Fact or Fiction?

Those of you who are Facebook users are quite aware there are hundreds of "games" that can suck you in and waste your time -- even more than Facebook already does!

Speaking for myself, that is.

There's everything from running a farm or bakery to playing virtual Candy slot machines. I have not tried any of them and do not plan to -- though I am highly tempted by Family Feud and Words with Friends. I may break down yet.

There are other interesting amusements to play along with, though.

Tonight a friend had listed 6 random facts about himself and instructed people to LIKE his post and he would assign them a number of facts to share, too. I decided to give it a try. He gave me 7 -- so here is what came to mind first...

Seven facts about me:

• 1. I live with the 2 greatest guys in the world.
• 2. I am spiritual but not necessarily religious.
• 3. I love to bake!
• 4. I hate to cook because I don't know how!
• 5. I have no athletic ability - so I write.
• 6. I eat ice cream almost 365 days a year.
• 7. I have been kissed by The Fonz AND Ponch

I'm pretty sure longtime readers of this inconsequential blog know all of that. But if you'd like to play along, let me know and I'll send you a number so you can share next!

It doesn't have to be real serious or real interesting, just real honest. I have plenty of facts in my life that many would think are "fiction," but we'll save that for another day.

Unless YOU want to go first...

The Other F Word

Besides Friends, Food and Fun, I forgot the most important "F word" of the weekend: Fotos! Hey, I'm a writer. I can make up spellings of words to suit my needs! Enjoy some of our scrapbook...

Carter suddenly is too cool to smile. But then, he and Nate were trying to impress some "older women." I think they were 13!

Jim has been a Celtics fan forever. Carter jumped on the bandwagon last year. And I just sort of dressed the part (but cheered, too). Don't we look like a "lucky" family?

The Celtics' Paul Pierce shoots a free throw. Obviously, I didn't get too many pictures to turn out. We were pretty high up. In fact, a little too high for my vertigo-challenged liking. But I still had fun!

Some of our entertainment including this Bucks Slam Dunk Team. Check out this video. Pretty cool!

"Aaaaaayyyyy!" Who's cooler than the Fonz? Not us. But we tried. The bronze statue of Henry Winkler is pretty much life size. I recall from meeting him in person that he's not that tall. I could look him in eye when he kissed my cheek...

Speaking of that .... For old time's sake, here I am (third from left) when I met the real Fonz a few years ago. See, he's not that much taller than me. Even without the leather jacket, he still looks pretty "cool"!

I know what you're thinking. Who's got it better than me?! Not many. Not many.

Gimme a Break!

Our weekend getaway was just what the doctor ordered... if we'd actually seen a doctor, that is, for our "overworked-underpaid" syndrome! Seriously, we really needed it and it was great. If I had to give it a grade, I wouldn't hesitate to give it an F. (F for Friends, Fun, Food...)

Friends: The rented minivan was just the ticket. It seated us all with plenty of room. Us ladies up front (thanks for doing all the driving, Christine!), the gentlemen (Mike and Jim) in the middle and the boys in back. We were quite pleased the boys got along all weekend and whining was kept to a minimum! And us grown-ups got along enough to have adjoining hotel rooms -- splitting beer, soda and treats evenly...

Fun: Our fun included splashing around in the little water park at the hotel. We adults relaxed in the hot tub while Nate and Carter played hoops in the water and raced down the slide a time or two. From our rooms we witnessed an incident last night where the pool was evacuated twice. It was reminiscent of the chocolate bar pool scene in Caddyshack, but come to find out the culprit was more regurgitative in nature. That didn't stop the boys from wanting to jump back in!

Our main focus of fun for the weekend was the Celtics-Bucks game today. We got to the Bradley Center early enough we could sneak down courtside and watch some warm-ups. Neat to see some of the players up close! Game was pretty exciting. Tied at halftime but the Bucks took a lead and the Celtics never recaptured it. Saw a surprising number of Celtics fans but the luck of the Irish was not our side. Maybe next time.

After the game, since it was warm and sunny (like 50s), we meandered along the river walk downtown. Found the new statue of the "Fonz," dedicated to actor Henry Winkler and the Happy Days show based in Milwaukee. That was cool. How many people can say they've met both the real and bronze Fonz? Not many!

Food: Of course we ate too much. But that was expected. Had dinner Saturday at a neat place called Beer Bellies. We actually were so full that we never did dive into our snack supply. I had gotten a piece of carrot cake to go (yes, they'll do that for you) and I had that for breakfast this morning with a Diet Dew. The breakfast of champions! Had a few treats at the game and stopped for dinner on the way home tonight at Sportsmen's in Waupaca. More good food. I don't think I'll really need to eat tomorrow!

It feels like we were gone forever but, as usual, stress breaks enjoyed with friends tend to be too short -- and too long in between. I'm looking forward to the next break time!

25 Random Things...

There's a "chain list" going around on Facebook (social network Web site) now where members write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits or goals about you. It's not hard to think of 25 things. It's hard to stop at 25. I still have so much more randomness to share!

Anyway, here is the list I shared. I might have to do one called "Another 25 random things..." at some point.

1. I am afraid of heights, rodents and large insects. I get nervous around big dogs, too.

2. I have a twin sister who has always been half a head taller than me.

3. I used to hate coffee but then some genius invented the flavored stuff. I still need to add milk or cream, though.

4. I could probably live without caffeine but am not willing to try -- yet.

5. I never knew how much a person could love until I became a mom. My baby is 10 and is the center of my universe.

6. If I could live on three foods, they would be ice cream, popcorn and just about anything mint.

7. I have probably been on a diet of some kind (or needed to be on one) since I was 16.

8. I am a huge fan of the Minnesota Twins and have seen them play in the Dome dozens of times. I'm looking forward to the outdoors experience in a year.

9. I was a camp counselor and lifeguard for two of the best summer ever at Luther Point Bible Camp.

10. I love writing. My first "published work" was an essay I entered in the county fair in 4th grade. They gave me a blue ribbon after I convinced them it was my original work -- not copied. I don't remember much about it except it was called "Life." Pretty deep for a 9-year-old. I now blog daily and try to keep it "On the Light Side."

11. I love the sun.

12. Every year I spend a "Wild Women's Weekend" with my 6 sisters somewhere in Wisconsin or Minnesota (and this past year at my sister's in Texas). It's a great time to reconnect and relax.

13. I have one brother. Everyone feels sorry for him, growing up with 7 sisters. I think he turned out alright. In fact, better than alright. I admire his faith, determination and creativity.

14. I never considered myself a potty mouth ... until I tried golf.

15. I love the '80s.

16. I used to have an evil cat named Rastro who soured me on the whole cat thing. Now we have a princess feline named Sylvester and she has changed my mind.

17. As a journalist, I have met a handful of celebrities from Al Gore to Thomas Kinkaide (lighthouse painter). My favorites were Erik Estrada and Henry Winkler because they give good hugs.

18. I like lighthouses. My teenage stepsons get a kick out of counting how many we have in the house. I don't consider myself obsessed.

19. I have probably tried every craft out there from cross-stitch to ceramics. I'm pretty much a scrapbooker these days with occasional breaks for beading.

20. Growing up in the 1970s, I became a fan of the Purple People Eaters. Although, the Vikings have broken my heart many times since, I just can't jump off that bandwagon.

21. I am not an athlete by any means but I somehow ran 2 5K races in the last few years. I love to play volleyball, too, when anyone's game.

22. I was raised Lutheran, went away from church for awhile in my wild 20s but now have a stronger faith than ever. I am a spiritual being, not just a church-goer.

23. As much as I love to talk, I don't pick up the phone unless I have to. I think I used up all my minutes in the '90s.

24. I live by the motto: "One day at a time." Sometimes, that's one hour at a time...

25. My best friend in the whole wide world is my husband Jim.

Picture Perfect?

Now that I've sent out all my Christmas cards, I can finally write about our not-so-perfect photo shoot.

I had warned the big boys that when they came over for Thanksgiving that I'd be taking a picture of the three of them for the Christmas card. So I set them up in front of the tree and coaxed a smile out of them. It wasn't until I checked the photo on the little screen (what did we do before digital cameras?) that I noticed Clay's shirt. (Take a good look at the photo above.)

"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms." What?

Thankfully he had another t-shirt underneath that one. Just guessing a shirtless photo wouldn't go over too well with a segment of our Christmas card population. So we did a retake and I get another good smile out of them and the photo shoot is over. Pretty painless.

For my card, I like to layout and design the letter to include more than one photo. I kind of didn't ask permission to include the priceless picture of Ponch and me. But I did give hubby a proof and, after the eye rolling, got the OK to keep it in there.

The big boys said, "Wow, Robyn, you sure meet some cool celebrities. First Henry Winkler and now Erik Estrada." Yep, I could hear the sarcasm dripping off that one. So what if those two are in the 60+ club? That just means I'll love Jim even more in 15 years!

I promised them all that if they meet anyone famous next year I'd include their picture, too. But I'll settle for our brown-eyed dimpled boys in plain white tees.

Dancing with the Stars

They mentioned on the radio this morning that it's Patrick Swayze's birthday. Funny, he just happened to be on my mind.

I caught part of Dirty Dancing on TV yesterday. For those of us chicks who like the movie, we can pretty much count on finding it somewhere on cable at least once a month. I rarely see it from beginning to end, but if I can just sit down and watch it for 15 minutes, I can get my fix.

So they said that Patrick is 56 today. 56! Now, before you go thinking I have this thing for older men (i.e. Erik Estrada, Henry Winkler, etc), it just happens that Mr. Swayze was my first brush with fame. Well almost.

In 1995, I moved to Wisconsin Rapids to work at the daily newspaper. One day in December, someone called the office and said, "Did you hear Patrick Swayze was in town?!" The managing editor asked if I wanted to cover the story. Are you kidding me? I eeked out a hyperventilated "Yes!"

As it happened, by the time the tip had been called in, the hip-swiveling star was already on his plane back to California. So it was one of those after-the-fact stories the readers of a small-town paper like to read about -- even if we clearly missed the boat. (It was my first story to make the national wire, though, so I had that small victory to hang my dancing shoes on!)

I did uncover that the reason he was in town was to see his orthopaedic surgeon, who'd recently moved to the area from California as well. I had a good interview with the doctor, who told about me about Patrick's bad knees -- due to dancing on Broadway, etc, not just on the Big Screen. The good doctor felt badly that I missed the story but promised that the next time Patrick was in town, he's call me and I'd get the interview.

For months I waited for that call. I mean, shouldn't you try to see your knee surgeon on a regular basis? As my luck (or very bad luck) would have it, during that same time frame, HIPPA regulations went into effect. Those are the federal privacy rules that say our doctors can't tell anyone who they are treating and why -- and they certainly can't tell a star-struck reporter that her heart throb is in town.

Dang! I imagine by now he's got his own local doctors so I can't expect to see him sashaying down the streets of Rapids anytime soon (make that, never!). But you never know. Stranger things have happened to me and my quest to meet the stars -- let alone dance with them or snuggle with them.

Happy birthday, Johnny Castle!