Sunday Salon: Found time

 What a great morning it is!  It is always good to gain an hour of time.  The only thing that would be better, in my mind, would be cloning myself.  What am I going to do with this extra hour?  I haven't decided.  I SHOULD use it to sleep, but most likely I will use it on a nice walk in this wonderful weather, or attempting to read.

Before I start my weekly yammering, I just want to apologize on behalf of that wench Sandy for the trouble she has caused.  My thoughts are with everyone in the Northeast that has been affected, and I truly hope all of you up there have gotten your power and are able to get back to your lives soon, complete with hair dryers and hot water.  We Floridians understand.   

So, what's new?  I did my normal grunt work...house, yard and extra stuff on the pool, what with all the flipping WIND over the last week.  I voted early, stood in line for an hour.  I think it is great that humanity has taken an interest.  I brought my iPod and listened to my audiobook, happily, while waiting.  I worked out and ran.  My daughter's cross country team competed in Districts on Friday afternoon, and they have been practicing after school instead of 5:30am this week, so that added an extra wrinkle in the chauffeuring activities, between that and football practice.  (Her team won 2nd, so they advance to Regionals next weekend.  Yay!)  

I had an evening meeting to coordinate the field trip to Boston next week, on which I will be attending Wednesday through Friday.  One hundred 6th, 7th and 8th graders and parents, 100 mph for three days.  Fun, in a sick and twisted kind of way.  It is supposed to be low 40's and rainy.  Hmmm.  Anyway, head's up.  You won't be hearing from me for most of next week.

Halloween consisted of pizza and scary movies at home.  Everyone seemed content with that arrangement.  I don't know, people say that Halloween becomes cool in high school but not with my 9th grader.

My son had another football game this weekend, a continuation of the Southeastern playoffs.  And they won!  Again!  Just to give you some perspective, they have three more games to win (one each weekend this month), and then could advance to the National Super Bowl at Disney in December.  But these competing teams are getting better and better, so I'm not counting any chickens, or footballs, or whatever.  One game at a time.  But the season started on August 1st.  The season without end...

So for a week now, I've been reading "The Man in the Blue Moon", which is this month's pick for She Reads.  We actually met this author at SIBA, and it is a wonderfully Southern book that takes place in one of my favorite places in the world - Apalachicola.  And let's see...I'm on page...126.  After a week.  LAME THY NAME IS SANDY.  Yep.  Well, I'll be happily posting a review for this lovely book whenever I get it finished.  I'm trying.  Maybe flight and bus time on this field trip next week will give me a leg up.  Not!

On audio, I finished "City of Women" and then blew through the AMAZING "The Language of Flowers" by Vanessa Diffenbaugh.  Just a thoroughly beautiful book.  You all told me so, but I didn't appreciate how in love with it I would be.  Then I got through one disc of "Last Man in Tower" by Aravind Adiga and I had to stop.  Accents that were making my ears strain, and a rocky start to the plot.  I won't delete the audio.  I may give it another try later.  Now I am close to four discs into "The Forgotten Garden" by Kate Morton.  Kate Morton's books, well, they take their time don't they?  But whenever I listen to her audios, I just want to sink down into them like a hot bubble bath.  I want to go for long walks.  I simply adore them.  This is going to be fun.

So with nothing planned today but church, I shall be interested to see what actually happens.  Will I get my long walk with Kate Morton?  Will I get sucked into a winter clothing shopping spree with my daughter?  Will I take a nap?  Will I write a review?  Oooh, the suspense and drama!