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 the US and England, with a few people in Canada, Guyana, and other sundry places. Sewdaye is Ted’s first cousin, and because her father was the youngest sibling of a large family, the age range of first cousins is 29 (her) to mid-70s. So quite a few people came over from England, and of course if you are coming that far, you make a vacation of it. Some spent time in SoCal, then drove up the coast. Some spent time here and then flew up to Oregon. It was a lot of family. I took the week prior to the wedding off and had fun playing host and driving people around.

One of the many things I love about Ted’s family is that they LOVE to dance. This is one of Ted’s cousins, up there dancing before the dinner. The bridal party has not yet arrived from taking pictures or whatever, and the DJ was playing some dance music, not just dinner time background type stuff, so he got up and started dancing quietly. Then another cousin (daughter of our pundit) got up and danced with him, and the next thing you know, EVERYONE was up and dancing and having a great time. They had to tell us to sit down when it was time to introduce the bridal party. I remember at our wedding, we had a reception line when people arrived at the venue (it was separate from where we got married) and after dinner we were getting up to go around from table to table and talk to folks. That was not going to work, the pundit came up and very politely told us no, it was time to dance. Thank goodness for him, because it was a GREAT reception, and we all danced our butts off.

While there were no cowboy boots in sight, the Saturday wedding was held at a horse arena/vineyard up in Sonoma county. The horses are from Portugal, I think, and they were truly beautiful. The arena was surrounded by vineyards, and I don’t know if they were owned by the same group or not, but they were beautiful as well.

That was September. October started with a lovely day spent with my sister-in-law, Kathy – hence the beautiful pastas and salads in an earlier post. Next was Canadian Thanksgiving. Usually we celebrate, just the three of us, but this year we decided to invite Ted’s brother to join us. It was really nice to spend some time with him. I wish I had taken a picture of my turkey, it was beautiful. I made a whole turkey (about 11 lbs) for just the 4 of us, because I wanted leftovers to make my leftover turkey chili, which was delicious, as always.

Also in October (oh, hey, look, it’s still October…) we have the New California Normal, otherwise known as fire season. I’m sure you’ve heard all about it on the news, but it sucks. Thus far we have not been affected by power outages, though the air again smells like smoke. Such bullshit.

The most recent fire, up in wine country, is looking like it was started by PG&E again. They turned off the power to customers, but left the power on to the transmitters. This whole thing is so frustrating. I think it’s a good idea to turn off the power so people don’t die and entire towns don’t burn down, but I think an even better idea would be for PG&E to do the work they said they would do, trim trees and work to prevent the conditions that are causing the fires, as best they can. Stop giving big money to the executives and shareholders, and spend it on trimming trees and clearing areas that need to be cleaned.

Tomorrow it’s supposed to be stupidly windy again, and of course it’s dry as hell because it’s that time of year, and even though our drought is over, so many trees are compromised, they break more easily than they normally would. It’s a mess. The last power shut off, we kept power, and so did most of the blocks in our area. There is a two block complex that is relatively new, and is maybe on a different grid somehow, and they were without power for at least several hours. That’s where the Starbucks is, so no coffee for the people in the big office building across the street. They survived. The next big power shut off is supposed to be this weekend, but when I check our address online, we are not scheduled to lose power. We’ll see. We have batteries and food and water.

Oh, also in October, we learned that there is a previously unknown fault line in our neighborhood. There was a relatively small earthquake that felt a lot bigger than it was, because the epicenter was about 3 blocks away from us. I was in bed, and jumped out and got under my desk. Maya stayed in bed, and Ted stayed downstairs, but came up and checked on us. Mulder did not care at all. When they say that animals warn you? That’s a lie, they don’t. At least, Mulder doesn’t. Our good china shifted a bit in its cupboard, leaning towards the door. If the earthquake had been a little bigger, perhaps our china and crystal would have fallen out and broken, which would be both expensive and messy. And sad. So I went out and bought a child proof latch for the cabinet. I need to install it this weekend.

Between the potential power outages and the earthquake, I revisited the phone situation. Lots of people could not use their cell phones, because the towers did not have power. I’ve always had a thing about keeping a land line in case of emergencies, worried about cell towers or phone batteries dying, that kind of thing. Our very old landline (circa 1988 or so) gave up the ghost a few months ago, and Ted bought us a new one. It is attached to the phone jack, but also plugs in to the power. Our last landline/answering machine combo (which also died recently) was similar, but if the power was out, the phone still worked. The answering machine didn’t, but the phone did. Our new one, not so much. Power is off, none of it works. Not OK, especially since I pay a stupid AT&T bill every month for just that reason. So, I went on Amazon and found a more old school landline, one that works when the power is off, does not need to be plugged into an electrical outlet. It arrived this week and sits quietly next to our bed, with the ringer off, just in case the need should arise. Whew. So, we’re a bit more prepared there.

See all that? I could easily have gotten 3 blog posts out of this…wedding, fire, earthquake. But since it took me almost 2 months to even post about the wedding, I figured I would just blurt it all out there for you. Next up, going to Washington D.C. with my step-mom and one of my sisters in early November. I will try to post about that before January at least.

SATURDAY UPDATE: The newlyweds are in a mandatory evacuation area due to the fire growing overnight. As are Bryan’s parents and grandparents. Hoping for a happy ending for them and their houses, but at least glad they are getting out and will be safe. I guess that ties some of my post together.

MONDAY UPDATE: They are still evacuated, and lots of people are without power.  Lots of fires in California, including one in our neighboring town yesterday.  People are losing their homes, but so far at least, no deaths, which is great news.  It’s scary.  Poor puppy wants to go for his morning walk, but it smells like smoke outside right now, which means crappy air quality, which would be bad for both him and for me, so it’s a no go.  Hard when you have a clock in your head telling you it’s time to go.

THURSDAY UPDATE: Sewdaye and Bryan, and Bryan’s parents and grandparents, are all going home today! They have power and houses to go home to, thanks to the tireless work of the firefighters. They are truly the heroes of this whole thing, along with the PG&E workers (not to be confused with the asshats at the top) who have worked so hard to get people’s power back on.