Helpful, not helpful...

Helpful: having lunch with librarians to talk about online registration and how it's working out, at MAD MEX, yum.

Not helpful: driving fast on back roads.

Not helpful: slamming doors.

Helpful: spending the afternoon at the Heinz History Museum in the glass exhibit.

Helpful?: buying miniature roses.

Probably helpful: doing my Beth Moore homework.

Somewhat helpful: talking to my girls.

Helpful: getting out of the house. I went to the Union Project for dinner and then to their "Health Fair" and learned about soy candles and other products.

Definately helpful: naps.

Unnnnnnnnhhhh. Off to try to do some Beth Moore homework...

I'm sure this never happens to you...

So, today I was going to work, 9-5. Busted! I had leg cramps and all over feeling wretched, so I worked from 9:45 to 1.

So, usually I take Sunday off. Busted! My co-worker's grandma died so I'm working her hours. But, that gives me extra hours (to make up for leaving early today).

So, I watched movies (well, fell asleep during Runaway Bride) and just as Akeelah and the Bee was finishing, my cell phone rang! I love that sound, b/c unlike my regular phone, I never get telemarketers!

It was Sandy, who wondered if I wanted to meet her for dinner. SURE! So I went to the Union Station Cafe and talked about how I was going to Babette's Feast. Maria showed up too. How much I love that movie, how a friend of mine runs movies...and I got home around 7:15 and thought, there is no way I'm going out again.

Well, I did, but not to see Babette and her feasting. I got two beers at the mini-mart on Friendship Ave and some more heating pads at Walgreens and I'm drawing a bath as I write this.

It's called flexibility. I can't wait to go to bed early!!

And when October goes....

(yes, Barry Manilow, though I heard it first on a folk album)

THERE WILL BE MUCH REJOICING!!

This so far has been the best October in near history but it still is vile.

Today was a great day wherein I hobnobbed and heard authors, not the least the most recent Newbery winner, Lynne Reid Perkins. I got to be a part of a writing workshop led by the same (!)

It was also a day wherein I spent 20 minutes trying to get to the Children's Museum once I'd reached the North Side. (Read: driving around in circles, Pittsburgh style--you can't get there from here.) But, once I got there, I did find parking and I was indeed signed up for the conference and the DELICIOUS LUNCH where I got to sit with Very Important Librarians, queens in the Children's field in Pittsburgh.

It was also a day of deluges of rain and umbrellas going inside out for the wind.

It was also a day of bad rush hour traffic and wrong turns once I figured out that I wanted to go to Goodwill in Cheswick. I got waylaid on the way there and made a few wrong turns on the way home. (Read: it took an hour to get home from Cheswick. It should take 20 minute

Home, I expected to have a few hours before sitting in front of ze TV and watching the season premiere of Crossing Jordan. Which has been moved to an undisclosed date.

Did I mention, though, how pretty the trees all are and how I spent $33 to buy four (yes four) pairs of Liz Claiborne or Bill Blass pants and other sundry items. (Inclusive was that $33--I can never go back to retail.)

This, however, was one of the biggest disappointments of the day. I so rarely get to the North Side and this cafe was started by seven of my brother's college friends.




November, come soon!

Tomorrow: Mother Daughter and then in the evening, ICE SKATING, Praise the Lord!

The truth is that existence wants your life to become a festival.

(Osho)

go here to read the whole quote, thanks to Blackbird, who six days ago celebrated two years blogging. Woo hoo!

I'm procrastinating my morning walk (cough cough) because I ache. And I'm grumpy. And I really wanted to do so much today but with my craZee week, today will be taking care of Harry so that I will be fresh as a tulip for the rest of the week.

Speaking of tulips, they were 7.99 last night at Whole Foods and I couldn't resist, even though my carnations from two weeks ago are still pretty good. I'll freshen them later.

Y'know, I thought I had more, and later I probly will, but for now I just want to feel the cold air. Tootles!

Momma said there'd be days like this...

...and it's not over yet!!

Our dept manager in Children's called in sick for the second day in a row. I sent my co-worker (also sick) home at 2pm and am staying an hour extra to man (woman?) the desk from 5-6. (Making it a 9 hr day--fun.) Which also means I've been on the desk (serving the public) since 2 pm. Thankfully it is now 5 and I can soon (51 minutes and counting!) go to dinner!

And I don't have to cook--we're discussing the practice of eating at BJ's!

Two Mother Goose sessions went well--I had 50 in the first session and 9 in the second. (This includes mothers, babies, and siblings.) It was nice to have an intimate group for the second session--I haven't had so few folks in AGES! Also, a woman called around 2:30 (right about when I was feeling a little blue) and said, oh, are you Sarah Louise, did you do the storytime at 10? Ye-es, I said, thinking, is this a lost and found question? She sung my praises. To me! She loved it and is thinking of rearranging her work schedule so that she can come more often. WOW! I told her, you just made my day. She said, you just made my week. (Don't you love that kind of a competetive conversation?)

Sometime later, a woman said, your hair is getting long (it's up, how can they tell?) and said it looked nice.

Around 3:40, I had an unanswerable question about Accelerated Readers and so I called Children's at Carnegie Main. I ended up talking to one of my professors from Library School, who part times in that department. (He was an adjunct, but still!) (Also, very cute, AND my age AND Christian, but he doesn't like girls, drat!)

And just now, I helped a nanny pick 5 books each for "her girls" off (guess what) an Accelerated Reader list for each one. We walked the stacks and I just handed her books, it's so much easier than looking them up in the computer.

Did I mention that I love my job? Did I? Cuz I do.

Also, I was disappointed when I didn't get to have lunch with our new Children's District Manager, because (see above) our Department Manager was out sick. And I didn't know lunch was cancelled until noon, although she had known since last night!! (I could have brought my lunch and or my homework for Patriarchs and or my 30 page questionaire!!) Instead, I went to lunch at J.Clarks and the waitress called me "hon." Even when she had to run my card through twice (Friday is payday, thank God!)

23 minutes to go...I am exhausted!!

One of my major projects (do not laugh!) has been purging my email files. I have a bad habit of keeping everything and our email only has 66000 mb or something like that. So every day I have been getting "Your email account is full." So today, as I had four hours on the desk, I have purged tons of emails. Trashing a lot. Sending the good stuff (articles from my dad from the New York Times--actually a lot of obits of people like Paula Danziger, Czeslaw Milosz, and articles about friends of friends of the family like Avery Dulles, and articles about places, like, you guessed it, Warsaw) to my Gmail and Yahoo! email accounts.

(I hit publish at 5:45 when my replacement showed up. It is now 40 minutes into tomorrow, Thursday and I am up b/c I fell asleep in front of PBS and Charlie Rose woke me up. I watched an interesting interview with Sandra Bullock and some guy who plays Truman Capote in a new movie and then Anna Quindlen. Hmm. A guy I worked with at Fox Books loved watching Charlie Rose. I was thinking about him on the ride into work today. Wondering what has happened to him. Thinking mayhap it's time to google him again. Thinking mayhap I should not. So--I was asleep when Carolyn commented, and I'll cuddle under the covers in a few minutes. Dinner at BJ's was great--it fascinates me week to week who the "key players" are in my mind. Ah, people watching.)

I came here to play hockey

"If you think about what could happen or what may happen, your energy's not in the right place." (Sidney Crosby, Penguin's player, in today's Post-Gazette.) See James 4:13-15 (NIV)

Well, um, yeah. When I walked down the stairs for this morning's walk, I was murky as pea soup. Today is a day of mysteries. Sundays often are: they are often the apex of my week socially. Today I have three events: StepTrek, which is walking the slopes of Sou'Side, a birthday party, and an appreciation party. Oh, and church, which is no small event. So I guess that's four.

I took some pictures:

This was how I felt this morning, as I embarked on my walk. Like a box of trash in front of a broken garage door.

Fall is coming--these vines are brown and dying.

The cracks in the pavement are like the cracks in me--

And plants can grow through the cracks in the pavement.

A veritable garden in the cracks in the pavement. A concrete garden....

This truck has been parked here so long that flowers have grown into the hubcap.

And this was the surprise! It was like getting a Valentine from God Himself.

************
I changed up my walking CD this morning. I'd been listening to Michael W. Smith's "Worship" album, decided I didn't want to get stuck in a rut, so I changed the CD to Kutless's album, "Strong Tower." Imagine my surprise when one of the songs was the same, "Draw Me Close." Here are some of the lyrics:

I lay it all down again
To hear You say that I'm Your friend

Okay, technical difficulties here. I just switched from Foxfire to IE and for a minute I had the italics off, but mayhap I need to work on the html...

Okay how's this?

Yes, even in blog-writing, life is a mystery.

Here's something I've noticed about Foxfire--it doesn't automatically refresh. So if I visit mah blog in Foxfire, sometimes I do a double take, wait a minute, I posted a new post, where is it? Then I hit refresh and it comes up. So, because there are things I like and (today's theme!) mysteries in both browsers, I use both. (IE and Foxfire, that is.)

Okay, waiting for the rest of the pix to download. Last week they did so super fast. This week, not so much.

Actually, I think I could do with a nap right about now...

Blogger's irregularities are part of why I haven't taken advantage of my "beta" status. That and the fact that I'd have to go and do the whole categories thing...which I'm thrilled about, but I have a feeling it will take a while. Maybe if I start small...

And wouldn't ya know, the darn pictures didn't post!! Back to Foxfire, shall we?

I really should get some grub.

*************
So, I started this post at about 9:14 am and am posting it at 10:16 pm. It took a while to get the pictures up and in the correct sequence. I had a very eventful day that I'll detail in days to come. Here's a trend, though: the sandwich I ALWAYS get at Tazza wasn't available, so I tried a new one. The movie I wanted to watch wasn't rewound, so I watched a different one. I wanted to get a quick bite at Taco Bell after the StepTrek and before the birthday party but their credit card machine was down and I'd used all my cash at Tazza. It was a day of this is my plan, oh no, this is the real plan.

Tomorrow: rest, recuperate, laundry, and ICE SKATING at MELLON ARENA!!

Now what?

The writing class I was going to start next Monday, the one that I was going to use to prep me for applying to the MFA in writing at Carlow, got cancelled. I can get a full refund...maybe I'll see about an online class...

Oh fudge!