Idle conversation
reminiscing on our childhood
as we travel to Tempe
Hello all! Just a friendly reminder tomorrow is CP Awareness Day so wear your green again. Today is the day of the new AC install so we are stuck here until it’s finished. On Thursday my friend who has a home up in Sedona came down to Phoenix; he had to drop his dad off at the airport. While he was in town, he asked if we wanted to go out for dinner and drinks. In order for Shawn to tag along, John came over to the house and then we drove out to Tempe. It is easier for Shawn to drive to a restaurant close to work than it is for him to fight the rush hour traffic all the way back to the west valley. Otherwise Shawn would have had to leave work very early. Instead John and I got to drive through the mess of Phoenix traffic. Shawn picked the restaurant as I know nothing about restaurants out in the east valley. Casey Moore’s is an Irish Pub 😉 the food was great and it was a nice evening to sit outside and enjoy it while catching up. Though John was the other friend who visited in November when Rick and Charles were in town. It hasn’t been overly long since our last visit.
Well since I’m stuck at home anyway, I thought I’d update on the poetry front. NaPoWriMo is closing in – one week from tomorrow. I got my poster from poets.org so I think I’m ready. I made a couple submissions this week, but otherwise all I’ve heard is crickets. The NaHaiWriMo Facebook page shared a submission call by Jacquie Pearce. Since we traveled by train on our honeymoon, I’m working on an entry.
Yes, I’m also working on other poetry forms today. I need to stretch my poetry muscle for NaPoWriMo – not sure if I’ll blog again before then, but I hope to see a lot of readers everyday in April.
Woken from sweet dream
Alarm turned back on last night
Lazy mornings gone
Good morning! It’s official both spring breaks have come and gone. The above photos are from the fun Gretchen had playing with snapchat. Also I promised my readers a photo of me in my green, Live your dash, t-shirt. So there it is. Well the first day of Gretchen’s break, she did sleep in past noon. Tuesday I woke her up at 7:30am because she had an orthodontist appointment. Then we went to the LEGO bricks & minifigs store. Believe it or not Gretchen still had some Christmas money burning a hole in her pocket.
Wednesday and Thursday we stayed home. Gretchen logged in quite a lot of time on the game Heroes of Might & Magic. I realized Saturday was St. Patrick’s Day and we did not have corn beef and cabbage. Shawn suggested we walk to the store, but we did walking on Tuesday and I can only walk so much. Friday Rachael is off so I thought we could buy the St. Paddy Day fixings then. Little did I know getting the oil change in the car would take almost 3 hours. The previous week when Rachael went to the dentist on her spring break, she texted, the engine light came on. Shawn was here because it was the day we were getting AC estimates. When Rachael got home, dad went out to the car; it’s the oil change light. Okay that we canhandle – Rachael and I are old pros at oil changes now. The reason it took so long – the tire pressure light has been on for quite awhile. Shawn kept checking the pressure but even when he added air, the light did not go off. We asked them to check the tires; there was a nail in one so we had that repaired as well.
After the fun experience of our second oil change. Rachael and I went to the feed store to pick up hay for the tortoise. The look on the guy’s face when two women pulled up to load a bale of hay into a Honda Fit. They got the hay in the car; then we had to unload the hay. Guess what? ASU is #1 in innovation. They plaster it up all over so no one will forget. It took all three of us, Gretchen, Rachael and me to get the bale out of the car. Then Rachael started flipping the bale up the driveway, “Number one in innovation”. See what our tuition money is paying for. The bale was too big to push, but then I grabbed the twine and started to pull while Rachael pushed. This worked well until we ran out of sidewalk. The bale didn’t slide very well on the stones. Rachael flipped it the rest of the way onto the back porch. Oil change and tire repair done, hay for the tortoise in the backyard accomplished, now it was time to pick up Gretchen’s new frames.
We get to the eye doctor’s around 4:30pm and see the new frames have lenses in them. They were only suppose to be frames and they would switch the lenses from the broken pair to the new pair. Figured out the lenses were plain glass most likely to keep the frames in the proper shape during shipping. Well the office was very busy and they only had one tech who could switch out the lens so we had to wait. We walked over to the grocery store because Gretchen was disappointed we didn’t buy food while waiting in Wal-Mart for the oil change (still have not gotten the corn beef and cabbage). Buy some snack food and a roast chicken for dinner, walk back over to the eye store and learn it’s going to be more than a little while. It’s 5pm and we need to sign paperwork for the new AC at 6pm. I tell them we’ll pick up the new frames tomorrow.
Replace old AC
it worked well for 18 years
New one will be cool
Yes, we are all signed up to get a new AC unit. The old one is the original one stage system that came with the house. It has worked very well. One summer while we were out of town it stopped working. My cousin was coming over to check on the house, cats and tortoise and realized the house was warmer than it should have been. When we got home a good friend (who does AC repair) came over and saw we needed a new fuse. He replaced it for the cost of the fuse. Since then we have not had a problem, but the unit is 19 years old; it was made in 1999 but we bought the house new in 2000, which is why I say 18 years. And last summer was VERYHOT – the AC was chugging away all the time. Grateful it did keep chugging because during an AZ summer, you do not want to deal with no cooling.
And that brings us to Saturday. Rachael drove Gretchen and me back over to the eye doctor’s. Gretchen got her new frames and then we went over to Fry’s to get groceries for the week and the corn beef and cabbage. After we got home and put the groceries away, I had a little time to recoup before I had to start cooking the corn beef. It worked out pretty well. Then Saturday night Shawn went to the final event for the Erotic Show at Alwun House. I stayed home; I was worn out from all the adulting I did on Friday and most of Saturday. Sunday Rachael was off to work as usual and Shawn went over to help his mom. Then my cousin called to see if Shawn could help him. His mom lives down the block from my cousin, Shawn went over there to help as well. While he did that I made soup with the roasted chicken we bought on Friday. Prepped the veggies to go in and then had just enough time to get ready to go see the band, Come Back Buddy. They  were having a free concert on the lawn at the Wigwam.
emerald color
supports cerebral palsy
keep calm and stay strong
March is cerebral palsy awareness month and the 25th is CP awareness day. But you would never know I have not worn the Emerald Isle color in years. On St. Patrick’s Day I’ve been known to wear orange. 😉 I grew up Protestant and I enjoy poking fun at Shawn’s Catholic upbringing – not to mention his grandmother was Irish. How does a man with Irish roots spell his name Shawn and not Sean? That’s a funny story. His grandmother’s maiden name was Barry. When she was pregnant with Shawn’s dad, she wanted to name him Barry if he was a boy and Shawn for the middle name. Cele (Shawn’s grandmother) wasn’t sure about the Irish spelling for Sean. She asked her neighbor who was straight off a boat from Ireland. The neighbor told her, S-h-a-w-n. At least this is the story I’ve been told. I think the neighbor liked the anglicized spelling over the Irish.
Well I’ve known that green is the CP awareness color for a couple years now, but I haven’t gotten a green shirt until this year. It just came in the mail the other day. When I wear it, I’ll be sure to snap a photo. I have the SunDevils reward app from ASU. You can log on everyday and earn pitchforks. As the pitchforks accumulate, you can redeem them on ASU merchandise. I saw they had Pat’s Run t-shirts from a couple years ago in the reward store and they were green. It says, Live your dash. I like the message as dash doesn’t necessarily have to mean run. Just like Colleen’s Weekly Poetry Challenge – there are plenty of synonyms to pick. Okay but really for green there aren’t many I like probably another reason I don’t have much of it in my wardrobe.
Finally! Spring break
alarm turned off the whole week
will be back too soon
I wrote this poem yesterday for the #haikuchallenge word (back), and my children have flipped their spring breaks. Rachael went back to ASU this morning and Gretchen is still asleep at 11am this Monday. It was nice not being woken up by my alarm clock this morning, especially after our busy weekend.
Friday we had three companies come in to give us estimates on a new AC unit. Rachael had a dentist appointment and then we picked Gretchen up early from school because she didn’t want to attend the assembly. We had Subway for dinner so no cooking for me. Then Saturday Gretchen had her Eng 102 class and Shawn and I went over to get our taxes done. Afterwards as we were pulling into the driveway, we noticed the girls getting out of the car. Apparently Gretchen’s class ended early and Rachael went over to pick her up. Sunday both Rachael and Gretchen got up early to go into 4 paws. Then when they got home, we went over to get haircuts.
Today despite sleeping in, I’ve put a nice dent in the housework; dishes, vacuuming and laundry started. Tonight Shawn and I have to go over the AC estimates and figure out who we want to go with. I’d like to get it done before I start my remote reading again (plus would be good to have a new AC before the desert really turns up the heat).
Since I blogged on Thursday last week, I haven’t sent off any new submissions was a little busy with the non writing part of life. A few weeks ago Bekah and Shannon Steimel interviewed me as part of the poet blogrevival. They posted the interview yesterday. Please go over and check it out and the other great interviews they have done with poets as part of the revival. They will continue the interviews throughout the year so keep an eye on their blog.
This morning Patricia over at Poetry Pea shared ahaiku I submitted to her. Yes, we do get snow in thedesert. Actually just looked this up, because I knew the outskirts of the valley has gotten snow. I didn’t realize there have been measurable amounts at Sky Harbor. It was just back in February of 2013 Salt River Fields where the DBacks hold spring training had a snow day. This year it’s been pretty dry and relatively warm so no snow. Remember when I posted I wanted my heat back a few weeks ago? I thought it was good to go. I was in the backyard yesterday soaking up the warmth and today through Wednesday highs will be in the 80s. But then we’re suppose to slide back down to highs only in the 60s again. Brrr…
Well my dryer just buzzed and Rachael sent me something she wants edited, so I have to get back to work. Wonder if Gretchen will get up before noon.
In my last post I wrote about dreaming about spring break and how Rachael is on spring break this week, which has made for a slightly chaotic week. Sunday we had Shawn’s mom over for dinner to celebrate Shawn’s birthday. I thought we would go out, but he wanted to have a cook out. It was a nice meal – steak pinwheels (stuffed with cheese and spinach), scalloped potatoes and green beans. Shawn made a coffee cake and Kathy made a pineapple upside down cake so we had plenty for dessert. Monday I spent the day cleaning from all the cooking that occurred on Sunday. Tuesday Rachael and I did the grocery shopping and yesterday Gretchen had the SAT; she feels like she screwed it up. Then after the test, she broke her glasses. We had to pick her up from school and drive over to the eye doctor. Yes, they are truly broken and we had to order new frames.
Today I just want to sit and veg – tomorrow we have a few AC companies coming over to give us estimates on a new unit and Saturday is tax day – fun wow. When I logged on to WordPress this morning I saw international women’s day is celebrating withhaiku. I’ve been reading some great haiku this morning. Thanks!
On twitter I’ve been going back and forth with a #haikuchain. Dawson @dathaikufool left off with:
The last line becomes the next person’s first line and I know it’s women’s history month plus today is international women’s day, so when I saw the #haikuchallenge word today is still, of course I had to have some fun.
Boldly goes A.I.
humans face termination
Sarah still persists
Yes, we are having fun with science fiction. If you want to read some true haiku/senryu check out the Inner Voices link above. Enjoy reading poetry by women this month. On my own poetry front, I got three rejections this week 😦 but I’ve sent more submissions out as well.
I’m not aiming for so many because I don’t think I’ll hit 100 submissions this year, but I have been writing more poetry this year and trying to keep up a writing routine which is very helpful.
Sound jars me awake
Cannot sleep in Saturday
Alarm pierces dream
Well Rachael began her spring break yesterday. She got two As on midterm exams so I said we should go to Ahi Poki to celebrate. We haven’t been since the grand opening back in December about a week after her wisdom teeth extraction. We actually hit another buy one get one free with the purchase of a drink promotion. Yesterday the #haikuchallenge word was free – of course I had to haiku about our lunch.
Ahi Poki bowls
Delicious lunch promotion
Buy one get one free
Unfortunately Rachael and Gretchen are on different schedules, and Gretchen’s spring break doesn’t start until March 11. Since Gretchen has a Saturday class at EMCC the alarm goes off on Saturdays, too. Last night Gretchen came into my bedroom with her chromebook and her US history textbook. Yes, she was doing homework on a Friday night! I said, Really you think your mother knows US history? Well it turned out she couldn’t find the answers because she was looking in the wrong chapter. There is one thing mom does know how to do is read. 😉 And it’s hard to answer questions for chapter 21 when you’re looking in chapter 20. It turns out she really didn’t need my help.
Next week Gretchen gets to take the SAT and she’s all signed up to take the ACT April 14. There was something that took a lot of texting yesterday.
What is our zip code?
What is the school code?
Do you want ACT updates?
You’re almost 17, really you need to know our zip code by now.
I don’t go to your school so how would I know its code for the ACT.
I already get email updates from when Rachael signed up for the ACT. Some reason once on the mailing list, you’re not off it.
And this is why parents dream of spring break, too. And after that I should be starting up as a remote reader again. Already filled out the intent to return paperwork. So #NaPoWriMo should be another busy month this year.
Frail physique
mind like a steel trap
cerebral palsy
Hello and welcome to March – Women’s Herstory month and Cerebral Palsy Awareness month. Since I fall into both categories, this should be interesting. When I found out February was #NaHaiWriMo, I stumbled on the Facebook page; and they actually have daily prompts for haiku all year long. Finally figured out where and how to contribute my haiku. It is not one of the most user friendly pages I follow. But I saw today’s prompt was frail and thought it would make an excellent intro for #cerebralpalsyawarenessmonth
My Herstory – a long time ago in a city far, far away (40 years ago in Buffalo, NY), I was sent to the children’s hospital for physical therapy for my CP. According to my mother, the above photo was taken at the hospital as part of my patient record. I hate the picture, but it’s still here. The downfall of marrying your high school sweetheart; Shawn took a bunch of old pictures of me and made them into a collage for my high school graduation. It did offer inspiration for my Golden Pixie poem in the My Mane Memories series on Silver Birch Press.
Hosking's Blog 