TheBanyanTree: A Good Holiday

[Theta Brentnall]

There were no burns, but we had a nice holiday also.  Darling Indiana 
got to ride in Grand Auntie Sharon's fancy dan BMW convertible along 
with the Morgan Hill Teacher of the Year.  Indy greatly enjoyed waving 
at all the people along the parade route.  Then we swam to the point of 
total exhaustion, and completed the day by eating far too many 
hamburgers and home made chocolate chip cookies.

Darling Indy does not care for the boom of fireworks but the firework 
show in Morgan Hill is about 10 miles away, so we saw the big, beautiful 
sky flowers and the booms were a few seconds off and of an acceptable 
volume.  The piece de resistance of the fireworks show was the flock of 
wild turkeys roosting in the trees just below Grand Uncle (pronounced 
Grunkle) Bob's deck, who had quite a lot to say after each salvo of 
booms.  Everyone enjoyed that addition to the show, especially the 5 
year old and the ladies who had had several very strong margaritas.

Happy Independence Day!  You can't say that too often.

Theta

On 7/5/2011 2:02 PM, Monique Colver wrote:
> You can tell I've had a good holiday when my burns are only first degree.
>
> Fortunately I'm only a danger to myself. Others are safe around me, unless I
> trip and fall on them, but even then, there's usually a pretty good chance
> said others can jump out of the way before my full weight descends on them
> like a ton of bricks. The burns, on the top of my fingers of my left hand,
> are only slight red marks now, and the swelling isn't bad at all.
>
> Not bad at all. This is my mantra for getting through things like scalding
> myself, cutting myself, and in general doing damage to myself. I have never
> broken a bone, but I'm thinking that's only because they're made of rubber.
>
> So other than the whole burning thing, which was only a slight inconvenience
> and allowed me the opportunity to sit on the couch with my hand wrapped in
> ice and later aloe while charming husband put together the rest of dinner,
> life is good. Painful, at times, but what isn't that's worthwhile? (This is
> another of my mantras that I use to console myself with.)
>
> Last night, which just happened to be some sort of holiday, I started to
> wonder when we'd moved to a war zone. It must have happened when I wasn't
> looking, because when looking for a house, I'm pretty sure I checked the
> option to be out of a war zone. Since I've never been in an actual war zone,
> only pretend ones, I have no idea what one sounds like, but I'm pretty sure
> I heard mortars going off, and air strikes, and explosions. I was also not
> aware that there are so many people around here. There must be, for all that
> noise to be going on. That, or we invited several other neighborhoods to
> join us for the festivities.
>
> I'm hoping the fatalities were kept to a minimum.
>
> Used to be, fireworks were a cause for concern around here. Honey does not
> like them. They hurt her ears, and it makes her upset. I'd be upset too if
> my ears hurt. But now that she's mostly deaf, she really doesn't care.
> Occasionally, when the racket was loud and long, she'd bark at it, as if to
> say, "Shut the hell up, will ya? I'm trying to sleep!" But it wasn't with
> the former panic she'd have when she was a hearing dog. It's not as if she
> could hear it all that well. And Ash, he doesn't care much, except for a
> particularly loud one that'll cause his head to pop up. He likes to sit next
> to me and burrow into me just in case though. Then again, he likes to do
> what when there's no sign of fireworks too, so I'm not sure it means
> anything.
>
> I do have the best life. It's not just on holidays that I notice, but on
> holidays, no matter the reason, I give myself permission to slack off and do
> whatever I want, the sort of permission I'm loathe to give myself any other
> time. If you ask me, I should be doing something useful and productive all
> the time. Not that I do all the time, but I do heap guilt upon myself if I'm
> not productive. Not on holidays though. On holidays there's none of that.
>
> Of course, I did do some work anyway yesterday, but it wasn't much, a couple
> of hours altogether. This was before the burn incident, when I could still
> move my fingers.
>
> And today I can move them just fine again, so I better get back to work.