Charlie Brown was at my Reunion Committee Meeting

No, this little sweetheart isn't the "Charlie Brown" I am referring to in the title of this post. Although his name IS Charlie, I had to begin this missive with his sweet shiny face - and what a smile! Wow. His mommy sent Charlie's little mug shot to me this morning with the question from "Charlie" about whether "Mimi" was coming over today (Monday is one of the days I visit my almost-8-week-old grandson). And of course his Mommy answered, "No, Mimi is in Colorado." Which of course I am, and take a look below at what I was seeing outside my front door yesterday. HOO-BOY - what a storm!

So we survived the snowin' and the blowin' and the picture below shows what we are looking at today. Sunshine and blue skies all the way. And even though the view is great, that isn't really what this post is all about.

So , on with the topic at hand. My Reunion Committee Meeting. In Pueblo. On Friday morning.

Let me just say that upon arriving in my hometown of Pueblo, Colorado I promptly caught what I am now referring to as the "Mother of all Colds." This is like "Storm of the Century" bad. It was so bad I was seeing signs of H1N1 (ok, maybe I was getting a bit paranoid) - but my sinus cavities felt like they were alternately being crushed to pieces and blazing like neon lights. My eyes were red, swollen and oozey. My chest hurt. Even my hair hurt. And try all this at 8500 feet in altitude where the oxygen is pretty much missing.

Put a sealevel girl into that thin air with one Mama of a Bad Cold and it ain't pretty!

But I had obligations. Our 45th high school class reunion was set for September. Lots of things remained undone. First on the list was meet with the webmaster for our school's website at noon at the university. I was taking over the website (gulp---what was I thinking) and Jeff Miller, web guru, was guidinge me through the intricacies of webmanship. Is that a word?

3:00 (following lunch with girlfriends and fellow committee members Nancy and Crete) we met with the catering manager at the Pueblo Country Club where our Saturday dinner event will be held. All went well.

Next morning, 9:00am. The "Big" committee meeting - there are 8 of us. Two were missing due to stomach flu and out-of-town business. This is the meeting Nancy, Crete and I determined needed to bear fruit. Final decisions regarding budget and itenerary MUST be set. The "boys" on our committee are good guys, but not what you'd call great communicators. And one of them had voiced some opposition to what he referred to as us girls being a "Frik" and "Frak" organization bound to do things "our" way without letting the guys have a voice.

Now the guys (most of them) could have cared less from what I'd witnessed in previous experience. Didn't bother to read their e-mails. Sometimes came to the meetings, sometimes not. For example, the "twins" (David and Danny) are hard workers living outside of town doing their ranching, farming things. They are tough sons-of-guns. Nice guys, but I couldn't see them getting all on their high horses about whether we were going to serve peanuts in pink frilly cups., Not that we were, but you get my drift...

David entered the room in the back of the modest diner where we were meeting. I hadn't seen David since we were 18 so I figured on some changes. He gave me a good hug and said, "I don't know who you are." Huh? Well, who did he think I was? I reminded him that I was Gale (Hoover) Hammond and he said, "You had dark hair." Well, so did you, Kemosabe, I thought to myself noting his grey locks beneath some sort of baseball cap.

I was seated next to his non-identical twin brother, Danny, who was famous for picking up everybody's breakfast chit at the diner. I'd only ordered toast ($.81) so I didn't feel that I was giving up a lot of my feminine independence if he wanted to buy my toast. Which I couldn't eat anyway, what with the sore throat and all.

Nancy, a former highschool teacher with the chops to prove it, led the discussions. Drowning in my own bodily fluids, this is how the meeting went to my stopped up ears and sluggish brain...you know, sorta how Charlie Brown would've heard it:

Nancy: "blah, blah, blah, honk, honk, honk, blah..."

Crete (semi-interrupting): Do we have the budget on the dinner yet?

Nancy: "That comes later in the meeting," referring to her agenda, which none of us student failures had thought to copy for our own use.

Nancy: "Now, is everyone ok with the change of venue for Friday night? We're no longer having the mixer at Danny's."
Danny: "I don't give a s**t."

(ok, I guess that was settled.)

Nancy: "blah, blah, honk, blah, blah..."

Crete: Do we have the budget on the dinner yet?
Nancy: "That comes later in the meeting. Blah...."

Gale: (swimming up from murky underwater swells of sick-dom) to interject: "Is everybody ok with the reservation form I e-mailed to all of you?"

David: "Yeah. It's beautiful."
Nancy: "David, you didn't see the form; your e-mail isn't working."

David: "Yeah, whatever, it's still beautiful."
Danny: "I don't give a s**t."

Les: Who up to this point hasn't made a lot of fuss, shrugs and rolls his eyes a bit and continues eating his way through a cinnamon roll sporting a small candle - a tribute to his birthday last weekend, although Crete had eaten just the tiniest noodge off of it although she explained she'd used a fork, thereby leaving the roll fairly germ-free for Les's consumption.

Crete: "Do we have the dinner budget yet?"
Nancy: "Shut up, Crete."

Naw, I was just kidding. All in all it was a great meeting, Nancy was a rock star and we did good stuff, settled on some other stuff and to the best of my knowledge, Danny still doesn't give a s**t!