AZDonna

1. Still basking in the glow of the city lights and Broadway shows.
2. Got home a day late and can’t seem to catch up.
3. Mom was in the hospital while I was gone, and I spent a day tending to her needs when I finally did get home.
4. Back to work. (ugh!)
5. Tired, jet lagged.
6. Celebrated Lauren’s 10th birthday.
7. Christmas shopping is looming and started.
8. Twenty tv shows stacked up on Tivo that I have to find time to watch.
9. Working on plans & shopping for a backpacking trip next weekend.
10. Just lazy, I guess.

I did have a fabulous time and will blog about the trip details soon.

I saw the Sound of Music last night for the second time in a theater. The first time was in 1965, the year it was released, and that was my second time in an indoor theater in my life (Swiss Family Robinson was the first). Last night’s event was a sing-a-long, with the words to every song printed at the bottom of the screen karaoke style.  There were 30 Facebook friends as well as about 30 other “singers” in the audience, and we had a blast singing along to every song. I had the album (yes, a vinyl 33rpm ALBUM) when I was a girl – I still have it – and I knew all the words to all the songs. (Well, I admit, I didn’t know the Latin words to the nun’s morning hymn, nor could I ever get all the words to The Lonely Goatherd).

I think this post can turn into a list of 10. Here’s 10 songs from The Sound of Music:

1. The Sound of Music
2. How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria
3. I Have Confidence
4. Sixteen Going on Seventeen
5. My Favorite Things
6. The Lonely Goatherd
7. Do-Re-Mi
8. Something Good
9. So Long, Farewell
10. Edelweiss
11. Climb Every Mountain

Whoops, it’s a list of 11. Just couldn’t stop myself.

WARNING — Some answers are starting to show up in the comments below (that’s fine!) If you don’t want to see them, don’t scroll down.

1. You throw away the outside and cook the inside. You eat the outside and throw away the inside.
2. Forward I am heavy, but backward I am not.
3. What is it that after you take away the whole, some still remains?
4. What is wrong with this statement?
5. What word starts with the letter e, ends with the letter e, contains just one letter, but is not the letter e?
6. How can you take 1 from 19 and leave 20?
7. Why are 1990 dollar bills worth more than 1989 dollar bills?
8. A cowboy rode to an inn on Friday, stayed two nights and left on Friday. How can that be?
9. Rearrange the following letters to make just one word: UTODWOERNJS
10. Two fathers and two sons have a pizza that is cut in three pieces. How can each get a whole piece without cutting any?

I’ve been on many vacation trips, and created a lot of memories.  Richard’s recent blog posts about our home town, Cuba, and Dale’s stories about his hikes on the North Country Trail with Karen have made me reminisce about some of the great getaways I have taken. Here’s a list of 10, and the reason each one is memorable.

1. Disneyland 1960. Our very first trip to Disneyland, and Walt Disney was there, riding in the Main Street parade! I remember I wore a dress, and got a bad sunburn on my shoulders.
2. Yellowstone 196?. Our first family trip to the most popular National Park in the country was dampened by round-the-clock rainfall. But the most memorable moment was as Richard was directing Dad into the camp space and a big black bear ambled up behind him. He didn’t believe us when we told him it was there, but he sure scrambled when he realized we weren’t kidding.
3. Zion 196?. On one of our camping trips to Zion National Park, Donnie fell into a deep hole in the river, and I tried to grab him. Since neither of us could swim (duh!), we both would have drowned if Dick and Dale had not swum over to us and rescued us. Funny, but I can still remember that feeling of going under the water and not being able to stand up and get a breath of air. Thanks big brothers, I never thought about it, but I guess I owe you my life!
4. Michigan/New York Road Trip 1973. When Brian was a baby, Roland & I drove back east for Christmas. On the way home, we encountered the worst ice storm Arkansas had ever seen, and we slid off the road into the ditch. Luckily, tow trucks were trolling, looking for business by setting folks back on that ice rink called a road, and so we were rescued and moved s-l-o-w-l-y on down the road.
5. Lake Powell 1980. Our first house boating vacation was definitely a blast, but I will never forget 7 year old Brian falling off that top bunk the first night.
6. Hawaii 1983. Even though Roland and I had the biggest fight of our lives over that nude beach, we still had a wonderful time seeing all the sights and relaxing in the sun.
7. Alaska 1997. On my very first trip to Alaska, my purse was stolen along with my airline ticket home, all my credit cards, my Social Security card (I’ll never carry THAT around again!) and $230 in cash. It was quite an ordeal getting everything taken care of in order to fly home. None of my belongings ever turned up, but neither did my identity on someone else’s mortgage, so all’s well that ends well.
8. Walt Disney World 2002. I got to experience Mickey, and especially the Winnie the Pooh ride, through 3 year old Megan’s eyes.
9. Walt Disney World 2003. WDW two years in a row, but the second time I saw it with 3 year old Lauren and 6 month old Nathan. Nathan gave us a terrible scare by passing out (he had sleep apnea) during the Epcot fireworks, but he doesn’t seem to have suffered any permanent effects.
10. New England/East Coast Road Trip 2005. Glenda and I earned a reputation as the “Lost Girls” as we continually got on the wrong route while driving through every state in New England and down the Atlantic coast, stopping in NYC, Philadelphia, Washington D.C, and finally Walt Disney World in Orlando Florida. An extra bonus on memory lane was experiencing the tail end of Hurricane Wilma.

If I were writing this in December, I’m sure I would have to make room for my November trip to New York City with Robin to see three Broadway shows. But that’s a future memory waiting to be made.

What are some of your memorable vacations? And by the way, does anyone know the dates of those 196? trips?