Between car trouble, ongoing HOA issues, and the start of an insane semester, anxiety is off the charts!

 ....so let's look at some funny pictures. And laugh. Really, though. Isn't laughter always so good for us?

My minivan has 75,000 miles, and I've never put any money into it, beyond oil changes and new brakes a couple months ago. So when my "check engine" light came on last week, I wasn't super surprised. I figured a tune-up was likely needed. I wasn't wrong, but the process to get there was long and complicated, and the thing is, I am not someone who can be without transportation, even for just a day or two. My fall schedule is bananas; I drive to three different campuses several times each week (more on that later). Eli and Amanda have been so kind to lend me a car, but I really hate doing that because it leaves them with only their minivan to share. Not to mention the fact that I had to add the car's license plate to my parking permits at all three schools, and of course they wanted to know the year, make, model, and color of the car. I knew none of those things; I literally had to get out of the car to see what color it is, when I was parked down at UCU, editing my permit. I had to text Shulamith to get all that other info. She knew, because this used to be Matt's car before they sold it to Eli and Amanda. Anyway, blah.

I've worried relentlessly every time I drive it that I will get in a wreck and total it, leaving Eli and Amanda without a second car. Let's face it; I am way overdue for a wreck. Anyway, my car is supposed to be ready tomorrow morning. They promised. We're gonna pray they keep that promise. Amanda needs their car back to take Jane to preschool by 12:45 p.m.

Then, I continue to deal with this dang HOA situation. It will be two years in January that I first learned of the issue, and here we still are, no closer to resolution than we ever were. Not sure what my next steps are, but whatever they are, I will surely take them soon, because I need to sleep at night. 

And fall semester is upon us! Teaching as an adjunct professor at three institutions is wonderful in many ways but challenging in many others. Each one of these schools operates as if it were my only job. Each semester, when they request availability for the next semester, they assume I'm not waiting for offers from any other schools. But I almost always am. Sadly, the school that pays the highest (by a lot!!) is the U. of Utah, but they are always last each semester to come in with an offer. Then have to consider their graduate assistants first and make sure they have classes to teach as part of their programs. Even after accepting offers from all the schools, I have to wait and see if all those classes will actually make. Ten students is the magic number at all three schools. And students just love to wait to register until the week before the semester begins.

So this time, I kinda under-estimated. Okay, a lot under-estimated. Enrollment was very low in three of the nine classes I was offered, and I really thought those three would not make. Six is a reasonable number to teach, difficult, but manageable. I felt pretty confident. Guess what? All nine classes filled, three at each school. All nine of them! I may die.

So here's the thing. Laughter is so good for anxiety. So is crying, actually, and I believe strongly in doing both, but today, let's laugh. The story is that occasionally, through the last 17 years, Shulamith and I have asked Matt to take a picture of us. The key here is "a" picture. One. But instead, Matt likes to take a bunch of pictures, one after the other, before we are even ready. Neither of us takes very good candid pics. We need to pose and smile. So usually I wind up deleting a zillion pictures, and keeping only the one that turns out (assuming one does, which isn't always the case). 

So a few weeks ago, we were on this Mexican cruise. One evening, we were out on the deck, and we asked Matt to take our picture. As usual, he starting taking pictures before we were even close to ready. And even the last one, for which we actually had time to pose and smile, didn't turn out because my eyes were closed!

Between car trouble, ongoing HOA issues, and the start of an insane semester, anxiety is off the charts!

 ....so let's look at some funny pictures! And laugh. 

Final vacation of summer; cruising on down to Mexico!

"So much fun last week, and I want a 'do-over'!" 

Matt's mom, Dawn, texted this to Shulamith and me Friday morning, talking about the week-long cruise several of us took last week to three Mexican cities: Cabo San Lucas, Mazatlan, and Puerto Vallarta. We can't have a "do over" just yet, but maybe one day! For now, memories in a blog post will have to do. 

This year, Dawn and Todd joined us, along with Seth's girlfriend, Kylee. We missed Eli, Amanda, and Jane terribly, but Amanda is due to have her baby in just a couple months and Eli is up to his eyeballs in grad school (along with his regular full-time job), so the timing did not align for them. I would say we missed Isaiah, but I don't think he'd ever do a cruise. He travels everywhere for his job, but cruisin' is not his style. Not sure if Gerald or Luke would like it either? 

The 10 of us!

Me? I enjoy cruises, but I like traveling in other modes too. Mostly, I just love to experience new places, people, language and culture. This was Kylee's first time standing on foreign soil, and I think she loved it too!

Here they are relaxing by the beach in Mazatlan

...and playing Jenga in the hotel in L.A. before our flight

...and lounging with me on the ship's deck!

Okay, my blog = my personal favorites:

1. Meal - Shrimp tacos in Cabo. Hands down the best tacos I've ever eaten. With each bite, I sat in amazement that anything could taste that good; I'm still dreaming about those tacos. Our time in Cabo was short, so while Seth, Kylee, and I feasted on that delicious meal, others were in the ocean.

The Webster-Monsons livin' their best ocean lives!

2. Show - Ice skating performance. All the skaters were talented, but one guy used to compete on the Russian Olympic team, and that explains everything. Wow! The rink was smaller than Olympic size, providing less room for a skater to gain the speed needed to perform challenging jumps, but this guy still managed to land a triple lutz, a triple salchow, and a double axel. Impressive!

3. Port - Mazatlan. We had no plans ahead of time, so when we arrived, Shulamith talked to one of many locals offering to take us places. "Come to my restaurant right on the beach. Great food, lounge chairs, hammocks, all for you to enjoy if you eat there," he urged. Without hesitation, Shulamith replied, "Sounds good!" We walked a short distance to be picked up by a "taxi" (truck, with benches on both sides of the bed) and taken to exactly what the guy described. It was the loveliest, most relaxing day.

4. Ship activity - Massage. This was the first time I treated myself to a massage on a cruise ship, and well, now it will need to be Every. Single. Time. Thanks, Dawn. This is all your fault. :-)

5. 2nd place ship activity - Ice skating. I was a figure skater as a kid, so when anyone says ice skating, I'm in! Just Shulamith, Kennedy and I skated, with others cheering us on from the sidelines. You can see Kennedy in the pink hoodie in the background. So fun and all the nostalgia for me.

6. 3rd place ship activity - The nightly dinners in the formal dining room. The food is meh (it's hard to feed 4,000 people every night), but the service is spectacular, and it's so fun to gather each evening and talk about our day.

7. 4th place ship activity - The gym. Yep, when you're kinda addicted to working out, it's pretty convenient to have a gym right there on the ship. Shulamith and I got up each morning before anyone else, filled our Diet Coke cups, and headed up to the gym on floor 12. (Okay, Matt was already up and outside doing hundreds of pushups on the deck, but other than him, everyone else was still asleep.) The gym was super crowded the first day, but attendance decreased daily, which was great for us! We missed Orange Theory, but this was still good.

8. Favorite non-ship activity - Snorkeling in Puerto Vallarta. Kylee was feeling seasick this day (very sad!), but the rest of us went snorkeling. Everyone looks exactly the same in a snorkeling mask, so I lost everyone pretty quickly, but I was super grateful to have Seth with me the whole time, and we had so much fun watching the fish in the clear, blue water below us.

It's been a summer of travel, which is exactly the way I like it! It began in May with the fulfillment of a 3-decade dream to go to Germany Then in June, several of us drove over to Oregon to visit my family. Rounding out summer was this cruise to Mexico. As I write, I am once again in Portland for the weekend, helping my brother and his kids transition my mom out of rehab and back home, but here's one last memory of the cruise: