A new beginning?

I can't believe it's been so long. I'm really very crap at this. But really I'm not sure that it's actually because I'm crap at this. I'm thinking it's more that the emotional baggage associated with this blog is too heavy most days and so I avoid coming here.

But I really wanted to thank Elspeth, Lceel, and Girlblue for being so consistently "here" even when I'm not, really, and even when I haven't been so kind as to consistently read and comment to your blogs many times. :)

I'm wondering if it's time to maybe shut this blog down. Its purpose and dream was to entertain and educate my friends and family while I was in Trinidad, but seeing a constant reminder of the failure of that dream only serves to make me very sad.

What I might do is close this one down and open up another blog, as a fresh start, sort of what Elspeth did a few months ago. I will certainly point you all there if I do that (whoever is interested). Now that a year has passed since I started this blog, perhaps this day, symbolically, is the best time to close it, to give it proper burial.

Love and joy to you all!

happy holidays

Hi, all! :)

Just a drive-by wish for you all for a wonderful holiday season!

I'm so behind. I've been very busy and so I will try to catch up with your blogs soon! :)

I will post again soon when I can remember what I have to say! (My brain is a blissful blank right now)

Another complaint about the cold...;D

The death plague was not through with me, it seemed, and it came back with a vengeance. I've been down for the count for the last four days. *cough, cough*

Elspeth asked if I was saying on my last post that "it's only December" because February, for example, is going to be a lot worse. Heh. Sort of. December, January, and February are what I call the Trio of Hell in the Midwest. The single worst months every invented, meant to torture people like me who abhor snow, cold, and dark. At least in December there are the holidays and time off work and other distractions. January and February can be quite grim. And having being down the islands and then in Florida before that for so many years, I had forgotten just how hellish that Trio is. :). Let us forget that in Decembers past, I was wearing sunglasses and hanging out outside at the Starbucks down the street from me in Florida. Well, here in the arctic tundra, there is always cuddling under warm blankets and writing on my laptop, right? Well, that is only if I don't have to go to work. And most days I do get called in to substitute. And that means going out into the arctic tundra at some ungodly early hour.

Tomorrow it's supposed to sleet and snow in the morning. I couldn't be more thrilled (note sarcasm).

Could be worse. I could be living in Duluth, Minnesota where they're getting subzero temps and blizzard conditions.

COLD

whee, still alive. Sort of. Just recovering from a hideous cold/cough/voice loss. Luckily I had a three-day weekend and it was enough to feel human again.

I have been sub teaching pretty regularly the last few weeks. It has made me crazy-tired. And apparently open to every single virus out there. Welcome back to teaching. :)

It is cold here. Did I mention cold? It is so so so so cold. Bone-chilling cold. Strangely I am resisting that urge to jump on a plane to Trinidad/Florida/California/wherever it is not cold, cold, cold. I am sort of reveling in my misery, I think. In some ways it is fascinating to see -- just how cold and miserable is it possible to get before your mind snaps into COLD MADNESS. Did I mention it's cold? COLD! It sort of fits with this new writing project I'm working on in a very out of the way way.

I think I might have mentioned that I'm cold.

It's only December.

finally updating!

Happy Thanksgiving to those in the US! To everyone else, happy weekend! :)

I'm so sorry I'm so lame at updating this! This weekend my baby niece came and I just had to spend the entire weekend loving on her of course! :) But more than that, I'm in the middle of an incredibly intense writing project. It's something very different than what I usually do and so it's been an exciting journey (sort of like Elspeth with her French novel! :)).

I woke up this morning to my very first snow in a very long time!



But Choey has the best idea!

what is cuter? Nothing, I think!

What could be cuter? I challenge you to find another on this earth cuter! :D




In other news, I am sub teaching now! Every day is an adventure! More details forthcoming.

I'm an auntie

On November 9, 2008, I became an auntie!




In a beautiful moment of coincidence or more, I realized that she was born six months to the date when the attack in Tobago occurred. What a wonderful symbol of rebirth!

Change

Wow, it's been WAY too long. I don't know if anyone reads this anymore. I wouldn't blame you if you didn't, since I'm really awful about being consistent in my own commenting to others or answering my own comments. But anyway, things have changed dramatically for me for the better in the course of a week or so. My niece is to be born any day (my sister's overdue so we're counting the days), the world has shifted into a positive direction, the robber who attacked us in Tobago in May has supposedly been arrested and charged, and I am working on an very awesome writing project that is making every day sparkle for me.

For the first time in months, the world doesn't seem so dark or grim.

weird me

This is probably the very longest I've gone without posting. I've been in a very weird state of mind since I last posted, during which I feel like I'm coming upon some sort of transformation, perhaps out of the darkness. Since the attack in May I've been far more cynical, far darker in thought than I ever have been in my life. The darker the news, the more it validates my own darkness. The more I think about what I lost, the louder I scream internally. Yesterday there was a report of another sexual assault and robbery of two UK ladies right in the same village in Tobago where our attack happened. This time I didn't freak out. Well, I had a moment of "oh my God, oh my God" and felt like I was going to barf for a few minutes. But then I quickly recovered (unlike after hearing about the Swedish murders which took me down for the count all weekend). I wonder if sometimes things have to get as dark as they can go before it reaches a tipping point and it can only start to go up.

The leaves are starting to change here in Illinois, and it is cooler than I've experienced in a long time.



Can you spot the kitty?

seriously...

It's been a long time, eh. I am presently in Barnes and Noble book store on the wifi internet (not free, alas, limited time) with my friend Lara who is visiting from a few hours to the north! :)

Well, the elephant in the room for me is of course the brutal murder of two Swedish tourists in Tobago in a villa. Same M.O. as what happened to us (M. and I), only we didn't get murdered. Um...luckily? For all I know, it could be the same guy, although I don't think that it is. Also ours happened in the middle of the night. Nothing like being awakened by your friend's blood-curdling screaming at 2 a.m. and finding a masked bandit wielding a cutlass in your room. haha. Don't recommend it to anyone. Anyway, this has been quite upsetting to me and I'm obsessing over it a bit, needless to say. I'm not sure that I've ever written out explicitly what happened to us in Tobago here in a public forum and I'm not sure whether that's good or bad. Maybe I will some time. Not in the mood today. Anyway, that's all I'm going to say about it, other than my heart goes out to the friends and family of the murdered couple. And I am so so so sad for the crime situation in Trinidad/Tobago. I so wanted to deny that it would affect me while I was there, but then it did. I wish that could change and that all the light and love and good things I experienced there could just overtake all the bad. Don't get me wrong. I have some of my best memories there. Thinking of several outings with Girlblue and Elspeth in particular :) and my writing workshop (which was the best workshop I've ever been in). Eh, I'm babbling so I will close now!

Love and light to all!

Mish-mash of things

Well, not too much has happened and I'm afraid I'm being a very bad bloggy friend by forgetting to respond to your comments! I'm still here.

Guess what. It's chilly now. Brrr! My thin tropical blood can't take this quite this early! It's sort of nice since the trees are beginning to change and all.

Today I got the treat that I always do when I have the car, Dunkin Donuts coffee with cream. I had already got home when I realized they screwed up my order by putting sugar in it. :( I can't STAND coffee with sugar in it. It makes me purse my lips like some people do when they taste lemon. So what a waste that was since I had to throw it out. And the lady even read me back my order. "Coffee with just cream?" *sigh* I get it. Mistakes happen. But it's not like they were inundated by customers right then.

So on Tuesday I went to Week 2 of the running club!

The negatives:

1. Between not being used to the suddenly cooler weather, my asthma acting up, nearly fainting at one point, and being within a few days of er...female issues, my run was not at its best! I did do a better time on the 1-mile race than last week, but that was only because of one member of my group there who kept yelling at us to go faster. It only works to a point, that point where your muscles really will not go a bit faster.

2. I had to stop and walk at one point during the mere 2-mile loop (post-race) because of literally not being able to catch my breath. This was humiliating since I had just been bragging to the others about running 40 minutes straight yesterday and I'm actually in way better shape this week (in theory) than I was last week.

3. I have a small blister.

The good:

1. This is such a fun, friendly, welcoming group. The leader does ultra-marathons (those insane races that are like over 26 miles, sometimes more like 50 omg!!!), and yet he chats about running really friendly-like to us beginner-like people!

2. Goals, goals, goals. Next week is going to be way better, yes it is. Right?

3. The three girls I ran with are really nice.

happy birthday to me!

It's another year, and the first since my life has changed so dramatically. But today I feel the warmth and love coming from all directions.

*speech! speech!*

Eh, whatever.

*raises glass to my friends and family*

hiya

Today I went to run with the local running club. I was terrified because I don't feel like I'm fully back in shape yet, and well, these are all Runners. Luckily there were a few ladies who were also pretty new, and the three of us ran together. We met at a local park and ran a timed race of 1 mile. I did pretty blah, but guess what, every week we have a chance to beat our last time! After that, we rested a bit and then had the option to run either 1, 2, or 3 miles, depending on which loop around the park we took. My new running mates and I chose 2 miles for this time. Oh, the agony! Oh the times I wanted to stop and walk. But no. If my running mates could keep going then by golly so could I. I was determined. I cared not if I couldn't breathe and that my muscles are going to be killing me tomorrow. I finished the damn run. *fist o' triumph*

In other news, I am trying...er...hoping to find a job and well, trying would be a word that could actually be used if I were more motivated than picking at and correcting the same online application for weeks on end without sending it or looking on online sites without panicking and hitting the back button.

pretty turtles

Aaaaas usual, I let a few days pass on by.

Holy crap, I just signed up for membership at our local running/track club. It's a social club for runners of all abilities, from beginners to ultra marathon runners. The people who suffer...ooops, I mean train together, bond together I guess is the idea. There are even pizza parties....0_0!

The first event I can attend with my shiny membership is the weekly Tuesday evening runs in a nearby park. I feel a bit fearful about attending this thing where I don't know anyone and I'm just showing up alone. And I'm a slooooow runner compared to everyone else.

A few days ago, after being foiled once by the bureaucratic machine that is the DMV (department of motor vehicles) because I forgot my passport, I went back later. While waiting, (and it's never a short wait, is it?), I took esoteric writing notes in my notebook.

When I was up, I was oh so casually informed that I had to take the written test again. :( That was a bit of a nasty shock, but luckily it's designed so that the lowest denomination of the population can pass it, so it was way easier than I remembered as a terrified 16-year-old, lol! And still I missed a question, d'oh! My shiny new driver's license picture is not nearly as scary as my previous FL one where I looked like a terrurist omg with my bra strap showing.

Well, I shall leave you with another picture. This was in Seattle at a park. See the pretty turtles?