Nephew

My sister just sent me an email with photo's of her son, whom I've never seen. (He's like 4 or 5 years old so this tells you how close my sister and I are.)

On the DNA gradient scale, my sister has very dark hair and very dark eyes. Her coloring is straight out of my dad's Native American gene pool. I, the second child, the middle of psychological development AND mom & pop's coloring, have lighter brown eyes and lighter brown hair. When I was younger, even till my early 20's, my hair was more red than brown. Cody, the 3rd child and only boy has my mothers complete European color. Creamy white skin, cotton blond hair, and Prussian blue eyes.

Color aside, we all three look exactly like my mom AND dad who don't look like each other.

My sister now has three children. Two daughters almost grown, and then the little boy. Same gender set up as our family. Her oldest daughter looks just like my sister (her mom) and just like me. The second daughter is a equal mix of her mom and dad. So, I was kind of expecting her younger boy to look more like my brother.

And then I opened the photo document. And the boy looks just like my sister and me! dark brown hair, dark brown eyes, same every thing! It really kind of threw me for a curve ball. I don't know why, but that is just not what I imagined her boy to look like, and it's not what I imagine my future children to look like, but I think there is strong evidence that they will. And that's not really jiving with the fantasy life I've concocted all these years...

Ducks

I had a not-so-great day today. Sometimes, when I have those days, the bike commute home clears my head and I get home happier and more relaxed. Sometimes though, the extra exertion raises my blood pressure and I get caught inside my head, having destructive conversations with myself. Today was that day and by the time I got to my street I could feel my face distorted in the pre-storm of big fat tears.

As I pulled up on to the side walk of my complex I saw a mottled brown mamma duck with three little ducklings walking through the sprinklers. Those little fuzzy ducks playing in the water zapped any bad thought right out of my head!

I don't know why I love animals so much but I just do!

Blog Roll

Do you remember a long time ago, before Blogs, in a land called Boston, we received almost weekly email updates from J. Andy Kane. The emails would contain the latest on what was happening at Club Passim, random trips, and the lyrics to a song? And you felt kind of cool that you were on the mail distribution list? I for one, would love to have more updates from Mr. Kane since marring one of the coolest girls in the world, running off to CA and having an adorable baby. I thought for sure that he would have one of the greatest blogs around. But the once great electronic communicators and his lovely wife are somewhat off the grid. sad. If anyone has any sway with these two, can you prod them into more updates for the wanting semi-public?

Anyway, I was thinking of them as I have a(n)(inactive) link to their blog. Do you wander who else I review on a constant basis? Oddly, I almost never log into my blog to get my updates via my links. This is more how it happens:

I go to Replikate's blog, see what is going on in her world. From her links I first visit
Kelly
then I back track and visit
Corey - from Corey I check up on Jodi and Jesse, Lane and Jalei, Lisa, and JaNe and Evan.
back track now I click on my own link. from my link I visit
Rachel & Jeremy and baby E. - then to Linda. From Linda I visit the Turleybenson. From Turleybenson I check in on all the Revere Ward people. then back up to Linda and go to Kevin (who is already on my own list, but I'm already on Linda's.)
then I back up to my list and visit Hyrum and Nicole - which give my Melyn & Kyler (if I'm NOT logged into my blog email...) and also gives me Leah
back to my list to visit Cassy
then to Cara from which I can visit Stacey and Aleigh and Lauren, if I hadn't already visited Lauren via Linda via Katie.

And if no one has posted in the past few days I'm not above reading links from people that I have never ever met. It's like People and US of the Mormon world for me.

This of couse is all after I've read the major newspapers and my scriptures...

Maya Angelou

Long, Long ago, I used to race almost every weekend. Don't get me wrong, I was never very fast, but I really enjoy the camaraderie of a race. And I love having a large collection of t-shirts. But that was long ago, and I really haven't been running much, let alone racing. But I've missed it, and so I talked my friend Krysta into doing a race with me last Saturday. It was the inaugural Maya Angelou something-or-other foundation 5-k fund raiser.

Neither of us have really prepared for the run, but we were both impressed with ourselves on how well we did and how easy the race was and it was really tons of fun. So we are thinking we are going to try to do one a month. YAY! I was really starting to run low on t-shirts. :)


Krysta and me before the race.

Me being cheesy before the race with all the boats in the background. I assure you this was the least cheesy photo of me. How do you like my hot pink top and my purple shorts?? Hey, if you can't outrun people by speed, you gotta try blinding them.

NYC

I have really been having an urge to go to NYC the past few months. I remember the first time I went was overwhelming to me. Not the bigness, but the noise. Non-stop noise and lights. But each time I go, I like it more and more. I don't think I'd ever want to live there, but I do love going for a day or two.

I took the Chinatown bus from DC. It was so strange to be entering the city from New Jersey. For the past many years I had been traveling down from Boston and entered from CT and it was a little disconcerting to see it from a different angle. An angle that doesn't seem to belong to me yet.

I had three specific things that I wanted to do: go to the temple, a matinee show at the NYC Ballet, and go to the Strand book store. Without giving you a line by line journaled detail of my time table, let me just say that I was perfectly timed to be where I needed to be, when I needed to be there. It seemed that the entire city was working on my time table.

I did get to see a few new parts of the city. Two favorite little spots where both gardens. I grabbed a quick deli lunch between attending the temple, and going to the ballet. There was no seating left at the deli. I walked down a side street and was going to be content to sit on a brick wall and eat my sandwich and soup, when I noticed across the way, a little garden with benches. I went in, ate my lunch, listened to the birds and felt more like a new yorker in a hidden gem, than a tourist at a flashy eatery.

The second garden is a public garden along East Houston. I spotted it as I was walking from the book store to Chinatown to find a bus home. I was in too much of a rush to go inside and look at everything, but slowed my walk and brushed my hand against the plants along the fence. It will be my first stop on my next trip to the city.

Another reason I'm glad that I don't live there is all the food! I am no foodie, but I think I'd get very fat if I lived in New York. There are so many tempting restaurants, bistro's, deli's, and pasty shops. I would want to sample the whole city and then I'd be a big apple! Sadly, there were no roasted nut carts anywhere in the city. Does anyone know the scoop on the missing peanuts?

The one thing that is difficult for me, and this is true of all trips, vacations or splurges, is my extreme unwillingness to spend money. My mind itemizes and adds every penny that I spend and I think about the things that I SHOULD spend my money on, not the things that I want to spend my money on. There are certain virtues to being such a tightwad, and I'm sure Benjamin Franklin would approve, but even Silas Mariner only found happiness after learning to spend his money instead of hording it away in his floor boards.

All in all, it was a very successful trip. And I can't wait till the next time when I can go visit the newly discovered garden.

Star Trek

I watched the new Star Trek yesterday. Ah the memories. I grew up watching reruns of the original Star Trek and it had quite an effect on me. My childhood fantasy life, when living with my grandparents in Louisiana, involved a combination of Star Trek and Fantasy Island. At dusk I would put on my grandmother's white flowing night-gown, with matching robe and hood and run around the yard, chiffon fabric blowing in the breeze.

In my world, the Magnolia tree was my mother ship, the Pecan tree close by was the evil ship, and all the Azalea bushes were worlds to be conquered. I wish that I had photo's of the schematic of my grandmother's yard so that you could see the distance involved in my conquering, and how large these 'planets' were. I couldn't suspend reality well enough to make myself believe that I could transport to these planets, so I had to create my own little space shuttle for travel. My space shuttle was a toy International tractor that looked like this:



The other thing I realized watching the new Star Trek is how much I love Spock. And I loved Spock when I was little too. I think this might explain a little bit about my troubles in my love life; I love men who are logical, structured, and emotionally controlled to the point of almost being robotic.

I'll probably have a better chance of getting to the Moon with that toy tractor than make a real-life Mr. Spock fall in love with me.

BTW, if you haven't already, go see the new Star Trek!

so boring it's not worthy of a post title...

Hello Reader, I haven't posted for sometime, because I have nothing new to post about. For all those who have wondered, the earrings are still in. And even though it has been well past the six weeks mark, I still wear the same little corn-flower blue earrings that I had the ears pierced with.

I have bought one pair of what looked like small sparkly studs. But I've found that earrings are like Christmas trees; what looks small out in the open, is too big for the living room once you get it inside. I first attempted to change the earrings around the 8 week mark. I got the left earring out of my ear with a little bit of pain and tugging. When I picked up the new earring, four times larger than the other pair, I knew that I should not have started this without assistance. It was Saturday night, my friend Krysta and her husband where out of town, and wouldn't see my co-worker Jess until Monday. And seriously, I'm a grown woman, I should be able to do this my self. With a few sweat and tears (literally) I got the new earring into my left ear. I didn't even try to work on my right ear. The next morning out with the new and back with the old.

I have since worn the new pair once.

So, I don't know if this post is a testamant to my very boring life that I am telling you all about this, or if getting my ears peirced has been such a trauma for me that each step seems note worthy.