Twitching

We are back in Cleveland and at our new house. Poor Shea has been moved from place to place for the past year. After driving seven hours in a car he has never ridden in before, it all seemed to come crashing down for him. For a little while anyways.

Shea's day started out cramped into the back seat of my car. A place he has never been allowed before, hence the covering sheets for protection! He had a hard time getting comfortable, tossing and turning for the seven hours we were driving. 

When we finally arrived, he jumped out of the car and was ready to explore this new place. Running around the yard and the house, sniffing everything in sight. However, for some reason, Shea got really restless. He began trying to eat the garbage, he cried at the back door, when nobody responded, he went to the front and cried. A very sad sight.  I finally caved and took him for a walk. He peed on every tree we passed and then refused to come in the house. After bribing him inside with peanut butter, he found a way to sneak out the back door. Thank goodness Shea never gets sick of the peanut butter bribe, as we had to lure him back from our neighbors yard with a full jar.

We left Shea alone for a little while when we went out to dinner. I was a little nervous to see what we would come home to. Besides getting into the garbage, I am led to believe he simply laid in the bathtub crying while we were gone. The dirty paw prints all over the tub was a dead give away. 

Now, after an exhausting, confusing day for the Big Guy, he is sleeping and twitching on the floor. Hopefully tomorrow is better for him. When he hurts, I hurt. 

I Could Have Been A Billionaire

My grandmother, who turned 89 yesterday, is MIA. Being the caring and considerate granddaughter that I am, I telephoned her yesterday to wish her a happy birthday. In doing so, I let her know that I was in town and would come to visit her sometime today.

I was disappointed by her response, as I've always considered myself her favorite grandchild (sorry to break it to you Nick and Danny). She got all excited and said, "Is Jeff coming too?" I had to remind her that Jeff was not here. With this news, she completely changed her tune. "Oh, well, you don't have to come." Me, I said, screw that! I'm going to see her. My grandmother only turns 89 once!

So, as I headed down today to visit, I called her to make sure she was awake. She didn't answer so I proceeded to call 900 times figuring she would get so annoyed she would actually answer her phone. Didn't happen. When I arrived there, her car was gone. This woman, who hasn't driven a car in 3 months, decided today, the day I drove down to see her, that she would journey out into civilization? Just my luck. So, I headed over to her sisters' house, thinking she may be there.

My precious (great) Aunt Gina just returned home from the nursing home yesterday. She was dozing off when I arrived, but perked right up at the sight of me. A little while into our visit, an old friend, Deb, showed up: a 75 year old spitfire. Right away they got after each other. Yelling, screaming, arguing. I mean, really, what better thing for "friends" to do?

As Deb started preaching, Aunt Gina decided she wasn't going to have any of it. "Shut up!" she yelled. "Shut the f*#& up!" With my phone laying next to me, I decided that maybe I should record this. So I did. By the time I came to this decision, things started to die down a little bit. But I still got some excellent footage. And, while I should be happy about that, it only pissed me off.

Had I come up with the idea to video tape family gatherings and visits since I was, say six, I would be close to a billionaire at this point. The footage would be absolutely incredible entertainment for people of all ways, shapes, and forms. Even if I had decided this when I was a teenager, I'd be a multi-millionaire. Now, with the oldest generation ranging from 92-82 the better years of footage are behind me. They can't hear very well and that does not make for good conversation. I really dropped the ball on this one! Damn me!

The Big Egg

Being here in New York for a limited amount of time, I have a people to do and things to see. I mean, ehhh, you get the picture. So, I set out this morning with an agenda. As soon as I was able to cross one thing off, I was side-tracked in a major way.

You see, as I stopped by my old school, chatted with some people, I noticed a group of guys playing basketball. I am a sucker for basketball. As is normal with me, I started watching for a little bit, only to notice that I knew these guys. They were, in fact, some of the people that I played ball with on Thursday nights. I miss Thursday basketball. I miss Wednesday basketball too. Never one to turn down a game, I ran to get my sneakers out of the car, and joined in the game.

I don't know if it was because I hadn't played in a while, but I seemed to have a little extra bounce in my step today. I got right into the thick of things. So thick, that driving into the lane, I took an elbow right to the forehead. The force of the elbow knocked my body to the side as I shot the ball. The good part is, before I had to close my eye to absorb the hit, I saw the ball go through the hoop.

Being in playing mode, pain is significantly less than what it may normally be. I shook it off with no problem, fending off apologies, and kept right on playing. I was confident that the feeling of my face sticking out ten feet was all in my head. It usually is. That is until the elbow thrower got a horrible look on his face, and starting reaching for my forehead. Then, I could feel the egg. Overtime, the egg bruised over and from what was described to me, spread up into my hairline, and now looks like this:

It does not hurt as bad as it looks. In fact, it only hurts when I push on it. I have no reason to push on it except to test and see if it still hurts. I just tested it: it stills hurts when I push on it. I got to stop doing that!

Rearview Mirror

I drove for six and a half straight hours today. The end result was my blessed reunion with Shea. I have driven from New York to Cleveland faster, but I have never made the trip east in such good time. Since my last trip on these roads did not go without incident: My Last Trip, I was especially aware of my speed. This apparently did not factor into my record time.

While I was driving, being cautious of hiding cops, I began rerunning all of the times I've been pulled over in my life. I write that as thought it's happened numerous times. It hasn't. But it's happened enough. The time I was thinking of mostly today really had me cracking up.

I believe it was back in 2002. Spending the summer home from college, I was at my parents house and heading down to a party about a half hour away. While I was driving the windy, narrow roads, I peeked in the rearview mirror to check out my beautiful hair. Well, it was a good thing I looked, because there was a piece out of place. I would have none of that. Concentrating solely on taking care of that out of place hair, I took my eyes off of the road. This wouldn't have been a huge problem if the road were straight. But, the two seconds that it took me to get my hair in tip-top shape, the road took a sharp curve.

When I looked back at the road, I was driving on the left-hand side of the road. Unfortunately, I was not in Europe where that is acceptable. Even worse, a car was coming. We were set to crash head-on. Through my instantaneous panic, I was able to see that this was not just any car; it was a cop. Before I could even comprehend the ramifications of fixing my hair in the rearview mirror, I was able to jerk the wheel and bring my car back to the right side of the road.

I immediately knew that cop was doing a u-ey and coming to pull me over. I didn't even let him turn his lights on, I just surrendered, pulling over voluntarily. As he approached, he asked the basic questions: licence, registration, and the such. Then, he asked what in the heck I was doing. His best guess what that I was changing cd's. I laughed that ridiculous guess off and told him exactly what I was doing. "I was fixing my hair, " I explained, as that was a completely acceptable thing to be doing while driving on windy roads.

The officer laughed and told me that probably wasn't the best idea. He warned me that that is how accidents happen. I enthusiastically agreed with him. With that, he told me to please, for the sake of everyone's safety, to never fix my hair while driving again. Since I agreed to this, he allowed me to go free of charge. My hair must have been looking really good!

Face-Licking

I have to get up early tomorrow. I am already up much later than I wanted to be, and did not get everything done I'd like to have done. With hopes that I am more efficient tomorrow, I am going to bed. The faster I go to sleep, the more efficient I am tomorrow, and the faster I drive, the sooner I will see my Shea-Man! I can't wait to get my face licked!

Towelless

Now that we are home from Brazil, it is time to move. The plan is to fill my days, and the car, with moving things over to the new place bit by bit. I got off to a great start today.

Clothes, moved. Books, moved. Dishes, moved. Pots and pans, moved. Bath towels, moved. Problem, Jeff, as should be suspected, decided that he wanted to shower.

Being the nice wife that I am, I took Jeff's used towel and put it in with the dirty clothes. I was going to wash it for him soon. I planned on replacing with a nice, fresh towel. Putting that new towel right on the rack where his previous one laid. Unfortunately, due to my complete lack of an adult attention span, after throwing the used towel in the dirty clothes, I packed all of the clean towels and brought them over to the new house. 

This was completely unintentional. In fact, I did not think twice about it until I saw Jeff heading to the bathroom with the shower look on his face. "Oh sh*#," I responded in a slight panic. I envisioned him getting mad at my inability to think. As I shouted out, "oh sh*#" a second time, I was pleased to see the smile on Jeff's face. He was entertained by my idiocracy. I won't tell you the solution to the problem, but I am happy to report that Jeff is out of the shower and dried off. 

A Different Kind of Top Ten

We have returned from Brazil. The trip was amazing and I plan on telling you of all of it's wonderfulness, just like the boys did on the continuous facebook blog we kept while there. I think Reid's post today put an excellent cap on the trip. I agree with much of Reid's top ten, although some things change with perspective. I do, however, one-hundred percent agree with his #6.

Trip Top-Ten

And, while I think the top-ten list is a wonderful way to wrap up a once in a lifetime trip, I want to take a different angle. In hopes of not sounding like a spoiled, ungrateful brat, I have compiled a Top-Ten Lowlights list. 

1) As the team center, Eric, boarded the plane in Cleveland, we noticed how abnormally tall the man sitting in front of me was. With Eric at 6'10'', this man sitting down, was a full head taller than Eric. Whispering among ourselves, we decided he must be a professional athlete. I mean, nobody is that tall and not a professional athlete. That would just be absurd. So, collectively, it was decided that the man sitting in front of me was former Cavaliers player, Tree Rollins. I was convinced and did not want to let the opportunity to chat with an NBA player go to the cows, I decided to ask him if he was, indeed, Tree Rollins. I couldn't think of a cooler way to start the trip. Except for the fact that he was not Tree Rollins. When I asked him ever so politely, he responded ever so politely, "no ma'am, I'm not." With that, I told him that he was rather tall and let my face turn red. 

2) Blame it on the time change, the early morning wake-up times, other unmentionable factors, or whatever you will. Whichever you choose, the boys were late the first two days for our departure to various places. This did not sit over well with Coach. To show his unhappiness, he unleashed a spiel which included 47 f-bombs. Yes, I counted. With him sitting right behind me, when he returned to his seat, I was left with such an awkward feeling that I nearly burst out laughing. Luckily for me, I bit my tongue. 

3) Soon into our trip, we realized the paper products in Brazil are very different. I am perfectly content wiping my face with my Bounty napkins. The quilted quicker picker upper feels soft on my face and hands, and is super absorbent. All that you would want in a napkin. The napkins at the eateries here around Cleveland, and back in New York, are not Bounty, but they work. We had no reason to believe otherwise when we reached for a napkin in Brazil. Only, we were greeted with small, tissue paper-like squares. It reminded me of the crinkly paper that was on the beds in the pediatricians office. The paper that stuck to you every move you made and as you tried to slide down off of the table. Don't roll your eyes like that. I know you know exactly what I am talking about it. It wasn't comfortable to lay or sit on back then, and it is certainly not comfortable to wipe your hands and mouth with now. 

4) Sticking with the paper/toiletries theme, Brazil does something I never, in all of my life, would imagine acceptable anywhere in the entire world. No matter where you are or what you do, there is always a little waste basket sitting next to the toilet. The purpose: to throw you used toilet paper in. There is no toilet paper flushing in Brazil. It all goes into the waste basket and sits there for the remainder of the day. It is not because Brazilians are gross and dirty, it is due to the sewer systems they have, or essentially, don't have. Either way, it was not a comfortable thing, and I found myself continually flushing my toilet paper and praying for the toilet not to clog up. 

5) What a perfect segue to my next Lowlight. When we arrived in Rio De Janeiro, we went out to a fancy steakhouse. Not a typical steakhouse, but one where servers walk around carrying giant carving knifes, offering various types of meats. This wasn't the lowlight. I was okay with the fact that every fifteen second a different Brazilian man was holding machete just inches from my face. I felt very safe with that. It was quite entertaining actually. The lowlight came when we returned to our hotel to find the first five floors completely flooded. Being the lucky punta (Portuguese word for what I am) that I am, Jeff and I's room was way up on the 13th floor. With the elevators out of commission, we rolled our pants up and hiked the 13 stories a few times with the first five floors resembling Niagara Falls. 

6) In all the wonderful vacationing and excursions, there was some basketball. Trust me, I couldn't forget. The games were great, the atmosphere incomparable. The smell however, overwhelming. Not only were we locked up on a bus together after each game, but Jeff, took it upon himself to rinse the stank-a$$ uniforms off in our shower. Without laundry detergent, the smell doesn't go away as easily. I was reminded each time I walked in or past the bathroom. 

7) My favorite dessert, or food in general really, has to be ice cream. It's definitely a major vice of mine. While I am fairly good at controlling myself when home, for some reason, being on vacation feels like an open invitation for me to eat ice cream at least once a day. And Brazil was very accommodating to this. The thing that differed here was the way they do ice cream. You, the customer, are in charge of scooping, choosing your toppings, and essentially assembling your ice cream dish. This part is awesome. The downfall came when you are asked to put the dish onto a scale and pay per ounce. One night my ice cream dish cost $12. The next night, convinced I had assembled a dish of less than $12, my ice cream weighed in at $11.89. Besides being a rather expensive dish of ice cream, it made me feel like a real pig. 

8) The pig feeling held true for most of the trip. With each meal we had, we ate like the dickens. There was no such thing as a light meal on this Brazilian experience. Before this trip, I found a pair of shorts I really liked. The only had them two sizes too big. I like them so much, I bought them anyways. They were noticeably big, but wearable. Now, after my twelve days of gorging, those too large shorts fit just riiiight. 

9) On this trip, I was able to spend countless hours with my husband. No, that's not a lowlight. This lowlight actually came the one time we were in different places. He and the team had gone to run a clinic for some of the locals. Myself and Angie (Coach's wife) decided we would hang back at the resort and get massages. In the spirit of being in Brazil we decided on bamboo massages. I went first. Not speaking a word of English, the massuer tugged on my sweatshirt as a way of telling me to take it off. So, I did. Then, she tugged on my tank-top. I took that off. Next, she tugged on my bra strap. Seeing as I was in a different country, I said, "what the heck," and took that off too. Guess what she tugged on next? Yup, my shorts. Being a word that crosses language barriers, I said, "No!" I had good reasoning, that I continued to explain although she apparently did not understand. "No underwear." You see, I am not much of an underwear wearer. Haven't been for years now. They serve me no purpose, so I do not wear them. After repeatedly tugging on my shorts, I just took them off. She ran over, picked them up, and actually looked for my underwear. Again, I used the universal term, "No, don't have any." With a little giggle, she signaled for me to put them back on. After that fiasco, she rubbed me down with bamboo. I feel very close to her. 

10) On the same night, since the guys were all at the clinic, we were to meet them out for dinner. We had a ride arranged courtesy of the hotel. This hotel was definitely a top of the line type of place. We knew we were in good hands to get where we needed to be. Angie and I both got a little pep in our step when we were escorted outside and saw a shiny, black Mercedes sitting in front of us. Sweet ride. We hadn't seen many of these in Brazil and got quite excited to ride in one. But our drive walked right on by the Benz and across the gravel parking lot. To our dismay, we piled into a tiny white buggy from 1956 like three sardines in a can. The buggy had no gas, so we were relieved that the restaraunt was strictly downhill.

Lowlights and all, it was a trip of a lifetime. I feel blessed to have been a part of the trip and to get that extra time with Jeff that we haven't necessarily had in the past year or so. Now, we are looking forward to being reunited with our Shea-guy!