Reasons to smile... (LONG)

Reasons to smile? There's TONS of 'em!

*Friday was the last day of summer school…which makes today the first official day of summer vacation! Bring on the R&R&R (rest, relaxation, and reading)!

*Speaking of reading, the “Welcome Back, Potter” parties at Hastings and Books-A-Million Friday night/Saturday morning were FUN…even though old librarians are no longer used to staying up that late. As I drove home from Hastings, it dawned on me (no pun intended!) that several times in college, we stayed up all night long and actually attended classes the next day without a wink of sleep. (How did we do that? I’ll bet we smelled kinda’ funny and didn’t make a lick of sense...)

*Speaking of Harry Potter, I traded a brand new Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (I bought two copies) for Kirsten’s old refrigerator! She had the good sense to go home and get in bed while I stood in line. (How cool is this?! For years to come, when people compliment the old side-by-side, I can wink and say, “Like that? I bought it with a book.”)

*May Bee hates jazz! Last night, she stalked and growled at the bathroom radio as Jon Faddis played some (admittedly kinda’ high & irritating) trumpet notes from his new CD Teranga. She even walked to the other side of the wall to see if there was something going on BEHIND the radio. It was adorable. She wouldn’t get her teeth brushed until she was sure there wasn’t some creature suffering death throes up on the bathroom counter…

(Funny jazz trivia: In a scene from The Simpsons, the KJAZZ radio station features a sign that says: “Jazz: 152 Americans can’t be wrong.” Snort!)

*When I called Karen to see how her vacation was going, she was safely tucked into our favorite Tuscaloosa hotel--the Quality Inn on Jug Factory Lane! It’s close to a Chili’s and a Taco Casa, a Books-A-Million, and a Food World so you can stock up on groceries, like grapes for the room & drinks for the trip. It also has a pool AND a free breakfast in the morning. And an elevator! When I called, she and the kids were saying their “good nights” to each other and saying their prayers for such a wonderful first day of travel.

*On the second day of her trip, when everything went to heck-in-a-handcart and her car wouldn’t start, the people of Tuscaloosa took the best care of her sweet little family…fellow hotel visitors even carted her around town in their own cars to buy batteries and what-not! (I love America. And The South. Yankees, go home…and stay there.) (Seriously. NOT kidding.)

*May Bee finally (and partially-successfully) socialized with another dog in the park! There was a little growling and tail-tucking on MB’s part and high-pitched squealing on the other dog’s part, but the other lady (the owner of an adopted, formerly-abused Basenji mix) assured me that her dog really, REALLY wanted to interact with other dogs, but just didn’t know how. We mommies patiently allowed them to work up to successfully sniffing and kissing each other, and it made us ALL so happy. (Her dog was afraid of her teenaged son when it first came to live with them, and she also couldn’t take off her shoes without the dog acting like it was about to be beaten. Isn’t that horrible?)

The lady was also glad to see a Gentle Leader on May Bee; she was relieved to know that I wouldn’t think her dog was muzzled. Oh, and she complimented MB on her “good watchdog” properties when a bearded, unfriendly man came up behind us. (Probably a Yankee.) Hooray, May Bee!

*My new White Stripes CD is amazing, and Jack White is a genius, and my next dog will be named Meg in Meg White’s honor. Last night, on the way home from church, I sang “Conquest” (which reminds me of the ‘Sixties, for some reason!?) at the very top of my old, wretched lungs.

*Speaking of church, it was wonderful, as always, and I cry every single week. Oh, and Lynn (a N.H. Yankee who knew my grandparents and is okay in my book) visited last night and stayed for the fellowship dinner afterwards. She had to put down her dog Molly three weeks ago…her best friend of thirteen years. (Please pray for Lynn, who has never felt so alone--two thousand miles from her New England home without her most steadfast companion and trying hard to concentrate on her master’s thesis…)

*Today, I’m putting The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou in the mail back to NetFlix…after watching it three times. Bill Murray is a genius. If kids today only knew how funny he was on SNL. (Remember French camp? “It's a little, bitty cat.” & Strother Martin’s “What we got here is a failure to communicate bilingually!”? Ha!) Oh, and Bill Murray is supposed to star in next year’s The City of Ember film, a book Karen & her kids LOVED.

Plus, NetFlix just mailed me 35 Up in Michael Apted’s Up series; Falisha and I are addicted to these! Every other movie in my queue is an Up documentary!

*Mr. Hufstedler is going to lend me a semi-automatic this fall when I get my license to carry. This way, my dad can take his sweet time shopping for a Makarov…

*God is good. Life is sweet. Tomorrow night we finish up Daniel in Ladies’ Bible Class. Have a great week, everybody!

WEIRD UPDATE: I haven't looked at Google Analytics in ages so a quick visit today held a few surprises! Today's stats...so far in 2007, 2,520 visits have been paid to this blog from 32 different countries/territories. The average visitor looks at 1.78 pages and spends eight minutes and 18 seconds on the site. The top keyword search is "Cali Gonzales," and six people came looking for a porn term (bet they left disappointed). The most popular page on this blog, besides the Welcome/index page, is the tribute to Aunt Judy. I've had 24 visits from China, 17 from the UK, 11 from Canada, 7 from India, 6 from Spain...and 103 from Atlanta. (Hi, Atlanta!)