April 13, 2003

Quietly

I'm the only one in the house that's awake. The cat's asleep on top of my clean towels on the bed, the dogs are sprawled out in the sun on the patio. Calvin is stretched out on the couch with the sun in his face, and Marie is curled up on her bed and snoring. I'm going about the business of lugging loads of laundry back and forth to and from the garage as quietly as I can, but I doubt much of anything would wake anyone up. Unless I opened a can of cat food or said "cookie" within Gypsy's hearing.

We got up earlier than usual to attend a Church function at Calvin's grandparent's congregation. It was a Palm Sunday celebration featuring an enactment of "The Borrowed Tomb" - the story of Christ's death and resurrection. It was extremely well done - elaborate costumes and set, and a very talented chorus backing members of the congregation passionate in their roles. I don't consider myself to be a very religious person at all, but several times I was actually near tears. Be you religious or not, a believer or not, with faith or not, there is something very wonderful about being told how much someone loves you. There's something refreshing about being surrounded by cheerful people with a positive message, for once.

Calvin's grandparents were in the chorus, and they did such a WONDERFUL job. We watched them throughout, hands upheld as they sang, delighted smiles on their faces. We caught up with them after the performance, and hugs were exchanged. They looked just adorable in their costumes - flowing robes and scarves, headpieces and a scratchy beard pasted to Grandfather's face. He said he and Grandmother had been placed side-by-side because he wasn't allowed to wear his glasses with his costume, and Grandmother had to watch out for him. They'd been at their rehearsals for three months, and this last week they had FOUR of them. They refer to themselves as Busy Seniors, and that's what they are indeed.

We've always believed that The Grandparent's (we refer to them with audible capital letters) prayers are on a hotline straight to God's ear. When they say that you're in their prayers, and that they've asked God's blessing to be upon you, that's a profound and special thing indeed.

After parting The Grandparent's company, we went to Mill Avenue for a bite to eat and some ice cream. Then home, where I worked out and then was pestered and teased and tickled and wrestled nearly to death by Calvin, who was "in a mood". We watched far too much of Reality TV, and Calvin crashed out on the couch. I eased his feet off of my lap, went upstairs to ask Marie what she wanted for dinner, found her asleep, and now here I am writing an entry.

So. Hello, there.

Things are a lot more positive around here since last I wrote. It's highly comforting to know that Calvin and I can actually work through our differences with the same amount of love, caring, and support that we offer one another when we're not angry. Sometimes these brief plateaus are necessary to break through to a new and better level in a relationship.

Let's see... what else has been going on? Oh! I got a raise! AcronymCo wasn't handing them out to the employees this year, but they were conducting a salary leveling to ensure folks were being compensated per industry standards. I was one of the lucky few that fell into that category - though maybe it's not a good thing that I was being underpaid for a year. Ah, well, it did my heart good to get some good news. I got a very positive review, too, so I was pleased to know that I'm still fooling them all. Heh. Of course, immediately following that meeting with my boss, I went into a week's worth of the most tedious time study I've ever done in my life. A little leaven in my lump of good news. And the universe is balanced once again.

Two weekends ago was a party at one of my colleague's house (MAN I wish they would adopt me, their house was fantastic), and last weekend was a party at Heather's (attended by Calvin's co-workers). We had a great time at both - Calvin and I are fortunate to work with some great people. Oh, man, and one of the ladies at Heather's party made this recipe that I absolutely must have. Bacon wrapped water chestnuts in some kind of sauce that was so completely addictive I found myself hovering by that end of the buffet table in case they were getting gobbled up faster than I could justify myself to have another one. Or two. Or ten. Like crack, these things were.

Anyway. The common theme between the two parties? We ended up talking about men's underwear at both. Don't ask me why, I have no idea how either conversation got started. "Whitey tighties, or boxers?" "Why do they have the little flap thingy?" "I never use 'em... it won't fit! ("Oh, yeah, SURE!!!")" "Thongs don't have the little flaps!" "DUDE! You wear a THONG?!?" "NO! I'm just sayin'..."

Perhaps the conversations were caused by the other common element - beer.

Michael and Lilly are coming home next weekend, then the weekend after that is the Yanni concert (shut up, he's GOOD). The weekend following that is an outdoor concert featuring REO Speedwagon, Journey, and Styx. Then three weeks after that I'm on SABBATICAL!!!!! I can't believe how slow and how fast the time has passed. 47 days to go, as of today. I'm going to be off just long enough to get used to the stay-at-home lifestyle, then get chucked right back into the grind. Hell, I don't care. I'm just happy for the opportunity to have a two month vacation during which I get to make myself sick on Mai Tai's at the place that invented 'em.

I've been doing a lot of research, trying to get good deals on activities we want to do in Hawaii. And I'm rather proud of my success. We're planning to do a day trip of snorkeling (two locations, turtles and dolphins and fishes (oh my!), all you can drink, breakfast and lunch included), a helicopter tour of the entire island (65 minutes plus a free video), parasailing (800 foot lines!), a sunset dinner cruise (again with the all you can drink open bar, plus dinner and dancing), a day trip to Pearl Harbor (inclusive of a rental car so we can explore Oahu), and a Luau (again with the all you can eat and drink - I'm going to be so fat! And inebriated...). Check this... the GRAND TOTAL for THREE PEOPLE to do ALL THOSE THINGS is $1600. Not per person. Total. Yea verily, I rawk.

As for the free stuff, we're going to go snorkeling around Black Rock, do a road trip to Hana, shop in Lahaina (okay, so that's probably not going to be free), and be the best beach bums we can be. Man, this is going to be so cool.

So! I have 47 days to get a tan, lose at least ten pounds, and save as much money as I can for this summer's activities. AB is our travel agent for the Maui trip, and I'm really hoping that she's able to find deals on our air and hotel. We're all reserved and everything, but if the prices drop before we make our final payment at the end of April, we can take advantage of that. She's been doing a really good job for us, as usual. Tons of research on discounts and deals, and patient with my constant questioning and yammering. I'm so anal about everything that I doubt it's a very pleasant thing to be my travel agent. She's such a doll.

I'm totally busting my ass trying to find good deals on rental cars in Hawaii and Maine, and air fare to Maine, but with no luck. I tried to find flights on Priceline for Maine, but the damn thing kept trying to send me to Boston. I DON'T want to fly into Boston, after the miserable time I had of it when I flew home for Grandma's funeral. That sucked so much ass, I shall not repeat it unless Calvin is there to deal with the damned rotaries getting out of the city. Since he's staying home while Marie and I travel to Maine, the plane I'm occupying shall set us down right in Portland. I insist.

Sometimes it's hard to wrap up entries. I shall end this by saying that I have a bunch of pictures yet to put up from our California trip of nearly a year ago (HEY! I've been married for almost a year! Go me!). I was going through them the other day and got the hankering to put 'em up, so expect that in the near future. Hopefully, with all the pictures I'm sure I'll be taking this summer, it won't take me until 2004 to show them to you all.

Take care! Oh, and if you're bored (or everyone at your house is asleep), I've been finding a lot of amusement wasting my time here.

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©Laura Charon 2000 - 2003.