poodering along

Went for a lovely morning bike ride before it got too hot. Stopped to appreciate the results of spring thaw + rain.

I call it "Shadow Selfie by the Poudre" . It's the Cache la Poudre River that runs through town. Everyone pronounces it "POO-der", and today I learned it's true French pronunciation is "poo-DRAY", which sounds snobby to me.

Shadow selfie by the POO-DER. Final answer

puddles

Happy Father's Day to all the good dads out there! (Deadbeat dads, move on).

Pic of my dad and me from a loooooooong time ago (I was about 16). Dad was a total gringo, mostly English probably. I recently heard the term "hapa" as to describe half-asian, half white people. 

So I guess I fall into that category (Mom was Filipina), but you likely won't hear me using the term.

Colorado is currently uncharacteristically lush and green. We've been getting so much rain, it's a jungle out there. 

Coming back from a dog walk, I snapped this pick of our young maple tree, George, whom we acquired about a year ago. He's filling out nicely, all "George of the Jungle"

Magnum removed the (HUGE) training poles a few weeks ago.  Looking back, he was so tiny *sniff*.

We've got other landscaping plans for the front yard, but that's where the status remains - plans.

I spotted this little spy while cleaning the week's mud and gunk from my bicycle.

I think I'll name it Puddles.

I have a short work week ahead. Juneteenth is a federal holiday, so the college is closed tomorrow. I do have one tutee to meet with, and I'll try to make good use of the rest of the day.

sometimes sunshine, go away

 Some Tuesday reflections

3 random thoughts/ moments:

• Are mullets making a comeback? I've been seeing mullets on more kids and young adults than I remember in recent years. I've gotta say, some people are able to rock a mullet. I don't hate them.
  
  
• Young guy came into the testing center for a certification test having to do with his job in horticulture. Party girl put him through the whole don't-cheat pocket check before seating him for the test.
  He responded with, "wow, this is worse than when I went to jail!", which had us giggling.
  
  
• Speaking of Party Girl and horticulture, she expressed her interest in trying psilocybin, or magic mushrooms - which are legal in our state - to improve her mood, with guidance from a knowledgeable doctor.
  She's totally given up pot and hard liquor and "only drinks beer".  She pretty much confessed to me that she knows she's an alcoholic, and she said it in such a way that assumed I knew it already, which I did. I just wasn't sure if she knew it.

News that caught my attention:

• 4 children found alive after 40 days in the jungle. The youngest was 11-months old!
• World record 2 miles in 7:54. I'd be hard pressed to run one mile in 7:54.
• Denver Nuggets are NBA champs. I don't follow the NBA, but "Denver Nuggets" and "Champions" aren't words that typically show up in the same sentence, so I suppose it's noteworthy.

Triumphs:

I have enough regularly scheduled tutees for summer to nicely round out my working schedule. I'm not going to take on any more students, so can settle into a modicum of predictability for the next few weeks (ha! as if).

Challenges:

We've been getting well above average amounts of rain for the last month or so, which isn't really a challenge. I appreciate the break from the hot 'n' dry. But the rain has flooded some areas, and it does put a literal damper on my bicycle commuting. 

Magnum got himself some trekking poles a couple of weeks ago. His knees don't like hiking downhill, so he mostly avoids it. He hasn't yet hiked "the tooth" (Horsetooth mountain) right here in our "back yard". It's such a local landmark, it seems illegal for him not to have hiked it in the three years we've lived here. 

I've been meaning to go up again now that it's summer, and Magnum says he'll test out the trekking poles and join me. They'd better work, I'm not carrying him down. In the meantime, we're waiting for the trail to be less muddy and mostly less hail-y and lightning-y. 

One thing learned from triumph or challenge:

Work Study shared with me a list she compiled with activities for getting out of her comfort zone/ routine. It's easy to get stuck in a rut. It's been too long since I've done much exploring outdoors. Rain or shine, just go.

strike up the...

I was a small town girl living in a lonely world...

Okay, I wasn't necessarily lonely, but I did spend my formative years growing up in a small coal-mining town - one where "everybody knew everybody" pretty much. 

When I was a sophomore in high school, our marching band was invited to a festival, featuring a large parade and field competition, in another state. This was a relatively big deal for our little town.

Anyone who's been involved in HS marching band knows the constant need for fundraising activities. This festival brought us band kids to new heights in such efforts. Finally, at a certain point, the townspeople responded with, essentially, 

"We don't need any more candles/ place settings/ chocolates/ mixed nuts/ child labor... Can't we just make a freaking donation??"

Why, yes. Yes you can. Now, this was long before the digital age. There was no web, so no website to go to and donate through Paypal or such. Everything was done face-to-face via check or cash.

One fateful day in late winter/ early spring was the designated HS Band Festival day or something like that. We band kids would infiltrate the neighborhoods and collect donations from anyone wanting to contribute. 

It was a Saturday morning, and we all showed up to the band room wearing our respective band hats  to get our - literal - marching orders. That year, I was part of the banner girl team. We toted around letters that spelled out our high school and mascot and did little dance things. 

I was the "A". Other side had a "S" for the spelling of our mascot. 

And yes, we wore blue hard hats.

Our instructions for donation collecting included that we stay in pairs when going door-to-door. Well, my similarly hard-hat clad teammate and I soon had the epiphany that our work would go MUCH faster if we split up. So we did exactly that, she hitting one side of the street, while I took the other. We'd meet at the end before returning to the band room.

This was all going smoothly as I neared the end of my route. I had two houses left. *insert dramatic music here*

I was on the tasteful porch of a tasteful house in the square behind my house.  A cheerful man answered the door, he was friendly, smiley. I could hear young children in a room off of the entryway watching Saturday morning cartoons. The man was still in his bathrobe.

"Oh yeah, yeah!" he greeted when I told him my reason for being on his porch (and wearing a hard hat), "My wife has the checkbook, hold on!".

A moment later, a similarly smiley, friendly woman arrived with checkbook and pen  in hand. She began making out a check, asking about the band's preparation for the festival, etc. The kids happily watched their cartoons, the man stood a few feet behind the woman, opened the bathrobe and...

• shucked the corn
• peeled the chili
• polished the banister
• adjusted the antenna...

Yeah, he was jerking off, looking me in the eye while his friendly wife wrote out a donation check and his cute kids watched cartoons. 

I said nothing but remember thinking, "oh for the luvah Pete..." something like, and fixing my eyes on the charitable woman's hand writing the check. The wholesome moment had taken a decidedly disappointing turn.

I said my thanks and exited the porch. 

But hey, the festival was fun.

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Linking up this week with Mama Kat for the prompt:

1. Tell us about a memorable neighbor from your childhood neighborhood.

end of week bullets

• Last Sunday, I went for a run in the rain. It was actually quite nice - just rain. No lightning, no hail. A couple of weeks prior, I'd got caught in a rainstorm while running. At the point of getting rained upon, I knew if I turned around to go home, I'd become fully saturated anyway, so I just kept on a-going... and got fully saturated.

So last Sunday, it was already rainy when I left the house, and I wore my nylon shell, which did a good job of keeping me relatively dry - between waist and neck. My shoes got fully soaked, however, from all the puddles. Add the soaked shoes to the fact that my left sock had a small hole from which my pinky toe had pooched out, and I ended up tearing a small patch of skin from said pinky toe.  

Surprising how annoying a skin patchless pinky toe can be. Talk about your first world problems.

• Work at the testing center was very slow yesterday during my shift. I was there for four hours and gave three tests. But there were a few other tasks to catch up and occupy my time, so I ended up feeling quite productive. Plus, Work Study - our student employee - was there with a pile of math homework.  Summer classes are more concentrated than Fall and Spring, and she's in the thick of it. So I got some tuting done, and she got her homework done (while getting paid). Win-win (win).
  
  
• A Youtuber I check in on now and then (I don't subscribe to any Youtube channels) announced this week that he's going to stop doing daily vlogs. And I was all, "Good for you!" He's vlogged every day for the last seven years! 

He's a likable guy, and his channel is centered on running. That's how I found him - via his well done, informative shoe reviews. He lives in nearby Denver, and he attended the same university I did, so there's a local flair. He makes his living off  Youtube and supports his family of wife plus five-with-a-sixth-on-the-way kids, so it's clearly a lucrative gig.

But EVERY DAY??

I wonder how that affects a person's off-camera life: to be on camera every day for a channel with a large following - while raising a family, no less. Out there every day with the selfie stick and whatnot. His growing family is naturally often featured on his vlogs as well. So I'm glad for him and the family that he's decided to back off. 

• We've been watching Beef on Netflix. Seen it? Finished it? We made it to the final episode last night and were about halfway through it when - ZHOOOP - power outage.  By the time the power was back, I'd shut off the laptop and was ready for bed.
  
  Ironically, the title of that last episode is "Figures of Light", of which we had none.

one for the books

Magnum's mom's husband - a.k.a my step-father-in-law - is 90 years old. For the past something years, he's spoken of this book he's been working on. His memoirs?

He'd tell us some tale of his family and/or past adventures, usually ending with, "It's all in my book". We first figured he was journaling and tracing his family tree - a nice little retirement hobby for him. Then he started mentioning publishers and ghost writers, etc. The book was becoming THE BOOK.

Honestly, this made some of us a bit uneasy, because as part of the family tree, all of us were in THE BOOK along with birthdates, birthplaces, extended family? How much information was he sharing?

A few months ago, Magnum's stepsisters sent Magnum copies of the portions of the book that feature us - our kids, and other relevant people. This so Magnum could check the accuracy and request any edits.  We both looked over the pages and found the writing a bit choppy, honestly. Apparently, SFIL just dictated things to a writer who then put it into text. 

I don't know how much he paid to have THE BOOK all put together and printed, but it is done. Magnum arrived home after a work trip to Colorado Springs, where his mom and stepdad live, bestowing a box and saying, "You're the talk of the town," referring to the senior living facility where his mom and stepdad live.

"Wha...?", my response.

He opened the box and revealed 3 paperback copies and one hardcopy of THE BOOK. Hardcopy for us and a paperback for each of our kids.

"Oh...", I recognized the cover. 

Several years ago, Magnum's mom asked if I would draw a pastel portrait of SFIL. 

Yeah, sure. Why not? 

When Magnum opened THE BOOK box, I remembered that, a few months ago, MIL asked if SFIL could use that portrait for THE BOOK cover. 

Yeah, sure. Why not?

And there it was, all 190 pages, hot off the press. We've sort of been treating THE BOOK as "he's having his fun". Seeing it now, all done up, I'm hoping he's happy with it. I was a bit surprised to find the last several pages include original poems.

I skimmed a few pages, mainly looking over the photos, but have yet to sit down to read THE BOOK.  

Judge a book by its cover?

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Linking up this week with Mama Kat for the prompt:

5. Book review! (hardly)

keeping it classy

Rain is lightly falling outside my window. Birds are chirping. It sounds like those rainforest videos... in Colorado?  We've been getting a lot of rain this spring, and I'm not complaining. The weeds are taking over, but it's green foliage rather than brown dirt, so there we go. 

This week became somewhat busy. I guess with one day less in the work week, all else became concentrated. Summer classes started at the college on Tuesday, but testing has yet to be impacted much by that. 

On the tutor side of things, I've been getting requests from high schoolers, mostly from the east coast  (schools here are already on summer break) for final exam cramming. Yuck. They didn't learn the material well enough during the semester and also didn't learn that they can't cram it all into a 2-hour tutor sesh. 

Moving on. Boss has mostly moved to his new office at one of the other campuses. Yay! The vibes we're getting from the crew at  his new location are quite grumbly, not surprisingly. God help 'em. I'm quite interested to see how this is all going to play out over the next few months. In the meantime, Boss's non-presence at our office is delightful.  Omg, so much.

I plan to catch up on a few things this weekend, including blog reading, after the busy week. Personal blogs have given way to vlogs, tiktoks, etc. 

We bloggers are the Classics!