T-Day Report

Yesterday was the best. We started out with a 5 mile Turkey Trot that in actuality was only 4 miles. Lots of people showed up for it, about 1200 according to the newspaper. We started out by waiting inside the hospital where it was a lot warmer than outside (and by the restrooms). Here's Eric, Bob and Shane. They look bored don't they?A livlier shot of Eric and Bob . . .

At least Kim and I are smiling . . .

Meredith (with hubby Clay) is a new runner. Not too many weeks ago she said the 3 words I HATE hearing, "I hate running". So after some "therapy" by a few other female runners (Mary, Laura & I), she is now hooked. After she came into the finish line she said the 3 words I love to here, "I smoked it". And she did!

After our run we came home and showered. Then we went to the local Sports Authority with a 25% off coupon in hand to buy some new running gloves. I have several pair of running gloves but none for those really severely cold days. Well, now I do. I bought some that are warm enough that my fingers shouldn't have any complaints.

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After we got done there, we went to Mary & Mike's house for dinner for (OK, Mary, here it is . . . ) the best Thanksgiving Day I have ever had!

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Here's Caitlyn, who is a charming 17 year old. She is very entertaining and an all round delightful person. This is her pose she's practicing for when she's rich and famous. Mary is teaching daughter Chelsea how to cook. Yes, here it is, captured on my cell phone, the actual passing down of the family secrets to a perfect Thanksgiving dinner. Chelsea is heading to college next year. I have no doubt in my mind that she will be very successful.

Ah! A perfect Thanksgiving turkey! I think Mary could have taught Martha Stewart a couple things (for one, Mary is a much nicer person than Martha).

After dinner, we played Apples to Apples with Laura, Vanessa, and Sam (AKA Jules).

and Gloria, Chelsea and Jack. (There were some more players but I didn't get their pictures.)

All in all, I ate way too much pie, and had a wonderful day.

Future Hockey Star?

Last evening we went to the Ice Sheet to watch Jackson play hockey. It turned out that the game was cancelled but they still did the ice skating lessons so we stayed and watched. Here he is getting laced up by his dad. Does this face strike fear in you? Or perhaps you're thinking more of Charlie Brown?

Once on the sheet, they were given buckets to use to help stabilize themselves on the ice. (It works the same as a walker for an old person.)

Once the buckets were taken away, he did a pretty good job of staying upright. (It was the movement part that was more difficult.) I'm not prejudiced or anything, he really is very good at standing still on ice. Hey - everyone has their strong points!

But his favorite part of the evening seemed to be playing the car driving video game. It's a bad shot but he and Carly was so into it that I couldn't even get them to look towards the camera.

Tomorrow's On Ice

Tomorrow we're going to watch our 5 year old grandson (Jackson) at an ice skating lesson, followed by a hockey "game". I've seen the pee wee hockey players before and it's usually pretty entertaining. This is his third week. We missed the first week because we were out of town and then last week we totally forgot. How could we have forgotten?

I think it's important for grand parents to participate in the activities the grand kids are involved in. After all, this is the time when the framework of that relationship is laid.

When I was a kid, I had a grandparent that I would more frequently see, at least more than the others. Because of distance, none of my grandparents were seen real frequently, and of course we didn't have the activities kids seem to have today. But the bottom line was that I was much closer to one set of grand parents than the others. For this reason, my one grandmother has a special place in my heart. And one day I hope my grand children will say the same.

(Will be posting pictures of this event)

The Result

It's hard to see it here because it's actually rather subtle, but I opted to go with a dark brown (natural color) with highlights in carmel and blond. Much less highlights than in the past. The sides and back are now pretty much the same length so that should be a much better grow out. The hardest part is over (it was cut over my ears). Now, was that REALLY me that was talking all that nonsense about embracing my grey hair?

Picture Frame

I know I've talked about this before but I've never dedicated a full post to it (at least as far as I can remember). And, since many people are trying to think about what to buy parents and others for Christmas, it might be timely as well.

One of my most favorite things, is a digital picture frame. We got our first one as a deal for spending a certain amount of money (too much) at a furniture store. I first thought it was just one of those silly and unnecessary things that I seem to end up with now and again. But as soon as we got it loaded up with some photos, it was apparent that this was going to be a much bigger deal than I thought.

Because we also have digital cameras, we have lots of photos on the picture frame. And the nice thing about these photos is that they aren't just the pictures that were taken as we went on vacation. You know, the ones we posed for, or made sure the palm tree shows we were in a tropical location. There are lots of spontaneous, imperfect, bad hair, silly, photos. And they are my favorite, hands down.

These photos are the ones that REALLY represent life. They show what was really happening at that specific moment in time. I have pictures of the grand kids as they were sliding down the big slide. You cannot get that huge smile of joy from the face of a 2 and 5 year old by posing them at Kiddie Kandids. I have photos of our first grand child when he was old enough to understand that Christmas was something special, but not old enough to know what was more special than unwrapping a gift and throwing the wrapping paper and ribbons into the air and having it fall on his head.

The original digital frame wore out in less than a year. And when it died, we didn't waste a minute, we replaced it with a larger, nicer one. It was expensive, but worth every penny. When the grand kids come over, the first thing they do is dart over to the picture frame and watch the display of photos. They sit mesmerized as they watch each photo fade into the next. Of course, their favorites are the ones in which they appear, but they delight in identifying who is in each photo.

I never realized how well they were getting to know the photos, despite the fact we're always adding to them, until one day when 5 year old Jackson was watching the photos. There are some pictures of me that were taken on my last birthday (I think they're actually on the opening pages of this blog from when I first started it). Anyway, one picture has me at Subway eating a sandwich, and another shows me at Starbucks. The pictures are similar in that I'm wearing the same clothes and seated outdoors. Anyway, the Starbucks one came up and upon seeing it, Jackson looked perplexed. Finally he turned to me and asked, "What happened to the sandwich Gramma?" It just cracked me up.

Throughout the day, I glance at the picture frame as I pass through the room. In the evening, I have a clear view of it from the spot I always sit to read or watch TV. It reminds me of places I've been, and people I've spent time with, that so often easily slip from ones mind. And once again, it proves that the simple pleasures really are the best.

What Was I Thinking?

I don't know if I'm full of crap or just fickle. Maybe it's a bit of both. But I got to thinking about when, a post or so ago, I referred to my hair as looking "white-trash-slutty". I recalled this description when we stopped into a convenience store to refill our water supply during yesterday's run. I remarked to hubby, as we were leaving, how badly the 3 employees looked. Now, call it what you will, but if it's there to be seen, it's fair game for my eyes (and blog), but all three of them were in dire need of dental work to replace missing or rotted teeth. And, they all were growing out color. They weren't old enough to be doing it for the same reasons I talked about, they just changed their minds for whatever reason. We're talking blond growing out to dark brown, you know the look I mean.

So this stayed on my mind awhile. After all, it was 14 miles, you have to think about something and usually whatever it is tends to be examined to great length. And I got to thinking, how long am I willing to put up with this white-trash-slutty look that I'm sporting these days? After great thought, I guess the answer is until Thursday. I called and made an appointment with my hairdresser.

I realize awhile back I talked on and on (blah . . . .blah . . . blah . . . ) about how empowering it was to accept myself as I am (in terms of aging and grey hair), and now I'm just feeling like somebody should have asked me what the hell I was thinking. I appreciate the fact my BFF Ellen put it bluntly when she, in no uncertain terms said, "I think you should color your hair."

I haven't been willing to accept the "norm" for anything else associated with aging, why was I so willing to roll over and accept this grey hair thing? I've pretty much spent my whole life doing things "my way", regardless of anyone else's expectations, so if I'm not willing to let my body and mind get old, why was I making an exception for my hair?

I must have gone crazy for a minute. Now let's all drop to our knees and pray that this is the last post about my hair!!!!

Just Thinking

It amazes me, and other times just scares the hell out of me, how quickly time passes. The days still feel about the same, despite the fact that darkness comes much earlier these days, but the weeks, months and years have sped up.

While driving through all the endless miles of boring desert scenery last week, my mind couldn't help but wander. I thought about people I haven't thought about for years, decades even. I wondered whatever happened to certain people, and why things worked out the way they did for others. I revisited my mourning of the loss of certain people, and feared the future loss of others. I thought about some of the bad decisions I've made in my life. Rarely do I consider the good decisions (and for the record most of them have been good it's just that the bad ones seem to have a greater, and longer lasting, impact).

I thought about the things that I used to know but have since forgotten. I used to know about the clouds. I love looking at huge, fluffy white clouds against a brilliantly blue sky. I used to know sign language and took enough Spanish classes in high school and college that I should be able to say something other than "Yo quierro Taco Bell". I thought about lyrics to songs I hadn't heard in ages.

Sometimes when I look in the mirror, I am surprised by the reflection staring back at me. First of all I see my father's image staring back at me and that just tends to piss me off. But the outside of me seems to be in conflict with my spirit. My spirit is much more free, much more youthful, than the image in the mirror. Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be in my 80's and all wrinkled. Will I still feel decades younger in my head, in my soul? I suspect the answer to that is probably "yes".

Growing older is weird. This is a good stage though because there are more perks than penalties. I've lost that uneasiness, the restlessness that followed me for so many years. I'm very comfortable with my day to day life, and there isn't a lot of stress. In my younger years that would have bored the hell out of me but now it fits me like a pair of comfortable old shoes.

Now that I'm being all deep and reflective, I have to change the tone of things with the telling of something that happened the other day. I still chuckle about it despite the fact it does have a scary truth to it.

Hubby and I have the same routine for a lot of things. I attribute what happened to the mindless carrying out of one of those tasks. As I made my way into the kitchen, I asked him if he was ready for lunch, and he said he was. We always have soup and a sandwich. As I grabbed the soup bowls and spoons, I turned around and saw that he placed a plate on the island for my sandwich. So after putting the soup in the microwave to warm up, and taking all the sandwich fixings out of the fridge, I started preparing my sandwich (we each make our own). At that moment hubby says,

"Gee, you got your plate but didn't get me one".

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I responded with,

"I didn't get the plate, you got the plate".

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So bottom line was that neither one of us recalled getting the single plate, yet here it was. I just started laughing and said one of us had to keep their memory or we were going to be in trouble. To which hubby responded,
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"Well, at least it will be interesting . . . maybe it will be like '50 First Dates' (the movie)".

Oh, the possibilities . . .