The first step was to recognize I have a problem.

1. I have admitted that I am powerless over the disaster that is my front lawn—that my lawn has become totally and completely unmanageable.
2. I have come to believe that something somewhere greater than myself could restore my lawn to green.
3. I have made a decision to turn my will and my life with regard to lawn care over to the care of Scott’s Turf Builder.
4. I have made a searching and fearless moral inventory of the all of the weeds in my front lawn.
5. I have admitted to the home owner’s association, my neighbors, and my facebook friends the exact nature of my wrongs (see photos).
6. I am entirely ready to have Scott’s Turf Builder remove all these defects of my lawn.
7. I have humbly asked (ok, begged and prayed for) Scott’s Turf Builder to remove my lawn’s shortcomings.
8. I have made a list of all neighbors I have harmed with our lousy front lawn appearance, and have become willing to make amends to them all.
9. I have tried to made direct amends to such neighbors wherever possible, except when to do so would cause them to actually have to look at my front lawn while I apologized.
10. I have continued to take personal inventory, and commit that when I allow new weeds to promulgate, to promptly kill them.
11. I have sought through hard labor, blood, sweat and tears, to improve my lawn’s contact with Scotts Turf Builder, praying that it works, and the elbow grease required to carry that out.
12. I, having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, will try to carry this message to other lawn offenders, and to also practice these principles in my side and back yards.

Today we mopped all the floors and rearranged the living room.  This was Offspring's idea.  A bit odd, but as he pointed out, I can sit in the morning with my coffee and contemplate the birds out the window.  I've had worse ideas ..... 

Steaks, robotics, and the van breaking down

So Friday we went to Angus Barn for our anniversary dinner with my parents.  It was their 45th, our 6th.  That made a combined 51 years of marriage at one table.  We sat at a table for four that was very close to a table for 2, in a little alcove area.  For the first half of dinner, an older couple sat at the table for 2 and I kid you not: said nothing the entire time.  Nothing.  NOTHING!  I started getting the giggles about it but managed to squelch them.  I mean who orders their food, eats it, pays and leaves, all the while saying not a single word to each other.  Not one word.  Ok, not to beat a dead horse, but they just sat there and stared at each other.  It was like a twisted game of verbal chicken, but neither swerved.  All I could think was perhaps after 60+ years of marriage (that would be my guess), one runs out of things to say???  It was downright weird ... and funny! 

The next two people to sit there - most importantly, spoke to one another, and secondly, were quite friendly.  We struck up a conversation with them and turns out they were up from Atlanta to see their son participate in a robotics competition the next day at Dorton.  It sounded very interesting (especially to a 10 year old boy), so we exchanged numbers and promised to see them the next day.  

Then we left.  Or rather, tried to leave.  We got out to the van, got Wheeler loaded in, strapped down and then .... tick tick tick.  Tick tick tick tick tick tick tick.  Van wouldn't start.  Absolutely zilch power in the battery.  Great......  The valet guy went and got someone to try to jump us, but that didn't work either.  It was around then that I remembered I didn't have Wheeler's manual chair in the van.  This is important because it was looking increasingly likely that the van would need to be towed, and a) he can't be towed IN the van (against all the rules for towing joints) and b) that 500 pound behemoth doesn't fit in any other normal vehicle, so he'd have to drive his chair home.  Except we were 15 miles from home.  Worst case I (with ALOT OF HELP) could get him out of the power chair, out of the van and into the manual chair, and from that into a regular car, since the manual chair folds down.  But first someone would have to fetch the chair from our garage instead of the back of the van (WHERE WE ALWAYS STORE IT FOR EXACTLY THIS REASON), drive it to us, etc.  

Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick.  My dad calls the towing company.  I start dialing the phone to call Offspring's dad to see if he'll get the manual chair from our house and bring it there.  Just then .... cough cough sputter.  Ah ha!  It didn't start, but it was sounding more promising.  We all hang up our phone calls, cross all available appendages and try again.  Cough cough, varoommmmmm.  YAY!  It started.  We drove home, and we were supposed to stop by to get Offspring on the way back, but my dad and Wheeler both suggested we not press our luck and just go home first.  The speedometer starting bouncing around erractically, the odometer stopped working, and it shifted itself into a low gear all by itself while driving down the freeway.  And it's a good thing we did - we pulled in the driveway and it literally died 10 feet in off the street.  Now THAT is some kinda timing.  

The next day we went to the robotics competition and found the people we had dinner next to.  They were really really nice and explained the whole thing to us - and as it turned out, their son's team won the whole shebang!  These were the regionals and they will go to the nationals in St. Louis at the end of this month.  I'll be sure to follow the results on their website.  It was alot of fun watching it, Offspring was totally awestruck.  I am going to see if I can sign him up for the junior Lego league.

And now ask me .... go on..... "have you put the manual chair in the van yet?"..

No.

I am an idiot!