I'd Rather a Trip to the Dentist

Here is the first of two posts about last weekend. This is actually part two, but I want to end on a positive note so it has to come first.

I despise, passionately hate, dislike, tolerate the Kennedy Space Center. I cannot tell you what it is about it that I have such a problem with. To be fair, I feel the same about the Johnson Space Center. Morgan begs to go each time we go to Houston. I have gotten out of it each time. Space is not my thing. I like the movie Apollo 13. That is about it.

A little over a year a go my father-in-law decided he wanted us to take a trip up to the space center. I tried everything to get out of it. It didn't work. We went. I tolerated it.

Robert wanted to go to the Space Center last weekend. Morgan and I had been so busy with work that I felt bad that we hadn't spent much time with him. I somehow agreed to spend my Labor Day at KSC.

We almost got killed on the way there. All joking aside, an SUV two cars in front of us swerved and then flipped multiple times right in front of us. We pulled over to the side of the road right next to the debris from the first time it flipped. I think all three of us stopped breathing. The lady driving the SUV miraculously walked away. There were already a few other cars that had stopped and people out on their cell phones so we drove on. I did really start to doubt WHY we were making the drive at this point!

We got to KSC at about 1pm. It costs $40 for each adult. That is a lot of money for looking at old rockets. I am not seeing the draw. We did the bus tour. The elevator was broken at the observation tower, so I let the guys go without me. At the Apollo/Saturn V Center handed Morgan the camera and I went off to wander around on my own. I looked over and saw Morgan lying on the ground. He was trying to get a picture of Robert with the rocket behind him. It was a good shot, but seriously!

We decided to skip the International Space Station portion of the bus tour due to time. We went on the new Shuttle Launch Experience ride. Morgan was a little weary after his Mission: Space experience the day before (that will be in the next post) but it was a pretty neat ride. After that we walked through the rocket garden. I guilted the guys into posing at each of the cheesy rocket seats. I think it was the "I almost go killed coming here for you today" that did it.

The highlight of the day was a stop at Cracker Barrel on the way back home. I think that says it all.

Happy Birthday Sis!

Happy Birthday Julie!
I hope that you have a fantastic day!

Catching up

I am a bit behind on blogging. I have two posts in mind from last weekend's trips. I want to update you on my latest adventure with worms. I have to wish Julie a happy birthday. I want to say congratulations to Shannon who had her baby girl yesterday. Then there is the square foot garden my grandfather just delivered as an early birthday present. I guess my point is, More posts to come!

A Guest Post

I woke up a little early this morning to see Rafa standing on the keyboard. I guess he had something to say...

Good morning,

These humans have been so busy I thought I would take the chance to update you on what they have been up to. From a feline point of view I will point out that the number of humans and cats is finally back to even. Moses and I have been out numbered for almost 7 weeks now. I know the humans like having the extra person around, but Mo and I are happy to have the guest room back.

We have been showing our appreciation though. I nearly tripped Mom as she walked in the house last night after Open House. I was just so happy to see her!

Mom has a lot of pictures from last weekend. It was the second weekend in a row that they abandoned the two of us. Not cool. At least they'd taken the extra human with them. And Aunt Lyndsay came by. She's not too bad. I have no doubt
that Mom with be back on this thing tomorrow to update you herself.

The news is on and the humans are talking about some guy named Ike coming to see us. They do not seems like like the idea of him coming...at all. They seem a lot more worried about him coming than they were that girl Hanna!

I'd better go. Mom needs to use the computer for school stuff. She went to bed early with a migraine last night and woke up early this morning to catch up.

Meow,
Rafa

Tired with a capital T

I am SO tired. Never recovered from last weekend away tired. I look tired. I sound tired. I feel tired.

My husband tried to convince me to drive to Orlando this afternoon after working an 10.5 hour work day. I flatly refused politely provided a counter offer. He too was too tired to argue.

Robert has had a pretty boring trip here so we are going Orlando this weekend. I tried to talk Morgan into going without me for some brotherly bonding. He decided he couldn't go without me. We decided to leave tomorrow either after 4pm Mass or in time to get to Orlando for Saturday evening Mass.

Sunday Cork is playing in some match that has been described as the "priority for the weekend" so the guys will research a yet-to-be-determined pub that will show the Cork match up there. After the 9am game we will head to a yet-to-be-determined Disney park where we will stay until closing. From there we will head to the yet-to-be-determined hotel. Monday we will hit the usual outlet malls before heading back to South Florida in enough time to recover before school on Tuesday.

That is the plan. I am tired thinking about it.

I took a nap when we got home. Morgan called Ireland and was chatting away. I read a little of my book and then fell asleep. When he got off the phone he tried to wake me up. I responded with an obscenity rude comment that shocked even me. I was allowed to sleep until dinner. (I won't complain...Morgan reheated it cooked!)

I am taking sleep seriously tonight. I changed the sheets on the bed and heading that way now. Morgan and Robert are going to the movies. I have no intention of going with them or even being awake when they get back.

(Morgan just came in and discovered that the movie is not until 9:55. He has secretly admitted that he too is wrecked. It has been a long week!)

Back in the Saddle Again

Is it only Tuesday? We got home from Houston at 11pm on Sunday night. Needless to say we are still recovering!

Friday afternoon we got to the airport early. If you know us well, that is no small feat. We were going back and forth between doing park and ride or paying the $12 a day to just park in the garage. Then God stepped in. Actually it may have been Fay. The sky opened and the rain fell. Hard. It was like water balloons hitting the windshield. And then there was the lightening. The now $15 a day parking garage won hands down.

As our luck would have it, we were early and no flights were leaving due to the weather, so we had some time to kill. On the plus side I finished a book, two magazines, and graded my reading & math inventories (that's 38 tests) before we even got off the ground. The down side was we killed the phone batteries and I had nothing left to read once the plane took off. In the end we got to Houston 2 hours behind schedule. Jason and Mom picked us up and took us straight to Pappasitos. Not a shabby way to start the trip!

Saturday we met up with Kristina, Jason, and Brinley for lunch. Kristina is one of my KD friends and I hadn't seen her in a few years so it was great to catch up and meet her little girl. After lunch we met Mom at the mall and helped her pick out Julie's birthday present. (I also dropped MAJOR hints to Morgan about what I would like for my birthday. The nice lady at Brighton even gave him a card with the item number on it.)

Saturday I had a chance to look at the reunion information. Remember the large bag that flew for free full of options to wear? Well the reunion website said the dress was casual, but the information mailed to my mom's house said "business casual/dressy." Hmm...this added a bit to the "What to wear" issue. I wore a brown halter dress that I had figured was the least likely to be worn on this trip. It worked just fine. = ) Morgan looked great as always!

The reunion. Sad but true I got lost on the way there. I have been away from Houston for too long! One of the guys there posted on Facebook afterwards that he was happy he went and even happier that it was over. I think I would agree. I'd say about 1/3 of the class there. I saw people I wanted to see. I saw people I didn't really care to see. There were lots of people who didn't come who I'd have liked to have caught up with. I think we took two pictures the whole night. They were not great shots. Trust me.

I got to catch up with people I had not seen or heard from since graduation. The low part of the evening was when the music started. (They even shut the doors hoping we wouldn't leave.) It was not long after that that the "party bus" left to go to another local establishment where beverages were not $6 each. While there were things that could have been better about the reunion, it was a nice excuse to fly to Houston.

I did have to laugh though because my Mom wanted to know the scoop on everyone when we got home. I got on the computer and showed her Myspace and Facebook pages for various people she was curious about. Then I showed her my brother's pages. Proud moments, lol.

(Okay so this picture doesn't really go here, but it is almost impossible to get all three dogs in one shot so I had to add it to this post anyway!)

Sunday we went to Kemah after Mass. I had not been there in ages. We had lunch at Landry's and then walked around a bit. My two favorite stops were still there: The Christmas store and the Kandy store. Morgan was thrilled. He got a Christmas fix and an English candy bar. I do find it funny though that this is possibly the best picture of the trip! In August!

The flight home was uneventful. We were ready this time with extra phone batteries, but the Southwest terminal in Hobby had plugs everywhere, so we didn't need the extra batteries like we should have had at FLL. Live and learn. We got to bed at midnight and were up the next morning at 5:45 am. Good times.

Last night we took Robert, Morgan's younger brother to Cheeburger Cheeburger. He once again finished the one pound burger. Morgan and I had to rush off to a Catechist meeting at church so we didn't wait for them to take his picture for the wall of fame. I figured this would be just as good. Or not. Too late now!

Let's see - what else. We are monitoring Gustav. Morgan was a bit disappointed to be out of the cone of terror. (I think he just wanted another day off work!) Now it is looking like it will become a monster and head in the general direction of Houston. Not good!

Right now Morgan and his brother are playing tennis and going for a swim. My brother and I are sending text messages back and forth. So much for our 10:00 pm bedtime! Maybe tomorrow...

Houston Bound

I think I have mentioned before how much I despise the night before a trip. I am almost ready for bed though, so it looks like this one is not as unpleasant as I thought it would be. Here is the update:

DELIGHTFUL: I remembered that my final assignment for my ESOL course is due tomorrow and got a copy of a test for ELL students to write a review on.
DISTRESSING: The type of test I got will not work for my paper.
DELIGHTFUL: Our wonderful Spanish teacher has agreed to meet me early before school in the morning so I can quickly write my paper.

DELIGHTFUL: I am teaching a half day tomorrow.
DISTRESSING: I have to leave sub plans for an unknown person. And we are not really teaching much yet. What do I leave for them to do?
DELIGHTFUL: I am almost done with the aforementioned sub plans.

DELIGHTFUL: I am missing my long afternoon without any specials.
DISTRESSING: I have to write sub plans for a long afternoon without specials.
DELIGHTFUL: I do not have to follow the sub plans for a long afternoon without specials.

DELIGHTFUL: I can check in for my flight on southwest.com
DISTRESSING: The printer is out of ink, so I cannot print boarding passes.
DELIGHTFUL: We got the tickets for a good price.

DELIGHTFUL: I have packed a suitcase full of clothes.
DISTRESSING: I still have no idea what to wear to my class reunion on Saturday.
DELIGHTFUL:Bags fly free on Southwest so I can afford to bring a big suitcase with lots of clothing options.

DELIGHTFUL: I get to spend the weekend in Houston.
DELIGHTFUL: I get to bring the Irishman with me.
DELIGHTFUL: I get to catch up with family and friends.

I guess the DELIGHTFUL out number the DISTRESSING!

Confession: I typed up this list as GOOD/BAD and then decided that I needed to expand my vocabulary. I will confess that I implored the use of a thesaurus to continue my endeavor toward a broader vocabulary.

Fay, Fay Go Away

It is official. They have canceled the first day of school.

This morning was supposed to be "meet the teacher" day. I was putting on my nice "meet the parents" dress when the ALERT NOW message came through announcing the event was canceled. After a change of attire, I headed for school.

Thankfully my wonderful, helpful, never sarcastic husband came with me to school for a couple of hours yesterday evening. He moaned and complained the whole time lovingly and patiently watched Desperate Housewives on his cell phone put together my entire class set of Mountain Math. My hands would have numb for a week if I'd done that myself. With the loss of a day in my classroom getting ready, last night's prep becomes more important! Thank you honey!

I was actually kicked out of school today. The university closed at noon and at 12:10 they made an all-call announcement politely telling us that the building was being evacuated.

Before we left we had to cover the computers with plastic bags. Now I have done this for 4 other storms. (Most a much bigger threat than Fay) Seriously, if the storm is bad enough that there is water inside my classroom, do you really think that plastic garbage bags are going to make a difference? When they went through homes businesses after Katrina, were the plastic bag covered PCs spared? I'm not buying it.

Tomorrow was supposed to be the first day of school, but the university is closed so the lab school is closed. It doesn't look like the storm is going to be that bad here, but we have a day and a half off. I stopped at Publix on my way home from work. We'd planned to do our shopping tonight anyway so I thought I would use my time wisely. It was crowded, but not "the end is near" busy like it has been for past storms. After Wilma, Morgan said he felt like he was in communist Russia the way things were being snatched up at the store.

Meanwhile, Robert is due to arrive at 10pm tonight. We shall see if the weather holds out for him. Right now it is just a rain event. Boy is it WET!

The Irishman just got home. He had to work an extra couple of hours more than me. (And I've kindly let him know it!) All this rain makes me want to take a nap. I guess I don't have anything better to do!