Internet friends and other things.

I'm glad the week is over. It's been a challenging one. Ups and downs but mostly downs.

The biggest part of it was the loss of my friend/coworkers mother. It's been an up and down 6 months for her and the last few weeks have been brutal on Jim. She passed away late Tue night. I feel so bad for him. He knows it's for the best and he is glad she's not suffering. It's been hard watching him go thru all this and I have felt so bad I couldn't do more for him. Then the funeral was Sat. and due to Kid1's audition I couldn't go. I feel like crap for that. He understands, but still. My mom did fix 6 pounds of meatloaf and 3 pounds of scalloped patatos for his family dinner today.

Him being gone so much has made work a challenge. With him gone so much I have been trying to keep up with my stuff and as much as his as I could. It's been pretty stressfull. I think I did a decent enough job at it all. We'll see.

Of course there was Kid1's big audition yesterday. She really wanted this one. I thought she had done a great job preparing for it. She's worked pretty hard. I thought she was pretty calm and ready to go yesterday. As we sat outside the room we heard so many kids go in there and sound like shit. I mean, these are honors musicians and they should sound great. There a few that were before her that literally sounded like beginners. They sucked. So she went in the first room to play the prepared piece. (In the 1st room you play the same prepared piece. In the 2nd room they play the chromatic scale, the days selected scale and sight read. You go by # and not name and never see or talk to the judges.) She went in the 1st room and I listened thru the door with 20 other kids getting ready to go. She NAILED the first part of the song. A couple of kids commented on how awesome it was. So I walked down to the 2nd room. (I have a hard time listening to her at these things. I get really nervous.) When she came out of the room she was damn near in tears. According to her, she nailed the 1st part, took a deep breath while thinking she was really "on" and then the nerves and the shakes hit and she really blew the rest of it. She is very hard on herself, so I don't know how bad it really was. So she went in the 2nd room and I listened to her play the chromatic scale. Her best scale. She's awesome, most days. Yeah, this time she played it like she was back in 6th grade. She did a good 2nd scale (G) and nailed the sight reading. She came out shaking and near tears. So we went back to the gym and got her stuff as she beat herself up. We got to the doors to go outside and I took her tag off and told her to scream, cry, yell or whatever before I open the doors, because once we go out them it's done. I took her to get ice cream and we drove to the Russell Stovers factory store and then the 1 1/2 hours home. We got fat and laughed and had an awesome time. She really is one of my best friends ever. It was a longgggggggggg and stressful day but sonce we shared it, it was all good.

So Saturday night after taking Kid1 to hermom's I had planned all week on drinking. By the time I was headed home I was so tired I thought it wasn't gonna happen. I stopped and bought some wave runners on the way home though. I thought 1 would knock me out. No, 1 woke me up and made me thirsty. I drank #2 while fixing my dinner. In 3 hrs I had drank all 6. Not having more, not being tired and not wanting to drive to the store I then started on irish whiskey. Jameson's. I think I had 1/3 of the big bottle. I felt great. Slept like a drunken baby. Woke up with my first hangover in a long time. it kind of sucked.

I had some stuff to do all day before getting the girls. But then mid afternoon I got a call from Dulcinea. She wanted to go to lunch. So I took her to lunch at a nice Chinese place I'd never been before. It was awesome. We had a nice visit. Very up and up. I maintained the relationship that I should with her. Then the fortune cookies came. I held them out and let her pick. Her fortune was cute and a good idea. The whole add the line "in bed" before or after didn't work too well with her's and I didn't bring that game up with her either. Then I read mine. I had to bite my tongue not to laugh. On the back in big letters it said "DRINK" then I read the fortune "Bide your time, for sucess is near." I kid you not. I didn't even think of the "in bed" thing. I read this line sitting across the booth from Dulcinea. Under my breath I said "OMG" or something like that. She asked what i said and I brushed it off as nothing and changed the subject.

Then to end my week I learned tonight that a friend of mine finally lost a long and brave battle with cancer. She is one of those people that I have never met in person, but I have known for a few yrs on this contraption. A kind and wonderful human being who lived life to it's fullest. The adventures she had in her 20' and 30's are amazing. I wish she'd have written a book. It would make an awesome movie. She is the kind of person who touched everyone who ever met her, be it online or in person. She made such an impression on me the last few yrs. Then her battle to the very end has been inspirational. I feel her loss as much as I would somebody close to me that I see every day. I never thought that it would be possible to feel feelings like that for someone you never met in "real life" untill I lost a very good friend at Christmas last yr. I am sure he was the first person there to greet this woman today. I'm sure they are hiking on some awesome trail right now and enjoying the other side. God bless them both.

Friday night the pep band had 80's night. I thought I'd post a pic on me while I fed them dinner.