Winter 2010

I am watching a friends cat and this morning it got into my purse and stole my sandwich. I got it away from her and I ate it for lunch anyway. She is the Bandita alias the KITTYCAT KONG!

It has taken some adjustment but now she and my cat are getting along famously. More on those two another time.

I've been hibernating since after Christmas...but hey it is January and this is now a ritual for me that starts after the holidays.

And we've had a particularly cold and snowy winter. I hardly see anyone unless it is by accident. (My friends had a baby and because it is snowy and they live in the country and I am afraid to drive up their driveway that is on a steep and curvy hill, i put the gift in the mail and told them I would see them in the spring.)

So what do i do with my free time?
I've been going to the gym .. basic survival...doing ZUMBA! and HIPHOP! and it is my
answer to alzheimer's because you have to remember the dance moves you learned the week before. NOT! And you have to be able to step up and wave your arms and sashay and jiggle in that order and all at once. When i first started this i was so upset at my two left feet that i went out and bought the biggest padded bra i could find and the lowest cut shirt to wear to the next class. At least i look good. (This was also my solution to my lousy skiing skills about 5 years ago... a fantastic ski outfit ...)

I've been taking Spanish classes Monday nights and dreaming of retirement.

I've been going to the library and getting out books on Costa Rica. (LAST Winter it was Chile and Argentina. I like to get travel books, travel guides, AND cook books.)

I've checked out books like FROMME'S Travel Guide, Retirement without Borders, a collection of short stories by Costa Rican (ticos) and Panamanian women writers titled "When New Flowers Bloom". The Author's notes are written by a man and all he does is go through the history of literature WHICH DOES NOT INCLUDE ANY REFERENCES TO WOMEN. Who does he think he's kidding?

I am in the process of labeling my house espanol-ish and in full sentences...as for example "The basement is down the stairs. It has three rooms, but there are no bathrooms." ...and then i look at it later and i don't know what the hell i wrote. I use google translation tools. This saves time. I say what i want (i've also been describing all my pictures and photos on walls around my house.. cut and paste it into word, print out a page full of them, cut them out and then tape them to the walls and objects etc..bulk statements..but takes a while to figure out what i was thinking, how to translate, and then where to stick it). Is this a rare form of cabin fever?

A coworker sent me this:

" Anne,

My oldest sent this to me.
This is weird enough that I thought you'd enjoy.... when you have time.
Not to sure anyone else around here (at least on my team) would get it. Not that there's much to get !

TOM SELLECK WATERFALL SANDWICH LINK

The names of the sandwiches are light and hard to read.
One of the pages has a link to the Sellick Waterfall Sandwich Theme Song which
sounds like it was recorded in someone's kitchen.
I was never a fan of Tom Sellick."

Well, I am a big fan of Tom Sellick...and I thought it was terrific.
I miss the shorts guys wore back in the 80's. So much
man-leg. Ha cha cha!

What did I do on my summer vacation?

I went up north with Corinne! Yes, and we had a G R E A T time. Corinne thinks I am immoral because I kept trying to get out of paying the state park entrance fees ..well.. no-ot re-ally. My thought was if they don't ask don't volunteer. Then come to discover that there are some shared parking lots between the Minnesota DOT and the park system. ANYWAY .. i think we saw every waterfall in Northern Minnesota between here and Canada. We went to the Boundary Waters National Forest and Thunderbay in Canada. I just wanted to see if we would get frisked at the border. I HAVE A VERY EXCITING LIFE. (But wait...in highschool my friends and I used to go to the Cleveland Hopkins Airport on a Friday night to go through security and the metal detectors. This was back in 1975. We just wanted to see if we could. And we could. What innocence!) We stayed at a famous er lodge called Cascade Lodge in the Boundary Waters National Forest. The brochure showed a lovely landscape with a Lake Superior view. Amazing how they were able to take the photo and completely edit out THE STATE HIGHWAY right in front of the lodge. (We didn't know it was famous till a found a book in a book store that chronicled its history in Grand Marais.) Needless to say Corinne thought it was a dump. I thought it was pretty nice and inexpensive and better than Motel 6. In truth it was quaint. Overall we did a lot of walking,talking and the weather was decent. We promised each other we would do it again for sure!

More of the same...

I am lazy, here is a note i sent to my friend Kate, she was asking
how things were going:

Yes I am starting to blog again. I am back doing some crafts (mosaics - finishing all my old projects..one i got so disgusted with i put it outside). In general people do not comment on blogs..you need one of those counters .. i use HISTATS because it is free ( www.histats.com ) ... My lawyer is $ 4.00 a minute so I don't talk to him. The divorce is not progressing ... so I wrote him a letter and let him know i appreciated how he is driving my issue (he had sent the other attorney a note .and cc'd me on it) ..and that I still wanted a divorce and anything he could do that would not compromise my position financially i greatly appreciated.

We did sell the house! The closing date is May 29 and so far it has passed all the inspections...this weekend Harry and some of his friends are going to move the last bit of stuff out of there and do some light cleaning. Johnny is signing everything on behalf of his dad. Johnny and I have not communicated much but Johnny has gone along with all my suggestions (have two checks at the closing.. 2 1099S forms etc).

Harry is home for the month of May and then will go back to Winona at least four days a week ..he is working at FASTENOL (he got a coop job and its a good opportunity). Its nice having him around ... last night i went for a bike ride with him. I was going to go to a local bar to see SHAWN PHILLIPS (have you heard of him ... cool musician big in late 70's) and Harry was going to drive me up there at around 8pm and then pick me up again at about 11am (I was going alone and I worried about drinking too much - he offered and it saves cab fare ) ..but then I was too tired so i didn't go. But its sooo funny ..only a few years ago i was driving him to the movies to meet his friends or up to the school for a dance and then picking him up when it was over. I love that the whole thing is so reversed. A couple of nights a go i ran into a girl friend of his in the bathroom at 3am. I watched her go back into Harry's room. So then I knocked on the door and Harry answered. I made the girl go home. I told Harry this was not a dorm and we have standards and while i did not necessarily mind if girls slept over they had to sleep in separate rooms. She left. I just can't believe he thinks he can get away with that. I had less clothes on than she did and it looked like they just fell asleep watching TV because her outfit would have been pretty complicated to put on in a hurry. Anyway secretly it made me laugh. He knows that I would go after him with a broom if he was really doing anything. Hope you are doing great Kate. The weather is fantastic. I'll be in touch...planning on taking a few road trips to Chicago this summer. I like your blog too. I love all your stories about your foster pets. Ciao! Anne
On Fri, May 15, 2009 at 9:15 AM, Ed and Kate wrote:

Thanks for the comments on the blog. I've decided people read it but don't know how to write comments. That's OK - YOU DO and yours are important to me!
How is life in your corner of the world? New projects? Work OK? Harry home for the summer? Progress in getting settled? Is the house sold for certain? Your family all doing well? Are you starting to blog again?
Kate

Please visit my blog!
http://pawstolove.blogspot.com
Visit our area shelter, www.apl-shelter.org
http://www.fund.org/

Its tough being a single mom..

Oh, I forgot I am retired...

An email exchange with my sister:

Subject: Fw: last night

ME:
I got up to use the bathroom at about 3am and ran into Harry's friend Kayla. (She was fully dressed etc. so I don't think anything was going on...it looked like they just fell asleep whatever). But anyway she went back into Harry's room. So i knocked on the door and Harry was in there and I said Kayla had to go home... this was not a dorm and that there were standards and if he was going to have girls sleep over it was separate rooms.

So Kayla left... she only lives a block away. She's a very nice girl so it was all friendly.
Harry says, well what about you? .... and i said how do you know? And he says well I am just assuming. And I said well has anyone ever been here when you were here? and he said no and I said thats right.

I do have to draw the line somewhere.

LAURA:
you prude!

that reminds me...remember when I told you how they named the roads after the characters in Bridges of Madison County and you wrote in your blog how that was promoting adultery or some bs?
Well, we stopped in the diner on the way home from NE on Sunday. The lady working there met Clint when they filmed but made a point of saying she did not like the movie whatsoever. There were pictures of Clint but NOT ONE of Meryl Streep. Such a double standard....

ME:
Yeah that is BS. I agree. I did really like the movie though.

Laura, I am not a prude! Its just being civilized! I don't mind if Harry has girlfriends over, but I need to consider formality and its not a dorm room. What Harry does at school is his business... and if he wants to have girls in his room fine.

I saw a movie a couple days ago i liked...it was a bit odd though .. Assassination Tango with Robert Duvall. I liked the sex scene.

LAURA:
i was kidding. I agree with you, she should have slept on the couch

So thats what that is...

Our group had happy hour get together at a neighborhood bar after work a few nights ago. My coworker asked me how it was going. I've always been pretty up front with everybody at work, and it is a bull pen, and sometimes I do take personal calls at my desk.

I spent twenty years in a pretty conventional domestic situation, with a husband, kids, pets, and a station wagon. (I still have the station wagon, which I plan to drive into the ground mostly because I can't afford to do anything else!)


So to give my coworker an idea of what was happening, I told him what my kitchen looked like at the moment. That is, my kitchen no longer looks like a kitchen. I took a sculpture class in February. After that I pulled out all the projects that I have had laying around unfinished for the last five or six years, all mosaics, because that has been one of my interests since Harry was young.


The kitchen table is covered in newspaper, with tile clippers and trowels and buckets in piles and stacks on top of that. I have my next projects in a corner with books open and scattered on the floor, in front of the counter and the sliding glass doors, waiting for the ideas that are still being formulated. There are dirty rags on the counter, and gloves for grouting in the sink, and this is the way the kitchen has looked now since February. The rest of the place is starting to look that personal too.


My friend laughed. He said "Hey, that reminds me of what I went through just after my divorce, but for me it was cars. There were car parts everywhere on newspaper all over my house!" Ah, so that's what it is. It made me feel good knowing that this was a perfectly natural condition.

Summer '08

I turned 50 last July. It really wasn't so bad. My sisters planned a surprise. The tradition started with Jennifer three years ago. Laura will be next year and we'll do Ann (first person on the left) as well, but Ann lives in Memphis. She has so much to say about it.

I had to go to Chicago to celebrate. The surprise was the people that my sisters invited, like Ann! Wow. She was our neighbor growing up. She was Laura's best friend and like a sister to us (she was the fourth sister), and has been a part of our family forever. Wafa, the girl next to Ann in green, came with her husband and kids from Michigan. She buddied around with us Saturday while her hubbie hung with the kids. They have some family here too. We had a great time. Spent the day bike riding around Chicago on rented bikes. We stayed at an old hotel in Chicago and went out to eat and all that and the next morning Cathy and Abu joined us for breakfast. I used to live with Cathy in Oakpark...and then in Elmhurst. It is always nice to see Cathy and Abu.

I spent the rest of the weekend with my sisters and Ann, who had a lot of advise for me on how I should handle the future and my suddenly single status. And my mother, who always gives me great advice, never hesitates to tell me, "Oh Anne you are going to have so much fun!" I love it. How can I lose?