India visa

I feel so official! The Indian Consulate approved my visa, so they’re going to let me in their country. (Good thing, since we're leaving in September.) I just got it back today. It looks kind of like this:

(I was going to post a picture of the real thing but then decided that wasn’t such a great idea…)

Memorial Day in Tulsa

All winter long I’ve been looking forward to going to Tulsa for Memorial Day, and the date finally arrived! I love Tulsa. I love leaving the airport and breathing in the distinctive Tulsa scent: the river, the trees (trees with leaves instead of trees with needles), the honeysuckle and other fragrant plants, and well yes, the oil refineries (but out by the airport the refineries don’t smell as bad). My skin soaks up the moist air, especially after a winter with lots of artificial heat, and the city is so attractive. I didn’t take this picture but I could have: this was the view from the window of my old apartment.

Of course, the best part about going to Tulsa is seeing Wendy! Here we are at the used bookstore:

Since I moved away from Oklahoma, Wendy and I have gotten together a couple of times a year, usually around Memorial Day and Thanksgiving. We used to have other friends in Tulsa who we used to visit, but they’ve all gradually dropped off the radar screen or moved away. Our last friend in the area moved to Virginia earlier this month (we miss you Brandi! ). But even though it was just the two of us this time, we still managed to have fun . We ate LOTS of food (we’re both great cooks—I’m not afraid to brag about it ), played video games, watched movies (we both liked the new Indiana Jones), and stayed up all night talking. I wish we lived closer to each other so we could get together more often! But on the other hand, once Wendy moves away from there (she’s finishing up a Ph.D. program at OSU) I won’t have an excuse to visit Tulsa anymore and that will be sad.

Wendy lives on the banks of the Arkansas River, and I like going out there in the morning (before it gets too hot) and hiking along the river. The water level was extremely high this year, at least compared to the other years she’s lived there. It made the Arkansas look like a wild, cascading river instead of the wide, meandering river it typically is.

The last night I was there, we had a severe thunderstorm. Wendy probably slept right through it because she’s used to this kind of thing, but it kept me awake!Every time I thought the storm had passed, there would be more rumbling hail, booming thunder, and flashes of lightning that lit up the sky like it was daytime! I didn’t take this picture either, but it was taken close to where we were.

Now I have to start counting down again. Only six more months until Thanksgiving (sigh).

Lilac Festival Parade

Spokane's annual Lilac Festival parade was on Saturday, and I got to be in it! It's a torchlight parade, which meant that it started around 8:00 p.m. and all the floats/bands/balloons/people were decorated with lights. The company I work for had a "float" (well, a truck and a sports car that carried our mascot) in the parade, and I got to be one of the people that carried the banner in front of them. It was fun! We saw lots of happy people (I'm quite certain some of their happiness was chemically induced) and nobody threw any overripe fruit at us! Here's a picture from when we were sitting around waiting for our turn to start parading. I'm the one in the middle

Six things

Megann got me back for tagging her with the movie survey!

TAG RULES:

1. you link back to the person who tagged you.

2. post these rules on your blog.

3. share six unimportant things about yourself.

4. tag six random people at the end of your entry.

5. let the tagged people know by leaving a comment on their blogs.

6. enjoy the results.

I’m not going to follow rule 1 because if you know Megann you already have a link to her blog, and if you don’t, why would you care about her six unimportant things???

6 unimportant things about myself:
1. I’m not scared of spiders or snakes or anything normal, but seeing a moth sometimes throws me into a panic.
2. Only three of my wisdom teeth came in (and got removed).
3. I watched the entire 3^rd season of the TV show Roswell last weekend. (My ankle was swollen and sore AGAIN so I was trying to stay off of it.)
4. I like the televisionwithoutpity.com recaps of reality shows better than I like the shows themselves.
5. I’ve been to every state except Hawaii.
6. I like to drink buttermilk.

Now I have to think of six more people to tag. Erik (got you back!!!), April, Katie, Jenni, Teresa, and Courtney (yeah, I know Megann already tagged you but I’m running out of names)

Movie survey

Thanks, Erik, for the tag. I appreciate it. Really, I do. (glare)

1. The total number of movies I own:

Seven that I can play (on DVD). I have about 20 others on VHS, but my VCR has developed a fondness for eating tapes. I should either replace the VCR (can you even buy VCRs anymore???) or get rid of the movies, but I haven’t yet.

2. The last movie I bought:

Ummm…I think it was Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, but I bought it a couple of years ago and I don’t own it anymore. I typically rent rather than buy, unless it’s a classic that I’m going to watch at least 100 times.

3. The last movie I saw:

Spiderwick Chronicles at the Garland. My friend Heidi L and I decided we had to get out and do something, and that’s what was playing at the second-run theater.

4. Five movies that mean something to me:

1. The Sound of Music – One of my two favorite movies. Great music, sappy romance, action, adventure…this movie has it all! I took a “Sound of Music” tour in Austria, and whenever the tour guide got tired of talking, he played the soundtrack and everyone sang along. Trundling through the Austrian Alps with a busload of people singing “I Am Sixteen Going On Seventeen” was a surreal experience.
   
   
2. Singin’ in the Rain – My other favorite movie. Whenever I need a pick-me-up, I watch the “Make ‘Em Laugh” scene with Donald O’Connor. It never fails to get me giggling.
   
   
3. Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead – My parents used to go on vacation together for a few weeks in the summertime, leaving me and my four younger brothers at home. For a few years we had a live-in babysitter, then we transitioned to a part-time babysitter, and then as we got older they just left us home alone and asked neighbors to check in on us once in a while. (If they tried it these days, they probably would have been arrested for child abuse!) So one summer when my parents were on vacation, I drove my brothers into town to see this movie. It was just like what we were experiencing: parents gone, no babysitter, kids left to their own devices. We had a great time conspiring to sneak snacks into the theater, so the movie always makes me think of hanging out with my brothers.
   
   
4. Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey – I know. But this was the first movie I went to see with just friends, where we drove ourselves to the theater and nobody’s parents were around. When I see this movie, it reminds me of that first taste of independence.
   
   
5. Beauty and the Beast – The first movie I saw on a date! ‘Nuff said.

5. Tag five people and have them do this on their blogs:

Do I even know five people? Paul, if he reads this, because he’s The Movie Man. My sisters-in-law because I want to see what you have to say. Wendy because I know you don’t have enough to do. Or if you just want to do this, consider yourself tagged.

Primary activity

Since this is a continuation of a blog I've been maintaining on Myspace (www.myspace.com/heidinjnr) I'm not going to do the whole introduction thing. I'll just jump right in with my first post!

We had our springtime Primary activity today, which was my motivation for moving from Myspace to Blogspot. I wanted to post pictures that people could see! We did sort of a Cinco de Mayo theme, with a lot of other non-Mexican activities thrown in.

One of our activities was making maracas out of plastic cups and beans, and then painting them...

The kids did the limbo...



We danced around the Maypole. (Yes, I know this is a pagan ritual. But so are Christmas trees!!! Hopefully none of the parents complain...)

We played musical chairs to Mexican music. That square board in the background was part of a beanbag game created by the husband of one of our Primary leaders. I wish I had gotten a picture of it: it was a big smiley face and was so cute! Some of the kids wanted to throw beanbags at it all day.

And we had a pinata. After a while we gave up on trying to hit the pinata and the kids took turns kicking it instead...

The kids had a lot of fun and nobody got hurt! I'm going to count this one as a successful Primary activity.