the sunday paper

I used to love reading the paper. When we were just in the first years of college, we'd get the ol' hometown paper to see if we knew anyone getting hitched or popping out a kid, etc. Read the whole paper, get my fingers all black and smudgy.

Dan's reading the paper now. If I think about it there are probably three sections I'll read: Variety, Arts & Entertainment and Travel. And the Target ad. Poke through the comics, and call it a day after about 10 minutes.

Fingers clean as a whistle. Strange how over time something that used to be a relaxing hour eating donuts and laughing at finding out that one of the cheerleaders is on child Numero Five has morphed into: I have SO much more to get done. So much better to do. Really? I do? Humph.

I didn't get my books signed the other night. We got up to Uncle Hugo's after fighting traffic for 45 minutes, grabbed something at the KFC after getting our number and settled in to wait. The store was packed, and because it's Uncle Hugo's and small and filled with piles of books already, stuffy and hot--and not in the good sauna way. By 745 LKH had only gone through about 40 to 50 sigs--this was based on her start time of 6 pm. She wasn't done w/ February and I was holding the date May 9th. I was over heating and bored, and having some blood sugar issues--dinner of biscuits and popcorn chicken and a diet Pepsi will do that. So I threw in the towel and Dan and I drove home.

Yesterday we did have fun--after going in for training at work in the morning, I wanted to do something cheapish, but out of our ordinary loop, and luckily Dan did too. So we grabbed lunch at Roly Poly sandwiches--VERY yummy! I had a stuffed spinach wrap, grilled, with cheese and tomatoes and artichokes and spinach, and for a twist, cornbread dressing. It was divine. Then we went over to Fort Snelling, where neither of us has been since forever. At least over 10 years for me, longer for Dan. We traipsed about and I got to visit with the living history folks, which is always amusing and fun. Everyone was very informative and we had a good laugh over the thought of Dan trying to fit in one of the bunks. I guess during the big days when the fort was stock full, and during MN winters, the men would sleep two to a bunk--which was about 5'8" long. The thought of 6'4" Dan squidging into the bunk just gave me the giggles. I did get to see some pretty nifty medical supplies--the "doc" was able to take out and show off some reproductions of trepanning equipment and an amputation kit. Very cool. Then we watched them blast off the cannon. I wish it'd been more than once because it was such a nice big boom! Everyone was so informative and they've done an excellent job of keeping things alive and in perspective for the folks participating. Spiffy.

The thing that struck me later, as we were leaving, was that the buildings that you pass on the way into the fort, Buildings 17 and 18, were used in WWII for soldiers and for the Japanese Americans who were doing translations, etc. Those buildings, built long after the parts of the fort that are original, are in worse condition than the for itself, which was construced in 1827. I hope that someday they'll have the funding to fix them up--seems strange that we're more concerned w/ 1827 than 1945.

Had dinner at Grizzly's and played a game of trivia--Dan won, I took second--and then came home.

Well, I'm off to page through the paper after strolling around the Ikea site quickly to see if there is a shelving unit there that will support my obscene amount of clothing that no longer fits in the closet. *sigh* When I was there the other day I got distracted by some really nice dishes...but dishes are gravy. (; What I need is a good sized dresser-wardrobe system. Something that will no doubt take up the whole closet and most of the upstairs den too. (;

cheers (: