Sisters and family get-together

My sister Cindi and I had all our kids and Cindi's husband over to Cindi's house. Lots of husbands didn't show up, but the main core was there.


Brett, Jenna, Kari, and Mindy













Ken and Mike

















Charly and me, with burp stain on arm.















Cindy, Charly, Mike, and Lisa













Brett and Charly

on my own

Tomorrow I will attempt to be "Dave" at a football game. This is exciting and I may fail. Dave usually types up a brief play by play for notes for a weekly article where he features the game that he is attending. This weekend we decided to split up. Usually I sit with him and try, try to identify who is making the plays. It is trickier than you think. Dave is going to the big MAC game, Kent State versus Ohio University. I am going in the other direction to attend the Western Michigan and Eastern Michigan game in Kalamazoo. I wanted to go see my sister with on Sunday, and this works out pretty good. I will stay overnight at Kari's apartment and then she and I will go over to Grand Rapids to see Cindy and her family. So all the cousins will hang out at her house.

Anyway, I am nervous that I will not be able to do the job that Dave does. He will have to write up the article about the Kent State/Ohio game. But if I do a good job, then maybe he will write up my game also, from my notes. We will see.

tastes from my childhood

There are certain tastes that I remember from my childhood and sometimes try to recapture. My mom's barbecue spareribs was my birthday meal. I would get the barbecue sauce all over my face.

My mom also would make mashed potates, egg noodles, and crumbled crackers sauted in butter to top them. You would pile the noodles over the mashed potatoes and the sprinkle the crackers over the pile. Then gravy poured over all of that. A heart attack waiting to happen, but my mother didn't die of heart problems and my dad is still alive at 84 years old.

But the one taste that I keep trying to recapture is the Frisch's Big Boy fish sandwiches. I don't know how often we would go there and how often I was allowed to have one, but it was at least two or three times. I remember the taste and feel of the tarter sauce and cod, mixed with the bun. It was delicious. My mouth waters just thinking of it. But trying to relive that taste can be disappointing. Elias Brothers Big Boy sometimes doesn't live up to the Frisch's Big Boy. One time I went to a Big Boy, all set to relive the experience and taste. I bit into the sandwich and almost gagged. They had run out of Big Boy tarter sauce and were using Gordon's Foods tarter sauce. Yuck.

Tonight I had a Swiss Miss, which is also made with the BB tarter sauce. It was good. But there was one bite that had just enough tarter sauce, lettuce, and bun that reminded me of the taste that I remember as a child. Heaven.

What tastes do you remember from your childhood?

first snow - 2006 October 11

my wish

Sometimes, just for a brief moment, I get scared that I will not be allowed to stay on earth long enough to see my kids have families and watch them grown and be able to interact with them. Probably that is my greatest fear, but I try not to think about it too much. My mom didn't really get to hang around long enough to do that, although, she didn't really seem that interested in being part of my life or even part of my kids' lives. My dad has been around for 84 years, which is a nice long time, but he doesn't seem to want to be involved in our lives either. He just wants people to call him and visit him, but doesn't call us first. He never asks how my kids are doing.

Me, I want to be around and involved. If I end up alone as I get older, I am moving to one of the cities where one of my children are living and they will have to invite me over their house for things. I will get a long distance phone plan where I can make long distance calls to all the other kids and grandkids. I want to go to school functions and recitals and sports events that they are involved in. My wheelchair/walker/oxygen tank will have to be allowed also.

almost knocked myself out cold

I don't know what happened. I laid down on the bed for a few minutes (during work) just to rest my eyes. About 1/2 hour later, the phone rang. I finally heard it ringing and jumped up and tried to get to the phone in the other room. Somehow, maybe I wasn't quite awake or something, I tripped, stumbled and finally fell headlong into the wall across the way from the bedroom door. Bing, bang, and boom! I jumped up to still get to the phone.

I don't know how I didn't knock myself out cold. I am still finding places that hurt. Bruise over my left ear, blood bruise on my middle finger on my right hand, left wrist tender, left knee now starting to swell and hurt, right side of my neck tender, left elbow scraped up and sore. I wasn't doing too bad until now, when I tried to go to sleep. Everything started hurting.

If someone could have taped me doing that, I am sure we would have won on America's Funniest Videos.

family of squirrels

Well, we do not have birds to watch or other critters in our backyard, but we seem to have a family of squirrels that live in the tree in front of our house. One was sitting on our front porch the other morning, eating his/her breakfast. He/she looked at me as if I was interrupting something. Then this morning I noticed that both were in the front garden. One was eating the flower weed that had grown quite large (we are having a hard time keeping up with the yard work). The other was sitting in the shrub eating the red berries that are all over it. They like to play in the front garden also. I notice them running in and out between the shrubs.

I will have to get so I name them and stuff. This is the same squirrel, just two different pictures.