Signs of Spring

Rant and Rave

Rant:
As I've mentioned previously on my blog, I am part of the South Jersey Area Wind Ensemble. Because this is the first time I've been playing my saxophone regularly since college it's in need of a "tune-up". I took it to the closest music store at a time when I knew I would be missing the next rehearsal, so I thought it would leave plenty of time to be repaired. When I turned it into the store they told me that they don't do repairs in-house, they send them out, but that it typically only took a week, or maybe two at the most. I was also told I would receive a call from the repairman with an estimate. This was February 15th. A week or two goes by and I haven't heard anything, so I call the store and ask about it and they say that it still hasn't been returned and assure me again that I will receive a call when it's ready. Another week or two goes by and I call again and get the same answer again. Finally, a few days ago, I reach the point where it has been a MONTH and I have heard NOTHING. So when I call the store again I ask for the number of the repair place. I'm given the number for another music store that this person said does their repairs. I call them, and the person I spoke with has no record of my instrument! She assures me she will look into it and get back to me. I call again the next day, they still don't know where it is, and I'm told they're pursuing some different possibilities and they'll let me know. I say, I'm a little confused as to how a saxophone can just be lost. She thanks me for my patience. Grrrr. When I speak with the woman again the next day, she explains that they do repairs for rental instruments, and that there is a different person/place who does repairs on owned instruments, and this whole time she had been assuming I had a rental instrument (even though I definitely said MY saxophone). So at this point, I call the music store that I originally took it to in the first place, and after asking a lot of questions, he finds the record of my sax being brought in, and gives me the correct name and phone number of the repairman. I call him and leave a message. After no response, I call him again (today - over a month after the store first took my sax) and he answers and says that he hasn't had it, the store has had it this whole time and he was on his way to pick it up. WHAT?!?! He called back later in the day with an estimate and said it will be back at the store next week. Clearly, either there are totally incompetent people working at this music store, OR I was lied to several times (or both). Absolutely RIDICULOUS.

Rave:
I have great friends. I am lucky to have them. I am thankful for the ones who stay in touch regularly and especially for those who have visited me. This is because maybe 95% of my friends live more than an hour (and most several hours) away from me. It's been hard out on here on the island, especially this winter. It has helped me to discover that maybe I'm not quite as much of an introvert as I thought I was or used to be. I need social interaction! And I've learned that making new friends as an adult is not always the easiest thing to do. Especially when most of my life revolves around my congregation, and I need to have some friends outside of that group of people. Well I think I have finally begun to find that. I have made some new friends recently that are (amazingly, for this location) around my age, and have given me reasons to get out of my house and laugh and have fun. Yay!

And now, in honor of Saint Patrick and my Scotch-Irish heritage, I'm going to enjoy a beer. Sla'inte!

Whoops!

I realized that today is the last day of February and I haven't posted at all this month! I have thought about posting several times, but I guess I never got motivated enough to write. As for how I filled my time this month, it was pretty much life as usual. Pastoring, trying to spend time with friends when possible, cleaning/organizing, taking care of my dog, going to the gym, reading and knitting. I hosted a Super Bowl party for some friends at the beginning of the month. Even though the Steelers didn't win, it was a good game, and I was glad to be able to play hostess. I also hosted some close friends from seminary for a visit just this past weekend. It was really nice to have visitors in the winter! As for crafty things, I haven't had the sewing machine out in a while, but I'm looking forward to a quilting retreat at the end of March. And in the meantime, I've been able to complete several knitting projects that had been laying around unfinished for a while (one since last spring, yikes). And as for reading, after I finished the Harry Potter series (and subsequently watched all the movies) in the fall, I decided I wanted to read through the Chronicles of Narnia series by CS Lewis. I am sure I have read at least one of the books in the past (when I was much yonger), but I know I haven't read through the whole series, so that's my current reading goal. Health and fitness-wise, I've been pretty consistent about getting to the gym this month (or outside on the few warmer days) and running 3-4 days a week and strength training 1-2 days a week. Now I need to start focusing on increasing my mileage, since I haven't really done any long runs all winter. And finally an update on my home organizing/de-cluttering plan: I've made it through the kitchen, dining room, living room, bathrooms, and 2 bedrooms. I only have 2 spaces left to tackle, but they may be the 2 most difficult: the garage (primarily storage) and the 3rd bedroom/office (also has a closet full of storage). Wish me luck! ;)

Looking through a new lens

It was time for an upgrade. I decided to use some money I received for Christmas and buy a new camera. As much as I would have loved to really upgrade to one of the SLR professional cameras, I had no idea how expensive they are until I started researching them. So I decided to stick with the model I already had (Sony Cybershot) and just upgrade to a newer model, with more megapixels (I went from 6 to 14). I haven't played around with it a whole lot yet, but I was excited to discover that there's a setting that automatically puts the camera on whatever setting it should be for the picture I'm taking. For instance, when I was taking pictures of the lighthouse, it switched to landscape setting. I just took my new heading picture today. I decided my blog needed a new look, and a new picture. And as long as we're stuck with snow and winter I might as well look for the beauty in it.

Looking for some help

So there's something I've been struggling with lately and I can't figure out what to do. So I thought I'd write about it here to send it out to the blogosphere and hope for some responses. My problem basically boils down to the fact that I've been tired a lot lately and have a really hard time getting myself out of bed in the morning. I'm a relatively healthy person, and I may even be in better shape physically than the average person (I did just run a marathon!). So why am I so tired? And most nights I'm getting around 8 hours of sleep (there are some nights when I have trouble sleeping, but they don't occur that often, and it's usually just the first few hours I'm in bed, and not all night). So I always have great plans when I go to bed to get up early and workout or get other stuff done and I set my alarm and it goes off in the morning and I hit the snooze button. I've never really been a consistent "snoozer" so how did I get myself into this habit, and more importantly, HOW DO I GET OUT? The last several years I haven't been that fond of winter, so could this possibly be something that is caused by winter? To be totally honest, I'm not opposed to counseling, but I also don't want to jump into that if it's not necessary. Any ideas on a simple way to get myself out of bed in the morning and not hit the snooze several times (I do know that's not quality sleep I'm getting while "snoozing")? I did sign up for a spinning class at my gym one morning and got up when I needed to for that. But that won't work for every morning. Can anyone help?

Looking Ahead

I'm not really big on new year's resolutions. I understand why people are attracted to the idea of having resolutions at the beginning of a new year and viewing it as a time to start over or try new things. But I also know that many of these resolutions aren't successful. So I "resolved" a while ago to make goals and try new things any time during the year that I feel I should. I've posted on here about some of the past goals I've made, and I did recently make another one. I'm going to spend time during the next several weeks simplifying and organizing my "stuff". I value living more simply and keeping my life organized. I've never really had a lot of clutter, but there are always things I could do without. So inspired by the desire to simplify, a book I picked up at a book sale last summer called "Cut the Clutter and Stow the Stuff" and a book my aunt showed me over Christmas called "Throw Out 50 Things", I am going through each room of my house and getting rid of what I can and reorganizing where necessary. So that I'm not overwhelmed or rushed, I plan to do one room a week. I started this week with the living room and have been pretty successful so far, getting rid of some books and magazines, a board game, a few old video tapes and doing a little re-organizing of the bookshelves. I purposely started with an easy room, and hope to be able to keep it up when I get to rooms like my 3rd bedroom/office where I had shelves put in the closet to hide a bunch of clutter. ;)

A Look Back

2010 was a pretty big year for me, with some major life successes and transitions. In an effort to help me remember what happened, and to not let the "small" things get overshadowed by the big events, I took a look back over the year and recorded a month-by-month review. I won't bore you with that detailed review, because I'm pretty sure there are some things on it that will only be meaningful to me, but I thought I'd post my "summary" by season.

2010 Year in Review:

Winter (including some events at the end of 2009)
Celebrated the wedding of two seminary friends, survived "Snowmaggedon" parts 1 and 2 in Philly, began my final semester of seminary, learned I was assigned to NJ for my first call
Spring
Spent some time at the United Nations for a class, saw my college touring choir perform, attended two Phillies games, went sailing with friends, ran in the 10-mile Broad Street Run with 30,000 people (and 2 friends), attended the wedding of two more seminary friends, graduated from seminary with my Master of Divinity degree
Summer
Attended my 11-year high school reunion (yeah, weird, I know), moved and began my first call as pastor of a Lutheran congregation in NJ, attended my friend's baby shower and my cousin's daughter's 3rd birthday party on the same day, celebrated the birth of my cousin's second daughter, celebrated my 29th birthday, went tubing and parasailing, attended two Lakewood Blue Claws games (Phillies farm team), enjoyed visits from my parents and from friends
Fall
Began rehearsing with the South Jersey Area Wind Ensemble (the first instrumental ensemble I've been in since college), Ordained as a minister in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, officially Installed as pastor of the congregation I serve, enjoyed more visits from my parents and other family, spent time at home with my mom as she recovered from hip surgery, and completed my first marathon in Philly