West Des Moines Police Reserve Unit 50th Anniversary

Long, long ago, in a galaxy far, far away I used to be a member of the WDMPD Reserve Unit - and that same Unit celebrated it's 50th anniversary this month.  Today at the Nature Lodge at Raccoon River Park in WDM there was an Open House from 12-4.  I popped in after church and it was fun seeing some of the guys I was in the Unit with - along with some of the fulltime officers that were with the department.

I do take a little pride in saying I am the first sworn female officer in the City of WDM to carry a weapon.  I joined the Reserve Unit December 1987 and left sometime during 1994 attaining the rank of Sergeant.  Mike always used to love saying he "outranked" me because he was a Lieutenant on the Urbandale Reserve Unit :)

Some interesting tidbits of my time on the Unit:

• Starting with me, there have been a total of four female reserve officers with the fourth currently on the Unit
• I had to draw my weapon twice while riding with a fulltime officer
• While a reserve officer, we also drove the ambulance
• At one time I had my EMT-A level qualification, didn't want to go for the EMT-I level because you could start I.V. lines at that level and that wasn't my deal
• I had a six-shooter (revolver) because when I started on the Unit automatics weren't approved, by the time our reserves could carry automatics we didn't want to spend the money for a new gun for me
• Qualifying with the shotgun wasn't too bad as long as I got it resting in the pocket in my shoulder - but my "pocket" isn't that big compared to all the guys' so if I didn't get the shotgun in just right, when it kicked, it kicked back on my shoulder bone - ouch
• All the guys that were working at the WDMPD and all the ones on the Unit that accepted me (a female) were, are and will always have a special place in my heart

Mike and I had our picture taken one time in our uniforms and I thought I had that saved on my laptop somewhere but I guess I don't. 

This morning during church the youngest bunch of kidlets - our Puddles group - sang a couple of songs.  They are a hoot - check out the picture below.  The adult behind them is our Senior Pastor.  One of his little girls is the sixth child over from the left (kind of looking at daddy) all in pink with her left hand behind her back.  My small group leader's little boy is the second child from the left and he really got into "I'm In The Lord's Army" with his marching :)  His twin cousins are in the picture too!  One is to the left of my pastor's daughter and his twin is the third from the right.  Part of our church of tomorrow.

We had our quarterly membership meeting after the service and I got to hold a friend's little boy that was born in late March/early April.  Now remember I "never birthed no babies" so I didn't realize one minute the little guy could be looking around and the next minute be out like a light - literally.  Wish I could go to sleep that quickly.  And then all of a sudden out of the blue he'd just really jerk while he was sleeping.  After the first couple of jerks I got a better grip on him :)

Turning 50 (Sigh)

Well Wednesday I officially turned old or at least an AARPer - again (sigh).  Actually I've been a spouse member of AARP ever since Mike turned 50 and joined but now I can actually be a member all on my own.....  I had a good day - lots of birthday posts on Facebook which was really nice, along with a few snail mail cards, an e-card, and a couple of phone calls.  I know the goofus that created Facebook is making some changes to it and we're pretty much stuck with how he wants it to look but one thing that is nice about Facebook is that it is a nice, quick and easy way to stay in touch with family and friends to give a shout out on birthdays and for special events.  Each post brought a smile to my face.

Below is Butler's birthday grin for me :)  And he may be old but the other night there was a young cat in the backyard that if the dumb thing would have just stayed behind the hibiscus Butler would never have seen it but no it had to come out in front of the plant.....so Butler gave chase.  First running into one of the hibiscus plants and then taking off after the cat across the yard.  After the cat zoomed under the gap of my back gate to hit the alley, Butler lippity-lopped across the yard back to me proud of himself for getting rid of that "thing".

I finally got the pictures scanned onto my external hard drive tonight that were taken at Branson Zipline and Shepherd of the Hills Vigilante Zipline from vacation - which you can see below.

Here they told us to turn around, look back and smile after taking off on one of the ziplines.  Yep - that's just a harness dealie that I stepped into that went around my waist that then hooked me to the zipline folks.

This was the last zipline at Branson Ziplines and they told us to pose.  You can see the tower we took off from behind me with Chrissy getting ready after me.  The longest zipline was 900'.

This is Shepherd of the Hills Vigilante Zipline that is like 200' high (the tower is 230').  Chrissy is on the left of this picture, I'm in the middle and some guy that had ridden it before is on the right.  That's right - Chrissy and I are NOT holding on :)



 

With the Vigilante you have a canvas-like seat to sit in and have kind of a five-point harness to strap you in for safety.  Waiting for Chrissy and the other guy to get strapped in, I could have been sitting in a steel cage waiting for the ride and would have still thought that wouldn't have been safe enough for this zipline but once the adventure started it was awesome.

The little thing hanging down behind my seat was a pouch that you could put things in like your camera for the ride with you.  We landed, the big guy got me all unhooked and out of the seat and off I go.  He's like, "do you have anything in the pouch?"  Only my camera - duh.  Almost walked off without it - imagine that.

Vacation - Another First

Well a week ago Saturday morning my sis-in-law, niece and I headed south to Branson for my first vacation since Mike's and my last vacation September 2009.  This was another first - my first vacation without Mike - and I had mixed emotions.  I was excited to show and share Branson with Marcia and Chrissy but knew I would have some emotional times remembering when Mike and I had done this or done that as we drove around but I had a positive attitude that this would be a fun trip - little did I know how "wild" it would be at times but more on that later :)  Below are some of the highlights of the week.

Saturday afternoon we checked in and checked out the two bedroom timeshare unit I had purchased last year.  Mike and I bought our one bedroom timeshare unit at our resort in Branson in November of 1985 but the one bedroom wouldn't "work" if I took others with me, so the Lord provided an awesome opportunity for me to purchase a nice two bedroom unit in our resort that was the week after the one bedroom unit I also owned.

Sunday we were up-and-at 'em checking out Branson and riding the Ducks because the Ducks brochure made it sound that after Labor Day they might not run the Duck tours each day - and we definitely didn't want to miss riding the Ducks.  I had bought a four-pack of small American flags that we had with us all day in memory of 9/11, that we took on the Duck ride with us too.  That night back at the unit we watched a 9/11 tribute on tv.

Monday I did something on my bucket list - I ziplined with Chrissy.  I am scared of heights but this is something I wanted to do and it was AWESOME!!!  Someday soon (hopefully) I'll get the photos scanned in the place took to share in my blog.  We zipped on seven ziplines and walked on 10 swinging bridges.  I figured I would take about three steps out on the first swinging bridge and they would have to come and get me - nope - I walked right across (surprised the poop out of me).  Then I wasn't sure about the first zip line but once you were seated in your harness gravity took over and there was no looking back.  I'll definitely do that again at Branson Zipline.

Tuesday Chrissy and I took a great horseback ride at a place Mike and I had never rode before - so that was a neat experience.  The guide had another horse at the stable that she let go with us without having it on a lead - so Magic the Appaloosa roamed free as we road the trail.  Magic would stop periodically to eat but if my horse, who was next in line, would come up on Magic, Magic would take off to make sure he was the second horse right behind his "mommy" who was leading us.  Oh ya - the temp got to 103 before the day was done too on Tuesday.

Wednesday we did some running around in the afternoon and then went to the Pierce Arrow show - Mike and I had never gone to that show.  It was good and the comedian was a riot.  We took the long way back to the resort to see the Branson strip at night lit up.

Thursday Chrissy and I went to Silver Dollar City.  Along with watching the crafts people and go through several shops we road three of the roller coasters.  The one that did the loops (Wildfire) I hadn't ridden for several years because the last time I had ridden it I got off the ride not feeling too well.  As we went up the very steep hill I'm like "what have I gotten myself into and I can't get off this thing" but once we were over the first hill it was great.

Friday we did more running around and ended up at Inspiration Tower at Shepherd of the Hills where they have a new attraction connected to the tower - the Vigilante Zipline.  It's like 230' in the air that is a gradual zipline that covers over 1/2 mile with you getting to speeds of 50 mph before you finally "land".  Chrissy and I debated on doing it and then decided we would.  Thank goodness there was a gate in front of you as you were sitting in the canvas seat and harness so you couldn't see how high up you were.  The kid loading us on the ride told me to lean my knees on the gate and I told him three times I didn't want to as I clutched the gate in a death grip.  Once he pushed the button to make the gate disappear (I'm not sure how it disappeared because I had my eyes closed :) and after the first couple of feet and screaming - the ride was actually pretty awesome.

I didn't have that many bittersweet moments - which I was glad.  There were a couple of times on the balcony of my unit when I was eating breakfast that I'd think Mike should have been sitting there with me and then after we loaded up yesterday morning I took one last time on the balcony, and told Mike that he should have been there with me but I was able to have my first vacation without him.  And he was there with me in my heart the whole week.

Dad had come up to stay at the house to watch Butler and I wasn't sure how Butler would do because this was his first time for him to be "alone" for a week without Milly.  I didn't know if he'd even still be here when I got home - but thankfully he was.  Dad said the two of them got along pretty good.

Now to get ready for work tomorrow :)  And to any of you who got some "rabid" email from my old greyhound484 email address last week while I was gone I apologize.  I no longer use that email so someone must have figured out my password to send that message. 

Labor Day and Stuff

It's Labor Day, hope everyone had a good, fun, safe weekend.  Dad went to Bloomfield for his 95th High School reunion.  Ok, I think it was his 65th reunion.  He left Friday and came back today getting to spend some time with my aunt/his sister.

Saturday I cleaned out the planter that is on the front steps - the Gerber daisies and Mandivilla (sp) were pretty much toast and planted two mum plants in it.  I'm not a big fan of mums but it's that time of year and thought a pink (they called the color purple) and deep red one might look pretty there.  Dad probably fell out of his recliner thinking I actually planted something on my own :)

I've decided it's time to take care of me and honoring my body (my temple) that God gave me.  I don't drink, smoke or do drugs - but I don't take care of my body like I should aka I don't exercise at all.  The only weight lifting I do is carrying Butler down the stairs 3-4 times a day.  So....I did it, I signed up with PrairieLife which is a "gym" close to the library in WDM.  I'm going to try to do Yoga one night a week and do weights 2-3 of the other nights - Wed is small group Bible study.  By doing this I will help my body get rid of stress and help my depression when it rears its ugly head.  One of my goals with the weight machines is to get my arms toned and firmed so that when I quit waving so does my arm - I'm sure most ladies got that one right away :)  Butler will just have to wait another hour before being let out at night because the Yoga class and/or weights would be on my way home from work.

I found out something yesterday when I stopped at Casey's on my way to spend some time on Mike's bench - they make pizzas in a small size.  I had no idea.  I thought medium was the smallest size they made.  So last night for a treat I bought myself a small pepperoni pizza.  It was awesome and Butler ate the crust.  I won't do that very often but it was nice to know I have that option.  That was the first pizza to be eaten upstairs in my bedroom since before Mike died - we almost always ate upstairs - on the bed while watching tv. 

Then today I really treated myself to McDonald's and headed to Walnut Woods to sit for awhile reading and enjoying nature - check out the pictures below.  I ate my French fries on the way to Walnut Woods and then leaned against the car eating my double cheeseburger - didn't eat all that.  But I made sure I pulled the pickles out and while doing that I had "one of those moments" where I smiled and got teary-eyed at the same time.  Mike always gave me his pickles because he knew I liked them.  Then I grabbed a chair from the trunk, my book and sweet tea and plopped down to read for a while.  After I'd been reading a bit a young girl and boy walk by - a little ways away from me and the young boy yells out, "oh look a garter snake!"  Lovely................

I plopped down in the sunny spot between the shade of the two trees.

The view the other way past the one tree.

Mike and I would also head to Walnut Woods different times when we put a pet down.  We'd stop and get a Coke and then sit on a bench in this area to look out over the water and talk about the pet we'd just lost.

Two things.......I remember being a little kid and Dad wanting to sit by the water and just watch it when we would be on vacation.  I couldn't understand why he'd want to do that when there was so much else to do on vacation.  I "got it" many years ago.  It's very calming to sit by the water and watch it flow by.

The other thing.....holidays.  I'm still not used to being on my own.  To me they are worse than weekends.  Mike and I never made plans for Memorial Day, 4th of July or Labor Day.  We'd get up and if the weather was nice decide what we'd do.  Maybe get McDonald's and go somewhere to eat it - lots of times the Blue Lights by the airport to watch planes take off and land before they rerouted McKinley Avenue.  Or we'd get an ice cream cone and just "head out" and see where we'd end up.  It's not always the easiest to decide what to do when it's just you.

When I got home and let Butler out I checked the plants and saw a little butterfly on my butterfly bush.  I tried to take a picture but I couldn't figure out the zoom option on my phone.  I've seen one other butterfly on it and that was a pretty Monarch butterfly.