bike racing

last night chris and i went to greenwood, south carolina to watch a friend of ours race in the carolina heritage bicycle race. that was the first bike race i've ever seen and it was intense! i cannot overemphasize how impressed i was by the bikers and how much i enjoyed watching. the skill with which the riders possess to ride so fast, so agressively and within such a close proximity of each other is amazing. and they biked non-stop for over an hour (approx. 40 miles)!! crazy. i highly suggest checking out a live bicycle race if the opportunity ever presents itself to you!

two years

two years ago today, on a day similar to today, the skies were rainy and overcast. on that day, a miracle happened and the drizzle stopped, the clouds parted, and i walked down the isle to say "i do" to my best friend in the whole world. on that day, two years ago today, my husband and i took our first steps together in the journey of our joined lives. eventhough i know that two years is really only just the beginning, it seems like we have gone through a lifetime together already. and if two years is just the beginning (and boy do i hope it is!), i look forward with excited anticipation to all the miraculous adventures we have yet to come. thanks, scoobs, for making my life complete.

2 things i hate

when people have the nerve to park on our lawn and tailgate ON OUR LAWN!

that my car radio is no longer working so i am essentially NPR-less:(

thoughts on the new pope

so for the past two days i've had a constant feeling that i should write something about the pope. not really because i have anything to say, but because i feel like it's what i "should" do, you know, being catholic and everything.

so riddled with my own self-imposed sense of obligation i have come up with these thoughts.

i've never seen this process happen before, the last pope having been chosen before my time. so the whole process has brought out some interesting and unforseen emotions in me. these emotions came out when they officially announced the new pope, cardinal ratzinger of germany, now benedict xvi. i know nothing about ratzinger other than what i've heard from the media. so i really have no opinion about him one way or the other (not that it would matter anyway). what this whole process has done for me, however, is called into scrutiny my questions on my faith and trust that God is leading the Catholic Church and not a person or people. with the announcement of the new pope it suddenly came to my mind how vulnerable the Church is to human judgement and mistakes and how much could potentially change in a relatively short period of time. i guess that's what the folks thought immediately following vatican ii!

what i have realized, though, is that this is God's plan for the Church. and, as paula said at bible study tonight, we won't really know the results until the end. i don't know if she meant the end of time, but really that's the time scale we're
looking at here. whatever steps the Church is taking it's taking it with a purpose in mind (it's just not our purpose nor our mind!).

one of the things i really like about the Catholic Church is that it is not a democracy. this is also the thing that i think i struggle with the most, especially when the Church issues a statement in which we do not see eye to eye. but i must remember that no matter what i think is right or wrong, no matter who i "would have chosen" (if i had someone in mind, which i did not), no matter what i think is the best course of action for the Church to take, it's not up to me. and i guess that does provide me with some level of comfort. so, in God i trust to lead our Church (and in some sense provide leadership to the world) in an age of importance (though i guess everyone thinks "their age" is an age of importance, huh?).

cadberry eggs!

yowza! cadberry cream eggs are $.06 at CVS! and i only bought one. what was i thinking?!! perhaps another trip is in order.

horray for balancing the checkbook, boo for no money

for the first time in i think forever i balanced my checkbook and it actually balanced. you know, the ledger matched my statement. wow! it's never that easy. i'm so excited that i'd like to go out to celebrate. too bad i balanced the checkbook and am all-too aware that we have no money. sigh.

cutie bumblesnatch

cutie bumblesnatch
Originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

erica reid, as cutie bumblesnatch, kicks some hoola hooping butt on "don't spit the water." go girl, go!

another hooray

another hooray for today goes out for my brother, the brilliantly published! he now writes columns for MacTECH and X-Ray magazine, as well as writing several on-line books. for anyone interested in applescripting or other such mac-related hoohah, check out the first issue of X-Ray, in which ben's published.

doctor anthony

hooray for my friend anthony who successfully defended his dissertation on friday to earn him a doctorate in computer science! well done, ol' boy! well done!

whad'ya know, the journey continues...

i have to send a shout out to my mom. apparently she's going to be on michael feldmen's whad'ya know? this saturday. WYK is a comedy quiz show on national public radio (npr for us snobs). michael (i can call him michael b/c he's also coming to my mom's house for dinner) said he wanted mom on the show last weekend. but then he had the nerve to "throw his back out," like that's an excuse. so they cancelled the interview and aired a rerun instead.

so everyone out in blogger world, tune in to michael feldmen's "whad'ya know" this weekend. it tapes live on saturday at 11:00 eastern standard time and usually airs around that time. but check out your local listings b/c times vary.

oh i guess i should say that it won't just be my mom w/ michael. he's talking to all the other people whose houses he will be visiting during his 20th anniversary road show. "mom's" name is diana cutshall and she'll be the one who will be so excited that her voice will be several octaves higher than anyone else's:)

what would you do?

what would you do if you had a middle school child who was being picked on? for whatever reason. say your child was goofy or slow. or say your child was "talking to" another young girl's boyfriend? what would you tell your child if they are getting phone calls at home from people saying they want to beat them up? what if your child was being cornered in the hallways at school? having rumors spread about them? being taunted into a fight? what would you do?

tell your child to tell a teacher?
tell her to walk away?
call the other child's parent?
done. done. and done.

then what? i'm really at a loss here folks. maybe i'm just tired and in a depressed mood but i'm really not sure. the parents say, "what would you tell your child, ms. reid?" and i don't know what to say. i'm not going to tell them to fight. because i truly believe that violence breeds more violence. not to mention it gets your child in trouble too. but how do you get your child to stand up for him/herself without being a tattletale and without being a bully?

"it's possible. but it ain't easy," i say.

leroy kisses his $1100 cooter

leroy
Originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

so we went to cooterfest this saturday in allendale county! for those of you with dirty minds a cooter is a turtle! cooterfest offered cooter races, fried meats, vendors selling bootleg music & cds, and tacky dj's. what more could someone ask for!

this is leroy kissing his winning cooter. this little guy beat over 100 contendors in the under 5" category and then went on to outrace all the big guys (including a tortoise and a few snapping turtles). leroy's cooter brought home $1100 to boot! way to go leroy!

flux

i just finished reading the book flux by peggy orenstein. it's about the role of women in the 21st century and how we traverse life in a 1/2 changed society. like, for example, young girls today are told that they can be anything they want to be, do anything they want to do. but in reality that's not really possible. our society isn't set up for women to be able to actually have it all. eventually something's gotta give, be it career, family or money. in any event, a fairly good book. i don't necessarily think that everyone falls into the categories of people that orenstein studies, but i definitely think she's got some good points. too bad that most of the people who read this book will be women b/c i think it's really men who should be reading stuff like this.

kids these days...

what a beautiful day in good ol' columbia, sc. perfect weather for the field days that both of my schools were having today. i even had a few free moments to run up to the field and watch the middle schoolers galavanting around, racing one another, eating crap food and bouncing on the moon walk thingy. i have to say it was really nice to see the kids actually playing for a chance. i think kids need more time and opportunity to play. i was just lamenting the other day about the lack of playgrounds and recess in middle schools. kids these days are forced to grow up so fast. no wonder they're having sex earlier and participating in risky behavior. they are expected to make adult decisions when their brains are not fully developed and they do not have the capacity to make such decisions. i think that if they just had more time to play, they'd hold on to their youth a little longer and we'd have a much happier, much safer and much better world.

okay, so that's simplifying it just a tad. but still, kids should be able to play, darn-it!

i love my husband. he's so sweet to me, except when he coughs directly into my ear. but, i digress. he brough me handpicked weeds today and put them in a little shot glass of water on the kitchen table. i should add that they were pretty weeds. you know, wild flowers. but it was sweet none-the-less.

redneck golf anyone?

redneck golf3
Originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

so here is brian pimped out for his st. patty's day party. they're playing something they called "redneck golf." i tried to find info on such a "sport" but found none. i think it was perhaps invented for backyard bbq's and drunken events. i have to say, it was fun to watch.

redneck golf2
Originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

redneck golf1
Originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

friends

friends
Originally uploaded by Waldie's World.

from left to right, greg and sara, tony and ingrid at the st. patty's day party.

whad'ya know?

okay, so my mom just called to tell me that the npr radio show whad'ya know? is coming to their house in june!! michael feldmen and his cast and crew are taking a road trip across the country from wisconsin, where the show is taped, to pennsylvania and new jersey to do some shows. they want to stop at houses along the way to have lunch and visit with folks. mom and jim live in cape may, nj, right down the street from the ocean. i guess that's enough of a draw for them to come bc mom got an email saying that they'd like to take her up on the offer to visit. needless to say, i'm taking my own road trip to be in nj for that! word!