nothing important...

well, tonight i am home all alone. josh agreed to pick up jay and dena and their two boys from the airport tonight. i worked late, so couldn't go along. josh called to tell me that he went to start dena's van, but the battery was dead. he took jay's truck instead and when he was just getting to the airport, the tire blew. so....i could be home alone for a very long while. i don't like being home alone when its dark; i'm a bit of a baby about that. but tonight the crickets and bullfrogs are talking to me through the open windows and josh made me rice krispie squares to keep me company, so i'll be okay. i still have warm fuzzies inside from seeing new pictures of sarah on cara's blog. her first teeth have just popped through!

i am still a wee bit sick, though not as bad as i have been. about the milk thing, mom...i guess the theory is that the bacteria in the milk causes phlegm buildup. it doesn't make you more sick, it just makes you more clogged. i have tested that theory and proven it very true. (i am sorry that i had to write the word phlegm on my blog.) my throat is still quite sore and i have a dry, hacking cough, so i am taking an assortment of medicines and vitamins. the green cough syrup is for night time. it tastes like sambuca, except not as fun. it does, however, get me a little goofy and sleepy and makes me say things i don't remember saying the next day. the red cough syrup is for the day time, and i ONLY take it because if i don't, josh will ask me if i've taken it yet or not. it tastes like nothing on this earth should EVER taste like. it is completely wrong.

so far, i haven't had to miss any work because of being sick, except for half an hour yesterday, when lloyd pretty much commanded me to leave early. i was sitting on the floor, trying not to nod off, while slowly putting books on the shelf. tomorrow is inventory day. when i worked at house of james, we'd have people come in to do our inventory for us. not so here. every single person that works there has to work tomorrow until everything in the store has been counted. i doubt i'll be home before midnight. lloyd told me today that he met a gentleman in the store yesterday that lives in aBOTTsford (he pronounced it like that). lloyd couldn't remember his name, but apparently, the man was a frequent customer at house of james and when lloyd mentioned my name, he said he knew who i was! it seems silly, but i was disappointed that i wasn't there when he stopped by. last week i was looking up a customer's name, and when i asked her what her last name was, she spelled it for me: W-I-E-N-S. i'm used to last names like gomez and rodriguez, so this name looked slightly odd and warmly familiar. i looked at her, and asked, "are you a mennonite?" it turns out that her husband is from saskatchewan. i never thought that little discoveries like that would make me smile like they do.

animal update: our remaining fish are still alive and well. we purchased a handy little razor blade on a stick to clean the algae from the sides of the tank. we put a new filter in, too and now our tank is sparkling clean and our fish seem much more happy. they act a little more frolicky. i have seen a few snakes. the first one, about 3 feet long, was alive and sitting very near our driveway when i was coming home. mike, our neighbor, bravely got close enough to tell me that it wasn't a rattlesnake, but a gopher snake--a good snake. josh and i drove right over top of a gopher snake down our road, but missed squishing it. then, on my way to work, i saw a huge snake slithering towards the road. i was going too fast, and ran over it, squishing its head! i looked in my rear view mirror, and could see it's body flailing wildly. i had the whole-body-shudder thing going on for a few miles after that. now i'm constantly scanning the road for snakes, horrified that i'll drive over another one. we do drive over very many little froggies all over the road when they come out on damp evenings. you can't avoid them, they just go pop under your tires. i drove over a whole lot tonight on my way home and i kept saying, "i'm sorry! i'm sorry!"

i think this is turning into a very long blog about nothing particularly important. i wish i could post a current picture to make it more interesting. i will post one of my most favourite pictures, taken in england. i don't know why i love it so much...i guess it just reminds me of all the walks we used to take when i was falling in love with josh...how we'd talk and talk and stare at the road in front of us. i hope you all have relaxing, happy sundays

--heidi