Ladybug Studio

July 4th weekend…

Holiday weekends go by so fast! It's not fair! How can it be Monday already? Now we have two long months until the next one. (Girls' weekend in Savannah! More about that later.)

Overall, despite the extra day, I can't say that the July 4th weekend was all that exciting though. There were some highlights, but mostly it was pretty middle of the road.

On Friday Tom and I took my little car to the dealership for servicing. Nothing was wrong, but a message was appearing every day requesting a Service A and whatever my little car wants, she gets. While she was having her spa treatment, Tom and I got a loaner car and ran some errands in Melbourne. Now, the loaner car was pretty cool - a GLK350, their new small SUV. We both really liked it a lot and it was fun to drive, too.

Saturday I attended the tennis round robin July 4th party. It turned out to be a pretty good day. I played much better than I had on Wednesday (didn't take much). Even had a player express shock when I missed a ball because, "you never miss anything!" Which is so not true, but made me feel good anyway.

I didn't make cupcakes or the punch. Instead, I got lazy and made brownies. And I didn't like them. I think my taste buds were off because when I asked Tom to taste one to be sure, he declared that they tasted like they always do. But despite that, I ended up bringing most of them back home. It was just too hot and humid for rich baked goods. A lot of people brought fruit and it was by far the most popular. In fact, I too was munching on fruit, but had no use for the other stuff.

While the day was a typical July scorcher, we were all pretty bummed when it started raining. At first it felt really good, but it rained hard enough to wet down the courts and tennis was over for the day.

Tom and I stayed in Saturday night and watched the first stage of the Tour de France. You know what I hate about watching the Tour? The commercials. OMG. By the end of three weeks we'll have them all memorized and that is not a good thing. Bah.

Sunday was kind of a sports day too. I spent 4.5 hours watching the Wimbledon men's final. It was quite an amazing match. And while I like both Roger Federer and Andy Roddick, I was definitely cheering for Andy. Roger has already won 5 Wimbledons, but Andy hasn't won there yet. And he really played like he deserved it, but in the end, Roger won the championship. Poor Andy. Maybe the US Open…

Thank God it's Thursday…

I wish we had gotten rained out last night. But the rain held off and it was actually pleasant with cloud coverage and a breeze. However, weather aside, tennis clinic was horrible. It was the kind of night that made me want to put my tennis stuff out by the curb and find a new activity.

We worked on lobs and overheads. Apparently, I need to do a lot of work on both of these skills. But my problems started with the warm up, truthfully. I prefer to start warming up close to the net, get the hand eye coordination working, then move back a little at a time until I'm hitting from the baseline. The other players were already hitting from the baseline though, when I joined them. And one of them was this guy who consistently hits the ball really hard. Too hard, most of the time. So I was uncomfortable and discombobulated from the start.

Once we began the various exercises, things continued to go downhill for me. I felt like such a loser and really wanted to leave. At least I can credit myself with sticking it out until the end. But the whole experience gave me the blues and now I don't want to play tennis on Saturday, despite the party. Yes, because it's the 4th of July, everyone's supposed to wear red, white and blue, and bring food of some sort. I figured on bringing cupcakes and possibly making Joy's punch. It's not very patriotic looking, but it's so delicious, I doubt anyone would care.

I just hope I can get out of my funk and into a tennis/party mode by Saturday.

Countdown to the fourth…

I didn't get my act together and I've missed out on the Wilson trade-in offer. I was hoping to come to a decision last night, between my current racquet and the demo. But doubles was rained out. I might still have ordered the racquet, based on how well it played on Saturday, but I forgot and now it's too late. Oh well, I'll just think of it as money saved.

I wasn't entirely disappointed to not play tennis yesterday afternoon. I would have enjoyed running around burning calories, but I'm not sure how well I would have played, considering the pain. Our upper body strength training class was taught by a new person yesterday and she really put it to us. I used heavier weights and tried really hard. I was proud of powering out 30 full body pushups on an upside down BOSU, but I'm suffering for it today.

After watching the latest episodes of The Next Foodnetwork Star (I'm rooting for Melissa and Jameka) and Royal Pains, I finally got around to installing the latest software update on my iPhone. Now I can take advantage of some cool new features: voice memos, landscape keyboard, copy and paste, spotlight search, and more.

Today's technically "Thursday" and I'm looking forward to the three day weekend. We don't have any exciting plans though. While my car gets serviced on Friday, we'll get a loner car and run some errands while we're down in Melbourne. It would be great if the camera shop would have the macro lens that I want in stock, but I'm not counting on it.

The Tour de France starts on Saturday, so I imagine we'll make a big point of watching. I love the Tour and I'm excited about watching it this year, but unfortunately, this will also be the start of three weeks of sleep deprivation. Throughout the Tour there are a couple of rest days. I'm pretty sure those days aren't as much for the riders as they are for the fans.

Note to Denise: I'm not a fan of bleu cheese either. You don't taste it. I guess the other cheeses take over. Also, I had them leave the bleu cheese crumbles off of the top. Maybe that's what saved it.

Leg abuse…

I'm surprised I can walk today. I was sure I would be stumbling slowly along, whimpering with every step. After all, I certainly put my poor legs through hell this weekend. It started with a warm-up on Friday afternoon when Alex and I met after work to hit again. The weather was more pleasant than last week, not quite as hot, with a slight breeze and some passing clouds. We even had about a minute of very light rain, which was quite refreshing.

I have two tennis racquets to demo, so I switched back and forth quite often, giving them each a fair amount of play. I got the racquets from tennis-warehouse.com because of a great trade-in deal that Wilson has going on until the end of the month. They're accepting any racquet, as long as it's playable, for $30 off a new Wilson racquet. The Wilson K Factor KZero interested me and since it costs the same to demo one or two racquets, I found another one to try out too, the Dunlop Aerogel 1000 OS. This racquet doesn't have any special deal and costs more than the Wilson. Naturally, it's the one I liked the most when were were finished hitting.

On Saturday morning I attended the round robin at Singleton. Again, I switched back and forth between the two racquets. The Wilson started to take the lead, especially when an opponent referred to it as Excalibur. Apparently I was playing pretty well and the racquet was getting the credit. By the end of the day I couldn't say that one was better than the other, I was so confused. And possibly neither is better than the racquet I currently have. Now I need to compare the new Wilson with my old Wilson and see if there's any point getting a new racquet at all. I may have just gotten swept up in the trade-in offer. I'm quite the sucker and I'll be the first to admit it.

Sunday morning, Tom and I drug ourselves out of bed in order to meet our pack for a morning ride. The earliest we could stomach was 9:00, which had us getting up at 7:00. Alex, Dallas, Matt, and Vicky met us at the park in Cocoa Village. From there we headed out on a nearly 42 mile loop. Yes, 42 miles.

The route: (for those who know the area and are interested)
Head north from the park, cross 520 and ride north on River Road. Turn left at Blacks Road, cross US 1, the road becomes Canaveral Groves Blvd. Turn right onto Grissom Parkway and go through Port St. John. Turn right at Perimeter Road and weave around Tico Airport. At 405, head east, over US 1, over the Indian River. Continue east until Space Commerce Way, then turn right. At State Road 3 turn right and continue until N Tropical Trail. Follow along until road comes out at State Road 3, turn right, cross 528, turn right onto Venetian Way, then left onto N Tropical Trail again. Continue south until 520. Turn right, cross causeway bridge, then turn left and collapse in the parking lot.

We haven't ridden that sort of a distance in over a year. Our 28 mile out and back is usually enough to tucker us out for the rest of the day. But we did it. And we're all still walking and talking. Some parts were better than others. We were lucky coming east on NASA Causeway because we had the wind at our backs. But that gave us the wind in our faces on SR 3 before we turned off on Tropical. It rained a little during that same bit, and that felt really good. We stopped at a fire station to get out the rain under a nice, dense tree. There was a Coke machine and Alex bought drinks. We also stopped at the Hess station at the Barge Canal and refilled our bottles with ice and cold water. Once we were back at the park and had our bicycles stowed away, we all (except Tom) cooled off in the fountain. It was heaven. We went to Murdock's for lunch and I had two ginormous glasses of Coke.

It has just now occurred to me that the tummy ache I had later in the day might have been caused by all of that carbonated beverage. Huh.

And something not relating to my poor overworked legs…

One of my friends from tennis is auditioning for American Idol next week. As a practice run, she sang at a local pub called River Roost. My ex tennis instructor plays in a bluegrass band, which happened to be performing Saturday night. The group invited Susan to sing her audition song between sets. I've never heard her sing before - matter of fact, I didn't even know that she sang - but she did a wonderful job and truly has a great voice. I've never watched American Idol, but if Susan makes it onto the show, I'll watch it for sure.

Tom and I went to TGIFriday's after the performance and I had something so yummy that I have to share.

Gourmet Mac 'N Five Cheese:
A rich and creamy five-cheese blend of Fontina, Bleu, Gruyere, white Cheddar and Parmesan is tossed with crispy bacon and penne pasta, and topped with Bleu cheese crumbles and a Parmesan-crust topping. Served with a juicy grilled chicken breast.

Scorcher…

This weekend was a scorcher! The heat index was above 100˚ every day. Gah. It's not usually that hot in June, but the lack of rain and west winds are not allowing the sea breeze to develop, keeping things pretty miserable around here. Yet, despite that, I spent a good deal of time out in the heat this weekend. Playing tennis, of course, and working in the yard.

Friday afternoon, immediately after work, Alex and I hit for about an hour and 15 minutes. We didn't play an actual game, just sent the ball back and forth over the net (most of the time). It was ferociously hot and sweat poured down my face almost constantly. I wasn't wearing a hat, which would have helped. The two of us took plenty of towel and water breaks on the shady bench. Because we weren't playing for scores, we were able to keep the running down to a minimum. If a ball was too far away to hit and would require an effort, we just let it go by.

I hope Alex wants to get together on Fridays on a regular basis because I think it really helped my game on Saturday. For the most part, I had a very successful morning. Won more than I lost and didn't make too many dreadful mistakes. I can't complain about that.

On the way home from the courts I stopped to get a Slurpee. Seriously, there is nothing so refreshing on a hot, hot summer day. But for some reason, I have the hardest time acquiring one. I went to the little BP station that I like so much (they're friendly and the store is clean), grabbed a 40 oz. cup and filled the cup about 3/4 of the way with Wild Cherry then - pfft. No more would come out. I fiddled with the handle for a bit, but nothing doing. Rats. I topped off the cup with Mango Passion Fruit and that was a very nice combo.

That happens to me so often that I've come to expect it. Either the Wild Cherry is frozen and won't come out or it's not frozen at all. I really have poor luck with Slurpees, but I keep trying…

After a quick shower and a couple of Cheetos to tide me over, I went to Avenue Viera with Joy. We started with lunch at Steak n Shake. Love those skinny little fries! We visited Petland because she needed cat food. I enjoyed looking at the puppies and laughing at the mice going upside down on their spinning wheel (little freaks). Looking at puppies made me want one, but as soon as I got away from the store I remembered what a bad idea that would be. Tom and I are away from the house so much, it wouldn't be fair to an animal.

We also went to Kohl's, Belk, Claire's, Coldwater Creek (I got a cute pair of dark blue capris) and Bed Bath and Beyond. To finish off our shopping adventure, we treated ourselves to ice cream at Cold Stone Creamery. Yum.

On Sunday morning, while Tom was off playing baseball, I worked in the yard. I'd really rather have gone for a bike ride, but the guilt got to me and I trimmed bushes instead. The electric trimmers may be one of the best purchases I've ever made. I can't believe I used to use manual hedge trimmers to whack away at the bushes. So much labor! I worked until the yard trash can was filled with clippings. I'd like to have done more, but maybe it was a blessing in disguise. Probably saved me from heat stroke.

The rest of the day was spent inside, away from the sun and heat.

Every day…

On my way to work everyday I see two interesting sights. One is the same each time and the other one is more variable. I've noticed a silver Corvette going the opposite direction. It caught my eye one time and then I started to see it on a regular basis. If I go straight home after work I will see it in the afternoon too. For some reason, the familiarity is comforting.

The second sight I've started to see every day is pigs. Small brown pigs, rooting in the grass between the woods and the road. First, there was only one pig. Then one day there were two. Today there were five! Two of them were little piglets and even from the distance I could see how cute they were, a lighter brown than the adults. Wonder how many there will be tomorrow.

* * *

Some catching up:

The weekend was pretty good, as I knew it would be. It was just shaping up that way, you know?

On Friday I had my pedicure. I did go with the crazy teal color and I have to admit, I don't like it. I tried to get out of my little conservative box, but I think I'm going to climb back in now. I can barely stand to look at my bare feet and I'm deliberately choosing to wear closed toed shoes. I'm going to have to take the color off and paint on one of my usual colors. Maybe I'll be more adventurous in some other aspect of my life.

Tom had a baseball game on Friday, so I was on my own. I didn't do anything interesting though, just worked on the computer, watched some TV and ate a healthy dinner of fish, rice and green beans. I probably would have been bad and gone to Burger King for a Whopper Jr. and onion rings, but I was too tired to leave the house.

Saturday morning I got up at 7:00 to watch the shuttle launch, which as we all know, was scrubbed. I immediately went back to bed, but was awoken at 7:30 when a coworker called to see if I knew what had happened to the launch (hydrogen leak when fueling). At that point, I should have just gotten up, but I didn't, so when I did get up at 9:00 I felt fuzzy headed and tired.

Around noon, Jenn and Mark came over with Mark's beloved Super Cub. The four of us had lunch at Kelsey's and it was like old times for me and Jenn. We used to have lunch there quite often when we worked together at Patch. We both got pizza and salad and it was delicious.

After lunch, the boys went to work on the Super Cub (I still don't know what it is they were doing) while Jenn and I headed out with our cameras to spend the day as photographers. First, we went to Lori Wilson Park in Cocoa Beach because some of our friends from Patch were having a party there. We never found them though. There were two picnic pavilions, but we didn't see anyone we recognized at either of them. We decided to check out the beach, in case that's where they were having their party. No dice. We walked around in the hot sand for a bit, but still didn't see anyone we knew.

The beach was definitely the place to be. At least, a great number of people seemed to think so. I'm not sure I agree, though. Even with the breeze off of the water, it was still super hot out there. The few minutes we spent on the beach had me sweating buckets.

At the top of the dunes, we stopped to take some photos. I was experimenting with trying to get the foreground sharply in focus, with the background blurred out. I wasn't exactly successful. I suspect the lens specifications won't allow the depth of field that I was hoping for.

After giving up on seeing our Patch friends (I'm looking at you, Chris!), Jenn and I continued on south with two brief photo stops for Jenn. (the two-faced VW van had her jumping up and down for joy) Since this was a photography day and we were both curious about lenses, we went to Southern Photo in Melbourne. We only had a half an hour before the store closed, but it was enough for us to come to some conclusions:

I definitely want a true (fixed focal length) macro lens and Jenn wants a 50mm lens. She originally thought she wanted a macro, but the 50mm will work out better for her and will be excellent for portraits.

After stopping for Slurpies (too frozen, very disappointing) and another photo op, we made it back home just ahead of a thunderstorm that whipped through the area. Lots of wind and rain, but otherwise wasn't too bad. We spent a little more time with our guests, but eventually they loaded up the New and Improved Super Cub and headed back home.

Sunday morning was just as interrupted as Saturday morning. Even more so, actually. Tom woke me up at 4:00 am to inform me that the air conditioner wasn't working and an error code was flashing on the digital thermostat. Great news. In addition to wanting to share the great news, he also wanted me to tell him where the AC paperwork was. I had to get out of bed to show him (the same place I had already shown him before) and he admitted that he had looked there, but since he didn't have his glasses on, wasn't sure if it was correct. WTFBBQ? He couldn't put on his glasses to see? No, he was just looking for an excuse to share the misery with me.

Anyway, I left a voice message with our AC company and went back to bed. I had just finally started to fall asleep again when the phone rang at 4:45. It was the AC people. Apparently, when you leave a message on the emergency service line, it pages the owners at home. Oops. I never would have called them at 4:00 in the morning if I had known that. I assumed they would check for messages when they woke up at a RESPECTABLE hour. They bushed aside my apologies and said that I had done exactly what they would have wanted.

In the mean time, Tom had gone outside to check out the compressor and found that the breaker switch was off. He flipped it back on and the AC started working again, just to add to my shame for calling for service at 4:00 am. Bah. But I'm glad the AC was okay. The theory is that the storm earlier in the evening may have had something to do with the problem.

Back to bed, again, for a few hours of sleep. Then we got up at 8:00 because we had bicycling plans. Originally they were grand plans, involving many riders and River Road. But it ended up being only me and Tom on our old standby Windover 30 mile out and back. Tom wasn't feeling super great so he wasn't interested in much conversation. So it was a quiet ride, but not unpleasant. Until my foot started its thing. The outer of edge of my right foot has an issue and will start hurting really bad in the middle of a ride. Nothing like being 10 miles from home and experiencing righteous pain. I'm hoping that I can get some custom insoles for my biking shoes at Orange Cycle that will solve this problem. Because I love my shoes with their silly, shiny, sparkly blue flowers and don't want to give them up!

Sunday evening Tom and I finally went out for our anniversary dinner. We did go to Longhorn and our meal was fabulous. Tom got his usual, The Renegade, but I kicked it up a notch with Flo's Filet and Shrimp and Crab Gratin. Plus a side of sauteed mushrooms. We also started with the Wild West Shrimp appetizer, so needless to say, there was no room for dessert.

Fifteen and one day…

About the big 15 year anniversary celebration…

There was no celebration. Tom's stomach started bothering him in the morning and continued throughout the day. He left work early, took some medication and hoped for the best. But he was still in pain after I came home, so we stayed in. No sense in going out for a dinner he couldn't enjoy.

I spent part of the evening doing freelance, then cooked a frozen skillet meal for us. Tom went to bed early, while I stayed up watching TV. By the time I was ready for sleep, Tom was snoring up a storm and I ended up sleeping on the couch in the spare bedroom.

Pretty sad story.

Oh well, time for the weekend and hopefully things will start going better. I'm having a pedicure this afternoon and I've got a crazy new color to try: an O.P.I color made for Sephora called Mermaid to Order. It's a teal sort of color, which is completely out of character for me. I'm not generally into non-traditional colors, but for some reason was really attracted to this one. The question is, will I be able to stand it for four weeks? Time will tell…

Saturday should be fun! Jenn and Mark are coming over to spend the day with us. The boys are going to be working on Marks Super Cub (scooter) while Jenn and I have a photo shoot day. I don't have a clue where we're going to go or what we're going to take photos of, but it should be fun all the same. We're going to start with lunch at Kelsey's.

Oh - we have a shuttle launch tomorrow morning! It's an early one at 7:17 am. I'm not playing tennis tomorrow and had hoped to sleep in. But I never want to miss a launch, so I guess I'll get up at 7:00, watch the television coverage, go outside to view the launch, then go back to bed for another hour or so.

Tom does not have a baseball game on Sunday and we're planning a bicycling excursion. We're just going to River Road, but as I haven't ridden there is a very long time, I'm quite looking forward to it. Mandy, the woman who bought my old bicycle recently, is going to join us and possibly a few of her triathlon friends. Dallas will be there, of course, and maybe Alex. It should be fun!

Fifteen…

Tom and I have been married fifteen years today. Pretty nice milestone, right? We don't have any exciting plans though. Just going to dinner tonight. We considered trying to find something nicer than our usual chain restaurant choices, but I think we're going to end up at Longhorn. The menu prices I am finding online for local restaurants are much steeper than we're interested in paying. I know, it's a special anniversary, but it's just not our thing. We'll have a really good meal, maybe splurge on a dessert, and just enjoy being together. We'll go back to our usual teasing and bickering tomorrow.

Tom did suggest that we both take today off and spend the day together. But I absolutely had to go to the gym today, in order to get my weekly Fitness Center points for WOW.

WOW is not exactly Wow! any longer. I'm getting rather tired of it quite honestly. I think there is only one team of four left in the program. Most teams are down to three and one team is down to two. We lost a person, then lost her replacement. We used to be called Fab Four but we've changed it to Fab Few, which seems fitting.

We were warned that it was a big commitment, but I doubt anyone realized just how big it would be. In addition to the bi-weekly nutrition classes, we also have extra classes like Stress Management, Flexibility and Introduction to Yoga. All while trying to get the the Fitness Center three days a week as well as working out at home, stretching and whatnot. Fitting it all in this week has been difficult and I'm getting mighty cranky about it.

I've been really super tired this week and all of this extra activity is contributing to it, I'm sure. Drills last night was good, but exhausting. It was quite hot on the courts, combined with all that running around… I was thrilled to get my racquet back with its new strings though. What a difference from my old one. We worked on volleys, which is always a weak spot for me. But by the time class was over I was feeling much more confident and hitting pretty solidly.

Two-fer…

I had quite a workout yesterday. It was two workouts, really, which is why I'm so tired and sore today.

During lunch I did the upper body strength training class followed by the abs class. There were only three of us in the upper body class. I don't understand why there is so little interest in the lunchtime classes. When I used to attend them regularly several years ago, they were very popular. In fact, I always headed over a little early, just to make sure I got the equipment and spot that I preferred. That's not much of a problem these days.

I really want to get stronger and have more muscle definition so I grabbed heavier weights, gritted my teeth and gave it my all. Three more people joined us for abs class; a couple of men who usually attend and a women who I remember from the good old days of crowded classes. Because it was a small group of regulars, the class was more of an advanced workout, so my middle is feeling it a bit.

In the afternoon I got my cardio workout with doubles league. I started warming up a little earlier than I usually do and we didn't get finished until 7:45. I was pretty tired by the end and had to keep bouncing and jogging to keep myself activated. Despite my old racquet, I played fairly well and managed to stay on court. Not as good as moving up, but much better than moving down.

Very tennis weekend…

I played tennis on Saturday morning, as usual. But instead of playing doubles all day I mixed it up and played two sets of singles. I haven't played singles in months and had forgotten how much fun it can be. Not to mention what a great workout. During drills clinic last Wednesday, we did a singles exercise and I really enjoyed it. When I arrived at the courts on Saturday morning, there was only one other person not on the courts already - a teenage girl who prefers to play singles. Mary Ann sent the two of us to a court and we played one set. Then after that, Mary Ann sent me to play a woman who also prefers singles. We had a good set too, though she pretty much kicked my butt. Well, not entirely. She did beat me 6-0, but I made some good points and had her running quite a bit.

After that, I finished the day with two sets of doubles. During one of those sets, to my great surprise, I broke a string! I'm not really a hard hitter, so I'm guessing it was just time to restring. Fortunately, one of the players on my court had a spare racquet for me to borrow. In fact, she had five racquets in her bag. That's crazy! It was like a tennis store in there. Anything one might need, she had it in her bag. Also fortunate for me is that one of the local pros/instructors was there and took my racquet with him to restring. I'll get it back on Wednesday at clinic.

I played tennis with Alex on Sunday and sadly, had to use my old racquet. I got used to it after a while, but I still don't like it and I'm looking forward to getting my newer one back.

In addition to all of that tennis playing, I did a fair amount of tennis watching this weekend as well. On Saturday I watched the French Open Ladies Final, and on Sunday I watched the Men's Final. Just two more weeks until the start of Wimbledon!