Blog experiment
Blogging while dosed with painkillers, and sleep-deprived. Thanks to my toothache (the one that woke me Sunday), I had 4 hours of sleep last night (8 restless Tues, and ~6ish on Sunday). It got so bad yesterday; my ear started hurting; that I called and got my appointment moved up. I have a great dentist.

I took what I needed to get to the app't. Dentists stress me almost to the point of panic attacks and I need drugs to take the edge off so that I can go. I had no brekkers so it was empty stomach. When Chris saw me staggering to my car, he decided that I should not be driving. So he drove me. He was not able to call his work because our phone's out. He was 'a little late.' I got back home at 11 am and still had to grab lunch and get my pain pills. So I emailed my boss that I wasn't coming in. I don't think that he was surprised. I hoped that I'd make it but this root canal just took it out of me.

I had stuff that I was going to write about. I don't remember what though. I messed up my "Bill" edging. I finally just cut that ring & I'll work in a new thread. Theshuttle is almsot empty anyway.

I've been want to go to sleep but the phone people might be senind gsomeone out. I don't think that I care anymore.

good blog for GMs: Gnome Stew

Neat shows: Time Warp & Deadliest Warrior. I don't always agree with some of the statements made in the latter. But it's still a neat show.

Memories
Despite the length of the trip (left home at 11 am, made it to the site about 4 pm, with a brief stop for lunch), the service was nice. Since Bill was such an avid nature lover, it was held outdoors on Pamlico River, or one of its tributaries. We stood around, with Bill's battered hat and a picture of him, uncharacteristically in a Santa hat. Bill, due in part to his size and shape, bore an uncanny resemblance to that famous fat man, which only grew as his hair and beard whitened. As a result, he would not wear a Santa hat & was in fact reluctant to wear a red shirt after Halloween.

We stood around and talked for at least two hours. It was very appropriate. We shared stories of funny things he had said and done; aid that he had given; glares he had dispensed; and some new thing that he had introduced us to.

Chris & I finally got home about 12:30 and it was one am before I made it to bed. Then a toothache woke me at 4 am. I finally got back to bed at 9:30 am. So I had 15 minutes to nap before I had to get up & about my day.

I was supposed to go to a tatting seminar/class this past weekend. Sorry as I was to miss it, this memorial came first. We had five, until we picked up Cameron in Goldsboro, in the van on the way down & back. We talked, a little about Bill but also a little about the sort of thing he would talk about.

I tatted, a nice edging in variegated blue & white size 10. I tatted during the service, too. Since Bill was the one who taught me to tat, it was appropriate.

Aw shoot, I'm getting all weepy again.

Excerpts from my Colorado vacation – Day 5
22 July 2008
7:30 am Breakfast at Waffle House. The waitress put songs on the jukebox: Neil Diamond, Genesis, Patsy Cline, Eagles & ELO.

8:30 am Leave town, 78F
Many overpasses are painted and have “Amarillo” with cowboy boots for the two “l’s”. It’s very attractive. Lots of RV parks around. There was one that advertised itself as horse-friendly.

Saw, and smelled, my first feedlot. Did not know what it was at first, just that it was not the usual terrain. I still think a hog lagoon smells worse.

9 am See another windfarm, Oldham C. more longhorns.

9:15 am Vaga, TX, gas; $4.10 per gallon. Ouch!

Dad’s stomach insisted on a slightly longer stop so I bought a Rte 66 t-shirt for my collection, plus 3 Texas ones (3/$10) .

9:40 am See a plane crop-dusting

9:45 am Terrain has changed again. It’s still scrubby but now it rises and falls. Here are mesas, hills that rise to a flat top-like cut with a knife. The sides are rumpled folds.

Sometimes there are buildings in the distance. There’s always a fence next to the road and frequently, there’s a dirt road or old roadbed alongside. More often than buildings, there are windmills and/or cattle.

Bushes polka dot the plains.

10 am New Mexico border

Speed 75 mph & time change, now it’s Mountain Daylight Savings Time. Set clocks back an hour.

Welcome Center is only 8 weeks old. It has no shelters and no plants. There’s just the building. It’s very pretty. The water is currently non-potable. So they provided the purell stuff.

Trees freckle the mesas.

10:13 am construction, 55 mph, until 10:24 am
½ hour nap, so tired

Flat bottom clouds like scows scudding across the sky
Once they reach us the temperature drops 6f.

11:43 am Clines Corners

Elevation 7200’ and 79 Degrees
There are barn swallows under the overhang. Neat!

I had a cheeseburger with toasted bun and fries. Our waitress, Mariam, is from Capetown, S. Africa.

Clines Corners was founded in 1934 [I read the history on the menu] at the intersection of 2 highways. Then Rte 66 came through and Ray Cline relocated. They lost the apostrophe but they’ve bee on the same site ever since then. It’s a huge, emphasis on the huge, tourist trap.

12:45 pm leaving
Rain is sprinkling down. 1^st rain on the trip. Since the land is so flat you can see where patches of rain are falling. There’s even some lightning in the distance.

Power & light poles are not creosoted. No insect protection needed?

Changed to highway 285 to go to Santa Fe when we left Clines Corner.

Bush-like cacti along the road. Some are in bloom, some pink and some yellow.

13 miles from Santa Fe I see my first Adobe. The highway retaining walls are pressed/imprinted to look like rock.

Adobe is everywhere, including the Walmart & the McDonald’s. I wonder if it’s like Cary or if they did it voluntarily?

1:45 pm Santa Fe Sage Inn, but the room’s not ready yet. We called the Art Van Gogh shuttle to take us downtown. The shuttle is part of the hotel package.

1^st stop: Governor’s Palace [I wish I’d taken more pictures] Since 16-something CE, Indians came to trade as they do to this day. There are 71 places for native artists to spread their wares on blankets. Better to buy directly from craftspeople. Very nice people.

Dad was talking to the husband of one of the artisans. If more than 71 people show up, they draw lots to see who gets a place. Today, one nice older man (with gorgeous & pricey pots) split his spot with a woman working in beads & silver. If I had had the money I would have bought one of his pots especially because of that. They were beautiful, a bonus. Or would the beauty be the key & his kindness a bonus?

I bought a pottery turtle for Steve and pottery cats/tiny bowl for Maya (Richard & Kathy’s little girl – her own ornament). I bought some jewelry for myself; a turquoise barrette (her son is a Marine at Camp Lejeune, finished 2 tours of Iraq); an earrings & necklace set of turquoise & other stones; silver earrings; silver & turquoise ponytail holder with water symbols; and a pendant from Mable, a very sweet older woman. She has the softest hands.

Kathy & I roamed the nearby shops, including an art gallery. I found presents for my co-workers, magnets of wood with a turquoise chip. I also found a wolf décor thing for Chris. I got a Santa Fe tee for myself & finally found a summer hat; a black straw cowboy hat.

We met Dad at 5 pm and set off to find a restaurant for supper.

~5:30 pm Coyote Cantina & Café
Downstairs (2^nd floor) was not open so we went up to the roof to eat. It was cheaper up there, too. Gorgeous view.

I had the Taco el Pastor, a 2 on the spiciness scale of 1-10. It was still almost too much, but very good.

Live jazz started playing in the plaza downtown. We were all tired so Kathy called the Van and we went back to the hotel to unpack the car.

I had trouble downloading the video from Dad’s camera. It took me over an hour and I finally gave up on trying to read the disk directly and hooked up the camera to my laptop.

I read a little bit and played a round of a computer game before going off to sleep.

Out of the Office get-together
I think it was only my 2nd ever, that wasn't held at work. A student in one in our offices graduated, after working for us for over 2 years (much joking that if she had worked for us for 3 years she would have gotten a car instead of a watch). We gathered at a restaurant/pool hall/sport bar. We were in the bar area so yes, there was *cough, cough* cigarette smoke. Blech. I fabreezed myself when I got home.

But we had fun. We played (5 of us, 2 teams of 2) 3 games of pool (my team lost all 3 times, I'm a lousy pool player). I also got to know the folks in that office a bit better.

Power was out in my room again. By the time I found out, I just didn't care about resetting it. I pulled out my emergency alarm clock and went to bed by flashlight. Didn't matter. Woke at an hour early, starving.

Tonight, meeting John & Chris for supper. I suddenly realized, when will I get my laundry done? I may be gaming tomorrow (it's up in the air because the gm's mom is sick). Saturday it's down to Bath for the memorial and Sunday it's Rosemary's game.

tatting: I continued the brown perle 5 edging that I started at Harmony Hall until I ran out of thread on the shuttle for the 3rd time. I started the butterfly bookmark for Melinda. I found a cute pattern that alternates flowers & butterflies. (I made one butterfly last night & about freaked the graduating student, she had never seen tatting before).

Mother's Day
Mom loved her present. She did wonder why I signed it (like she wouldn't know who I was), but that's because we were at her sister's house and if her brother-in-law comes across it, he'll know who it belongs to.

I gave Mom some chickens, in Guatemala. Aunt Shirley liked it, too. She really wants to get that sort of thing from her kids, too. I also have a couple video tapes for Mom, but I forgot to take them with me.

Mom hemmed some jeans for me. As usual, they were too long. She also patched one pair and she's going to work on a black pair and see if anything can be done for them.

I almost finished making a chemise from a torn sheet. I need to run elastic through the neck casing, sew a casing onto the sleeves, then hem the sleeves & bottom and it will be done. I used a fitted sheet and used the pre-existing casings for the top edge. It made it a little harder to cut out but saved so much effort in sewing it that it wasn't funny.

The left nosepiece on my glasses has disintegrated a little more this weekend. The hard plastic "skeleton" is now exposed and pressing on my nose. Not painful, exactly, but not comfortable.

And Chris picked up that certified letter. I need to make a phone call and a doctor's appointment this morning. I am not looking forward to it.

We got the call last night. Bill's memorial is next weekend. At least 4 of us, maybe 5 or 6, will be going down to Bath, where his closest cousin lives, for it. Part of me doesn't believe that he's dead. He's just out of touch.

And of course, this morning I took 5 steps out the door & it started raining. Rather than unlocking the door & finding an umbrella, I just got my emergency umbrella from the car. It's bright yellow & highly visible. It had also come off 2 spokes. That's why it was an emergency umbrella. I sewed it back to the spokes once I got to work.

It's a cycle, a downward spiral
Yeah, I'm depressed. Again. It's not enough to prevent me from eating or working. I just have problems sleeping and I hit the Escapism button over & over.

Let's see what's happened in the past 3 weeks. Dinner with Dad. Dad's bootcamp 'yearbook.' Weekend with Mom. Breaker to my room flipped. Again (3rd or 4th time). I think it's the grounds maintenance folks, cause it's usually on a Tuesday.

Finally got my state tax refund. Played Rosemary's game, with the new plot. The one that she started the game in order to run (demon web pits or something). Interested in Shadowrun Missions. Writing 3 Jadeclaw adventures to run at Animazement.

Got my necklace repaired. Bought a couple (okay, 3) computer games. Played one to the end. May give it to my niece. It's a hidden object puzzle kind of thing.

Went to Harmony Hall Heritage day. Really hot again this year. Bought a couple history books. Gave my namesake her birthday presents (bookbag, flowerpot thingy, & books). Tatted a split ring rose & started an edging.