Father's Day

It's not something I think about every day, but I am very lucky to have the dad I have. I just read today's PostSecret and was made freshly aware of that fact. He is a dad who made the Easter Bunny and Santa more than real--notes from both, soot tracks from Santa and Rudolph, yarn trails from the EB and then clues to follow as we got older. It was real enough to me that I believed it until I was 9 or 10, long past most kids. In fact, they both still come to visit.

He is a dad who put notes in my lunch box every day in elementary school with clever little drawings and clues for me to figure out with my classmates, something I thought was just about the coolest thing ever. He is a dad who very calmly handled me getting my first period at the middle school where he was the band director and I was a beyond mortified teenager. He is a dad who keeps his emotions in check when he in fact feels a lot. The only time I've ever seen him cry was after my younger sister had back surgery. He is a dad who has had two families and I think has a lot of regrets about how things have turned out with the first one. Luckily my brother, at least, has finally decided it's time to move beyond the past and has come back into Dad's life even though my sister has not.

Dad is so many things, and I don't mean to imply that perfect is one of them because nobody is, but he sets a high bar. He set my sister and I up to be constantly disappointed by men (shh, don't tell Kyle) because everything he does is to improve the lives of the people he loves. The one thing he does for himself is a short fishing trip with old friends every summer. Otherwise he is always working, improving the house, making the yard look beautiful, driving to Lincoln to do things for my grandparents since my grandpa can't and they're too stubborn to move.

I called him to wish him a Happy Father's Day today and I certainly made no big speech. I probably should sometime, maybe next year. But for now, I love you, Dad.

Aww, poor kiwi

This is adorable...except for the end.

And a repeat, except with Mad World (Donnie Darko version)...there were tears in my eyes. The power of music never ceases to amaze me.

Come hell or high water

Ames is flooding. This came as a surprise to me today, since the thunderstorms last night didn't seem any more devastating than normal. Here's a pic from our porch:

















This is the worst our parking lot has flooded since we've lived here. Luckily my car is on the dry part, but this means I can't (or at least shouldn't try) getting around that corner right now. Good thing I didn't have to work today! So, when I saw that this morning I was kind of surprised. Then I talked to my friend Tara. She sent me pics from her apartment building, which has now lost power and has water on the first floor:


















Just a little worse!! She managed to get her car moved to higher ground, and her fiance had to come home from work (in Des Moines) so they could push his motorcycle out of the water. Luckily they have a second floor apartment so they should be okay.

The reason they are flooding so bad is that they are near Squaw Creek, which floods at 9 feet and at the last update was at nearly 16 feet. A nursing home had to be evacuated, and parts of Duff Ave., Stange Rd., and University Blvd. (formerly Elwood Dr.) are closed. Hopefully the water will stop rising soon.

//edit: Now Highway 30 is closed where you get on I-35, so I'm going to have to hope I can take 13th all the way to 35 tomorrow or I may not make it to work.

I need to stop being such a people-pleaser

I was supposed to work from 1-7 today, but I was woken by a phone call at 9 to ask if I could make it by 11:30. Of course I said yes, just like I said yes to working 11-4 tomorrow when it was supposed to be my day off. This is something I told myself I was not going to do this summer. I need to be more assertive and say no when I don't want to do something. I called Kyle afterwards and bitched about it, and he was like "Next time, just politely say that if they want to change your schedule it would be nice if they would ask the day before rather than a couple of hours because you made plans". I was like....yes, that would be easy wouldn't it. It's a good thing someone in this relationship is level-headed. :P


I finished Stephenie Meyer's The Host last night. It's her first book for adults, since the Twilight series is technically YA. I say technically, because I feel that with both this book and that series there's really no appropriate age of enjoyment. For example, the head tech at my clinic was raving about Twilight the other day, and she's probably in her late 40s.

It took me a few chapters to get into the storyline. I haven't read a lot of sci-fi lately, and this was so different than Twilight. I soon very much believed in Wanderer, the alien soul that was inserted into Mel, the human host, and their struggles since Mel wouldn't give up her body and fade away.

Earth has been taken over by these souls and there are only a few wild humans left. The souls do not believe in violence so they believe that every world they take over is improved, but through the course of the story Wanderer begins to see that this is perhaps not the case.

The book seems to be leading toward an inevitable conclusion, which is suddenly ripped away and this new twist appears that shocks the reader--or at least shocked me. I loved the ending, and I loved Meyer's writing. During Wanderer's biggest personal struggle I was crying for probably 50 pages straight as I waited to see what she would decide to do.

This book is HIGHLY recommended, even to readers who are not fans of science fiction. In the end, it's not a sci-fi book; it's a book about love and the strength of the human spirit that happens to have a sci-fi background.

I'm So Weird

My stomach is eating itself in nervousness right now. Why? Because I have to go to work. I've noticed that when I have a good day at work I'm, if not excited, at least prepared for the next day. But, when I have a bad day like I did on Monday, the next day I have to go in--today--it feels practically like first day nerves all over again.

Hopefully today will be a good day.

Oooh!!!! *squeal*

I'm getting *really* excited about this movie. I wasn't completely thrilled about some of the character choices but I think it will work out well. If they can manage not to butcher the book it will be more than most book-to-movies do.

220 Pounds

That was the size of the Mastiff I had to try to hold for a blood draw today. He had merely to shake his head like dislodging a fly and I would be thrown off. His head came up to my chest. I have never seen a dog that large in my entire life--it was incredible!

Today went much better than Saturday. I have tomorrow off, but then I'm working Wednesday through Saturday. I hope as I begin to get the computer system down and learn the way things are run there I will enjoy it more. The other workers there are very nice even though the vet can be a bit snippy. I can say with all honesty I've dealt with much worse over the course of a summer.