I’ve been whining about my weight most my life. Looking back from where I am now, for no good reason. Most my younger years, I was at a good weight – not perfect, but I so wished I could be back there NOW.

In 1998, I tried Atkins. When I started out, I did not think this would ever work, but it did. Within 3 months, I dropped over 30 lbs, and it was the easiest thing I’ve ever done. I ended up weighing around 130 lbs, which for my 5’9″ is pretty darn slender. I actually bought a pair of size 4 shorts (K-Mart had a sale – and they were pretty tight, and I only wore them once or twice, but by gosh, they zipped and it didn’t require pliers!!)

It gets hot and dry in the summers here in San Antonio. In the summer of 2009, we broke the record of number of days where the temperatures went above 100° – and I loved every single one of them. Unfortunately, this kind of heat and severe lack of rain also drastically depletes our water supply. If the Aquifer Levels get to certain lows, certain stages of water restrictions are put into effect.

Last year, we made it to Stage 2 Water Restrictions – and actually, for a very long time, we were just inches away from Stage 3. So responsible resident alien that I am, I looked up the rules for Stage 2, and found the one day per week that we were allowed to run the sprinklers.

….however, according to court records, as of March 23rd, I have been. And that’s not even counting failed attempt # 1 that lasted almost 10 years (on record – not real life). So TWENTY years with one man is a long time. And we’ve come a long way. We met in my home town Crailsheim, Germany, in 1988 (May 21st, I think) – I was 26, he told me he was 22. It was just supposed to last until his Army time was up – but plans change. And here we are, all those years later; me still beautiful, he’s lost a lot of hair; me still rebellious and swimming against the stream, he still pretending to be nice; he having come a million miles professionally from where he was back then, me still typing something; The kids are grown, there are 2 grandkids. It just does not seem real.

January started great with my parents visiting and me on vacation. They were here for Christmas (’08 along with Melanie & Co – but they had to leave before 2009) and stayed through New Years. I had fun showing them how a real winter looks like – a real San Antonio winter, that is:

In February (the 18th to be exact), my second grandson, Liam, was born. I’m still pretty sure I’m way too young to be a grandmother, but apparently, what I think here (or there, or anywhere) doesn’t matter all that much. And they are beautiful:

March 2009 was a fun month – Eric’s Mom and Dad and an uncle (MIL’s brother) and wife who live in Indiana and Minnesota, respectively, came to wait out their winter with us. It was great fun and great company, and they can winter with us any time they want to. Sadly, while they were here, we had to say ‘good-bye’ to Fred, our beautiful, strawberry-blond, long haired, haunted cat.

Between Christmas and New Years 2008, Phillip signed up for the ‘College First’ program with the Army National Guard. That means he had to do his monthly drills starting in January, and after he graduated High School this June, he had to leave for Basic Training and AIT. We dropped him of at the hotel to leave for Basic on July 27th, and he went to Ft. Jackson, South Carolina.

Eric had been planning on flying out for the Graduation all along, I was going to stay home with the animals. My best excuse probably is that any graduation in Germany just doesn’t have the same extending significance it has here. One usually goes to one’s own graduation – if at all, and that’s it. So after Keesha died and there was only one dog to worry about, and we already had the hotel and car booked, it just struck me that what if…. What if I worked it out at work so I could work the weekend and would not have to use up vacation days I didn’t really have. And surely, there’s a way to take care of Leia without totally traumatizing her.