What's a Girl to Do?

What is it about packing for a trip that makes me feel like I'm about to go through the Great Depression with no resources. I swear every time I go on a trip that I will pack LIGHT and not take everything I own. I start out ok. Few blouses, check. Pants, check. Socks, undies, check. From there, things get out of hand. Makeup, check, hair stuff, check. Before you know it, I have packed most of my medicine cabinet. Just in case, you know. What if I need something to read. I'll take a book. What if I finish that one? Better take two. And on and on.
Next thing you know, I'm sitting on the suitcase begging my husband to try to force the zipper closed. And wondering how I'm ever going to get it all back in there to come home.
Last cruise, we took four suitcases and two totebags for two people. This time, my friend and I were determined to take one large suitcase each. Well, she brought her's by today, and it weighs about two hundred pounds and bulges from every seam. I felt better.
So tonight I'm going to unpack what I've packed and try to pare it down some. But that little voice in my head that screams at me, "But you might need that!" will just have to shut up. Think light. Think light. Geez. What's a girl to do?

Get Down, Granny!

In case you haven't read my daughter's blog, I found out yesterday that I'm going to be a GRANNY next July. We don't know what the little one will be yet, but loved is on the list! Of course, we know the baby's favorite colors will be orange and blue and the baby's first words will be War Eagle, that is if Daddy's influence works. But among the baby's first sentences will be, "I want to go to Granny's!" "Granny, you make good cookies!" and "Granny loves me."
I am so excited. That means we will have a baby for 2007 Christmas! Christmases are always a lot more fun with babies.
So there are different kinds of Grannys. There are cool Grannies, old fogey Grannies, embarrassing Grannies, and soft, squishy, hugging Grannies. Which one will I be? I'll be a cool old fogey, sometimes embarrassing, but always soft, squishy and hugging Granny.
Geez, eight months is a long time to wait.

Pass me the Rhinestones, Dahhh-Ling!

I heard a joke once about how the French people sat around one day and said, "Those Americans are so dumb, I bet we could bottle water and sell it to them." And the rest is history. I buy my share of bottled water. We even have one of those spring water coolers perched in the corner of our kitchen, which we make good use of often.
But when I go to the store, and plunk down my $1 for a bottle of water, I can't help thinking what my dad would say about it. "Water? You are paying a DOLLAR for WATER? Why, I get all the water I want from the faucet. And I don't pay for it. It comes from a well. A well I dug with my own hands. And it's cleaner water than anything you get from those pipes the city sends it through..." etc. etc. etc. At least I'm paying a dollar, and not thirty five dollars for the latest BlingH2O, with rhinestones on the bottle for a mere $35!

When we took the cruise, my husband and I decided to have lunch one day in the dining room rather than the buffets or pizza bar. We were seated in a nice booth in the corner, and all was well until they decided to use up that space we didn't take up in the booth by seating Biff and Buffy with us. Of course, Biff and Buffy weren't their real names, but they might as well have been. They were manicured better than the White House lawn, and had the attitude to match. In five minutes, they asked, "What do you do? Do you have children? What schools did they attend? What do they do?" and on and on....Since we didn't have any Ivy League schools to mention, I guess they had put us into the country bumpkin category by then.

But just in case, we had not yet been relagated, we clinched it. The waiter asked for our order, and I ordered a salad and water with lemon. To which my husband replied, he'd have water, too, no lemon.
Biff and Buffy were horrified. "You mean you drink the water from the ship?"
"Uh...yeah. Why?"
"It's loaded with chlorine. It has more chlorine in it than our swimming pool at home! Can't you smell it? It's horrendous!"
"Uh, no, hadn't noticed whether my water smelled. Tastes ok to me."

To that, they turned up their noses and we all finished our lunches in peace. Buffy had her bottled water, and Biff, his iced tea. Made from what, I thought....That nasty chlorine water I bet...

Thelma and Louise on Carnival

My friend, Dawn, came over today and we tackled the bedroom closet. It looks so much better and I found a lot of things I had lost. While she was here, we talked about her divorce, how hateful her ex is being, and how much she needs a break.

She asked about the cruise and went on and on about how she's had one vacation in thirty years and they camped, in a TENT, which flooded when it rained, and she cooked and cleaned up after everyone the whole time. She said she'd LOVE to go on a cruise, and she has wanted to all her life.

So...I said, could you afford to go? She said she had some money tucked back her dad sent her for her birthday. So I went online to look, and while I was looking she said she could never go by herself, because she wouldn't know what to do or anything. Well, we found a cruise leaving the 28th of this month. So...I booked it, for a girls' week away.

THEN I called my husband. He was so nice about it, and said he would give me some spending money to take with me. We ordered a certified copy of her birth certificate to be overnighted, and we're all set. She was jumping up and down she was so excited.

So...in ten days I'm sailing away again. And I can't wait. This time it's just the GIRLS.
Here's a funny side story to this whole thing. She called her attorney to make sure her going away on a cruise wouldn't negatively impact her divorce progress, and told him she wanted to go on a cruise with her friend. He said male friend or female? She was so embarrassed she turned bright red. She said, "Oh My! She's FEMALE. I'm known her for thirty years!" I thought it was funny.

I told her we eat in a dining room, and she can order what she likes from a menu. She said do they ever have steak? I said they have steak every night if you want it. I told her they also have seafood, chicken, etc. She said I sure don't want chicken. I have chicken at home. I NEVER get steak. I'M EATING STEAK EVERY NIGHT! Then she danced around some more.
I think it will be so fun. Thelma and Louise on Carnival. ha

It's Gripe Day! An Official Holiday for Gripers!

You ever have those days when you keep telling yourself how good you have it, and how grateful you should be for your life, and you don't believe it? A day when all you want to do is bitch and gripe? Well this is that week for me. My hormones are raging and this feels very much like major PMS. I almost wish it were, since that would give me a REALLY good explanation for gaining weight while totally depriving myself of everything I wanted to eat on the cruise. It could be PMS, since one of the side effects of peri-menopause is having no earthly idea when Mr. Monthly is going to show up.
Add to that the fact that I'm ready to pack a suitcase and leave this cluttered pile we call a townhouse behind, all the while looking longingly at houses in my book on minimalist decorating with clean tables and no knick-knacks, and no excess furniture. So I called my friend, Dawn. She's known me for 24 years, and has heard this belly-aching story more than once. She and I worked out a plan. She's coming over the next two days, and we are going to tackle the clutter.
She is an expert on clutter busting. The fact that she doesn't do it at her house doesn't mean she's not an expert. Everyone knows it is a lot easier to organize anyone's house but your own. We are starting with my bedroom closet. It's a walk-in that can no longer be walked-into because my husband refuses to throw away anything. Won't he be surprised when he gets home tomorrow.
I hope she can help me with closets and drawers. I don't care what he keeps as long as I have a place to keep everything out of sight. When the clutter fills the hidden spaces and spills over into spaces I SEE, it's time for drastic measures. I considered hiring a bulldozer and a dump truck. I considered fire. Then I settled on seeking help from my friend and making our local thrift store very happy. Of course, I agreed to pay her for her services. But some of it we will trade out as she gets first dibs on the junk. She loves my hand-me-down clothes as she and I can wear the same size.
I had a submission accepted while I was on the cruise. It's for a writers calendar and I wrote a short ditty about writing they liked. They offered to pay me, give me free calendars, advertise my writing website, and list me on their website as a contributor. Here's the catch. They wanted a bio, no big deal. They wanted a photo of me in my element. She explained it like this...one garden writer was photographed in the garden, a wildlife writer in the forest. Must not be posed. Must be candid. Must reflect your personality. Well I appointed my son to the camera and task at hand. He followed me around and we tried all kinds of situations and he snapped away. I reviewed and vetoed them all. Oh My God, do I look like that?? What if I hold my head higher? Will that hide my neck? Wait, let me put on more makeup! He was getting so frustrated with me. Finally I said, let's do it at the kitchen table. I write about Southern women. Where better than sitting at the kitchen table? So he took twenty at the table and I vetoed them all, then went back and settled on the best of the worst, which the calendar editor loved. I'll just be very selective about who I tell about the calendar.
I started my book today. It's about the haunted house we live in back in the 70's. I wrote the first four chapters of the rough draft. So far, I like it. When you write it and it even scares you to write it, you figure it's working. I'm excited about it.

And my life goes on...

Battle of the Sexes Won, Battle of the Bulge Continues

The cruise was wonderful. We made a list each day of all the activities we wanted to do, had a lot of fun, stayed up late, got up early, walked a lot, ate a lot, and just had a great time. I tried my best to eat the "light selections" from the menu, and except for one night when I had what I considered to be the best dessert on the menu, I stuck right by that. I also took the stairs up and down all day, and we walked through Cozumel rather than taking a taxi to do our shopping. I thought I had done great on my weight loss. I came back and weighed this morning and had gained 1 and 3/4 pounds. But I decided on my way back from weighing-in that I did the best I could, and that I had only failed if I gave up. Since I'm "keeping on keeping on," then I won't worry about it. Yes, it could have been much worse.


One of the highlights of our trip was the day we attended "Battle of the Sexes" in one of the auditoriums, which the host had separated into all women on the right, all men on the left. He then asked, "Which of your men are happily married?" My husband raised his hand, along with many others, but since he's a big guy near the front, the host then said, "Great, sir, you can be our captain of the men's team. Come on up to the front." Then he turned and, you guessed it, said, "And where is this man's wife?" I reluctantly stood, and he said, "You will be our women's captain!" I thought I would die. I thought about killing my husband. Then I thought, I will never see these people again, and I trudged up to the front. Of course, we women won the battle of the sexes. Did you have any doubt? And I won over my battle of being the wallflower in the corner, at least for one afternoon.
I am going to post a couple of pictures we had made, which show my fat face. But consider these "before pictures" with after pictures to follow at a later date.

Ma'am, Your Clothes Are Falling Off!

It's been a month since I started taking better care of myself. Making the decision was the hard part. Fearing failure was always in my mind the first couple of weeks, afraid to get my hopes up in case I failed. Now it's been a month. I decided to get a new outfit for the cruise, a satin skirt and sequined jacket. I looked in all the local stores but no luck. So I found one in an online catalog and ordered it with priority shipping. Yesterday it came. It's gorgeous.

So this morning I tried it on. I zipped the skirt and then grabbed the jacket and put it on. I looked in the mirror. The jacket is hanging off my shoulders and there is an awful lot of extra material in the front of the jacket. I tried rearranging it on my body but no luck. Still looked too big. How can that be? This is MY SIZE.

So while I'm still standing by the mirror, I take off the jacket and then STARE at the skirt. The waist of the skirt is now around my hips. Wh-h-h-at? The skirt is too big. WAY too big. So I pull off the skirt and start dancing around in my underwear and singing, "Oh yeah! Oh yeah!"

I went back to my closet, and I decided to try on one of the dressy dresses I had, but figured I'd never get into. It fits! So now I am going to take this new outfit back to the catalog desk today, and I'm going to wear what I already had. But I'm thrilled!

Eating better is actually getting to be a habit. I think of what I'm going to order BEFORE I get to the restaurant. I went through the "watching tv and munching" fear, until I figured out some snacks like popcorn that I can have at night. The thing is, I've sort of gotten to where I'm not even wanting that at night. I can watch tv without feeding my face at the same time, most of the time.

So am I proud of myself? Yes. Am I scared to be proud of myself? Yes. I'm scared to even post this for the fear that some food demon will possess me and I'll blow it. But so far, folks, so good.
Here's the main thing. I feel so much better. I am still not exercising enough, but I'm going to get a jump start on that next week on the cruise.

So for all of you who sent good thoughts my way, keep 'em coming, because it's working.