Dance shoe saga

E needs a pair of black ballet shoes for the musical she is in. So after contacting the niece who's been in dance for many years to ask about borrowing a pair, niece becomes very sick with a kidney stone and is in no shape to go digging through boxes. A week later, my sister-in-law calls to confirm they had looked, but all she has are beige or white shoes, no black ones at all. So unable to buy such things locally, I go online, find a discount-y type of dance supply company and order a pair, and pop for the extravagence of expediated shipping (which more than doubles the cost of the shoes themselves) to insure the shoes are here in time for her first dress rehearsal--tonight.

I've been checking online every day and the order status never changed from "Order received." My credit card got charged though. Still no shoes yesterday, so I called this outfit in Las Vegas. They confirmed they got the order, but they haven't shipped the shoes. Why? No one knows. The first person I talked to blamed UPS. I got an email today from another person apologizing for the delay and said there must have been a "computer glitch that dropped the order." Strange that it hung on to the order long enough to ding my Discovercard, though. Anyway, the good news is that the dumb shoes are somewhere between Des Moines and here after traveling the US throughout the night (LV to Phoenix to Louisville, KY to Des Moines). Fortunately, E hasn't inquired about the shoes and I'm hopeful they will arrive today before her evening rehearsal.

We are winding things up for the school year. My hand bell choir is done after playing for both services on Sunday. We passed the hat so that the bells could be repaired over the summer and raised just over $1800. We needed about $2500 but we have some discretionary funds within the memorial monies so I think we can get the major two octaves fixed.

E's youth group had their last meeting on Wednesday night. They had a picnic supper at the county park. E said it was awful. They left late and returned 45 minutes late (thank you for calling me and letting me know, E!), the fire was too hot and big to roast hot dogs, the bugs were bad, two or three kids got hurt, etc. She was very happy to finally get home and hit the shower.

The last track meet was yesterday. I missed E's first race but I saw her run in the 4x200 relay race. She had the second leg and ran by the stands so I got to cheer for her. She was in 5th place, but passed a girl just as she ran by me. A proud moment. Her handoff wasn't smooth though and her team kept lagging further and further behind and came in 5th out of 5 teams. We left the track meet earlier than I expected since she was done, stopped at McDonald's for supper (Asian chicken salad is quite good!) and got home before 8:00 p.m. An early night for us!

In work news, the VP my boss reports to is leaving for another job, a chancellorship in Minnesota so a step-up for her in terms of rank and a much larger institution to boot. We knew she was looking-the local paper had a story about the four top candidates. I guess the news about her leaving was on the radio before the college released the news. Darn media, anyway! So we face a year without leadership and then another several months of a new dean learning the ropes. Seems like we are without a dean about as much as we have one on board. Recruiting for these top positions has been very difficult lately.

Weekly weigh-in went well. I was down just a little less than a pound so total loss is now 22 pounds. Very good considering how much I ate last weekend. No big soirees planned for this weekend, although K was telling me how wonderful fruit pizza is and could I make it? Yum. I haven't made it for years, but I sure *can* make it.