Saturday

Hi All!

Despite the fact that I didn't get enough sleep due to Buzzer . . . oops, I meant to say because of Skor! Anyway, Skor was determined to wake me up early this morning. I managed to ignore him for a bit but . . .

I am feeling pretty chipper this morning. I am listening to Sister Hazel.













I have liked this band ever since Hubby and I met the band members on a flight from Ohio to Dallas about 10 years ago or so. At the time neither of us had heard of Sister Hazel. We did a little research and got their album (I can't tell you if it was their first or what). We liked their album.

Last night I was talking to my friend Tricia (who spells her name TOTALLY wrong!) and was telling her about the availability of free albums on Amazon. While I was talking I happened to look on Amazon and there was a FREE album by Sister Hazel! I was THRILLED! Needless to say, I downloaded the album. It is what I am listening to right now!

Hubby did give me a moment's pause when he said that Al Gore likes Sister Hazel too. I wasn't given pause by the mere fact that it was Al Gore politically - I don't care. My pause was caused by the fact that he is older than I am and maybe I am liking "old person" music! Heaven forbid!!

Another reason I am feeling chipper is this:

Yesterday I stopped by the book sale put on annually by the school district I used to work for as a teacher. I love this sale. Every paperback is only 75 cents and there are LOTS of books. The sale is in an empty Old Navy store. There are long tables stretching across the space with an aisle in the middle. The books are all organized into different sections like a book store and there are literally millions of books!

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Heaven!

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The only downer is that I forgot my book list - the list of books I have read - so it was hard for me to get books written by any of my favorite authors without being sure that I hadn't read them or not. Because of that, I wandered the aisles and picked up books by authors I had never heard of! That was fun! Also, I have a lot of "serious" books in my stock already - you know, mysteries and things like that. So - when I was at the sale I picked up "light" books. Romances and things like that. To balance out my stock!

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After giving my new books a thorough sniffing, both cats seemed to approve of my selections!

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Today is "The Phantom of the Opera" at the Music Hall at Fair Park. I am excited. This will be the second time Hubby and I will have seen the musical and the reviews in the paper have been excellent.

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Have a super weekend!

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Trisha

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Voice Update: My stuffy nose and the drainage is making me a bit raspy in the mornings but other than that . . . doing fine.

More Memories

Hi All!

Yahoo! It is Friday! I have survived another week.

Did I mention that my bosses think they have hired a person to replace me? I am so happy I am almost bursting. Yes, I will miss the challenge that working brings each day but now I might be able to spend some more time concentrating on my class (and SUCH a lovely class it is!) and might actually be home when Hubby gets home from work! The potential employree is most likely going to come to the office on Monday to spend some time with me to see how things work and to meet Susan.

Speaking of Susan - did I tell you that she cut her finger - badly? Apparently, she is going to have surgery on the finger on Wednesday. She was told that she can't play tennis - her passion in life - for over a month. Needless to say, she isn't happy AT ALL!

Today I am going to show you two more pictures I found while roaming through my picture files.


This time you get to see my Grandma Denny.

Guess who the little girl is! That's right! It is me! Grandma used to cut my hair in her kitchen. I can't quite remember if I was happy to have my hair cut this time or not but I do remember having her cut my hair. She was a woman who seemed capable of doing everything!

As a side note - are those my shoes in the bottom right of that last picture? If so, they are HUGE! I must have been Bigfoot when I was little!

Back to Grandma. She was a dairy farmer's wife and could milk a cow with the best of them. Some of my favorite memories of her involved her milking cows and helping out in the barn with her "barn cap" on. Usually the cap had bright polka dots on it. I also remember her making "Grandpa's butter" from the cream from the barn. Once I helped her make apple butter. So many of my memories of Grandma involve cooking in that big, warm kitchen. Or out in the garden weeding the green beans or picking tomatoes!

She was quite a woman!

Trisha

Voice Update: Doing well even though it seems that I have finally succumbed and caught Hubby's cold! Oh well!

I Still Remember

Hi All!

It is Thursday! I am tired from being out until nearly 11:00 last night (that darn class!) and I have a bit of a headache (probably because I didn't get enough sleep?!?). Mom is wondering why I am not feeling as happy as I felt last Thursday. I can't figure it out either!

Oh well! I am just pleased to have survived another class with little harm and with some pleasant interaction with my friends. That is one reason I really keep going to the class that I don't enjoy. My friends are there and I get to see them!

In addition to my friends who are actually taking the same class as me, I also have friends in the lab - Deaf friends who have worked with me for the past two and a half years as I struggled to learn the language. They are wonderful people and I miss seeing them more often. When I had class twice a week I would see them more but this once a week deal makes it difficult!

Anyway. I was looking at pictures from my old computer and found these.

This is my Grandpa Denny.


















This picture was taken when Grandpa wasn't as healthy as he once was. He was probably in his 80's in this picture. This isn't how I remember Grandpa Denny.

I remember Grandpa in his white t-shirt and his overalls just coming in from milking the cows and working in the barn. He would take off his work boots and wash up in the garage where there was a sink for just that purpose. Then he would come into the big, warm kitchen smelling like hay and manure (if you were raised in the country it isn't that bad of a smell!). Grandpa would sit in the rocker in the kitchen and chat with everyone before heading downstairs to take a shower before supper.

I loved seeing Grandpa like that. He always seemed so big and strong. He was a hard worker and even as a small child I was proud of that. Seeing him in the barn with the cows or on a tractor in the fields made me feel happy. He was a good, decent, hard-working man.

Grandpa might not have been the most educated person in the world but, to me, he was one of the smartest people in the world. I love him and miss him.

This is my Grandma Frank.

I think I got a lot of my ornery personality from Grandma Frank. She was an amazing woman. Grandma lived on the farm my father was raised on and loved those country roads. She was a speed demon in her car and I always believed that was because she drove the ambulance for the volunteer squad for a number of years. Grandma was also involved in EVERYTHING! She knew everyone and everything that was going on. Grandma enjoyed her gossip.

Grandma lived to be 95 years old and her mind was sharp pretty much to the end. One of my favorite memories of Grandma is when I first told her about meeting Hubby. My parents were living out of the country and so Grandma decided that she should ask all the questions a mother should ask her daughter about a man she met. Let me tell you, some of the questions were hilarious! The conversation ended with both of us laughing because Grandma asked if Hubby was an alcoholic kleptomaniac!

Grandma always had her own opinion of things and didn't do anything she didn't want to do. She was a strong woman and I miss her.

Trisha

Voice Update: Doing surprisingly well! In fact, Susan told me yesterday (on the phone) that my voice sounded excellent. What a compliment! Of course class got my neck and back all tight so I have to work on relaxing that again. *sigh*

Painful!

Hi All!

Sorry I didn't get a post up yesterday but I had the chance to sleep in so I grabbed it with both hands and hung on for dear life!

This morning - no sleeping in!

Last night Hubby and I backed up everything on our computer with our newly arrived Clickfree Automatic Backup. This is the same device we saw on the Home Shopping Channel the day that our old computer blew up. Hubby ordered one and we are attempting to be better about backing stuff up! Anyway - the back up took WAY longer than we thought and that precluded any intentions I had of working on the computer.

That means that the two videos I needed to watch and evaluated on the computer didn't get done last night. AND since today is CLASS day (I am certainly NOT excited by that fact!) and I go to work early I don't have the kind of time in the morning that I normally do. That means that I needed to get to work early this morning.

Luckily, I have now gotten both videos watched and evaluated.

The unlucky part - one of the videos is of myself telling a story in American Sign Language (ASL). It is painful to watch yourself on video. It is even more painful to see all of the mistakes you make when you are trying to interpret something into ASL. I can hardly stand it but . . . I must do it so . . . I must. It is just so darn painful to watch!

In other news, my bosses are starting to interview people for my position tonight. Yeah! There might be a light at the end of my work tunnel. Of course, I will probably miss it once I stop working!

Hope your day isn't nearly as painful as mine has been so far!

Trisha

Voice Update: My voice is doing okay. It is a bit breaky here and there as I get stressed from class and work and whatever but it isn't as bad as I was thinking it might be. I must admit that I am not being good about my exercises and massage. I can't seem to get "into the groove" right now.

Going "Potty!"

Hi All!

First of all - no, this isn't a bathroom related post. Second, it isn't referring to any illegal substance. It is referring to my weekend task of repotting several of my houseplants!

For several weeks now I have been intending to go purchase some new, bigger pots to transfer some of my plants into. My poor ficus has been residing in a pot which was woefully small. My Shefflera has been routinely showing its disdain for the small pot it has been living in by letting its water overflow onto our carpet. And my Christmas cactus . . . it has even gone to the lengths of dropping large portions of itself in an effort to draw attention to the fact that its roots were needing some "breathing room."

So - off I headed to Home Depot with Hubby in tow. We checked out ALL of the pots and debated their various merits before finally heading home with two new pots in the back seat of my car. The need for a third pot was negated - after much discussion - by the fact that there will be a pot of the correct size available after the Shefflera is repotted.

Once home I got out the potting soil and spread a layer of newspaper out on the kitchen floor so that the mess wouldn't become too extreme. Normally I repot on the back patio but it was raining so . . . it was the kitchen.

First up was the Christmas cactus - or what was left of it after it showed me its displeasure by dropping half of itself onto the carpet. It is now safely (and happily, I hope) ensconced in its new pot and looking quite sharp. Skor got into the "helping" mode by making sure that the bag of potting soil was okay. I had quite a task to keep him out of the bag while trying to get dirt into the new pots. It was a bit humorous to see Skor with his white fur covered in black potting soil. Of course, Hubby wasn't too pleased with the tiny black footprints which wound their way through my music room!

After the cactus I did the shefflera -- it also needed a good trim to keep it from getting too lanky. Then I scrubbed out the old Shefflera pot and the ficus got a new home as well.

With all the plants safely into their new abodes, I settled down to clean up the dirt on the floor - helpfully scattered by my two adorable kitties!

Even though repotting plants is a bit of work, it certainly feels good to get your hands dirty and to work with soil. I can't wait for the weather to get a bit better so I can work in my flowerbed outside. It is a good stress reliever!

Trisha

Voice Update: Doing fairly well. I still have some problems but the exercises are taking care of them pretty rapidly. My neck and back are too tight due to stress from my class. I really need to make an effort to get that "thumper" working so I can deal with those tight muscles before they sabotage my voice!

Finally Friday!

Hi All!

Well, I survived another week and it is Friday. That means NO work and no place I really need to be until my haircut at 4:00! The haircut is more than a month overdue and I WILL NOT be missing it! Last night the front part of my hair - which is heavy and grows forward - was so darn annoying that I put it up in a "whale spout" just to get it out of my face! One of my friends, who called this morning, offered to pay me if I took a picture and posted it online. I don't think so! I can hardly wait until 4:00!

A bit later this morning I will be heading to the college to do some work in the lab. Doesn't that sound like a ton of kicks and giggles? At least the teacher won't be there but I will be getting her feedback on what I do in lab. *sigh*

On to happier thoughts. Have I told you that I am getting my hair cut today? Yes? Oh, well, I just don't want to forget such a happy event!

Yesterday was great! I felt so light and happy. I headed to work where I realized that I had forgotten to do some things on Wednesday. Things which I really needed to do! Oops! Luckily, my bosses are all very understanding so I just did them first thing yesterday and got on with my good day! Due to the little problem, I ended up working a bit later than I had planned. I was going to stop at a nearby mall and go clothes shopping (yes, Mom, I was actually looking forward to going clothes shopping!) but, due to the later time I just headed home to Hubby.

It was a good day and today is Friday! Life is good for the moment!

Trisha

Voice Update: Still struggling a bit due to stress causing the muscles of my neck/throat to tighten up. I have started using my "thumper" and that is helping but I really need to get this darn stress under control! I am back on track with my exercises - doing them in the car in time with classical music made me happy yesterday!

Pop Tarts and Shuffle Mode

Hi All!

It is a good morning. I am sitting here IMing with Mom, eating a brown sugar Pop Tart, and listening to my iTunes music is shuffle mode. What could be better?!?

Okay, many things could be better but, for this brief second in time I feel like all is right with the world. *sigh* I am just taking a moment to soak it all in!

My LONG day, Wednesday, is over and I feel like a heavy weight has slid from my shoulders. I am still really, REALLY struggling in this darn interpreting class. The teacher has a ton of very, very good information but she is a HORRIBLE teacher. Last night she verbally flogged us several times over things we had done wrong collectively as a class. One of these mistakes is that only 2 out of 12 in the class knew that we were supposed to do an assignment. Now, I ask you - if you have that kind of percentage who is clueless, just whose fault is it? I am a professional teacher, I know whose fault it is - and it isn't the students!

Several times during the course of the four hour class last night I contemplated just dropping the class. It is causing so much stress in my life and just a few hours before going to class Susan told me that I needed to get rid of stress in my life because it negatively impacts my voice. There were a few brighter moments in class when I was glad I was there and was happy with deciding to take it - however, they were few and far between.

So . . . now what do I do? Drop and be stress free for the time being knowing that I would have to take the class again sometime in the future or continue, get it done, and work on managing my stress better? I do have a massager I can use to help keep my muscles a bit looser despite the stress!

Anyway - that was my day yesterday.

This morning I woke up for the first time at 6:30 with a raging headache. I took my regular meds, ate a cheese stick, took some headache meds, and fell back in bed for another hour or so. Now - headache is gone and I am enjoying my Pop Tart and shuffle mode morning!

Trisha

Voice Update: Stress is a bad thing for me. The past week has been really stressful for many reasons - class and a family issue (nothing major just a little stressful) included. I haven't been very good with my exercises during this time and my voice pays the price. Susan has told me to try to get more massages while at work either from her or Maria, her colleague. I need to do that and I need to start taking my "thumper" massager to work again and using it. So many things are running a marathon in my mind . . .