I’m never sure that I have any answers to life’s questions. I’ve lived a more than a few years now, and I keep finding things I have no answers for. A part of life, i guess, to be constantly looking for answers.

I hope to find them, I hope they can be found.

Growing up, I thought my father had all of the answers. To my young eyes, he appeared to be the best of everything. As I grew older, I realized my father had a lot of things that he could teach me, but there were things he didn’t know. His life experiences were not the same as mine, so he had no knowledge in same areas. I had to learn those things on my own.

As a father, I would assume my children thought at one point in time, I knew more than I actually did. As the grew, I’m sure that they found my life experiences not quite fitting the lives they followed. They needed to find their own answers.

I hope to give one more piece of advice. Unasked for? Maybe. Not needed? Perhaps. Good advice, ahh, that is up to you. It is advice for anyone who needs it. And actually it came from my Dad.
“When you are in a situation where you will be making a choice, it is best to stop and think before making the choice.” Maybe my Dad did know everything after all.

Another fun-filled weekend!  Friday,  I invited a trio of lovelies to take in Elizabeth’s elementary school’s production of Seussical, Jr.  It was a cute show and what A LOT of work!  THIRTY-FOUR songs and a group of 58 youngsters on stage the entire time.  I have no idea how much more is involved in the full-scale edition of the musical but I remember how daunting a task of a 21 song show was especially for the director.  For those of you who do not know, the musical combines the tales of Horton the Elephant who Heard a Who and Hatched the Egg.  Along with Horton, we were entertained by the Cat in the Hat, JoJo (the son of the Mayor of Whoville and his wife), Gertrude McFuzz, Mayzie LaBird, and other characters from the pages of Theodore Geisel.  I have found myself humming the signature piece from the show “Oh, the Thinks You Can Think” for the last few days.  Unfortunately, the youngest of my three companions did not make it through the entire 90 minute production.

Saturday night,  I was the leader at mass which went really well as celebrated the Second Week upon the journey to celebrating the Birth of Our Savior.

Following mass, I headed out to another fun-filled game night with an 80s flare.  I decided to wear my Indiana Jones t-shirt.  One of the other party-goers was REALLY creative and came as the White Cosby in slacks and colorful sweater.  He even brought a box of Jello Instant Chocolate Pudding (after his search for Jello Pudding Pops turned out to be fruitless).  While playing Life, we had The Goonies playing with no sound which somehow made it go quicker.  After Life, the 9 of us formed teams for a round of Trivial Pursuit 80s style while Christmas Vacation went on without sound.  About 1:30AM without a clear champion, the game broke up and I bid adieu since I had to be up in 5 1/2 hours for work.

A fun weekend filled with great friends!

After a fun weekend, I just found out that one of my very good friends is leaving to make a new home for herself Down Under.  It has been some time since I have seen Britt but I do think about her often.  We met when she was in junior high and sat from time to time with my cousin.  In high school, she worked at the grocery store and I came home on the weekend from school to work and we often were scheduled the same shift.  “Boo Boo” spent her senior year in Australia as an exchange student something she wanted to do since she was in elementary school but took her that long to make her dream a reality… ironically, she was among the first to welcome in the millennium.  While she was gone for the year, we wrote back and forth and I got to hear about her cool experiences… kangaroo hunting, going to the beach in January, and all the rest.

She is also a relative.  My uncle and her mother married several years ago.  Last summer, Britt returned to Australia and Lu went along for the ride.  Shortly after her return (or even before), Boo Boo decided that she wanted to move there!  WOW!  Talk about shooting for the stars and going after your dream!  Some others could learn from that example.

She is also a very staunch supporter of your truly!  One who saw me as Rooster as well as some beyond.  Teaching and coaching at a school in a city school a hour or so away kind of makes it difficult to make it to a lot of shows when you are in as many as you can.

Godspeed my friend.  You will be missed!

Last evening I was feeling a bit of insomnia invading my room, so I decided to try to finish a book that I blogged about some time ago.

Step one accomplished, I did finish around 3:00am. My view of the work itself changed very little. I can’t honestly say that it was a sleep problem cure, but it never captured my interest. So here you have it folks, my final thoughts on Timothy Frost’s “Final Passage”.

So in my humble opinion:

The book had enough plots and subplots for multiple books. it was busy. Because of this, the character development actually suffered. I never really cared what happened to any of the characters. I found that I didn’t like or dislike any of the characters. I was ambivalent. If they got in trouble, I wasn’t driven to find out if they made it through. In fact at one crucial point in the story I was thinking, “Just shoot them all, it doesn’t matter.” Any other character could have stepped in to finish the story.

The initial plot, brought forth in the prologue, didn’t seem to have any importance at the end. Oh, I do understand how it could have been important if revealed earlier, but too much other ‘stuff’ happened, and I no longer cared about that either.

I guess I won’t give this book the “Insomniac Relief Award” now, I can’t say that I would recommend it either. In some ways I feel a bit saddened by this. The prologue of the book grabbed my attention. I waded through many chapters in the hope that the book would turn back to that beginning. When it finally got back there, I no longer cared.

People who don’t pay much attention to baseball and the MLB, particularly the Chicago Cubs, might not realize who Ron Santo is or that he is gone.

Ron Santo, legendary Chicago Cubs supporter, has passed away at the age of 70.  Gaining popularity first as a player then as an outspoken sportscaster, Ron Santo became the voice and face of the Chicago Cubs in recent years.  Always saying what was on his mind, Santo’s gravelly voice was the easiest way to find that Cubs game on WGN radio 720 in a hurry.  As a Cubs fan, I will miss it.

Sadly, Ron Santo did not live to see himself inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, nor did he see his beloved Cubbies win the World Series.  If you’d like to read more about Ron Santo or about his crusade against juvenile diabetes, here is an article in the suburban Chicago newspaper, The Daily Herald.

Condolences and prayers to the Santo family.

Another holiday, come and gone…  seems like yesterday when I  told my husband that I would be on board to put up the Christmas decorations early.  Had we not done it then, they would be late now; how fast time flies.  Our Thanksgiving holiday was great, as always, and in this glorious season, I’m making sure to take the time to truly appreciate our blessings, thank God for everything, and to savor the family traditions  and memories we’ve been creating.

From the delicious spread on Thanksgiving Day (thank you to Hubby!) shared with great friends to the joyous ‘Welcome Santa!” parade we enjoy annually in our small town the day after Thanksgiving (though a tad bit nippy at the parade this year, but fun as ever!); with Black Friday bargains (Hubby took a few kids Black Friday shopping early in the morning this year while I slept in – always fun!) and a long, lazy vacation with the kids while they enjoy a break from school, our Thanksgiving weekend was happy, prayerful, relaxing, and full of traditions that I hope will last for years to come.

Hope your Thanksgiving was happy, safe, wondrous, and that you were able to have some time to relax and reflect upon your blessings…  may the rest of your 2010 holidays hold the same.

The holiday weekend was replete with joyous gatherings and happenings but two events seemed to have drawn a dark curtain upon its close.  One was the passing of one of my all-time favorite slap-stick comedy performers. Leslie Nielsen was known in his later days as a master of deadpan antics in such classic spoofs as Airplane! and the Naked Gun trilogy of movies.  However, did you know that he got his start as a serious actor mainly as guest spots on Golden Age television?  It was 1980s spoof of the airplane disaster movies of a decade earlier that put him into the comedy spotlight.  Shortly after that came the short-lived Police Squad! television series which led to the films.  Mr. Nielsen lost his life Sunday after complications from pneumonia.  He was 84.

Another event hit much closer to home.  Three young boys have been missing from their Morenci, Michigan home since Thursday. An Amber alert has been issued for young Andrew (9), Alexander (7), and Tanner ( 5 years old) Skelton.  They were last seen with their father who now is in a mental health facility undergoing treatment after an apparent suicide attempt.  The search led to the small town of Pioneer and the surrounding communities, a mere 25 miles from my own small town.  Very little is known at this point about the whereabouts of the youngsters.  I’m sure that any prayers offered up to the family of these three little ones would be more than appreciated.

Yes, something about Tangled, but no spoilers.

I was able to see the new movie Tangled with my youngest over the long Thanksgiving weekend. It was good little show. As with all Disney movies, it was a little be removed from the original story. A good family show that I recommend to all, but that is all I’m going say about it.

As I sit thinking back to this and other fairy tales, and I think back to the origin of these types of stories. They were all lessons to be learned. Morals for a good life. Things happened when you disobeyed. Hard times happened and the stories did not always have happy endings.

Now a funny thing happened when our society grew up, we no longer had the same needs. The endings of the stories were changed. Then we ended with “everyone lived happily ever after.” Not real life, but everything was cleansed for the children.

I remember reading the stories as a child, and of course these were the updated versions. As an adult, I remember finding some of the original stories. The endings weren’t as nice. People died. They were tortured. Life was not good and they didn’t live happily ever after.

Some original tales are here.

Production week essentially started the Thursday before Thanksgiving, as we had no rehearsal last Wed. and Thurs. for the obvious reason.  Well, we didn’t have Wed. rehearsals period due to the church being used that night.  I have to say that those rehearsals left me drained.  We were there until after 11, and with my sleep troubles and having to be up for work- well, let’s just say that I didn’t always maintain a good handle on my frustrations.  Not that there were any blowouts or even close to them, just periods of anti-social me.  The biggest struggles were moving sets around.  There is no stage crew, so we all chip in with moving set pieces and props around.  Between some scenes there are a lot of changes.

On to the topic, we opened this past Friday to a sold out crowd.  Saturday was sold out as well.  I should add that the small church only seats about 140, so it is actually not hard to sell out.  In fact, at least one more performance is completely sold out and a couple others have less than 10 seats available.  Not bad for a theatre in a church, eh?  So Friday night we performed after a two-night break and I had two spots where I messed up.  One minor, one not-so.  For some reason, there is a set of lines I constantly struggle with.  An excited Dr. Campbell runs out to George and excitedly informs him that the Building & Loan will keep going and that in fact there is a special treat for George (which he doesn’t think is so great, but that’s beside the point).  Well, with the excitement and my slow brain, I tend to fumble some of this.  Even after going over it in my head several times during the day.  Sigh.  The not-so-minor messup was me not making it out in time for the start of act II.  I don’t know what happened- I heard the one-minute call, but it just didn’t register.  I realized the problem when I heard the start of the scene and rushed up there.  Too late.  Well, my role was very minor with one line that wasn’t really necessary, so it wasn’t as bad as it could have been.  Still…

Fortunately the next night I did much better.  I don’t know if we as a whole did much better (the second act dragged Friday- we were told it lasted 15-minutes longer than it should have!) but I would be surprised if we didn’t.  Anyway, I don’t know if there will be a pickup rehearsal or not, we’ll see.  Otherwise, next performance is this Thursday.

By the way, you may have noticed I wrote “Dr. Campbell” above.  In addition to Mr. Gower I play three other roles (two others really- I combined a couple of them).  Mr. Partridge is the third.  His first name became Charlie, the fourth role.

Please, someone remind me to ask for this weekend OFF next year.  It may not have been a very exciting game for non-Buckeye fans, but I must say (from what I heard from the radio) it was OUTSTANDING! Running back a kickoff following a Michigan TD.  An interception.  Hearing that Nick Swisher was honored.  Wonder if his fellow Yankee, Captain Jeter (a Michigander… nobody’s perfect) was at the ‘shoe.  And the FINAL SCORE: OSU 37… UofM 7.  WOO HOOOO!!!!  It sounds like a tie for 1st place in the Big Ten which I believe gives Wisconsin the Rose Bowl berth… correct me if I am mistaken.  Next year will see the Big Ten decided playoff style; however, the tradition will continue for the Buckeyes and the team from the North.  GO BUCKS!

I must agree with several of my family members and co-conspiators! Michigan should KEEP RICH RODRIGUEZ as head coach!  7 in a row for Coach Tressel and his men  and 9-1 since the man in the sweater vest came to the helm.

O-H