According to NC lore, so goes the woolly worm, goes the winter. I officially hate woolly worms and am glad Paul ran a bunch over. We are in for a VERY cold winter in NC.
But the kids had fun! 
Here is the link to the pictures:
http://picasaweb.google.com/sanders1745/WoollyWormFestival?feat=directlink
Not much to report lately, which is kind of nice really. We have been getting a few requests to update the blog so here are the highlights:
SICK
I stayed home from work Monday and Tuesday of last week (9/28 and 29). At first I thought it was flu, which means automatic 7 days out of work. Luckily (?) it was only a sinus infection. I am finally feeling back to normal today (10/6) 1 week later. It has indeed thrown a wrench in my training and weight loss progress (more later). But as of tonight (great run!) I am back on track. Paul and the kids had gotten the respiratory funk a couple times in earlier weeks. I think we all are on the mend. I got my flu shot and the H1N1 flu vaccine will be at our site in a few weeks at the latest. Because I am a high risk person (asthma) in a high risk job (healthcare), I am near the top of the list. Which I feel mixed about since they are still looking at long term side affects. I did also get a pneumonia vaccine free at work b/c of the high risk thing and the fact that the H1N1 tends to affect respiratory system and turn to pneumonia.
HEALTHY
So Paul and I have been in a weight loss contest of sorts w each other for a couple months now. My goal is 11 pounds, Paul’s is 7 (I think). So we weigh in every Wed morning and if we have dropped weight we get a certain amount of money we chose put towards the kayaks that we want (but cannot afford). If we did not lose, but we did our workouts for the week (training for the 1/2 marathon in Dec), we put 1/2 the money back. So far I have lost about 6 1/2 pounds. This means that I am under the cut off for what our life insurance company thinks is high risk. So once I can stay there, I will get re-tested and save us some money!
KIDS
Tyler had a hard time w getting used to school and its routine/restriction/discipline, but he has been doing much better recently. He lost his 2nd tooth yesterday. I woke up in the middle of the night (ok, 10:30) and heard him rolling around, then nothing, then…”yessss!!!!” He had found his quarter from the tooth fairy.
Tyler's first lost tooth
Anna is kicking butt in school. She has her dad’s spelling prowess so we have been working on that, but she has aced her test each of the last 2 weeks. She is very much into mermaids right now.
Both kids love riding their bikes, Tyler prefers trails and Anna the road. Tyler wants to play hoops this winter. Anna changes her mind daily, but did decide she wanted to do a craft from a book she got from Miss Sallie, one of the triathletes I coached through Team in Training this season. Sallie works at Edward McKay, a local used bookstore we LOVE LOVE LOVE. Anna got to go a couple weeks ago and pick some books ($3 worth) b/c she got to 10 on her reward chart (for following the rules at school and home).
FUN
Paul read one of my books about Michael Jordan–its about his retirement and (first) comeback. I recently read 2 books my mom brought me: Never Change (Elizabeth Berg) and Garden Spells (Sarah Addison Allen). Now I am reading Seven Summits–it is about the first 2 guys who climbed the highest mountain on each of the 7 continents. Next comes 2 books I got in Wilmington at one of my favorite little shops, Two Sisters Bookery. My choices are Why the Devil Chose New England for His Work (Jason Brown) or Breakfast with Buddha (Roland Merullo). The weekend of Sept 20th (our anniversary!!) Paul and I went to Wilmington for the race that my TNT peeps did.
L to R: Tom, Sallie, Kathy, me
The weekend after that my parents came down and we had lots of fun, especially at the zoo w Paul’s mom, sis and her kids.
Mom, Dad, Susan, Paul at lunch at Fishbones
Tyler stylin' in my cap while he fixes my hair (at the zoo).
Girl time at the zoo!
Then last weekend Paul and I went to see B.B. King in Myrtle Beach’s House of Blues. It was SO KICK ASS! I will let him tell the rest. No new real house projects in progress. Saturday will be an easy weekend at home so we will have chore day (shhh–Paul and the kids don’t know yet).
I know it doesn’t look like it, but she really did start it. I am an innocent younger sibling.
We are back from our trip to Syd-cinnati. What a cute baby girl! I posted more pictures (scroll half way down, when the images change to non-numbered ones, you are on the 2nd half–I think it starts with Michael snoozing on the couch with Sydney).
It is always great to see my sister, but this was definitely one of those weekends where you see time marching on before your eyes. I am 35, she is 37. I am a step mother of 2, she has a newborn. The miracle of all of this is that my parents have not seemed to have aged. They are still mom and dad!
OK, enough deep thoughts for today. Off to read before bed–back to work tomorrow. BTW–I gave in a started the Twilight series. AWESOME. I was worried I would be scared, but I am not. Also, Elli–I also took your book, Atonement. Will you add that to my Scarpelli library card check out list?
Happy Independence Day!! Paul and I are in Cincinnati with Elli and Michael and their latest addition–Sydney Olivia! Here are some photos.
Paul drove us out on Thursday, we arrived about 4:30pm. We have been chilling and hanging out, trying to help Elli and Michael where we can. My mom and dad are coming today for the 4th–they should arrive anytime.
Paul and I ran yesterday and this morning. It was brutal. I did some crunches yesterday and made Paul do some w me this morning. He did not like that. He said, “Why do I have to have a fitness nazi for a wife? Why can’t my wife be lazy like everyone else’s?” Cracked me up. Elli was up by the time we were finished and I told her what Paul said. She laughed too and said, “Yeah–you married the wrong sister for THAT!!”
Susan and her mom shelling at Lover's Key Beach (Elli's shadow)
Paul and I returned from Christmas with my family in Ft Myers, FL (they have a condo down there). Elli and Michael (and of course Zoe the Zygote) were there too. We arrived on the 25th in the evening and just got back tonight (Sunday) about an hour ago. Here was the basic schedule:
Wake @ 7:30am; exercise til about 10-ish; big breakfast; pool time (80 degrees and no clouds); dinner (we rotated which couple cooked); games; bed about 9pm. That’s right folks–I almost got my 12 hours/night of sleep!
Other activities that were interspersed were shopping (Paul bought Life is Good pj pants and a ball for Maggie), reading (yep–Paul too!!), shelling (girls only–the picture shown) and napping (ok, mostly me there). It was very relaxing.
We are both off tomorrow, and we have the kids so we are planning some activites: pool, movie and getting the kids their library cards!! I promise we will blog about their birthdays and celebrating Christmas–there is so much to tell and so many pix, its hard to narrow it down to a blog.
This Wednesday I flew up to New Jersey to meet with some people from our human pharmaceutical division. My main meetings were with the Data Management group. I also got to meet with the eCRF development group, clinical coding group, and archive group. We had some really good meetings and my group came back with a lot of ideas that we want to implement in Animal Health. Since most people here complain when I talk about computers I am sure everyone would be bored to death hearing about processes involved with the handling of clinical data so I will leave it at we had a great meeting.
Wednesday night Bryan, Wesley and I decided to take a train into New York city to have dinner and look around. We were staying in Newark NJ which is right on the border so we figured we would have about a 20 minute train ride. Turns out we were wrong, we had a 1 hour train ride into Penn Station so by they time we got there we were starving. When we first got there we thought we were in for a long night because it took us a little bit just to figure out how to get out of the station. Luckily once we got out the rest of the night was easy.
We found a little hole in the wall pizza place for dinner. We almost got thrown out before we even got to eat because none of us could understand the guy behind the counter. He kept asking Bryan if we were eating there or taking it with us, but Bryan couldn’t understand him and the guy was getting mad. Finally we figured out what he was asking and he calmed down and, reluctantly, allowed us to stay. The pizza there was really good, although it may just have been that I was so hungry at that point that anything would have been good. After dinner we walked up Broadway, through Time Square and over to Rockefeller Center to see the Christmas tree. We lucked out on our way back because the train was running late and we were just able to make it. If we would have missed that train we would have had to wait a hour for the next train and wouldn’t have made it back until midnight. We had a lot of fun walking around but I think you would have to be crazy to want to live there, there was WAY too many people.
We were done at 1:30 on Thursday and headed back to the airport. Our drive over turned out to be foreshadowing to how the rest of the day was going to go. I am pretty sure our driver kept falling asleep because we were all over the road the whole way back. He almost smashed one car into the barriers but luckily they were able to avoid us.
Our flight was suppose to be at 5 so we had a while after we got in there. At about 3 I noticed that they had changed the status of our flight to canceled at the gate, although no one ever said anything. We went up to the counter and they were able to get us on another flight but it was suppose to be leaving at 2:40 and it was all the way in another terminal (remember it was 3 at the time) so we asked if we were going to make the flight. The girl said “you have a few minutes, hurry and you will make it”. So we hop on a bus to the other terminal, hurry down to the gate to see closed doors. We asked the guy at the gate and he looked at us like we were crazy and said that the plane hadn’t even left Boston yet and that the flight time was change to 5:50. Good, we made it. So we were sitting there and they changed the departure time to 6:50 (again not telling anyone, we just saw it). Then at about 5 or so the board showed that our gate had changed, but no one said anything (are you starting to get the trend?). Once we got over to the new gate we were settled until we left. At 7:30 we finally got on the plane and I thought everything was going to be good. That was until the guy sitting next to me got on. He was so big that even with the seat belt all the way out he had to suck in and push as hard as he could to get his seat belt buckled. Being so big meant that he took up all of his seat, part of mine and part the other guy sitting next to him. Now I barley fit in those seats myself so this meant that I was hanging out in the isle the whole way back and was beat up by everyone that waked buy and by the drink cart the whole way back. Our flight was to Charlotte so once we made it back I still had a 2 hour drive left and didn’t make it home until midnight so I was exhausted.
Other than our trip back it was a great trip. I took a couple of pictures while we were in New York if anyone wants to see: http://picasaweb.google.com/sanders1745/NewYorkCity# .
Susan was speaking at and attending the National Medical Fitness Association Conference last week in San Antonio TX so I went along to hang out with her. We stayed at the Riverwalk Marriott right on the river walk which was nice. They put us in room 2323 which Susan and I simultaneously said we got the Jordan/Jordan room as we walked away from the check in counter. As you will see the majority of our trip consisted of eating Tex-Mex food.
Our first night in San Antonio we ate at Casa Rio. While Susan was in one of her sessions that day I had gone for a walk and I heard that this restaurant was on it’s 4th generation of owners so we figured they must be doing something right and decided to give it a try. We had guacamole for a appetizer then I had the Casa Rio Deluxe Dinner (Cheese Enchilada, Tamale, Crispy Beef Taco, Chili Con Carne, Guacamole Salad, Chili Con Queso, Mexican Rice, and Refried Beans) and Susan had the taco plate. For dessert Susan wanted to try flan because she had never had it before. It is unusual for her to want to try something new but I love flan so I went with. She wanted to share one since she wasn’t sure if she would like it or not so it turned out good for me that she liked it but it wasn’t her favorite (that meant I got more of it ). It turned out that we made a good choice to eat here because the food and service was great. This ended up being Susan’s favorite place we ate (it was a close second for me). The enchiladas were the best I have ever had and the tacos, with home made taco shells, were excellent also.
The second night we ate at two restaurants. We started at the Cafe Ole’. We weren’t planning on eating dinner here but they had a appetizer special of chili con queso, Texas style nachos, quesadillas and guacamole for happy hour so we decided to give it a try. After the appetizers we were glad we weren’t eating dinner there. The food wasn’t horrible but it wasn’t the best either. After Cafe Ole’ we moved on to Rita’s on the River. Here we had guacamole for a appetizer, yes we had another appetizer, then I had fajitas for dinner and Susan had tortilla soup. The food here was pretty good but not our favorite place. The fajita meat was marinated very well and had a good flavor, the home made tortillas where also very good but the rest was just OK.
Friday we met and had lunch at Rio Rio Cantina. Here we had guacamole for a appetizer (again ), then I had pollo en mole and Susan had 2 cheese enchiladas and a taco. This turned out to be my favorite restaurant of the week. The mole here was one of the best that I have ever had. Susan said it wasn’t bad but it wasn’t her favorite. They made things here a little different than she is use to which is probably why I liked it so much and it wasn’t her favorite. Friday night we were so stuffed from all the eating that we ended up eating ice cream at Häagen-Dazs and pretzels at Auntie Anne’s Pretzels for dinner.
For lunch on Saturday before we left we broke from the Tex-Mex trend and ate at Schilo’s Delicatessen (a German deli). Susan read about this place before we went and saw they had home made root beer so we planned on going to try it before we left. I hadn’t had any soft drink since I was 16 but I love root beer (especially home made root beer) so I decided to give it a try. It was really good and I am glad I had it but I’m not going to go back to drinking soft drinks, they are way too sweet. For food I almost got the cow tongue but I knew I wouldn’t be able to eat for a while if I didn’t like it since we were going to the airport after we left so I went with a Ruben sandwich instead. If I can find it again I would still like to try cow tongue sometime! Susan had the creamy chicken soup and a piece of cheese cake. The food here was good and worth the evil stares we got when we wanted to order lunch at 10:58. Lunch started at 11 so apparently 2 minutes is a long time in Texas.
For the sake of not making us sound any more like pigs, since we ate the whole time, I left out our breakfeasts, airport meals and a couple others. We had a good time on the trip but ate WAY too much. This was Susan’s first time speaking at a national conference so she was a little nervous. She ended up with a full room for her talk and things went very well so I was happy for her.
You can see some pictures from the trip here.
54 hours of weekend; 1500 miles/24 hours of driving; 15 stops along the way; only 14 hours of visiting;
Saying goodbye to your childhood home….PRICELESS!
My parents bought their home in Crown Point, IN 40 years ago and they close on its sale today, Nov 17, 2008. Paul drove me home this weekend (that’s right–he drove every mile of the trip) to see it one last time. We went on a 5 mile run past my old high school, my junior high, my elementary school, the new high school in town, the park where we played pick up and I worked for my summer job, my track coach’s house, my jr high bball coach’s house, the fairgrounds and more!
It was kind of sad, but I truly believe home is where your loved ones are.
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