It Was Just An Oil Change

I haven't been spending much time on the computer when I'm not at work, so blogging has suffered (obviously).  My apologies.  Truly.

Yesterday, Jay and I had a rare day off together and had errands that needed to get done.  First on the list was an oil change for Newt, so off to the dealership we went.  We dropped her at the service center and went to wander the lot.  Before we even got to the lot, right there, smack-dab in the middle of the showroom floor was the most beautiful Soul I'd ever seen.  We wandered over to look at it, and ooh'd and aah'd for a bit before we headed outside to look at the other cars.

When we came back in, I had to see the Soul again, only this time, we made the mistake of opening the doors and looking at the interior.  She was beautiful. Like, beautiful-beautiful.  A helpful salesman came over and we told him we were just looking, that our Soul was in for an oil change.

But something about the new one wouldn't let me go.  Jay and I decided that if we could do a straight across trade for the new one, we'd do it.  I don't know why.  She just spoke to me.

We talked to the salesman again and he was willing to run the numbers and see what he could do.  Next thing you know, we're moving our stuff out of Newt and into the new car. 

Since Ripley and Newt were both named based on their colors, I saw no need to change the trend.  Salome is Caribbean blue, and that just screams Jimmy Buffet to a ParrotHead like myself.  I wasn't going to name her "Jimmy Buffet", so I needed a name from one of his songs and Salome came to mind.  If you don't know "When Salome Plays the Drums", I've got a little earbug for you.


Some of the trim work that Jay did on Ripley and Newt is already done, so he's hard at work designing a wrap for her back gate that keeps inline with the Jimmy Buffett/Caribbean theme.

We absolutely do NOT plan on trading Salome in any time soon, so we agreed that we will never go to the dealership together again.  One or the other of us will go do her oil changes, but not both.  We tend to be impulsive when we both go to the dealership, after all, that's how we ended up with Newt (and now Salome).

Leaving the Nest

Monster, my youngest, has marched to the sound of his own drummer for a long time.  Sometimes, doing so has gotten him into trouble (and not the "you're grounded" kind of trouble, I wish it was that) and, being a firm believer in natural consequences, I've tried not to fix things for him.  If he was smart (or dumb) enough to get himself in the predicament, he should get himself out.  He's realized that maybe some choices he made years ago are still having some repercussions and that maybe those choices weren't the best.

He has also realized that if he continues on the path he's on, nothing good is going to happen for him.  Being an impulsive soul, he came to my office the other day and told me he wanted to start fresh.  He wanted to leave Colorado and start over some place where not everyone knows his past mistakes.  At first I was upset and accused him of running away from his problems (ok, I still feel that way a little bit), but then as we were talking, he came up with a plan that I could get on board with.  Not that he needed my permission, seeing as how he's eighteen.

I thought back to what I did at eighteen and realized that moving away from home wasn't nearly as bad as getting married, which is what I did.  And then at twenty, twenty-one, and twenty-three I popped out three kids in a row.  Looking back on that, I realized moving away to start fresh wasn't so horrible after all.

I hope he can truly make a fresh start out in Kentucky.  He has moved in with a friend's parents, who were kind enough to tell him he could live there for two months while he looked for a job and a place to live.  I don't know these people, have never met them, and kind of get the feeling they think they're "saving" Monster by offering him a place to stay.  At one point that would have bothered me, people thinking that they could "save" my son when I couldn't, but it doesn't any more.  If they think they can control him and get him on the straight and narrow when I couldn't, more power to them.

Tuesday was moving day.  Monster packed his suitcase and backpack and Jay and I took him to the airport.

I don't care that he's eighteen and old enough to do this by himself, it was still hard to let him go through security by himself.  As I was standing there, watching him wind through the line, I worried about all of the things I should have told him or taught him about navigating the airport.  I worried about if he'd find his gate and board on time.  I worried about all sorts of things that were out of my control once he stepped into that line at the airport.

But mostly, what I saw as I was watching him go through security was my little boy.  The one with the big heart who could make us all laugh and warm the hardest heart.  The one whose favorite Jimmy Buffett song in the whole world is Jolly Mon.

Someone Pinch Me

Holy cow, the last week has been ... odd.

But in a totally good way.

I went back to work on Monday and was told by the big boss that once I got settled in he needed to talk to me.  Now, we've had some "re-arranging" of the campus, so I was a bit worried.  He laughed and told me it wasn't a bad thing.  And it wasn't.  It wasn't excellent, like a promotion or a big fat raise, but it wasn't bad.

We're finally going to be able to start being in charge of our own advertising, instead of being told how to do it, and my boss wanted me to do a videotaped interview about our upcoming Family 9Health Fair.  I was up for it.  And then he told me it would be the next day.  Wow.  That was fast.  Good thing I'm passionate about the 9HealthFair.  On Tuesday, I met the interviewer and the camera man and we pulled off the interview in one take.  We had five minutes allotted for time and our one-take interview was 5:02.  'Bout as good as you can get.

The next day (Wednesday), I got a Facebook message from someone I'd met at a blogger roundtable, asking if I would be interested in doing a presentation on guns at the upcoming Great Outdoors Show.  No brainer.  Of course I was interested.  I contacted her and we set up a time for me to do a radio interview on Thursday to run on Friday.

The interview was fun and was conducted by a D.J. who is also a shooter, which put me at ease right away.  I think we spent more time talking "off the record" than we did on.  I also found out today that I'll be taking the stage on Saturday right before RJ and Jay Paul from The Swamp People.  How crazy is that?

I'll have a ton of people in the audience for my talk, but I know they'll be saving their seats for RJ and Jay Paul.  It's all good, though, because they're gonna have to hear what I have to say about shooting.  So it's really a win-win for me.

On top of it all, I got a phone call from Estes' Other Mother and the mares are already at CSU.  The baby horse planting will happen tomorrow.

And ON TOP OF THAT, I'm still working on my book and hope to have it out by the middle of August.  Whew. 

AAAAANNNNNDDDDDD...my non-Parrothead husband bought me tickets to go see Jimmy Buffett in October.  I can't tell you how much that means to me.  It's a hell of a culture shock for a non-Parrothead to attend a Buffett concert.

When did I step into the Twilight Zone?