close out on 2006...bargain prices

2006 is for sale! i know there's only 1 day left but you can have it now for next to nothing. i know this will sound disgruntled in the beginning but i will bring it around to the positive, i promise. the year at the institute for leadership advancement started with 2 vacancies and 2 more arose, tilting the sinking ship again, and those of us hanging on clutched our 4% raise knowing it was the reminder not to leave (given the state budget had operated in the red for the past 5 years). our Ph.D. assistant suggested we might want to read the leaderless organization as he departed for his newly appointed deanship at a small florida college. indeed we might. things have shaped up with a new director finally, but it is still an unstable environment, so much so that a colleague shared the openings on campus so that i might have a plan B. women's studies and international education are staffing. i'll definitely keep that in mind. you see this is a college town in an agricultural state. so, unless i want to raise cattle or grow cotton, i should plan on working for the uni and that i do. its just difficult to operate at wages that i believe i began my career with in the 90s. can i have some cheese with that whine?

okay enough about work. my family is well, sister-in-law is out of the gutter, and everyone is happy. aubrey and i are quite content in the tiny matchbox we call home. hopefully the yoga room renovation will be completed soon and we'll have another room to escape to. the deck and yard are expansive but not as frequented in wintry weather. aubrey continues to remodel homes and is currently finishing one near lake oconee. actually its not near enough to the lake to call it our lake house so we will sell it for sure. i guess his next one will be near athens...or there has been some talk about exploring asheville, NC. its just talk though, i think.

before i quit bitching, let me throw in the health card. i've been reading up on 'women's health after 35' and the window it covers is from age 35 to menopause, commonly believed to be around age 51. the book is full of useful info that explains the changes but come on, its a 15-year window of time. its like, be ready for any of this at any time. so far, i'm not thrilled with the changes and they really throw a wrench into my other plans for life. i suppose this is the adjustment period. humpf. anyway, i'm grumbling my way through it reminding myself that i have my health, home, family, career, and partner. and i'm thankful for that. see, thats positive right? i brought it back around.

hope your 2007 is what you expect and if not, i'm sure someone has written a book about it. head to the local library.
all the best,
grumpy

deck the halls...

the holiday buzz started weeks ago with office luncheons, followed by office luncheons, i think i went to 3 this year. and now i'm off for 10 days, yahoo academia! we'll hit mom's for dinner and presents tomorrow, then visit friends xmas eve, then aubrey's mom's for dinner and presents on monday. we just cancelled our post xmas road trip to DC to enjoy the quiet of our college town sans coeds. we'll finish the yoga room remodel and just catch up on things. this is my first adult tree after decades of living in studio apartments and observing it solo. miracles do happen. hope your holidays are relaxing too. merry merry.

meet the johnson's...for thanksgivinig

well, as a couple we're progressing, to the point where we drive all over the state visiting every family member on both sides for holidays. whatever that gets ya...we went to canton to the johnson's and had the best dressing ever: its chicken and dressing all baked into one dish. its so awesome, we took what was left home with us.

Colors of autumn...or the 70's

aubrey and i painted the house recently. we went with a green/ orange/brown colorscape, otherwise known as my favorite colors. given that autumn is also my favorite season, its a no brainer as to the color choices. when we were all done though, aubrey said it was very 70's...not sure what that means b/c that certainly wasn't my favorite decade. well anyway, here it is with a fresh coat of paint and a shed to match. Color names are rice paddy, fudge truffle, and pumpkin umber. hungry? the green is just shy

of a pale celery shade, it has a tad more yellow than i wanted and in sunlight looks more pale yellow, but on a good shady day, its pale celery green. now the fudge truffle brown is just the right shade but it turns out you have to paint brick with oil-based paint if you want it to stick and thus it has a sheen. i'm very much into matte finish and they say the sheen will dull quickly in weather. i'm still waiting. lastly the deck is sort of a terra cotta shade which i love with green and brown. you may notice the shed is green with brown trim and that

the brown is subtler. thats the mocha brown in matte finish that i selected initially but opted out of for fudge truffle. so truth be told, there are 2 browns. and the front door is stripped down to natural wood and we loved the color so we just put on a coat of poly to protect it. come to think of it, the steps dont look so shiny anymore in full sunlight. whew! who wants a shiny house with 70s colors. oh and finishing touch, that's aubrey's sculpture on the front porch.

Let the eating begin...

Mom had her retirement age birthday yesterday and the whole family made it to the brunch celebration. Not that she can actually retire just yet, but any excuse to eat big eh? So we went to the Blue Willow Inn in Social Circle, GA, reknowned for its fried green tomatoes, fried chicken, and mac-n-cheese among other typical southern specialties. Bad time to try low-carb diet...but I made the best of it. Said no to the mashed potatoes, dressing and gravy. Tried awesome turnip greens, butter peas, squash with bacon, mac cheese (had to), pork bbq, and a tiny pinch of corn muffin. The food was like most southern food i've had actually, which is fine, but not what i really eat these days. so i dont know if the menu is awesome, but the decor is fun and we ate in the charleston room. all in all, mom loved it and it was her favorite birthday in a while. i think she just loved grandkids crawling all over her. ;-)

aye matey

as usual, we decided at the last minute to dress up for halloween. really it was just for the trick-or-treaters who came to the door. i mean we didnt actually go out for halloween, no that would require leaving the house. well, actually we have in years' past, but anyway, we did have candy handy and i whipped up a pirate's outfit.

cumberland island solitude

the highlight of the birthday weekend was the day trip over to cumberland island. a perfect off-season excursion from 9am ferry ride to return at 4pm. it was just enough time to take a ranger-led hike, eat lunch at the beach, take another hike back and soak up the indian summer. there was literally no one on the beach when we arrived, having taken the road less traveled, or simply having waited for others to choose their path and then take the one no one took. we collected sharks teeth, shells, frolicked in the ocean, dried off, hiked over the dunes, explored the marsh, and learned about the island's history on a ranger hike. the wild horses have been there forever, they arent 'maintained' so some look pretty scrawny. the dungeness castle remains are from the gilded age and there were some posh parties during the summer-long vacations folks took here back in the day.

salvage in savannah

september is my favorite month and its almost over. the climate settles down and the air is crisp and cool. you can sleep with the windows open and listen to the crickets and the train. since we enjoyed that on vacation it made me feel like i was sleeping in a cabin somewhere away from home on holiday. in fact i think i'll go on holiday for my birthday. actually we already have flights. were going to hit savannah antique salvage yards, tybee island crab shack, ferry to cumberland island and just soak up georgia's oldest city ambience. i was doing a little digging online for culture and found a tour company that rolls around the historic district on segways! now i would expect shiny new modern transit in singapore but not savannah georgia. we wont actually take one but i hope i see one so i can snap a photo as they overtake a horse and carriage on a cobblestoned street. with aubrey in decorator mood we'll be scouting for antique appliances and mantles and lighting. hopefully we get to tour some of the squares and historic homes like these.

cooling my heels

post vacation finds me back at my desk, on campus, waiting in lunch lines behind throngs of students, wondering why there are so many cars on my bicycle route to work. but just last week, i had a lovely 10 days in the TN/NC mountains, a few even at a spa, to recharge me. i swam in a muddy pond, several pools, rivers, and a big lake. we spent time with a llama, goats, sheep and buck the very skilled farm guard dog, my extended family, and then just us 2 road tripping thru the hills. back home it approached 100 every day and we were cooling it in the 80s; perfectly timed escape i think. we managed to bring home some hwy127 sale antique ladders, saws, barrels, mirrors and parasols. then we saved our money for walnut encrusted trout, fine coffees, and desserts. we ended the week at the nantahala gorge, on the heels of diane sawyer's recent visit, and soaked up the beauty. unable to bring myself to return home, we then buzzed down to my other home and alma mater, young harris and hiawasee for the weekend and finished off the trip swinging lakeside at virginia's place in absolute peace. ahhhhh.

water is the answer

yippee! aubrey sold his house, we close tomorrow. and we've already bought another fixer upper, a great old house foreclosure near a lake. anyone have a boat that needs a home? so with that pressure off, we've decided to take a little vacation. we head to the mountains next weekend. we start off in Tennessee with the Hwy 127 sale, hit the farm in amish country for a few days, then cruise over to the Nantahala forest for some river time, again in the mountains. GMA was there this summer and told the whole world so i hope there's still water left in the river. that's my new plan for surviving the south, stay near water, yearround.

Isabelle

puppy sitting isabelle this week. i forgot what that involved. they are really sweet when they are tired and sleepy, but watchout for a freshly napped puppy. she's beagle/lab mix so there was fun to be had with a tennis ball. she also took well to instructions from luxi, the momma surrogate. within 2 days, she slept in her crate, did her business outside, and made friends at the fenceline. i think we're gonna miss her when she goes home...;-(

summer vacation budget

i have a new air conditioning system for the house! the other one died on the hottest day of the year so far: 104. also, we have a new boss at work, finally after a 1 year search. i got a raise for the new year which starts in January, ugh. hopefully aubrey's house will sell this week. oh and i'm puppy sitting for my brother soon. there's an option to keep Boss for Sean who left for afghanistan this week to work for KBR aka Halliburton for a year or more, which would require driving to colorado, but that would be in the autumn if at all. so, thats it for our summer vacation plans. i'm mostly hiding out indoors in the AC. still biking to work, but melting my face off, so i dont know how long that will continue. anybody who wants to send us to costa rica to caretake their home in august, we're available.

roller coasters, the faster the smoother, supposedly

now, dont get me wrong, i hate 'em, have since i was a teenager. my inner ear just never could catch up and the thrill was gone early from amusement parks. but the kids had never been to six flags and one of them is 9 years old which is prime time for loving this kind of stuff! so we all went on UGA night at six flags where the university kindly arranged super discounts and openend the park in the cool of the evening for univ families and friends only.
here are the head fashions that my nieces and nephews were fascinated by. i must say that they were more intrigued by that than any roller coaster which scared the daylights out of most of them. aubrey dragged me to a couple of ride lines that i just refused to enter, so i agreed to go and ride the old school roller coasters that i recall surviving in childhood. aunt connie and howdy, retired and also spending a fun evening with the kids, even agreed to get nostalgic and try the dahlonega mine train and great american scream machine again with me. what we experienced: stomach dropping plunges, neck breaking jerks and turns that still have me outta whack, what we learned: supposedly all the new rides, that seem like thrill seeking death challenges, are actually less jerky and dangerous. it remains a theory b/c none of us was willing to test it. i know where they get the ideas for shapes of those hats.

give me mountains over beaches any day

aubrey and i made a dash over to the coast, 5 hours is the shortest drive to any ocean from atlanta, and we chose the coast of south carolina. we camped where we could with no reservation on memorial day weekend. the first day we found a site at Hunting island and because the island was solely a state park it had a gorgeous landscape. amazingly, we were the only non-RV camper and given the tiniest site, but it was a site, against the dunes, with the closest view of the ocean and loggerhead turtle nesting grounds. however, what that really meant was, it was the site beside the boardwalk that everyone uses to cross the dunes, or thru your campsite, which was out from under the shelter of the palmettos and thus HOT, very hot. we made the best of our very windy, thus sandy, hot site and blocked the wind with the car.
in the morning, at 6am, we took our chairs down the shoreline to a grove of palmettos and read, yoga'd, and coffe'd in peace for a few hours. the water was really murky and with an oil rig in site, we decided to pack it up and hit edisto island, the next in a chain. as we left we felt a bit of RV and recreational bike envy. not really, but sorta.
Luckily, Edisto Island, was equally botanically blessed and seemingly had plenty of beach cottages for rental and a state park for camping, but alas neither had any openings. so we spent the day choosing our dream beach cottage, hitting the sand and then headed to Charleston for the evening; again with a bit of cottage envy.
a quick phone call to mary from charleston and a bit whining about murky water, RVs, no vacancies, and she quickly had her brother-in-law set us up with a room overlooking the cooper river bridge into charleston on opening night of the spoleto art festival! envy that eh!
Needless to say, with the realization that we'd gone soft, that we were no longer the fearless campers of our youth, we dove into the king sized bed and turned up the AC...and did not see any Spoleto acts. Morning came and another local friend, melissa guided us to shem creek the next day for lunch and exploring. after dining on the deck along the canal where the yachts parade and hearing that blue crabs were just not comin in this season, we left with a bit of boat and crab envy. next we found the quaint historic little fishing village of mt. pleasant where our friends were restoring an old church to live in and quickly developed historic house envy.
Mary suggested we not miss sullivan's island stations 22-24, so we decided to hit the beach again after lunch and hang with the bocce ball crowd...only we forgot our bocce set and the walk from the car was so long that we just watched...you guessed it, with envy.
Later that evening we decided 3 days was enough and that we would cruise charleston's waterfront and then head home, driving in the cool of the evening. a quick roll down meeting street and along the battery showed folks out and about headed to another pricey night of spoleto arts and culture. we agreed right then to get out of town, hit the waffle house on the road for dinner and get home before we developed another envy.
it was a disappointing beach trip, oh the water was a little prettier up by charleston, but still very churned and cloudy. perhaps it's just because we are financially challenged or perhaps i'm spoiled by the pacific beaches, the clear blue waters of tahoe, or maybe, just maybe, i dont like the beach. i mean i havent seen the caribbean yet or costa rica, but i suspect even when i do, i'll say give me a cottage up in the hills, in the cool of the trees, with a view of your beach and when you come home at days end you can tell me all about it.

Triple A.D.D.

Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder

This is how it manifests:
I decide to water my garden.
As I turn on the hose in the driveway, I look over at my car and decide my car needs washing.
As I start toward the garage, I notice that there is mail on the porch table that I brought up from the mailbox earlier.
I decide to go through the mail before I wash the car.
I lay my car keys down on the table, put the junk mail in the garbage can under the table, and notice that the can is full.
So, I decide to put the bills back on the table and take out the garbage first.
But then I think, since I'm going to be near the mailbox when I t ake out the garbage anyway, I may as well pay the bills first.
I take my checkbook off the table, and see that there is only one check left.
My extra checks are in my desk in the study, so I go inside the house to my desk where I find the can of Coke that I had been drinking.
I'm going to look for my checks, but first I need to push the Coke aside so that I don't accidentally knock it over. I realize the Coke is getting warm, and I decide I should put it in the refrigerator to keep it cold.
As I head toward the kitchen with the Coke, a vase of flowers on the counter catches my eye--they need to be watered.
I set the Coke down on the counter, and I discover my reading glasses that I've been searching for all morning.
I decide I better put them back on my desk, but first I'm going to water the flowers.
I set the glasses back down on the counter, fill a container with water and suddenly I spot the TV remote Someone left it on the kitchen table.
I realize that tonight when we go to watch TV, I will be looking for the remote, but I won't remember that it's on the kitchen table, so I decide to put it back in the den where it belongs, but first I'll water the flowers.
I pour some water in the flowers, but quite a bit of it spills on the floor.
So, I set the remote back down on the table, get some towels and wipe up the spill.
Then I head down the hall trying to remember what I was planning to do.

At the end of the day:
the driveway is flooded
the car isn't washed,
the bills aren't paid,
there is a warm can of Coke sitting on the counter,
there is still only one check in my check book,
I can't find the remote,
I can't find my glasses,
and I don't remember what I did with the car keys.

Then when I try to figure out why nothing got done today, I'm really baffled because I know I was busy all day long, and I'm really tired.
I realize this is a serious problem, and I'll try to get some help for it, but first I'll check my e-mail.
Do me a favor, will you? Forward this message to everyone you know, because I don't remember who I have sent it to.
Don't laugh -- if this isn't you yet, your day is coming!

shade trees

well i'm filled with good vibes and joy these days but i think its because of the shade trees (pecan and water oak) in my garden and all the blooming flowers vs. the cleansing routine. i tried it for a month and the results were regularity and feeling lighter. but now i worry that im dependent on the stuff. im taking a 5-day break so i'm not sure yet, but i'll try it again for another month and see. i'm also biking to work daily, trying to resume my yoga routine and perfecting a mean game of bocce ball. so soon, all will be right with the world. oh, the dog, luxi, is aubrey's and she's afraid of bocce so she investigates while we take a break for beverages and then runs back and hides on the deck while we play.

cleansing

well its springtme in the southland and if i were a good housekeeper i would be thinking of spring cleaning and attacking all the corner critters in the house. and to that end i have been in the garden clearing away the beds and planting new flowers, however the real spring cleaning i have decided to do is for me! i just bought into colonic cleansing and am starting a 2-month odyssey to clean out my system. yep, drnatura.com says it all and since all the customers are happy and i am not, i jumped in. i promise i wont write about all the strange and unbelievable things that i encounter but i will testify if i 'feel' noticeably different.
this last year has been a challenge for me as my body began to feel old for the first time ever. hormonal changes affected my moods, my weight, and general positive disposition which really ticked me off. my boyfriend of 7 months has hung in there fine, but i feel i'm robbing him of knowing the best me that i can offer. so ive chatted with my internist numerous times and swapped out Rx in search of the right hormone balance, but nothing has really clicked. i got outta whack with exercise over winter as we all tend to do but this year it really showed, and how! i cant wait to start biking to work again and rekindle my love affair with yoga, at home, since i cant afford a studio class nowadays. the rest i chalk up to perimenopause or so my latest book (changes in women's health after 35) calls it.
in any case, im hoping that the herbal cleansing powder and pills clean me out and give me that jump start i need to get back on track. the reports are abundant energy, stomach weight loss, light and clean feeling, and yes departure of many unusual substances that you never dreamed were in you...my only misgiving is that i bet i wont eat sushi again after all the parasites are out and i really love sushi. oh well, i can be happy in other ways.

flowers for valentine's

aubrey surprised me and arranged a truckload of flowers from the garden center on my front steps in the shape of a heart for valentine's day. we had talked about what we both expected on gift occasions in hopes of pleasing and yet still surprising each other. i told him of my favorite flowers and not to waste money on cliche roses or roadside stand flowers that die soon after purchase. it was springtime and i needed to spruce up the yard so voila, he made the wisest choice in ages, flowers for my garden. i like the way he thinks; and we planted them together. in fact, we went back to the store and bought enough to do his yard too!

tennis anyone?

spring has almost sprung here in the south so we busted out the bike and tennis racket and gave both a little whirl last week. but yesterday we had snow/sleet so the cold snap is back on for a few days. as you can see the winter didnt phase me b/c i had make bear-like preparations to keep me warm. but it is hard to play tennis while skating across the court, so i hope spring shows up soon. hey speaking of winter olympics, maybe ive just created the newest sport, skating tennis...tenskating. okay better get back to work...