Weekending

Linking up with Holly and Sarah for Hello Monday:

Friday, I subbed. It was our school district’s day before break. The last two hours of the school day were hours of fun for the students. They did various rotations centered around March Madness. Many of the students were absent from school due to already having left for spring break trips. The idea was to make the school day somewhat "lite" to account for fewer students and that it was the last day before a week long break. I got to work with and see some of my favorite people at the school; it was a good day!

After school, I did two of my favorite activities- one sedentary and one active... I sat on the couch for a while and read and then I got up and ran/walked on the treadmill for a few miles.

Neither Donnie nor I were super hungry for dinner and so we decided to have popcorn for dinner. Truly one of, if not the, only good thing about being an empty nester is the freedom to eat whatever we want to for dinner (without having the guilt, anyway, of not providing a nutritious meal for kids!). We watched an episode of Reacher before going to bed early.

Got a good night's sleep finally! (I'd slept terribly the week before- I think it was because I was truly relaxed. On days where I'm set to sub the following day, I generally don't sleep well.) Saturday morning, Donnie went to the gym while I ran an errand, including getting a twenty five cent Big Gulp. The sale ends on Tuesday so I gotta strike while the iron is hot.

Donnie had work to do for work.  He keeps getting new work in that he doesn't want to turn down. While he worked, I ran on the treadmill and did some work of my own. It's for the library board where I sit. At our last meeting, we were given a document to review. Some of the information in it pertains to the American Library Association, the country's largest library association. Based on what I read (a statement from the ALA), I decided to do some research into the ALA. Oh dear. Let's just say that I don't see eye to eye with the ALA on a variety of topics. The next board meeting is not going to be a fun one...

Speaking of not seeing eye for eye, when I looked at the news online, I saw a story (and video) about a young man who was wearing a MAGA hat on a NYC subway. A woman confronted the man, calling him a racist for liking Donald Trump and she questioned whether he is really educated after he told the woman that he is highly educated. The man's skin tone is quite a bit darker than the woman's but it seems that "racist" is now used as a pejorative against anyone who voted for Trump/America first. When the young man was ready to exit the subway, he took off his hat and said something smart alecky to the woman like, "I hope you like my hat!" (Not, in retrospect, the best thing to say!) and he dashed out the doors of the subway. Here's where things got interesting. The woman also dashed out the subway doors and gave chase to this lithe, young, "racist" in an apparent attempt to grab his hat. The woman was spectacularly unsuccessful- she wasn't going to beat him in a foot race under the best of circumstances. But in this case, she tripped and fell flat on her face. 

Assuming this wasn't staged by all the parties involved (I don't think it was but it's impossible to know for sure), one lesson learned is to never underestimate the extent to which astonishing amounts of adrenaline, hubris and animosity can result in making not well thought out decisions. 

Why can't we all just get along? Co-exist? Treat each other kindly? Be tolerant of other people’s viewpoints? Affirm diversity of thoughts and opinions?  Live and let live? Must we chase after people and their hats, call them names, set fire to cars, etc?

I hope and pray that when I speak out at our library's next board meeting (that is on my birthday no less 🤨) when I'm almost certain to say things that others disagree with, my words come across sagaciously and that I am at all times respectful of others while stating the truth. (Also really hoping not to be chased by anyone!!)

Here is a link to the video that shows the incident in NYC. Be forewarned that there is distasteful/ foul language in the video.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bYXD4exnw6M

Let's go back to the weekend...

We decided to go out for dinner and then run to Sam's Club. Chili's is near Sam's Club so we went there. Chili's $10.99 3- course meal (soft drink, appetizer and entree) is such a good deal! The burger I got had two patties and I could only eat half of it. Donnie ordered broccoli as his side but they brought fries. He pointed out what he ordered and so our server brought out his broccoli. He kept the fries they had given him. I didn't eat nearly all of my fries so we had enough left fries for our dinner at home on Sunday. I did order dessert to go which was a fun treat!

Donnie's firm supplies soft drinks gratuitously (as well as coffee and tea) to its employees and Donnie had volunteered to pick up pop, water, and a large bag of paper towels. So we did that at Sam's Club. Hey, maybe I should get a job in Donnie's office. "Free" pop (it's not really free when Donnie is one of the ones providing the pop but... still, conceptually, it sounds like a good idea!)

We went home and watched a movie that Donnie thought that maybe he'd be in the credits for as he did some of the legal work for it. Alas, he wasn't. And we had to rent ($9.99!) and watch the entire movie just to not see his name. The movie was okish. It was called Riff Raff and it had some great actors- Jennifer Coolidge, Ed Harris, Bill Murray and others but it wasn't great. It was very violent- definitely not my cuppa.

Sunday morning was church- the service was great. We chatted with a friendly woman before the service who sat in front of us. I miss seeing our friends at our old church! I hope to volunteer and make friends at this church. 

We ran errands and relaxed the rest of the day.