Putting a plan into motion

I think I've decided to run myself through another 30 day challenge using the Wii Active. I enjoyed that and *I* see results, even if my husband does not! 99.9% of your success is mental anyway, or so I think, sooo...that's my plan. It feels really good to workout in the mornings before work anyway!!

I talked to my instructor on Saturday for a brief moment. At some point or another, we are going to get together and choose a weapon for me to start training with. In case you're interested in it, go here and read "Choosing your Weapon".

I'm currently listening to the whispers of the men on the other side of the wall from me. I'm at work earlier than normal. I can't stand being late, so I generally get to work on Mondays at least 30 minutes early. It gives me time to get my first (and possibly second!) cup of coffee, have breakfast and read my mail.
Plus I can pull myself together and get organized--as organized as I can be--before the calls start rolling in. The only downfall is, people know I'm in my cube and come over to ask me LOADS of questions!

I was tagged by a friend to do an honest blog, and I will do that in a bit. For now, I'm about to go get myself another cup of coffee, find an address and mail a card for the little man. He wrote a thank you card to a friend, plus he wrote her a letter too, and I promised to mail it for him. It'll go out today and arrive...well, we don't know when it'll arrive. Hopefully she'll enjoy receiving it!

Sick Saturday

I don't like being sick. I feel worse when my family is sick. I woke up early this morning (not sure of the exact time), with Aidan telling me he doesn't feel good. He climbed into bed and made himself comfy. He was running a fever (very hot to the touch!), so I didn't force him to leave. I let him stay, but told him he had to be still or he'd get moved. He was good to his word...except for elbowing me off the bed!

I wound up getting up early and hanging out with the cat. I had coffee, read a few magazines and had the cat sit with me, enjoying the silence. I got a chance to watch some home improvement shows on HGTV. I haven't watched HGTV in months! I usually don't get the television to myself in the mornings. Usually it's controlled by one of the kids and they're watching one of the shows they've recorded.

The little guy is still feeling puny--he's laying on the couch, sleeping, currently. I'll get him to his room shortly and tucked in. He's definitely not feeling well because he didn't even eat his dinner and I didn't hear about how hungry he was all day.

Hopefully this is a 24 hour bug. I've heard from another parent whose son is in our Cub Scout pack that his son was sick with a bug too. Hmmm. I hope it clears up soon!

Pinewood Derby procrastination

If you're the parent of a young boy in Cub Scouts, you'll understand when I mention two words that have been on our minds lately...Pinewood Derby.
We have the pinewood blocks that are the cars...or are supposed to be the cars. Saturday is Pinewood. Have we done our car yet? ha! No. My husband picked up a Dremel tool yesterday, but then they didn't do anything with it. They sat on the couch and watched television, played video games and generally goofed off. This is a last minute thing, or so it would seem.
Our assistant Den leader is being kind enough to take our Derby car over to his brother's house to use a band saw to do the rough shape of the car. He said he'll take the axles and polish those for us, plus he'll sand the burrs off the wheels (the burrs are left from the molding when they created them). That pretty much gives us the base sanding and painting/stickering to do with the car. I really appreciate his offer because it means that I don't have to scramble around at the last minute every night this week, ranting and raving that the car isn't done. He has a base design, but he's not sure how it'll be. I'm not either. We sketched out the idea on a piece of paper, but translating that to a block of wood? Yeah we'll see how that works!!

I didn't get my walk in today--so my friend now owes me a cup of coffee. It's a bit chilly outside so I guess that's okay. Next week, we'll have to go either in the afternoon on Saturday or on Sunday morning as Pinewood is Saturday.
I still need to find the charger for my camera's battery so I can take lots of pictures of Pinewood.

Mornings

I love the morning. The earlier, the better. I feel like I'm at my best, even if I'm half sleepy, when I see the sun starting to peek over the horizon, chasing away the indigo of the prior evening. The sky turns from indigo to gray, to a stunning cerulean criss crossed with cirrus clouds that are streaked with rose and mauve. It's a truly wonderful sight to behold. As the morning progresses, the sky lightens and the blues are shot with gold, as if the sun's rays are a priceless metal, touching everything as if Midas was alive.

I think I'm at my best first thing in the morning. Even without coffee, I feel like I'm starting new every day. I enjoy getting up in the morning and looking out the window, watching the sky change. My living room faces the East, so I have the advantage of being able to open my window and have the morning light stream in.

Saturday

Today was a relatively quiet day. I spent the day doing laundry and we cleaned up our patio. I'll go out tomorrow and have a cup of coffee on the porch.
I've been working on the dining table--it's almost to the point where I can put the Halloween tablecloth on it. That'll be the highlight of the week. The kids will be able to sit down and do their home work at the table again.

We were 'invaded' by one of Aidan's friends today. Aidan called him up and invited him over. They spent the afternoon playing Sonic on the Wii. It was kind of funny to listen to them. They were both reasonably well behaved. I'm impressed. Usually I see this boy running around, playing with the other boys at Kids' Club. Today, he was very quiet. He and Aidan spent their time playing with his "Indiana Jones" hat and whip. I have to admit that young C looks really good in his Indy outfit. I wonder if he's wearing that for Halloween?

Tomorrow we have the BTK family picnic. I've signed up the entire family to go. I just have to make *something* to take. I think we'll take a salad of some sort. I'm not sure yet. It all depends on my mood when I get up in the morning. I'll have to get up early, have my coffee and HOPE that everyone stays in bed until late. That would be nice for me. I need some quiet time. I've got two movies I need to watch--The Kite Runner and Reservation Road. I've read one book (RR) but not the other (TKR). It'll be interesting to read.

Ahhh, apartment life is wonderful (NOT!!). One of the neighbors is outside yelling. Gotta love it. I wish we had a house...or something...

Morning Light

I have to admit that my favorite time of day is when the sun is just barely peeking over the horizon. It's that time just before full sunrise, when it's neither dark nor light, but kind of a "twilight" if you will. It's usually coolest at that time of day and if there's a breeze blowing, it's the softest breeze of the day. I enjoy being able to get up early and go out on the patio to watch the sunrise. We're lucky in that our apartment faces East--I see the sunrise every day that I'm home, when the sun is shining. I can take a cup of coffee (if I get it made early enough!) out on the porch and just stand at the rail, watching the colors play across the sky. It's somehow soothing and invigorating at the same time. My little garden is my companion at this time of day. I like to go out and sit out there and just enjoy the sun rise.

Tomorrow's Easter Sunday. It's also our 17th anniversary. We've been together as a couple for 19 years. We're not really planning anything. With our luck, we'll both sit on the couch and enjoy being "old" together--he'll be on his computer playing a game and I'll be surfing the Internet on mine. LOL!! The cats will probably find any available patch of sunlight to lounge around in and the kids will play Wii or something else. They like to do that. Amanda wants to go to her friend's house today and spend the night. I told her that if her friend's mother said it was okay, that's fine with me. I WILL, however, get into her room and toss out all the old clothes she's not wearing, plus pick up everything on the floor. I'm tired of looking at it (again!). She says "It's fine to me!" whenever I mention it to her. She's not quite figured out that if Mom says the room is annoying, ya better LISTEN!! hahaha!!

Sunday morning coffee

I received a neat little surprise in the mail yesterday. I received a packet of "Jamaican Me Crazy" coffee from Joffrey's Coffee and Tea. It was GOOD! I made it yesterday and inhaled the entire pot of coffee. I think I'll have to look seriously at ordering some. Need to tell hubby that it's going to be in my head for a while.
Seriously, it was good! The house smelled great--that was a plus! Another plus was the fact that it was something warm in the middle of the afternoon. I had been outside in the wind yesterday for almost an hour and was chilled to the bone when I got home. The coffee helped me get warm again. Yay!!

Tonight's the Black Belt Banquet. It'll be held over at the dojang. After all the searching I did, I couldn't find a nice dress that I thought would be appropriate for wearing tonight. I couldn't justify buying a dress that was dressier than most, so I didn't get anything. I'm considering just wearing a nice pair of dress slacks and a red blouse I have in my closet. It'll be "business casual" but not overly casual. I don't know. I may drag hubby out for a minute or three this morning. Number one son is supposed to have company over today and number one daughter is going to a friend's house for the afternoon, so I'll have to go early.

Daylight Savings started last night/this morning. How the stupid government thinks it's saving us money, I don't know, but...I did hear on the news last night that there wasn't a huge savings. People used more energy for heating and cooling their homes. Maybe less energy was used for lights, but they still had a lot of output to heat and air conditioning. I am not a fan of DST and would like to see them just decide to leave things alone.

March 2, 2008

Happiness is having a quiet house so that you can enjoy a cup of coffee! The cats and I are the only ones up this morning. Everyone else is still in bed. This gives us time to sit in the living room and listen to the black birds cawing, and the mockingbirds yelling. They aren't singing--yet.
Today's supposed to be a gray day. The skies are overcast right now which is just fine with me. I'm an oddity down here as I LOVE gray days. I have the windows open. The cats are in the window and on the back of the love seat in front of the window. Every time a bird flutters by, they both go on alert. They're silly!

Last night I crashed completely. I guess I needed the caffeine withdrawal I had. I'm not going to do that on Friday--I'll have my morning coffee. I need to figure out what I'm going to eat during the day so that I'll have plenty of energy for the test that night. I'm open to suggestions.
Obviously it'll need to be something points friendly!

Speaking of points friendly, yesterday's weigh in was anything but friendly. Again, I didn't go up to the meeting, but weighed in at home. I did put it in my weight tracker on WW. I am seriously unhappy about it, but...I needed that wake up call. I haven't been tracking my points and I need to. I also need to drink more water--that's a huge thing for me. I drank 2 litres of water yesterday but feel like I could have drunk more. I usually have tons of excuses for not drinking water but they're just excuses. I shouldn't let work or my co-workers interfere with MY health.

A day without caffeine?

Let me tell you, starting your day off without caffeine is not the best way to go. I don't usually have coffee before I go to the Black Belt Prep classes because I don't want to be dehydrated. I've done that once in a two hour class and I decided that once was enough! I usually come home and have coffee, but that didn't happen today.

This morning's class was a true preparation for the test. We lined up, figured out where we're going to stand, taught the Cho Dan Bo's that they need to face Kwan Jang Nim, and practiced the bowing in and the standing meditation. Then he got us organized for the actual test and we were off and running.
I was in front of a kid who is 17 or 18, very tall and, ahem! LOUD!! He also doesn't realize the extent of his reach and came very darned close to kicking me in the head. (I have asked Sa Bu Nim to move me or him. I don't want to be in danger of being kicked.)

When the second class of the morning started, Sa Bu Nim told me that *I* was going to warm them up. ME?! Okay! That was a bit of a fun thing for me. I actually stayed around a little longer than I had originally intended because I was enjoying the technique and working out. I also got to see my kids do their warm ups. My daughter did her push ups very well. My son has some work to do. His push ups are worse than his "elderly" mom and mine haven't been the best. By the way, *I* did 30 push ups in one minute.

We came home after the kids' class and I've been here ever since. I managed to do laundry with my daughter's help but nothing else. I'm very tired and have been dozing off on the couch. I watched/slept through Breakfast at Tiffany's. Audrey Hepburn was wonderful.
I'm going to be concentrating on forms all week and resting as much as possible. I know that Friday's going to be a great challenge. I can do it. I'm ready. I will try to have my friend Johnny take pictures.