I Must be a Total Loser

As many of you know, Michelle is expecting our fourth child sometime in October. (Can it really be that soon? This pregnancy has flown by; for me, maybe not Michelle) In any case, we try to spend as much time as we can during the summers in Pinetop at the Hazar cabin. It has become one of our favorite family traditions to spend weekends up where the temperatures are about 30 degrees cooler than here in Scottsdale. (Current temps: Scottsdale - 108 degrees, Pinetop - 76 degrees. Where would you rather be?) The kids love to spend time up in the mountains with their grandparents and their cousins.

Michelle decided early on in this pregnancy that she would be taking an entire week off from teaching classes sometime in July and taking the kids to Pinetop to get out of the heat. Well, I have been dreading this week for some time now and it is finally here. I drove Michelle and the kids up to Pinetop on Friday afternoon. We had a barbecue on Friday night, got up early on Saturday and went on a nature walk with the kids (could be an entire post in and of itself), went to a movie on Saturday afternoon with the family and then an early dinner and then Jim and I drove home Saturday afternoon so that I could attend to my church assignments today and work all week.

It has now been a little less than 24 hours since I left and I am BORED OUT OF MY MIND! I thought that I would be able to get a lot accomplished around the house such as cleaning and laundry and dishes and other items that are difficult to do with kids in the house. It turns out that Michelle decided to leave me ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do. The dishes are done, there isn't a stitch of dirty clothing in this house, the beds are all made, the carpets vacuumed, the windows are cleaned, the kitchen is spotless and the only thing I can think to do is clean the tile floors, which I can't do until tomorrow.

I admit, I like to watch TV - there are certain shows that I enjoy tremendously. It turns out that watching TV by yourself is no fun at all; in fact, it's downright painful. Last night, I tried watching an episode of Wipeout by myself and the old adage is definitely true: if a man lying in bed laughs really loud at a stupid TV show and nobody is there to hear him, he really DOESN'T make a sound. Interesting.

I enjoy playing a video game now and again - it turns out that video games aren't near as fun unless you can play with your kids and let them beat you. (More accurately, they actually beat you and then you pretend that you let them win)

The wife of one of my friends in the ward told me today that her husband can't wait until she goes out of town because then he gets to go out with his friends and hang out and watch movies and do guy stuff. After that conversation with her, I have come to the following very sad conclusion: I don't have any friends. I don't have guys that I can just go "hang out with". I must be a total loser. I have friends that Michelle and I go hang out with and have fun with, but it's always as a couple. This makes me wonder if these people actually like me at all or if they are just putting up with me so they can hang out with Michelle.

So, it's Sunday afternoon. Luckily, I have plans for the afternoon. I am heading to Mesa to eat some dinner with my Mom, who graciously accepted to have me over (after I invited myself). Come to think of it, she didn't sound real excited when she found out that Michelle and the grandkids weren't coming. After that, I have a couple of Church meetings to attend. After that, I have no idea what I will do. And I deleted all my Wai Lana Yoga from my DVR.

Our former Bishop in the ward just called and invited me to help with a move in the morning at 7AM - yeah!! Something to do!

Five days and counting . . . .