awol

yeah, i've been awol for a while. dan reminded me the other day that i had only posted 3 times in february...not much, and i'm long winded, too. (;

thank you all for birthday thanks!!! (: (: (: (: (:

work's been nuts; lots of overtime for a few weeks, and now of course there's a moratorium on it, which means that you don't take lunches and then you have to come in late or take a long lunch...which piles up and becomes a longer workday, anyhow. ya'll know how that goes.

girls weekend up north was fabulous! we had a great irish dinner at brighid's cross, and then trooped across the street, where we did shots and gabbed and sang along to the jukebox and laughed until our cheeks hurt.

by cheeks i mean the ones on my face. (;

the next day cari and i had lunch at a diner, and i drove home. stopped on the way to do a drive by hugging in st cloud with my parents, and then jumped back on the road again.

the following weekend dan and i drove back to st cloud for a BUSY saturday. by 730 am we were at the st cloud mall for my dad's heart walk--which went VERY well! the wednesday before, i brought the donation form to work and passed it around the office. between my immediate coworkers and my own contribution, we had 220$. i called in a favor from a sales rep and she drummed up 200$ from the sales reps! the actual total was 420.00, and my company (despite seeming like slave labor at times) matched the full amount. on friday night, when we got home, i gave dad the folder. of course he got teary--he's just like me, never expects anyone to do anything nice for him. i think total, with his contributions and mine and my company's, he pushed over 1200.00! it was beautiful!

my mom, my dad, myself, dan and my bro in law, brett, all walked. halfway through my brother showed up, a little hung over, and walked the rest of the race with us. i think we were done around 9. on the way home we stopped to visit my sister at the eye clinic; she's got a new office and my parents had yet to see the remodel. got a tour and went home to clean up around 1030.

when we got there, my brother was already downstairs, playing with my sister's dog, maura. my mom gave him crap about wrestling with the dog and dave said he hadn't yet, because she'd torn apart a kleenex box and left evidence all over the crime scene.

the actual total destruction points was as follows:

1 book of my mom's
1 box of kleenex
1 plastic glass coaster
2 books i loaned my sister (who left them on the coffee table the night before)
1 tube of vanilla flavored toothpaste (mine)
1 toothbrush (mine)
1 toothpaste holder (mine)
and 1 comb (mine)

(sensing a trend yet?) i think it was the cat odor that clings to me.

anyway, maura my canine niece gave me a gift certificate to barnes and noble, so that i can replace the book that was most damaged (Love in the Asylum by Lisa Carey). the book was acutally missing only a small bit of the front cover, but most of the first 50 pages of the book, too. the other book (Hula Done It by Maddy Hunter) has tooth marks in the bottom corner, but is still quite readable.

spent the afternoon visiting; i rarely get to see david. it's like when you watch national geographic on tv and they show only night shots of the animal, because it's nocturnal and reclusive. dave's not a reclusive type, but he's also not one of my sisters, who like to hang out and chat over coffee or shopping.

around 7 or 8 we drove to becker, mn, for a benefit concert my sister had organized; she volunteers at a domestic violence shelter. it was all heavy metal, which is usually my music of choice. the first concert raised about 700.00, so she was hoping to make a little more than that with this one since the first was on a sunday and this was on saturday. the bar was smokey (ish) and the first band was okay. the second band was right up my alley--dark, crunchy and the singer's voice was amazing. kind of peter steele from type o negative, but not so low that you can't hear the song. got the cd and have listened a few times, and still really like it!

around 12 another band was coming on, and they had the executive director of the shelter speak before them. she was a gal my mom's age, who clearly did NOT belong in the bar. very nice, good speaker. one of the dj's from the radio station supporting the benefit got up and talked about her experience with domestic violence. the band started playing and we both went, uh, no. the sound was good but neither dan or i liked the lead singer. i moseyed over to beth to tell her we were sneaking out, but she insisted we had to stay...so we stayed. before the next song, the band said, "there's a girl in the bar celebrating her 30th birthday--kim, this one is for you. it's called victory song. "

it was very nice to be noticed, but i'm an under the radar girl. i was petrified that they were going to ask me up on the stage, or have me stand up, or something. beth came back for hugs goodbye and such, and we left around 1230. instead of driving back to my parents house, we just drove home and slept in on sunday. thereby avoiding mass on sunday morning.

yes, i'm a bad little recovering catholic girl. (;

tuesday the girls at work brought in lunch and cake, and then we met family for dinner at this organic restaurant on the north side of the cities. it was good, but somewhat bland. at the end of dinner, the staff brought out a peice of cheesecake and the restaurant sang to me.

*sigh* so much for under the radar.

wednesday night i met coworkers after work for a quick drink, and then thursday...cripes. what did we do on thursday? oy. anyway, yesterday morning we had breakfast with friends at our favorite breakfast cafe--their syrup is AMAZING! homemade maple warmed with butter...gaaaaaaaaaah. now i want more! (; did some shopping yesterday night, stopped at blockbuster for movies but couldn't find the one i wanted so i ended up with mansfield park...which was okay. nothing special.

now it's sunday morning. i'm up. the house needs cleaning.

i'll try to be more consistent. being awol is easier done than said. (;