After a lot of tsuris which I'm certain Mom never meant to visit upon us, her remains were laid to rest on Friday the 13th, and — for what it's worth, since we've been far from traditional about it — the week of shivah, the deepest mourning, has been observed.

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While I really hate being such a "Debbie Downer" this early in the year, I'm getting extremely frustrated with the red tape surrounding my mother's passing. The basic: we are still waiting on the life insurance to cut loose enough money to bury my mother. While she pre-paid the funeral expenses, she didn't have enough money to pay for a plot —
and without the life insurance money, neither do we.

I'll spare the details of dealing with government-based life insurance (Mom was a Federal Government retiree). The funeral home has been as helpful as possible (which is actually very helpful, especially in terms of compassion and empathy), but the end result is that we are dealing with businesses, and at the end of the day, they need to report a profit (or at the very least, the lack of a loss).

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In ancient times, the body was said to be controlled by four humours, related to the body fluids blood (sanguine/red), phlegm (phlegmatic), yellow bile (choleric), and black bile (melancholy). In addition to predisposition to certain diseases, an excess of one or another humor was associated with a particular appearance, personality, and/or personality disorder. While the theory is long discredited, the descriptions carry through to today: a sanguine personality is friendly and outgoing; a phlegmatic one, slow-moving or lazy; a choleric one, quick to anger; and a melancholic one, prone to sadness, discontent, or depression. (Interestingly, I haven't been able to find a relationship between diabetes — either major type — and an imbalance of one or more humours.)

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Sad to say, I've not had the bicycle out since Sunday morning. A combination of parental schedules, the Tour de France, rush hour traffic, and a heat wave have conspired to keep me indoors for most of this week. Now, this year's Tour de France has been about as predictable as an adolescent Type 1 girl's blood glucose levels are around menarche -- many favorites crashed out early; the second and third race leaders hung onto their leads far longer (and through more difficult terrain) than expected; expected attacks were never launched (while others were launched at unexpected times), and the French press has been having a field day (or ten) with the first potential French winner in more years than they'd care to count.

So much for "why watch, when I could be doing?".

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There's an old adage that says success is "one part inspiration, nine parts perspiration". We tend to see only the first part -- the results, the glitzy façade. Except at the finish line of a race -- whether that be marathon, triathlon, bicycle race, or horse race -- all hints of the perspiration (or let's face it, sweat) are carefully hidden.

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It used to be that "back to school shopping" meant two or three new outfits, new shoes and sneakers, and a short handful of "school supplies" -- one or two notebooks, paper and dividers, writing implements, a pencil case, and maybe a ruler.

For good or ill, those days are long gone.

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