Friday, June 13, 2008

Music, Walmart and Dust - Oh My!

I really enjoy music! I listen to AOL Satellite radio at work - switching between country, oldies and lite rock, depending on my mood! And if I hear a song I want to put on a CD, I have a special tablet that I write down the name of the song and the artist - once I get around 15 or 20 songs, it's time to download them on a CD.

I never used to be able to download music - up until the last couple of years, I would give my list to Jessi and she would download the tunes from Itunes and present me with a wonderful CD for my birthday or Mother's Day with all these great songs! But I decided a few months ago, that I would tackle the computer and try to download myself. AND I DID! I downloaded Itunes and with Jessi on the phone, she walked me through how to FIND songs and order them! It really wasn't hard at all and then I decided to put a lot of my other CD's right on the computer so I have music while I scrapbook! I'm excited that I have figured out just a little bit of this computer technology that I'm really not very good at!

Just this week, I received a very special CD from a long-distance friend, Helen. Helen just recently married in San Antonio and although I was unable to attend the wedding, I do have plans to fly down and see her sometime this year! The CD was a collection of a few of the songs played at the wedding and it's a romantic, easylistening CD - thanks Helen!

Helen and I go back a LONG ways! We became friends through the Lutheran Church in Missouri Valley, Iowa. And the reason we became friends was our passion for music - Helen and I both played the guitar - she was MUCH, MUCH better than I was but we loved playing together. Soon we were doing Easter services, the Chicago Folk Service, and my all-time favorite, Christmas Eve services. We would sing and play together and just have the greatest time, enjoying each other and our music.

Helen is soft-spoken, compassionate and just a joy to be around. Although we haven't seen each other in many years, we communicate at Christmas time and I always look forward to hearing from her. I know she has continued to play her guitar and has even taken lessons, while my guitar has been in its case for years now! I'm looking forward to seeing her and meeting her new husband, Joey.

I walked Walmart yesterday on my lunch hour - usually I do the driving cart as the store is large - but I decided to tackle walking. It took me all of lunch hour to get my shopping done but it was fun and I did OK, just much slower than I'm used to. I walk VERY fast when I shop - if Glenn is with me, he is still walking in the door and I'm usually 1/2 way across the store - I'm just a fast shopper! But I found some cute things including some solar lights for outside our home, a caddy full of red -handled silverware and some wild sheets to put on the massage table when I have my massages! It's always fun to find a bargain!

And after work yesterday when I went grocery shopping, I bought 4 of the canvas bags to pack your groceries in and to bring back each time! Jaime had suggested I do this a while back but I was waiting for the bags to go on sale and at $1.00 a bag, it was time to do it! I was amazed HOW many groceries fit into those bags and how NICE they were to carry to the car vs. those plastic bags! I felt very "go green" as I unpacked those bags last night and put them back in my car for the next shopping trip!

They chip and sealed the highway that I drive to work on. Talk about dust! And I learned something I didn't know about chip and seal - I always thought they put the gravel type stuff down FIRST and put the tar on top - wrong - they put the tar down first and THEN the gravel! So I've been driving on the gravel the past couple of days (hoping it will SOON get pressed into the tar) and driving as far on the shoulder as I can, due to the idiots driving as fast as they can and spraying rocks everywhere, including MY windshield! SO far I have dodged the flying rocks!

And just for an update - I have found a WONDERFUL place to get my coffee on Friday mornings - it's in Divide, right on my way to work and they make great coffee, just the way I like it. What more could I want on a Friday morning -special coffee and wonderful smelling lilacs on my desk!

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