Recently, one of my long, long-time blogger friends -Skittles -announced that she and Mike (her husband) had just made a big purchase and boy, much as I hate to admit it, that bit of news created a whole lot of a bad thing within me.
It's called ENVY!
Yeah, Barb and Mike purchased an RV!
I've wanted an RV -preferably a nice big Winnebago Wagon type -but I'm not that fussy as I'd take any brand, as long as it qualified as an RV. I've always dreamed about being able to drive all over the country -heck, all over the continent here for that matter -why leave Canada out when there's so much to see up north as well as in the States, ya know.
But sadly, unless I were to win a huge jackpot by playing the lottery, that dream is never going to be fulfilled for me.
Oh well, maybe I can live the rv'ing lifestyle a bit vicariously through Barb and Mike's travels. Ya think?
Just so they also purchased themselves a darned good rv insurance plan that will cover their nifty new vacationing home on the road so they can travel about and rest at ease then!
Or, who knows but maybe I can convince Barb and Mike to drive by this way, pick me up and take me along on a little spin around this part of the globe?
After all, she does know where I live, ya know and it's a thought I'd be willing to entertain.
Wouldn't you?
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Dirty Words!
I had a doctor's appointment about two weeks ago -just a general six-month check-up kind of thing with my primary car physician but I had to have blood work done prior to that visit so she could decide if she felt I was going to need a change of meds or additional prescriptions.
The tests were the usual blood tests -one for blood sugar and the other for my cholesterol levels -and I wasn't looking forward to that appointment, not in the least!
The upshot of the blood tests resulted in her putting me on an additional prescription, this one to work on the cholesterol levels, plus she added another pill to the mix too that will work in conjunction with the stuff I've already been taking for my blood pressure as well as to control my blood sugar levels too!
But the bad part of all this is that now I am supposed to work really, really hard on my diet to lower the cholesterol as well as to try to keep the blood sugar balanced with the meds and diet too.
This is no easy task for me. Not. in. the. least!
Life would sure be a heck of a lot easier to deal with if she'd just given me a prescription that might help me a bit -like for some top rated appetite suppressants maybe?
Something like that would make pushing myself away from the table and those good foods -pastas especially, that I really love -wouldn't it?
Right now, to try to curb my food intake to control the sugar plus the cholesterol really only seems to leave me with a diet primarily of lettuce and/or broccoli! Thankfully, I like tossed salads and I love broccoli but I also love a whole hell of a lot of other things!
Why is it that the foods we love almost always turn out to be bad for us? Why does "diet" have to be just another four-letter dirty word anyway?
The tests were the usual blood tests -one for blood sugar and the other for my cholesterol levels -and I wasn't looking forward to that appointment, not in the least!
The upshot of the blood tests resulted in her putting me on an additional prescription, this one to work on the cholesterol levels, plus she added another pill to the mix too that will work in conjunction with the stuff I've already been taking for my blood pressure as well as to control my blood sugar levels too!
But the bad part of all this is that now I am supposed to work really, really hard on my diet to lower the cholesterol as well as to try to keep the blood sugar balanced with the meds and diet too.
This is no easy task for me. Not. in. the. least!
Life would sure be a heck of a lot easier to deal with if she'd just given me a prescription that might help me a bit -like for some top rated appetite suppressants maybe?
Something like that would make pushing myself away from the table and those good foods -pastas especially, that I really love -wouldn't it?
Right now, to try to curb my food intake to control the sugar plus the cholesterol really only seems to leave me with a diet primarily of lettuce and/or broccoli! Thankfully, I like tossed salads and I love broccoli but I also love a whole hell of a lot of other things!
Why is it that the foods we love almost always turn out to be bad for us? Why does "diet" have to be just another four-letter dirty word anyway?
Make Time!
Boy, life has begun to get more than a bit busy around here for me and by the looks of things, it's gonna get busier yet over time too!
This past weekend was my birthday and surprisingly enough, that day was nice in all respects -calm, easy, beautiful weather, nice meal, family around -very relaxing and fun. Sam and I went for a nice walk, visited along the road with some of my neighbors, then back home where I had some time to relax with a tabletopper I've been working on. Mandy and I collaborated on fixing supper which made that task easier that way. My son showed up for supper and brought a very nice -also really tasty chocolate cake too that he had purchased. Apparently Mandy had told him to run into town and pick up an ice cream cake and it was really funny the way that played out.
When he arrived here, he came in carrying this big box and Mandy immediately yelled at me to "Look the other direction. Do. Not. Look. This. Way!" And he came through the dining room and disappeared, carrying this big box, into the bathroom. So I figured they had gone into cahoots with each other then to get me another birthday gift but it turned out it was this cake he had bought which was iced but nothing written on it and he had taken it into the bathroom and was "trimming" it, using one of those icing pens, if you know what I mean. Anyway, eventually he resurfaced and carried this box, containing my birthday cake, out to the kitchen counter where we had a good chuckle over the inscription he had written on it -"Happy Birthday Crackerhead!"
The inscription is in reference to a lady we both used to work with at a truckstop about 30 miles from here and that was what she and my son always referred to each other as -"Crackerheads!" It's our own little brand of family humor here but the kids saw that and then, of course, Maya wanted to know what that meant. Don't think I want to be trying to explain that to her just yet!
Supper turned out very nice and surprisingly calm too considering any meal here can turn into absolute pandemonium at a moment's notice if one or both of the kids decides they aren't going to eat what ever happens to be the fare for the day but although we had a little issue with Maya over the potatoes I had fixed, she ate enough of 'em to be allowed then to have a piece of Gram's Birthday Cake.
I don't know why, but for some reason neither Mandy or I even thought to get the camera out and get a video of the kids and my cake as they sang Happy Birthday to me because Kurtis was really quite entertaining in the song department! Time to cut the cake and as I was doing that and plating each piece, passing them around the table, my son says "So, this cake then is just a regular chocolate cake with white icing, huh?" And initially, it didn't register with me as to why he would make a comment like that but Mandy understood what he was getting at. Seems that yes, she had told him to get an Ice Cream Cake and he thought that's what he had purchased because -well, because he got it our of the freezer/cooler at the grocery store not realizing that it was just a regular cake with icing on it stored there, and not the ice cream cake he thought he was buying. Only my son would do something like that! So if anyone reading this ever needs an ice cream cake, don't send my son to the store to get it! However, I have to say that the cake was just fine even if it wasn't ice cream cake and the kids ate every last bite of what they'd been given whereas with ice cream cakes, Kurtis often won't eat the chocolate crumb mixture in the center of those kind of cakes and that part then either goes to waste (gets tossed in the trash) or else, it goes to my waist as I hate to see things like that not get eaten and I really do not need the extra calories at all!
So anyway, the day was all really nice, smooth, very little of the normal fighting between the two little ones which made it even more pleasant for all concerned!
But now, things are going to be changing, gearing up for another birthday celebration this coming weekend with Maya's birthday party for openers. I'm going to have to make some things -food items -for that party in the next couple of days, plus get a few things organized for some activities at church that have to be done by Sunday, Plus, I've got some fabric that I purchased recently to make a jumper out of it for Maya for her birthday and of course, though I finished the tabletopper I was working on, I've already started work on another embroidery project and I have several more needlecraft projects I had hoped to have completed in time to take them to our Fall Bazaar which is coming up the beginning of November too. Then there is that cookbook project as well which is due to come to fruition the end of the month with the arrival of our shipment of cookbooks that we plan to begin selling at the Bazaar too and that's going to be a job and a half to get them set up, ready to go the day of the bazaar too. All those things, along with the food items I'll be involved in baking and preparing for the bazaar too -a couple batches of Swedish breads plus at least one, probably two big pans of lasagne for the dinner that day and finding time in between to bake some cookies or other things for the bazaar too and well, I'm wondering now if maybe I'm getting a tad close to over-extending myself!
By the time all these events come to pass, I think I'm going to need a nice long rest and I'm thinking boy, I could really go for a trip to Texas to visit my cousin but actually use that as an excuse to go to hcg Austin instead!
Well, it does sound like the weeks ahead will be full -for sure -and hectic, yep -that too! But if I start now to plan my days out a little better, I think I'll be able to squeeze most of the things I want to do in -just need to prioritize a bit and most of it -the important stuff anyway -will all come together in the end!
It better happen that way!
This past weekend was my birthday and surprisingly enough, that day was nice in all respects -calm, easy, beautiful weather, nice meal, family around -very relaxing and fun. Sam and I went for a nice walk, visited along the road with some of my neighbors, then back home where I had some time to relax with a tabletopper I've been working on. Mandy and I collaborated on fixing supper which made that task easier that way. My son showed up for supper and brought a very nice -also really tasty chocolate cake too that he had purchased. Apparently Mandy had told him to run into town and pick up an ice cream cake and it was really funny the way that played out.
When he arrived here, he came in carrying this big box and Mandy immediately yelled at me to "Look the other direction. Do. Not. Look. This. Way!" And he came through the dining room and disappeared, carrying this big box, into the bathroom. So I figured they had gone into cahoots with each other then to get me another birthday gift but it turned out it was this cake he had bought which was iced but nothing written on it and he had taken it into the bathroom and was "trimming" it, using one of those icing pens, if you know what I mean. Anyway, eventually he resurfaced and carried this box, containing my birthday cake, out to the kitchen counter where we had a good chuckle over the inscription he had written on it -"Happy Birthday Crackerhead!"
The inscription is in reference to a lady we both used to work with at a truckstop about 30 miles from here and that was what she and my son always referred to each other as -"Crackerheads!" It's our own little brand of family humor here but the kids saw that and then, of course, Maya wanted to know what that meant. Don't think I want to be trying to explain that to her just yet!
Supper turned out very nice and surprisingly calm too considering any meal here can turn into absolute pandemonium at a moment's notice if one or both of the kids decides they aren't going to eat what ever happens to be the fare for the day but although we had a little issue with Maya over the potatoes I had fixed, she ate enough of 'em to be allowed then to have a piece of Gram's Birthday Cake.
I don't know why, but for some reason neither Mandy or I even thought to get the camera out and get a video of the kids and my cake as they sang Happy Birthday to me because Kurtis was really quite entertaining in the song department! Time to cut the cake and as I was doing that and plating each piece, passing them around the table, my son says "So, this cake then is just a regular chocolate cake with white icing, huh?" And initially, it didn't register with me as to why he would make a comment like that but Mandy understood what he was getting at. Seems that yes, she had told him to get an Ice Cream Cake and he thought that's what he had purchased because -well, because he got it our of the freezer/cooler at the grocery store not realizing that it was just a regular cake with icing on it stored there, and not the ice cream cake he thought he was buying. Only my son would do something like that! So if anyone reading this ever needs an ice cream cake, don't send my son to the store to get it! However, I have to say that the cake was just fine even if it wasn't ice cream cake and the kids ate every last bite of what they'd been given whereas with ice cream cakes, Kurtis often won't eat the chocolate crumb mixture in the center of those kind of cakes and that part then either goes to waste (gets tossed in the trash) or else, it goes to my waist as I hate to see things like that not get eaten and I really do not need the extra calories at all!
So anyway, the day was all really nice, smooth, very little of the normal fighting between the two little ones which made it even more pleasant for all concerned!
But now, things are going to be changing, gearing up for another birthday celebration this coming weekend with Maya's birthday party for openers. I'm going to have to make some things -food items -for that party in the next couple of days, plus get a few things organized for some activities at church that have to be done by Sunday, Plus, I've got some fabric that I purchased recently to make a jumper out of it for Maya for her birthday and of course, though I finished the tabletopper I was working on, I've already started work on another embroidery project and I have several more needlecraft projects I had hoped to have completed in time to take them to our Fall Bazaar which is coming up the beginning of November too. Then there is that cookbook project as well which is due to come to fruition the end of the month with the arrival of our shipment of cookbooks that we plan to begin selling at the Bazaar too and that's going to be a job and a half to get them set up, ready to go the day of the bazaar too. All those things, along with the food items I'll be involved in baking and preparing for the bazaar too -a couple batches of Swedish breads plus at least one, probably two big pans of lasagne for the dinner that day and finding time in between to bake some cookies or other things for the bazaar too and well, I'm wondering now if maybe I'm getting a tad close to over-extending myself!
By the time all these events come to pass, I think I'm going to need a nice long rest and I'm thinking boy, I could really go for a trip to Texas to visit my cousin but actually use that as an excuse to go to hcg Austin instead!
Well, it does sound like the weeks ahead will be full -for sure -and hectic, yep -that too! But if I start now to plan my days out a little better, I think I'll be able to squeeze most of the things I want to do in -just need to prioritize a bit and most of it -the important stuff anyway -will all come together in the end!
It better happen that way!
Economic Insanity?
The more I try to figure out things with respect to the economy and economics and prices and stuff like that, the more confused I get!
I think back to when I was in college and the class I did the absolute worst in was Micro-Economics. I got a nice big fat "D" in that one! Didn't understand it then and I sure as heck don't understand it or anything about it apparently now either!
Prices for things -even around this area -are just ridiculous any more. Wages here are not near what they are in most other areas but boy, that doesn't mean the prices for things are lower or more affordable.
Yesterday, when Mandy had Sammy out for a walk, she was talking to a neighbor of ours and they got to talking about houses for rent. (I have no clue what got them on to this topic but the neighbor told my daughter that in our little town, there is an old home -about like ours -that rents for $675 a month and also a three-bedroom trailer that rents for $575 a month.
Now, I know compared to rental costs for homes, apartments, trailers and the like in the big cities and larger towns and such, this would be considered to be cheap rent but around this area, where wages sure aren't very good, how on earth do people afford rentals like that anyway?
Things like this just totally boggle my mind!
I know one thing for sure, if I didn't have this old house, and had to rent a place, I'd never be able to find an affordable place to rent and also be able to pay utility bills on top of that too!
I think back to when I was in college and the class I did the absolute worst in was Micro-Economics. I got a nice big fat "D" in that one! Didn't understand it then and I sure as heck don't understand it or anything about it apparently now either!
Prices for things -even around this area -are just ridiculous any more. Wages here are not near what they are in most other areas but boy, that doesn't mean the prices for things are lower or more affordable.
Yesterday, when Mandy had Sammy out for a walk, she was talking to a neighbor of ours and they got to talking about houses for rent. (I have no clue what got them on to this topic but the neighbor told my daughter that in our little town, there is an old home -about like ours -that rents for $675 a month and also a three-bedroom trailer that rents for $575 a month.
Now, I know compared to rental costs for homes, apartments, trailers and the like in the big cities and larger towns and such, this would be considered to be cheap rent but around this area, where wages sure aren't very good, how on earth do people afford rentals like that anyway?
Things like this just totally boggle my mind!
I know one thing for sure, if I didn't have this old house, and had to rent a place, I'd never be able to find an affordable place to rent and also be able to pay utility bills on top of that too!
Thursday, October 06, 2011
Brain Farts? Maybe Facebook Ones!
Boy, if I thought I was confused, having major brain dead issues or just simple little brain farts before, they don't hold a candle to the confusion in my pea brain today!
About two weeks ago, I started to receive occasional e-mails sent to my primary e-mail account by me!
Yeah, you read that correctly! It seems I was sending e-mail from my yahoo e-mail address -which I rarely ever use -to my primary e-mail account so I figured, Hey -I've just had my yahoo e-mail account hacked!
And guess what? I was right! Wow -I figured that out all by myself! So I took some steps to change some things and thought things were all okay. That is, until this morning I thought things were okay.
I logged into that lovely Yahoo account after a friend on Facebook who is also a friend in a yahoo geneology group I belong to sent me a message about getting a message from me -from my yahoo e-mail addy and so I went over there and checked things out again.
That's how I came to discover that I had 4 friend requests sitting there for my Facebook account!
Now how in blazes -or why -did those requests go to my yahoo e-mail anyway? To my knowledge, I have never listed my yahoo e-mail address anywhere on Facebook so how/why did that happen?
I went through and organized my yahoo group messages and tried then to get the Facebook friending issue resolved but that merely ended up with things getting really weird then -in my mind -with Facebook as it appears now that I have a second facebook account that I can log into via my yahoo e-mail but it doesn't have all my friends showing up there that I see when I log into Facebook using my primary e-mail address!
Remember that old TV sitcom from years back -Welcome Back Kotter -and Vinny Barbarino putting his hands up to his face and exclaiming "I'm so confused!!!"? Well, that would be me right about now with all this crapola now between Yahoo and my primary e-mail addresses and the appearance -or so it seems -of my having to facebook accounts!
Hells Bells! I can't manage to keep track of one facebook account and have any degree of understanding of what's going on there what with all the changes Facebook itself seems to be making, like every other hour lately, much less taking on a second facebook account!
My abilities are severely limited at best to begin with so however this all came about, someone please explain this to me and tell me how to go about getting this all consolidated into just ONE area, please!
Now, to add to my confused state of mind, there are a few other things I want to tell you about too!
First off, our phone here in the house has been giving me royal fits for quite some time now. I already have some issues with my hearing, as my kids will attest to (they say it is selective hearing that is my problem but I contend it's them, not me who has selective hearing problems). However, the main house phone here is a cordless unit which, when a call comes in on it, frequently I can barely make out what the caller is saying! They tend to sound like they are calling from 5 million miles away from me, in a cavern or some such and I get really frustrated then when I answer the phone on my phone. This doesn't happen with incoming (or outgoing either) calls to my daughter, Mandy's number, which is a wall unit as well as it has a cordless phone to it too.
The lousy reception on my phone has been something of a thorn in my side, a major bone of contention too between my older daughter and myself as I would often be asking her to repeat what she was saying to me and she would get very snippy with me and irritated, and then yell at me over the phone when sometimes, I might be able to hear her but due to the damned phone reception, her words would come through somewhat garbled. No matter what I tried to do with the headset on my phone here, to try to increase the volume, it wouldn't do that!
So last week, I decided to check out pricings on another phone here. I couldn't purchase any the day I was over at Walmart looking at the phone selections because at that point in time, it would have cost me a bunch more than their sale prices since I knew I didn't have adequate funds available in my checking account so I just looked over the units and told Mandy that I was planning on getting a new phone here for on the desk for my phone line after I got my check this month!
Well, yesterday I had a visitor -my son's girlfriend and her little boy stopped by the house and little Ryan (who just turned 3 years old about 2 weeks ago) came in and handed me a smallish box and said "Here! Happy Birthday, Grammy J!"
Okay -it will be my birthday this coming Saturday so that's why he was giving me this box, you see.
I opened it and there inside -a nifty little gadget that all three of my kids and probably just about everyone else I know too have all, already had for several years now -a cellphone! My present from my son and Elizabeth and Ryan! Pretty neat, huh?
Elizabeth had taken the necessary steps to get this cellphone for me through "Safelink" -which I understand is a program whereby you can get a cellphone according to her, for free! I'm not sure what the requirements are to get this item in that manner but anyway, it comes with 120 minutes loaded into it and it renews those minutes every month too!
She said the reason they got this for me was so that when I go out anywhere, I can take it with me and that way, if my vehicle should break down, or I run out of gas -or also, get lost somewhere -then I can pick up this handy-dandy little cellphone and reach out and touch someone to come to my rescue! Yeah -the bit about the if I should "get lost" probably is what really triggered my son and Elizabeth into getting this phone for me since it was my son who was left out in the boondocks, in the rain, about two weeks ago when I was enroute to pick him up and ended up getting myself majorly lost up in the southwestern portion of our lovely county!
Well that, plus the fact that the gas gauge on my jeep doesn't work properly so you have to keep track of how much gas may be in the tank using the trip meter and remembering to reset it each time you put any gas in the tank, to make a mental note of how many gallons you put in and calculate then -mentally -how many miles you can probably safely go on that amount of gas too! This probably was embedded in Elizabeth's mind after she ran out of gas early one morning last winter while using my Jeep, in a really cold, snow and rain mixture on the interstate and ended up walking two miles to the exit ramp to try to phone someone here to come pick her up! (Yeah, that was one heck of a mess that morning and she's darned lucky she didn't have any issues with frostbite as a result of that walk too!)
So now, I have the also confusion producing thing here to figure out how to load phone numbers into this little cellphone and also, how to charge it up and keep it charged along with the general basics of simply how to operate the darned thing!
Don't get me wrong here now as I do appreciate their thoughtfulness in getting this phone for me and it is all registered and set up and ready to use -as soon as I am ready to try to use it. Thankfully, it doesn't have all the accoutrements that the cellphones my kids have on their cellphones -the internet, texting, a camera, etc. Okay -this one does have texting but I haven't a clue as to how to go about doing that plus, texting would tend to use my minutes up before I would know what the hell hit me so I just need to learn a tiny bit about how to operate this phone in that capacity and I think I should be okay there then. Agreed?
Now, if only this cellphone would have the capability of keeping me from getting off base, off target in my conversations, my postings to my blog, to my life in general, then it would definitely fulfill the function Clate and Elizabeth were thinking about when they figured this would help me in case I ever get lost again! Yep! Good luck trying to keep me from getting lost in my train of thoughts, ya know!
And, now -to move on to yet another area that is guaranteed to put more than a tad more confusion into my life over the coming two years at least and that would be taking on the responsibilities of being President of our Women's Group (WELCA) at our church! The lady who has been president of said group for the past two years now (and of which I had been willing to serve as Vice President) has tendered her resignation two months before the expiration of her term so that puts me then in the post of President till December of this year. However, she had asked if I would take on that position for the next two years though, beginning in December. I had thought about it a good bit but then, told her and the members of the nominating committee that I didn't feel comfortable in taking on the job as a duly elected representative ya know.
My main reasons for turning down this auspicious honor were mainly that I am way too disorganized, not nearly detail oriented enough and also, extremely -yes, extremely -forgetful! I just didn't feel I would be able to follow through and do all the necessary stuff to keep on top of the groups many activities!
However, after our meeting this past Tuesday night and having had a fairly lengthy conversation with our pastor after that meeting, I gave this a bit more thought and decided if my daughter here would agree to trying to keep me on top of things by coordinating our schedules and such a little more than we already do now and by her poking and prodding me to remind me of things that have to be done and when, etc., that maybe, with a lot of help from her there I could do this job after all.
So, Mandy and I talked it over Tuesday night and yesterday, I phoned my good friend, Kate, who is on the nominating committee to tell her I had changed my mind and would be willing to take the position of President now within our group!
So, with that in mind, keep me in your thoughts and prayers that I can keep things in order with the many things that are involved in this post and also, that I can keep our meetings in order, within a decent (i.e. short) time frame for the meetings and also, am going to set up a game plan that hopefully, will rein me in when I go off-topic, lose my train of thought while leading a meeting and begin to ramble!
I'm going to set up a couple little, simple, hand-signals that my friend Kate has been instructed to use -very subtly, of course, to let me know that I need to shut up! If you think I am the queen of ramble by the way most, if not all, of my posts are here, you ain't seen nothing till you see me in action, verbally! So, I told my friend Kate when she sees that is beginning to happen at our meetings, that she is to casually run her hand over her neck -in a gesture indicative of throat-cutting, ya know -to let me know it's time to switch gears and get back on track, moving things forward again! Pastor Carrie says she can't wait to see how we manage that one but I think if anyone can give me subtle signals to tell me that, Kate's the one who can do that! She's known me longer than anyone else except for my extended family -cousins and such, ya know -and she knows me probably even better than those relatives do too! Yeah, she can do it, of that I'm sure!
And now, before I get any more behind my so-called schedule for today -which means I have a sink full of dirty dishes at the moment in need of being washed, chicken thawing that I'm to use tonight to make Chinese Chicken for supper per request by Mandy's stepdaughter, who will be coming here for supper and then staying on tonight to watch the kids so Mandy can take me to the movies where we'll be seeing "The Help" which is part of Mandy's game plan as being part of my birthday present. I also have to get dressed -yeah, still parked here in my pajamas and it's now going on 1 p.m. -and take the mutt for a nice walk in the lovely chilly air but sunshiny day and after that, try to squeeze in enough time to do a little bit of stitching on the tabletopper I'm trying to get finished now too!
Now, if I can make it through the movie tonight without falling asleep in the seat -something I have a tendency to do whether it be in my recliner at home or in church or a movie theatre and it makes no never mind either how interesting whatever it is I may be listening to or watching either that I will do a crash and burn, zone off and catch some z's during said things either ya know -then it will definitely have been a really good day and night for me!
So wish me luck, please! And feel free to offer any suggestions or information to eliminate any aspect of the confusion in my mind with Facebook, Yahoo, Cellphone usage or my impending rise to the presidency! Heaven knows I'm gonna need all the help I can get in any and all of those departments!
About two weeks ago, I started to receive occasional e-mails sent to my primary e-mail account by me!
Yeah, you read that correctly! It seems I was sending e-mail from my yahoo e-mail address -which I rarely ever use -to my primary e-mail account so I figured, Hey -I've just had my yahoo e-mail account hacked!
And guess what? I was right! Wow -I figured that out all by myself! So I took some steps to change some things and thought things were all okay. That is, until this morning I thought things were okay.
I logged into that lovely Yahoo account after a friend on Facebook who is also a friend in a yahoo geneology group I belong to sent me a message about getting a message from me -from my yahoo e-mail addy and so I went over there and checked things out again.
That's how I came to discover that I had 4 friend requests sitting there for my Facebook account!
Now how in blazes -or why -did those requests go to my yahoo e-mail anyway? To my knowledge, I have never listed my yahoo e-mail address anywhere on Facebook so how/why did that happen?
I went through and organized my yahoo group messages and tried then to get the Facebook friending issue resolved but that merely ended up with things getting really weird then -in my mind -with Facebook as it appears now that I have a second facebook account that I can log into via my yahoo e-mail but it doesn't have all my friends showing up there that I see when I log into Facebook using my primary e-mail address!
Remember that old TV sitcom from years back -Welcome Back Kotter -and Vinny Barbarino putting his hands up to his face and exclaiming "I'm so confused!!!"? Well, that would be me right about now with all this crapola now between Yahoo and my primary e-mail addresses and the appearance -or so it seems -of my having to facebook accounts!
Hells Bells! I can't manage to keep track of one facebook account and have any degree of understanding of what's going on there what with all the changes Facebook itself seems to be making, like every other hour lately, much less taking on a second facebook account!
My abilities are severely limited at best to begin with so however this all came about, someone please explain this to me and tell me how to go about getting this all consolidated into just ONE area, please!
Now, to add to my confused state of mind, there are a few other things I want to tell you about too!
First off, our phone here in the house has been giving me royal fits for quite some time now. I already have some issues with my hearing, as my kids will attest to (they say it is selective hearing that is my problem but I contend it's them, not me who has selective hearing problems). However, the main house phone here is a cordless unit which, when a call comes in on it, frequently I can barely make out what the caller is saying! They tend to sound like they are calling from 5 million miles away from me, in a cavern or some such and I get really frustrated then when I answer the phone on my phone. This doesn't happen with incoming (or outgoing either) calls to my daughter, Mandy's number, which is a wall unit as well as it has a cordless phone to it too.
The lousy reception on my phone has been something of a thorn in my side, a major bone of contention too between my older daughter and myself as I would often be asking her to repeat what she was saying to me and she would get very snippy with me and irritated, and then yell at me over the phone when sometimes, I might be able to hear her but due to the damned phone reception, her words would come through somewhat garbled. No matter what I tried to do with the headset on my phone here, to try to increase the volume, it wouldn't do that!
So last week, I decided to check out pricings on another phone here. I couldn't purchase any the day I was over at Walmart looking at the phone selections because at that point in time, it would have cost me a bunch more than their sale prices since I knew I didn't have adequate funds available in my checking account so I just looked over the units and told Mandy that I was planning on getting a new phone here for on the desk for my phone line after I got my check this month!
Well, yesterday I had a visitor -my son's girlfriend and her little boy stopped by the house and little Ryan (who just turned 3 years old about 2 weeks ago) came in and handed me a smallish box and said "Here! Happy Birthday, Grammy J!"
Okay -it will be my birthday this coming Saturday so that's why he was giving me this box, you see.
I opened it and there inside -a nifty little gadget that all three of my kids and probably just about everyone else I know too have all, already had for several years now -a cellphone! My present from my son and Elizabeth and Ryan! Pretty neat, huh?
Elizabeth had taken the necessary steps to get this cellphone for me through "Safelink" -which I understand is a program whereby you can get a cellphone according to her, for free! I'm not sure what the requirements are to get this item in that manner but anyway, it comes with 120 minutes loaded into it and it renews those minutes every month too!
She said the reason they got this for me was so that when I go out anywhere, I can take it with me and that way, if my vehicle should break down, or I run out of gas -or also, get lost somewhere -then I can pick up this handy-dandy little cellphone and reach out and touch someone to come to my rescue! Yeah -the bit about the if I should "get lost" probably is what really triggered my son and Elizabeth into getting this phone for me since it was my son who was left out in the boondocks, in the rain, about two weeks ago when I was enroute to pick him up and ended up getting myself majorly lost up in the southwestern portion of our lovely county!
Well that, plus the fact that the gas gauge on my jeep doesn't work properly so you have to keep track of how much gas may be in the tank using the trip meter and remembering to reset it each time you put any gas in the tank, to make a mental note of how many gallons you put in and calculate then -mentally -how many miles you can probably safely go on that amount of gas too! This probably was embedded in Elizabeth's mind after she ran out of gas early one morning last winter while using my Jeep, in a really cold, snow and rain mixture on the interstate and ended up walking two miles to the exit ramp to try to phone someone here to come pick her up! (Yeah, that was one heck of a mess that morning and she's darned lucky she didn't have any issues with frostbite as a result of that walk too!)
So now, I have the also confusion producing thing here to figure out how to load phone numbers into this little cellphone and also, how to charge it up and keep it charged along with the general basics of simply how to operate the darned thing!
Don't get me wrong here now as I do appreciate their thoughtfulness in getting this phone for me and it is all registered and set up and ready to use -as soon as I am ready to try to use it. Thankfully, it doesn't have all the accoutrements that the cellphones my kids have on their cellphones -the internet, texting, a camera, etc. Okay -this one does have texting but I haven't a clue as to how to go about doing that plus, texting would tend to use my minutes up before I would know what the hell hit me so I just need to learn a tiny bit about how to operate this phone in that capacity and I think I should be okay there then. Agreed?
Now, if only this cellphone would have the capability of keeping me from getting off base, off target in my conversations, my postings to my blog, to my life in general, then it would definitely fulfill the function Clate and Elizabeth were thinking about when they figured this would help me in case I ever get lost again! Yep! Good luck trying to keep me from getting lost in my train of thoughts, ya know!
And, now -to move on to yet another area that is guaranteed to put more than a tad more confusion into my life over the coming two years at least and that would be taking on the responsibilities of being President of our Women's Group (WELCA) at our church! The lady who has been president of said group for the past two years now (and of which I had been willing to serve as Vice President) has tendered her resignation two months before the expiration of her term so that puts me then in the post of President till December of this year. However, she had asked if I would take on that position for the next two years though, beginning in December. I had thought about it a good bit but then, told her and the members of the nominating committee that I didn't feel comfortable in taking on the job as a duly elected representative ya know.
My main reasons for turning down this auspicious honor were mainly that I am way too disorganized, not nearly detail oriented enough and also, extremely -yes, extremely -forgetful! I just didn't feel I would be able to follow through and do all the necessary stuff to keep on top of the groups many activities!
However, after our meeting this past Tuesday night and having had a fairly lengthy conversation with our pastor after that meeting, I gave this a bit more thought and decided if my daughter here would agree to trying to keep me on top of things by coordinating our schedules and such a little more than we already do now and by her poking and prodding me to remind me of things that have to be done and when, etc., that maybe, with a lot of help from her there I could do this job after all.
So, Mandy and I talked it over Tuesday night and yesterday, I phoned my good friend, Kate, who is on the nominating committee to tell her I had changed my mind and would be willing to take the position of President now within our group!
So, with that in mind, keep me in your thoughts and prayers that I can keep things in order with the many things that are involved in this post and also, that I can keep our meetings in order, within a decent (i.e. short) time frame for the meetings and also, am going to set up a game plan that hopefully, will rein me in when I go off-topic, lose my train of thought while leading a meeting and begin to ramble!
I'm going to set up a couple little, simple, hand-signals that my friend Kate has been instructed to use -very subtly, of course, to let me know that I need to shut up! If you think I am the queen of ramble by the way most, if not all, of my posts are here, you ain't seen nothing till you see me in action, verbally! So, I told my friend Kate when she sees that is beginning to happen at our meetings, that she is to casually run her hand over her neck -in a gesture indicative of throat-cutting, ya know -to let me know it's time to switch gears and get back on track, moving things forward again! Pastor Carrie says she can't wait to see how we manage that one but I think if anyone can give me subtle signals to tell me that, Kate's the one who can do that! She's known me longer than anyone else except for my extended family -cousins and such, ya know -and she knows me probably even better than those relatives do too! Yeah, she can do it, of that I'm sure!
And now, before I get any more behind my so-called schedule for today -which means I have a sink full of dirty dishes at the moment in need of being washed, chicken thawing that I'm to use tonight to make Chinese Chicken for supper per request by Mandy's stepdaughter, who will be coming here for supper and then staying on tonight to watch the kids so Mandy can take me to the movies where we'll be seeing "The Help" which is part of Mandy's game plan as being part of my birthday present. I also have to get dressed -yeah, still parked here in my pajamas and it's now going on 1 p.m. -and take the mutt for a nice walk in the lovely chilly air but sunshiny day and after that, try to squeeze in enough time to do a little bit of stitching on the tabletopper I'm trying to get finished now too!
Now, if I can make it through the movie tonight without falling asleep in the seat -something I have a tendency to do whether it be in my recliner at home or in church or a movie theatre and it makes no never mind either how interesting whatever it is I may be listening to or watching either that I will do a crash and burn, zone off and catch some z's during said things either ya know -then it will definitely have been a really good day and night for me!
So wish me luck, please! And feel free to offer any suggestions or information to eliminate any aspect of the confusion in my mind with Facebook, Yahoo, Cellphone usage or my impending rise to the presidency! Heaven knows I'm gonna need all the help I can get in any and all of those departments!
Monday, October 03, 2011
The Heavens Opened....
Judging by the weather we've had around here since -oh about Labor Day or so -and also, feeling the very wet hair on my head now as I type this, I do believe the heavens have opened and the Good Lord apparently forgot to turn off the faucet or has decided to water, all too generously, the eastern part of this country while leaving the southwest in a mega state of wishful thinking for water, any amount, any day soon!
It does seem to me that it has rained at some point in time just about every single day since Labor Day weekend around these hills. I can't speak for everyone around these parts, but I'm pretty darned sure the majority of folks here feel as I do and that is that we are getting darned sick and tired of the wet, gray -very gray -and pretty damned cold days too that we've had delivered to us over the past month now!
Today, about an hour ago, I ventured out with Sammy to walk up to our mail boxes so I could send out two cards -a "get well note" and also, a straight get well card. Good exercise you know for Sammy as well as for me because walking up to the mail boxes gives me about twice the distance Sam and I generally walk here of late. And trust me, I really do need all the walking exercise my old legs and back will permit! Actually, I need a whole hell of a lot more but the legs are showing the aging process, as is my back, and they don't appreciate handling the extra work load apparently because they then ache like toothache by the time I get back home!
But today, when Sam and I left the house, it was gray -yes, nothing new in that -but it was NOT raining. We got about halfway up the road to the mailboxes, when as we were in front of the last house on the hillside, on the left -just before the little wooded area -this dog, about twice the size of Sammy (at least that) came tearing down through the yard there, heading -of course -straight for little old Sam. Sam, as is his manner, greeted this bruiser (I learned later from Mandy that is "Clyde" and he's a two-year-old pit bull) like here was his long-lost, life-long friend who should be met with hugs and kisses! How else would one possibly greet a very friendly pit-bull anyway?
I stopped to let Sam and Clyde do their normal sniffing things and the owner of Clyde had also come down the hill just to be on the safe side I suppose, that things stayed cool, calm and collected between the two dogs.
We, the owner and I, stood there and chit-chatted a good while, as I wasn't in a big hurry to make my way to the mailboxes and then, as we were talking, wouldn't you just know but it started to rain!
Yeah, and there I was totally unprepared to get a full body shower of a rather chilly type too, I might add. I had no umbrella with me, of course. Why in blazes would I want to go walking and take an umbrella along anyway? Who'd a thunk I was gonna get drenched anyway? Obviously, I sure hadn't seen that as a potential in my life today.
Well, with the rain coming down, we said our goodbyes and I made it up to the mailboxes, picked up our mail, dropped my outgoing cards in the slot and Sam and I started heading back to the house. Shortly after passing Clyde's home on our return trip -and as quickly as the shower had come on -the heavens closed up again and we had dry travels then the rest of the way home.
Now as much as I really am not that big a fan of rain, especially not damned near every day for over a month, what we received yesterday morning though was just totally out of line!
Here's what I saw when I went outside about 11 a.m. Sunday morning!
If you look a bit closer at the stuff on the windshield of my little old jeep-buggy, and also, note the little dabbles of white on the grass in the background to the left of this photo, you will see an unmistakable substance there call SNOW!
Yes, we had snow here yesterday! According to the weather reports last evening, there was an accumulation of 1.2 inches -no less -in Philipsburg, the biggest town closest to this little village.
Now all I have to say about that is that it is time to find the shut-off valve on the heavens and stop this nonsense.
Do it NOW, too! Please?
It does seem to me that it has rained at some point in time just about every single day since Labor Day weekend around these hills. I can't speak for everyone around these parts, but I'm pretty darned sure the majority of folks here feel as I do and that is that we are getting darned sick and tired of the wet, gray -very gray -and pretty damned cold days too that we've had delivered to us over the past month now!
Today, about an hour ago, I ventured out with Sammy to walk up to our mail boxes so I could send out two cards -a "get well note" and also, a straight get well card. Good exercise you know for Sammy as well as for me because walking up to the mail boxes gives me about twice the distance Sam and I generally walk here of late. And trust me, I really do need all the walking exercise my old legs and back will permit! Actually, I need a whole hell of a lot more but the legs are showing the aging process, as is my back, and they don't appreciate handling the extra work load apparently because they then ache like toothache by the time I get back home!
But today, when Sam and I left the house, it was gray -yes, nothing new in that -but it was NOT raining. We got about halfway up the road to the mailboxes, when as we were in front of the last house on the hillside, on the left -just before the little wooded area -this dog, about twice the size of Sammy (at least that) came tearing down through the yard there, heading -of course -straight for little old Sam. Sam, as is his manner, greeted this bruiser (I learned later from Mandy that is "Clyde" and he's a two-year-old pit bull) like here was his long-lost, life-long friend who should be met with hugs and kisses! How else would one possibly greet a very friendly pit-bull anyway?
I stopped to let Sam and Clyde do their normal sniffing things and the owner of Clyde had also come down the hill just to be on the safe side I suppose, that things stayed cool, calm and collected between the two dogs.
We, the owner and I, stood there and chit-chatted a good while, as I wasn't in a big hurry to make my way to the mailboxes and then, as we were talking, wouldn't you just know but it started to rain!
Yeah, and there I was totally unprepared to get a full body shower of a rather chilly type too, I might add. I had no umbrella with me, of course. Why in blazes would I want to go walking and take an umbrella along anyway? Who'd a thunk I was gonna get drenched anyway? Obviously, I sure hadn't seen that as a potential in my life today.
Well, with the rain coming down, we said our goodbyes and I made it up to the mailboxes, picked up our mail, dropped my outgoing cards in the slot and Sam and I started heading back to the house. Shortly after passing Clyde's home on our return trip -and as quickly as the shower had come on -the heavens closed up again and we had dry travels then the rest of the way home.
Now as much as I really am not that big a fan of rain, especially not damned near every day for over a month, what we received yesterday morning though was just totally out of line!
Here's what I saw when I went outside about 11 a.m. Sunday morning!
Yes, we had snow here yesterday! According to the weather reports last evening, there was an accumulation of 1.2 inches -no less -in Philipsburg, the biggest town closest to this little village.
Now all I have to say about that is that it is time to find the shut-off valve on the heavens and stop this nonsense.
Do it NOW, too! Please?
Sunday, October 02, 2011
Lovely Trees
Thanks to all the rain we've been having here the past month -I think it has rained at some time or other almost every day since Labor Day -I haven't been out walking Sam near as much as I should. My walks with him haven't been near regular enough to really do me much good in the exercise department, mainly because too many days my joints have been really notifying me -big time -that they are there and not happy about walking much. I've not had many walks this past summer where I went the distances I normally walked last summer due to the combination of the yucky, wet weather and the aches firing up on me a lot quicker on those walks then too.
I did however get a couple of pictures about two weeks ago that I meant to write a post about the trees but got waylaid by some other important matter of some sort I guess.
This is how the trees just down the road from my house looked about two weeks ago -just starting to turn colors a tiny bit.
And this view, is just past the area in the first picture and was taken two weeks prior to the first picture. Everything the end of August was still all nice and green and quite lovely and two weeks later, autumn painting had begun!
This tree -or bush -is located at the corner of the property catty-cornered from my house and I had never noticed this one before this year. I don't know why, but just never noticed it so, if it had something in the way of a fruit or whatever on it in previous years, I'd not seen them. But I saw them this year and have to confess I have no idea whatsoever what kind of tree/bush this is and therefore, certainly have no clue as to what it is producing on it either. So, if you will, take a closer look at the "fruit" and see if you can identify it for me!
Here's a picture of one of the three apple trees located along the dirt road down the street from my home -and which Sammy and I walk past on most of our strolls. This tree has been just loaded with apples this year! Around the end of August, Mandy, Ken and Maya took a great big bucket (I think it's a 5-gallon size) with them one day when they were walking Sammy and filled that bucket to the brim with apples they picked up that were on the ground and presented them to me to use for applesauce or pies or whatever. These apples are really remarkable to me in that the trees are totally untended, certainly have never been sprayed or anything, and when I peeled them, I never came across a single wormy apple!
This apple tree is almost across the road from the one above and as you can see, it had produced a very large crop of apples this year too. But by the time I took the photo of the first apple tree -two weeks after this picture was taken -this tree had shed almost all its apples! Both trees yield a very tart apple, but they do cook up well for applesauce and/or pies!
This picture was taken of an area along the old road going down to Peale -the ghost town -and just behind that log across the little rill or ditch there, are all kinds of big mushrooms growing. I have no clue if they are the kind of mushrooms one can pick and cook with as I never learned how to differentiate which are good and which are poisonous, but never noticed as many mushrooms growing around here as there seem to be this fall!
This is the beginning of the wooded area behind where the apple trees are growing -which is the hillside behind my house directly in the middle and to the right, is the woods on the way out Cooper Two Road. Sam and I occasionally walk that road out Cooper Two Road and up to where the mine reclamation project was last year. This year, I have no walked up the mountain though on Cooper Two Road and up to the reclamation area but I do have a very good view of that project down at the end of my road, where Peale Road begins. Unfortunately, my little camera can't capture that view very well though so I have no shots of that this year.
About two or three weeks ago, we had visitors here at our house! These are my two lovely nieces -Angela and Heather -who had come here for the weekend to attend their Mom's baby sister's wedding.
And here are the cousins -Maya, Lizzie, Kurtis and Gracie -when they were here for a short visit that weekend. Maya is four days older than Lizzie so both those girls will be 8 this month now. Kurtis, of course -the thorn between the roses, ya know -is 5 now and little Gracie, is four! We hadn't seen Angie, Heather and the girls for three years so, when I happened to hear some voices in the yard and looked up from my garden to see two little girls running up the steps to our back deck, I had no idea who in blazes those kids were! Until I walked up to the deck myself and got a closer look -plus Angie came out of the kitchen to the deck then too and of course, I recognized her immediately! Aren't they a cute little group though?
This is Maya, last Saturday at Burger King, doing what apparently is one of her "interpretive" dances in honor of my son's girlfriend's little boy (Ryan) for his birthday celebration there!
Here's Elizabeth -Clate's girlfriend -putting the finishing touches on a special cake she fixed for Ryan's party. It's all different kinds of fruits -cantelope, honeydew, watermelon -stuck into a cake via toothpicks. Now, this is something that held absolutely NO interest whatsoever for Maya and Kurtis as those two picky ones wouldn't dream of touching any of those tidbits of fruit, not even if their lives depended on it! But, the other little kids there cleaned house on those pieces of melon! See Maya -some kids do have good tastebuds after all!
Kurtis -getting into the swing of things with his own special dance techniques!
And finally, here's Ryan -the birthday boy himself! He was being a tad on the shy side when we got this shot of him, but the shyness was very short-lived (as it usually is with Ryan) and he quickly took command of things and was racing and chasing around the place, having himself a high old time! (That's my son standing beside Ryan there.)
And that's about what's been happening around my little neck of the world -short walks with the dog, watching trees change color and judging apple production levels with a short but very much enjoyed and appreciated visit by my nieces and great-nieces this past month!
Hope the weather begins to dry up a bit here soon so I can get a few more nice walking days in and here's hoping that Angie and Heather (my very favorite nieces, both of 'em) along with Lizzie and Gracie have an opportunity to come back and visit again soon and when they can stay a little longer then too!
I did however get a couple of pictures about two weeks ago that I meant to write a post about the trees but got waylaid by some other important matter of some sort I guess.
And this view, is just past the area in the first picture and was taken two weeks prior to the first picture. Everything the end of August was still all nice and green and quite lovely and two weeks later, autumn painting had begun!
And that's about what's been happening around my little neck of the world -short walks with the dog, watching trees change color and judging apple production levels with a short but very much enjoyed and appreciated visit by my nieces and great-nieces this past month!
Hope the weather begins to dry up a bit here soon so I can get a few more nice walking days in and here's hoping that Angie and Heather (my very favorite nieces, both of 'em) along with Lizzie and Gracie have an opportunity to come back and visit again soon and when they can stay a little longer then too!
Friday, September 30, 2011
Literally Speaking?
One of the traits that most of the bloggers I follow know about me is that frequently, when I comment, I get more than a bit oh, long-winded, shall we say? Yeah, go ahead and say it cause it's true, it really is.
But there's sort of a reason behind that.
Sometimes, I could kick myself when I do that because I might be dealing with being brain dead here trying to think of a topic to write about or a story to tell and then, I read someone else's post, which changes my train o thought and opens up a mini-gusher of a well and I can't seem to stop myself.
I have no job to write about in my posts -haven't had one of those for oh, the past almost nine years now -so sometimes that limits (in my mind anyway) what I could kind of, sort of, write about I guess. I can write about jobs I've had at times in the past but unfortunately, trying to remember word-for-word the really good stories I used to remember, that I thought I would never ever forget too, can be like pulling hen's teeth!
Sometimes I think well, if I'd had a career consisting of something like Physicians & Surgeons Jobs, I'd really have a plethora of things to write about, wouldn't I? Well, maybe, maybe not there too cause I'd probably slip up and break that HIPPA Privacy ruling or something by tossing in information that would thus identify the patient and we wouldn't want that to happen, now would we?
Well, we don't need to worry about that though because I don't know diddly-squat about that stuff and we're all much better off from that too.
But one thing I can and often do try to write about are some of the things my two little grandkids -who live here with me, remember -do and today was one of those days when there were some good comments coming from both of them.
For openers, today was Picture Day at school for them so they were each supposed to take the form sent home about a week or two ago which Mandy was to fill out and return showing how many lovely photos she was going to want to purchase (sight unseen too) of the little darlings all decked out, shining brightly those two little stars that they are, ya know.
And of course, last night, wouldn't you just know it but Mandy could not locate those doggone forms no where, no way, no how! Seems they had apparently moved to a different state of disarray within the house -something that here, is quite easy for things like that to do -develop legs of their own and get up and move to who knows where!
So, after she pretty much had torn the dining room and parts of the living room and kitchen too apart, doing a search and destroy mission, Mandy gave up and remembered she could go online and order the pics, plus pay for them then too and not have to worry then after all about sending the form in to school this morning with the kids.
Of course, this was fine with Kurtis because he had no clue about what picture day means to start with, much less that you had to have a form signed, sealed, paid for and delivered to the powers that be to have his picture taken. Fact of the matter is that he could care less about getting is picture taken at any time and tends as a result to act the total goofball, not trying to pose nicely but rather -well, to waste Mom's money by making some sort of weird face as soon as the shutter snaps.
Maya on the other hand -well, she is generally quite the ham, very much the diva too and she wanted to be dressed as nicely as possible, hair all done up just so (gee, so many memories come to me of sooooo very many days over three decades ago when I went through very similar episodes like that with her aunt, whose every hair had to be just perfectly in place, whose outfit had to be completely coordinated and heaven forbid that she even thought she might be getting a zit that would surely break out into a mountain by the end of the next weekend to come!) Yeah, she was very much like that and Miss Maya very much is like that lovely aunt of hers!
So to Maya, that paper was a necessity so she could have her picture taken today looking her very best! And when she realized that paper wasn't present and accounted for in her backpack this morning, for a brief while, it did look like all Hell was going to break loose! Eventually though, Mandy did get things explained to her that all had been already taken care of and that Mom had done all of it online -and Maya -who understands a good bit about how people can do lots and lots of things using the internet then finally settled down and trundled off to school, ready to be photographed in all her stunning glory!
Mandy then, trying to be on the safe side with Kurtis, then sent a text message to Kurt's TSS (the aide who works with him all day in school to try to keep him focused and on the straight and narrow) asking Miss Dawn to please try to get him to smile nicely, not one of his normal sillliness poses, ya know. (EGAD! But here again, history, for me is repeating itself because that was always one of the things I worried a whole lot about on picture days a few decades back with my son, Kurt's lovely Uncle, and of whom Kurtis is virtually a clone! In more ways that just this one!)
So Miss Dawn had written back that she would try but to remember that she is merely a TSS not a miracle worker!
And so, a bit later after the picture-taking was all done, Mandy received a text from Miss Dawn saying how she and Kurtis had practiced over and over, the art of presenting a good smile,making for a nice picture of him. And things were going pretty smoothly she thought as they stood in line, waiting for his time in the spotlight of the camera to come, when he turned to her and asked "Can you sit up there with me and we get picture taken together?"
Thankfully, he accepted her explanation that no, he'd be there, sitting by himself but that he would do fine and near as she could tell from her visual vantage point, she thought the smile on his face was one that wouldn't shock the living daylights out of Mandy when she gets the kids picture packets delivered a couple of weeks from now.
Now, fast forward from the picture episode to the supper table tonight. I fixed some baked Tilapia fish fillets -just lightly "kissed" them with a brush of a teensy bit of olive oil mixed with a bit of paprika and baked till they flaked. With that, we had some long grain and wild rice mixed along with baked acorn squash, home grown in my lovely little garden. Can you believe that -fish without mac'n'cheese? In this house? What's this world coming to anyway? And I admit having a lot of trepidation too about fixing those things for supper because fish was the only item on the menu that usually those two kids will eat. Key word here being "usually."
Well, at first they both balked, big time, when they saw what Mandy had put on their plates! Kurtis decided immediately that he doesn't like fish because "it makes my mouth and tongue all hot!" Actually, the reason he made a comment like that was because he's pretty much only accustome to fish that has some kind of coating on it and this, tonight -no coating, no breading involved, ya see! He threw a bit of a hissy fit too about the rice but that I pretty much expected he would do. Maya on the other hand, at the rice with no complaints, no comments but hadn't touched her fish for quite a while until when we asked her why, she said she didn't know it was fish. I'm not sure what she mistook it to be but once she realized it was fish, she just wanted some tartar sauce and in a flash, her fish was gone! We didn't even entertain trying to get either of them to take a taste of the squash cause sometimes, Mandy and I know how to pick our battles, especially with foods, with those two.
But it was quite a struggle to get Kurtis to eat anything tonight as he diddled and dawdled away, pushing the fish and rice around a bit but not putting any of it near his mouth. Then Mandy announced to him that if he didn't eat his supper, he'd not be getting any dessert which of course, resulted in a whole lot of whining and wailing from him.
By this time, I was getting really peeved with him and his refusals so re-ran the bribery thing past him several times about how he would be very hungry later tonight from not eating anything and there would be no peanut-butter bread in its place and most certainly, there would absolutely not be even a teensy bite of ice cream either.
Finally, somehow or other, something in my threats to him must have registered and he thought things over saying well, maybe he could eat as long as he only had to have a couple of bites. I said well, by the looks of what's on your plate, I think you could do it in probably about six or seven bites maybe. So he began then to get one little grain of rice on his spoon and into his mouth it went, counting -silently though -as he did that. I then told him he needed to make those bites count and proceeded to show him that a little bit more on the spoon constituted a spoonful, which then in turn made it what I considered to be "a bite." And that was what I told him "counted" in the eating process.
To which Maya then piped up and said that he couldn't count though because only second graders could do that!
Hmmm. Seems Gram sort of forgot that there are different meanings to the word "count" or "counting" aren't there?
But there's sort of a reason behind that.
Sometimes, I could kick myself when I do that because I might be dealing with being brain dead here trying to think of a topic to write about or a story to tell and then, I read someone else's post, which changes my train o thought and opens up a mini-gusher of a well and I can't seem to stop myself.
I have no job to write about in my posts -haven't had one of those for oh, the past almost nine years now -so sometimes that limits (in my mind anyway) what I could kind of, sort of, write about I guess. I can write about jobs I've had at times in the past but unfortunately, trying to remember word-for-word the really good stories I used to remember, that I thought I would never ever forget too, can be like pulling hen's teeth!
Sometimes I think well, if I'd had a career consisting of something like Physicians & Surgeons Jobs, I'd really have a plethora of things to write about, wouldn't I? Well, maybe, maybe not there too cause I'd probably slip up and break that HIPPA Privacy ruling or something by tossing in information that would thus identify the patient and we wouldn't want that to happen, now would we?
Well, we don't need to worry about that though because I don't know diddly-squat about that stuff and we're all much better off from that too.
But one thing I can and often do try to write about are some of the things my two little grandkids -who live here with me, remember -do and today was one of those days when there were some good comments coming from both of them.
For openers, today was Picture Day at school for them so they were each supposed to take the form sent home about a week or two ago which Mandy was to fill out and return showing how many lovely photos she was going to want to purchase (sight unseen too) of the little darlings all decked out, shining brightly those two little stars that they are, ya know.
And of course, last night, wouldn't you just know it but Mandy could not locate those doggone forms no where, no way, no how! Seems they had apparently moved to a different state of disarray within the house -something that here, is quite easy for things like that to do -develop legs of their own and get up and move to who knows where!
So, after she pretty much had torn the dining room and parts of the living room and kitchen too apart, doing a search and destroy mission, Mandy gave up and remembered she could go online and order the pics, plus pay for them then too and not have to worry then after all about sending the form in to school this morning with the kids.
Of course, this was fine with Kurtis because he had no clue about what picture day means to start with, much less that you had to have a form signed, sealed, paid for and delivered to the powers that be to have his picture taken. Fact of the matter is that he could care less about getting is picture taken at any time and tends as a result to act the total goofball, not trying to pose nicely but rather -well, to waste Mom's money by making some sort of weird face as soon as the shutter snaps.
Maya on the other hand -well, she is generally quite the ham, very much the diva too and she wanted to be dressed as nicely as possible, hair all done up just so (gee, so many memories come to me of sooooo very many days over three decades ago when I went through very similar episodes like that with her aunt, whose every hair had to be just perfectly in place, whose outfit had to be completely coordinated and heaven forbid that she even thought she might be getting a zit that would surely break out into a mountain by the end of the next weekend to come!) Yeah, she was very much like that and Miss Maya very much is like that lovely aunt of hers!
So to Maya, that paper was a necessity so she could have her picture taken today looking her very best! And when she realized that paper wasn't present and accounted for in her backpack this morning, for a brief while, it did look like all Hell was going to break loose! Eventually though, Mandy did get things explained to her that all had been already taken care of and that Mom had done all of it online -and Maya -who understands a good bit about how people can do lots and lots of things using the internet then finally settled down and trundled off to school, ready to be photographed in all her stunning glory!
Mandy then, trying to be on the safe side with Kurtis, then sent a text message to Kurt's TSS (the aide who works with him all day in school to try to keep him focused and on the straight and narrow) asking Miss Dawn to please try to get him to smile nicely, not one of his normal sillliness poses, ya know. (EGAD! But here again, history, for me is repeating itself because that was always one of the things I worried a whole lot about on picture days a few decades back with my son, Kurt's lovely Uncle, and of whom Kurtis is virtually a clone! In more ways that just this one!)
So Miss Dawn had written back that she would try but to remember that she is merely a TSS not a miracle worker!
And so, a bit later after the picture-taking was all done, Mandy received a text from Miss Dawn saying how she and Kurtis had practiced over and over, the art of presenting a good smile,making for a nice picture of him. And things were going pretty smoothly she thought as they stood in line, waiting for his time in the spotlight of the camera to come, when he turned to her and asked "Can you sit up there with me and we get picture taken together?"
Thankfully, he accepted her explanation that no, he'd be there, sitting by himself but that he would do fine and near as she could tell from her visual vantage point, she thought the smile on his face was one that wouldn't shock the living daylights out of Mandy when she gets the kids picture packets delivered a couple of weeks from now.
Now, fast forward from the picture episode to the supper table tonight. I fixed some baked Tilapia fish fillets -just lightly "kissed" them with a brush of a teensy bit of olive oil mixed with a bit of paprika and baked till they flaked. With that, we had some long grain and wild rice mixed along with baked acorn squash, home grown in my lovely little garden. Can you believe that -fish without mac'n'cheese? In this house? What's this world coming to anyway? And I admit having a lot of trepidation too about fixing those things for supper because fish was the only item on the menu that usually those two kids will eat. Key word here being "usually."
Well, at first they both balked, big time, when they saw what Mandy had put on their plates! Kurtis decided immediately that he doesn't like fish because "it makes my mouth and tongue all hot!" Actually, the reason he made a comment like that was because he's pretty much only accustome to fish that has some kind of coating on it and this, tonight -no coating, no breading involved, ya see! He threw a bit of a hissy fit too about the rice but that I pretty much expected he would do. Maya on the other hand, at the rice with no complaints, no comments but hadn't touched her fish for quite a while until when we asked her why, she said she didn't know it was fish. I'm not sure what she mistook it to be but once she realized it was fish, she just wanted some tartar sauce and in a flash, her fish was gone! We didn't even entertain trying to get either of them to take a taste of the squash cause sometimes, Mandy and I know how to pick our battles, especially with foods, with those two.
But it was quite a struggle to get Kurtis to eat anything tonight as he diddled and dawdled away, pushing the fish and rice around a bit but not putting any of it near his mouth. Then Mandy announced to him that if he didn't eat his supper, he'd not be getting any dessert which of course, resulted in a whole lot of whining and wailing from him.
By this time, I was getting really peeved with him and his refusals so re-ran the bribery thing past him several times about how he would be very hungry later tonight from not eating anything and there would be no peanut-butter bread in its place and most certainly, there would absolutely not be even a teensy bite of ice cream either.
Finally, somehow or other, something in my threats to him must have registered and he thought things over saying well, maybe he could eat as long as he only had to have a couple of bites. I said well, by the looks of what's on your plate, I think you could do it in probably about six or seven bites maybe. So he began then to get one little grain of rice on his spoon and into his mouth it went, counting -silently though -as he did that. I then told him he needed to make those bites count and proceeded to show him that a little bit more on the spoon constituted a spoonful, which then in turn made it what I considered to be "a bite." And that was what I told him "counted" in the eating process.
To which Maya then piped up and said that he couldn't count though because only second graders could do that!
Hmmm. Seems Gram sort of forgot that there are different meanings to the word "count" or "counting" aren't there?
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Flying By - Before My Eyes!
Something I remembered yesterday - that September 26th was my grandfather's birthday! I hadn't thought of that in a long time but I guess because there were so many things going on around here of late -which reminded me of people from my past -that it was a memory that came to me and stayed on my mind all day yesterday.
Were it possible for him to have lived this long, he would have been 137 years old yesterday! He passed away in March of 1957 -54 years ago -when I was 12 years old and I still miss him, very much, all these many years later. A quiet, very gentle man he was with a soft voice and, as I remarked to Mandy about him, he had very, very little trace of an accent of his native language, Swedish. He loved music, had a beautiful bass voice and I suppose because of how much I loved to hear him sing, to this day, I love hearing a good bass voice! He read -a lot -loved history and gardening and would probably be appalled at my attempts to grow a garden -especially my first ones about 30 years ago which were really dismal failures. This year, he might have thought there was a bit of potential for me to grow a few things -that is before the damned squash bugs came along and sucked the juice out of my yellow squash plants. Oh yes, they did that! But to my credit, we did get quite a number of yellow squash to dine on before that plague came to live in my garden and I also got about 15-18 acorn squash too -although they were a bit on the smallish side they still tasted darned good! By comparison to his gardens when I was a kid, mine is just a tiny drop in the bucket! He grew lots and lots over a much larger area too that I plant but we rarely wanted for most any vegetable that could be grown in the type of climate in this section of Pennsylvania. Corn, green beans, beets, were planted in abundance and when they were ripe, my Mom and Grandmother canned and canned and then, canned some more, for days and days -actually probably for weeks too when you add in all the tomatoes they would put up along with the apples they would go down to Peale and pick to can jar after jar of applesauce! He and his older brother used to have contests to determine which of them could grown the largest potato, along with who could harvest the most potatoes in a season too. And onions! We rarely ever had to buy onions from one year to the next as what he got in one season generally lasted almost up until the onions were ready the next summer!
It was my Grandpa who taught me to love books -and reading -and as a child I spent a whole lot of my time, year-round, with my nose always in some book! One of my favorite bloggers -Rick at In My Own Write (or Stories I Share With Friends) has a passion about reading that is a lot like mine was as a child but as I grew older, too many other things seemed to prevent me from reading near the volume of stuff I used to consume all the time as a kid! I do still enjoy reading but just don't do it near as often these days. But Rick and I tend to enjoy a lot of the same things in our reading -history! However, my favorites in that category lean more to fictionalized accounts of history whereas he prefers non-fiction. Today, he posted a list he has on Amazon.com with his favorite books, which was interesting to read. One thing that amazed me though was one of his favorite topics is Labor and Labor Unions and he listed a book there that was written by one of my professors at Penn State -who just happened to be one of my favorite instructors too -Dr. Paul Clark! You know I loved learning that because it totally appealed to my love of "small world" kind of things too!
A few of my favorite bloggers have remarked recently that they are celebrating their anniversary of beginning their blog -Skittles, Technobabe and Dave at "Rather Than Working" all began their blogs around this time, five years ago and that's about when I started blogging too. Funny thing though is I can't remember how I found them way back then but I've been following them for quite sometime now -Skittles I found I think around late October or early November that year and though she doesn't post that much these days, she and I are still friends on good old Facebook as is Dave now too. A whole lot of the bloggers I follow -and have followed for anywhere from 3 to almost 5 years -rarely post to their blogs these days but thanks to Facebook, I still keep in contact with them too!
Ah yes, good old Facebook! I play a bit at that place but not a whole lot. Not super active there you see but for me, it's a great place to keep in contact with family, old and newer friends, classmates, bloggers and thanks to a special page that the granddaughter of one of my good friends from high school set up - called "Grassflat Grown" I try to keep people who still live in this area along with a whole lot of folks who have roots back to this little village, a bit connected with things happening around where I still live.
One of the things that is now in place on this facebook page is a place where I try to remember to transcribe obituaries of people from around here to let those who live all around the country know when some one has passed away.
Today, I posted 4 obituaries to that page! On was the passing of an elderly gentleman who died about 2 weeks ago but I had forgotten to transcribe his obituary then and fortunately, was able to find a copy of it on a local site, but the other three passings were all between this past Thursday to Sunday and all three of those involved someone I had known fairly well too.
One was a lady four years my junior who I knew but not that well but her children and mine were pretty much in the same age ranges and our kids were friends. Another was a lady who was 84 and who I'd known since I was just a little kid and though her children -all seven of 'em -I could remember as little kids, then followed them through their high school and college years but today at her viewing, though I remembered the names of those kids, only one of the seven could I have identified who she was although the boys, I would have known what family they belonged to because they all resemble their late Dad very, very much!
And the third obituary I posted was for a man who I first got to know back in the mid-60s through a guy -also deceased for 23 years now but who had been a very, very good friend of mine from first grade on! I met Don Harter back then when my friend Dennis was beginning to get involved in stock car racing and Don was an excellent auto mechanic. When my ex-husband and I moved back here, Don was probably one of the first people in this region who my ex developed a friendship with and it was actually more through my ex-husband then that I came to know Don and his wife, Pearl, much, much better.
And it was because of that friendship my ex shared with Don that after we divorced, Pearl and Don's home became almost like my kids' home away from home! Those two people loved my kids, would entertain them at their house and often allowed my son to come out there and roam the junkyard Don had there and Clate would "help" Don. Actually, though Clate did no doubt on some occasions "help" Don, it was much more that Don was helping Clate -trying to show him how to grow into a fine young man which Clate is (for the most part) today!
Back when my son was about maybe 10 or 11 years old, he amazed Don in that he could tell Don exactly what kind of junked cars he had parked in that junkyard, where each unit was located -what row, how far down, etc., and often, could even rattle off most of the usable -thus still good -parts were on this or that car too! Quite a feat considering how many cars Don had in that junkyard back then!
I think it would be safe to say too that Don Harter was one person who very few people in this township, if asked, would say they didn't know him, or at the least, didn't know who he was or where his junkyard was!
If you didn't know Don, on first meeting him, he might have seemed to be a bit gruff, sometimes a bit on the brusque side, but once he got to know a person -and they, him -it was just a short time before you learned he was just one very, very decent man! Honest, hard-working, excellent auto mechanic and an avid collector of old, old cars that he had restored over the years! If some one expressed the least bit of interest in antique cars, Don loved to show those units he had lovingly restored and he also too great pleasure and a lot of pride too, frequently driving one of those antiques in many local parades too!
Back in the mid-90s though, Pearl and Don were the victims of a terrible -and very brutal crime. Two men from an adjacent county showed up at their home -which was back well off the beaten path/roadways -cut off their telephone lines and broke into their house where they tied both Pearl and Don up, then proceeded to rob them and also, to beat Don -severely about his face and head!
The man who at that time was the local police officer said when he responded to a call from them for help -after they had somehow managed to free themselves and had gone to a house near their that was actually a camp but they tended to the place in the owner's absence and thus had a key to get in there and use the telephone to call for help -said that when he pulled up in front of Pearl and Don's place, there stood Don, with blood running down his face, but holding a big old shotgun, ready to take aim the best he could under the circumstances, should those two guys return that night! Eventually those two guys were caught and convicted and one of them is now serving a VERY long prison term. Thankfully!
So, yesterday, Mandy and I went to the viewing in the afternoon and my son went there last night. This morning the three of us attended the funeral too. Don's passing -though very difficult to lose a good friend as he was, was also one of those things that was a blessing too now as he had endured two bouts of cancer and it was this second go-round that eventually took him down. His daughter-in-law said that he had suffered a good deal with that dreadful disease this time so they -the family and his widow -were prepared and even, I suppose one could say, at peace with his death now, just to know he was also at peace too!
After we got back home, because there was to be a viewing for the lady who passed away yesterday this afternoon and because I regarded her as a good neighbor and friend and my son liked her very much as well having worked with her when he was still in high school at the local truck stop, plus having been her paperboy for several years before that too, we still had our same clothes on that we'd worn to the funeral when the grandkids returned from school.
As Mandy was getting Kurtis out of the van, he spied Uncle Clayton standing near by his mother's car and asked Mandy, "How's come Uncle Clayton is dressed like a principal?" Only Kurtis would take note of his uncle's clothing -suit, dress shirt and tie -being more than a bit out of the norm! And I'll have to be sure to call Pearl and tell her that line too as I know she'll get a big kick out of hearing what Kurtis had to say today!
But the thing that really amazed me this evening was after I returned home from the viewing and was thinking about that woman and her children -those little kids I remembered them being; those teenagers who were good kids and all of 'em very good students in school too; and those kids -all of whom went to college, graduated and moved on to good jobs away from this region -who in my mind were still those young people until it hit me that oh my, the oldest son is now probably around 60-61 years of age!
How in blazes did that happen anyway? How did they get to be so old, so fast?
Then again, how did I get this old and so damned fast too is something else I'd like to know now too!
Were it possible for him to have lived this long, he would have been 137 years old yesterday! He passed away in March of 1957 -54 years ago -when I was 12 years old and I still miss him, very much, all these many years later. A quiet, very gentle man he was with a soft voice and, as I remarked to Mandy about him, he had very, very little trace of an accent of his native language, Swedish. He loved music, had a beautiful bass voice and I suppose because of how much I loved to hear him sing, to this day, I love hearing a good bass voice! He read -a lot -loved history and gardening and would probably be appalled at my attempts to grow a garden -especially my first ones about 30 years ago which were really dismal failures. This year, he might have thought there was a bit of potential for me to grow a few things -that is before the damned squash bugs came along and sucked the juice out of my yellow squash plants. Oh yes, they did that! But to my credit, we did get quite a number of yellow squash to dine on before that plague came to live in my garden and I also got about 15-18 acorn squash too -although they were a bit on the smallish side they still tasted darned good! By comparison to his gardens when I was a kid, mine is just a tiny drop in the bucket! He grew lots and lots over a much larger area too that I plant but we rarely wanted for most any vegetable that could be grown in the type of climate in this section of Pennsylvania. Corn, green beans, beets, were planted in abundance and when they were ripe, my Mom and Grandmother canned and canned and then, canned some more, for days and days -actually probably for weeks too when you add in all the tomatoes they would put up along with the apples they would go down to Peale and pick to can jar after jar of applesauce! He and his older brother used to have contests to determine which of them could grown the largest potato, along with who could harvest the most potatoes in a season too. And onions! We rarely ever had to buy onions from one year to the next as what he got in one season generally lasted almost up until the onions were ready the next summer!
It was my Grandpa who taught me to love books -and reading -and as a child I spent a whole lot of my time, year-round, with my nose always in some book! One of my favorite bloggers -Rick at In My Own Write (or Stories I Share With Friends) has a passion about reading that is a lot like mine was as a child but as I grew older, too many other things seemed to prevent me from reading near the volume of stuff I used to consume all the time as a kid! I do still enjoy reading but just don't do it near as often these days. But Rick and I tend to enjoy a lot of the same things in our reading -history! However, my favorites in that category lean more to fictionalized accounts of history whereas he prefers non-fiction. Today, he posted a list he has on Amazon.com with his favorite books, which was interesting to read. One thing that amazed me though was one of his favorite topics is Labor and Labor Unions and he listed a book there that was written by one of my professors at Penn State -who just happened to be one of my favorite instructors too -Dr. Paul Clark! You know I loved learning that because it totally appealed to my love of "small world" kind of things too!
A few of my favorite bloggers have remarked recently that they are celebrating their anniversary of beginning their blog -Skittles, Technobabe and Dave at "Rather Than Working" all began their blogs around this time, five years ago and that's about when I started blogging too. Funny thing though is I can't remember how I found them way back then but I've been following them for quite sometime now -Skittles I found I think around late October or early November that year and though she doesn't post that much these days, she and I are still friends on good old Facebook as is Dave now too. A whole lot of the bloggers I follow -and have followed for anywhere from 3 to almost 5 years -rarely post to their blogs these days but thanks to Facebook, I still keep in contact with them too!
Ah yes, good old Facebook! I play a bit at that place but not a whole lot. Not super active there you see but for me, it's a great place to keep in contact with family, old and newer friends, classmates, bloggers and thanks to a special page that the granddaughter of one of my good friends from high school set up - called "Grassflat Grown" I try to keep people who still live in this area along with a whole lot of folks who have roots back to this little village, a bit connected with things happening around where I still live.
One of the things that is now in place on this facebook page is a place where I try to remember to transcribe obituaries of people from around here to let those who live all around the country know when some one has passed away.
Today, I posted 4 obituaries to that page! On was the passing of an elderly gentleman who died about 2 weeks ago but I had forgotten to transcribe his obituary then and fortunately, was able to find a copy of it on a local site, but the other three passings were all between this past Thursday to Sunday and all three of those involved someone I had known fairly well too.
One was a lady four years my junior who I knew but not that well but her children and mine were pretty much in the same age ranges and our kids were friends. Another was a lady who was 84 and who I'd known since I was just a little kid and though her children -all seven of 'em -I could remember as little kids, then followed them through their high school and college years but today at her viewing, though I remembered the names of those kids, only one of the seven could I have identified who she was although the boys, I would have known what family they belonged to because they all resemble their late Dad very, very much!
And the third obituary I posted was for a man who I first got to know back in the mid-60s through a guy -also deceased for 23 years now but who had been a very, very good friend of mine from first grade on! I met Don Harter back then when my friend Dennis was beginning to get involved in stock car racing and Don was an excellent auto mechanic. When my ex-husband and I moved back here, Don was probably one of the first people in this region who my ex developed a friendship with and it was actually more through my ex-husband then that I came to know Don and his wife, Pearl, much, much better.
And it was because of that friendship my ex shared with Don that after we divorced, Pearl and Don's home became almost like my kids' home away from home! Those two people loved my kids, would entertain them at their house and often allowed my son to come out there and roam the junkyard Don had there and Clate would "help" Don. Actually, though Clate did no doubt on some occasions "help" Don, it was much more that Don was helping Clate -trying to show him how to grow into a fine young man which Clate is (for the most part) today!
Back when my son was about maybe 10 or 11 years old, he amazed Don in that he could tell Don exactly what kind of junked cars he had parked in that junkyard, where each unit was located -what row, how far down, etc., and often, could even rattle off most of the usable -thus still good -parts were on this or that car too! Quite a feat considering how many cars Don had in that junkyard back then!
I think it would be safe to say too that Don Harter was one person who very few people in this township, if asked, would say they didn't know him, or at the least, didn't know who he was or where his junkyard was!
If you didn't know Don, on first meeting him, he might have seemed to be a bit gruff, sometimes a bit on the brusque side, but once he got to know a person -and they, him -it was just a short time before you learned he was just one very, very decent man! Honest, hard-working, excellent auto mechanic and an avid collector of old, old cars that he had restored over the years! If some one expressed the least bit of interest in antique cars, Don loved to show those units he had lovingly restored and he also too great pleasure and a lot of pride too, frequently driving one of those antiques in many local parades too!
Back in the mid-90s though, Pearl and Don were the victims of a terrible -and very brutal crime. Two men from an adjacent county showed up at their home -which was back well off the beaten path/roadways -cut off their telephone lines and broke into their house where they tied both Pearl and Don up, then proceeded to rob them and also, to beat Don -severely about his face and head!
The man who at that time was the local police officer said when he responded to a call from them for help -after they had somehow managed to free themselves and had gone to a house near their that was actually a camp but they tended to the place in the owner's absence and thus had a key to get in there and use the telephone to call for help -said that when he pulled up in front of Pearl and Don's place, there stood Don, with blood running down his face, but holding a big old shotgun, ready to take aim the best he could under the circumstances, should those two guys return that night! Eventually those two guys were caught and convicted and one of them is now serving a VERY long prison term. Thankfully!
So, yesterday, Mandy and I went to the viewing in the afternoon and my son went there last night. This morning the three of us attended the funeral too. Don's passing -though very difficult to lose a good friend as he was, was also one of those things that was a blessing too now as he had endured two bouts of cancer and it was this second go-round that eventually took him down. His daughter-in-law said that he had suffered a good deal with that dreadful disease this time so they -the family and his widow -were prepared and even, I suppose one could say, at peace with his death now, just to know he was also at peace too!
After we got back home, because there was to be a viewing for the lady who passed away yesterday this afternoon and because I regarded her as a good neighbor and friend and my son liked her very much as well having worked with her when he was still in high school at the local truck stop, plus having been her paperboy for several years before that too, we still had our same clothes on that we'd worn to the funeral when the grandkids returned from school.
As Mandy was getting Kurtis out of the van, he spied Uncle Clayton standing near by his mother's car and asked Mandy, "How's come Uncle Clayton is dressed like a principal?" Only Kurtis would take note of his uncle's clothing -suit, dress shirt and tie -being more than a bit out of the norm! And I'll have to be sure to call Pearl and tell her that line too as I know she'll get a big kick out of hearing what Kurtis had to say today!
But the thing that really amazed me this evening was after I returned home from the viewing and was thinking about that woman and her children -those little kids I remembered them being; those teenagers who were good kids and all of 'em very good students in school too; and those kids -all of whom went to college, graduated and moved on to good jobs away from this region -who in my mind were still those young people until it hit me that oh my, the oldest son is now probably around 60-61 years of age!
How in blazes did that happen anyway? How did they get to be so old, so fast?
Then again, how did I get this old and so damned fast too is something else I'd like to know now too!
Saturday, September 24, 2011
Travelling in a Labyrinth!
Tonight, I am truly questioning my sense of direction!
One thing I've always been pretty proud of is that I usually have a pretty good sense of direction and, when driving some place where I'm not totally familiar with the lay of the land, even if I do get off base a bit, I can -or have in the past -been able to find my way around and get back on track.
After all, back in the early 80s, my kids and I drove down to D.C. -where I was fairly comfortable getting around the city and the suburbs and one night, after meeting a friend of ours for dinner on the outskirts of Annapolis, we started to head back home -north to PA, ya know -and I missed a turn as we were supposed to be picking up Route 70 on the outskirts of Baltimore but landed, instead, in downtown Baltimore instead! This happened late at night and I realized, by looking around at the area, that the area of Baltimore where we were wasn't exactly where a female with three children ranging in age from about 5 to 14 should be driving at 2 in the morning! But, I found my way to Route 40 and followed that north then which brought me out in Fredrick, MD and from there, I know exactly where I was -on the road back home!
Then, back in 2000, I had gone down to the Philadelphia area -riding down to a family reunion with a cousin I'd never met before but who, at that time was living in State College (which is near to me) so I hitched a ride down with him and had intended to have one of my other cousin's husband drive me into the city the day after the reunion to the bus station there and had planned to come back to State College -where I'd left my car -by bus. However, after the reunion, the ex-wife of yet another cousin had offered to drive me back home in her van so, I figured well, if she wants to do that, why not. Actually the offer was that I would be the one doing the driving. We would use her van to get me back up home and then, she would go on from there to her other home in Latrobe, PA. Sounded like a reasonable plan to me at the time.
However, I found out the next day when she came by the cousin's house where I'd stayed the night and we got ready to get on the road, that she hadn't a clue -nary a one -about how to get from that cousin's house to any route we needed to take to get out of that Philadelphia suburb and on our way to Harrisburg where I was familiar with the routes and would easily be able to find my way home from there.
So, off we went with her saying maybe we take this street then, no, maybe it's this one and so, we wandered around the streets in and out of several suburbs of northern Philadelphia with her trying to figure out what street to take and when and I decided just to look for route numbers that I was familiar with, that I knew if a particular route ran east or west or north to south and then, once I found one that rang a bell with me, I took that route following it in whatever direction it went that took us west after which I then started to watch for any route I recognized that would then take us north. Figuring sooner or later, I would come across a main artery type route that traversed the state -like Route 322 or Rte 81 or 76 or Rte 30. I don't recall now which route I encountered first that took us to a point where it connected with another route I knew, that would in turn eventually take us to the roads that ran near or into Harrisburg and we did make it up to my home. Obviously -because I'm still not roaming around those streets in Harrisburg kind of like the guy in that old song about riding on the MTA with the chorus of "Oh he never returned, no he never returned and his fate is still unlearned...." Yeah, I thought I did pretty good that day manipulating us around to get from Philly to Philipsburg in about 7 hours! (Normal driving time between those two points is actually about 4 to 5 hours -but that's for people who actually know where the hell they are going too, ya know.)
Well tonight, I managed to get myself lost right here in Clearfield County! And boy, did I ever get myself discombobulated too!
Sit tight now and listen my children and you shall hear about the early evening ride of me -no, not Paul Revere!
My son drives tractor trailer for an outfit up on the back side (so to speak) of Curwensville, PA -which is a town about 28-30 miles from where we live and the place where the company he drives for is located is oh, about 12-14 miles from Curwensville. He usually leaves here on Sunday evening about 5-6 p.m. to go to where the trucking company is located southwest (I think is the general direction) from Curwensville -a drive of about 42-44 miles, one way. Someone has to drive him up there on Sunday night to pick up his rig and then, on Fridays, when he finishes up for he week, someone has to go pick him up there too because he and his girlfriend only have one vehicle between the two of them and if she has to work from 2 p.m. to 10 or 4 p.m. to midnight, then he needs a ride either to work or from work on either Sunday night or Friday night.
And tonight was one of those days when his girlfriend was working from 2 p.m. to 10 p.m. and he was due to get in at the barn about 6:30 p.m. so I had offered to come pick him up.
Now, I've done this drive up and back twice before tonight and the first time I drove him up to work, I got a bit lost on the way home -coming back from Ansonville (approximately where the trucking company's barn is) to Curwensville. A couple weeks ago when I took him to work, I had no problem at all coming home.
Wish I could say the same about my drive up there tonight to pick him up cause it sure wasn't that way!
I left my house a little later than I had originally planned as I should have been on the way to get him by 5:30 but it was almost 6 p.m. by the time I started out however, I had no problems at all, of course, getting from home to Curwensville. And in Curwensville, I turned left at the light -don't know the street name but I am familiar enough with how to get to this place that I knew exactly where to turn left there. So I drove out that road a short piece until I came to Rte 969 where I was to take a right and drive up the mountain, along the northern end of Curwensville Lake (or Dam as some folks still call it) until I got near the top of that mountain and then I was to turn left on Rte 729, go over the bridge there that crosses the Susquehanna (West Branch of it in our county) and head up to Ansonville from there.
I got to that point too with no problem whatsoever. By that time, I was roughly 6 -8 miles from where the trucking company is located. I was also feeling a bit cocky too because I knew that while back on Interstate 80, my son's boss's son had passed me on the Interstate, heading home too but when I came out on the ByPass around Clearfield, I had passed him on the hill there so was ahead of him then by oh, about 2-3 miles then when I made that turn onto Rte 729 and headed up the really skinny, really windy road there to the barn's location.
I remembered too that abou a mile or 2 from the barn I would come to a turn in the road -left, if I remembered correctly, and that would take me then right to the barn.
Well I don't know exactly what I did wrong, where I made a mis-turn, but I made one and what should have been the last 6-8 miles of my journey ended up being about 40 miles of driving around, trying to get my bearings, looking for anyone outside as darkness was falling (rapidly too, I might add) that maybe I could stop and ask them for directions to get me back on track again.
After about 35-40 minutes of driving around, obviously lost, I came across the little town of Glen Hope and spied a little corner gas station/convenience store out there in the middle of nowhere so because I'm a female and unlike most men who when they get lost, refuse to ask for directions, I have no problem doing that!
So I go into this convenience store and ask the clerk how to get from there to the trucking company's place of business -off Rte 729 -which by the way was right there at that intersection -Rte 729, that is.
Now, if I were a bit more familiar with the lay of the land up in that neck of the county, I would have had a better sense of where I was, where I needed to go to get where I needed to be because I would have known then which little villages abut each other for openers. And too, if the state had direction markers that were more indicative of what little towns -and somewhat larger ones -were in which direction, I could have found my way with little to no problem then too.
But no, that isn't the way the state does those things with their direction signs!
So I had to go inside and ask the clerk for directions only to find out he had not a clue how to get to Ansonville from there! He did however point me in the direction of Irvona which is on Rte 53 and Rte 53 you see intersects at that point in Glen Hope with Rte 729 -which I knew was the Rte I wanted to be on but I just didn't know then and there, which direction I needed to go on Rte 729! If one of the direction signs at that intersection of 729 and 53 had pointed in a particular direction and said Curwensville on it, I would have known then I needed to go in the opposite direction from that but the guy didn't have clue one as to where I should go. Nor did either of the two men now waiting in line in the store behind me as I inquired about driving directions.
So, I left, taking Rte 53 to Irvona (which is the mailing address by the way of the trucking company -go figure) and I stopped there at a Dollar General Store where I inquired of the clerk (a middle aged woman) and a customer (a younger woman) as to how to get to the trucking company I was trying to find.
The customer there right away gave me instructions to go back to Glen Hope, turn left there at the intersection of Rte 53 and 729 and proceed from there about 6 miles or so and I would come to the trucking company.
All that extra roaming around added 40 miles to a trip that should have been about 42 miles but ended up being a little over 80 miles on my odometer and instead of taking me about 45-50 minutes to get there, took me almost 2 hours because those roads, where I was wandering, trying to find my way, are narrow, steep, hills, in deep forested lands, plus it was raining off and on thus hindering my vision and speed as well as dark then by that time too!
I did -obviously though -eventually make my way to pick up my son and made it back home then with no problems albeit it with a total then of 120 miles on my odometer by the time I got home!
I wanted to show you a map of the area where I was majorly lost but apparently you can't save a map from Bing Maps -although I sure thought you could do that -and can't post it on here anyway! Isn't that just special though too?
But one thing is for sure, whenever anyone tells me in the future that where I live is really out in the boondocks of Clearfield County, I might agree with them but only to a certain degree. I would most definitely tell them that the region up beyond Curwensville, and between there and Irvona, is even more out in the boondocks that the area here where I live is!
Shoot, I think I'd have been less lost if I'd taken a wrong turn going out of Karthaus, up through Pottersdale and to Sinnemahoning or Driftwood than I was up in Glen Hope!
Now, if someone knows how to print out a map from Bing Maps that I can then carry with me and that shows all these little, itty-bitty villages up in that neck of the woods so I'd then have a little bit of a clue as to where I am when I'm off wandering around up there, I'd sure appreciate that!
One thing I've always been pretty proud of is that I usually have a pretty good sense of direction and, when driving some place where I'm not totally familiar with the lay of the land, even if I do get off base a bit, I can -or have in the past -been able to find my way around and get back on track.
After all, back in the early 80s, my kids and I drove down to D.C. -where I was fairly comfortable getting around the city and the suburbs and one night, after meeting a friend of ours for dinner on the outskirts of Annapolis, we started to head back home -north to PA, ya know -and I missed a turn as we were supposed to be picking up Route 70 on the outskirts of Baltimore but landed, instead, in downtown Baltimore instead! This happened late at night and I realized, by looking around at the area, that the area of Baltimore where we were wasn't exactly where a female with three children ranging in age from about 5 to 14 should be driving at 2 in the morning! But, I found my way to Route 40 and followed that north then which brought me out in Fredrick, MD and from there, I know exactly where I was -on the road back home!
Then, back in 2000, I had gone down to the Philadelphia area -riding down to a family reunion with a cousin I'd never met before but who, at that time was living in State College (which is near to me) so I hitched a ride down with him and had intended to have one of my other cousin's husband drive me into the city the day after the reunion to the bus station there and had planned to come back to State College -where I'd left my car -by bus. However, after the reunion, the ex-wife of yet another cousin had offered to drive me back home in her van so, I figured well, if she wants to do that, why not. Actually the offer was that I would be the one doing the driving. We would use her van to get me back up home and then, she would go on from there to her other home in Latrobe, PA. Sounded like a reasonable plan to me at the time.
However, I found out the next day when she came by the cousin's house where I'd stayed the night and we got ready to get on the road, that she hadn't a clue -nary a one -about how to get from that cousin's house to any route we needed to take to get out of that Philadelphia suburb and on our way to Harrisburg where I was familiar with the routes and would easily be able to find my way home from there.
So, off we went with her saying maybe we take this street then, no, maybe it's this one and so, we wandered around the streets in and out of several suburbs of northern Philadelphia with her trying to figure out what street to take and when and I decided just to look for route numbers that I was familiar with, that I knew if a particular route ran east or west or north to south and then, once I found one that rang a bell with me, I took that route following it in whatever direction it went that took us west after which I then started to watch for any route I recognized that would then take us north. Figuring sooner or later, I would come across a main artery type route that traversed the state -like Route 322 or Rte 81 or 76 or Rte 30. I don't recall now which route I encountered first that took us to a point where it connected with another route I knew, that would in turn eventually take us to the roads that ran near or into Harrisburg and we did make it up to my home. Obviously -because I'm still not roaming around those streets in Harrisburg kind of like the guy in that old song about riding on the MTA with the chorus of "Oh he never returned, no he never returned and his fate is still unlearned...." Yeah, I thought I did pretty good that day manipulating us around to get from Philly to Philipsburg in about 7 hours! (Normal driving time between those two points is actually about 4 to 5 hours -but that's for people who actually know where the hell they are going too, ya know.)
Well tonight, I managed to get myself lost right here in Clearfield County! And boy, did I ever get myself discombobulated too!
Sit tight now and listen my children and you shall hear about the early evening ride of me -no, not Paul Revere!
My son drives tractor trailer for an outfit up on the back side (so to speak) of Curwensville, PA -which is a town about 28-30 miles from where we live and the place where the company he drives for is located is oh, about 12-14 miles from Curwensville. He usually leaves here on Sunday evening about 5-6 p.m. to go to where the trucking company is located southwest (I think is the general direction) from Curwensville -a drive of about 42-44 miles, one way. Someone has to drive him up there on Sunday night to pick up his rig and then, on Fridays, when he finishes up for he week, someone has to go pick him up there too because he and his girlfriend only have one vehicle between the two of them and if she has to work from 2 p.m. to 10 or 4 p.m. to midnight, then he needs a ride either to work or from work on either Sunday night or Friday night.
And tonight was one of those days when his girlfriend was working from 2 p.m. to 10 p.m. and he was due to get in at the barn about 6:30 p.m. so I had offered to come pick him up.
Now, I've done this drive up and back twice before tonight and the first time I drove him up to work, I got a bit lost on the way home -coming back from Ansonville (approximately where the trucking company's barn is) to Curwensville. A couple weeks ago when I took him to work, I had no problem at all coming home.
Wish I could say the same about my drive up there tonight to pick him up cause it sure wasn't that way!
I left my house a little later than I had originally planned as I should have been on the way to get him by 5:30 but it was almost 6 p.m. by the time I started out however, I had no problems at all, of course, getting from home to Curwensville. And in Curwensville, I turned left at the light -don't know the street name but I am familiar enough with how to get to this place that I knew exactly where to turn left there. So I drove out that road a short piece until I came to Rte 969 where I was to take a right and drive up the mountain, along the northern end of Curwensville Lake (or Dam as some folks still call it) until I got near the top of that mountain and then I was to turn left on Rte 729, go over the bridge there that crosses the Susquehanna (West Branch of it in our county) and head up to Ansonville from there.
I got to that point too with no problem whatsoever. By that time, I was roughly 6 -8 miles from where the trucking company is located. I was also feeling a bit cocky too because I knew that while back on Interstate 80, my son's boss's son had passed me on the Interstate, heading home too but when I came out on the ByPass around Clearfield, I had passed him on the hill there so was ahead of him then by oh, about 2-3 miles then when I made that turn onto Rte 729 and headed up the really skinny, really windy road there to the barn's location.
I remembered too that abou a mile or 2 from the barn I would come to a turn in the road -left, if I remembered correctly, and that would take me then right to the barn.
Well I don't know exactly what I did wrong, where I made a mis-turn, but I made one and what should have been the last 6-8 miles of my journey ended up being about 40 miles of driving around, trying to get my bearings, looking for anyone outside as darkness was falling (rapidly too, I might add) that maybe I could stop and ask them for directions to get me back on track again.
After about 35-40 minutes of driving around, obviously lost, I came across the little town of Glen Hope and spied a little corner gas station/convenience store out there in the middle of nowhere so because I'm a female and unlike most men who when they get lost, refuse to ask for directions, I have no problem doing that!
So I go into this convenience store and ask the clerk how to get from there to the trucking company's place of business -off Rte 729 -which by the way was right there at that intersection -Rte 729, that is.
Now, if I were a bit more familiar with the lay of the land up in that neck of the county, I would have had a better sense of where I was, where I needed to go to get where I needed to be because I would have known then which little villages abut each other for openers. And too, if the state had direction markers that were more indicative of what little towns -and somewhat larger ones -were in which direction, I could have found my way with little to no problem then too.
But no, that isn't the way the state does those things with their direction signs!
So I had to go inside and ask the clerk for directions only to find out he had not a clue how to get to Ansonville from there! He did however point me in the direction of Irvona which is on Rte 53 and Rte 53 you see intersects at that point in Glen Hope with Rte 729 -which I knew was the Rte I wanted to be on but I just didn't know then and there, which direction I needed to go on Rte 729! If one of the direction signs at that intersection of 729 and 53 had pointed in a particular direction and said Curwensville on it, I would have known then I needed to go in the opposite direction from that but the guy didn't have clue one as to where I should go. Nor did either of the two men now waiting in line in the store behind me as I inquired about driving directions.
So, I left, taking Rte 53 to Irvona (which is the mailing address by the way of the trucking company -go figure) and I stopped there at a Dollar General Store where I inquired of the clerk (a middle aged woman) and a customer (a younger woman) as to how to get to the trucking company I was trying to find.
The customer there right away gave me instructions to go back to Glen Hope, turn left there at the intersection of Rte 53 and 729 and proceed from there about 6 miles or so and I would come to the trucking company.
All that extra roaming around added 40 miles to a trip that should have been about 42 miles but ended up being a little over 80 miles on my odometer and instead of taking me about 45-50 minutes to get there, took me almost 2 hours because those roads, where I was wandering, trying to find my way, are narrow, steep, hills, in deep forested lands, plus it was raining off and on thus hindering my vision and speed as well as dark then by that time too!
I did -obviously though -eventually make my way to pick up my son and made it back home then with no problems albeit it with a total then of 120 miles on my odometer by the time I got home!
I wanted to show you a map of the area where I was majorly lost but apparently you can't save a map from Bing Maps -although I sure thought you could do that -and can't post it on here anyway! Isn't that just special though too?
But one thing is for sure, whenever anyone tells me in the future that where I live is really out in the boondocks of Clearfield County, I might agree with them but only to a certain degree. I would most definitely tell them that the region up beyond Curwensville, and between there and Irvona, is even more out in the boondocks that the area here where I live is!
Shoot, I think I'd have been less lost if I'd taken a wrong turn going out of Karthaus, up through Pottersdale and to Sinnemahoning or Driftwood than I was up in Glen Hope!
Now, if someone knows how to print out a map from Bing Maps that I can then carry with me and that shows all these little, itty-bitty villages up in that neck of the woods so I'd then have a little bit of a clue as to where I am when I'm off wandering around up there, I'd sure appreciate that!
Friday, September 23, 2011
Kids and Kittens!!!
What can one possibly say about kids -small children type that is -and kittens that hasn't probably already been said many, many times before?
Both are generally really cute with an occasional one who is, shall we say "interesting" and leave it go at that.
Not that it's taken me over 40 years to figure this out but this morning, as I was trying to first sweep the grubby mess that was our kitchen floor but also then trying to mop it after the sweeping was done that kids are messy little creatures, for sure. But then too, so are some adults who live in this house too so I can't blame all the stuff I swept up -and then, mopped up -on just the kids.
But one thing for sure is that work has apparently the same effect on cats, particularly on kittens, as it has on kids.
It fascinates them and they can watch it go on for hours!
Well, sort of watch it anyway, in the case of kittens. They tend to want to lend a helping paw in the work aspect. But that paw, being thrust with every push of the broom to try to capture the broom -or whatever Pearl seemed bent on doing while I was sweeping, one thing for sure was she wasn't being Grammie's best little helper!
Not. At. All!
Her thrusts and parry routine with the broom wouldn't have been all that bad except that she also began to play a little game akin to kids jumping into a pile of freshly raked leaves and waiting to be hauled off to a burn pile or stuffed into a big garbage bag and hauled away. Her game though consisted of pouncing on the growing pile of dust and dirt I was accumulating from my sweeping.
The last straw for me was when she decided now was a darned ideal time to either jump right smack dab into the center of that pile or to take a bit of a running start and then, put on the brakes suddenly when almost to the pile so as to skid into it and send it flying off into several directions.
No, cleaning here with Pearl underfoot is not something I particularly care to do -especially if I want to get the floor swept and mopped up to appear at least semi-clean by late this afternoon.
That's about all the longer the "clean" state of my kitchen floor will last too -late this afternoon -because you can bet your bottom dollar when two certain small children return home from a hard day of studying at school, the first thing they will have on their agenda will be "Let's see how quickly we can get Gram's clean kitchen floor totally messed up!"
Both are generally really cute with an occasional one who is, shall we say "interesting" and leave it go at that.
Not that it's taken me over 40 years to figure this out but this morning, as I was trying to first sweep the grubby mess that was our kitchen floor but also then trying to mop it after the sweeping was done that kids are messy little creatures, for sure. But then too, so are some adults who live in this house too so I can't blame all the stuff I swept up -and then, mopped up -on just the kids.
But one thing for sure is that work has apparently the same effect on cats, particularly on kittens, as it has on kids.
It fascinates them and they can watch it go on for hours!
Well, sort of watch it anyway, in the case of kittens. They tend to want to lend a helping paw in the work aspect. But that paw, being thrust with every push of the broom to try to capture the broom -or whatever Pearl seemed bent on doing while I was sweeping, one thing for sure was she wasn't being Grammie's best little helper!
Not. At. All!
Her thrusts and parry routine with the broom wouldn't have been all that bad except that she also began to play a little game akin to kids jumping into a pile of freshly raked leaves and waiting to be hauled off to a burn pile or stuffed into a big garbage bag and hauled away. Her game though consisted of pouncing on the growing pile of dust and dirt I was accumulating from my sweeping.
The last straw for me was when she decided now was a darned ideal time to either jump right smack dab into the center of that pile or to take a bit of a running start and then, put on the brakes suddenly when almost to the pile so as to skid into it and send it flying off into several directions.
No, cleaning here with Pearl underfoot is not something I particularly care to do -especially if I want to get the floor swept and mopped up to appear at least semi-clean by late this afternoon.
That's about all the longer the "clean" state of my kitchen floor will last too -late this afternoon -because you can bet your bottom dollar when two certain small children return home from a hard day of studying at school, the first thing they will have on their agenda will be "Let's see how quickly we can get Gram's clean kitchen floor totally messed up!"
Apologies and a Rude Awakening!
If you follow my blog at all -or have for anytime I guess I should say -you know that one of my traits -and certainly not one of my finer ones too -is that I tend to be quite long-winded.
It's something that's been a part of me for many, many moons and considering I will soon turn another year over and be saying "in all my 67 years on the planet" I've had more than enough time to hone the long-windedness or better yet, perhaps practice honing it down a bit. Better yet, a lot!
I've also mentioned on numerous occasions in the past that I do have a lot of blogs that I follow too. I have them all on my reader and that's the only way I can deal with trying to keep current with the number of blogs I do try to follow.
However, in the blog following department I have another really bad habit too in that when I do comment, all to often I have a tendency by the time I've finished writing my comment I realize I have just written what could have gone for a complete post of my own then -but on someone else's space -on their "dime" as it were!
I'm trying to curb that aspect of my blogging life. Occasionally, I meet with mediocre success in the curbing the comments department but damn it all, if my favorite bloggers would write such great posts that really grab me and remind me of this or that or some other crazy thing, or some subject that really sparks my ire and I go on a rant -like I did on blogger friend Rick the other day about employment or lack thereof -well, maybe I'd be able to not let fly with those really long-winded comments, ya know!
But please, don't take that as a cue for you folks on my followings list to start writing about things of little to no interest to me or others, or to writing shorter posts, or to writing really crappy stuff either. (Not that I think for a minute that you people could or would ever do anything like that though and for that, I am really quite thankful!)
Tonight though, in going down the line on my reader I discovered something that really did bother me about blogs I follow.
This is something that I was of the impression once someone had laid claim to a particular name for a blog, that name was theirs to keep, to use, forever -whether they wrote one post and never wrote another one for a month or a year or several years later, that blog name still belonged to that person.
But apparently that's not true.
A while back, I saw a post under a blog name that I had followed but the guy whose stuff I used to read had dropped out of sight for a good while. I hadn't taken him off my reader because I know occasionally people do drop off but then, return at a later date however, when I saw a new post by under that fellow's blog title, I was a bit confused because it was all about a big pitch about a car -Infiniti -I believe is the make of car that the writer was going on and on about and that sure didn't sound like the stuff I was accustomed to reading at that guy's place.
Tonight, I came across another posting though, on a blog that I'd followed for quite some time a while back but she had dropped off the blogosphere too. When I saw her blog name up there on my reader, I was really happy and excited to thing she had come back to the blog fold but as I started to read the actual post, I was really disappointed to see her blog has apparently been hacked and someone has now taken it over writing about nothing but -of all things -poker sights!
I suppose there's nothing that can be done to stop things like that from happening but, if there is, and you know about it, how about sharing a bit of that information with me! I'd much rather have a blogger's place lay fallow, unused, unwritten at all, than to see that someone is stealing the other blogger's namesake and using it in a manner that the original blogger would never have abused the site in such a manner!
I know I can easily correct this for me by simply making a little adjustment on my subscription list on my reader but I hate to do that too in the off chance that suppose that blogger tries to return and can he or she then pick up their old blog's name and start writing again? I dunno cause I don't understand the ins and outs and the ways of the blog world all that well I guess. But if they ever would come "back to life" here in blog land, I'd like to be there to read their stuff again, ya know!
At any rate, if there isn't a law or rule or even an unwritten one, about actions like that, there really should be!
Just my little old opinion about some things that kind of, sort of, well yes it actually really does, annoy me!
It's something that's been a part of me for many, many moons and considering I will soon turn another year over and be saying "in all my 67 years on the planet" I've had more than enough time to hone the long-windedness or better yet, perhaps practice honing it down a bit. Better yet, a lot!
I've also mentioned on numerous occasions in the past that I do have a lot of blogs that I follow too. I have them all on my reader and that's the only way I can deal with trying to keep current with the number of blogs I do try to follow.
However, in the blog following department I have another really bad habit too in that when I do comment, all to often I have a tendency by the time I've finished writing my comment I realize I have just written what could have gone for a complete post of my own then -but on someone else's space -on their "dime" as it were!
I'm trying to curb that aspect of my blogging life. Occasionally, I meet with mediocre success in the curbing the comments department but damn it all, if my favorite bloggers would write such great posts that really grab me and remind me of this or that or some other crazy thing, or some subject that really sparks my ire and I go on a rant -like I did on blogger friend Rick the other day about employment or lack thereof -well, maybe I'd be able to not let fly with those really long-winded comments, ya know!
But please, don't take that as a cue for you folks on my followings list to start writing about things of little to no interest to me or others, or to writing shorter posts, or to writing really crappy stuff either. (Not that I think for a minute that you people could or would ever do anything like that though and for that, I am really quite thankful!)
Tonight though, in going down the line on my reader I discovered something that really did bother me about blogs I follow.
This is something that I was of the impression once someone had laid claim to a particular name for a blog, that name was theirs to keep, to use, forever -whether they wrote one post and never wrote another one for a month or a year or several years later, that blog name still belonged to that person.
But apparently that's not true.
A while back, I saw a post under a blog name that I had followed but the guy whose stuff I used to read had dropped out of sight for a good while. I hadn't taken him off my reader because I know occasionally people do drop off but then, return at a later date however, when I saw a new post by under that fellow's blog title, I was a bit confused because it was all about a big pitch about a car -Infiniti -I believe is the make of car that the writer was going on and on about and that sure didn't sound like the stuff I was accustomed to reading at that guy's place.
Tonight, I came across another posting though, on a blog that I'd followed for quite some time a while back but she had dropped off the blogosphere too. When I saw her blog name up there on my reader, I was really happy and excited to thing she had come back to the blog fold but as I started to read the actual post, I was really disappointed to see her blog has apparently been hacked and someone has now taken it over writing about nothing but -of all things -poker sights!
I suppose there's nothing that can be done to stop things like that from happening but, if there is, and you know about it, how about sharing a bit of that information with me! I'd much rather have a blogger's place lay fallow, unused, unwritten at all, than to see that someone is stealing the other blogger's namesake and using it in a manner that the original blogger would never have abused the site in such a manner!
I know I can easily correct this for me by simply making a little adjustment on my subscription list on my reader but I hate to do that too in the off chance that suppose that blogger tries to return and can he or she then pick up their old blog's name and start writing again? I dunno cause I don't understand the ins and outs and the ways of the blog world all that well I guess. But if they ever would come "back to life" here in blog land, I'd like to be there to read their stuff again, ya know!
At any rate, if there isn't a law or rule or even an unwritten one, about actions like that, there really should be!
Just my little old opinion about some things that kind of, sort of, well yes it actually really does, annoy me!
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
A Terrific Time!
As most of you may know -or have figured out by now -I really enjoy getting together, running into, hearing from old friends! I especially enjoy reunions though and in particular class reunions. Next year, my high school graduating class with be celebrating our 50th year since graduation and next week, several of my old classmates and I will be getting together to discuss the details -when, where, how, etc. -our class will celebrate this anniversary. And I'm really looking forward to that lunch get-together next week now to open the discussions needed to bring about a really great class reunion for all of the members of my graduating class.
This past weekend, my cousin was back home for the purpose of attending her 50th Class Reunion. She and her husband flew in Thursday morning from the Austin, TX area and Mandy and I had supper that evening with them. I posted about that dinner a few days ago, you may recall. It was so great to have a chance to wine and dine -and do lots and lots of talking then too -with her and her husband -something we rarely are able to do because, of course, the distance between Texas and Pennsylvania and it sure ain't cheap getting from there to here and back again.
But something else happened over this past weekend that was really an outstanding thing for me!
I actually got to attend her class reunion too!
My cousin and I graduated from the same school system -West Branch Area School -but we didn't graduate from the same school. Back then, this particular school system had just been formed and the class of 1960 was the first class to graduate as "Warriors" from West Branch. Back then, the students attended one of two schools in our area. You either attended classes at the Morris Township School or at Cooper Township High School. The school district encompassed five different townships - Cooper, Morris, Graham, Karthaus and West Keating -when it was formed but it took another four years after the jointure -and the district -was formed before the "new" school was built and opened. The first class to attend classes at the new high school was the class of 1964.
Prior to that joining together of these townships, Morris Township and Cooper Township had been big, BIG rivals -in all things athletic, so for those of my cousin's and my generation, the joining together was in name only. We still really didn;t get to know the kids in our class from the other building -or if we did know some of them, we didn't usually have the opportunity to get to know many of them very well. (And yes, there was still a good bit of the old rivalry still going on between the two schools too, which was a bit hindersome for us then too.)
But anyway, when it came time for those kids from my cousin's class to celebrate 50 years since graduation, they opted to have a "joint" reunion -kids from the Morris School as well as kids from the Cooper School -under one roof, together. Actually the class of 1961 had a joint reunion five years ago for their 45th reunion and from what I heard from friends who were part of that class, they'd had a great time at that reunion so decided to do it all over again this year with a really big celebration.
Last Friday evening, they had an informal get-together out in Munson, at a nice little restaurant-bar there -Casanova's -and then, Saturday evening, they planned a nice dinner get-together over in Clearfield at St. Charles Cafe.
Saturday morning though, my cousin Ruth phoned me to inquire if I'd received an e-mail she'd just sent me. I clicked on my e-mail and yep, there it was so opened and read it. In that e-mail she told me how on Friday evening she'd spent a good bit of time talking to one of the guys from the Cooper school who she knew had been a very good friend of mine -both in school and following our graduation -and they got to discussing how much I would have enjoyed it had I gone to their informal gathering and gee, wouldn't it be nice if Jen could come to our dinner event this event. Yeah, that's the way my cuz operates -she's always been looking out for me, ever since we were just little kids, ya know.
So, Pete, the guy from the Cooper Center told my cousin that if I would like to go to the dinner that evening, to let me know and I could attend with him, as his guest! Now wasn't that a nice gesture on his part though?
Well, I talked this over a little with my cousin and said I'd have to check first with Mandy to make sure she didn't have plans for that evening and wasn't counting on me to be here with the grandkids and that was clear, then I said I'd love to attend that reunion. I phoned Mandy -who was at work at our church doing the cleaning stuff there and lucky day for me, she said "You GO Mom and you have a GREAT time!"
And so, I did just that!
I first tried to call Pete of course to let him know I was going to take him up on his offer. Called the motel where I knew he (as well as my cousin and several other out-of-towners for the reunion) was staying. The desk clerk rang his room but there was no answer. However, I was able to leave him a message to call me back. But then I thought, well what if he's out rambling around and doesn't get back to his room in time to call me, so I dug around in my e-mail messages from him and located one in which he'd given me a phone number for him. So I called and his wife answered the phone. (Now I know his wife quite well too but had only seen her once in the past 44 years -same as with Pete. So anyway, I knew there was no problem in calling that number, talking to her, etc.) She gave me Pete's cell phone number and instructions too that in case I didn't get in touch with him by phone, that I should just go over to Clearfield and show up there about 5 p.m. and meet him as he came to the restaurant and go in with him! (Now there's a trusting wife for you, isn't it?)
But anyway, I called his cell phone and was able to connect with him and we then made arrangements that he would come down here and pick me up and take me with him then to the restaurant.
Well, that sounds like all was well then, arrangements made, smooth as glass, right?
Wrong!
I then had to start thinking about what on earth I should wear to that class reunion dinner that night!
And that was a difficult process to deal with, believe you me!
Making decisions is not something that comes easy to me under the best of circumstances but when that decision involves clothing -well, that has the potential for taking not just an hour or so but days on end! And so it began then with me rooting through my closet, my dresser drawers, in search of some outfit I could pull together that would be appropriate for me to wear. Did I want to get really dressed up, or semi-dressy or casual or really casual? I tried on one outfit after another, each time modeling it for daughter Mandy to get her impression and her opinion. One red (very dressy) top and a long black skirt, Mandy ruled out immediately as being "too Christmassy." Then there was some discussion between us about that skirt but maybe wearing a nice cream colored semi-dressy top with it and that idea -particularly anything involving a cream top. me and food -got shot down by me then too! I know my graceful side very well by this time of my life and I realized that would be inviting disaster for sure as the odds were definitely in favor of some blob of food, probably the kind that would leave a big greasy stain too, would end up at some point in time landing dead-center on the upper front of a blouse/top/sweater of that color ya know! And I really didn't want to risk being seen by people I hadn't seen in 40-50 years as being that much of a slob!
Eventually, I did find something that both Mandy and I felt would be appropriate -a pair of tan-colored dress slacks, a dark brown light-weight but long-sleeved sweater (hey, it was cold here Saturday) and a brown and tan print shirt to wear over the sweater! Okay, finally got that ordeal squared away and all I had to do then was watch and wait for Pete to show up in his vehicle and pick me up.
He'd told me he would stop in front of my house and honk the horn for me when he got down to my street so I figured that would be no problem. I was watching the traffic go by the house and saw a vehicle approaching -one that I didn't recognize -so I figured that was him. It went by the house and I figured he was turning the vehicle around and waited then for him to pull up out front but he didn't appear. So I walked out on the sidewalk, looking down the street to see if I could see him driving up to my place and it was then that I saw this pickup truck stopped in front of my neighbor two doors over's house. Hmmm. Could that be Pete? I then walked up to the road and glanced over and when I did, I could see that the truck had out-of-state tags on it so I knew then that was Pete! And true to form for him, as well as it having been over 45 years too since he'd last stopped by my house to pick me up, it was Pete -at the wrong house, tooting the horn!
I motioned to him -by sticking my right arm out with my thumb raised to indicate I was a hitch-hiker -and when he saw that, I could see him raising his arm and hitting himself up side his forehead -saying "Duh!"
But that gave us something to share a lot of chuckles over then as we drove over to Clearfield for the dinner!
And that's how things came about for me that I then got to attend the 50th Class Reunion for the West Branch Area High School -Morris Township and Cooper Township Centers!
And that's also how I came to have one really terrific evening to spend amongst many, many old friends -and my dear cousin and her husband too! Just a little extra quality time with Ruth and Bernie there ya know!
The meal was quite good -buffets are not necessarily the easiest things to put together and serve and keep the food good but this meal was quite nice and very tasty!
But of course, the absolute best thing about the entire evening was the opportunity to meet and greet so many people with whom I had shared a considerable portion of my younger life with in school! Many of the folks there I've know about as long as I've known a goodly number of the kids from my own graduating class -meaning that I grew up with several of them! But hadn't seen most of them since their graduation!
One guy who I was super anxious to see though was Eddy -who had shared an apartment for a couple of years in Virginia with Pete -back in the days when I lived in Maryland and shared an apartment with 2-3 other young women. Pete and Eddy had frequently been my transportation to and from Virginia/Maryland to Pennsylvania and then back to our respective apartments again on many, many weekends between 1964 and 1966! And on the weekends that the guys didn't come up home -or I didn't come up home for a weekend (hitching a ride with two other guys originally from up this way), odds were that you would have found Pete and Eddy at the apartment in Maryland I shared with my roomies and enjoying a big BYOB type of party with our friends!
Ah yes, those were the good old days, for sure! Such fun, such great times we did have together then!
I know in a post a couple days ago I did tell you a good bit about things that Pete, Eddy and my roommates did back in the day but I hadn't gone into detail in that post about the reunion itself -or about the issues I had just trying to get ready to go to that dinner and such.
And I hadn't shown you any pictures either of the reunion itself and that's what I wanted to do here today.
Here then is my cousin, Ruth Ann and her great husband, Bernie! So wonderful to have had the ability to spend some time -again -with them!
And here's my old, old friend Pete too -in a pose that really brings back a LOT of memories for me! Just so nice to see him again too and realize that he still has the same silly sense of humor that he had back then!
Here below are pictures of the people who shared the table where we enjoyed a very nice meal and lots of fun conversation together too!
This is Mike and Sally. Funny thing here -Mike is retired from his position as the Cooper-Morris Township Police Chief and I joke that he actually knows my son much better than he knows me! But one of their daughters used to be my daughter Mandy's boss at a restaurant in State College where she worked and at that same time, Mike and Sally's son was one of the big bosses too at the truckstop where I worked back then as well!
These two lovely ladies -both named "Helen" were good friends in school and still are good friends today as well!
And here's Pat and Mary -who got to know quite well back in the summer of 2002 when I was working in Harrisburg at an internship position during the day and evenings, I worked part-time as a sales rep for the Hecht Company at the Camp Hill Mall. They live in the Camp Hill area and often would come over to the store just to check up on me and make sure I was okay, see how things were going at the internship and such! Pat's a retired PA State Trooper and is responsible for putting together a mailing list that he keeps as up-to-date as possible of his classmates from 1961 plus, he keeps a running e-mail dialogue going with his classmates along with several others who like to stay in the loop as to what's happening with people from our past -like me, ya know!
And finally, here's the photo of the entire group -all kids who graduated from our school district in 1961! There's Bar, Mary, Doreen, Gracie, Marilyn, Eddy, Bunny, Norma, Margie, Martha, Donna, Connie, Ruth Pat, Mike Bill, Phil, Fred and upteen others -whose faces I can't identify right now as I look at this pic on my screen here. Too small, ya know in this view! Plus, a lot of the kids from the Morris school I don't recognize today either. Maybe someone else got a picture of the group that is clearer, bigger and has identification of everyone there available too and will share it with Pat, who in turn, will share it with everyone -including me -and I can post that then!
But there you have it!
How I spent my night, Saturday, September 17, 2011 -in the company of some of the best friends an old girl could have ever know! Well, next to my own class, of course, that is!
My sage advice here to anyone who has an opportunity to attend a class reunion -especially one covering so many years as this one did -regardless of whether you really loved your high school days and classmates or if you absolutely think of them and those years as wasted, futile, friendless even perhaps, forget about that idea in your mind and go to your school reunion!
People do change -a lot -over the years and there are bound to be at least one or two folks you remember in good memories and can enjoy seeing once again. Even if it's only for that one or two people, to be able to get together and get reacquainted again, it's well worth it!
This past weekend, my cousin was back home for the purpose of attending her 50th Class Reunion. She and her husband flew in Thursday morning from the Austin, TX area and Mandy and I had supper that evening with them. I posted about that dinner a few days ago, you may recall. It was so great to have a chance to wine and dine -and do lots and lots of talking then too -with her and her husband -something we rarely are able to do because, of course, the distance between Texas and Pennsylvania and it sure ain't cheap getting from there to here and back again.
But something else happened over this past weekend that was really an outstanding thing for me!
I actually got to attend her class reunion too!
My cousin and I graduated from the same school system -West Branch Area School -but we didn't graduate from the same school. Back then, this particular school system had just been formed and the class of 1960 was the first class to graduate as "Warriors" from West Branch. Back then, the students attended one of two schools in our area. You either attended classes at the Morris Township School or at Cooper Township High School. The school district encompassed five different townships - Cooper, Morris, Graham, Karthaus and West Keating -when it was formed but it took another four years after the jointure -and the district -was formed before the "new" school was built and opened. The first class to attend classes at the new high school was the class of 1964.
Prior to that joining together of these townships, Morris Township and Cooper Township had been big, BIG rivals -in all things athletic, so for those of my cousin's and my generation, the joining together was in name only. We still really didn;t get to know the kids in our class from the other building -or if we did know some of them, we didn't usually have the opportunity to get to know many of them very well. (And yes, there was still a good bit of the old rivalry still going on between the two schools too, which was a bit hindersome for us then too.)
But anyway, when it came time for those kids from my cousin's class to celebrate 50 years since graduation, they opted to have a "joint" reunion -kids from the Morris School as well as kids from the Cooper School -under one roof, together. Actually the class of 1961 had a joint reunion five years ago for their 45th reunion and from what I heard from friends who were part of that class, they'd had a great time at that reunion so decided to do it all over again this year with a really big celebration.
Last Friday evening, they had an informal get-together out in Munson, at a nice little restaurant-bar there -Casanova's -and then, Saturday evening, they planned a nice dinner get-together over in Clearfield at St. Charles Cafe.
Saturday morning though, my cousin Ruth phoned me to inquire if I'd received an e-mail she'd just sent me. I clicked on my e-mail and yep, there it was so opened and read it. In that e-mail she told me how on Friday evening she'd spent a good bit of time talking to one of the guys from the Cooper school who she knew had been a very good friend of mine -both in school and following our graduation -and they got to discussing how much I would have enjoyed it had I gone to their informal gathering and gee, wouldn't it be nice if Jen could come to our dinner event this event. Yeah, that's the way my cuz operates -she's always been looking out for me, ever since we were just little kids, ya know.
So, Pete, the guy from the Cooper Center told my cousin that if I would like to go to the dinner that evening, to let me know and I could attend with him, as his guest! Now wasn't that a nice gesture on his part though?
Well, I talked this over a little with my cousin and said I'd have to check first with Mandy to make sure she didn't have plans for that evening and wasn't counting on me to be here with the grandkids and that was clear, then I said I'd love to attend that reunion. I phoned Mandy -who was at work at our church doing the cleaning stuff there and lucky day for me, she said "You GO Mom and you have a GREAT time!"
And so, I did just that!
I first tried to call Pete of course to let him know I was going to take him up on his offer. Called the motel where I knew he (as well as my cousin and several other out-of-towners for the reunion) was staying. The desk clerk rang his room but there was no answer. However, I was able to leave him a message to call me back. But then I thought, well what if he's out rambling around and doesn't get back to his room in time to call me, so I dug around in my e-mail messages from him and located one in which he'd given me a phone number for him. So I called and his wife answered the phone. (Now I know his wife quite well too but had only seen her once in the past 44 years -same as with Pete. So anyway, I knew there was no problem in calling that number, talking to her, etc.) She gave me Pete's cell phone number and instructions too that in case I didn't get in touch with him by phone, that I should just go over to Clearfield and show up there about 5 p.m. and meet him as he came to the restaurant and go in with him! (Now there's a trusting wife for you, isn't it?)
But anyway, I called his cell phone and was able to connect with him and we then made arrangements that he would come down here and pick me up and take me with him then to the restaurant.
Well, that sounds like all was well then, arrangements made, smooth as glass, right?
Wrong!
I then had to start thinking about what on earth I should wear to that class reunion dinner that night!
And that was a difficult process to deal with, believe you me!
Making decisions is not something that comes easy to me under the best of circumstances but when that decision involves clothing -well, that has the potential for taking not just an hour or so but days on end! And so it began then with me rooting through my closet, my dresser drawers, in search of some outfit I could pull together that would be appropriate for me to wear. Did I want to get really dressed up, or semi-dressy or casual or really casual? I tried on one outfit after another, each time modeling it for daughter Mandy to get her impression and her opinion. One red (very dressy) top and a long black skirt, Mandy ruled out immediately as being "too Christmassy." Then there was some discussion between us about that skirt but maybe wearing a nice cream colored semi-dressy top with it and that idea -particularly anything involving a cream top. me and food -got shot down by me then too! I know my graceful side very well by this time of my life and I realized that would be inviting disaster for sure as the odds were definitely in favor of some blob of food, probably the kind that would leave a big greasy stain too, would end up at some point in time landing dead-center on the upper front of a blouse/top/sweater of that color ya know! And I really didn't want to risk being seen by people I hadn't seen in 40-50 years as being that much of a slob!
Eventually, I did find something that both Mandy and I felt would be appropriate -a pair of tan-colored dress slacks, a dark brown light-weight but long-sleeved sweater (hey, it was cold here Saturday) and a brown and tan print shirt to wear over the sweater! Okay, finally got that ordeal squared away and all I had to do then was watch and wait for Pete to show up in his vehicle and pick me up.
He'd told me he would stop in front of my house and honk the horn for me when he got down to my street so I figured that would be no problem. I was watching the traffic go by the house and saw a vehicle approaching -one that I didn't recognize -so I figured that was him. It went by the house and I figured he was turning the vehicle around and waited then for him to pull up out front but he didn't appear. So I walked out on the sidewalk, looking down the street to see if I could see him driving up to my place and it was then that I saw this pickup truck stopped in front of my neighbor two doors over's house. Hmmm. Could that be Pete? I then walked up to the road and glanced over and when I did, I could see that the truck had out-of-state tags on it so I knew then that was Pete! And true to form for him, as well as it having been over 45 years too since he'd last stopped by my house to pick me up, it was Pete -at the wrong house, tooting the horn!
I motioned to him -by sticking my right arm out with my thumb raised to indicate I was a hitch-hiker -and when he saw that, I could see him raising his arm and hitting himself up side his forehead -saying "Duh!"
But that gave us something to share a lot of chuckles over then as we drove over to Clearfield for the dinner!
And that's how things came about for me that I then got to attend the 50th Class Reunion for the West Branch Area High School -Morris Township and Cooper Township Centers!
And that's also how I came to have one really terrific evening to spend amongst many, many old friends -and my dear cousin and her husband too! Just a little extra quality time with Ruth and Bernie there ya know!
The meal was quite good -buffets are not necessarily the easiest things to put together and serve and keep the food good but this meal was quite nice and very tasty!
But of course, the absolute best thing about the entire evening was the opportunity to meet and greet so many people with whom I had shared a considerable portion of my younger life with in school! Many of the folks there I've know about as long as I've known a goodly number of the kids from my own graduating class -meaning that I grew up with several of them! But hadn't seen most of them since their graduation!
One guy who I was super anxious to see though was Eddy -who had shared an apartment for a couple of years in Virginia with Pete -back in the days when I lived in Maryland and shared an apartment with 2-3 other young women. Pete and Eddy had frequently been my transportation to and from Virginia/Maryland to Pennsylvania and then back to our respective apartments again on many, many weekends between 1964 and 1966! And on the weekends that the guys didn't come up home -or I didn't come up home for a weekend (hitching a ride with two other guys originally from up this way), odds were that you would have found Pete and Eddy at the apartment in Maryland I shared with my roomies and enjoying a big BYOB type of party with our friends!
Ah yes, those were the good old days, for sure! Such fun, such great times we did have together then!
I know in a post a couple days ago I did tell you a good bit about things that Pete, Eddy and my roommates did back in the day but I hadn't gone into detail in that post about the reunion itself -or about the issues I had just trying to get ready to go to that dinner and such.
And I hadn't shown you any pictures either of the reunion itself and that's what I wanted to do here today.
And here's my old, old friend Pete too -in a pose that really brings back a LOT of memories for me! Just so nice to see him again too and realize that he still has the same silly sense of humor that he had back then!
Here below are pictures of the people who shared the table where we enjoyed a very nice meal and lots of fun conversation together too!
But there you have it!
How I spent my night, Saturday, September 17, 2011 -in the company of some of the best friends an old girl could have ever know! Well, next to my own class, of course, that is!
My sage advice here to anyone who has an opportunity to attend a class reunion -especially one covering so many years as this one did -regardless of whether you really loved your high school days and classmates or if you absolutely think of them and those years as wasted, futile, friendless even perhaps, forget about that idea in your mind and go to your school reunion!
People do change -a lot -over the years and there are bound to be at least one or two folks you remember in good memories and can enjoy seeing once again. Even if it's only for that one or two people, to be able to get together and get reacquainted again, it's well worth it!
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