In loving memory...

Today we buried my grandmother, "Grandmommie." She was 87 years old and survived by 4 children, 8 grandchildren, and 8 great-grandchildren. The questions I keep getting asked is, "Was she sick?" and the answer was no she wasn't. I'm not sure what's easier to handle, dying quickly, watching her suffer with illness, or watching, as we did, her slowly give up on life when Papa died.

So I choose to focus on the good times with Grandmommie, to remember through the cloudy veil of childhood memories. To remember a woman who...

...was so proud to be the first Strawberry Queen of Portland which was all she could remember to tell me when I came to visit her at the nursing home.

...wiped my forehead off when I passed out from heat exhaustion working in the field, and made sure I never had to go back out in the fields again after.

...always made sure to send tomatoes home with Dad because she knew I loved them so much.

... with quite determination survived many a childhood illness, cancer, open heart surgery and so much more.

...instilled in all her children, who then passed it down to their children, the importance of a college education.

...knew the value of a dollar to the extreme.

...hated animals with a passion, even though she was a farmer's wife.

...was the rock we all depended on when our parents couldn't help.

...was the Grandmommie we always took for granted because she was always right across the street.

At the service they played the hymn, "His eye is on the sparrow,"

I sing because I’m happy,
I sing because I’m free,
For His eye is on the sparrow,
And I know He watches me.

She's singing now, a song of freedom.

Way behind!!

So this past month, starting on December 18 and going through this week, has been CRAZY! I've had to use two sick days this month which I NEVER do, I had two crowns put on my teeth for no good reason other than my old fillings were old and couldn't just be replaced. Then, of course, there was the fun with Mom at the beginning of December. Plus I've started tutoring on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so I have even less time, but the money is good, so I can't refuse!

Anyway, the point being that I have wanted to post Christmas pictures for about two weeks but haven't had a chance. Since I'm on my second sick day this year I thought I'd use this day to catch-up because I'm confined to a couch that is only two feet from the bathroom -- Joy! I can now completely emphasize with my sister-in-law....

Ok So here's my favorite Christmas Photo: Santa Carter. It was hard to get the little bugger on photo, he was crawling everywhere! Even this photo was a little fuzzy because I couldn't get another one of him. He was a little grumpy... :-)



Here's my other favorite of Bradley, Ted's cousins baby, watering everyone. I asked him to smile and this is what I got.


This last photo is of Tojo... Ted and I got bored Christmas day...


Over all we had a great Christmas and I am very glad that everyone was heathly. Well relatively speaking...

:-)

This article is so asinine that it borders on ridiculous.

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20081212/NEWS08/81212034/1025


If you don’t actually want to read the article, which I don’t blame you, here’s the jist. A Russian man wants to put a trademark on the emoticon ;-)!! What actually made me laugh was the whole time I was reading I kept thinking that I was reading a news skit from SNL. I mean really couldn’t you just hear Tina Fey (Yes Tina Fey, she’s the only SNL anchor I have actually liked in the past 10 years.) commenting on this?

“After trying to have said emoticon trademarked, other Russian Internet entrepreneurs reacted to the effort predictably - :-( ”

(Part of that line was actually from the newspaper article.)

The waiting game

I once heard a newscaster make the following statement about his vacation, "I actually enjoy the week prior to vacation than the actual vacation itself. Now don't get me wrong, I love being places I've never been, but the entire time you are on vacation you are constantly thinking 'four more days till we go back,' and so on. It just take some of the fun out of the vacation."

That's how I feel. If you ask my students they will tell you that my favorite day of the week is Friday. It's my favorite day because I can truly enjoy the feeling of relief of the weekend. It's the only day I'm not counting down the hours and minutes until I have to go to work next. Which is exactly what I'm doing right now. I have 4.5 days until I can begin the 14 day return to work count down. Oh the life I lead....

Picture tag!

Part of this tag is to post the fourth picture from your fourth picture file.

Here's what I got:


This was taken back in October when Ted and I went camping. I was playing around with the lens on my camera. Yes this is a beer bottle.... yes alcoholic beverages are prohibited in state parks... Poetic?

I kind of like the next picture, which is also at the state park. This photo is in its natural state- not edited or photo shop. I could have photo shopped it and made the dark parts lighter, but I really liked the contrast. This took several shots because I had to set my camera at a very low shutter speed.

Tis the Season...

Yesterday I had an interesting experience. If you had talked to me yesterday, interesting wouldn’t have been the word I used to describe my experience.

I was at Wal-Mart yesterday to return a Christmas present that I had purchased that had broke by the time I got it home. Now usually at Wal-Mart there is someone to greet you with your returns to place a sticker on it. There wasn’t. So I proceed to the customer service desk. After waiting for 10 minutes, I get a lady, who to put mildly, was not happy with her lot in life. She proceeds to look over the returned item and then asks me if I had a sticker put on it. I say, “No ma’am, there wasn’t anyone at the door when I walked in.” She quickly informs me that, “yes there was, there is always someone at the door and next time you need to look for them.” At this point my irritation level just sky rocketed. Here I am not really making any fuss and she’s telling me I need to do the job of the Wal-mart employee? We banter back and forth for another 5 minutes because I’m not giving up, until she talks to the manager. NOT to placate me. OH NO. It’s to reiterate what she’s already told me that there is always someone at the front door. At this point I just walked away.

My anger was astronomical. The reason I walked away was because my anger was at such a boiling point that I couldn’t talk much less articulate what I wanted to say, an issue I have when extremely mad – the inability to articulate thoughts. After thinking a few minutes what I wanted to say was this, “I’m sorry you are apparent in a very bad mood, but that is no reason to take your anger out on me. Furthermore I can’t help but noticed that you just asked me to do the job of your employees. If your company would like to enforce certain return policies then perhaps it should have more diligent employee not customers.” Of course I don’t go back and say this but I did want to get the district managers number and tell him.

However much I might have wanted to go back and lay into this woman, I’m glad I didn’t. It wasn’t until much later that I got over my anger– sorta. I am reading a book called Assassination Vacation. In this book it discusses this religious group (I use that in the loosest terms) called the Oneida group from the 1880’s. (You should google them… that are fascinating to say the least.) This group was an early commune of sorts that had a gathering of around 300 people. Once a month they would take time as a community and have a “Mutual Criticism.” This was what I liked to refer to as a “Clearing of the air.” They would basically choose members of the community to stand in front of everyone and the community would air their grievances about said person. My friends and I did this back in middle school, we called it trampoline talks. You can imagine what would precede these clearing of the air talks. Disgruntled communities members and teenage girls refusing to speak for a few days. Sure it makes the person who gave the speech feel better but what about the poor person who was standing in front of the community getting the verbal beating? Not good, let me tell you. It takes lots of love to continuing be friends after a verbal whipping. I know.

This brings me full circle. Should I have, as the Oneida group, have aired my grievances out to this woman, who might just be having a bad day? Would it have actually helped the situation? Probably not. Because once said grievance were stated, I would have walked away possibly costing that woman a job. So instead, I choose to air my anger out in a community of no faces and wish that lady a peaceful Christmas.

THANKSGIVING!

3 of my Favorite Thanksgiving Foods:
1. Turkey and Noodles
2. Pumpkin Pie
3. Sausage Dressing

3 Thanksgiving Foods I usually pass up:
1. The nasty mince meat pie
2. The oyster dressing
3. Yams

3 Things that Thanksgiving isn't Complete Without:
1. Eating with my family
2. Mom and Dad arguing over watching the parade or football
3. Watching the parade because WE always win the fight.

Where do I celebrate Thanksgiving?
I’m a stickler for traditions and it’s lucky that I married a man from Sumner County because I have to have Thanksgiving with my family. This means that I also have to have a second dinner with the Taylor's because I’m unwilling to budge. This is my compromise…

3 Things I do over Thanksgiving Weekend:
1. Shop AFTER all the crazies leave the store… I’ve worked one too many Black Fridays.
2. Put up the Christmas Decorations
3. Watch old Christmas movies on TNT or TBS with Family

3 Things I am Thankful for This Year:
1. A new marriage
2. A healthy Tojo
3. Enjoying the holiday season with all the new additions to the family