Nothing But Love :: golf blogger

UP, UP, AND AWAY

now i won't be able to get that song out of my head. pfffft. the 5th dimension. hold on while i go download from i-tunes..... [i remember seeing the 5th dimension at wixy 1260 appreciation day at geauga lake in either 1967 or 1968. smokey robinson and the miracles were the other year. can't remember which was which. do the math. i'm old.]

holy crap! a lot of recordings named "up, up, and away!" i got the only one that matters -- to me.

jeez-o-man, do i LOVE i-tunes and my mac
and my i-pod! you don't know what you're
missing if you're using a pc. i used pc's for
20 years, and i'm sold on macs now. thanks
to my i-t guy, matt (our son matt),
for insisting on the changeover.

hey! how do you like this artistic stuff? i love trying it
every once in a while.

go to mandarindesign.com for the instructions.

anyway. i started out wanting to post on something else, but i got distracted and can't quite remember where i was going. wait. it's coming to me. montana. the desert is no place... cooking blog blues. my aunt. pumpkin spice lattes. jax. in no particular order. i think i'll start chronologically. kindasorta.

we knew when we sent jax off to montana that there was a "family week" portion of the treatment. "addiction is a family disease..." blah, blah, blah. there was the same thing in utah where jax went at 16. at the aspen achievement academy in utah, treatment was ENTIRELY in the desert. totally basic stuff. dig-your-latrine (no toilet paper), find-your-water (and "drop" it to kill bacteria), make-your-fire-with-your-fire-bow (no matches) kind of camping. we were to join him and his graduation group in the desert and camp with them. jax was worried about gimpy mom and sent us the infamous "the desert is no place for a handicapped woman" letter. laugh, laugh, i thought i'd die (another song allusion). but, as it turns out, he was soooo right. at least for THIS handicapped woman. bill and i are fond of saying that the holiday inn is about as basic as we like to go. i lasted for a day and a half in the desert, then HAD to go sleep on a bed the next night and be "jeeped" back in the next morning for the all-important "bring these people to their knees weeping family/group therapy sessions." bill and jax were never more thrilled to have me in their family. they got to come. jax had his first shower and toilet experience in 7 weeks, his first mattress, his first candy bar. do not get me wrong. i am sooooo glad to have had the experience, as limited as it was. i have never seen a sky so clear and beautiful. the scenery. ohmygod. it was (i'm stuck here trying to find a word to begin to describe it)...(minutes pass)...umm...breathtaking? gorgeous? ask bill how many times i elbowed him out of a deep sleep to look at what i was looking at (do NOT go there. i KNOW not to end a sentence with a preposition. i'm trying to make a point here).

just got this e-mail from my darling friend, marlene: Please don't say you have to sleep on the ground again.....you have that system figured out, right, that the Holiday Inn is best for you? (and any other sensible adult)
Glad its going well. Knew it would. Just takes time. one step forward, two steps back, then forward again on pace. So few rehabs stick in just one try. He'll be ok. very wearing on good parents. Hang in there.

back to montana. anyway, we THOUGHT that the family week thingy was going to be in october. at the end of the total 60-day treatment. as it turns out, it's in OCTOBER. between the traditional 30-day treatment and the wilderness trip. we have to be in kalispell montana (closest airport) on october 1. but we get to stay in a hotel in kalispell at night. no wilderness camping "attempt" this time for us. ah well. except for the fact that there doesn't seem to be a starbucks in kalispell, montana, we should be quite comfortable. i AM freaking out -- not just a little -- at the little, teeny, "prop" notation on the flight information. because i think that's code for propeller. they can't fool me. and me all out of xanax. i say the following with all due respect for alcoholics and addicts everywhere: i think it might be time for me to start drinking. now. i mean today.

my aunt: yesterday, my sister and i joined our cousins (hi janice! hi dani!) to visit their mom, my aunt marianne, at the rehab facility where she's being led back to health. it was sooooo great to see her and dani and janice. except, for the fact that i ... umm ... never. stopped. talking the entire time. i swear to god it was 1,897,843,895:74 (stacey's words:everybody else's words combined). AND THEY ACTED LIKE THEY WERE JUST FINE WITH IT. that's love. aunt marianne kept touching my knee and smiling like she was totally ok with it. um. i'm blaming it on the 2 pumpkin spice lattes i had before the visit.

speaking of starbucks pumpkin spice lattes: try one. if you're a nube, get one full on. it's like a dessert, but you'll love it. if you're not a nube, order it with only 2 shots of the pumpkin spice flavoring, nonfat (but get the whipped cream, you idjit -- i know it's NOT nonfat, but i'm pretty sure the barrista won't report the infraction).

cooking blog blues: i suck. i have been cooking -- and baking -- like a mad woman for the past 3 months and not posting much of it. i feel like such a schmuck that other cooking blogs continue to link to it. too much responsibility. so i'm making a quarterly resolution here: post!

speaking of cooking: yesterday, after visiting with aunt marianne, janice drove me to meet bill at ... (shutup! don't START with me!) ... starbucks, where i had ANOTHER pumpkin spice latte (I FREAKING TOLD YOU TO SHUT UP. DON'T MAKE ME GET UP HERE). stopped at the grocery store on the way home for ... well ... groceries. called friends on the way home who came over and shared the pot of stew i put on for dinner (no, i didn't post my recipe) and one of the little pumpkin cakes i made friday night (NO, I DIDN'T POST THE RECIPE). we had the greatest time laughing -- and eating -- most of the night at the dining room table. i LOVE friends who'll spend the evening at the dining room table. for some inexplicable reason, sam had never had stew before. they're more goulash people, according to sam. good times (snl allusion).

jax finally called at about 11 our time. he sounds really good. it does my heart good to feel that. he's excited that we're coming. but he's living and working at living in the moment. good on him.

matty (our oldest and i-t guy) had the foresight to rip and burn all of jax's beloved led zeppelin collection (believe me -- he had it all. jax is a l-z freak. as is matt) before j pawned it all. it's an excuse to meet matty and mel for lunch next weekend and get the copies. i feel verrrry guilty that it must seem that all i think about is jax. i'm sorry, matty, for that. i adore you. i am so grateful that god put you in my life. thank you for you. and give mel a hug from me.

here's one of my favorite pictures of matty and the jackal. and the infamous betsy. [i know i speak and write as though you all know what i'm talking about. sorry to those of you who don't. please don't think i'm mean when i say THIS about THAT: sucks to be you.] jax was 6, matty was 10.