Facie’s Ramblings

Before I launch into a woe-is-me tale, let me tell you how bad I feel about complaining, knowing how many good things I have in my life and how much worse off others are. But I feel the need to get this off my chest. Unfortunately as much as I like my job, I find myself staying late pretty often. I had one blissful, leave-on-time week two weeks ago, which I thought was how it was going to be for the next month or so, but, well, um, no. We have deadlines. And, more than that for me/the bigger reason is I want my materials to be perfect or nearly so; I am unwilling to let pretty much anything slip past me. As a result, I find myself doing a lot of extra work/going the extra mile. So after putting my time in (and often eating at my desk), I walk the 10 minutes to my car, sit at every light imaginable (seriously, can we just computerize those babies after 5:30 or 6?!), suffer through tunnel traffic, even after 6 p.m., and I am home late (duh). Some days I eat with my family; more often...

Ever since J was a toddler, we (or at least I) have been taking her to the Pittsburgh Zoo. Once or twice, we went when it was free (thank you, RAD). Mostly, we would go with the Pittsburgh chapter of the Penn State Alumni Association. And the past two years, J and I went during the week when the Penn State College of Education sponsored a day at the Zoo, most recently last week. I love our zoo! I cannot say that enough. I could spend all day there, but unfortunately, we seem to end up going on days when it is near or over 90 degrees. Still, I have never had anything less than a great time there. As creatures of habit, we always start out clockwise with the tigers and leopards. When it is hot, those guys and gals aren't too exciting, so we tend to see them (if they are not hidden) and quickly move on. I like to spend a few minutes looking at the flamingos because they are so pretty.  I am not too enthralled with the rhino, but I still manage to get a pic for good mea...

What do you consider a vacation? Does your trip need to be a certain number of hours or miles away? Do you need to be gone for at least three or four days for it "to count"? Or as long as you are off work or school for more than two days, is that enough of a vacation? I was a pretty spoiled child. We went to the beach for a week pretty much every year in addition to going to another place or two for a day or more. When I was in high school, my family had a house in Ocean City, Maryland, which meant several weeks at the beach. And for about a year, my family also had a house on Indian Lake (near where Flight 93 crashed), so we had many weekend getaways there as well.Yep, rough life I had. But as an adult, I never felt the need to go away every year. And once I got married, we often went several years in between "going on vacation." In fact, during our 13-plus years of marriage, the only week-long trip we have taken was to Disney for our honeymoon. It took us 10 m...

This summer I made it a point to try to take at least one pic of Jordan whenever we went somewhere, which most often was a park. I wanted to capture all the great, fun things we did this summer, knowing that it was probably going to be my last summer not working for quite some time. So here goes. I have expressed my love of Frick Park, particularly Blue Slide Park, in other posts ; it really is one of our favorites. And this summer marked the first one I did not feel the need to follow J around like a little puppy dog. I actually let her run around and explore, though, admittedly, I would panic if more than three minutes went by and I had not seen her. In the pics above, J is at the end of the blue slide, and then hanging several feet above concrete (which scared the crap out of me). We also visited another section of Frick Park, the area on the corner of Braddock and Forbes, a few times. There is not as much to do as Blue Slide, but we go there to mix things up a bit. In the p...

Kennywood! Kennywood! Kennywood! Kennywood! Kennywood! Kennywood! Kennywood! Yesterday, Bri, J, and I went to Kennywood to celebrate J's excellent grades this year. The last time I was at Kennywood was in 2000, when the Aero 360 first opened. I won a contest on the now-defunct B94 and was one of the first few people to try out that new ride. Even though my body started rejecting spinning/turning movements back in the late 1990s, I managed to employ mind over matter for that experience. The last time I had spent an entire day at Kennywood was back in 1994 or 1995, when Bri and I were just dating and had gone with one of my friends from high school and her boyfriend. Back then, I could ride all things that spin, twist, turn, or loop. The good ole days! We started off our morning on the Phantom's Revenge, which is a super-fast coaster (85 mph) with some twists, but fortunately no loops. In hindsight, it was probably not the best way to begin a day at Kennywood for someone li...

This evening Jordan and I attended the second of three Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy meetings focused on Kate and Peter's treehouse . You may recall I blogged about the first meeting before it happened, and was not even sure we would end up going, thanks to Jordan's reaction to Kate and Peter's death. I am happy to report despite my concern, Jordan seemed to accept what happened, and that meeting went well. Here is the treehouse masterpiece she and a friend's daughter created that evening: Tonight's meeting was held at Frick Park. On our way to the three areas we were to visit, all the treehouses the kids had created from that last meeting flanked the pathway. I thought it was pretty cool. Jordan is standing near hers. Not nearly as cool is my shadow! We then went to the site of the future treehouse and wrote down our ideas on cards hanging from/on wires as well as on trees. At first, I kind of struggled with this creative process. I worked at a design firm...

On more than one occasion, I have blogged about my having only one kid and the grief that has caused me. Grief is really a strong word, but I don't know which word is the right word. Having one kid was a mostly intentional choice. Years ago we had decided that once we sold our house and moved into our larger one, we would try to have another kid. But we put our house on the market a year later than we anticipated, and by that time, I had gotten over the desire for another kid. Good thing, because we are still here in this same smallish house, in this crappy, crappy school district! Most days I am glad that I am able to devote myself to my one child; she does not have to share my affection with anyone else. But, as I have mentioned countless times here and to others, it can be difficult being your child's playmate. I can take only so many Barbies, babies, and princess play times. I can never say, "Go play with your sister." But I love reading to my kid and enjoy most...

I have complained a few times about how I used to be lucky but then I pretty much stopped winning anything . I was particularly dismayed that I had never won a contest with Pittsburgh Mom , despite the fact that I had entered probably 50 giveaways and some of them had only 30 entries, for the love of Pete. Well, that changed just over a week ago when I became the winner of a Nicole Begley mini photo session, courtesy of Pittsburgh Mom. This past Saturday, Jordan, Brian, and I had a bunch of pictures taken at a nice park in the Cranberry area. Of course, Brian and I argued about what to wear; he pretty much has no dress clothes and I don't own a single pair of jeans that fits me decently, hence our dilemma. Ultimately, we decided to wear gray, and we were overdressed (really, who wears dress pants or a dress at a park on a cold fall day?), but, hey, we got free pics! You can see a few of the photos on her blog . I just love the last one of Jordan. The ones of me? Not so much, th...

For years, pretty much for most of my adulthood, I have not looked forward to summer. Once you become a grownup, it kind of loses its allure, since you have to, in most cases, keep on working. And as I have stated many times, I am just not a fan of heat. There is only so much you can take, and you certainly cannot peel off layers of skin once it gets too hot. But for some reason, even though this summer has been hotter than last (to the best of my knowledge), I am finding myself not hating this season as I usually do. This is not to say I have not complained; a few of those over-90-degree days coupled with high humidity were pretty unbearable. But, holy crap, I think my body may have gotten used to it. Lest you think this has something to do with the harsh winter we had, I can assure you it did not. I complained very few times this winter. Most of my grumblings revolved around the big snowstorm when not only were we without power for about 30 hours, but we also had over 22 inches o...

I used to be pretty meh about spring, but this March, much like last March, was a pretty good month weather-wise. Of course, in comparison to the longest February of my and many others' lives, March really had nowhere to go but up. And considering the next few days are going to be in or near the 80s, I am hopeful April will turn out to be just as good or even better. And with the good weather comes hours spent outdoors. For us, that means going to a park whenever we can. Since Jordan has been off since Tuesday, we have visited two of my favorite parks in and around the Burgh. Boyce Park last year renovated O'Block Playground. There is now a large play area with slides, ladders and climbing areas, plus a half dozen swings. I like that everything is in one place, so I don't have to worry about my kid wandering off. And when she tires of that or just wants to explore, there are wooded trails we can explore. A noteworthy feature of this playground is it was designed for ki...

April is normally a month of hope. The first full month of spring. Typically Easter falls within it. We usually end up with at least a week or two of nice weather (one year we had a week in the 80s). People spend time outside. Baseball season starts (remember, no one starts with a losing record!). This April, however, and particularly over the next two weeks, I will be thinking about the one-year anniversary of some sad things that occurred within a seven-day period last year. The tragic death of Amy's (from Callapitter) children. I will be sending her good thoughts and vibes over the next few weeks. As difficult as this last year has been for her, I am surmising the anniversary will be trying in a different way. I am, however, glad to see that plans for the playground memorializing her children are coming together. If you are interested in donating, please go here. The slaying of three Pittsburgh police officers. Sadly, someone is killed almost every week in and around the ci...

Yesterday, I went to a local park with Jordan, as I have done quite often over the past four weeks. It was a beautiful day, although I felt a little sad as I had spent some time earlier watching TV coverage of the procession of the three slain Pittsburgh police officers through the streets of the city. Probably an hour into our time there, I saw a police car drive up. At first, I wondered if it was because I had emailed the mayor just the day before, asking, among other things, if police patrolled the park. On several visits to the park, I had noticed people young and old alike sitting in cars for long periods of time. I am not entirely sure what any of them were doing; I just know each time, it left me unsettled. When a second police car pulled up, and an officer got out with a police dog and started walking down the hill, I figured this was more than just a patrol. I waited until two young adults finished talking to one of the officers, and I asked them what was going on. Apparently,...