A year in the life...

So- it was my birthday this week - thursday to be exact. And for the third year in a row -I found myself off work on my birthday - two years ago, it snowed, last year we were out for some random reason, this year - we were closed for three days due to the flu epidemic. I did younglife stuff all those three days, lunch with some girls, prom dress shopping (not for me!), and homecoming. I also tried to feed Kaa, and unfortunately, too early -sigh - so the little rat was just hanging out in the cage for 24 hours - it was such an oddity, to see kaa and this rat, just "hanging out" being the cruelest of roomates. Finally Johnross came to extract the rat - whew!! Needless to say - I'm not going to try and feed him again for a couple of more weeks - that whole wintertime - reptile metabolic rate thing.

For my birthday dinner, I spent it with Amy and Lydia, which prompted several memories of our birthday's past - my 25th upon which I was kidnapped and taken to Ober G-burg, Amy's 24th, for which I had alluded to the fact that I hired her a stripper, because I knew it was the only way to distract her that we were acutally having a surprise party, somewhere else. And Lydia's 23rd; for that one, we had a surprise party, but I had blindfolded her and led her through the "woods" first -the woods being the landscape at the apt complex where we were having the party, and unbeknownst to her at the time, all of our friends were watching her stumble her way through the woods. hehehehe.

Yesterday, Gretchen and I celebrated by going to Hot Springs, NC, for a soak in natural spring water - and besides a whole morning with just me and G., added to my delight was the fact that it was the first time I had been in any water, submerged since early July. (Early July being when I got the horrid tube put in) So there was much rejoicing, besides the obvious factor that I've been pondering LIFE and how thrilled I am to still be in the dance.

Daddy and Deborah are up here for the week, so I'm headed up to Kingston to spend the day with them. Yay!

Paunxatwney Phil

SO, yesterday was Groundhog's Day, and the little fat rat did see his shadow. I love GD - it's way better than Valentine's Day. Someone in one of my classes yesterday-pointed out the obvious- why is there 6 more weeks of winter if he sees his shadow? One would think that if he DIDN'T see his shadow, that would mean it's gloomy and overcast and spring is nowhere near.... Who knows? All I know is that I am out of school today for a county-called "flu day" Several counties are out because of the flu and no Susie, I'm NOT gloating that Knox county is NOT off today. I feel sorry for their superindent though - he's going to take a lot of hits from the community, it's not like they don't have the days padded in the schedule and it looks doubtful that it's going to snow again.

Enough of that rambling - the Oscar nominations are out - and it's going to be a tight race - wow - after last year's Lord of the Rings sweep - this year it's pretty much spread out. It's hard to tell where "Ray" is going to fall in the Academy, it's either going to sweep big, or just pick up a few. And who else is excited that "Lowell" from that old sitcom "Wings" got nominated for Best Supporting Actor?? I was mightly impressed with Cate Blanchette's Katherine Hepburn in "The Aviator." And quite blown away from "Hotel Rwanda." That is a MUST SEE.

On the 'me' factor, feeling pretty good - still on the numbing lollies, able to add some pasta to the diet - just now have to be careful not to blow up like a Macy's Thanksgiving Day balloon! School is fabulous - so much fun - we laugh all the time, and there's so much energy flying around - it's definitely healing. It's all about the double sided tape and things that keep getting taped to my ceiling!