A photo essay

Here in Arizona the season's are spring, summer, fall and then back to spring. We really don't have a winter. The leaves fall off my ash trees in January and in February the buds are already budding.

It's also allergy season for some, not me. The orange trees are blossoming, so are the grapefruit, lemon, and lime trees.

The bees are out because of the blossoms.


A perfect orange blossom. . . .

Lime blossoms don't smell as strong as orange blossoms.





Nectarine blossoms are beautiful too. The hummingbirds like this tree.

And teeth fall out.



But hey, new ones *spring* in.


All from my backyard.

Hoping for a Brain Cloud

So I woke up at 3:55am this morning and was wide awake. I would actually say I was wired. This never happens. 3:55am is usually my bedtime. After a piece of bread, milk, and a digestive enzyme, I had layed in bed, pondered the wonders of Facebook and took my pulse several times using the stopwatch on my itouch, until after 5:30 and decided to get up. After all, I had an idea for a blog post. Don't worry, I'll take a nap at 8am when the kids go to school.

 Have you every compared yourself to a character in a movie, or the character's situation in a movie? Recently there were some oldies but goodies on Encore, so I recorded a few movies to watch with the kids on Friday nights. Jonathan, Brandon, Riley and I watched Joe Versus the Volcano. After an hour, Jonathan was just to involved in playing backgammon on his iphone to watch anymore and Riley is just too young to catch the ins and outs that make the show interesting. So it ended up that just B and I watched it. So tonight, during my moments of wakefulness (is that a word?) I all of a sudden thought about how similar my life is to Joe's at the beginning of the movie.


I walk through each day doing the same things, taking the same abuse, dealing with the same situations. I vacuum the kitchen floor. I let the dogs in. I let the dogs out. I start laundry. I yell at the dogs to be quiet and realize that yet again its the neighbor's dog. I dread 3pm when the tornadoes come home and scatter like fleas so that I have to round 'em up and force homework on them. Then chores. When I talk to them I sound like Joe's boss at the factory - endlessly repeating myself. Then they talk to me like Joe's boss talks to him. It makes me feel like Joe. I go to the doctor all the time. Why does my head hurt all the time? Why do I keep getting sick? I think there is something wrong with my hormones. I think my body says, "Seratonin? Ya right, like I am going to use THAT!"


But. . . I am looking forward to the day that my doctor, or anyone for that matter, tells me I have a brain cloud. Okay, not literally a brain cloud. A metaphoric brain cloud. Something that will change my life, the people around me, and send me on some journey that gives me purpose. I am not looking to jump into a volcano. . . well maybe someday. I just want to meet my limo driver that will point me in all the right directions.


And then find my Dede, Angelica or Patricia.


(Remember, I'm Joe here.)


And its okay for that person to be someone already in my life.


And then I want to realize that my brain cloud wasn't real and it was all me to begin with.

Christmas 2008

Christmas has come and gone, thank goodness! Its not my favorite holiday of the year. I'm more of a Labor Day kind of person. No unhealthy fattening dinner to plan. No bazillion dollars to spend on gifts. But seeing as I am required to participate, we spent Christmas at out cabin in Hunter Creek, Arizona. My mom, dad, sister and her family all came and squeezed into the cabin. Since the remodel was done, our square footage has doubled and so it wasn't so bad with 14 people and 3 dogs in 3,000 square feet. On the 24th, my mom and sister put up the tree. Someone commented that it really felt like Christmas with all the snow, the fire and putting up the tree on Christmas Eve. Then my mom told us that it was actually the poor people long ago who waited until Christmas Eve to buy a tree because the trees were extremely cheap or free the night before Christmas.
















It sleeted and snowed outside and we all complained how cold it was, after all, we are used to the temperature being 115 degrees. No doubt this summer we will be complaining how hot it is! But the snow and sleet made it beautiful.



Ahhh, isn't it picturesque?

Conversation with Brandon

Brandon (age 11) overhears me talking to the pool service company. Then he asks, "Mom, why don't we just drain the pool ourselves? Don't we have one of those things you put in the bottom of the pool that drains it?"

"No, we don't have one."

"Uh huh, we do."

"No, we don't. We always have the pool company do it."

"Well, couldn't we do it ourselves?"

"Sure Brandon, go get a straw and start draining 30,000 gallons."

He starts laughing.

I'm so glad that he understands sarcasm.

Here's a thought. . .

Does anyone think its funny that spellcheck wants to change blogspot to bloodspot?

Ahh, you know it has been too long since you tended to your 3 month old blog with 3 posts and it takes you 15 minutes to remember your sign in information. Maybe blogging isn't for me? Maybe tomorrow.

Discovering Death

I get a phone call a few weeks ago. Its dear Mrs. Fultz. Saying her name that way suddenly makes her 62, but she's not. She's Emily's first grade teacher.

Emily has a peanut allergy.

Its not as bad as Brandon's. Any exposure whatsoever and B gets a Twinject, adult dose (he's 11) and a 6 hour trip to the ER.

Do you realize how fast you get in when you use the first Twinject dose, and then get the second one ready (remember the phrasing "Twin" in Twinject), and show up at the ER holding the exposed needle and saying, "My 11 year old son was exposed to peanuts. He has swelling in his throat, nose, and all over his face. He's throwing up. He's having a difficult time breathing." Everyone drops everything and we get all the attention.

I don't particularly like the attention, but Brandon is not one to ever turn attention away.

Less digressing . . . . Emily has been allergy tested for peanuts and she's a 2 to 2 1/2. Brandon is like a 10, on a scale of 1 to 4. But we don't know exactly her symptoms progress. So, we've informed her of sensible eating habits when away from home.

Apparently we've scared her so much, that she won't eat at school.

Apparently this had let to her being a major hypochondriac.

I hear little feet going 90 miles an hour down our stairs. I'm in the kitchen with Lisa and I say to her, "Here it comes."

Or maybe I said, "And here we go again."

Whatever. . . but I'm sure it was witty because at least inside my head it was.

She runs in the room screaming, and I mean screaming (if you know the REAL Emily, you know what I mean. "Mom, I'm having a heart attack!!!!!!! I am going to die!"

By this stage in, well, her stage of discovering death, I have become quite numb to it. If you knew her, and all my kids, you would understand. Exaggeration was taught to them all in secret by whom I have yet to determine. But I think genetics is really to blame. Jonathan can't tell a story without a bug becoming a giant tarantula.

(No offense Jonathan.)

In the movies - Mall Cop - at one of the most pivotable points (its such a deep inspirational experience that I was saddened by the interruption) Emily feels a bit of reflux. Too much popcorn.

And it starts.

And it ends 2 minutes later.

Well, ended in the theater, when she started screaming, "I'm gonna die! Take me to the hospital! I'm gonna die! Call an ambulance!"

Why we couldn't have seen Pink Panther, I do not know.