#338 Yesterday

All my troubles seemed so close to me. Here is a recap of my yesterday:

The morning started out great. I got up time and had a really good weight workout ending with some back exercises and stretching.

My mattress was scheduled to arrive yesterday. They called Tuesday to give me a three-hour delivery window – 10:15 a.m. to 1:15 p.m. They were to call 30 minutes prior to arriving at my house. I told them previously to call my cell number (I can get home in 20 minutes). I was proactive and called again Tuesday night to confirm they would call my cell number. Did they call my cell number? Of course not.

Trusting they would do as I twice asked them to do, I went to a meeting from 10 to 10:30 a.m. When I got back to my desk, I saw my parent’s home number on my phone screen, showing they’d called. Apparently the driver called my home number and left a message at 10:07 a.m., saying they would arrive in 15 minutes (not 30). Thankfully, my dad got there at 10 a.m. Unfortunately, he forgot about my security alarm and it went off. 

I did drive home to see how they set the bed up and spent my lunch hour re-making my bed, cleaning the floor, moving my nightstand back, etc. I lay down for about two seconds on the new mattress and then went back to work.

Back at work, I sent the wrong password to someone two times before I got the right one. Ack!

I stopped at my parents after work to have dinner. After dinner I put some things in my trunk before we headed to a Lenten service, and noticed that my driver’s seat was fully reclined. As in Van Halen, “ease the seat back” reclined. I have electric seats and while the forward/backward button worked, the up/down button did nothing. Are you serious?! My dad drove to church so I silently prayed all would be miraculously ok when I returned. 

After we got back to my parent’s house I tried the seat again. Voila! It worked! I did the same exact thing as earlier in the night so I have no idea what happened. My car is a little on the old side and maybe things are starting to wear out. Regardless, I was so thankful all was ok and I didn’t have to spend time/money at a car repair shop today. Thank you Jesus!

Got home at 9 p.m., just in time to watch Modern Family. I sure needed some laughs!

Oh yeah, I had a great night’s sleep on my new mattress!

#337 Dating Down

I recently saw an interesting segment on CBS Sunday Morning that discussed the topic of tall women and their limited dating pool, with most of them having to date down (aka, date shorter men). Mo Rocca (LOVE him) talked to several tall women (6’ to 6’3”) to get their thoughts on this phenomenon. (Ok, why is it when people talk to “tall” women, they are always 6’1” or 6’2”. They never talk to the seriously tall). Most admitted that they prefer dating men their height or taller. However, he did talk to one couple where the woman is 6’1” and her husband is 5’7” and they are very happy together. I did love his quote…something like, “I never thought I would end up with a woman who could physically pick me up.”

In high school I refused to date down. I actually had a couple guys ask me out who were under 6’. Nada. No way. No how.

When I got to college I thought I would be in guy heaven. Surely there would be at least one guy out of the approximately 20,000 students who would be of a suitable height. As luck would have it, there was one. Oh there were plenty others who were tall enough, and even some on the basketball team who were way tall enough. I went on a few dates but no one really caught my attention. Except for the one who happened to be 6’4”. (See Post #329 to see how that turned out.)

Post-college I’ve dated sporadically and I would estimate that the height of the guys has ranged from 5’9” to 6’10”. I’ve met a few guys (and dated a couple) throughout my life who were a lot shorter than me that I was really interested in (most recently, “Carl”. I’ll save that for another post). Ironically, I’ve found that shorter guys are more likely to be interested in me than guys closer to my height. I was on a first (and last) date with a 6’4” guy who said he always wished he was taller. He then commented that I probably wished I was shorter. I said no. (Crickets)

The 6’10” guy (referenced above) told me that if I was taller than him he wouldn’t want to date me. I can agree with that to a point. 6’11” is tall even by my standards, but I know a couple attractive women in that height range.

I have had my height “rules” - my Jim Harbaugh Rule (Post #2) and my Costaki Rule (Post #249). (Alas, both of them are taken.) In all seriousness though, at the end of the day, it’s not only about height. It’s about a connection and how that person makes me feel. I want them to be in the height ballpark, but I would choose 6’4” and a great connection over a 6’10” dud. (For the record, the 6’10” guy was not a dud. We just wanted different things, i.e., marriage and kids).

Why the rules? Why don’t I like to date shorter men? The bottom line is that I just feel more feminine when I’m around a tall man. I could care less what others think of how I look with a shorter man. I actually think it looks kinda cool when I see celebrity couples where the woman is a little taller. But if the difference is too great, I start to feel like a dude. One woman Mo talked to said she feels like their mother if she’s significantly taller.

Which brings up one of my biggest pet peeves - seeing a really tall man with a really short woman. Really?! Save some for the rest of us!! If they’re holding hands it looks like he’s taking her for a walk. But I digress…

So what’s a tall girl to do? Especially when approximately four percent of the male U.S. population is 6’2” or taller. (Holy $#!% that is a scary statistic.) I will continue to date people I’m attracted to who are close to my height.

But where are all the tall guys? I think Mo needs to do another segment on that topic.

#336 Where Are We Going?

I heard an interesting story on the radio last night while driving home. I was scanning stations and ended up on 90.5 (K-LOVE), a Christian station. The DJ told a story he heard from a friend. His friend was running errands one day with his small child and they made several stops. At each stop they took the child out of the car seat, then put them back in to go to the next place. Eventually I think they were going to a sporting event.  In the car seat, out of the car seat, etc. The child didn’t complain and just went along for the ride.

Finally the child asked, “Where are we going?” The parent told them they were going to a basketball game. “Ok.” And that was it. They trusted their parent to take care of them and get them to where they were supposed to go.

The DJ then spoke about how we humans sometimes are unhappy with where we are in life. We’d like a better job, a bigger house, a nicer car. We often question God as to why things happen the way they do. I know I have my own questions for God now and then. Why didn’t that relationship work? I love my job, but is there something else I could be doing?

This story is a good reminder to have the faith of a child and trust God that we are where we are supposed to be.  There may be some bumps in the road and we may have to get in and out of the car seat numerous times. But God is with us all the way and we have to trust in His plan for us.

#335 The Princess and the Pea

The Princess and the Pea is a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale about a young woman who sleeps on 20 mattresses and 20 feather beds, yet feels a pea that is placed underneath them all. Her physical sensitivity is an indication of her royal identity, which the prince, who is looking for a real princess to marry, is quite happy about.

Tuesday night I purchased a new mattress. I am currently sleeping on a Stearns & Foster innerspring mattress, which is nice enough, but after six years it is sagging (that actually happened after a year) and is causing me some discomfort. I wake up several times during the night to turn over and in the morning have a sore back and sore hips (yes, I know I’m in my 40s, but that shouldn’t happen). I am tired of the pea! I can only rotate the Stearns & Foster mattress, which seems kind of silly since I take up the entire length of the mattress and my butt hits it in the same place no matter which way I lay on it.

My mattress before that was from Holder, a local manufacturer. I liked this one because I could flip and rotate it, thus helping a bit with the sag. I was also able to get extra length (84” long vs. the standard 80”). I sleep on my side, but it was nice to be able to stretch out to my full length and not have my feet hang off the end of the bed.

So after seven years on the Holder mattress and six years on the Stearns & Foster, I am giving up on innersprings and going for memory foam.

My brother and sister-in-law bought a ComforPedic mattress about three years ago. Paul researches everything very well and I like to copy him, so I looked primarily at that brand and after a couple visits to the Ashley Furniture store in Castleton, I bit the bullet and bought one. It should arrive in mid March. I cannot wait!

Debbie, the salesperson at Ashley, was very helpful and mentioned that very thin women have a harder time finding a comfortable mattress. She recommended that I look for a plush mattress instead of a firm one. I have a history of minor back pain and always associated a firm mattress with more support. Debbie has worked in the mattress industry for over 18 years and I have not, so I took her advice and went with the plush mattress. It has the same support as the firm mattress but has more layers of cushiony foam to ease my bones.

A mattress is a very personal purchase, and an expensive one, so you need to do your homework before purchasing. I agreed with the information Paul found on the ComforPedic brand, but in the end I chose the type of bed that was best for my body type.

Hopefully the pea will be gone. Now if I could only find my prince charming.

#334 The Gong Show

The Gong Show was a television show that aired beginning in the late 70s. It was basically “America’s Got Talent”, but with a gong. There was a panel of celebrity judges each week and if they didn’t like a performer’s “talent” they would hit a gong to make them leave the stage.

This morning I had my own gong show. There is a woman at my gym that I frequently see and she also teaches yoga. This morning she asked me to participate in a “gong thing”. I had no idea what that meant, but she said it would only last five minutes, so why not? After I finished my workout and stretching, I met her and a few others in the yoga room. We lay down on a mat with our arms stretched out like a cross. She told us to breathe deeply and then proceeded to hit a large gong that was the size of a bicycle wheel.

At first it wasn’t bad. Then it got really loud. So loud that I was tempted to put a finger in my ear that was closest to the gong. I didn’t want to offend her, so I refrained. Eventually, the gonging got softer and we were done. Interesting.

After my shower the woman happened to be in the same locker room area and of course, she asked me what I thought. I told the truth: It was ok, but it was a bit loud for me. So then I asked her where one buys a gong. She knows another yoga instructor who knows a gong dealer. Be clear on your pronunciation of that!

She also mentioned teaching a gong class at another facility that lasts 20 minutes. Let’s just say that if I was a celebrity judge during a 20-minute gong show, I would definitely gong the gong.

#333 New Attitude. Period.

I’ve never bought into the idea of blaming a bad attitude on my period. I just never saw the connection. Lately I have. I was playing tennis with my regular group this week and for some reason I was being a brat. I know I can never be perfect in anything, but I felt like I should have been hitting shots I wasn’t and it was making me mad. I started kicking balls to the side of the court, stomping my feet, etc. Nothing directed toward anyone else, just being mad at myself. This went on for maybe 10 minutes (sporadically) until I kicked yet another ball and it almost hit our instructor. Not cool. I apologized and made an effort to turn my attitude around. I did much better for the rest of the night.


On my drive home I thought about the correlation between my period being about to start and my bad attitude. Now, I am usually a very easy-going person and have “acted out” at tennis maybe one other time. This is not the norm for me, so there might be something to this period thing! I can’t think of any other explanation and I’ve noticed mood changes the past several months during these times.

In the future I plan to be more aware of my visits from Aunt Helen (as my college roommate Tammi called that time of the month) and take some pills so maybe I won’t be such a pill.