I'm MELTING....

I've just realized what the worst part of working from home is... no A/C. The best part of that, I can take cold showers all day if I want to. And eat ice cream. Well, Skinny Cow ice cream sandwiches (only 140 cal).

The weather has been unusually warm lately. We went across the state this weekend to my home town and the hottest temp we ran into - 111 degrees (that's 44 degrees to those of you downunder). Fortunately, most of the time it was 103 and thank god we have a/c in our car. We did the drive in about 5 hours, stopped for lunch in hickville in a lovely air conditioned building. It took about 30 minutes on the road before I started to feel like the blueberry girl from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Remember she ballooned up to the size of a big blueberry or something like that? Yeah, that's how I felt shortly after lunch. We had to stop in another exceeding small town in hickville, wa so that I could buy some... ahem.. gas-relieving tablets.. and walk it off, so to speak. It was PAINFUL. And 105 degrees there, so that was a lot of fun.

Upon arriving at our cute little boutique hotel with air conditioning, we collapsed for a nap and barely woke up in time to walk to the first reunion event. Actually, I had a really good time. I talked to alot of people - mostly the women for some reason, which I'm still wondering about. I didn't seek out to chat with too many men. Irish was a great sport and I parked him down with a few 'spare parts' as they called themselves, while the girls and I wandered around chatting with everyone. I couldn't believe it but we stayed for 5 hours. I saw people I hadn't seen in.. well, 20 years... most of them I hadn't seen in that long. I hadn't even been to my hometown in 10 years.
It was exhausting too, let me tell you. All that chat about nothing. I don't think I know much more than the following items about my fellow classmates:
1. They have all been married at least 10 years.
2. Many have at least 3 kids (which surprised me, really) and quite a few have twins.
3. The women have aged MUCH better than the men.

Let's see, I guess that's it. After all that, this was the information that was imparted. Most could not tell I was pregnant and there was not another single girl there in my 'season of life' - I guess you could say. Most had their kids young.

The next day, Irish and I took a walk through the park, before the heat of the day appeared. My hometown was host to the 1974 World's Fair Expo, so they have a lovely riverfront park. We wandered around and took breaks in the shade and it was nice to see how some things never change. After that, we drove out to my old 'hood, saw my old house, which I'd lived in for 15 years. What a nice neighborhood it was, I have to say. We drove up the hill to where the rich kids lived and I was shocked by the amount of new homes going in. And cheap. (Not that I'd ever live there but it was definitely cheap!) Finally we drove out to Couer d'Alene, Idaho - used to be a sleepy lake/beach town but it was hopping on what must have been the hottest day of the year so far. We had lunch and stuck our tootsies in the lake for a while, then ran as fast as we could back to our air conditioned hotel for another nap.

The second event on Saturday evening was a dinner/dance. There were a few different people here but mostly the same crowd. The nice part was that you could actually sit down and have a chat with whomever was at your table. I sat with a girl I'd known since pre-pre-school days and another girl I'd known since the 6th grade. Catching up with them was very cool. I'd love to keep in touch with them but you know how that goes.. Again we stayed for about 5 hours and I talked to many people. I was so relieved to go home though. It truly is exhausting. Some people haven't changed a bit (personality-wise) which is unfortunate. The same people hung out with the same people they did in high school. I can only wonder though, can you really like those same people or is it just BECAUSE they knew you then that you gravitate towards them. I tried to talk to everyone, mostly because I am a completely different person now than I was then. But you could definitely see the cliques forming, which was an interesting vision. I'm glad I'm home.

Now I can see why they only do that once every 10 years, any sooner would be far too much.