Fear of Heights

Look at these narrow spaces! And a view that looks over things that are a very long way down.. That little box thing? It fits about 4 or 5 people in a very small cramped space that's an elevator. And it shifts sideways as it goes up. Weird feeling. I actually had a hard time looking at the view. Ron took most of the pictures. This irrational fear was similar to how I felt going to the top of Pike's Peak. I gripped, well, whatever was handy and felt woozy the entire time on top. Which wasn't long let me tell you.

All of a sudden: Winter

Sheesh. It was -11 degrees this morning. One day we're running around without coats on and the next... winter arrives with a vengance! It was the howling of the wind that lulled me to sleep last night, warmed and comfy under a heavy winter style quilt. But only a couple hours before that we were driving smack dab in the middle of a blizzard. We has been just a mile out of town baking cookies and watching football with friends when we decided we needed pizza. That involved sending "someone" into town to pick it up. That "someone" called me as soon as they got to town and said, "We will eat one piece of pizza and then we are going home. You don't know how awful it is out here." 10 minutes later as they made the trek back through the dark blizzard he called again and said, "gather your stuff up, we are going home immediately." No pizza only a one mile dark ride in a raging blizzard. Let me describe... Can't see the road, can't see the center line or the side, the flashing lights of the car ahead of us disappears quickly and we are totally alone. The words, "white out" mean that all you can see is white. There is nothing behind or before and you are left with the mere memory of the road. And it was only one mile. It was not pretty, but we made it.

I have been in 'white-out' before. After the last one, I swore I would NEVER do that again! What could I be going to that could possibly be worth risking life and limb for? I can tell you. It was Christmas Eve. We drove a few short miles from my mother's to Ron's mother's for the afternoon. Family Christmas Eve supper was scheduled at my mom's for the evening. The whole family woud be there. We enjoyed a quiet afternoon at grandma's then started out for the Christmas Eve meal. Imagine our surprise when we found barricades across the road and the big words ROAD CLOSED. We sat a minute. "well, we can't not go." I said. "Mom's expecting us for Christmas Eve Supper. She's got everything ready!" So we drove around the barricades It didn't take too long for us to figure out why the barricades were up. The right hand lane was completely blocked with drifting snow. We drove on the left hand shoulder, unable to see more than just a couple feet, praying that no semi truck heading the opposite direction would also have been foolish enough to be out in such weather. It was the longest, most terrifying six miles I have ever gone. And did I mention that we had 3 kids in the car? I have always said that God watches over fools and little children. There were both of them in the car that night. To boot we were the only ones that managed to get out to the farm for my mother's Christmas Eve meal. And I promised..."NEVER AGAIN" Sometimes there's nothing for it. You are stuck with it. I don't want to have to do that too many more times in my life.

Christmas Program

We got to go to our first grandchild's Christmas program on Sunday. While the program lasted longer, Isaiah's part was about five minutes long. Here he is singing "Away in a Manger". He knew this song! And Phin sat on Grandpa's lap and clapped for every single song. What a brother! I know this is the best part of being a grandparent. I absolutely loved this. And you know, I think Isaiah enjoyed himself too.

Dentist. Again.

I don't suppose there's anyone here who enjoys their visit to the Dentist. Last year at exactly this time I was wondering how it was that I actually had an appointment to visit the dentist in the first place. I think hubby told me that he had set up an appointment for me after his last visit. After I stopped shouting at him, he told me that it was in 6 months. Oh. Well. I could live with that. After all six months was...well, almost like never. But as you can see, the six months came and went. I survived my first visit to the dentist in nearly five years and actually set up another appointment. For a year later. That too, is like, well, almost never. And a whole year has gone by and I went and got my teeth cleaned. I guess it wasn't so painful or awful. Just inconvenient. I hate opening my mouth wide. I hate having someone poke and prod at my gums. And then the real dentist appears and tells me "well, we should take care of those cavities in those two teeth." See. I told you no good could come from going to the dentist.
Now I'm down to having cavities fixed. I don't want that. I am having a minor hissy fit over here. Although set the date for as close to never as I could get, It isn't close enough. It's Jan. 2. Maybe if I eat enough junk the two teeth in question will rot out of my mouth before then. Think there's a chance? If I didn't go back I wouldn't feel bad.

Library moments

So what could be more fun than this: I left the library for about 10 minutes this morning and when I got back there are the police arresting some guy right there in the foyer. Handcuffs and all. He'd come in the library just as I was leaving. Sheesh. I think I missed something there. And the gals at the desk told me that just as I was leaving last night the police were there to "visit" with some juveniles that had raced in earlier to use a computer..
We had another one in later on that was overly adamant about his love for Jeanne Dixon. Ok, she's been dead for awhile and her "prophecy" was never too hot in the first place, but I bet she never predicted the real weirdos that would be hanging on to her every word.
Don't I love this job?!

Isaiah helped us put up our Christmas tree the other day. He loved checking out all the ornaments and figuring out what everything was. Some of our ornaments are eggs! How weird. He helped put the pickles in, too, so those of you who want a head start can check with Isaiah to figure out where they are on the tree! The ornaments did tend to get clumped all towards the bottom, so we fixed that by using a stool so we could hang them higher! All in all the tree looks great. I have to say, there's nothing like little ones to help you get into the spirit of things.

All Angles

I can't believe 3 whole days have gone by since my last post. You wouldn't want to know what I've been filling my time with. It's really very uncharacteristic of me. Math problems. Have I ever talked about how math and I are at odds? Those of you who know me well, know that this is truly so. But these pictures of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis are appropriate anyway. You know, Angles. Math. Why everywhere you look math problems abound. I like these angle problems much better though. Don't you just love perspective? Turn the camera a bit this way, or stand over in a corner here and everything looks different. Yes. math. I didn't ever believe I would become so aquainted with it.
( by the way, who can tell me what the number is for 6 and 3/4 cents per thousand of 33,200,000?)