Say What?

I love our rec room, actually WRECK room would probably be a more appropriate spelling.  It's one of the reasons we bought this house. It's a little haven just off the kitchen and over the garage. It has hosted countless scary movie marathons, Donkey Kong tournaments and surprise sleepovers. It's the place where all our cast off furniture goes to die. The cozy sofa that has family room written  dripped all over it.  White laminate bookshelves left over from childhood bedrooms. The GIANT antique chest I bought for next to nothing--topped with all the dusty awards that we're too self conscious to display anywhere else. The ugly old fashioned tv, that could double as an anchor for the SS Arizona. The hand me down rocking chair from Michael's grandad, complete with shag carpet glued to the bottom of the rockers, I KID YOU NOT.  Somehow it all works together with sort of a Martha Stewart meets Sanford & Son charm.  Tucked in every corner you'll find little treasures--like the ceramic dog "trat" canister made by Aly or the Andy Griffith throw Mallory bought for her dad for Christmas.  One of my favorite rec room gems is the furry, yellow day-glo pillow with purple stitching, a gift from our friends Doug and Cindy.


 A few years ago Doug had recently jumped into the wonderful world of email and suffice it to say, he wasn't quite up on all the lingo.  He didn't know his BFF from his BRB, if you know what I mean. Michael, being the epic emailer that he is was doing his best to get Doug up to speed on the basics. They emailed back and forth almost daily, sharing jokes and making plans for the four of us to get together. One weekend we had made plans for dinner and a movie with them when we got the sad call that Michael's dad had passed away.  Quickly, we packed up the family and headed to North Carolina for the funeral.  Just before we left, Michael sent Doug a short post to explain and cancel our plans for the weekend.  Once we got to North Carolina and settled in for the night, Michael set up his laptop and checked his email.  There was a response from Doug expressing his and Cindy's sympathy and letting us know we'd be in their prayers and he signed it--LOL, Doug.  Michael read and reread the email and finally said, "Babe, am I missing something here?"  We thought it a bit odd but figured it must have been a typo and frankly, we had lots of other things on our mind at the time.  In fact, neither of us thought of it again until we had them over for dinner a week or two later.  Michael said, "Man, I want to ask you about something.  You sent me a really nice email after my dad died, and you signed it LOL... I was kinda curious about that, you know the LOL."  Doug looked puzzled and turned to Cindy and back to Michael and said, "Well, you always put that in your messages--it stands for Lots Of Love--right?"  Let me tell you I snorted so hard I had sweet tea up my nose for DAYS!  Poor Doug, we teased him unmercifully.   We were all, "Hey Doug, sorry you've got the flu man, LOL or you guys have a good time on vacation, LOL."

When Doug and Cindy attended the state fair a few days later, Doug played one of the games on the fairway and wouldn't you know it, he won.  As he looked over the lovely array of prizes, he knew immediately which one he wanted. Today, it still sits in a place of honor in the rec room, a beacon of friendship shining forth from the rocking chair with the shag carpet trim.

The best laid plans of mice and square dancers...

It's two a.m. and Michael is standing on a chair in his underwear flailing away at one of our smoke alarms. I'm leaning against the doorway trying desperately to figure out which one of the blasted things is emitting the unholy screeching that has plagued us for the last 3 hours. How did we get here you ask?  Let me start at the beginning--

Last fall there was a flurry of birthday celebrations as several of our friends hit the big 5-0. I kicked it off as the recipient of a surprise party given by the aforementioned underwear clad chair stander. *so sweet*  Then there was the one with the cook out and hay ride and the one in the yummy Mexican Restaurant, but the one I was most excited about was a square dance. I knew very well that most of our crowd hadn't do-si-doed since sixth grade gym class so it promised to be an quite an entertaining evening, i.e., lots of pointing and laughing.  Finally, Saturday night rolled around and hubs and I headed out in jeans and boots, ready to bust a country move.  Okay, I was VERY  excited about the party, but being the mature adult control freak that I am, yammered on and on all the way there about how we needed to make sure and not stay too late; it WAS a Saturday night.  I was all, "you know I have to sing in the morning and I want to be responsible I can't sing at all when I haven't had plenty of rest---blahblahblahblah."  Michael listened and nodded his head good naturedly, bless his heart, he knows how I am.

When we arrived, the party was in full swing--yes pun intended. The caller took his place at the head of the room, gave a few instructions and we took to the floor like a thundering herd of wildebeasts on the African Savannah, only slightly less graceful.  We bobbed and weaved, laughed non stop, stepped on one another's toes, sweated profusely but mostly-- just tried to avoid having a heart attack.  We took a short break to gather our second wind and I looked at the clock, oops, time to go, you know, early bedtime and all.  Reluctantly, Michael and I left the party behind.

Once at home, we took a while to wind down from all the excitement of the evening but managed to get to bed at a reasonable hour.  I had just drifted off to sleep when I was awakened by the sound of a smoke alarm. Michael and I popped out of bed, hearts pounding, and ran from room to room sniffing the air for a tell-tale sign of smoke.  Almost as quickly as they'd started, the blasts from the smoke alarm stopped and we determined we weren't in grave danger.  We shrugged our shoulders and went back to bed.  Less than an hour later, the piercing cries of the smoke alarm woke us again. Fast forward to my beloved perched atop the chair in his tighty whities.  This scene played out over and over for the next 3 hours and ended with me ripping our alarm control panel off the wall and cutting the wires in a fit of sleep deprived lunacy.  FINALLY--peace and quiet at FOUR A.M. 

So this is how my well intentioned evening came to a close.   The moral of the story?  Sometimes you should just stay at the party.  Another hour or two of square dancing and we'd have been so exhausted we could have slept right through those smoke alarms!

Man plans, God laughs. -- Yiddish Proverb

The Now and The Not Yet

I like closure. Answers. Neat tidy solutions all tied up with a bow. Call me a sucker, but I love a Hollywood ending. Trouble is, in real life they're not all that easy to come by. In real life the people we love get incurable illnesses, families slowly fall apart, long time friends turn on one another for seemingly no reason. We stand by hoping, praying for answers. Please don't mistake my impatience for unbelief. My faith is strong, unwavering and I know God has a plan for it all. Sometimes I wish He'd let me in on it. Paul said that now we know in part, but one day will know fully. But right now, I'm caught in between the now and the not yet and sometimes it does seem like forever and ever.

I've always loved this beautiful lyric by Pam Mark Hall

*insert something profound about beginnings here*

Since I'm somewhat of a smart alecky, constant commentator on whatever is going on around me, I shouldn't be surprised that lots of my friends have prompted me to start blogging. I'm still trying to decide whether they truly feel my brilliant musings should be shared with the world via the internet or if they think once I see them all neatly typed out in this window I'll realize what a goober I am and shut up for a change. Well dear reader, if they're hoping for the latter, all I have to say is, "fat chance."

I will say that starting out is the most difficult part. What to call the silly thing? What sort of topic to delve into at the beginning? This has kept me paralyzed for the better part of six months. I guess I'm sort of a procrastinator, or possibly an incubator. I stumbled across the whole "incubator" concept in an Oprah.com article this week, and frankly, I like it. It pretty much lets you off the hook for procrastinating as long as the work eventually gets done and it's fairly decent. Never mind that you drive everyone around you crazy as you waste time research by surfing the internet or reading endless novels. Yep, that's me! Good old incubator Tanya.

Well, I guess that wraps up post numero uno. For good measure, I'll sprinkle in a handful of the recent snow photos I took. Yes, I finally busted out the SLR camera Michael bought me--after a 12 month incubation period...