Sunburns

I get sunburned a lot.  And almost every time I get a sunburn it turns a very bright red.  Fortunately, I don't really mind sunburns, they tend to amuse me.  The more red, hot, and even swollen they are, the more amusing I find them (which is good, because those are the particularly painful ones).  I will often get cold in the evenings of days where I have gotten a sunburn (not sure why, feel free to speculate), but instead of getting a sweater, I'll just try to curl around, or hug, the sunburned area.  It works, kind of.

Sunburns also seem to work well for me as conversational topics.  I once went to a dance after getting a sunburn (actually, this happens about once a year.  Or more), and people would skip the hellos and just shoot straight into "Wow, you're sunburned."  I've had people interrupt me to inform me that I got quite the sunburn today (this was a family member, at dinner.  One would think they would be used to it by now).

I really want a shirt (I'm thinking bright red) that says "Yes, I'm sunburned."  But it sounds too snarky, so I doubt I'll ever make one.

I guess it isn't too much of a problem for people to tell me that I'm sunburned, cause I always forget.  Sadly, the reminders never come right when I need them, which is when something itches, so I scratch it, and then realize that my skin is terribly damaged in that area, and I just wounded it even more deeply.

I suppose I could  wear sunscreen, like a normal, intelligent person, but as noted in my hike post, sunscreen doesn't always work for me.

Confidant, 5.28.13

I’ll never argue to your face

I’ll never tell you that you’re wrong

But when you leave in shattered grace

I’ll think of you the whole night long

My heart is heavy in my silence

And oh, how I long to speak

If you’d give me just one chance

I’d finally tell you how it feels

To be the only one that listens

To be the only one that cares

When you turn from me completed

I’m the one that still is here.

The Hike

I celebrated Memorial Day by going on a 20 mile "hike" along various roads in Rolla.  This was Fine Linen's  6th annual post-production hike, which I think is a really cool tradition, and this is the first time I've been able to go on the whole thing.

The first 10 miles went pretty well.  Rests were welcome, and occasionally the spray painted mile markers were a little farther apart than seemed right as a walker, but I was fully enjoying it.  At mile 10 we took a pleasant break for snacks and restrooms, as we still had three more miles until lunch.  Those three miles went well, except for the horrid hill right before the house where we stopped.  I had feelings of anger towards that hill.

At lunch I considered (and pushed aside) thoughts of calling it quits.  The bridge of my left foot was hurting.  The best way to describe it was that it felt like I did not have enough cartilage to cushion the joint between two of my bones.  I reasoned within myself that I was not likely to do any permanent damage, so I may as well walk on it.

The next 7 miles to the finish line are a pretty good testimony to my pride and stubbornness.  I wanted bragging rights after this, and 13 miles (or 16... or 17... etc) just wouldn't have cut it.  It needed to be the full 20 miles (and a little bit more, but not quite certain if it was a full 1/2 mile farther than 20). 

I learned a few things on this trip, though some of them I "knew", just not from personal experience:

• 20 miles is a long way
• The left side of my body is weaker than my right side
• I can still get a sunburn on my face even if I have sunscreen on and am wearing a ball cap
• It is still possible to run/jog after walking 20 miles, and in a weird sense, it even feels good
• Bobby pins are indeed how females mark their territory, as I found some in my backpack from college (that had gone in to storage a while ago, and that I had "thoroughly" emptied out)
• Hocker Gas closes sometime before 9 p.m.  Or else they don't even open on Memorial Day.  That hadn't even occurred to me until now.

 I want to make it clear that at no point did I stop enjoying it, it just turned into a painful enjoyment after a while.  I was always surrounded by nice, fun people, and had a caring, helpful, and upbeat hiking buddy (Jeni Steele is always fun to be around, but I could especially appreciate her cheerfulness at mile 20).  My knowledge of the words to "What Makes You Beautiful" came in useful as we sang that towards the end (much to the chagrin of the gentlemen in front of us).

At dinner and afterwards, I was in enough pain that I decided to leave a bit early.  Considering the fact that two people offered me painkillers (one because I was limping, the other was because I was swaying back and forth in my chair as I was sitting), that was probably a decision that everyone else could understand.  I was pleasantly surprised that my soreness did not keep me awake at all that night.

Yesterday, my muscles were still rather mad at me, every time I moved they responded something like this: "WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?  YOU DESERVE ALL OF THIS!  I WILL NEVER SPEAK TO YOU IN A NORMAL VOICE AGAIN!"

Today has been a bit more reasonable.  It has gone down to the level of, "Hey, you had a lot of exercise on Monday.  I just wanted to remind you that maybe you should STAY IN SHAPE!  Have a nice day."

I'm eagerly looking forward to next year's hike...

Wild Edibles

I get Fridays off of work, something for which I am extremely grateful.  A couple months ago, Tracy asked me if I could come over Friday afternoons and teach some sort of lesson or do some sort of activity with the boys.  A few weeks in I decided to go outside and identify various plants for them.

This worked pretty well, despite the fact that I had forgotten my wildflower book, and that there was one flower which I was almost sure was Henbit, but not sure enough to impress it upon young minds (it was).  To make up for it, I brought my wildflower book, our wild edible book, and our bird book to our next meeting.

Now, every time I go over Edmund will have new flowers to show me.  "Did you bring the flower book?"  Last week I visited with them for a little while, and we saw some field sorrel (or wood sorrel, not entirely sure on the difference), so I told Edmund it was edible.  When I came over on Friday I again told them it was edible, and we all ate some.  I also showed them clover, telling them that it is edible too.

After I taught the 6 year-old, the 4 year-old and the 3 year-old that these flowers were edible, I realized my mistake.  Jack (Jeremiah) started picking every yellow flower in sight saying, "I tan eat dis.  I tan eat dis," and popping them in his mouth.  I then told him, in a very serious voice that he should only eat plants outside if he asks someone if they are fine.  After all, some plants can hurt you.

He then went on picking every yellow flower and eating them, changing his chant to, "Dis not hurt me. Dis not hurt me.  Dis not hurt me."

I'm very glad that the only yellow flowers in that area were clover and field sorrel.

I'm also very glad that Jeremiah is still alive.

Too Much Sunlight, 5.7.13

It hurts my eyes

It hurts my head

It makes me want to

Lie down dead

I always forget

All that I said

Or anything important

That I’ve read

Too much sunlight

Is what I dread

Billboards

While on our trip out to Georgia I was constantly drafting blog posts in my mind.  Pretty much anytime I was thinking through something, I was wording it how I would for a blog post.  It seems to be getting into my head.

That being said, I don't really have anything to write about at the moment.  Oh, except for a billboard I saw in Georgia.  But before I tell you what the billboard said, I need to prepare your thinking.

First of all, let's say I treat a group of kids with ice cream cones.  Or ice cream sandwiches, you choose.

But then someone tells me that ice cream cones aren't healthy, so they treat most of the kids with balloons.

And now the billboard: "We treat the most kids with broken bones in the state of Georgia."

Let's just say it hit me wrong.  And I hope my little exercise ensured that it hit you wrong too.  If it didn't, I apologize to you for trying to make you take a perfectly grammatically correct statement (as far as I can tell) incorrectly.  It isn't their fault I assume the worst.

Goodnight folks.

I seem to have acquired a "life" (of the social kind)

I've been pretty busy recently.  At least on weekends.  I've had a luggage bag in my room for four weeks now, having used it for three weekends in the last four (I'm already talking about this upcoming weekend as something in the past.  You'll have to bear with me on that, cause that's how I've been thinking about it.)

The busyness started with a wedding in Texas.  Kimberly and I drove down on Wednesday the 10th, and we got home on Saturday the 13th.  The next weekend was tolerably free: only Saturday was booked with two soccer games and a dance in Rolla.

Then I did something all by my lonesome.  Doesn't happen often, folks, even though I am an adult.  I went to a craft weekend from Thursday to Sunday.  It was crazy.  And fun.  I think I'll take pictures of everything I made and make another blog post about it. I'll give you my thoughts on crafters, Hobby Lobby, and soldering.

Tomorrow, we are off to Georgia for my cousin's wedding, and we will be staying out there until sometime next week (Wednesday or Thursday).  By "we" I mean Mom, Pop, Justice, Kimberly and myself.  Ellie is staying home, and Jaired and company didn't want to take such a long haul with a wee one.

This weekend will make the second weekend in a row that I haven't seen Ellie.  It's really weird.  The last time we were apart for this long was last May when she went to Montana, and before that, probably never.  It falls under the category of "strange and unusual". Last weekend it fully sank in how long it would be, and that's when I realized something very important:  Most people my age don't get to see their family, their whole family, every single weekend.  Kimberly and Ellie both have jobs where they live away from home, but they always come back.  We usually have a big family dinner with Jaired, Tracy and family at some point over a weekend as well.  I am extremely blessed.

Anyway, I should have been packing instead of writing this.  Or sleeping.  Or something other than writing this.