Monday, March 31, 2008

March Out Like a Lion

March flew by. I had a week (10th to 14th) in Burbank with Warner Bros. facilitating "Writing Netiquette" sessions. One beautiful evening I had a great Oriental dinner sitting outside with my talented cousin Dave (Mongo) Lloyd and his interesting writer friend, Miv, from Wales.

On March 18, Nana and I picked up Alexa and Donovan in Dallas at Love Field, spent the night with Jeff & Emily (and 2 adorable 'munchkins' as EAT puts it), and the next morning Alexa drove home in her "graduation present." Meanwhile we started our 1900 mile trip with Donovan to Big Bend Nat'l Park by stopping in Austin to stuff in Jason to go with us. God has put a taste of heaven in west Texas and Big Bend National Park. Everything was a lot of fun -- we saw a herd of about 100 big horn sheep, I saw a herd (?) of javelina (not hogs but peccary), hundreds of deer, a herd of pronghorn elk, incredible rock formations, the pink granite at Enchanted Rock State Park (near Fredericksburg) , the LBJ Ranch Park (Johnson City), hundreds of windmills (as Donovan called them - "new ones" and "old-timey ones"), the art of Marfa, and the rail tracks through Marfa where Donovan wanted to spend all his time crushing pennies. Retrieving an old railroad spike was the best part of Donovan's trip. We passed through many ghost towns - Study Butte, Terlingua, Boquillas, and others -- a moving experience for a history dreamer. And camping in a tent in the Chisos Mountain Basin with the sun going down and the full moon coming up was a spiritually moving experience. Even hot dogs and chili over a campfire was a memorable experience. But the little coyote running through our camp gave me a quick fright. Nana and Uncle Dudley (Jason) walked almost 3 hrs. and were exhausted that Saturday night. Donovan and I played P's&Q's by flipping a quarter instead of using cards. Darn - I had to get up three times in the middle of the night with TB (tiny bladder). But in so doing I saw the Big Dipper rotate around the North Star for the first time in my life! The unexpected cold and wind on Easter morning made me think of the Lord coming from the tomb.

Nana and I took Jason to the airport to fly back to NYC on March 26 and had a great Luby's lunch with Aunt Jo. Donovan fished that afternoon and on Thursday and Friday catching four 2-lb. bass and several 1-lb bluegills. The pain of his sunburn was offset by the joy of his experience. I enjoyed the fried fish at Luby's and at home!

I flew Donovan back home on March 29, enjoyed a great weekend (although suffering with either allegeries or a cold) with Alexa and Aaron, devoured a meatloaf sandwich at Cracker Barrel, heard a moving sermon on "3-way honesty" at their church, and flew back today.

I'm exhausted. Nana and I have been on the run all month and today was her last day of work - first day of "retirement" is tomorrow. I predict she'll finally sleep in. She's had a crazy busy month also - too many 4 or 5 am mornings and 1 pm bedtimes this month. I'm sure April will come in like a lamb. I'm hoping for daytimes in the garden and evenings just sitting with Nana cracking pecans.

Monday, March 10, 2008

San Antonio Weekend

Nana and I drove to San Antonio last Thursday night to pick up Sister Joy. Then on Friday we toured San Antonio - Huervos Ranchero breakfast, Alamo, Trolley Ride, Mercado, River Walk, Botanical Garden, the Four Missions, King William District, and that old Bermann hotel. It was a packed fun day.

Then on Saturday it was Nana's Aunt Euna Faye's 80th birthday party at the Country Club in LaGrange. It was a great party with Nana's aunts, uncles, and cousins (lots of them).

A great worship Sunday morning at Madisonville and then worked all afternoon to get ready for a week in Burbank. Nana and I have been tired -- sleeping long and solidly each night lately -- travel gets to us.

Thursday, March 6, 2008

Workbook Frenzy

A crazy busy day yesterday. Nana helped me put together 75 workbooks yesterday to ship to Warner Bros. for my sessions there next week. Putting workbooks together - strategy, development, printing, collation, packing, and shipping it off is fun when we do it together. After that we went to a basketball game at SHSU to watch them thrash UTSA. I love b-ball, but the game made me want to coach basketball again. I had a great time when I coached little league back in about 1988-1991. It was also exciting to get the phone call from Alexa at Colorado State saying they offered her a post-doc position for next year. What a day!

Today Nana has a presentation at SHSU so I'm going with her and will get a blood test while she's there. Then we leave for San Antonio to meet Joy who's flying in for a conference. We'll spend Friday with her sight-seeing in the Alamo city.

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Trip to Birmingham, Alabama

I'm at the Birmingham airport with Nana, about to fly home. We came over the weekend to visit Bill Moss (college buddy) and his wife Pat. Then yesterday I visited trainers at Maxwell AFB, Verizon Wireless in Huntsville, and at NASA's Marshall Space Center. Hopefully some new business will come out of this. Nana and I had a great time together, and I really liked having the companionship on a business trip. They can be so lonely.