Ding dong, it’s Christmas

This is my 6^th Christmas in Australia. I’m sort of getting the hang of doing the BBQ thing because it’s too hot for lasagne. I am still not used to being sweaty and dusty on Christmas Day. And Christmas lights when the sky is light until 10p make me chuckle.

One of the things I have enjoyed in the last few years is singing Christmas Carols – sometimes the tunes match the tunes I know, sometimes the words match the words I know, sometimes it all matches (wooohoooo!), and there have been some totally new to me carols. 

Now in Anglican hymnals they often have the music without the words aligned to it, which makes sight reading a new hymn a bit tricky. Often when there’s a word that gets lots of notes, it’s a complete surprise to me and I usually end up laughing my way through. So you can imagine how it worked the first time I was in church for what is now my new fave Christmas Carol: Ding Dong Merrily on High. Every place it’s been sung (and there have been a few in my experience so far), this carol causes even the most reticent singer to belt it out with gusto. I think that’s part of why I love it.

Here’s a picture straight out of the bulletin so you can see what it looked like on the sheet (the words were already enough to make me giggle):

And here’s what it sounds like (courtesy of a Melbourne Choir, in a Melbourne venue): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXPoYbvvSzI

and another choral version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dzc2TUNPA4I I find it hilarious watching serious choral singers sing "swungen" :^)

Now go get your gloooooooooooooooooooooria on, while you are swingen, swungen and sungen! Merry Christmas!

Me, the kids, and the 80 year olds - August 2017

Several months ago, I took up exercise at a place called Myofunction. The owner, Emma, is a myotherapist who does individually tailored fitness programs. This was particularly useful to me since I was recovering from shoulder surgery and have a bunch of other high mileage parts that require gentle handling. 

In addition to my twice a week fitness session, Emma also prescribed several daily exercises to help improve my posture, get more flexible and using my muscles appropriately, rather than my literally half-assed previous state (where I could only use the butt muscles on my right side for squats and lunges). One of these exercises she calls connection squats. Here Emma demonstrates it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKdJa_wzfpo

 

Now the daily prescription for connection squats is 50. When I first started it was agonizing to get to 50, and still I am pretty sorry from 35-50 and ready for them to be over. But they do actually have all the benefits Emma describes in the YouTube video. Dammit.

Today I saw a short video about an experiment in the UK where they brought 4 year olds in to hang out with elderly folks in a retirement home to see what the result would be for the residents’ health and well-being: http://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/im-crying-documentary-four-year-10928364

This reminded me of two moments:

1) Back in 2014, I was home visiting after moving to Australia. My niece Gillian was probably two at the time. I was regularly doing kettlebell class and I discovered that kettlebell swings were way more fun when Gilly Bean was my kettlebell. There was a lot of giggling on both our parts. I suspect both of us said “Whee!!!” more than once. It was fantastic.

2) This year I’ve had two flights to the US. The first leg is usually 13+ hours. I typically go to the very back of the plane a couple times and do some connection squats (thanks, Emma) to keep my legs from swelling up. They are usually as painful, annoying, and effective on the plane as they are at home. On one of the flights, there was a dad hanging out in back with his toddler (parents and toddlers spend a lot of time cruising the airplane – it tends to keep everyone happier). I started in with my connection squats and the little girl caught my eye, then looked away, and then started doing squats with me. Up and down, up and down. There was giggling. I probably did 75 connection squats and didn’t suffer at all because she and I were having such fun.

Turns out I have something in common with those 80 year olds in the retirement home, besides just my high mileage parts. Exercise is WAY more fun with kids. :)

Dome Light Revelation

I hop in the Uber at 4:15a in Phoenix. Driver is a young Cuban guy - he's got tiny boxing gloves with Cuba on them hanging from the rear view mirror.  He's listening to some funky Latin music when I get in the car. He sees me in the dome light and once we're underway he switches the playlist. Tunes include...

Patrick Swayze: She's like the wind.
Whitney Houston: I will always love you
BeeGees: How deep is your love

I couldn't be offended because I knew all the words to every song that came up.

Cream soda summer - January 2017

The summer between my 5^th and 6^th grade, my Dad took us to Vancouver, British Columbia for six weeks  while he did some work/study at UBC. It was a pretty epic car trip from South Dakota (we sat down in a booth at a pizza place en route and all reached to put on our seatbelts). We stayed in someone else’s place while they were traveling – another faculty family, I think. They were Norwegian and had a kid around my age named Tjörsten (probably not spelled correctly). Part of the house deal was that we could use their bikes, which was pretty fantastic for me. I didn’t really make any friends in that six weeks that I remember, but I did get to ride Tjörsten’s 10 speed  bike around in the neighbourhood of the house, which was one of those developments with endless circular streets and lots of cul-de-sacs. This was a step up from my no speed bike at home, and there was a lot to look at in suburbia - and no gravel roads to wipe out on.

At some point on a walk with my mom and my little sisters, we discovered that not too far outside the circular streets of our neighbourhood was a 7-11 where they had cream soda slurpees. This was the first time I’d ever had cream soda, and on a hot summer day it was DELICIOUS. The slurpees were pink – which Mom said was different from US cream soda. Eventually, I was allowed to ride Tjörsten’s 10 speed, by myself, to 7-11 to get a cream soda. The height of adventure. Hot summer days, pink slurpees, and a girl on a bike out in the world. Warm and happy memories.

Sure enough, back in the US cream soda was caramel colored, but still tasty. When I moved to Australia, I was delighted to discover “creaming soda” is pink here.

A couple weeks ago, on a warm summer day, I was ready to relive my summer of adventure, so I bought some.  Turns out 5^th grade Amy had a much higher tolerance for sugar than 45 year old Amy (6^th grade Amy once ate 5 bowls of Smurfberry Crunch cereal in one sitting at my friend Zhaleh’s – her family still talks about it with amazement). Thank goodness it was on sale so I bought a 10 pack. Anyone interested in 9 cans of my summer time memories?