Pass the "effort", please

How do you successfully avoid dealing with life?

Sit in your library or bedroom or kitchen or dungeon, and stay hunkered over your PC all day and night...of course! I know it seems to be working for my son(s). The oldest is depressed - and having broken up with his girlfriend, it has only gotten worse. He won't go see anyone to talk about it. And by "anyone", I mean a trained, board certified counselor or psych. In early September he tried the program at OU where grad students practice/hone their fine, fine skills (I had to gag back a little vomit with that) before moving on to the real world. His therapist will be destroying psyches all over the Detroit Metro area...she was inept and self-centered, and I am sorry Brian didn't go to his old shrink.

He has a second interview coming up the beginning of December, a call-back for a face-to-face with a representative from the airlines. He has decided to become a flight attendant, and it seems that if he is accepted, Brian will be heading to Minneapolis for 6 weeks of training. The pay is a meager $30 per day while in MN, and he says they told him they provide room and board, transportation and he thinks that is grand! I believe the traditional meaning of room and board included meals (and I don't think they are using the phrase 'traditionally'), but he tells me that the $30 allowance is for meals. Of course, he only gets that for 5 of the 7 days he is there, so I don't think he's banking on what to do over the weekend. He is a notorious spender - and has lost track of how to save, and I can only get about three sentences out in any conversation any more before I am certain my voice goes in his ears as the adult wah-wah-wah sound from the Charlie Brown cartoons. So, I am stymied and worried and stepping back.

Gosh, being a parent is hard. I can't even type this without crying...so excuse me a moment, please. Talk amongst yourselves, or look at a few photos.

Can you guess who Austin's guest co-anchor is? No fair looking at the shirt for clues!

Sarah smiles for the camera. Very nice! Thank you, Sarah.

Um...is it just me, or do the Avengers look a little different? I remember when they were on TV (yes...in black and white), but this is a different look altogether!

OK, I'm back. Thanks for your indulgence.

Oh! Sorry... the answer to the question is Phil, of course.

We'll call this next set "Efforting", whatdaya think?

Oh yes...we are 'efforting' all over the place. Efforting left...efforting right...efforting at the bridge,

under the bridge (never mind), behind the cameras...

in front of the cameras.

You name it,

we've efforted either on it, around it,

through it,

over it,

into and out of it.

We have efforted our butts off!

Well, most of us have.

Uh-oh, I have successfully managed to avoid typing my assignment for Krystle's class until now. Shame on me [wagging finger of shame in own face], so I guess I should get my efforting azz in high gear, since now it's 10 o'clock. Yikes!! Have a great holiday week, if you don't visit here frequently. Otherwise, check back tomorrow morning, when I hope to have posted the last of the stuff from our first graded shows. Oh yeah.... and the "test pattern". That should be finished here, real soon.

Stay safe and warm and happy. My love to all, and Happy Thanksgiving!