A walk in the Dark

I began to feel a heaviness in my chest on Sunday and I knew I was coming down with a cold. How did I catch this cold anyway? I haven't been on a plane since late June, where I usually pick up some bug without fail, but this last trip I was fine. Now out of the blue I am sick. Hmmm, my husband was on five different planes last week...

Fortunately, I am not that sick that I'm off my feet and lying flat on my back, dying kind of sick. And if it was not for the N1H1 I would not be home from work.

I feel lethargic, sore and dopey. Well not really dopey because I hate taking drugs, and thus I have not self medicated at all. However, last night I was coughing so much I need to take something to calm my cough. It is 1:35 am and so dark in the bedroom, I cautiously feel my way in the dark because I didn't want to wake the sleeping dog. Bodhi our family dog, who was asleep at the foot of the bed, the only member of the household who is not afraid I am going to infect him. The others have abandoned me to sleep in another part of the house. But not my loyal friend, Bodhi.

As I make my way down the hall, I think to myself, I hope I can find some kind of drugs in the kitchen, even children cough syrup, anything. I was willing to take anything. I scan the fridge and find some children's dimetapp that expired in 2007, but who cares. I'll just take more, maybe even the whole thing after all it is for children and really expired way pass the expired date. I tried to open it but it won't budge. What? I know it is child proof, but I'm twisting and turning, squeezing, and turning, pushing down and turning, biting it and turning, but nothing I did would open it. Ugh!

Maybe it has a date sensitive thingy that prevents it from opening once the expiry date is in excess of two years. I doubt it, this particular one is defective. It is not just child proof it is mom proof as well. I chuck it into the garbage and make my way down the hall, coughing, as I felt my way back in the dark to bed.

A Beautiful Week

What a wonderful week, that began with seeing deer beside our lane. Nature enhances the beauty of our landscape, you can't improve on that.

Speaking of landscape, construction at the office was in full swing. I decided I wanted the front of the office to look natural not manicured, and contracted the 'rock whisper' . This man looks at a rock and knows instinctively where it should belong. He was done at the end of the week! One can always tell when people love their work, it shows up as a masterpiece.


My son was very happy to have his friend from China visit for the week. It had been over a year since they played together. They went to a canoe camp, although it rained on the last day, I think they enjoyed just hanging out together.

It was great having another boy around the house who is similar in nature but with enough difference to make it interesting. I think the reason they get along is that they are both Sagittarius, born one year and one day apart. Sadly, the friend is leaving back to Shanghai and they'll have to make do with email for another year.


I ended my week with a nice dinner at Siam Kitchen with my friend who was in town on business. We had a wonderful discussion on family, spirituality, and books, I always love hearing about what is happening in people's lives and the books they read.

Getting together with friends is important especially if these visits are rare because they live in another part of the world. Often you can just pick up where you left off as though the time apart was only a figment of your mind. Keeping connected electronically will suffice, but nothing, nothing, will ever take the place of person to person visits of that I'm sure.

When the Last Page is Turned

I have just finished reading this book and this book. Both by the same author and both are an historical fiction, both brilliantly narrated, that took me to a place where past and present merge together in a compelling story.

I don't know about you, but as I near the end of a book I get sad. Especially if I am reading a good book with characters who are alive and dance in my head long after the last page is turned. Often, I will take a break close to the end of the book and ponder the storyline and let the subjects run amok in my head. I like keeping my favorite characters alive like close friends. I know that when the last page is turned all the characters will evaporate into thin air and will cease to exist.


But eventually I will finish the book. After all we all need closure, don't we?


One summer, I got into this romantic historical novel set in the 1800's and as I got close to the end I read slowly the last chapters savoring the every word before it all came to an end . To my surprised, it actually did not end but rather was to be continued in a series of five other books. Each of the books had over 1000 pages filled with this epic love story. Indeed, I was one happy camper that summer!

Done. Complete. Finished. Fin. End.


And sometimes it does not end. Diana Gabaldon's next book "An Echo in the Bone" will be released in 2010. Yay! More Jamie and Clare!!!! To read a excerpt go here.

My Life in So Many Words

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