Yellow Mellow Jello & Things I Learned Recently

My mind seems to be made of jello lately. 

Yellow, mellow Jello.

Yellow, mellow Jello roughly translates into "I've been so scattered lately I can't focus long enough on any one thing" to write something clever.

So instead, I spend my time doing things like laundry, or I decide to make a vat of chili, or I play with that cute little puppy we're babysitting, or I eat a nice chocolate custard cone from Sheridan.

Compound all of that with the fact that in the last two weeks, I've taken two days off. Now before you start turning green around the gills with jealousy, let me just tell you I'm using that term rather loosely because "off" meant spending my day away from work walking 20 miles as part of that little 3-day for the Cure 60 mile walk thing I did.  And, then, of course, my most recent day "off" meant spending my entire Monday grading all those projects I didn't get a chance to grade because, well, I was off walking and then recuperating.

As a result, my blog along with my feet has suffered from my neglect. It's rather difficult to feel clever when you're walking around with feet the size of Bozo the Clown (especially since I never really felt Bozo was all that funny to begin with.) 

See how this whole grading thing tends to make me rather cranky? Oh, and let's not forget whiny. Yeah, I've pretty whiny lately, too.

But since I promised some amusing stories regarding the 3-day for the Cure extravaganza my team Pink Me Out participated in a week ago, I probably ought to write something before my short term memory fails me and my long term memory embellishes it. So here are the top three lessons I learned…

Lesson #1… If there ever was any doubt, there is none now. I am not a camping kind of gal. I do not like sleeping in a cold freezing tent with wet hair. Nor am I fond of bright, prison-type lights shining down into our little tent (so bright that you could actually read a book at 9 p.m. without a flashlight). And, no, I wasn't fond of those same flood lights coming back on at 5:15  in the morning. (And to think I was worried about oversleeping.)

Lesson #2… One should not bring hot chocolate into one's tent unless the hot chocolate has a lid on it because the law of averages pretty much guarantees that the offending beverage in question will somehow get knocked over and spill onto everything. On a positive note, everything smelled pretty good after that. It's like living in the Chocolate Hotel but without the spa treatments, towels, beds, running water, flushing toilets, room service etc.

Lesson #3… Self control skills. I must say it's easier to understand now how one can just snap and exhibit violent tendencies. You know, tendencies such as popping a perfect stranger upside her little pointy head especially when that stranger sneaks in a blow dryer to camp and dries her hair you're standing on a chair under a portable outdoor propane heater hoping your hair doesn't catch on fire. (They did say NO blow dryers.)

I could ramble on and on and on about other lessons I learned, but quite frankly, they were more confirmations of things I already knew and not particularly funny.

Most of the funny stuff doesn't translate well into a written rendition. This one doesn't fare too well, but it's just too good to not try, so if it loses its funny my apologies…

It was Day 2 and apparently the planets all lined up perfectly because something very funny happened. We had walked probably 18 miles. We were tired, sore and probably just a tad cranky. One of my teammates--Susie Sunshine-- was wanting to pass a slower walker. At that moment, Susie (who tends to be overly polite all the time) said to the other walker, "Excuse me, passing on the left." At that moment, the other woman said, "Kiss my…"

Susie Sunshine, of course, was mortified and asked in disbelief, "Pardon me?"

To which the other woman, who was equally mortified exclaimed, "Oh no, not you, it's written there on the side walk."

And sure enough there it was. 

Someone, when the concrete was new and wet had written the offending phrase. The walker just happened to read it out loud at the exact moment Susie Sunshine was trying to pass.

What are the odds of that? Probably a gajillion to one. 

If my feet hadn't been so tired, we probably would have dashed off to buy a lottery ticket.