I’m afraid my day was a bit rough today so I have little in the way of thoughts, energy, or pictures to share.

Napping in a sunbeam

Sweetest sleeping Puddy

ok… well maybe just one photo. She’s just so adorable!

It has been a lovely few days here at camp.  It has not, however, been without incident.  Wednesday, I worked half a day and we loaded up the car (and the cat!!) and headed out to camp.  Despite my fears, Puddy cat has done amazingly well here at camp and she will be joining us every weekend from now on. It makes life much easier since I can administer her blood pressure medication here & we don’t have to worry about getting home early to make sure she doesn’t go too long without meds.  Also, I don’t have to board her and deal with all that expense and anxiety about her being in a little metal cage with no window and no love.  (She’s currently curled up on the bed with me, blissfully purring away.)

Wednesday night I fired up my netbook and taught my 7pm class successfully. My 9pm class, however, did not go as well. The internet fritzed out about 5 minutes before I planned to end class. No harm, no foul for my students, who still got full credit, but it was one of those straws on the camel’s back for me. I hate teaching at camp because my little netbook has a poor connection to the internet and the wifi out here can be spotty at times anyway.  It makes coming out here early in the week very anxiety provoking for me.

Cor went and helped the boys with the Thanksgiving day prep while I taught – she chopped an entire 10lb bag of onions herself – and all the boys were extraordinarily grateful because they were tear producing!!

Thursday was filled with food, friends, laughter and love.  We had a lovely communal Thanksgiving meal (complete with real place settings!!), a lovely campfire, and we were very thankful for all we had.

Friday, I sat down to do some grading and take some trainings for work and poof – there went the internet again. That was it. I got up, told Cor that I wanted to do the unthinkable… I wanted to go to Walmart on Black Friday.  Luckily, one of the only Walmarts nearby is in Sebring, Fl – a tiny little berg just up the road from camp.  So we toddled off to Black Friday in the backwater of Florida and I bought a new laptop.  (Seriously, they only had one type of laptop available – luckily it was a Toshiba & has worked out very nicely.)  We did a little shopping and then ate at Bob Evans – and we both drank 2 cappuccinos each!!  We came back to camp, went & played bingo, then Cor napped while I went out to the back 40 for a huge bonfire.

Today, I broke out the new computer and did some grading. Cor did a little weekend cooking and Camp celebrated the start of the Christmas season with our very own version of Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade – complete with Santa and Mrs. Claus!  I switched our C-9 lights out from red, orange & yellow to red, green & white.  I staked out some rope lights with the candy cane stakes Cor bought – so now our site is cheery and bright.  We had our normal Saturday night potluck with the rest of the boys and in a couple of hours, the Saturday night disco thumpa thumpa will begin.

Tomorrow, we’ll rest, nap, socialize, and then pack up to head home.  I’ve needed this break and am seriously contemplating looking at my calendar to take some additional time off before the holidays. I need the mental down time.

In random news – I finished reading Out of Oz by Gregory Maguire.  I am not entirely sure what to say about the series.  I enjoyed many parts of it and others were tedious. There are too many loose ends Maguire leaves loose throughout the book for me to feel very comfortable with. I get that he was working with Baum’s world and took liberties to make it his own, but he introduces ideas and never goes anywhere with them. I think I would have been a little more satisfied with his series/ending if he had taken a little more risk and given some closure to the story. As it is, you’d never know this book is meant to be the end of a series – it is left wide open for another book to follow.

In other random television news – if you don’t follow me on Facebook (is anybody NOT on Facebook these days?) – you might not have realized that I found a new TV show I like. Actually, it’s not new at all, but I just found it, so I’m all enamored as if it were new. Which, I’m glad it isn’t because I have 6 whole seasons of it to watch!  It’s Doctor Who – the 2006 to now incarnation, not the one from the 1970s. After we found the back seasons on Playstation Network, we thought it might be cheaper to buy each season on DVD, rather than pay $2 for each episode. Wrong. On Amazon.com, one season retails at $80 … on sale for $40.  Each season has 13 episodes at $2 each is $26 for a season that I can save on a memory card.  You do the math. No DVDs for us.

Finally, I really am truly grateful for all the good things I have going on in my life right now. Cor and I talked about how intensely stressed I’ve been for the past year. It’s been really difficult, and with her upcoming surgeries, I will probably continue to be stressed… but we’re taking steps to take care of ourselves & remember to be grateful. I’m grateful for all the blessings I have – especially the people I love.

Bookends

Thankful

Puddy goes camping!

We made it out to camp and so far… Puddy is doing ok!

One child at a time…

This artwork hangs in the main lobby of our building. I love it.

Sweetie in her element.

Cor made a huge batch of cranberry preserves today for the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday.