September 29, 2008

Running as fast as I can to stay in the same place.

Whew! I think I spoke too soon when I said that the weekend seemed to be busier than the weekdays. When I made that statement I had not yet stepped into the current week which kept me running pretty much every day. following is an update on the weekend, I'll catch up on the week later.

We never did make it to the Roxbury Day celebration on Saturday, there was just too damn much going on. Some how we did manage to fit almost everything else in except cleaning the bathrooms. If I am going to be taking karate, I have to fit that into the weekend schedule somewhere else. I can tolerate a messy house to a degree, but a foul bathroom just makes my skin crawl. For those who don’t know, the usual Saturday routine is for Mrs. to take the boy to karate, leaving the house about 10:30 on Saturday morning and returning about 12:30. During that time I have usually gotten 2 load of laundry done and cleaned the kitchen and the bathrooms up stairs and downstairs. No more, we now leave the house at 9:20 and don’t get back ‘til 112:30. Time to figure out a new routine.

Karate was fun. Including the Mrs. and me there is a total of eight parents taking the class. There is one other woman and most of the men are a good 10 or more years younger than I am. But I am by far not the least fit among them. Never the less, I felt like a total klutz, mixing my left and my right and not being able to repeat a simple move more than a couple times in a row. It didn’t help that just across the gym from were we having class, there was a gaggle of 7-year old beginners who were jumping and leaping about with wild abandon. And then there was our son the brown belt who sat in a corner smirked at us the entire class. I was hoping that he would assist the other teachers with the beginning group, but he chose to smirk instead. We made it through the class with out suffering too much embarrassment. It will be interesting to see if everyone returns next week.

Following a quick trip home for a change of clothes, Mrs. had a dentist appointment, she is having crowns put on her front teeth as she damaged the enamel a number of years ago, and it was decide it was time to take the plunge and have them done. The appointment took about 2 hours and she leaf the office with a pair of temporary crowns that made here very self-conscious. The permanent crowns are not due for a couple of weeks. I don’t think that we are going to see her smiling much in the interim.

Smiling pot luck faces

Finally sometime around 3 we made it up to the potluck at the community garden. We didn’t bring a dish to share, as I had done a Costco run the day before to purchase paper plate, cup and a mountain of frozen hamburgers and hotdogs. It was a nice gathering and the food was great. We chatted most of the rest of the day away with old friend, met some new friends and generally had a great time. We spent a little time harvesting what was left in our meager plot, while making a vow with our neighbors with whom we share the plot to ‘really plan it right’ next year. We shall see, the road to hell etc.
We got home around dusk and spent the rest of the evening doing pretty much nothing.



Sunday we did manage to make it to the local pow wow at the Indian center. It was actually the first one we have gone to this year. Between bad weather and the cost of gasoline, we just didn’t get out. As I mentioned before this event is more like a neighborhood pow wow that anything. And much like the previous days pot luck it was very much a gathering of friends. More than any other pow wow we attend this is about spending time with friends. We know all the dancers, drummer and vendors, and at one point we were recruited by one vendor to watch is stand while he went up and sang a few traditional songs. It was a most pleasant afternoon, the weather was beautiful the drumming good and the singing better. We didn’t spend money like we often do. Mrs. bought a nice wampum ring from our vendor/artist friend. Another vendor artist / vendor was teasing Mrs. showing her all kinds of wonderful stones that he had, when she offered to buy one that really was speaking to her, he told her is wasn’t for sale, the cheek. She did happen to have one of her latest project with her and showed him the kind of work she does, and he was mightily impressed. It was a nice moment.

So that was last weekend.. As I said, I had little idea what the week had in store. I’ll try to catch up on the highlights of the week in the next couple of days.


Busted, I didn't think he saw me taking the picture..

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