This is the Lobster Capital of the World. Rena and I stayed there overnight and, of course, had Lobster for dinner. But, the scenery is definitely not like those at Bar Harbor, ME.
In NB we drove by “New Maryland”. We speculated it was the place that those Royalists moved here from Maryland. ?
Today, we keep driving east-ward to Prince Edward Island and from there all the way to Canadian Rockies and beyond.
Does anyone else celebrate this? The anniversary of their first kiss? 17 years today! In front of the Chemical Engineering building. Ah the romance. Totally ready for the next 17 sweetie.
I started my one class this week – on my way to finishing the prerequisites for nursing school one course at a time. Jeremy laughs at me and finds it funny that I don’t try and petition my way out of some of these courses. Of course, I could start nursing school earlier, but I’m in no real rush. I’m hoping to matriculate in the Spring of 2014 and then go for five years, so the finish date is 2019 which is a long time away. For example, they wanted me to have a chemistry class within the past 5 years – it has been over 15 years since I’ve taken a chemistry class, but since I look at chemistry patents all day, every day, I will petition out of that particular class.
This summer I’m taking a statistics course which, of course, is all very familiar – but, you know, I can’t do all the calculations without looking up the formulas and hunting around a little bit in my old math books. Which counts (at least for me) not really knowing the math because I can’t just whip it out on the back of a napkin. Unfortunately, having gone to a high-powered college and graduate school, I just feel so stupid at math. I mean, if you take the whole general population, I’m probably up there in terms of math ability, but I did not end up going to school with the general population, I was going to school with people who were really, really, really good at math – so, you know, I’m a little self-conscious about my math ability. A little review (even with relatively simple math concepts) makes me feel good. Also, it just makes me feel good that math problems have only one right answer, which so rarely happens in real life where there are never any right answers.
I am also slated to give the service at church this Sunday. I’m a little nervous about the public speaking, but I’m trying to stretch myself a little in various directions. Below is a photo of the tree that was blocking the church’s driveway last week.
Jeremy is eagerly anticipating his return to work tomorrow. After a week of chaperoning 12 ten-year-olds in the hot-hot sun which culminated in a back-yard camp out in which he had to watch his second summer action flick in three days (Transformers I) and no one went to sleep before 1 am and the ambient temperature never went below 85 degrees, Jeremy is ready to go back to work and relax in an air-conditioned office and work uninterrupted for 3-4 hours at a time and not have to slather on sunscreen (which he loathes). I told him that I hoped that he would fix this global warming thing in the next year or so because 100 degree weeks and freak hurricane force winds from the west (!) in DC are really cramping my style here. I grew up here and we spent the summers without air conditioning both because my parents were very frugal and also because it was never so freaking hot!
Edda is still intensely unhappy in the afternoons and evenings. Well, maybe intense is not the right word. She is unusually unhappy. Of course, we have no idea what the problem is – we just fret about it a lot and look concerned. She is happiest (I kid you not) – strapped into her special needs potty chair in the tiny first floor bathroom watching Blue’s Clues. We could show her the same video on the living room TV and she will just flip out. Why? I have no idea. Maybe she is tired of pacing the room? Maybe she thinks she needs some privacy? Maybe she just loves the tiny portable DVD player! Maybe she just likes hanging around with no pants on. Anyways, it just makes us feel guilty leaving her in the bathroom for 30-45 minutes at a time, but every time you peek in, she is laughing her head off and every time you pull her into the living room, she starts complaining and yelling and trying to find you to take a bite out of our tender love handles (which provide ample flesh for biting). I like not being bitten. Anyways, tonight we decided it might be reflux, so we are doing SOMETHING instead of doing NOTHING which feels good even though I don’t think it will solve the problem.
So tomorrow both kids will be in camp, Jeremy is at work, I am at work. The temperatures will be in the 80s. Hopefully a quiet week.
I have been running, running and running. Almost everyday since Memorial Day. I believe in love. And I believe in exercise. I’m not sure what else to believe in these days (OK, I believe in ice cream, but I think that is a form of love.)
We send Edda to Camp JCC during the summers. They have a great inclusion program in which Edda gets to participate with the typical kiddos and have fun. Vince goes too for most of the summer (except for the first session in which he was suppose to be camping), it’s the only organized outside-of-the-house thing the two of them get to do together. I secretly wish that instead of school, Edda could go to camp all year. What’s not to like about going on trips, singing and dancing all day and being in the pool everyday?
Edda is having kind of a rough week – some grumpiness I can’t really pinpoint, not in the mornings – usually in the evenings. Appetite is still good and sleep is good too. I can’t figure it out (maybe tooth pain?). Edda’s counselor also noticed some grumpiness at camp the past few days, although I can’t decide if it is just that Edda is pissed that it is 100 degrees and she has to be outside at least part of the day. Frankly, I expect Edda to be at least a little grumpy at camp where she doesn’t have immediate access to videos/music/food, however, it’s really unusual for Edda to stay grumpy in the evenings at home with her every whim taken care of. Edda had some poop issues at camp today and if there is anything worse than me cleaning a messy diaper – it is knowing that someone else has to do it. So not fun. I could tell from today’s log in the daily diary that Sarah (Edda’s high school aged one-on-one) had a tough day (she’s the one driving the wheelchair in the above photo).
I have been obsessed with this song today – played it over and over again at work, keeps the patents rolling. For you easily offended, it has the word bulls**t in it like 17 million times, so be warned.
It has been a little hectic around here. Friday night, a strong storm system moved through the area and blew hurricane force winds for about 30 minutes. This is the sort of damage we saw in the area (this is just around the corner from our house):
We lost power for only an hour, however, many of our neighbors are still without power today. It has been a long five days. So ever since Friday night, we’ve been kind of like a refugee camp here – lots of people (including my parents) sleeping in the beds – some neighbors brought over meat that was thawing in their melting fridge and we had an impromptu dinner party. Lots of hot/tired/exasperated people in DC.
The storm also put a kink in our summer scheduling, Vince and Jeremy were to go to sleep away Cub Scout camp this week, but the power went down at the camp and there was extensive debris, so it was cancelled. Jeremy and the handful of other dads who took the week off have been trying valiantly to recreat cub scout camp here locally, because now you have twelve boys who have nothing to do all week. Jeremy (although exhausted) is enjoying his week off – he gets to hang with Vince and his pals AND sleep in his own air conditioned bed at night.
