Spring Break is Over

Yesterday was a busy day dedicated to tying up loose ends for the vacation.
Bear and I went to get Squeaky and bring him home. This we did quickly and successfully... to the amazement of others involved in our delivery of the boy.
Then it was back home to leave him and head out for the town to the left. The baby needed a big boy hair cut. It was time. So we did that and he was so good we were not sure that he was not a foundling switched for our wiggly guy in the night by fairy folk. Now he's the little man!

After that it was Chinese food out and a quiet night at Bear's house. Watched the Nickelodeon Kids Choice Awards of all things... twice. YIKES. Doe it amaze anyone that Twilight won for best movie? Me neither.

Cousin J got me some CDs of more punk... Pogues, a rare Murphy I do not have and some Flogging Molly that I don't have. Yes, it's my Irish thing. Today I down load them into the MP3 for walking use. I am happy. It was a nice surprise. What a sweetie he is.

I got to do a little reading before bed, so my lizard saga continues to my great joy. It is my plan to devote hours to it today while I do my mountain of vacation laundry and prepare for going back to work like normal people. I'm missing my vacation already. I know, I know... what am I griping about? In a couple of short months I will be on a nearly 3 month vacation... complete with pay checks (because I have already worked for that pay by the time vacation comes, not because they pay me vacation pay). That is my prime reading time. I garden and read. Boy am I ready for that.

I am also starting to plan my trip to Germany next Tax-mas. Did I tell you about that? Well, a kid that grew up in my house as much as in his up the street... B-wreck's best friend... is stationed in Germany. He's a sergeant there with a wife and a couple of darling little girls. They have invited me to come and visit. He's going to take off two weeks while I am there and we will get in the van and see Germany and perhaps a few other close spots. I am so excited to be going somewhere outside of this continent. I know I have a ton of stuff to do... get a passport, shots, whatever. I have to find out exactly what and get on it.

I am ending my week exhausted in a good way. I hope that you are all feeling as content. Big smile.

Taking Squeaky Away

It's now Monday here. The Bear is coming today to help me take Squeaky away. He and his geek freak friend, L spend all holidays and vacation time bouncing back and forth between our homes. This year I get Spring Break to myself and he goes to L's house.

L's family moves a lot. Every time I take him there they have just moved or move while he is there. So it's always a map quest adventure. I've mentioned before that I can get lost anywhere on my way to a new location... but once I have been there, it is etched in stone in my head and I can find my way home and back again with ease.

You might think that because of this the Bear has taken pity on me and come to the rescue of poor old get lost mom. Nope. She worked her last day on Friday. She is going back to college to become a nurse and has some time off before her classes begin. (I am so proud of her!) She's bored. She has a nice new car to drive and I am glad to ride in it. It will also help sedate Squeaky who firmly believes that we will never be un-lost once I get lost. I will be glad too to see my precious baby Mikey, who has not yet figured out that there might be something better on earth than grandma.

I know that I talk about my boys all the time, because they are so often with me. I don't mention the Bear that often. She lives in the town to the left. We will hang out there tonight while her dad does his meeting thing. It's not always parking lots, though I love the reading time... especially now that the lizards have attacked and the Tosevites are just getting it together. She is a big part of my life too and sometimes when I use the term "boys" she is lumped in there too. Like the boys say... she is the toughest and the meanest among us. I know, girls are not supposed to be that way, but she is also the funniest and most energetic.

This is the girl who, after clothing shopping, sat in the back seat with her new panties on her head and waved to the cars that passed us by( in middle school). She was the homerun queen in softball. Also the girl that mom had to leave work to go to a local bad place where mom had to storm the house to physically drag her out. For a time in high school she was deeply depressed. We have gone rounds. There was a time when I was scared silly that I would lose her to alcohol abuse. My boys have been saints in comparison. She was not an easy child. My hair shines with silver from this girl! As difficult as she was, I love her a bazillion times more.

Here is the wonderful part. She got through it, even the humilation of biserker mom. I could not be happier with who she has become. Life is an evolution for each of us. As long as the evolution moves in a positive direction, we are doing well. Today will be a fun day that I am sure will involve Chinese food from Fortuna... the best place ever. We will laugh ourselves silly and baby will entertain us. A good segue to our coast trip tomorrow.

It is a good day for being thankful for family and friends. Hard work sometimes but pure joy!

That's the way it goes

I got up this morning to swollen ears and hives all over me-self. Oddly enough, this is not that unusual for me. The ear thing... I do not know what that is about but it comes with the hives. The hives come from being sick. My body's rage against illness.

Despite the mess in the mirror, I drug myself to work, only to retreat after first period to my home. I get up, dabble at the computer and go back to my chair for a nap. Twice I have drained all the hot water from the tank by standing under the shower. I know it is not good for hives but the heat feels so good. It's a weird illness. Achy and tired mostly. Not too bad. There is much worse out there.

I have begun my Spring Break by coming home. Squeaky is still ill but on the far side now, almost well. He will want me to take a map quest trip... which never goes well for me, as you may recall... and drive him to his best friend's new home. These two are geeks to the nth. They are connected at the headset just about every moment he is off from school that he is not doing homework. Squeaky will take his computer, game machines, etc. with him.

Next Tuesday I am supposed to go to the beach. I am looking forward to that. But will have to be well by then. I won't make baby Mikey sick. Go Tuesday and come home Thursday. I will be sure to take my camera. The coast up here is more wild than the beaches I am used to. I love how the wind whips the waves around. No one will be swimming. Shell collecting and surf watching. Do the tourist thing... but I will throw my own trash away, unlike our tourist here. I will be an annoying camera geek instead.

The rest of my time I will pretty much be alone here with Squeaky gone. Max works. Even when he doesn't, he stays busy the way that twenty-one-year-olds do. It will feel weird. Maybe peaceful?

What will any of you do for Spring Break or do you get one? I'm lucky that I work in education and have these vacations all over the place. It was the ideal job when I was single mom... if the kids were off, mom was there. Bummer for them. ha. If not Spring Break, do you have any plans for the weekend? Or something special coming up?

STUFFS

Spring Break is coming up for me. One of the advantages of working in a school is that I get spring break, winter break, many holidays and the entire summer off. I get 12 checks a year, so it isn't feast or famine. I am trying to figure out what to do for that week and the weekends on each end of it.

What would you do if you could go on vacation this time of year? Any suggestions?

Here are a few Irish factoids... Oh suffer through them! Humor me. There are only 4.

Did you know that St. Patrick was the second Bishop of Ireland, not the first?

He had dreams and heard voices like Joan of Arc... good thing he wasn't in France.

There were Irish immigrants in Colonial times too, though they were not poor and many were rich... one, Charles Carroll, who was the wealthiest man in the 13 colonies, lived to be 94 and was the only signer to see a railroad train. (My own Great-grandma, "Ma Boo" danced a jig for me when she was 96 years old! Go old Irish folk!)

Between 1830 and 1920 4.5 million Irish immigrants came to the USA and now 36,495,800 people claim Irish heritage (2006 census), second only to those of German heritage. Mexican Americans are at 28 million and something in the same census. (The Irish number doesn't include the Scottish-Irish who are counted separately and number around 5 million more.) Facts came from
http://memory.loc.gov/learn/features/immig/irish2.html.

That's all the Irish for the day.

My favorite quote heard today:
“You should take this one because I have a fat head.” --one
kindergartner handing a piece of paper to another one. No, I don't get it either.

I found this and thought it was interesting enough to do:
Earth Hour: March 28,2009 8:30-9:30 p.m. turn off your lights.
http://www.earthhourus.org/main.php

Now I am going to go and figure out how to get photos from my camera into my computer and from the computer into my blog. Wish me luck.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope your blessings outnumbered the things that ticked you off today!