Current Mood: Exhausted

I am exhausted, big time. Doesn’t help that for the last 2 nights I didn’t hit the hay until 5 am and got up around 10am………and that was on top of drinking.

Friday I stole my best friend away from her family and headed to a mall not that far from her. Pretty much just did the woman thing and walked the mall. We pretty much talked, talked and talked. We are lucky to see each other once every few years and even though we spend a lot of time on the phone, it is not the same.

Then we went a few towns over to a hotel that my husband booked for us. The hotel had a bar that had live music on Fridays and Saturdays. So we went down to do some drinking. Since we originally planned on finding a dance club, I want to do my drinking while all we had to do was walk to the room. =) That night we got a table towards the back of the bar and talked some more….lol We were there until the bar closed, I got drunk and then we stayed up talking about our old school mates and what we knew about them, seeing if we could find them online. It was weird to see some of their names again.

We finally crashed and she is so use to getting up for her kids, so we ended up coming alive around 10. Didn’t mean we really got moving………..lol Then it was on to another mall. I’m not really a mall person, but we wanted to look for xmas present ideas. Both malls we ended in didn’t have really what we were looking for.

In one mall, we did find a music store where you just scan the cd and you can hear samples of the songs off of it. So I with her help, I was able to find some more update artists that I would like. Luckily for me, her having kids kept her update……lol Without them, you get to busy in everyday life you just can’t keep up. So when we were there I used my ipod to voice record the artist and albums, now I just need to listen to it and type it out. Then I’ll have my xmas wish list. =)

We were originally going to go to a dance club Saturday, but it was a drive away, my friend didn’t bring any dance clothes and it isn’t really her thing. So we cheated and stayed at the hotel, got a table at the front and just enjoyed ourselves. She feels we had more fun then if we had gone to a club, partly because we knew 99% of the songs that the band played. Most of it was from our teen years, so it wasn’t like we had to guess the songs. She would dance in her little corner of the table. I actually got up on the dance floor a few times later in the night and neither of us was feeling any pain. =)

We had a few guys checking us out, but then there weren’t that many that were close to our age. Most seem to be about 10-25 yrs older. Of course, we get corner by the drunk ones you want nothing to do with……..lol I did have one guy get the nerve to ask me to dance, he was cute in his own way and nice, just didn’t get me going. He offered to stick around and hang out with me………..grin That made me feel good, I wasn’t dressed sloppy but I wasn’t dressed to the nines either, so it was good for the ego.

After the bar closed, we headed back up to the room. Our room had a 2 person jacuzzi. So we got some wine out and spent several hours in it……….grin.

It was a great weekend. It was just us two and on one hand I felt we should have gone out and done more, but all we wanted was to spend time together………and boy did we talk, talk and talk. I so missed that. We can so fully be ourselves with each other.
Sometimes it hard to believe that we’ve been friends for 18yrs and are still so close. We share a lot of the same thoughts and ideas on one hand, but are so, so different in things that rip other relationships apart………mostly religious wise…………..like prochoice/prolife, evolution…..

She was raised very strictly, no dancing and stuff like that, she doesn’t like how religion is organized and has been avoiding church, but has a very strong faith and takes the beginning of the bible literally, she can even quote parts of it. Me, I believe that the beginning of the old testament is mythology, just man’s way explaining what they don’t understand……….the historical part of the bible doesn’t come until much later…..So it makes for very interesting conversation and that is really where our differences come in.

But I will send her books that are religious with a feminist twist, because she doesn’t believe in how some extreme religions treat their wives. So she uses those books to argue with pastors and members of the church when they try to beat women down using religious text……..fight fire, with fire. Just because she is religious doesn’t mean she can’t be a feminist…………so I just try and do my part…………grin

She doesn’t understand how we can handle the other being with someone else (she knows everything about me), but accepts that is who we are. Our relationship is unconditional and I believe that is what makes it survive.

What is funny, is when we meet she was the party girl, lots of boyfriends, getting into trouble, getting put into placement, I on the other hand, on lack of a better description, was a good girl, virgin until I was almost 20, even if I wasn’t dressed like one………..grin I was the one trying to keep her out of trouble.

Now, she has settled down with one guy and been married for about 11yrs, which is an accomplishment since they had some really, really bad times but it has made them stronger………… and they have 5 kids…….icks, I love them, but that is not for me. =) Me, I’m married, but now I party and have fuck buddies………..it is like we switched places…….weird.

When we were talking on the drive back to her place about making up a scrap book for each other, it dawned on us that we don’t have many pictures of us together………..and didn’t get any this weekend……….doh…. we are usually just enjoying each other’s company so much and talking (boy, we talk a lot and seems like we are never done…lol).

So on my long drive back, I keep trying to figure out why I don’t take many pictures of people…..because I don’t. Even of my family, I have to force myself and that is only because I don’t see them often and when it comes to the kids, they change so much. If I do take a bunch it is due to an event or gathering, family wise. And the more I thought of it, I don’t like the pictures that I take of people. I really prefer and enjoy taking scenery pictures. Maybe it is because the subject is stationary and to get the right picture, I just make the changes…..zoom, lighting, etc…..instead of also having to worrying about someone’s facial expressions and movement. Unless I can get people to pose for a few moments, I suck at the spontaneous shots and they frustrate me.

Tomorrow, luckily everyone is going to be busy, because I have neglected my online work for that last few days and need to spend a day on it.

After working on this post on and off for the last 2 hours, I better get my ass to bed.

Current Mood: Cool

The weather is beautiful now. When I got to Indy it was rainy. It finally started to clear up Friday evening, been pretty nice ever since.

The trip had been good. My sister and I went up to NW Indiana to visit our great aunts. We don’t have many left of that generation so I wanted to see them while they are still around. One aunt is 95 and the other is about 90/91 area. Had a good visit them, especially with the one in her lower 90s. Her mind is as sharp as it could be with her age, still living on her own and total frustrated that her body doesn’t allow her to walk very normal. She has always been very active and not being able to go out drives her nuts.

We also stopped and visit one of my aunts. She is battling cancer on her head. =( 2 of my cousins came over. =) I love visiting with them. =)

I did head up to Merriville and picked me up some Fannie May Candies. I love that stuff and was not happy when they went bankrupt 3 years ago. I went a little over board, but it will last me about 6 months since I love to savre it and take my time.

Saturday I left about 5 hrs before the wedding. Packed up the clothes I was going to wear and headed out.

I needed to pick up my wedding/engagement ring set up from the jewlery. I’ve worn the engagement ring for 12 yrs and the wedding for almost 10yrs, so the prongs needed work. When I had them checked out down in Florida, the jewelry I went to was one of those pretentious one…total snobs, with high sky prices. I’m like I don’t think so, Torn worked at a jewelry store years ago and I know how the up prices. So I don’t trust any of them. There is only one that I trust and that is in Indiana and if I have to I’ll ship it to them. So I finally got my rings back….they look great….I didn’t have them for just over 24hrs and it drove me nuts!!! You don’t realize how much you miss it and fiddle with it until it was gone.

I wanted to walk Purdue. I love that campus. So I went around and got some shots of the things I used to know so well. Ironically I saw a wedding party out getting pictures by Hovde Hall and I thought of my friends’, I took a picture from the distance but didn’t get too close because I didn’t want to intrude…………well I should have, it for the wedding I was here for…….doh!

****My connection is too slow to be able to load up any pics. =(

After walking around Purdue, I headed down to the village so I can blow our money on some Purdue stuff, since I don’t know when I will be back and all of our other stuff is a couple years old and starting to fall apart.

The wedding was beautiful. Between the wedding party (3 members, including the bride) and some of the guests (3 of them) is was a small reunion from my old job. It was great! I had so much fun. One of my girls, who barely use to talk, now talks so much more. One of my troubled kids, is all cleaned up and doing good. I was afraid that I won’t have anyone that I really know to share a table with. I had fun and loved seeing all the my kids grown up.

This morning I had to my oldest niece to get her some elbow and knee pads for a rollerskating party. Everything has been going good until Torn called me about 10am…….Diesel’s wife called, he is not doing very well at all. He has blood clots in his lungs from the treatment he is getting for his tumor. =( All Torn could get is that the doctor told his wife that she needs to prepare. So he jumped into the shower and headed up to Vancouver, BC. I don’t know what is going on. Torn may have to change his flight so he stay up there longer. I’m taking off 3 days next week, which we were going to do our anniversity stuff, well I may have to fly out…………I don’t know. I’m really hoping that I don’t have to. Diesel is too young and has 2 young boys with his wife…..I want to be able to go and visit him when we move out there. =(

***Just heard from Torn, he feels that D’s wife overstated the urgency.  D had been in the hospital since Friday and Sunday morning was the 1st chance that his wife had a chance to call anyone.  When she called, she was crying so Torn and with how she presented it came out very bad.   He is in the hospital for about 10days, but D doesn’t think it will be that long.  I don’t know, Torn hasn’t been able to talk to him one on one very much since D gets a ton of visitors.

Current Mood: Exhausted

**on the plane, somewhere over this great country of ours about 13:30 EST.

Well this sucks, I wanted to watch a movie that we’ve had forever and it is playing rough, where the sound is broken up.  I’ve played dvd on my vaio before so I don’t know what is up.  I tried 3 different programs, but no dice.  Even tried it with a dvd that I’ve played on here before.  I see what I can figure out when I get to my folks.

I’m exhausted.  I try to nap on and off and it just doesn’t happen.  =(

While at the airport, I took care of a few store orders, surfed the local news, got 2 of my Time magazine read…..now I just have 2 more to read, and I finally got some of my private messages answered.  Sorry everyone for that.  It seems to have gotten away from me. 

I also made a phone blog.  I keep telling myself to use it more. But unlike the written blog, where I can pause and think about what I’m going to write, you have to think quickly on your feet.  I will say I suck at that.  That and I am never sure about what you really want to hear about.  Do you want to hear my everyday stuff?  My life is not all the fun stuff you see in pics and vids, it is just as stressed and crazy as everyone else.  I just don’t want you to hear me bitch too much.  No one wants to hear that all the time.  So I don’t know.  Give me some feed back in the members area.

I must say that I love having my sprint wireless card.  Now, keep your fingers cross that I get a signal at my folks. I would really hate to use their dial up, even though I made sure to set up for it last time I was up.  =(  Now that I think about it, I don’t remember if I have my phone cord for that………..mmmm………lol

Here is a blonde moment.  I’m coming up to attend a wedding and guess what I forgot?  The invite!  Doh!  Good thing I know the area and know where things are taking place.  I’m going to email the bride to confirm my memory.  I’m just stunned that I forgot it.  I remembered when we pulled up to the airport.  Duh!

As you have read, I need a root canal….icks.  But honestly I rather go thru one of those then go through this pain.  It is a relief. I’m so hoping that I can find a dds to take care of this when I get back and not have to wait until the 11^th!!  That would really suck.  =(  And I’m not taking those damn pain killers, codeine makes me sick……ggrrr…..nasty crap

If you read Torn’s post, he had a good visit with his folks.  He brought back about 1500 pics.  He got some great ones in there.  His mom sent me some crochet dollies.  I like those.  I have so many knick-knacks that they are great for.  We are thinking of trying to get up there in Oct.  He has been trying to find a different place to fly in other then Minneapolis.  That was the horrible part of the trip and then he had to drive about 4-5 hrs. to get to his folks from there.

Not sure what else to say.  Sorry I haven’t been around as much.  I’ve just been totally swamped here with everything.

I do plan on stepping down from my position and cutting back on my hours at my day job in June after I use up all of my vacation.  There is just so much that I need to do online that I’ve been neglecting that it sucks.  But by stepping down and staying on some, I can help with the transition.  Maybe I have a blown head, but I’ve been there so long and other then the boss, none of the other members of the management have the force of a personality and knowledge that I’ve gained over the years. They are getting there.  But part of it is that both of the other managers never had a management position before this.  So not is not just them learning the job fully, it is developing them into managers. If they had the experience before it, there probably won’t be the issues that there are.

Oh well, maybe I should finally respond to some emails so when I get online they will send out.

***It is about 9:30 and I still haven’t had any slept.

I spent time talking and visiting with my dad.  Learned how he got his 2 bronze stars in ‘Nam.  For the repairs he did under fire (he was ordinance) and he had the best repair record out of the whole battalion.  That is cool.  I knew his helicopter got shot down once, but I didn’t know he got shot down 3 times…….1 taking off, 1 coming in and another a few hundred feet up.  Lucked out and had a good pilot that was able to land on the beach.  It is hard to imagine my dad out there as a young GI, but wow…..then learned that he was stationed right at the front by the DMV, where the VC would send over a few bombs over at the same time everyday like clock work.  One left a 15 ft crater right next to his bunker………….damn

He brought up some very interesting insights into ‘Nam & Iraq, but of course, I’m way too exhausted to write them out.  But if I remember I want to explore those ideas.

Time to hit the hay.

Current Mood: Reflective & Working

Ok, that settles it, I need a clone and I need one bad.  All my plans that I had for myself got totally shot down.  I’ve been home since 18:30 and it is currently 23:16 and other then speaking to my mother-in-law and Torn for about 30 minutes I’ve been working on rude stuff the whole time.  And it just dawned on something that I forgot to do.  So as soon as I get this done I will attack that.

I do have to keep up earlier then I want to, but still later then today.  So once I get that one thing done for rude I’m going to try and get my private messages done.

I will say that I had a great conversation with my mother-in-law, she has just been over joyed with Torn’s visit.  It has been going well.  They had been having the wine that we sent them for the holidays and when I called she started to pull my leg on asking who I was…………LOL  I’m like his wife, the one he has been married to for 10yrs in May…..it was too funny. She was just over the hill happy.  It was really cool
Torn got the printer going.  It was one of those things that they had hooked everything up correctly but it didn’t want to work until you unplugged and plugged it back in.

She was very surprised at the amount of pictures that he took when they went out to the falls and few other site seeing things.  He took about 450 of them in a short time.  For us, that is normal for us, for them it is stunning.  She really loved how well the pictures came out.  I took her that she has to poised for some pictures so I can have some. The only one we have is one they gave us years ago.

Torn has had a rough relationship over the years with his folks.  She was surprised at how he has changed. All the things I’m use to him doing, simple things like helping on a rough trail, holding a door open she says she hasn’t seen that in years….sounds like before he left for the Navy…her polite son that she knew is back.  For me, he has always been that way, but what I noticed is that his overall coping skills have come a long way and so has his patience.  He really has grown though the years……even though he can still drive me nuts………grin
She says that this visit is what they needed.  She doesn’t know what really happened in their relationship with him but hoping that with all of them changing that it will keep getting better.  She thanked me a lot for telling him that he needed to get up there sooner then June.  My schedule just will just never let it happen.

I need to get back to work before I head off to bed.

Current Mood: Beautiful Day

Ok, wow……Torn will be heading to see his folks next week. It is a spur of the moment thing.

He had ordered his mom a new dell a few months ago since her old pc had so many issues. Well, we didn’t think and when he ordered it, it came with Vista….oops. His mom doesn’t know and we don’t know it at all to help her. She hasn’t been able to get the printer to work and of course, telephone customer service isn’t all that great in general.

I hate the fact that she has this pc and printer and isn’t able to use it for what she needs. We wanted it make it easier for her to stay in contact with family and print out pictures, not harder and more frustrating.

Then I feel bad about my work schedule……I just don’t have the time off for us to head up there to visit and we haven’t seen them in about 5yrs. We were planning on heading up there in Feb., but Torn broke his foot and had to have surgery. =( I really don’t like not seeing immediate family for that long and the fact that Torn hasn’t seen his own folks in that time……icks. So I suggested to Torn about flying out in the next 2 weeks to see them before he heads to Portland and I on to Indiana for the wedding.

What I’m not going to miss by not going up there is to see Torn get frustrated when trying to get everything hooked up and dealing with dell………grin At least his folks knows how his mouth can get…….lol Plus, he will not be happy dealing with Minnesota cold…….lol
I’m happy that he is going to see his folks, since it has been a long time. I just wish I was able to go and we’ve been able to do it sooner.

Speaking of family, I’m so looking forward to visiting with mine at the end of the month. =) I fly in on Thursday and on Friday, my sister and I are going to take a road trip and visit 2 of our great aunts. They are in their 80s & 90s and some of the very few family member left in our grandparents generation. I would like to spend some time with them since there isn’t much left. Saturday I’m heading to Purdue (thank god, the Grand Prix crowd is the weekend before) so I can get some shirts and other Purdue things. Then off to the wedding. Sunday, it is all about spending that day at my folks with my sister, nieces & nephew. I can’t wait, I’m going to be running every, I just hope I remember how to get to my locations….I have a horrible memory when it is hasn’t been used in awhile.

Rats, time to get ready for work…..at least I have Sopranos afterwards tonight………..grin

Current Mood: Esctatic

Torn called and talked to D’s wife, thankfully it may not be as bad it sounds!!

The issue with his heart may be stress related and now nothing is showing up on the ekg.  The doctors seem confident that he will recover from the cancer tumor.  But we aren’t sure of the throat?

He still has issues, but it sounds much better then we thought……..thank god!

Current Mood: Sad

It isn’t good, he got through surgery.  But we sent out an email asking for an update to anyone who knew and this is what we found out:

Diesel is out of surgery and talking but they found cancer during the brain tumor surgery…(this is killing me to write this) another tumor in his throat, there’s an issue with his heart as well and he will have to undergo more tests and begin radiation soon.

That is not what we wanted to hear…………

I just had a big dinner, I’m sitting out here in the patio looking at the pool thinking how nice it would feel to jump in if I wasn’t feeling so stuffed………..lol It is my day off and I’ve been enjoying it while trying to get things done.

I ran to the post office today and got some things shipped to my family. My nephew had read all 3 of the 4 Harry Potters I sent home with them. His sister is still reading one of them. So I had purchased the latest 2 book and sent them off. They started school today, so I’m not sure when he’ll get time to read them, but at least he’ll have them. =)

My 15 yr old god daughter (HOLY SHIT! That makes me feel old) called today. She had a rough summer visiting her biological father and had just got home and need someone different to talk to about it. She ended up seeing a side of him that we have always hinted at but never really told her about.

Her mother had never fully told her everything about what had happened between her and her father, just wanted her to grow up knowing him in her own way and knew that she would eventually see him for what he is. Her mother grew up not knowing her biological father and just didn’t want that to happen to her daughter, even though she would’ve been justified in not letting her know about him.

I feel bad for what she saw and heard from her father as he fought with her stepmother, but in some ways I’m glad that she saw things on her own. So when she asks questions of her mother (who doesn’t lie about what happened) she knows she isn’t just saying it to say mean things about her father. My niece is a very smart girl and is starting to make the connections on the things he says compared to the things he does.

I’m just glad that she feels comfortable enough to contact me on her own when she needs to. I don’t get to see her or her brothers & sister enough and that bothers me.

I just hope that my other 3 nieces and nephew feel the same way. I know that Torn doesn’t feel this way, but I’m missing them. I look into the spare room and expect to see them. I try not to think about them too much, because it brings me down when I think about missing them.

I partly figured out why I have such a hard time getting things done while set up in the office. It is because Torn wants to play catch up with programs on TV and I can’t concentrate when he does that……gggrrr I want to get work done and he wants to watch TV. I have shows that I’m addicted to, but when I want to work I just want music. Actually, if I had to choose between TV and music, music would win nearly every time.

I think I also just hate the feeling of being cooped up. It drives me nuts.

So if I want to get things done, I’m just going to have to set up else where. =)

I need to actually try and get some letters done. The bulk of the letters are from my blog. So that part is easy enough. I just haven’t done it since April………lol

**This was started the July 9^th.

I’m here in Indiana……..the state for fun…..not….lol The only thing I miss here is my family and Iam enjoying that.

The kids enjoyed their first plane ride and did good untilthey started getting antsy at the end, but that is normal. I was proud of them.

My mom picked us up and we went to see my sister. She hasn’t seen her kids for 7 weeks, Ihaven’t seen her in about a year and it was her 30^th.

To get to the prison we have to drive through one of the state parks. Boy, do I miss the vegetation in the northern states. The stuff in Floridais so rough and looks half dead; it is just not green enough. I miss all the actual shade trees, the soft grass, the lush greenness, the coolness. I told Torn that I can’t wait for us to move to Washington so I can have it again with my mountains. Yes, I know it rains there alot. =)

It was nice to see my sister. Being in prison has made her a reader, which is something you couldn’t pay her to do. She says she is afraid of screwing up again. We’ll see.

It didn’t take long for the kids to start running all over the yard, getting their bikes out and all the normal things that kids do when they get home. They tore up their rooms,went through the kitchen………..they were back in their element and it showed.

Found out something interesting about my nephew about him being picked on at school. He was a bully the year before. He had gotten in so much trouble that he stopped, but he did it to the point that he doesn’tstand up for himself and the teachers don’t believe him. So just like all former bullies, the kids are doing pay back. He needs to find a balance. I knew it didn’t sound right about them picking on him….didn’t make sense. He is bigger then the majority of the kids. But with that little tit-bit it all make ssense. Even though he was the bully he did let his sister get away with picking on him.

My nephew is very good at coloring with detail. Dad thinks that he may have some artistic ability and that is why he is so sensitive.

I spent Sunday just chilling out and spending time with family. I grew up with family being the most important thing. That you are always there for them and they are for you. I grew up not only hearing that but seeing the examples of sacrifice that has been done in my family.

My great-grandmother on my mom’s side was a horrible in-law to my grandmother, but my grandmother was the main care taker of her and saw her more then her own son before she died. She did it cuz she was family and you took care of them.

My mom and dad decided that my father would retire from the Army and move to Indiana to take care of my grandfathers. If it wasn’t for the fact that both mygrandfathers had strokes and needed help, my father would’ve taken the promotion and did another tour in Alaska and that is where we wanted to retire to. My grandfather on my dad’s side had lots of family to help out; on my mom’s side they needed help and almost lost everything. So my mom’s folks lived with us.

A few years later, after my grandfathers died, my uncle came to live with us since he was dieing of AIDS. So my mom took care of her brother-in-law. That is what you do with family. You take care of them. You give up some of things you’d rather do and help. There is no resentment from my folks about it; they did it out of love and what you do for family. It was part of life and you go on.

Well, I had the sex talk with my 10yr old niece (with the 6yr old there). My mom, a neighborfriend and her 13 yr old grand daughter was there. It was interesting and I don’t know how much is going to stick, be we got a start. I had gotten her a couple of books this summer to lead up to it. One was “The Keeping and Care of You”, an American Girls book and “The Period Book”. So I had start taking about the changes she was going to start on going through. For this about of the talk I got “Lets Talk About Sex” from Planned Parenthood. I think what really helped was that it had pictures so it made it much easier to explain.

I got a lot laughter when after I gave the actually names of the body parts, I then gave what most people call it……talked about caring for someone, saying no and doing what feels right for them, not some boy, condoms,safety, babies, mentioned that not all boys likes girls and not all girls like boys, masbastion and the crap that they will be told at church about some it.

Of course, we had to tell the girls that they can’t just go about talking about it at school. They can bring up questions when they get to sex ed, they can call me or they can talk to their grandmother (who was never a blushing violet about frank discussion, which was both good and embarrassing with her timing……lol)

I’m on the plane heading back to Orlando. I have a post about Indy security……..damn Gestapo. I know I’m putting it in my blog, but not sure what else. Debating on rewriting and sending it to my representatives, homeland security, FAA, the president………just to get my bitch out. I haven’t decided.

When I get to airport, I’ll be waiting for Torn’s plane toland. So I may work on some email while waiting. =)

**Added July 18^th.

I’m happy to have my life back, but I miss them. I got use to them calling my name all the time and them eager to tell me what was going on or what they learned. I think what I miss is the love that they give with the hugs. In my family, as kids, you can give and get a lot of hugs as much as you want. So you always know that you are loved.

Current Mood: contemplative

Is wasn’t even 19:45 when I put the kids to bed.  I’m going to be heading to bed shortly.  I’ll be getting up around 3am to get ready and then getting the kids ready.  We need to leave here by 5am for the airport.

I was able to get off early from work, which was a huge stress reliever on the packing front.  I have the final load of laundry in the dry.  So the only dirty clothes going back will be their pajaminas.  I can’t wait to close up the suitcases………that would be a huge load off of my mind.  Instead of taking one piece of luggage for the 3 kids and myself.  I’ve had to pack two extra just for their stuff………..holy cow. I have their back packs all ready including a bottle of water and a small bag of munchy food.

I got some food in my tummy today.  I haven’t been feeling very well the last few days.  I felt sick to my tummy, but never got sick.  I would get hungry but nothing sat very well.  I’m hoping that I’ll be able to chill sometime is weekend so I won’t feel this way.

I know I’m just babbling…..but I’m going to miss them, even though they drive me nuts and I missed the time that Torn and I get to share around my work schedule.  I hate being torn between wanting to be with the kids and just having together time with Torn.  I try to balance it, especially since work takes up a good portion of my time, but it felt like a tight rope and I was falling all the time.  I won’t mess that feeling……….but I’m going to miss them anyway.