Thursday's Thirteen* Random Thoughts ala June

1. It feels good to be writing again. I just wish I had time to write something besides articles for work.

2. Kipper is ten today!! Last night we sang Happy Birthday to him before he gulped down a vanilla cupcake with white frosting and sprinkles.

3. Wally moved out. I thought I would feel bad when he decided to live with his father but I don’t. I am relieved he has taken his snarky frustrated energy somewhere else.

4. My 30th high school reunion is sometime this year and I’m already anxious about how much older I look than the other women in my class. Mind you, I went to school with about 450 beauty queens. Seriously. Beauty Queens. Damn. The other 300 women were adorable. I was somewhere between plain and cute. My dear friend Jen commented a few years ago: “If we had gone to school anywhere else, we would have been the prom queens!”

5. I literally vacuumed in my pearls yesterday. I forgot to take them off before I went to bed the night before. Too bad I didn’t realize it until I was finished, I could have donned a pair of heels. Because even alone and in private, I relish irony.

6. Some people feel like adults once they have kids, or buy a house or some such occasion. Me? I finally made it to adulthood because I have a professionally done something that isn’t a part of my body or taxes. I have a professionally landscaped yard.

7. I think I brought the wrong baby home from the hospital in 1994. The Beav showed me a list of classes he has to take over the next four years; the sports he wants to participate in and is already formulating an essay for his Air Force Academy application. I don’t remember ever being that focused on anything (aside from getting a date on a Friday night) and I sure as Hell know Ward wasn’t ever that driven to do anything but lark off.

8. Everyday I think about smoking. Everyday I say no.

9. I love McDonalds hamburgers. I let myself have one every few months. I eat it guiltily, too. Like I’m snorting cocaine or shooting heroin. I snarf it down alone and usually in my car. With such dysfunctional eating habits, I'm surprised I'm only 20 pounds over weight.

10. Last month, I dreamt I wrote a novel and was reading from the first chapter. I remember what the novel is about and the characters.

11. A few weeks ago I discovered I had Mean Girl tendencies when I was 17-18 This helps me understand them/us better. I was acting from a place of overwhelming insecurity and grief. I’m only now dealing with some of the grief that precipitated the behavior. Better late than never, right? But it still doesn’t mean I don’t want a redo on a few months of my life. If my kid treated someone the way I did, I would spank him.

12. My father wants to travel with a woman (a widow, old friend of the family) and asked my permission. I’m delighted he has someone to travel with and love how his eyes light up when he talks about her and their plans for Ireland.

13. We have state of the art music systems at home but I usually listen to the quiet when I’m home alone. I developed this habit after years of working in the noxiously noisy ICU.

I swear next week, I’ll have my continuing ed done, the articles due for my unit’s newsletter, and my certification study guides in place. Then I can write something aside from random lists and work on the scrapbooks. At least all this nursing as science stuff makes me realize how much I love my job.

* I stole the "Thursday Thirteen" from my friend at Alpha Heroes.