Wow. It has been awhile since I posted anything. Or at least it seems that way. If anyone is keeping count, I have seen Serenity 5 times now (paid for 3). Saturday night after the social at the dance club, I convinced several people (5 to be exact) to see the movie with me. I think they all enjoyed it. They laughed at all the right parts and even jumped in the right parts. I think it is a testament to the universal appeal of the film when you consider that the average age of the five people was over 50. We saw the movie at 10:40 PM and there were probably 6 or 7 people also in the theater. I thought that was decent considering the time.
The rest of my weekend was pretty full.

Saturday morning I went out to try and get my GEO Tracker moving. It has been parked for quite awhile in my driveway and something rusted together keeping the breaks from disengaging. I am not that mechanically inclined, so none the less I was unable to unstick the stuck thing. I called a friend to give me some advice and he ended up coming down with his two boys. We jacked up the rear driver's side and the wheel spun freely. As we let the car down, it made a pretty loud creaking sound. We then proceeded to jack up the rear passenger side, and that tire spun freely. As we stood around wondering if the front wheels were stuck, I decided to try to move the car. It actually moved. I think we freed up whatever was stuck when we let the car down on the driver's side.

Having freed the Tracker, I thanked my friend as they drove away and then went to the Grass Pad to get some advice on my lawn. My lawn sucks. I have somewhat ignored it for the last six years (since I moved in) and now I am paying for it. At the end of last year I had a sprinkler system put in, but the damage had already been done. One of the problems was that I had voles. These are little nocturnal mice that eat the roots of plants. Unlike moles who raise the ground, voles actually leave little paths on top of the ground. I have fairly deep ruts in my front yard from these little critters. Anyhow, I bought some stuff to spay on the lawn to loosen up the clay and make it agreeable to growing grass. I also bought 50 lbs of grass seed. After that I went to Lowe's and bought some equipment to fix my lawn: broadcast spreader, shovel, dirt, mulch fork. I still haven't done anything. I am a real procrastinator.

On Sunday, I found out that my maternal grandmother had passed away. I can't say that I wasn't expecting it. She has been in a nursing home for about 10 years and for the last month her body had been slowly shutting down. It was similar to what we saw when my paternal grandmother passed away. She stopped eating, she wasn't fully digesting anything she was taking. Several of my sisters had even flown out to Washington state to see before she passed away. They were in Washington when it happened. They had left for the evening and Grandma passed away a couple of hours later. I personally think she finally let herself leave once she saw them and knew it would be OK. Due to several reasons, her funeral won't be until next week. I have not received so many calls from my sisters as I did this week end. All of them seeming to complain about the others. My younger brother is actually using some of his frequent flyer miles so that he and my other two sisters can be there for the funeral. I have made my own arrangements. When my family gets together it is not always a good thing. They usually do pretty well for events like funerals and weddings. I just have to have a little hope.

Late Sunday afternoon was our Home Owner's Association meeting. It was quite interesting. It has been awhile since I have attended one. I saw my neighbors (who I do know) and many people that I don't. Some of the houses have changed since I was last at a meeting. There were some really young people there. They were probably early to mid-twenties. That really isn't that young, but when you are pushing 40 it sure seems like it. Anyhow, one of these young people is now the HOA president and my neighbor is concerned there will be a lot of drunkfest type parties. Most of the people that live around me are older with older kids and I know they wouldn't want that type of thing. It will be interesting as time goes by.

Intaminatis fulget honoribus
Untarnished, she shines with honor
--Wofford College motto