THE DAILY DIVERSION

LUB DUB AND MORE...

Wow, what a quick weekend. It seems like I need another two days off just to catch my breath. Well, that's not happening, so I'll just have to work and forget about being tired!

My Boo is back home in Owensboro now, so I'm pretty down about it. We had a good two weeks together though, and it's just over a month away from the wedding. Speaking of which, one of my fears (or thoughts anyway) was realized over the weekend. I knew something had been bothering her while we were making our drive up to Missouri on Friday, but she wouldn't talk about it. Finally, she felt like letting the cat out of the bag.

As I have mentioned before, I am afraid that I haven't been helping her much in the wedding planning. Well, I was right. I've tried to do what I can, but I haven't done very well. I wanted to be a big part in the planning of everything, but being 5 hours away it's kind of difficult. So, this has left most everything up to her to decide upon, which isn't fair. I didn't want to be one of "those" grooms that just show up to the wedding and say "Wow! This is nice! You've done a great job!", and she definitely didn't want that either. I feel like I know most everything that is going on, but I'm in the dark on some things, of course. Hopefully I'll be able to make it up her in other ways.

As for our one day road trip... Well, it went well. My boss was nice enough to left me leave work around 3:30 on Friday, so we got a head start. The weather was pretty rough all around the area and even up in Missouri, but we never saw a sign of it. The sun was out for most of our drive. We only got sprinkled on twice the entire drive, which is good. There's no direct route to get to Salem, Missouri from Memphis, so it takes a little while to get there. You have to drive I-55 for 20 or so miles then take US 63 up through Jonesboro. This road will actually take you all the way up into Missouri, which is nice, but it's mostly two lane and pretty winding (wine-ding?). It's made ten times as bad if there are a bunch of semi's on it, which, on Friday, there were. It took us just about 5 hours to get there, and that was after two pitstops. One of which I'll talk about shortly, because it's silly.

My Grandma is doing much better. She was actually up roaming the halls (also known as "Doing her physical therapy") on Saturday, and eating solid foods. I was almost expecting to get there only to see her hooked up on I.V.'s, tube feeders, and a respirator. Well, none of the above was the answer, which is good. We didn't get to see her a whole lot, since she was pretty tired from the P.T. However, we did get to visit with her and help boost her spirits, and that's better than nothing.

Okay, onto the pit stop. We stopped in a little town in Missouri called West Plains. I'm not sure what the population is, but I'd say it's less than 12,000. I've driven through there a bunch of times, but have rarely stopped to visit. This time we just happed to be hungry for some Sonic, so we made this our eating destination.

With that being said, I think the town in atypical of "small town America". Every teenager was out "cruising" (since it was just after 7 pm on a Friday night). However, I found it absolutely amazing that they were all driving huge gas guzzling trucks.

Now, I don't know much about West Plains and what kind of job market they have, but I sure as hell know I'm not happy about paying $2.60 a gallon for gas. This got me to thinking, "What are these kids thinking? Better yet, what are their parent's thinking?" I even said to Adrianne, "If we didn't have to be driving right now, we wouldn't be."

I don't know how much disposable income these people have, but they are just flushing it down the toilet driving around Sonic in a 1986 Chevy Silverado with no exhaust. Insanity I say!

Okay, I'll get off my soapbox for now and get on to other things that I usually talk about. However, I don't remember much of my dream last night and I've got a recently occurring song in my head.

The only thing I really remember about my dream last night was that it had Phyllis Dyller (is that the right spelling?) in it. It started off that she was on some game show, like Love Connection or something. The three guys on it were all bragging about their "conquests" with her. Weird stuff, to say the least. Then, all of a sudden, myself, some guy and her are on top of a roof someplace. I'm just standing back to the side watching. The guy is talking to her while she keeps back-stepping toward the ledge, until she walks right off the building.

That's it. That's all I remember. I don't even know if that's enough to try to break down?

I had the song "Possession" by Evans Blue in my head again today. That's the song that Sarah Maclahlan did, which she sings on in their version too. I think it's goes to me thinking about my "Snuggles".

I was laying in bed last night (sometime after midnight) tossing and turning, trying to go to sleep when I had a bright idea. Back in the day I had this sound machine that helped me fall asleep. It had several sounds on it that usually worked. I always like "heartbeat" and "white noise". It also had "rain forest", which always made me have to pee. I can't remember what else was on there, but there were a few more.

The heartbeat is commonly called "lub dub", since that's the sound it makes. Anyway, I decided, since I have my computer in my bedroom with me, that I'd download a sample of a heartbeat and play it throughout the night. Maybe that would help me sleep? Well, it worked like a charm. I woke up once, but for only a split second. As soon as I heard the heartbeat I fell back asleep. Now, I know this won't work when Adrianne is here, because she can't handle noises like that. Ticking clocks drive her nuts while she's trying to sleep. They put me right to sleep though.

So, there you have my secret to a good night's sleep! Some people just turn on CNN or Fox News to be put to sleep, but I prefer "lub dub" all night long!