Love
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Meme Monday – Happy Birthday Edition!
Today is my daughter Maya’s 25th birthday! That is somewhat shocking to me, I remember 25 very well. Actually, 25 is when my biological clock started ticking, and I started really wanting a baby. Before that, I was more hypothetical about it. But Ted and I were dating still, had just recently gotten engaged, and I was just graduating from college, into a recession. So it was 5 more years before we had Maya. Anyway, this is her 2nd COVID birthday. She went out yesterday with some friends, and sat in the park and had a lovely time while socially distant. It was almost 80 degrees, so pretty perfect weather…
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Meme Monday
Today’s meme Monday is a two-for. The silly meme above, and the old school meme below, which is questions asked by AllyBean on her blog. Q1 – What’s your favorite movie? Oh gosh, so many. Maya would say, ‘Out of Africa’, because I sometimes like to watch that movie on my birthday. Such a gorgeous movie. Ted would say, ‘Flashdance’, because gosh, I love that movie, god help me. I just do. I might throw ‘Babette’s Feast’ in there, because it is lovely indeed, and I don’t get tired of ‘Sleepless in Seattle’ for some odd reason. Q2 – When trying to buy shoes, what’s your biggest problem? Arthritis. I have arthritis…
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Picture with Santa
We brought our daughter, Maya, up without Santa. My mom said she would not lie to us, so did not tell us stories about Santa Claus. Ted’s parents did raise him with Santa, but they failed him, in that when he learned Santa was not real, it was because his parents forgot to buy stocking stuffers, and left a note (In his mom’s handwriting) that said, “Sorry kids, I ran out of candy…see you next year.). Perhaps because he was the 4th of 4 kids, this was the amount of energy left. So we didn’t have the experience of a parent telling us that we were ‘part of the magic’…
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Meme Monday – Art Edition
Art ala 2020. I miss museums. A few years ago, I went to see an exhibit at a local museum with my dear friend Marilee. I paid for the admission to the exhibit, which was Degas, Impressionism, and the Millinery trade, and while we were in the gift shop at the end of the exhibit, she found out that the ticket price could be applied to an annual membership, and she paid the difference as a gift to me. I discovered that with that membership, I went more often. My step-mom, Julie, always gives me money for my birthday, and for the last couple of years, I have been considering…
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Wordless Wednesday
#DollyPartonChallenge. Credit to Maya.
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My Trip to Washington D.C., Day 3
Saturday my BFF Rosemary, who lives in Pennsylvania, down near the Delaware border, drove down to D.C. to spend the day with us. We started out at the National Portrait Gallery, and ended up getting separated from the rest of my family there. It was OK with everyone that we did so…Rosemary and I wanted to go slowly and read the blurbs about all of the Presidents, and my sister wanted to take her kids to the Air and Space Museum, which I didn’t care about. So they ended up seeing more pictures than we did, but we went more slowly at our own pace. It was interesting to us…
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My Trip to Washington D.C., Day 2
As if it weren’t emotional enough to honor my dad at the Grant Writers’ Association conference, we also honored my step-mom’s first husband, Bruce, who died early in the Vietnam War. She was married while in college, and he left soon after their wedding to go to Vietnam, so they did not have a lot of time together. They did spend some time in Hawaii once when he was on leave. His death broke her heart and changed her life. She left college and travelled in Europe for awhile, and when she came home, discovered she could not bear to live in California anymore, there were too many memories. So…
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My Trip to Washington D.C., Day 1, Part 2
After spending the morning at the Grant Writers’ Association Conference, we walked over to the National Mall and went to the National Museum of African American History and Culture. It was amazing and overwhelming and so emotional. We only had the fortitude to visit the History section, and at that point were worn out and ready to head home for the day, which is too bad in a way because I think the Culture section would have been well worth seeing as well. The museum is part of the Smithsonian, which means that it is free, and I think a person could spend a month or two in D.C. and…
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Rocking Good News!
Not a recent picture, but one I like a lot…anyway, my darling sister, Melissa (on the right up there, black dress), got the news today that her cancer is in FULL REMISSION! YAY! What a relief, I feel like we can finally exhale. Thank you for your kind thoughts her way. I am so very happy for her, for our sister, for her husband and kids, for myself, for all of us. Very good news. I’ll tell you more about the DC trip soon, it was great.
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Friday Randomness
This is Ted’s cousin, Sewdaye, and her husband Bryan, who were married in early September. They had a Hindu ceremony on Friday, which brought back so many memories of our own wedding, 26 years ago. The pundit who performed their ceremony (and ours) was Ted’s mom’s cousin, who flew over from England both times. Here we are with him and his wife after the wedding. It was a wonderful day. Saturday they had what I call a western ceremony, which to me means western civilization, not cowboy boots. This wedding was also beautiful, weather was perfect, and it was great to see so much family. Ted’s family is divided between…
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Belotti Ristorante
My lovely sister-in-law is visiting California from Alaska, and I got to spend Friday with her. We started out with lunch at one of my very favorite restaurants, Belotti Ristorante. I first heard about this restaurant on a local TV show, Check Please, Bay Area, and as I am a huge fan of pasta, I was intrigued. Ted, Maya, and I went for a late lunch there back in March, and I loved it. They loved it too, but they don’t love pasta as much as I do. Kathy, happily, LOVES Italy. She has been to Italy a few times, most recently she went for a month (alone even, so…
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Allergy Boy
Last year, Mulder appeared to come down with allergies. He was losing hair at an alarming rate, and was very itchy. His fur felt dry and brittle. He has an undercoat, which is what he was losing, so you couldn’t really TELL that he was losing hair, except that the evidence was all over our house, we could see tufts of hair fly behind him when he walked, our clothes were covered with it, etc. His armpits went bald. It was worrisome, and when he was at the vet, she said it was not uncommon for dogs to develop allergies at about age 3. So, we tried giving him Benadryl,…
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Monday Randomness
Since finding the pomegranate in a bush last year, I have had my eyes out for pomegranate trees and bushes. There is one on the path of my daily walk, and I noticed the other day that it has both flowers and little pomegranate buds. Aren’t they cute? I will be interested to see how many large pomegranates the tree gets. I don’t know whether the people whose yard it is eat them, or if people take them, or perhaps squirrels and birds. We shall see what happens. I’ve lived here for almost 23 years, and this is the first year I’ve really paid attention to pomegranates in the area.…
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Only Kindness Matters…
So many gods, so many creeds;So many paths that wind and wind,While just the art of being kindIs all the sad world needs. ~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox
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Hog Island Oyster Co – Napa
Ted and I decided to take advantage of the lovely weather here, and drive up to Napa today. The catalyst for this drive was that next Sunday is Easter, and we will be having Easter Brunch with his family. Last year, we had delicious Eggs Benedict with crab cakes in place of Canadian bacon, and it was a hit, so we decided that would be on the menu again. There is a small chain of bakeries in Napa County, Model Bakery, that has amazing English muffins, so we drove up to buy some, and while there, we had lunch at a neighboring restaurant, the Hog Island Oyster Company. They are…