So it begins

I found my first grey hair today. Who knows how many more are hiding underneath my color treated hair.

It's all downhill from here.


*Back to hiding in the bathroom from the tornados.

I'd smile if I had control of my facial muscles.

Last week here, the temperatures dipped below zero on a couple of nights. For most people, that simply means that when the alarm sounds in the morning they don't really want to roll out of bed. For me, it means that there's a good chance I'll be fighting off frost bite.

By now it's no secret that my second job entails working around planes at the airport. I'll pretend, by not mentioning the company by name, that perhaps there is still a bit of mystery surrounding it. But it's safe to say that while I'm sorta inside a building for 3 of the 4 hours at night, the massive doors on the building are open all night with the wind whipping through. Then, at the end of the night, I have to walk out to the plane across the ramp. Surprisingly, they don't exactly have shade trees planted along the way to block the wind. This week, when I'd get home, I'd be lucky if I could even open my mouth because my cheeks were so wind blown and dry I couldn't move them.

Don't worry, this summer when it's 95 out, I'm sure I'll be complaining about that too.

Peeve

I realize I am going to be entirely alone in this one, and I'm ok with that.

I realize that much of fashion is tied to France. But I don't live in france. Much less, I don't watch tv in Franc.e. So when I watch What Not To Wear, it bugs the daylights out of me that thy pronounce "empire" ahmpeer. We live in the states. There's a famous building and an even more perhaps famous movie. Look it up.

On Location

I've been having issues with my computer lately which have made intenet access nonexistent. namely, the battery connection won't work and the life is about 12 minutes. Since I can't exactly blog from work, blogging has been moot.

I did however get a new phone and am currently blogging from it. I always wondered why people needed the intenet on their phone. I must say, this is fun. Hope not to make it a habit.

I have a long holiday weekend, so I'm chilling (both literally and figuratively) around my apt. A little cleaning; a little reading; a lot of sleeping.

Hope life is treating you well.

Grave Humor

After what's seemed like an extraordinarily long week, we finally laid my grandfather to rest yesterday. Don't worry, this isn't a sad post. Fortunately, on the day he passed, most of the family was able to visit his house and say our final goodbyes. Don't get me wrong, the funeral itself was sad, but it was also joyous, because that's the way my grandpa would have liked it.

In fact, a few times throughout the service, I got a case of the giggles. While it may sound disrespectful, my grandfather would have approved. He was faking heart pains the day before his passing just so his caregiver would get close to listen to his heart and he could startle her with an abrupt "boo!" That was just the way he was. My uncle advised the pallbearers to jostle him around a bit and maybe pretend to drop him, because he would have liked that.

The first time I got the giggle was actually while I was crying. I had managed to keep it together pretty well, until I caught sight of one of my younger cousins at the moment it finally hit her. Which got me going. Then I giggled when I had a moment remembering my grandmother. My grandmother used to love to go to the airport when my mom was younger just so that she could watch the families saying hello and goodbye and she could cry with them. I guess I got that from her. She would really have loved the intro and closing of Love Actually.

The second time the giggles struck were as the service was wrapping up. The funeral director was giving directions to the audience to get their coats and then go through a certain door. My grandfather was always full of anecdotes and one of his favorites certainly applied. He always liked to say that those who leave first get choice of coats. So when people kept asking me where my coat was (which was in the car), I kept having to say that I left first and chose the best coat and was now hiding it. Maybe you had to be there.

Anyway, life will return to normal for me tomorrow. It's been a long 2 weeks of "vacation" and holiday and funeral and I'm sure I'm going to be swamped beyond measure by the time I return to the office. Here's hoping I can keep my head about water.

Tidbits

On the way to dinner in the car the other night, I was trying to keep my niece from whining so much, so I started singing along to the radio. The song at the moment happened to be "Ba Ba Ba, Ba Barbara Ann.." About halfway through, she turned to me and said, "Heidi... you sing GREAT!" If the kid knew what sarcasm was, I'm certain she would be being sarcastic. As it was, we followed that song with "Benny and the Jetts". (Which, funnily, has a great scene in 27 dresses). The next night we were out for my birthday and my niece started singing away like she normally does. Usually she sings the ABCs or the like, but we caught her singing "Ba Ba Ba Benny and the Jetts." A hybrid song, I guess.

You may not have been able to tell from my previous post, but my grandfather passed away over the weekend. Things have been a bit hectic around my parents' house as you can imagine, and I'm trying as much as I can to get things squared away at my work since I will be out for the rest of the week. Probably not the best situation to be out the whole week after I took off last week for vacation. But you have to deal with what life throws your way. And the miniscule stress I'm dealing with doesn't compare to what my mom has to face since she is the executor/power of attorney/finance person and everything.

My niece doesn't understand death, which isn't surprising since she's 3. She keeps saying she wants to go visit Papa Guy. My sister told her the Papa Guy isn't at his house and he's in heaven. To which my niece responded, "oh, that's bad mommie." Not sure what that means. Then she determined that she wanted to go to heaven too to visit Papa Guy and Jesus. I'm not sure how my sis is going to explain it at the visitation tomorrow when Papa Guy is at the funeral home.

Well, not much else to say at the moment. Please keep our family in your thoughts/prayers as we say our final goodbyes. It's tough to let him go, but we know he's not in pain anymore.