Losing our minds by degrees

I'm the youngest person in the water fitness class at the gym by at least 20 years.  Today I stayed in the pool to do a little extra work after everyone else left.  I saw that someone had left her water bottle by the pool, so I took it to the locker room to catch her before she left.  I've been going there long enough to recognize people's water bottles, and I was 99% sure whose this was.  I saw her towel outside the shower, so I put the bottle next to her towel.  I thought I'd better make sure, so I yelled in and asked if she'd left her water bottle by the pool.  She yelled back, "No, I sure didn't."  I said, "Oh, then I don't know whose this is."  She opened the shower curtain and pointed to the bottle that I had just put there and said, "Well it's not mine, because that's mine right there. I'm not losing my mind yet."  I smirked to myself and said, "Yep, you've still got it!"

Then I went to the locker room to get my stuff, opened the locker I thought I had left my stuff in, and it was empty.  Immediately I thought, "Who stole my ratty Tshirt and stinky shorts?" but then I realized I didn't use that locker today because it was already full when I arrived.  So I opened another locker that I sometimes use when my favorite one isn't available.  It was empty too.  I stood there staring at the rows of lockers with absolutely no clue where my stuff was.  I started opening random ones, and then noticed the young person (looked like early 20's) standing at the sink, apparently smirking at me.  She said, "Did you forget which locker you used?"  Right then I opened the correct one, so I said, "No, this is the one. I'm not losing my mind yet."

Whales, evolution, and getting dropped on my head

I was having a conversation with Sarah, and for some reason, I broke into whale sounds.

Sarah: What?
Me: Sorry, I was speaking whale.
S: I don't speak whale.
M: Doesn't everybody speak a little whale as a remnant of when we used to be whales?
 [I was testing what they're teaching her at public school about evolution].
S: We didn't evolve from whales, Mom.  You didn't come from a whale.  Come to think of it, I don't really know where you came from.
M: God dropped me straight down from heaven.
S: I think he must have dropped you on your head.

My new career

For several years, I've been praying about and thinking about what I'm going to do for my next career.  Now that my homeschooling career is drawing to a close, I was starting to feel a little desperate about my next step.  But God revealed it at the perfect time, of course.  Last month, I applied for a freelance transcriptionist job.  The only requirements were good typing and English skills, which are pretty much my only skills.  The application involved grammar testing, word usage testing, and transcribing an audio file.  It took me about an hour to complete the application process, but I felt good about it when I submitted it.

About thee days later, I heard that I got the job.  I was considered a rookie for the first several jobs until I proved I could do it.  Rookie pay is very low, and the jobs aren't great (mostly transcribing collect calls from prison inmates).  At first, I was pretty slow and not very accurate, but after several jobs, I started getting the hang of it.  Yesterday I got promoted to full transcriptionist, so now I'm making more money and getting better jobs. 

It's the perfect job for me, because I don't have to get dressed or talk to people, but I get to use my skills and learn interesting things, and I can work as much as I have time to spare.  Noah says I like it because I'm nosy.  I never considered myself nosy; I just have a well-developed sense of curiosity.  But I do enjoy hearing the juicy details of lawsuits as I transcribe the lawyers' audio dictation.  My favorite job was transcribing a Holocaust survivor's biography.  Very interesting, but difficult, because he had a Polish accent and I had to look up a lot of cities in Poland and Germany and learn to spell them. 

As soon as I graduated from rookie status, I became eligible to apply for video captioning, so I applied yesterday.  More grammar and word usage tests, plus learning the system for closed captioning and then actually captioning a video.  That was more difficult, because there are more rules and the additional step of syncing the words with the video.  But if I get that job, I'll have more interesting opportunities. 

So for now, I'm going to try to pick up a quick transcription job before I start teaching for the day.

Indiana Dunes--last day

Friday, May 31, 2019
I was eating breakfast with Sarah when I had a genius idea about how to get all our stuff from the room to the van (the elevators were still broken).  There were two luggage trolleys in the lobby, so my idea was to position one at the bottom of the stairs on the first floor and one at the top of the stairs on the second floor (loaded and rolled from our room) and we could run stuff down to the first floor one and roll it out to the parking lot.  Sarah spotted a problem with this idea immediately.  She asked, "How are we going to get the first one up to the second floor?"  I thought that was smart, and I felt dumb.  While she finished breakfast, I went upstairs to the room and told Mike and Noah about my idea.  Mike thought it was a good idea.  Noah immediately had the same objection Sarah did.  Smart kids.  I parked the van by the door, and we had it done in only a few trips.  We left at 10 a.m. and arrived home at 1:20 after an uneventful, but slow ride home with lots of construction and traffic.  Everyone was very glad to be home and have privacy and space. 
Sarah's favorite part of the trip was Zao Island, and everyone else's favorite was the hike.  We all agreed it was a really nice trip. 

Indiana Dunes--day 3

Thursday, May 30, 2019
Four people with opinions living in the same little hotel room is a bit of a challenge as the days go on.  People snoring, hogging blankets, putting their legs across the center line of the bed, leaving stuff all over the place, stinking up the bathroom, walking around not fully clothed, etc.  Mike wants the curtains completely closed; I like them all the way open.  He wants to keep the room at 66 degrees; I want it about 10 degrees warmer.  Noah ate sunflower seeds in the bed yesterday, which understandably made Sarah furious.  He claimed to clean them all out before they went to bed, but she woke up with sunflower seeds in her hair (she said it was 81 seeds, but upon counting again, it was only four, but still).  Heard just now: "Stop moving!" "YOU stop talking!"
Questionable weather today, so we're heading to Valparaiso to an amusement center with options for indoor fun.

Sarah got 164 on the Speed of Light game; Noah got 159; I got 155.  Mike didn't play.  It was so stressful, I almost had a heart attack. 

We ended up with 830 tickets.  Noah spent 400 on a Bears pennant. Sarah spent the rest, mostly on candy.

The cross on Mike's hat glowed during laser tag, so he was an easy target. Even so, he hit me more than I hit him.

Noah slaughtered us in laser tag.  He was Thor, Mike was Wolverine; Sarah was Robin, and I brought up the rear as Flash.  I'm really not good at laser tag. I get scared and scream a lot.  Noah is fast and stealthy.  

Noah had fun in the batting cages.

Noah lapped Sarah.  I'm pleased to see that she's a very cautious driver.  Gives me hope for when she starts driving real cars soon.

Mike and Noah enjoyed the Connect 4 Hoops game.

The weather turned out to be perfect when we left Zao Island, so we decided to make today the beach day instead of tomorrow.

Our own personal lifeguard with the biggest umbrella in history.

 

It took several tries to achieve this selfie.  We're still pretty selfie-challenged.

Sarah made sand castles.

After Noah got buried up to his neck, he was covered in sand and had to brave the freezing water to wash it off.

The hotel is starting to fall apart.  First, the elevator broke. Then the ice machine.  Just about time to get out of here.

Indiana Dunes--day 2

 Wednesday, May 29, 2019
Sad start to the day, because they found the body of the missing guy this morning.  The family found out while we were at breakfast with them (not with them, but just at the same hotel breakfast).  I talked to his mom and prayed for her.  She was pretty stoic at the time, but later she was just wailing.  There was much discussion about what to do with the body, and who would tell his girlfriend.  It was all just horrible.

We made it to the Trail 9 trailhead in the state park and hiked the whole thing (almost 4 miles).  It was amazing!  Forest, wetlands, dunes, and the shore of Lake Michigan (the very same place where the body washed up this morning, which I tried unsuccessfully not to think about). Perfect hiking conditions: cloudy, 60 degrees, not too hot, not too cold, not too many bugs, and not too crowded (we saw only one other person the whole time).

This fanny pack is one of my best friends.  It holds 2 bottles of water, my camera, sunscreen, bug spray, sunglasses, and maps.  I so appreciate it.  Mike hauled the backpack with snacks, jackets, toilet paper, etc. 

Sarah at the top of a dune.

Mike and Noah charging down the dune towards the shore of the lake, which was covered in fog.

Mike and Noah at the bottom of the dune. Sarah and I were at the top.

 

The forest part of the trail.

When we got back to the hotel, the boys got ready to go golfing.

Mike and I drove to the beach for a sunset date, but it was pretty cold and cloudy, so we didn't stay long. 

 

When we got back to the hotel, Sarah and I went swimming, and the boys watched baseball on TV. The highlight of Mike's day was when Sarah told him, "You're the butthole of humanity."  He said, "I think that's the nicest thing you've ever said to me."

Indiana trip--day 1

Tuesday, May 28, 2019

My dad arrived to take care of the cats, plants, and house, and we left around 10:30 a.m..  I felt good leaving everything in his capable hands and knowing that the cats would be loved.  It was a fun ride.  We listened to Mr. Stinky Feet's Road Trip, as usual, and did a couple mad libs.  I asked for a noun, and Mike said "crack" and for the next noun, Sarah said "heroin".  Mike said he was referring to a crack in the road, but it was too late.  The rest of the mad lib had a decidedly druggy theme.  Sarah still has her injured middle finger in a splint (from her random shaking-out-a-homework-cramp injury), so when she holds that hand up, it looks like she's making a rude gesture. When a semi cut us off, Noah yelled, "Show him your splint, Sarah!"  We had a long discussion about whether we would be in the same time zone in Indiana.  We also weren't sure if Indiana is doing daylight saving time. Sarah announced that her phone said it was 1:08, and the van clock said 12:26.  We said even if Indiana is in a different time zone, it would be off by exactly an hour, not some random number of minutes.  We ended up deciding that Sarahland is in a different time zone from the rest of the world.  Random road trip quote from Sarah to Noah: "My brain noises are more entertaining than your music."

We arrived at the hotel (Comfort Inn and Suites in Porter, IN) at 1:30 and were shocked at how cold it was outside.  It was in the 70s in Illinois but was only 55 here!  We had to wait about ten minutes for the hotel clerk to appear.  When he finally showed up, he had a bloody tissue hanging out of his right nostril.  Mike just looked at him and asked, "Do you have an issue?" which made me and Noah laugh.  He told us we couldn't check in until 3:00, so we drove around exploring the area.  Our first stop was the visitor's center, where we picked up some maps and brochures.  There were some activities, like nature rubbings, puppets, etc.  It was a nice place.

Then we tried to find the dunes and/or the beach.  We found the entrance to the state park, but there was an entrance fee, and we didn't want to pay since we weren't planning to stay long.  We followed the signs to a learning center, but that ended up in a strange camplike place where Sarah rode this turtle:

and then we left, having never found the learning center.  We came back to the hotel and saw a missing persons flyer.

I took a picture of it and made a mental note to keep my eye out for him.  We settled into our room (223).  It's a cheap hotel but nice enough and meets our requirements.  On our way to the pool, I saw a guy who looked like the missing guy in the flyer, so I held up the flyer next to him and asked, "Is that you?"  He said, "It's my brother."  Then a news camera showed up and started doing a story on the missing guy.  I hope they find him.

We had a good time playing in the pool.  I was glad I remembered to bring a ball and frisbee.  The pool and hot tub were nice and clean.

I took some flyers of the missing guy to distribute when we went to dinner.  We ate at this place called "Country Pride Restaurant".  Mike's meal came with a salad bar, which he didn't want, and all I was going to order was the salad bar, so the waitress just let me have his and didn't charge me. It was a good salad bar with lots of vegetables and beans.  Noah ate way too much (his whole meal plus two trips to the salad bar and soup) and was pretty miserable when we got back to the hotel.  He said, "Is it possible that I ruptured my stomach? Because it really hurts."  Sarah said, "You're just pregnant with your food baby."
Boys are watching Cubs on TV and girls are getting ready for bed. Big storms coming overnight with high winds and heavy rains.  Hope we can get out and do some hiking tomorrow.