Happy Birthday, MOM!!!!!

Happy Birthday, Mom! You’re 68. You were born Sunday, December 12th, 1937 As I’ve come to expect, I bounced out of bed at 530am. The ground’s still covered with snow from last Thursday’s snow storm with very little meltage. It’s no wonder though. We’ve been in the freezer through virtually all of December. I think Saturday is the only day that’s made it above freezing, and that was short lived. This would be a short work week, and that alone helped frame my week into a good one. My morning ritual went the same as most weekdays. But that’s by design. No special planning necessary. Instead, it just happens now. This is a pivotal week as we move towards Christmas and the year’s end. Several things, such as performance reviews need to be completed this week, and I need to get a leg up on my Christmas shopping. Come the weekend, I should know where I stand. To help address Christmas preparation, I have scheduled this coming Friday off of work. That’ll be my power shopping day. I’m not stressed much, if at all. That’s due in part to having a detailed list of gifts for everyone. It makes shopping that much easier. Just stick to the list! The few things that I don’t trust myself with are mailing Xmas cards and baking cookies. They both require large chunks of time set aside from all other activities. But as I write this I recognize the folly in saying that. If it’s too stressful, why do it? Hmmm? I should be fine with time, though. Again, having a list of to do’s helps immensely. I simply have to watch adding too much to the list. During the day I called my mom to wish her a happy 68th B-day. While talking she finally agreed to come to town this weekend (Saturday) to visit so we can celebrate a little. I committed to try to and corral my brothers, minus Glenn of course, as well as my daughters and grand children. Too, my mom should then have an opportunity to meet Mindy. She’s planning to be at my home by 1pm and depart probably around 4pm so she can be home while it's still daylight (she doesn’t like to drive in the dark – I guess). Work, run, work. I left the office at 510pm. I had three stops planned before heading home. My first stop was Kroger to pick-up some needed veggies. My next stop was Saturday’s to get a haircut. The wait was ten or fifteen minutes, so I signed in then headed to the Mill Run Target to look for a couple of items on my Xmas shopping list. This is probably a good time to reveal a Jimmy quirk. Whenever I hit a store with a certain list of items to fetch and can’t find exactly what I’m seeking – especially if it’s the first item I’m seeking - I somewhat turn off and don’t want to buy anything else from my list in that store. Instead, I feel deflated and disappointed, used and betrayed. It’s even worse if the item in question was one they advertised to draw me into the store in the first place. And that was the case tonight. I left. Back at Saturday’s they were ready for me. They got me into the chair immediately. Cool! Tonight I would get my hair cut shorter than I have the past three or four times. It’s just getting ridiculous feeling like I need another haircut two weeks after the last. Perfect! It was now 605pm (not bad for leaving work at 510pm and making three stops). A call to Mindy indicated that she was on her way to my house. We pulled up within less than one minute of one another. I quickly put away the veggies I bought and leashed up Ykraps. Mindy went ahead and helped me prep for tomorrow. I appreciated that. After everything was done and I had redone my hair to my satisfaction (never looks right after leaving the salon), we decided that dinner at El Vaquero was a rock solid choice. We were off! We were seated right away, as usual, and served up some of their delicious chips and salsa. We ordered our entrees and ate in all of about 35 minutes. Soon, we were headed back to my house. We hung out on the couch talking until about 830pm when Mindy had to go home. After she left I worked with some recent photos and did some catch up on my blog. One thing I noticed about my new camera is the graininess in many indoor shots. That tells me that despite even greater mega-pixels, the auto ISO setting must be defaulting higher than my first digital. After some research it’s apparent that I’ll need to learn a little more about using some of the manual as well as other photo modes aside from “auto” that are available with most high end Canon digital cameras. By 11pm I was dog tired and ready for bed.