serves 4.
Colorful Veggie Coins
Ingredients:
4 medium carrots, thinly sliced
2 medium yellow summer squash, sliced
2 medium zucchini, sliced
2 garlic cloves, minced
4 T butter, divided
1 C chicken broth
1 t. salt
1/2 t. pepper
Place veggies in a shallow 3-qt. baking dish. In a small saucepan, saute garlic in 2 T butter for 2-3 minutes. Stir in the broth, salt & pepper. Pour over vegetables; dot with remaining butter. Cover and bake at 350 degrees for 50 minutes or until vegetables are tender.
Yield: 8 servings
Friday, August 10, 2012
Critics Needed!
Imagine you are a big-time agent off in publishing land. You get 300 emails a day from aspiring authors who want you to represent them and find them a book deal. Would this letter intrigue you?
Seriously. Be harsh. This is no time for "oh, you're so great" -- tell me where I lose your interest or what you'd recommend to make it stand out more.
August 10, 2012
Dear Ms. Sherman,
$5000. A car named Cherry Cherry. A sarcastic thirty-five year old woman. A date in every state. A diamond ring at the end of the road. This, in a nutshell, is Fifty Dates in Fifty States: a Rocky Road Trip in Search of Love and Adventure.
I’d done a fair amount of traveling in the past, including volunteering at an orphanage in Ghana and hiking the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu in Peru. I had not, however, seen much of my own country. It was time to remedy that. And since I hadn’t found the man of my dreams by my mid-thirties, I figured it wouldn’t hurt to open up the dating pool, either.
The end result is this: a fifty-chapter memoir highlighting the unique dates I went on around the country, such as skydiving in Vermont, swimming with dolphins in Hawaii, and kayaking around icebergs in Alaska, plus snicker-inducing tales from my cross-country adventure, including being terrorized by a raccoon in a Florida campground, resisting the urge to punch a bitchy German tourist in NYC, and trying to convince a woman in North Carolina that I did not need to be rescued from an abusive relationship, but had, in fact, just gotten a particularly bad facial. The icing on the cake? I ended up marrying one of those fifty dates.
Every woman in America had a look of envy in her eye when I explained the dating part of my project; every man I met wanted to quit his job and road trip around the country, too. I hope you’ll be as intrigued as they were! Thank you so much for taking time to read my query, and please let me know if I can send sample pages.
Sincerely,
Me and my contact info, yadayadayada
Rip away. Constructive criticism over cheerleading!!
Seriously. Be harsh. This is no time for "oh, you're so great" -- tell me where I lose your interest or what you'd recommend to make it stand out more.
August 10, 2012
Dear Ms. Sherman,
$5000. A car named Cherry Cherry. A sarcastic thirty-five year old woman. A date in every state. A diamond ring at the end of the road. This, in a nutshell, is Fifty Dates in Fifty States: a Rocky Road Trip in Search of Love and Adventure.
I’d done a fair amount of traveling in the past, including volunteering at an orphanage in Ghana and hiking the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu in Peru. I had not, however, seen much of my own country. It was time to remedy that. And since I hadn’t found the man of my dreams by my mid-thirties, I figured it wouldn’t hurt to open up the dating pool, either.
The end result is this: a fifty-chapter memoir highlighting the unique dates I went on around the country, such as skydiving in Vermont, swimming with dolphins in Hawaii, and kayaking around icebergs in Alaska, plus snicker-inducing tales from my cross-country adventure, including being terrorized by a raccoon in a Florida campground, resisting the urge to punch a bitchy German tourist in NYC, and trying to convince a woman in North Carolina that I did not need to be rescued from an abusive relationship, but had, in fact, just gotten a particularly bad facial. The icing on the cake? I ended up marrying one of those fifty dates.
Every woman in America had a look of envy in her eye when I explained the dating part of my project; every man I met wanted to quit his job and road trip around the country, too. I hope you’ll be as intrigued as they were! Thank you so much for taking time to read my query, and please let me know if I can send sample pages.
Sincerely,
Me and my contact info, yadayadayada
Rip away. Constructive criticism over cheerleading!!
Zombie Zumba
I blame Katie for all my Zumba woes. She teaches Zumba at the Y back in Dubuque -- funky, fun, heart rate-elevating classes that I LOVED. I credit those classes for my ten-pound weight drop before the wedding. (Well, that and starvation, but as far as exercise goes . . .) So yeah, it’s natural that every Zumba class I’ve taken since then has been a letdown.
I signed up for a new class this week in my little town. I don’t think I’m going to benefit physically from this one, but it was rather entertaining. When the teacher resembles Al from Happy Days, you realize you’re probably not in for the fitness experience of a lifetime. Here's the entertaining part, though -- if I had only one word to describe the teacher, it would be this: flamboyant.
We started out with an oldie for the warm-up. We marched side to side, shaking our fingers at imaginary men, like, “Oh, no you di-int!!” I was puzzled, because it wasn’t very Zumba-like. It seemed like a routine he may have copied from that Richard Simmon’s classic, Sweating to the Oldies. The third song was in Spanish, so I thought, hey, here we go. But nope. Next was a song by Britney Spears and then -- I kid you not -- “Fergalicous.”
I was laughing at this point, trying to be a good sport in this completely non-Zumba-esque Zumba class. He didn’t have an iPod playlist, or even a CD with the music for the night on it. He would walk over to his CD player after each song, put in a new CD, then play the first three measures of every song until he found a track he liked. So much for keeping up that heart rate.
The highlight of the evening, though, was a song from the GLEE soundtrack. Seriously. GLEE. In Zumba. It was a mashup of “Off With Your Head” and “Thriller.” The teacher was having the time of his life, dancing around. We did the “Thriller” walk, which you would totally expect, but then probably two-thirds of the way through the song, he started doing this move than I wish I could have gotten on film for you, dear reader. It was kind of a squatting, high-kneed walk, combined with arm moves that looked like you were brushing vines out of your way as you walked through the jungle. Got the mental picture? Good. Now picture the flamboyant fat man doing this move as he yells, “Stomp over those dead zombies, ladies!”
I did. I stomped right over those imaginary dead zombies. Because you know what looks sillier than stomping over imaginary dead zombies? Standing there, refusing to do it, while all the other women are stepping over imaginary dead zombies.
But the best part? It’s in a school gym with no mirrors, so no women are seducing themselves during this one. Small victories.
We started out with an oldie for the warm-up. We marched side to side, shaking our fingers at imaginary men, like, “Oh, no you di-int!!” I was puzzled, because it wasn’t very Zumba-like. It seemed like a routine he may have copied from that Richard Simmon’s classic, Sweating to the Oldies. The third song was in Spanish, so I thought, hey, here we go. But nope. Next was a song by Britney Spears and then -- I kid you not -- “Fergalicous.”
I was laughing at this point, trying to be a good sport in this completely non-Zumba-esque Zumba class. He didn’t have an iPod playlist, or even a CD with the music for the night on it. He would walk over to his CD player after each song, put in a new CD, then play the first three measures of every song until he found a track he liked. So much for keeping up that heart rate.
The highlight of the evening, though, was a song from the GLEE soundtrack. Seriously. GLEE. In Zumba. It was a mashup of “Off With Your Head” and “Thriller.” The teacher was having the time of his life, dancing around. We did the “Thriller” walk, which you would totally expect, but then probably two-thirds of the way through the song, he started doing this move than I wish I could have gotten on film for you, dear reader. It was kind of a squatting, high-kneed walk, combined with arm moves that looked like you were brushing vines out of your way as you walked through the jungle. Got the mental picture? Good. Now picture the flamboyant fat man doing this move as he yells, “Stomp over those dead zombies, ladies!”
I did. I stomped right over those imaginary dead zombies. Because you know what looks sillier than stomping over imaginary dead zombies? Standing there, refusing to do it, while all the other women are stepping over imaginary dead zombies.
But the best part? It’s in a school gym with no mirrors, so no women are seducing themselves during this one. Small victories.
Thursday, August 2, 2012
 |
| Not me. Random baritone player from internet-land. |
A: Eu-phone-ium.
As I've told you ten times now (sick of hearing about it yet?), I've been a little bit bored and looking for things to do in my new town. Things to entertain me. Things to make myself useful. Things to give me a reason to get out of my pajamas before four o'clock in the afternoon, which I may or may not have done one day this week. (And by may or may not, I mean I definitely did . . . but I got a few items checked off my to-do list whilst in said jammies, so it's okay, right? And I was showered and dressed by the time Delecta Daddy got home from work, so no one even noticed . . . )
Looking for options, I picked up a copy of the La Crescent Community Education booklet to see what I could try. They offered all kinds of things this summer from computer courses to Zumba dancing. They also advertised their (free, and thus most attractive) community band.
I was a pretty good baritone player in high school. And by pretty good, I mean I grew up in a small town where there were no such thing as tryouts. If you showed up, you were in the band. I wish I had a picture to share -- the baritone was almost as big as me.
So anyway, I showed up for practice one night, thinking it would be like the community band in the little town where I grew up.
Uh, no. These La Crescent Community Band people are serious. I took one look at the music and went, oh crap, I am in way over my head.
Granted I hadn't picked up a horn in twenty years, so I was bound to be a little rusty, but one page of music had so many notes on it that I was instantly intimidated. And I was pretty sure I didn't know how to play some of those high notes and low notes even when I was playing every day in high school band. When did the baritone range double?? Yowza.
The other thing that became clear very quickly? I wasn't likely to improve my social scene with this group. I'd say it's about 1/3 high schoolers and 2/3 retirees. Bummer.
But here's the thing: as we played a song that had "Tis a Gift to be Simple" incorporated throughout it, I got teary eyed. You'll laugh if you were never in band, but if you were, I think you'll understand. There's something about adding your line to everyone else's and creating this beautiful noise . . . you just feel like you're a part of something amazing, so I decided to stick with it, even if I did play only a quarter of the written music while the old man beside me hit everything I missed.
Turns out I really am an amazing baritone player, and here's why: I know when NOT to play. Examples: that note's too high, that note's too low, that's a sharp I don't remember the fingering to, that measure has too many notes in it, etc. Why pressure myself to be amazing? Heck, it's community band playing in the park, not professionals playing in a concert hall. It's supposed to be FUN.
And geekily enough, I had fun. And you know what? A lot of stuff came back to me in the past month, practicing alone or playing with everyone else. Tonight while warming up I even busted out a riff from a piece we played back in high school. I don't know if it was muscle memory or what, but bap-bap-bap-ba-da-bah . . . out came this run from somewhere deep in my brain. Who knew it was still in there?
Oh, and a little old lady totally validated my existence as we packed up our horns.
Her: Did you have a busy day today?
Me: Well, I ordered all of my wedding pictures, so it was nice to get that done . . .
Her: Oh, did you just get married?
Me: Yep, in June. And then this afternoon I baked cookies.
Her: Oh, then you DID have a busy day!
We'll go with that. And I even changed out of my pajamas before I started baking! Whoohoo!
Monday, July 23, 2012
Scaredy Cats
We love nature. Sometimes it just doesn't love us back.
We went up to Kevin's family cabin again this weekend, and I woke up way too early Saturday morning. I told my body to ignore what my bladder was saying, but around 5AM, I gave up and got up, went outside, shuffled down the stairs, and stumbled the length of the cabin to get to the toilet in the far back corner of the building. By the time I got back upstairs, I was too awake to go back to sleep. Dang it!
I turned on the lamp and started reading.
"Whazzuhmatter?" Kevin mumbled from the twin-sized bed on the other side of the end table.
"Nothing," I replied. Pause.
"Can I use your eye mask?"
"Okay," I giggled and tossed it over to him. He looked so cute in my fuzzy white mask.
About an hour later, I noticed he was curled up in the fetal position. I wasn't sure if it was because he was cold or just too big for the bed, but I got up and pulled a quilt over him.
He jumped like he was being attacked . . . and had been struck blind. He jerked his head way back so he could see through the little slit at the bottom of the eye mask . . . and found me laughing at him.
"Sorry, babe," I whispered. "It's just a blanket."
He groaned, rolled over, and went back to sleep.
Later on that afternoon, we were lazing in the lake . . . well, I was lazing, floating on a little yellow inner tube, while Kevin used a big rake to muck out some leaves and branches near the dock.
My bikini bottom has strings on the side; from what I can tell, they serve no real purpose, just dangle there. Saturday afternoon, though, they were submerged with the rest of my backside while my arms and legs and head rested on the top of the tube.
And then a string got pulled. I yelped and instinctively thrust my pelvis up and out of the water, but then I realized I didn't really have anywhere to go, being on a flimsy little yellow inner tube. My first thought -- and what does this say about me? -- was not that I was being attacked by a shark or piranha or any other water-dwelling creature. Nope. My first thought was, some psycho guy is in the lake underneath my tube pulling my bikini strings!
And then I realized it was more likely just a fish.
"A fish just tugged on my bikini string!" I called out to Kevin. He gave me one of those old-farmer-head-nod things to acknowledge he'd heard me, but kept on doing what he was doing. Seriously? I could have been maimed, buddy! A little sympathy?
I felt better ten minutes later when he let out a yelp. Taking a break from his work, he was squatting to submerge himself shoulder deep in the shallow water. The only thing visible was his ratty old cowboy hat and the can of beer he was carefully holding above the water . . . until he shot up with that yelp.
"It bit me in the nipple!" he yelled. Seriously. Pretty sure the whole lake heard him.
I laughed.
"It's bleeding!" he called, looking for sympathy like I had.
He'll live.
The next day we went for a hike. I was in the lead on the 4.5-miler since Kevin walks as slow as he drives. I was thinking how nice it is to be married now, having someone to protect me in case of bears or something, when my hand hit a big cobweb. I was wiping it off on my shirt when I heard a roar and a thud behind me, so loud that I fully expected to see my new husband on the ground when I turned around.
Nope. Upright. Wiping wildly at his face. Having a good foot on me in height, I'd caught the bottom corner of a giant cobweb with my hand; it had clothes-lined him. He looked at me with an I'm-trying-to-remain-calm-but-I'm-really-kind-of-freaking-out look in his eyes.
"Is there a spider on my face?"
And then I did a rotten new wife thing. I laughed.
"No, there's nothing on your face," I assured him. And then, trying to be sweeter, I checked his shirt and the back of his neck and his legs while he wiped the web off his face.
Wife of the year I am not.
I picked up the water bottles that had flown out of the pockets on his backpack when he'd done the Matrix-esque move after his face met the cobweb, amazed at how loud they'd sounded. I was sure glad it hadn't been him hitting the dirt; he's just a smidgen too big for me to carry out of the woods on my back.
I got mine twelve hours later. Back in our apartment, lying in my nice, soft bed, plumb tuckered out from our outdoorsy adventure, I heard what I was certain was a rat, right behind my head and surely about to jump on my face. I did a whole-body convulsion thing, the same kind of thing you do when you dream you're falling.
"What?" Kevin asked from behind me. I figured if he didn't see it, it must not be real. I rolled over and lifted up my eyemask.
"What was that noise?" I asked. His look of concern change to one of guilt.
"This?" he said, then used his bottom teeth to scratch his upper lip, replicating the sound that had just scared the crap out of me. I grabbed his face with one hand, squeezing his cheeks like a chipmunk.
"I thought a rat was about to jump on my face!" I hissed. He just laughed.
If we ever do see a bear in the woods, we're both totally going to wet our pants.
We love nature. Sometimes it just doesn't love us back.
We went up to Kevin's family cabin again this weekend, and I woke up way too early Saturday morning. I told my body to ignore what my bladder was saying, but around 5AM, I gave up and got up, went outside, shuffled down the stairs, and stumbled the length of the cabin to get to the toilet in the far back corner of the building. By the time I got back upstairs, I was too awake to go back to sleep. Dang it!
I turned on the lamp and started reading.
"Whazzuhmatter?" Kevin mumbled from the twin-sized bed on the other side of the end table.
"Nothing," I replied. Pause.
"Can I use your eye mask?"
"Okay," I giggled and tossed it over to him. He looked so cute in my fuzzy white mask.
About an hour later, I noticed he was curled up in the fetal position. I wasn't sure if it was because he was cold or just too big for the bed, but I got up and pulled a quilt over him.
He jumped like he was being attacked . . . and had been struck blind. He jerked his head way back so he could see through the little slit at the bottom of the eye mask . . . and found me laughing at him.
"Sorry, babe," I whispered. "It's just a blanket."
He groaned, rolled over, and went back to sleep.
Later on that afternoon, we were lazing in the lake . . . well, I was lazing, floating on a little yellow inner tube, while Kevin used a big rake to muck out some leaves and branches near the dock.
My bikini bottom has strings on the side; from what I can tell, they serve no real purpose, just dangle there. Saturday afternoon, though, they were submerged with the rest of my backside while my arms and legs and head rested on the top of the tube.
And then a string got pulled. I yelped and instinctively thrust my pelvis up and out of the water, but then I realized I didn't really have anywhere to go, being on a flimsy little yellow inner tube. My first thought -- and what does this say about me? -- was not that I was being attacked by a shark or piranha or any other water-dwelling creature. Nope. My first thought was, some psycho guy is in the lake underneath my tube pulling my bikini strings!
And then I realized it was more likely just a fish.
"A fish just tugged on my bikini string!" I called out to Kevin. He gave me one of those old-farmer-head-nod things to acknowledge he'd heard me, but kept on doing what he was doing. Seriously? I could have been maimed, buddy! A little sympathy?
I felt better ten minutes later when he let out a yelp. Taking a break from his work, he was squatting to submerge himself shoulder deep in the shallow water. The only thing visible was his ratty old cowboy hat and the can of beer he was carefully holding above the water . . . until he shot up with that yelp.
"It bit me in the nipple!" he yelled. Seriously. Pretty sure the whole lake heard him.
I laughed.
"It's bleeding!" he called, looking for sympathy like I had.
He'll live.
The next day we went for a hike. I was in the lead on the 4.5-miler since Kevin walks as slow as he drives. I was thinking how nice it is to be married now, having someone to protect me in case of bears or something, when my hand hit a big cobweb. I was wiping it off on my shirt when I heard a roar and a thud behind me, so loud that I fully expected to see my new husband on the ground when I turned around.
Nope. Upright. Wiping wildly at his face. Having a good foot on me in height, I'd caught the bottom corner of a giant cobweb with my hand; it had clothes-lined him. He looked at me with an I'm-trying-to-remain-calm-but-I'm-really-kind-of-freaking-out look in his eyes.
"Is there a spider on my face?"
And then I did a rotten new wife thing. I laughed.
"No, there's nothing on your face," I assured him. And then, trying to be sweeter, I checked his shirt and the back of his neck and his legs while he wiped the web off his face.
Wife of the year I am not.
I picked up the water bottles that had flown out of the pockets on his backpack when he'd done the Matrix-esque move after his face met the cobweb, amazed at how loud they'd sounded. I was sure glad it hadn't been him hitting the dirt; he's just a smidgen too big for me to carry out of the woods on my back.
I got mine twelve hours later. Back in our apartment, lying in my nice, soft bed, plumb tuckered out from our outdoorsy adventure, I heard what I was certain was a rat, right behind my head and surely about to jump on my face. I did a whole-body convulsion thing, the same kind of thing you do when you dream you're falling.
"What?" Kevin asked from behind me. I figured if he didn't see it, it must not be real. I rolled over and lifted up my eyemask.
"What was that noise?" I asked. His look of concern change to one of guilt.
"This?" he said, then used his bottom teeth to scratch his upper lip, replicating the sound that had just scared the crap out of me. I grabbed his face with one hand, squeezing his cheeks like a chipmunk.
"I thought a rat was about to jump on my face!" I hissed. He just laughed.
If we ever do see a bear in the woods, we're both totally going to wet our pants.
Thursday, July 19, 2012
Hey, I just got you/And this is crazy/But I just love you/So call me Jan Brady
I got a bike. It rocks.
When we moved to La Crescent, one of the first things we noticed was how active the people in this community are -- people were out walking and biking all day, every day.
There were signs up around our neighborhood for a resale bike shop, so we went and checked it out one night . . . and I got a sweet new ride. It's got wide handlebars and a squishy seat, and I feel as giddy as Jan Brady when I'm riding around town on it. (But my handlebars aren't quite as big as hers . . . nor is my hair.)
I'd thought about getting a bike before, but let's face it: I'm cheap. I love the look of those beach cruisers, but even at WalMart they're over $100. Another fact: I don't like to work too hard when I exercise. I hated to spend over a hundred bucks on a bike if it turned out biking was hard. I mean, I biked as a kid, but mostly just to show up my brother. After we grew up, I kind of gave it up as a sport.
So anyway, for just $45, the price was right.
I've taken little jaunts -- up to the grocery store and such -- and Kevin and I often go out for rides at night, once it cools off. The other night we rode to the far side of town to a bar that has sand volleyball courts outside. We thought joining a league might help us meet people. As the only two patrons in the bar, though, we wondered who we're going to have to pay in this town to be our friends. (The only people our age we've seen around here are at the t-ball field with their kids. Not really our crowd.) But the barman said the volleyball season was half over and it was too late to get in. They do have a "bags" league on Sunday afternoons, though, and we could come hang out and see if they'd need subs. (Not likely. Sounds like we'd be standing up against the wall like the last kids picked for kickball during elementary recess time.)
But anyway, back to my sweet new ride. Much as I love it, there is one problem: the new helmet I got for $5 with my resale bike is about two sizes too small. As in, so small I still had an indentation in my forehead when I went to bed an hour after our trip to rejection-bar. (When I went looking for sympathy, Kevin assured me he wasn't looking at my forehead. Such a man.)
We've pedaled up to the local farmer's market the past two weeks for some fresh produce. Here's an easy recipe I found to try out some of our local veggies:
Chocolate Zucchini Bread
3 eggs
1 C vegetable oil
2 C sugar
1 T vanilla extract
2 C shredded peeled zucchini (about 1 medium)
2 1/2 C flour
1/2 C cocoa
1 t. salt
1 t. baking soda
1 t. ground cinnamon
1/4 t. baking powder
In a mixing bowl, beat eggs, oil, sugar, and vanilla. Stir in zucchini. Combine dry ingredients; add to zucchini mixture and mix well. Pour into two greased 8x4x2 inch loaf pans. Bake at 350 for one hour or until a toothpick comes out clean.
I fed this to my non-veggie eating brother and nephews last weekend, not telling them there was zucchini in it. They never knew the difference. :)
I got a bike. It rocks.
When we moved to La Crescent, one of the first things we noticed was how active the people in this community are -- people were out walking and biking all day, every day.
There were signs up around our neighborhood for a resale bike shop, so we went and checked it out one night . . . and I got a sweet new ride. It's got wide handlebars and a squishy seat, and I feel as giddy as Jan Brady when I'm riding around town on it. (But my handlebars aren't quite as big as hers . . . nor is my hair.)
I'd thought about getting a bike before, but let's face it: I'm cheap. I love the look of those beach cruisers, but even at WalMart they're over $100. Another fact: I don't like to work too hard when I exercise. I hated to spend over a hundred bucks on a bike if it turned out biking was hard. I mean, I biked as a kid, but mostly just to show up my brother. After we grew up, I kind of gave it up as a sport.
So anyway, for just $45, the price was right.
I've taken little jaunts -- up to the grocery store and such -- and Kevin and I often go out for rides at night, once it cools off. The other night we rode to the far side of town to a bar that has sand volleyball courts outside. We thought joining a league might help us meet people. As the only two patrons in the bar, though, we wondered who we're going to have to pay in this town to be our friends. (The only people our age we've seen around here are at the t-ball field with their kids. Not really our crowd.) But the barman said the volleyball season was half over and it was too late to get in. They do have a "bags" league on Sunday afternoons, though, and we could come hang out and see if they'd need subs. (Not likely. Sounds like we'd be standing up against the wall like the last kids picked for kickball during elementary recess time.)
But anyway, back to my sweet new ride. Much as I love it, there is one problem: the new helmet I got for $5 with my resale bike is about two sizes too small. As in, so small I still had an indentation in my forehead when I went to bed an hour after our trip to rejection-bar. (When I went looking for sympathy, Kevin assured me he wasn't looking at my forehead. Such a man.)
We've pedaled up to the local farmer's market the past two weeks for some fresh produce. Here's an easy recipe I found to try out some of our local veggies:
Chocolate Zucchini Bread
3 eggs
1 C vegetable oil
2 C sugar
1 T vanilla extract
2 C shredded peeled zucchini (about 1 medium)
2 1/2 C flour
1/2 C cocoa
1 t. salt
1 t. baking soda
1 t. ground cinnamon
1/4 t. baking powder
In a mixing bowl, beat eggs, oil, sugar, and vanilla. Stir in zucchini. Combine dry ingredients; add to zucchini mixture and mix well. Pour into two greased 8x4x2 inch loaf pans. Bake at 350 for one hour or until a toothpick comes out clean.
I fed this to my non-veggie eating brother and nephews last weekend, not telling them there was zucchini in it. They never knew the difference. :)
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
Next Monday at Midnight . . .
My phone buzzed near midnight last night. I'm surprised I even heard it, really, since I was pretty much exhausted and dead asleep after hosting my family for the weekend, but in my sleep fog I thought maybe they'd had an accident on the way home (despite the fact that we'd talked on the phone a few hours earlier and they were home safe and sound), so I bumbled around on the nightstand until I found and picked up my vibrating phone.
"Hello?" I croaked into my phone, then, "mmbbggtthtththththrrrrrr . . . rrr . . . I think . . . rrrr . . . wrong number . . . " when a woman asked for Angie. "Yeah, I suppose it is," she sassily shot back.
Okay. An "I'm sorry to have woken you," would have been more polite.
I dropped it back on the nightstand and rolled over. It started buzzing again almost immediately but I ignored it. My voicemail message starts out with, "Hey, this is Tiffany," so I figured rather than tell her she had the wrong number again, she'd figure it out on her own.
Nope. I woke up to find I had a voicemail. A long, rambling voicemail. It started out like this:
"Hey Angie, I know we haven't talked in a couple of years . . . "
My first thought was, duh, did you not hear the voicemail message that said my name is Tiffany? My second thought was, man, didn't your mother teach you not to call people after nine? Some people sleep, you know.
The message went along in the "haven't talked in a couple of years" vein for a while, and then a switch flipped or something, and mystery caller started on a rant, directing Angie to, "close your mouth . . . shut your mouth . . ." in about five different ways, ending with a dramatic pause and then . . . "underground."
Huh. Was that a overdramatized death wish, mystery caller?
I was thinking about it today, and I'm not sure which is more sad, a) that she's still mad at someone she hasn't talked to in two years or b) that she was clearly drunk at midnight on a Monday. Seriously? A Monday? Get a life, hon.
I thought about who I could call at midnight next Monday, 'cause if that's the hip new thing to do, I totally want to do it, you know? I started my list of people who'd wronged me so I'd know whose numbers I needed to Google in preparation.
1. Kevin. Yes, Kevin. My beloved. My Delecta Daddy himself. Why? Because on Valentine's Day -- Did you catch that? VALENTINE'S DAY! -- he called me Courtney. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it wasn't this Valentine's Day, when he gave me that fabulous sparkler and asked me to be his wife. And fine, yes, he'd just left work and had been working with his intern Courtney, so the name was on his brain. And yeah, we'd only been dating a couple of months. But still. On Valentine's Day? Unfortunately the midnight phone call probably wasn't going to be as effective with him lying right there in bed beside me. And also, I didn't want to wish him dead. I kinda like him.
I resolved to give him a sharp elbow to the kidneys next Monday at midnight and claim it was an accidental/justrollingover move. I crossed him off my call list.
I needed to think of women who'd done me wrong. Stolen a boyfriend or something. I racked my brain.
Couldn't think of anyone.
Went back to high school . . . scene of all drama, right?
Couldn't think of anyone.
I went further back. Kindergarten. I got one!!
At recess one day, I was doing a headstand. I'd taken off my headband, because the hard plastic would have thrown off my balance and hurt my head. One of my classmates thought it would be funny to knock me down mid-handstand. I'm pretty sure it was because she was jealous of my awesomeness. Down I went . . . and the plastic headband I was holding in my hand BROKE. IN. HALF.
Injustice!
The teacher didn't seem to think it was a big deal, but I was livid. I'm gonna call her next Monday at midnight and let her have it.
But I don't really want to wish her dead. I mean, the headband probably cost, like, a quarter, and I certainly had other fully intact headbands at home. And she was my best friend in seventh grade, so obviously I'd forgiven her by then. So . . . yeah, I'm probably not gonna call her.
Darn it. I gave up the list. I suck at catfighting.
And I think we can all read between the lines here: I'm never going to be a reality TV star. :(
My phone buzzed near midnight last night. I'm surprised I even heard it, really, since I was pretty much exhausted and dead asleep after hosting my family for the weekend, but in my sleep fog I thought maybe they'd had an accident on the way home (despite the fact that we'd talked on the phone a few hours earlier and they were home safe and sound), so I bumbled around on the nightstand until I found and picked up my vibrating phone.
"Hello?" I croaked into my phone, then, "mmbbggtthtththththrrrrrr . . . rrr . . . I think . . . rrrr . . . wrong number . . . " when a woman asked for Angie. "Yeah, I suppose it is," she sassily shot back.
Okay. An "I'm sorry to have woken you," would have been more polite.
I dropped it back on the nightstand and rolled over. It started buzzing again almost immediately but I ignored it. My voicemail message starts out with, "Hey, this is Tiffany," so I figured rather than tell her she had the wrong number again, she'd figure it out on her own.
Nope. I woke up to find I had a voicemail. A long, rambling voicemail. It started out like this:
"Hey Angie, I know we haven't talked in a couple of years . . . "
My first thought was, duh, did you not hear the voicemail message that said my name is Tiffany? My second thought was, man, didn't your mother teach you not to call people after nine? Some people sleep, you know.
The message went along in the "haven't talked in a couple of years" vein for a while, and then a switch flipped or something, and mystery caller started on a rant, directing Angie to, "close your mouth . . . shut your mouth . . ." in about five different ways, ending with a dramatic pause and then . . . "underground."
Huh. Was that a overdramatized death wish, mystery caller?
I was thinking about it today, and I'm not sure which is more sad, a) that she's still mad at someone she hasn't talked to in two years or b) that she was clearly drunk at midnight on a Monday. Seriously? A Monday? Get a life, hon.
I thought about who I could call at midnight next Monday, 'cause if that's the hip new thing to do, I totally want to do it, you know? I started my list of people who'd wronged me so I'd know whose numbers I needed to Google in preparation.
1. Kevin. Yes, Kevin. My beloved. My Delecta Daddy himself. Why? Because on Valentine's Day -- Did you catch that? VALENTINE'S DAY! -- he called me Courtney. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it wasn't this Valentine's Day, when he gave me that fabulous sparkler and asked me to be his wife. And fine, yes, he'd just left work and had been working with his intern Courtney, so the name was on his brain. And yeah, we'd only been dating a couple of months. But still. On Valentine's Day? Unfortunately the midnight phone call probably wasn't going to be as effective with him lying right there in bed beside me. And also, I didn't want to wish him dead. I kinda like him.
I resolved to give him a sharp elbow to the kidneys next Monday at midnight and claim it was an accidental/justrollingover move. I crossed him off my call list.
I needed to think of women who'd done me wrong. Stolen a boyfriend or something. I racked my brain.
Couldn't think of anyone.
Went back to high school . . . scene of all drama, right?
Couldn't think of anyone.
I went further back. Kindergarten. I got one!!
At recess one day, I was doing a headstand. I'd taken off my headband, because the hard plastic would have thrown off my balance and hurt my head. One of my classmates thought it would be funny to knock me down mid-handstand. I'm pretty sure it was because she was jealous of my awesomeness. Down I went . . . and the plastic headband I was holding in my hand BROKE. IN. HALF.
Injustice!
The teacher didn't seem to think it was a big deal, but I was livid. I'm gonna call her next Monday at midnight and let her have it.
But I don't really want to wish her dead. I mean, the headband probably cost, like, a quarter, and I certainly had other fully intact headbands at home. And she was my best friend in seventh grade, so obviously I'd forgiven her by then. So . . . yeah, I'm probably not gonna call her.
Darn it. I gave up the list. I suck at catfighting.
And I think we can all read between the lines here: I'm never going to be a reality TV star. :(
Friday, July 13, 2012
If you were wondering how to annoy me at Zumba . . .
I went to Zumba at the La Crosse YMCA yesterday. I loved it in Dubuque, and since my Dubuque membership is still valid and I have some guest passes through it, it was free to try here. Yay!
I got there fifteen minutes early, not because I'm a stickler for punctuality but because, as previously mentioned, I don't have a lot of other pressing appointments these days. My early arrival meant I was able to pick out pretty much any spot in the room I wanted. I didn't want to be in the front row since I wasn't sure whether or not they used the same routines as the Dubuque Y. I didn't want to be too far back, though, because if they did have different routines, I wanted to be able to see the instructor so I'd have a clue what was going on. I planted myself firmly in the second row, slightly left of center, with a clear view of the instructor.
Imagine my frustration when, three minutes after class began, a straggler came in and stood right in front of me. Seriously? Go find a spot in that wide open back row, lady! Can you not see that you're not in an actual row? There's the first row, and here's the second -- you are in neither! Technically she was between me and the lady to my left, so saying she stood right in front of me is a slight exaggeration. But seriously, one late step on her part and I'd be kicking her in the keester. She was that close.
It became clear, though, that she would not be making any missteps. She was clearly an every-weeker and knew all of the routines without looking at the instructor. How do I know this? Because she rarely broke eye contact with herself. Facing the front, she admired herself in the front mirror. Turning to the side, she admired herself in the side mirror.
What do I mean by admiring?
Have you seen Toddlers in Tiaras? Or the cheerleading competitions they sometimes have on ESPN? I'm gonna guess this lady has lots of that stuff on her DVR and watches it frequently. You know the facial expressions I'm talking about -- extra cheese. Cheese overload. Cheese that's not attractive on little girls or teenagers, let alone forty-something Zumba class participants. The kind of cheese that makes you uncomfortable, because you're not sure if they think they're sexy, or want you to think they're sexy, or what it is exactly they're going for.
I tried to look around and see if anyone else was noticing this. Or heck, were other people doing this? Maybe here in La Crosse these faces were encouraged during Zumba. I glanced surreptitiously at my dancing comrades and realized, nope, just her. Some women were laughing at themselves. Some women were huffing and puffing. But only one was seducing her reflection.
Don't be so judgmental, I told myself. Maybe she has a really tough job, or an unhappy marriage, or teenagers who are embarrassed to be seen with her. Maybe this is her one outlet . . . her one chance to really live it up. I tried to give her some grace.
But then she winked at herself.
I kid you not. In one particularly risque Zumba move, we did two chest bumps and a booty roll . . . at which time ilovemyselflady gave her reflection a naughty come-hither look and winked.
I considered vomiting. Really, I did. It was super hot in that room, with fifty women sweating bullets, so the conditions were right with or without this lady making me want to hurl.
I kept going though, pretty much because a) with all the baking I've been doing, I needed the calorie burn, and b) I'm hoping to make some friends here, and interrupting Zumba class with a pukefest probably isn't the way to do it.
The jury is still out on whether or not I'll go back . . .
I went to Zumba at the La Crosse YMCA yesterday. I loved it in Dubuque, and since my Dubuque membership is still valid and I have some guest passes through it, it was free to try here. Yay!
I got there fifteen minutes early, not because I'm a stickler for punctuality but because, as previously mentioned, I don't have a lot of other pressing appointments these days. My early arrival meant I was able to pick out pretty much any spot in the room I wanted. I didn't want to be in the front row since I wasn't sure whether or not they used the same routines as the Dubuque Y. I didn't want to be too far back, though, because if they did have different routines, I wanted to be able to see the instructor so I'd have a clue what was going on. I planted myself firmly in the second row, slightly left of center, with a clear view of the instructor.
Imagine my frustration when, three minutes after class began, a straggler came in and stood right in front of me. Seriously? Go find a spot in that wide open back row, lady! Can you not see that you're not in an actual row? There's the first row, and here's the second -- you are in neither! Technically she was between me and the lady to my left, so saying she stood right in front of me is a slight exaggeration. But seriously, one late step on her part and I'd be kicking her in the keester. She was that close.
It became clear, though, that she would not be making any missteps. She was clearly an every-weeker and knew all of the routines without looking at the instructor. How do I know this? Because she rarely broke eye contact with herself. Facing the front, she admired herself in the front mirror. Turning to the side, she admired herself in the side mirror.
What do I mean by admiring?
Have you seen Toddlers in Tiaras? Or the cheerleading competitions they sometimes have on ESPN? I'm gonna guess this lady has lots of that stuff on her DVR and watches it frequently. You know the facial expressions I'm talking about -- extra cheese. Cheese overload. Cheese that's not attractive on little girls or teenagers, let alone forty-something Zumba class participants. The kind of cheese that makes you uncomfortable, because you're not sure if they think they're sexy, or want you to think they're sexy, or what it is exactly they're going for.
I tried to look around and see if anyone else was noticing this. Or heck, were other people doing this? Maybe here in La Crosse these faces were encouraged during Zumba. I glanced surreptitiously at my dancing comrades and realized, nope, just her. Some women were laughing at themselves. Some women were huffing and puffing. But only one was seducing her reflection.
Don't be so judgmental, I told myself. Maybe she has a really tough job, or an unhappy marriage, or teenagers who are embarrassed to be seen with her. Maybe this is her one outlet . . . her one chance to really live it up. I tried to give her some grace.
But then she winked at herself.
I kid you not. In one particularly risque Zumba move, we did two chest bumps and a booty roll . . . at which time ilovemyselflady gave her reflection a naughty come-hither look and winked.
I considered vomiting. Really, I did. It was super hot in that room, with fifty women sweating bullets, so the conditions were right with or without this lady making me want to hurl.
I kept going though, pretty much because a) with all the baking I've been doing, I needed the calorie burn, and b) I'm hoping to make some friends here, and interrupting Zumba class with a pukefest probably isn't the way to do it.
The jury is still out on whether or not I'll go back . . .
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)