In Full Swing

If you had asked me three days ago how I felt about the start of December I would have said that I wasn’t that excited about it since it would be so incredibly busy and I have procrastinated too much already.

On the way home and to Ben and Ruthie’s last night I noticed that a few houses had Christmas lights up already. Seeing those lights twinkle made me smile. They made me remember a recent post on Brad’s blog about really experiencing life. At times it feels as though I’m in a whirlwind with work and with something going on in my life on almost every single night that I tend to forget to just be in the moment rather than get caught up in all that I have going on.

I love Christmas. I love everything about the holiday season and this year I plan to enjoy it instead of being so stressed out about every single detail. (and that means not staying up until 3am baking cookies or making fudge.)

"few of us ever live in the present. we are forever anticipating what is to come or remembering what has gone."...louis l'armor

seeking

"The effort of the genuine spiritual seeker should be to cultivate love until the mind becomes saturated by it." ~Bhante Y. Wimala

in case you missed it...

...my highlights of the weekend:
*Christine's birthday fun complete with a horrible waiter, marinara sauce in liquor (I don't know how that happened), Christine singing Happy Birthday to herself, Mike getting groped by the crazy drunk woman, meeting a new friend while waiting for drinks at the bar (I couldn't tell if she was only being nice or was trying to hit on me...) and Christine and Clint singing Slim Shady (I laughed really hard).
*Saturdays are for sleeping in or so some people say. Well, I took full advantage of this theory and slept in very late. My eyes didn't see daylight until almost noon...and it was glorious.
*Saturday afternoon I was pounced on, jumped on, elbowed, grabbed at, and tickled. It's what my niece and nephew like to do to both my mom and myself on my mom's bed when they're not using it as their own personal trampoline.
*Then some Holly time happened on Sunday night. We shared a blanket and a little of what's going on in our lives.
*More laughing ensued when Dave (or Davis as Holly calls him) started talking about everything from male anatomy to the people on his "list". Oh man.
*Sunday morning was a blur and then I got into cooking mode and cooked a big pot of potato soup and roasted two chickens (they were in my fridge and needed to be cooked).
*While we were walking from the Taft to the F.R. piano bar Mike said something to the affect of "Are you sure they're open?" It's Sunday, why would they not be open? When we reached the doors and looked inside I realized that his suspicions were probably correct. Not many bars have all their lights on and a ladder by the front door to greet you. We cautiously walked in and were greeted by a nearly drunk man that greeted us warmly, no doubt hoping to entice us to stay and help decorate the bar for the holidays. We should've taken him up on his offer. ;)
*The night then progressed to grabbing a drink at a different bar (that was uber nice) and walking back to the Taft to support Ellery. I love them! There were lots of cool people there. Again, more laughter. Some of the performers were hilarious. And, I'm not sure that I mean that in a good way. It was good fun.
*All in all there were many good moments of this weekend.

FreeDOM

A few things needed to go in the mail today and as I was walking to the Post Office I noticed this shady looking character in our lobby. He had on a dirt brown hoody on with the hood pulled up on his head. I noticed that he was heading over to the plasma TV that hangs on the wall in our new lobby and as he did this he flipped the bird to the TV. Now, this isn’t nearly as funny (and strange) until you learn who was on the television at the time. It was none other than George W. This seriously made me laugh out loud (after the shady guy made his departure, of course).

Umm, hello, he can’t see you dude.