Memorial Day

Today, Marty rode the 50K route for the Tour de Cure. The Tour happens in two weeks, and he is trying to decide which route to ride that day. (He rode the 25K route on Saturday.) Here he is all decked out in his riding gear, with his bike.

Thank you so much to everyone who has contributed to our Tour de Cure fundraising activities. If anyone else would like to help our team raise money for diabetes research and care, please visit my Tour de Cure webpage.

The rest of the family has been a little less active today...

Spring at last!

I meant to post these pictures a week ago, but better late than never. They're from the Airline Trail. Click on any of them to see the larger version.



Yes, it's finally spring out there. This week we had a lot of wind, rain, and chilly weather, but yesterday was a beautiful, sunny day, and it looks like today is going to be at least as nice. Yesterday morning, Marty rode his bike all around Middletown, training for the American Diabetes Association's Tour de Cure, which is in a couple of weeks. He tried out the 25K route yesterday, and tomorrow he is planning to ride the 50K route.



Ziggy appears to be enjoying the sunshine too, lying around in the windows and watching the birds outside at the birdfeeder. We have all kinds of visitors now -- cardinals, bluejays, doves, chickadees, woodpeckers, sparrows, mockingbirds, and many others that I don't recognize. I should get a bird identification book.



Today I have lunch plans with Amanda, and it will be nice to see each other again and catch up. Also, I am hoping for some advice on the web site I'm developing for my chorus. It has been a very long time since I started a new web page. As far as design goes, I am still hanging out back in 1997.



Enjoy the weekend, everyone!

Weekend Wrapup

Doesn't that look inviting? Marty and I thought so. Yesterday we spent two hours on the Airline Trail -- he rode his bike 20 miles and I walked about 3 miles. The weather finally felt like spring. I have a bunch of pictures that I'll try to post in the next few days.

The rest of the weekend was spent on household chores and getting together with our neighbors. And then, today we went to see the new Star Wars movie. I saw the first one in 1977 when I was eight years old, at the movie theater with my uncle and aunt. It seemed so scary and grown-up to me then. It was really neat today when Darth Vader drew his first breath, the same sound I'd heard for the first time all those years ago. We've been nitpicking all day since we saw it, but we both enjoyed it.

Tonight, we watched the original Star Wars again. I'm telling you, it's a vicious circle.

Stay tuned for more pictures of the Airline Trail. Including menacing feathered friends!

Geese in Springtime

I hear geese honking outside. In the middle of the night. Do they fly all night long? Why aren't they as tired as I am?

"I just flew in from Connecticut, and boy, are my arms tired!"

This has been a week of very early mornings -- and it's only Monday. But the early rising started a week ago (and continued through the weekend). Tomorrow I don't have to get up until 6:20, and that practically feels like "sleeping in" to me right now.

I hear snores coming from the bedroom, of both the human and the feline variety. I think that means it's time for me to go and join in as well.

Good night, geese.

An even dozen.

An even dozen.



In celebration of twelve years of fun and adventure. Thank you, sweetie!

After the Contest

We had a wonderful weekend at the regional competition. On Friday, our director's quartet won the regional quartet competition. Now they will go on to represent Region 1 at the international competition in New Orleans this October. I can't wait to go and cheer them on.

Yesterday, my chorus got our chance to show how hard we've been working. Our score of 578 was 33 points over last year's, and we came in fourth overall out of 18 competing choruses. We were second in our size category, by only four points.

When you consider that last year this chorus was the "most improved" chorus, gaining thirty points over the year before, we have come a very long way in a short time. We were overjoyed with our performance, our score, and our feedback from the audience and the judges. Not to mention our medals!

The best feeling of all was being onstage, in front of the lights and the crowd, doing our thing. Our ballad was a big hit with the audience and we got many compliments on it afterwards. Hearing the audience's response to our fun choreography in the up-tune made us want to give even more.

We left it all on the stage yesterday, and we are very happy and proud today (if a little hung over), for all that we've accomplished together. It's the most wonderful feeling, to share such fun and accomplishment with your friends and your sisters in sequins.

And false eyelashes, too!

Off to Springfield

Off to Springfield

I am headed out to Springfield, Massachusetts, in just a little while. This weekend is my chorus's regional competition. We are excited and hopeful!

The competition starts today with the quartets from our region, and the chorus competition is tomorrow. We compete ninth (out of 18), so we will be onstage at Symphony Hall tomorrow around 1pm.

Here's a picture from our dress rehearsal on Wednesday. Sorry it's a little blurry! But you can see from it how sparkly we are.


Click to enlarge.

Perching

This is a little blurry, but I had to take it out the screen door or it wouldn't have been taken at all! I hope you can see the pretty red cardinal that has been eating from my bird feeder. There's also been a blue jay, some sparrows, and two cute little fat birds (I don't know what they are) that are my favorites. But the cardinal is my second favorite. He's so pretty! Even his bill is bright red.

I have been suffering from a nasty cold for the last week, hence my extreme lack of updates. It's kind of strange, because I went all winter without catching anything! I guess I was way overdue. I am still getting over it now.

In other health news, Ziggy went to the doctor last week for some shots, and we learned that his weight is back up to 12 pounds! That's nearly at his normal adult weight again (12.5), and way up from the 9.5 pounds he was last fall. His thyroid number is still very low (but not too low) and he really seems back to his old self again. I am so glad we had the radiation treatment done. He will be 13 years old this summer.

Check out his latest perch:


Click to enlarge.