Shuffle for the Cure-Crawl for the Cure-Stand Around for the Cure

Well, Gerri and I finally passed the starting line at 8:33 am. I had received the invitation the day before when she called to invite me on a whim. Sounds like fun, it's a good cause and there is a mall nearby. Also, having walked in the Plano and Dallas walks before, I knew there was a ton of free loot to be had. woo hoo! I ran into Hauself while gathering loot. (Thanks for the great bandana!) I found myself welling up and touched reading the name placards that people had on their back. They had things like "my Mimi" and "Grandma Johnson", aunts, sister-in-laws, and even several men's names.
I saw the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders signing autographs and realized that my little nephew would love getting something from them for his birthday. I was already planning on getting him a lunchbox shaped like a football, so this would stick with the theme. (If any of you tells him what he's getting, I'll have to deny everything.) I tried calling my brother to see if this would all pass muster since I do not know what an 8 year old boy likes. He called after the race and said that girls still have cooties for Samuel and the pictures of the team might be more of a hit for him but the girl's picture would be okay too. Win Win Win!
Pink was the focus of the day, lots of little boys wearing the pink scarves as headbands which I thought was cute.
The course had people cheering for us at a few of the intersections. Towel waving, kids dancing. One guy had disco music blaring from a boombox. The funniest site was seeing two cars trying to leave the neighborhood and realizing that they were going nowhere for a good hour or so. We just waved and smiled.
Although the finish line was a few more minutes ahead, we passed the starting line again at exactly 9:33am. A one hour walk, pretty damn good, I'd say! We hung out for a little while, but everything started catching up so we headed home.
Over 30,000 people united for a single cause on a Saturday morning at NorthPark. That kind of thing is inspiring. Already, it was a beautiful day surrounded by beautiful people.
I never do that much before 11am!

I will never have a feather pillow fight

I will never own another feather pillow.
I will never own another feather pillow.
I will never own another feather pillow.
I will never own another feather pillow.
I will never own another feather pillow.
...at least as long as I have this dog.

Set up: Middle of the night, Friday night. Have to get up early for the Race for the Cure...apparently the dog does not care about this schedule.

I hear him playing in the room, but it doesn't sound right because he's coughing, so I roll over to look at the floor at 12:39am (yes, I look a the clock when I get up.) I see a pillow...no biggie. I pick it up and realize that it's not all white. The dog has eaten a hole in it. Let me rephrase that. It has an opening like a bag of potato chips - all the way across the top! The dark is feathers. Lots of feathers. Urgh!
So I now need to get up and put the thing in the trash before he digs in some more. Mind you, I have to put my feet on the floor for this task. The floor is soft...and fluffy.
There are feathers ALL OVER the bedroom!!! At this late hour, my mind will not let the concept of cleaning up this stuff enter. What do I do??? Well, I carefully removed the feather covered sheet from my bed and grab a new sheet and climb into bed, dog safely on the other side of the bedroom door. The little feathers were making us both cough. Right before I fall into dream land, I realize that if I had not found the feathers in the bed, I could have choked to death on them.
The headline: Death by Down. A Feather Fatality. How embarrassing.
Well, I get up and do the Race for the Cure and try not to think about the clean up that this will require. I finished up in a few hours because a vacuum seemed the best way to clean up and I had to empty it a lot. Geeesh!