Ghetto->Fabulous

Sorry I missed writing yesterday. I had a great trend going...for two days. Tuesday evening, clm did come to yoga which included some innovative morphed Sun Salutations. Afterward, I waited for the bus with her......and ncd came to pick me up. He and I went to atr + tlh's house. ncd made pesto chicken pasta and some fruit & cake concoction for dinner. He and atr watched finals basketball; trisha and I sat on the porch. Trisha listened to my lunatic ravings about work. The only thing worse than living it, I'm quite sure, is listening to me hold forth on the subject for FIVE years (trisha is very VERY patient...and looking forward to my career change, I'm sure). Trisha shared her wisdom on a variety of management fronts and we enjoyed her porch-top pot garden and candles. We also enjoyed Sophie Cat's bug-pouncing and screen-climbing (trisha not so much on the screen-climbing front).

On Wednesday the morning happened and then I went to mail some books to a mysterious book buyback internet place. They are paying me approximately four cents for my books, but that's fine because they are also paying postage for me to send my books away (which is all I really want). I realized that the walk to the post office and back was not nearly going to fill my lunch hour so I continued to walk. I walked west, then north on Montreal to the fabulously tall walking bridge, then up and over:

I wound around through a park next to the golf course where I saw signs for an emergency facewash station (what a relief! One never knows when one might get sprayed in the face by a wayward can of Coke or maybe some bear spray.)

When I wound around into a nearby neighborhood and began heading back in the general direction of the office I discovered streets with the same names as the ones in the neighborhood where I work. Only in this area the houses are manses, the lawns are immense and immaculate, and the shady boulevards indicate that the Eleanor St. here is perhaps in another dimension from our Eleanor, near which someone's car was stolen out of a liquor store recently...with their 5-year-old daughter in it (not harmed). Once I found my way back to the office, I realized that this lush, plush neighborhood is the bluff I gaze at from the office window. However, when I look at them, I'm always imagining prehistory: dinosaurs roving the bluffs and floodplain of the Mississippi (or "RAAAAR" as it was known to them).

Then: "RAAAR! I, T-Rex, have mated with a river otter to start a NEW RACE!"

and Now: This house.

Sassafras

I hope that my communications today are identified as "sassafras" instead of crabby, but I guess that is in the ears of the listener because truly, I was quite respectful while also being assertively truthful (unlike last week, when I repeatedly wished that my brain could beef up the myelination to speed the "SHUT UP" command). Today I was just defending the honor the finest dental staff in Saint Paul so I figure that justifies a little sassafras.

Last night after work I walked up the street to meet ncd in downtown Saint Paul. He rode his bike from Minneapolis and beat me by quite a lot. I conversed with my friend jrn on the way in. She's finishing the school year in a Catholic elementary school in CA and has to write 35 report cards by the end of the week and move to a new room for her new job as Reading Specialist next year. Good to hear she's found a way to fill her spare time now that her 8 zillion graduate classes are over for the summer.

Nate and I walked past these GIANT WRENCHES (above, not at right) on W 7th, through downtown, over the bridge, past the Wabasha Street caves, to Boca Chica where we ate delicious dinner with "McParty" who was up from Iowa to pick up her wedding dress, and some other fab friends (at right).

Nothing much to report from this morning. Here's a shot of the first bus I ride in the morning pulling up. I'm pleased that the 53 (1st bus) and the 54 (bus I ride after I get off the light rail) have been upgraded to swanky double buses. I explain the upgrade to myself by citing record ridership, though I suppose I have no definitive evidence. This morning a man sat down next to me and had a conversation with himself about the length of the stop, muttering about the time and glancing at his watch. I studiously ignored him since he did not solicit seat partner participation and continued to read the paper. I was surprised by what a normal grandpa-type he was when I got off the bus at the light rail and had a chance to look at him. I often have difficulty suppressing my inner monologue, and I suppose once I look grandmotherly, perhaps I'll have just ceased trying.

jkd, RDA kidnapped me for Chipotle lunch today which was (literally) just what the dental assistant ordered. No pictures of that--shame!

Nothing much happened after lunch. Dr. Phillippi called. He is on a cross-country bike extravaganza. He has already survived a shoulder injury which necessitated riding a bus across the western part of Virginia and Kentucky, and he just recovered from an ear infection to get back on the road this weekend. He had his first tent sleep last night and awoke refreshed this morning to bike across the Kansas state line. He's staying in Pittsburgh tonight and unfortunately will continue across the southern part of Kansas and therefore will not see BAK bikers...right? Too bad. He is a social being and he could use an audience for his endless supply of jokes...or just the sight of other people, it sounds like.

Dental Office Basement Yoga (DOBY) tonight. I should see if Ceara's gonna show up. She performed many a midweek Sun Salutation this week so I hope she does.

Who skips May?

Pretty much everyblog apparently. Yeah, I'm just saying that to make myself feel better. Time to jump right in. Ceara rode to work with me this morning to get her dry socket checked. One of our doctors did clm a favor by taking on her4 impacted wizzies instead of referring her to an oral surgeon. He did a great job--I don't know why he doesn't do that kind of work more often...unless it is because in involved 2 hours and gruesome words synonymous with "extract"(see wrench, pry, etc).

On the whole it was a slow and repetitive morning, but I was on hold with an insurance company midmorning listening to the smoov jazz when the weekly floral arrangement arrived. Definitely the high point of my morning!

Held out until 2pm for lunch and walked up to Grand Avenue to deposit a check. I love being out seeing things! Over the weekend, Nate and I went for a bike ride and saw a gigantic piece of the 35W Mississippi Bridge being transported from the Big Cement Segment Corral down to the bridge a couple of blocks away. This piece must have been 20 feet tall, strapped a truck with a bunch of wheels (for all the good that strapping might do). Construction workers had laid out steel plates along the route (covering potholes, I assume?) and the truck just crept along. We rode right through its shadow--way cool. But I digress.

On my walk today I saw an array of smaller delights including:

A gazebo added on to a house attached by an exterior hallway. It was geometric like a gazebo, but not white. It was a humble midwestern blend of 3-season porch and gazebo.

Several ship-shape duplexes.

This aftermath from the weekend thunderstorms

And this crazy cat sitting outside a cluster of houses at the base of this steep hill across the street from the railroad tracks. The grass all around the house was hip height and out of the corner I caught the cat's yellow eye fixed on me. He posed for more than one picture (my un-zoom button is broken off so I have to push a fingernail in to the hole to get things in the frame sometimes) and was supremely unconcerned. I almost felt that he might be the sole occupant of the home.

The reason the blog was out of business is that I left my camera at Lump and Amanda's house when we went for a delicious Chinese dinner. I stole Ceara's camera to satisfy my need to record mundane details on a tiny digital card, but she lost the cord to get the pictures OUT of the camera and until the quality of writing on this blog improves substantially, it is really not fair to expect you to read posts without pictures! Here is a shot of Ceara and Nate walking to the previously mentioned downstairs neighbor's 60th birthday party which included a view of Lake Calhoun, champagne, custom cupcakes, and an interesting conversation with Bill. Bill sails on Lake Calhoun. Occasionally, his friend, Werner, from Germany, sails on Lake Calhoun as well. Since Werner is extremely outgoing, he began recruiting passersby to sail with him. Bill, the opposite in temperament as far as public relations goes, quite liked this idea, so he relies on Werner to recruit people to sail with him as well. Once you are out on the lake, he warned, their instructional styles match their personalities--one is methodical and keeps you informed, the other flies by the seat of his pants and lets sailors learn as they go.

Here is a photo of clm and ncd on the way to this fete: