The lengths to which he will go

His love knows no limits.

He would climb any mountain, sail across a stormy sea, if that’s what it takes him, baby…

or he would travel to San Antonio just to bring me these:

He probably didn’t go there just to bring me back a bag of chips, but his sexy factor sure did increase several points by handing these to me when I picked him up from the airport.

Julio’s Chips are a legend in their own time. Lula has mentioned foodgasms (you know, food and …. well, you get it) and other bloggers have expressed their love for the seasoned corn chip. It wasn’t until early this year, though, that I got a taste for myself.

The Krazy Fam invited us over for dinner and somehow the topic turned to Julio’s. Out came a bag, never opened. I got to taste a fresh Julio’s chip. G had to slap my hand and snatch the bag away because I was shoveling the chips into my mouth with both hands. It was ugly.

Now I have a bag of my very own. I’ve been guarding them like a mama alligator protects her pod–biting and suffocating and drowning and all. I’m trying to be a little more decorous this go around, and so I only use one hand to shovel them into my pie hole.

P.S. And to think, I actually lived in San Angelo where Julio got his start and didn’t know about the golden goodness. To my credit, I lived there around the time he was getting his feet wet so word had not quite spread. Still, shame on me.

Stereotyping

My husband and I were in church this past Sunday and I realized something that’s so obvious it’s just known, but seldom talked about:

It is obvious which hand was female and which was male. (And these aren’t the notes from church. I wasn’t dreaming about my herb garden in the middle of a sermon.)

We’re all taught how to write in manuscript and cursive in basically the same format. Teachers do not intentionally set out teaching girls bigger, more rounded letters, nor do they teach boys chicken scratch (sorry to whomever was the male writer of the above note…). Somewhere along the journey boys and girls tend to start writing in distinctly male and female ways. Of course there will be exceptions. It’s fascinating to me and I wonder if it’s more of a case of nurture or nature? Or a mix?

If you were to actually care about the differences in boy and girl handwriting…what do you think?

Gargoyle Love

I have a fascination with gargoyles and generally any kind of human, animal or creature carved into stone, wood, you name it. This started when we lived in Germany. In Europe there is at least one insanely old church or castle in every city. So there are animal and human faces all over the place. I find it somehow comforting and human to know that people, even in the middle ages, had senses of humor that mirror mine. Because, without a doubt, had someone given me the charge of coming up with creative ways to hide drain spouts you better believe there would have been some humor and mischief involved in getting the job done.

My favorite is the bottom picture. Not to be outdone is the bottom picture of this next set:

I was very excited to read in the WaPo’s Sunday magazine today this article: That’s grotesque! on all the gargoyles and “grotesques” carved all over the National Cathedral! Who knew?! There’s even a Darth Vader grotesque.*

If the temps weren’t up into the fry-an-egg-on-the-sidewalk-hot range I’d be there tomorrow searching for as many of the 1,242 that I could find.

P.S. All of these pictures were taken in Amboise at the château except for the little black shutter holder (he lives across the street from the château) and the art deco bug who lives on the other side of town.

*I didn’t even know what a “grotesque” was before the WaPo article. And there is a difference between grotesques and gargoyles. The article spells it out.

Running partners

Believe it or not I’m running again. I’m even training for a race. 10K, it’s a start. In fact, it may be the longest distance I race. I’ve been training for several months now and I’ve seen some interesting things just running through my humble neighborhood.

Take for instance, Thing 1 and Thing 2:

See, I was running so fast the black squirrel picture is fuzzy. I had never seen anything but grey squirrels before moving to DC. We’re very inclusive in the nation’s capital. I’m all about reducing the squirrel population around here, but these guys are kinda cute–and there’s only one white one and several black ones in the neighborhood.

Things you may see or hear during a Daddy Date

  • A daddy running down the street to catch the bus with a kid in his arms and a kid desperately trying to keep up.
  • The running kid swooning into the street like she can’t make it (said in 8-year old, whiny voice), so much so that the bus actually slows down so as not to run over her.
  • The bus following the little, running family at 1 mph for half a block in fear of a swooning kid darting out in front of it.
  • The kid carried in the arms complaining, “whoo, my legs hurt!”
  • A daddy’s shirt becoming a napkin as his daughter conveniently uses his shoulder to clear her face of PB&J.
  • Two little girls happily dancing in the aisles of the restaurant to the jukebox music.
  • A conversation that went something like this:

Daddy: Where were Abraham and Sarah headed after God called on them?
3-year old: I know, I know! Fantasy in Lights!*
Daddy: Um, no. Not quite.

  • Little girls playing in the fountain and one of them coming up to the daddy saying, “Look! I made 53¢!”
  • A little 3-year old seeing many cars parked along the road and exclaiming, “we should drive someone else’s car!”
  • The daddy explaining to the little deviants what a jail is and who goes there.
  • A policewoman flashing her red and blue lights at the daddy and chastising him for not being close enough to his little deviants while they were climbing all over a bench.**
  • The daddy biting his tongue so he didn’t show his little girls first hand what jail is.
  • Little girls petting dogs for going on five minutes and having to be physically dragged away by the daddy.
  • Little girls stopping to smell the flowers.
  • Little girls stopping to watch the ants.
  • Little girls stopping to check out every. single. utility post in the yards.
  • Little girls waving at all the cars driving on the racetrack, which is what the littlest calls I-395.


*Fantasy in Lights is nowhere near the Promised Land. It’s a Christmas light festival in Callaway Gardens, Georgia. Abraham and Sarah would have been amazed although thoroughly confused, having come before Jesus in history.

**No little children were harmed during the making of this Daddy Date. In fact, the daddy wasn’t even 25′ away from his children when they were climbing on the bench. This daddy and mommy try not to be helicopter parents.

The Eiffel Tower

For you, Nicole 🙂

I haven’t forgotten about the blog, no matter how hard I try! I can’t believe how little time I find these days to blog down my thoughts. It’s not that I’m not having them…

We (mostly me, I freely admit) took over 1,000 pictures in Europe. I am thoroughly overwhelmed with that now. I did take the whole final match of the World Cup Soccer playoffs (which was completely boring and worth not paying attention to) to make the collage above. How am I supposed to get any editing and photobooking done if it takes so long to make one group of pictures!?

Here’s one more:

This is the castle in Amboise, the city in France where we spent most of our time. We’d go back and spend more time there in a heartbeat.

More to come!