It got to be a rather long day yesterday for both of us, much more so for Eric, but at long last, he's home! I couldn't be happier.
I hadn't seen or talked to him since I dropped him off at the airport September 9, where he was headed for Valencia, Spain by way of Madrid. Thank goodness for email! So ... yesterday. Eric was originally due in at 6 pm. After work, I headed up to the Mall of America to spend time there before heading to the airport. I quickly discovered I wasn't in the mood to shop, so the afternoon started dragging. I just wasn't in the mood for all the noise (live music, piped in music in the mall, piped in music in every store, theme park noise, ...), all the people. I think I'd rather have been in a big old quiet barn somewhere rather than a big mall, truth be told. Sounds weird, I know ... Segue here: I'm from Chicago, but am definitely not a big city girl. I'd much rather be on the open road, or on a beautiful wooded trail, running with friends than at a cocktail party dressed to the nines ANY DAY. : ) Back to yesterday. Eric called from Chicago at some point in the afternoon saying that the flight from Madrid had been delayed and he'd now be arriving in the cities about 9:30. So I now had even more time to kill. Spent quite a bit of it in Barnes & Noble, which was relatively quiet. More about that to close this post. About 8:00, I'd had enough of the mall and decided to head for the airport and hang out there instead. His new flight was now delayed. I was really beginning to wonder whether we were ever going to get home. (Not really, but you know what I mean.) The plane finally landed about 10:15 and Eric came walking up to the luggage claim area about 10:30. When I spotted him I literally ran over to him and threw my arms around him and told him how glad I was to see him, grinning from ear to ear. Definitely the most PDA in the vicinity, but I didn't much care. More importantly, Eric didn't seem to care either. I noticed a bench full of females smiling at us, so I guess it was OK after all. : ) We left the airport just before 11:00. I'm normally in bed by this time, so my eyelids were really heavy and I knew I'd have a hard time staying awake on the drive home. I told poor Eric, who'd been up for 24 hours as they'd flown with the sun, that we had to talk all the way home if I was to stay awake. We did. We talked about Spain all the way home. The funniest thing he mentioned were the females' hairstyles. He said they pretty much all looked like 'Jedi knights'. There's more to the explanation, but it made me LOL. Got home about 12:15 AM. Finally. Home. The net: Eric had a wonderful time. He has learned to appreciate art (Picasso in particular), started not only speaking fluently but thinking in Spanish, had a really great family to live with, and made many new friends among the other students studying there.
From a press release: The finalists are all set for the 4th Annual Rochester Area Sports Banquet to be held on Monday, January 26th, 2009 at the Mayo Civic Center Auditorium with the guest speaker this year being Olympic softball pitcher Jennie Finch! The Rochester Amateur Sports Commission will once again be the host of the banquet where the top 2008 athletes/teams in six categories have been selected from 10 different sports. ... Organization of the year finalists are Ice Hawks, Rochester Youth Soccer, Rochester Royals Baseball, Rochester Figure Skating Club and Rochester Track Club. ...
Tomorrow the Rochester Family Y will unveil the fitness center filled with brand new cardio and strength training equipment. If the winter storm warning we've been issued allows, I hope to make it down there to try it out.
Today, some friends got together to bake cookies all day. In past years we'd bring the dough for a couple of types of cookies and bake them at a friend's house (she's got a double oven) and then divide them all up to bring home. As I had to work in the morning, and wanted to prepare all Eric's favorites for supper tonight, I just couldn't make it. It's always a fun day, though. Here's the recipe for Eric's favorite salad.
Dressing:
4 Tbsp. frozen raspberry/apple juice concentrate (do not reconstitute)
2 Tbsp. canola or light tasting olive oil
1 Tbsp. white vinegar
1/2 tsp. Dijon mustard
Combine all ingredients. Shake or stir well.
1 head romaine lettuce, torn into bite-sized pieces
2 c. cooked chicken, bite-sized pieces
1 c. raspberries
1 c. sugar snap peas cut in half diagonally
1/4 c. pecans, toasted
1/4 c. red onion, sliced thin
Combine all ingredients. Toss with dressing. Serve immediately.
Substitutions (when berries are not in season):
Substitute dried cherries for fresh raspberries. Substitute a cherry/apple flavored juice concentrate.
Tomorrow I'm going to lunch with a couple of very good friends. We do this every year right before Christmas. My friend Mary always makes each of us a pie. They're fabulous. She used to make the pies for the cafe at The Mouse and Marketplace. The Saxman boys' favorite is cherry, so that's what we get. They'll be happy campers tomorrow afternoon. : )
Back to Barnes & Noble to close out this post. While sitting there, I read a good portion of a little book called Don't Sweat the Small Stuff ... and It's All Small Stuff. It's worth reading. I just might go pick it up. Wrote down this quote from Stephen Levine: "If you had an hour to live and could make only one phone call, who would you call, what would you say, and why are you waiting?".
Go make that call.
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