A Good Summer Weekend

Now, I’m no longer working, so the concept of “weekend” doesn’t mean as much but we had a very busy one. Got lots of outdoor time even though it was a hot and humid weekend.

Friday night is typically spent at the dance studio since I do a double lesson on Friday night. My lesson starts after group class ends so a couple of the students from group were hanging around when we started. Right off the bat, she says we are doing a rhythm round. For those not familiar with the concept, it means you do all the dances in a row (Cha-Cha, Rumba, Swing, Bolero and Mambo). One each with no repeats and no breaks.

Its a prep for events where you may have to do a bunch of different dances back to back and so you need to mentally shift from one to the other. Also, if you screw up in one, you have to put it right out of your mind and get ready for the next one. Got to have a short memory in those cases.

There was one student who started watching while we were doing the Cha-Cha. We got done with the Rumba and he tells me he had to ask another instructor what dance we were doing because we didn’t do any boxes. I did hit a wall in the middle of the second lesson. It happens. Just sometimes the body decides to remind me that we aren’t really that young.

Random little thing that happened Saturday while we were shopping. There was a toddler riding in a cart who was giving me the eye since both our carts were stopped. I was waiting for the spouse to finish loading all her fruit for the week. Anyway, I just gave him a little smile and he responded with a big one.

Then I just think of all those little moments like that we missed during the height of mask mania. I see kids in masks these days and I just feel sorry for them. I’m really starting to believe that all the pandemic related things we did are going to have a high cost and we are going to be paying those bills for a long time.

I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that we had put the lawn chairs away since we didn’t have plans to attend any additional outdoor concerts. Long story short, we ran into a couple of friends a week ago and they had extra ticket to the show on Saturday. There was going to be free food and an opportunity to sit right by the stage and who could really turn that down.

Now, the tables were in the sun so it was a little hot while we were eating. We managed to set up our lawn chairs in a shady spot and eventually the sun went down so we didn’t have to spend a lot of time being sun roasted.

This was a cover band specializing in the songs of a couple of people. The one guy did actually try to look a little like the singer he was doing. It wasn’t bad but I’ll admit I still don’t quite get the attraction. I guess it is just a way to sit outside and gather with friends but it seemed like a lot of people got into it like it was a real concert.

Because we got in for free, I decided to leave a little early because the place was packed and getting out was going to be a zoo. It was fun and something we wouldn’t have done so it was nice to get the opportunity.

Yesterday was our second visit to the State Fair. Like I mentioned before, they’ve had to rearrange the animal schedules because a couple of the building are not in use this year. And this week the cows were back. It isn’t a state fair unless you see cows. They had more rabbits as well so that made my wife happy.

We also ended up seeing the sheep and goats. I have no way of knowing if this is true or not but sheep just kind of seem dumb as far as farm animals go. They did show an interest in a bag we were carrying even though there was nothing edible in there. Goats always seem more clever to me. Not sure why but sheep just look they come in last in the intelligence race. Still like walking through the barns with them though.

It was a seriously hot and humid day so we had to keep stopping for lemonade/lemon shake ups. Most of the booths give you a discount on refills but the place is so big you aren’t likely to circle back when you need a refill. So we probably spent more on fluids than we did on actual food even though we were there for about seven hours.

Busy but fun. Wouldn’t want every weekend to be like that but a few like this are good.