I don’t sleep much. This may not be a surprise to those of you who know how active I am and how much I get done on any given day. Unfortunately, often on any given night I’m pretty active, too. Even though I always get to sleep easily, I wake up often. Many nights I find myself wide awake at 2:00 or 3:00 a.m. (for a while, 3:30 a.m. on the nose was my body clock’s daily wake-up time) When I don’t have these wide-awake-in-the-middle-of-the-night episodes, I get, on average, five to six hours of halfway-decent sleep each night. Believe it or not, five hours is really quite enough for…
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Weirdest Halloween Ever.
Halloween came and went (as it tends to do), and for the first time in twenty years we didn’t have a kid in costume. Not only that, but Halloween was almost–dare I say it?–exactly like any other day. It was bizarre to say the least. In fact, when J left for school, he said goodbye to me like he always does and walked out before I even remembered that it was Halloween at all. My decorations, as I’ve written about before, were pitiful. I didn’t even have time to take pictures of Roxie in her 2012 costume because I took a TDM class in the morning and then worked on…
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Cody Simpson + Hallmark = True Love (& other stories)
A couple of months ago, I received an invitation to a Hallmark event that was actually taking place only about seven miles from my house. As a blogger who is contracted with Hallmark for 2012 and writing monthly posts for their awesome “Life Is A Special Occasion” campaign, this event was not “mandatory” by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s not every day that my buddies at Hallmark have an event in my neck of the woods and I also thought it would be fun to cover it. Apparently this young man named Cody Simpson was going to perform at the event, which was to promote the new Hallmark…
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Old.
I had an appointment at the doctor today, just for a normal exam and a follow-up on my high blood pressure. (Who knew I would be the type of person to have high blood pressure, right?) I was not very excited about this appointment due to the blood pressure thing and the getting weighed thing and the probably waiting on the doctor thing. I had no idea. I got there at 10:50 for an 11:00 appointment and checked in. It did not get past me that there were six women already seated in the waiting room, and they had ALL checked off my doctor’s name on the sign-in sheet. I…
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Ice Is Nice.
I am a huge fan of the Today Show. If I’m home Monday through Friday mornings, I always start my day watching it. I was thrilled when I started seeing promos a while back about the 10th Anniversary of “Where in the World is Matt Lauer?”, which is five days’ worth of Matt traveling around the world and inviting viewers (as well as Ann, Al, and Natalie) to figure out where he’s going from a clue given the day before. It’s a great way to learn about some fantastically beautiful destinations, some of them familiar by name and some not. Monday morning, I sent out a tweet asking that people…
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Another Example Of How Time Flies, For Your Reading Enjoyment
Today J and I officially begin the in-person part of his college search by taking our first campus tour. (That’s not the example of how time flies.) (Well, it’s ONE example, but not the one referenced in the title. Wait for it.) We are starting in hyper-local fashion, by touring a small, private college located in our own town, one that I toured twice with D. J’s new Admissions Advisor at the college happens to be an alumna there. As it happens, she worked at the front desk of the health club where I was also employed, when she was a student of this college herself. She used to wave…
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Old Is Relative.
In celebration of my being the birthday girl today, I decided to take a year off from my usual “reflection route” and share with you some cold, hard facts about just how old I am. Here is a (partial) list of things that are younger than I am: ~Post-it notes ~Pong, the first video game ~Southwest Airlines ~Vince Vaughn ~Wendy’s fast food chain ~Saturday Night Live ~The Nasdaq ~Walt Disney World I’m younger than television and sliced bread, though, so at least I’ve got that going for me. Want to make this a long-term commitment? (Great birthday gift to me, by the way.) Please subscribe to my feed by clicking…
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Vintage.
When I was a kid, I collected rocks. Just plain old rocks. I used to delight in the acquisition of a rock that was slightly sparkly, or a small stone that had a smooth side or an interesting shape. Heart-shaped rocks and stones were my favorites, as were “worry stones”, of which I owned several. (They were plentiful when I was a kid in the 70s!) When I grew up, I started collecting two things: menorahs and cobalt blue glass pieces. Menorahs these days are so much more than just the traditional “U” shape: they are available in all shapes, sizes, and themes. I have a New York City skyline…
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Hey, Nineteen
THIS BABY? The one who HATED how grass felt on his feet that first spring? The one who used to chew on my dirty shoe laces whenever he could? IS NINETEEN TODAY. Despite a babyhood that left Jim and me wondering if we’d survive parenting him (the aversion to grass, the shoe lace-chewing, oh, and the fact that he cried for most of his first year if he wasn’t in the same personal space with me), THIS KID has grown into such a wonderful human being, way beyond our expectations (which, admittedly, were still pretty high even after that first year) and still pleasantly surprises us on a regular basis.…
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Party Like A Rock Star
Jim and I headed to the city yesterday for an overnighter. We had few concrete plans except to stand next to the Chicago River this morning at 10:00 and watch the annual “Dyeing of the Chicago River” for St. Patrick’s Day. (more on that in the next post). The two of us had all Friday evening to paint the town red, raise the roof, and cause a general ruckus. We were very, very excited to let loose in the city and looked forward to a wild night. Here’s our actual timeline: 5:42 p.m. Arrived in Chicago at Union Station. Hailed a cab for transport to hotel. 5:55 p.m. Still in…