Summer @ soapcentral.com

Hey all...it's been forever since I've been on here!  I never thought my summer was gonna be busy as it turned out to be.  It's a "good" busy though.  I am having a great summer and I hope everyone else is too.

So here's what's been going on with me lately...during the last week of June we went to Door County, WI for a week.  That's an awesome place to vacation...it's the peninsula that sticks out the east side of Wisconsin...that place is always so much fun to be at.  The month of July was pretty busy...my dad and I went to Rochester, MN for a weekend...we used to live there so it was fun going down Memory Lane.  My sister had surgery on her ear last month...she accidentally tore her ear lobe a few months ago while taking an earring off, so she had to have surgery to get that fixed.  And pretty much for this whole past month we were doing stuff like going out to eat, taking our boat out, getting together with friends, etc.  And this past weekend my dad, brother, and I went to Milwaukee and then for the EAA Air Show in Oshkosh.  So yeah, this is turning out to be a pretty fun summer.  And tomorrow we're beginning a two-week vacation down the east coast, which we're all SO excited for!  Here's the itinerary...

1 night--Chicago

1 night--Columbus

3 nights--Washington, D.C.

1 night--Wilmington

1 night--Savannah

3 nights--Orlando (Disney World)

1 night--Key West

Then on the way back...

1 night--Gainseville

2 nights--New Orleans

1 night--Memphis

1 night--Kansas City

That is gonna be SO much fun!  I can't wait!  So that means I won't be online for another two weeks.  When I come back, I'll let you know how it was and share pictures.  So I'll see ya in a couple weeks...just thought I'd touch bases real quick

Hey all!  Well, I am a week into my summer vacation, and I am enjoying it.  I am at my grandparents' house in the Twin Cities now and I'm having fun down here.  It's just me, Nana, and Papa...and my great-aunt Frannie, who lives very close to Nana and Papa, is here a lot too.  We've been going out to eat, we've been playing cards, we've been talking a lot of politics (we're total conservatives and we're all scared to death of Obama becoming president ), and we've watched a lot of episode of The First 48.  The First 48 is a reality show where police and detectives solve these gruesome murder mysteries in just 48 hours.  It's really good...very compelling and addicting.

On Tuesday we went down to southeastern Minnesota to visit some relatives.  We had lunch with my great-aunts Marge, Betty, and Eleanor; and my great-uncle Bob.  We had a nice lunch with them...also, on Saturday, they had some flooding in southeastern Minnesota.  It wasn't major flooding...didn't cause much damage, but some areas down there were rather messy.  We saw one baseball field that was completely submerged in water

Frannie had her cat Sammy put to sleep yesterday.  That cat was REALLY old...18 years old, and he was as thin as a rail.  He never really ate so much, so Frannie definitely did him a favor by putting him down.  Frannie says she feels kinda guilty, 'cause she never felt so close to her cat.  She really didn't love him that much, and she always thought he was kind of a nuisance to have around.  For instance, he always got in the way of her and the TV.  She also kinda felt guilty 'cause she left him alone all the time...she spends most of the time at Nana & Papa's house instead of her place.  But she says that now that Sammy's gone, she thinks she loved him more than she thought she did.  But she says it is nice to not have the cat around anymore; no more of him getting in the way of her and the TV, and no more feeling guilty about leaving him alone all the time...so I definitely think she did the right thing by putting him down.

Well, I'm gonna go watch another First 48 with Papa and Frannie.  Later!

Hello everyone...well, yesterday was the last day of my freshman year.  I have had an amazing school year.  This first year of high school has just FLOWN by and I can't believe it's already over!  These last few weeks were a total drag...as great as this year was, the last few weeks are ALWAYS a drag 'cause you're just ready to be done!  And now I am

So here's what I've got planned for the summer.  The day after tomorrow I'll be spending the week down at my grandparents' house (Nana & Papa) in the Twin Cities.  I'm really looking forward to that...for a week every summer I go down there and spend a week with them all by myself.  And at the end of June (two weeks from today) we're leaving for Door County, WI for a week.  We go there every summer for that week and we always have a blast...that week's gonna fly by.  At the end of July my dad, brother, and I are going to the EAA Air Show in Oshkosh.  And in August for two weeks we're going on a two-week trip down the east coast.  We'll be in DC, the Carolinas, and down to Key West.  REALLY looking forward to that!

Ya know, it feels like forever ago when I actually blogged...I mean, I posted Desperate Housewives reviews every week, but other than that, it doesn't seem like I blogged so much this past school year, 'cause it kept me busy...but now that I'm done for three months, I'll be blogging this summer just as often as I blogged last summer (I think most of my blog entries were from last summer).  I hope everyone has a happy summer!

Ahh, im up early during the summer for my first day of summer school this semester. I've done this before so its no biggie its just getting up so early can be tough on me at times. I didnt get off work last night till 1 AM so im a bit under rested; but i have a big cup of coffee to help perk me up as well! If i hadn't worked so late last night i would have got up early enough to work out. Im trying to get back into a regular exercise routine this summer that will continue over into the winter and so forth. Its a hard transition because i haven't worked out regularly since my senior year in high school 2 years ago!

Anyways, im taking English Comp 2 this summer and i have a feeling its going to be a bit extreme because cramming a whole semester worth of classwork into 1 month is going to be a stretch. It was bad when i took Sociology during last summer but when i took Govt for that first summer session it almost killed me. It can be a bit too much reading at times and i have a VERY bad habit of procrastinating. Since i dropped this class during the Spring semester, im expecting to get at least a B in it. So i've got two goals to achieve during this summer.

Err...Three...I need to go visit my friend in his new place and i feel like i keep lying to him saying "tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow" but eh, work and school are more important that attempting to keep my social life

How many people here either are kids or have kids?  If you are one of these people, do you have anything planned over Spring Break?  Our plans...going to New Orleans.  I have been to New Orleans twice before Katrina, and in six weeks or so I'm gonna see what it looks like now.  Obviously it will be very different...I am very interested how it has changed.  We will be driving down there...it is about a three-day drive.

We also have some family down in New Orleans.  My great-aunt Alice lives there with her husband John, and my dad's cousin Julie lives there with her husband Max.  None of their houses got destroyed.  Alice and John live in a very nice neighborhood.  Their neighborhood is known for mansions and trees...but most of the trees are gone now which is really sad 'cause those trees are what made the neighborhood really beautiful...their house didn't get damaged at all but a lot of houses in that neighborhood were very badly damaged, so Alice and John lucked out.  Julie and Max's house sustained zero damage, but the street behind them got completely flattened, so they REALLY lucked out.

I really hope we can be able to see them, but there's a chance we might not be able to 'cause they have a lot on their plate right now.  Alice and John are both 83 years old and niether one of them is doing great healthwise.  Alice has arthritis very badly and she hasn't been responding to her normal medications, but luckily her doctor recently prescribed her some new med and that's been working well for her.  So she's getting progressively better and she says that as soon as her doctor says it's OK, she's gonna come up to Minnesota for a visit, which is good 'cause Alice is a lot of fun.  So things have been looking up for Alice...John, on the other hand, is getting progressively worse.  A couple years ago they found a tumor in his voicebox, so he underwent radiation therapy.  The tumor is gone, but he is left with the yucky side effects of radiation, as all of his upper teeth are gone.  Also, his back condition has been really getting to him.  He uses a heating pad and there are some activities he can no longer do, such as golfing, which is a shame 'cause he LOVES to golf.  A nurse comes to their house on nights and weekends but given that John's health is deteriorating, they might have to have a full-time nurse soon.  As bad as Alice and John may have it, Julie and Max have it worse.  Max is in the hospital dying of cancer.  It started in his kidneys and spread to his spleen, lungs, pancreas, and lymph nodes.  He is undergoing chemo every day, and if you're doing chemo every day it can't be good.  He lost 50 pounds since he started chemo and Alice says he looks terrible.  And Julie is not holding up well.  Julie is a sweet, wondeful woman, but she is not a strong woman at all.  Alice has told her that she needs to be strong for Max, but Julie just hasn't been holding up well.  It's awful 'cause these are great people and they don't deserve what they're getting.  It's awful also because Max is only 59, he's a great guy, and given that he lives a thousand miles from me, I never got to know him very well, and I wish I could've been able to get to know him well.  So I definitely hope I will be able to see him one last time when we're down there.

So in addition to going to New Orleans this March, we have also been talking about what we should do this summer.  After all, we are halfway there.  From June 20-27, we will be going to Door County, WI, as we always do during the last week of June.  Also, every August the past few years, we've been going someplace we've never been before.  In 2005 we went to San Francisco, in 2006 we went to Boston, and in 2007 we went to Yellowstone.  We are gonna go somewhere in August...we have decided on two possible places.  Either we're going to Seattle, or we're gonna go to the east coast and drive down the east coast...we'd be in places such as Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Washington, and the Carolinas.  They both sound like fun trips.

I suppose this was one of my longer blogs, huh?  Well, I should be going.  Got homework to do