Waiting

It's after 10 and I'm tired (woke up that way, then cycled to work and ran 4 miles this evening), and I would really like to go to bed. But I am waiting for the dishwasher to stop running, because I will never fall asleep while it is still going. And for the reason why that should bother me... keep reading.

Chad left for Mexico on Saturday morning, and as soon as I got back from the airport I started packing things up for our move in two weeks. And I needed a place to put the packed boxes, so I decided on... our bedroom! I moved out the mattress (we were planning to do this anyway) to the living room, hauled out the rest of the furniture, hoovered, and then moved in all the boxes I'd packed up. Now, the entire apartment looks like a poorly-organised jumble sale.

So, with the mattress in the living room, I have to wait for noisy appliances to stop going if I intend to sleep at all. And even the quiet ones are a problem... last night, the crock pot lid kept doing that little bounce thing that is no problem during the day, but is murder at night for the light sleeper. The night before that, the wind chime on the porch was frantically waving in the wind (it has since been taken down and packed).

What has been gratifying from this whole Chad-free experience is the knowledge that I cannot easily sleep on my own now. When we first married, I spent about 3 sleepless months, followed by 3 difficult-sleeping months, followed by an undefined period of mostly sleeping but getting annoyed every time Chad woke me up. And now, I have a chance to sleep by myself, in my own bed, for a week... and it's been rough. Now I feel like an old married woman!

Does anyone want to come help me pack?

Tagged, again.

I'm sure these are not repeats of the last time I was tagged. (The reason I'm so sure is that I just read it when I hunted up the link.) The rules for this one are: 10 things about yourself, followed by 10 new tagees.

1. I was named after a Hostess cake! Not really (at least, I HOPE not really), but my dad wanted to call me Suzi-Q, hence the name Susan. One that was extremely out of style by the time I was born, I might add; most of the Susans I know are over 50. Anyway, I'm still not wild about Suzi-Q, although I do like Su (stolen from the Narnia books). There aren't many people that call me that, but I do hear it. Just don't spell it with an "e".

2. That was like 3 in 1, right? So I'm now down to about 7, instead of 10?

3. When (if) I grow up, I would like to earn a master's degree, and perhaps a doctorate, in linguistics. I really want to get a handle on half-a-dozen (or so) languages, and work as an interpreter, possibly for the government. Doesn't have to be ours, I'll work for the British government if they want me to.

4. The above-mentioned dream might be out of my reach, because my brain cannot process more than one accent at a time. Therefore, if you are American and you are talking to me, and a Scottish person walks in the room, expect to be tuned out. Sorry, I just can't do it.

5. Did I mention I love Scotland? Its people, its scenery, its customs, its long hours of summer daylight, and sometimes even the weather and the food. But mostly its people.

6. I have never lived in a blue state. Well, I've only lived it two states, so it's not been that hard. This primary election cycle, we Texans are finding out what it must be like to live in a swing state. It's nice to not be ignored.

7. Bible bowl is fun, but should be taken in small doses. :) Except that there is no such thing as small-dose Bible bowl, although we are closer to it this year than we have ever been. The cast of Bible bowl changes so quickly; there are a lot of people I still think of as "Bible bowl people" or "Bible bowl kids" who haven't been for four or five years. But it is still a good motivator to get the kids to study the Bible.

8. I run for fun. I used to think people who did that were a. masochistic b. insane or c. stupid. Now I know that while "b" is certainly part of the equation, and "c" probably finds its way in from time to time, "a" is not. So that's a bit of a relief. My running is slow and strange, and I've been told ever since my freshman year of high school that I run like a duck (people used to quack behind me in P.E., and my husband has taken to doing the same thing).

9. Speaking of waterfowl, I have had to run for my life from geese in the park. They tried to bite me, but missed and only got a beakful of scrub bottoms. I thought about fighting back, but decided I would never be able to convince animal control that the geese started it. So I ran, and the geese forgot that they have wings and can, therefore, move faster than me.

10. I'm going to be 30 in two months. My birthday falls on a Saturday, and for my birthday I'm getting my hair cut & coloured, and I'm going shopping. For a dress. My goal is to walk into church the day after my 30th birthday and not be recognised. Heh heh heh.

I'm not tagging anyone. If you want to play, consider yourself tagged.

The voices in my head

I had to change the title of the post after I wrote it, because the post went a completely different direction than I intended once I started typing it.

So, I'm listening to Derek, and I'm wondering AGAIN why I have so much trouble with the Scottish accent. Of course, I know the answer; my pathetic brain can only deal with one accent at a time, and Chad came in a few minutes ago & started talking. Scottish comprehension gone.

That is not the point of my story. For the past year or so I've been going on to the Castlemilk blog that Charlie keeps so up-to-date, and then following the links to read the lessons. And I will usually try to "hear" the lessons in the speaker's own voice in my head (except for David, because I haven't heard him enough to remember what his voice sounds like). But now, Derek's page has two-- TWO!!-- lessons on mp3. Brilliant, no need for me to conjure up Derek's voice in my head.

Instead, I'll have to listen a couple of times while I'm alone in the house to make sure I get it all. Perhaps I should rethink my life's dream of being an interpreter.

Quite a photogenic group!

The aftermath of our first Bible bowl sketch. Actually, it was the second, but we were out of town for the first one.

The dress I wore that day had a ripped-out zipper, so like any good hillbilly, I safety-pinned it all the way up. This brought a lot of laughs from the other adults.

This little light of mine

"The true measure of an individual is how he treats a person who can do him no good."--Ann Landers

So I get these daily e-mails with inspirational quotes, plus a thought to go with the quote, and a mixed bag of other stuff. Some are truisms, some are fluff, some are complete rubbish. But I've started saving the good ones, if for no other reason than to have something to blog about.

I don't think there is anyone currently in my life who fits the category of "a person who can do me no good." Seriously. Do I need to change my circle? Move to a place in which I can help people? Stop hanging around my current gang of friends?

I don't suppose that is Ms. Landers' point. She is, to some extent, just repeating the Golden Rule: treat others the way you want to be treated. How do I speak to the cashier at United? The girl at the McDonalds' window? The bus driver? The elderly woman at church who glares at everyone around her? It is easy to be kind to my friends, the patients at work (getting paid to be nice goes a long way), and people who are already nice to be around. What about those who aren't?

What message am I sending about myself in the way I treat others?

The update

So I've been reading blogs this evening, maniacally commenting all over the place, etc. So here is what is going on, in case someone wanders over and wonders why all the lights are off:

Bible bowl: Three weeks of instruction to go, then we are done and the other teachers (you know, the ones who actually have kids in Bible bowl) will continue with review sessions. The only competition we are planning to go to is the first weekend in April.

Journeyland: We just finished another rotation. Once Bible bowl finishes, we are taking a break from childrens' ministry for a while.

Dance lessons: Chad got us eight ballroom dancing lessons for our anniversary. Our first one was this past Tuesday, and our instructor is a hoot! He made it a lot of fun for us, although neither of us are much good at dancing.

Running coaches: Who in their right mind would want us as running coaches is beyond me, but the man in charge of the Team Kids' Cafe is obviously not in his right mind, so we've been coaching a few kids for the past 5 weeks. This week coming is our final week, because the race is on Saturday.

Angel food: Today was the 48th Angel food distribution day, or the finish of South Plains' 4th year of involvement. It does not seem like that long ago that we started doing this, but there is a group of very committed people who make sure this comes off every month. We are not part of that group, but we do turn up most months to help hand out food.

Ladies' retreat: I'm on the committee, which is kind of odd since I am generally opposed to women's events. However, the Ladies' Christmas tea chairwoman cannot shun all events but her own, I'm afraid. It is a bit ungracious. :)

Moving: We are moving to a different apartment at the end of March.

Work: Yeah, I still do that, too.

Another running blog

I try to keep these to a minimum (hence the reason for not blogging much lately), because I'm sure it is wearing on the non-runners around here. But here's the update:

We missed the January running club race, because we hadn't renewed our membership yet, because we still thought we were leaving. And so, we were pretty lazy about training in December and January.

At the running club year-end social, I got a third-place plaque for my age group for 2007. This is purely by default; everyone else who had more points than I didn't volunteer for a race last year, which is a requirement to get a year-end award. Chad won a door prize that evening. And we went ahead and renewed our membership.

So, at the February race, Chad went for the 8-mile, and I tried the 4-mile. Chad unfortunately realised that he was in over his head and didn't finish. (Although we still think that Did Not Finish is better than Did Not Start.) I did finish my race, with a better time than I expected, and got my first WTRC medal; third place in the 25-29 age group. No prizes for guessing how many runners were in my age group. :) I am happy that I did finish before the first 8-mile finisher.

We have been coaching 10-15 kids at a local Boys and Girls Club since the beginning of February, in preparation for a kids' fun run, which happens next weekend. Chad and I will be running a 4 mile race that day, after we cheer on our team to finish. Although we have had fun (mostly) with the kids, we are ready to be done with this little venture.

I am currently training for a 15K (9.32 miles) in April, and an 11 mile in May. My goal for both of these races is survival; I just want to finish without embarrassing myself too much. :) We ran our long run on hills today (the next three races are hilly), and it proved to be too much for me, again. It is really discouraging to have to cut a run short, but the good news is that I will know where the trouble spots are next week. Well, in two weeks, because we have a race next week.

So, building endurance is the goal. There's a metaphor for life in there somewhere.

I thought we were done.

We finished up being Journeymen for the fifth-graders, and were looking forward to Bible class with adults, when the new Journeymen asked us to fill in for them this week. And since we like them (and they were the first people from South Plains to come visit us), we said yes. So, one day more!

Actually, they are a great group of kids. It is pretty evident that they are almost to middle school, though; they don't talk much. I threatened a few weeks ago to make them sing "Father Abraham" over and over until they started to participate, which much have worked, because they have done a good job since then. Quite a change from first- and second- graders, though.