Another Phone Call to Brazil, Massage Therapy and 27 Years of Ryan Boothe

Well, besides not having a huge party for Ryan’s birthday, it went pretty well. I made him breakfast and then he got to open his presents. At his request, I made him a homemade lemon meringue pie for his “birthday cake.” It was time consuming but well worth it. We bought Bombay House take out (Indian food...YUM), played video games and watched a movie of course! We got a large translation for his birthday which balanced out our slow month.

We have both been steadily losing weight little by little. So far we have both lost 10 lbs. YAY! Hopefully by the time we move to Cali we will both be our target weights!

I am very excited for California, but I must say…I will miss the Utah mountains. I never understood how people from Utah could love their mountains so much. After living here for about 4 years on and off, I realize what a blessing they are. They are so majestic and beautiful…and right there in your face…every day! I never thought I would call Utah home, but it sure feels like home every time I come back. It is comforting every time I see the mountains after I have been away.

There is a Massage Therapist who lives in the same apartments that we do. We trade whenever her schedule permits it. I love getting more massages! My last full body massage before I met her was in Brazil at a hotel we were staying at. Besides their far less modest draping techniques (in Brazil), I was quite relaxed. It is cool that we both had different training because we are able to experience different modalities than what we were taught.

So far so good with the supplements I have been taking. I really, really like them! In the 2-3 weeks that I have been taking them I have checked most things off my list (the list of things I wanted to see improvement on). There is only one more major thing on the list (out of 5 major things), and that one is more complex than the others. Hopefully that too will be accomplished soon.

Oh, I got called to the Young Women’s presidency in my ward (LDS congregation). I am now the 2^nd counselor and over the 12 and 13 year old girls (Beehives). They are a fun bunch…lots and lots of energy!! It is strange to think that I am the grown up, when I was a Young Woman in my ward in NY about 5 years ago! I was a Beehive 10 and 11 years ago!!!!!! It is amazing how time flies!!! I never thought those years would end, and here I am married for the past 3 ½ years, out of school and moving to California…for the 2^nd or 3^rd time???!!!! HOLY COW! As a girl from NY, I never imagined I would be living in California.

Anyway, that is all for me this week.

Thank you very much to all of you who remembered me on my birthday with phone calls, cards and gracious gifts. It was an enjoyable day. Birthdays have seemed less important to me after I turned sixteen but it is still very nice to see who I am important to once a year.

Knowing Portuguese has certainly been a blessing in my life. This week I read on the internet about a Brazilian professor who published a poetry anthology called Babel de Poemas where he translated poems from sixty different languages into his native Portuguese. Other than making me want to buy the book, I became curious about the translator.

His name is Carlos do Amaral Freire. In 2001 Cambridge University gave Dr. Freire an award and included him as one of the 2,000 greatest intellectuals of the twentieth century. His scholarly studies have included learning 115 languages. He has conducted research and taught college courses in several universities in South America, the USA and Europe. After reading several interviews with him I did my internet stalker thing and found his home telephone number. He lives in Florianopolis which is one of the cities that Becca and I visited last year. This morning I gave him a call and he was gracious enough to talk to me about a number of subjects from language learning to translating to Ziad Fazah to language comparison and so on and so forth.

Life goes on much as it has for the past eight months or so. Work was slow but steady this week and I made some efforts to get new clients. My right knee and ankles have not been hurting as much so I went jogging twice instead of riding a bike or exercising on an elliptical machine. There is something satisfying about working out regularly. As Becca and I have been eating much healthier this past month we have found our bodies reacting adversely to unhealthy foods. I suppose that’s a good thing. It’s sure nice to feel my clothes fit more loosely.