Sunday Sniffles

Don't ask me how I caught a cold in the middle of the summer, but I've got one. Coughing, sneezing, sniffling... the works. Thankfully, I think it's on the way out. After a good, sound sleep last night, I think the worst of it is over. My friend A came down here this morning with a cold remedy called "Airborne." Made of all natural herbs, it's very popular (Oprah loves it) and works wonders on cold germs. I opened the package and found large Alka-Seltzer type tablets.... put them into some cold water and them them fizz up and dissolve, and it tastes like orange soda when it's ready to drink. I hate being sick... such a waste of a good day.

The balloon ride for my husband and C went just fine yesterday. They came back with beautiful photographs, and a thrilling experience. The owner of the balloon is on the committee for the annual Balloon Festival that's held at the Johnson Space Center at the end of August each year. He was saying that those balloons range in price from $40,000 to upwards of hundreds of thousands of dollars, depending on the size and design of the balloon and its basket. An expensive hobby, to say the least. No wonder they charge so much for a balloon ride. ($350 for two people, for 50 minutes up in the sky.)

We took C out to lunch before bringing her home yesterday. We had a gift certificate for The Olive Garden restaurant, sent to us by my aunt & uncle out in Arizona. We've had it since Christmas and just never got around to using it. So yesterday was the perfect day for lunch there, since Babbo Bruno's isn't open for lunch on Saturday and we had promised to get C home by 3:00 in the afternoon. Funny thing happened when we picked C up at her house the evening before--- as she was saying goodbye to her mom, she put out her hand as if to shake hands with her and said "See you next summer!" Even with that cute little smile on her face, that wasn't exactly the proper thing to say when you're saying goodnight to your mom the day before you're going thousands of feet up in the air for a balloon ride. I keep reminding C that although we do a lot of fun things with her when she's here, her parents are still her parents and they're the ones with all the major worries and responsibilities.

I need to polish my nails.... haven't had color on them all week and I'm getting tired of looking at "naked" nails. So that's what I'll do... polish my nails and get a book to read from my always-growing pile of books-to-read and relax and let this "Airborne" stuff do its thing.