A fantastic day

It’s been dark for an hour and yet, no full moon visible on the river. Rats! Last night afforded no moon view either as the clouds took precedence. This was unfortunate since Judy J. was here last night and so enjoys seeing the reflection on the water. We had dinner together before watching “Sarah’s Key”.

What a wild ride that movie turned out to be. Some of my friends in book clubs had read it already, as had Judy J., but Judy C. and I had not. Avoiding giving away the story, we ladies agreed that we had not ever heard about this going on in France during the war. OR, it has been blocked from our brains, but I do suspect we were never taught. This story seemed almost too outrageous to be true, which means it likely was. In one scene in the movie, when the magazine staff was sitting around a table discussing what took place, a writer expressed her dismay that no one did anything to help the 1942 Jews. The main character asked her co-workers, in 2009, “What would you have done?”…very similar to what is taking place now in regard the Jewish people.

We so enjoyed, besides the movie, delicious lasagna and garlic bread. Justin was going to be in for the night so he shared dinner with us and took care of the clean up thereafter. He busied himself in his room, supposedly getting things straightened away. It seems he is making some forward progress but also some not forward at all. Before we went to bed last night he put some stuff in the washer on the rinse cycle and was then drying them in order to avoid ironing. It works better when they are pulled out immediately rather than the next day.

Tuesday, Justin went shopping with his friend, Sarah, and bought my CHRISTmas present. He is chomping at the bit to give it to me but I think we have to wait. He goes through this all the time, he just cannot wait! But he must. What he did give me was a wonderfully thoughtful present of hand sanitizer from Bath and Body Works, in my favorite scent of Warm Vanilla Sugar. Oh yum! Not only does it sanitize, but instead of drying my hands the way regular stuff does, it leaves my hands nicely softened and great smelling. What a sweetheart he is!

Today, Justin was my driver, making sure I got to Great Hang Ups in time for the Open House. Julia was still busily making things ready so we pitched in to help get the shop situated. He used wires to attach the ceramic mugs to the lattice wall while I smoothed wrapping paper and cut up the entry forms for people to use for the door prize drawing. Also I helped Julia price a few things and dressed a table which the jewelry designer would use when demo-ing her jewel creations. Janet wraps gems and cameos in wire and then attaches them to necklaces or chains. They are amazingly gorgeous pieces and it is quite something to watch her work. In a couple hours’ time, she has a piece ready for sale. While the doors were not banged down, or pulled open, as the case might be, the Open House did generate some sales and framing orders, which is good!

Justin used my car to run errands and I gave him my debit card in order to fill the gas tank for me. At noon he was coming back to have lunch with me at Koko’s but we forgot they are not open on Saturday’s for lunch. When he came for me, we had to decide where to go instead. I suggested Mojo’s for some brisket and he said he knew that was where he thought I would want to go. We ordered onion rings for an appetizer and shared the lunch size brisket meal. It was perfect for us, no leftovers!

When he took me back to the shop, I reminded him to please get gas but that stinker went all the way back home and then gassed up on his way to collect me again. Ugh! He claims I still had two gallons to spare but my poor nerves cannot tolerate having that little light come on…which he knows well. Such a provocateur he is!

Once back home, he hooked up the Roku which was delivered via USPS and then got ready for a CHRISTmas party he is attending at Jesse’s mom’s house. He rattled off to me what his schedule is going to be for the next couple days, including getting up early in the morning tomorrow to sauté onions for their tailgate adventure before the football game. He has burgers, brats, tomato, onions, cole slaw, and buns ready to go, plus picked up his grille. He will miss church for the game and will miss again Wednesday evening as he uses his father’s car to finish his moving from the beach house. Time is of the essence now, it seems. He expects to be here with me until April sometime so I had better get used to it!

Justin has offered to repair or replace my switches and outlets for me as some are unsightly or won’t hold onto a plug. I am not sure I trust his skills in this regard as electricity is nothing to mess with, but would not mind some fresh switch covers or clean ones, at least. He wants other projects to tackle as well, and I can certainly come up a sizable list for him. I may as well make things better for myself as long as I am likely staying here for a while.

Today I talked with a lady who lives in one of my former neighborhoods in EH. She told about homes in one of the nicer areas of EH that formerly sold in the 700’s now going for about half that amount. Folks get a lot of house for much less money with the neighborhoods looking weary because of it. This is certainly nothing new but interesting to hear about my old stomping grounds. And sad to hear, as well.

On another note, Wednesday night, Justin joined me for church. Before we left though, we had to stop up at Nancy’s condo on the 5^th floor where she was hosting a party. I had let her know I could not participate in the party due to church and choir but could chip in for the charity collection. Most of my neighbors were there and it was nice to see them again, as well as my friend, Penny, whom I’ve not seen for months. Oh how I wish I could have stayed and enjoyed the fun. Oh well! Miss Chardonnay said she was planning to have a party at her house on a night different than Wednesday so that I can come. This would be the opposite of discrimination and I like it!

Justin was quite warmly welcomed both at the party and at church, with some of the ladies hugging him. It must have been Easter when he was there the last time and he was not home during the Ladies’ Group party, so they didn’t see him then. That must have made him feel quite good, at least, I hope it did. I was outside on the sidewalk waiting for him to come out behind me, but Julaine informed me he was inside ‘still hugging people’!

Another early start

Not having to take Justin to work this a.m. allowed me to stay snug in my bed for another hour before having to be boots on the ground by 8:30. Marlena had encouraged me to breakfast at The Club saying she had a few affirmative replies to "Meet, Eat, and Play" in the morning. Last week it was only Randy and me, which was delightful for breakfast but would not work out for a game of Trivial Pursuit. He had to be somewhere afterward, his wife, Carol, staying home to give the housekeeper some instruction. Being close to the holidays, it’s more difficult for people to find the free time for an activity such as this one.

I got myself to The Club and waited for the others to arrive. Marlena had told me she invited a new gentleman to join our group, someone who wanted to meet more people and such, so that would be nice! As I sat and waited, a young mom with her daughter came in to have breakfast. Tina was a lady I had visited with poolside and it was so nice to see her and chat with as I waited. She reported that her daughter, Grace, and she were making the hateful trip to The Avenues Mall to a kitchen shop in order to find a tea strainer spoon for her husband for CHRISTmas. She could not think of anywhere else to look for such a thing. I suggested the gift shop/tea house "Basketique" which I am sure would have the things needed to make tea! Marlena happened to have one of their flyers to give Tina and off they went in search of the tea strainer.

In the meanwhile, a young man came into the dining room, escorted by the hostess toward my table. His name is Andy, a lifelong member, with his parents, of The Club and somehow, we had never met! None of the others showed up to eat or play Trivial Pursuit so Andy and I talked until nearly 11:00 a.m. He is a man of letters, a professor who has taught at Virginia Tech in the past, and is currently a blog writer and author. He is the caretaker for his mother who still has her social life. Andy had me with “I write reviews of movies, analyzing the politics in them…”

We discussed books and movies, politics past and present, the currents events, education and more. Having seen education from the inside out and been one of those responsible for “filling the heads full of mush”, as Rush would say, Andy had much to add in that regard. He made me laugh when telling me how, as a younger man, advisors told him he should keep his part-time job at Sears, that he was ‘not college material’----guess he showed them!!! I shared the story of Justin’s testing for St. Johns Country Day School, when the Headmaster told us he had ‘some verbal overflow’…This was after Andy and I had talked for almost two hours. Yes, Justin came by that naturally!

Andy is also a rabid Facebooker, as am I, and shared his e-mail, blog address, and other contact information with me. Since I had not brought my purse along, I did not have a card to give him. We talked about following Twitter, which Justin has tried to sell me on, but I have resisted. Yet, another distraction, I fear! I told Andy about the book I have about “The Dumbest Generation”, those who have not developed interpersonal skills due to reliance on electronic media. I am also sharing a couple movies, “Cinderella Man” and “Waiting for Superman”, the latter being a documentary on the state of the government school system. At least one of them has a happy ending!

Neither of us checked our phones during breakfast and conversation, much to our credit, but then I saw Justin had been trying to reach me. Nothing of urgency, only that he was home and wondering what had become of me since my purse and car were at home, and I was not! Oops! No longer am I in the habit of letting people know my whereabouts and am now scaring them half to pieces.

I let him know I was on my way back from The Club, which he then remembered was my Friday routine, and could drive him to work. He was going to work for his father for the afternoon and then asked if he could bring home a desk for his room. Sure! I am liking this, he is getting settled in. When Jesse dropped him off in the morning, he had unloaded his car with belongings brought from the beach house, including my big camera which had been borrowed last March! Clothes were everywhere as he unpacked his tightly packed luggage, an amazing packing job, if I ever saw one!

The other night I saw the “Seinfeld” episode where Elaine broke up with her perfect boyfriend because he had a flaw---failure to use an exclamation point when taking a phone message. Oh, yes, this is important! I think of that episode often when I write because I am also a huge fan of punctuation. I had been looking up vocabulary words, perhaps because of the recent conversation with some ladies about diagramming sentences. That discussion took place at the Ladies’ Group party Monday night and stirred some memories for me. What was a dangling participle and was it a bad thing? Would I recognize a diphthong if it came into the room? I wonder if I could yet diagram a sentence and identify the parts of speech, etc. It made me think of taking a drivers’ test---I can drive just fine but could I pass the test???

Tonight is “Dinner and a Movie Night”, with Judy and Judy coming to watch “Sarah’s Key”. Many of my friends who are readers and/or part of book clubs have read this story. Judy J. has read the book and said it is an amazing story. I hope the movie measures up. Supposedly it is on the order of “The Diary of Anne Frank” but some takes place in modern times. I will certainly let you know, and write my own review!

An empty nest again

Justin is gone for the night again, being picked up after work by Jesse and going with him to school. He said, “I will have to ‘occupy myself!’ while Jesse is in class…”, a little play on words! Earlier he sent me a text message telling me to look with the binoculars toward downtown to see if I could spot the blimp. Must still be here from Monday’s game or something. Just this moment, I heard a dull roar and rushed to the window to see if it was the blimp. Nope---it was a pair of giant helicopters making my windows rattle.

Speaking of window rattlers, my upstairs neighbors were having some demo work done in their river room. Due to the leaking which took place during the rain storm a couple weeks ago, which shorted out my TV power strip, they are having to replace their ceiling. A wood ceiling looks really nice but the wetness over a period of time caused mold to form between the wood and concrete. Out it comes! It did not bother me at all, especially since I was away until nearly 2:00 pm today. The repair team is the same ones who came to inspect my damage, wondering what I have done to repair the damage. Uh, nothing, except replace the power strip! I do not wish to tear out the entire ceiling in my family room to repair a small area.

This morning, Justin came tapping at my bedroom door to wake me up. Normally I would have been awake at that hour but instead was in the midst of a dream involving a circuit pastor’s conference and me making a fuss about something being planned. Good thing he woke me or I might have said something I should not have! The second day in a row I served as his wheel man for taking him to work before 7:00 a.m., dropping him at Blanding and Kingsley area. It’s not too early for me to be awake, but it is a bit too early for me to be out and running around. He really needs to get his car checked over and that’s it!

Today’s Bible study, minus Justin because of working, had fewer people but a very interesting subject. The topic is yet the Ministry of the Keys, which prompted some deep discussion. We heard about the days when people in the congregation would make ‘public confession of a public sin’, receive the forgiveness of their fellow members, as well as from the Lord. I wondered if society had influenced that practice fading in its use or what other reasons would there be for this not taking place any longer. Pastor had no sure answer, we just speculated on the reasons, talking about how one determines the seriousness of a sin as compared to another, and so on. Someone brought up the break-down of the family unit over the years, how little is done anymore when people live in sin or bear children out of wedlock, even senior adults who live together without marriage in order to keep their Social Security. It’s as though nothing is black or white anymore, there is ‘fine print’ or a disclaimer attached to sin.

The conversation progressed to the Biblical role of men and women. My remarks were ‘do we really want another responsibility?’ when it came to women’s role in the congregation. Pastor mentioned that often men, left to their own devices, would rather stay home and be little boys. I found that mildly but sadly amusing. His point was if women overstepped, the men would step back, which was my point exactly! It is our role as women to encourage our leaders and let them be our voices, just as takes place in the home. Not a friendly attitude or practice in the world, but I am good with it. After all, I have enough to do already, working behind the scenes, sometimes quietly….

After class I had to fly, or drive directly, to Carrabba’s on San Jose Blvd. for a luncheon hosted by my investment counselor friend, Diane. Justin was originally to be my guest but had to cancel his RSVP when he found out he needed to work today instead. He was so hoping to see Kyle Brady again, after we had shared a table with him at Koko’s a few weeks ago. Kyle is a law student besides handling investments so was in classes today. Justin was also looking forward to the wonderful Carrabba’s food and did miss his favorite chicken dish, Polo Rosa Maria. I had the sirloin marsala which is my dish of choice when we go for dinner. Some nice ladies were seated around me and I had a wonderful visit with them. Some were widows or the divorced spouse of railroad men, as the RR Credit Union was absorbed by the financial company that I work with. Just regular ladies having a regular good time at lunch---love it! Always always always I meet such nice people at Diane’s functions. She will have another one in the spring so I hope they are there for that one, too.

My thoughts and prayers are with my friend, Rita, as she makes a hasty trip to MI to her mom’s hospital bedside. This might be the final time she sees her mom alive, as her diabetes is taking her life little by little. Mom is done fighting and is ready to go home to the Lord. Poor Rita has many details to address here in regard to her son and his getting cared for, as her husband lives and works in Canada. The church family is helping her out until her spouse can get home. Tears were shed and hugs shared, and now prayers requested on her behalf…

House Concert in Holmen

My sister and brother-in-law, Lori and David, hosted a house concert this past weekend, featuring musicians who perform Celtic melodies. Their home was decorated cellar to attic (nearly!) for the weekend's Tour of Homes, so the band was bathed in CHRISTmas lights.

This shot was taken from the landing on the stairs, looking down into the family room at the performers. David posted video of the performance as well via Facebook so if you are a Friend of mine, you can listen there. This is David's element and Lori's is the decorating, a fine team!

Hey, the moon is out!

What’s going on? It’s only 4:00 pm and already the moon is out. As I glanced up, an airplane wwaayy up high crossed the face of what I can see as the moon’s. The sun is shining as well and it is quite warm for December. Even last night, for the Ladies’ Group party, I had to run the air conditioner to cool the house for the hot guests. When I was bustling about, I did, too, get a bit warm but once seated, was quite comfortable. Today was predicted to be in the mid-70’s but later in the week, we will also have lows in the 40’s. Wrap and peel weather, to be sure!

My lips are chapped and are most annoying to me. Perhaps dry is more the word, but regularly are slathered with Blistex balm to sooth them. It’s not working! Lipstick does little to solve the problem either. I am drinking more water in hopes it will touch my lips and then stay there to moisten.

The Ladies’ Group party was very nice, not quite as many guests as I would have liked, but just the perfect number for my chairs. Before the ladies came, I had pulled out four folding chairs just in case we needed them, being easier to handle, I thought, than the heavier metal ones from the river room. My back did not like wrestling them from the front hall closet, as nothing is ever as simple as it seems. The closet is spacious, only not deep, so one must pivot left or right to get things out. My back was quite pleased to lie down at the end of the night.

Martie called me from work on her way over Monday night to ask if I needed anything. Ice! She really made my day by bringing a bag of ice. I had gotten a bag from Jessica but feared it would not last through the party and now, I had enough to make it for a couple more parties. Who gets so excited about a bag of ice?? The ladies arrived in teams, as I requested they car-share to make parking more convenient.

My plans were to serve the bottle wine from Thanksgiving, brought by Larry, only it was not a screw cap. While I own a wonderful Pampered Chef wine bottle opener, I have never used it. Oh, oh! Wanting to be sure all things were ready before the guests arrived, I asked my neighbor, Randy, to open it for me. Instead of using my fancy PC tool, he came equipped with three different ones, in order to instruct me in the fine art of bottle opening. I cannot complain since I was the one asking the favor, right? At least I didn’t have to break the top off on the edge of a table like they do in the Westerns! Fortunately, the one guest knew how to use the corkscrew and opened her own bottle of Hawaiian wine, which many enjoyed.

Gretchen brought me a gift for being hostess---a lovely gift box with a roll of toilet paper in it. Oh that Gretchen!!! I just love her!!! The ladies brought refreshments, a delicious assortment of treats, some homemade and others store purchased, all perfect for the party. I got to keep some leftovers including some Renee’s husband made, called “Whoopie Pies” which resemble round Suzy Q’s, with layers of colored, flavored cream filling. One was cherry flavored and the other minty. Add a pretty do-dad in frosting to the top, and it looks like a professional treat. She left the remainder here for me! Talk about a wonderful leftover! I have been munching on my remaining meatballs which smell and taste so good.

The Jaguar game was due to begin about 8:30 but that was not the reason people started to leave. It was like all of a sudden the party was over, the moment I hate the most. Just because one or two were leaving, they all decided to leave. I was hoping some would hang around to watch the game with me, but at least Terri T. stayed and helped straighten up. Carol was so funny as she was one who actually was hustling to get home for the game. She and her dad have a ritual where she calls him before or during the game to compare notes, instead of watching in the same house. Like I do with my sisters and friends in WI when a Packer game is on! Only there are 1200 miles keeping us apart!

Terri cleared the table, rolled the table cloth up, and even carried the chairs back to the dining room. She wanted to rinse the dishes too and load the machine but I stopped her from doing that. She knew my back was tired and had mercy on me. I had told her that Justin would move the chairs but she just got busy, like a whirlwind, and took care of it. It tickled me to see her using the Windex on the glass-topped table in the family room, because she knew right where to go to find it—under the sink! It was great! Before she left, she gave me a couple pizza-sized cookies from those she brought, from Panera Bread…mmmmm!

It felt good to lie down on the bed to watch the football game but when the Jaguars were doing so poorly, going into half time, I simply rolled over and went to sleep. At some point I remember hearing the score of 34-14, not a total wipe out, but guess I didn’t miss much. Not edge-of-the-seat like the Packer game was, to be sure! Sleep restored my back and I woke to a cleaned up house. Nice!

Justin at the game

Justin was given on-field passes for the pre-game for the Packers/Giants game Sunday and posed at the goal post on the field. He is wearing layers, with his Aaron Rodgers' jersey over the top! Hope he was snug enough! If you click the photo, you can see some of the players on the field, including some Packers!

Now you're talkin'

Line 'em up for lunch at Chili's! That is one smart waitress and she was rewarded for her efforts!