The Myth & The Majesty

Tomorrow morning, rather early, my sister leaves for Seoul, South Korea. After delivering her in Minneapolis, my parents are coming here. My house is NOT ready for visitors, particularly not my mother. But am I doing something about that? No. I'm distracted. I could blame the sister-to-South-Korea thing, and there'd be something to that. It's certainly distracting. The little-brother-in-South-Africa thing doesn't help the SK thing any. How did I end up the only sibling staying in the States? It's a little amusing.

It's going to be quiet and dull in here for the next two days -- a fact which I find a little depressing. Wouldn't be so bad except I won't be able to shut off the part of my brain that's saying, "Hey, don't you have somewhere else to be?" I can't concentrate.

This is the best I've felt immediately following a vacation in quite some time. Not to imply that I'm happy to be back and dealing with paperwork today -- just that I seem to have the energy for it. Oh, Hills ... I miss you already.

[I love email-to-post. It lets me have these five minute breaks from reality. With alarming frequency today.] Just a few short hours and I'll be on my way west. A long layover in Minneapolis (four hours -- seriously, what the heck?!) and then my little flight in the dark across SoDak. I. Can't. Wait. I won't land till well after 10:00 tonight, but that's okay. The lights of Rapid City will be there ... The amusing black hole of Rapid Valley ... M-Hill aglow ... The antennae on the hills throughout town ... The sign on the top of the Alex Johnson downtown ... And Mia Sorella there to pick me up for the weekend's first adventure. Then the gorgeous (even in the dark) drive, likely skirting town on our way south and west ... Past all the tourist stops, the last convenient gas station, and to the Gaslight (also a distinctive light feature!) ... We'll be all over the Hills, too. Custer, Rapid City, Piedmont, Storm ... Lots to see. I've lost chu

Consequence of an early morning: I'm really, really hungry right now. And still a bit sleepy, but that's a fairly normal occurrence. A decent storm blew through about an hour ago ... Lots of wind and rain -- sadly short on lightning. Hopefully some of that weird humid pressure outside has relaxed now. I get the feeling that first flight is going to be rather stuffy, smelly, and cramped.

I am very rarely at work before 8:00 anymore. Generally speaking, I usually prefer to stay up later at night and get up later in the morning. As such, when Moonie gave me a ride to work this morning and I therefore walked in before 7AM, there were some surprised faces. I have to admit -- I like this hour here. It's quieter, darker, calmer ... It's easier to work without interruption. I feel a bit like I'm intruding, but this morning I'm okay with that. Just a few hours and my first plane leaves. That's a good feeling.

(Originally posted Saturday, June 20th. No changes have been made aside from this note.) It was April 26 th , 1995 when we first saw him. The day before, the neighbor's dog had given birth to a large litter of tiny, wriggling purebred labs, five black and five yellow. Their eyes were still closed and at any given moment it was hard to distinguish one from another. We oohed and aahed and came back every day for the next couple of weeks, waiting for them to get big enough for us to play with them. As is inevitable, we started begging for a dog. My family had always been a cat family; it had little to do with personal preference and a lot more to do with kindness. Until the previous year, we had been "city kids" -- no room for a large dog in the house in Sioux Falls and my parents refused to get "a Nick," a reference to my grandparents' small yapper -type dog. But now we lived in a considerably more rural area; we had space for an outdoor kennel, room to take

For four years, I dealt with Rapid City extremes. Below zero in the winter. Over 110° in the summer. Snow in July, just to mix things up a bit. 80 in February for the same reason. Sunsets at 4:00 and sunrises at 4:30. That is to say -- I'm used to extremes. You know what I'm not used to? Humidity. And I don't like it. Not one little bit. Current temperature -- 80-84°, depending on which thermometer you check. Current humidity: soul-sucking. Oh, Rapid City, you will be an escape in more ways than I realized ...

I'm tired. I'm also down to less than 80 hours before my trip west officially starts. Yeah, I think it's safe to say I'm excited. I'm even looking forward to my four-hour layover in Minneapolis. I'm not entirely sure why -- it probably won't be interesting and will mostly involve me finding food and a quiet place to read. (On a related note, Boris Akunin is excellent travel reading in case any of you are looking for something new.) I'll miss the best daylight hours and land in Rapid City well after dark. But that's okay. Because I'll be landing in Rapid City. And the first person I'm meeting up with is Mia Sorella. It'll be good.

Today's Yahoo! Horoscope for Taurus: It's not often that you don't feel confident. That alone might mean you'd be tough to get along with, but you're also far too genuine and approachable to hang that over anyone's head. When someone does need to take charge, you won't be shy about stepping up. If it's to defend someone or something who can't do it for themselves, you can be positively formidable. Good luck to anyone who gives you a reason to take charge now. You know, it's kind of funny. This single lone paragraph touches on two things that get me in trouble -- my confidence (which, in long past years was low but in more recent years has been maybe just a little too hight) and that approachable thing. That's right. It's not always a good thing to be approachable. Something I've only learned in the last few months ... 90% of the time it's fine. The other 10% makes you wonder what the heck kind of people live in this town. Enough o

Note: If you saw a post here earlier, my apologies. I'm going to re-post that one in a couple of days, but for now I'm removing it (for several reasons).

Why am I always on a plane or a fast train? Oh what a world my parents gave me Always traveling ... But not in love Still I think I'm doing fine -- Wouldn't it be a lovely headline? "Life is beautiful" on the New York Times... - "Oh What A World" by Rufus Wainwright The hyperactive planning for my next trip has begun. Next weekend I'm flying out to the Hills for my granddad's 75th birthday. Except that's not the only thing going on -- the first night, I get to hang out with my friend Melissa from Texas, whom I haven't seen in two years. On Saturday my parents, sister and I are going to a wedding for a family friend that none of us has seen in three years (and before that it was a lot longer -- we spent a lot of time with them when we were younger but not much since about early high school). All of my dad's siblings will be out for some period of time for the family stuff, and it's the last weekend I get to hang

Hey guys... I had something else in the works but this is more important. There's this fantastic kid from Storm named Alex. He was just diagnosed with childhood Hodgkin's lymphoma and will be starting chemo on Monday. Among other things, this knocks him off track from starting his robotics degree this coming fall. Please pray for Alex and his parents, Marty and Pearl, along with his sister and brother-in-law.

For the Wausaunians out there: Concerts on the Square start tonight! 6:00 on the 400 block downtown. (Inside the Grand if the weather doesn't cooperate.) Tonight's feature is John Altenburgh -- also known at times as Johnny & the Mo-Tones. I'm not sure if it's just him or the whole band or what, but I heard the band itself on New Year's Eve and they're highly recommended entertainment. Concerts continue through the summer -- every Wednesday from 6:00 to about 8:00 (except next week because there's a circus at the Grand) through August. The bigger your crowd, the earlier you should go to get seats. Bring along blankets or chairs and any food or refreshments you want for the evening. Alcohol IS allowed and strangers will usually let you borrow a corkscrew if you forget one. If you're not into packing picnics, there's an Erbert & Gerbert's down there, several Chinese restaurants from which to get takeout, and two or three other rest

Got marooned at home this morning due to a migraine. My body has a weird response to stress -- it doesn't overreact till it's over. So although work was at a fever pitch for a couple of weeks, my siblings are both leaving the country, and I took an exhausting whirlwind trip home, it wasn't until things had calmed down that my body decided to freak out on me. I won't really complain. It's much more convenient this way. At least missing work this morning wasn't a big issue. Of course, now I'm back and feeling a bit like I've been mugged, but that's okay. At least I'm here to deal with these things. And the room's stopped spinning.

Accomplishments in the last 24 hours: - Escaped work unscathed. - Drove back with only about fifteen minutes' total delay due to construction. - Watched "Monsters vs. Aliens" with Mia Sorella. - Got up at a reasonable hour despite starting said film after 1AM. - May have talked parents into visiting over the 4th of July. - Took dog for walk and never lost him nor got itchy eyes. - Tricked dog into taking medication. - Lured cat back inside with a black clip tied to a piece of yarn. - Helped Dad rebuild a trellis. Perhaps not the most distinctive of days, but that's the joy of going home -- an oddly productive day with amusing small victories. Now, to convince Dad to go to the 4:00 show of "Up" ...

I took a rather sudden but convenient (last truly free weekend till mid-July) trip to Green Bay on Sunday afternoon so I could get fitted for the bridesmaid dress I need for Bri's wedding at the beginning of October. It seems so far off but considering I needed to order the dress and it won't be in till late July or early August -- I'm glad I took care of it when I had the chance. Anyway! This weekend I'm headed west for one last hurrah before Shorty leaves the country. While he's gone, Mia Sorella will leave as well. It's the last chance the five of us are going to have to hang out for about a year -- crazy thought. We're growing up. It's weird. Given the relative intensity of last week, the number of things I took care of this past weekend, and the events coming up, I have absolutely no focus. It's causing problems. I'm making this trip west this weekend. In a couple of weeks I'll be flying out to RC for a family reunion/bir

More rain.

Coolest. Thing. Ever.

Day one down, two more to go. Meetings today were long, stuffy (in the humidity sense), and not really pertinent to our system, so not overly interesting. I've got a much better idea of what to expect tomorrow, though, when things get a bit more involved for us ... so I guess that's good. I've also had a fantastic steak (last night) and veal tonight. Yes, I know what veal is. Yes, it was damn good. And no, I don't intend to make a habit of ordering it. Yeah ... I just realized how anti-animal-activist that whole paragraph was. Anyway! More antics ahead. Tomorrow night, a venture into New York ...