Alan's Class Reunion

We attended Alan's 25th class reunion this past weekend. It was a real blast. The reunion had a kick off on Friday night that coincided with the homecoming game for the school. We walked down the hall to were the class was meeting in the drama room and many recognized Alan right away. After the get together in the drama room we went to the football game and Meghan enjoyed that part. She is a HUGE Kowboy fan. (No I did not misspell it - that is how this school spells it). I suppose she will remain a Kowboy fan until she starts high school which will make her a Bulldog. (Just what our family needs is another school represented by a Bulldog.)

Saturday night was the formal part of the reunion. First we agonized over what to wear. I have lost enough weight over the past year that I do not have a lot to chose from in the dressier section of my closet. Alan was having issues as well. The invitation said cocktail attire, and we both tried to make sure that we were dressed accordingly. Now with that said let me tell you cocktail attire does not translate very well for a very large portion of the population that is from this area of Florida. So here is what I took away from the gathering on Saturday night. First, regardless of your preconceived ideas about them, flip flops are not just for the beach and really can be worn in formal surroundings. I have also discovered much to my surprise, shorts and t-shirts are acceptable cocktail attire. If you should ever find yourself in a bind as to what to wear to a cocktail event in this part of the country never fear, your best pair of wranglers, cowboy shirt, cowboy boots and cowboy hat will be ok also. So the point here is that obviously we put entirely too much thought and effort into what we should wear.

Getting there was an adventure in and of itself. We went to that great map site on the Internet and typed in where we wanted to go and this was off by miles and miles... So we get to downtown where the site told us we wanted to go. At first we thought we were in the right place because we saw people everywhere that are dressed up. Well there was a wedding, the homecoming dance and some other event all down there. So we stopped for directions and everyone sent us off in another direction. After 30 minutes of this going on, we called one of the event organizers and she told us were she "thought" it was. She told us two of the right roads but missed telling us the name of the one that connected the two of them. Next solution - stop and the ask one of the five police cars that had arrested a whole group of individuals. The cops' response, "Well it is outside the city limits and I have not been there but I think it is down this street and turn on to Kings Highway. Don't worry if it is not down that road because the road ends pretty quick." I do not what you think but it is bad when no one really knows how to find the place you are holding the reunion. The cop was right and we found the Elks Club but the road seemed to go on and on. We apparently were not the only ones having a hard time finding the place. GPS 's could not find it either so we won't be too upset with the map site. The funny part is we spent about 45 minutes lost in the town where Alan went to high school.

Many of you realize that Alan operates in a time zone that has not truly been found on the East Coast. His times usually involve an "ish" which could be any where from on time (in a very rare circumstance) to two or three hours late. Do not despair folks - he is aware of our time occassionally. We were runnng late for both of these events (compared to the start time) and I caught him looking at his watch constantly. I truly find it amusing that he seemed so aware of time in this instance. I was not sure he carried an awareness for time.

I want to give all of you a little history about the high school thing with Alan and I. We spent the early years of our relationship near my high school in Georgia. Alan teased me endlessly about the "Redneck" tendencies of the area I went to school. He also claimed to not really understand how I graduated because he was sure a graduation requirement for the girls was the ability to carry a baby on your hip. We have now spent the past six years near his school. I have found that he was sort of "the pot calling the kettle black". Do you know that his school is out for the rodeo. Yes Internet ... the rodeo. A very little recognized holiday by the rest of us. When he played football the games were played on the Rodeo Grounds. (My school played on a football field and... well that did not help them much but hey someone has to lose.) Whose school has more "redneck tendancies? Alan, I think your school has defintiley won that title fair and square now!! :)

Mom's Surgeries

As many of you know Mom had bi-lateral knee replacement surgery. The first surgery September 23rd was in the left knee and the September 26th was the right knee. The pain has been relatively non existent for the most part. The left knee did not give her any real problems at all. She was able to bend the knee at a an 80 degree angle after surgery without any pain. The right knee gave a little trouble but a lot of it was probably psychological as she had little sleep in the days leading to that surgery. She was released to go home on September 29. She has a nurse two times a week unless she needs her more and physical therapist five days a week. She has some discomfort but some of that is from the therapy. She has a very good attitude and does her exercises without being reminded.

For those of you like me, I was astounded by the lack of pain she experiences. The IVs caused her more pain than the actual surgery. Her doctor is using a procedure that pulls palettes from blood that is taken from you just before the surgery. I have tried to locate something that explains what he does in terms the average person understands but all I found is a site for Thrombin-JMI. I believe this is probably what he does and if you are interested click on the the site. There are videos of her doctor performing knee replacement and hip replacement surgery. Also under clinical data is an article that tells more about it. The pictures in the article are pretty graphic so I did not finish reading it. So be warned that the sight does contain graphic (real life images) images of the knee or hip. I am a wuss and cannot handle the pictures; however, if you are the Discovery Channel type person then you can probably handle it.

October

With the onset of October we begin the three month long holiday overload. As a kid I enjoyed the haunted houses and the haunted hay rides. I am old enough that the early haunted houses I went to did not have the Friday the 13th influence that became so popular with Jason and chain saw. I feel that the quality of the haunted houses went down after this influence. When I was a cheerleader one of our fundraisers was the creation of a haunted house in the field house. I was around my daughters age when I did this, and it still is prominent in my mind after all these years.

Here in our little corner of the world, our local zoo sponsors a program called BOO at the Zoo. They have several activities for the kids and Meghan has enjoyed it every year. She has always had issues with some of the more "scary" scenarios that they have. She barely handles the haunted train ride. Last year I finally persuaded Meghan to walk the haunted trail with me. I thought the whole thing was hilarious and laughed the entire time we were walking along the trail. The high school kids that were doing this were quite distressed and tried even harder to scare me which made me laugh harder. Meghan informed me tonight that she was not going to go with me through the haunted trail. So I am searching for a new haunted trail partner. Of course we have a few weeks left to convince her that it will be alright. I am very disappointed that these things appear to scare her to the point that she will not share the experience with me.