…were certainly surrounding a family member this past weekend.  thanks to the wonders of fb, we heard about this saturday morning and we were shocked.  one of hubby’s cousins was driving home to visit family for the weekend last friday and ended up having the biggest scare of his life thanks to a sociopath who apparently doesn’t deal well with road construction.  he was shot at while driving down i-75.  the bullet hole was inches behind his head.  and judging by the angle of the hole, the man was mere milliseconds or centimeters off on his shot.  either way, my cousin-in-law escaped a potentially fatal incident by a much smaller margin than anyone wants to contemplate.  for the sake of his children… for the sake of his wife (who has already been widowed once and was in the seat next to him)… for the sake of the family… i am so thankful that we are not burying another far-too-young friend/loved one.  thankfully, they are both uninjured.  although i’m sure it will take some time for the memory of it to fade.

the good news is that both the man and his wife, who was driving, are in jail.  these upstanding citizens with no registration, no insurance, and no drivers license, are being charged with two counts of attempted first-degree-murder and facilitation of a felony, respectively. 

for more, news video and article about the incident.  cousin-in-law was clearly still on an adrenaline rush when he was interviewed in the video.  i just can’t imagine.  at least during my frightful gun experience, it was never actually fired.

it’s finally here… the time of year that we can start reclaiming our beach and pool.  and so i have.  yesterday was the first time in months that i swam laps in the pool.  i did either 24 or 28 lengths.  i was aiming for 28 but i think i only got 24.  i lost count when ms. B. stopped me to talk for several minutes.  such is life.  it was my first day back at it so i was fine with it being a short one.  when i was done with my workout, i got out and headed toward my towel and ran straight into cargo.  we talked for a few minutes before i realized that it was him and his new girlfriend sitting on the steps at the other end of the pool.  they had been sitting there for probably half my laps with me swimming right up next to them and i never noticed it was them.  and they never realized it was me.  so we talked for a few minutes while i dried off and then i went over to say hi to K before heading back up to work.  we made plans to get together last night but were never able to get in touch with them.  we did go out with scooter and sunny and a couple of their friends, though, so that was fine.

today i did 40 lengths of the pool, which is the equivalent of 2/3 mile.  there was a little girl, probably four years old, who was very intrigued by my swimming.  she asked questions such as “why are you swimming so many times?” every time i got to her end of the pool.  she even followed me back across the pool once (she had water-wings on).  i told her what an awesome job she had done swimming all that way and she exclaimed that her legs were SO tired.  she ended up getting out and walking back to the other end again.  my next lap by her, she asked why my legs weren’t tired.  i told her that they were very tired.  she asked why i kept swimming if i was tired.  i told her that i was swimming for exercise and it was good to get tired when exercising.  i don’t think she got it but she sure was cute.  i wanted to stick her in the pocket of my robe and bring her home!  on my last lap, i made sure to let her know that i was done swimming and that i had enjoyed talking with her.  sure she slowed me down but she was such a cutie, i didn’t mind. 

really, there’s not a whole lot to say about swimming so i won’t be going on about it all the time, but i do intend to make it a regular part of my workout routines again.  and i’m genuinely looking forward to it, even if it does kick my butt.

monday turned out to be a day of disappointments for both hubby and me. 

1. you’ll recall that on saturday, we got up at the crack of way-too-early to chase down surfboards.  the seller, who wasn’t even there for the meeting that he set, supposedly was unaware of some minor damage to each board but volunteered to fix them and bring them to us this week.  well after a couple calls to him monday, hubby finally got a hold of him.  he told hubby that he would make the repairs – but not the way they should be fixed – and they’d be ready in a couple weeks.  he also mentioned that if someone came along before then, he would go ahead and sell them.  hubby reminded him that that was not the arrangement that they had worked out saturday morning and  he turned around and informed hubby that he had a buyer that would pick them up friday as-is, cash in hand.  i was ticked off when hubby told me this.  he had been so daggum excited about getting those stupid surfboards and this jerk just decides to change the game.  unethical piece of junk!  hubby thought about it for a while and then sent him an email telling him how disappointed he was in the man’s behavior and that he was no longer interested in doing business with him.  my poor guy.  he really was so excited about those boards. 
2. while all of this was going on, i was on my way to the dentist to get my teeny, tiny filling fixed.  i arrived, got in the chair, had the dentist prod around in my mouth a few minutes, and then he says, “i can fix that for you, but not today.”  what?!  i had this appointment for a week.  it was a big fiasco because his office staff is apparently incompetent and had trouble scheduling the appointment.  clearly, he read the displeasure on my face because he started apologizing and said he was in the middle of a surgery next door and they just walked in and told him that he needed to do an exam on me.  i was ticked… not at him because i know that he doesn’t know anything about his scheduling… but i was ticked nonetheless.  he asked how hard it was for me to take time off work to which i replied that it wasn’t just about taking time off work.  this is MY time.  it takes me thirty minutes to drive out there.  so, his office cost me one hour of MY time in driving, plus two hours of wages.  he kept apologizing and told me that maybe he could see me after he finished his surgery.  could i stick around for an hour or so?  i told his staff that i would run some errands in town and to call me when his surgery was done so that if i was still nearby, i could come back and get my filling.  so i went shopping.  a lot.  retail therapy, i guess, after being so disappointed about hubby’s boards and my filling that i’ve been waiting to have fixed since it fell out shortly before my cleaning back in june.  which was a disappointment all it’s own because we showed up that day just to find that the dentist wasn’t even there.  he had left earlier in the day for vacation and his office staff never bothered to let us know that so that we could decide whether or not we wanted to reschedule.  anyhow, after about an hour of shopping and still no call from them (they never did), i decided that i really wasn’t in the mood to go back there.  and i’m increasingly thinking that it’s time to find a new dentist.  as far as i’m concerned, that was three strikes.  the shame about that is that we both really like our hygienists there. 
3. a new episode of weeds was on tonight but i didn’t get to watch it.  yep, showtime is still gone.  i’m pretty sure it’s gone for good and this makes me remarkably sad.  i am so disappointed that i won’t be able to watch dexter next month.  i know it’s stupid to get so down about tv.  i know this, but i genuinely enjoy tv.  i’m a junk!e.  i admit this and i won’t apologize for it.  and, dangit! i want my dexter!!!

to reduce the clutter of exercise posts, i’ve decided to just start doing a weekly summation of all of my activities.  maybe seeing it all laid out in one grid will help motivate me to fill in more spaces… it’ll be like playing fitness BINGO!  😉  i’m sure there will still be inane posts with details of specific activities.  what can i say, i’m boring and have nothing better to talk about here.  i guess that’s why i only have two readers. 

last night, we went to mello’s store to get hubby a new pair of running shoes.  while there, we made tentative plans to meet up with them at our plaza later on.  we stopped to do a bit of grocery shopping on our way home and that was where i had a complete stranger make me feel like absolute crap.  hubby and i went up separate aisles.  i was getting some whole wheat pasta when a man approached me.  i’m not a fan of getting approached by strangers to begin with but i try to be genial and unafraid.  this man handed me a card and told me that he knew a program that would help me lose my extra weight.  cue the polite smile while struggling to fight back tears.  why?  why would you say such a thing to someone you don’t know?  i know that i’m not as svelte as i once was but i didn’t realize i had gotten so monstrously huge that a stranger would want to help me lose weight.  luckily, hubby came up the aisle a moment later and he left.  unfortunately, the damage was done and i felt downright lousy for the next couple hours.  good thing we had plans with friends and the fun conversation was enough to pull me out of the funk.  next stranger that tries to talk to me will get an immediate fu. 

this morning we got up early to go meet a guy about some surfboards for sale.  hubby had talked with him last night and made arrangements to meet him at his house at 07:00 to look at the boards.  so…we go up at 06:00… on a saturday.  and we drove a couple towns up to meet this guy.  we called when we were a couple miles from his house to let him know we were just about there and he informed hubby he wasn’t home.  apparently he had emailed hubby but he didn’t bother to check his email at 06:00.  great.  up at the crack of dawn on a saturday for no reason.  luckily, the guy told us to go on into his yard and where to find the boards so we could at least look at them.  we looked them over, called mello for a phone consultation, and called him back.  there were a couple minor (i guess, we really don’t know anything about surfboards) dings that the guy volunteered to patch up.  he’ll fix them and then bring them to us sometime this week.  the good thing about that is that we should be able to arrange to have scooter or mello around to look them over before we make the purchase. 

when we got back home, i made a quick breakfast and then napped on and off the rest of the morning and afternoon.  around 18:00 i decided it was time to get off the couch.  i dragged hubby away from work and we walked down to the park at our plaza to run some laps.  we took the gps with us so that we could finally measure of a mile lap.  it took us three laps to get it right but i think we ended up with the right combination of turns for a 1.03 mile lap.  close enough for government work.  so after our 3.06 miles of running, we walked through the plaza a bit, grabbed some dinner at panera, and then walked back home.  with the roughly four miles of walking there, around, and home, it ended up being seven miles of activity.  not too shabby for a saturday.

because i can.  i’m not sure what these were but they were part of the landscaping of whichever relative hosted the family reunion last month.  they were huge, floppy, plentiful, and oh-so-purty. 

and lest you think i was exaggerating the hugeness, they are bigger than hubby’s head.

the bridge run tonight was really great.  surprising really, since i was feeling so *blech*on the way out there.  i ran further up the bridge than i have been before walking the rest of the up.  i then ran hard down where i encountered a sidewalk closed sign with tape all around it.  so i veered off and took a longer path down toward the college before turning around and running back to the bridge where i walked up again.  i met hubby at the top and he turned and went back with me the rest of the way.  i ran hard down, walked while i grabbed and drank my water cup, and jogged back to the parking lot.  i really felt great about it.  and i felt like i had been faster.  even though i added a little (very little) distance on the other side of the bridge, i was almost back up to the top of the bridge before meeting up with any of the two-lappers.  it also seemed like the camaraderie was very high tonight.  not only did i get smiles and words of encouragement, but it seemed to be the night of the high-fives.  six or seven guys wanted their hands slapped as we passed.  which was nice… a bit odd and i badly wanted some hand sanitizer from exchanging sweat with so many guys… but it was a nice, uplifting gesture. 

sadly, my “runner’s high” was to be short lived.  i got home, turned on the tv, and discovered that showtime has been taken away from me.  i am so frickin bummed about this.  they play the funkiest movies but i absolutely love their shows.  i’ve been counting down the days to dexter‘s new season because i’m a total dexter addict.  and this season of weeds hasn’t even ended yet.  and i was just getting caught up on californication.  i really, really hope that it comes back in the next few days but i’m doubtful.  seriously, folks, i cannot even tell you how sad i am over this.

seems like we’ve got an awful lot going on over the next few months.  here’s a sampling of some of our upcoming fun:

• hubby’s birthday is next weekend.  the plan was to have a casual gathering of all the usual suspects around here but we can’t seem to get things settled enough to really set plans.  very up in the air right now due to family stuff in ‘bama.  my guess is that we’ll end up there instead.
• hubby’s boss and another co-worker are supposed to be coming down for a working “retreat” the week after next.  it’ll be our first professional company.  technically, jt is a coworker and he’s come with his family several times, but since we practically lived with them when we first moved to ga and have been around all their kids since birth and babysat over weekends it’s hard to count him in that category.  anyhow, i don’t know that they’ll actually be staying in our home but i’m sure they’ll at least be in the building and, no matter what, it should make for some interesting times.
• the week after that, my cousin and CIL will be coming to visit.  i’m so psyched!  it was such fun last time they came up here.  although i guess i’m going to have to try harder to kill her with my kayak this time. 
• that same week we’ll also be having our first stranger house guests as an old friend of my cousin will be bringing her little boy to visit with my cousin for a couple days.  i’m a little anxious about this… not because i think she’ll be an axe murderer or anything… but just because it’s a bit odd to have strangers in my home.  which i’m sure is how my cousin felt when our friends sylvis and peach stayed with them on their recent visit.  although, in my defense, they had been plurk and scrabble buddies for almost a year so they at least virtually knew each other.
• the middle of september will be my ten year high school reunion.  i doubt i’ll bother with it.  after all, i didn’t bother to show up for my graduation, why show up ten years later to celebrate it?  actually, there are really only a couple of people i’d drive six hours to catch up with and they are both across country (and one will be seven months pregnant) so i doubt they’ll be bothering with it either.  i had a very small circle of true friends in high school and i keep up with most of them online or IRL anyhow. 
• toward the end of october, we’re taking two weeks of vacation for which we are both SO READY.  we’ll be doing two cruises, one little two nighter that we got for free for booking our cruises last year and one seven nighter.  we’ll be spending the in-between days playing tourists in south florida.
• originally, my cousin was supposed to be accompanying us on the two nighter but life got in the way of those plans.  instead, my sissy and BIL will be dumping the kids and joining us.  i’m very excited since we don’t get to spend much adult time with them.  not that i don’t absolutely adore my kids, because i totally do, but it’ll be a lot of fun to spend a few days with just us four adults.  here’s hoping this “free” cruise doesn’t suck.
• if my cousin has her halloween anniversary party, we’ll make it back just in time for it.  of course, after disembarking a cruise and driving back to orlando, i’m not sure how much fun we’ll be but that’s beside the point.  she’ll be happy if i just refrain from making her clean.  now costumes… that’s a whole different concern.  i’m so lousy at costume ideas and/or execution.  i absolutely loved my costume last year but i guess it would be pretty lame to wear it two years in a row. 
• we still haven’t decided on the holidays this year.  after losing both grandmothers last year, we had talked about swapping holidays this year – thanksgiving with his family and Christmas with mine – but we haven’t really discussed it since then.  not sure what we’ll be doing. 

last weekend turned out to be a pretty social weekend.  we had our anniversary date friday night.  saturday night was a birthday dinner for panda.  i think there were thirteen of us there.  but sunday was the big day.  in order to welcome tropical storm claudette to town, fifteen or sixteen of us got together at the state beach.  there was surfing, kayaking, laying, sunning, and conversation.  we stayed out there four and a half hours or so and many people got cooked.  fortunately, hubby and i learned our lesson last time and wore enough clothing to combat the sun (even though the sun wasn’t actually out this time).  i still got way too much redness on my face but the rest of me stayed nice and pale.

o'neil

mello on a wavelet, tat and o'neil talking, hubby and train in the background looking for waves

hubby knee surfing

hubby belly surfing with a huge smile

stretch and mello riding while o'neil watches

k and yoda hanging ten

tat self-portrait

me, panda, mello, nightingale, N, and some guy

yesterday afternoon, i got the following text from my loving husband:

10 years ago i went on a date with a girl i fell in love with

yep, it was ten years since our first not-a-date.  TEN years.  ten YEARS.  it’s hard to believe that we’ve been together for more than a third of my life now.  ten years ago yesterday, i went on a not-a-date with a man who would become my soul mate.  who’d have guessed it?  we were against the odds and yet, here we are… ten years later… happily married. 

i so love this man. 

so, in celebration of our first not-a-date… dinner and bowling… we went out last night for… dinner and bowling.  he even wore the same shirt he wore that night (which i recall being extremely attractive on him). 

ten years ago, i beat him the first game (he claims he let me win) and he won the next two.  and our big moment was a post-strike high-five that lasted a little too long when i inadvertently grabbed his hand while looking in his eyes. 

last night, he won the first two (118-105 and 110-105) but i beat him on the last game (121-113).  there were many high-fives, many held-hands, many hugs, and many kisses.  it was a really great time.  with the exception of me tripping, throwing myself down the lane, and twisting my ankle and knee on my way down.  if it didn’t hurt so badly, i might have been embarrassed.  and, of course, it was my left leg that i fell on, which happens to be the leg i have so much trouble with when running.  aw well, such is life.  small price to pay for a spectacular commemorative date with my husband.

this week i did next to nothing.  i blame hubby.  tuesday morning, he dragged me out of bed at 03:15 to take him to the airport at 04:00.  by the time i got back home, i just wanted to crawl into bed.  so i did.  and i tossed and turned until the alarm went off and was miserable the rest of the day.  the rest of the week, i really did try to get up at 06:00 but between not being able to sleep when hubby’s not here and not having him to pry me out of bed… it was a lost cause.  here’s my wholly unimpressive week of morning exercise:

tonight was the bridge run – without my hubby.  and it was a melancholy day for me thanks to the very sad dream that i kept slipping back into all night long last night.  and when i got to the parking lot, it seemed that nobody wanted to talk to me.  all this to say, i was feeling pretty lowly when i started my run.  heck, when i first started, i wasn’t even going to run.  i walked the first eighth of a mile or so.  but then panda took a couple minutes out of her run to talk to me and tell me what was going on with her.  and that made me feel much better.  so when she took off, i told myself to jog the rest of the way to the bridge.  i walked up, RAN down, walked up, jogged down, stopped for water, walked while i drank my water, and then jogged the rest of the way back.  several folks offered words of encouragement along the way.  they just don’t know how much that means to me and how helpful it is.  by the time i made it back to the parking lot, i was feeling much better.  *don’t tell hubby that exercise improved my mood, i’ll never hear the end of it!*  i stood around talking with everyone for an hour and a half or so and had a great time.  i really kinda wish we did at least one more group run like that each week.