Bad News at the Dentist

I had a dentist appointment to get my teeth cleaned today. at 7:10 AM!!! It was the only time they could fit me in, and I really needed a good ‘ole cleaning before moving to New York because I'm not up to dentist searching in crazy land. So I said oh brother and took the time. I avoided the 5's this morning by taking a shower last night, rolling out of bed, downing two cups of coffee, brushing my teeth twice (because that's what you do before a teeth cleaning, especially after two cups of coffee) and heading out the door, groggy but on time.

My cleaning went very well, way better than expected, because she said I was brushing well and hardly had any build up. This was very positive news to me because I don't floss even though I tell them every visit that I will. Even more exciting than that was that the cleaning didn't hurt at all! It must be what that one dentist lady told me a few years ago. She told me the right way to brush. I guess that really WAS the right way. They all tell you the right way, but this one lady must have really had it.

You put your toothbrush (toothpaste and all) right where your teeth meet your gums. Then you tilt the brush ever so slightly toward the gums, up on the top, down on the bottom. Then, you brush in a small circular motion, gently, not harshly, so that you can feel the bristles of the brush reach under your gums. But the trick is to do this gently, so it massages your gums, or you'll just bleed everywhere. It really works! My cleanings are getting less and less painful as the years go by!

But there was a problem this morning. I sat in the chair at 7:10 AM, and the first thing she did was take my blood pressure. I don't really get why the dentist needs to do that, but whatever. She checked the diddelydad when it was finished and said, "Wow, is your blood pressure always this low?"

"Uh," I said, "I don't know. What is it?"

"92 over 45."

"Huh." I said, but secretly I had no idea what those numbers meant.

"Yeah, that’s really low,” she said apparently sensing I was ignorant to blood pressure lingo.

"Oh." And I worried about it the rest of the cleaning.

So I did some research when I came home and this is what I read on the internet.

Low blood pressure (hypotension) is pressure that is so low that it causes symptoms or signs due to the low flow of blood through the arteries and veins. When the flow of blood is too low to deliver enough oxygen and nutrients to vital organs such as the brain, heart, and kidney, the organs do not function normally. When the blood pressure is not sufficient to deliver enough blood to the organs of the body, the organs do not work properly.

Well no kidding! My low blood pressure must have been due to the fact that I had to get up at the crack to sit in her chair! My organs never function properly at that hour of the morning. I'm not worried anymore.

I Spy with My Little Eye....

Here's a pic of all the things worth keeping that came out of our now sold cars. You don't want to see the discarded items pile. How embarassing.

But let's play "I Spy" to all the things worth keeping out of Seth and Amber's car. Why? Because it's after midnight on Saturday night and I just finished a MAJOR project of tossing somewhat wanted clothes into Goodwill bags, sorting through shoes and sweaters and belts and dresses and skirts, making big time decisions here, people. Reserving moving trucks. Reserving movers. Reserving flights. Making itineraries. Trying to figure out how our entire life fits into one small square of space. And I need a little no-brainer entertainment in my life.

So let's play a game. Here we go.

I spy...

We're Moving to NYC!!!...And Selling Our Car!

2001 Ford Exlporer Sport. Black with tan interior. 2 door automatic. Good condition. Good tires. GREAT car. I will miss it, but it's a hassel to own a car in NY, so it's gotta go. PICTURES HERE

CD and cassette player. Power windows, power locks, power steering, cruise control, keyless entry, good sound system, tinted privacy windows...

125,000 miles. Most are road miles, being musicians and all. It's taken us on quite a few gigs. One time owner...me! And I've taken good care of it, regular oil changes and a new set of tires.

If we weren't moving, I'd drive this little SUV forever. Great buy.

We need to sell this FAST!

$4500. We'll sell it for $4000 if you act fast. Spread the word!

PICTURES HERE

If you're interested, email us at sethward@mac.com

We're Moving to NYC!!!

You already know, if you read Seth's blog, and most of you do. (Observation: Everytime I write, "if you read Seth's blog," I nearly always follow it with "and most of you do." So henceforth if I am blogging on a topic already mentioned by my husband, then I'll always say, quite naturally, "blah blah blah dee blabady bloo....if you read Seth's blog, and most of you do." Just so you know.) So thanks alot, Seth, for stealing my thunder about the move. But you started blogging before me, so in my line of reasoning, you hold the right to blog about it first.

Most things I have to say about this move I will reserve for a later time when I'm not doped up on Mucinex DM. (I'm telling you, that stuff makes me bonkers.) I caught a nasty cold in NYC and have almost lost my voice entirely, but thanks to Mucinex DM, I can vociferate, which means to "shout, complain, or argue loudly." I know this because I had first written "vocificate," which I believed to mean "utter any sound with the vocal chords." Clearly I made that word up. My vocal chords thank thee, Mucinex DM.

Here are some things I learned in the Big Apple:

1. Don't help old ladies cross the street.

2. The term "very light" in regards to the creamer added when ordering coffee at the local bagel shop alludes to the color of the coffee, not to the amount of calories.

3. People in New York stand "on line" instead of "in line."

4. The naked cowboy is really, really tan.

5. The D train stops locally until a certain point and then all of the sudden becomes express and it's a very...very long time until the next stop.

6. The place to buy music is called...oh shoot, what's it called? Company? I don't think that's right.

7. The partial-viewing box seats for 25 bucks at the Mary Poppins show are precisely partial-viewing and require one to lean halfway out of the box to see half the scenes, and still only half the stage is seen.

8. Rebecca Luker, who plays Mrs. Banks in Mary Poppins, is more magical than Mary Poppins played by Ashley Brown, although Ashley Brown has one of the most delightful voices I've ever heard.

9. You can hear incredible jazz in Greenwich Village, which is pronounced GRENNICH Village and not GREEN-WITCH Village. The rock and folk and whatever else is found on the East side.

10. Ordering a grilled chicken salad for $15 does not give you a gigantic salad like you'd think, but a very small salad, leaving you hungry still and in dire need of the Tollhouse Chocolate Chip Pie at The Brewry in The Empire State Building.

Rules That Don't Apply in NYC

Yesterday I was speedily crossing a busy street, daring the blinking red hand in the sign in front of me, when the blinking red hand became a solid red hand. My speedy walk turned into a scurry, and at that time, I noticed the old lady with the walker walking across the same street, with the same solid red hand staring at her, a car rushing towards her. She took two tiny steps with each forward push of her walker, between each of the two tiny steps a lingering two seconds, and between each push of her walker and the next pair of steps, a lifetime.

The car continued to barrel towards her. My southern manners kicked in, and I abruptly stopped running, turned around, and approached the frail woman with the walker.

"Ma'am? Can I help you?" I said as sweetly as possible with the ever-looming car in my peripheral vision. But instead of hearing the expected thin, cracking voice of an old, tired woman, my hospitality was met with a high-pitched, nasally, and very...VERY loud voice, spoken with the best of New York accents (of which I will spare you in my writing),

"No! NO! GO ON! GO ON! GET OUTA' HERE!!" She miraculously moved one hand from the handle of her walker and waved me away.

"Ok, ok! I'm goin'!" I ran out of the middle of the street and walked the long avenue block toward my friend's apartment. As I reached the end of the block, I looked behind me to observe the situation. The old woman was only three-quarters of the way across the street. Push. (Wait) step...step. (Wait) Push. (Wait) step...step.

That'll teach me to help old ladies cross the street. I mean, what was I thinking? How RUDE of me.

NYC Update

Corner of Amsterdam and 83rd

My life is a bit crazy right now, so I'm sorry for the lack of posts. I promise that once everything slows down, I'll be a better blogger. I haven't given up on the Catholic discussions. Just haven't had as much time to develop my thoughts here in NYC. Jumping from roommate to roommate. So far there's been a tornado in Brooklyn, the subways were closed for a day due to intense flooding, the heat has been a scorcher, but yesterday felt like fall, I have blisters on the bottom of my feet from walking in Texas shoes rather than New York shoes,

and I'm having a FANTASTIC time!

Tonight I'm going to see a FREE production of Romeo and Juliet in Harlem with my current roommate and some friends. I ate at a great cafe for lunch followed by dessert at Ben and Jerry's, walked it off with a day of window shopping in the Upper West Side, and made plans to go see Mary Poppins on Broadway very soon. I love this place.

Oh and I became a member of Facebook. Yikes.

Thanks, Air Traffic Control...

I flew here today. Another eventful flying experience.

Air traffic control rerouted us due to thunderstorms between Chicago and New York. No problem. Just fly around the city and come in from the north side. No rain in NYC. Not a problem at all. Except that moments before the wheels of our airplane touched the ground, the pilot suddently surged forward and jerked us back into the air, flying over the runway instead of landing on it.

I nervously glanced at the passengers around me as they nervously glanced at me. We all nervously glanced without speaking. After about 2 minutes of flying over New York City, the pilot said over the speaker,

"Sorry about that, folks. We had to, uh, abort landing at the last minute. There was a plane sitting in the middle of the runway."

WHAT! There was an AIRPLANE sitting in the middle of the runway and we almost landed into it!? We gasped. We raised our eyebrows and looked at each other. I smiled in disbelief, a bad habit of emotional displacement. I thought to myself,

"Thanks, Air Traffic Control, for a bunch of nothin'."

I imagined it was a terrorist plot. They all had somehow maneuvered planes to sit on runways so that the flying planes couldn't land, anywhere...and the flying planes all just flew and flew until they ran out of gas and crashed into buildings and oceans.

We continued to circle the city, and a cell phone rang behind me. The cell phone belonged to a man who looked stoned. Why did he have his cell phone on? Didn't that interfere with communication and whatnot? Surely, he wouldn't answer it. Not after we almost rammed into a sitting plane.

The woman across the aisle from me looked at the man sitting behind me, then looked at me and said, "He ANSWERED his phone! I can't BELIEVE he would ANSWER his phone!" She gaped at the man with a look of disgust.

A guy a few rows back hollered out, "Hey, man, I don't think that's the best time for that right now!"

The pilot lowered the plane for a second attempt at landing. We bowed our heads and closed our eyes. I made peace with God in case it was the end.

Obviously, it wasn't. We bumpily landed and screeched to a stop.

Welcome to New York City, where airplanes like to sit still on runways reserved for other planes' landings.

Tunesday: Still Haven't Found

Ah, Ha HA! That is a laugh of sheer spiritual glee at this video. I love this. I found this video on Stephen and Haley's blog. They are good, good friends of ours and are moving to Scotland so Stephen can go to almost as much school as Seth. Stephen will be working on a doctorate in some really spiritual and smart field, Early Church History, is it? Stephen talks about the hope we have in the kingdom to come, and how it's a hope that won't materialize into reality until Christ comes again. But it's a hope worth holding till the end. He says it way better than I could. We're really gonna miss you guys. Damn you for moving so far away. (Not really - the damn part. All in jest, all in jest. May no curses befall you.) Keep that bed or air mattress or futon ready for us. We're coming.

I used to go to a black church in Waco: Greater New Light Missionary Baptist Church. The choir was alot like this one. I miss it.

Gosh, I'm in a weepy, sentimental mood. Oh well, deal with it, people.

Tune: I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
Band: U2
Album: originally Joshua Tree

It's the Hard-Knock Life...

The past couple of weeks we've been house sitting. Such a hard job, let me tell ya. The pool and hot tub every night. The bike path behind the house. The tasty food and wine she leaves behind with permission to consume. The FANtastic washer that takes only a tiny amount of detergent for one load of laundry, and the dryer which dries clothes ultra fast. The service that mows the lawn. The piano. The very fast internet that doesn't crap out on us every two days, like the ridiculous TV Max cable internet we were forced into using because of our silly apartment complex. Ugh. Did I mention the wine?

Of course, house sitting does come with responsibilities. I mean, don't get the wrong idea. It's not complete utopia here. I do have to water the plants and feed the eleven-year-old-boy's snails upstairs. And if you've ever seen me with green things that grow, you know that it takes some effort on my part. I fret over whether I should water them today or tomorrow, and once I've watered them, if I've watered them too much. And the snails. Well. I don't know if you've ever fed snails, but...gross. That food stinks. Or is it the snails? Water snails in a tank rarely cleaned by its eleven-year-old owner....probably the snails. Why snails, I wonder? I get fish, or lizards, or even tarantulas. But snails? Not seeing the entertainment or companionship factor there, not even the nurturing factor. I was only instructed to feed them on the weekends. They don't feel like pets when you feed them only once a week. BUT, to each his own...

Oh, and the light from the windows in the morning. WAY too early. =-)

Finished

Finally done. Stayed up until the wee hours of the morning Tuesday night/Wednesday morning to finish. I couldn't get around to reading the week of my show.

After many tears shed over what Harry had to do in the end and what happened to many of the characters that I love, (trying not to give it away here) I can't believe that I'm saying this, but I thought it was a little too long. She really strung this one out. And so when it climaxed I wasn't as affected as in the previous books.

I didn't get into the Hallows idea. In the end it just seemed unnecessary to the book. Like she thought she'd do more with it, but changed her mind in the end. So again, less words would have been fine for me. I loved what she did with Snape. Loved it. I'm a little mad at Dumbledore, for being weak and mortal. But I suppose that was Rowling's intention. Even the greatest among us are mortal and flawed.

I can't say anything else without ruining it for anyone still reading.

A fond farewell to Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived.

To Be Known

I made a trip to the bank the other day to make a needed deposit, and upon driving up to the nifty, vaccuumed, tubed device I heard from the speaker,

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Ward. How are you today?"

Surprised, I glanced at the teller in the window with a look of elated astonishment. She knew my name. How did she know my name? How nice. My day brightened in an instant, and I smiled back and said,

"I'm good, thank you. How are you?"

And I thought as I drove away, how good it feels to be known. And I remembered how much more God knows me, and how glad I am for that.