The Best Mah Jongg BirthdayParty

My cute young student Emily has become one my favorites. She gathers many groups to learn Mah Jongg and she even gives Mah Jongg lessons as gifts to her loved ones.

Today she threw a birthday party for Sarah Lane that was a Mah Jongg themed party. No detail was spared from Emily’s talented eye and exquisite taste. She had a photographer there, but the party should appear in Garden and Gun. She invited me to come to run a tournament for those guests who already were Mah Jongg players and teach a lesson to those who were not.

I arrived early to set up and got to get a close look at the beautiful flowers, balloon arches, spectacular table settings with napkins embroidered with a red and pink Pagoda and Sarah Lane’s initial.

It was so fun to visit with the guests as they arrived since I knew most of them. I love my young friends and was so happy to see Meghan and Caroline. Everyone enjoyed drinks before we all sat down to an Asian inspired lunch. After cake we got up for the playing time.

I divided players into fast, slower and learning groups. The tables who were playing were competing for prizes. I was quite proud of Sarah Lane’s grandmother Mary Ann for winning the whole kittenkaboodle. (Her cohorts, known as Table -4 in my classes, would also be proud.)

I gave a very abbreviated lesson to the newbies and now they are ready for real lessons. Thanks to Edie, Emily’s Mom for helping out with the learners.

We were all so pampered by the staff, led by my favorite Pandora who always takes care of me when I teach classes at this club.

It was a most fun afternoon thanks to Emily. She thought of every detail and was a most gracious hostess. Happy Birthday to Sarah Lane.

Valentines Through the Years

When I was little Valentine’s Day was dominated by the shoe boxes we decorated to be the “mailboxes” our classmates put our tiny valentine cards into. You always brought a card for everyone in the class, no questions asked. Somewhere in the late sixties people started attaching lollipops or candy hearts to the cards, but nothing significant.

I still remember one card I got in fourth grade from Curtis Zelbisher. Since my last name was Carter and he was particularly found of Carter’s rubber cement he wrote on my valentine, in his practically illegible hand writing, “I want to stick with you.” Perhaps there was a schemer of rubber cement on the envelope.

In college one of the sororities sold carnations. They came in different colors, which had different meanings. People would fill out a little note and it was attached to the carnation with a string. I can’t remember exactly how they were delivered, but I do remember loving reading all the notes that came on all the different flowers, mostly from friends. One year I had a number of red carnations with just question marks on the notes. The red ones I think meant love, not the color I usually got many of. I never knew who sent those flowers. The person never revealed himself to me.

There were the years in Washington, DC where I was often catering someone else’s romantic Valentine’s Day. I had more than a couple of clients who liked to pretend they had cooked so I had to deliver food and put it in their pans. One man didn’t even have a two matching plates and two matching forks. I wonder what happened there?

When Russ and I were first engaged he gave me a camera lens for a camera I hated. He spent years trying to live that down. And did.

Now I am happy with the sweet cards he writes me. He always beats me with the first card of the day and more than one card to my singular card. Thankfully no rubber cement is included and it is so nice to know who my valentine is.

Happy Valentines Day to you all.

The I Believe in God Necklace

I was talking to a friend tonight and told him an old story about Carter. It is such a good story I thought I would share it here so I have it written down for posterity.

One day when Carter was about three or four she was riding in her car seat in my car as we drove through the drive up teller at the bank. A nice male teller helped me and Carter watched the whole transaction from the back. This was a time in the world when kids did not have devices or TV’s in the car so she took in the world around her.

As we drove away she said to me, “That man had a big necklace on.” He did indeed have a big crucifix on and I replied, “Carter, that was a cross that means he believed in Jesus.”

Without missing a beat Carter said, “I think I would like a ‘I believe in God necklace’.” Carter interchanged Jesus and God seamlessly and I did not spend a lot of time making a distinction for her.

“OK,” I said. Thinking that going to church might be rubbing off on her.

A couple of days later Carter and I were walking through Sears to get to another store inside the mall. Halfway into Sears we came upon a big jewelry display with lots of necklaces hanging on a spinny thing with an 80% off sign. I did not normally think of Sears as a place to buy any jewelry, but I thought it might be a good place to buy Carter the Cross she had asked for.

“Carter, do you want to look at these necklaces to see if you can find a “I believe in God necklace” you want like the Man at the bank was wearing,”

This seemed like a great idea to her. She looked intently at the many mixed metal necklaces hanging on the spinny thing and considered the many crosses carefully.

She gently took one off the display and handed it to me. I looked at and looked at it again.

“Carter, this is a dolphin necklace.” I said quizzically.

“Yes, it’s my I believe in God Dolphin.”

It all made perfect sense to her. So I bought her that dolphin necklace and she wore it religiously.

Give Your Mother and Early Gift for Mother’s Day

The best month of the year to learn Mah Jongg is April. The perfect gift you can give your Mom is to bring her to High Hampton to learn Mah Jongg. The new card is out and you will learn all the secrets and tips on the new card and have a whole year to get it right. If you are a beginner or a seasoned player I have a class for you at the completely renovated High Hampton in Cashiers.

I recently taught my first weekend of classes there and it was a truly magical place to teach and to learn. The room where the classes were held was comfortable and cozy. The staff was attentive and fun. The food was spectacular. And the rooms were luxurious.

I am never sure how a resort is going to do as the host for classes. High Hampton exceeded my every dream. The students came from far and wide and were a delightful mix.

I look forward to returning the last weekend in April, 25-27. The beginner class is being held in the morning so If you come from away, come the night before and enjoy all that High Hampton has to offer.

The Beyond Beginner class with be offered in the afternoons. The first day with be a new card orientation learning all the trick and tips for the 2025 card. The following two days will be hands on exercises to maximize your chances of winning through learning how to pick the right tiles to pass and picking the best hand. As always you will learn strategies to make yourself a better player and win more games.

Beyond Beginner is the class that teaches you how to think like a Mah Jongg pro. Most Mah Jongg classes teach you rules. This class goes beyond the rules to the strategies. No matter what level player you are you will never look at your hands the same way again.

This weekend makes a perfect mother daughter getaway or inspired early Mother’s Day gift.

If you want to join me in the mountains in April visit www.highhampton.com to make reservations.

Law Of Unintended Consequences

From what I understand from people who voted for the current administration, many were unhappy about the way things were going and wanted to change. I always say be careful what you wish for. So a change we got. We now have the disrupter in chief. Some say he uses disruption as a negotiating tactic. Fine if you are doing it on behalf of yourself, but for a whole country it has consequences.

I am in a Facebook group for Pawleys Island, basically because my parents lived there for 20 years. I had an office there with my Dad and spent lots of time working there. Not that we have a place there now, but I did spend my whole life going there, so I stay in this group. I have been reading a lot of posts from people complaining that their homes and condos have stopped being rented at anywhere the same rate they have been in the past.

These people are wondering out loud if this is happening to others and they don’t understand why it is happening. The response has universally been the same, all rentals are way down.

Now I don’t respond in this group. But what is happening is clear to me. For all the years I worked in Canada my clients and friends there would beg us to have meetings for them at our Pawleys office. They loved to come to Pawleys and Litchfield and the whole Grand Strand. They would fly in for the meeting and would then take another weeks vacation while they were there and play golf.

When the head of your country threatens your biggest trading partner and closet neighbor and friend with 25% tariffs out of the blue that pisses people off. What do pissed off people do? Stop coming to visit and spend money in your country. It does not matter that the trips were paused for 30 days. They still stay pissed off.

So for all those people who wanted a change, you got it. It is your loss of revenue, not the president’s. It is your state who will have lower revenues because of loss of tourist taxes.

Be careful what you wish for. You are the ones facing the unintended consequences.

To all my Canadian friends I send my personal apologies. Know I love you and would never endorse treating our best friend that way.

Nothing Burger

For all my readers who think I am so productive and get so much done today will make you realize how boring my life can be. It was cold today. Like so many Americans I was laying low after the Super Bowl, but not because I went to a party and over indulged. Just because everyone else was.

Then the rest of the day I cleaned all the toilets. I folded clothes that had been strewn around my room for a few weeks. I unearthed white dinner napkins from Christmas parties that had been washed, but not ironed and I ironed two thirds of them. I just got so bored ironing I could not be bothered to do the rest. I sent some emails.

I got in my soft clothes at seven and had to offload a bunch of things off my iPad so some new update could download tonight. It is ridiculous how much space a new download needs.

Other than that I have nothing to show for my day. I did make some new food for dinner so Russ would feel like I did something, but it was nothing special. Some days are basically nothing burgers.

My Super Bowl Thoughts

Russ is from Philly so we were going to be for the Eagles all day long. I am writing this in the third quarter so there will be no commentary on the game until the game is over.

I am here for the ads in the first 3 quarters. So far my favorite ad was the rocket Mortgage ad singing John Denver’s Country road. The line “Everyone deserves a shot at their dream” won the night for me. The visuals of all kinds of Americans is the story I was buying.

I feel like Brad Pitts Movie before the start of the game set the tone that American was made great by all kinds of people. “By lifting up others, that’s how we rise.” Hear that Washington. I also loved the NFL ad, “I am somebody.”

The grossest ad as the coffeemate ad. Don’t look it up.

The weirdest ad was the Pringles mustache ad. In all the years I have eaten pringles I never noticed the mustache on the can. Highlighting the mustache does nothing to make me want potato chips, in fact it does the opposite.

Mathew Mcconaughey’s ad for Uber Eats beat the door Dash ad for the best food delivery ad, but I am still going to go pick up my own food.

Meg Ryan and d Billy Crystal could recreate that scene from When Harry Met Sally all day long. Good job Hellman’s to get in on it.

I loved the Nike ad for women’s Sport, “You can’t win. So win!” Here that you bro’s trying to silence women. We aren’t going back and real men know that, are not threatened by it and love us just the same.

At last a word on the half time show. I did not understand a word of rap. I should have turned on closed captioning. I hope he took some shots at some bad people. I just don’t know what they might have been.

Thai Hot and Sour Soup at Home

One of the things I bought at Li Ming, was A jar of paste used to make Hot and Sour soup. So I made up a pot last night

5 T. Hot and Sour paste

3 quarts water

2 pints of straw Mushrooms

1 pound of peeled raw shrimp

Big bunch of sugar snap peas

4 small zucchini sliced

2 cans low fat coconut milk

4 t. Grated fresh ginger

2 T. Lime juice

2 T. Fish sauce

2 T. Brown sugar

3 T. Knoor Chicken broth powder

Mung bean sprouts

Cilantro

Rice

Chopped green onions

Put the water and the hot and sour paste in a stock pot and bring to a boil.

In a frying pan pan on medium heat brown the zucchini.

Once the stock pot has come to a boil add the mushrooms, sugar snaps, Knoor Chicken powder, shrimp and zucchini. Cook for two minutes.

Add the coconut milk, ginger, lime juice, fish sauce, brown sugar, and bring back to a boil. Then turn off the heat.

In a bowl put rice, sprouts, cilantro and green onions and Spoon the soup over.

Enjoy!

I went to Li Ming Today

It should come as no surprise I am not a fan of the idea of ICE detaining people who don’t look American. Before anyone bites back at me that they are only detaining criminals, you are misinformed and I don’t need to hear your propaganda.

I have lived in foreign countries, ones where I spoke the language and ones where I did not. Well, not well. Being an outsider is hard. It is less hard if you grew up with White American privilege. I fully understand the privilege I have just because I was born white, to married college-educated parents. My father was employed. I lived in the safest place and went to great schools. I am a WASP, so I never was discriminated against for my religion or where “my people” originated from. No one ever asked me, “where are you really from,” or “commented on my middle-Atlantic accent.” I never worried if we would have food, or if I would not have new clothes whenever I needed them.

If any of these things apply to you, you might also have white privileged and not really be able to understand the fear that Americans detained by ICE might feel. You may not have an American born child who worries that their foreign born parents will not be home when you get home from school. Or if you should go to your place of worship because ICE might be there.

I have very little power to do much about what ICE is doing, but I can support ethnic stores and show them that I support them, even if half the country does not. Today I went to Li Ming. They have great vegetables and wonderful Asian foods. I was the only Caucasian in the store. I don’t read any Asian languages so I always have trouble deciphering the ingredients in a jar. Putting myself in the shoes of what it must be like to be a non-English reader at Harris Teeter.

I also go to Hispanic markets and the Indian Market. I do this as a means of support for those communities. It is a small gesture, but one I hope helps in some way. I can’t change my white privilege, but I can show compassion, warmth and kindness to those who are newer to our country.

Unless you are Native American, we all got here because someone in our family came from away. Just because we might have come earlier does not make this country ours alone. We just get to live here and then, when we are gone it belongs to new people.

Newer Immigrants to the US are usually the hardest working Americans. If you ate a Salad today, you probably have an immigrant to thank for it, unless you grow your own lettuce. If you had a chicken salad an immigrant probably processed that chicken. Just remember that when the price of lettuce and chicken go through the roof because we don’t have people willing to do those jobs. I might grow my own lettuce, but I am not processing chickens.

When Mah Jongg Class Discovers Less Dana

I don’t usually tell my students about my blog. They have had enough of me after nine hours of class. But when a student announces to the class that they found my blog that is when the questions come.

I tell them that it’s called “less Dana” and then apologize that it is way more Dana than anyone bargained for. I explain that I have been writing it for almost 14 years every night before I go to bed. I don’t proof read, or edit, I just post because I just don’t have time to do something that is blog worthy and write a worthy blog. So I just write and post and it is what it is.

I am a horrible speller and I often use the wrong word. No one is reading this for quality writing. But I do try to add levity to the world, point out absurd shit, call out bad people, encourage kindness, share good recipes, explain complicated things in simple ways, share beauty and laugh at myself.

I am asked all the time, if I do things just so I would have something to blog about. NO. I literally forget I even have a blog sometimes, until I get into bed and then I think, “Oh crap. I have to write a blog. What happened today?”

I don’t write about everything I do, sometimes I have a big day and I don’t write about any of it, because it might be off the record. I might write about the most mundane thing or a big international situation. When you write a daily blog they aren’t all going to be that interesting.

Since my evening class was interested in my blog I took a photo of them and told them they would be in the blog. So here they are. My beginner class at CCC for February. They all graduated tonight. No one failed Mah Jongg. They were a wonderful class. Thanks for giving me something to write about.

My Lunch Bunch

I didn’t get a picture today which was a big mistake on my part. I am teaching at CCC all this week and my lunch bunch has come to have lunch with me everyday before class. Jill, Martha, Bit and Mary Jo all make my day shine brighter. Holly was supposed to be there, but getting ready for her family trip got it the way. I missed you Holly!

The friends I have made teaching are the jewels of this job. They come through for me when I need them. They make sure I am never alone. If I need a place to stay they take care of me. They cancel doctor’s appointments to have lunch, just not pedicure appointments.

We agree on many important issues and lament when the world goes wrong. I feel so lucky to have made these dear friends. Thanks for being my CCC Posse. You all are the best.

Mah Jongg is Hard at First

I’ve recently had a lot of students who came to me for Mah Jongg lessons, but they had initially learned from someone else. The someone else might have been a “teacher” or just a friend who said, “sit by me and I will teach you.” As I have been teaching them they tell me things like, “I never was taught this,” or “how could this have been left out when I learned the first time.”

Here is what I have to say about learning mah Jongg. Just because you don’t remember being taught something does not mean your “teacher” did not mention it. Learning mah Jongg is hard. There is a lot to take in. You might have been told something and at that moment you just could not handle remembering it.

I have learned that I have to mention many things over and over and in different ways before I am confident that a student might remember it. Part of being a real mah Jongg teacher is having a very precise use of language so that things are not ambiguous.

Learning mah Jongg is as much about the rules as it is about the exceptions to those rules. I find it is best to explain a rule and immediately talk about an exception if one exists. You can’t really teach someone how to play by letting them sit beside you and watch what you are doing because then the exceptions get missed. People construe rules from a situation that might not be true.

Building a foundation of understanding how to read the card and make hands is the best investment you can make. Just learning the rules will not make you a great player. Learning how to think about hands and how to make them is what makes someone an accomplished player.

And it all takes practice. You learn much more from your mistakes as long as you understand why they were mistakes. Just keep at it.

Welcome Back to The Food Bank Amy Beros!

You know I have had a 25 year long relationship with the Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina. It started when my minister Haywood Holderness pointed at me one day and said, “We need you at the Food Bank.” He was on the board and recognized a kindred spirit.

So I did what he said, and got involved. I have had every kind of volunteer job one could have at the Food bank, from mopping the floor of the Durham Branch to being Board Chair.

One of my jobs on the board was in finding a new VP of Development when one of the best people in that job in a long time was leaving us. We did a nationwide search. It took months. I had lived through some terrible development people. I still know their names and their sins. I did not want to go backwards after having a good one.

My dear friend Felicia was also on this committee with me. Between the two of us we were tough on all the candidates. I remember being on a conference call sitting in my sunroom when we rejected all the finalists. “None of these people are good enough.” It had been almost a year of searching.

“These people are not as good as Amy,” who was a junior member of the team who, during the year of our search had grown greatly in her job. “I would rather take a chance on promoting her than restarting a national search and get someone else’s reject.”

Felicia was right on board with that. So the idea took hold of our group and Amy eventually got the big promotion. It was the best thing we had ever done. She turned out to be even better than her predecessor. She created a team of super stars. She was young, bright, hard working and dedicated to our mission and a really great manager.

After a few magical years she needed more to do. She took a big job at Feeding America. She got experience on the national stage.

This year when our President resigned after barely a year Amy was ready to come back. It was clear she was the right person to take the helm. Peter who had been the President for many years and Amy’s boss when he was there was a big cheerleader for her. So was I and Felicia.

So I am happy to announce Amy Beros is Back at the Food bank, now as the President and CEO. Congratulations to Amy! I know our state is in good hands.

Farewell to Dan Shannon

Today we celebrated the life of Dan Shannon. Dan passed away in September after suffering from a brain tumor that he fought valiantly. He left behind his loving wife Ellen, three fabulous kids, two grandchildren and one on the way and as Ellen told us, a trifecta of kids-in-law, along with so many other family and friends.

After only a few hours sleep I drove home this early morning because it was important to me to go celebrate Dan’s life as I adored working with him at Durham magazine. Russ and I arrived at the Carolina Inn to a packed ballroom of so many friends and family, many of whom had traveled far and wide to get there.

True to himself, Dan had planned his own service right down to the last word, which was his, read by Ellen. He asked three people to speak, Rory Gillis, who was just a very young woman who came to work at the magazines when I was there and now is the owner of the whole Shannon Media outlet, which she renamed, much to Dan’s chagrin. Rory was funny and sweet and told stories that made me laugh hard and tear up.

A friend of Dan’s from Westport spoke next, despite not liking to speak in front of crowds. Dan had asked him while he was still alive. The friend said he didn’t necessarily feel comfortable doing that. Dan told him to think about it. In the most Dan way, we called back a couple of days later and said “The family has decided, you’re going to be a speaker.”

“So much for getting to think about it.”

That rang so true to me. When I met Dan it was because he had called me into this office after the first issue of Durham Magazine came out. My friend Nata had told him he should hire me. I did not know this when I went to visit him. I thought he just wanted my thoughts on the first issue, which you know I gave freely.

I told him what I thought of the magazine he told me he wanted to hire me. After a short back and forth about me not looking for a job he insisted I work there. “You have no idea if I can write, let alone do anything else.” Remember, we had just met!

He said, “You have a strong voice. That is all I need.” I thought he might be hiring me to read the magazine out loud.

The last speaker today was Dan’s youngest, son Drew. Drew was a kid when I worked with Dan. We used to talk bout raising kids during those early years. It was beautiful to see how great Dan’s kids turned out. Ellen gets a lot of the credit, but being a father was clearly what was most important to Dan.

Russ and I had sat at the service with Matt, who had been hired as the chief Editor of the magazine a couple of years after I started. He was a kid. It took him a while to get that I had no designs, or skills, on his job. I watched him grow under Dan’s tutelage. Dan treated most of the young people who worked at the company like his children, since most of them were young enough to be his children. Eventually children grow up and move on.

Right after the service Matt and I went to the front of the room to see Kevin, the art director, who came to the company a year after me and stayed. Carl who was there before me and left before Matt, and Rory. Rory said we need a picture of the OG of Durham magazine. I wished that Bri our Photographer was there because she was there before all of us. I also missed Andrea who was the editor after Matt.

I am thankful Dan was good at gathering talented smart young people and one old one, me. We all did not always agree on everything, but I think we all learned plenty and I loved them all. Especially Dan. Go with grace Dan Shannon. It was clear, you were loved.

High Praise for High Hampton

The first time I go to a new location to teach Mah Jongg I never know exactly what to expect. If you know me you know I am very prescriptive, I like things done correctly and I want the best experience for my students so I don’t like to leave anything to chance. I have been teaching Mah Jongg long enough at such a wide array of locations that I have seen some real shit shows as well as the most class acts.

So many things are out of my control, yet if something goes wrong I still feel responsible for it, even if it has nothing to do with me. I have always lived by the saying, “don’t Expect people to be mind readers.” If I want something done a certain way I tell them up front and explain why. I don’t believe in wishful thinking, you are always disappointed then.

Today was our last day of Mah Jongg classes at High Hampton. From my point of view everything was a resounding success. The inn it’s self and the new renovations is spectacular. The spaces are large and warm and welcoming and cozy all at the same time. The room where Mah Jongg lived was perfect, especially with the table lamps.

The staff, from Emma the bellhop to Leigh Anne the Events Manager and all the Food and Beverage folks felt more like friends. Suzanne comments tonight that she genuinely felt like people were happy we were here. Everyone remembered what we liked to drink, right down to my extra lemons. If we were running short on time, they rushed to get us lunch. Nothing was ever an issue, there was no need for negotiation, the answer was always yes, with a smile. It was true southern hospitality with no “bless your heart.”

The food, oh the food. I am so thankful that I was here with dear friends, Suzanne, Jan and Tracy, because we shared all our food and ate off each other’s plates. Tonight we had this farewell dinner and I wish that I could have spread it out over three days because each part was a treasure. And don’t be misled by the title of the menu, no Dana Lange was served.

As usual, I loved all the students. It’s takes three days with me for them to drink the koolaid I’m selling. By the third day they understand the madness that I’m trying to teach them and why I want them to think about things in new and different ways. I have heard that some have already signed up to come back in April to my next class here the weekend of April 25.

I can’t wait to get back. Usually the second time is better than the first. I am to sure that is going to be the case though as this was also just a fun time with Tracy, Suzanne and Jan. We told so many stories and laughed so hard. I thought Suzanne might pee in her pants when Jan told the story of her middle school son telling his social studies teacher and class of students that their family motto was “It’s five o’clock some where.”

Tonight after all the mah Jongg was packed up and we were hanging out in the lobby talking Suzanne and Tracy gave me a present and a card. The front of the card said, “Get Old Later.” Inside Suzanne wrote, “This was our mantra way before it was a card.” That’s the truth. We will always be young together, learning and laughing is how we stay that way.

I’ve Created an Addict

I have been friends with Suzanne since 1979. If you are not good at math, that 46 years. I have been playing Mah Jongg thirty of those years. I have been teaching 25. She finally came to one of my classes. She convinced her friend Tracy Tang to come learn too. They have had two days of the three of Beginner lessons.

I left my room here at High Hampton at 9:00AM. I was not able to return until 10:30PM. When I wasn’t teaching, I was eating with Suzanne, Tracy and Jan talking about Mah Jongg or playing Mah Jongg with them.

When class ended at 5:30 Suzanne, who was not in that class, came right in my Mah Jongg room to start playing. We played past our dinner reservation. Eventually we went to dinner, but Suzanne was chomping at the bit to get back to the table.

She stood at the end of the dining room beckoning us to come on. We played and played. She learned every lesson the hard way.

She won the last hand. She is no longer a mah Jongg virgin. Addicted? Absolutely.

We Shut The Place Down

Mah Jongg Weekend at High Hampton is off to a roaring start. We had an excellent class of beginners who were engaging, attentive and brilliant. All things I love in students. There were more of them than we originally thought which worked out fine. We shall see how they do on their homework in the morning. I predict 100% from them all.

Between beginners and beyond beginners Suzanne, Jan and Tracy (who arrived this morning just in time for class) had lunch in the tavern. I must get a photo of the mountain we looked out at while we ate. It is a shear rock face rising up over the lake. Gorgeous is not a good enough word to describe this wonder.

The afternoon was for the students who know how to play mah Jongg to move to the next level. Each one of these ladies is a new student to me. They came from far off lands of Atlanta, Nashville, Birmingham and further afield. I blew more than a few minds with some of the concepts I was teaching them since they had never had me as a teacher before. I do wish there was a certification that is real, (not from a mah Jongg tile company) for Mah Jongg teachers. This is a completely unregulated industry to say the least.

The beyond class is my favorite to teach as it is teaching people how to think, not what the rules are. Perhaps I can make a dent in the number of players who play with blanks. If you don’t know what that means, it’s mah Jongg junior.

After class we had a wine reception. By that point I needed a down time reception, but a woman showed up who missed the first day of beginner class because she thought it started tomorrow. So I gave her a quick private lesson to try and catch her up.

Suzanne, Tracy and Jan and I had dinner together. The food here is exceptional. We all ordered this carrot soup that defies description beyond the word heavenly. The chef came out to see us and we begged him to make it again tomorrow. He said yes. I know what I am ordering.

Our dinner was a story telling fest. Suzanne wanted me to tell Tracy the story of how I met my husband. That is really six stories woven together with a lot of laughing. By the time we were done we were the only people left in the restaurant having sat there for three hours. I did notice that one couple who was seated at a table next to us quickly got up and moved to another table, perhaps offended by a story I was telling about Ron DeSantis. Not sure why they moved as it was clean. Not like most of my stories. I’m certain I was just too loud. You know how loud I am.

I promise I will get better pictures tomorrow, but I won’t be any quieter. For now I need for my extroversion to calm down so I can actually sleep. I have to get up and do it all again tomorrow. I can’t wait.

This is Gonna Be Great

Today was the big travel day to Cashiers, in the gorgeous NC Mountains. Suzanne and I had a slightly slow start as she got the clock mixed up between twenty after and twenty ‘til, but it was no problem. We picked up my friend Jan and my two friends finally met in person. They practically knew each other from my blog and facebook, given that they became Facebook friends way before they ever met.

We had a beautiful drive west. All of us like a good road trip. Jan picked our stopping point for lunch, the Veranda in Black Mountain. We were very interested in seeing how things had fared since Hurricane Helene. We saw plenty of giant piles of tree debris that were systematically being ground into mulch. I have a feeling if you pulled a truck up they would gladly fill it with free mulch.

The downtown of Black Mountain looks good so if you have been holding off visiting the Mountains I say GO! They can use the business and there is plenty to do, see and eat. We particularly liked these dish towels that were for sale.

We enjoyed a yummy lunch and Suzanne got a pimento cheese sandwich, which prompted her to ask us how to make pimento cheese. Thankfully Jan and I agreed on all the ingredients and techniques. Pimento Cheese can sometimes cause a rift in a friendship, but not ours!

We wound our way around Asheville, Brevard, Lake Toxaway and Sapphire to Cashiers and arrived at High Hampton. The guard was a little surprised to see us since the Inn was closed today. We are the only guests until tomorrow when they reopen for Mah Jongg Weekend.

We pulled up to the Inn and two woman came right out to greet us. They were very excited about Mah Jongg Weekend and quickly had all our bags and all the games out of the car. Once inside I met Leigh Anne who I had been talking with for months and her events person. For an Inn that was closed we had a lot of people waiting on us.

High Hampton was purchased by the BlackBerry Farm group three years ago and was totally redone. From the looks of the lobby we knew it was going to be gorgeous. Emma took us to our rooms, each one was more spectacular than the next. Emma explained how the old inn had communal bathrooms in the halls and when it was redone they joined rooms and put in en-suite bathrooms. These were not regular bathrooms, they are more like retreats.

Suzanne really liked the fainting couch in my room and took a little nap there while Jan helped me set up the Mah Jongg room. We also played a few hands while we were there.

Since the Inn was technically closed they sent us to a fabulous restaurant in Sapphire called the library. The food was special. We should have ordered one meal for the three of us the portions were so big, but we did enjoy tasting each other’s.

Now we are settled in for the night. The other students come tomorrow. We’ve got two big classes and lots of fun activities. It’s gonna be great.

It’s a Big Week

Today my BFF Suzanne flew in for a visit and a trip to High Hampton for Mah Jongg week. She had quite a journey getting here from New Hampshire. It should have been easy as they have a great bus that goes to Logan, but the bus had a little trouble. The driver took a google inspired detour through some tiny Massachusetts hamlets with roads made for a cart and donkey. The full sized motor coach clipped a cement barrier and tore off a lower portion of bus siding. Suzanne reported the last three miles had an awful dragging sound like a radio flyer was being run through a grinder.

Her bus was late. She ran into the terminal with a bag to check. Thankfully the agent told her the flight was delayed half an hour, and perhaps more due to the possible need for deicing.

That turned out not to be the case. The crew was late. Then the pilot discovered a computer glitch which took many more fifteen minutes chucks of time than he reported, the first two times. Eventually they took off without the need to deice because they sat their long enough for the weather to improve.

After all that she only ended up being two hours late. I think she had a whole day before she even got here. So we did what we do best, laid around and talked. Eventually we cooked dinner when Russ finished his day.

As all that got done by seven Suzanne and I decided to watch a movie. She had heard about the new Saoirse Ronan movie, The Outrun. It was really quite extraordinary and she is in every scene. We both loved it and wondered why is was not nominated for an award.

I am certain we will discuss this more on our travels this week. We have an early morning to pick up my friend Jan, who finally gets to meet Suzanne in person. We will be off to the mountains. It’s a really big week.

If You Are Cute and You Know It

Shay went for her grooming appointment today. This was her second visit with Rae at Bull City Dog Spa. Without ever looking in a mirror, Shay comes home and poses. She struts. She flaunts her new hairdo. Somehow she knows she looks cute.

Perhaps she acts this way because she feels better being so clean and fluffy. Maybe it is her new donut bandanna. Whatever, she is one proud princess.

When she wants to get picked up to get on my bed, she stands on the bath rug in my bathroom. Today her posture was a little straighter and she gave me the knowing nod. I practically could hear her singing, “I look good. na, na,na,na, na” in her best James Brown Impression.

Welcoming Newcomers

Russ and I got a new job at church. We are running the newcomers class. For as long as I can remember Daren Skeen ran this class. I used to come to one of them to explain church finances to the newcomers so I knew about but about the class. I can’t remember what it was like when we took it, since it was 26 years go and called inquirers class.

Twice a year we have these classes at Westminster for people who want to consider joining the church. Honestly it is a choice assignment for us because we get to meet so many nice people by doing this job.

This morning was out first class. The “get to know you” class. We had Ashley Barnes come to represent the welcoming committee. Thank goodness because the pastor who was supposed to come was sick, so Ashley took the notes. Russ and I brought the snack and set up the coffee. Then I ran the meeting since Russ will run next weeks. He did all the clean up which took almost as long as the class.

As we went around the room, everyone introduced themselves and gave a little information about themselves. Russ was happy as many of them were engineers. Each person was so interesting and accomplished. I was most intrigued by the two UNC saxophone Professors who are going to marry each other this spring. I had no idea that a school would have two Saxophone professors.

We also had a family from Taiwan. This is really helping our diversity Which is something we always are striving for. How can we help the world if we don’t understand all the different kinds of people in the world?

One theme ran through, people were coming because they like our involvement in the community. I am glad they found us. Now Russ and I have to do a good job helping them see if they want to join.

My Beautiful 87 Year Old Mother

It’s Janie’s Birthday! Looking great at 87. Russ and I went to pick her up and take her out to lunch, but first Russ gave her her best present, fixing a computer issue. I am never allowed to let anything happen to Russ as long as my mother is alive.

While he was fixing that issue I looked at the six beautiful flower arrangements my sister Janet sent my mother. Don’t tell my sister, but she is exactly like my dad in the gift giving department. Over the top! I can’t compete, but I bring Russ.

We went to the WaDu for lunch. It was a lovely sunny day and we had a yummy time. The best thing for my Mom is she only ate a quarter of her salad so now she has leftovers for days.

I’m not sure when she is going to have time to eat it with all her birthday celebrations with her friends. She said she thought people were going all out because they thought this might be her last birthday. Ha! She is in great shape and so happy. We have many more birthdays to come with her.

I’m just glad today was such a good one.

Always Assume People Are Nice

This morning I went to get a much overdue pedicure. Since I don’t get a manicure I am able to needlepoint while getting my toes done. I am working on a seat for one of my game table chairs. The canvas is not painted and I am freehand stitching it. I was just working on the back ground, which is huge and very boring.

You know when you go get a pedicure at a place where everyone who works there speaks a language you don’t you can still figure out when they are talking about you. So as the various nail techs where talking across the whole shop and looking at me I asked the sweet woman working on my nails if they had any questions for me.

She blushed and shook her head in embarrassment. Then one of the bossier techs said, “Yes, what are you making?” They were just curious about my big white canvas and what in the world it might become.

I unrolled the whole thing and showed them, explaining it would become the cover for a seat on a chair. One by one, as they finished with their customers they came up and looked more closely at my needlepoint. They said things like, “I don’t think I could do that.”

I told them that what they do with nails is way harder than needlepoint and they absolutely could do it. When my feet were in the dryer I had two different women come sit by me and I taught them basket weave while I worked and my polish dried. It seems like I can’t go anywhere and not teach people something.

Another customer who walked out with me said, “You were so brave to call them out when they were talking about you.”

I nicely said to her, “I wasn’t brave. They weren’t being malicious. Their language sounds different to us, but they are so nice, like most people. They were just curious, but too afraid to ask.”

She went on, “Oh, I assume they are saying something not nice.”

I wanted to say to her, “That says everything about you and nothing about them,” but I didn’t. I didn’t want to stoop to her level.

Home For Entertaining

I just finished my two classes this week at Home for Entertaining in Cary. As I was walking out the door at 9:45 tonight I said to Dan, one of the owners, “Don’t miss me too bad.” As I had been there for 9 hours each day for the last three days.

He responded, “It’s like you are doing a residency here, like the stars in Las Vegas.”

I love it when anyone might think of me as a star in Las Vegas.

Home for Entertainment has been a great partnership for me. They are a business that sells home things for Entertaining in a beautiful house that doubles as an entertainment spot. They hold classes and events there. When I teach there they serve food and drinks to the students and I teach in a beautiful room with comfortable tables and chairs. And they are run by the nicest family!

The best part is since it is not a club, anyone can sign up to take classes there. So if I get inquiries from a single person about trying to get into one of my classes I tell people about Home for Entertaining.

I will be at Home for Entertaining regularly. So if you want a mah Jongg class you can always go to their website and look at the events tab and find my classes. They also do all kind of cooking classes, so after you learn mah Jongg you can learn how to make dim sum. I think I might need to take that class!

Is It Still January?

This might be the longest month in history. It has been cold, cold, cold in North Carolina. I know it’s been cold everywhere, but I am here. We got snow yesterday and even though it did not get anywhere close to above freezing today it mainly melted except in the shady spaces on the north sides. That means right in front of our driveway and all along our whole driveway is still snow covered and will be until spring actually comes.

I feel like there have been ten days since the inauguration. I am still not watching the news and trying not to read any national news, but could not miss the fabulous Bishop Budde prayer service sermon. I must have watched it two dozen times. What a powerhouse inside that tiny quiet woman!

My favorite part is watching 47 sit slumped in his seat looking like he is doing his business. The man can no longer stand or sit up straight. He looked the same way at Carter’s funeral. Someone needs to make him a back brace. But I guess that only works if you have a working spine.

I really wonder what the immigrant and first generation wives thought of Bishop Budde’s take on how immigrants should be treated. Do their husbands not see who they are married too?

I am now praying that the next four years do not move this slowly. I am doing my best to be so busy that I can keep my mind off what I can not handle or change.

Thank Goodness I Grew Up with Snow

I was searching through my photos for a picture of our house in Wilton from about 1967. It was before Janet was born. We still had the many garages on the down stairs part of our house, before my parents converted them to a down stairs kitchen and playroom and bathroom. I think photo was black and white, so go figure how old that was.

The photo showed that it had snowed so much and obviously blown so much that the snow had completely covered the garage doors and the top of the drift was at the bottom of the windows on the second floor. Margaret and I climbed up the drift and were looking in the second floor windows.

A subsequent photo showed the tunnel my Dad shoveled from one garage door to another. We opened the garage doors from the inside and walked out one garage door in the tunnel and back in a different garage door. It was a fun game, especially since our garages were heated. It was exciting. It was also just snow. So it wasn’t dangerous, like ice.

Growing up with all that snow, regularly, we learned how to drive in snow. Cars were big and heavy, but we didn’t have four wheel drive. We learned that snow gave you traction and as long as you went at a steady, not too fast a pace you could drive no problem.

Fast forward to today. I was teaching Mah Jongg in Cary when the snow started coming down. Since it has been so cold the snow was sticking as it fell. The good news about that it it was not melting and refreezing so it remained snow. Snow equals traction.

Not everyone in North Carolina knows how to, or likes to drive in snow. So there is a predictable amount of freaking out about snow. To make sure my students were going to survive the snow we ended class an hour early, planning on making up the time in subsequent classes.

I got on the road to get home. Driving was fine. I went fairly slowly, just so I could stop if need be at lights. I got on the highway and there were plenty of cars, but most were doing the right thing. The snow was coming down fast.

By the time I got to my exit we had about and inch of snow. It was so beautiful, but there were people who followed too closely or tried to break too quickly. I watched as one man slid into the middle of an intersection he was trying to stop at because he waited until the last minute to break. Thankfully no one was coming the other way.

I got to my neighborhood and it was obvious no one had driven on the road at all. I had the pristine virgin snow all to myself with the snow still falling. With no other cars to worry about sliding into me I inched along savoring the snowfall. I was back in my childhood when snow meant fun.

I am so glad I don’t have a history of fearing snow. Now I just fear people who don’t know how to handle it. If that is you, stay home. Learning to drive in snow is something that should be done young.

Just Not Today

No TV for me today. At least not broadcast. I went to church this morning to join a huge crowd of like minded people to do some good works in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr.

I decided I was best suited to make valentines for people in a nursing home that my friend Elsa visits regularly. She said they needed 82 valentines. As I sat around a table with small children and grand mothers and some in betweens. I calculated that if I made 20 and the other ten people made some we would have no trouble getting to 82.

I work on production speed at all times. I cranked out those 20 in less than an hour. I laughed as a grandfather who joined his granddaughter finished one and he wrote two words and one initial on it. At least his granddaughter attached a boat load of hearts on the card. I’m certain the receiver will understand the sentiment behind “Happy V Day.” I think this grandfather was feeling the seriousness of the day.

After that little volunteer opportunity I went to lunch with friends. Michelle had offered this lunch to me and Lynn as the Christmas gift for our party. What a thoughtful gift it was. Our friend Elizabeth joined us and we had a merry ‘ole time and not a word was spoken about anything else that was going on today.

This was all I could manage today. It’s back to teaching tomorrow. With two classes each day the rest of the week I should be able to hide out in my own little world. Eventually reality will seep its way in. Just not today, not today.

What’s Tomorrow? Martin Luther King Jr. Day

My dear friend Nancy brought this quote to my attention today. Another friend of her’s had included it in her Holiday message. It was written by Howard Zinn, a playwright, professor of history and political science at Spellman College and Boston University. He passed away on 2010.

This quote seems to be one of his most famous, first published in 2004, but quoted many, many times since. I am not exactly sure what was happening at that moment that inspired him to put these words down, but they are true today.

“To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize…will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys are capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.” – Howard Zinn

I may not be looking forward to tomorrow, but I am always hopeful that human kind can strive to be better, do better and be kinder. There have been many low points in history, which are followed by sunnier days. My hope is that we don’t let dark days last as long as the dark ages, that damages are never permanent and that we all strive to treat all humans as we would like to be treated. Do not be afraid to speak truth to power.

For me tomorrow is Martin Luther King Jr. Day. That is all it is. A day to honor the life of a truth teller, looking for us all to not stand idly by and watch bad things happen, but to speak up.

The Perception of Time

You know that your perception of time is not always equal. When I was a kid waiting for Christmas to come made each day in December feel like an eternity. And thus the phrase, “Slow as Christmas,” was born. Then as an adult, Christmas comes fast as can be because there is always more to do to get ready. Then it comes and it is gone before we knew it.

Now in the doldrums of January, as an adult, things could not be slower. Sure there are things to look forward to, like summer in Maine, eight months away. And some things I am not looking forward too sooner than that, but time has slowed to almost a standstill.

We thought it was going to rain today. So Russ and I decided to stay in all day. The rain never seemed to come. Maybe it did and I didn’t notice as I was inside, wiling away the hours. When I still had not gotten dressed by eleven in the morning Russ suggested I could spend the whole day in my flannel nightgown. As it was his idea, I felt no guilt and that is what I did.

Everything I was doing or not doing could be done in my night gown. It was a very slow day. I had taken all the Christmas down before January 4th, except for the actual tree. It stood bare in the gathering room all this month awaiting help to move it. Since a friend volunteered her husband to help tomorrow Russ and I wrapped it all up, ready to move.

For a minute today I thought I must have had this naked tree up for over two months. Then I looked at the date and realized we are just a bit past halfway for the month. So slow, so slow. Each day is like the others.

It’s dark now, I’m still in my nightgown. I thought it must be time for bed. I looked at my watch, only 7:30. So slow, so slow.

I never knew that getting dressed made the day go faster. Perhaps that is not it. But January, this dreaded January is so long, so long.

I never want to wish time away as it is so precious, but I like it better when I have hope for all good things, not dread. Dread makes it even slower.

New Mah Jongg Card Coming

For all the Mah Jongg Enthusiasts you know that April 1 is the start of our new year. My gentile friends call it Mah Jongg Christmas. We mean it as no slight to our Jewish sisters. It just denotes the day we get our new big present, the new card.

Like all of you I don’t see the new card until April 1, or March 30 if the postman is nice to me. Once I get it I get right to work analyzing, playing, and writing the power point for my NEW CARD ORIENTATION CLASS.

The first week of April is my favorite week of the year. There is nothing I like more than analyzing! My husband often comes in the room where I am huddled over my iPad, playing Real Mah Jongg and asks, “Are still playing Mah Jongg?”

I quickly and loudly remind him, “I am WORKING.”

He knows that I take creating the PowerPoint to help people grasp the new card quickly very seriously. Last year the PowerPoint was 81 slides long. (There was a lot to talk about.)

Sadly editing of the card is not always perfect and reading it and understanding it can be complicated. I try and make everything clear for my students. I also create decision trees to help players be able to make smart decisions so they can win more.

Right now I have New Card Classes scheduled around North Carolina and a Zoom Class for my out of state and country students.

If you are interested in registering for one of my 3 hour new card classes please DM me or text me and I will give you the info on how to get in the class you want. It is a lecture class, no playing takes place. Therefore the seating is theatre style allowing for many more people in each class, but some classes do sell out.

You must pay in advance to secure a seat, but it will be a fun three hours and each year more and more players come to these classes as everyone wants to be able to beat their friends.

Here are the locations and times for the classes that are scheduled already:

Durham. April 8 6PM

Raleigh April 9 9 AM, 1 PM, 6 PM

Raleigh April 10 6 PM

Atlantic Beach April 11 3 PM

Zoom April 14 2 PM (will be taped)

Kinston April 16 9 AM

Rocky Mount April 17 afternoon

Smithfield April 22 6PM

I will also be at High Hampton in Cashiers April 25-27 teaching a beyond Beginner class that will start with the new card class. I will also be teaching beginner Mah Jongg that same weekend and April is the perfect time to learn.

Remember to order your new card now from the National Mah Jongg league. The sooner you order it the more likely you are to receive it by April 1. There are no guarantees when it comes to card deliveries.

If you would like me to come and give the new card class in your town DM or text me.

Nothing But Fun

My friend Hannah gave me this puzzle this Christmas. There is nothing I like more to have going during the holiday than a puzzle. I have no guilt watching Christmas movie and working a puzzle. This was a really fun one as I have lived in London a total of seven years in my life and know the city fairly well.

It was very helpful to already have a good working g knowledge of where things were, especially roads, tube stations and railway stations so when I was looking to place a piece I could generally start looking in the right place. That being said there were lots of tiny things in the puzzle which were very hard to place because the finished example of the puzzle was so tiny.

Nonetheless it was a fun puzzle to work. It also got me back in the kick of working on puzzles. I did so many during the pandemic because I had no guilt. Now I do feel like there are other things I SHOULD be doing. But why when I could be doing a puzzle.

I might go ahead and get another one out and start sorting pieces. There is no deadline to finish it. If I don’t do something important in place of working a puzzle who will know? It’s nothing but fun!

No Saints for Me

I am married to the most curious man on earth. The internet, Chat GPT, Siri, they were all made for him. If he wonders about anything he looks it up. We call out iPhones the answer machines.

Sometimes what he wonders about is completely nonsensical. When I got home from teaching tonight he was curious if there was a patron saint of games? Since we are not Catholic it was the first time I have ever heard him wonder about a patron saint Of any kind.

Once he asked the question out loud, I wanted to know the answer. Siri came back and said that the patron saint of athletes was saint Sebastian, and therefore he covered sporting games.

I immediately said that athletes are not the same as the games I played. There is nothing athletic about me. So Russ asked if there was a patron saint of gamblers. That seemed like the right direction.

Alas, there was patron saint of gamblers according to Chat GPT. What? Of all the people who need a saint, it’s gamblers.

So now I want to know how one goes about requesting a saint cover your area of interest? I would be happy to teach a bunch of nuns how to play mah Jongg and see if one of them would take us on.

Perhaps it’s time for Jews to start being saints for particularly Jewish things. Mah Jongg and Bagels could be a good place to start.

Certainly there are no Presbyterians who are going to ascribe to the whole saint thing. So I can’t offer any help there.

I guess it’s good for my business that there isn’t a saint. No one is going to be able to pray to someone to make them a better player. People are just going to have to take matters into their own hands and take more classes.

What’s in a Name?

Tonight I had my first Mah Jongg class is Siler City, NC. For the record it was a very nice group of people. It was the first time I had ever even been to Siler City. Never even driven through it.

Siler City, was exactly as I excepted. A small NC town with an old downtown and some newer fast food and strip malls on the outskirts closer to the big road.

Siler City sits on the Western Edge of Chatham County, a fast growing county adjacent to the more well known triangle counties of Wake, Durham and Orange. Apparently there are under 10,000 people in Siler City. So my question is when it was named Siler City was it an aspirational naming or did they actually think of themselves as a city?

I grew up in Connecticut and as far as I was concerned the only real city in America was New York City. It was the all caps, definition of a CITY. Other places that were considered cities paled. Perhaps Chicago might be close to a city, but otherwise, no. My childish definition was if you could live easily in they city without ever learning how to drive a car, and if you could easily get a meal of any cuisine any hour of the day or night and if the buildings were so high that sometimes you could not see the top floors from the sidewalk, that was a city.

So how does Siler City fit in this picture? In a North Carolina there are 8 towns with city in their name. Besides Siler City, there is Cove City, Elm City, Forest City, Oak City, Surf City, Tabor City. Some of these I have never heard of. I have driven through Tabor City many times on the way to Pawleys Island and it is clearly misnamed. There is also Elizabeth City, which is probably the biggest of all these “cities, with a whopping 18,948 people. Hardly a big town in my book.

I feel like if you have a tree name followed by city it is just an oxymoron and how anything concerning the Surf could be mixed up with a city is just plain wrong. I hold no malice to these “cities,” but in the words of someone who might be from one of them, “A city we ain’t.”

New York City makes sense to differentiate it from the state of the same name. If we had a North Carolina City then maybe it could qualify for the city name.

I am not sure having a name that is too big for your britches has done any of these places any good, but it is probably too late to do anything about it. Just know that other places are snickering just a little when you call yourself a city and you don’t have one good Jewish deli.

Being a city is not the goal. Being a place full of nice people is way more important and I bet that all these “cities” have that, because they are North Carolinians. I think I need to make it my goal to visit every “city” in North Carolina, and since I have already been to Charlotte, Asheville, Winston Salem, Greensboro, Durham, Raleigh, Fayetteville it’s Time for Oak City. I’m not sure where you are, but I’ll drive through and get a biscuit. Because the one thing I can guess is you don’t have any knishes, but I bet you make a good biscuit.

Poor Shay Shay

Shay is starting to treat her vet’s as a place she has a weekly subscription for. It started between Christmas and New years when she had a split nail that required a little surgical removal.

Then there was the follow up for that. Thankfully after five days with a cone and two prescriptions she healed well. But last night she woke Russ up every hour and needed to go out. Thankfully he wakes up when she does this. I do not.

So I called the vet and they had a spot for her, as they do every week. They asked me to catch a urine sample, which was easier to get than I thought it would be using a wide mouth plastic container. When I told her we were going in the car she started shivering. So far every car trip has been to the vets.

Sure enough she has a urinary tract infection. Poor thing. This adds insult to injury jury. At least there were no invasive exams. Back to having two extra pills to take everyday. I hope she heals well and quickly. She can’t stand going back to the vet any time soon and Russ needs a good night’s sleep. Oh the life of an old dog, and I mean Shay.

Be Prepared

If we have learned anything from the last few natural disasters, the floods and fires, none of us are guaranteed to be immune from disasters. None of these people probably ever thought these things could happen to them. Certainly not to the scale that they have.

If you suffer a personal tragedy, your local friends and neighbors often come to help, but what if your whole community is in the same boat? Then the rest of the world needs to help. Hopefully that is what is going to happen for the California fire victims once the fires are out and the totality is added up.

The one thing I came across today is a check list of things we should have in the cloud in case we ever need it. I am guilty of not having these items in one place I could easily get my hands on if I had to evacuate. I did watch a fire victim having it her fire safe cracked open and the papers were unreadable. It seems that if it were all in the cloud one would be able to access it from anywhere.

I write this knowing that it will take me a while to gather all this information, and even longer to upload it, but I know it it’s important to do. So I share it with you. Sorry it is not in a more user friendly format. I screen shot the information as I didn’t want it to get lost and at least the photo of it is now in the cloud for me.

To all my LA friends. I hope you are still safe. I know there is a long road ahead. Please know we are praying for you and your community.

Make Sure Your NC Vote Does Not Get Thrown Out

Some 2024 elections are still not over. A big one in North Carolina for a Supreme court seat is still dragging out. Incumbent Allison’s Riggs, the Democrat, beat the Republican candidate Jefferson Griffin by 734 votes. He contested. There was a recount. She still won. Then another and she still won.

The Republican controlled NC Supreme Court and Republican control legislature keep giving Griffin more and more bites at the apple. Now he is challenging the validity of over 60,000 votes cast in NC allegedly without any actually evidence. Just a big fishing trip.

There is a website to check to see if your vote is one that is being challenged. Don’t let your vote get thrown out. Go and check to see if your legal vote is trying to be thrown out.

https://terrymah.github.io/challenge/

Voter suppression after the fact needs evidence to prove it was illegal. There was voter fraud in NC years ago when a man went around collecting ballots and filled them in for people. That is not the case here. At least, no one has brought that forward. For the record that guy who did that was doing it for republicans.

Please check this web site and keep democracy real. Not some made up witch hunt.

No Need to Freak Out

It’s been almost exactly two years since we had snow here in Durham, NC. I had to look through my photos to figure that out. Thankfully I photograph the most mundane things.

Two years and it was barely a dusting then. Now it is snowing and it came exactly when they said it would. I was on the phone with my friend Jan, who lives a couple of miles south of me. While we were talking she said it had started there. Sure enough about five minutes later it started here. It was after four in the afternoon.

They canceled school in our town today because of this tiny snow that started after school would have gotten out. The fear of snow is so paralyzing to southerners. It is quite ridiculous.

I drove by the grocery store after having lunch with Lynn and Christy and saw that the parking lot was more full that the day before Thanksgiving. Christy said she went to the store yesterday at 7:45 in the morning, before the big rush of milk and bread buyers. She had one of her favorite cashiers and Christy asked her if people were kind to her during these pre-snow shopping panics. The cashier said, “no.” Christy thanked her for working and being kind every time Christy shops. Christy is one of the always kind ones who all cashiers love.

I waited a little too long to try and get a picture of the snow, but the sun had already gone down. You can’t really see the tiny flakes we are getting. I am thankful they are flakes and not ice. I hope that it stays cold all night so it just keeps snowing and doesn’t turn to something worse.

We can’t complain about snow when LA is burning. If only they could get precipitation and no wind.

So to all my southern readers, I hope you are snuggled up in a warm home with plenty of bread and milk, whether you eat those things or not. And to the rest of the world who wonders why real southerners freak out over a dusting of snow, I have no answer for that. The one thing I wish is that southerners would not lose their humanity when it snows. Please treat all the people who continue working through the weather well. Be a Christy.

Back in the Swing

I just got home from my final class of the week. I taught a fabulous group of ladies Beginner in Raleigh at North Ridge Country club in the morning this week followed by an equally fabulous group of ladies Beyond Beginner in Burlington in the evenings. It made for very long days with lots of driving.

I got to spend a few hours at home in between classes. Today when I got home from Raleigh Shay herded me into the sun room where I promptly fell asleep on the sofa snuggled up with her with. A little nap was nice.

Despite the three hours of driving I was totally energized to be back to sharing the love of Mah Jongg with nice people. I consider myself the luckiest person ever to have this be my job.

I wish everyone had work which they are passionate about. I am often asked if I get bored teaching the same thing over and over again. I can honestly say never. The way I teach is constantly evolving. I am much better at it now than I was 25 years ago.

Figuring out how different people learn and how to best communicate to different learners is the fun. I know I am lucky because I don’t have any homework to grade, tests to give, parents of students to deal with or standardized tests to teach to. This is teaching just for fun and the love of the game. What a great life.

Is it Broken or Just Too Cold Outside?

I am a hair moron. That means I can not use hair styling tools and a hair brush at the same time or in some cases one at a time. When curling irons were first invented I must have burned my forehead a half dozen times. I learned my lesson…I can’t use a curling iron.

Due to those scaring adventures, I mean scalp scaring, I never tried a flat iron. But really, when your hair is already flat and lifeless there was no point in that. Probably saved myself some second degree burns.

Finally in my third score and three years, I have mastered a blow dryer, but not necessarily with a hairbrush at the same time. I basically turn my head upside down and run the hot air over my wet hair until I feel light headed.

In the last few very cold days I feel like my blow dryer is not putting out the same heat as it once was. It blows at the same velocity, (oh, isn’t that a sentence all our husbands would love to hear?), but I am just not getting that hot feeling. It’s just warm, but is warm.

What I can’t tell is if a heating element is partially out or is it so cold that my hair dryer is having too much cold to over come?

Sadly cheep hairdryers are not like new cars. There are no dashboard lights to tell me one of the three heat coils has died like the car tells me the individual PSI in each tire.

When it is so cold out I really want the full Monty of heat. (Another thing the husbands would like to hear.) I hate the idea of shelling out $29.99 for another cheep hair dryer just to discover it is only as hot as my current cheep hair dryer.

Not that any of this really matters. As a hair moron, my hair is only as good as the operator. I know I’m not going to make my hair look better. I just want to be hotter. Not going to happen, no matter how you take that sentence.

A Man of Generous Heart

I had a few hours break at home today between my morning class in Raleigh and my night class in Burlington. I’ve said it before, this morning and night schedule is not my favorite, but at least I got to be home in between. I was having my late lunch/early dinner, as there is no good time to eat with this schedule and the TV was on.

A special news report interrupted whatever I was not watching so I paid attention. It was the coverage of Jimmy Carter’s arrival on air force one to Washington. The news was showing the casket and his family coming to bring him to the capitol for his funeral. As the coverage was a lot of watching a hearse drive down a road David Muir was talking with different people who knew Carter or and interviewed him as a color commentary to fill boring video.

One person who was riding in the motorcade with the family was one of Jimmy Carter’s spiritual leaders. I didn’t catch his name, but what he said really struck me.

It was clear he had known the president well and for a long time and they had a profound relationship with each other. This man said every time he went to Plains to see the President, right up until the end, Carter would ask him the same four questions.

“Where have you been?”

“What have you done?”

“Who did you help?”

“How can I help you help them?”

I burst into tears because it was a lesson on servant leadership that was so simple.

Carter was diagnosed with Cancer and given two weeks to live, three years before he actually died. His friend said that even during those last three years the questions and the heartfelt offers of help never changed.

We lost this kind of leader. Please remember this the next time you have to vote for someone to be a leader. We need people who know it is not about them, but about how they can help, and do it with a generous heart.

God Bless Jimmy Carter.

Female Dog Day

I had a mess of day. This was my get back to real life day with many tasks to complete before resuming classes tomorrow. I scheduled myself with a terrible set up his week. Morning classes in Raleigh and Night classes in Burlington so I needed to be ready.

I had to mail packages to Carter. I dropped a big box on my toe and it hurt like a female dog. (I can say this as Shay had a hurt foot all last week.) Once I got my boxes in the UPS store I had an unpleasant time. The young man working there was not my favorite human as he made me stand awkwardly holding a fifty pound box because he wanted to weigh the 2 lb box first. I asked if we could do the heavy one first as there was no way to perch it and he said no. (Again a female dog.)

I went to fill my car with gas and after I had gotten half way home I got. Notice that an air tag I had was no longer with me and was “left behind.” Turns out I had dropped it at the gas station. Thankfully I drove back and found it.

I had some issues scheduling classes that hopefully will get resolved, but it caused me a lot of work today. (If they don’t, they will be a real female dog.)

I had to bake cookie for a funeral and I took a picture of them in the freezer at church to show the he’d of the committee. I did not look at the photo as I took it, but here it is.

After all these annoying things went wrong I suddenly realized it is January 6. I should have realized earlier. January 6 will always be one of the worst days in American History as far as I am concerned. Thankfully I saw Kamala on the news doing her constitutional duty in a grown up way. (Definitely a female dog day for her.)

I hope January 7 is better.

January, Time to Get Real Shit Done

The whole last six weeks from Thanksgiving to New Years and those carry over days after New Years until the first Monday of the year are my “take time off to do nothing but celebrate” weeks of the year. I don’t worry about doing anything that is not about a holiday, or family or friends. This means a few little jobs get by me, like my shoes have started a union in my closet and refuse to stay with their mate, except for those on the picket line outside my closet, who refuse to be put away at all.

Tonight is the end of all that lollygaging around. I did spend the day cooking for my friend Holley’s family, which felt restorative to me and productive. If only cooking could fix Holley. But since I am helpless to fix anyone, the least I can do is feed people.

I am one of those annoying AP’s. We are multi-taskers who the phrase, “If you want something done ask a busy person,” was actually created for. We tend to prioritize our tasks in order of importance. I was not always like this, but over the years I learned life is better if I do the important stuff first, just in case I run out of time. Thus cleaning out the attic has perceptually been on my list for the last say 29 years. Something else is always more important and as the years go on without it being done I have proven the point.

Tomorrow it’s time to get back to being actually productive. I’ve decided there are basically three types of people. The Truly Lazy (TL), the Actually Productive (AP) and the worst kind of all, those who are so busy doing all the wrong things that they say they can’t possibly get to the things they should be doing (Delusional). I will refer to these groups, by their parenthetical nicknames.

I don’t mind the TL’s. If you can get away with doing nothing, and like doing nothing then own it. These people don’t pretend to be something they are not. Good for them. That life would drive me crazy because I like to have tangible results.

Being an AP does not mean I get everything done, but if I say I am going to do something for you, I will. I will let my own shit slide to do something for someone else. And thus the attic.

The Delusionals are my least favorite group. We all have worked with some of these in our adult lives. These are people who are the ones who say they are the busiest. Appearing to be busy is their goal. When you call and ask how they are, “Busy” with a capital B is always the answer. The problem is what they are busy with is not always the most important thing. And just because they are busy they think they productive.

You are not productive if you let important things slide by because you felt like you had to reorganize you filing cabinet before filing your taxes. One thing doesn’t matter to anyone else and the other could send you to jail for not doing. Yeah, I know it will take years to go to jail for not filing your taxes, but the IRS will eventually get you.

The problem is the Delusionals are also the group who have a lot of anxiety about to do lists, but it is all about the number of tasks, rather than the importance. If I were to write down everything I needed to do in January it might stress me out, but if I only write down the most important, then do them, I won’t be stressed out about negotiating a new union contract with my shoes. My shoes are not important. But they are to the Delusionals.

So if you want to get stuff done this month, and isn’t that what January is all about? Resolutions, starting fresh, clean slate and the likes, then start with coming to grips with your personality type, are to a TL, AP or Delusional. If you don’t like that you might be a Delusional,

In the Dark Mid-Winter…

The sparkle is practically gone from the house. I still have one small tree to put away, but since it was new this year I need a new hinged container for all the painted balls on. All the other decorations are put away safely in the attic. The big tree in the gathering room is still up because I need to get some man power to help us move it down stairs.

After all the packing up was done I dusted, scrubbed, washed, vacuumed and swept every room. With the bleak, darkness coming so early the only consolation is that everything is clean. Clean, but boring.

I don’t care to decorate my house for any other holidays. But I really miss the sparkle of Christmas, especially in January. I know I could keep Christmas up, but really these first few days of January are the only free time to put it all away.

After having six different parties at my house in December, at this moment I have no parties planned for the rest of the year. My house feels so naked without the Christmas that I can’t think about having a party.

I guess I will just throw myself back into teach Mah Jongg as I have so many classes scheduled starting Tuesday. So good bye Christmas, Hello Charleston. If you know, you know.

Shay’s Back to 100%

Last week Shay had an emergency toe nail removal. Sounds painful, but I think it was pain relieving compared to the pain of keeping that injured nail. She came home with bandages, medications and a cone she had to wear.

Little baby was a trooper. She didn’t complain about the cone, and when we took it off she did not bite at her wound. She took her medicine, with just a little complaint. Mostly she was the best.

Today she went for her check up. She knew we were going to the vet. She would not get in the car. It took ten minutes of chasing her around the driveway before she finally gave in and let me pick her up. With all the running and hopping she was doing playing keep away from me I knew she was fine.

She got a clean bill of health from the vet and even the two other issues she has have gone away this week. Who knew that a split nail could be so bad.

Dog are such important family members. Even dogs we only know peripherally. Today we got word that Ripken the Durham Bulls bat dog had passed away. We loved Ripken and are so sad for his owners. He brought great joy to us at so many baseball games.

Love your dogs. Their time with us is much too short.

My Least Favorite Day of the Year

Russ had to go back to work today. Last night he brought all the Christmas boxes out of the attic so I was set up to start the de-Christmasing. I did not jump right out of bed. Taking Christmas down is my least favorite thing to do.

Shay and I lazed around playing games and watching TV for too long. I was procrastinating in the worst away. I eventually started taking the needlepoint down, then the garlands. I undid all the Living room decorations, but did not clean the room or replace the non-holiday decorations that have to be put away during Christmas.

In between all these jobs I would stop and look at my phone, or play a round of mah Jongg and then get back to work. I undecorated about a third of the tree. Shay kept asking for attention so I gave it to her. Happy for the interruption. Finally at seven I threw in the towel for the day. I barley made a dent.

I promised myself I would do better tomorrow. I hate spreading this job out.

2025 Off To a Good Start

Last night we enjoyed a fabulous party at Carter’s future in-laws, the Dickson’s beautiful house in Darien. Their best friends came to the celebration. Carter had invited them in September when they were all in Germany together. To celebrate Carter and Clair’s engagement they came dressed as lobsters! Needless to say it was a very fun party!

The Dickson’s put on quite the spread and now I am addicted to a smoked Marlin Spread that comes from a small store named Fjord. Russ had a great time getting to know Duane better and I enjoyed talking with all the girls.

Russ and I did not make it until Midnight, but the party went on happily without us. It was a very celebratory day indeed. Claire and Carter are the happiest.

Russ and I met our dearest friends Steve and Suzanne in Westport for Breakfast at Terrain. As Carter’s godmother Suzanne wanted to hear every detail. Since we were each other’s maids of honor we like nothing more than discussing weddings.

It was a great trip to Connecticut. We figure it is not our last. We have a wonderful new family in the making. This makes starting 2025 very happy.

Two Girls, Means Two Rings and Two Proposals

Earlier in the month Claire proposed to Carter. So Carter had her moment and got her ring, but what about Claire? Carter has been planning on proposing to Claire on New Year’s Eve for months, but it was a surprise. It was important to Claire that her family was near by. So Carter coordinated with Claire’s parents, brothers and sister-in-laws since everyone was going to be together for New Years. The surprise was that Russ and I would be here too.

With a large What’s app Group text going of everyone, except Claire, there was lots of discussion about the location and logistics. Cameras were charged and champagne was chilled. Russ and I flew up to Connecticut yesterday. We hid out in Stamford and sent decoy texts to Claire and Carter making look like we were home with Shay. My blog yesterday was about my bed at home so there were be no digital foot print of us being in Connecticut.

We tracked Carter and her location on our phones so we made sure not to run into them. The plan almost got pushed back by Claire’s trip to Old Navy. Russ and I met up with Alex and Lilla, and baby Hadley (Claire’s next up brother’s family), at the Weed Beach Parking lot and we walked to the snack shack where we were going to be hiding. The rest of the family joined us. Barb, Claire’s mother held her grandson Hadley to quite his sweet coo’s as we hid. Claire’s Dad, Duane, was across the water with a paparazzi sized lens on his camera shooting the whole proposal from afar.

Carter proposed to Claire on the dock and we all peered out from behind the snack shack. After Claire said yes, she said we could come out. Having seen the iPhone’s around the corner. Russ and I came out with the rest of her family and she was surprised that we were there. She might have suspected the proposal at the time, but she was not suspecting us.

There were hugs and champagne, tears, a toast and more photos. It was a glorious time. Carter and Claire are so loved and it was so wonderful for me to get to meet Robert and Andrea, Claire’s oldest brother and wife who got married in Germany in September and Lilla and Alex and Hadley, and see Barb and Duane again. These people who love Claire have welcomed Carter into their family and that means everything to us.

Tonight the celebration will continue at Barb and Duane’s House with a party. As far as I am concerned this is the best thing to happen in 2024. I am looking forward to the future for these sweet girls who are surrounded by so much love.

The Best Christmas Presents I Bought Myself

This year we did white elephant for our extended family gifts. My sisters and I decided we would buy all the gifts and divided up the responsibilities. Then there were negotiations about they number and value so I ended up buying extra gifts. We had big and little gift categories

Since we had a mix of people I tried to get gifts that were unisex. I was searching for large gift choices at Costco one day and came upon a king sized down duvet I thought was nice and down pillows. So I bought two pillows that would be one gift and the duvet as another.

When the opening came Carter opened the duvet and made some rumblings that she would be up for being stolen from. Russ stole the duvet from her, which was a kind sacrifice since he would be happy sleeping under a burlap sack.

Then when it came my turn to open in the third round and no one had opened the pillows I picked them, just so they could get into the stealing. No one wanted them and I ended up keeping them.

The day after Christmas I changed the sheets and decided I wanted to wash some of the pillows on our bed. Russ made up the bed with the new pillows and the duvet. I put one of my handmade quilts on top since I did not have a duvet cover yet.

That night I had the best nights sleep I have ever had in my own bed. I thought maybe in was an aberration. Until the next night. The combination of that duvet and pillows with my temperpedic pillow was heaven.

I am so thankful we got to keep the gifts I bought. I feel guilty that no one else stole these gifts now that I know they are so great. If anyone in the family asks about them I will get these things again for next year’s exchange. If not I won’t because I can’t use more, but boy are they great.

D CARTR

In college I had a yellow VW Scirocco with the Connecticut license plate D CARTR. Since my name was Dana Carter my father thought it was a good plate to get me. A bight yellow car parked on the street of Carlisle, Pennsylvania stood out. One day an upper class man, a short little weasley guy who was also from Connecticut asked me if my license plate stood for Dump Carter as he was the fairly unpopular president at the time.

My Carter family is no relation to Jimmy Carter’s family. In college having the same name as President Carter was not necessarily a positive. Interest rates were sky high, the economy was doing poorly, Iran had taken American’s Hostage. I didn’t really want to be associated with Carter. He lost his bid for reelection in 1980 and went back to plains and I kind of got my name back.

Then he started to do great work, both at home and abroad. As the years went by he was improving his legacy, overcoming an unsuccessful presidency. Eventually he built so many Houses for Habitat and oversaw fair elections around the world and taught people what being a good person acted like, that he reached beloved status. Then having the name Carter was a positive.

He made it to 100 years old, the oldest President ever. And now he has left us and does not have to witness what is coming next. I wish that they could hold his funeral until January 20 so we could chose to watch his funeral rather than anything else that happens that day.

Rest in Peace Jimmy Carter. You lived a good life which we all could learn from.

Final Party of the Season

Tonight was our cousin Christmas dinner. It was at our house this year and is my final party I have to cook for. I made a big vegetable lasagna last week in preparation and was thankful I did that in advance so I only had to make Chicken Piccata and a big salad tonight.

Last night we discovered that Shay had a hurt toe nail. First thing this morning we called the vet and texted a photo. The word came back that she needed to go in to see the Doctor. She had split the nail all the way down to the quick, which was starting to get infected and it had to be removed. Russ and Carter had to leave her there while they did the procedure. What came home was a very drugged up baby, with a cone and a wrapped foot, which Russ called her flat tire.

Since she was so out of it we also put her in a diaper. Oh the indignity of the whole thing. She has been slow moving, non-eating and drinking little bit of a thing all day and night. Even when my cousins came she just kind of hung back, not her normal welcoming self.

In spite of Shay’s situation we had a fabulous party with my Mom, Aunt Janie, Cousin Leigh and her husband Peter and girls, Eva and Emerson, Cousin Sarah, her husband Mark and their kids, Sam and Jane.

Everyone is of the age that they are interesting and are doing exciting things. When it came time for dinner we all fit around the dining room table. The highlight of the dinner was the dessert auction. Aunt Janie had brought individual tarts of three types, fruit, lemon and chocolate. So I offered them one at a time and it worked out perfectly that everyone got the kind they wanted. The fun part was every time I said, “Who wants a fruit one?” And someone would raise their hand, everyone clapped as if the hand-raiser had won the tart.

We all agreed that having this cousin’s dinner after Christmas is perfect because everyone is home and it is after all other events are over so it is less stressful. I just love my cousins and am glad Carter loves them too.

Tonight I think Shay will sleep through the night as she appears to still be drugged up. I hope tomorrow she feels a little better.