Sunny Monday

Gorgeous day today....... and yesterday was as well...... the azaelas are in full bloom again, after losing their December blooms because of the frost we had. All the trees that lost their leaves after the holidays are now budding again. Summer is about twelve minutes away, and it can't come quick enough.

I stopped at the dry-cleaners this afternoon and Lucy (the gray parrot) is on friendly terms with me again. She had stopped talking to me after I went into the shop with my husband a couple of weeks ago. I've read that parrots can get very jealous, and being that Lucy and I are having a bird-to-woman relationship, I guess she didn't like my unfaithfulness. But today she hopped closer to the cage door so I could pet her neck feathers, so I guess she's giving me another chance. If my husband and I go back into the dry-cleaning shop together again, I'll have to make believe that I don't know him.

Frankie's daughter arrived last night from Ohio. She was in the midst of going through her mother's tiny house when her brother arrived and starting making a fuss. He's "in charge." Doesn't want her to touch a thing. All she did was donate her mother's clothing to a women's shelter and her books to the local library. It isn't as if she's going back to Ohio with a fortune that was hidden under the bed. Frankie had so very little to begin with..... she lived from week to week. Where was her son when the holidays came around? Because of all of the fuss with her brother, Frankie's daughter is turning right around and driving back up north.

I've been getting more phone calls from Frankie's friends...... they're planting trees and having dinners........ "Thank you, but no thank you," said I. I am just not getting into the middle of everything that's being done. I didn't know these people when Frankie was alive and I'm not going to cultivate friendships with them now that she's gone. For whatever reason Frankie had, she kept her life with her Clear Lake friends totally separate from her life with her Seabrook friends. And if that's what Frankie wanted when she was alive, then that's what I'm doing now that she's gone.

But she's not gone, as I told her daughter. She's all around us, wherever we go and whatever we see. Rock on, Miss Frankie.

Or should I say "Morning Glory on, Miss Frankie."

Sleepy Saturday

Today has been a cloudy, drippy, rainy, dreary day. I spent most of the afternoon curled up in a chair with a book in my hands and ShadowBaby on my lap. I didn't get much reading done, but ShadowBaby and I had a great nap.

I think this whole week just caught up with me..... all the emotional ups and downs since Frankie passed away. All those phone calls, with people wanting to do things that Frankie never would've approved of. I had told my husband that I wouldn't be answering the phone and I asked him to tell "those" people that I just wasn't here.

Well, I decided that doing that would be making myself such a wuss. Frankie wouldn't approve. She never took the easy way out and didn't respect people who did. So I told my husband that I'd just answer the phone as I usualy do, and take any calls when he picks up the phone. I will tell people that I just can't take part in all these elaborate plans they're making on Frankie's behalf. Thank you very much for asking, y'all, but no thank you.

As far as I know, Frankie's body is still resting at the morgue. Last I heard, her son intends to have an autopsy done so he can try to sue the hospital for wrongful death. Frankie had visions of a quick cremation. Her son has visions of a quick million.

Very sad, as I've said before.

For my part........ I can't wait till the sun comes out so I can plant these Morning Glory seeds so Frankie's favorite flowers can start their march across my garden.

Morning Glories

I finally thought of a way to remember our friend Frankie. Anyone who knew Frankie would remember that she loved her flower garden. Along with the 'senior citizen' column she wrote for the local paper, she also had a gardening column..... she called that one "Granny Greenthumbs," which gives you an idea of her sense of humor.

Frankie's favorite flowers were Morning Glories. While I was in the hardware store today, I happened to see the packets of flower seeds. And there were the Morning Glories and of course they made me think of Frankie. There were about five varieties of Morning Glories, and wouldn't you know..... there was a white Morning Glory called Pearly Gates. Now... how perfect was that?

I bought ten packages of those and came home and wrote out cards to our friends who knew Frankie from parties and dinners at our home. In the cards, along with the little seed packets of Pearly Gates, I wrote that Morning Glories were Frankie's favorite flowers, and I hoped they would plant the seeds in their gardens so a little bit of Frankie would keep on blooming.

I'm sure Frankie would love this gesture. I hope so. I have a feeling she wouldn't be so thrilled with what's going on between her son, his wife, and her daughter. Not to mention people that she worked with..... one of whom called me today asking all sorts of questions and wanting to know if I had gone into Frankie's home to look for her Will.

What??? I never went into Frankie's house unless she was there to open the door, so why would I go now? And why on earth would I be wanting to look for her Will???? I told my husband that this is all getting so overwhelming that I don't even want to pick up the phone for the next couple of weeks. Every day since Frankie passed away, there has been at least one phone call that I didn't need to be getting. And these aren't three-minute calls... these are calls that go on and on for nearly half an hour at a time.

I was Frankie's friend, not her lawyer, not her guardian, not her keeper, not her confidant. If she indeed had a Will, she neither told me about it or told me where it was hidden. And someone has totally misinterpreted Frankie's spoken wishes for a simple cremation. Now her co-workers are wanting to collect money so they can hire a huge party boat to take Frankie's ashes out to the middle of Galveston Bay. Which really surprises me, because a lot of those co-workers didn't pay much attention to Frankie when she was alive, for the simple reason that they thought she was a simple-minded old woman.

Keep me out of this........ I'll have no part in any of this.......... I asked my husband to answer the phone and tell all of "those people" that I'm not at home.

Hence.... the Morning Glories. My own quiet little way for myself and Frankie's friends to remember one very nice lady.

Rainy Thursday....

Lots of storms last night, which left us with heavy rains this morning. Pouring so badly that I cancelled my piano lesson, which had been cancelled on Wednesday also. Which was fine with me, because I really wasn't ready for this week's lesson. I'm still not ready.... guess I just wasn't in the piano mood this week.

I spent the last two days making soups........ clam chowder, crawfish bisque, lentil. I also baked some apples and cranberries. Our nice warm and sunny weather turned into rainy days, so that means soup in this house. And now that my husband knows I can really make good soup, I guess he won't be looking for cans of Chunky Clam Chowder anymore. Oh well..... the secret is out.

Frankie's daughter-in-law called me this afternoon.... they still haven't made any decision about "arrangements" for Frankie. She wanted to know my opinion. I really didn't want to give my opinion, but she kept asking. She specifically wanted to know if I thought Frankie would want a wake and a viewing.

Not the Frankie I knew. I can just hear Frankie now, responding to someone looking at her in a coffin who has just whispered "Doesn't she look wonderful?"

Frankie's response would be "I don't look wonderful..... I look dead!" I told her daughter-in-law that I really didn't think Frankie would want that. Frankie believed in cremation, and she wanted her ashes sprinkled somewhere along Galveston Bay. And that we know for a fact, because Frankie mentioned that quite a few times.

Frankie's two (grown) children are now fighting with one another... both want to be in charge. According to Texas law, if no will is found, then the oldest child is legally in charge, which puts Frankie's son in that position. Her daughter told me that her brother wants to sue the hospital...... saying that Frankie caught an infection in the hospital and that's what killed her.

Frankie's daughter is a nurse....... who believes that Frankie died because her lungs collapsed because of all those years of smoking... she couldn't breathe on her own, she couldn't eat on her own, then she caught pneumonia. A simple (and very common) staph infection was the least of her mother's worries.

When Frankie's daughter-in-law realized that I wasn't buying into her "let's sue the hospital" theory, she quickly ended the phone call with me this afternoon. I don't want to get involved in all of this. Her children will have to work this out. All I know is this: Frankie's body is "on ice" (as her son is calling it) and will stay there for seven days until he either agrees to have her body cremated or he finds a lawyer to take on this case and they'll do an autopsy.

We had very, very bad storms last night. Lots of thunder and lightning. Torrents of rain and flash-flooding. As my friend A said: "Frankie is really ticked off about all of this." The one thing that Frankie couldn't tolerate was being cold.

And now her son is keeping her "on ice."

How very, very sad.

Happy Birthday Frankie

Today would've been Frankie's birthday. Her 75th, give or take a year. She's no longer with us so we can't celebrate her birthday, but we can celebrate her life.

Knowing Frankie, she'd probably like that better anyway. When my husband's mom passed away last year, Frankie told me not to be sad about her death but to be happy about her life.

Frankie's life was simple. She lived on a fixed income and counted her pennies and saved her dollars, but that didn't stop her from enjoying every minute of every day. Even on a pouring, drippy, rainy, thundering day, she would remind me that "everything green" needed the rain, and "the ducks are having a blast in Clear Lake Park."

Hats........ she loved hats and owned at least thirty of them. Mostly bought at resale shops and yard sales, some were gifts, some she'd bought years and years ago. Even in the deep heat of an August day, she'd be wearing a straw hat with some sort of silk flower pinned to the side of it. "My kingdom for a new hat!" she'd tell her friends.

Chocolate.... Frankie just adored chocolates. Everything from Hershey's Kisses to Belgium bon-bons. "Is there anything better in this world than chocolate melting slowly in your mouth and warming you right down to your toes?" Frankie and her daughter went on a weekend cruise from Galveston to Mexico a few years ago. There was a Midnight Chocolate Buffet one night on the ship. Frankie didn't eat a thing that whole day. She was the first one to arrive for the Chocolate Buffet and the last one to leave.

Animals... Frankie loved all of "Mother Nature's creatures," as she called them. She didn't have a dog because she worked too many hours to leave a dog at home alone. She had a cat named Charlie who died about six months before she did. Charlie was a stray who found his way to her door and charmed her into keeping him, even though she was still heart-broken over the cat she'd buried not long before Charlie came along. "How could I turn my back on that poor little thing? Maybe the angels sent him to me." Charlie was with her for more than 12 years, I think. When he died, one of her neighbors buried him underneath his favorite tree in her yard. Frankie memorialized Charlie in her monthly column for a local newspaper. Not until you read the last line of her column did she reveal that Charlie was a cat. But of course, her friends knew who Charlie was from the very first line.

Parties... Frankie was the first to arrive whenever we had holiday dinners or Charades parties. The last party she attended here was our Halloween party. She wore a red devil's wig and held a yellow Mardi Gras mask in front of her face. Between the glitter-wig and the feathered mask, she could barely see. Our friend D took a scissors to the wig and trimmed a little off so she wouldn't fall. Our friend A snapped a photo of that moment when Frankie was being "totally Frankie." The last holiday dinner she attended was Thanksgiving at our friend A's house. Frankie oohed and aahed over all the autumn-y decorations and was thrilled to go home with leftovers so she wouldn't have to cook for a couple of days. Frankie never made it to our house for Christmas dinner because she had just been released from the hospital and was under doctor's orders not to leave her house. My husband and I took leftovers to her the day after Christmas. "How wonderful! I haven't celebrated Boxing Day since I left England," she told us.

Frankie's life was full and busy in her younger days. She worked on huge sailing ships and traveled all over the world during her 20s and 30s. She settled down in Texas in her late 50s because the weather was "warm and sunny for most of the year, but cool and cloudy for just enough time to make you appreciate the warm and sunny parts." As she got older, Frankie lived alone but was always on the look-out for the perfect man. "One who cooks, one who cleans, one who has some money, one who can make a decent martini, one who likes to have fun, one who doesn't complain too much. Find me one of those, will you now? Or possibly two, just in case I don't much like the first one."

Frankie hated, hated, hated to be cold. When she was brought to the hospital the first time, our friend A brought her a warm comforter from home so Frankie could wrap herself up in it while she was in that hospital bed. The comforter brightened up the hospital-white room and it made all the nurses smile. Frankie told me "They can smile all they want, but they're not getting my blanket."

On Frankie's second-to-last night in the hospital, when she was still conscious, one of the nurses asked her if she needed anything. Frankie looked the nurse square in the eye and said "A gun." The nurse laughed and probably thought Frankie was just a silly old woman. Not so. I'm sure Frankie was serious. I'm sure she knew how sick she was and I'm certain she knew the end was as close as it could be without her tripping over it.

Frankie always said that when the day came that she couldn't hold a book in her hand to read and all that was left to her was to lie in bed in front of a television set, then the end couldn't come quick enough for her.

The end came quick enough for Frankie, I think, but it came too quick for those of us who loved her. I've read that a person will never die as long as there are people left to remember their stories and say their names.

When my young 13-year-old friend C met Frankie for the first time, C asked me: "Is Frankie what you would call a character?"

Yes indeed, I told C, Frankie surely is a character.

"Good," said C, "I didn't want her to be just ordinary."

Ordinary? Frankie? Not a chance.

Her Real Name was Iris.....

Our friend F (Frankie) passed away at 5:30 this morning. Thankfully, gracefully... her tired body just gave in and gave out. Frankie's real name was Iris. When I first met her, I asked how she got to be called Frankie...... she told me that it was so long ago that she didn't remember.

As I got to know Frankie better (or as much as she would allow anyone to know her) I sort of figured out that with her love of language and words, there was no way she would've forgotten how she came about to have that nickname. I didn't question her again about it..... I just figured that it was something she'd rather not share.

Tomorrow would've been Frankie's birthday..... her 75th, I believe. Her children are taking care of whatever funeral services or memorial will be given for their mother. Any arrangements they make will more than likely be very simple and without fuss. Come to think of it, that's how Frankie lived her life: simply, without fuss.

Frankie had very little tolerance for ignorance, apathy, laziness, hatefulness. She would seethe when she saw The Powers That Be in this world labeling people into categories, such as black, white, Asian.... and she'd scream when she saw "Other" on any sort of application. She stood by the belief that "We are all really just one color."

Frankie would "tsk, tsk" at people she knew who refused to learn, refused to "saddle their own horse," as she would say. She believed that we were put on this planet to learn as much as we dared, not merely take up as much space as we cared.

Little lessons..... all those little Frankie-isms that would come out in our conversations and become lessons. People who didn't know her looked at her and saw a little old lady on the outside without ever giving themselves a chance to see just how young and astute and "with it" she was on the inside.

Frankie used to call my husband Darlin'........ when she called him that, she sounded like a southern belle, shortening the ing in "darling" so it sounded as if she'd been born in Alabama, rather than in London. Few people even knew that Frankie was born in Britain... she shared that story with only very good friends.

I was awake at 5:30 this morning. AngelBoy woke me up by pounding his paw on the laundry room door. I got out of bed and let both AngelBoy and ShadowBaby out onto the screen-porch. It seemed a little stuffy in the house and I went down the hallway by the TV room to turn on the air-conditioning. I didn't put the light on.... I just stood there and tweaked the thermostat a teeny bit till the unit clicked on.

As I stood there in the dark, I could've sworn that someone else was there. I am never, ever afraid in this house and I walk around in the dark all the time without so much as a thought. This morning, however, it just seemed as if I wasn't alone in that dark hallway. I even peeked into the TV room and my husband's computer room, to see if he had gotten out of bed. Both rooms were empty. The air-conditioning clicked on and I rushed back to bed..... when I got under the covers, I was tempted to wake up my husband and tell him that I thought someone else was in the house.

But that sounded so silly. My rational mind knew there was no one else in this house. I just got under the covers and got as close to my husband as I could get and fell back to sleep till nearly 9:00 this morning. When Frankie's daughter-in-law called us at 9:30 to tell us that Frankie had passed away at 5:30, I didn't even remember those minutes in the hallway. It didn't pop back into my mind till later on this morning when I again went to the thermostat to adjust it.

Only then did I remember feeling as if someone had been in the house earlier this morning.... just a little bit after AngelBoy woke me up at 5:30. Makes you wonder...... after someone passes away, do they pass by places they've been to on their way to their final destination?

Frankie would know the answer to that question now. I imagine that she now knows the answers to a lot of questions that the rest of us can only think about.

More Trees for the Decoration Forest

The little white feather tree that I decorated for Valentine's Day came out so pretty that I decided to do two more...... one for St. Patrick's Day, another for Easter. Off I went to Hobby Lobby, to find the decorations and buy more glue sticks for the glue gun. (Wonderful invention, that little glue gun.)

They had just one aisle for St. Patty's Day, but there was more than enough green shamrock garland and bright green plastic shamrocks for one little 14-inch tree. It's already all decorated and sitting in the middle of our dining room table. Both ShadowBaby and AngelBoy have looked it over from top to bottom. Neither were impressed. But that's good.... if they're not impressed, they won't be bothering with it.

Hobby Lobby had about six aisles filled with everything you could imagine for Easter. No bright curly garland that I was looking for, but I decided to use curling ribbon instead and that worked out better. Pastel shades of purple and aqua for the ribbon, plus small eggs lightly dusted with glitter, lots of those tiny fluffy yellow chicks that pop up every Easter, and I even found some tiny bunnies. They're all sitting on the tree and looking adorable.... but I've got that little tree up in the closet for now.

With all of the holiday decorations on them, the white trees no longer look like little Christmas trees, which is actually what they are. A friend of mine sells Avon, and these little trees were in the sale booklets for just $5 each...... too cute not to buy and use for something.

And.... back to the real world on this nice & warm Monday...... no word about our friend F, so I'm guessing that she's still the same. If she had gotten better or worse, we would've heard from either her son or her daughter. In this case, no news isn't really good news.

I decided not to go back to the hospital while F is still unconscious and hooked up to all of those machines. They only let two people into the ICU room, and if I go up there, then her son or her daughter-in-law has to leave. They're family, I'm not. I can't see taking visiting time away from them.

Visiting time. If you can call it that. All anyone can do is stand by the side of F's bed and look into her lifeless, unseeing eyes. I wonder if anyone has tried to close her eyes.

And if no one else tries, I wonder if F will try on her own.

I keep thinking of what Johnny Carson said when he decided to retire from The Tonight Show after thirty years: "You have to know when it's time to just get off the stage."

Sunday Company / Sunday ICU Visit

A warm and mostly sunny Sunday......... we had friends K & B and J & S over for lunch....... I started cooking two days ago but it was worth it because this morning was very easy. Everyone got here at noon and all I had to do was pop things in the oven and "dress the table" (as those designers on Oprah say). Wonderful conversation........ we sat down at 12:30 and didn't budge till 5:30. Except for me...... I was up and down because I served lunch in courses and it worked out very well.

Plus, it was so warm outside that the cats were able to stay on the screen-porch. As soon as K walked in the door and said hello to us, she went straight out on the porch to see AngelBoy. She has a definite understanding of my blue-eyed cat. And she is one of the few people that AngelBoy doesn't ignore.

We all decided that we're such a good group that we'll have to do this again. I'll have to think of a different menu. Today was crawfish bisque soup, tossed salad, baked cheese bread, Greek spinach pie, Italian meatballs. (I just had to do the meatballs again, since they were such a hit at the Valentine party). K & B brought a chocolate cake for dessert.

Everyone had just signed our guest book and was heading out the front door, and our phone rang. It was our friend F's son-in-law, calling from Ohio, to tell me that F was taken from her private hospital room and brought back to the ICU. So much for my "Wonder Woman" theory. My husband and I drove to the hospital. We were going to wait till tomorrow, but it sounded too serious to wait till morning.

F is now hooked up to all sorts of machines....... a tube going through her nose to feed her, a tube going down her throat to send air into her lungs. Poor F is so drugged up that she doesn't know what's going on. Her eyes are open but she isn't seeing a thing. Without that machine to force the air into her lungs, she wouldn't be breathing at all.

Come to think of it..... if a machine is pushing air into your lungs, you're not really breathing, are you?

On top of all of that, F now has pneumonia. How much can a body take?

Quality of life.... there is no 'quality' in F's life at the moment.

During lunch today, our friend J (a retired medical doctor) and our friend K (a retired biologist) talked about the medical profession and their success rate in hospitals. K said she "stays out of hospitals." J doesn't believe that keeping a patient alive for "six more weeks or months" is a success.

Now if these highly trained professionals don't have trust in the hospital system, where does that leave us?

And where does that leave our friend F? Not in a good place. I wonder how long F's children will allow the doctors to leave her hooked up to those machines.

F would be appalled at her current life. I can hear her now. "This is only living if you happen to be a rock." It was sad to see F in her current condition. It would be sadder still to see this continue.

This Bug's For You.....

Why is it always me who stumbles upon a bug........ On my way through the living room this afternoon, I looked up and happened to see a huge wood roach just sitting on the wall. We have very high ceilings in the living room, and it was making its way down the highest side of the room. It had stopped right near the air vent, so I guess it found its way into the attic from one of the roof vents. And lucky me... it also found its way out of the attic by way of the air-conditioning vent.

These wood roaches are all over outside, and we'd just had the outside sprayed with the bug spray, plus the bug-guy spritzed that stuff up in the attic as well. Are the wood roaches immune to the sprays? In Florida, these things are called palmetto bugs...... just about the same thing as our wood roaches.... big, brown, like a common roach on steroids, they fly fast and they can crawl fast. Too fast for me, which is why I'm so afraid of them.

I just froze when I saw that bug. I stood there watching it. I had a dish towel in my hand and I wondered if I could throw the towel at it and kill it. Not a chance. My shoe? I didn't want to try that.... my aim isn't the greatest and my shoe could easily break something if I missed the bug. Plus, I was wearing the prettiest pair of gold sandals. Not exactly a bug-killing shoe.

Thankfully, my husband was home. Sound asleep in his chair...... he had been working at his computer all day long and was taking a break. I guess he knew by the tone of my voice that something was going on because he got up the first time I called him. When he walked into the living room, I held my shoe out to him and asked him to smash that bug to smithereens. I figured he could just use the sole of the shoe to whack the bug without getting any of the blood and guts on the gold flower that was at the toe of the shoe.

He didn't want to do that....... violence isn't his thing. He asked me to get a plastic bowl so he could capture the bug and bring it outside. Ah.... the old catch and release method. Into the plastic bowl went the bug..... out the front door went my husband...... he walked all the way up to the corner before letting the bug go. My hero. (This story can be filed under "101 Uses for Old Tupperware.")

Wonder Woman

That's what I'm going to call our friend F from now on... "Wonder Woman."

I went to the hospital today and took the elevator right to the second floor, expecting F to still be in the ICU. Not so........ the nurse told me they had brought her upstairs to the third floor, to a "regular" room. Back to the elevator I went, and up to the next floor... and there she was. Sitting up in her bed, with just simple oxygen tubes in her nostrils instead of that huge and cumbersome oxygen mask that she had been using.

Her voice was very weak, and hardly sounded like dear old F, but her attitude was there and she was full of her usual spirit. I had brought her a piece of chocolate cake and when I offered to unwrap it for her, she told me to leave the foil on the plate because she had no intentions of sharing it with anyone. "Why let everyone see what I'm not going to let them have?"

F will be going through lots of therapy for the next couple of weeks..... she can barely walk, so they'll start with that. Her doctor plans to keep her in that hospital for as long as the medical insurance allows. After that? Who knows.... but let's take one day at a time.

Valentine's Party.... the details........

I guess I didn't write too many details about the Valentine's party in here because I've had eMail from out-of-state friends who wanted to know more, more, more......... So here goes......

First of all, the foods for the potluck dinner were outstanding....... Italian meatballs, Greek green beans, Swedish meatballs, sweet potato casserole, homemade chocolate cake, chicken salad with artichokes & olives, chicken casserole, tossed salad with lots of different ingredients, a Mexican taco casserole, baked bread sprinkled with cheese, homemade lemon squares, homemade cookies, and of course, Valentine candies.

The cellophane bag that I filled with the tiny candy hearts was a lot of fun...... everyone wrote their guesses on pink post-it notes (heart-shaped)..... and I had prizes for the man and the woman who came the closest to the correct number. The one whose guess was the furthest from the correct amount got to take home the bag of candy hearts. And I had that card with the little quiz called "What Kind of Shoe Are You?"..... that was a lot of fun, but I think just the ladies took the quiz, not the guys. (I typed out that quiz in here....... you can find it if you scroll back a bit on the titles.)

We had twenty large red heart-shaped balloons. I gave each of the ladies one of those... I tied the balloons right onto their gift-bags. I had those balloons tied up outside by the front walkway, and every statue in the house had a balloon tied to it. The balloons, and all of my little heart-shaped boxes on all of the end tables, plus the centerpiece I made for the table--- we had a festive, red-sprinkled house for the party.

I had found the softest red teddy-bears for this party.... so the ladies who I thought were 'teddy-bear people' got a Valentine bear..... the others got a small heart-shaped pillow. I also filled the women's gift bags with chocolate Kisses, heart-shaped soap, hand cream in a Valentine-decorated container, heart-shaped emery boards, heart-shaped notepaper... and for the ladies who like to read-- a romantic book. For the husbands, I gave them each a funny cartoon-like book called "For Better Or Worse"--- cartoons about love & marriage. I also found red-covered business-card holders (sort of a binder to hold business cards... keeps them all very handy and near the phone). I also had chocolate Kisses and Valentine candy in the bags for the men. I also found comedy videos for the guys--- different titles, trying to give each of the guys what I thought they'd be interested in.

The Charades game was the loudest, funniest, most frustrating game....... and the men won. I had written out the titles of love songs on heart-shaped cards for the men to guess. All of the songs I picked had the word 'love' in the title. You had to see the guys acting out the word love. -- They stood there pounding their heart with their fist and rolling their eyes....... as if just the word was a cross they had to bear. The guys guessed just about all of the clues..... which, of course, is why they won.

The women had to guess titles of movies and songs that my husband printed out and pasted onto heart-shaped cards. He looked through lists on the Internet, and came up with the most obscure, most ridiculous, most unlikely names/places/songs/movies/people that you've ever heard of. All of us were saying What? Are you sure? Is that the title? Very frustrating, to say the least, especially when my clues for the men were so much easier, with that four-letter word in each of their answers.

After Charades, we popped open the Victorian gift-crackers, and that's always a lot of fun. Between the fire-cracking sound of the "snaps" and then the paper crowns and little gifts and riddles tucked inside, it's a good way to end the craziness of Charades.

And we are a crazy group, I must say. One of my clues (which the ladies couldn't guess) was the song "A Groovy Kind of Love." Well, I did all I could think of to get them to say the word groovy but nothing worked. We each have three minutes to act out the Charade, and I went over the three minutes, but the men didn't say anything because they were having such a good time watching me strut around the living room to the groovy beat that I was playing in my head. (Note to myself: Don't ever do that again.)

So that's about the story of the party...... it was comical and crazy, frustrating and funny. And... just to make sure the clues for next Valentine's Day aren't as ridiculous as this year's, I've already filled up those paper hearts with love songs, love movies, and all things related to Valentine's Day. I figure that by the time next February comes around, I will have forgotten everything I wrote down on those heart-shaped cards.

For The Birds

Another glorious day, this day after Valentine's Day. I took a couple of those red heart-shaped balloons from the party and tied them to the bushes out in the front of our house. They're blowing around in the breeze and looking happy. When Gracie goes by the front door, she barks at them.

I also took two of the heart balloons over to our young friend C's house yesterday. I tied them up on the post of her front porch. C was still at school, but her dad was at home so I chatted with him for a few minutes. He told me that C is beginning to get interested in boys. (She'll be 14 this March.) Ah.... the teenage years. I've known C since she was in the second grade... and wasn't it just last year that she said to me: "Boys are good to have around when you need someone to play cards with or if you need a fourth person for Monopoly, but what else do they do?"

I guess C is finding out what else they do........... Good grief....... she's growing up right before our eyes....... I hope she takes this nice and slow. I don't know if her dad and my husband can handle this. Or me........ I want her to stay a little girl for a while longer.

Lots of little errands to do this morning, one of which was stopping at the dry-cleaner's. The local cleaner has two huge bird cages in the store..... one holding a black mynah-bird, the other holding a gray parrot.

The mynah-bird talks to nearly everyone who comes into the store. He usually says Hello! Not a questioning hello, but a demanding Hello! As if to say: I'm saying hello to you, so you'd better say hello to me. There are days when the mynah-bird says "Hi-i-ii-ii-i" and drags it out to make it nearly a six-syllable word.

Today, however, the mynah said "Can you talk?" And he said that as if he were asking a question, so I'm guessing that enough people have asked the same question of the bird, so now he's added that phrase to his vocabulary.

The gray parrot's name is Lucy. She's a friendly bird, but only friendly to certain people. I happen to be one of Lucy's chosen people. When she sees me, she'll come close to the edge of her cage so I can pet her. I call her "Lucy Pretty Girl" and she seems to like that. When I say that to her, she turns her head down on an angle so my finger can get through the cage and stroke the back of her neck. For as long as I keep repeating "Lucy Pretty Girl," she will stay in that position and let me pet her. One day last week, I spent so much time with Lucy that I walked out of the store without the shirts I went to pick up.... the girl behind the counter brought them out to me before I drove away. (It was a bird-brain moment....)

So on this beautiful, sunny, glorious day, two birds made me smile....... one by asking Can you talk? and the other by trusting me enough to stroke and smooth her neck feathers.

Valentine's Day

Gorgeous... an absolutely gorgeous day today. Nice and sunny and warm, not even a sweater needed for outside. Finally... our own weather back again.

We went out to Babbo Bruno's for a Valentine lunch this afternoon, being that my husband has to teach a class tonight. The restaurant was more crowded than usual for lunch-time, so I guess a lot of other couples wanted to beat the night-time rush. And they will get crowded tonight--- they had taken so many reservations for the night that they ran out of writing space in their book.

I think Stefano saved the best fish for Valentine's Day...... Hawaiian Sea Bass.... made in a very light sauce with white wine, gold raisins, pine nuts and thinly sliced apples. So good, and he arranged it so beautifully on the plate. That man truly loves to cook and must truly love to see beautiful food leaving his kitchen. No matter how busy he gets, he almost always manages to run out of the kitchen to say hello to us and ask us how everything tastes.

After lunch, my husband and I went to the hospital to see F....... she's still in the ICU...... still hooked up to oxygen, but at least they didn't have that huge, heavy mask on her face today. She was able to speak, but just a few words, and her voice hardly sounded like her own. She was picking at a lunch plate when we walked into her room. I was surprised to see that they gave her solid foods.... some type of chicken, with mashed potatoes and vegetables. She barely touched the mashed potatoes (she said they weren't good), she didn't touch the chicken at all (Are you sure that's chicken?), and she just moved the vegetables around on her plate a little bit.

F seemed to like the Jello that was on the plate.... it was orange-flavored, with bits of fruits set into it. I told her to at least eat all of the Jello if that was the only thing on the tray that appealed to her. F looked at my husband and whispered: "She's a bossy little thing, isn't she?" Nice to know that her sense of humor hasn't left her. The hospital kitchen had put two heart-shaped Valentine cookies on the tray. My husband suggested she try those. She just shook her head. I'm sure she wasn't in a Valentine mood, but it was a nice gesture from the hospital.

F wanted to know all about the party...... we sort of low-keyed it, not wanting to tell her how much fun we all had. I did tell her that the men beat the ladies at Charades, and I told her we lost because she wasn't there to help us win.

It was a bittersweet visit....... it pains me to see F so helpless in that bed. My eyes just puddle up every time I leave her room now. I keep hearing F's voice telling me "We're not guaranteed tomorrow," which is something she used to always tell me.

Two words again for everyone: Don't smoke.

Sunday... Back in The ICU for You-Know-Who

I just got back from the hospital... our friend F is back in the ICU, after spending most of yesterday in a private room. I was surprised that they had taken her out of ICU in the first place, given her poor condition the day before yesterday. But the doctors know what's best, don't they?

As my dad always says: "Not all doctors graduated in the top ten percent of their class."

Poor F looked awful this afternoon.... she's getting thinner by the day, being that her food consists of anything that can be dripped through a tube. And I'm sure she's ticked off because they aren't pouring melted chocolate into her arm. But on the bright side, she did know I was there, and she did know who I was. So she's awake and aware, which is a good thing.

I gave F a message from her British friend C.... he told me last night at our party to tell F this: "Look, old girl, this could all be worse-- you could be back in Birmingham." C told me that F would get the joke... and she did... she raised her eyebrows and nodded her head. Smiling was impossible, with all the stuff they have around her face and down her throat.

F's daughter and son-in-law were at the hospital as well. They'll go back to see F later on today, then they'll be leaving for Ohio early tomorrow morning. While they've been here, they've been staying at F's house, and they have cleaned and shined and polished and have everything in that little house looking just so. With the hopes, of course, that F will be back there to see their efforts.

Fairy buttercups. Besides being able to take good deep breaths on her own, F could use a meadow filled with fairy buttercups right about now...... fairy buttercups as far as the eye can see.

From my lips to God's ears, as my dear friend Blanche always used to say.

Sunday... Post-Party

Another great party.... we laughed so hard and so long last night. And, for the first time ever, the men's team won. Instead of using the deck of cards from the Charades game, my husband and I made up cards for each team. I found titles of love songs (using Google) and wrote them on the backs of red & pink hearts. Most of the song titles had the word "love" in it, so the guys kept beating their chest over their hearts to signify love. It got to be comical after a while.

My husband used the Internet to find titles of movies, songs and quotes, all pertaining to love and romance. He printed them out on address labels and stuck them on the backs of red & white hearts. Some songs we had never heard of, and the quotes were hard to get. The women kept asking him "Where did you dig that up?"

We had heart-shaped balloons floating all over the living room and dining room. I had bought ten of those balloons and my husband took them to get filled yesterday and came back with twenty instead of ten, so I had some tied up outside, and tied to each of the gift-bags for the ladies. Plus, every statue in the house was holding a balloon--- even Venus de Milo (I tied her balloon around her waist).

The food last night was outstanding.... the Italian meatballs, the Greek green beans that my husband got at the Greek Deli, a Mexican taco-casserole, Swedish meatballs, French bread, a sweet potato casserole, a chicken casserole, tossed green salad, artichoke & chicken salad, lemon squares, a chocolate cake, chocolate chip/coconut/cranberry cookie-bars, and I'm sure I've forgotten something or other....

The guessing game with the little candy hearts was a hit..... and I'm glad I had a few extra prizes for that so I could match up the prize with the person. I'll keep the extras for next year's Valentine's party, and maybe think up another guessing game-- maybe Hershey kisses instead of the candy hearts. Or red M&Ms--- that would work out better than the kisses.

So this morning, of course, my husband and I are thinking of the next party. And do we play Charades again? Or what about Pictionary? That could be fun.... We even thought of a twist on Bingo using Scrabble letters... but decided the game would be too quiet because everyone would be thinking too hard to make five-letter words and the party would get awfully quiet.

St. Patrick's Day... we could have a St. Patty's Day party... everyone wearing something green, and bringing a food with something green in it.... I'm getting carried away here.... but that might be a good idea... and I've got the prettiest green beaded blouse I could wear. And I even have some invitations with green flowers on them.

And this is how a party gets started here.

Back to the real world....... our friend F is still in intensive care... and I'm going to visit her this afternoon. I spoke to her daughter yesterday... she told me that F's doctor says that F will come out of this and be just fine. I hope he's right, but I hope his definition of "just fine" matches up to F's definition of "just fine."

Breathe In.... Breathe Out....

Sometimes the easiest thing to do becomes the most impossible. I went to the hospital to see our friend F today... she's still in the ICU. Still hooked up to oxygen.

Today, however, the oxygen machine is forcing air into her lungs so she doesn't have to exert herself by breathing on her own. She was unable to speak, but she knew I was there and she knew who I was. In fact, as I stood there talking to her, she began to play Charades with me, trying to get me to guess what she wanted to say.

She held up three fingers. Three words? She nodded her head.

She held up one finger. First word? She nodded.

F pointed to her eyes. You? I? She nodded at the "I."

F pointed to her chest. Ribs? Would you like some barbequed ribs? She shook her fist at me.

I got serious.... Heart? She nodded.

Love? said I. She nodded. I didn't need her to go further.

You love me. Is that what you're telling me? F grabbed my hand.

"I love you too," I told her. And I held onto her wrist, which seemed so much thinner than the other day, and I put my face on the top of her head and just let my tears fall into her hair. I must have stayed right there in that position for ten minutes or so. When I lifted myself up, F's eyes were closed and the machine was forcing air in... air out... air in... air out.

I have six words for everyone today. Don't smoke. DON'T smoke. DON'T SMOKE!!!!!!

Friends and Neighbors

Our neighbor ML is back from New Orleans, so M isn't home alone anymore. The little Yorkie puppy is still running on high energy, but at least ML is there to take care of him now. ML gave us a huge loaf of French bread and a crispy flat-bread type of sweet that's called a "Shoe Sole" -- to thank us for looking after mama while she was away. They'll be at the Valentine party on Saturday and "mama" is already thinking about what to wear.

Our friend F is still in the ICU. I didn't go to the hospital today... her son and daughter-in-law are there, her daughter and son-in-law are flying in from Ohio and will be at the hospital in a little while. No sense in me getting in the middle of the family at the hospital. Visiting hours are just a half-hour long and F will have her children there. I doubt she can even stay awake for most of the half-hour.... she's just exhausted by all of this and I sit here wondering how much more her body can take.

Our friend J should be home from the downtown hospital by now. I'm sure he'll never pick up a prescription again without making sure the medication is correct and the dosage is what the doctor prescribed. He swears he'll be at our party on Saturday night. And he probably will... he loves Charades... and he'll be telling everyone at the party about the prescription mix-up.

As for our young friend S next door... we don't know if she has told her parents about all of the teenagers who were at their house while they were out of town last weekend. Now I'm beginning to think that we should've just told V & B about all the kids, rather than telling S to do the right thing and tell her parents on her own.
Teenagers.... that's a tough stage to go through. I don't know how parents do it.

We found out recently that our friends B & P have sold their house and will be moving to Dallas. They told us the same thing last year and it never happened, so when they told us the same thing this year, we didn't think much about it. But, surprise, surprise.... this time their house sold to the first people who saw it. I told B that he's breaking our hearts by moving to Dallas. Then I asked him if the people who are buying their house like to play Charades. I was only kidding, but that silly man gave me a serious answer. B & P will be at our party on Saturday. And unless we have another party before the end of June, this will be the last Charades party for them.

Our friends A & D are going to San Antonio for the weekend.... so they won't be here for the party on Saturday. I told our friend J that they were going up there for a "golf weekend" and J said "What? Not enough golf here in Clear Lake?" (Not even the wrong medication can take away J's sense of humor.)

I've typed hundreds and hundreds of words in the last twenty-five minutes. I guess it must be that "Shoe Sole" pastry from New Orleans..... I'm not used to eating all of that sugar. Plus, I haven't been paying attention to what my husband is doing.... heaven only knows how many meatballs are left now.

Tiny Candy Hearts and Mini Meatballs

I spent at least two hours this afternoon making bite-sized meatballs in marinara sauce, to be served at our Valentine party on Saturday. I went grocery shopping this afternoon, intending to buy those frozen, pre-made meatballs. I found the large-size frozen meatballs, but they didn't have the bite-sized ones. I picked up the bag of regular sized meatballs and read the label. Jeez.....

Plus, I kept seeing my Aunt Dolly's face in front of me. You're buying frozen meatballs? Frozen? FROZEN???? I couldn't do it. Back went the package of meatballs. I headed to the meat counter and bought five pounds of the best ground round. Then I went to the canned tomatoes and looked for Progresso.

And what do I have now? A pot of super-delicious bite-sized meatballs in the best pot of marinara sauce I've ever made. All ready for the party...... the meatballs will be soaking up all that sauce between now and Saturday and they'll taste even better than they do now.

That is, if I can keep my husband out of the pot. He came home late this afternoon and I told him to take two if he wanted to taste. Two turned into four... four turned into seven... I think he's had about 10 of them. "And that," said I, "is dinner.... because I'm not cooking anything else tonight."

As for the little-bitty candy hearts..... I decided to buy a couple of bags of those little heart-shaped Valentine mints, the ones with the two and three-word messages on them. When we had our Halloween party, I filled up a pretty cellophane bag with candy corn and everyone had fun guessing how many candy corns were in the bag. So I did the same thing with the little hearts. Prizes for the winners... one prize for the man who gets closest to the number, another prize for the woman who gets closest. And, of course--- the person whose guess is furthest from the correct number gets the bag of candy hearts. (A sweet consolation prize.)

I'm also having the "What Kind of Shoe Are You?" quiz for everyone, so that should be fun. Between the potluck dinner, the shoe quiz, guessing the heart-mints, and Charades, everyone should be very busy. Oh... I've also got the Victorian "crackers" ready for opening after Charades. And Mardi Gras-type heart necklaces for all of the ladies... and huge red heart balloons for each couple.... and the Valentine gift bags for each person. Lots of fun things for this party.

Got to stop typing... my husband is on his way towards the kitchen...

Turn The Radio Up......

The above words are part of a song by Barry Manilow, on "The Mayflower" album. And, the only way that I listen to Manilow's music when I'm in my car is by turning it up. There's just no other way.

So there I was today, driving down Bay Area Blv. towards home, after going to the supermarket for groceries for this weekend's Valentine party. It was sunny and warm today, and when I got into my car after shopping, the car was hot, hot, hot. So as I drove out of the parking lot, the volume on my Manilow CD went up and the window on the passenger side went down.

The first traffic light I came to was red, and I was in the middle lane as I stopped. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a car stop along-side me on the right, but I was just enjoying the sunny day and Manilow's music and I didn't pay much attention. All of a sudden, I hear the slightest beep of a car horn coming from my right. Which is unusual, since hardly anyone in Clear Lake ever beeps their car horn unless they're in an emergency situation. Even if you're at a red light and it turns green, the car behind you will not beep their horn to get you moving.

Anyway.... the car to the right of me beeps the horn. I glanced over, and I see a young 20-something woman smiling at me and sort of waving a cell phone at me. I saw her lips moving, so I knew she was talking but I couldn't hear her over my Manilow music. She beeped the horn again, just a little. I turned the volume down on Barry and looked at her again, intending to ask her if anything was wrong. She smiled at me again and said "Can you turn that music down.... I'm on the phone."

What????

I just looked at her and smiled... then laughed... then turned up the volume on Barry to where I had it in the first place. I just laughed and laughed... couldn't stop laughing. I mean, really... I am in my own car with my own music, and did that girl actually think I was going to turn down the volume (on Barry?) so she could talk on her cell phone?

That entire incident took only seconds to transpire... and I'd guess the red light stayed red for maybe two or three minutes.... but that whole incredible scene has been in my mind the entire afternoon.

Something in The Air, I Swear.......

Everything is so crazy lately...... can we blame it all on the weather? All of these cloudy, drippy, dreary, damp days...

First, ML across the street goes out of town and leaves her mom home alone with a five-pound Yorkie who has a bottomless pit of energy. Then, our friend F ends up in the ICU at the hospital because her lungs are unable to get air in and out and in and out. Now, our friend J is in the hospital because the drugstore where he gets his prescriptions filled gave him the wrong medications. J didn't question the new medication and the new dosage... he just started taking the pills..... and the results were stroke-like symptoms that could've sent him into a coma.

Fortunately, one of J's friends got him to the hospital when he saw that J couldn't walk or speak properly. When J's doctor saw the medication he was taking, and the dosage amount that he was following, he told J that he's lucky to be alive.

I swear...... I've been on the phone all afternoon......... checking up on M across the street, then on J in a hospital near the downtown area..... then calling our friend F's daughter in Ohio to tell her that I saw her mom this morning. Both my husband and I went to the hospital to see F, who, by the way, is doing better than she was last night when I went to the ICU to see her. She's better than she was, but not as well as she should be. Her daughter is flying down from Ohio tomorrow and will stay till the weekend. I told F's daughter that I don't think her mother should be living alone anymore. Between F's daughter and her son, they should be able to work something out.

Two words for the day: Stay healthy! (And checking all of your prescriptions when you pick them up at the pharmacy wouldn't hurt either.)

Tuesday Night at the ICU

My friend F was taken to the hospital's Intensive Care Unit late last night via ambulance. I found out at dinner-time tonight when her son-in-law called me from Ohio. After F's last hospital stay, her children arranged for her to have one of those "I've fallen and can't get up" alert-buttons to wear around her neck. F's daughter and son-in-law live in Ohio, and her son is a truck driver who is out-of-state during any given week.

I called the hospital to see if they'd let me into the ICU to see her, being that I'm not a family member. I told them I'm close enough to 'family' until her daughter can fly down from Ohio and until her son can drive back from Georgia. The nurse told me to be there at 8:00. And let me tell you, they didn't unlock the doors to the ICU till 8:00 on the dot.

And there was F... struggling for every breath, hooked up to oxygen with a plastic mask around her nose and mouth. She looked so tiny in the bed. I had just spoken to her last night and she sounded just fine. She was able to tell me tonight that she had gotten up to use the bathroom at 2:00 this morning and her lungs just wouldn't let her breathe. She used her "panic button" as she calls it, and the Medic Alert company got an ambulance there and called her children.

It was hard to watch F gasping for air tonight. Gasping, struggling... and I do mean struggling. It seemed that her whole body was trying to breathe in just one bit of oxygen. Her entire body seemed to lift up out of that bed trying to get the air to go into her lungs.

F is one seriously independent woman. Doesn't ask anyone for anything and if she does ask, then she truly, truly can't do it for herself. And here she is now, not able to do the most basic things on her own. Like walking and breathing.

I have one thing to say tonight. Two words. Don't smoke.

Is that so hard to understand? Just don't smoke. The cigarettes that you "can't live without" now will be the reason that you "can't live" later on. I have friends who say "Well honey, I'd just die without my cigarettes." Well, they've got it wrong--- it's the other way around.

Two words. Don't smoke.

Neighbors... and Rainy Days

It must be the rain... and all of these cloudy days. As I type, it's pouring outside. Again. Too much rain... I believe it's getting to everyone. We're sun-starved in southeast Texas. I just spoke to my sister on the phone... how can it be that right this very minute, it's warmer (with lots of sun!) up in NY?

The neighbors... it's been strange since the weekend. Our neighbors V & B went away for the weekend to see their older daughter at college. While they were away, their younger daughter was home. Ah... no parents... let's invite a couple of friends over. Two friends turned into five.... five turned into ten. Ten made a lot of noise... which got our attention being that it was nearly midnight.

My husband went next door. "Are your parents home?" We already knew the answer. My husband didn't say much to the daughter, not wanting to embarrass her in front of her friends. But S ran after him, catching up to him by our front porch. I had gone outside by that time, to see what was going on over there and I heard S begging my husband not to tell her parents.

Before my husband could say anything, two more cars of teenagers came down the block, headed for next door. I told S to get right out there and tell the kids in those cars to go home. Which she did, gratefully, it seemed to me. Then she came back to our front porch. We told her to go into her house and tell everyone to go home.

S didn't want to be all alone. We compromised. I told her to pick two of her favorite girlfriends and ask them to spend the night with her, but everyone else had to leave. Immediately. She agreed and that's exactly what she did. Gratefully also, I might add. Kids just don't realize how quickly situations can get out of hand.

S begged us not to tell her parents. I told S that we wouldn't say anything to her parents, but I expected her to tell her mom and dad about the weekend's activities when they got home. We gave her a hug and told her we loved her, which we really do. Poor S... she's in the shadow of her older sister and she never feels "perfect enough."

Moral of that story--- parents shouldn't compare one child to the other. Every child is perfect in his/her own way. And if a child feels less than perfect, he/she might make less than 'perfect' choices in life. (P.S.... we haven't said anything to V & B... but I'm hoping that S did.)


Our neighbor ML across the street has been away since before the weekend, tending to out-of-town family. ML lives with her mom and when ML is out of town, M is home alone. We always keep an eye out for M when she's alone. M is in her mid-80s or thereabouts and gets around quite well and drives all over town, but still, it makes her feel better when we know that she's alone.

And this time, she isn't exactly all alone--- she has ML's little dog there with her. ML usually takes the dog with her, but this time, she left the dog with her mom. The dog is a five-pound Yorkshire Terrier with fifty pounds of terror in his little bitty soul. He moves so fast that all you see at times is a flash of gray and brown fur. Way too fast for M to handle all on her own. Plus, they have two cats, which the little Yorkie is always chasing after. An accident waiting to happen for an 80+ woman who walks with a cane.

To add to the mix-- the phone isn't working over there because the cable company cut the wrong wires in their yard. M has a cell phone, but it's only working if she takes it outside and stands in one particular spot on the front walkway. (Can you hear me now?) I brought my cell phone over to M last night and showed her how to use it. This morning, I brought over the charger for the cell phone in case she needed that.

We fixed that little dog out on the screen-porch, so the door is open and he can bring himself out into the backyard grass if he needs to, rather than jumping up all over M every time he wants to sniff the grass and bark at the trees. Which he does constantly. M told me this morning that the next time ML goes out of town, she's going to tell her to "Take that little sucker with you!" (Her words, not mine.)

The cats seem more at ease over there with that little dog on the porch. And that's another thing... poor M couldn't kneel down far enough to clean out the litter box for the cats, so I took care of that this morning as well. Then we got to talking, and she told me how much she loves to cook soup for herself when ML is out of town. I asked her if she liked lentil soup and I took her some of the soup I made yesterday.

Moral of that story--- don't expect an 80-something-year-old woman who needs a cane for support to be able to take care of a hyper-puppy who barks at trees and chases cats from one end of the house to the other.

As I said... it must be the rain. This is usually a very quiet street.

Meowsical Chairs =^..^=

Oh goodie...... today was another rainy, drippy, cloudy, dreary, damp day. Which means the cats had (and still have) cabin fever. They love the screen-porch in beautiful weather, but I guess they don't like the sound of the rain on the porch roof. As soon as it starts to pour, they run into the house.

Now you would think, with all the furniture that's in this house, each cat would find a favorite spot to curl up in and just stay there. That would be the easy way. Not so, thanks to ShadowBaby, the youngest cat. ShadowBaby's motto must be "If you're sitting there, then that's where I want to be."

Rusty (oldest cat) will sleep just about anywhere. He's not picky, as long as he can sleep. This is one cat who will never ever suffer from insomnia. He takes sleeping to its highest level.

AngelBoy (middle cat) has always picked the prettiest, most expensive, most girl-y chair to cuddle up in. (We think he's "fashionably-inclined," if you know what I mean, but that's a whole different story.) No sooner does poor AngelBoy make himself comfy, and ShadowBaby is right there in his whiskers, doing whatever needs to be done to get AngelBoy off of that chair so he can curl up in his place.

And AngelBoy does indeed take great pains to get good and comfy. If there's a pillow on his chair of choice, he'll either rest his chin on it or he'll use it as a back-rest. It takes him about five minutes to settle into a chair and get his little body curled up just right. After that bit of Art-Carney/Ed Norton action, it takes ShadowBaby about five seconds to get AngelBoy out of the chair.

For the past six months or so, AngelBoy has given up the fancy, girl-y, antique-y chairs and has been settling into one of the rocker-recliners in the TV room. Rusty and ShadowBaby tend to stay out of that room during the day, and I guess AngelBoy thought he was hiding from the world in there. And he was... but that all changed with this string of bad-weather days that we've had.

Both Rusty and ShadowBaby kept strolling from room to room in their cabin-fever mode... and ShadowBaby discovered AngelBoy's sleeping spot on the recliner. (Ah-ha! So there you are!) Up onto the recliner went ShadowBaby... and he pounced on top of AngelBoy... which sent AngelBoy flying to the floor... giving the warmed-up spot to ShadowBaby. (Ah-ha! So here I am!)

Poor AngelBoy... he mewed his way from the TV room into the hallway... through the living room... through the dining room.... into the kitchen and then into the laundry room. He looked up on top of the washing machine, and there was Rusty, all curled up and sleeping. AngelBoy jumped up there for a look-see. It took him just a minute or two to decide he didn't want to sleep up there.

Down he came... mewing his way through the kitchen again... into the breakfast room... back into the living room... across the house and through the foyer... into our bedroom. Ah.... the fainting sofa by the windows. Across the room he went... up onto the sofa... he curled up with his chin on a soft fleece afghan and his back resting up against a satin pillow.

So far, so good. ShadowBaby hasn't found his new spot. I truly believe...... no, I know this for a fact... that these cats sit/sleep/nap/rest on our furniture for more hours than we do. As that book said--- "I am the cat... and don't you forget that."

Sunday Stuff

Cloudy day again today... after yesterday's sun. So nice to have a sunny day yesterday, and the temperatures warmed up so much that only a light jacket or sweater was fine when we went out to dinner last night. I love my coats, but I don't need to be wearing them so much.

I went to the supermarket this morning. I needed just a few things (which always means half the shopping cart gets filled by the time I leave there) and we were up early enough this morning so that I'd had breakfast and was all dressed by 10:00.

The grocery store was a madhouse... filled with people buying foods for today's SuperBowl parties. They were giving out lots of free samples in the frozen food aisle and near the deli counter. Nothing that I cared to try, since most of the offerings were just frozen junk food filled with processed meats and cheese. One woman was giving out tiny cups of chili... she had the biggest line of tasters. And the chili was just some canned brand of beef and bean chili. That woman asked me three times if I'd like "a teeny taste of this here chili." Each time, I just said no thank you. I learned long ago not to tell strangers that you don't eat meat. Especially here... the beef center of the southwest. (You don't eat meat? How can you get through a day without meat?)

Not much to write about today. My mind is filled with last-minute details for the Valentine's party. I decided to make cookies for the party... I have miniature paper baking cups that I can use to hold the cookies on a pretty platter, and I bought those tiny heart candies with phrases like "Call me" and "I Love You" and "You're Sweet" stamped on them. I figured I'd melt some chocolate and use that to stick a little heart candy in the center of each cookie.

I was going to bake the cookies today and keep them fresh in a tin container. But today is only Sunday. The party isn't till Saturday. Too many days inbetween now and the party... too much of a temptation to have a taste of the cookies every time I see the tin. Better just to wait for the baking. I can easily not eat meat... it's much harder not to eat homemade chocolate cookies.

Friday... Shopping!

Went to SteinMart today for a look-see. I had one sweater to return that I'd bought last week, and found three more-- all keepers.

I love that store.... it isn't too big, they don't try and sell everything, they have clothing and household and gift items in every price-range, and they're really good at marking prices down if things aren't moving. And they have clothes and shoes that you don't find in other stores. (I also bought two pairs of summer slides. Shoes always seem to just find me.)

My only complaint with clothes shopping is that everything, everything, EVERYthing has to be tried on for size. I bought three sweater-tops today, all different styles, all different colors, but one is a size 'small,' one is a 'medium,' and one is 'large.' When I had them hanging up on that little hook in the dressing room, they all looked identical in size. Now why is that? And the tops weren't "seconds" or "irregulars" and they weren't at the low-end of the price-scale.

And jeans........ I must've tried on 25 pairs of jeans. The only ones that I liked had all sorts of embroidered flowers running up the right leg. I just want plain jeans. Nice soft ones, light blue, no embroidery... jeans that don't hang down seven inches below the bottom of my shoes, and don't sit five inches below my waist. I guess I'll have to go to the mall for the jeans. I hate the mall. When you buy something in a shopping mall, you can bet that 3,756 other people have already bought the same thing.

But on the bright side... the sun was out today. It didn't get as warm as they said it would, but I'm not complaining about the 65 degrees that we had. I'm holding out for 90 degrees....

Still cold at night... too cold to let Rusty sleep out on the screen-porch. He's getting to be a pain during the early morning hours-- he woke me up four times last night. I spoke to my sister on the phone this afternoon and told her about Rusty's night-time habits. She said "Poor Rusty."

Poor Rusty? How about poor me? "You spoil those cats," she told me. I asked her if she'd rather be a cat who has to sleep on a cold porch, or a cat who's spoiled enough to be let out on the porch at 3:00 in the morning to use the litter box he likes out there and then be allowed to come right back into the warm house when he's done. Her answer: "Poor Rusty..."

I should ask our vet if I can give Rusty a sleeping pill. His answer will be no, so I won't even ask. He'll probably tell me to take the sleeping pill.

Thursday... Sunshine!

Finally, finally, finally... the sun has found its way here. As I sit here typing, the sun is coming through my window and I can feel it on my shoulders. So wonderful, after all of those cloudy days.

And, as I sit here typing, two plumbers are working in my little Victorian powder room. What started out as a simple faucet change has turned into a project because there was a leak behind the old faucet. Ah.... and a little leak turns into a big leak, which is what we learned from having the shower fixture replaced in the larger bathroom a few months ago. So not only are they changing the faucet in the bathtub, they're having to replace the valves and pipes and whatever else is connected behind the tub.

This project started last Thursday. The plumber said he'd be here at 9:00 in the morning. He rang the doorbell at 10:30. When he started to change the faucet last week, he found the leak behind it, but didn't have the valves he needed. Special order. Everything is a special order, it seems.

When he asked me last Thursday if he could come back today to finish the job, he wanted to be here at 9:00 a.m. Oh no... I wasn't going to fall for that again, so I told him to be here at 10:30. He showed up at 12:30. I swear, you just can't win.

But they're here now, the bathtub is getting new valves, faucets, whatever.... out with the old silver pieces and in with bright shining gold ones. We thought this would be such an easy job, since there's a little trap door in the wall behind the tub. That wall, however, backs up to my husband's computer room and the trap door is behind his desk. And wouldn't you know it... when this house was built, they thought to put in that trap door, but didn't think to put it high enough from the floor to reach the valves.

Ah me.... the plumber had to cut a piece of the wall out... he did it very neatly, a nice little square about 5 inches above the trap door. When he's done, he'll put the piece of wall right back in the spot where he cut it out. My husband's desk will cover everything, so I'm not too concerned. When we get the handymen back here for other little jobs, they'll fix up the wall so it'll look more 'finished.'

Always something to do when you have a house. This is why my sister doesn't want to own one. She loves her apartment, and before living where she is now, she loved her old apartment, and loved the one before that. She told me she doesn't mind moving, doesn't mind getting new apartments from time to time. She says she'd get bored living in one place for too long.

I'm just the opposite. I don't ever want to move from here. I don't get bored... I like the thought of living here forever. I can walk around this house in the dark and find something as small as a postage stamp, if I had to. That's how well I know this house.

However, if I walked around this house in total darkness, I would probably trip over one of the cats. My sister doesn't have cats, either.

What Kind of Shoe Are You?

This is a cute little quiz.... read the questions and mark down the points that are at the end of each question. At the end of the quiz, you'll find the shoe-personality to match your total points. (No peeking! Answer the questions first!)

A. What phrase best describes your personality?
--Bouncy and carefree. (1 point)
--Sleek and sophisticated. (2 pts)
--Active and sporty. (3 pts)
--Intellectual and serious. (4 pts)
--Hip and trendy. (5 pts)

B. What's your favorite place to spend a Saturday night?
--Neighborhood movie theater. (1 pt)
--Four-star restaurant. (2 pts)
--Sports stadium. (3 pts)
--Art museum. (4 pts)
--Downtown nightclub. (5 pts)

C. If you could pick any career in the world, what would it be?
--Vegetarian chef. (1 pt)
--Supermodel. (2 pts)
--Pro athlete. (3 pts)
--Book editor. (4 pts)
--Disc jockey. (5 pts)

D. Pick your favorite movie from these:
--"Hair" (1 pt)
--"Body Heat" (2 pts)
--"Vision Quest" (3 pts)
--"Being John Malkovich" (4 pts)
--"Trainspotting" (5 pts)

E. Who would you most like to meet for coffee?
--Janis Joplin. (1 pt)
--Marilyn Monroe (2 pts)
--Billie Jean King (3 pts)
--Eleanor Roosevelt (4 pts)
--Gwen Stefani (5 pts)

Now... add up your points. If your total is between 0 - 6, you're a "sandal." -- You enjoy simple living and have both feet firmly planted on the ground.

If your total is between 7 - 12, you're a "stiletto." -- Sexy and stylish, you're usually seen turning heads in a little black dress.

If your total is between 13 - 17, you're a "sneaker." -- Always on the go, you crave action and adventure, from rock climbing to skydiving.

If your total is between 18 -21, you're a "loafer." -- Whether playing chess or attending a poetry reading, you like being seen in classic "thinker's" clothing.

If your total is 22 and over, you're a "platform." -- Fun and funky, you're ahead of the curve and ready to party.

And... as this quiz says... no matter what your personality is, you are one-of-a-kind and no one else can fill your shoes!

February... Already?

Tomorrow is Ground Hog day...... surely that little rodent will proclaim winter is not yet over. We've had a string of cold, cloudy, damp, dreary, rainy days here. Not very nice, and not typical for this time of the year. Usually, around this time, we're having Spring-like weather. What's going on out there feels like a 'real' winter to me. And I know that for every drop of rain that we're getting, there's a snowflake falling up north. Let's see.... raindrops or snowflakes? I'll take the rain. What I'd really like is a bushel of fairy buttercups.... but we need sun and heat for those.

Yesterday was a two-soup day. After coming back from the supermarket, I made a pot of clam chowder and we had that for lunch, then I made a larger pot of lentil soup. I only know how to make a huge pot of that, so I'll be eating that for lunch and dinner till it's gone. When it's this cold, I can barely look at a salad, which is what I usually eat. I've been having hot oatmeal for breakfast, and hot soup for lunch and dinner. Sometimes I'll add a baked sweet potato. I love sweet potatoes... and the ones here are so sweet you only have to mash them up and they taste like you're indulging in sweet potato pie.

I've been adding dried cranberries to the oatmeal lately... a small bunch of those and a couple of teaspoons of crushed pineapple... gives it sweetness without adding processed sugar. AngelBoy has discovered that he likes the cranberries. Oh goodie... That means that if he's in the house and not in the backyard while I'm having breakfast, he'll sit himself right down in front of me and flash those kitty-blue eyes at me till I give him some cranberries.

And with the weather the way it's been, the cats have been inside more than outside. Rusty woke me up three times last night... or I should say early this morning....... at 3:00, 4:30, and around 5:30. Each time, I heard one of the other cats meowing for all they were worth because Rusty had them pinned down. Rusty will do that if he gets hungry. I guess he blames the other cats for the empty food dish, when in reality, it's Rusty that never leaves a morsel of food in the bowl.

So I was in and out of that bed three times last night, thanks to Rusty. I don't have the heart to just put him out on the screen-porch because it's just too cold out there. But just wait till the weather gets back to normal. Rusty will be out there in a flash so I can get a good night's sleep. Cats........... No different than kids. If you're a cat-person, that is. As I keep saying--- if God is a cat, I've got it made.