it's prettier than risk

And today was a scorcher, right?

I've been popping quite a lot of Tylenol PM these days in an effort to stifle the screams of my whip-lash (is that hyphenated?), caused from my run-in with a deer a few weeks back. This morning, I foolishly washed those capsules down somewhere around 4:30 AM, completely disregarding my intended wake-up call of 8:30.

Fast forward 5 hours: Here I am coasting down I-78 West into Pennsyltucky to meet my sister, my niece, and my Cheech and escort them safely home to the Garden State of euphoria. My anticipation the entire ride was difficult to mask and I shamefully took it out on the iPod, listening and re-listening to Huey Lewis & The News tunes while singing at the top of my lungs. I was driving my mom's mini-van... didn't I once dedicate an entire blog to my ridiculously unprecedented nerdiness? Probably. But it can't be helped - the heart of rock and roll is still beating.

I'd say I'm a little unhealthfully obsessed with my nephew, the Cheech, but I don't know that it's possible for any sort of unhealthfulness to exist when it comes to obsessions with Cheech. He's that incredible. My sadness when he left New Jersey to head back to the smokey mountains of Tennessee was heart-breaking, to say the least. I'd be lying if I were to tell you that I expected to love any human being as much as I love this child. It is only occasionally that I feel a little guilty for not putting Olivia or Elliana (my two nieces) in the spotlight. Ever.

They're less than a year old.
They're still growing into their cuteness.
They can't share with me in dialogue about Dora the Explorer.
I love them too - but the most I can do right now is hold them and hope they grow up to be anywhere near as cool as their older brother/cousin.

So what did the Cheech and I do today? We ran circles in the parking lot of the Wawa until we were sick from dizziness - making sure to take off our shoes beforehand, turning the soles of our feet a deep ebony.
We jumped on the bed.
We played monkey tunnel.
We harassed the dogs.
We went exploring in the garden and found japanese beetles mating and albino crab spiders waiting in prey.
We had a blast.

Another portion of joy has returned and for real, this is a time when I know beyond anything that God is watching out for me. There's no other reason He would choose to bring something so absolutely amazing into my life.

Currently listening : Plan B By Huey Lewis & the News Release date: By 24 July, 2001