Living the Busy Life by Robin Janney

I had to do some  investigating when I saw that our last post was a late one from myself.  I realized late last night that I hadn't done my post last week, and was surprised to see that CP missed her week as well.  I know from her Facebook posts that she's been busy: graduations and weddings have filled her days as well as formatting her latest work Overcoming Sarah into a proper format for paperback.

I think I needed to come up with 2 sets of 3 for this hand...
didn't have the greatest start, but I've seen worse!

Trying to think back on what I did last week to lose track of time and turns.  And I'm not really sure!  Friday and Sunday night were card night at my in-laws.  A while back, my mother-in-law decided it would be a good idea for the four of us to play cards on Friday night.  Sometimes we play just one round, other times we get in two.  Last weekend we played cards on Sunday night as well since the two of us who work had Monday off.  It's always fun, even when the cards don't go my way.  One night we made homemade ice cream while we were playing cards!  Usually we don't have any snacks at all.

Monday was Memorial Day and my side of the family celebrated as usual by a having a picnic.  This year we were at the Waverly Glen park just over the NY border.  My maternal grandparents are buried in the cemetery that borders the pretty little park.  I was trying to stay out of the sunshine because a medicine I was on carried a sensitivity warning, so I didn't get any pictures of the water fall that graces the park...although I still managed to get a slight sunburn anyway!

Then of course it was back to work on Tuesday.  And really it's kind of a blur.  I know I had a doctor's appointment Thursday afternoon, after which we hit the Toyota dealers to ask about a metal piece we thought had maybe come off our truck (it wasn't ours!) and then to step into Mr. Janney's doctors so we could ask about his stitches.  No one ever told us they were the dissolving kind and so that was another relief.

One of my husband's attic finds; he placed it in my computer area :) I love the
creative ambiance it adds!!

There is a yard sale coming up next Saturday and there've been a few days our focus has been sorting and cleaning and deciding what to keep and what to sell...and there'll be more of that this week.

Mr. Janney also took the opportunity to rearrange the computer room one day while I was at work as well - he needs to take it easy still, only 3 weeks after his surgery, but he's getting antsy.  I forget which night we went up to his parents and helped go through their attic.  Mr. Janney found a few things he's been looking for, although I'm still not sure if he's keeping or selling the stand up pin ball machine in the yard sale.

One evening we were called up to help my mother do a quick cleaning job to make room for a new couch in her living room. I think it was the same day as the doctor's appointment because I remember coming home and my smartphone connected to wifi and I had all these messages from people and a bunch were from my mother!  It was a quick job, but still managed to take up a large portion of the evening due to the conversation that took place!

You'd never know a storm had went
through  minutes before this pic.
Stephen Foster Lake at Mt Pisgah State Park

This weekend my husband and I tried to go swimming at an area pool, but the weather wouldn't cooperate.  I'd barely gotten changed into my bikini when it thundered and the pool closed...we had to wait until 20 minutes after the last thunder before it would reopen.  We hung around for a while, and had been in the pool for maybe five minutes before the next storm made itself known.  This time we took off to find a spot to picnic at while it rained.

Our only visitors; they made a little noise but not much.

We found an empty pavilion and hoped the ones who had reserved it for the day had either already come and gone or were coming later...we got lucky, no one showed up and told us to leave.  We ate in peaceful nature, with a gorgeous view and a few animal visitors.  But the threat of more thunderstorm shut the pool down for the rest of the afternoon so our swimming was over.  Which was frustrating because none of my doctors want me walking for exercise and instead would rather I swim.  Which will be hard to do with this being the only free swimming pool that I know of in our area.  The fact that I can't actually swim aside.  At the least, I can 'walk' in the pool without creating stress on my torn foot tendon.

Today we are just relaxing.  My Janney is playing his GTA 5 and Clash of Clans.  I'm catching up on laundry and computer stuff.  What have you all been up to in these past few summer-like weekends?

Getting Away by Robin Janney

Yes, this is LAST week's post.  I had a very rough week, and:

So Friday afternoon Mr. Janney and I called it a day, took our dog and went to his parents' early for our Friday night card night and just wandered around their large acreage.  My foot doctor didn't want me going walking, doesn't want me to inflame the foot any more than it is.  But I went anyway because nature is an excellent place to de-stress and that outweighed the possibility of doing further damage to my foot.

Needless to say, we all enjoyed getting away for a while.

Especially our dog Jaclyn.

For Arts and Humanities' Sake By C.P. Stringham

My sincere apologies for the delay, but this week's Broads of a Feather blog will be late. 

A Grateful Heart by Robin Janney

Sara and me <3

The past week or so has been particularly rough for my younger sister.  Some of you may know her only through her picture Carol posted from our last girl's night to the right.

She and I don't always get along, but sisters are sisters no matter what.  So when she approached me one morning at work and asked for a hug, I knew something was wrong.

The price of dinner...

The night before, she had stopped at our local McDonald's and while she was inside the restaurant, someone backed into the rear of her jeep.  And it had completely shattered the back window.  When I got a chance to see it, I saw that a bit more damage had been done than that...broken taillights and a dented bumper are still minor to the busted window.

At least she was able to get insurance information from the offending driver...and $10 towards her diner.

But her bad luck held.

Thursday afternoon I got a phone call from my mother asking if I would come help her at Sara's place with some last minute cleaning before an important meeting.  I figured I'd go, at the least I might get treated to dinner as a thank you.  No, it's not my mess but sometimes we all need help getting out of messes we've made.

As Mom and I were sitting at Sara's home, waiting for her, there was a knock on my window.  Which startled the poo outa me.  But anyway, it was a woman from the veterinarian clinic next to my sister's and she had a message from Sara - 'she was ok, but she'd had an accident and they were taking her to the ER just to get checked out and could we pick her up from there?'  Once we survived the message, Mom and I traveled to the ER only to discover that we had beaten her there!

So we waited some more.  Made some phone calls.  Including my sister just to see if she had her phone with her and if she'd be able to answer it.  She did and she was.

Sara was released from the ER close to 2 hours later and we got to hear the whole story.  She had stopped at the Dollar General after work, and she was trying to make up that time in a hurry to get home.  She was very anxious about the meeting, which has been moved to Monday.  So even though it's a road she travels everyday, and even speeds on everyday, something about this day was different and as she turned through a slight curve she lost control of her vehicle and then overcompensated.  Off the road she went and got up close and personal with a tree.

Her worst injuries...

Sara got off lucky.  Her worst injuries are the cuts and bruises you see in the picture to the left.  They're from the air bag or maybe the steering wheel; she's not really sure.

Her jeep did not fair as well, but jeeps are replaceable and humans are not.  We are all very grateful that Sara was not badly injured even though the loss of the jeep is a hardship.

Busted back axle.

Fender damage

The part that kissed the tree

Full frontal view, lack of anything witty to say...

Pulled the drive shaft out of the transmission.
And those are her feet

My sister's learned a few valuable lessons from this experience.  Don't speed.  Don't drive around with a messy vehicle.  Don't eat at McDonald's...just kidding, I don't think she'll ever abstain from the restaurant.

Even though the weather is nice and we don't have to worry about snow-slicked roads, I want to remind everyone that nothing is worth speeding for.  Unless you're in labor, but I don't know anything about that.  Or if you're being chased by evil doers. I am just as guilty as Sara, but I've been watching my speed more.  It's hard when 'keeping with traffic' means going 75mph or getting out of the way so they can pass you at 5am.  I've been driving our pickup recently and I haven't figured out the cruise control on it and so I've been going faster than I did with our car which is parked waiting for rotor work.

I just wish I could convince my husband of this truth!  But that's another story.

Sometimes you don't know how much a person means to you until they're gone or they've had a close call with serious injury.  Appreciate your loved ones, and let them know you care.  Make that phone call, write that letter.  One day it will be too late.