For the Word a Week Photo Challenge: WAITING, here are Chicago O’Hare folks up and at ‘em — yet waiting — at 6:00 AM this week!

1.  People waiting in line for hot coffee and pastries at Brioche Doree.  (Ya gotta have something to wake you up at 6, but I wonder what time the percolator got going!)

2.  Some folks spent time checking their early-morning emails or eating a wrapped-in-paper breakfast in the waiting area.

3.  Others checked the departure status of their flight.

4.  And some just waited and waited and waited . . .

For more posts on WAITING, click here for the Word a Week Challenge on the blog Word in Your Ear.

So, here’s to you, yellow schoolbuses.  You transport our most beloved commodity — our children — and you help us get ‘em to where they need to be to get educated.  There’s nothing about that action that we need to take for granted!

To view more entries in the A Word A Week Challenge, click here.

Moving the T down the field at Neyland Stadium

Sue’s A Word a Week Challenge this week from her blog A Word in Your Ear is LINES. And since we’re big University of Tennessee Vols fans,we watch intently as the Pride of the Southland Band lines up, marches into the stadium, and performs the circle drills that bring down the house.

The Pride marches in front of the Natalie L. Haslam Music Center on Volunteer Blvd.

Before the game, the band gathers near the new Natalie L. Haslam Music Center and then marches in almost near-perfect lines down Volunteer Boulevard to Neyland Stadium.

The band’s pre-game performance gets the crowd roaring as The Pride forms the Power T, and in rush the cheerleaders, Smoky (the blue-tick hound), and the players and coaches.

The Pride of the Southland forms the Power T

Players and cheerleaders run through the T to pump up the crowd in Neyland Stadium!

But it’s the halftime performance that sparkles.  The Pride moves across the field forming lines that move and morph into various shapes.  Like the circles they’re known for.

The Pride performs their famous Circle Drill.

Or spirals that move yet maintain their shape.  (How DO they do that?)

Moving the spirals during the half-time performance

And sometimes they get really fancy forming geometric shapes like we used to make with a Spirograph!

Another great half-time performance!

Lines have defined UT’s Pride of the Southland Band, and most folks forgo getting popcorn and Coke or taking a bathroom break until after the band’s mid-game performance.  You CAN’T miss The Pride!

After all, even when the Vols aren’t playing so well, we can truthfully say, “We ALWAYS win the halftime!”

For more interpretations of the Word a Week Challenge: Lines, go to http://suellewellyn2011.wordpress.com/2013/11/19/a-word-a-week-challenge-lines/

This is post #19 for National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo) 2013.

If I’m there at sunrise, this is the view I get from that widow’s walk.  I look beyond two rooflines toward the ocean at daybreak to jumpstart my day.

When I look back, I see another widow’s walk with an owl decoy standing proudly to guard his “estate” at Pawleys, the oldest seashore resort in America.

And if I direct my attention to the marsh, I look at the roofs of the porches on the docks stretching into the creek.

But looking at these pictures from the Westin Lake Las Vegas, you could almost swear that we HAD entered a tropical paradise — in the middle of a Nevada desert!  The tall slightly bending palm trees hovering over the clear blue pool in this elegant resort appointed with fountains, outdoor fireplaces, and sheer water walls glimmering in the sun transported us to the tropics . . . even if only for a little while.

A Word a Week Challenge: Tropical (Click here) from the beautiful blog A Word in Your Ear.

The Westin Lake Las Vegas Resort and Spa

101 Montelago Boulevard

Henderson, NV 89011

http://www.westinlakelasvegas.com

A Word a Week Challenge: Vibrant