Halloween has come and gone, as has our visiting House Guest. Amber had a good time. Yesterday, we drove out to Duluth, MN and spent most of the day hiking at Hartley Nature Center. It was nice because I got to show off my old workplace. I miss the place; I had my first teaching experiences there as one of their Naturalists. I held my first professional seminar there, “Inclusion of GLBT Youth into Outdoor Education”, which made several connections for HNC with the local youth groups. It was a place that I actually felt like I made an impact.
After hiking the trails, and taking silly pictures, we went to the mall to eat at Applebee’s and then perused the many books we couldn’t afford at Barnes & Noble. Thankfully I was talked out of any books I did think about buying because later we ended up at Michael’s and I bought a new drawing book for the figure drawing sessions I’ve started going to.
While it seemed that the day was going to end on a good note, the world just didn’t think we deserved that. It was dark on the way home and Ash was driving. She’s not a speeder, not usually, but last night she happened to go a little fast. There was a reason though. She had slowed down because there were some deer on the side of the road, and, as she was speeding up to get back to normal speed, she looked for her hazard lights to warn the car behind her. Unfortunately, it took too long and she sped up a bit too much but just as she caught herself, the car behind her turned on its lights. It was a cop.
The good thing? The cop was nice and just gave her a warning. The bad thing? The cop was mean and fined her $160 for not having her dad’s car up to date with registration in TEXAS. We are in northern Wisconsin. Ash registers her dad’s car every summer she goes back to Texas. This summer she didn’t go home, so we were waiting until we went to Texas next month for Christmas. One more month. It’s not even her car, it doesn’t have Wisconsin plates, and because of some legal issues with her insurance, she has to physically be in Texas to register the car. She didn’t go in August (when it expired) because we didn’t have money, and yet this cop said that she was supposed to figure it out and fined her $160. It’s ridiculous, we don’t have that money, and Ash is going to take the issue to court with her dad’s blessing.
It just seems like we keep getting these little breaks of happiness, only to have the world slam some form of negative energy back on us. We’ll get through it, we always do, but it just gets tiring after awhile. I just want some good in our life, and I want it to stay good.
We’ll figure something out. This morning was nice. We woke up early and I made fluffy pancakes as a Good-Bye breakfast for Amber. She’s gone now, and the rest of the day is going to consist of us trying to stay warm and cleaning house. I’m already sick of cold weather.
Is it time to go South yet?
