Just a Quick Post About the US Open - For Now

I have so much that I'd like to write about my 2011 US Open experience only I feel too darn sick to even be on the computer now so I will just make this a brief post. This is a picture taken at one of the booths at the tennis center. My brother and I entered a contest to win a Citizen watch and the chance to meet Kim Clijsters. The weather was wonderful all week, thank goodness. I should just be greatful that it was and that we even got to be there but I can't help but be upset about the fact that we lost power in just our 2 blocks in my small town for 4 days because of Hurricane Irene so we couldn't recharge our camera batteries until Wednesday night. I took alot of pictures on Monday and by the time of my main guy Melzer's match on Tuesday afternoon the battery was getting weaker so I wasn't able to take that many of him. Oh how I wish that I had been more conservative with the picture taking at other matches. More about this topic next time. I was so close to going myself for a 6th day on Saturday. The guy at the ticket booth said that there weren't any tickets available when I asked on Thursday night but to come back on 8:30 that morning. If I hadn't gotten this awful cold I definitely would've been there. I got sick after this event last year too which sucks but it was worth all the suffering that I'm going through now.

I did read some of my emails and comments on my posts and would like to thank Chelly, Pam, Darrin and all my other blog friends for their kind words and I certainly will respond to you all as soon as I'm feeling better. I'm looking forward to reading your posts too. I've missed everyone here. Hope that you all have been well these days.

Hurricane Irene Might Spoil Our US Open Plans

Here are some photos of the grounds of the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Queens, N.Y. from last year when the weather was very hot but no rain except for a little showers for about 25 minutes or so one day out of the 6 that we were there. Well, it looks like things might not go so smoothly for us this year because of the Hurricane that is due to hit this area Saturday into Sunday. Sure, the rain will end by Sunday night, but there's always the worries of floods, power outages, delays or cancellations of trains and other factors that could spoil things for Monday especially. It might be okay by Tuesday but I'm hearing some doom and gloom reports on the news. We have to take the train and subway to get out there, no way could I do any city driving. Very scary and stressful, esp in those areas that we'd have to take to get there. I'm just praying that things work out alright but I'm not very hopeful.

I feel bad that I have not responded to comments on my posts lately. I've had very limited computer time and I've also been catching up on tasks, projects and other chores. I promise that I will do so and also read and comment on posts of my friends here in the blog world as soon as I can. Next week is going to be a very busy one with us being away most of the day for the tennis event so it won't be for another 10 days. I'll miss being in touch with you all and I'll send out my thanks for everyone who has been reading my posts.

Disney World 1976 - Part 3

I was looking through my photo albums the other day and it just hit me that it has been 35 years since my family and I went to Disney World. I just had to scan some more of these photos. I had done a couple of posts about our trip there before but never really labeled them 1 and 2. These bring back some great vacation memories for me.

The top set of photos is the Haunted Mansion and Adventureland. The 2nd set includes Mark, Mom and I by the castle and also outside the Disney Story. The 3rd set has Mark and I by the train ride and riverboat and also includes the ride that we never went on that time or during our 1983 trip - I think it's called Space Mountain. The bottom 4 photos are of It's A Small World.

Music Boxes - Lara's Theme

My parent's favourite movie is Doctor Zhivago. Their wedding song was the theme from this which is called Somewhere My Love aka Lara's Theme. They gave me the name from that character in this film. My grandma got the music box in the bottom photo on her trip to Germany for mom before I was even born. The piano one was given to me by my parents when I was very young. I've had it for as long as I can remember. It also is a jewelry box and has a little ballerina inside that twirls around when the music is playing but that broke a long time ago.

I actually used to not like my name. I'd get annoyed when people would say it wrong calling me Laura instead of Lara but I was usually too afraid to correct them but when I was in my mid 20's I did start correcting people who did this. Well, I did see my grade school principal about 12 years ago and she called me Laura only I was still too scared to tell Sister Donna that my name is Lara. That does seem rather ridiculous. I'm not sure why some people have trouble with my name - it's like Sara or Tara with an L.

Muppets Stuff 2

The towel was originally mom's but she gave it to me by the end of the 1980s. It was hardly ever used so it looks like new. I got the Miss Piggy and Kermit dolls as a Christmas gift in 1981. I have a picture of me holding them on a post about that year's holiday. I have such great memories of watching The Muppet Show with my brother. Mom enjoyed it too!

Movie Memories of the 1970s

Our family friend Al who was like an uncle to us had a projector, screen and the movie reels for these 3 films that he showed to us at our house on seperate occasions in the 1970s. Willie Wonka and Bedknobs and Broomsticks were shown in our basement. My brother and I had our friends over to watch them with us. One was for my birthday - Wonka, I think. Young Frankenstein was shown in our yard on a beautiful summer's night. He worked in the theater as did my Aunt Dorothy so we were lucky and got to see alot of free movies up until about 1983. Mom said that we went to most of the Disney films although I only really remember The Rescuers.

My Lunchboxes

I got these 2 photos from ebay and another site since I no longer have the actual lunchboxes. I loved them both and do enjoy seeing collections of lunchboxes, many of them are so cool. The Tupperware one came with containers inside for a sandwich, snack and juice. We mostly brown bagged our lunches once we were in 7th grade. I don't even remember ever getting anything except maybe a drink from our high school cafeteria occasionally. In grade school Fridays were hot lunch days which my brother and I would sometimes get. The choices were limited - hot dogs and Ellios pizza. There was also milk, chips and those Carvel ice cream sandwiches - Flying Saucers?