Oy, this heat

This week has already worn me out, and I really haven't done anything. The past two days I've been so tired and have had a hard time getting to sleep--not usually a good combination. A big part of that is the heat. I really think that yesterday I got overheated. The weather so far this summer has been so crazy. I can't remember another summer that's ever started out this hot or lasted so long, and it's only the beginning of July. We've got some blistering months ahead of us.

At least I have tomorrow off. Yay for the 4th of July! I finally have a job where I get regular holidays off. It's so nice. In the morning I'll be going to the zoo with my family, which should be fun since we'll have my 3-year-old niece with us. Everything is more fun when you have a child with you, especially the zoo. We're going early to avoid the midday heat. But either way, it should be fun. Here's wishing everyone a wonderful holiday!

Family

This evening I finally went to visit my grandma in the hospital. She's doing really well, though she still has a little numbness in her left hand and face, which is to be expected after a stroke. Fortunately it was only a small blood clot, so she should recover well.

I'd never realized how stubborn my grandma is. Most of my memories of her involve my grandpa, who was such a strong personality she had to be the docile one in the relationship to balance him out. Well, now that he's been gone a good 8 years or so, she's had to do a lot without him. But I never took the time to notice. She was always the quiet one in the background at family events. Tonight, however, I was for the first time her wit and vivacity coming through. She didn't want to wait for the nurses to help her with anything. At one point she had her walker rocking back and forth raring to get out of the chair and couldn't wait another second until they came. The only reason she waited is the nurses got upset if she tried to walk without them, so she waited, but not patiently.

It was also good to talk with other members of my extended family. I hadn't seen some of them in years. At first I was hesitant to open up to any of them because I've never really had much in common with many members of my extended family. Our lives are so different, and sometimes it's hard for me to get past the differences. But I need to learn, because they are family, yes, but also because I need to learn to love people different than myself. And what better place to start than within my own family.

Out with the birds

Well, I had my date with the bird man today and it was . . . meh. Nothing clicked, I wasn't attracted to him. He was a nice person, but he was definitely nerdier than I had originally thought and we didn't really share many of the same interests. That will definitely be the only date, considering I sat in the park after we finished eating our sandwiches and kept thinking, When will this be over? What time is it? How much longer do I have to sit here and talk about nothing?

There's nothing doing, and I can finally say with certainty that my online dating days are finally over. Yay! It was interesting, though, that he kept asking me about my experience online or if I'd met many guys online. Same as last date with a guy I met on the Web site. And he also touched on some first date no-nos, like talking about previous girls he'd dated and even mentioning that one dating site had rejected him. Not really things you want to share with someone you might want to date.

His peregrine falcon, on the other hand, was beautiful. When he took the cap off the bird's head, I could see her big beautiful eyes. She couldn't fly yet, but she was lively enough biting bark on the ground and even at one point attacking my bare feet.

I was surprised, though, that my friends actually showed up. Before the bird man got there, I was sitting in the park reading a book when they walked by. They called out to me, since they didn't see him yet, and so we chatted for a while. He'd called earlier to say he'd be half an hour late. More like an hour, but anyway, we talked until he called to say he was there. So they went and hid behind a bush close by. I got a picture of them 'hiding.' Those girls make me laugh. I feel bad, though, since the bird man and I went to Subway to get food soon after he arrived. When I was getting into his truck, though, I could see them playing spy, running stealthily and hiding behind trees. One of them even waved at me when bird man's back was turned for a second. I just feel bad for my friends that, after waiting half an hour to see us on our date, we left so quickly. But it still makes me laugh.

So that's the story of my was my not terribly interesting date.

And hilarity ensues

I had a hilarious night, well, pretty much the whole day, with the girls from work. They are all so much fun. I don't know how I lucked out by getting such great people to work with that they're also my friends.

A funny thing that happened at work today involves our summer intern. She is such a random person, but I like to think of her as our comic relief. Well, anyway, I saw her sitting in her chair this afternoon with several orange streaks running down her face. I didn't know what to think, so I asked her, "Are you sick? No, because your face looks a little odd." Everyone else had to take a look to see what was going on, and the laughter started up immediately. I convinced her to go look in a mirror, and then she started laughing too. I was almost crying by that point, I was laughing so hard.

She couldn't think of how they got there. I had originally thought she and another girl had gotten in a marker fight or something, but that wasn't the case. After thinking about it for a few minutes, she realized that she had leaned up against the sliding door of my new cloffice and somehow there was orange there that rubbed off all over her face. She washed it off, sadly before I thought to take a picture, but honestly, it was Friday and I found it so hard to concentrate on work after that.

This evening, the hilarity continued as I was describing my date for tomorrow. Since his picture and profile are online, we obviously had to go find it so everyone could see the bird man. Then we started looking at other profiles on there and *cough* discussing them. Pretty much we were mocking most of them, but it was so easy to mock. One of our favorites said, "If you're looking for adventure, you'd better search somewhere else." Another classic was the man who proudly touted the fact that he could kill at playing the Kevin Bacon name game. Sadly, we'd been discussing that exact thing earlier during our pie break at work. We couldn't stop laughing.

And the outcome of all this? Several of the girls are now planning to crash my date tomorrow. I just pray I don't see them, because I don't know if I could control my laughter. They promise to stay out of the way, but who knows what will happen. Well, as long as I get a good story out of it.
And, by the way, Miss Potter is an excellent movie that I highly recommend. It was interesting to watch it with a bunch of book editors and hear our comments on the movie pertaining to authors and printing. All in all, it was a good night.

Potpourri

I'm all about things that smell nice, but the title of this post refers to a "miscellaneous collection" as Mr. Webster says, which is basically what my thoughts are tonight. And I've included a random picture of flowers just because I want to.

To start off, I have neglected to blog about my beautiful new cloffice at work. That's what we've decided to call my new closet/office. When they hired me, they didn't have anywhere to put me, so while other people have been out on sick leave or leave of absences, I've been squatting in their offices.

Soon a few weeks after I started work, they started construction on the space underneath the staircase leading to the "loft" where I worked for 6 weeks. And then this week they let me know it was finished and I could move in. Fortunately they're good about providing supplies, though not for space. They really need to either expand the barn or build an additional workspace because we're almost all in really cramped quarters. But at least I have my own space now, where I can put things how I like and put up pictures and such. They even said I could paint, if I wanted to, but I can't imagine wanting to put in all that effort or time. For now, this is great. I'll have to take pictures later that I can post. Then you'll see exactly what I'm talking about.

In other news, my hummus wasn't actually as bad as I originally thought it. Sitting in the fridge did it good. There's still too much tahini, but that isn't as noticeable when eaten on pita bread. So my recipe is in good order, with a few modifications, that is.

On a completely unrelated topic, my grandma is doing better, according to family members. And she's had quite a few visitors at the hospital, so I don't feel as guilty about not visiting.

Changing subjects again, I finally talked to the bird man and we set a date for this Saturday. It should be interesting, and maybe even a good thing if it all works out well. But I was surprised by his voice. Not what I expected at all, though I could detect a hint of his Southern accent. To tell the truth, I'm not sure what I was expecting, it just wasn't what I heard. More news to come on this subject.

Oh, and one more random thing. My plans for tomorrow night include a movie night with the girls I work with to watch "Miss Potter." It should be a lot of fun since I get along with all of them so well. You know, I really have been so blessed the past few months. I have a great job I love with people I really like. It finally feels like I've found where I belong. Now if only I could find a great apartment and have fun dating, things would be perfect. As it is, life ain't half bad.

Ooh! I almost forgot. But how could I forget this? It's such a lovely gift Shelly at This Eclectic Life gave me. She saw my things to do before I die list yesterday and decided to give me a jump start. She found these flowers growing in her yard and decided to name them after me. Aren't they so pretty? (And I promise I didn't intentionally steal the title of her post. It must have been subliminal, I swear.)

TT 13 Thirteen things to do before I die

Well, after my adventures with creating my own recipes, which is part of my endless list of goals, I thought I'd continue in that vein and list the

Thirteen things I want to do before I die.

1…. Go skydiving. This desire was somewhat tempered after my brother fell out a plane during Airborne training and got caught up in another parachuters chute, making both of them plummet to the ground. They survived, miraculously, when the other guy got his emergency chute to deploy. I still want to go, but I'll just have to be very careful when I do it.

2…. Perfect my salsa and hummus recipes, as well as any other I can think up. I've been thinking about the perfect guacamole recipe too. Hmm. . .

3…. Become a published author. This has been a dream in the making, and I might be able to do it. . . if I could finish my novel in progress, which, by the way, you can read the first part of here.

4…. Travel around the world, though not necessarily in one trip. There are so many places to see. My first stop: Paris.

5…. Buy and decorate my perfect house. This also includes having the perfect garden. Working for a book publisher that specializes in interior design and garden books add a lot of fuel to my imagination

6…. Learn to tread water. The whole fear of drowning thing does a lot to hamper this ability. I can swim a little, though I always freak out when I'm only surrounded by water and don't have anything to hold onto. This may be one goal I don't completely accomplish, but it won't be for not trying.

7…. Have something named after me, like a flower or a star. After editing a book about gardens and reading all the names of cultivated roses, many of which are named after specific people, I thought it'd be nice to have something that beautiful named after me. Maybe I just need to date a gardener or astronomer.

8…. Visit all 50 states--only 9 left to go. (We traveled a lot when I was younger, all of it in a car. You see a lot of land that way.)

9…. Spend a week at a day spa. That just sounds delicious.

10…. Learn how to really take excellent photos. This would probably include taking a photography class where they show me exactly how to use my SLR. That and a lot of practice.

11…. Raise a flower or plant from a seed without killing it. What can I say, I have a red thumb.

12…. Write a cookbook filled with my own recipes. After editing cookbooks all day long I got the crazy idea that I could do that myself. I never really thought of it before, but it would be a lot of fun, especially the taste-testing part. And besides, number 2 on the list will help with that.

13…. Give birth. Well, that and the whole pregnancy thing. I'm excited for the time when I'll actually get to be a mom. Now all I need to do is find me a good man. That could take a while.

Experimental learning

Well, I tried my hummus recipe out, and not having done it before, wasn't sure what to expect. First lesson learned: Blenders don't work so well, or at least mine didn't. Most recipes I read indicate a food processor should be used, and there's probably good reason for that. Second lesson: Tahini has a very strong flavor, so don't use much of it. I still have some of the aftertaste in my mouth.

That said, it wasn't a complete failure. I was able to salvage it by adding some basil which did a lot to counteract the tahini and salt, since I put a little too much of that in too. It is also pretty runny since I kept adding liquid to get the blender to even mix up the garbanzo beans. So I think that in order to make a really good hummus, I need a food processor. It might be awhile before I perfect this recipe, but I'm not worried. Sometime before I die I'll have it down pat.

To change topics completely, my dad told me last night that my grandma had a stroke and is in the hospital. I was a little out of it at the time, it being 2:30 in the morning at the time. I guess he left right then to take her to the hospital, but I'm a little confused on the point since he would have had to drive 3 hours to her house, 2 hours back to the hospital and then drive home an hour. And she lives with other relatives who could have driven her.

I don't know details yet, since he and my stepmom went to see her right after work. They invited me to go along, but I really didn't want to go. I hate visiting people in the hospital. I've never liked them and honestly, if it's her time to go, I'd rather remember how she has always been and not how they are just before they die. Maybe I'm just being selfish. I probably am, but for some reason I couldn't make myself go tonight. So I'll hear how everything is when they get home.