Tragic Loss

At nine last night Carter comes into the kitchen from her room with a glazed look in her eyes and says, “A girl died at Camp today.” Camp for Carter is the place in the mountains of North Carolina that she affectionate calls “home.” It is her favorite place on earth, where she pines to be all years, waiting for summer like a three-year-old waits for Santa.
Carter is going to be a CIT at camp during the coed session that starts in July, but she spent many years going to the girls session and has lots of friends there now. That’s how she heard. A tragic zip line accident and a poor family who entrusted their sweet angel to a wonderful camp lost her. For the poor staff and counsellors it is the worst thing that can happen.  
There are risks in everything in life. I read a posting on Facebook yesterday from a friend whose son almost drown in a pool with life guards as she turned for just a second to get something. Thank goodness she turned around just in time to notice his lips below the water and the look of panic in his face. That story ended happily, but not without perhaps taking some days off that mother’s life.
I am so sad for Carter, who has lost two other friends this year. It seems like more than a teenager should have to deal with. I pray this tragic loss does not color the magic that happens at camp. There is an innocence about summer at camp with the games, songs, and friends. The real world did not exist in an electronic free environment.  
Please pray for the family who will not feel the same way about camp. Pray for the people who were there and will forever have that picture with them. Pray for the staff and counsellors who take the responsibility of caring for our children very seriously. Pray for the cabin and camp mates of the girl who was lost. Pray for all the campers to come that they will have the same wonderful life changing experiences at camp that Carter has had.

Are Airlines Crazy?

Today at Mah Jongg my friend Katina asked if we had heard about the new airline carry on regulations? What? When I got in the car NPR was playing a story about the airline fiasco. Apparently European airlines are reducing the size of carry on bags that are allowed to a size that does not actually exist in the luggage universe. Half an inch length , half and inch less in width and like five inches less in depth to a seven inch high bag.
The airlines are trying to maximize revenues by forcing everyone, but Barbies to have to check their bags or go naked when they are on vacation. It seems to me that the European airlines that are in collision to all do this at the same time as well as with the luggage manufactures who are going to be able to sell us all new luggage and the nude vacation sights.
So far the American Airlines have not answered if they area going to follow suit,but you know the worst amount our carriers are thinking about. Actually I bet Spirit Airlines already charges for carry-ons as well as toilet paper.
I am putting out a plea to all good U.S. airlines to set themselves apart and not screw over the flying population and reduce the size of carry-ons. I can’t imagine going back to handing over my bag to people who can’t possibly care enough about my stuff as I do. The airlines who do not reduce the carry-on size will be the ones I will try and patronize forever and ever.
Maybe this is a new diet incentive that the only way you can fit your clothes into tiny carry on bags is to become a size zero. Since that is never happening for me I might have to start wearing all my clothes on my body when I get on a plane and just use my miniature carry-on bag for my tiny travel size tooth paste and lotion.  
Please just raise the prices of tickets a few Euros and just let us carry our stuff on. I know they are justifying this move by saying this way there will be more overhead room for everyone, but if they just enforced the rules they already have their would be enough room. I have literally been on flight from Miami to Puerto Rico where one person brought a kitchen sink on and put it in the overhead bin, taking up the whole bin.
I guess it’s time to learn to fly. Who wants to go in on a plane with me?

Use Your Spices

The other day at lunch a friend of mine asked me how long her spices would last. Nobody at the table liked my answer which got me thinking that even some of the best cooks I know are using old spices. Here are the guidelines for how long spices are really best; 4 years for whole spices, like whole cloves or fennel seeds, 2-3 years for ground spices, like cinnamon and cayenne pepper and only 1-3 years for dried spices like basil and oregano.  
Now before you go throwing away your whole spice drawer open a bottle and take a whiff, not too big if it is red pepper. If it has a strong defined smell it is probably ok, but as the spices age you may have to add more to get the taste and it still won’t be as good as fresh spices.
My friend Stephanie, who grew up in Baltimore where McCormack spice company started, said they ran a campaign a few years ago saying, “If your spice bottle has a Baltimore address on the back and not Hunt Valley, Maryland, throw it out, it is over 20 years old.” Despite have a corporate headquarters in Baltimore, Hunt Valley has been the packaging location for over 20 years.
Rather than thinking of your spices as some precious exotic item to be used sparingly start using the ones you have until you use them up. I dry pan seared some okra tonight and dosed it heavily in coriander, which gave it a bright citrus flavor. Add some spices to you bottled salad dressing, if you use that, or make a fresh salad dressing by throwing in a bunch of different spices, like basil, garlic and ginger with your oil and vinegar.  
Just be careful not to add too much at first. To this day I hate dill because someone in my house used to add much too much of it to potato or chicken salads. A little dill goes a long way.
If you are an infrequent cook and don’t have any idea how old your spices are start writing the date on the bottle the next time you open something new. In two years any bottle of a dried or ground spice without a date can get thrown away and you will only replace them as a recipe calls for them.
One great way to use up things like nutmeg, cinnamon, allspice and cloves is to make a spice cake. Just don’t share it with me, because it is a favorite of mine and can’t only eat one bite!
This message was not brought to you by the spice manufactures of the world, but for full disclosure my Grandfather used to own a spice company called Try Me Spices, so encouraging you to use your spices might be in my blood.

Half Way Through Upper School

Summer officially started for Carter today since she had her last exam as a sophomore yesterday. As a parent it is almost as exciting to not to have to think about school as it is for the child. Being half way through high school is hard for me to comprehend especially since I feel like I was just half way through yesterday.

As I think back to myself at Carter’s age I realize that I did not really begin to find my voice until well into my junior year. There is so much pressure on kids today to invent fabulous new technology or be a world-class athlete or save an endangered species all before they get to Upper school, but in reality most people are just not fully developed yet.

Learning what you like in the world and how you might fit in is a long process that should involve some stumbles along the way. I certainly was no star at anything at the end of my sophomore year at Ethel Walkers. I was just trying to keep my head above water while not falling into some hole at the same time. One of the hardest parts was learning to deal with people who were equally as undeveloped.

For Carter I look forward to her having a successful summer as a CIT at Camp Cheerio. It is a great chance to try out new leadership skills while being at her favorite place on earth, after London and Rome, oh and Paris. But Cheerio is the place her heart is happy and the stress level is low, low, low and friends are supportive.

Discovering all that you are takes time so, Carter, keep exploring and being curious and trying new things, especially if they are hard. It’s Ok not to know exactly all that you are going to be at just 16. How boring life would be if you did. At sixteen no one would have bet that I could write a lick, I had never left the country, I did not know that my true passion was to help hungry people, I don’t think I knew any hungry people, I also was probably not even that funny. What I did know is that good friends are worth investing in and that cooking was a useful skill.

So cheers to a good summer. Rejuvenate, rest and relax. Mostly explore and expand your understanding of your true self. It is a self that has lots of time to unfold.

Nice Pays Off

Today while Carter was taking her first exam I decided I would go to the mall and buy her a quilt and new cooling pillow that she wants for camp. You have no idea what a big sacrifice this is for me. I hate going to the mall. I think the last time I was there was before Christmas.
If there were stores that had different and unusual merchandise I might not mind fighting the groups of slow walkers walking abreast with no idea they are taking up the entire width of the walkway, or the circlers looking for the closest parking spot at 3 miles per hour, or the sales clerks who have their faces deep in their phone with no peripheral vision to see how desperately I need help. No, the regular old stores are just not worth putting up with these people and the many others who have all the time in the world to while away at the mall.  
Carter had pointed out the items she liked in a catalogue I had purchased from before. The shipping and handling charges were like $34 for a small box and the stuff was not cheep to begin with. You know what handling charges are, PROFIT. Since Macy’s had texted me they were having a big sale I decided in the name of cheapness I would go and actually shop. How Macy’s got my cell number I’ll never know, but the marketing worked. At least to get me into the store.
After perusing the quilt offerings at Macy’s I decided to sprint the length of the mall to see what Belk’s had to offer. Usually if Macy’s is having a sale so is Belk’s. After dodging the lotion squirters and massage givers I fast walked my way past the stroller brigades and AARP card holder mall walkers to Belk’s where I found the perfect quilt. It helped that looked so much like the $189 one in the catalogue, before tax, shipping and handling but was on sale for 50% off and when the young man rung it off he added an additional discount and it came in at $25.87 which included tax. Hooray for the mall!
Having been without iced tea for at least the last 45 minutes I decided to stop at Panera Bread on my dash back to the other end of the mall where my car was. Since I am on this crazy strict diet iced tea is the highlight of my day. There were quite a few of the mall walkers waiting in a very long line, but I spotted the hallway window was manned and no one was waiting. As I approached the young girl in the black Panera apron I noticed a very old man in the main line who looked like he could not stand another minute without sustenance. The approved one asked what I wanted, just as I was summoning the old man to come and order in my short line.  
I looked at the Panera girl and said, “I only want and iced tea, but why don’t you take this man’s order first, I think he has been waiting a long time.” He thanked me as I stepped back so he could order. Before he got a word out the young Panera girl handed me a clear plastic tea cup and said, “Tea’s on me since you are so nice!”
What? I am rarely called “Nice.” I stepped into the drink dispensing area and made myself a big cold free tea. It tasted better than any tea I had drunk in a while. I think I am going to have to try this being nice thing more often, but I hope it works at places other than the mall because I still don’t want to go there.

It’s Always a Challenge

Last year about this time I reached my goal weight. I tried to set a new lower goal, but true to my weight loss/gain history had a hard time just maintaining my original goal. I am a strong believer that losing weight is exciting and maintaining weight is the real hard work. Since the weight loss game is a brain issue and not an eating one my brain decided that once I got to the goal I had been trying to reach for two years it could take a break. Now my body kept exercising and my cooking tried to keep me eating the non-white diet that I knew was good for me, but without full brain cooperation things broke down.
About this time one other big thing happened to me, I finally was declared to be in full blown menopause. Not that I could really tell. Years ago I had an operation so the normal signs of growing old were more subtle with me. I have been lucky enough to not suffer hot flashes, or as some of my friends call it, their own personal summer. I was glad that I had gotten my weight down before I passed over into the world of old womanness because true to folklore I found out fairly quickly that losing weight is more difficult at this stage of life.  
Actually what I quickly found out was gaining weight was more easy now too. So between my brain taking a diet break and my body taking a youth break permanently I started gaining back some of the hard fought pounds I had lost. I tried upping my exercise but with that I also ate a little more than I needed. I also enjoyed the eating seasons, starting with Thanksgiving, passing or not passing on the Christmas feasts, rolling right into Spring break in Italy with all things normally forbidden, like pasta, pizza and gelato all around me, followed by May – the month all about me with my birthday, anniversary and Mother’s Day.  
I knew I had do something while I could still wear my smaller underpants. The answer was try a new program to reengage my brain and hold me accountable. I had a bunch of friends who had tried Metabolic Research Center so I am giving it a try. The good news is that I went in when I have just a little to lose so it won’t take me long.  
I can tell you that any diet you do works if you stick to it. For me I like to try something new because it engages my brain and makes me work harder if I am having to learn a new plan. Of course I also really like having to weigh in with someone else. I know most people think that is the worst thing on earth, but once you realize no one cares what your number is on the scale just that it is going down, it becomes a great tool for accountability.
I hope I am getting smarter and not letting my weight yo yo the full string’s worth. A little tiny bit up and it is time to nip this issue in the bud. It helps that the eating season is over and my garden is starting to produce edible results. I’ll report back on my feelings about Metabolic as a good way to loose weight .

Bad Words

For the record, I think that most of the bad words I know I learned from my father. Not that he purposely sat down and taught them to me, just that he used them freely probably around the time I was in fifth or six grade and susceptible to picking up naughty words.   One of my favorite phrases my Dad used to use with us when we were young to describe someone we did not care for was to say, “He is such a shit bird.” Considering all that you can imagine my surprise when my father told me the following story when we were touring his childhood haunts.

As we drove up to the Ardmore School where my father had gone to first through seventh grade he pointed out the window of the principal’s office. He described her as a nice woman, but that she had a rubber hose in her desk drawer that she would use to hit children who needed punishment. We drove around the backside of the school and as we did my Dad said, “This is where I heard my first bad word.”

Hearing a bad word in elementary school did not seem like that unusual a thing. My Dad continued, “Yes, I remember it like it was yesterday. We were sitting in class and then as matter-a-factly as anyone could be Adam Sandler said out loud, ‘somebody farted.’ And all hell broke lose.”

“How old were you?” I asked. That is when my father shocked me. “We were in fourth grade.”

What?!? Fourth grade was the first time my father had ever heard anyone say a bad word, and it was the only barely a bad word, “FART.”

“Adam Sandler was sent to the Principal’s office and we all were shocked. I never forgot it.”

A while later as my father was driving through the neighborhood pointing out where all his friend’s had lived we passed by Adam Sandler’s house. “I wonder what ever happened to him? I bet he ended up in jail.”

It was comical to me that my Dad who taught me every bad word on earth thought that this nine-year old potty mouth ended up in jail. For the record this Adam Sander is not the famous one, but I have no idea if they are related.

In a real juxtaposition when Carter was in third grade she came home and said, “Benjamin told me that the “F” word is the worst word. I told him to tell me what it was so I won’t say it. He said, ‘No way, your Mom would kill me.’” So Carter asked me to tell her what the “F” word was. Not wanting to have to define it for her I quickly told her it was “Fart.”

“Hmmm,” she said. “I did not know that was such a bad word.” Oh how times have changed.

Home Again to Winston-Salem with my Dad

Today was the day I took my Dad back to Winston-Salem to visit all the sites of his childhood. Actually he drove me since it is a better gift to him if he gets to drive his own car. So I got up extra early this morning and went up to the farm where I found my father dressed up and ready to go on our big adventure. Meandering our way in the hour that it took us to go to Winston-Salem I was thankful he was driving because I was in unfamiliar territory.

My Dad had thought long and hard about this trip and had the whole route mapped out on what we were going to try and see and the order we would go in. Since I had only lived in Winston-Salem from the ages of zero to six weeks I was up for what ever he wanted to show me.

We got off the interstate at 5^th street to see if we could find the hospital where my father had his serious back operation three months before I was born. The building was there, but we think it was now part of a school. It was not my idea of the happiest place to start, but it was important to my Dad. As we entered downtown we went by the warehouse/factory where my father had worked summers at RJ Reynolds when he was in school. The factory where my Grandfather had been the manager was a shell being renovated, but still existed.

My Dad was really interested in finding the first place he worked out of college and amazingly the building was still there, now listed as a historic landmark. He thought that was great since it had just been a supplier to mills and factories back when he worked there.

From there we drove to the Episcopal Church that had been his church for the first 11 years of his life. As a child I heard the stories of the church he had built as a teenager and clearly this fancy building was not it. Dad explained that his parents along with 49 other families had broken away from this church to create a new one because they were the worker bees of the church as opposed to being the check writers/decision makers and they got tired of that.

Along the tour of the day I saw the basement of the furniture store where the new church met for the first two years, the place where the congregational church once stood in their Ardmore neighborhood where they met as a church on off hours for the next three years and finally St. Timothy’s the church my father had help build. He quickly pointed out where the mortar mixing station was that he manned and how he carried all the cement blocks up the scaffolding. See, his father had been the first church treasurer and knew that one way they could afford to build that first church building was to use my strong Dad as labor. My father had experience doing cement block work since he had done it at his own family home as a ten year old.

The highlight of the day for me was the tour of my father’s paper route. Many life lessons we taught to me as a child through my father’s stories of his morning and afternoon paper routes. We started our tour at the place where his 210 papers were dropped off at five each each morning. Amazingly most of the neighborhood looked the same to my Dad. There were a few new houses, but most looked very similar to the way they were in 1948. As we neared the end of his route we came to two houses next to each other with some African Americans sitting on their front porches. My Dad stopped the car and got out to talk to them. Turns out that they were the same family that had lived in those two houses when my Dad had delivered their papers.

We met a nice woman who was a year younger than my Dad who had lived with her grandmother in one of the houses. She and my Dad talked about which schools they both went to. Since the schools were segregated back then she told us how she had to take two different busses to get home from her school in the East part of town. My Dad had an easy walk to the Ardmore school that was just a few blocks away. Turns out this woman had a daughter exactly my age who had been the first African American to enroll in Ardmore school as a first grader when desegregation first happened. It is hard for me to imagine that all this happened in my lifetime.

More about my trip with my Dad back home again in tomorrows blog.

In Praise of NameTags

I had a church committee meeting tonight where one of the items on the agenda was permanent Name Tags. We are a name tag wearing church which as I age I appreciate greatly. No one likes name tags more than my husband. If it were up to him people would have their names tattooed on their forehead since he is so tall that even if they have a name tag on he looks very awkward leaning far enough down to read it.
At my meeting tonight I told a very old story about Russ and his lack of knowing people’s names. After we had lived here for a good number of years we were invited to go to our friend’s Bill Lindsey and Jean Bethea’s lake house. We had a wonderful day with them swimming and eating and telling stories.
A few months later Russ came home from the grocery store and proudly announced to me that he had seen my friend Jean Bethea at the store and called her by name. This was big for him. first he actually noticed a person, and that he knew that person and knew her name– this was a red letter day! I told him I was so proud of him.
Five minutes later the phone rings. It was my friend Carol Shepard. “Russ just called me Jean Bethea at the grocery store.” So much for the celebration of Russ’ facial recognition skills.
If only we all were wearing name tags all the time these terrible mistakes could be avoided. I used to be able to remember everyone I ever met, where I met them, and who introduced us. Not anymore. I never say, “nice to meet you.” In case I have already met a person before and just don’t remember. “Nice to see you,” is the perfect noncommittal greeting. It does not mean I have or have not met you before. It also avoids my having to say someone’s name since I don’t remember that either.
I guess that Russ was just further along developmentally than me, but now that neither of us can remember anyone I don’t know what we are going to do. Maybe we will just have only old friends who are in our long term memory. Unless the whole world starts wearing name tags. Actually the way our eyesight is going perhaps they need to where license plate sized name tags so we can read their name without our glasses on. Or if everybody wore junior high school PE t-shirts that have their name written in sharpie right across the chest, that might work for us.

For the record after living here for over 20 years Russ does know the difference between Carol and Jean, at least this week. 

Fourth Blog Year

i got a congratulations email from my blog host site on completing three years of blogging everyday for the last three years. After over 1,000 posts you would think I would not forget to blog, but here I am thumb typing on my phone. Russ is driving us from Pippen to pick Carter up from a sixteenth birthday party and the day is getting long past me. 

Please forgive this non substantive post on nothing, I took a small celebratory break from less dana to practically no dana today. I look at it as a day when no one pissed me off. Hopefully year four will have me back on track.  

Contractor Hell

A couple of days ago, early in the morning, before I ever expect to see anyone who I don’t already know or love at my door I got a knock. A young man who I did not know sheepishly said hello. I was thankful I had my cell phone in my hand in case I needed to call 911.

“Hi, I’m working at the house next door and we need to use your water?” Said the stranger.

“What are you talking about?” I said.

“I have to cut some holes in the concrete and the water is turned off at that house and I need water to run my saw blade.”

The first thought that went through my head is, this is not my problem.

“How much water are we talking about?”

“I could just run your hose to the house.”

I am a big water conservationist. I have a rain barrel that catches the water from my gutters, I refuse to water my grass figuring it is not a good use of the most precious resource we have. In drought ridden summers I have caught my shower water in buckets and used that to water my vegetable garden. I was not happy about being asked to let some stranger run my hose to the house next door. How in the world would I know he was not just running it constantly?

“You did not answer the question,” I probed. “How much water are we talking about?”

“I only need your hose for an hour. I will get the contractor to reimburse you”

Against my better judgment I agreed he could use it for an hour since I know and like the woman who bought the house.

After an hour and a half I went over and asked if they were done since I needed to go out. Just a little longer they promised. What could I do now?

I left the house and when I returned five hours later the hose was still over at the neighbors. Now I was furious. One hour my #$%^%!

“We are done,” the young man said preemptively when he saw me coming with a look that could kill a bear on my face.

“Please, have the contractor call me.”

No call. So I called the homeowner who was rightfully embarrassed. I asked her to have the contractor call me, knowing it was not her fault. No call.

Now three days later I was out walking my dog when the contractor’s site supervisor pulled up. I introduced myself to him and we had a conversation about the water. He tried to tell me it was a normal way of doing business that they would take water from neighbors. I told him it was not normal around here and quite presumptuous to assume they could show up early in the morning at my house and even ask. He said he had no idea how much water they used since they did not have a meter on it, not that he offered to pay me for it.

In the last five years contractors have surrounded our house since practically every house on my street has been redone. It has been hell to have workers who scream loudly at each other running very noisy equipment at all hours with little concern about the people who live in the neighborhood

The only exception is Robert Hallyburton whose crews were considerate, the rest have been a nightmare. If I were building a house I would throw a party for the neighbors to apologize for the trouble they have to endure from the contractors.

We are all at the mercy of the people we hire to do work for us. If you are looking for a contractor I would be happy to supply the names of the ones who were not considerate of the neighbors. I am looking forward to having my new neighbor move in who will be so much better than her contractor.

Still Seaching For Jane’s Body

Netflix has done it again.  Introduced a new show called Grace and Frankie staring Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin whose husbands leave them after 40 years of marriage to marry each other.  It came out yesterday and I have already binge watched the whole thing.  My guilt is only half as high as my usual Netflix binge because it is a half hour show.
The show deals with how 70 year old women deal with the loss of their husbands, but to me it is a diet motivational show.  No two women look as good for their age as Jane and Lily.  Hell, they look better than women my age.
Obviously all those years doing aerobics in leg warmers really paid off for Fonda.  Her body is one I would kill to have, but I am not actually willing to give up eating to get it.  In the show she lives basically on alcohol and admits to not having tasted ice cream for the last nine years.  Maybe living with a secretly closeted gay husband that is the secret to cause you to try and attain a perfect body.  If that is the case, then I am happy to have my terribly flawed and very flabby thighs if it means I have a normal husband who is happy to be married to me.
I remember going to see “On Golden Pond” in college with my boy friend and thinking that Jane Fonda in her bikini as a middle aged woman was about as good as anyone could get. She made me feel inadequate then and she still does.  Well, I am here to tell you that some thirty years later she is even better looking.
Lily Tomlin is no slouch either.  She looks about a thousand times better as an old woman than she did as Edith Ann on Laugh In.  Certainly this gives me hope that the best years can still be to come.  I don’t hold out any false hope to have Jane Fonda’s thighs and certainly not her beautiful hands with the long skinny fingers, but if Lily Tomlin, who was no real looker as a younger person can look so great as an old woman, then there is hope for all of us.
Sadly I’ve finished another new series in two days, but at least it gave me lots of incentive to get my steps done.  When is Orange Is The New Black coming back? I don’t really want to be like any of those prison women, but at least the story is so entertaining that if keeps me on the treadmill and that is the only chance to look like Jane.
 

Dana’s Future Graduation Pop-up Restaurant

When I was in kindergarten we lived on the street that dead ended into my elementary school.  What that meant is that many of the kids who lived within a mile of the school walked passed my house to get to and from school.  Since kindergarten was only half day and I went in the morning I quickly discovered a great business in having a regular cookie and lemonade stand when the kids walked home from school.  I did it multiple days so kids learned to have a nickel to buy the cookie for three cents and Dixie cup of lemonade for two.  It was a good tax free business.
Later in third grade I sold nickel packages of Sweet Tart filled Jaw Breakers for a quarter since they were a hot candy commodity that was in short supply at the Wilton Pharmacy.  I quickly learned that rich kids had money to burn and were perfectly happy to pay five times the regular rate just to get their hands on the sweet and sour treat.
This weekend is both UNC and Duke’s graduation as well as Mother’s Day.  Local restaurants are taking full advantage of the proud parents coming to town to celebrate their child’s matriculating achievement.  I learned yesterday that the Washington Duke is making hay by charging $31 for a salad.  Russ somehow got us a reservation at Four Square tonight for dinner, but we had to pre-pay $100 and agree to a $68 three course menu plus 18% tip right off the bat.
I realized I am missing my childhood training of making the most of a hungry situation by not running a pop-up restaurant in my house this weekend.  With the great success of Air B&B I think that I certainly could do the same plan, but for lunch and dinner.  Feeding large numbers of people delicious food is something I am trained to do.  How have I lived in a University town for so long and not taken advantage of the people wanting to come and celebrate?
There must be some parents, probably of a son, who are furious that they are having to eat dinner at Wendy’s because their boy did not try and make any reservations for their party of twelve before last week. I know it is too late for this year, but if I put the word out now that I am willing to cater a big graduation party at my house for just the right family I think I could do almost as well as I did with the jaw breakers.  I have enough China and plenty of space that I could have three or four parties all at the same time.
If this goes well I might also consider making Mother’s Day brunch here.  I would rather be making and serving really good food, than eating mediocre food at the only place available in Durham on graduation weekend.
No more complaining about what graduation does to us locals.  Rather than grumble I’m going to capitalize on the situation, um I mean offer a much needed service to the poor parents who are being fleeced, um I mean provided the opportunity to celebrate their child.  Pass the word, Dana’s Graduation spot will be taking reservations for next year.

Voice Threaten

If you watch TV in North Carolina you must be familiar with the CPI Security ad where what is clearly a robber, a man who practically has a black mask on over his eyes breaks into a house and an announcer says in a deep threatening voice, “CPI Security, identify yourself.” The sound of the husky voice is enough to drive the would be robber out of the house, that and the follow-up voice saying, “the police have been notified.”

My family thinks I missed my calling as a security voice announcer. I say it is never too late. I agree that I have a deep and what can be a scary voice when I am mad. If were a criminal heard me voice telling me to get out I would run for the hills.

Today, I was looking out my office window and noticed a giant black crow standing in the middle of my tender Arugula seedlings eating whatever he wanted. I ran out the garage screaming, “Get the HE%$ out of my garden, “ at the top of my lungs.

Well, walking just behind my giant magnolia tree was an old man I did not see, and a little further up my yard was a woman walking her dog, who apparently was peeing on my grass. Quickly I heard a small voice from the woman, “I’m sorry.” Then the old man, “Me too!” I ventured further down the driveway to find the people I had scared to death.   “I’m sorry, I was screaming at a crow,” I explained.

‘Thank goodness, “ the old man told me. ‘I was worried you had video cameras and were one of those CPI Security people.” I got a big laugh out of that and told him my child also thought I was one of those people. I quickly let him and the dog walking woman know I did not consider them intruders, but secretly I was hoping that maybe she won’t let her dog pee on my new grass again.

If you are looking to make a recording to scare people off your property I am offering my voice up for recordings. I also can do voice messages that scare teenagers when the liquor cabinet is opened or wildlife that might attempt to walk in your garden. I find a there are a lot of advantages to a threatening voice and I’m happy to share it, I’m just glad I did not give any old people walking by my house a heart attack today.  That would not have been good.

The Rainbow Moment

Russ is away so Carter and I decided to grab a quick bite of dinner out. As we were leaving our local eatery we saw a huge rainbow that stretched from one side of the horizon to the other. We both stopped and in the waning light of the evening took in the beautiful colors. Then as is the way of this decade we pulled out our cameras and both took photos and videos. Of course only Carter’s phone could capture the whole thing in one shot.

We got in the car happier than a mother and teenage daughter usually ever are together bathing in the joy that seven little colors in the sky brought us. Of course the tale of the pot of gold being at the end of the rainbow can never be proven since you can never actually find the end of the rainbow, but the happiness seeing that rainbow together tonight brought me something much better than gold; a close moment with my daughter.

If you have a teenager I hope that you can have a rainbow moment with them. It washes away all the crap.

How Old Are You When You Start to Appreciate Good Health?

When I was little I remember an old man, who as I think of it now was probably was not so old, whose house burned down saying, “Well at least I still have my health.” I was about ten or eleven and thought, that is the craziest thing I ever heard, you lost everything, why are you talking about your health? Taking health for granted is certainly something the young can do. The problem is you don’t really appreciate it until it is jeopardized.

Today I went to visit a good friend who had a big health scare and has had to endure a lot of pain for the last six weeks and has many more weeks ahead of her. The good news is she is alive thanks to a good husband and living near a good hospital, but living with pain is something I don’t think any of us want to experience or expect at a relatively young age, did I mention she is younger than I am?

Between my brother-in-laws serious heart attack this winter and this friend’s big illness I am really appreciative of my health. I am not looking for anything I need to fix, but I certainly am feeling my age creeping up and the need to do as much preventative maintenance as possible.

I’m not talking about lines on my face, I am perfectly happy showing the life I have lived when I smile. I’m talking about the things that might kill me. Fat in my organs rather than just fat on my thighs or plaque build-up that could break off and cause a stroke or heart attack.

Maintenance, maintenance, maintenance, that’s what it is after 50. So please pay attention to any warning signs your body might be giving you that something is different. My brother-in-law is alive because a co-worker did not just let him go home and lie down when he thought he hurt his back, it was a heart attack. My friend got to the ER because her husband took her. Waiting would have had a different ending.

I really want all my friends and family to stick around and be able to say right up until the end, “I have my health.” I just don’t want anyone to say it in response to his or her house burning down.

You Are Being Watched

George Orwell wrote 1984 in 1949. He only got the idea that Big Brother is watching our every move off by a few years. I wonder if George were alive today he would recognize our world of cell phone cameras, security cameras, you tube postings and thousands of hours of reality TV as what he described in his prophetic work?

With the proliferation of cameras and ways for people to share what they have filmed I don’t know why people continue to act like no one is watching when everyone is watching. Police should be the first to know that their every moves are being scrutinized. But the people who protest those same police actions with illegal reactions are also being filmed. The problem now is there is no way for society to prosecute all the wrongs that are being filmed.

Not all people protesting are doing anything wrong, but surely if you are doing something wrong the chances are great that someone or something is going to catch it on film. Has society gotten so numb to these pictures of people breaking windows or trashing cars that don’t belong to them that we no longer see the faces? Are their grandparents upset by their showing up on TV or is it all OK somehow?

I never understood when a college team wins a big game and their fans go out and burn things up in their town. The team won, why are you destroying things? How can we change this pattern of reacting to something bad or good with destruction?

I for one figure there are cameras watching everything so I don’t even want to scratch my backside when I’m out in public in case I show up on some horrible You Tube video. When I was a teenager the worst thing that might happen to you was if you went out of the house dressed in a terrible outfit you might show up in the back of the Glamour Magazine with a black bar across your eyes and the label of a “Glamour Don’t.”   I don’t think I ever knew anyone who was published as a “Glamour Don’t,” but the fear of being called one was real. Today, I don’t think people have that same fear. I feel like the reaction to something like that would just be the middle finger.

Now more people are watching, but less people are caring. I think I need to reread 1984 and see how Orwell’s character’s reacted. Somehow the idea that we are being watched has just made people react worse not better.

Curried Veggie Salad

I did not do anything all day except walk and binge watch “the Forsythe Saga” and just as I was about to pass out I realized I had not written a blog!  How I forget to do this when a I have been writing for three years I do not know.  Obviously it takes more than three years for me to create a habit.
This is the third salad I made for my luncheon.  I took this picture the first day I made it.  I later added cashews when I served it again and it was greatly improved
1 small head of cauliflower broken into florets

1 can of chick peas, drained and rinsed

1 onion sliced thinly

1 mango cubed into 1/2 chunks

1 bag of baby spinach

Big handful of cilantro leaves-chopped
Spice mix

1 T. Mustard seeds

2 t. Cumin seeds

2 t. Coriander seeds

1 t. Turmeric

1T. Curry powder

1 T. Sugar

Salt 
Olive oil

Juice of 2 limes

1/2 cup cashews
Blanch the cauliflower Ina big pot of boiling water for 1 minute and the drain and set aside.
Put a frying pan on a medium heat and put the mustard, cumin and coriander seeds in the pan and heat for about two minutes just to toast.  Remove from pan and grind them up with a spice grinder or mortar and pestle.  Add all the other spices and mix well.  Set aside.
Using the same frying pan put the onion I with a table spoon of oil and cook on medium heat for five minutes.  Add the spices and continue cooking for another five minutes.  Remove fro. Frying pan and put in big bowl.  Add the drained cauliflower to the pan and cook on medium heat about four minutes to get it browned.  Add to the onion bowl.  
Add the chick peas, mango, spinach and cilantro and toss together.  Add the lime juice and a splash of olive oil.  Sprinkle with cashews right before serving.

The Self Driving Car Can’t Get Here Fast Enough

The Self Driving Car Can’t Get Here Fast Enough

I have seen a couple of test cars on the news recently that are totally self-driving. One was an Audi and another a Mercedes. Leave it to the Germans to want to be first in the big world of car automation and to that I say “Yawhol.” I am sure they are up to the task to enable us to ride in cars and safely get to where we want to go without putting a hand on the wheel or a foot on a peddle.

As much as I would like to ride in my car needlepointing away and not have to bother with doing any of the driving there are two groups of people who need this invention more; small children who are too young to drive and old people who should have their driving privileges revisited.

Although it seems like a nice idea to be able to put a three-year-old in a car and have them delivered to pre-school I don’t think that is going to happen anytime soon. Kids still need a parent’s hand to hold when they get out of a car, so I am nominating the elderly as the first group we should give self-driving cars to.

Specifically I would like to nominate the nice look older man with the silver hair in the button down shirt who was driving a grey Prius today in Chapel Hill at the intersection of Legion Road and Ephesus Church road at three in the afternoon. As anyone who had ever driven west on Ephesus Church road toward 15/501 knows the road can get very backed up at that light.

I was heading the opposite way and wanted to make a left hand turn at the light at Legion road. Since the cars were so backed up I waved at this nice looking man who was going the opposite way and asked if I could turn left since the traffic his way was at a dead stop. The old guy looked me dead in the eye from his non-tinted windows and mouthed, “Fu%& you” and pulled to the center of the intersection blocking anyone turning. There I sat with my face right next to his trying to go the other direction.

I rolled my window down and in my nicest southern voice said, “I know you have the right of way and I’m happy you are exercising your rights, but I’m very embarrassed for you that you have to sit here stuck in traffic and look at me after you swore at me for just asking to make a turn when you clearly are not going anywhere anyway.” The light then changed giving me a green arrow to make a left hand turn, but I was unable to do it since he was still stuck in the traffic of his side. The light changed again and the people trying to turn from Legion road were now blocked because he was still there. Eventually the light at 15/501 changed and his lane moved forward.

If that man had been in a properly programed self-driving car that did not block an intersection that was backed up none of this would have happened. Well he might have still screamed an obscenity, but he might not have had to sit through two light changes looking at the person he cussed out.

I just hope that the self driving car programmers have someone with manners on their team and program the cars to do what is nice as well as safe and not just what is someone’s right.

Crespéou-  What You Don’t Know What That Is? 

At Christmas I bought an eight inch authentic French crepe pan in order to make crepes for Cannelloni. Since it was the most sinful thing I ate all year, save the crack pies, I have not used that pan since.  I hate having cooking equipment that is used once and then set in the cabinet to take up space, reminding me every time I open the door that I had made a silly purchase.

To quiet the condemning voice in my head I decided to use my crepe pan tonight for a healthy Crespéou, which is French for a stacked-multi layer flat omelets with different fillings.  My photo is terrible and does not rightfully represent the green-red-green-red layers, but trust me I made four small omelets to produce this cake like structure.  The best part about it is that you can use any old leftovers to make your layers and it can be served hot, cold or room temperature.  The French think of this as picnic food, nothing to go bad out in nature.  We just ate ours for dinner.

You do not need a crepe pan to make it, any old frying pan will work, so I guess I am still guilty of having bought an unnecessary piece of cookware.

8 eggs

1/3 cup of half and half

1/2 c. of crumbled feta cheese

Salt and pepper

Mix this all together and set aside as the base of all the omelets.

For the green layers I used:

1 bunch of green onions cut up

1 handful of flat leaf parsley chopped

For the red layer I used:

1/2 cup of caramelized onions

1/2 red pepper chopped up and sautéed and cooled

Preheat the oven to 325.

Put the pan on a medium heat and warm, spray with Pam or coat with a little olive oil.  Using a cup measure ladle spoon slightly less than a full measure into the 8 inch pan and swirl than pan around.  Add 1/2 of the green layer ingredients on top and cook about four minutes until the layer is almost set. Using an offset spatula if you have one losses the omelet from the pan and slide it on to a pie pan.

Repeat the process using the red ingredients and slide the next layer on top of the first.

You get the idea to keep doing this until you have used up all your egg mixture.  I made four layers.

Place the pie plate in the oven to finish the cooking for about ten minutes.

I think it is best if you take it out of the oven and let it cool for at least 15 minutes.

The 150-Year Day

It has been a most eclectic day. It started with a visit to Bennett Place, the site of the largest surrender of the Civil war that just happens to be in Durham. Today is the 150^th anniversary of the confederate army’s General Johnston and the troops surrender to Union Major general William T. Sherman. No, neither Russ nor I have suddenly become Civil War enthusiasts, but one of my college classmates, Eric Wittenberg was a visiting expert and speaker so we went to see him and his wife Susan.

Eric is a lawyer by trade, but a civil war history is his passion and he has written 16 books on the subject. He gave an interesting talk about the battle of Monroe’s Crossroads. Most everyone in packed theatre were Civil War enthusiasts and knew the players Eric introduced well, but to me most of the story was a new one, which he was able to bring to life for a novice like me.

After spending the morning learning about Durham 150 years ago I went to my friend Lucy ‘s mother’s funeral. Mary Louise had been born in Durham 88 years ago and lived her whole life. Although she had a long decline with Alzheimer’s I can only imagine the changes she saw in Durham over her lifetime.

With so much of my day concentrating on the past I decided I needed to do something hopeful for the future so I thought gardening therapy was the way to go. With my driveway gardens prepped by Russ last weekend I was able to plant my vegetables this afternoon. Putting seeds in the ground with the idea that in a month and a half I will be eating arugula I grew is the most optimistic thing I can do.

I hope that Durham continues to improve over the next 150 years. I will keep doing my little part, which might be as small as planting a garden every year. I wonder how this day will be celebrated at the 300^th anniversary?

The Fun Of a Friend Sleepover

One of the saddest days is when a good friend moves away.  The only thing that makes it better is when they come back to visit and stays with you.  I am lucky that my great friend Jeanne, who moved to Alexandria last fall had a couple days free in her calendar to come back to Durham this week.  The best part about visiting is you get a good amount of concentrated time to really catch up.

Jeanne and I like a lot of the same things, and when she showed up at my house yesterday we were even wearing the exact same outfit.  Not surprising since we buy our clothes from the same place and usually pick out the same pieces.  You know you have a really good friend when you can ask her what she is buying and she encourages you to get the matching outfit.

It is not just matching clothes we have in common, but walking and needle pointing, both of which we did today.  I had a Durham Magazine event to go tonight and Jeanne was even a good sport about going with me.  Just having her to talk to in the car made going much more fun.

The way I know she is the perfect guest is Jeanne is happy to eat whatever good for you food I am making for myself.  I have some guilt about serving a house guest Special K for breakfast and arugula salad for dinner, but that is my own issue.  Jeanne is always happy about whatever I suggest.  This is a trait I need to try and emulate whenever I go to stay with anyone. 

You know you have a good friend when they are happy to sit in a chair in your office while you walk on the treadmill or even worse watch TV in their PJ’s in your bedroom since that is the best TV in the house.  Moving away was sad, but visiting is good because when you live in the same place you don’t necessarily spend 36 hours straight together.  So hooray for visiting. 

Where’s The Wagon?

I love traveling. This spring I have had my share. When visiting other places I like to try the local food and the one thing I find is that it is hard to find healthy food when you eat all your meals out. One might suggest I could miss a meal or two, but since I can’t remember the last time I purposely skipped a meal that did not involve anesthesia I don’t think it is going to happen when I am on vacation.

I gave myself permission to eat whatever I wanted in Italy since we were only going to be there 10 days. It made for a fabulous holiday in everyway, but getting back to the eating I need to do to keep myself in the clothes I own is hard. After spring break we had Easter then my trip to Tennessee with my Mom. If you saw the people in Gatlinburg you would know it is not a place known for its salads.

Eating is not the only issue. Exercise on vacation is hard too. When you walk nine miles a day as your baseline there is no way to keep that up unless I am on a hiking vacation with other walking enthusiasts.

Now it’s time to get back in the saddle and put the brakes on eating the naughty stuff. It is harder done than said. I know that dieting is all in my head, but I have to rebrake my brain form sugar and white flour. I know that I could conquer a small nation of indigenous people if they had never eaten sugar before I tried to take over. All it would take is a few cases of Snickers Bars, a sack of Reese’s Cups and a palate of sea salt brownies. I could get any previously non-sugar eating tribe to follow me anywhere if I was the one to introduce them to such things.

Knowing I must stop with all sugar for three or four days to get it out of my system is the only way to get back on track, but I have fallen off the wagon and I think it rolled away without me. Now I am in search of the wagon to get back on. If you see me wandering, glassy-eyed, mumbling to myself, don’t worry. I am just going through sugar withdrawal. This is my first step, to admit I am powerless against it, that’s easy. Staying away is hard.

Mom’s Going Home Tour

When you grow up in one place and go to the same place for vacation every year it really does not take long to revisit your whole childhood.  Between late yesterday afternoon and lunch time today my mother and I were able to see everything she wanted to see from her birth to the death of her parents and lots of fun things that happened in between. 

We started the tour of my mother’s childhood home and drove past practically everyone of her friend’s homes as if we were on her regular bike route.  We stopped at her elementary school and could not retrace her walk to school exactly because some new houses had been built where there once had only been woods, so we settled for driving the route.  As is always the case, what used to seem so big or far away, was now tiny and close.  My mother said she used to complain about what a far distance she had to walk to and from school, when in fact it could hardly have taken her more than five minutes.

We saw her junior high, now a community center and the University of Tennessee where she spent her first two years of college before heading east to UNC back in the days when Chapel Hill only admitted women as juniors.  We drove up to her grandparents house which became her parents home when my mother went to boarding school.  That was the house I spent my childhood visiting and it looked much smaller than I remember, but the huge front yard with it’s hundred year old oaks was just as big and thankfully still full of those same trees.

We meandered past my grandmother’s hairdresser, Mr. Christopher, a very important spot in the life of a genteel southern lady on the way to the cemetery where all our family is buried.  The place is huge, but my mother kept telling me to keep going up the hill, “they are at the top.”  We parked the car, still unsure of exactly where the family marker was and no sooner did we look to the left, there, right at the top of the hill was the big “Wright” headstone.  I think visiting my grandparents graves was really the most meaningful part of the trip.

Having done all of Knoxville we headed east to the Mountains my mother loves best.  As a child her family had a summer place called Cascades Lodge, which had fourteen bedrooms and a big  commercial kitchen and dinning room with lots of tables with checkered table clothes.  I know this because I used to go these when I was a kid too.  The lodge had porches that hung over the river which it was built beside.  There was a huge swimming pool that was fed by a stone trough from the river.  The lodge was the my mother’s favorite place since it was where her family escaped the summer heat of Knoxville to sleep under blankets, play in the river, read books on the porch and while away the summer days with no worries.

Long ago, well after her father had sold the lodge it burned down suspiciously, probably for the insurance money.  Since it physically is gone it made finding it hard, but we did.  The river with  the many waterfalls make it sound exactly the same as it did years ago so.  We walked down a driveway of a house for sale and found the foundation and the outline of the old pool.  The stone walls that held the river back were still there.  Of all the things we revisited I think this made my mother the saddest.  She always longs to have those summer lodge days again, but we all know you can’t go back.

To solidify that even if the lodge were still here, we might. To want it back we visited Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg. Pigeon Forge had been nothing more than a laundry mat and small country store when my mom was a child.  Today it is outlet after outlet and every has been fast food restaurant you can imagine.  Gatlinburg is the worst that America has in a vacation spot.  With the exception of the Pi Beta Phi Arrowmont crafts school, there is not one thing in Gatlinburg any person I know would like unless they were blind.  No one can see the beauty of the mountains through the haze of Ripley’s Believe it or Not Museum or the Moonshine Company.  It is a good place to end the nostalgia tour because it really makes us love where we live now a lot more.  You may be able to go home again, but you just might not like it as much. 

The Christmas Gift Trip

In a moment of “Oh shit, what do I give my parents, who need nothing, for Christmas?” I came up with the gift of trips to their childhood towns with me alone so they could show and tell me everything about their lives before I came along.  My mother jumped right on this specially designed present and scheduled our trip to start today.  Since she grew up in Knoxville, Tennessee and spent her summers in the Smokey Mountains at her family lodge her trip is more extensive than my Dad’s will be just going to Winston-Salem.  Much to my Mother’s liking her present involves overnight luxury accommodations and three meals a day, all thanks to her best son-in-law that will ever be.     

Finding three days to leave home is tough in the busy spring time so to maximize our time my Mom came down to Durham last night to spend the night at our house, arriving while Russ and I were off at the auction and Carter was celebrating her friend Ashley’s sweet 16.  Russ and I tiptoed into the house like teenagers who were late for curfew late so as not to wake my mother.  Still exhilarated from the fun of the auction I had a hard time falling asleep and the pressure that early morning would come soon to start the five hour drive to Tennessee was not helping.  

The drive was not part I was looking forward to, but the time slipped by as I peppered my mother with questions about family history.  Trying to figure out where some once rich relative’s money went when he died without a will brought us to the conclusion that the mistresses must have been well provided for.  Without even a chance to turn the radio on we were in Knoxville, right by the building that had been my Grandfather’s business.  

After checking-in to the hotel we walked the downtown tracing the route similar to the one my mother took every Saturday where as a child she would come downtown for the movies, shopping, mostly windows and a twelve cent hamburger lunch.  Amazingly many things are the same, the S&W cafeteria in the fabulous art deco building may now be an Aveda store, but looking through the windows the interior is the same as it was 65 years ago, just without the grand piano and the scary lady who serenaded customers as they dined on the finest of meals. 

Three major theaters are still in business on Gay street and we went into two of the to look around.  Without any advance planning we happened upon the East Tennessee Historical center and amazingly it happened to be free day.  Saving the four dollar entrance for senior citizens and five dollars for me thrilled my mother to no end.  I have to say that it is a really well done little museum which I wish we had more time to study, but my mother was able to show me a display of a railroad which my Great Grandfather was the council for since he was a big time lawyer.

Our only real plan of the day was a visit to see my Mother’s Cousin Sis.  We drove out to her beautiful house and had a great visit and got to watch the end of the Master’s together.  Since we all were thrilled about Jordan Spieth it made for a very happy visit.  It was extra nice for me since we hardly ever spend any time with cousins from my Mother’s side.

After a nice dinner outside it is back to our downtown hotel and sleep at last. So much more to see tomorrow. The good daughter points are racking up fast, but really it is the best present for me.  I am having a great time with my Mom.  We might have to take another reunion tour and go back to my childhood home. 

The Emerald City

I don’t know why I thought I could delude myself and think we could have a year without pollen. It must be because the long cold winter made it come so late. But the tardiness of the tiny green particles might have concentrated it to all come at once for today the air seems to have a thick green veil. The tree spores that are everywhere like ribbons of pistachio pudding makes it feel like I am breathing underwater. I am lucky, the pollen just annoys me, not taking me down like so many who have red and itchy eyes and throats swollen practically shut.

For the past two days we have had torrential rainstorms in the night filling buckets that had mistakenly been left outside over and over again. Despite all this rain the pollen persists. I can only imagine what it would be like if it had not rained creating green rivers running down the roads and into storm drains.

The places on my car that I touched with my hands appear like skeletal x-rays with extra pollen sticking to the oils left on the black paint. One dog walking in the yard and my navy blue Mary-Jane sneakers are aquamarine with the allergens.

The only good news is no trespasser or thief could get on to and back off our property without leaving an absolutely identifiable trail of footprints right down to the exact wear tread of their shoes. Of course that also means that I drag the green stuff into the house leaving footprints on every once perfectly clean floor.

It is going to rain again tonight. I wonder how many cycles of rain and pollen-producing sunshine it will take for us to be done with this seasons irritants? At least I have not had to dodge the green tumbleweeds of pollen that blow down the street when we go multiple days without rain.

I guess this is the price we pay for not having feet of snow like Boston or twisters like the Midwest. I’ll take a week of green and a box of Claritin any day. It certainly seems timely that tomorrow’s DA auction is called “The Emerald City.” I was hoping for the gems though.

In Praise of Great Craftsmen

For the last few years the end of our gravel driveway that connects to the road has been washing away. With each big rain storm and we have had more than a few, I can find large loads of our precious stone washed down the hill about fours houses and into the storm drain. I know it makes me unhappy and probably the city, if they knew. I like having a gravel driveway because the permeable surface helps with rain drainage everywhere except the end of the driveway.

Russ has a paying job, so driveway management really should have been my responsibility and most of the time it was. I have to admit I was not as quick as drivers in my family would like me to be and so the driver of the smallest car sometimes would shovel new gravel into the ever-increasing gully that the rain would make.

One day I went to a garden club meeting and met a man named Allen Gracey who seemed to be the answer to Russ’ prayers, someone who could handle the hard and landscape needs to fix the driveway. Since I was so bad at gravel management I knew that I should not wait a moment and hired Allen to make things right.

It was the smartest decision I made all year. Not only did he come up with a plan, but he also satisfied another customer who happened to be a friend of mine and wanted to sell a load of ancient Belgian block. The perfect solution. I would buy her block, Allen would bring the craftsmen who were fine stone layers and together they would fix my driveway, fill in the gulley that years of water had created, unclog my storm drain, move my mailbox and level and resod the grassy area. I got a new mailbox in a place that meant the mailman would not have to drive in my yard and a very fancy driveway connection to the road.

What I hope I really got was a way to keep the gravel I have in the driveway and out of the storm drain and a happy husband whose tiny little car is not falling in a hole Mother Nature created in my driveway. I did not have to lift a shovel, or carry a load of block, or push a wheelbarrow full of dirt. What a happy day. This inspires me on to bigger and better home improvement projects as long as I can find other great people to do all the hard work!

Night Time Grocery- Like A Zoo Visit

After dinner tonight Carter asked me if we had a healthy dessert so I made her the five-minute miracle of Sugar Free Cheesecake Pudding with sliced strawberries. I was instantly hailed as the best mother, well maybe not those exact words, maybe it was the best dessert that made Carter instantly happy. The only problem was I used up the last of the milk in the house to make it. After the dishes were put away I decided to run to the grocery so I could have cereal in the morning without having to get dressed and go shopping to do it.

Since I have the luxury of being able to grocery shop in the light of day I am usual there with people who know the layout of the store as well as I do and could probably all win as contestants on Super Market Sweep. What I discovered or rediscovered tonight is that people who go to the grocery store at eight at night are a whole different breed.

The first, and most common shopper there was the man-alone-sent-to-the store-by –his-woman. You can recognize this species by the lost and confused look in his eye, his lack of cart or basket and the cell phone up to his ear loudly saying something like, “I don’t see red ones, are you sure they aren’t orange?” This group appears to be larger because of their inefficient traffic pattern as they Chris-cross through the store looking for some foreign item, but staying true to their sex, not asking for any help from people inside the store.

The second largest group is the working woman with the large binder of coupons looking to maximize her shopping dollars by comparing the store sales to her coupon choices all neatly organized in plastic sleeves divided up by categories, like Salas, dressings, condiments. I like to steer clear of these people at the checkout because the use of so many coupons more than doubles their check out time.

The next group is the people who bring babies and small children to the store when it is clearly their bedtime. These obviously sleep deprived people leave little children unstrapped in carts and walk far away from them as they are search for something on the shelf unaware that their child may fall out of the cart at any minute. When I see this I try and pretend I am looking for something near the child just in case I need to stop any attempted escape. It is fairly easy to do since these parents tend to leave the cart with the unattended child right in the middle of the aisle so it makes passing them next to impossible. They may mistakenly think it is safer there since the child can’t reach any items on the shelf, but they don’t realize it just makes they want to stand up in the seat to get the brightly colored box of cereal.

Tonight I also so a rare breed, the How-to-shop-for-healthy-food class from a local weight loss program. Through out the store I could hear the nutritionist instructing people how to read food labels. Her advice was good and I wished she could just have been doing it over the loud speaker so all the other shopping novices could learn from her. Of course the other people in the store were having a very hard time just finding the exact items they were looking for so I’m sure that nutritional info would have fallen on deaf ears. Grocery Store sociology is very fascinating.

Happy Basketball Fatigue

Last night I stayed up way past my bedtime to watch my adopted hometown’s team the Duke Blue Devils tie up the win of the Men’s NCAA basketball tournament that has gripped the country in the month of March and one big carry over week of April.  The emotional roller coaster of watching two starting Freshmen get into foul trouble in the first half and the subsequent success of Freshman bench player Grayson Allen who changed the trajectory of the game when the team was down nine points practically caused me a coronary.  I had no skin in this game, no bets, no brackets, not even my school, so why did the back and forth of this final of final four keep me up way past the final buzzer?

Anyone who does not fall victim to the humanity of sports during major events like the Final Four, the Masters and the Olympics is some kind of troglodyte, you know, someone who lives in a cave.  You don’t have to like or even fully understand a sport to be sucked into the stories of the competitors and be in awe of their ability to rise to an occasion or buckle under pressure.

In the case of college basketball it is mind blowing to think of these young people performing with the eyes of the world on them.  So much credit goes to the coaches and staff who are able to keep them focused on the game while distracted from the hype.  I know that for so many of the stars the real goal is to not to graduate from college, but to get a lucrative NBA contract and play in the pros. I hate that there is a only a one year college requirement before they are eligible for the draft.

No professional team is going to take as good of care of these teenagers as Coach K takes care of his players.  I wish the Freshman stars would think of staying at Duke at least one more year so they can develop the life skills that being on this team gives them.  

Today, the Duke Men’s team has got to be exhausted.  I know I am and I just stayed home and watched them on TV.  They deserve a good rest and a few moments in the sun, like when they get to go to the White House and meet the President.  It seems like it is going to be a summit in life that will be hard to top, but I hope that this win is not the highlight of their lives, just a really good start on a life well lived.

Durham Driving Issue

Durham has been in talks to bring a light rail system to the triangle and I am all for that, reducing our need on cars is a good thing, but until we get that alternative we need to keep the roads we have.

If you live in the Hope Valley area and have tried to drive downtown in the last few years you probably encountered the “Forest Hills back up” on University when a transportation expert changed a two lane straight option into a one lane straight and one lane right turn only at the light East East Forest Hills Boulevard. Losing the second lane that could drive straight to a two lane road running in front of the Compare Foods shopping center meant that many times during the day and night traffic is backed up to Thai Café.

Experts want to further reduce the lanes that enable us to get to downtown, but this time on the Boulevard -15/501 business. The proposed plan is to reduce the two lanes running both directions from the Thai Café intersection up past Fosters to the Academy road on/off ramps to one lane and add parallel parking in front of those businesses. I can only imagine the back ups we will have on the boulevard when the feeding road is two lanes at 45 miles per hour and once you pass under the overpass of Academy Road forcing two lanes to merge into one and slow down.

One business that does not have enough parking on the property they own is in favor of this. Sure, they are taking our roads to add to their parking. I am not for reducing the lanes to add parallel parking. Most people are not good at that kind of parking to start so having them stop on the only lane we have to drive to try and park will be a nightmare.

If you are a Hope Valley or South Durham resident and ever try and travel on the Boulevard you need to come out to the Rogers-Herr middle school tomorrow night at 6:30 to 8 PM to make your voices heard.

The entire South Square area needs better city planning. Just changing the roads to reduce traffic is the tail of the dog. It will not reduce the traffic, just back it up where it is not backed up now!

Happy Easter and We Almost Don’t Have Your Table

He is risen, He is risen indeed! Easter is all about Jesus, but then after church and the fabulous brass playing Handel and the Choir singing and the preacher reminding us what it is all about it’s time for Easter to be about family.

As is our tradition my parents drive down from the farm to go to our church with us and have Easter brunch afterwards. It is generous that they forgo their Episcopalian ways for my Presbyterian practice, but as my mother said today at church, “It’s nice to see so many young people who obviously have jobs.”

This year one of Carter’s very best friends, Ashley and her Mom and little sister decided to come to our church with us. Of course the place was packed so we ended up not sitting together. Carter reminded me that Ashley was going to come to lunch with us. I had made a reservation at our traditional Easter spot two weeks ago so I called up this morning and left them a message adding one more to our table. Since we were originally a party of five I knew that making it six should not be an issue since they only have table sizes in even numbers.

Since my parents need aids to hear well I had requested the quiet, adult only room for lunch. When we arrived and the hostess started looking for our reservation it was quickly obvious that we were nowhere to be found. I told her the name of the room we requested and she gave me the, “You certainly don’t think we have room for you there,” look. If it were Christmas I might say we were offered the manager.

Having just left church with a charge to go out and do good in the world I held back and just took the horrible table in the loudest room that was set for eight with no name card on it, a sure sign it was a table for walk-ins.

After a very less than satisfactory meal, but well above average company we went home. Thanks to my making my reservation on my cell phone I was able to find the record of my call to make the reservation and let management know of the exact date and time. I see that in the future I am not only going to need to phone for a reservation, but ask for a confirming e-mail back about it and perhaps a registered letter. That is if I ever consider going back. I am getting very tired of mediocre food and lots of service excuses. Nobody likes when I have risen, because I’m not going to sit on the right hand of the father, but to instruct people how to run a successful food service business, and I’m no saint.

And The Basketball Madness Continues

As I watch Duke slaughter Michigan State (sorry Hannah) at the semis of the final four I wonder if anyone is left in Durham.  The camera pans over the crowd and I see so many friends and familiar faces.  It helps that I am watching the game on the Duke Team Stream channel so all the commentary is about Duke and the side bar interviews are with Duke supporters like Chris Collins, former Duke assistant coach who now is the head coach at Northwestern.

Watching all these talented athletes makes me feel really old.  As the young men fall down so gracefully as they are fouled and pop right back up and sprint down to the other end of the court I feel an imaginary pain in my own knees.  I can not imagine falling down at all, let alone getting up quickly.  If someone pushed me over and I fell on my ample butt I know I would sit there crying.

The most impressive thing about this team is how young they really are yet how focused they played.  With the eyes of 70,000 people watching live I can only imagine the sound it that stadium.  Carter asked me if they were playing in an aircraft hanger it is so big.  So much bigger than Cameron Stadium where they play the regular season.

Congratulations Coach K, all the other coaches and the players.  One more game to go.  It certainly takes more than a village to keep this basketball machine going.  Since half of Durham appears to be in Indianapolis I hope you all are staying until Monday to keep the Duke love going.

Everything Green Spring Salad

There’s this theory about all greens in nature go together that I took a little further to make a vegetable salad to take to a Seder we were generously invited to go to tonight at some friends house. Not wanting to make anything with any dairy so it could be served with meat in case kosher was an issue I followed the lead of the great UK chef Ottolenghi.

1 bunch of fresh asparagus 

1 pound of haricot vert

2 cups of cooked shelled edamame 

3 shallots thinly sliced

3 T. Sesame Seed

Dressing

Juice of 1 lemon

1 t. Sesame oil

2 T. Olive oil

2 dried red chillies

4 drop hot chili oil

2 t. Honey

Big pinch of salt 

Black pepper

Blanch the asparagus until just tender, about 3 minutes in boiling water and then shock in cold water to stop the cooking.  Do the same with the haricot vert, that’s small green beans in case you did not know.  Chill the vegetables and add the Edamame and the sesame seeds.

In a blender or jar using a stick blender mix all the ingredients for the dressing and pulse until the chillies are pulverized.  Pour of the vegetables and serve.

Appreciating Short Lived Seasons

When we built the addition on our house twenty years ago I was childless and had more time for gardening. One feature we built in was a tiny secret courtyard garden with a pierced brick wall. In that garden I planted Clematis that I trained to grow up the wall to soften the look of the brick.
I loved the year round green foliage when I chose it not knowing about the beautiful white blossoms that came with the spring. The first spring the plant bore a cascade of small white flowers with the most glorious aroma, but the plant was still small and the blossoms were few. Over the years the vine grew wide and tall reaching the roof of the second floor.

When spring came the flowers were so many that the gardenia like perfume from them almost seeped through the windows. That smell made me happy, over powering any real sadness that might be going on in the world.

About ten years after we built the addition we decided to paint our raw red brick house a taupe color. I hired a man who I wish I had liked more since painting fifty year old brick turned out to be a bigger job than either of us anticipated because it socked up paint like a Labrador who has been out playing in the yard on a summer day slurps up cold water from a bowl.

When the painter got around to the secret courtyard he announced that the Clematis vine had to be cut down so he could paint the pieced brick wall. Heavens no I thought, ten years of beautiful growth must not be destroyed.

So I told him I would build scaffolding that the vine could be draped on, away from the wall, but under no circumstances was the vine to be cut. He was wary that this would work, but I was determined. I did have to do some trimming, but with enough ladders and two by fours I was able to move the climbing vine away from the wall.

After the five coats of paint were out on the wall and allowed to dry I tried to place the plant back. It was in no way perfect. Some of it had not made the transition well, but the roots and major stalk of the vine lived and eventually flourished.

Today I went out back to sit on the patio and just suck in the air from the best smelling flower I have ever grown. The work of building the scaffolding was long forgotten and the joy that the vine brings me the few days of the year it is blooming is worth whatever it took to keep it. This plant reminds me that many things are worth working to save.

The Candy Barons Are To Blame

My friend Denise announced today that she was going home and make “Money Bunnies” for her grown boys as Easter presents since none of them needed any candy. I thought that was a brilliant idea because the last thing we need in this house is candy.

When I was a kid Easter, Valentines Day and Halloween were “candy holidays,” but I don’t think they were full of candy to the same extent when my parents were kids and certainly were not that way at all for my Grand Parents.

Easter was first and foremost a religious holiday that might have entailed a new hat and dress with some egg salad or deviled eggs thrown in at lunch. None of this overflowing amount of chocolate and certainly nothing in marshmallow existed. How in the world can we reclaim holidays from the fat increasers they have become?

Denise is probably on to the only answer; we have to buy them back. To counteract the money spent on candy we are going to have to fork out triple or quadruple the cost of Easter baskets in cash. The only hope is that the recipients do not go out the day after Easter and spend the money on half price holiday candy.

I am open to all creative ideas that are out there to decrease the candy in “candy holidays” but I don’t want more big present holidays either. I don’t think that Easter warrants a new iPhone, maybe just a new app.

Nothing is special any more. When I was a kid it was a big day in our house when my Dad brought home a Tiger Beat magazine and a Heath bar for us three girls to share. I can only imagine how big that would go over now. So send me your non-food ideas now, but an Apple Watch is off the list.

Random Lunch

Today I had lunch with a wonderful friend who I have known since well before Carter was born. We had been in a club together for years where we got to see each other once a month, but when that club disbanded we had less regular contact, but no less affection for our friendship. Our two-hour lunch could have easily gone on for another two hours, but we both had other commitments and had to promise to schedule another in a month or so. My friend had weathered some health issues, which she is now on the good side of so it was as much a celebration as a catch-up time.

I came away vowing to try and have lunch with someone different at least once a week. I am eating lunch everyday so why not do it with a friend at every chance? There is nothing I am doing that is so important that I can’t make time for friends ahead of most everything else. I can get my walking in before or after lunch. Laundry can be done while I sleep. Carter and Russ are busy more hours of the day than I am awake.

The big thing that has been on my list of things to do is clean out the attic, but I am looking for every excuse not to get that done and I think lunch with friends is the answer. As I started thinking about who I would like to invite to lunch the list got very long very quickly. In a matter of a half an hour I had three years worth of people I wanted to see and the idea of grouping them seemed the logical way to go.

That’s when I resurrected my random dinner party idea with a twist of doing it for lunch. If you don’t know what a random dinner party is it was a concept Russ and I developed to have more people over for dinner. We just put everyone we wanted to invite for dinner in a mason jar and when we had a party just pulled names out of the jar and invited people randomly. Our thought was if we like them, they would like each other. It made for some great dinners. Sadly we hardly made a dent in the jar.

Now I want to have a random lunch. No work for me, it will be at a restaurant and everyone will pay for himself or herself. Instead of me doing the inviting I am going to let people self invite. The first one is next Tuesday, April 7^th at 12:30. If you want to come send me a private message and I will take the first five people who respond. Once you have gotten a confirmation I will let you know where it will be, but it will be someplace in Durham. If you are one of my far off readers you are welcome to come, you just have to get yourself to North Carolina. The only rule is I am not going to tell any of you who else is going to be there. Let’s just see what happens.

Like Christmas Day

Today is like Christmas, Halloween and Easter, minus any religious connotations, all rolled into one for me – It is the day the new Mah Jongg card came in the mail. It is almost sad that I look forward to this day with such glee. Every year Ruth and the mavens in NYC who run the National Mah Jongg League keep this monopoly going by creating a new set of hands that they deem as the winning hands for the year and require the whole nation to buy a new card. The set day is April 1, that everyone in America who plays Mah Jongg their way is “required” to start using the new card.

I woke up this morning think that my “New Card” might come in the mail today since April 1 is two days away and sure enough I was right. I quickly called some other enthusiast and had some friends, run, not walk to my house to play. No sooner had one group left to pick children up at school when another group, whose children are all grown, showed up to play. Two rounds of Mah Jongg with the new card, what could be better?

Just as my second group was leaving Carter walked in the door with flowers for me and a movie for us to watch tonight since she had finished her homework. How could this day get any better? I had already made a big pot of white bean soup for dinner, had folded all the laundry and gotten all my steps.

A great day is going to turn into a better night. Movie with my girl and needlepointing — Even better than Christmas day. I hope your day was as good.

It’s All About Perspective

Today is Palm Sunday, the start of the big week on the life of Christians.  As I sat in church today rehearing the very familiar story of Jesus’ last few days I was struck by the disciples lack of realization about what was happening to Jesus despite the warnings.  As I thought more deeply about it I considered that I was coming at the story as a middle aged woman who had the advantage of having had religious scholars, teachers and preachers connect all the dots of the story with the advantage of years of perspective.  It made me think about how little a vision I ever have of a situation that I might be right in the middle of.

Now I am certainly not likening anything in my life to those of the disciples of Jesus, but I am certain that I have ignored signs or important messages that foreshadowed coming events, good or bad.  Maybe, after the fact I might have put two and two together, or more likely gone on blissfully unaware.

Where I am going is that I have come to appreciate time in helping focus one’s point of view and understanding of the world.  A few years back I learned to consider that all situations do not revolve around me more deeply than the way a toddle does.  This came after a painful interaction with someone who was once a close friend.  After a few soul seeking months trying to figure out why this friend had been so cruel, it dawned on me that it was not about me, but about the pain she was in and I was just an outlet for her frustration.  

If I had better perspective of the whole scenario I might have seen the pain my friend was in before she lashed out at me and been able to offer help, rather than just being a punching bag.  But then again, maybe not.  

There is no way that one human can see all points of view over time and certainly never in real time.  Knowing this gives me a lesson I wish I had learned much younger in life, no matter what is going on it is a good idea to stop and take a breath and wait before acting or worrying or even celebrating too loudly.

My younger self was a fixer, see a problem, offer a solution.  Only now as my older self do I realize I did not always really understand what the problem was I was sure I could fix.  I am now learning not see the world as problems and solutions, but more as complex stories of different journeys, none right or wrong.

The one thing I am sure of is that no one will study the path of my life and connect all the dots and missing information or foreshadowing that shows where I went wrong and what I might have done well.  Knowing most of my mistakes will go away when I do makes me happy to keep trying and making them.  I am sure I will always be a fixer, but hopefully I am gaining a better perspective.

When Binging Became Acceptable

Not so long ago if someone admitted to binging you might worry that they were eating or drinking too much.  It certainly was not ladylike to say, “I went on a binge,” unless you were talking about buying more than three pairs of shoes at a time.  Now a days if someone utters the word “binge” more often than not they are referring to watching multiple episodes of a TV show all at once and not to eating thirty-two cupcakes in a sitting.

I am now here to say, “hello, my name is Dana, and I am a binge watcher.”  Normally, I don’t think of binge eating or even binge shoe buying as being contagious, but I am promoting binge watching as the way of the future, even saying that it is the best possible way to watch TV.

My latest addiction is an original show on Netflix called “Bloodline” that stars the very cute Kyle Chandler, of “Friday Night Lights” fame.  It is the story of a family, that I don’t need to describe as dysfunctional, because all families on TV are, that live in the Keys in Florida and run an Inn.  Sissy Spacek plays the mother and Sam Shepard is the father.  I don’t want to give away any of the plot line, but trust me, once you watch an episode or two you will keep watching it to see where this story is going. 

This binge watching plays perfectly into my two at home obsessions of walking on my treadmill and needle pointing, both of which I can do while I am watching a good show.  The only thing that gets in the way of finishing the series is sleeping.  I started watching this show yesterday afternoon and after seven episodes I decided it would be OK if I stopped and went to sleep because that meant I would still have six more shows to watch today.  

Now I am down to one show left and I am sick that in an hour my short lived obsession will be done, at least until a new season comes out next year.  In my defense, or really justification for watching so much TV is that it was not fattening, I still got my family fed during this time and i had the bonus of  never being confused about what was happening on the show because I did not have time to forget who a character was or what the story was since I did not have to wait a week to see the next episode.  

So let’s redeem the word binge from the shame it has faced in the food and drink world to be the great thing it is in the television on demand era.  Who says we need variety in our viewing everyday?  There does not have to be any shame in engulfing yourself in the world of television characters for a day or two.  This is only a problem if you can’t discern the fictional people from the real ones in your own home.  Thankfully I don’t think I am closely related to anyone as bad as these characters, but it is really fun to watch for a day or two.  

I wish I had never seen any Downton Abbey, because I would have loved to have binge watched that show and pretended to be engulfed in their world.  I wonder if I would have imagined myself upstairs or downstairs?  I guess I’ll never know.  But now back to the warm weather of the Florida Keys and my last Bloodline episode.

Herb Weiman Memorial Tuna Fish

When I was a kid I did not really like the tune fish salad I was served at home. The large chunks of too much celery added to stretch out too little fish swimming in a pool of mayonnaise just never really hit the right notes with me. Then in college I met Herb Weiman, and his skills with a can of tuna changed my outlook.

Herb and I met when we went to school in France together what was the summer between my freshman and sophomore year and his senior year and first year of law school. We became fast friends and shared a lot of cooking between us. The best part was that Herb, who had the best sense of humor, was in law school in Carlisle while I was finishing Dickinson and he often retold the most outrageous cases he was studying with me while we shared dinner.

Herb had learned his special tuna salad from a diner in Ventnor, New Jersey where his family spent their summers. He even had a giant painted plywood menu hanging in his kitchen that had been discarded from the diner when they needed to paint a new one with higher prices.

Herb was always fastidious in the preparation of the tuna salad and impressed on me not to skip any of the important steps. I was more of a seat-of-my-pants-cook relying on my natural instincts rather than learning from great master of the diner culture. I have to admit that to this day when I make my tine salad the Herb Weiman way, not straying from the tried and true recipe I am immediately transported back to those happy years in college at my first bite.

Sadly Herb passed away at the much too young age of 40 from a brain tumor. His laughter and wit are still missed by so many. I do my best to keep him alive in his famous tuna salad.

1 6 oz. can of the best tuna in water you can afford – Herb swore by black diamonds

2 T. sweet pickle relish

Squeeze of half a lemon

1 T. mayonnaise

2 t. Dijon mustard

½ t. dried oregano

Salt and Pepper

Herb insisted that you must drain the can of tuna the best you can and then rub the tuna between your thumb and fore finger breaking it up into the tiniest bits you can, making it light as a feather. Mix in everything else adding only enough mayo to make it “Not dry” which is completely different than wet. It is best made a little in advance so the dried oregano can blossom in the salad.

No Photos So The NCAA Does Not Come After Me

I love March madness. I don’t have any guilt about doing nothing but watching TV while getting my steps on my treadmill since I am sure that half of my town is also watching our home town team make it to the sweet sixteen round.

I’m not going to mention any actual team names or describe anything about the great games I watched since the NCAA announces the very threatening copyright rules. You know what that is, “This game is for the private use of the audience and no photos or description of the game can be used without permission of the NCAA.”

This blog is my private use since I don’t make any money on it, but I am not about to put it past the NCAA to go after even a little blogger like me. So I can’t post a photo of Shay Shay standing next to me while I’m on the treadmill watching the game. She normally does not care a thing about what is on the screen, but for some reason this dog is interested in basketball.

It seems like during March, basketball is about all that half the country is talking about. I would think that the NCAA wants people to describe the games and post photos of it. I certainly think that plenty of people who are at the games are doing that. Is the NCAA going after them, or are they just acting like a big bully and threatening those of us watching on TV?

There is only one thing I want the NCAA to do and that is change the shot clock for men’s basketball to 30 seconds from 35 seconds. I think that games get very slow at the end when one team is up far above their opponent. There is good reason to run out the clock and not give the other guys a chance to score, but it makes it more boring for the spectators.

I don’t think discussion about this is in violation of the NCAA copyright rules, but I’m sure the NCAA does not want anyone discussing them and their rules. For right now I am just going to celebrate that I can walk nine miles in a game and a half. That means I can sit down and needlepoint during the rest of the games.

St. Patrick’s Day is Not Made for Me

I don’t know what the original intention of St. Patrick’s Day was, but it has certainly turned into an excuse to drink beer. The way I see it, people who like beer don’t really need an excuse to enjoy it. Almost anything can be a good reason to pop open a cold one. Celebrating March Madness, have a beer. It’s a warm spring day, have a beer. Hard day at work, have a beer. You are just plain thirsty, have a beer. Not Irish, but want to celebrate the like you are, seems like the way most people do that is to, you get it, have a beer.

Well, what if you don’t like beer, or shouldn’t drink beer, how can you participate in the celebration? You could always eat Irish food — that is not really as much fun as having a beer. Nothing about corned beef and cabbage screams party. There is just not much in the Irish diet that is well, very dietetic, so I’m out on that account.

I guess that leaves Irish dancing. You know the river dance type thing where people with really good posture bounce straight up and down while wildly moving their feet. Yeah, that seems like it is a really good work out, maybe that is heading in a direction I should go, but then again, no. I think that if I were to try and bounce up and down that hard with my aging breasts I might give myself two black eyes. I guess I need to leave Irish Dancing to prepubescent little girls.

What’s left? A pot of gold, maybe a bowl of lucky charms, searching for four leaf clovers… Just not anything I am really interested in. So I just wore a green sweater today and tried to seem like I was fitting in without really having any Irish fun. I’m glad we don’t have one of these holidays for every country on earth. I can only imagine how little of Russian Day I would be interested in.

Thanks To The Food Bank



Tonight I had the pleasure of attending the Food Bank’s annual Evening of Appreciation to thank those businesses and organizations that give most significantly to the Food Bank.  The highlight of the evening is the Hunt-Morgridge Service Award that recognizes extraordinary leadership and dedication to hunger relief efforts.  This year the honoree was a man I highly admire, Ashmead Pipkin.

When I first came to sit on the board of the Food Bank it was as an ex-officio member representing the Durham branch.  I had served on other non-profit boards before, but they paled in good governance compared to the Food Bank.  It became very clear to me in the first or second meeting that Ash, a Duke lawyer by trade with a Harvard MBA thrown in for good measure was the guy to learn from.  If ever there was a question about by-laws or regulations Ash was the authority to turn to, but he was so much more than just the rule enforcer.  Ash was always thinking about what was the right thing to do to help feed hungry people in the most efficient and productive way.

I was lucky enough to serve on the board with Ash for at least five years.  When it was finally time for his mandatory retirement from the board, thanks to the term limits he wrote into the by- laws, I was worried about how we would continue without his wise council.  Thankfully about that time another wonderful man sent me to Harvard to hone my non-profit governance skills.  In almost every case I studied at Harvard an issue was discussed about how highly effective boards should handle situations.  Time and time again in that course I would hear Ash’s voice in my head guiding my instincts to come up with creative, but sound answers to the kind of problems all non-profits face.

I know I was lucky to get to sit at his side and learn from Ash through all the years we served together.  It thrilled me that the Food Bank recognized his great contributions in this way, although there is no way we can ever thank him enough.  

Tonight I sat in the audience with my friend Jane Cox who had been the President of the Food Bank when I first joined the board.  It feels just like yesterday I got to know her when we opened the second Durham Branch, but I think Carter was two years old, so that means it was fourteen years ago.  I am so thankful for all the wonderful people I have had the honor of learning from who serve the Food Bank from both the staff side and the board side.  I count my hours spent helping hunger relief as probably the most satisfying work I have ever done.  I know tonight was an evening of appreciation to thanks others, but it really made me think how much I appreciate the privilege of working with the Food Bank.

Goodbye Italian Vacation Food, Hello Arugula and Chicken

One of the joys of traveling is discovering new foods, well maybe in the case of Italy is not so much discovering them, but allowing myself to eat them.  I have to say that the Roman diet is almost as unvaried as my at home diet, except that there it is full of pasta and bread and here, well, not so much.  

To me it is amazing how quickly I can get sick of pasta, which once was probably in my top five favorite foods.  Now Russ proved that he could eat Carbonara almost everyday, it is and has been his favorite food for a very long time.  On my last count he ate it seven times while we were away, of course it helped that he had a trio of different Carbonaras at one restaurant.  I did not know there were different ways of making what is basically a bacon, egg and cheese pasta dish, but I am wrong.  

As fun as it was to try gelato in interesting flavors like stracciatella, which is a vanilla base with tiny bits of chocolate, somewhat reminiscent of chocolate chip, but not the same since the chocolate is little flakes like angel wings in cream.  Describing it was almost better than eating it because I knew that I would have to pay the piper as soon as I got home.  

Do I think that the gelato combination cup of almond and dark chocolate was worth it?  Maybe, but ask me in three weeks when I am still trying to work off the vacation weight.  Overall taking a break from the salad life is good in small doses, but in no way can I live a vacation eating existence full time.

I had to get back in the groove right away.  Russ ran out for milk and blueberries first thing this morning so I could enjoy my regular cereal.   Salad for lunch, and salad for dinner.  I actually missed all my greens.  I also came home to a DVR full of missed shows, which made getting my steps easy while doing the vacation laundry.  Treadmill laundry folding should be a new Olympic sport or at least a good you tube video.

So goodbye artichoke paninis and hello grilled chicken.  I’ve actually missed you and am happy not to be reading menus and being tempted by descriptions of yummy sinful food.  Thank goodness we have no waiters at home placing bread baskets on the dinner table, actually thank goodness we have no bread at all.

Code Share is No Share





When I booked our flights to and from Rome I picked Delta based on the great long haul flights Russ and I had to South Africa this summer.  Getting to Rome on Delta was not a problem.  I had lots of different flights to choose from so both our flight from RDU to JFK and the one to Rome were all on actual Delta planes.

Interestingly the return options were greatly limited.  I don’t know why Delta thinks so many people need to get into Italy, but don’t need to get back.  This meant I had to pick one for Delta’s code share partners to get back to the US and then use Delta to get back to RDU.

When Delta was selling me the tickets they did their best job at hiding the fact that the flight from Rome was actually an Alitalia flight.  They have a Delta flight number but outside that code sharing number nothing about the flight has anything to do with Delta.

The trauma of this fact started when we got our email reminder from Delta yesterday in Rome to check in for our flight.  Yes, they sent us the e-mail that linked to Delta’s automated check-in website, but once there we got a message saying we had to log-in to Alitalia’s site to check-in.  That site did not work on our phones so Russ said he would do it from his computer once we went back to the hotel.  Russ is definitely an automated check-in expert, but even he was frustrated when he logged in to the Italian airline’s site and they said that they did not have any record of our tickets, despite us having the confirmation and ticket numbers.  Three phone calls later we find out we can’t check-in online because Alitalia can’t issue us boarding passes for the Delta last leg of our trip.  What the #%€£!  This code share thing may only work for selling tickets, but not for the customer experience.

This meant we had to get up and hour and a half earlier this morning to get to the airport three hours before our flight since we had to check-in in person.  Many people in Italy told us nightmare stories about inefficiencies at the airport and warned us not to take our chances.  So we didn’t.  Of course since we were there so early there was not one person in the Boston flight line.  By then we had gotten an email from Delta telling us our RDU leg was going to be taking off on time, but landing two and a half hours late.  What the €%#?!  How could our two hour non-stop flight suddenly change to a five hour flight?  Did it become a bus?

The good news is our Alitalia flight got to Boston.  It was no Delta.  The service stunk, the food was crazy bad, four starches, no fruits or vegetables for lunch, the attendants were more like prison guards.  Once we were stateside I checked with a Delta agent about what the story is on our last leg and she said it was a mistake sent out by the computer.  Hooray!  We are about to get on our last flight and get home to see our sweet baby Shay Shay!  Loved Italy, love getting home.

I wrote the above at Logan Airport before our RDU flight was delayed over an hour due to mechanical issues.  I never should of written any thing about a flight until it was over because I am sure I jinxed it!

Arrivederci Roma



You know it is getting to be time to go home when Carter, who loves history starts to be bored by guides and is having more fun visiting with the local horses.  That and it’s time to get a little variety in our meals.  Last night after a week of all Italian food and I mean mostly all Roman food, all the time, we revolted and went to have sushi.  Carter was ecstatic and made me go and tell the sushi chef how great it was.  Of course she was mostly concerned that there were not many patrons in the place, but we eat on the early side for Rome. By nine o’clock when we were leaving the place was beginning to come to life.

To me a week away from home is perfect.  You get a chance to see someplace new, but you are sad to leave.  Staying too long makes me unhappy.  I am always happy to get home to my own bed, but I want to have great memories of a trip.  I think I will be most excited to get home to different shoes, iced tea and salads as my main sustenance.

I also will be happy to not have to have discussions with my family members over which is the best way to get somewhere.  Not having to follow a map will be a bonus.  For Carter I think going back to unlimited data will be what she likes best.  Even though Russ buys her the biggest data plan there is for international she still uses it up well before the trip is over and then is relegated to wifi which is usually nofi in most places.Not having to say no to “selfie stick” salesmen every few feet will also make me happy.  

Arrivederci Roma.  We loved spending time here, but still liked the countryside best.  

Potential Double Travel Disaster Adverted



For the record I am a a fairly seasoned, somewhat savvy, well researched, experienced, intrepid traveler.  Started young, and did it so regularly for work and fun that not a lot throws me.  I have lost suit cases and survived for days, arrived in foreign cities with no hotel reservations during peak holiday travel, missed planes, driven the wrong way down one way streets, been spit on by camels, survived high fevers alone in countries where few spoke English, been thrown off mopeds, broken multiple bones on an island with only a vet/doctor and a 1954 X-ray machine, slept nights on the local train that that stopped every fifteen minutes, been thrown out of youth hostels for being too loud, found enough cash on the street in France to live for three weeks, out bargained an Egyptian bazaar owner and gotten a lost suitcase back while I was naked.

So far this trip things have gone fairly well.  I made everyone pack in just a carry on bag so there was no chance of the airline loosing our luggage.  The hotels I picked from online reviews have been incredibly nice and the strong dollar that keeps getting stronger while we are here helps a lot. The tours we have taken have been great.  Carter says that Pompeii was the best so far.  The food we have eaten has been, well Italian, need I say any more?  Of course I will be paying for that part next week.

Today, two things happened that could have been huge disaster.  The first was this morning in Positano we wanted to get an early start on our three and a half hour drive to Tivoli to visit the Villa d’Este and it’s incredible gardens with the hundreds of fountains built over five hundred years ago.   

The hotel bellman went to retrieve our car from the hotel parking, where space for cars is at a premium.  He pulled it up in front of the hotel on the skinny space barely wide enough for our car and the huge busses driving both ways on the street.  After he put our luggage in the way back I got in the driver’s seat and he stood in the street to stop any traffic coming in either direction so we could pull out.  As we did a funny sound went off in our rental car, but stopped as soon as we turned off the flashers which the bellman had turned on.  

If you have never driven on the Amalfi drive let me give you a small description of what it is like on a good day.  The road, singular, is a thin strip of asphalt carved out of the cliff with a sheer three hundred foot drop to the sea on one side and a solid rock wall on the other.  It is either climbing uphill or dropping steeply down hill with a hairpin turn every few hundred feet.  The natives drive fast and close, the German Buses are too big to pass side by side with one another, the tiny three wheel workman’s wagons don’t have enough power to make it up the hills at any reasonable speed, people pass cars going the same direction with no where near enough space to see if anyone is coming towards them, but they don’t care, often if a large bus or truck is coming toward you, especially at a curve you have to stop and back up to make room so that someone can go.  

This morning as we were trying to get out of Positano we encountered at least two big busses coming at us that gave us pause, a couple of slow work men’s vehicles and a native or two who passed us.  We had gone about five kilometers when suddenly we noticed a fast motor bike starting to overtake us on the drivers side.  I looked over and noticed it was the bellman from the hotel.  We stopped as a big lorry was blocking the road and the bellman reached out his hand to my window and passed me the key fob to our rental car.  “Sorry,” he said and then turned the motor bike back the other way.  Since our car was keyless and the bellman had started it we were able to drive off without it, but if we had stopped the car we would never have been able to start it again.  We decided that was the alarm sound the car had made as we drove away and it was just coincidental that the alarm went off when we turned off the flashers.  It was incredibly lucky that we had two big busses block our progress as we got out of town, and that I had told the desk clerk where we were going.  The most lucky part is that motorbikes are able to make greater progress since they skip all the traffic by driving in the middle of the road, passed stopped traffic.  Disaster one adverted.

The second potential disaster came after a wonderful visit to the Tivoli and the successful return of our rental car.  We got an uber car to bring us to our hotel,  Since the road was being worked on that the hotel is on we got out and walked with our little rolling suit cases the two blocks to the front door.  As we walked in the tiny boutique hotel Carter said she got a feeling something was wrong from the look on the desk clerk’s face.  Apparently I had booked the hotel for two nights starting tomorrow, not today.  Rookie traveler mistake.

Amazingly enough they happened to have the suite of rooms I had booked free tonight and only our rooms.  The sweet clerk showed us our rooms with a lovely outdoor terrace and Carter announced it was a strong finish to a great vacation.  Lucky day all around.

  

Bar Bruno





The first time I came to Positano I was just three years older than Carter.  I had spent the first half of the summer in school in France and then came straight to Italy to go on vacation with my family before going back to my parent’s house in London.  Those were the days.  Carter would love it if she could live that life today.

My youngest sister Janet was only eight years old that summer we spent here in Positano.  We were staying at Le Sirenuse, a lovely hotel right in the middle of town.  During the day my other sister Margaret would sun by the pool, I would explore, and Janet would disappear.  My parents were fairly laid back even for those times, and never really knew where Janet went everyday, all day by herself.  The attitude was as long as she showed up for meals everything was fine. 

I remember one night at dinner after we had been here for a few days my father asked Janet where she went everyday.  She said that she would show him the next morning.  So after breakfast I went with my Dad as we followed Janet out of the hotel and up the street to “Bar Bruno” a dark bar with a bead curtain for a door and a couple of old Italian men drinking early in the morning.

I was horrified that my sister had been hanging out in a bar during the beautiful Mediterranean summer days.  What kind of bar let an eight year old kid in any ways?  Then Janet who was the consummate Tom boy showed us her reason for coming to this bar.  There in the corner of the small dark bar was a car driving video machine.  How Janet discovered it I can’t remember.  But I do recall that she had figured out that the machine took a lire coin that was about the same size as a 2p piece, which she had plenty of.  In fact, I think she had jammed a coin in so that she could just continuously play this driving game.  Apparently none of the old men who hung out at the bar realized what was going on.  

This morning when Russ and I left our hotel to go explore in town I discovered that Bar Bruno was still open in the very same place.  The beads on the door were gone as well as the video machine and old men drinking at nine in the morning.  Today Bar Bruno is also a restaurante and in honor of this being the first hangout bar in Janet’s life we ate lunch there, sitting at a table overlooking the sea.  Sorry Carter, we don’t live in London or let you hang out alone in bars, but we do bring on vacation to Positano, one of my favorite places on earth.

You Can’t Be Afraid to Drive Yourself





It was probably easier for the Italians to find Pompeii, 1,700 years after it was buried in 79ad by Vesuvius erupting covering it in 21 feet of ash than it was for the Lange family to find the Hertz desk at the Termini station in Rome.  That being said, we eventually did stumble upon the tiny and off the beaten path car rental center and got our car for this leg of our trip.  

Of course finding the desk was just the beginning since we then had to find the parking garage where the car actually was a few blocks away and seven floors up from the street. Just as we had the car located and packed a young American woman came over to us and asked for help, since she said her husband was too embarrassed to ask.  They had a manual car and could not figure out how to get the car into reverse.  Russ volunteered me as the manual expert and once I got in their car I quickly discovered the locking ring on the gear shift.  

The young couple who probably were on their honeymoon were very thankful and drove off in front of us.  At last we were on our way to Pompeii.  We started the winding decent down the very tight corridors of the parking garage until we were blocked by the honeymoon couple who had stopped because their GPS was not working and they did not know how to get out of Rome to go to Assisi.  Russ volunteered us again to lead them to the ring road where we would get the AutoStrada south and they would go north.     

Driving in Rome is stressful enough with other drivers apparently not really following any road rules, add to that driving without a real map and only with Google maps my least favorite way to navigate since I am a visual driver, then the pressure to ensure a less confident manual driver is able to keep up with me as the Romans are doing their best to separate us.  Carter, who for some reason felt very responsible for the happiness of this newly married couple kept watch on them as we maneuvered traffic circles and trolley crossings, telling me, “Mom, slow down, they are losing us.”  Finally we reached the ring road and even though they were not behind us I had to tell Carter that they were going to be fine that we had to go a different way to get to Pompeii.

Since Carter had been studying Western World in history I thought it would be fun to go to the oldest place I could take her.  I had debated if we should go to Herculaneum or Pompeii, but Carter insisted on the later.  Knowing that ruins can begin to look like just another bunch of rocks without a good guide I decided this was the place to spring for a private guide.  After much research I booked one through the Internet last week and we met Dino who thankfully showed up a half an early just as we were arriving.  

Dino, an archeologist who gives tours since there is not much digging going on in Italy due to lack of funds, not lack of dig sites, was the perfect match for us.  He brought Pompeii to life for us and I know that Carter will never forget all the lessons she learned, especially the more racy aspects of the “Las Vegas of Italy” as Dino described it.  

Three and a half hours of history flew by and before we knew it we had to be back in the car to make the hour long drive along the Amalfi coast to Positano.  Since I was already the Italian driving expert and I also was the only one with the experience driving the winding cliff-side coast road and I am the worst back seat driver, I took the wheel while Carter tried not to look over the side of the road into the Mediterranean as giant German busses tried to push off off the side.  Since it is low season the traffic was not too terrible and we made it to Positano in one piece.  My lesson of the day to Carter was the importance of being able to drive yourself in a foreign country.  We never would have been able to do what we did today by public transportation. Carter happily announced that Pompeii was the favorite part of the trip so far–that makes it all worth while for this mother.

The Napping Way of Life



When Carter was a baby she started to refuse taking naps before her second birthday as well as wanting an adult to sit in her room with her until she fell asleep at night until she was very old.  Oh, how times have changed.

Today we had to get up extra early for people on vacation because we were taking a tour of the Vatican before it opened to the public.  Carter did not understand why this was necessary  until we left St. Peter’s four hours after we went in and saw the thousands of people lined up waiting to get in.

One could spend a a week at the Vatican museum and still not see everything, that one would not be in my family.  Knowing this I planned the very small group private tour that just hit the highlights.  Thanks to Carter’s interest in history we were able to keep her fairly engaged and interested, but all those people eventually zapped the energy out of her.  Even a good lunch that included her favorite meat did not fully restore her so back to the hotel we went for siestas.

I have to admit I have quickly come to embrace an afternoon nap.  Rather than spending the afternoon packing in as many sites as we could see, we snoozed away, spent time on the roof top terrace of our hotel and went out for a most fabulous dinner that included lots of truffles.  

After living a life of limited pasta, bread and sweet options for almost the last three years I think I have lost my stamina to eat so many carbs.  I am already tiring of pasta and am looking forward to going to the Amalfi coast for some fish and vegetables.  Tomorrow we will leave Rome for a couple of days, but I hope when we get back we can make more progress on being tourists and less life as Italians taking naps.