Tempus Fugit
Those benches are not going to take pictures of themselves. Time flies. It’s late. I better get on home. It’s late. I been gone too long. It’s late. I need to stop typing song lyrics and get the kids up. I am an hour behind in my “schedule”. Time to make the boy mad! There’s another bench below. Last year was “Music”. I think this years theme is “Fairytales” or “Fairytale Stories”. We did a preview/drive-by yesterday. It’s hot out there too already. And feels humid. I predict a lot of complaining in my near future. Oh FYI, I switched to Latin. It’s my favorite language. Valē! See you later!
All Hail the New York Giants!
Madagascar! Alright Eli, I guess you want that Super Bowl pretty bad! Green Bay! What the heck were you doing out there? Did you just not want to play any more? Now that the Packers are out of it, I have to root for the Giants. At least for the next game. But I’m torn if they have to go against the Patriots. I know someone, who is great friends with a player on the Patriots, and even though both quarterbacks involved have SuperBowl rings, he does not. And it would be pretty awesome to get one! Last time the Giants and Patriots SuperBowled together the Giants won, so maybe this is payback year? As I have said before, I am a fan of football. And I will watch the games no matter who is playing, but it’s always a little more fun to watch if you have a vested interest. Usually that involves money and an office pool, but personal connections can be good too. Anyway, if you feel torn and need someone to root for, let’s go Patriots! And since Clay is out now and I have a special soft spot for the “50’s” (that’s usually the Linebackers position), the man to watch on the field will be Rob Ninkovich. Special shout out to Stephanie and all those friends and family that have far more time and personal interest in this win than me just being a fifth or sixth string observer. I always love it though when someone’s dreams come true!
On another losing football note: Thanks a lot Pittsburgh Steelers! I finally get a Terrible Towel and now it has to sit in the closet until next year! Boo!
On another note altogether…I think most people are off in some way today, in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. And I always thought it was kind of the real working start to the new year. We all get that over-zealous, shiny, hopeful, stars-in-our-eyes, January 1 boost. But it’s a false start. And everyone needs another day to stop for a minute, reflect and re-group. By the third week of January, hopefully we all know where we’re going and what we want to do. And we are ready to buckle down for the longest part of the winter and get things done. All the while keeping one eye out for that break in the clouds that will take us back into the light of summer. And since everyone likes to lay down a quote, I’m going to join the party:
We must use time creatively, and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right. (MLK, Jr. 1963).
Time is what we are always battling in the end. Too much. Never enough. Take a little bit for yourself today if you can. One hour, one minute, one second. We can change the world! You all have a great Monday!
We interrupt this program for another appearance by Mother Nature
That Bitch!!
When I left a few days ago, happy, P90X’d on day 30, I was recovering from Core Synergistics. I am actually still sore but who has time to think about it when the natural world gives you so much more to do! Let me explain.
I have trees. Big trees. They keep falling down. Not the whole tree, just parts of the tree. Limbs crack and break and then lay across the yard or the fence or the neighbors garage or her house…it keeps happening. Every single time it storms I worry. Every single time a tree part falls on my neighbors house it is the calmest, clearest, least windy day EVER! Every. Single. Time. I leave, the tree is fine. I come home, BOOM, it’s laying on something. Then I have to get tools (now the BF and I have to get tools) and we cut it up and drag it to the nice wood/limb/branch pile I have going in my backyard. I’ve posted pictures of it. I’ll post again in case you don’t believe me. It’s ridiculous now because every time I get it mostly cleaned up, nice and neatly stacked for continued ease of disposal, more falls and the pile grows. It’s a joke to the neighbors now.
The far left side and the far right side wood piled up is the old stuff. Everything in the middle is from yesterday.It doesn't look like alot I guess in this pic, but trust, its all tangled and gnarly and high.
This time I really got a surprise. MN (Mother Nature) decided to shake things up by NOT felling the tree limb I was actually worried about but a completely different one that I never even considered! Tricky! I should have known. I took pics of this tree. Foam was coming out of the bottom. I do not know what that means in tree life, but it’s probably not good. Got pics of that too.
So anyway, this real dangerous, heavy, stretched out limb just hangs over my neighbors house looking menacing every day and extra scary in storms. The birds don’t care. The squirrels don’t care. They just keep adding weight to it, running up and down, just doing their thing. I panic thinking it will fall. It’s huge. It’s old. It has NO chance in hell of missing her house and landing neatly in between on the driveway. It’s just that kind of tree. But it’s expensive to remove this kind of tree. Thousand dollar or more type money, which I don’t have. So we wait, and hope, and cringe every time the wind blows, but so far so good.
And oh yeah, there is also another limb that goes off it in the other direction, over my house, that looks fine. No worries. We noticed on Saturday when we got back from motorcycle class that it was dangling its leaves on the roof. Brushing ever so slightly like it was caressing the house. We tell ourselves, well we’ll have to get up there and trim those back. Not me…the BF…he’s much better at that sort of thing…plus it could start interfering with the satellite dish! Oh my! Can’t mess up the TV! He’s off on Monday (yesterday) so we can do it then.
So Saturday is class—sitting, talking, learning, then leaving. Expect to arrive early on Sunday and be prepared to ride the whole time! Ok. After class we take the kids clothes shopping for school, have a nice dinner and chill in the evening. Everyone’s happy! No P90, no other exercise except the brain stuff earlier.
Sunday 7 am. Off to class. Riding riding riding. It’s fun. It’s stressful. I feel worked out. 5 hours on a machine I have never set foot across in my life. And I get to control it and ride it and shift it and stop it…it’s too much fun! Not for everyone though. We did lose some people on the riding portion. 3 out of 12 had to go. As deemed by the instructors. Dropping the bike more than once or stalling it over and over in traffic, or actually flipping off of it, it did happen, right next to me, is pretty much instant exit. So needless to say, I was burning some stress calories and actual cals pushing that bike around. But I survived it and actually had a pretty good time. I am by no means ready for the road. I could drive it fine and turn it and stop it and all that, but I had some trouble with the quick, up and down shift (I think my boots were too fat and I couldn’t get my toe under the gear lever smoothly every time) and apparently I go WAY too slow for the other people! I’ll admit I was putt-putting it, but I shouldn’t be the leader. I need to follow someone else to gain speed! It’s not my fault!
After we got home, the kids are going to hang with their dad and he shows up to get them and notices that lovely, dangling, brushing, tree branch is now sitting on the damn roof solid. Crap. Seriously?? It must have cracked at a seam overnight (no storms, no wind) and laid itself gently to rest on the roof. Nice. So what is the afternoon like now? Up on the roof, the BF, not me, cutting branches and getting the limb up and off, then call someone to remove the rest because it is heavy and big and probably too much for us. Accomplished. The BF managed to use a handsaw to remove enough of the branches that it is up about 6 inches and if it continues to lean it will just rest back on the roof and not cause any major damage. It did crinkle the nice furnace exhaust pipe thing that our friend Jeff put up last fall but thank fully that was easily straightened.
If you look close you can see the crack. The left side is the main trunk to the ground, go across the limb to the dead knob and it's right underneath like a gash in the side. Just enough to bring it down. But not too much that it crashes on to the roof.
Here’s another question. Why, after all these years, have I never purchased a chain saw? I have needed one almost every spring and summer since I moved into this house. That money spent would have proven itself worthy over and over again. Well, we own one now. A big, nasty, loud, long-bladed monster tree cutter. A few inches short of the commercial kind. I’m not spending 500 dollars on one, but I can handle 200. After removing enough and watching it basically lean right back on over to the roof and then calling some tree services and getting a quote for 1000 dollars (WTF?? Seriously?? We already took half that shit off and it’s practically stand-up accessible) Then for another $1300, he’ll take off that other limb that is super-giant, super-heavy, and hanging so far over the neighbors house that it could be considered a whole tree all by itself. Really? Only 300 extra dollars to take off the giant limb as opposed to the half cut one? I was nice and didn’t say anything. What a rip. They have a bucket! I guess that’s what we pay for. Either that or he just didn’t want to do it so he throws out a ridiculous number hoping we would laugh and tell him to move along.
So I get the idea that since it’s obviously just going to lean back on the roof, we can go get a chainsaw and hack that sucker off ourselves. We can get it on the roof and just hope we can cut it back enough it will swing and miss the house when it goes all down. Ha! Lofty goals on Sunday night! Monday morning. Different story when my shaky ass is standing on the roof, on that treacherous angle, trying to hold limbs and not fall to my death on chainsaw chips and debris. I REALLY underestimated my ability to stand on a roof with confidence and move around. I was constantly afraid of falling off, therefore I was afraid to move too much and therefore not much help in the removal process. The longer I was up there I felt a little better, but those slippery chips were too much for me. Bright ideas look 100 times better from the ground looking up.
I have to give every kind of respect for people that can work on a roof with no problem. That is an awesome balance thing and confidence and surefootedness that I do not have! Your job is tough and scary and I can see why people pay you the money to do it.
Once the BF and I realized there was no way we could do it ourselves, because of my chicken-shitness and his lack of reach over the house and up to the limb, we decided to use the trim, wait, let the tree limb lay back on the house, trim, wait, lay, etc…method of removal. It might take awhile but the lower the limb comes down, the easier it is to remove. The person we finally got to take a look and remove it for us said that method is not going to work and is not really smart. He’s a 20 year tree guy and he has removed stuff for us before. He’s back in the biz after hurting himself some years ago, and ready to take on some small jobs! Ha! Small jobs! That’s what he considers it. I don’t care because he’s cutting us a really good deal and he knows what he’s doing. He hopped onto the roof to look at the tree like he was walking on the flat ground. Jealous!
Anyway, so there it sits now, about three feet off the roof, maybe four. Alot of the weight is off and if it starts lowering, our tree guy said just leave it. Don’t be fussing with it anymore. But, again, I have a giant pile of branches and limbs and leaves and sticks and junk in my yard. So this week is cutting and stacking neatly to make room for all the rest that is about to come. This might be the most yet! Seriously. I just thought about it this minute. We are going to have basically a tree’s worth of trunk and limbs in the yard. I really got to wrap this up and get outside. Those lazy kids of mine are still sleeping and I’m wasting hours typing and we have some work to do. I’m going to need some bribery options to really light a fire under their asses. I’d like to get all of what we presently have cut up today if possible. That’s prob going to save us alot of time and pain down the road. Especially if it starts storming like its supposed to.
Ugh! I may skip P90X again today. I was going to sneak it in (I have missed 3 days already!!) and I’m feeling nervous and agitated, but this might have to take precedence. Ugh! Kenpo too. It’s fun. I don’t HAVE to do it. It’s my choice. It’s voluntary but I feel guilty. I don’t even know why! It’s ridiculous the things that go thru my head. I’ll try to do it later. I swear. It’s not like I’m going to turn into a lump of fat in 4 days. But still…I also have the stress of this cycle class, the test is next weekend. I have to read the book. I have my real school starting the next week and I have to read that material. I have no money. All my savings money is going to stop a tree from poking through my roof. I have laundry and house stuff, and frankly I’m feeling a bit queasy right now thinking about it all. I let myself stress way too much about things I can’t even control. AND things that aren’t even going to happen for 2 weeks! (I’m thinking school. I’m trying to tell myself I need to make it fun like I did when I first started. I love it. I’m afraid of failure. But I love it. Nursing is the best job in the world and I just have to get through. I think I need some BF support tonight. Help!! Thanks honey!! I love you. Sorry for being a baby. Love you!) I feel like an old lady shaking her fist to the sky cursing the powers that be. Ugh!
Enough of the whining. Stop thinking. Start doing. Alright. The tree limb is still high and mighty for now. The crack is still cracky but not split all the way through. I will get dressed, cut limbs, exercise, figure out the money situation for the week and do laundry until it doesn’t matter. I will read and absorb and take it one little day at a time. Hour here. Hour there.
If you are still reading this, WOW!, and thank you. It’s like listening in to someone’s therapy. I hope to never look at it again! The internet is a great big toilet bowl of random crazy and I just laid a big old load down! Feels better! And you helped wipe! Alright, eeww, that’s probably enough there.
We need a picture of calm. A picture of soothing. I don’t know what I have, butt, I’ll find something.
Oh man. The hilarity never stops around here. I think it’s bad when you have to add a whole new category to your site, dedicated to tree trouble because it just keeps happening. Ugh! The picture below is much better. I found it trolling for something to illustrate all this text.
Just breath and relax:
Day 26 trying to keep the momentum going…
I have about 3 more weeks before the real world kicks back in and I cannot devote my mornings, days or nights to this workout thing. I am trying to work the schedule now. I can do it with the kids yelling in the background that they want to go do something fun! I can do it with them walking in and out of the room telling me how gross and sweaty I am! I can even do it with the BF in the room watching or not watching! That’s how you know you have passed a roadblock in your mind! If you can bring it just as hard with other people staring at you as you would alone with no one around then you have crossed into another area of fitness! I’m a little hesitant on the “Oms” for the Yoga still, but in my defense I don’t have the big breaths anyway that can carry my voice for that long.
Here’s a funny thing that happened today: I gave my daughter a little pop in the jaw this morning as she walked past me while I was doing my warmup jumping jacks. It tapped her perfect right under the chin and clicked her teeth together. I swear I almost pee’d after the sound it made and her voice that said, “Oh!” I said, “Why the heck did you walk past me when you knew I was throwing my hands up?” And she said that she knew how light I throw my arms up and she didn’t think it would hit her and even if it did it probably wouldn’t hurt anyway! She’s a koo-koo but it made the workout less serious and more fun. And don’t worry she is totally fine. She went right on into her room to watch a movie while I dripped all over the living room floor.
Anyway, I want the exercise part of my day to be seamless for when I start mine and the kids school schedule. I’ll need to workout the minute they leave for the bus and then shower and get the heck out of here to make my classes. 16 weeks now. 16 weeks after X-Mas. Then I am done. Done done done and I can work work work for the rest of my natural born life. Good thing I’m working out now. I’ll be so strong I’ll never die! Ha.
Alright, well, I need to motivate my son to finish his “job” for the day. He’s so close! All the lawns are cut and all he has to do is sweep and get rid of the big stalky weeds.
Oh and if I haven’t talked enough about how great P90X is and how much I love Tony Horton (is it wrong to have a crush on my fitness instructor??? heehee) then here’s one more reason to love him and the system: Tony and the Kids! The DVD I just got for my son (and daughter) but mostly my son. HE WILL BE FIT! No more beer belly! Haha. For the record, Mason says, “I don’t have a beer belly!! You are not even funny anymore MOM!”
Then let’s go! Everyone push play and bring it with whatever you got! I’ll be back later. X it!
Cool Word of the Day!
Hiatus (noun)
Definition: A slight break or lapse in space, time, or continuity: break.
Day Quote. Tempus fugit
I seem to be overly preoccupied with this subject lately. This is one of my favorite pieces of writing.
If it looks goofy it’s because I scanned it into the computer and cropped it so you could read it clearly.
Jump in the line!
Rock your body in time!
Oh no! I believe it!
Jump right in…start the body line… shake, shake, shake, Senora! Work it all the time!
I’m kind of making up words and moving them around. I am home from the first official day of school. Short and sweet. Serve it up and push me out the door. This. This. This. Test Monday. Skills Tuesday. See you tomorrow. Don’t be late. Two hours in, and the hand holding portion of the program is over.
I am exaggerating for dramatic and humorous effect. The teachers are all quite friendly and helpful, actually, but, they are not slowly walking us along the education path. They warned us of the fast pace, rapid start, rapid finish; fall behind and you might not be able to catch up. There just isn’t time. Time is fluid. Sometimes we forget when it thickens up. It’s really more like water, and it flows the same whether you are standing in it, sitting in it, swimming in it, being dragged along unmercifully by it, or drowning in it. Unless you cry for help, no one is going to hear you. And even if they do, no guarantee they can always save you. They might be able to get you out of it, but you won’t really be o.k.
But that is a little too much for the first day. I’ll save that little rumination for about, October, when I am failing the math test! Just kidding. Positive thoughts. (Not going where you think) I’m only taking it one week, one day, one class, one hour, at a time. Small doses. Even using a teaspoon eventually fills up the bowl. And my bowl is empty!!
So why the heck am I typing on this time wasting website?? Because I like it. And I need it. I need to put all the crazy thoughts somewhere so I can make room for the technical stuff I need to do a job and do it well. I don’t think this writing thing is going to pan out in the way that I had hoped and I only won $3 bucks on the Mega Millions and $2 on a scratch off, and that’s the most we have won on lottery in like, two years.
So this is my future. I will be busy with school, in 16 week chunks, for the next two years. But I’ll still try to post to keep updated and sane. (You should subscribe to me! Top right column…and you won’t miss any of the fun. And you can comment and give me encouragement and make me feel warm and fuzzy!)
In about 20 minutes, when my daughter gets home, we will be going to the store to get me a detailed schedule planner, for the minute day-to-day things I need to do (tests/skills/exercise–yes, I still do it, just don’t talk about it as much—next race is Labor Day!) anyhoo…we need groceries and breakfast food and cash for my son’s gym uniform and sports physical….it seems kind of scattery right? (Run on sentence anyone???) But I have already done laundry and cleaned the house and did the dishes, prepped for dinner and bedtime…I am never more productive than when I have less time for the tasks planned.
Here is a picture of a nurse coffee mug I was given 2 years ago when I started this mess. (Thank you Nancy!!) I tentatively bring it out now in anticipation of success. I am normally superstitious about cart-before-the-horse and all that, but what the hell. I have to pass. Failure is not an option for me.
I also threw in the picture with all the books I was told I would need for the first semester. Semester. 16 weeks. Hey! You keep them, FOREVER! And if you are like me, you’d want to know this too:
Height of books: 17 inches
Weight of books: 42.4 lbs.
You never have to bring them all anywhere, (so they say) but I still think it’s interesting to know the stats.
You can't see it exactly, but it's about 16" tall. AND I forgot a book! I took its picture all by itself. So that brings the total to 17".
The missing book from the pile. I included it in the weight though. I should have taken a picture of the scale! I'm not going to now because I don't feel like moving all those books again. Too heavy. Too many.
Don’t Read TIME Magazine!!
Or NewsWeek, or any of the other kind of magazines that make you think about the world and problems and issues and things that are important to life and living here in America and on Earth. If you do, you will only be sorry. Like me.
I feel bad because I did read the TIME magazine this morning, BB (Before Burrito’s) and before Bike Riding, and it makes the silly stuff I talk about all day seem kind of lame. I should have a point or a view and opinions and controversy. But I don’t. I have ideas. But then I see a colorful bird in a tree or a strange frog on the sidewalk and I forget all about deeper issues.
I really do have a master plan, and I do have some really good life improving ideas, but I need to get through school first so I can start earning the kind of money and hooking up with the right kind of connections to put things in place. Plus, I have to get my kids up and ready for high school. That’s their first step toward all of the rest of the education they are going to be required to have to make any kind of difference in this world.
I bring it up now, because I am going to be posting stuff that I get from the “smart” mags along with the usual crap I get from the internet and the gossip mags my brain absorbs like a dried up jellyfish. Plus, I may be suffering some kind of post-exercise-nature-beauty-world-love withdrawal, as the coffee and vodka (not together) courses back into my veins and displaces all the healthy-oxygen-clean-pure-blood, but it takes time!
And! I have some International New Features I want to post! The BF’s good friend from work just moved to Germany with her hubby and sent an e-mail and photo’s that are absolutely out of this world, funny and brilliant and real-world people perspective of other places on the globe. And she said I could post it all here!
For now though, here’s my stuff: We rode those bikes, in the rain (it stopped now and then) for 19.2 miles! Once we got out there the actual trail was a bit longer. Took us One hour and 45 minutes. Not bad for ups/downs/traffic/road crossings/the requisite work phone call (BF is on the job) and a stop to take a picture of an old cemetery that was there in the early 1900’s. The sign explains it, but the Forest Preserve acquired the land with the cemetery on it and chose to keep it as it was. History and all. Now you can say the site is educational and we can both feel better.
There were power lines too! Giant, humming, massive towers that were really crackling in the rain. I was so in awe of being that close and riding underneath all of them that I forgot to take any pictures. It’s probably good anyway. I would have pulled my phone out, aimed it up at the wires and got electrocuted when an arc of electricity shot out and grabbed the cell killing me on the spot. That would have sucked.
See? No sense of world. Ooooh…power lines. Electricity. Well, without it, we couldn’t type or read this, so….it needs to propped!
Anyway, if we go back tomorrow—which I’d like to—I will get those pics. It is pretty amazing. I know people that live by them don’t necessarily think so, but I don’t have my brains getting fried on a day-to-day basis…or…?? Just kidding. Seriously. I don’t really think brains are getting fried just because of power lines. You don’t need to live by the high wire to get the high if you know what I mean.
Also, in case you were wondering, I think I successfully burned off all the cals from those terrible, but delicious burrito’s. I checked the internet for an exercise calculator and it says I did. Now, what’s for dinner? Let me finish my vodka lemonade and think about it while you look at pictures of headstones and a sign.
OMG! We are having the problems this week!!
Be aware that if you try and fix up the place you live in, AND spend money doing it, you will have to spend even MORE money to fix all the OTHER new things that break while fixing the original broken things.
Electric pole. Downed in the storm/fallen tree limb 5 years ago. Put up a brand new one. Ooops! Old power lines don’t reach anymore! No electricity. Call Com Ed. Yay! New lines!
Phone goes dead. Along with internet. Horrors!! We cannot live without internet! Seriously. What do people do anymore?? Call AT&T. Yay! New lines!
The neighbors must think something weird is going on over here. We’ve had giant service trucks here, coming and going, all week! Crews of manly-men carrying tools and belts and ladders and boxes of mysterious wires and cables and clip things. I personally don’t mind. I’m a sucker for a uniform and a hard hat, so whatever…I’ll go around breaking extra stuff to have utility workers show up here! Kidding. Slightly. But…My house is super-powered now. I got new lines for everything!
Seriously it wasn’t that bad. The service guys were all awesome! They came pretty fast and fixed the probs with no trouble! I have no complaints!
So now I will post the things I wanted to post last night. Missed my desired “hit count” by 2 stinking people! I hate to live and die by internet popularity, but there it is. Thank goodness I’m not an actual celebrity. I might read about myself negatively in a gossip magazine and be depressed! Those people really DO have it rough.
Anyway. We are up and running. (We have plans to go out into the real world for material that I can post during the next week–exciting!–while my kids are gone again on yet another vacation with their daddy. Here’s a hint: Benches of Love. Hmmm??? But we can’t go until Mason cuts all his grasses!! So it’s just me for now). Please enjoy all the useless, dumb things I have to say for the next few hours until my son is done!
Afterburn…
When last I left you, I was dragging my unhappy children to the Forest Preserve Trail to exercise for 3.6 miles. They bitched, they moaned, they whined, they sulked, they refused to move from the car…but once we started going they found new light and energy! It was like a miracle. Not really. But they were much happier after that.
We even managed to run 1.6 miles of the 3.6 total! Broke down in money-time (that’s how I was asked to explain it based on “quarter” miles, etc…) we ran $1.60 out of $3.60. And that’s pretty good for Mason’s third day and Stevie’s first. That’s one third of the trail!And Stevie managed to do it clomping around in K-Swiss court shoes. (We went and bought her some running-type shoes last night–and school supplies!–oh no, summer is almost over! Boohoo)
In case you are confused, we go around the whole thing, but we have been running every other ¼ mile to build endurance and burn more calories. Today we are going to use scooters. Well, the kids will scooter. I will run. Good for me (I get to do the whole thing now at a running pace) and good for them (they get to have their feet on the ground only half the time). Win win. I have to say, I recommend taking your kids with you to exercise whenever possible. It’s good for them and it builds respect for you. Seriously. I can’t tell you how many times my kids have said, “Oh whatever, I could run around that track no problem! What’s the big deal?” Now they are in awe because I CAN run around the whole thing. Without stopping! Oh yeah. It’s definitely the little things in life!
I got some other stuff for later, but I HAVE to go get my kids registered for school. And Mason has grass to cut. And we have another 3 ½ miles to burn.
Here’s a picture of the big finish for my little athletes. They look pretty good if I do say so myself!
just shy of pretty 