Weblog 27

July 30, 2006~ 9:15pm
The 'vacation' officially ended on Tuesday, when I was back to work after spending 6 consecutive days with my whole family, all grandchildren included. Wow, that flew! So it was a 4 day work week playing catch-up, and typing as fast as these fleet fingers would allow, and I did a pretty good job of shaving the stack.

But what I want to share with you is the 6 days of fun and mayhem. It was a blast- despite the heat and humidity here in Pittsburgh. We went to Kennywood and spent 11 hours there watching the wee ones ride rides, eat cotton candy, and pull us by the arms from one attraction to the next. I still have to get a whole role of film on disposable camera with these memories embedded - but I DO have some pictures to share with you. Click on the little blue pushy pin and that takes you to the pictures.

Yup. It's the whole crew...in the flesh. A beautiful lot with 4 grandsons ages 6, 5, two who just turned 3, and a grandaughter having her first birthday this coming week, but we celebrated while we were all together and before her cousins flew off to Michigan to see their mom's side of the family for a week's reunion. (Then back to Arizona, to bake with the javelinas and the scorpions. LOL!) Click on the Blue 'pushy pins' to see the pictures.

..This spot was the main attraction for the week-- the backyard wading pool. And here is lovely Kay being what she was born to be: a bathing beauty!

..Here she is even HAPPIER! "Splish splash, I was takin' a bath..." She's a baby Esther Williams! (And probably MOST of you reading, have no idea who I'm talking about. But that's because I'm OLD. I'm a grandmother five times over.)

..More water fun! Kay's brother Bill learns the joy of finger pressure on the lawn sprayer. Especially delicious when it's 90 degrees and steamy outside. (He'd just learned this trick from his older cousins....) and man, did he love it!

..This is Isaac (the old man at 6yrs old) and his brother Eli, five, having just caught some H2O right across their legs and middles. Wheeee!!! Anybody remember how much FUN that was in the blistering sun?)

..Here's Eli climbing Holly's front tree...(my daughter Holly has the BEST climbing tree in front of her house. It attracted those boys like a giant magnet and wouldn't let go. Not for six days! LOL!)

..Another view of Eli through the leaves. Oh man, if Johnny Weismuller still played Tarzan, this kid'd give him a run for his money! (Oh dear, dating myself again.....somebody throw me a cane and a shawl.)

..And of course-- there was Kay's first birthday party. Here's baby Gabe (the youngest of my son's trio, at 3 yrs old)- looking mighty sour having to wear what for all the world, looks like a miniature dunce hat for heaven sakes! (Who wouldn't be slightly piqued?)

..In order to be right in step for the event, clever Kay started walking 2 weeks before. She honestly looks like Charlie Chaplin in drag with that baby "just-learned-how-to-do-this" duck waddle.

.. Here's Holly and Matt, my two grown kiddoes. A lovely pair if ever I saw one. (And so compassionate. Just look at how Aunt Holly has joined her nephew Gabe in a show of solidarity for his having to wear the conical dunce cap. That's real familial devotion right there-) "Attica! Attica!", Holl....

..The next fun place was the Pittsburgh Children's Museum. Bill found his way into the 'Mr. Roger's Room' and quickly climbed into the 'trolley'. Here he is, listening for the clickety clack.

..Isaac made his way to the top of this climbing 'thingamajig'-- a combination treehouse, gymnasium, wonderland of sorts, just perfect for climbing by adventurous young fellas. He's looking wistful already, knowing the thingamjig won't fit on the plane to take with him.

..Kay's the little 'shortie', so she was more than pleased when the beachball that's kept aloft by a strong stream of air being blown out of a tube would fail for a minute...that's when she showed her cunning and made her move. (If we had stayed another day, she would've been throwing 3-pointers!)

..For the sporting sort, there was the ever-changeable Hotwheels swift track. Here's Bill and his cousin Gabe (these guys are 2 weeks apart in age) reving their engines. I believe Kay is off to the 2 dollar window and placing her bet.

.. She's obviously WON ! Kay....very much in her cups......toasting the winners and just in general, adding to the overall happiness quotient of the world at large.

..Like all happy memories, this one had to end. We're sad now that it's over - but BOY, do we have the wonderful snapshots of the event - in our heads and hearts, too. (And that's the most important album of all.) Hope you enjoyed this look back on last week's festivities. I know I sure did.

What a lovely group of fun pals they were. And of course, Grandma showed them things like 'how to burp really REALLY loud'- and my scariest face- and all the good stuff that grandsons have an interest in, we packed it all into six wonderful days. Bye kiddoes! Don't think for a minute I'll forget you. You're deep, deep in the pockets of my deepest dreams and hopes and I'm a 'hanger-on-er'- that's for sure.

I love you guys. XOXOXOXO


July 31, 2006~ 5:15am
Whoa! Is it Monday already? Lordy, those weekends do rip on past! Muggy as the inside of a lung here - and going up to 90, I believe. More thunderstorms on the way.

The kitchen ceiling light blew out when I turned it on this morning, and with these bad knees now, I'm not about to climb up on a chair, then onto the top of the stool to try and change it, so it's moody 'coffee in the dark' this morning...lol. Maybe when I get home from work I'll attempt it, but not with groggy morning head and wobbly on my feet.

Here's hopin' that break in the heat comes soon. I've about had it with the phlegmy, heavy air swirling around like the stuff in an old gym locker room - can't wait for fall's crispness.

But I did hear my first LOCUSTS last week! Can orange leaves and brisk mornings be far behind? Yeah, fall!


August 1, 2006~ 6:30 pm
HEAT!! Too much galdern HEAT!! I don't believe I've ever dripped as much sweat climbing out of my car as I did today (yes, the dang air conditioner in the car is on the fritz and only seems to hold a charge for a day.) Imagine my surprise when I went looking for a picture of 'fire' to add to his little entry, and I found this.. Do you know what that is? That is the Chinese character for FIRE--and what does it look like? Yep. Looks like the letter 'K'... ('moi') ...dripping SWEAT! I mean...my brain hasn't fried, has it? That little squiggle is my essential self, but rendering down like tallow. Guttering in this awful August inferno.

I'll bet if my name was the character for 'water'-- or say, 'snow', I wouldn't suffer as I do in hot temperatures. I would not for instance, have the very real capacity to become an ax murderer at the merest slight. I wouldn't feel like my eyeballs are boiling out of my skull if my name meant 'breeze'-- or 'dew'. I know it.

I just know it-
CHARACTER IS DESTINY

.......................and don't you forget it.


August 2, 2006~ 6:00 pm
Another potboiler of a day! Man o man....hope this hot streak breaks like it's supposed to tomorrow. Till then, I am sweating and mopping my head like a Luisianna trumpet player. Nothing is as mean as I can get in heat- no badger, no weasel, no pitbull- I b'leeve I take the cake.

So to get my mind off this and to provide some 'virtual' cooling off for all of us, someone sent me this cute little gif today in an email, and hell....I'm gonna just let him out to play...........isn't he a darlin'? LOL.


August 3, 2006~ 4:30 pm
Home and limp as a twisted washcloth. Hot and dripping, but I've been laughing my ass off at Robin Williams who was being interviewed by Terry Gross on FreshAire. Thank God for that show! It's seen me through many a hideous commute, in the past, but that Robin Williams had me laughing out loud, wishing there was someone else in the car to share it. (It's great to laugh, but it's WONDROUS to laugh WITH someone.)

As it was, other drivers probably looked over at my dripping face, red as a tomato- mouth wide open like I was in the chair for my annual dental exam, and thought: that one's jumped the track. Must be the heat- and when I finish this entry here, I'm gonna go look up a Robin Williams fan site and post a thank you to him. It takes a HELLUVA LOT to make me forget how damn impossibly uncomfortable I am with this heat wave, especially driving in a car and no air condtioning.

Tonight I'm gonna get off this computer as quickly as possible. I was given a DVD to watch- and in the interest of preventing my ankles from blowing up to twice their size as they have done since Sunday, when all I do is sit around and swell in this weather- I'm gonna spread the cushions on the living room floor, get an iced cold glass of tea, a sandwich, turn 2 fans on me and remain HORIZONTAL for the evening. Then up to bed for more flat plane posture.

Man! I'm not kidding- by the time I head upstairs at 8 pm or so, my ankles look like pans of Jiffy Pop that're ready to tear through the foil ...and they hurt when that happens. LOL! So you all fend for yourselves--I'm layin' low tonight. Oh, the movie is "Bonfire of the Vanities", a 1990 film and I know I've seen it, but just once-- way back when. Good stars- Tom Hanks, Bruce Willis and Melanie Griffith (before she allowed the plastic people to start messin' with her face.) Her lips will be normal size and she'll speak in her very real, breathy little girl voice. She's a terrific actress, I think, and probably the one closest to Marilyn Monroe in terms of vulnerability and softness. What do you think?

Anyway, once that poor girl got hitched to Antonio Banderas and then had some kids, AND realized she was aging while being married to a male sex symbol (that's gotta be the PITS ) her insecurities must have begun dialing up botox doctors and plastics guys--Too bad. Too bad that this is a society that HATES the perfectly natural aging process. And being a female past 35 and in the spotlight to boot and married to a man who doesn't age at all, has got to be hell. Sheer hell.

Anyway-- NOT being in the spotlight-- -I'll be lounging around on the carpet like a beached whale, and enjoying a good Thomas Wolfe story. Talk to you again- on a hopefully cooler Friday.



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