Talk Thursday - What I Learned - And Did - This Summer

Wow. I don't think I've ever gone this long without posting. It's been a wacky summer, kids. Some ways good, some ways bad, all ways more than I wanted, I think.

I've done a lot, and a lot of nothing. It depends on which week/month it was. I promise to post some pics of our trip to DC, but in the meantime, here's what I was up to this summer.

Things I Did:

Went to Reno to see Big Bit graduate. Mom, TH, Little Bit and I made the trip and my cousin the Godmother made a detour from her vacation in order to see her Godson graduate. It was a good weekend and really amazing. Big Bit asked me if I cried afterwards, to which TH responded "How many times would you like to hear about?" Too true. All I could think of was him in his little pink and blue cap laying in my arms while I said "Hi Dude, welcome to the world." It goes so damn fast.

Got hooked on Twitter. It gives the instant gratification a distracted Type A personality like me seems to require. I've had some great interactions with people there, some famous (Kelsey Grammer), some known to many (Mike Freeman, who writes for CBS Sports Online, has written several books and apparently wants to kidnap my beagle) and some known only to me. That may have been part of the reason I haven't blogged, and I know Kris has alluded to this as well...you've kind of said things you wanted to say and that takes away from the will to write. If you don't Twitter, you might like it. If you ever do and you follow me, it's really me, warts, liberal viewpoint, Packer obsession and all. You have been warned.

Went to Washington, DC. Awesome week. Did not want to go home. Could live there if I could live in the city. Have to make much more money to live in the city than I think I can. We hit about everything you could want to, including the White House and the Capitol tours (thank you Senator Crapo, I'll never vote for you but still). Met @thewino (Kris), @htphelps (Holly) and @KingMonkeyPants (James Bond), the first two being lovely ladies who blog about life (Kris) and the Packers (Holly) and now are on Twitter as well, the latter a dear friend of Kris' who is a source of absolute joy to me with his abundant humor on Twitter. I would have taken a picture of all of them, but KMP has some sort of super secret government job and I think he would have had to shoot us had he been photographed (I keed, I keed). The whole family was taken with them, to the point that when we went to National Airport (as the locals still call it) to fly home, Little Bit sadly waved out the window of the Metro and said "Bye, Monkey."

Not something I did - but - TH won the Golden Mallet tournament. AGAIN. Friend Steve was a bit apoplectic, because it's Steve's party, on Steve's birthday (this year) and he lost that damn mallet again. He'd gained it back for all of one year.

Had our annual Fourth of July BBQ so we could all troop over to the Depot and watch fireworks. Little Bit had a friend over, friends Steve and Bob brought their kids and everyone had a blast. The amount of munitions in our driveway the next day spoke for themselves.

Went to the Braun Brothers Family Reunion weekend in Challis. Never have been, always wanted to go (an old friend of TH's used to play in their band WAY back when) and finally did. I knew Muzzie and Billy's Mom and Dad when I was little and they were very sweet.

Mom organized it and we had a lot of fun. I think we'll go back next year but I will take earplugs because while I can still party, I can't stay up until 4 a.m. with the kids from LSU; or, to be honest, the nice cowboy and his wife (older than us!) from central Washington who were riding their bicycles in the dark at midnight while TH and I had a last beer and chuckled our heads off. They were very nice though and offered us breakfast the next day.

Went to Seattle for a PACKER game - Woohoo! Okay, here's the thing, Seattle contingent, including not only family but my Packer blog buddy Cuphound - we got there Friday night, ate dinner, went to bed, got up Saturday morning, ate breakfast, went into Seattle on the light rail (we stayed by the airport), had lunch with my old boss, Jenny, who we haven't seen in over a year, went to a tailgate party that I had been invited to by the Northwest Packer Backers, met another Twitter buddy @Greg_A_Bedard who writes for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (boy was I nervous, but he's just a nice, witty, guy who likes to write about the Packers and their crazy fans like me), went to the stadium, ate, watched the game, took the light rail back, got up, had lunch and flew home. Whew. Next time I go over there I'm going to have more time and less things booked.

Things I learned:

It sucks when your teenager really starts acting like one. It was a rough summer with Big Bit, he tended to disappear off the face of the earth once he got back from vacation with his Dad. He wanted to spend most of the summer in Reno with his friends, understandably, but he also decided that he never needed to talk to me just to let me know he was alive (much less had he done any of the things he needed to do...yeah, Mom was asking), there were a few tears and a couple of irritated conversations. If you've gotten to 18.5 years without having all this attitude, I think it surprises you even more. Thank God for my sister-in-law who provided the exact perspective I needed after one of these conversations as she had gone through the same thing - late rebellion. Now Big Bit is here, all is fine and back to a different kind of normal and he's ready to kick off Welcome Week this weekend and get in the swim of college life. I'm excited for him, but I think he might be more excited, though nervous.

Life is damn hard and I'm not as resilient as I used to be. I am grateful to have a decent job with good pay in this economy. I am glad my boss is not Sybil and her boss (and his boss) seem to like me. Still, there are many writings on the wall which say the long term prospects are not good. I'm tired of feeling underutilized and overbored. I've been working on the attitude but it's hard. (Whiner, you say? You would be right and I've said that to myself.) There is a possibility of a job on the horizon that in some ways looks promising and in some ways looks scary due to some inside info I have. I should know if I have it next week. Without divulging much, let's just say that it involves a very stable employer. And a pension. And those are very, very attractive things.

I probably don't have the patience to really learn to play piano, but God bless my friend Allen for trying to teach me.

I am technically old enough to be Aaron Rodgers' mother. Damn, that's depressing.

Our little Mario beagle has a big heart and a fierce growl. We think he may have been abused because the poor little guy recoils if you even raise your voice. Big Bit terrified him accidentally with a fly swatter of all things. But he's very dear to us already.

Little Bit has to have some testing, probably in a couple of months, because the dr. we got referred to thinks he may have borderline Asperger's. Maybe not, but maybe. And while I'm grateful that it isn't worse, because obviously things always could be, I'm struggling more than a little bit with this particular bit of news.

I'm two months from being a year older and I don't think I'm any wiser. When does that kick in, exactly?

Lastly, I found out last night that the EHFH has a tumor on his liver and has to have a biopsy next week. He's only 44. Big Bit is understandably upset and concerned (as am I, actually) so please keep EHFH and Big Bit in your thoughts and prayers. With BB starting college next week here, the timing is of course impeccable. NOT.

So, in WAY more than a nutshell, that is what's been going on. I promise to write more so as not to write a novel again. I hope you've all been well and I promise you haven't been away from my thoughts.

Just When I Think I've Got It Together

Then the last 10 days happen. (Actually I never think I have things together, but sometimes I do like to dream).

Let's see...in order of things happening (though not of importance) we had our Weekend at Willie's and the official Golden Mallet Tournament.

Before all that started though, we found out the horse races were going at Les Bois Park. Yes!!! We've actually gotten to go twice in a year. We got to go for an hour between getting up and having lunch; then attending the Golden Mallet Tournament. So, when I said it was busy, it was. This was our one hour of taking a deep breath.

Love Les Bois. It is pretty in its own Idaho way. And we saw Rod Stewart. Sort Of. Big Bit played paparazzi and stalked him.

"Rod" is apparently a limo driver in Boise who dresses up for his clients (I found out from my cousin Dan the next day). I guess he's been around for years but we'd never laid eyes on him. Now, we have. And who says you can't see interesting things in Idaho?

Pics of the track and environs - I sure miss this place. All of it.

We even picked one winner before we had to go. I think we cleared exactly nothing if you add in the cost of beer. Maybe less, since we picked the winner to show so I think we made a whopping $4 on a $2 bet. We won a few others but nothing of distinction.

Did I mention it's pretty? I think I did, but bear with me, here's some proof.

Then...it was on to THE TOURNAMENT.

Our friend Steve (well, TH's friend Steve, since he was the ERISA attorney for our department at the old Mother Ship he probably wishes he'd never met me other than because of that he got to meet TH) hosts a croquet tournament annually. The first time he invited us was I think four years ago. Steve has an expensive croquet set he bought from a Wall Street Journal ad back when the Mother Ship actually paid profit sharing because there were profits. He's gotten a lot of fun out of it over the years. I note that it's expensive, because if you look at the pictures, you will see it is NOTHING like any croquet set you or I grew up with.

TH won the first year we went. Then, incredibly, he won the next two years as well. The prize? The total discomfiture of attorneys, college professors and human resource professionals everywhere who really shouldn't be this competitive; and a beautiful gold spray painted croquet mallet (the kind we all have that paid $15 bucks for our sets at Target) with the names engraved. Steve REALLY wanted that mallet out of Utah and we'd heard there was a plot afoot to reclaim it at any costs. There wasn't, and TH almost won AGAIN, but a last minute ploy by Jim the professor killed TH's ball and it was all over. It was almost more fun this year not winning because last year when TH won I thought some people were going to lose their tempers, so now they're all happy.

Here's (from left) Steve, Jim and TH plotting their strategies:

I got to see my friend the Donna-lama (kind of like the Dalai Lama, she is very peaceful and calm). It was good to see her and we will have our final Weekend at Willie's with her in September. Yay!

TH and friend Shawn got to visit some. Shawn is interesting - he lived in Nevada in the same town as my ex in-laws at the same time I lived in Nevada and knew many of the same people I did. But we didn't meet until he interviewed for a job in my department at the old Mother Ship. It is a small world, but I wish I would have met Shawn in Nevada. It would have made it more bearable. He's born and bred Utahn (he is a Utah man, if you know the Ute's fight song) and he won't live here, either.

Shakespeare for that weekend was MacBeth and I really was disappointed in it, though the Green Show was probably one of the best ever. I can't wait to see Tom and Joe in "Greater Tuna" which is the last play of the season. Right now, I really need a dose of Joe and Tom, the Fool Squad, available for parties (www.foolsquad.com). I think the problem was it reminded me of MacBeth when we saw it in Ashland with Cousin Steve with its Asian theme (fun weekend with him, but didn't like the presentation of the play) and we'd just seen it I think two/three years ago at the Festival in a different setting. Plus Mr. Dan P. wasn't there. It made for a cloud.

But here's Tom and Joe being Tom and Joe! (Oh, Big Bit is REALLY talking College of Idaho, he even said it to Grandma. Must make plans to be home in 2 years, but I think it will be sooner given what's going on at work).



Wanted to get this out there - the Sunday, 2nd half of the weekend involving a wedding that made me feel really old and ANOTHER pregnant cousin (I currently have four and counting) - that post is yet to come.

Cheers.