Flotsam and Jetsam

We live in a different world today than we did 40 and 50 years ago thanks to the Space Program. There are a multitude of items that are available to us because of the program that have become so common that some people can't imagine a life without them. I am not talking about the big items like the automobile, electric lights, indoor plumbing or those kinds of things that were developed a century or so ago; I'm talking about the common everyday things like freeze-dried food, athletic shoes,Computer Aided Topography (CAT scans), Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI scans), 'Tang' the powdered OJ drink, Betadine, to kill germs, suits to keep you warm in the winter, thermal clothing, cordless power tools, self inflating life rafts, eyglasses that are less likely to be scratched, and the list goes on and on. All these items and more were developed by the space engineers to aid the astronauts and allow them to be comfortable on their flights. Life savers in many instances. They have been incorporated into our everyday lives and make life better for all of us.

When a need becomes a problem for the astronauts the engineers strive to solve the problem. Hence, the announcement the other day that they have been able to build a washer/dryer combo machine that can do both operations in one appliance. The astronauts are required to wear the same clothes for the whole mission. Except they do have to change their unders every few days; they remove them and jettison them out into space.It is rather staggering to think of how many tidy whities are orbiting in the outer spaces. This new appliance can wash the clothes, rince and spin out most of the moisture and then switch to a drying cycle and dry the articles.

We earth bound people have faced dilimmas when we are packing for extended trips abroad. You must face the fact that you will spend most of your time in the same clothes. You cannot take changes for every day of your trip because it would encrease the amount of luggage. That is not too hard to deal with, but it does get a little dicey when you try to figure out your ' unders'. You do have some choices, the travel catelogs have disposable underwear , or you can wash your underwear in the hotel room at night and expect them to dry by morning, or you could 'go commando'. When I was traveling in Ireland, one of the women on the tour bus had her 'still damp' underwear hanging in the window of the bus one day.

Now, to get back to the skivvies that the spacemen are throwing over board. I think eventually they will burn up on entering the Earth's atmosphere. It could well be that those shooting stars that fill the skies in August are actually flaming skivvies. Perhaps that star bright, star light, first star I see at night that I wish on, is a pair of size 34 boxer shorts going down in flames.It gives star gazing a whole new perspective,what if, as the song says, "Stars Fell on Alabama" that could make a rather unsavory mess on your front lawn if you lived in Alabama. I, for one, am glad that the new washer was invented! Not a moment too soon!

Now, I wonder how they manage removing their underwear while wearing those bulky space suits, aren't they pressurized or something? Maybe thinking they are wearing plain ol'boxers or the like is way off the mark. Perhaps they wear diaper type garments and have a trap door in the suits. Maybe I'll quit thinking about this and get on with things! Probably a good idea. I'm just sayin'. Caio

Ite, Missa Est

Today is the second Sunday of Advent. Two weeks in a row we have used the new Litergical changes in the language of the Mass. In the days leading up to the beginning of the changes, I was amused by the media coverage. They interviewed 'the man on the street' and others to see what the reaction was to the changes. If you knew nothing of the nature of the changes you might have been led to think that they were radical and worth being stirred up about. I was surprised by the reactions of some of the people that responded in negative ways.

For the most part, if you go back to some of the missals that were used in the past, you would see the same words used that we are being asked to use today.None of the changes in the language of the Mass in any way change the meaning of the prayers. When the priest says, "The Lord be with you", the response is "and with your Spirit".

They tried to return to the literal translation of the Latin. Any old time Catholic remembers, "Dominus vobiscum" and the responce "Et cum spiritu tuo." (The Lord be with you. And with thy spirit.)Big deal? Hardly.

We are becoming more and more willing to let our language erode in every day life. I am sometimes appalled at the lack of ability to express or use our beautiful language to communicate with others. We are becomming more and more inarticulate. If we took 'Oh my God' out of the language some people would be struck dumb when it comes to expressing feelings and thoughts. Ex."Were you surprized when you felt the earth tremble?" "Oh, my God" " Was your holiday nice?" 'Oh, my God" " Did you like the lunch?""Oh my God."

I saw a snippet of news on TV one day that recorded the meeting between two twins that had been separated at birth by adoption. They were grown up and had just been told that they were actually sisters and they greeted each other by saying over and over, "OH, my God" "Oh, my God". Not once did either one of them express the joy of meeting their blood sister. They were speechless except for the "oh, my Gods".

We speak in sentence fragments at best. Anything beyond that is alian to us. The texting and e-mails are filled with examples of the limited usage of literate speech. When Silicon Valley ushered in the computer chip and the era of technology, our language fell by the wayside. The young teenagers of that area developed a unique way of speaking. We referred to the female teens as 'Valley Girls' At first they were mocked but before too long, more and more kids spoke 'Valley Talk'. The phrase,'you know' and 'like' became standards of expression. Ex. "Ya know, like, my dad was like, really mad when he like,saw the dent, I put in the,like, fender! If one would ask that they speak an entire sentence without using the word 'like' they were unable to speak.

So many people have the habit of using a vulger word in each and every sentence. Conversations are very hard to follow when you mix 'like,' and foul words with 'ya know' thrown in. "Like' the 'friggin' (sic) car was 'like' out of friggin gas, ya know, I was like stranded." A man came up to me and,like, he goes," Can I like, help you?" I go, like, Dude, do you like, have any friggin gas, like ya know, in a friggin can?

Some of the people that were interviewed by the media voiced their concerns about some of the multi-syllabic words that our children would have to deal with in the prayers at Mass. It may well be that Mass will be the only place that they hear conversational English spoken.
(aside)
When I was growing up, all of the prayers at Mass were in Latin. Near the end of the "Lord's Prayer" were the Latin words' Et ne nos inducas in... (pronounced et nay nose in du kas)..the boys in my class would swear up and down that the priest was saying, 'It ain't no sin to cuss..' They considered that their go ahead!

I think the kids are very capable of learning the multisyllabic words and will quickly adapt to them. Much ado about nothing as W.S. would say. I didn't see any people run from the church schreeking at the few changes. Those that expressed so much concern must be 'like' freakin' out 'ya know?'

Dominus vobiscum. Ciao!

Shopping

Grocery shopping is an art now. It is no longer the mindless chore that it used to be. There was a time when you could go to the store and quickly grab a can of tomatoes off the shelf and move on to the next item on your list. Those days are gone forever! Tomatoes for example:do you want Petite diced, plain diced, diced with green chilis, tomatoes with peppers,or with onions, Italian flavored, tomato wedges,tomato with garlic and onions,crushed tomatoes, whole peeled tomatoes, tomatoes with no salt, or with salt... It doesn't end there. You have choices of what kind of green beans, Julienne cut beans, French cut, whole beans, just plain cut beans. No longer mindless! You could spend 20 or 30 minutes in the canned goods aisle alone.

When you finally make it to the hosiery section you could go into shock. Have you ever seen the size chart on the panty hose package? No wonder so many women are going bare legged now a days! You must be focused and able to concentrate to the max before you attempt to determine what size you need. Are you a size A? size B, C,? I seriously doubt that you are any one of those sizes. They give weights and hights possibilities to help you along but you find if you are five feet tall and weigh 100 lbs. you take a size A but if you are 5'6" tall and weigh 100 lbs. you also take a size A. A Masters degree in hosiery size scales is required. I've frequently gone home with a pair and when I tried to wear them, I find that no matter how many plie's I do, the hose still come just above my knees. I get a larger size the next time ,a size B perhaps and find that they are baggey at the ankles and I look like Ruth B. from Laugh In. It's a discouraging task.

I've come home from the grocery with Velveeta with Jalepenos, Mayo with olive oil, unsugared apple pie, unsalted peanuts, not that I could't make do with those items,but I'm just sayin'.

Just to add insult to injury, go shop on Geezer day! It's a whole new world out there. Gridlock in the aisles, run away oranges, and so on makes for a treacherous adventure. However you save 10% if you are extremely mature! If you do go and see a five foot tall woman, scaling the shelves in an attempt to reach the Cream of Wheat on the top shelf, give her a hand, it could be me. Ciao

test

I Met the Monster

Each year at Christmas I strive to make a goodly number of Christmas cookies. I have a great selection of recipes that meet with approval from all of the family and friends. One of my particular favorites is the Peanut Blossoms. I'm sure all of you have had those at one time or another. The basic cookie is a peanut butter cookie that has a Hershey Kiss pressed into the middle of it. So good! It seems a shame to only make those at Christmas so, a number of years ago, I decided to make it a Holloween cookie also. I buy those Braach Mellocreme Pumpkins, (similar to candy corn) and a few minutes before the cookies are done I press a pumpkin into the middle of the cookie.Voila! Holloween Cookies!

Some years I have a hard time finding the pumpkin candy but this year I lucked out and bought a bag of them. I occasionally have a few of my great-grand goblins drop in to visit, so I made up a batch of cookies yesterday so I would be prepared for visitors, having been involved with the Boy Scouts for so many years, I like to be prepared.

Oh, the aroma of those cookies wafting through the house was delightful! I could hardly wait for the first batch to come out of the oven! I took one sheet out and put the second sheet in before I put the cookies on the rack to cool. I thought I should try one to see that it was up to standard. It was pretty hot, I had to pass it from one hand to the other to help it cool down, and to save my tongue from cookie burn, I finally got it to my mouth! It was as good as I remembered from years past. The pumpkin candy softens just a tad and the taste blends in with the peanutty taste of the cookie. Oh,my! Sheer delight!

By this time it was time to press the pumpkins into the second sheet of cookies and in just two minutes, time to remove them from the oven. In the past I've had one trey of cookies not be quite as good as the first, so I needed to eat a test cookie and compare it with the first one. It did seem to measure up. One of the cookies was slightly smaller than the others so I felt I should eat it to avoid comparison.

My neighbors were in their back yard doing some yard work so I bagged four cookies to take out to them. JoAnne said she was going to eat her two before Jay saw them because otherwise she might only get one! I understand perfectly. I suggested she go ahead and eat three of them.

During dinner I was pleased to know that I had dessert to look forward to. I must admit I got a little carried away. In an effort to make the milk and cookies come out even, I had to eat six cookies! I know you'll understand because you have probably been confronted with that problem also, at sometime in your life.

After eating my totally healthful breakfast of oatmeal and walnuts this morning, I ate two cookies to polish off my meal. Shortly thereafter, I did the math. I started out with 40 cookies, I gave four to the neighbors, ate two test cookies,or was it three? (I had to do that!) six for dessert and two for breakfast, the number of cookies remaining is dwindling!

If the great-grand goblins don't get here in the next day or so I may have to eat the rest of the cookies at one sitting to get rid of them so they won't tempt me anymore!! I've had to do that in the past with boxes of chocolates and ice cream and chocolate pie.. It is a sure way to avoid temptation. I'm hoping for a happy ending. Maybe I'll end up joining Cookies Anonymous!

I have met the Cookie Monster and it is ME! Caio

Do you want the recipe?

Fall

It is such a beautiful day,that I decided I would go outside and cut down some of the wild trees and vines that are growing in my flower garden. Some of the growth is growing taller than I, time to trim. I filled two trash cans with cuttings. I was so exhausted by all of that activity that I decided to quit even though more work needs to be done. Conditions have not been just right for sitting on the deck with my book and a glass of wine lately but today was perfect for that. Not too hot, not windy, not chilly; it was delightful. I have an umbrella/table on the deck that I put my shamrocks, my large ceramic hippo and ceramic cat and other small plants on. Last Mother's Day I went to breakfast at the Bonnycastle Club with Karen and Paul and I received a small chrysanthemum that was a table decoration, I have nurtured it and watered it and even transplanted it to a larger pot. It has florished and is full of buds that I am anxious to see bloom. Well, you guessed it! my arch enemy,the squirrel, attacked it over night. Grrrr! He thinks my table is a snack bar! I have put the severed stems in a glass of water, hoping they will survive but I am still mad at the little beast for killing all my tomatoes and now this! Does he have some sort of vendetta against me?

I calmed down, sat down at the deck table and read my book and drank my wine. 'The leaves of brown came tumbling down' all around me and I was finally at peace! I'll keep a close watch on my crippled mums and hope for the best. The birds were all at my feeders, a bright red Cardinal and many smaller birds. Sitting on the ground near the holly tree was a Robin! I think we are going to have a heavy winter because there are so many acorns around. We'll see. Happy Fall. Ciao

Weather

Remember Howdy Doody? He had an Indian Princess on his show named,Princess Summer-fall-winter-spring.Even little three and four year olds could name the four seasons, unbeknownest to them, they had been taught. It may have been a few years later that they became fully aware of the meaning of those words.

We all learned the seasons and learned what to expect when the seasons change from one to another. We are now in the early days of Fall and we would expect a cooling down of the temperature. At first the days continue to be reasonably warm since we live in the North Temperate Zone, the average high is somewhere between the sixties and seventies during the day and dropping down to temps between fifty and sixty at night. The days are shorter. In December when winter arrives, we expect it to become colder and colder as we go into January and February, then in March Spring blows in and we experience both warm and cold days and cold nights as we approach Summer. Summer brings extremely hot days and nights!We all pretty much know the drill. Put the heavy clothes away and get out the light weight clothes. However, we can't predict with any accuracy what Fall will bring this year or of what Winter will be like. We have had some disagreeable, even harmful atmospheric conditions in the last few years that have been anomalous. We had a 'freak' mid-western hurricane whose straight line winds wreaked havoc with trees,some structures and thousands of power lines. Many of us went for days without power. It took the city about six or eight months to remove the fallen trees, branches,and other debris from the curbs of the city. Trees that had been standing for more than half a century were torn from the ground. In the following season we had a devestating ice storm that felled many more trees and more power lines and small shrubs and so on. We have had floods in places that have never experienced floods before. This past summer we had so many days in the 90's that we came to expect it. We had days of 90 degree weather in May, for Pete's sake.

The weather has become a 'bone of contention' At first when changes were noticed the meteorologists (some of them) blamed it on El Nino. The local weather was analyzed and compaired to recorded conditions. But eventually the scientists and others took it a few steps further and noticed changes throughout the world and realized it was a global problem. The Polar Ice Cap, is melting, lakes are drying up, even the largest bodies of water have shrunken or whatever its called. They have accumulated a lot of evidence that has convinced them that it is not a cyclical event; they are thinking that it could be anthropogenic. There is undisputed proof that the ozone layer has thinned.

If you can believe this, there are some that have turned the discussion of this anomoly into a political issue! Remarkable!

The Readers that I taught out of in the classroom for many years had many stories about the Indian Tribes and their culture. I'm sure some of you may remember the theme that was often presented in those stories. The Indians taught their young, from the very beginning of life, the importance of taking care of the earth so that the generations that came after them could enjoy the same gifts that they had. The responsibility of the Indians was to leave the Earth as rich as they found it.

I could go on here for a week but I am not informed enough to give any advice as to how to reverse some of the damage but I do know that tearing off the tops of mountains, burning fosil fuels, using aerosol sprays, dumping trash in the rivers and creeks,and ravaging the Rain Forest,etc. are harmful and PERHAPs contribute to(gasp)Global Warming.

I joked with Andrea about perhaps having a pool party on Christmas Eve for the family get together. Sounds absurd but who knows what the temperature will be. Just last month it was 102 degrees here one day and two days later it was 62 degrees. Whoes to say it won't be 85 on Christmas Eve?

Hey you guys, quit poking holes in the Ozone! Ciao

*anthropogenic means, man made.

Technophobia

For almost thirty-five years we've all been living in the era of technology. We're surrounded by it. Internet, e-mail, cell phones, I-Pods, computerized engines in our cars, the microwaves flowing through the atmosphere prompt AT&T to remind us daily, on our HD TV's, that we live in a world of possibilities. Yes, we do!

Just to list a few: we can track our kids,parents, stocks, neighbors, dogs, cats, weather, sports scores, sale items,movie critiques, and a variety of other things just by touching the screen of our i-phones. One of the ads for one of the newest phones shows a mother,that is out shopping, touching a screen on her hand held phone and seeing her young son at the dining room table doing his homework, she asks,"Why are you working in the dark?" With a touch of another image on her phone she turns on the chandelier over the table! How tender!

Another commercial shows a little girl tracking her dog, that seems to be running off on his own pursuits. I'm sure he has a chip inserted into his body.

Texting has become the number one method of communication. A mother was complaining one day about her young daughter that was riding in the back seat of the mother's car with one of her friends. The mother became aware that no conversation was going on, all was quiet in the back seat. She looked into the rear view mirror to see what was going on back there and found that the girls were texting each other. R U in trbl with U'r rents? Spelling has fallen by the wayside.

I always found it to be self satisfying to go into a library or in some cases, go to my own book shelves to seek information.I wanted to become a Renaissance woman. I wanted to be well versed in many fields of knowledge. Searching for knowledge, sometimes just randomly, was an exercise that I throughly enjoyed. I could go back to look at my reference books if the need arose. I looked upon that activity as a pleasure. There is something lacking in simply going to Wikipedia or any other reference engine on the internet to 'read up on it'. Boring and not at all challenging.

I have many reference books, one of them is entitled ,"The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy" sub titled, "What Every American Needs to Know." Perhaps if some of the polititians and some of the voters were to read a few books like that they would not be so prone to make fools of themselves in their every day conversations.(I used to reward my students by reading a passage from one of my books to them. When they worked well they would ask for the reward. They ended up learning many, many facts by the end of the year. Believe it or not they enjoyed it and loved to discuss some of the facts.

I'm wondering how far away we are from having computer chips embedded under our skin, perhaps on the head, then we would not have to carry those infernal i-phones, i-pods, GPA's and other devises with us. It could be called a 'head pod' and it would carry all the information, music, knowledge, etc. We could have a key pad on our fingernails or maybe our teeth,(that would be neat ,we could use our tongue to activate it). Everybody could know where you are at all times, maybe you could establish a connection to the people you wanted to converse with and could have 'hands free' communication. Head to head, so to speak.You could download books onto your chip and just close your eyes and 'read' at all times. The people without head chips could be called block heads. Time marches on!! Ciao

This is not what I set out to write at all!

It's Not Easy Being Me!

As I so frequently say,"It's not easy being me!" Throughout the years those of you who spent a lot of time with me, so often heard me bemoan the fact that I never had any time in my house alone! Doc always worked the afternoon shift (3PM until 11PM)which meant that he left for work at just about the time the kids came home from school. He was in the house half the time and the kids were there the other half. I was never alone in the house. I used to fantasize about the possibilities of what I could do with some alone time. I could sit and do nothing but enjoy some uninterrupted reading time, I could turn the radio up and sing along at the top of my voice, I could eat ice cream out of the container, I could dance to my heart's content, I could take off my clothes and dance around in the nude,scary thought, I could take off my skin and dance around in my bones! The possibilities were endless! Alas, it never happened! Well almost never.

It did happen once in the 1980's Gregg took Doc to a Trinity/St.X game! I had three or four hours to do as I wished! I thought long and hard about it before coming to the decision to get into a bubble bath and just lie back and ponder the imponderables.So I filled the bath tub with steamy hot water and added flowery scented bubbles and slipped into the tub with a sigh of perfect contentment. After what seemed like an hour or so, I arose from my heavenly bower, toweled off and returned to my bedroom to dress. Guess what? I'd been in the tub all of 15 minutes! It seemed like an eternity to me! I didn't know how to relax!

However, time marched on as it is wont to do and I ended up having the house all to myself all of the time. Be careful what you wish for.

There are some up-sides to living alone and some down-sides. The freedom to make all of the decisions regarding the day's activities,food choices, thermostat settings, bed times, and many others. The thermastat wars are over! If I don't want to turn the furnace on yet I don't do it! Nonetheless, I still find myself sort of argueing with myself. "I'm not turning it on yet!"
"Why not?"
"It's barely September!"
"But you're cold!" This goes on and on. I win a few I lose a few.

One of my ingrained habits has me puzzeled though. Every morning when I get up I worry with what to wear. Should I wear my green shirt or my blue, I can't wear the black, I wore that yesterday. Should I wear...wait a minute what does it matter? There are times that I don't see a single person from one week to the next. Why does it matter what I wear? I could just stay in my jammies if I wanted to but then I would feel like a slattern. What if someone DID come to the door unexpectedly? I was so glad when the weather cooled off enough that I could put jeans on. Problem solved, I can just wear my jeans every day. One of the pair of jeans will have to be replaced because over the summer they seemed to have fallen apart. They look like Charlie Chaplan pants, they need a patchin'. Now I just have to choose a fresh shirt each day, although why would it matter if I wore the same shirt two days in a row? Oh,well. I guess you can't teach an old dog new tricks.

Actually someone did come to the door unexpectedly once, he knocked, entered, kissed me on the head, called me Mama and went straight over and sat on my sofa. Problem was, I had never seen him before in my life and I ordered him out of my house! Thing is, though, I was dressed very neatly and had my hair combed! If he was expecting to catch me unawares I fooled him! I'm sure the police officers appreciated the fact that I looked respectable. Today,I have on my green shirt and a tan sweater! Oh yeah, and my jeans. I may go out later to empty the trash so in case someone catches a glimps of me they will see that my shirt is a defferent color than it was yesterday.

By the way, what ever happened to 'house dresses'? Not my style. Ciao

Septermber 11, 2001

This is the tenth anniversary of the "9/11" attack on the Trade Buildings in New York City. I could probably not write anything new about what an abomination that attack was. Millions of words have been written about that attack, far better writers than I, have written about it, but still, no person has come up yet with words strong enough to accurately describe or define the act that ripped the mantel of conplacency that we in America lived under. There are no words to aptly describe the evil that is Al-Quaida, no matter how vile, disgusting, obscene, or insulting the words are, they still are not bad enough to express the horror or hell that caused so much suffering for individuals and for the whole country. We cannot forget it!

That having been said, why are the daily papers and the news stations on TV showing us and telling us about the miserable state our country is in at this time? Why aren't we all on the same team? Why aren't we all in this together trying to work together to do what's best for our country? While we are all grieving still, over an outside force trying to distroy our country, why are we all busy calling each other names, rejecting any idea that doesn't originate with the party of our choice, why can't the governing bodies that we elected to speak for us, do their jobs? What is more important, their "jobs" (which they are not doing) or the country that we are all living in? Are they willing to destroy our economy and our country just to prohibit one party or person from being successful? Are they willing to neglect the sick and poor and starving children in our country because, to do otherwize, would diminish their superiority?

They are not bombing our buildings or trying to destroy our cities but their actions are slowly but surely destroying the fabric of America just as the Al-Quaida tried to damage our buildings and the people in them. Is it any worse to destroy the spirits of the jobless and the poor and eventually cause them such hardships that their lives will be shortened, than to fly an airplane into a building and kill lives and dreams along with it? Is it?

Today's news

I've been on this earth for many, many years and I've always been attuned to what is going on in the world. Probably,this is due to the fact that my parents were political people and active in the world around them. They came from a very small town in Ohio but were the grandchildren of Irish immigrants. My mother's family lived on a 1500 acre farm just south of London,O and my dad's dad was the town's only blacksmith. Horses were the mode of transportation in those pre automobile days so Grandpa was kept very busy. By the time I was born, both grandfathers had retired. Maybe because they were the families of immigrants they kept up with the world around them. The country was relatively new to them.

My first memories are of my mother getting a Maytag washing machine and Al Smith running for president. My dad schooled us on the events of the day and faithfully read the newspaper aloud to us each evening. I knew all about the Ku Klux Klan and Herbert Hoover and FDR, prohibition and anti-Catholic propaganda before I even went to kindergarden.

Some of the issues that were dealt with in those days are still on the agendas today and the ones that faded away have been replaced by more volatile issues. The KKK isn't heard about as much, not because of any solutions but because they just went more undercover. Prohibition was ended, not because it accomplished any good but becasue it spawned so much crime and so many gangsters that it was repealed. Anti-Catholosism is still alive and well but the rising distain and distrust of Muslims is taking over.

If you read today's paper you read articles on the very same things that were causing problems 80 years ago and will probably be with us for the next 80 years. If the country doesn't fall of its own weight in the next few years.

The media has pretty much taken over, and the internet and instant reports on everything is the rule of the day.

1921-2008 Rest in Peace ,Doc.

On August 22, 2008 Doc passed away. This is the third anniversary of his death. We always mark on grave markers and pictures and other places the year of the birth and the year of the death with a dash in between.. The 'dash' represents the life in between birth and death. Doc's 'dash' lasted for 87 years

The Registry from Rattermans and the cards off of flowers and the sympathy cards and letters of condolence that I received were all saved in a box in my closet. I had put them all away and knew that one day I would take them all out and read them again. Today was the day. .

The first days after his passing were all so busy. I had to adjust to a whole new way of living. I had spent sixty-six years as part of a 'couple'. After all that many years, your thoughts and actions concern 'we'. If it affected me it would affect him and his actions affected me as well as him. We were a pair! 'for better or for worse'. We had a lot of hard times together and a lot of great times together. But the 'we' became 'I' with his last breath.

The days and weeks following a death are filled with filing papers, signing papers, making hard decisions, evaluating your assets and your status. Sort of starting over, so to speak.

Today, I opened the box and sat for the greater part of the day and read all of the cards and letters and looked at the registry and felt the urge to let people know that their words, prayers and thoughts had consoled me and meant so much to me at the time but mean even more to me today, three years away from the sorrowful days that I received them. I can still recall the soothing words of some of the callers, some of the visitors, I felt all over again the sincerity of the feelings of sympathy and love. I vowed to express my sympathy to the people I care for and help them heal in their losses. It doesn't have to be elaborate or costly, it just has to be heartfelt. It is surprising how just knowing that someone took the time to let you know that they care can lift your spirits.

I put all of the things back in the box to perhaps, read another day. Three years seems like a long time, in some ways, but seems like yesterday in others. The memories linger on. The third anniversary seemed like a good time to take my memories out and look at them.I'm glad I did. Ciao.

Another strong storm hit Louisville a couple of nights ago. This one had straight line winds that were between 65 and 70 miles an hour. Fortunately it only lasted for a few minutes. Well, maybe five or ten minutes. I live in fear of my oak tree crashing in on my home but I escaped again. However the roof and yard were a total mess. There were some small branches and twigs and leaves and just plain clutter all over my yard and windows. I did drive to church the next morning and saw a few large branches down but overall the area did not look too bad. My power flicked off a few times but came right back on. I had to reset the clocks twice. Abrahams lost their power but their yard was about in the same condition as mine. Last time my umbrella on the deck was blown over onto their roof. Not so this time!
Brian called and said he would come and help me clean up the mess. When he got here he was amazed at how good things looked here. He had seen trees that had been uprooted and were on top of cars or houses, wires down, telephone poles pulled from the ground, large signs blown against building and such havoc that he felt I should count my blessings. He did get the blower and cleaned it all up but made me feel thankful for being spared and guilty for whining about my minor mess. That's the story of life.

Things are never so bad that you can't look around and see someone worse off than you. My Grandmother taught me that lesson when I was a young child. I have found so often in life that she was right. So often when I begin to have a pity party for myself I have to look around and see that I am the lucky one.

Does this mean that I don't whine and complain about my plight once in awhile? No,on many occasions I have to adjust my attitude but I try to eventually come around to seeing the good things in my life and let the less than good things go. However, I am still mad at the squirrel or raccoon or whatever it was that ate my tomato plants! I see a few of my neighbors and some members of my family and some of the people at achool that have bumper crops of tomatoes and I ask where did I go wrong? Is there a 'tomato ref' around that I can complain to? Surely, the little beast that ate the plants deserved to have a foul called on him. It just doesn't seem fair. I love tomatoes! Why me,Lord?

Oh well, my oak tree is still standing!!!Ciao.

School Days

Today, all of the teachers are going back to school. How I wish that I could be there,too. I love school! When I was growing up I could hardly wait for Labor Day to come because schools opened the next day,the next week day. I lived in Ohio and we didn't start in August. Many states still follow that pattern. School begins after Labor Day! Kentucky started opening in August because of the possibility of snow causing "snow days"in the winter. In Ohio, when I was growing up, if it snowed you put your boots on and went to school. There was no such thing as a "snow day". Not only did you go to school but you walked there. I loved that too. We would walk to school and the walk was so quiet. The blanket of snow absorbed the usual noises.

For forty years, I went back to school on this day to get ready for the year to come. We always gathered together to enjoy the "Opening donuts". The teachers shared all of their summer experiences and renewed friendships and exuded excitement to be back, they checked out the new faculty members and made their acquaintances. The synergy in the room was almost palpable

I scrutinized all of the class rosters and wondered which kid was out there waiting to see if he could challenge me, see if he could make me wish I had taken up some other career; I wondered which kid was out there waiting for one of us to change his life for the better. Which kid was going to find a friend that would enrich his life forever, which kid would learn how to be more enthused about learning and more enthused to be thinking and recognizing his/her talents.

There are usually workshops presented to keep all teachers up on the latest techniques and new methods of grading, clarification of school rules, dress code infractions, banned articles and so on.

I liked getting the classroom in order, assembling the name tags and making a seating arrangement, posting the "Class Rules" in a prominant place, displaying books suitable for reading, making sure that there are games available for rainy day recesses, charts or posters that refer to subject matters that we will be working on. Of course the alphabet and number line must be visible to them for reference. Class schedules posted for easy access lest they forget what's next.

Lesson plans for the early days were made. A planned recitation of class structure and likes and dislikes. A 'getting to know each other' session. It is always good to establish just what your expectations are. I always thought it was wise to let them know just what you would tolerate. I informed them that I personally had only one rule and as long as they did not break my rule, we would get along just fine! RULE: Do as I say!

I hate it that I am not there today! I feel that a part of my being has been excised. I love school in general. I like volunteering to do some of the mailings and any thing else that I can do. I like the atmosphere of school, the 'smell' of school. I must say that part of the ambiance of schools was tossed out when they switched from 'black boards and chalk' to 'white boards and markers' I know that the thinking is that so many children were allergic to chalk dust but what about the marker odors? Can they be good for you? I inhaled chalk dust from the time I was five years old and so did millions of others and we survived. For tactile learners I think the feel, sound and odor of chalk on a black slate is theraputic and inspiring. Oh, well!

I could hardly wait till Monday when I was a student. I had almost perfect attendance, most illnesses that we have immunization for now, were dealt with by the Health department by quarantining the whole family. My sister got the measles, so I, and the rest of the family were quarantined. I had to miss many days of school. I didn't get the measles but in case my brothers would get it, my aunt took me to stay at her house until the danger was over. I absolutely did not want to miss any more school!

As for going to school to teach for forty years, I made every effort to not miss days. I never woke up in the morning and thought, "I don't want to go today." I always woke up and went to school if I could, no matter what. I loved school and always will.

I wish I were there as I write! Ciao

PS Have a great year, teachers and count your blessings. Go forth and change someone's life for the better.

Adventure Number ????

I read a quotation that said,"Man is born to live not to prepare for life." I really don't see how you could prepare for life when you don't know what's coming next! Life is just one adventure after another. I seem to have more than my share but that's Ok. I think life would be mighty dull if there were no adventures.

My latest adventure really livened up an otherwize mundane Friday evening. I was planning to watch "Blue Bloods" at 10 PM and so I prepared for bed so that I could just watch the show, and then read my current book until I fell asleep. I had turned all the lights off downstairs and locked all of the doors and planned to watch from my bed.

I had not yet completed my nightly rituals when I noticed the Police helicopter circling the neighborhood. That routinely happens every month or so. I soon became aware that the circles had become smaller and smaller and seemed to be concentrated on or near my property. The spot light on the plane was shining down on my area. Now, that is not routine so I started to become alarmed. More and more lights were being focused on my house. The living room and kitchen were targeted and as I looked out through the slats in the shades I could see many police with their flash lights in my yard, driveway, Tabb's driveway, the ditch and all the surrounding yards. Many patrol cars were gathered on the streets.

I was very, very frightened! I tried to call the Abrahams and they were not home. I left them a message and hung up and then decided I would call 911. I didn't think about what I was going to say when the dispatcher answered so when she asked the ,"Do you need fire, police or ambulance?" I said I just want information! I'm sure my panic came through in my voice and she, the dispatcher, said,"Tell me what you need to know." I said I wanted to know what all the police and police vehicles and the helicopter were doing. She quickly asked where I was, what my name was, and if I was alone in the house.

She said, "Do not go out of your house!!" She went on to say that the police were chasing someone and then she went on to assure me that I would be safe. She said not to hang up, she said,"I know how scared you are so I am going to ask one of the officers to come to your door, do not hang up! The officers will have flashlights and will identify themselves." At that point I heard them come to the porch and in my nervous state, was trying to get the door unlocked and I dropped the phone and it hung itself up. She immeciately called again and said I could open the door because it definitely was the police. Then she hung up.

I had heard what sounded like a gun shot and I had also heard a 'thump' on the deck. I told the officers about that and they went out back and checked the deck and shined their lights all over the area. They said there had been officers with dogs up and down the ditch and around the yards.I had seen four to six police cruisers on my street and on Sunder. They encouraged me to 'be not afraid'.

About 5 minutes later the Abrahams came home and they were surprised to
see their lights in the front and back yards, and to see an officer walking away from their yard to get in his patrol car. They have sensor lights. They walked back to Chatham Rd. before going into their house. The neighbor back there said he had thought he heard someone shooting off a firework and had come out in time to see all the patrol cars leaving. He was in his basement.

Of course when the Abrahams entered their house they heard my message to them and called to get the details. One neighbor said he heard that the police were chasing an escaped convict. No report on the news nor in the paper today!
Mystery,Nu nee,nu,nee! I hope we find out someday what it was all about.(Probable not about the Hokey Pokey).

P.S.

It did say in the paper that Karen Sypher has already filed papers to get a retrial if and when she gets out of prison in six years or so. She never got to tell her story! (she says).

Stay tuned for the next adventure. Ciao

Mount Rainier Adventure

Quite a few of our family members stayed at the same hotel in Seattle. The hotel has a "free" breakfast each morning that is actually very good. It is not just a Continental breakfast with Danish, toast, sweet rolls and coffee,tea and milk. It had scrambled eggs, hash browns, sausages, oatmeal, a variety of dry cereals, make-your-own waffle or pancake equipment, bagels, muffins and juices...but by Sunday most of us were rather tired of the selections and the tables only accommodated four people and there were about 26 of us. We decided to walk to a resturant a few blocks away that Pete Lowry, Paul's nephew, suggested. The weather was perfect and outdoor seating was available and could easily seat all of us together and comfortably. We sat under magnolia trees that had hanging baskets of georgeous yellow flowers hanging between each tree. There was an elaborate iron fence between us and the street. It was brunch time. The food was excellent! I had Eggs Benedict with crab meat and the others ordered various brunch offerings that looked as good as mine. A couple of the guys had Bloody Marys. The kids enjoyed it as well as the adults.We ate and then walked back to the hotel so that part of the group could check out and move on.

The rest of us, that were not planning to leave until Monday, chose to drive to Mt. Rainier National Park. There were enough of us to need two cars. Mt. Rainier is 54 miles south east of Seattle. It is visible from almost anyplace you are in Seattle, when the clouds are not hiding it. It is exciting to drive along and look up ahead to see the snowy peaks rising above the clouds sometimes, at other times the whole mountain is visible, not just the peaks.

After we left I-5 behind us and got away from the city traffic it was a very pleasant ride. Needless to say it was uphill all the way, as we got further and further up the mountain the view out any window was beautiful. The trees almost met overhead and it was like driving in a two lane tunnel. Looking out the left hand window you could see that it was a long way down! The road signs warned of the curving roads ahead. The bright yellow signs with double s's as an example of what we were facing. Rowan had fallen asleep in the back of the car and Kristin was reading books to Maureen.
after a short time Kris said reading and riding the curvy road was making her feel a little queezy so she discontinued her reading. Suddenly, Maureen started crying and as we turned to see what was was wrong, the great breakfast was making a recurrence! Kris had only a book to try to catch it. It was just at that time that a small area on the right side of the road appeared. Fortunately, Tim could pull off the road and we had a major clean-up task. There was an extra change of clothes, even another pair of shoes and sox so that worked out well. Kris and Tim did a yeoman's job of parenting. Kris took care of Maureen and Tim was the clean-up man for the car. Poor Maureen was so sick and kept saying as she cried, I don't feel well! Rowan slept through the whole ordeal. There was a news paper in the car and it became the cleaning tool, when we got back on the road the whole mess was cleaned up. Whew!

By the time we caught up with Scott,Kathy, Paul and the kids it was too late to take a short hike on one of the trails so we just got out and enjoyed the scenery and took some pictures. With binoculars we could see climbers up on the mountain, they looked like little ants crawling along. We saw a deer run across the road and off into the wooded area. We started our trip back down the road. After traveling for a few miles traffic suddenly stopped moving. We could see emergency vehicles ahead and could actually see someone lying on the road. One of the medics ran over to the ambulance and came back with the defibrilator which indicated to me that it was not good. Finally we saw them doing chest compressions. We could hear sirens of more emergency units coming and the people in authority started to let us move on. We were third in line back from the accident on the right lane the action was in the left lane. We were the last to be let pass. As we passed by the scene we could see one motorcycle off on the side of our lane. We headed back to Seattle to meet with Carrie and Gabe so we could go to dinner. It was getting late and we needed to be up at 3:30 AM to get to the airport for our flight home Monday morning. As it was, we had a minor problem finding a resturant that could seat 13 of us but we finally made it. We arrived back at the hotel about 10 PM and had to pack and be ready to go before going to bed. We had to sleep fast! 3:30 AM rolled around very quickly. When Kristen awakened Rowan to get him dressed and ready for the trip home he was quite snarky! She said, "Rowan, don't you want to go home?", he said,"Not now!" He would have preferred to get a little more sleep before going.

Karen checked the internet to see if there was a report on the incident on the Mt. Rainier road and found the account of the accident. Two women were on their motorcycles going up the mountain road and a deer ran out in front of one of them, she swerved to avoid the deer and hit the other motorcycle. The biker died of the impact and the swerver was injured and taken to the hospital. The internet article said that after letting three or four cars get through the rest of the traffic was stopped for three hours before being allowed to go. We were obviously the last car to make it through.

How tragic, instant death on a blacktop mountain road. It can happen so fast! May she rest in peace.

We headed out the next morning and had a smooth trip home. Karen and Paul arrived home on Tuesday evening, Carrie and Gabe are in Hawaii and we will always remember their wedding week!!! Ciao

Carrie and Gabe's Wedding Week

Ordinarily I am a very promp person. I like to be on time for things but for this event I was a few days late arriving. The wedding ceremony was on Saturday, July 23, 2011 at 5 PM. The actual festivities began on Sunday July 16. I arrived on Wednesday, July 20th. very late in the evening so my fun began on Thursday.

If you've never been to Seattle, you should put it on your bucket list of places to see before you die. It is a picturesque, quaint, beautiful, city overflowing with lush flora and I'm sure fauna even though I didn't see any. (Other than Harley Rose and the resident cat, whose name escapes me.)The hills remind me of Cincinnati but the homes perched on those hills are of a distinct architectural style that blends in with the natural landscape. The view from Carrie and Gabe's deck/porch is spectacular. It reminded me of a view that I had from the balcony of my room in Delphi, Greece. The majestic mountains in the distance and the cloud formation above them was breath taking. We were fortunate enough to get the full view because the clouds were high above the mountains. Imagine getting up each day and being able to step out your front door to such beauty.

On my first full day there, Thursday, we visited the Aquarium. We drove there and parked near Pike's Market, a tourist attraction in itself, and walked over to the Aquarium. Some of our group took the bus almost there and then got off and walked the rest of the way. Seattle is a great city to walk in if you are not in the burbs where you might need one of those tools that the mountain climbers use. The ones with the big hook on the end? It is a very good aquarium, the kids could pet(?) the star fish and feel the skin of a shark, a dead one, and watch the otters play. They had both river otters and ocean otters. One otter floated on his back using his chest as a table with his food fish on it. He floated and ate and looked so relaxed that we were amused. There is an arch over one of the paths filled with jelly fish, fun to walk under that and see the jelly fish overhead.

After the Aquarium we went to lunch at a Seafood Resturant, Ivars I think. We ate on the patio overlooking the water and watched the pelicans cavorting about. We moved on to our next activity after lunch.

I'll digress here for a minute to relay some information that had an affect on the next activity. When Gabe awakened that morning he became aware of the fact that the tooth that had been giving him some trouble had suddenly become pretty unbearable. It was Thursday, he was to be married on Saturday and leave for Hawaii on Monday! Get thee to the dentist!!

We carried on without him.He went to the Doc-tor and we went on the "Duck-Tour" Reservations had been made for all of us. (24) During WWII there was a need for vehicles that could operate both on land and in the water. (Amphibians) These vehicles are still operable and are used as tour vehicles.We toured around Seattle and saw many of the tourist attractions on land and then went into the water and sailed around the inlet and saw a whole community of houseboat homes. It was remarkable. We had enough life jackets overhead to accommodate us if we needed them! It does give you pause for thought to realize that this vehicle was built about 65 or 70 years ago.

The tour guide was a comedian. He was actually very funny. He found out that Carrie was being married and we were all celebrating the event so he directed most of his comedic spiel to Carrie's wedding. He asked where the groom-to-be was and when told he was dealing with a dental immergency, that really gave him fodder for his act. We did a lot of laughing at Gabe's expence. He, the guide, had a bubble machine and a vast selection of hats. He changed his persona each time he changed his hat and fired bubbles out the window at random. When we arrived at a very busy intersection, he had us all shout, "Hello Seattle, Carrie's getting married!" Meanwhile he is shouting through his mike and shooting bubbles out the window.It sounds very juvenile but it was actually very amusing.He insisted that Carrie come to the front of the bus, she looked so cute and did in fact become a true 'blushing bride"-to-be.

Thursday night was Kareoke(sic) night. It was so much fun! We went in with so many people saying they would be listeners, not participants, but before the evening was over, after a few libations and exhibitions almost every one joined in.

Friday, we went to Carrie's and Gabe's and helped with some last minute preparations for the up-coming rehearsal dinner. Some of us worked on completing the decorative flags for the wedding and we all ate KFC on the deck. Good fun, lots of laughs, camaraderie, and bonding. All Gabe's family and Carrie's family had the chance to meet and share life stories! That was a good thing!

The rehearsal dinner was at the Gas Works Park and we were joined there by all the friends and the rest of the family for excellent food and drink. The tention is building for the main event!! Tomorrow at 5PM we're all good to go.

Early on Saturday morning as we had pretty much taken over the breakfast room in the hotel, Karen's phone rang, she shouted out, "Gabe, that's not funny!" The question? " Have you seen Carrie?" Actually, we all laughed, it was funny.

Some of us headed to Carrie's with wedding garb in hand and others headed to Martha Washington Park where the ceremony would take place later in the day. Last minute glitches took over for awhile, the music "thing" somehow or other fell or was dropped and distroyed and Carrie's phone fell into the bath tub and the back-up music met with the same fate as the first or something. I was a little confused by the music disaster and am not sure of all the details but I do know that before long
Gabe was talking about Bridezilla which aptly discribes Carrie's reaction. Gabe's mom was out shopping for solutions for some of the glitches. Pretty soon, Carrie showed up smiling and her usual ebullient self and we knew that ALL WAS WELL! A few of the boys worked on making a blue satin bow and blue ribbons on Harley Rose's collar and Harley was overjoyed to be an integral part of the wedding!

The wedding ceremony went off without a glitch. Alex escorted me down the pathway to the chairs. We were followed by two of Gabe's grandmas then, Karen and Paul, Gabe's mother, his step-mother and his father. The music was provided by a really cool group of musicians that had the look of a Blue Grass band. They played while the guests gathered. The band stood to the right of the area where the actual vows were made. Gabe's friend played and sang a song that I think he composed, and then his dad sang and a friend of Carrie's read a reading. The bride and groom each had composed their own vows. The vows were beautiful and heart felt and sincere. Carrie, cried a little and needed a hankerchief provided by Gabe who later told us that someone had ask him beforehand if he had a handkerchief and when he said,no she provided him with one. How wise of her! Both sets of vows were very touching, very revealing and words to remember. Abbey was the junior brides maid and Gus was the ring bearer. Emotional!

The ceremony took place,as I said, at Martha Washington Park. They chose a spot between two huge oak trees, Carrie had asked that we make flags to string between the trees. They were in keeping with the color theme of the day, turquoise, red and blue. There was a soft breeze that kept the flags moving, the sun was shining, it was about 77 degrees and the clouds were white and puffy, and the mountains were clearly visible beyond the Martha Washing Lake. Blue skies smiling at us on a picture perfect day! Flawless!

We moved on to the reception site. The band came along for that too. Good food, good music and a happy crowd made for a marvelous evening. Carrie and Gabe started off the dancing by dancing together, then Carrie and Paul, Gabe and his mom and finally everyone joined in. We could never have pulled it all off without Neil Diamond's "Sweet Caroline" and Carrie being Carrie came prepared with shorts on under her sensational wedding dress so she could do the splits and wow the crowd with a cart wheel!! Gabe, are you ready for lots of surprises in your future? A good time was had by all!!!!! Aloha.

Annie

I've tried two or three times to write about the passing of Karen's friend, Annie. She was so dear to all of us and was a very major part of our lives. She will be sorely missed, not only by Karen but by me also. She was bigger than life! She laughed with us and she cried with us. I would like to offer the words of Charles Dickens as a eulogy to her:

"And can it be that in a world so full and busy,
the loss of one creature makes a void in any heart,
so wide and deep that nothing but the width and depth of eternity
can fill it up!"

At the end of the funeral Mass for Annie the mourners in the church stood and gave her a standing ovation for her life well lived. We loved her.
May she rest in peace.

Ciao, Annie

Time Marches On

I have been so busy living life that I have not taken the time to write. It seems that there are so many events that I want to reflect on and blog about but before I get to it, something else happens.

The last time I blogged we were preparing for our annual Family Festival. It did, in fact, take place as planned and was quite successful. Everyone had a good time. There were a few family members that could not make it and we missed them. It makes me pleased to know that they all enjoy each others' company and share a lot of laughs together. There isn't even bickering among the little folks. They have fun, share and show good sportsmanship by playing fair and just enjoying each others' company. Wow, what a family.


We did have Frogmore Stew, as planned, and a variety of other foods and drinks. The kids had great fun fishing, slip/sliding and riding on the ATV, and attacking the Pinata. The adults had great fun visiting and catching up on all the things that took place during the past year. Andrea and Travis are gratious about sharing their home and grounds for our event and for this we sincerely thank them. I'm already looking forward to next year.

I was very touched by Nathan choosing to wear Doc's special hat to remind all of us that Doc was with us in spirit. I'm sure he also would be as proud as I am of this spectacular family that we have. We are truly blessed!

No one fell into the lake this year and that's a good thing! Ciao

Fun Festival Coming Up!

We have been busy e-mailing, checking Facebook, and phoning back and forth and I think we are definitely on the track for a great feast and a fun filled family festival! (How's that for alliteration?)

We have commitments for all of the Frogmore Stew ingredients and that leaves lots of other things for the rest of the fam to supply. We'll need butter, a couple of lemons, snack type things, like cookies, chips, etc. dips, six packs of soda, and other casseroles to appease the 'stew non eaters'. We have one person bringing bread and could use another bread contributer,one person is bringing slaw, we have fruit salads and a birthday cake but could use another dessert or two. Maybe a casserole or so of your choice if you'd like, pasta, macaroni and cheese, or baked beans, whatever! You bring it we'll eat it!

As I mentioned before there will be a 'slip and slide' thingy but the blow-up bouncy thingy is not going to be there. (That's just as well, did you see the little film clip of one of those things blowing away, with kids in it?) Bring play items and swim suits.

I have been watching the weather predictions and it looks as if it is going to be in the 90's with perhaps a few showers to cool us off. There will be tarps and tent type structures and the patio/porch to keep us dry. (We Derby goers have spent whole days under those tents in the rain! No problem>)

I am really looking forward to seeing every one! If you have any questions call either Andrea or me. Ciao

Interim Post

I will be posting more about the Fam. Fest. when I have more information to give to you. In the interim, I will be complaining, pontificating, whining, commenting and opining.

The weather is somewhat cooler today than it has been for the past week. It was actually pleasant outside this morning when I retrieved my paper from the porch. It felt better out there than it did in the house. The AC has run, non stop for days and days. I shudder to think what my bill will be. I think my ceiling fans need to be reversed, they were set for winter and I cannot climb up there to reverse them. Next person that comes to visit will be asked to do the task for me.

I have planted my tomato plant and I go out to check on it two or three times a day. I discovered this morning that I can check on it from my bedroom window that overlooks the deck. So far so good. I also bought two Impatient plants and they also have survived. Maybe the ravenous squirrel has found a better feeding place. Great!

I have a new cell phone. It is not at all exciting. It lives up to its name, "Cell Phone". I can call people up on it and they can call me up on it and we can chat and hang up. They must identify themselves when they call, no pictures to remind me to whom I am speaking and if I call them they must imagine me in their mind's eye because there is no picture of me when they answer. If they are familiar WITH me, they already know what I look like and if they are familiar TO me, I know what they look like. If neither of us know the other it is just as well that we remain anomymous.The greatest feature of my new cell phone is that when you pick the phone up to answer it, your finger is no longer on the "shut off" button and the volume of the 'ringer' stays where you put it and does not shut down so that you cannot hear it ring. I cannot text, access the inter-net, read my e-mails, take pictures, play music or view films. It is truely a utility phone! I love it!!!

I can carry my phone around in a little holster! Sounds ominous but it is non threatening, it also has a little charger that you slip the phone into when you sleep and it charges it up. How clever is that? I have been instructed to carry it with me at all times so that if I fall down and can't get up, I'll have my phone right there with my 911 button and my ICE button with my immergency contact numbers and all. Problem is ,what if I knock myself out when I go crashing down? What if I am scantily clad and there is nowhere to clip the holster. EX. night gown, unders, towel (as in I just finished my shower and have a towel on) It all seems so simple doesn't it?

Some of the exotic features that the phones and internet connections have in this day and time can be life altering. As for me I got along without all those features on my phone before and I guess I can get along without them now. I just deleted about two paragraphs of my objections to some of the features availaable but I will let it go. (So to speak).

I do get a lot of pleasure out of the pictures that are now available to me on my PC. Some on Face Book and some by e-mail. Shannon sent pictures this morning of their vacation at a Lake in Indiana. The pictures were beautiful. The two boys and Lenny and Shannon all looked so contented and rested. Gregg and Brian share a lot of their pictures with me. I have some from the Indy 500, which Gregg, Brian, Brett and Linda attended, some from the TOL which I got to attend and the Derby which was well attended this year by most all of the family. I go back and look at all of the pictures, over and over. I do all of this on my PC but no phon-y pictures!

I have mixed feelings about FB. I'm almost afraid to post comments on there for fear that my wit will be misinterpreted and I will come across as being harsh, sarcastic, mean, whatever. I must admit, I am sarcastically witty at times and those that know me well can deal with it but not always. I sometimes think that too much information is posted at times but that's OK. When some people say their life is an open book they are possibly referring to FACEbook. I get it! On the other hand I am so amused by some of the posts and the responses to them that I hasten to check each day to see what's new. Face people keep it up! I enjoy reading all of the posts. Modern technology is indeed miraculous.

Call me so I can take my phone out of its little holster and guess who you are!!! Cioa

Fitzgerald Fun "Get your groove on" What to bring!

The 18th will be here before we know it! I will list all of the food items and mention other things. Andrea has advised the kids to bring swim suits because we will have two 'slip and slides', we will also have the Pinata and the lake is still there for the fishermen,fisherwomen, fisherpeople! and the wide open spaces are still there, if you have an outdoor play item,that you can bring, do it! Tee ball stand and ball with plastic bat, portable basketball hoop,blankets to sit on, bring it on!! Robert Hall, Julie Heil and Brian will be celebrating their birthdays so there will be cake.

As to the food items needed for the Frogmore Stew and other possibilities:

10 lbs of red potatoes (new)
3 dozen ears of corn
4 lbs. of kielbasa
Shrimp ( one person will purchase all of the shrimp so it will be the same size)
Seafood seasoning (Ex. Old Bay Seasoning)
16 ounces of sour cream (for potatoes or shrimp or whatever)
Cocktail sauce
catsup
3 or 4 lbs. of butter (for potatoes, corn and shrimp) some to melt to dip shrimp if you want)
You can arrange to share some of these items with another family member, a couple of you bring potatoes, two or three bring kielbasa, two or three bring corn etc. You can call me or Andrea to let us know that you have the potatoes covered, corn etc.

Breads
Desserts
fruit
snacks ( chips,doritos etc.)
Dip
Side dishes
If you do not like shrimp you might want to bring another type of casserole.Pasta of some kind, Mac and cheese, whatever you like.

Jeanine has decided to bring FrogEye salad, in keeping with the theme and some other fruit also. An ice cold water melon might be a good thing to have on hand.

You are welcome to bring whatever you want and rest assured it will get eaten!

Any more suggestions or questions you have give one of us a call or post on FB. We'll need lots of paper towels or napkins to mop up with.

Ciao,ciao

Fun Festival FYI

Time: 12 Noon
Place: Andrea and Travis's

We started planning our annual event some time ago and talked about various menus for this year and finally came up with Frogmore Stew. We sorta took a straw vote and had enough positive feed back that we decided to go with it.

Some of you are familiar with it but I know there are others that have never heard of it so I will give you a little of its history with a promise that there will be more to come.

It is a well known dish served in the Carolinas. It contains red(new) potatoes, corn on the cob, Polish (Kielbasa)sausage and shrimp. It is cooked in a large pot. The first ingredient is water, then the whole, unpeeled potatoes, next ears of corn broken in half or thirds, depending on their size, then the sausage cut into two or three inch cuts and for the last few minutes the large shrimp with shells on. Appropriat seasonings are added also. The whole process takes about 30 minutes.

We have a designated shrimp purchaser but the rest of us will provide all the other foods necessary to complete our feast. We will have the stew as the main dish but will need slaw, desserts, sour cream,for the potatoes, lots of butter, for corn and potatoes, cocktail sauce, melted butter and some kind of bread. Of course ,we'll need potatoes, corn, and sausages.
As soon as we have a number for the participants we can give suggested amounts to bring for the potatoes etc.

For those of you that do not like the stew you may want to bring a dish or item that you are sure your family will eat, (and maybe we can share!) We are going to order a couple of pizzas and maybe some corn dogs or hot dogs for the kids that might not like the main dish.

Jeanine is very excited about the Forgmore Stew, despite the fact that she had not heard of it before, (what's not to like) and said we can count on her for the Frog Eye Salad, in keeping with the theme. She will also bring some fruit for those that do not like Frog Eye Salad. See, how accommodating we are? Frog Eye Salad would come under the dessert heading.

If you will let us know that you are coming, for sure, we'll compose a list of amounts of ingredients needed. We've always had plenty to go around and I'm sure we will this year, too.

Last year we had about 56 people in attendance and I'm hoping for at least that many for this year. I've extended the invitation to the Cincinnati relatives also.

More to follow. Ciao

Beastly Battles

Have you noticed the tomatoes in recent years? They are not the tomatoes of yesteryear. It used to be that you could walk through the tomato garden, on a hot summer day, and pluck a tomato off the vine, rub it on your shirt to get the enviromental dust off, and take a bite of it and enjoy. The juice would trickle down your chin and the acidic taste would nip your tongue and you could experience pure gastronomical pleasure.

Tomatoes are an integral part of my diet. My dad raised tomatoes in his garden but still when September came, he went out and purchased bushels of tomatoes for my mother to can. She canned about one hundred cans of whole tomatoes and fifty or more bottles of catsup. The tomatoes out of the backyard garden graced our table at every meal. In the fall before the frost could hit them, we picked the green tomatoes and fried them or wrapped them in news paper,stored them in a closet and let them ripen.

In recent years I've had to depend on "store bought" tomatoes and they leave a lot to be desired. First of all, I like to peel my tomatoes, dipping them in a pot of boiling water for a nano second and slipping the skin off to get to the solid red 'meat' of the tomato, that is essential to me.Have you tried to peel a 'store bought' tomato? Today's tomatoes are hard, tough, pale,and almost tasteless. I took a class at Bellarmine a year or so ago and one of the guest speakers was from one of the tomato processing plants in this region. We saw films of the tomatoes being processed. The open simi trucks filled with tomatoes are unloaded at the plant by machinery that picks the tomatoes up and drops them down a shute to fill containers that move on a conveyor belt into the plant. The presenter told us that the tomatoes have been geneticly altered to have tough skins so that they can be handled in mass. They are also uniform in size to accommodate the machinery that will be removing the skins and whatever else they do to get them ready. (This particular plant made the tomato sauce for Domino's Pizza.)The same kind of tomatoes are what the stores,and fruit markets offer for sale to us. Paul's has what they call Heirloom tomatoes that closely resemble "real" tomatoes but the price, when they have them, is prohibitive.

I decided that I would grow a few plants, in containers, on my deck so that I could have my own supply this summer. I bought two plants and planted the smaller of the two, a few weeks ago. I thought it might be wise to wait until the rains, winds and low temperatures were gone before I planted the larger one.I kept it inside to wait for warmer, sunnier days.

I planted the small tomato one evening and the next morning went out to check on it only to discover that a squirrel had dug it up, threw dirt all over the table, and ate the roots and all the leaves except for the top most leaves! Not good! The plant in the kitchen, meanwhhile, is doing well. Now that warm days and cool nights have arrived it is really time to think about placing it outside but...I'll digress here and tell you about my avocado seed that I have kept in water, in a glass, in the kitchen window waiting to plant it outside,too. I planted it yesterday and I'm sure you've already guessed that it also met the same fate as the tomato plant. Although, it was not completely devoured.

I bought potting soil and I have a container that I think would be ideal for my tomato plant but twice bitten once shy, as the saying goes, I am planning a trip to Home Depot to buy some hardware cloth or mesh screening or something to see if I can foil the evil squirrel! I already went to K-Mart but had no luck there. I did buy one of those cages for the tomato vine to grow on in the event that I succeed at matching wits with the little beast!

I'm trying to remain optomistic. Y'all come for tomato pie in August! OK? Ciao

A Corporal Work of Mercy

Yesterday, Karen called and asked if I would like to accompany her on a visit to Annie, who is in University Hospital at this time. I was very pleased that she had thought to ask me because I have Annie on my mind so often these days. Annie is one of Karen's closest friends, they went to high school and college together and have remained close throughout the years. She has been quite ill for the last six months. Karen either didn't know yet or just failed to tell me that she, Karen, was having 'one of those days'!

Our trip downtown was fairly uneventful. We entered the University Hospital Parking Garage and drove clear to the top, maybe six or seven floors, but found not one parking place. As we exited the garage, the attendant gave us a paper with instructions for getting to another garage on Chestnut Street. ((A deer was running loose on Chestnut on Wednesday and it growled at a news man trying to take its picture.) Anyway, Karen said, "Why don't you just get out here and wait for me?" We were just across the street from Univ. Hosp. entrance so I got out and she drove on in her quest for a parking place.

I am a people watcher so I rather enjoyed watching the people come and go. I saw a lot of blue scrubs, the predominant dress for the day, and a lot of people with back packs, one person walking a dog,must have been a downtown dog, and a number of people who were pale and wan and looked like they needed attention. The streets were filled with buses, trucks, taxis, and cars, some of which were Jaguars or Mercedes (doctors) and some junkers (patients). I was very entertained.

After a prolonged length of time, I became concerned, I had visions of the headlines in the paper or the lead story on the 6 o'clock news: "Woman abandons mother on street corner in downtown Louisville!" I didn't even know which direction I should be looking to see if I could spot her coming for me. So I looked in all directions, a bus pulled up to the corner and I, for a nano second, thought she might get off the bus. The taxi cabs didn't even slow down so I didn't expect any thing from them.

Suddenly, rain drops appeared on the sidewalk in front of me so I ducked around the corner of the building that I had been leaning against. Large pillars surrounded me but I thought I was under cover and would be protected there. Not! The rain quickly became a deluge and the wind picked up and the pillars only protected me from being blown away. As I left my house this morning, I ran back in to get a light sweater in case it turned cool but I failed to pick up my ever present hat. I had a few biopsies performed on my head a few days ago and I was angry at myself for forgetting the hat when I felt the pain of the rain drops falling on my head. Actually they were not falling they were pelting my head.

The sky had darkened and the situation was looking quite grim when Karen came hurling around the corner, shrieking,"This is a nightmare! I swear to you I had this nightmare just the other night! I was lost downtown and it was storming..." True deja vu!!

Water was dripping from her hair, from her nose, she looked like she had just stepped out of a swimming pool. I fished ,no pun intended, a kleenex out of my wet purse and gave it to her to help dry her face and eyes. We took off running across the walkway to the hospital. The water was coursing down the street, it looked like a stream, we waded through it at full speed and finally reached the marquee where we were protected from the 20 or 30 mile an hour wind. I just barely made it because the wind almost blew me off my feet, my wet feet!

The dry people on the elevator remarked, "Is it raining outside?"

We stopped in the restroom on the 7th floor where Annie's room is to repair some of the damage. Karen was wet through and through! She combed her hair and sopped some of the water off but she still looked pretty miserable. I fared much better than she because she had walked about four blocks in the deluge. She did get a parking place in the garage but took a wrong turn when she left, on foot and realized her error when she arrived back at the garage. She had apparently walked around the block. Needless to say she was pretty mad, I hesitate to say, 'mad as a wet hen'.

When we got to Annie's room we informed her that,' greater love hath no...' She meant no offence but couldn't help but laugh her head off. Oh,boy.She said ,"Why did you come in the rain?"

Her lunch had just arrived and so while she ate she regaled us with an account of her room mate. The room mate was a bit bizarre. She started telling Annie about some of her friends or relatives and she kept getting phone calls. She would yell at the caller and tell them not to call her again and then she would cry aloud. For some reason the phone did not ring on her side of the curtain, it only rang on Annie's side, so Annie would have to answer it. Someone named Joe kept calling. We were having a conversation on our side of the curtain and she would join in and laugh when ever we laughed and be generally disruptive, in between phone calls.

We had some very serious, personal discussions with Annie and had a few tears but then some conversations that were very funny. A nurse that had been in the Army with Annie and now works at University brought her own lunch and came to visit with Annie while she ate. She is a psyc. nurse and since they are doing some remodeling work in the usual psyc. department they have temporarily moved to a trailer out in the back parking lot so she finds it more relaxing to eat in Annie's room. Good visiting with her.
While we were visiting the nurses and aides came in and moved the off balance room mate out. We were so interesting in our own selves that we didn't even notice what was going on until a nurse stuck her head around the curtain and said, "She's gone! We moved her to a private room!"

The Psyc. nurse left and we went on with our visit but I did get the other chair in the room and move it over so we could both sit down. Annie, with former room mate in mind, was recalling a time when Linda Mansfield went to a mixer at Central State Hospital during their high school days and at one point when one of the guys she had met there made an absurd comment Linda said without thinking, "Are you Crazy?"

In the middle of our laughing the person from housekeeping came in to sanitize the vacated section of the room and simply joined our conversation. She shared 'war stories' as Annie called them. She, at one point asked if Karen and I were sisters! Annie said," no, its mother and daughter." From that point on she referred to me as "Mom". She was about 5'8" tall and was African American and felt very free to be a part of our gathering. Sheez!

Shortly, thereafter when Annie was telling us about the last time she was in the hosp. One of her friends took her soiled underwear home to launder it for her and she hasn't seen it since. Once again we were laughing and a nurse's aid walked in and said, "Each room is only supposed to have two chairs so I will have to take one of these chairs because the room over there has six visitors in it and they only have one chair." I suggested she could have waited until we left to take the extra chair out of the room and she said that the person in the room was not going to 'make it' and her visitors needed to sit down. Unbeknown to Karen, she must have rolled her eyes, because as the girl was removing the chair from the room she snarled, "And you don't need to roll your eyes!" Now between the time they moved the off kilter room mate, who was laughing and blabbing on the phone and butting into our conversations,and the chair incident, she must have had a sudden down turn. The chair was going to her and her six visitors that had suddenly showed up. Rude behavior on the part of the aide and me thinks she was stretching the truth just a tad!

By this time we decided to end our visit and as we were starting to leave Karen mentioned the fact that the next time we were going to come on a sunny day. Promptly, Annie burst into song and without losing a beat we joined her singing a familiar tune: "We'll meet again, don't know where, don't know when, but I know we'll meet again, some sunny day...."

The housekeeper said,"Goodbye Mom." and we left. Our shoes were not dry yet and Karen looked not quite as bedraggled but we walked the few blocks to the parking garage and used my old trick of hitting the panic button on the remote to help us locate the car and we were off. There was a small glitch when Karen couldn't recall where her ticket was but it was easy to find and we were on our way.

Karen called this morning to say when she got home she could not get into her house at first. They have a new lock and for some reason the key wouldn't work. She was at the point of taking some drastic action but decided to try the back door and finally got in. When she has a bad day she doesn't mess around! We're hoping she got it all out of her system!

You might want to visit the sick and do your corporal work of mercy It is refreshing! Ciao

Epilogue

Annie called Karen and pretended to be an administrator of the hosp. and banned her from coming again to the hospital in her "drowned rat" condition and giving the hospital a bad name!

Wild Birds and Beasts

I have an affinity for birds. I am facinated by them and enjoy watching them. I'm not what you would call a 'bird watcher' with binoculars and a membership in a 'bird watching' organization. I just like to observe the birds. I do have bird feeders and bird houses and bushes that attract birds and some that accomodate them as building sites for their nests. I particularly like humming birds and have a very unique humming bird feeder that Gregg got for me. I like to think that the birds know that I'm their friend. If the feeders run out of food they all chirp and 'yell' at me if I step out onto the porch. They are not shy about coming around when I am sitting out on the deck. The doves will even walk right past my feet as I sit there.

I have a book that helps me identify the birds that do come to the feeders and houses. I am pleased when a rare bird stops in for a bite to eat when it is migrating. I make note of the time and date so that I can look for it again the next trip through. I have a "Bird Inn" you might say.

I've won some money a few times at the Track because if I'm at the track and a horse with 'Bird' in it's name is running, I bet on it. You may recall an Oaks winner a few years ago that had Bird in its name and Derby 136 had Mine That Bird with fantastic odds, and another Bird, I believe Summer Bird, showed in that race and I came out with over $300.00. Good Birds!

Occasionally a bird mistakes my glass door for free air and flies into the door with quite a crash. I think they are kamikaze birds,I hate dealing with the little corpses; on one occasion a bird hit the door with it's wings spread out and left an imprint on the door glass that resembled the Holy Spirit! (Or could it have been the Holy Spirit paying me a visit?) There was no corpse left behind! Mayabe that was bird rapture day!

A bird seems to think that my mail box would make a good nesting place. Every day I've had to clean the makings of a nest, out of the mail box. I finally told JoAnne about it and she said that Jay loved devising things to thwart the wild animals from infringing. He put an elaborate devise on the box and now the mail man has to unhook a hook to put the mail in and then re-hook the door of the box. (I considered just putting the recycle bin out there and telling the mail man to just drop the mail in there. It would save me a trip.)

On Monday I was not having one of my better days, the electricity had gone off and it wasn't even storming, the CO warning devise was bleeping every 30 seconds and I could not figure out how to make it quit nor could I figure out why I had no power. I came down to find LG&E's number so I could call and report the outage and discovered a baby bird trying to fly out of its nest above my kitchen window. Its little foot was caught and it kept trying and trying but became exhausted with the effort and would stop and rest for awhile and then try again. I could not reach it because the nest hangs from the eave so I called Jay and JoAnne and asked for assistance with all my problems. We never did get the bleeping bleeper to stop, we had to take the battery out and abandon that task, Jay got the electricity back on, I don't know how or why it was off and then he tackled the task of setting the bird free. JoAnne and I watched while he climbed up on a stool and loosened the chain that was holding the foot. The bird flew up when it was freed and scared all of us. Fortunately, Jay did not fall, the bird was crippled but managed to get away and all was well again.

I bought two tomato plants to plant in containers on the deck. I am tired of the store bought tomatoes and hope to grow some 'real' tomatoes. I planted the smaller of the two plants and kept the other one in the house until I can get the necessary items to plant it. The planted one was only about 4 or 5 inches tall and I had it in a clay pot... for one day! A squirrell had breakfast the next morning! He dug the plant up and ate the roots. Poor plant never had a chance! I'm holding off on the other plant until I can get to Home Depot and get some screen or something to ward off the tomato invador!

Today there was an "on the scene" reporter on the news at 6 AM when I turned on the TV. He was very animated because he was reporting on some deer that had found their way into downtown Louisville, on Chestnut Street. As he and his camera man approached the deer, one of them GROWLED at him. He was astonished. He kept saying,"I didn't know deer growled!" Who knew?

Life is not only curiouser and curiouser it is also tediouser and tediouser. Ciao

Say it isn't So!

Do you suppose that down through the centuries there has always been a tendency to ask, "What's this World coming to?" When Shakespear was seen wearing an earring in his left lobe? When Lady Godiva rode naked through the streets of Coventry, on horseback, to get her husband to abolish heavy taxes? When pregnant women were seen on the streets in broad day light!When Howard Hughes designed a bra for Jane Russell? When the mention of an 'unmentionable' was crass? Shocking, shocking behaviors were whispered in front of children to protect their innocence. We have moved on from that era, big time!

Gradually we entered the "Anything Goes' era. What is considered shocking in this day and age? Women have long since lost any sense of modesty. I am not opposed to short shorts, if you browse through my photo albums you will see many pictures of me in short shorts! I wore them long before "hot pants" became the fashion of the day. My sister ,Mart, once said, "Are there any pictures of Betty where she doesn't have on shorts?" I liked shorts and still do! However, when I wore my short shorts my 'cheeks' did not hang out. When that came into vogue, I thought it was indecent and humiliating.

I also passed on the 'bare the boobs era'. We are still being affronted each and every day by excessive boob exposure. If the girl doesn't have large boobs, she can buy them in any department store. I do remember some of my highschool friends stuffing Kleenex into their bras to help nature along, but even then putting up a 'false front' was frowned on by the guys. Some falsies, as they were called, look like balloons and make the girls look like freaks of nature rather than 'sex symbols'. Some resort to surgery to enhance their appearance. Husbands, willingly pay for some of these enhancements. That is shocking to me! Are men so gullible that they can be fooled by silicone implants that look like jelly fish?

NOW, we are entering another era! Have you heard of Representive Aaron Schock (R) of Illinois? He was the cover boy on Men's Health Magazine this month. He is shirtless and exposing, for all to see, his abs! Also known as his six pac. I shudder to think of all that this could lead to. A few years ago Abakrombie and Fitch crossed the line by displaying, in their catalog, a suggestive picture of one of their male models but this picture of a semi nude guy showing off his abs is a United States Congressional member! He has appeared before in a magazine dressed in a hot pink checked shirt, a turquoise belt and white pants. His picture, at that time, raised a few eyebrows but this is somewhat different.

If this were to set a trend, could we now expect Newt Gingridge, Mitch McConnell,David Williams shirtless and...well I guess, ab-less in their campaign ads? Many of their six pacs went south and turned into twelve pacs. Will the politicians run out and get silicone abs to enhance their torsos? Can they do belly lifts in an effort to find their abs? Could this lead to fake ab vests? Or wait a minute, could they come out with a Kevlar ab vest, since everyone will be carrying? The possibilities are staggering!

On Derby day they interviewed a man on TV that was wearing chaps and when he turned around he had just a pair of red skivvies on besides the chaps. Provocative! One can only hope that there were no Congressmen watching.

Let us hope that the gluteus maximus muscles will stay out of sight. I know the heart is a muscle, what about the brain? Maybe there should be more effort to develop the brain and keep the brawn under wraps.Ciao!

Derby 137

Derby 137 has come and gone. Brian takes us to the Backside every year and we set up camp and spend the day. Some of us go as early as 5 AM and we all stay until the horses are put to bed! It's dark when we get there and dark when we get home. It is like a big family picnic except that about 10 feet from the fence we have in front of our area the thoroughbred horses are running! We are really up close and personal with the horses, jockeys, out-riders, ponies, track maintenance trucks, starting gates, owners, trainers and a multitude of others, including the ambulanace that follows after the horses. We look across the track and see the Twin Spires and the hundred and sixty five thousand people that paid big money to be there and know that none of them can join us. You can't buy your way in.

This year we had quite a group, usually there are about ten or twelve of us but this year there were twenty six or seven of us. Big group!

Our spot is located right across from the press building and it has betting windows, restrooms and tv monitors. We make our bets there but you do have to stand in line to get to the windows. The crowd is usually very jovial and chatty as they move slowly through the lines. There are no food venues Backside so every one has to bring their own food. Some people bring their grills and cook burgers, steaks, hot dogs etc. while others bring KFC or Popeyes, or various sandwiches. Snacks, dips, vegie treys, and barby-Que are evident all around. Coolers filled with soft drinks and an ocassional beer, maybe even a small box of wine find their way in, too.

The crowd is very well behaved, there are lots of laughs, lots of funny chatter and horse talk. The racing programs are ubiquitous and after each race there is joy for the winners and teeth gnashing for the losers. I do believe we had a few more losers than winners though. Linda may have been the only member of our group that had "Animal Kingdom" across the board but some of us had others in other races . If there were any big winners among us they kept it to themselves!

We all joined in on singing "My Old Kentucky Home" and the people that do not know the words were urged to learn the words during the coming year so that they, too, can consider themselves one of us! If they can eke out a tear or two during the chorus,"Weep no more, my Lady..." all the better!

Thanks, again Brian. You are a great host! I won't name all of the group with us but suffice it to say that Mike, Karen, Linda, Gregg and of course Brian were all in attendance and Keith called to tell us he did have "Animal Kingdom" at the Dog Track, where he bets in Sarasota, so he ,also,was a big winner. Derby 138 maybe, he will get to come.


Until next year, may the 'horse 'be with you! Ciao

Weather's the Weather, Weather or Not

I haven't kept accurate account of how many days this rain has lasted but certainly we are approaching 40 days aren't we? Maybe not. It just seems like 40 days.

When I was a child I used to be afraid of storms and when I grew up and had my first child, my mother told me I could no longer show fear of storms because it would instill my child with fear. (How did I get to be afraid? Huh!) So, I restrained myself and stiffened myself to bearing up under the most fierce storms so that my children would not see me quaking in my boots and lo and behold I learned to enjoy watching storms and pretty much lost my fear of them. I especially love to watch storms when I am at the beach!

This month we have had one storm after another all month long. I think we've had eight to ten inches of rain and the month isn't over yet. We have had tornado warnings, tornado watches, flash flood warning, high winds warnings and 'golf ball sized hail' warnings. The whole gamut of midweastern weather ogres have threatened us. Parts of the state have experienced these disasters in one form or another. Property damage has been rampant, roofs blown off, twisted mobile homes, fences, outbuildings, fallen trees, even whole homes collapsed in heaps, flooded homes , basements,... it has been devastating.

The meteorologists have been on the air twenty-four seven with their dire predictions, they continue to tell us to take cover and be prepared. They take a lot of grief for interrupting regular programing and boring us with their visuals that resemble ectoplasm and other unidentifiable blobs and point out to us the 'hooks' 'bows,'upper level disturbances'and always end with 'go to your safe place'. I've spent two or three nights in the small hallway in my lower level trying to decide if the oak tree falls will I still be safe in my 'safe place'...?

My heart bleeds for the people that have lost their homes, their possessions, their keepsakes, their security. I thank the agencies that are helping give these people solace, comfort,shelter and encouragement. The meteorologists that give up their time to warn the community of eminent danger, are to be commended. They give people the time to seek cover and maybe, while losing their homes, save their lives.

So far I am lucky to have just lost sleep, I have not lost my possessions or my life. While I am writing this I can hear the TV in the next room talking about the severe weather that we can expect tonight. I especially dislike 'night storms' it doesn't seem as ominous in the day light as it does at night but for some reason we can only talk about the weather we can't do anything about it, a truism that has long been established. So be it! Pray for sun! Ciao

Things are looking mighty green!!!!

The Sky's the Limit! Part 3

This whole thing would make more sense if you scroll down and read Parts 1&2 before reading Part 3

Saturday morning, the weather was still pretty gloomy, it was raining off and on, misting when it was not raining and even though temperature in the 40's does'nt sound so cold, when accompanied by wind, it can be pretty brutal. The hotel had filled up by then and the areas outside were getting populated too. The appropriat dress for the occasion was hats with earmuffs, gloves, scarves, heavy jackets, preferably hooded, heavy sox, boots or warm footwear. I personally had a plethora of hand and toe warmers. We whiled away our time visiting some of the shops, notice I did not say 'we shopped' because the merchandise was beautiful but the prices were prohibitive.(For me anyway.) We went to the Command Center and marveled at the synergy taking place in the confines of the Center. Everyone was doing his/her job and the camraderie was outstanding. A mini-crisis would crop up and it would be handled quickly and they would all go on with their work. The media had arrived on the scene and their demands were met promptly and professionally.

I was so impressed with the resilience of each and every member of the Thunder Team. They don't try to out-do one another, nor claim individual credit, they are a true team. If one sees that another member needs help they jump in and help. All the time maintaining a jovial attitude.

By noon Gregg had upgraded his room reservation, that he made last year, and we now had a room with a partial view. It overlooked the front entrance of the GH West. The view that we had was good, we could look to the left and see the river and the bridge where most of the activity would take place. We would see the barge to the east of the bridge and could get a good view of the planes. All the aircraft came in from the east.

The schedule called for the airshow to begin at 3:12 PM. The weather outside was still miserable. Cold, windy and wet. We had already chosen the spot that Linda's group had used in the past for viewing and a blanket had been placed there to save the place. Another person who had used the spot adjacent to Linda's spot had established her 'camp' and was planning to stay in it for the duration! She told Linda she would hold down not only her fort but Linda's too. We were free to roam. We spent some of our time outside watching the spectacular air show, the Jets, the refulers, the Super Stallion copter, Falcon F16's, a rescue maneuver by a copter that fished a man out of the water, the Starjammer, one after another the planes came in order, performing for the crowd. The river banks were crowded with people and the hotel balconies were full, it was awesome with a capital A and Invigerating with a capital I. I loved every minute of it despite the numbing cold. I would run inside the door behind the pool and try to warm my purple hands for a few minutes but come back out because I didn't want to miss any of it. The F-22 Raptor, the star of the show, was still iffy. He needed that 1000 ft. ceiling and it was not looking like it would happen. About 5:40PM there was clear air space. The Raptor was scheduled to demo at 5:55PM but the ominous sky looked too forboding. I, and some of the others were feeling the cold so we retreated to the Hotel rooms. Gregg and I were in our room watching the TV account of what was going on but still able to look out our window to see any in-coming planes. When they finally announced that the Heritage flight: P-51, F-4 and the F-22 were going to fly, Gregg bundled up, took his camera and headed out. I crawled up on the window seat and waited. The TV was still on and I could hear them discussing the fact that it was probably too late for the Raptor (F-22) to do his demo because it was getting late. After the Heritage Flight, which made me happy because I did get to see the Raptor at least, the TV and everyone else, including the Thunder planners, were stunned because the pilot decided he had his ceiling and he would thrill us all by doing his demo!!! Jubilation!! That's what I'm talking about! I was all alone and had a perfect veiw out the window of the room and rejoiced aloud. The sound of the jet flying over reverberates in your chest, You tremble inside. The Raptor is capable of slowing down to look as if it is standing still, almost, and then suddenly the afterburners kick in and it flies straight up in the air with the afterburners spewing fiery contrails. Oh, what a beautiful scene. My cup runneth over! However "it ain't over till it's over!"

I was so energized by the fact that I got to see the Raptor, I was willing to pile on the clothes and go outside to watch the 'real deal'. Gregg came back in and joined Linda and I getting ready, Courtney got her crew together and grabbed a few blankets and we went off to our own private veiwing site, which Linda's friend had saved for us. Brian joined us by that time also, camera in hand, and it was on with the show. Colder than blue blazes but right on time, 9:30 Boom! Fireworks!

With the first Boom of the cannons, the cockles of my heart were warmed and I forgot about the temperature and reveled in the beauty of the display! We had blankets to help warm us and as one of the members of the family remarked, we looked like the 'family in Bethleham' but by jove we were warm, delighted, and awed. It is an experience that I'll never forget! After the spectacular finale, the 'waterfall' from the bridge, the crowd was not ready for it to be over so they had another finale. they still hung around regretting the fact that we would have to wait till next year to see it again!

We headed for the Command Center to help celebrate another successful and glorius Thunder Over Louisville. Champayne corks popped, congratulations were in abundance and even an emotional tear or two was shed at the joy of it all. What an adventure!!!

I will end this account for now but there is more to come. I'll confront the human interest aspects of the week-end in a separate entry in a day or so. It was all great! We had so much fun and I'll gladly share it with you soon. Ciao