Randomness

Picture Day

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / Leave a comment

Just Write –Today and every Tuesday, I am joining Heather in her brilliant idea to freewrite.  I love this idea as it frees me up from having to ponder too long for a topic.  Click through to her blog for the details and her own Just Write.

I looked in the rear view mirror as I drove too fast to get the kids to school on time for their sibling pictures.  I don’t know why I can’t get my crap together to leave on time each day.  There is a reason my license plate in high school read Illbl8.  I am often late.  As I looked at my precious cargo, my heart swelled with pride, happiness, and the knowledge of just how blessed I am to parent these two amazing kids.  We pull into the parking lot and frantically search for where the before school sibling photos are being shot.  The kids school offer the option of having siblings get a photo taken together on picture day in addition to their individual photos.

They stood side by side as they waited for their turn and it just hit me, the love they have for each other–the bond that will stay with them through life.  The gift they are not only to us but to each other.  I watched as they sat on the stump and the photographer told them to “act like you like each other!”  Zoë immediately put her head on her brother’s shoulder and looked up at him with shear adoration in her beautiful brown eyes.  Noah smiled that smile that will melt hearts every day for the rest of his life.

I tell them it’s time to get their lunch boxes and get to class–they plead to stay and watch the pictures while I run the car.  They sit side by side on the seat and look on with interest.  They are both observers of life and action.  They love to watch, observe, take in, and figure out.  I rush to the car and back and they are still sitting side by side, talking and watching.  It still gets me when I see them like this.  It is so special.  We quickly walk into school and Noah asks for his lunch box and if he can go to his classroom.  Zoë asks as well.  I give them their lunch boxes and they bound onward in their own little world where everything is rainbows and bunnies.  I walk slowly behind soaking it all in and allowing them their independence.

Zoë carefully carries the pictures she painted last night for her teachers anxious to present them to each teacher.  Their tiny hearts are so full of love and trust and innocence.  I watch and hope that it lasts as long as possible.

Not Really A Cop Out

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / Leave a comment

So isn’t this how most excuses start out?  I have been meaning to blog and to keep track here of my donations–which I am happily still doing–but I’m stuck in this transitioning summer time space.  The kids are home this week before school starts and we were on vacation last week and honestly I am swamped at work and with my dissertation research and I still haven’t written the syllabus for the class I am teaching that starts on Monday.  So, needless to say I have been busy doing things and haven’t had much time to write about them.

I haven’t been training much for the century I am suppose to ride on the 28th.  I have decided that after this weekend’s long ride that if I don’t feel really good and can’t keep up a good pace then I am just not going to do the century.  I don’t have anything to prove–I know I can ride a century–I have ridden two already.  My next goal is to ride one well and finish in under 7 hours.   I know I am not there yet and my BFF who rides with me is in much better shape than me and could easily ride a century in 6 hours.  She is so good to me and rides patiently with me–but I know it isn’t “fun” for her to take so long to ride that distance.  So, I’m cool with my decision to not do the century if I’m not ready.  There is another one in October that I’ll shoot for.  But if I am honest–I don’t have a lot of time to train for one with everything that is also going on in my crazy world.

I have some more money to donate–on average I have been able to put aside about $3 a day.   I know that doesn’t seem like much, but over the course of a month that is about $100 and over a year $1200.  Not bad at all.

I’ll update later this week with a new total of $ and who I am decided to donate to.

Please Just Slow The _______ Down

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / Leave a comment

Life that is.  I know–I hate whiny posts about how someone has been so busy they don’t have time to blog.  The truth is–I’ve been exhausted and overwhelmed by the pressure I put on myself to donate each day and write about it.  Did I forget that I have a full-time job, make that two full-time jobs, if you count doing academic research for a dissertation a job.  Add on that one part-time job (I teach at the college), parenting, spousing, and well crap, everything else.  I just don’t have the energy to write about giving money away.

I am still saving a few bucks each day to donate and will be donating on Friday before I go on VACATION.  Sadly my vacation isn’t to attend BlogHer’11.  I have been trying to attend a BlogHer conference since 2006.  But every summer something gets in my way and it just doesn’t work out.  I vow to go next year.  I feel a little late to the party as so many of the people I know through blogging and whose blogs I have read since I started in March of 2006–have been attending every year and I’m sure it will be a little like walking into the neighborhood bar and everyone staring at you knowing you aren’t from the neighborhood.  UGH!.

I am currently taking time away from filling out my application for the trip to Thailand that I want to go on.  It will allow me to present my preliminary dissertation findings at an international conference.  And to see Thailand.  Awesome.

I am moving in high speed and am sure I am going to miss something.  As my to do list mocks me with all the things that I have already forgotten.  I need a frickin’ to do list for my to do list–or at least a to do list to remind me to look at my to do list.

In other totally exciting news–my washing machine is still broken and we leave for a 7 day vacation on Friday at that ass crack of dawn.  I will be packing dirty laundry to take with us and so at my MIL’s lake house.  I know so glamorous and a little…well…gross.

Isn’t my life grand???  Where the hell is my wine?!?!?!

Sunday, Bloody Sunday

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / Leave a comment

Well yesterday was a bloody day at the Tour de France.  I’m a cyclist.  Not a very good one, but one just the same.  I caught the bug in 1994 when I was ready to get in shape and it is pretty much the only outdoor cardio I can do because of my knee and ankle.  So, I started riding and I love it. My obsession started innocently enough with spinning classes.  Then I got a bike and would ride in forest park.  Now there are bike trails in lots of place and thanks to Lance Armstrong, biking has become a respectable sport and I can ride on the road without too much danger of being run over by one of those huge trucks with the balls hanging off the trailer hitch.

Getting his is always on a cyclists mind.  It is a very real danger.  I work hard to make sure I share the road and only use the space I need.  When there is a shoulder to ride on that is safe (clear of debris), I ride there.  When there isn’t a safe shoulder, I hug the line.

But as a rider in the Tour de France, you pretty much put getting hit by a car at the bottom of things that are going to go wrong.  These drivers are professionals and they know that the right of way goes to the guys on the bike.  The guys they are filming. The guys whose quest and work is what gives them a paycheck.  As, I sat and watched Sunday morning’s stage, I was floored and sick, as a TV car took out one of the guys in a 5 man break away, causing another to go up and over his handlebars at an unbelievable speed.  The riders both got up and ended up finishing the stage (which is a testament to their physical conditioning and their ability to endure unimaginable pain.

But what kept running through my head is that that car could have killed that rider.  Could. Have. Killed. Him.  These are real people riding bikes.  Fathers, sons, mothers, daughters, sisters, aunts, uncles, brothers, etc.  So please remember this when you approach a cyclist.  We aren’t out there to get in your way or make your drive more difficult.  We are just like you, on our way somewhere and we only want to get there and get home safe to our family.  Take a moment, slow down and move a little to the left.

Attack Of The Killer Zucchini

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / 1 Comment

Let me just start by saying that–I totally grew this. In my garden.

I can’t tell you how surprised I as to see this ginormous zucchini ascending from it’s plant when I went to check on my garden yesterday. I mean–Holy Shit–this thing is huge.  It’s about the size of an eggplant.  I have pulled 6 other zucchini from my garden and they have all been average size–but this one?  It’s a freak of nature.

I am totally stoked with how some of my garden is doing.  I am an over planter and cram as much stuff in my garden as I can–I need more garden space.  I love a summer veggie garden.  I tried carrots this year and sadly they aren’t doing that great–but my peppers and tomatoes are doing amazingly well.  I’ll soon have lots and lots of ripe tomatoes.

Will be making zucchini bread with some of the smaller ones and am currently surfing the net for recipes to utilize the King Kong of Zucchini that I have managed to completely on accident grow.