Oh hi! For day 2 of NaBloPoMo I have a few highs and lows of the week. Let’s start with a couple (minor) lows so I can end on a high note.
LOW #1: I had a terrible week of sleep. Part of it was anxiety about the… er… “E” word, part was anxiety about another issue (coming up below) and part of it was due to a bizarre sleeping “injury”, which I’ll describe in greater detail in tomorrow’s Weekly Rundown. Not sleeping well is NOT fun.
LOW #2: Well, Halloween was a little bit of a bummer. We hardly got any trick-or-treaters! Every year we have less and less. It makes me a little sad, and we have WAY too much candy left over. Sigh.
Okay, but let’s talk about the highs, because those outweigh the lows by far.
HIGH #1: All-state audition results are out! For kids who are total band nerds, this is a big deal. All-state music comes out in June; my daughter practiced it every single day, worked on it with her teacher, ran through mock auditions with me; then, in September everyone auditions; the auditions are recorded and sent to a central location to be judged.
Results always come out November 1st, and I think this was one of the reasons I had trouble sleeping. My daughter works so hard- it would be heartbreaking for her not to make it. I know it’s good for them to fail sometimes, I know it builds character. But I’m very glad to report that there will be no character-building this year- my daughter made the all-state band! PHEW.
(Fun fact- this also means I get my annual mini-break to Tampa in January, as I’ll be going with her. I’m looking forward to it!)
HIGH #2: In spite of my sleep issues, I had a great trail run on Wednesday. It was the last long run before my race on the 9th, and I guess I’m… ready?
HIGH #3: I was also very tired tonight (are you sensing a theme here?) but rallied and went to the high school football game. I did take a nap after work and got to the game just in time for the halftime show. My high school years weren’t the happiest, but all the good memories I do have come from being in the band. I still get a thrill of excitement when I see the band lining up to go on the field.
Did you have any important highs or lows this week?
30 Responses
Oh low #1 is bad. I feel you here. Since we had the day light saving switch thingy I wake up every day at 5:30 am… Sigh. I rarely go to bed before midnight and it’s been exhausting. So booooh for not sleeping.
I could have sent you a ton of trick or treaters… It was ringing non stop and I hid in a dark apartment with my husband. I am a Halloween grinch and odd with lady of the neighborhood…
Congrats to you daughter making all stat band. What an honor and yeah for a trip in January.
Thank you Tobia! That’s funny about Halloween- I wanted trick or treaters! I had candy!!! I’m the opposite of a Halloween Grinch.
Congrats to your daughter! What an exciting accomplishment. Your children are clearly both incredibly musical AND hard-working.
We had more kids than normal this year and literally finished all our candy (which has never happened before!). I feel like these things cycle, at least where we live?
Yay for trail running!
Thank you Elisabeth! Hard work does pay off.
A lot of our neighbors don’t give out candy anymore, and I think the trick or treaters are going to different areas. You’re probably right- it goes in cycles.
congrats to your daughter to make it to the band. Seeing a kid working hard without the desired outcome is so hard.
And not sleeping well is HARD! I’ve had my fair share this week and still not fully recovered.
Thank you Coco! You’re usually such a good sleeper- you’re good about getting in bed early, at least. I hope you can get back on track this week.
Yay for the highs! It feels wrong to say this, but I can’t wait to hear about your sleeping injury! And also I can’t wait to hear about the sleeping injury being a thing of the past.
Also yay for your daughter making the all state! It’s true that disappointment builds character, but having things work out and achieving one’s dreams is another way to do that. Plus the Tampa mini trip!!!! Squeeeee!!!
RACE WEEK!!!!! Another squeeee!!!!!!
Thank you Birchie! That’s true- working hard and having it pay off also teaches valuable lessons.
Congrats to Angie! I am glad all of her hard work paid off!! What an accomplishment though as I know it’s very hard to be selected!
I was in Michigan for part of the week and just felt absolutely exhausted. I think it is because I traveled with someone I hadn’t travel with for the first day which means I am on for the entire time which is more tiring. The 2nd day was more fun as I knew the guy well so it’s like hanging with a friend in between meetings.
That is too bad you didn’t get many trick or treaters. We have way too much candy, too. I think we got about 40-50 which is more than we expected given how cold it was!
WOW! You got 40-50 trick-or-treaters? That’s awesome! Here we had beautiful weather and didn’t even get half that many.
And, thank you. It is hard to make all-state on flute- there are a lot of good flute players out there!
Congrats to your daughter for making All-State! And does this mean we can make a plan to visit a cat cafe when you’re here in January?!
It feels like neighborhood trick-or-treating is becoming less and less a thing. Last year, my mom only got 7 trick-or-treaters!! Or maybe everyone goes to a specific neighborhood – idk.
The high of my week was meeting my new boss who I have good feelings about. And the low has been dealing with this abscess on my armpit. I was able to get into my dermatologist on Wednesday to have it drained but it’s been bugging me ever since, argh.
Oh yes! I’ve been thinking about our cat cafe/indie bookstore get together ever since we got the news!
Ack- an abscess on your armpit sounds painful. Why are they always in awful places???
Wow, your weather/conditions for that run looked great! I hope that your race goes well! I think that you have now had some experiences now (weather, injury etc.) that will put things in perspective more, so I bet it will be good, even if you are not as fast as you want to be. I bet you are happy to be able to get out there and run, regardless!! I ran Boston twice; the first year I did well. The second year I had been injured and hadn’t trained, and I ran about 20 minutes slower than the time before. However, after being injured, I had not been sure I was going to be able to run at all, so I was really happy to finish! I think you have to have some downs to really appreciate the ups more.
Kyria, that is VERY true! I’m just happy that I can get out there and run.
Congrats to your daughter for making All-State! You must be so proud – I know I would be. I am a little sad my kid did not like her band teacher and quit this year. Bit I completely understand her reasons. My low was when my leg started hurting again (long story) and my high was Halloween.
We’ve been VERY lucky with our band teachers- my kids loved their middle and high school band directors. It makes a huge difference.
Your leg is hurting? i’m heading over to your blog right now.
Head over tomorrow – I decided to get it off my chest then. It happens so often that I want to say “I can’t do this or that because my leg/back/hip hurts” that I have the feeling I need to get it out of the way.
I didn’t love high school myself (SO MUCH STRESS – why didn’t I just relax a little?), but marching band is definitely some of my favorite memories. I love watching bands!
Yes- I wish they would show the halftime shows for the college games! I always see the bands lining up, waiting to go on the field and then they cut away to talk about more football. My son thinks there should be a channel that just shows halftime shows, ha.
Congrats to your daughter, and exciting for you that you get to go with her! I had a really good experience with band in middle school but I quit in high school because they were so focused on marching band and I didn’t want to do that — I played saxophone and liked being in jazz band in MS and just generally playing because I enjoyed it, but my HS experience was not like that at all unfortunately.
My highs of the week were the cooler temperatures (finally!) and having a strong 15 mile long run today and not feeling like the sun wanted to kill me!
Ah, cooler temps for the WIN!
Luckily our high school doesn’t focus TOO much on marching. I mean, they don’t go to competitions or anything. They usually have one after school rehearsal a week (which by now, they’ve dropped even that) and then the games. But the games are fun.
We had 1 trick or treater, which is 1 more than most years. My optimum number would be maybe 10 kids, all early, so I can see their cute costumes, and then relax and have dinner and watch TV.
YAY for your daughter! Her hard work is paying off! Dealing with disappointment and rejection does build character, but so does hard work and having it pay off. She’ll have lots of both opportunities in her life, I’m glad this one went the way it did.
I hate not sleeping well. I hope you sleep great tonight. <3
I’m kind of wondering who that one trick-or-treater was… a next door neighbor? I hope you had at least one piece of candy to give out!
Since we moved to a new neighborhood, I wasn’t sure what you expect for Halloween. We didn’t use to get Trick-or-Treaters at our old home , but we did get quite a few here. I am so glad I did get candy last weekend.
I am sorry you haven’t been sleeping well. I hate that. I hope you get an extra good night’s sleep tonight! And congratulations to your daughter making the all-state band! Woohoo!
Thank you San! And I’m also glad I got candy. My worst fear is some little kid in a cute costume knocking hopefully on my door, and I have nothing to give them, ha ha.
Congrats to your daughter!!! That is SO awesome!! You must be so proud!
Huge bummer about not sleeping well. That is the worst. Whenever I sleep poorly, I marvel at HOW DID I FUNCTION with babies and toddlers who woke up all the time??! I always feel like a trainwreck the next couple days if I can’t sleep now. Also, when I was younger, I seemed much more able to just fall right back to sleep after being woken up. Now, if something wakes me up, there is often a very good chance that I am then going to lay awake for a very long time after. Which is extremely annoying!
I think that’s why it’s optimal to have babies in your 20s- you can cope with sleepless nights better at that age. I had my daughter at the age of 42 and let me tell you… it was ROUGH.
THat is great news for your daughter, it is good to see results from all her hard work. I had no idea you were doing a race soon, it seems not that long ago that you were injured. somehow I guess I’ve completely lost track of time.
Congratulations to A for making all-state! What an incredible accomplishment! Both your kids are so gifted musically, and I think your husband is a musician–are you a musical too, Jenny?
Sorry you’ve been feeling tired–I hope you’re not coming down with something. <3
Yay to the highs outweighing the lows, and leftover candy? Definitely a high.