Still Alive

Still alive! Promise! Be back to the bloggosphere soon!

Curses!

Funny story: We were (are) in desperate need for a vacay. Bad economy, schemonomy! We're saving! We work so hard! No one should be this pale! It's been so long! It's simply time for A Real Vacation! We deserve it!

So, justification complete, we decided in March to plan a tiny trip for early May, to coincide with a certain date.

Options were weighed.

Europe? Long flight, bad exchange rate.

New York? Super fun but also super busy. We need a relaxation vacation, not a vacation where we're running around the whole time amidst crowds sightseeing (read: shopping) and museum hopping (read: living at PioPio.)

Bahamas? Could be nice. Could be a hurricane.

Hawaii? Maybe. Been there though. A lot.

Mexico? Si? Mexico! Que bueno! It's just a hop, skip, jump and border crossing from California! Good diving, inexpensive lodging, great beaches, ancient pyramids... Woot! Perfecto!

Tickets and resorts were researched, locales surveyed, Trip Advisor consulted... At long last, after multiple weeks of planning, Playa del Carmen, an hour south of Cancun would be the destination of our luxurious getaway. Everything was booked, moneys paid, new warm-weather footwear and beach towels purchased. All we had to do was survive and countdown April until it was time to go. A vacation! A real vacation of nothing but beachy, sunny, lazy, fun!

And THEN... This.

Expletives! Big ones. Stupid pigs! Do you hear me?! I HATE YOU, pigs, and your crazy transmittable-to-humans SWINE FLU that is ruining my vacation (read: life). But I do still love you for bacon, so, um thanks for that.

Now what?

Eight

Eight. It's a special number.

Some fun facts about the number 8, most of them courtesy of Wikipedia:

8 is the only Fibonacci number that is a perfect cube and 8 is the largest cube in the Fibonacci sequence.

In nuclear physics, 8 is the second magic number.

8 is the atomic number of oxygen.

In human adult dentition there are 8 teeth in each quadrant. The eighth tooth is the so-called wisdom tooth.

In particle physics, the eightfold way is used to classify sub-atomic particles.

In Islam, 8 is the number of angels carrying The Holy Throne of Allah in the heavens.

In Christianity 8 is the number of Beatitudes.

The Buddha's principal teaching -- the Four Noble Truths -- ramifies as the Noble Eightfold Path.

Eight is considered a lucky number in Chinese culture because it sounds like the word "prosper" or "wealth."

In chess, each side has 8 pawns and the board.

There are eight vegetables in V8 juice.

And, 8 is a power of two. I like this definition the best today.

To my other half: You are my luckiest number, my oxygen, my perfect cube, my source of much wisdom, and I adore making moves on the game board of this life with you by my side as we walk our own noble path together. I have loved being a power of two with you for the past 8 years. So, I lift up a glass (of V8?) and toast to you, my darling; here's to many, many more magic numbers together.

Overheard:

Stanley & Lucy in the Morning - A Conversation

S: Psst... Lucy! The sun just came up… almost. Wake up!
L: Yes! Let’s wiggle up to the humans’ faces and touch our noses to their faces somewhere.
S: I’m going to scratch behind my ears frantically for a minute or two in order to better shake the bed and leave a small pile of fur under the covers.
L: Good idea. I’m going to stretch out and poke our humans in the back with my paws.
S: K. Let’s go sniff us some delicioso morning breath.
L: Mmm-mmm! That was fun! I think I saw an eyelash flutter on mom! Let’s dive bomb her head!
S: ‘K you do that. I’m going to walk along her side like a mountain goat on a ridge. La ti da… Look at me! I’m a mountain goat! Watch me jump off! Watch me jump back on! Watch me do it ag—whoops! I slipped off and landed on her neck.
L: Hey! Idea! Let’s do sprints around the house.
S: Wait-- dad’s getting up to let us outside! Hurry—let’s go pee on the mat.
L: Totally. And then let’s do sprints around the house. And bark!
S: Super awesome idea, sis. Wait—I see a human in the bed still. Let’s go sniff around her to make sure she is still sleeping.
L: And then let’s jump wrestle on the bed.
S: Only if you let me growl and yelp at the top of my lungs! BARK!
L: OK, I will too! YELP! GROWL!
S: Ooh, I see my reflection in the mirror in the early dawn light! I better tell it who’s boss. BARK!
L: I want to wrestle this pillow! GRrrrrrrOWL!
S: Now I will body slam you into mom’s chest.
L: Oh yeah, tough guy? Watch as I pin you down next to her and stand above you from her shoulder, digging my nails into her arm.
S: She moved! Yes!!!! Commence double licking of nostrils!
L: Incoming!

April Fools

It was April Fool's Day yesterday. I texted Ian around midday and told him I was pregnant. He wrote back with, "Me too!" Clearly, he wasn't fooled. (That, or he's a miracle of science-- something I've long suspected since he seems to also suffer from PMS.)

This blog is long overdue a quality entry but yet, here I am, past midnight, working yet again on things of little or no importance in the grand scheme of life things but very important in the now scheme of work things. Sigh. Plus, it's been cold here. And windy. Chicago windy. Kansas windy. At least, how I imagine Chicago and Kansas windy, never having actually lived there. (Or having been there in the case of the latter.) The wind flurries around all day and gusts mightily at night, shaking our sad, thin window panes and making the stove vent rattle and leaving me wondering if I were to step outside into a big gust if I'd maybe just fly away like the tree branches and garbage can lids I keep seeing displaced in the roads. The howling wind seems to also blow away any motivation to actually spend time on the interweb when not required by work or church or otherwise. Thus, I'm neglecting the bloggosphere these days... People's lives spinning on, changing in big and little ways and posted for the absent masses and for commenting on, and me, out of the loop, with a rattly stove vent, just trying not to fly away. Be back soon.

Andy? Is That You?

Dear AIG,

Are you all on crazy pills?

Bailout money for bonuses? To the tune of $165 million? Honestly, this is starting to feel like a joke. Like the kind where one of your fat cat executives, during a flashy press conference, suddenly unzips his fat cat executive costume and out jumps Andy Kaufman.

But, alas, it seems it's real. Very real and maybe not fixable. And it makes me angry. The hot kind of angry where my temples pulse and my brow furrows and I want to punch someone in the face with my keys. That kind. Bad angry. Danger angry. Keys-in-face angry.

So, I ask you, maybe, just maybe, stop taking the crazy pills and behave yourselves.

Recession Mantra: Frye Boots

I do not need you. Sure, you're gorgeous and subtle and classic and fabulous and amazing and would probably go with more than half my wardrobe and are Frye boots that I've been drooling over since college. But you are so expensive. Not Chanel or Prada or Gucci expensive, but still... You cost a pretty penny, Frye boots of my dreams. And we are in a recession now. And, let's be honest, even pre-recession you were not exactly a reality. And I do not need you. It feels like I do, but you are not sustenance nor shelter nor water nor oxygen nor Trader Joe's... And I am not currently void of any other footwear, or taking up horseback riding, or going on a safari or inflicted with a shin condition requiring some kind of Frye-leather-contact therapy. You are simply excessive. A luxury. A golden soap dish on the Titanic. A fur coat in the Bahamas. I do not need you.

Yes, I spied a pair of your relatives on a co-parishioner and knew immediately that they too were Frye and was reminded again of how perfect you would look in my wardrobe, from casual weekend wear to church dress to work attire... And yes, I felt a longing in my heart as I watched you function elegantly amongst the pews. But then I reminded myself that we do not go to church to covet other people's boots (or footwear of any kind,) or cars or clothes or hair or babies or anything, ever. (Except maybe handbags. Because those hold scriptures, after all.)

And though I pine for you from afar and have no fewer than 673 justifications of why you would certainly be able to do everything from rescuing me from fashion peril, to possibly curing disease, I really do not need you. Sure, you were high on ye olde list of "I can't wait until I graduate and get a Real Job and..." things; one I thought I would easily be able to attain with A Real Paycheck. But here we are, out in the Real World lo these many years and yet you remain elusive, Frye boots. Your $400 price tag has simply never made you practical in my Grown Up World, and that was before salary cuts and layoffs and all the other scariness of today's Really Scary Grown Up World. But I think I love you and you love me and we're supposed to be together. But still, I do not need you. I've lived this long without your kind enveloping my legs in legendary leather quality and... magic.

So, I beg you, cease your call to me-- that gorgeous, hypnotic siren song of your exquisite soles being clip-clop-walked across a polished floor somewhere in my dreams, and more literally from Zappos.com, on sale! with free! shipping! and an amazingly non-threatening return policy. For I do not need you. I do not need you. I. do. not. need. you.
Right?