I Called It...

Didn't I say this was the semester from hell? 

I was eating dinner and reading assignments on the computer Saturday night.  I chewed my food and swallowed, and then realized a cap had disappeared from a back molar.  Oh, geez.  I swallowed it.  I hope I crunched it up; the idea of that porcelain crown making its way through my body is frightening. 

So, tomorrow, I need to find a dentist--fast.

Then, I called my daughter this morning to get some information to add her and her brother as beneficiaries to my insurance policies.  I asked her how the previous week went--she's two weeks into her teacher certification program at UT Austin--and she said, rather nonchalantly, "Well, funny you should ask about that.  I was hit by a car on Thursday and couldn't go to class Friday.  But I emailed my teachers to let them know."

Wait a second--back up.  You were hit by a car, and you didn't call me? 

"Well, Mom, he was only going about five miles an hour.  I was crossing Congress [It's a huge, busy street in downtown Austin] and he came around the corner and knocked me down.  I fell on my bicycle [she was pushing it through the crosswalk, trying to get to her bus].  The bus driver called 911.  The EMTs checked me out.  Nothing broken; I'm just bruised and sore."

Enough to make a mother's heart stop.  She acted as though she was talking about a walk in the park.  She was a bit disgruntled, though, because the EMTs offered to give her a $500 ride to the hospital, but no one offered her a ride home!

If she had called me, I'd have been on the way to Austin Friday before the sun rose.  But, really, what could I have done?  Make her tea, get her ice packs, take her to the doctor. I know, she's a grown person; she can take care of herself.  But that's not what worries me--what worries me are those other people, the ones who come around corners and run into my children.  I can't stop them, and I wish I could.

Here's How the New Year Starts...

...not with a bang, but a whimper (sorry, T. S. Eliot).

Happy New Year, ya'll! Hope it's good for you.

I had a great Christmas, with overlapping visits from my children and their significants. Dot and her guy, Pete, showed up the Saturday before Christmas and stayed until about 3pm Christmas Day; Dan and Carly, his lady, showed up around noon on Christmas and stayed until the Thursday after. So I had company for about a week.

Dot and Pete did a great deal of yard work. They built a firepit in place of my burnpile. Here's a picture of the firepit with a fire:

They cut up the limb that fell a couple of months ago, so we had plenty of firewood to burn. We roasted marshmallows and made smores, something I haven't done since Girl Scout Camp!

Behind the firepit in the picture you can see my old shed. We cleaned that out. I can't list everything we found in there, but a partial list of contents includes old mason jars, a half-full bottle of whiskey (we dumped it out), and assorted tools (a circular saw, a hand planer, a hand lathe, a grease gun), plus enough flammable liquids to worry me. So, all I have to do to turn this into a chicken coop is rebuild the roof and put in a new floor. And Pete reinforced the open part of the shed so that the roof isn't sagging anymore.

Dan and Carly and I couldn't really get out in the yard because it rained all day Wednesday. But we read and knitted and watched movies; then they made two excellent pizzas and we played two games of Scrabble.

I think their visits were the highlights of Christmas for me. We had fun at my mom's and ate too much good food, but I enjoyed my time with my children. They've only been to my house once since I bought it, but I've been to their house in Austin many, many times. So, they owe me a few more visits!

The new year started ominously--the bathroom shower started dripping and I couldn't get the garage door down with the remote (I used the rake handle). But, on an optimistic note, Bluebirds have moved into the birdhouse on my front porch! I watched them move in today.

I hope the Bluebird of Happiness, Prosperity and Peace lands on your porch, too!