My Day: 25 October 2011

Long time, no see. Or no post, anyway. I was really trying to post more frequently, but I seem to have let a whole month go by without a word. What a lazy old broad.

So let's see -- what's been happening? Well, I've spent most of this month recovering from yet more dental surgery. My dentist can't seem to figure out what's causing all these infections, but he says the tendency is probably genetic and there might not be much I can do about it. Brushing and flossing and rinsing like mad doesn't seem to have any effect on the problem. I am being sabotaged by my ancestry.

And because of the dental adventure, we haven't done much of interest during the past few weeks. But I'm off the pain medication and the antibiotics now, and ready for some action. And the weather has improved -- seems like we had rain almost everyday in September, but October has been really pretty nice. The leaves are changing color, the high temperatures are very mild, and the nights are brisk. A very acceptable autumn so far, even though it's not my favorite time of year.

We still hope to get over to Shenandoah for a day or two before the really cold temps set in. Michael loves the mountains and the forest -- trees and grass and all those things that make me sneeze and cough. Not that I don't like the outdoors. I do. I could sit and watch it through my window all day long!

My Day: 18 September 2011

Well, here we are – number 65! How can I possibly be this old? I always used to think it was funny when my elders said that. After all, they'd always seemed old to me! But now I know exactly how they felt. Old age has crept up on me and smacked me from behind.

Well, actually, I look more like it’s jumped out and punched me in the face!

Don't really feel any older though, and I've been pretty good about ignoring it until just the last week or so. But the past few days have been really depressing. Happily, Michael was great – surprised me with a little chocolate birthday cake, along with "Happy Birthday" paper plates and napkins. Then he made my favorite grilled salmon for dinner, even though the weather wasn't really perfect for such activities.

So, all things considered, it wasn't such a terrible day. I even got a little reading done. Oh, and the Cowboys won – now that's a great birthday gift, right?

My Day: 10 September 2011

Sitting here, unregenerately wearing white pants after Labor Day, watching the US Open online. One of my favorite events of the summer. Don't know why I'm such a tennis fan, since I haven't played a game in about forty years. But I've always loved watching. And for me, summer is nicely bracketed by Wimbledon in June/July and the US Open in September -- I won't really feel like fall is on its way until that last match is won.

My Day: 3 September 2011

Last night I finally got around to watching the recording I made of the Tony Awards show from back in June!!! I do this every year, but I think this is the longest I've ever waited to watch. And it was really one of the better shows, too -- but the Tonys are always entertaining. Especially now that Rosie O'Donnell isn't hosting. Glad to see that John Laroquette won the Best Featured Actor in a Musical award for his role in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. One of my favorite musicals, although I haven't seen this revival. Hard to imagine Harry Potter (sorry -- I mean Daniel Radcliffe) as J. Pierpont Finch, but it's a role that's hard to mess up.

News from Texas: Cactus Pryor has died. Now that's really a name from the distant past!

My Day: 1 September 2011

September! Already! How is that possible?

Not one of my favorite months, even though (or possibly because) it's the month of my birth. Pretty nice day, though -- mostly sunny and clear. Roger Federer won his match at the U.S. Open, and I started reading a new book. Not a bad way to begin any month.

My Day: 28 August 2011

Well, Hurricane Irene has pretty much cleared out of our area. Didn't do an enormous amount of damage right around this part of Northern Virginia, although many other areas were hard hit. We didn't even lose power this time, which is very unusual. I'm getting really weary of all this extreme weather. I grew up in Texas, so I'm used to extremes, of course. But since I've lived in Virginia I've been through a tornado, an earthquake, and several vicious hurricanes -- never had experiences like that in Texas.

On a happier note: Today was our wedding anniversary. We had sort of planned an anniversary trip to NYC this year, but never got around to doing anything definite about it. As it turns out, that was a good thing since Irene is now moving up the East Coast. Instead, we took a drive over to Shenandoah National Park -- I think Michael's happier there than he would have been in the Big Apple, anyway.

My Day: 23 August 2011

So that's an earthquake???!!!

I've actually experienced one other earthquake, many years ago, in Mexico City. But it was very mild and lasted probably about two seconds. The one we had here in Virginia today was much more like THE BIG ONE!

We had just finished lunch, and I was tidying up at the time; and at first I didn't really notice anything because after living in a high-rise all these years I've gotten used to a certain amount of vibration in the building from time to time. But then as the shaking got really violent, I thought I was having some kind of attack or seizure -- the power didn't blink, and nothing was falling off the walls right at first, so it took me a second or two to realize what was happening. And by that time, Michael was up saying "Is this an earthquake?" Don't really know how long it lasted -- seemed like at least a couple of minutes. And then it took me about half an hour to stop vibrating, myself, after the quake was over! Also, I was very nervous that it might start again, so I quickly gathered up all the stuff I thought we might need if we had to evacuate, and stuffed it in my purse and my big Vera Bradley bag – cell phone, glasses, iPad, Filofax, all our pills, a change of undies, and my old Teddy bear. Oh, and my makeup bag, too.

I was very worried that the building might have been damaged -- that would be just our luck to have this place declared uninhabitable now that we're so close to putting it on the market. But they issued a notice later in the afternoon, on the condo website -- no structural damage. We didn't have any sort of real damage here in the apartment, either. A few things fell off the bookcases in the study -- but a clock was the only thing that got broken. And Michael went right to work on that and fixed it while I was still bracing for aftershocks (there were some, but fortunately we didn't feel any).

The only positive note I’ve found in the whole thing is that they say now it’s really unlikely we’ll ever experience another earthquake of that magnitude in this area, in our lifetime. But I’m of two minds about that -- in a way, it sounds reassuring; in a way, it sounds like famous last words.