Nana's new pal

I'm in North Carolina.
Which I probably couldn't find on a map.
But here I am.
Annie and Edwin live outside of Spring Lake, a few miles from Fort Bragg, which is where Edwin works every day. Lately, he has been working excruciatingly long hours, rigging and packing supplies for Haiti. We're proud of our boy.
Annie is about ten weeks pregnant and doing the family thing, throwing up all the time. I managed to coax her out for some shopping on Thursday. I had to, you see, because I threw out their non-stick pots. They were in sad condition and probably very unhealthy. We hit Ross and TJMaxx in Fayetteville and found some nice stainless steel pots with thick layered bottoms. I love a good pot.
Earlier that day I took Roxy for a walk. It was a balmy day, almost like summer. Roxy is a Labrador/German Shepherd mix and is a sweetie, but she is not leash trained. Me, I have never owned a dog. Needless to say, our first walk was interesting. I spent most of the time spinning in circles, trying to untangle myself from the leash as she wrapped it around me. Then, as soon as we headed for home, I could hardly keep up with her.

Ellen gave me some tips, so I tried again on Friday. Every time Roxy pulled on the leash, I either turned around and walked in the other direction, or stopped and pulled up on the leash. We made slow, slow progress. Even Roxy was starting to look up at me like I was crazy, so who knows what the neighbourhood thought.

I think that by the time we got home, she was starting to get the idea.
Today, my shoulder feels wrenched.
Thanks Roxy.

For some reason, now she loves me best of all. Last night, Annie called her to go back to the bedroom when she went to bed and Roxy wanted to stay with me.
Ha!
Smart dog.
She knows what all my grandkids have learned.
Nana loves her best!

I was hoping to get out and continue our walks today, but we woke up to snow covered with ice. A strangely inconsiderate turn of the weather, especially since the warmest thing I brought with me was my raincoat.
I sometimes think that I would like to have a dog.
But then I remember three things.
Dog smell.
Dog poop.
Dog hair.
And I think maybe I'll just be Nana and come visit.

Anniversary presents

Today when I got home from work there were heart balloons in the driveway, a nicely decorated table, and lasagna smells emanating from the kitchen.
Bethany and Jenny were making dinner for us, while Jon watched all the kids in his apartment.

I should have taken photos before we ate, but I forgot.

Instead, here is the kaleidoscope we bought from the Freed Gallery in Lincoln City. I can hardly put it down, the images are so spectacular.

And this original drawing by Ken Dust.

And finally, a collage of some of the images from the kaleidoscope.

Blue skies and wet feet

On Saturday, we took a long walk. It was a rare day at the coast, sunny with almost no wind. Here are some random photos from our walk.

We decided to brave the tide pools. It's always a bit dodgy, Jeff with his bum knee and me with no balance. The rocks were slick with seaweed, but we were doing okay until a sneaker wave caught us out pretty far and drenched our lower legs. I thought Jeff might get washed off his rock, but he kept his footing. Too bad I missed the moment, it would have been a good photo.

People still collect agates, although they are few and far between these days. Agates, not people.

These boys were having a grand time, building moats and throwing sand all over each other.

If you want to see a collage of all the photos I took on our walk, go here.

Clam chowder, reprised

Maybe I've been blogging for too long.
I was all set to blog about my search for the perfect bowl of clam chowder,when I realized I had said it all before.
But I did find another glorious bowl of chowder at the Blackfish Cafe in Lincoln City.
Jeff thoroughly enjoyed his fish and chips, which made up for the perfectly awful identical dinner we ate at McMenamins the night before.

Because we were celebrating our anniversary, this complimentary homemade DingDong was ours to enjoy. I almost think it was the best part of the meal. Chocolate-y, creamy, and not too sweet.

I ordered this creme caramel, but it was a little too rich on a full stomach...

...so Jeff let me finish off the DingDong. Which is what all good husbands should do.

The winner is....

...me!
Every week, I hopefully enter KINK FM's contests of the week.
Three times:
One for me.
One for Jeff.
And one for Charlie.
(That's as many email addresses as I can monitor.)
I win quite frequently.
Well, once or twice a year.
I gave it up for a few weeks because I hadn't won anything for a while, but decided to start up again about a month ago. Shortly after starting up again, I won tickets to go see "Snow Falling on Cedars", the play. I was a little dubious, not having been to see a play for a long time. But it was free, and I was curious to see how the playwright had adapted it for the stage. For the price of parking, $5, we had an entertaining night out. The play was astoundingly well done, the audience was rapt, and the venue was pleasant. The building is in the Pearl District in an old Armory, renovated in Portland edgy-environmental style. The parking structure across the street was also interesting, with narrow, steep ramps, skinny parking places (woe betide any SUV's that attempt to park there), painted brick, and arched windows. We deduced it must be part of the same military complex. Here is my conclusion about Portland. It may be on the extreme left edge of political wackiness, but once in a while it gets something completely right.
But I digress.
Then, last Tuesday, I got a call from the radio station to say that I had won tickets to the Tower of Power concert at Chinook Winds, the casino at the beach. "Cool," I said, although to be honest, it wasn't my first choice of a win. But my philosophy is, I enter everything and then if I win, I decide whether to go. If not, I pass it on to someone else. So far, I have chosen to capitulate to fate, and been pleasantly surprised every time.
As luck would have it, I had been looking for a getaway this weekend, as it is our, wait for it, THIRTIETH anniversary on Tuesday. So I booked a beach house, and off we went.
Do you even know who Tower of Power is? Jeff didn't. But he trusts me (why, I will never know) and he loved them. He is a good sport to tag along on my adventures.
Tower of Power puts the "fun" in "funkify". They have been together for 42 years and still sound as fresh as they did when I listened to them in the 70's. How do they do that? Their presentation is snappy, synchronized, and syncopated to the extreme. Jeff sat next to a black guy who was at the concert for the second night in a row, having driven down from Seattle just for that purpose. He knew all the words to the songs, the name of all the band members, and their whole history.
Now that is a fan.
This is my favourite Tower of Power song. They played it for the encore, thus rescuing me from abject disappointment. Turn up the volume and feel the funk.

The Monday Militia

What did Nana do today?

She went shooting with Jon, Jeff and B.

The guns belong to B., who has a passion for the topic and subscribes to rule # 5 of gun ownership: You can never have too many guns.

Jon, as usual, dressed appropriately for the occasion, except he forgot that it was cold, so he shivered the whole time. He gets annoyed with me for thinking he's cute and funny, but I ask you, how can I not? He's trying not to smile.

B. owns four hand guns, so we got to try out several different calibers and makes. See how intelligent I am already on the subject?

Jon, trying out a very beautiful rifle. Note the cool scope.

You may have noticed that there are no photos of me, shooting. There's a reason for that. Nobody, but nobody, gets to take a photo of my backside in shooting stance. But here is my target from the rifle shots. My group is the tidy little cluster in the SSW corner. Woot woot for me!

Mind you, I did use the closest target. Here are the boys, walking to the back of the range to check their targets.

Aren't they cute?

If you want to read up on women and guns, check out the Women of Caliber blog on the Blog Roll.

George Washington said, "A free people ought to be armed."

I do believe I am beginning to feel quite enthusiastic on the matter.

Meandering through the days of our lives

The philosopher, Martin Heidegger, said that time persists merely as a consequence of the events taking place in it. The old saying, "time flies when you're having fun," is apparently more than a truism. Our brains, according to recent studies, do a poor job of tracking time. Our internal clocks seem to respond more to the kind of activity in which we are engaged than to the actual passage of time. Which is why an hour in the dentist's chair passes so much more slowly than an hour eating chocolate and reading a good book. (Feel free to insert your own dreaded and favoured activities into that sentence.)

Speaking of truisms, I had to look the word up to make sure that I was using it correctly. Cliche, platitude, banality. I never knew it was such a despicable word! Which led me, as is wont to happen when surfing the web, to this website, which has compiled a hilarious list of truisms.

Here are a few, with some commentary by yours truly.

Never go to Dudley. It's not the end of the world, but you can see it from there.

I was born in Dudley, therefore I resent that remark.

Never pretend you can horse-ride.

Ask Bethany, if you don't know why.

If you can't believe it's not butter, you're an idiot.

There is only butter. Nothing else.

Never mix sleeping pills and laxatives.

Ouch.

The trouble with being punctual is no one's there to appreciate it.

Eh, Ellen?

My hope for all of us is that 2010 zips right on by, we're having that much fun.

We're having a new baby, did I tell you?

A little Annie or Edwin.

Send good thoughts their way.

Annie is really sick, in the tradition of the Tuft women.

She's going to have a really LOOOONG seven months or so.