Day One-Seventy-Nine - To Turn a Phrase

I sometimes say something and then I wonder where in the world the phrase came from.  Not something genius like "fixin' to".  Why would anybody ever wonder about the origins of THAT phrase.  (See Day One-Seventy-Seven if you are wondering what brought that up).  No, I'm talking about phrases like "old timey".  Where did something like that come from?  And if you still say it are you, in fact, "old timey"?

I saw something on TV the other day and in my head, I thought "Wow, that's really old timey."  Then I thought, "How old timey am I if I think something is old timey and the phrase literally goes through my head?"  I think it is a phrase that doesn't get a lot of use anymore.  A few minutes ago I looked it up.  I couldn't find the origin, but I did find a definition.  In case you were wondering if someone refers to something as old timey, it is not as hip as something that they would refer to as retro.  Two things can be from the same era and one can be considered retro while the other is considered old timey.  Take for instance, the Chrysler Building in NYC and a Barber Shop Quartet.  You would totally think of the quartet as being old timey, but that building is nothing if not retro.  They also said that old timey can refer to something as old as 200 years, while retros cut off point is about 80 to 100 years.  

But this got me thinking about other phrases.  Where do they come from.  So, I found a website.... Go figure, there's a website for origins of old phrases.  Okay, before I go further, have you seen the commercial, I don't know what it is for, with the girl who is convinced that everything on the internet is true.  At the end of the commercial she introduces her boyfriend from France who she met on the internet and he looks like a neanderthal and sounds like he is from the Bronx.  Love that commercial.  "It's true.... it was on the internet..."  Back to my topic, so after much research I have chosen a few select phrases to educate you about whether you like it or not.  Hey, if you don't want to be educated, just close your browser.  But these are facts....  I know.... because it was on the internet.

The first phrase I decided to look up after "old timey" was "drunker than Cooter Brown".  Naturally, it wasn't on the website that I found, but it does have it's own Wikipedia page.  Who would have thought that we are all sitting here in complete anonymity and Cooter Brown has a Wikipedia page.  Anyway, they weren't completely sure of the origin, but it seems to come from a Civil War era drunk.  By some accounts he lived on the Mason-Dixon Line.  In another explanation he lived in southern Louisiana and was half Cajun and half African-American.  But either way, he was a drunk who didn't want to take sides in the Civil War and was afraid of getting drafted by either side, so he just stayed drunk for the duration of the war to prevent that from happening.  I do have to say that I initially heard this phrase from an old family friend, Don Bailey and the only thing I can tell you about it from personal experience is that if you say it with no accent and just say "drunker than Cooter Brown", it sounds kind of stupid.  But if you say it the way I am sure it was meant to be said and the way I always heard it "drunker'un Cooter Brown", it sounds much better.  By the way, when a Texas State Trooper utters the phrase "drunker'un Cooter Brown" you know the person was blowing WAY above the legal limit because those guys see some pretty drunk people.

After looking up a few phrases on the website that I found, I figured out that it was put together by an Englishman which explains why he had never heard of Cooter Brown.  It would seem that he "didn't know shit from Shinola" when it came to Cooter.  And that's a phrase that he was well aware of.  But he was a little derogatory toward Americans for coming up with it.  Apparently, it was coined during WWII.  Shinola in case you were unaware was a shoe polish, which I suppose could be easily mistaken for poop if you are an idiot.  As he so articulately states, "The distinction is well made; only one of them would be good to apply to your shoes and only particularly dim people could be expected to muddle them up."

A phrase that I use daily is "for the love of Pete".  Usually, I say this when Jingle is meowing incessantly and I cannot find anything to make him stop.  Like now for instance.  At times like this I blurt out "Jingle!  For the love of Pete!!!!"  It does nothing except to let me blow off a little steam.  Apparently, it is nothing more than a substitute for saying "for the love of God" which obviously would be blasphemous.  It would seem that Pete refers to St. Peter.  Ditto with "for Pete's sake", St. Peter is simply substituted for God.  Even "peter out" can be linked to St. Peter.  "Peter out" goes back to mining, but they weren't sure why miners would have substituted the word Peter for dwindle.  One of the explanations had to do with Peter being referred to as "the rock" and they were mining in rocks... blah blah blah.....

So there you have it.  These are the weird things that I wonder about while I sit here in my house and Jingle won't let me study my travel agent training manual because he needs constant attention.  If you are curious about the origins of anything, let me know.  I'll see what I can find out PDQ or Pretty Damn Quick which finds it origins in a play "The Mighty Dollar" by Benjamin E. Woolf in case you were wondering.

Enjoy your Sunday! 

Day One-Seventy-Eight - Oh! The Places I'll Go!

As you all know by now, I have trouble ever deciding what I want to be.  I figure life decisions aren't supposed to be rushed.  My old boss Jon Lee can attest to this.  I worked for him for about 3 years and during that time, we sat down regularly and he would ask me what I wanted to do next and every time my answer was to shrug my shoulders and say "I don't know".  At the time, I felt stupid that I couldn't figure out where I wanted to go from planning since all of my friends knew exactly what they wanted to do next.  But now I know that my biggest fear was of jumping out of a frying pan and into a fire.  I hated the job I was in and had sought it.  What if my next decision was just as awful.  P.S. It was....  .com Planning sucked a lot worse than Merch Planning.

So, I have sat here for the last 177 days trying to figure out what to do next.  And I have finally taken a step toward my next career.  It might not be the final step, but it's a step.  I may have to seek other employment to keep me in wine and peanut butter while I am getting this venture off the ground.  But again, it is a step.  I am opening my own home based travel agency.  The name of my agency will be Places You'll Go Travel.  I have purchased a domain name, www.placesuwillgo.com which isn't live yet because I haven't figured out how to build my website and I am currently going through loads of training.  Presumably part of the training will have to do with building that website.

Monday I will be in a webinar most of the day.  I have Royal Caribbean and Carnival training slated for next week as well as Funjet and others.  Right now it is all a little overwhelming.  But I know how much I enjoy planning trips, it is almost as much fun as taking them and one of my greatest pleasures is telling someone about a great trip that they should take and then hearing back about it when they return.  So, I think this is the route for me.  It will be a few weeks before I am really up and running.  But if you have been thinking about planning a trip, please give me a few weeks and let me see if I can help.  The vendors pay my commission and if you find a great price on line, I can at least match it.  So, going through me won't cost you a thing plus I might be able to find you some extra deals.

Getting back to the name of my agency....  Places You'll Go Travel.  Obviously it is based on the Dr. Seuss book Oh! The Places You'll Go.  I gave this book to my nephew Chris for his high school graduation along with a note about the cruise we would be taking together a few months later.  I wish I had thought of it for Matt and Jacob (my two older nephews).  It is a perfect graduation "card" for them to keep and refer back to and remember the trip that they went on with the "fun aunt".  It is also a great reminder about how to get through facing life's ups and downs, particularly when you are in one of life's downs (which occur much more often than a recent high school graduate might expect).  Rebecca and Tim will each get a copy along with details of their graduation trips.  And now that Aunt Susan has a travel agency, the prospects of those trips could become much better.  I found a recording of John Lithgow reading the book yesterday on YouTube and have listened to it about 10 times in the last 24 hours.  I'm currently working on a slogan for business cards and the website since my training yesterday told me to do so and I thought listening to this, might help.  It certainly can't hurt....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQRWeZy-S8Q

"So be sure when you step,
Step with care and great tact
And remember that Life's
A Great Balancing Act."  - Dr. Seuss

Day One-Seventy-Seven - Fixin' To Write a Blog Entry

You can tell a lot about a person not just by what they say, but how they say it.  For instance, if you heard a person say, "later this morning I'm going to go to the homeless shelter so that I can work during their lunch feeding people."  You would probably think, what a generous person.  If you heard the same person say "I'm fixing to go down to the homeless shelter so that I can work during their lunch feeding people", you'd think....  Oh!  A generous Texan.  If that same person said "I'm fixin' to take this deer that I just dressed out to the homeless shelter and feed some folks", you'd probably think....  Ahhhh.... A generous East Texan.

I heard a story on the news the other day that the Texas accent is dying.  It made me a little sad.  For those of you who know me well, this might come as a surprise since you have probably heard me say that I believe a heavy accent is a sign of laziness.  I have always felt that if a person living in a major metropolitan area wanted to sound smarter to non-Texans, they needed to get rid of a heavy accent and I don't believe it is that difficult to do.  I think that I still have a Texas accent.  But I don't believe it is a heavy one.  Meanwhile I know people who have lived in Dallas for 30 years who sound like they just walked out of Tenaha http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenaha,_Texas or Chireno http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chireno,_Texas.  What's up with that?  I do have to admit that after about 10 minutes in Nacogdoches http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nacogdoches,_Texas I am right back to talking the way I did when I was 12.  That was back in the days when I would speak a sentence to someone from outside of Texas and they would ask me to say it again just for the laugh.  But as soon as I return to Dallas, I start talking like me again.  I don't think that a Texas accent is bad, to the contrary, I think it is good.  But I do believe that there is a time and a place for everything.  In a small town in any part of Texas, you should have an accent.  But in Dallas or Houston, you sound kind of dumb when you have a heavy accent.

The guy on the news said that it is dying because there are so many people living in Texas now who are from different places.  Ummmm... duh!  I hardly know anyone in my circle of friends that I talk to regularly who is from Texas.  There just aren't many life long native Texans left.  On the news they also said that "fixin' to" is going away.  That, my friends, is a problem.  There is no more perfect phrase in the English language than "fixin' to".  It says in two words what could take 7 or 8 words to say otherwise.  You can either say, "I'm fixin' to go to work."  Or you can say "The next thing I'm going to do after I finish writing this is go to work."  They both mean the same thing.  With either sentence you knew that I was going to work as soon as I finished what I was currently doing.  But through the miracle of "fixin' to" it only took me 6 words to say it as opposed to the 16 words it took without using the wonder phrase.

You see, I may have gotten rid of most of my East Texas accent years ago, but I will never do away with "fixin' to".  Why would anybody get rid of such a perfect phrase?  It doesn't make sense.  I used to work for this mean, hateful, horrible, store manager whose name I won't mention but who still works at the former employer who shall not be named.  He was from somewhere in the northeast, and I don't mean Bonham http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonham,_Texas, and he worked at the Prestonwood store in the 90's.  I'm sure that several of you know exactly who I am talking about.  Anyway, the mean, horrible, hateful man always made fun of the Texans when we said "fixin' to".  Until he started making fun of me I didn't even know that other people didn't say "fixin' to".  I couldn't figure out how people in other states could even relate a point if they didn't use that phrase.  Once we tried to explain to him why it was such a perfect phrase.  He continued to make fun of us.  When I was fortunate enough to get transferred out of that store he was still a jerk and all of the Texans still disliked him.  His being a jerk wasn't completely due to his disdain of our perfect phrase, but that didn't help.

The fact that I said the mean, horrible, hateful store manager was from "somewhere in the northeast" rather than from Pennsylvania or New Jersey or wherever he was from is telling.  I didn't know what state he was from because it doesn't matter.  All of those states up there are the same.  One blends into another.  What difference does it make if you are from Pennsylvania or New Jersey if you can drive all the way across your state and go to work in another state daily.  But if you want to drive across my state, you better pack a lunch because you are going to be driving for a while.  If you have pride in your northeastern state that you chose not to live in, I don't mean to be ugly about it.  I'm just saying that you obviously made a decision to live in Texas for a reason.  Some of us still talk a little funny here and if it's all the same to you we might just keep it that way.

Day One-Seventy-Six - Cock-A-Doodle-Do!!!!

Good morning!  I sat my alarm for 8 this morning.  I am trying to get back into the swing of a schedule.  Not one of those crazy go to work 9-5 eat lunch at exactly 11:45, get coffee at 2 then come home, eat, sleep and do it again schedules.  I HATE that kind of schedule and if it is up to me, I'll never do it again.  No, I'm just talking about the sort of schedule where you wake up before the sun has fully risen and complete as many tasks as possible during the day, then go to bed when you are sleepy schedules.  The kind that God intended us to follow.

When I first moved back to Dallas from Tyler, about 15 years ago I lived in Rowlett for a few years.  I was renting a little place by the lake.  I could see Lake Ray Hubbard from my front door.  I had both a front yard and backyard.  The property management company took care of the front yard, so it was fairly boring and ugly.  I took care of the backyard which was fenced in.  I planted grass on one side of the sidewalk leading to my detached garage.  On the other side of the sidewalk, when I moved in, there was a bog.  There was really not much that could be done for it so I dug the weeds all out, brought  a load of dirt in to fill in the low areas, then covered it in plastic and put rocks over it.  That became the place where I put my picnic table and it became a nice backyard.  I planted rose bushes and had all sorts of flowers growing in my little yard.  That was not what I had planned to write about.  But while I was on the topic of my place in Rowlett, I just decided to throw it in as a bonus.  You're welcome.

Anyway, I moved to Rowlett in the 90's.  It was much smaller then than it is now.  I had wanted to live over there because it seemed like more of a small town atmosphere and after having lived in Tyler for the previous 6 months, I really wanted that.

Many things about Dallas appeal to me.  I think I could easily be one of those people who lives in a high rise in uptown.  I would like being able to walk out of my building and immediately be a part of a city.  I like the anonymity of city living.  I have always been a loner.  I don't like to stick out in a crowd.  When I get singled out for any reason I get angry.  I'm one of those people who panics when a group of waiters come in my direction with a piece of birthday cake with a candle in it.  Even if my birthday is months away and I know they are not bringing it to me, I fear that I will become the center of attention in a crowded restaurant and I hate that thought.  So, to be nice, instead of calling me a freak or a hermit... how about if we just call me a "blender".  I like to blend in.  I don't want to be the one sprig of celery in the veggie cocktail that didn't get ground into juice.  I want to be part of the drink.  Maybe that means I'm not so much a blender as a blendee....  I'll leave that to you to figure out.

Anyway, again that is not where I was going with this entry.  I have lived in many different places in my life.  Just as an adult, I have moved into and lived in 14 different places starting with my first apartment in college and ending with the condo that I have lived in for nearly 9 years.  I was a nomad before buying this place. I  have lived in this house longer than I have lived anywhere in my life.  (We lived on Nottingham for about 8 years when I was growing up.)  I think this is the perfect spot for me.  It is actually in Dallas, although just barely.  But the people who live around me don't have the small town, chat with everybody vibe that you get in say, Wylie.  For the most part everybody has something to do or someplace to be so they don't waste time trying to dig into my business.

It's close enough to downtown that during non-rush hour, I can get in my car and either using the Tollway or 75 be downtown in 20 minutes or so.  If I choose to take mass transportation, I can be at the train station in 10 minutes and downtown in 45 minutes.  It just fits me.  I like the options that living in a place like this affords me.  But there is something to be said for living in a small town.  There are a lot of things about it that you miss from time to time.  The most amazing thing happened when I moved into my house in Rowlett that I will never forget.

The first night in a new place is always very interesting to me.  That first night, you lie in bed and you hear all of the sounds that your new home makes as it goes to sleep for the night.  The creaking and groaning, the traffic noises outside, the airplanes flying overhead.  If the home has a ghost, that is when I imagine, it would make itself known.  In Rowlett I heard a lot of crickets and some creaking as I went to sleep but not much else.  Around 4:30 on my first morning in Rowlett was when the amazing thing happened.  A rooster crowed.  He was an adamant rooster.  He had a job and he knew what it was.  Wake up Rowlett.  That was why God had put him there and that was what he was going to do.  He crowed and crowed and crowed for about 30 minutes and then he stopped.  That first morning, I thought perhaps something was after him and had caught him.  But in the 2 years that I lived in Rowlett I came to realize that it was just his routine.  He woke up at 4:30, attempted to wake the rest of Rowlett for 30 minutes and then he went about the rest of his daily business.  For 2 years, I was awakened at 4:30 every morning by a rooster.  After the first few weeks, I grew accustomed to it and went back to sleep after hearing the initial crow or two.  But without looking at my clock, I always knew that I had another hour to sleep before my electronic alarm would go off.

You know how great it is when you wake up during the night and look at the clock and know that you can go back to sleep and have another hour?!!?!  I love that feeling.  I got that feeling everyday for 2 years thanks to that rooster. Roosters really get the hole, do your job and then just move on philosophy.  They don't harp on it all day.  I've heard a few wacky ones, you know that crow at 3 in the afternoon or something.  But I am pretty sure that they are just broken roosters... or maybe roosters in training.  But a good rooster who knows his job is a really perfect creature.

So, cock-a-doodle-do my friends!  Have a great day!

Day One-Seventy-Five - The Cats are Running the Asylum

Jingle apparently got wind of my attempt to sell him yesterday.  He was a perfect cat last night.  This morning he is acting up a little again, but nothing like yesterday.  He is practically tolerable.  Don't get me wrong.  I understand that this is just a ploy to get me off my game.  But he is nearly pleasant right now and I will take what I can get.

I have a long To Do list today that starts with sweeping, mopping, vacuuming and dusting downstairs.  Ugh!  I know that it all has to be done and I will get it done.  But if I take a little longer than normal to get my blog posted this morning you might realize that it is an attempt to put off the housework for as long as possible.  Jingle doesn't want me to do it either.  I can tell by the unending meowing that he started just as I began this paragraph and didn't stop until just a few minutes ago when I followed him out into the garage.  When I got out there, he and Shiner jumped up on the car and were completely content.  I think that the meowing was Jingle saying.....  "Hey Mom, Mom, Mom, Mommy, Momma, Mama, Ma, Mother, Mommy, Mom, Mom, Lois...."  Then when I finally gave in, he just wanted me to see that he could get on the car.  So, here is what I saw when I walk into the garage.

You see Shiner in the background, going "this wasn't my idea".  But there is Jingle right up front with his "See what I can do" expression.  As long as he is the center of attention, everything works out just fine for him.  It is when I give an ounce of attention to the computer that he gets pissy.

He just stormed off into the bedroom and is pouting now.  So, I should be able to get a lot done for the next few hours.  I love it when I win.  If he were a kid this would all be much easier, you know because he would be in school right now torturing a teacher instead of me.  I think that is the main reason I don't understand those people that home school their kids.  Why wouldn't you want to send them to someone else for several hours each day?  I would be all over that if I had two legged kids instead of these four legged ones.

I'm thinking about going to Nacogdoches this weekend since the Lumberjacks will be at home.  I've only been to one game this year and it was the SMU blowout.  I just wish a cold front would come in to give us some football weather.  It is hard to get into the idea of going to a game when it is going to be in the 90's when you get there on the last weekend of September.  As you realize by now, I hate cold weather.  But a football game when the temp won't drop below 85 before the final whistle is a bit extreme.

Well, I better get busy on this house while Jingle is chilling.  Sorry the blog is so boring today.  Not much going on here at Casa del Gato.  Have a good Wednesday.

Day One-Seventy-Four - Another Topic Clearing House

So many things on my mind.... so little time.....

First and foremost, when I turned on my computer today and got on line, Google suggested to me that I register to vote on line since the registration deadline is in 12 days.  I am not sure if I am still registered to vote so, I went ahead and did it.  People, it takes 5 minutes then you print it out and mail it in.  Super easy.  Do it today!  The only thing that makes me mad is that it requires no sort of ID.  They really should want to know if I am AT LEAST a real human before they will allow me to vote.  I'm not going to get into the hole illegal alien debate here.  But really.... Susan Meyers could be from Mars for all they know and once I mail this form in, I am a registered voter.  Weird!

I finished the Europe photobook yesterday and ordered it!  I know what you are thinking....  I didn't even know Susan went to Europe again!!!!  I didn't.  I just never did one 4 years ago when I went so it was past due and in case you were unaware, I have a little time on my hands these days.  I did a lot of work on it while I was sitting in the hospital a few weeks ago and Dad was sleeping.  I had already done a lot of work on it previous to that.  But I got a lot more done then.  Yesterday, I got a Shutterfly 40% discount email, so BAM!  Photobook finished and ordered!!!!  Woohoo!!!!!  It allowed me to post it on the blog.  So, if you get a chance in the next week or so, go back and look at it if you are interested.  I really like this one.  And if it inspires you to take a Mediterranean Cruise, wait a week or so to book it and give me a call before you do.  We might be able to work something out.  More to come.

Next topic - I have an appointment at 10 this morning to get ET serviced.  It is the big 10,000 for ET.  We are all pretty excited around here.  I hope he is in the top quartile in all the important areas of growth.  But I feel like I should sit back and take a moment just to enjoy him.  Kids grow up so fast these days.....  Let's all take a look at the little bugger on his first big trip, shall we?

What a cutie!  The hamsters are standing just out of the picture, Eileen.

Final topic before I got get dressed so that I can get ET to his appointment on time.....  Does anybody want a well used 12 year old Sable Burmese?????  I'll sell him cheap.  I think he may be broke though.  He won't shut up and is climbing on everything in the house and knocking stuff off of shelves to try to annoy me.  If you take him, you will probably have to accompany him to his litter box to watch because apparently it is something that he is proud of and you may occasionally have to sit with him in the car while he sleeps....  Oh and he likes it if you sing "Soft Kitty" to him.  (He watches entirely too much Big Bang Theory!)  I keep trying to tell him that "Soft Kitty" is only for when you are sick but he won't listen.

Gotta go.  Have a great Tuesday and wish ET luck on his check up!!!!!

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Day One-Seventy-Three - Did I Mention, I'm a Procrastinator?

In case you read my blog yesterday, I'm just gonna go ahead and tell you right now, that nothing I mentioned on the blog actually got done.  I wound up playing hooky and skipping church entirely.  Then I never made it out into the garage except to get a bag of carrots out of the freezer.  I did watch football, but even that was lacking.

For a number of years, I had the NFL Sunday Ticket on DirecTV.  I loved it.  The thing I loved most about it was the Red Zone Channel.  It is amazing.  But I also loved that I could flip from one game to another when the games got really boring and I never had to sit through a game that I had no interest in.  I could also enter my fantasy football starting lineup into a channel and get up to the minute stats without ever having to look at my computer.  I got rid of it last year because it was just too expensive.  I guess anything that great is, right?

So, yesterday I had one early game and one late game.  The early game was the Cowboys and I love the Cowboys so that was good.  But there were a number of times, during commercials, at halftime, etc., that it would have been nice to flip channels and see what was going on in another game.  The second game was the Texans.  Now, I HATED the Oilers when I was growing up.  I mean, nearly as much as I currently hate the Eagles.  But the Texans, I kinda like.  I think it is because they haven't been crammed down my throat the way the Oilers were when I was in high school.  I hated it when we moved to Lumberton while I was a freshman and we only got Saints and Oilers games on Sundays.

Then in Bay City it was even worse.  I had to listen to one of the greatest Cowboys games of all time on the radio by myself in my bedroom on December 16,1979.  On that day the Cowboys were playing the Redskins in Dallas and on the line was the NFC East title along with home field advantage in the playoffs.  Both teams were 10-5 going into the game.  It was Roger Staubach vs. Joe Theismann, good vs. evil, and I was stuck listening to it via a weak AM radio signal in Bay City.  The Cowboys were down 34-21 with 3:49 seconds left in the game and Charlie Waters who had spent the entire season on IR was in the radio booth with Brad Sham.

Charlie was my hero, I had posters of him in my bedroom and I wore a faux Charlie Waters jersey to school every week during football season.  I say faux jersey because it really was. I went to one of those t-shirt stores in the mall that were popular in the 70's and got a blue t-shirt.  I had them put the number 41 on the front and back and "Waters" printed across the back above the number.  I loved that shirt.  I was wearing it at school once in Bay City when someone stopped me and asked if Charlie Waters was really my uncle.  It was one of my proudest moments!  I went home and told my mom that somebody thought Charlie Waters was my uncle.  Looking back, I am not sure why I thought that was great....  If they had thought Charlie Waters was my wink wink... "uncle".... wink wink, that might have been much better.  I have searched the internet high and low looking for a photo of the beefcake poster of him I had hanging in my bedroom when I was in high school to no avail.  A lot of people talk about it.  But there are no copies to post for you.

Anyway, getting back to the game, Charlie was doing the color commentary and Brad Sham was doing the play-by-play.  While the Cowboys were down 34-21 Brad was starting to talk about what would happen as far as wildcard chances if the Cowboys lost and Charlie got upset.  He said, "you've gotta believe".  I paced around my bedroom in Bay City with fingers crossed on both hands chanting "I believe, I believe, I believe....."  and the Cowboys got a turnover.  Then they scored a touchdown with 2:20 left and they still needed one more to win.  I was cheering in my room, so my dad came in to see what was going on.  They were watching a crummy Oilers game in the other room.  I wanted to say, "if you cared you would be in here with me", but instead, I told him about the touchdown.  The Redskins went 3 and out on the next series and punted to the Cowboys.  That's when Roger lead the team 75 yards down the field in 7 plays and the Cowboys won 35-34.  It was absolute greatness and because of the Oilers I had to listen to all of it through a scratchy AM radio signal.  When that team got moved to Tennessee I cheered and believed that it was all just a serious case of Karma coming back to get them because of that day in December of 1979 when I was forced to listen to one of the greatest games in history on the radio.

Anyway, yesterday my second game was the Texans vs. Broncos.  The Broncos always used to be my favorite AFC team, but in recent years that has changed.  I never could get into them with Jay Cutler or Tebow at the helm.  I've never been a big Peyton Manning fan unless it is on a commercial.  On commercials he is genius.  I on the football field..... he's just another overrated dumb looking Manning in my opinion.  Is it just me, or do all the Manning's have Forrest Gump like expressions on their face most of the time???

So, the Texans and Broncos were on TV here in Dallas yesterday afternoon after the Cowboys win and I had the game on but ended up in the kitchen cooking most of the time anyway and didn't really pay attention to it.  It turned out to be a relaxing Sunday.  Nothing got done.  I didn't get to hear the sermon at church that I had been looking forward to.  But I will download it today and give it a listen.

My friend, Debbie posted on FB yesterday that I should wait until it cools down to work on the garage.  I always knew that Debbie was a smart woman and felt like I should listen to her advise a little more closely.  So, I am going to hope for cold weather this week.  I really have to get this thing done so that I can move junk out to the garage before the middle of Oct.  But it is only Sept 24th.....  I have all the time in the world.... right?

Day One-Seventy-Three - Procrastinators Unite!

It is Sunday morning before 8 and I am sitting in front of my computer already.  It isn't by accident that I sit here so early.  I had a plan for today.  I was going to get up at 6, write my blog, go to the early church service and be home before 10 so that I could work on my garage which was supposed to have been cleaned a few weeks ago and still has not been.  Then at noon I was going to come in and watch football and clean in the garage in between watching football.

It is now 7:51 and I have gotten to my second paragraph in this blog.  You see, I hit snooze for the first 45 minutes.  Then I turned on the TV and watched an episode of I Love Lucy.  Then I came downstairs and made a big pot of coffee, fed the cats and opened the window for Jingle and let Shiner out on the patio and then I finally set down in front of my computer about 5 minutes ago.  Go ahead and say it....  I'm a deadbeat!

So, now I am bound and determined that I will make it to the middle church service which starts at 9:45.  That will still get me home before 11 which is a good thing.  Of course, we all know that I won't make it out into the garage.  I mean, by then, the pre-game shows will be on and there really won't be enough time anyway to start dragging things out in the garage.  Besides, I worked on it for a few hours one day last week.  I am practically 1/32 of the way done.  What's the hurry?  The garage sale isn't for another month..... right?  I told my mom just a few weeks ago that I work best under a deadline.  I suppose in a few weeks, we will see.

In college, I never got anything done unless it was due the next day.  It is just part of my M.O. I'm a deadline kind of girl.  If I started working on a paper before it was due, I actually got a lot of other things done.  Like, if I had two nights to go before the paper was due, on the first night, I could get the refrigerator cleaned, clean the oven, write a few cards to send to friends and family (it was before there was email), and get all of my laundry done.  Then on the second night, (the night before the paper was due) I would put clean sheets on my bed (which had been laundered the night before), vacuum the entire apartment and bake a cake.  Then around midnight, I would start the paper, finish it around 4.  I would sleep until 30 minutes before the class in which the paper was due started, get up, go to class with no makeup on, get the paper turned in and then continue on with life.  My roommates always knew when I had something due or a test the next day because I would run around the house in a cleaning frenzy to avoid working on my project or studying.

I'm a world class procrastinator.  Procrastinators could actually take lessons from me on the topic.  My most sought after lecture would be the one where I teach them not to sweat it.  So what if your paper is due in 9 hours and you still don't have a topic.  Just relax!!!!!!  It'll all work out.  In fact, that might be the heading across my lesson plan for that day.  "Just Relax!  It'll All Work Out...."  People will come from near and far to hear about my techniques.  I'll become a celebrity.  They'll beg me to write a book, which I won't start on until one month before the deadline.  But THAT my friends is when the garage will finally get cleaned.  Once I am 5 weeks away from an awesome book deadline, I'll suddenly realize that I can't possibly start working on that book until the garage is cleaned!!!!  I won't be able to concentrate on the first sentence until I know that everything in my messy garage is in complete order.

I'll alphabetize my garden flags by main character, I'll measure all of the bolts and sort them by size, I'll colorize yarn and raw fiber and put it in airtight containers based on fiber content, I'll hang a peg board for all of my pink tools to hang on and probably draw outlines in each spot, so I will remember where the pink hammer goes and where the pink phillips head screw driver goes.  It will be perfection.  I may even become one of those people who paints their garage floor.  Then and only then, will I start the book about how to be the perfect procrastinator.  It can be done.... It WILL be done....  But don't hold your breath.

Day One-Seventy-Two - Balloons!!!!!

I love a good festival.  The Plano Balloon Festival started yesterday afternoon.  After watching several reports on Fox4 News about it yesterday afternoon, I decided to just go. I haven't been in several years.  The last time I went was as a volunteer so I worked out there all day.  It isn't as much fun to volunteer at a festival is it is to just participate.

So, yesterday afternoon I posted on FB that I was going to go to see if anyone wanted to go with me.  The one person I am sure that I can usually count on in an instance like this is Jenny and sure enough she was up to the challenge.  So, we planned to meet there a little after 6 this morning.  I set my alarm last night for 5 a.m.  I not sure but I may have mentioned before that I am not an early morning person.  If you don't know what I am referring to go back and read the blog about me taking over the world.....  It explains a lot.

Anyway, the alarm went off this morning as planned at 5 a.m.  I was pretty proud.  After only 4 hours of sleep, I was able to get up after only hitting snooze once.  I quickly washed my face, put just a little makeup on, a ball cap so that I wouldn't have to do anything to my hair and gathered my things.  I was out of the house by 5:35.  I stopped in the alley to spray myself thoroughly with Mexican Mosquito Repellent.  Let me just tell you that the Mexicans take their mosquito repelling seriously.  This stuff may be banned in the US, I don't know.  But I was able to get it back in on a cruise ship last year and it is strong!  I got it in Costa Maya in July of 2011 and it is just as powerful now as it was then.  The Texas mosquitoes who had the gall to come toward me, stopped in mid air, took one sniff and did a 180 and flew away in the other direction.  If anybody wants some, I might be able to smuggle some back on my January cruise.  Jenny borrowed it to spray herself after I finally got there and I think the people around us would attest to just how strong it was.

So, I stopped at the ATM for cash, Starbucks for caffeine and headed to the Dart Rail station at Arapaho.  Once I got off the train at Parker, I got on a shuttle that took me to the event.  The shuttle was a little bit of a disappointment.  It took about 20 minutes for the bus to fill up and the stupid driver wouldn't leave without a full bus.  So, Jenny was texting me from the park where she already had our spots before I even left Parker Station.  But I arrived in time to see the Texas balloon "glow" and way before any of the balloons launched.  All in all, it was fun.  I got a few good pictures and it got me up and moving before half of the day was gone.

So, I'm attaching a few pictures.  I hope you enjoy them.  Please scroll down all the way to the bottom so that you can see me with one of my most favorite people in the world, the very cynical Tim Ryan.  Have a great Saturday and Happy Autumn!

Okay, it's only a picture, not the real thing.  But a girl has to take what she can get.  After all, Tim doesn't pose with just anybody!

Day One-Seventy-One - Ahhhhh... Cruise Planning....

Okay, so as you are all aware, I am a cruise freak.  I can't go on enough of them.  I just find them relaxing and I don't understand when people don't want to go on a particular cruise because they have been to the stops before.  It's a cruise people!  You are going to relax, eat well, relax some more, drink, relax some more, meet new people with similar interests, relax some more, listen to live reggae music on a deck near a swimming pool while cute Philippino boys bring you buckets of beer, and relax a little more while countless people wait on you hand and foot. I have a cruise planned for January and I can't wait.  And to make it even more exciting I just found out this morning that another friend of mine will be on this cruise as well!!!

Here is something else I don't get about the "I've been to those stops before" cruising excuse......  You were there for what?  Maybe 12 hours at best?  But then you had to get off of the ship and then get back on, so in reality, you were off of the ship for a maximum of 10 hours.  In that 10 hours, you probably spent at least an hour or two getting to the location where you were going to spend your day and back to the ship.  So, you might have had 8 hours in that location if you were the first off of the ship and the last one back on.  Are you the one person who figured out how to do every single thing that location has to offer in a single 8 hour day????  So, you have already been to each beach on the island?  Been to each tourist location?  Hiked each waterfall?  Zipped each line?  Snorkeled each reef?  Seen ALL of the fish?  I doubt it!  So, why wouldn't you want to go back?

I truly hope that one of these days I can say, Ugh!!!!  I can't stand the thought of ever going back to Grand Cayman again!!!!!!  I have been there soooooooo many times, I just get bored when I am there because I have done everything and who could possibly swim with those boring sting rays and snorkel in that crystal clear 78 degree water again??!!?!?!?!?  It is just awful!!!!

Okay, don't hold your breath because the chances that you will ever hear anything like that from me are slim to none.  If you held a gun to my head and forced me to go to Grand Cayman or Roatan every single month of my life for the next 20 years, on the 21st year, I would still be saying, can we go again?????  Please!!?!?!?!

Yesterday Barefoot Divers in Roatan posted 40 or so new underwater pictures on FB and I nearly cried it was so beautiful.  Now, I have never done any scuba diving.... YET!!!  But I fully intend to soon.  I do however find a way to snorkel on 9 out of 10 vacations.  Even just snorkeling in Roatan, you can see many of the things they posted pictures of yesterday.  I have seen many of the sights I was viewing in those photos in real life and it is almost like a religious experience when you do.  The beauty of Roatan is that the reef is so close in that you can walk down to the beach with your snorkel gear and put it on and swim out to the reef and in about one minute you are in the middle of the most beautiful sight you have ever seen.

This particular cruise won't take us to Roatan which just means that I have to schedule something else that will get me back there.  The nice thing is that my niece graduates from high school in May..... So, chances of me getting to Roatan next summer are very good, assuming I can talk her into something that doesn't involve baseball.  Keep your fingers crossed for that.  I'm going to keep at her.  I think for now, I'll go dig up some photos of past cruises.

Day One-Seventy - My Inexplicable Happiness

Good morning friends.  I had another really good day yesterday.  I have really been happy this week.  I know... you're all thinking.... OMG!!!!  Susan's taking drugs!!!!  But that is not the case.  I don't know what has gotten into me, I am just happy.  At least I was until about 2 this morning.  At 2 this morning I was sitting in the chair in my room waiting for laundry to finish so that I could go to bed.

You see, yesterday in my stupor of happiness, I yanked the sheets, summer blanket and duvet off of the bed and started washing them.  I washed the sheets first because they are my favorite sheets so I decided I wanted to put them back on the bed rather than another set.  Once they were finished washing, I threw them in the dryer, put the blanket in the washer and went to Starbucks to try out the Starbucks card I had found in a drawer from a few Christmas's ago.  You will be impressed to know it still had $10 on it.  I used almost 4 of those bucks on grande non-fat latte.  It was good and while I drank it I spent about 3 hours writing.

I like writing at Starbucks.  I think it is mostly because I can.  You see, when I worked at the former employer who shall not be named, I would sometimes go to Starbucks in the middle of the day during a PTO  and be terribly jealous of all the people sitting in Starbucks seemingly working.  I would think, how do you get these amazing jobs where you sit in Starbucks all day??!?!?!?!?  I have got to GET me one of those!  Well, here I am 5 months later and nobody is paying me, but I am sort of one of those people "working" out of Starbucks many days.  I usually get a lot done when I am there.  There are lots of great people to watch and that is good when you are in need of characters to write about.  Plus usually most of the noise is really good background noise.  I mean whose concentration isn't better when the SHHHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOO of a coffee machine is all you can hear as the barista makes another latte type drink.  I know it works for me.

Of course yesterday I was there when school got out and this stupid woman brought three little girls in to see their dad who is apparently one of those people who gets to work at Starbucks.  He may actually be getting paid, I don't know.  Their shrill little voices immediately drowned out even the SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO of the coffee machine.  All I could hear for half an hour was three over excited little girls telling their dad about everything that happened at school yesterday as if it was the most amazing experience of their lives.  Don't get me wrong, they were cute kids and in the proper setting, you know like the playground at McDonald's, it would have been a touching scene.  But if your child's voice can drown out that SHHHHHOOOOOOOOO noise, it is a problem and you must do something about it.  My first suggestion would be not to bring the kid into the Starbucks at Frankford and Preston.

So, anyway, I got back to my house around 4:30 or 5 yesterday afternoon.  I never walked upstairs because there was no need to.  I ate supper, leftover meatloaf, potatoes and green beans around 6:30.  Meatloaf, in my opinion is one of those foods that gets better when it is left over.  There are only a few foods like that.  But I don't think any of us can argue that good meatloaf is one of them.  This might be a topic that warrants later discussion.  But I'm just saying, you never heard of anyone taking a fresh meatloaf out of the oven and then slicing it for meatloaf sandwiches on the first night.  Nope, meatloaf sandwiches can only be made from leftover meatloaf which means that God intended you to eat it left over.

Getting back to today's topic, my friend, Katherine came over at 7:30 last night to watch the season premier of Survivor with me.  Here's something interesting that happened.  Just as she walked up to the door, there was a loud bang and the electricity went out!  It only stayed off for about a minute.  You know just long enough to screw up the DirecTV receiver so that we missed about 15 minutes of the show while the receiver was being reset.  She always comes over after whatever show we are watching has begun so that we can FF through the commercials of the DVR'd show.  The electricity was also off just long enough to cause all of my clocks to blink 12:00 12:00 12:00 12:00.... which, by the way, they are still doing.  Anyway, then it came back on and we watched the end of Survivor and then went back and watched the first 30 minutes.  Survivor is sort of anti-climatic when you watch the last 45 minutes prior to watching the first 30 minutes skipping about 15 minutes in between

After that was over, Katherine left and I watched a few more shows that I had DVR'd that weren't screwed up by the temporary power outage and played around on the computer for a few more hours.  Finally about 1:15 I went upstairs and the light in the laundry room was on.  I thought to myself, that's strange, I don't usually leave that light on unless I am doing laundry and then I leave it on as a reminder to move the clothes from the washing machine to the dryer......  Oh crap!  I had left the blanket in the washer all day and the duvet was still sitting on top of it with Shout squirted in a couple of spots pre-treating it!  You see, the duvet is white and the cats like to sleep on it and so, they sometimes get little paw prints and such on it.  The sheets were still in the dryer and my bed was unmade.

So, at 1:15 I resumed washing my bedding.  You will be happy to know that by 2:45, all of the bedding was back on my bed and I was safely tucked away for a good nights sleep.  But sadly, Jingle had been in his bed for a few hours already and was getting plenty of rest so that he could get up at his normal 8 a.m.  So, I went to sleep around 3 and Jingle woke me up at 8.  This is not a great start to a Thursday.  But I can live with it.

As my friend on FB yesterday so eloquently quoted the Zac Brown Band I'm just.....

Wishing I was knee deep in the water somewhere 
Got the blue sky breeze and it don't seem fair 
Only worry in the world is the tide gonna reach my chair 
Sunrise there's a fire in the sky 
Never been so happy 
Never felt so high 
And I think I might have found me my own kind of paradise 

Day One-Sixty-Nine - What Makes a Day Great?

Yesterday was a truly great day.  I posted a similar comment on FB last night and someone asked what made it so good.  I couldn't answer it because I didn't know the answer.  I guess a lot of things made it great.  Maybe there is no one thing that goes into making something great.  Maybe it is just a lot of really good little things.

For instance, finally, the second murder took place in the book I am attempting to write.  I knew that another murder would need to occur for all of the characters to think this was a big deal and not just a random murder of some woman that nobody new.  So, now I am up to two murders and it is about to be a really big deal.  I'm in chapter 11 and I just now got around to the second murder.  But the really good news is that my main character is falling in love with a really hot cop.  I'm almost as happy for her as I would be for me!  Weird, right?  I know.....

So, I also went grocery shopping yesterday.  I had 13 things on my list.  It cost me $106.  Tomatoes, lettuce, bread, lunch meat and so on cannot add up to $106, I mean unless you buy a crap load of it and I didn't.  But I did add to what I so desperately needed once I got to the store.  I wound up buying several weeks worth of meat that went into the freezer.  It was all on sale, so I actually saved money.  And if I don't need to go back to the store for anything other than fresh produce, milk and bread for the next month, I have saved money!  I mean let's face it, I'll be eating on this food for at least a month.  So again.... great day!

When I came home from the grocery store, I put the groceries up and it was really easy because I had cleaned the refrigerator out on Sunday and thrown all of the old stuff away.  So the fridge was nearly empty. I LOVE that!

While I was putting the groceries up I called Mom to let her know that I had inadvertently come home with one of their garage door openers.  She was all like, don't worry about it.  We'll get it from you the next time we see you.  Apparently they never use that one and it's no big deal.  I thought I was going to have to find a box to pack it in and overnight it to them.  Who knew!

I turned the A/C off yesterday morning after I got up and opened windows.  I didn't turn the A/C back on until 6:45 last night!  Nearly 12 hours with no A/C and I never felt the least bit hot.  Did I mention that it was a great day?  I should have slept with the A/C off last night.  But I just wasn't sure.  It was just barely 70 when I went to bed.  But it was plenty cool this morning.  So, the windows are back open again.

I'm not sure what I need to do to make today turn out as good as yesterday.  But for openers I'm going to try to write a few more chapters.  Plus I think I'll try to bake something.  One of the things I have to do today that I am not looking forward to is to change the names of the two cats in my book from Jingle and Shiner to new made up names. I have decided that I really need to change ALL of the names to protect the innocent, not just the humans names.  So, I'll be going back through 11 chapters looking for references to the cats and making that change.  I'm thinking Jester and Spooks but we'll see.

Have a good Wednesday and I'll talk to you guys tomorrow!

Day One-Sixty-Eight - Look it Up!

Which group do you fall into?  I know which one I am in.  But I think it is interesting which of us fall into which groups.  When you are writing an email, text, blog, book, Word document, handwriting a card, list or (God forbid) a letter, do you always just spell everything right naturally?  If not, do you get as close as you can and then hope that spell check takes care of the rest when on an electronic device?  Do you turn the auto correct on and just hope that your text doesn't end up being forwarded to millions of people as the most embarrassing text ever in which you inadvertently talk dirty to your mother?  Or do you still look words up?  I know a few people who are perfectionists in some parts of their lives but for whom spelling does not matter.  If you are one of those people that is fine.  If I love, like or hate you the spelling issue does not play into that.  It is simply an annoyance from time to time.

Can I tell you how much I hate getting a text that says something like:

"were goin to c u ther"

First of all you have to decipher it and try to figure out what in the hell the texter meant.  Did they mean "We were going to see you there."???  If that is what they meant then does it mean that they aren't now?  Did something happen to change their minds (whoever they are)?  Or did they mean "We are going to see you there." but they were too lazy to find an apostrophe on their cell phone.  Or perhaps they were never taught that apostrophes replace missing letters in conjunctions.  If that's the case, wouldn't it be just as easy to have typed "we r going  2 c u there".  I mean it's the same number of characters and it is much more clear.  Granted you might have had to change screens to get to the 2.  But how much work is that really when you can send 20 texts per minute?  What I am saying is I understand your need for expediency when texting.  But for the love of Pete!  At least try to make me understand what you are trying to say.  I don't like working through your texts like they are coming from someone who speaks English as a third language.  And I hate having to send you 3 texts to try to clarify what the first one meant.

It is one thing when you use the wrong word through misspelling, but when auto correct takes a word that might have been sort of close to what you were trying to say and turns it into a different word entirely, I go nuts.  The other day I got a text from a friend using the word "kick" in place of the word "key".  I am certain that she was closer than that on her spelling, but due to the genius of  IPhone's auto correct, I had to try to figure out that she meant "key box" instead of "kick box" when referring to a box on a doorknob that holds keys when a house is for sale.  The most aggravating thing of all is when you spell a word correctly but auto correct doesn't recognize the word and changes it!  This happens to me when I spell Nac in a text when referring to Nacogdoches.  Auto correct always changes it to Nat so that my text reads something like....  "Heading to Nat!  Woohoo!!!!"  Then whoever I sent it to is left to try and figure out why in the hell I am going to someplace called "Nat" and what could possibly be so exciting about it that would warrant a "Woohoo" and four exclamation marks.

If you depend on spell check in email, step number one is to make sure that spell check is turned on.  Step number two involves getting your word close enough that Bill Gates and his team of crack engineers can figure out what you meant and offer an appropriate suggestion on the correct spelling.  If your computer doesn't know what the hell you meant by what you typed, then how do you suppose I will know?  As my Mom used to say to me in second grade as I did my homework....  "Sound it out...."

I write a blog almost daily.  I am by no means perfect.  I find errors in my blog regularly after it is published.  I'm sure that you find even more errors than I do.  Sometimes I go back and correct the error when I find it.  Other times I just let it go figuring that none of us are perfect.  But I hope that most of my errors are grammar related and not spelling related.  If there are any English teachers reading this, they are no doubt cringing now.  I hate spelling errors.  To me it is a sign of laziness.  When I was a kid and asked my mom how to spell something I would always hear those three little words that I hated so.... "Look it up."  Ugh!  I thought, if I don't know how to spell it, how can I look it up???  As I got older, I realized that looking it up actually made me a better speller.

I have been writing a lot lately.  When I write my blog, I write directly into a template that has a seemingly weak spell check system but it has one.  If for instance I were to misspell the word misspell and spell it like this - mispel - it would return the following:  misspell, dispel, misapply, Ispell and misplay.  For the record, I tried to look up Ispell in my 30 year old American Heritage Dictionary (thinking that perhaps Ispell was a Greek god, maybe related to Isis) and it wasn't in there.  So I had to Google it.  Ironically, it is a spell check program.  I say that the spell check program in my blog template is weak because sometimes it doesn't even come close to suggesting the appropriate word even though I am not too far off.  When this happens, I'm a looker upper!  I admit it freely.

As mentioned in the previous paragraph, I have a 30 year old American Heritage Dictionary.  It is hard back and about four inches thick and I keep it handy for spelling emergencies and so that I can look definitions up.  Yesterday, I used it three times in a day full of writing.  I wrote for about nine hours yesterday.  Three instances of looking a word up didn't seem extraordinary to me.  However, if I had to look a word up in each paragraph I wrote, that would get old pretty quick.  In two of those instances, I had a word in mind that I wanted to use, but I wasn't sure if it was the appropriate word for the context.  On the third, I just flat out had no idea how to spell it and spell check wasn't helping me too much because I wasn't even close.

So, there you have it.  I am a looker upper but only if it is necessary.  My first option is to let spell check get it.  On occasion, I have been known to Google the word and see if Google asks "Did you mean Perjury?" when I type the unknown "purgery".  But I do actually attempt to get my spelling correct before any of you have to try to figure out what in the world I meant.  So, the next time I misspell a simple word in my blog and you are left trying to figure out what I meant, I am sorry.  My system failed.  But at least you don't get blogs from me that read as follows:

U r luky too get nything at al.

Hapy 2sday!

Day One-Sixty-Seven - Misc. Catch Up Stuff

Dad is doing great.  Yesterday when I left he was moving around on his walker like he had entered a race.  He is going 6 hours between pain meds and is almost as happy to be in his home as I am to be in mine.  Saturday I baked an angel food cake so that Mom could make this fruit truffle thing that she likes to make.  Then when that was out of the oven, I went to Brookshire's and got ingredients so that I could make Dad a German Chocolate Cake from scratch.  I started it as soon as I got back to Mom and Dad's.  I had the cake out of the oven and the icing made when Mom and Dad got home from the hospital.  Once Dad was settled in, Mom helped me ice the cake.  Then she made her fruit truffle thing.

Once that was done, she started a Gumbo.  It had sausage, chicken and shrimp in it when she was done.  I made a Cajun potato salad to eat with the gumbo.  Saturday night at about nine, I took the chicken out of Mom's gumbo and de-boned it, then we put her gumbo in the fridge for the night.  Then yesterday morning we got up and made a nice breakfast for Dad's birthday then I started my shrimp gumbo.  My brothers and their families came over Sunday afternoon and we all had gumbo for Dad's birthday.  I cannot tell you how tired I was by the time I got home last night.  To top things off, the Cowboys SUCKED yesterday.  I listened to most of the game on Sirrus/XM while driving home.  I had to change the radio to Radio Margaritaville in the 4th quarter because it was just too depressing.

Through it all, the one thing I can tell you is that I am so happy to be home, I just can't STAND it!  There truly is no place like home.  Dorothy knew what the hell she was talking about.  I love spending time with my parents.  They really are my favorite people in the world and I hate to think what I would ever do without them.

But I always wonder what it would be like if I had found my soul mate and there was someone at home who knew what I was thinking before I said it and if he knew when someone had said something to hurt my feelings, even if they didn't mean to, he could come behind me and squeeze my shoulder, that would be really nice.  But Jingle has no thumbs so he can't squeeze my shoulders and he is usually too dense to see that anyone has hurt my feelings anyway, so thumbs would be wasted on him.  After all, he's only a cat.  And as much as I like cats, I would prefer that my soul mate have only two legs and not meow incessantly.  So, I guess I'll keep looking for Mr. Right.

I really enjoyed all of the cooking I got to do on Saturday.  It is a lot of fun cooking when you know someone else will taste it.  It sucks to cook when you are the only one who will eat it and you know before you cook it that you will be eating it for a week.

While in Nacogdoches, I got a lot of work done on a photobook that I have been working on while I was at the hospital and Dad was sleeping.  I also got a lot of writing done at Mom and Dad's house.  Two more chapters completed.  As far as my writing goes, I still do not know who the murderer in my story is.  But I have a lot of very interesting characters who make me want to write more each day to see what they will do next.  I told Mom on Saturday night that writing a mystery is even more fun than reading one.  Even if no one other than me ever reads it, I will have had so much fun, that it will have been worth the time spent doing it.

Well, I must go so that I can see what happens with my characters today.  Have a great Monday!

Day One-Sixty-Three - Just 4 Little Rules

Dad's surgery went very well yesterday.  After the surgery, the anesthesiologist inserted a nerve block (like an epidural) in his pelvic region above his left leg to prevent pain.  That was only supposed to last for about 24 hours so he will probably be feeling some pain today.  But yesterday, he was a pretty happy camper.  He does have a button he can push for pain meds.  Yesterday even when he had a spasm of pain he wouldn't press it, so I don't know how that will work.

I had not planned on writing on my blog while I was here.  But I had to come by Starbucks today and get my starting line up ready for fantasy football this morning anyway.  So, while I was sitting here finishing my coffee and scone, I thought, what the heck.  I just have to say that the things people will share with total strangers in a hospital waiting room are really extraordinary.  People, please use some discretion!  I just don't want to know some things about you or your relatives.

I think that it could be worse in Nacogdoches than in say a Dallas hospital waiting room.  Let's face it, most people in Dallas aren't actually from Texas anyway.  But people in small towns in Texas are just naturally friendly and I think many just assume that we all want to know what is going on with them.  It can be interesting to an extent.  But when you start sharing the really personal stuff, it makes some of us uncomfortable.  Also, when you start thinking about sharing these things with us, please put your teeth in.  I don't think it is too much to ask.

So, two rules, wear your teeth when talking to strangers in hospital waiting rooms and think about what you are going to say before you start sharing.  That's all.  Wait... one more... and I don't mean to be picky here,  but how about if everyone in the waiting room wears shoes?  Is that too demanding?  Because if it is, you can take your teeth out and I'll just put my earbuds in and divert my gaze so that the denture thing doesn't effect me.  But really, I'm going to have to insist that you put your shoes on. 

Okay, one more.... If you feel that you have to go everywhere with your General Foods International Coffee tin, don't insist that everyone else smells it before putting it in your coffee in the waiting room.  I have smelled french vanilla before, I really don't need to smell it from your coffee tin in a waiting room you stupid toothless wonder! 

So, four rules, discretion, teeth, shoes, no food smelling.... Got it?

Okay, I have to get to the hospital now.  You guys have a good day and I will try to be back in touch tomorrow if possible!

Day One-Sixty-One - My Space

I'm sitting under the stairs looking up at the pictures on the shelf mounted on the wall over my desk and wonder how many other people are sitting under a staircase right now by choice.  We all know that Harry Potter was relegated to the room under the staircase while he was living with his muggle family.  But he wasn't happy there.  I am very happy under my staircase.

Some of my favorite things are under this staircase.  First of all and most importantly, my computer, printer/scanner, all sorts of office supplies (including a 500 count box of business size envelopes, printer paper in multiple sizes, weights and colors, pens, pencils, notepads, a miniature stapler, many colors and strengths of reading glasses and a tattered copy of Excel 2003 for Dummies as well as a less tattered 2012 Writers Market) maybe I mentioned it before, but I am an office supply freak.  Going to Staples is for me like going to a botox clinic must be for the Kardashian's.  It feels like Christmas morning every time I walk in that place!

But the really important things under my staircase are on the shelves.  There are two 6 inch deep glass shelves under here, just above my head.  The top one contains, a telephone company Pioneers coffee mug celebrating the Texas sesquicentennial (1836-1986) that is full of pens and pencils.  I got it at a phone company function that I attended with my parents while I was in college.  It reminds me of Dad when I look at it.

Next to the coffee mug is a photo of my mom, Aunt Jean, Aunt Lou and Aunt Gerri that I took at Lake Tahoe.  They were all standing on the side of an overlook above the lake.  The photo was taken in Sept of 1993.  My mom was furious with me when the picture was taken because a man had offered to take the picture so that I could also be in it and I refused.  You know, sometimes you just don't want to be in the picture.  That was the first time my mom and I had decided to just take a trip without Dad.  Since then we have gone to Orlando, on a few Caribbean cruise, and to New York.  Sometimes it has just been the two of us.  Other times, like with Lake Tahoe, other people come along.  But it is always fun, (unless someone wants to get me in the picture too).

In front of that picture is a red Butterfly Duncan Yo-Yo.  I love that yo-yo.  I have had it for at least 25 years.  I used to keep it at my desk when I was a merchandiser in the Nacogdoches jcp store.  When I would go to watch a broadcast and do my buys, I would stand in the broadcast room and yo-yo while I looked at the merchandise until something struck my fancy and I would stop to write down my buy quantity and then go right back to yo-yo-ing.  I bought a lot of merchandise with that yo-yo in hand.  Next to the yo-yo is an Andy Moog autographed hockey puck.  I just like Andy Moog.

Sort of behind the puck is a small basket that is overflowing with match books collected from various restaurants all over the U.S.  Back when I traveled on business a lot, I would always bring a matchbook back for my collection because back then, smoking was allowed in restaurants and so complimentary matchbooks sat near the hostess stand near where the mints are now.  You don't see that too much anymore.  But on the occasion that I do, I always pick up a matchbook.

Next to the matches is a double photo frame that holds wallet sized pictures and in it are photos of my brothers from 30 or 35 years ago.  Behind that is a framed picture of similar size of Audrey Burch as a baby.  My friend Katherine, gave me that picture in the frame when Audrey was a baby and it has had a prominent location in my house since.  Who doesn't need to look up from what they are doing occasionally and see a picture of a pretty baby looking back at them?

Next to Audrey's picture are my last pair of prescription glasses before I had my lasik surgery and a crystal pendulum clock that I got as a gift from my brother and sister-in-law a number of years ago.  The glasses are the last ones I thought I would ever need.  Boy was I wrong.  I must have 15 pairs of readers stashed in various locations throughout my home and car.  I usually put them on top of my head when I am not reading anything then go upstairs with them and take them off.  So usually once a day, I have to go upstairs and get 3 or 4 pairs of readers to bring back down.  I hate having crappy eyes!

My second glass shelf is mostly just photos most of which are unframed.  A lot of them were taken as I was leaving a cruise ship usually with whoever I was traveling with, there are photos with me and Mom; me and Jenny; me, Mom and Rebecca; and even me, Mom, Eileen and Jan just before getting on the Circle Line in NYC.  There is a framed photo of Jingle which sits next to a ceramic "S" that was meant to be hung on the wall and I never got around to hanging so it has been sitting above my desk for years on the shelf.  Now it just belongs there.  Next to that is a small wooden box that you are supposed to keep jewelry or something in.  It has a picture frame in top of it and I keep it standing up so that the picture frame faces out.  It contains a picture of Jingle as a kitten with all of his toys sitting around him.  Inside the box are valuable earbuds that have come with various electronic devices, a small microphone that came with my laptop, a rock that I must have picked up somewhere and a few lapel pins from the former employer.

Behind that box is the most important collection I have.  It is the collection of sea pass cards from all of my cruises.  Anytime I have a need to remember when I was on a certain cruise or which ship I was on during a given photo, I can look back through the sea pass cards and get the information.  Along with it are some hotel room card keys that I have collected over the years and my passport.  I know that the passport should be kept in a safer location.  But sitting on my shelf, I can always find it quickly.

The final objects on that shelf are a volunteer badge from the State Fair a number of years ago, when we did the sheep to shawl there.  There is a framed photo of the Golden Gate Bridge that I took the first time I went to San Francisco and finally two commemorative golden rulers from (you guessed it) the former employer.

All of these objects over the years have been an important part of my life at some point and for some reason.  Now they serve as reminders of a lot of fun times.  I like being able to gaze up at my little shelves while I am thinking.  When I put my desk under the stairs several years ago, before I got my Dad to hang the shelves, I never would have imagined that I would come to spend so much time under here and be so happy here.  But unlike the room under the stairs in the Harry Potter books, my space under the stairs is pretty awesome.

I have to get ready to go to Nacogdoches now.  I won't be writing for the next several days since I'll be entering the "black hole" of cyberspace.  So have a good week and I will talk to you when I get back!

Day One-Sixty - Misc....

Well, here's an update for you.  If I am not mistaken, I think I wrote in this very blog a few weeks ago that I was going to get my garage cleaned and my goal was to complete it by Sunday, Sept 9th.  That was yesterday.  I am seriously considering starting it at this point.  However, I will be going to my parents house tomorrow for an extended stay.  So, we are looking at next week before I can possibly get anything done in my garage assuming that I am so inclined when I return home.

Dad's knee replacement surgery is scheduled for Wednesday.  I know that he is going to be happy to get this done.  He had the other knee replaced several years ago.  This gets the second one done so that he can go back to being as active as he would like to be.  He says that the one that was replaced previously isn't perfect, but the reduction in pain was so amazing, that he is fine with the limited mobility it gives him.

We have a cruise scheduled for January and if he wasn't able to get the knee replaced soon enough to complete the rehab prior to the cruise, I think he was planning to cancel.  So, he is a very happy camper right now.  In addition to his knee replacement surgery on Wednesday, his birthday is Sunday.  So, I will stay in Nacogdoches through the weekend to celebrate.

My friend, Jenny's birthday was yesterday.  After church, I went to lunch with her and her family.  Then we went to her house for birthday cake that her grandmother made after that.  Of course, we also watched a little bit of football.  At this time last year, we were getting ready for our Hawaii trip.  We flew out on the 12th last year to celebrate Jenny's 40th birthday.

I know that it is hard to tell from reading my entries to this blog, but I have been really busy lately.  I have been writing so much!  I have thoroughly enjoyed it, but it is keeping me from accomplishing much else.  I got up at 5:30 this morning so that I could get some housework done early today.  Jenny is taking today off from work and is coming over this afternoon to finish or perhaps continue celebrating her birthday.  We are going to hang out at the pool this afternoon after a much needed pedicure.  At least it is much needed for me.

Well, I suppose I should get busy.  It is fish tank cleaning day.  Ugh!  I wish those fish would just clean up after themselves.  Have a good week!

Day One-Fifty-Nine - Just Bury 'Em....

In case you were wondering, the Jacks didn't actually "Axe 'Em" last night.  There were no axes involved.  If the truth be known, the only yard care tools used last night might have been a shovel to bury the dreams that some may have had of a victory.

But the tailgate was fun.... at least once we found it, it was fun.  My wonderful brother got my sister-in-law, Eileeen and me a terrific parking pass and comp'd tickets.  The parking was mere steps from the stadium.  The seats were inside the stadium, which is all that is necessary at Gerald J. Ford Stadium since all vantage points seem to be good.  I don't know if I have mentioned it previously in this forum, but my brother Rob is an Assistant Athletic Director at SFA.  So last night according to my pass, I was a sideline reporter.  Hey, if the need arose, I could have written a story.  In fact, I think I am doing it right now.

We found our parking lot and parked around 4:45 yesterday afternoon.  Then we began looking for the SFA Alumni tent.  I had seen on line that it was to be located on University.  But quite frankly, I never paid close enough attention to what I had read to know a cross street or what building it might be in front of or anything else.  Eileen may have been the only person there last night who knew less about where the tailgate was than me.  To tell you the truth, I was relying on Eileen to know exactly where we were supposed to go because Eileen is just that sort of person.  But I don't think she had originally planned on tailgating yesterday.

So, once we arrived, we got out of the car and asked the first people we saw directing traffic how to get to the SFA tailgate party which we thought was located on University.  The first man we asked didn't really speak English.  So, he directed us to a second person who told us to walk north.  That was pretty much all of his advice.  So, we walked north.  After a few blocks of walking north, we ran into several other people wearing SFA shirts.  We all clung to one another.  At this point we were in the heart of the SMU tailgate party and we needed a sense of SFA community.  Our fellow Lumberjacks were Jasmine, Justin and Jessica along with Justin and Jasmine's cousin Chris.  I know!  After all of those "J's", Chris was somewhat of a let down.  But never fear!  He was an alpha male and went out on his own.  FYI.... I was on my second beer before Chris made his way into the SFA tailgate area.

When we ran into the J's and Chris, they told us that the alumni tent was at University and Airline.  So, Eileen immediately started looking for this magical intersection on her trusty Iphone.  According to her Iphone, those streets did not intersect.  After having found the alumni tent, I can tell you that Steve Jobs put a hell of a GPS in those Iphones and it was correct.  Airline and University do not intersect.  However, there is a courtyard between University and Airline that did contain the alumni tent.  The problem is that those damn SMU people keep putting buildings up in the middle of roads and so the roads have to go around the stupid buildings.  So, we followed the snake like Airline Rd. for several blocks around a few new buildings until finally two really nice SMU guys in a golf cart showed us the light.

The truly amazing thing that happened prior to finding the tent though, was that we found out that the people directing traffic may have just arrived in the country around noon yesterday.  And yet they were already employed.  None of them had any knowledge of the area.  Only a select few spoke English.  When you asked any of them for directions, they didn't have the slightest clue.  Jasmine asked one while we were on Airline which way we should go from where we were.  He pulled his map out of his pocket and then told her to ask someone else.  Really!  I am not making this up.  The next guy we asked pulled an identical map out of his pocket and offered to give it to us.  When Eileen and I got adventurous and struck out on our own, we asked one who told us to go the exact opposite way that we were headed and wound up to be the correct way.  Fortunately, by then we already knew that they were more lost than us and didn't listen to him.

Somewhere along the way, Justin finally decided to ask a cop for directions since the traffic directors seemed to be more lost than us.  Eileen and I waited a few minutes and then while Eileen was looking at her trusty Steve Jobs GPS I happened to notice an SUV of SFA people who were just given directions to go north.  So, we followed them.... until they did a U-turn and started going back south.  When that happened, we asked the two men wearing SMU gear in the golf cart behind the SUV for directions.  They told us which way to go and even drove slowly for about half a block to show us.  These were the first two people we found all day who knew what they were doing.

Just a few short minutes later we arrived at he alumni tent where we got in line behind the J's for free BBQ.  Apparently, Spring Creek provided SFA with free BBQ for our event.  Nice!  Eileen and I got plates and took them over to a bench in the shade.  On the way to our bench we found our other friends who we hooked up with after we had eaten.  While we were eating Eileen discovered the bar which was serving beer.  At this point we were both drinking iced tea.  So, we threw our plates in the trash and went to the bar area.  Turns out, the beer was free too!!!!!  I love SFA!

By the time all was said and done, I had a knew SFA shirt, I had had a nice meal, more than two beers and had caught up with some people I hadn't seen in the last year, as well as meeting other people I didn't know before.

After the tailgate, we headed over to the game.  The trip to the game turned out to be not so difficult once we knew where we were going.  One kid of a couple with us got lost during the walk to the stadium, but only temporarily.  She just walked faster than the rest of the group and had gotten ahead of us resulting in just a little panic by her parents.

We got inside the stadium a few minutes into the first quarter.  The group we had been hanging with had seats on the front row around the 30 yard line.  Ours were around the 10 yard line about 50 rows up.  We did however, have a really nice breeze and there was no one sitting around us.  So we were able to spread our stuff out and relax.  Eileen and I chatted throughout the game.

Through the 1st quarter and into the 2nd quarter the Jacks were able to keep the score close.  But as the game went on, it became slightly one sided. Okay, I have to admit it, SMU kicked our asses.  The final was something like 52 to 0.  Eileen and I left during the 4th quarter because her cell phone reception in the stadium sucked and we decided it we were going to get beat this bad, we would at least rather hear Rob's play by play than see the whipping and we could only do that through the use of Radio Pup, the greatest app ever!  So once we were in the car, we got to listen to the rest of the game in the parking lot.

Basically, the SFA vs SMU game is one that SMU is supposed to win easily.  All universities do this thing where the put a super easy non-conference game on their schedule at the beginning of each year so that they are able to win a home game for the alumni.  SMU has to look a little harder than some schools to find a team that they can beat so easily.  But SFA is their bitch.  SFA's game like this was last week vs. some small school from Oklahoma.  While we were getting our butts handed to us yesterday, Texas State experienced the same type of defeat at the hands of Texas Tech.

We all expected this loss yesterday.  But the nice thing about being from a small school in a small east Texas town is that even having known going into the game that it was going to be an ass whipping, we all had a great time.  We got together, we wore our purple, we drank a few beers, had some good BBQ supplied by the great folks at Spring Creek and we celebrated SFA.  I had a great day.  Thanks to Rob and Eileen for always getting me into the SFA events.  And maybe next week, the Jacks will indeed Axe 'Em!