OK, fellow New Mexico residents: Please share with me your tips for avoiding tracking into your home those little prickly things that get stuck in the carpet and then embedded in the soles of your feet. I don't know if they're called sand burs or what. All I know is that in the last 24 hours, I've gotten FOUR of them stuck in my feet and had to spend subsequent minutes pulling them out, which is a painful process, and I need to know how to avoid this in the future. I await your sage advice. For now, I'm wearing flip flops indoors at all times.

I know, my life is very glamorous and exciting. Don't be jealous.

As has been previously mentioned on this blog, Dan and I, largely due to the influence of my baby sister Audrey, are now "Lost" fanatics. I don't know what crack cocaine addiction is like, but I'm pretty sure this show is the television viewing equivalent of it.

This is all well and good so long as I'm getting my fix. But tonight, the third season of "Lost" premiered. And do you know what I'm not doing right now? Cowering in fear and cursing some new mystery that puts an unexpected twist on the new season. I'm not doing that because even though our Tivo recorded Lost for us, Dan refuses to watch it with me!

This is because Dan has developed this theory that it would be better, nay, The Right Thing to Do, to wait until we have about 4 hours of the show saved up and then watch it all at one sitting. That way, we don't have to deal with commercials or the suspense of not knowing what happens from week to week. This kind of random arrival at an unalterable opinion over something relatively trivial is something that Dan does from time to time, (remember this?) and I'm used to it. But now it's getting between me and my show. So I'm resorting to drastic measures.

If you watched the season premiere of Lost last night, I want you to call Dan at least once over the next few days (I"ll give you his contact information if you don't have it) and tell him one thing that happened on the show. Don't even bother to identify yourself. Just spill the beans and hang up. My hope is that he'll crack and watch the Tivo version with me tomorrow night and we can join the ranks of normal people who must rearrange their lives so that they can watch a ridiculous show that probably has no satisfying conclusion. Because that's the Right Thing to Do.

I thought you might all want an update on the progress of Operation Let Haley Watch Lost.
Thanks to the valiant efforts of Cody and Erika, who each left a message on our answering machine last Thursday revealing one aspect of the plot of the "Lost" premiere, Dan relented, and allowed me to view the Tivo-recorded episode, but only on the condition that he was not in the house at the time. (It was more like he wrestled me to the ground and took the remote out of my hands to keep me from hitting "play" on the Tivo in his presence.) But I prevailed. So I can now proudly join the rest of America in saying .... "WHAT? There's a BOOK CLUB on the island? What kind of sick, twisted game are the writers of this show playing with my mind?" But that's about all I can say, because true to form for this show, that's about all I learned. I can't wait for next week.
Dan continues to avoid all conversations that reveal the plot of the show, and actually deleted Cody and Erika's messages before they were fully played, but I think he'll crack. Kind of like Locke, who wanted to keep pushing the button down in the Dharma station until he realized it was all futile. Except of course that turned out to be a bad call. Once again, I hate this show.
Back here in reality, we'll be spending the rest of the week with Dan's parents, who are coming into town on Wednesday for the latter half of the Balloon Fiesta. Should be good times, but maybe not a lot of blogging. Hang in there. A rescue plane will be here any day now. Or not.

This makes me so sad I could cry. Dan and I had our first date at the Guadalajara Cafe in Clovis in May of 2002. The story I'm linking to is written by my former newspaper, and it's a sad story to tell. Not only does Guadalajara have some of the best enchiladas known to man, they also have exceptionally short doors, a fact that six-foot-six Dan failed to notice while he was trying to hold the door for me while looking sideways and talking to me at the same time. He should have ducked, but instead, he smacked his head on the door frame. It looked like it hurt, but it was kind of funny, so we laughed, and that took away that weird, awkward feeling you have on a first date, and it was pretty much gone from then on. I never felt awkward around Dan again. We went back to my little apartment and sat on the porch and talked until 1 a.m. or so, and less than a year later, we got married. I had fond fantasies of taking my grandchildrend to the Guadalajara to show them the place where their future got started over plates of fabulous food. Now the restaurant is closing. I suppose it's the inevitable fate of small businesses in small towns that are coming to look more and more like everywhere else, but it's a shame. It's probably no consolation to the owners, but we'll remember it fondly.

We're really not. We've just been busy. Very very busy.

To keep the blog from being blank, and to keep Chris from whining yet AGAIN, I will tell you that I want to go and see the upcoming movie, "Stranger Than Fiction." It has so many of the things I look for in a film: Emma Thompson, Will Ferrell, a plot about writing, and most importantly, the guy who plays Buster on Arrested Development and is thus my all time favorite actor from one of my all time favorite shows. Who's with me?

Happy Friday, people.

I have a somewhat embarrassing admission to make. It's probably not something the average person would care about, but remember, I was an English major in college. OK. Here goes: I have never read The Brothers Karamazov, Crime and Punishment, War and Peace or Anna Karenina in their entirity. I cannot tell you how many times I have started The Brothers Karamozov, and I truly think it is brilliant, and enjoy reading it. But for whatever reason, around page 600 on that book or any book written by Dostoyevsky or Tolstoy, I lose the thread of the narrative and find it covered in dust a month later, when I have no hope of remembering all the Russian names and complicated back plots enough to finish the book, and I give up in defeat.

I mention this because I am currently on about Month Two of struggling through Anna Karenina, and I don't know if I'm going to make it. I find this particularly painful to admit, because I decided on about page 200 that Tolstoy was, essentially, writing the "Desperate Housewives" equivalent of his day. Yes, it's well written, has great character development, and is an interesting portrait of Russian society and mores of the day. But essentially, it's a story about a woman who marries a man she doesn't love and subsequently cheats on him. It's fluff, with, as far as I can tell, no great redemptive message. (Granted, it's not over yet. Not by a long shot.)

And now I will make the most truly shocking admission of the day: I'm starting to wonder how these books became great staples of literature in the first place. Perhaps it's because Anna Karenina, when it was written, was breaking new ground, but these days, stories about dysfunctional marriages are everywhere. The other thing I wonder about the great Russian novels is if everyone just decided they must be significant because they're so daggum long. I don't include the Brothers Karamozov in this, because based on what I've read, I'm pretty sure it really is a great book and it's just my own lack of attention span that is depriving me of the privilege of reading it. But in general, I'm not sure laboring over obscure back plots to the point that your novel reaches 1,200 pages is really good writing. Maybe what these boys needed was a good editor, but at this point, I would just about kill for some brevity. And some shorter names. Furthermore, if someone had forced me to read these books in junior high or high school, I probably would have stopped reading forever. We bemoan the fact that Americans are illiterate television gazers, but is it any wonder when we force kids to read this stuff at an impressionable age?

So now you can report me to the Literary Police and have them strip me of my English degree. But in the meantime, can anyone tell me if I'm really really wrong and should keep charging ahead with Karenina? At this point, I'm seriously considering viewing it as a handy ten pound weapon should anyone ever attempt to break into my home. Because you could drop a moose with that book.

By my count, I have posted all of six times in the month of October. Not good statistics, but I have a decent excuse: I didn't realize the month would be over so fast! I am stunned that November is upon us, but given how busy the last month has been, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. Early in the month, Dan's parents came to spend a few days with us and go to the Balloon Fiesta. I forgot to bring our camera to the fiesta, so I don't have any photos from that, but it looked much like past years, except that we only saw about a third as many balloons take off as usual because the weather was bad the morning we went. Still, we had a good time, and it was fun to have Dan's parents for a visit. We even went and watched Dan race his radio controlled cars on Saturday night, which was cool, because Dan and his dad share a passion for small motorized vehicles. Dan's dad has his airplanes, and Dan has his cars. I have a feeling our future children are in for a lot of talk about engines.

Two days after Dan's parents left, my dad came into town to spend a couple of days with us on his way to go elk hunting. New Mexico has vast expanses of public lands, and there are outfitters that set up camps and send guides out with individual hunters to track elk. Dad didn't kill one because he didn't see one that looked like a good trophy, and he wasn't hunting just for the heck of it. He saw lots of elk though, and had a great time. We enjoyed hearing all the stories from his hunt, especially the ones about his guides and fellow hunters. To me, the strangest part about a trip like that would be spending five days out in the wilderness roaming around with a perfect stranger. But then, my dad can talk to anyone, so I don't think it was awkward for him.

Obviously, the wild is not known for its fabulous running water and shower facilities, so Dad came back with a beard. I don't know that I've ever seen my dad with a beard, and it got us talking about the one and only time that dad shaved off the mustache he's had for as long as any of us kids have been alive. My sister Audrey was about three years old at the time, and for whatever reason, it totally freaked her out. She started bawling and would not be consoled when dad walked out of the bathroom with a hairless face. Needless to say, he grew it back out. So here he is with a beard. Don't cry, Audge:

The reason Dad looks so pleased with himself is that he and Dan and I had just spent 20 minutes wrestling the sub-zero down sleeping back he bought for the trip back into its ridiculously small carrying bag. I was convinced it wasn't going to fit, and kept saying so the whole time that we were all laying on top of it to crush air out of the lining. As usual, I was wrong to be so pessimistic.

In my almost complete absence from the web, another exciting thing happened along today's theme line of family: The birth of the son of our friends, Megan and Andy, who started a new blog a few weeks ago to document their new adventure in parenthood and life in California. There was much rejoicing in the news of baby Joseph's birth at our church in Albuquerque. I'm also proud to report that their blog has the coolest design and name ever. So stop by There's Treasure Everywhere if you haven't already.

Across the country, my cousin Jenni got married in what I'm told was a beautiful outdoor ceremony in Florida. To Jenni, Aunt Emily and Uncle Gil, my cousin Dan and the rest of the family, I'm so sorry we couldn't be there, but we wish Jenni and Nate many happy years of marriage, and we miss y'all.

And in sad news for another family, we watched the St. Louis Cardinals win the world series. Normally I care about baseball about as much as I care about lengthy congressional reports, but this year, I found myself rooting for the Tigers, and even praying for them because of the Overbeek kids. The Overbeeks are fanatical Tigers fans, and their children, Joshua, Abigail and Chloe are all in the Wednesday night children's class that Dan and I teach at our church on Wednesday nights. In that class, we have been faithfully praying for the Tigers in recent weeks, from thanking the Lord that they made it into the series to praying for them to have good games, so it broke my heart when they lost. But the Lord works in mysterious ways, even in baseball, and there's always another season. I'm buying my Tigers sweatshirt now. I should add that I am so happy that our church has such an abundance of beautiful, sweet, hilarious children right now, but I am also tempted to snatch one of them up and take them home every single week. They are that adorable.

I'm off to make some potato soup. It's getting colder at night here and it makes me want to make warm food and wear sweaters and enjoy my own little two-person family.