Headed Home Today

Everyone has crisped up nicely here. We are still in Galveston but will be leaving later this morning. We left the water park when it closed it's doors yesterday. 5 hrs spent climbing stairs for a quick ride down the slides, and hours spent floating the river left Carrie exhausted. On the way back to the hotel she asked "Nana, can we go to the pool tonight?" and to this I replied "Sure we can. After we have dinner we will go for a swim."

Carrie finished her shrimp dinner and laid her head in my lap waiting for us to finish our meal. Ted carried her to the car while she slept. She made it to the room and passed out on the bed fully clothed. The girl couldn't hang. She was exhausted and there was no pool for her.

Before we head out this morning we will take her to the pool for a last swim.

The water park was a hit as usual. We laughed through the huge waves, lost our innertubes, slipped and slid around while trying to regain our footing before a big wave came and rendered us helpless; my sunglasses became a casualty and lost to the slippery bottom of the river. In short a lot of fun and laughter and way too much sun has left everyone a bright pink color.

I'm waiting for the late sleepers to wake up and for  the bedlam that ensues when packing  begins.

I have the cd players now hooked up and Carrie and Ted will watch a movie on the ride back. Our yearly trip to Galveston has come to an end. The Schlitterbahn delivered it's usual fun; a good time was had by all! 

Happy Birthday Trip Ted

It's that time of year once again. Ted's birthday falls on the "almost last day of May". We wait until school is over for the year (usually safe if we wait until the first days of June) and we head for Galveston for three days.

Our goal? The big water park called The Schlitterbahn. I hang out with Carrie while April and Ted hit the big slides. Each year Carrie is one year older of course so she can participate in more of the slides that Ted and April favor. Today Carrie and I will spend most of our time floating the river in the inner tubes. It's not a "lazy river"...you can choose which branches of it you want to ride and of course Carrie and I select the "white water" runs and scream and squeal as we watch over our shoulder the huge wave approaching that will lift our inner tube out of the water and slam us forward along with all the other wave riders in the river. We squeal and laugh and hang on to our inner tubes as we bump against the other inner tubes with their passengers who are also squealing and laughing. Great fun ..this water park and the family always looks forward to this yearly trip. It's about 215 miles from Lafayette and a pleasant drive.

The weather is humid here as in Lafayette but at least there is a breeze blowing in from the Gulf.

Yesterday we checked into the room and then walked across the street and down the stairs to the beach. Galvestons' beach leaves a lot to be desired. The beach is not groomed; the sand is not white and the water is not clear. The water is usually full of sand if there is any storm activity in the Gulf. Carrie thinks it is just fine though so we pack our blankets and towels and hang out with her so she can play in the water and build her sandcastles and hunt for shells.

I much prefer a pool for my water activity. My imagination leaves me screaming in terror every time sea weed brushes against my legs. I'm screaming in terror and Carrie is screaming in pleasure as the waves hit us. She is clueless about my feelings on playing in the ocean and I let her believe that this is a good time for me. No sense in instilling my feelings about the creatures in the sea. I've never had a desire to scuba dive nor go on a cruise. If I can't see land I get very uncomfortable.

While everyone sleeps the morning away, I did slip out of the room and to the car to drive the seawall and have some quiet time. With my McDonald's cup of coffee in hand, I cruised down Seawall Boulevard. The huge graders and backhoes were out working on the beach. I have no idea what there were doing as it was still dark but I know this beach is NOT groomed. Stewart Beach at the tip of this island is an area that charges admission and allows cars to drive right onto the beach. If April was a beach person and wanted to spend a day there, I would be open to checking it out. April is not real fond of the beach. The sand in her clothes and shoes is unpleasant for her and she feels the same way I do about the critters in the water.

Galveston has changed a lot since my first trip here. The place is cleaner for one thing. The shabbiness got washed away when Hurricane Ike hit and wiped out most of the town. The rebuilding has left this area with refurbished hotels, restaurants and streets. The Seawall Boulevard street now is wider and freshly paved. The city has rebounded and is much improved. There are still a few signs of that disaster left; a few buildings on the seawall that haven't been repaired nor torn down but for the most part Ike cleaned up the tired run down hotels and bars.

I'm waiting on the family to ring my phone and let me know there are out of bed. After breakfast we will drive up the beach to the Pier and let them hang out at the amusement park and later this afternoon we will head for the water park. Friday will find us heading back to Lafayette. 

I'm off to the coffee shop to sip on some brew and wait for a phone call that lets me know everyone is awake and ready to roll.

I'm done..and I'm gone for now! 

A Hot Day in Lousiana, or It's Summer, what did you expect?

Here I sit or more accurately, I'm lying in bed, the television tuned in to a show about murder and mayhem. I'm a bit addicted to murder mysteries, a interest I used to satisfy by reading. It seems now that television has discovered the opportunity to glean a bunch of money by broadcasting murder mysteries. Normally, I steer clear of reality shows and I suppose these shows can be considered reality shows.

I was talking to a friend just the other day about my aversion to reality shows. She was currently enthused about the reality show where the boss goes undercover to observe how his businesses are being run. Somewhere in our conversation, she says "Can't they (the employees) see the cameras following this boss around?"  Well duh damnit. My point exactly! As in the show with the drug addicts where the family gets together for an intervention, how much of a surprise could it be to the addict with a camera and lights and crew following him around? I've never understood how the viewer of these shows never questions the actual reality of the reality of these shows. Ah, we apparently want to believe.

Have I mentioned how much I dislike the new blogger format? Yes, I believe it was in my last post so I shall try to limit my complaining to once a month on this.

The thunder is rumbling just outside my window. Occasionally I can hear the loud splatter of rain. In a few weeks I shall have new double pane windows in the three bedrooms here. I won't be able to hear the rain which I shall miss.

During our home renovations most of the windows got replaced in this house. The single pane energy wasters were pitched to the curb and the new windows that replaced them are awesome. I didn't replace the bedroom windows as they are surrounded by the brick part of the house. It's time. Along with those three window replacements, it's time to put a new roof on the house. This year will be an expensive year here. Is owning a house really worth it? I just paid the house insurance premium for the year and that was a healthy bite from the checking account.

This post appears to have taken on a direction all it's own. I never know where a post will take me. I just follow along on it's journey.

My day here was very quiet. A little house cleaning and a lot of watering of the flowers around the house. Had I known this rain was on it's way, I could have saved myself some time and some water and waited on this storm.

I'm off to watch more television and enjoy the thunderstorm rumbling around this house. 

Don't Mess With Me or I'll "Unfriend" YOU!

That title will not have to be explained will it? By this time most of us know what that  means. Facebook. That social medium that isn't always about being social. A college class could be initiated as a social studies class or maybe it already is being studied in colleges across the world; a study in human interactions and reactions.

First comes the interactions quickly followed by the reactions and both of these intercourses aren't always of a friendly nature.

Everyone is so excited to hook up with people they haven't contacted in 40 years. A quick request for "friending" and another person is added to your friend's list. The list grows and grows though many of these people you will never interact with. You have "friends" on Facebook.

You have friends until interactions and reactions lead to the "unfriending" stage of the social experience. This part of the scene reminds me of grade school and high school when one friend became angry with another friend and ostracized that person from their circle of friends. Of course all your friends were expected to ignore this one person in support of you. I never played this game in school and to this day I  continue to make independant analysis of friends and acquaintances.

The difference with Facebook is the angry one unfriends and then continues to unfriend all the friends of the person who is object of their displeasure.

I watch this action over and over; a study of sorts in human interactions and behavior. Are you insulted when you are unfriended? Does Facebook try to be kind by not sending out a notification to you in the hopes that you might not notice and your feelings will be spared?  Observing people is one of my favorite past times and my social studies class was, of course, one of my favorite classes. Being a Facebook voyeur is an awesome place to study.

Besides this benign activity on Facebook, the personal attacks are inevitable. This is not something I enjoy watching and usually it is the main reason I will use the "unfriend" option. I don't enjoy watching one human being bully, degrade and insult another. It wasn't the reason, I'm assuming, for the creation of this popular venue.

I don't watch Jerry Springer/Maury Povich type shows and when Facebook veers in that direction, I have to change my viewing there too.

I'm not much on posting often on Facebook and sometimes when I'm busy I may not check in on a daily basis but catching up on it isn't a task that takes up a lot of time. Much like soap operas, one can fade out for days or weeks and return much to the same place where they left off.

Now to change up the subject a bit. I dislike the new blogger format. It's not because of it being a "change" in the usual that I'm used to but because the layout is impossible to work with. I'm sitting here looking at a split screen and inputting typing into it is a random operation as it "saves" in the midst of the typing and all the letters that you have inserted were not recorded so it becomes a matter of hitting the backspace key to go back and insert all the words that weren't recorded. I may have to look for a new place to exercise my typing skills which is what I coin this blog as.

If I start blogging more then what I have been doing in the past 4 months, I'll hunt for a new home.

I'm done here..for now!

"Welcome, Do come In and Sit a Spell"

I've heard this all my life. Just what exactly is a "spell" and how long is a "spell"?

You don't hear that phrase uttered often now but I remember hearing my grandparents using it. I loved being at my grandparents and my parents on the weekends when relatives and friends would visit. It was always such social times. Where have they gone?

No longer do relatives gather as they did every weekend to visit and enjoy each other's company and food. Life has picked up speed; there are too many other options and families have spread apart to obtain jobs to support their own growing families.

The bonding has been severed and what a loss it is. I'm reminiscing a lot after this little trip.

A most interesting trip and one that has ended today. I arrived back home. 1600 miles driven, 45 minutes spent on the beach, 12 hrs of visiting and hundreds of dollars spent on gas and motel rooms doesn't compute for a fair and balanced good time. It happens. Things went awry from the beginning of this trip so why would I not think it would end the same way.

Customarily, when one invites someone to visit, it's understood that shelter will be provided unless specified otherwise early on in the invitation. Many times the area to be visited hinges upon knowing or having a friend in that area that will be kind enough to offer an invitation.  Such is the case for all my houseguests. I've had so many people converge on my house at the same time that sofa cushions were comandeered as temporary pallets swaddled in sheets and blankets and spread upon the floor to sleep on.

The giggles late at night can be heard throughout the house and I always envied those that got to "camp" out which usually were the children visiting with their parents.

I've always wondered what it would have been had the adults got to do the camping and sharing of stories while gathered together on their make shift beds in front of the fireplace protected from the outside elements.

Christmas visits are the ones that come to mind for these in house camping visits. The bitter cold air and the snow laden ground, the plaid blankets and  people in every corner of the house, the chatter and the baking was all holiday connected.

My welcome mat is always out. Accomadations are offered and hopefully you will have such a good time  my hope anyway and I'll make a special effort for each and everyone that expends the energy to just get here. I want you to feel "at home"!