Film Chris and I leave for Hawaii early tomorrow morning. I am making sure to have the most important items: sunscreen, books, and wine. (Just two bottles, in case we can’t find any decent wine on Molokai.)
At the suggestion of one of my favorite readers, I am taking Dear and Glorious Physician with me. I am hoping to finish Outliers on the plane, and I also have The World As Stage (The brilliant Bill Bryson’s book on Shakespeare) as a back-up. Oh, and The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. We’ll be gone five nights, you know, so I need to have options.
Aloha!
Hello, readers! I’m back from my convalescence. Surgery went well, and the pain that has been plaguing me for the past five months should be behind me now. I’m feeling better, we have a treatment plan, and I’m already full of more energy than I’ve had all year.
So then yesterday my employer laid me off. Ouch. I got a nice severance package, though, and I’m taking a few days of R & R before starting the job search in earnest on Tuesday. (Monday is FilmChris’ birthday, so that day will be spent doing things that make him happy, like watching movies and playing video games. You know, normal 12-year-old boy stuff.)
I’m making big plans for the next few weeks, to take advantage of time off and good health. I plan to finish editing the book, writing more blog posts, and reading more great books. But right now, I need to finish unpacking boxes from this move before the boxes from my desk show up.
Hello, readers. Sorry for the slow posting lately, but it won’t get better for another week or so. FilmChris and I are packing up the apartment to move to a new place, and I have a medical procedure ahead of me this week.
Those of you who know me know that I’ve been dealing with mysterious abdominal pain since late November. On Wednesday, I’m having exploratory surgery, and we might get answers that day as to the source of the pain. I’m crossing my fingers, toes, and everything else I can. Having been in daily pain for nearly six months has been no good at all.
In the meantime, please mind your punctuation and spelling. I won’t be gone long.
You may have read that I have an interesting relationship with contractions. There is one that stumps me beyond all others.
I grew up in Michigan, where we point to our hometown on our hand map, call Diet Coke “pop”, and have an unusual affinity for nasal vowels. Film Chris and I have a lot of relatives back there, and some of them (very dear, special people to us) drive me bonkers with the use of you’se.
Yes, you read that right. My spell-checker is dying to fix that.* You’se. As in “We’ll miss you’se guys at Christmas this year.” I’ve also heard “You’se guys should tell us when you’ll be back in town again, so you’se guys can come visit us.” There seem to be bonus points awarded for using it multiple times in a sentence. The Christmas card we received yesterday, sparking this post, contained four uses of the word, with two in one sentence.
I’m going crazy trying to figure out what exactly is being contracted here. You, obviously. But what is the second word? What word fits there, and was so long that it needed compacting?
I’ll let you’se guys consider that and let me know what you think. I’m going to go get a pop.
I grew up near the left heel of that hand.
*I think this post broke my spell-checker.
So, I’ve been tagged with the 20 Questions meme by my husband Film Chris. So let it be ordered, so let it be done. Rules:
A) People who have been tagged must write their answers on their blogs & replace any question that they dislike with a new question. (I haven’t changed any questions.)
B) Tag 8 people to answer the questions.
1. How many songs are on your iPod?
It’s in the other room, and there’s a class going on in there. I’ll guess 1500.
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Sorry for the lack of communication, friends. We made it back from Buenos Aires with compromised health.
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