The song would continue “is like being nowhere at all.” Today I spent the evening in Toledo, actually the Suburb of Maumee and I had a wonderful time. Spent the evening with a large group of my daughter’s friends. Went out to eat a great Restaurant, when to her house and played some group games. All around fun for the evening.

This was a bit of a change from my reflective evening yesterday. We had such a large group at the restaurant that we were asked what the occasion was. Welll the occasion was that it was Saturday. Fellowship, food, drink were all enjoyed.

Just getting into my relaxing phase. I do tend to psych myself up for long drives in the evening, and it takes me a bit to unwind to fall asleep.

Night folks

A beautifully choreographed piece from beginning to end:

Christmas came early to our humble abode this year.  We have members of our family who are moving to Alaska next week.  My cousin lived with us from her first grade year until she graduated from high school two years ago. Her husband is now a PFC in the Army and was recently stationed in Alaska.  My father’s niece came to live with us after she had been in at least three foster homes and my mother was approached by her case worker to discuss assuming custody of her.  It was deemed much more beneficial for her to live with actual relatives.  So on Thanksgiving Night of 1994, she came to our doorstep.  I hate talking about her in the third person, but the first few years of her life were less than idyllic (and I will NOT get into that).  Needless to say, she eventually became a much more important part of our family.  Some of the little things that most of us take for granted she had to accept over time (leaving the bathroom door closed, getting too emotionally close too fast).  However, I am ecstatic that she has grown into a young, mature, caring wife and mother to their 17 month old daughter.  But like any siblings, we have had our share of quarrels.

So today was spent watching the Buckeyes handily defeat Northwestern (a three-peat to the National Championship is now out of the question, but a Bowl berth is still entirely likely).  Then eating a feast after which I took a nap.  After the nap, we watched all of the little ones open their gifts that were given to them before the departure.  Later on, my cousin’s best friend stopped by to deliver a rather expensive Build-A-Bear (or penguin as the case may be) and we played some Phase 10.  I kept getting skipped time after time (by the same person) while another player continued on her way and eventually won the entire game.  Not very strategically minded I must say.  So, a bit of Christmas cheer arrived a bit early.  May God bless the little family as they make their way WAY North to Alaska.

There are times I spend contemplating the past. I’ve done this most of my life. Quiet reflection on the things I’ve done, the things I’ve seen others do, what I could change, what I can’t. Pondering the what ifs in life.

Then things happen, and I stopped doing this for a time. Contemplating the past was, to say the least, painful. Too many things happened in too short of time. The what ifs in life were overwhelming.

It took a long time to get to the point when I could look backwards without dwelling on those what ifs. But recently the what ifs have crept their way back in. As I’ve mentioned before, I think it has something to do with the turning of the calendar, but also with the weather this year. There were days in 2003, late October, early November when I was taking Sarah to this Doctor or that specialist that were unseasonably warm. Nobody knew what was wrong. The weather later turned cold, as Novembers will, and the bottom dropped out. A week before Thanksgiving we knew it was cancer. That date, that day is in a few short weeks. Sobering thought that. As with the early months of 2004, I now wonder what if.

Writing this help to clear my mind, as I so aptly put on my page header. The what ifs aren’t so pressing. A futile wandering of a tired mind, that sorely misses its best part and partner.

I know that the baseball season has ended and legions of Cubbies fans are still mourning the playoff showing (not trying to rub it in; honestly, there is a point to this madness).  Tonight at work, I was chatting with a friend and customer whose daughter lives in Chicago.  I told him that some of my best friends moved to this area from the Chicago ‘burbs.  Greg’s daughter lives within breathing distance of the hallowed ivy covered outfield walls of Wrigley Field in Wrigleyville.  Her apartment building is near the Budweiser sign where a game can be seen right out the window.  Coolers and grills are frequently seen going while games are going on.  I said, “Don’t tell my brother.”  “Don’t worry, Chad and I have already discussed it.”  But don’t be asking to use any connections anytime soon.  The apartment complex has been purchased to be redeveloped into something more lucrative (just don’t ask me what).

This brought about a discussion of my brother’s devotion to the team.  Every spring, he conveniently becomes ill at lunch on opening day (or takes a vacation day from work)… EVERY YEAR.  One would think that the school would catch on.  In our youth, Chad and I shared a bedroom.  He would spend hours in the room making towers of baseball cards.  Invariably, these towers would be placed right beside the closed door.  Consequently, the door would open and the towers would come crashing down.  THIS was not done purposely.  Periodically however, I have a cousin who would stay overnight and we would have some fun by going into the bedroom and mischievously knocking over the cards.  OH, My… you would not want to be caught dead after Chad discovered his hours of work destroyed (intentionally or not).  And guess who was first on his radar?  To this day, I never understood why he stacked and restacked those cards when he could have been protecting them and probably would have some money in them.  Even less did I understand his practice of personally autographing the cards that did not have a signature on them.  I do not know how many cards he has but we have speculated that it has to be in the millions (I’m not kidding).  He would also get entire sets of cards for Christmas year after year which he would open and mix in with all the other cards or trade with friends.  AH… YOUTH.

remember your recipe for gravy.

Thanksgiving is just around the corner. Usually a time to spend eating too much and watching football. I’m kind of wondering about that this year. The two games played on Thanksgiving usually feature the Detroit Lions and the Dallas Cowboys. This year is no exception. I realize that nobody was saying the Lions would be 0 and 8, or that Dallas would be 5 and 4, but isn’t it time for the NFL to give these two prime football slots to different teams? What kind of deal did the Lions and Cowboys make? Kind of wondering is there a college game on? How about the NBA? NHL? I don’t think I’ll be watching the Lions. Maybe the Cowboys, we’ll see if they start playing football again when Romo gets back in. The Lions haven’t played much football this year, I don’t expect them to start any time soon.

Unless someone else does it first I’m going to try to find out about the NFL Lions Cowboys deal.

Construction- gotta love it.  Construction on the roads, construction of buildings, and so on.  Just yesteday when I went to vote- nice short lines by the way, a far cry from the two-hour wait I expected- one of the volunteers there noticed where I live and mentioned she lives down the street in a two-story house.  Of course I was thinking, “This is a ranch neighborhood, except for…”  Then she completed my thought by adding that they had just added a second story.  Construction.  Just a few years ago it seemed like every fifth house was being made into a McMansion, a topic proudly taken on and condemned by the King of the HIll crew just last weekend by the way.  If there can be one good thing said about this economic downturn it means less of these teardowns.

Today I can add construction in classrooms to the list of construction to deal with.  I subbed in music today and the music room was under construction, so I had to hold class elsewhere.  The other music/drama teacher gave up her space to me and decided to hold her classes in the regular classrooms so it didn’t bother me.  We didn’t do much.  It was a last-minute illness so the teacher just set me up with videos for lesson plans.  For the morning she left two alternatives- a Beethoven movie titled “Beethoven Lives Upstairs” and a movie titled “Bach to Rock.”  Well, Beethoven wasn’t in the building let alone upstairs, so we watched the other one.  Ironically when I went to the library after work the Beethoven movie was on the rack with recently returned movies.

There was one more class before noon where I read a book to the kids and then in the afternoon I travelled to another school.  Fortunately the road construction that had been going on a couple of weeks before in front of that school was finished.  I had stupidly left the lesson plans at the other school so I upset the secretary at the afternoon school by having the morning school fax it over.  Apparently the fax machine was in a room where only the secretary could retrieve it and she was very busy.  That drama over, the afternoon classes were, well, drama so naturally we watched sing-a-long videos. 😛

Well, that was my day today.  Monday as I previously mentioned was 8th grade math.  No teaching, just worksheets.  And a practice ISAT extended response problem for the Algebra classes.  The only interesting thing to write about was homeroom at the end of the day.  I may have blogged about a boy recently from Italy a couple of weeks ago when I did ELL.  Well, that boy was in my homeroom.  Actually, the homerooms in this district have two teachers and here is where it gets interesting.  The other teacher is the Italian teacher.  That’s right, this school has an Italian class.  I subbed for her last year incidentally.  I wonder why they chose to put this boy in this particular homeroom… 😛

Most memorable television series have at least one key phrase that is associated with it.  The following link not only provides the best of these catchphrases but also the story behind the phrase.  For instance, Arthur Fonzarelli’s famous sound would not be heard nearly as much if the character had not caught on.  The Fonz did not even wear his trademark leather jacket (which now sits in the Smithsonian) until season 2 of Happy Days.

There are so many other great examples of catchphrases not listed.  Definitely more recent ones are presented (“Not that there is anything wrong with that.”).  I can think of several from one series that was not included in the list (“Sorry about that, Chief.”).  But as Gary Gnu said: “No gnus is good gnus.”   EVERYONE WINS!!!  Sorry, I had to throw that in there.

Following a trail through the woods, you come to a place where you need to choose a direction. Which way do you go. If you are lucky you are following a marked path and there are arrows to point you in the proper direction. They give information on what lies ahead. If you are on an unmarked path, maybe you can get your bearings from the sun or a compass. But what if you don’t have any of these things to guide you? What do you do? How do you find your way?

In a way, this is exactly what goes on in life. You follow a path. Sometimes you have directions, or a guide. Sometimes you have knowledge of the trail. Sometimes the ability to work things out. Sometimes you are lost. Sometimes the decision is too difficult to make and you a stuck, stranded and not capable of make the choice. There are times when you go back the way you came, because the path was blocked.

Without getting too deep into the religious and philosophical ramifications, there are many guides in life. Religion/God is one aspect. Friends and Family can also guide you. Your parents were your guides during the beginning of you journey. School and life’s hard knocks give you knowledge and ability on your travels. But there are times when you feel lost, alone and stranded. How do you make the choice of direction.

Where is this going? What direction? None really. Just pausing to reflect on choices made, paths followed, backtracks taken, and the long journey itself.

I heard today that author and screen writer Michael Crichton died Tuesday.

I did like the movies based on his books (at least the ones I saw), but I really enjoyed the books. Especially the Jurassic Park books. His books kept me on the edge for the entire read. So much better than the movies. I think that is because my imagination is so much more creative than any digital or Hollywood effect.

Another loss in the creative world.