Concert

Hey! Last night my sister and I went to see Ani Difranco live in concert. This was our second time seeing her, and she is awesome. She is and always has been very brave with her open and honest lyrics, she is an activist and fights for women and gay rights and she puts on one heck of a show. Ani has some very sweet slow songs, some of which I have fun attempting to play on the guitar, while others shake the stage and I stand in awe as the beautiful sounds swing by. We started the evening with dinner out to a delicious restaurant and then made our way to the show. The opening act was a man named Buddy Wakefield. He is a poet and performs with a sweet intensity. He spoke about the difficulties of his childhood and he too, yearned for better treatment of all human beings.

As we fought our way to a decent spot in a standing room only floor, one tall person after the other, followed by someone with big hair, each would take their sweet time blocking our view. I tried to guard my pregnant sister as people pushed passed, not to mention the geniuses behind us that lifted their friend into the air when she wasn't ready. Not cool. I spent my time swaying opposite directions as the person in front of me who happened to be my same height. I managed to see 1/4 of Ani's body throughout the show, luckily it happened to be her face, or her guitar which is also amazing to watch as she frantically moves her tiny hands up and down the neck of the guitar while her other hand beats rhythmically against the guitar. As I sway to the right I get a perfect view of the stage, sway to the left I can still kind of see but then I get a wiff of the young man standing next to me, a mixture of sweat and smoke. A few minutes later we find ourselves in a slightly better location yet the girl in front of me is carrying a bag half her size and the bottom of the purse is pointed my direction. As the purse slid across my forearm my germaphobe side immediately imagines all the disgusting places the bottom of that purse has been laid (bathrooms, taxis, etc.) My mind jolts back into the music and I am present again.

There is a woman around my age standing about four people in front of us and she is the most physically into a show I have ever seen. She jumps and sways, shifts her body with every beat. She shot her hands up to the sky as if she was having some religious experience, and actually to her, I think she was. At first you might be annoyed to stand right behind her due to all the sporadic movements continuously blocking your view of the stage, but every time I looked at her, I couldn't help but smile. She was being so open around all these strangers. She was so touched by the music she didn't let any insecurities hold her back and I thought that was great. Usually I will sway, tap my feet, and occasionally do a little dance at a show, but nothing compared to what this woman was doing. After all that people watching it is so easy to get caught up in what other people look like, their clothes, their hair, accessories, but this woman made the experience completely about the music and I found it to be refreshing.

So then I wonder why do we even go to concerts? To fight the crowds, smells, germs, I could go on.... But then I get goosebumps during one of Ani's glorious tangents about the government and women's rights I remember I go to shows for inspiration. I want to see this artist perform live and support the brave work she continues to do. She speaks her mind, she cares about where the direction of our world is going and how people are treating one another, she wants equal rights for all, she cares about the Earth, plus she makes rockin' music. You definitely don't have to agree with her views and I am sure there are plenty of people who despise her because of her views, but isn't that what it's all about? Figuring out your own path, exploring what you believe to be true, and ultimately (hopefully) creating a journey where not only you are happy, but you care about the people next to you and you wish them a life free from suffering.

And now I wonder, what makes you inspired? Where do you find it?

Neti what?

Matt has bad allergies and today his eyes started to get blood shot because of them. After dinner out at one of our favorite Mexican restaurants (that always makes us think of the delicious food we had on our honeymoon) we went to CVS and bought a 'neti pot', ya know one of those tea pots that you drip water through your nose in order to hopefully clear out all your sinuses (I always think of Dwight Schrute using it on the first season of The Office). Of course we had to document this unusual new purchase in use.





I was trying my best to be supportive. Not too sure if the neti pot did it's job or not, but let's hope so !


Also, while at CVS we found an adorable dog bed that I thought was the perfect little size for Ellie. The second we bring it home I put it on the ground and encouraged Ellie to get on it... within thirty seconds she walked by it and Jaxon quickly placed himself on top of it and has not moved since.

Apparently it will be Jaxon's new bed as Ellie is reluctant to give up her spot on Jaxon's oversized bed.

Happy Easter!

We woke up kind of early this morning and took care of a lot of house work, cleaning, and we got out some more spring clothes (it felt nice to pack up some sweaters and to get rid of some other clothes). We went to church with my mom and Steve then spent the day at my mom's house eating a delicious meal (grilled salmon, asparagus, sweet potatoes, rice and pasta, SO good! We spent the rest of the afternoon catching up and playing with my brother's new dog. He is SO tiny but soooo cute. My brother originally wanted a bigger dog, but I think he (and his girlfriend) fell in love with this little guy, and he just couldn't help himself. It's funny when you first get an animal like a dog and when you don't have kids yet, you ask questions as if they just had a child... is he sleeping through the night? how's potty training going?

He is a very sweet pup, and hops like a gazelle through the grass until he wears himself out. Also, the weather was gorgeous today! I hope it stays like this throughout the week. Hope you had a nice day!

Have you ever felt...

like the people you are with don't really 'get' you? I was at a dinner with the other coach's that I work with and this is the third year I have worked with these women. Each year gets more comfortable and we all get in some sort of a groove working side by side, however I have known from day one that I don't have a ton in common with these other women. We don't like the same t.v. shows, we don't spend our time talking about similar things, I am sure we don't listen to the same kind of music, and overall these things hinder the level of conversations we can really have. The past few days I have noticed that sometimes when I am in this particular group I tend to laugh at things that I normally would not laugh at. Also, I will come home with stories to tell my husband about something funny that happened at practice, but as soon as I repeat the story at home, I quickly realize that it was not that funny at all. Does anyone else do this? It's like because of your environment your sense of humor gets temporarily warped. So then I have to end the story with not only 'you shoulda been there...' but a 'guess it was funnier at work' or even a 'the sunshine made me feel dizzy and it made things even more funny at the time'...
Cut to dinner tonight, one of the coaches makes a little sarcastic remark to another nothing statement and the whole table erupts in laughter. Right after that, one coach proclaims to the other 'you are now my funniest friend.... it's so nice to have a friend that is funny too, because i have to be the funny one all the time and now i finally have someone who can be funny!'

Let this sink in for a minute...

Now, I don't think this was a kick to my ego AT ALL. But I will admit that I have spent the last 15 years or so trying to make people laugh and have been pretty successful at it. I know there are plenty of people funnier then me, but I will give myself credit when it is due. I am not great at math, I will do anything but file my own taxes, I like cleaning but HATE dusting, I immediately throw away almost all directions to anything because I won't take the time to read them, I am a semi-germaphobe, I am awful with geography but I continue to try to get better at it..... all of these things are tiny pieces of me, but the point is I do some things well and other things I need to work on. Comedy, is not one of them. I can make people laugh. And when I was surrounded with things that I found un-funny but next to people that couldn't stop laughing, I just... I was .... appalled. Not to sound too dramatic, but I was. I almost felt like it was a competition that I never signed up for. Yet I was ready to compete.

(Next, the funky bass sounds from Seinfeld play as this rapidly turns into the next episode)

Laughter

I quickly realized how boring my last post was, so don't worry, at least I am aware of it and will hopefully not make the same mistake twice. I find myself up during the night which does not happen that often at all (thankfully) but I can NOT fall asleep again. I have slept for a few hours and then find myself incapable of going back to sleep so... what better to do then, by the way I always forget if it's then or than... anyone want to set me straight on this one? What to do next.... look up funny outtakes of course! After a long day, long week, or even a normal day I LOVE having any reason to laugh because I think it is so important for the human psyche. Find me someone who doesn't laugh, and I will say they are unhappy. Isn't that the boldest statement you've ever heard? Probably not, right? But still... laughter is hugely important and I hope everyone (in the world of course) but if not, at least whoever is reading this finds themselves in funny situations or if nothing else can laugh by yourself in the car driving home from work.
FOR INSTANCE; Friday night I found myself at a stoplight staring at a guy who was dressed as the statue of liberty (I assume it was one of those odd advertisements for tax day but I'm not quite sure considering it is literally a guy, probably 23, dressed in a hoodie and jeans but with a bright green toga type outfit and a matching queen like hat). As I watched him he randomly broke out into dance, I could tell he had headphones in and it was obvious he was listening to music. So I appreciated his ability to stand on a very busy street corner and just dance while showing his face. For some reason I think I could totally do that if I had some sort of a mask, but that is just lame. This guy was going to town on his random and quite spastic moves but I had to laugh because as I sat and watched him I quickly flipped through the (mostly) awful radio stations and was pleased to find that Cher's "do you believe in love" was on... normally I would change the channel so fast but in this situation it perfectly fit, and it cracked me up that this guy happened to be listening to "do you BElieve in love after life...." on repeat, which by the way, that's what I think she is saying I don't actually know.
Similar situation about a week ago I was on a busy highway about 5 p.m. and ready to be home. I sometimes like to listen to Enya on the way home because not only is it better than any talk or music on the radio but I find it to be very relaxing. Well, my Enya cd was not within reach and I had to settle for whatever I could find on the radio. As I am getting comfortable with the tunes, I notice a car driving so very close behind me that I could not see his front lights. Now, that is way to close for comfort in my opinion and I found that very annoying. First of all, if I am driving slow (or the exact speed limit) I always put myself in a lane in the middle or far right to make it easy for people to pass me. For whatever reason this dude would not pass me, and spent about a minute huffing and puffing behind me until FINALLY he got in a lane next to me. But when he made this lane switch he was within inches of hitting the back of my car. In my anger, yet serene environment in my car (because I so happened to be listening to Bette Midler's 'God is watching us') and as he passed throwing his hands up in the air, I gave him a 'thumbs up' as I was singing 'God is watching ussssss... from a distance'.
Now if you've never spent some time with me, or heard of any of these songs, I probably sound like a crazy person. But I will encourage any sort of hilarity to ensue on your end of things because we need more of that in this world. Thanks for reading!

And in case you want some of 'The Office' outtakes please check this out.... and I will post some of our home movie outtakes very soon.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXYNYjrgfKw

End of the week

We had our big site review at work on Monday and Tuesday and I could visibly see that my supervisor was nervous about it. After lots of preparation and a kind of intense interview from one of the reviewers, we got really high marks! Not only that, the reviewer expressed his interest in our program and listed all the things we were doing right, in front of my supervisor and the C.E.O. Then I had my performance review with my supervisor on Friday to end the week. She rated me higher than I rated myself on a few things, which I think is kinda of hard (and a little ridiculous) to do anyway... example; rate yourself 1-4 on a list of issues, rate yourself too high and you seem overly confident, rate yourself too low and she questions your ability to do the job well.
So after a couple of longish days and still recovering from traveling over the past weekend, going to softball practice was a welcomed distraction. We were outside a bunch and got the dogs out for several walks, and I was refreshed by the sunshine!
We've had a great start to our weekend and we have NOTHING planned but a hair cut for me, and a trip to Target for a few things, and I love those kind of weekends.

Grandma Sugar

We heard this past week that my grandma was "not doing very well" and after several visits to the hospital and different spats of bad health, grandma always came back from it, this time we were all pretty worried that she wouldn't. My sister, nephew and I quickly traveled to Minnesota Thursday and spent Thursday night, and all of Friday with my grandma. We had the amazing opportunity to tell her exactly how we feel, let her listen to the calls of loved ones, and even though she was not fully awake, she responded in different ways and I absolutely know she heard everything we said. Several friends, residents, and nurses came by to tell her how they felt and a goodbye just in case. We shared very special moments with nice Chaplains and Hospice, which I could not imagine doing that job every day, we so appreciated their sincerity and kind words.




Thanks to Kestan for being our comic relief during a very difficult time, he would grab a Kleenex and take turns bringing it to me or Shannon saying "for your boogers..." or "please stop, it's okay, stop." Grandma loved laughing and I knew she was smiling on us then.

I have called grandma "sugar" ever since I can remember. She was a charmer, and the best at one liners, and cute phrases. Grandma called little ones her "little sugar sugar" and that is how I began to know her and how our family always referred to her. Grandma would have been 92 years old this June. She created a beautiful family and touched many many lives.



Grandma Sugar will forever be missed. I am so very grateful for Grandma Sugar for many reasons, but especially for her letting us be apart of her journey leaving this Earth. And now she is flying free...