Fun with Family and Friends

I love laughing, and life often gives us much to laugh about. In addition, life at work is stressful right now, so I turn to laughter as an important coping mechanism. Here are some things that have made me laugh and/or brought me joy recently:

--As I looked through pictures of my grandmother’s funeral with my mom, we ran across a picture of three men I did not recognize. I asked my mom whether she knew the three men, and she responded dramatically, “I have never, ever seen those three men in my life!” IN MY LIFE. I scrolled over to reveal the rest of the picture, and I found my mom talking to the three men. IN MY LIFE. Uh-huh. It turns out that they were her co-workers from 2007. How quickly she forgot!

--After work, my mom picked up my brother’s four kids and took them for ice cream. They happened upon me at a four-way stop and rolled down the window to talk to me. I actually turned, not knowing that they wanted to talk to me. My mom later told me that she said, “ay, chamaco” (translation: “oh, that boy”), and all the kids repeated the same phrase. My niece also added, “Oh, I love J.J., but ay, chamaco.” Yes, my two-year-old niece called me a little boy, and I found it both funny and very cute. Many members of my family call me J.J. As a boy, the nickname infuriated me, and many of my family members would come to my Little League games and yell out my nickname. They thought it would make me mad enough to take it out on the ball and hit a homerun. It usually just made me mad. Grrr…

--I turn everything into a competition. My nieces and nephew came over the other night and asked me to color with them. My niece asked me to help her color a picture for her teacher, and I told her to color the cat and that I would color the dog. When we were done with the picture, I commented on how beautiful her dog was, but I then informed her that my dog was much better looking than her cat. My nieces and nephew then destroyed my dog for my excessive show of pride by scribbling all over it. Jealousy…

--I love how worked up my family and friends get over the novelas. Everybody is now talking about the 8:00 novela, “Amor es para siempre.” My mom sits there and allows the novela to evoke every emotion imaginable (I’ve heard sighs, shrieks, gasps, laughter, cries—a real rollercoaster), and as I was sitting in my room at my desk, she ran back to my bedroom during the commercial break to ask if I just watched an episode of the novela. “No, you need to watch. This one is the best one ever.” She said that about the last. They’re trying to suck me into another one, and I refuse to budge! The women at work then come into the Courthouse and discuss the show, saying, “Can you believe how evil that woman is? Ay, que mala!” My cousin, who works in my office, told me about her 60-something year-old aunt from Guadalajara and her reaction to the show. She said, “Oh, I just want to have such a heart attack when I see that woman. I just want to grab her by the neck and strangle her! It’s already over in Mexico, and I can say that this is the BEST novela ever.” I will not cave, I will NOT cave!

--I am playing tennis everyday again and loving it. A longtime friend and I are equally passionate about the game, and we have been going out to the courts for 1½-2 hours every night. We have been challenging all the members of the varsity team because we want to work with the players and see the program do well, but we have earned the nickname of “The Bullies” for relentlessly pounding the ball down their throats. Oops. We decided to go for a different approach by splitting up the teams and working with them individually. My first lesson: talking trash.

Fun times, fun times!

Home

Again, I fall victim to life and return to my blog after a long hiatus. I thought about inventing a word for a “blog slacker,” but when all I could come up with was “blocker” or “blacker,” I decided that I should leave the word inventions up to Brian.

Life is good out here in West Texas. I am still working for county government, and I am trying to get a couple of service projects up and running. In addition, I spend lots of time with my family. As hard as I fought it, my family now has me addicted to a novela, but luckily, it’s just one and not the typical block of three that goes from 6:00-9:00 on Univision. My brother, my sister, and their families often come over to enjoy a meal cooked by my mom and to watch the novela together. These are the kinds of shows I tend to stay away from because I often cannot deal with the suspense. LOST would certainly give me a heart attack, I am sure. I grow impatient about what will happen next, and this is why I usually stick to comedies. Even then, I often find the suspense in the storylines to be very taxing on my nerves. Let’s hope that the novela causes only minimal damage.

I am reading again for fun and loving it. The plan is to continue reading something on an academic interest and then to supplement it with pleasure reading. My academic read is about human resource management. Exciting. Well, it’s exciting to me anyway. My current pleasure read is another Vonnegut book, Hocus Pocus, and it does not disappoint. He tells a story in a simple, funny way, but through it all, a powerful, important message emerges. My next project will be a nonfiction book about the Civil War.

I am also planning to explore my backyard a little further. Out in West Texas, we have beautiful Big Bend National Park and numerous state parks, and I look forward to camping soon.

Yes, life’s pace is much slower out here, but I have every intention of making life just as exciting.