Karrie's Box of Thoughts

Monday, October 30, 2006

Friday Night Lights

So this little story is a week old, but oh well. So you know (or should know by now)my passion is hockey. But coming from a football town growing up, I still get the twitch for it. Well last Friday I was twitching like crazy! It was homecoming for Jackson High School and as a freshman; Emily got to be a part of it. So off we went to Memorial Stadium.

Now I personally have not been to Memorial since I was in high school! It was kind of odd and the memories came flooding back. It was weird being there as a parent as my parents were back in the day. Same freezing wind, same crappy bathrooms, same PA system that you can’t understand – although I swear the guy doing the announcing was the same dude that did the games back in my day! But this time is was Em. The dance team performed Michael Jackson’s Thriller and KICKED ASS! They had the moves down and the crowd loved it. It was cool to see the kids cheering them on. The team got to hang with the cheerleaders and the band and hold the banner that the team busted thru at halftime. It was fun to watch Em be a part of it like her mom (I was a band geek – but a REALLY COOL one!) I’m thrilled she’s jumped right in to high school life and is enjoying it. It can be a stressful time and I’m glad she’s gotten a good start. And it seems that her little brother is doing things the way my little brother did too. A lot of the kids Em goes to school with have younger brothers and sisters Glenn’s age (just like me and my brother), so they spent the game bugging the older kids – yup just like in my day! My mom really got a kick out of that – another chance for her to point out what goes around, comes around.

So now along with hockey, it looks like football will be joining the line up and we are going to do the all American ritual of Friday night lights. There’s a buzz that they’re going to do the basketball games as well *sigh*. I can smell the gym socks now....

As told by moi11:45 AM ...

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Good GAWD! It's alive!

Yeah, it me. So yeah, it's been awhile and I won't start from my last post and bore you with all the details. Here's a few highlights and lowlights.

So the traveling continued. Managed to catch 8 DL shows this summer. Would have been 9 but I wasn't able to go to the show in Ames with Jules. And that I'm truly sorry. This summer was an east coast thang and I had a blast. I honestly had no desire to hit the east coast before, but now can't wait to go back! I do believe I managed by the second time around to figure out the toll booths, the obscure signs and the Dunkin Donuts vs Starbucks ratio (Jules, there's hope for us yet!)

Starbucks.... I have caved to the man! The last time around at the Mohegan Sun there was just enough downtime and reading opportunities that I hit the Starbucks grab my books and enjoyed. Now I've joined the masses and made the stuff part of my morning routine - Bastards!

The morning routine includes the mom taxi to school (with enough time in between to hit Starbucks). For Em it's being a freshman in high school *shudder* and she's loving every minute of it! No worries there about her fitting in. She made the dance team and was hanging with the girls at camp and school all summer, so she just slid right in like a pro. She's been practicing like crazy because they will be competing at the state level at the first of the year and are performing at the prep assemblies and football/basketball games until then as practice. They're doing Michael Jackson's Thriller for Halloween and the Homecoming game and I have to say, they're pretty good. Glenn is in last year of grade school. Because of his late B-Day (November) he's a year behind most of his friends who went up to middle school. But he's still having fun "ruling the school". He made the peewee rep hockey team so he and dad start their travels in November. He's very excited and we're super proud of him making it as a '1st year'. They start checking in peewee and that's something to get use to! Glenn got moved to offense and it's a little weird seeing a defenceman pop him one.

Hubby - Hockey, Hockey, kids and hockey, work. 'nuff said.

Me, well good and bad. The trips and shows being the good and the great. But other then that it's not been too fun for me this summer. I came back from the first trip out east to a mess at work and myself in a mess physically. The combination pretty much had me in tears and buried under the blankets for the rest of the summer. Personally, things are much better and I won't dwell on it. Professionally, I can't say the same. Effective Dec 5th, I'm out of a job. The office I work at is being closed. 140 plus people will be out looking for new jobs. I'm one of them, I have 22 years with the company but we all know that means nothing these days. And honestly, there's nothing internally that I'm interested in. I have 20 weeks of severance and with the cash savings plan - I've got about a year. I'm looking at other options and not going to jump at the first thing. It's not the pay I'm focusing on, but the flexibility. That's what I'm going to miss the most. After 22 years, I (and the family) have gotten use to a certain amount of vacation and leeway to work around outside activities. And yes that means my summer DL trips. Bottomline (to a point), I'm going to be selfish. I don't want to give up those things that I've come to love doing and I'm going to try and find a way to save it. If I can't, I can't. But I'm going to give it a hell of shot first! We'll see.

Of course I'm not going out quietly. I have already sent out a memo telling everyone to drag out every decoration they've got and get them up. We won't be around for Xmas so lets do it now. Any and all holiday decorations are out and about. It looks like a Party City store vomited!! I love it. Also planned is a monthly potluck (we have so many different ethnic backgrounds at work, we have great potlucks!) and I have planned the "Pink Slip Party" for a club the weekend after we close. We have two guys at work with bands and another who has a friend with the club to party in!! I've never done things the conventional way and I'm not staring now!!

Toodles for now!

As told by moi8:06 AM ...