Start of the breakdown

First things first, I've completely stolen part of Blue Meany's disclaimer and am posting it here in this entry. If someone out there knows how to get it into my header (like Blue Meany), I'd greatly appreciate it.

If I know you personally and haven't invited you here -- well, there's a reason for that, so kindly go on back to whichever part of my life you belong in. Trust me, this is for your own good.

Now, back to your regularly schedule program.

I'm very excited. I leave Thursday for Edmonton. If you haven't looked at a map of Canada before to figure out where Edmonton is exactly, let me just say this: it's REALLY far north. You can try this, but I've found that links to mapquest's maps rarely work, so just go to mapquest, type in Edmonton, AB and then zoom out a bit. The good news is that yahoo weather is telling me that it's going to be 88F & 89F this Friday and Saturday. That won't make HRH happy, but considering that for last year's race, the weather was in the 50s and raining, I'll take high 80s. Freezing to death and being wet at the same time at the race track is so not fun. I've done it and trust me, I prefer sweating to death. But I'm crazy that way.

I had an absolutely insanely busy weekend, which started off with me being exhausted and just got worse from there. As Pamela said on Friday, "I can sleep when I'm dead." And at this rate, I might be upping the ante. The Concert of Colors was very cool. The sad part was that it was FREE, and there were not that many people there. Sure, there were quite a few people, but considering it was FREE!!! The DSO played a piece by De Falla, Danzon #1 by Marquez (Mexican composer) and the Ginastera piece that sent me over the moon last year when Maestro Jarvi played it as an encore. After a brief intermission, the DSO joined with Poncho Sanchez (apparently a well-known Latin Jazz conguero – means he plays the congas) and performed a bunch of songs. I'm not really much for instrumental jazz, but the stuff with the DSO was very cool. The songs he and his band did by themselves were cool, but I have issues with long-ass single instrument instrumental, if you know what I mean. I honestly don't need to hear the trombonist do his thing for five minutes. I prefer to hear all the instruments at the same time. Still, I would have to say it was very cool. We also caught about 15 minutes of Big Chief Monk Boudreaux from New Orleans and they were very fun. I wouldn't have mind catching their whole show, but they were playing at the same time as the DSO.

Saturday I caught up on the Tour de France (half-assedly watching Saturday's stage) before napping for 30 minutes before going to The Nephew's Graduation Party. It was only 90+F, so it was perfect for an outdoor open house get together. The OS, of course, had nothing vegetarian of any sort of substance or nutritional value (cole slaw and potato wedges and fruit salad) She had a pasta/mostaccioli dish with a red sauce and cheese, but when I looked closely, I saw that it was a meat sauce. They also had chicken, so there was no reason to include the meat sauce on the pasta, except that that would mean encouraging me in my silly little vegetarianism. Honestly, it's been over 20 years, at some point, do you think they could accept it and even possibly think about it and consider having food for me? I'm constantly being told to bring my own food to family functions which ceases to amuse after a while. Nobody else has to bring their own food! Is it that hard to pick up a package of Boca burgers when you're buying the hamburger for BBQs? Apparently it is.

Oh, sorry, this wasn't supposed to be a rant entry! After the graduation party, I went home to take a nap, as I was going to see The Muppet Movie at midnight. Jason had mentioned it in his blog last week and I got a bee in my bonnet about it. I wanted to see it on the big screen! I had mentioned it to Martha, Pamela and Pamela's friend Monty and they all sounded fairly up for it, although Martha was unsure about the whole midnight start time. I ended up going with The Libertarian and a friend of his. Pamela is fighting a cold and decided to go to bed at a decent hour instead of hacking and coughing her way through a movie, and Martha never called me back (which she regretted on Monday when I talked to her). Neither The Libertarian or his friend had ever seen The Muppet Movie before! How does that happen??? I've seen it so many times it's not even funny. Some people have lived such deprived lives. The miracle of the night was that I stayed awake for the whole thing!!!!

Sunday was hotter than the hubs of Hell, so, of course, I was sitting at the ol' ballpark in left field with not a smidgeon of shade anywhere to be seen watching the Tigers lose to the Royals. I had a feeling since they had won the previous three games in the series and Leyland was resting our three big hitters, that they were going to lose, but still. I'm a firm believer in the saying, "You can't win 'em all" but when I'm sweating to beat the band, it would help if they could win. Todd Jones is my new favorite Tiger (Sorry, My Brandon), as he brought out the hose and sprayed those of us sitting right behind the bullpen with water. He did it twice and I have to say, "Mr. Jones, it was GREATLY APPRECIATED! You rock!" The second time he was just spraying the shirtless kids standing right in front of him and those of us behind were not getting any of the residual spray, so I stood up and yelled his name, he looked straight at me and then turned the hose in my direction. I was quite wet, but it was worth it. And of course, it was so damn hot out there that I was completely dry within 30 minutes. I'm not sure how The Libertarian felt about Sporting Event Kathleen as at one point, he looked at me and said, "I thought you were shy and quiet." LOL! You've known me for five years and you're just figuring out I'm not shy and quiet? I will admit that I do have my shy moments, usually around new people, but quiet? Ha ha, only when I'm being shy! He lived through the second baseball game of his life, and he did say that I'm his favorite person to go to games with - over the two guys from college with whom he went to his first game years ago. Damning with faint praise?

I made my fat butt go to the gym yesterday where I did another hour on the elliptical machine but this time the program was trail blazer which is more difficult than Forest Walk. And I'm planning on going again today before heading to the baseball game. At least I'm trying. I might not be accomplishing anything, but at least no one can say that I'm not trying.

Today is my third baseball game in six days. I'm going with some co-workers. It should be quite exciting as we are playing the White Sox who are 4.5 games back on us for the Central Division. Nate Robertson is pitching and I'm very excited about that! I tried to buy Major League Chew last night for us, as Nate started the whole Gum Time which is kind of the Tigers answer to the rally monkey, but stupid CVS didn't have any. I hope Dentyne Fire works as well!

And there you have the excitement that is my life! Hope I had you on the edge of your seat!