Spoiled, and undeservedly so.

Why are some Christmases so much better than others? This Christmas was, well, just really fantastic. The lovely in-laws came down on Christmas Eve, and we spend a hilarious and hysteria filled evening with the family at Mark and Shan's, watching the kidlets do laps around the kitchen, dining room and living room, screaming in glee from the effects of sugar, avarice and Yuledite cheer. I love watching little kids open presents. They get so excited just when they see the first corner of the box they start quivering and shrieking before they even know what it is. We gave Kyan a little shopping cart, which he pushed around for the rest of the night, picking up all the toys and accessories he could find, like a 1950s housewife. He just needed the pearls and a twinset.

We open presents Christmas Day, and I don't know what Christian was thinking when he went shopping, but I got not only a Compact Oxford English Dictionary, but a Bernina sewing machine. Now, most women wouldn't really like to receive a dictionary and an item of domestic importance for Christmas, but this is THE dictionary to end all dictionaries and the sewing machine, it has an AUTOMATIC NEEDLE THREADER. I don't have to lick my thread and get the point of the needle stuck in my finger when I feel the need to hem something. I no longer need to knit my sweaters together as I can now sew them (after they've been blocked on the blocking board I received from said lovely in-laws), and make a tidy, shiny, pretty, neat and fancy edge that will never unravel. And, using my loupe that weighs about seven pounds, I can look up the definition, etymology and first known written example of each digitally programmable stitch I use.

I'm very excited. I now truly am Little Suzy Homemaker.

Still in the running.

As most of you already know, I was in a car accident on my birthday, last Wednesday. It was a collision with a man on a Vespa while I was turning left across Aurora to get to Steel Pig for a birthday pork sandwich. The other driver was apparently fine, which is a miracle, but due to HIPAA regulations, the police were unable to give me his name or the name of the hospital where the ambulance took him. I have not heard about his state, but the paramedics were fairly certain he wasn't seriously hurt. It was an accident, pure and simple, as the two stopped lanes of traffic that gestured for me to turn kept me from seeing the man, who was very small in stature and was hidden behind the hoods and roofs of the lanes of traffic. It was horrible, and I never want to have anything like that happen to anyone I know. I additionally and not as importantly missed my Seattle Opera principal audition. I had a hard time thinking about this audition the day it was supposed to take place and for several days afterward, as the welfare of the man on the scooter kept my mind pretty much occupied, but once the worst of the anxiety after the accident was past, I became more and more upsent that I had missed my chance to be heard for real roles with such an important house. I thought that I wouldn't get a chance to be heard again until the next round of auditions in two years time, but I was told tonight that, despite not having sung for the General Director, I would still be considered for appropriate roles.

'Tis the season to be jolly.

Welcome to the world, Blewett 3.0.

Declan Joseph Blewett was born to my brother, Mark, and his wife, Shannon, yesterday:














The little burrito is another behemoth, weighing 9 pounds, five ounces at birth. I think whatever the hospital bathes new babies in should be classified as an illegal substance due to its mind-altering properties. Has anything ever smelled as good as him? No.

My parents and Shannon's parents are all in town to help. Mom and Dad are staying with us, and I awoke this morning to Mom standing on the stepstool in the kitchen, the contents of my entire spice/tea cupboard spread on the counter and Mom scrubbing the shelves and reorganizing all the contents by type and frequency of use. "This is fun!" she said. She then wanted to iron my clothes and I'm wondering what the house will look like when I get home. Will she have reupholstered the couch? Remodeled the bathroom? Who knows. Anything is possible.

An indigestible problem.

Cut it out, tie it up, fill it with sand and have the Fire Department decommssion it, I don't care. I just want someone to fix my stomach so I don't have reflux anymore. Singing today felt as though I had sandpaper glued to my cords, rough side down. I feel like I always have to clear my throat, acid bubbles constantly nto my esophagus and I feel wheezy all the time as my trachea is irritated.

I'm going in to a new doctor next week to have an upper endoscopy, a pressure test and a 24 hour pH monitor. I'll then have a consultation with the doctor to see if I'm a good candidate for hiatal hernia repair surgery. Cross your fingers for me.

If only we had loam instead of oak.

When I get home from work, the first thing I do is let Cyril out of his cage. I hear the rustling and impatience as soon as I open the door. The top of his cage has a "playtop" held open by a wooden perch, which he only sits on when we wants to be the highest being in the room. He usually waddles over to the little birds' cage and flaps for a few minutes, whether to establish that he could, in fact, gobble them up with one bite (although he's afraid of Fritz since the great October toe-biting incident) or to exercise, I don't know. He then climbs back into his cage, retrieves a pellet, climbs back out again and perches on the very front of the top of the cage and eats the pellet, holding it in his three toed foot, occasionally losing his balance from leaning over too far while trying to catch a glimpse of me in the kitchen, as I may be making him up a sumptous meal of beans and cooked squash. Mmmmm. Lima beans. He looks like a little spectator at a ball game, eating popcorn with one hand (foot) while watching the game with the one eye not facing the back wall. It must be hard to have monocular vision.

When we bought our first bird, all the books warned of the parrot blast radius. As parrotlets are so tiny, the amount of mess they created was equally tiny. However, Cyril is a medium size bird and makes a medium sized mess, right in front of his cage; a constant rain of bits of pellet, bits of his breakfast, bits of treats from the previous night, all in a little, filthy pile in front of his cage, into which I step every time I walk by, and then track into other parts of the house. I find broken pieces of nut shell in the bathroom, and not from my own consumption. Now, I know that the biological purpose of this disturbingly barbaric means of eating is to ensure future generations of the jungles and forests that are parrots' natural habitats, but my living room does not need to be planted. The food he eats wouldn't be good for growing anything, anyway. Well, maybe the squash. It grows well in Seattle living rooms, I hear.

I won't have to draw a line up the back of my leg.

I was browsing through Interweave looking at the impractical and odd designs, and a little article about the knitting exhibt at the V&A caught my eye. Scroll down to the bottom and note that there is a pattern to knit fishnet stockings. Yes, FISHNET STOCKINGS. I must knit them. They'll hurt the soles of my feet and leave little liney imprints on my legs, but I'll have KNIT them. Myself. And then I'll have to knit the balaclava for Christian. It's just so "defending the homefront".

Walt Disney World, November 11-18, 2006

Sunday, Nov. 12, 2006
Day 2

C: We started Day 2 at Animal Kingdom. First up upon rising was a dash to Expedition Everest (heretofore referred to as EE). We hadn’t eaten breakfast yet, but upon seeing a short line we decided “what the heck.” It was probably a wise decision in hind-site, as the ride was one of the more “extreme” rides in WDW. EE is, as usual, immaculately themed as a Himalayan base camp/Buddhist temple, with ratty prayer flags all over the place. Actually, quite dirty looking, but authentic. There are many sacred prayer bells hanging in the queue to reach up and clang. Or at least I did, prompting other teenagers behind me to do the same.

S: And every other person in line plotted how best to kill Christian for starting the cacophony.

C: We sat in line for about 35 minutes, which to date has been the longest line we’ve endured!

S: We found out that every line was shorter than the notice stated, and EE is a really fast loading ride, so the wait was really too short. I wanted to see the theming better.

C: After EE came “Flights of Wonder,” a live bird show.

S: And all of our friends gasp in shock! The Salases went to a bird show? I never would have thought it!

C: This has been my favorite attraction so far, as it featured…PARROTS! First we heard Oscar the amazing talking Amazon Parrot sing “I’m a Yankee Doodle Dandee” and “Camp Town Racetrack (Oh, the Doo Dah Day),” complete with vibrato.

S: It was so adorable! I can’t even think of anything snarky to say about it. The handler had to follow his head with a microphone since he swung his head back and forth as he sang.

C: A buzzard buzzed within inches of our heads, and one lady held out a dollar bill at arm’s length for a bird to steal.

S: I wish I had been the volunteer as it was a rose breasted Cockatoo, one of my favorite birds, and I think I could have made it out with the bird in my arms before anyone noticed.

C: Finally a spectacled owl with enormous eyes came out and stared at us, and she was the outright champion of the staring contest, defeating all comers.

Other highlights were the Kilimanjaro Safari, in which we saw and photographed many an animal, (unfortunately blurry due to the bumpy ride), including the elusive lion, and “Dinosaur” in which we traveled back in time to save an iguanadon!

S: Same ride vehicle as Indiana Jones in Disneyland, more noise and fewer snakes and rolling boulders.

C: All rides and shows had mercifully short lines.

S: No kidding. Everything was a walk on and Fastpass machines weren’t even running.

C: God bless the off season! But one casualty is that we missed a lot of that special Disney theming. For instance we sprinted through the Yeti museum at EE so fast we couldn’t stop to read and even see most of the pieces. Poor us…

We then bought a Pal Mickey, which turned out to be well worth the $65 we paid for him.

S: I love him and feel the need to cuddle him constantly.

C: Pal Mickey reacts to microchips embedded around the park to inform us about where the short lines are around the park, locations of animals and fun facts. Our own personal tour guide. Case in point: as we were leaving Animal Kingdom for the day, Pal Mickey perked up and vibrated repeatedly, reminding us about the parrots and anteaters we should’ve been looking at. We looked around in confusion, and eventually found the somewhat hidden side exhibits of wallabies, pygmy deers, rhinoceros iguana and other exotic fare. Unfortunately we ran to the Macaw areas just after they had retired the birds for the night. But we shall be there again.

S: Apparently, they’re not caged and hop to and from their perches and the fences surrounding their enclosures. Hello, people, how am I supposed to refrain from kissing them?

C: Next it was back on the bus for a short trip to the Ticket & Transportation Center, and from thence onto the Monorail for another quick jaunt over to the Magic Kingdom. It’s always quite an emotional moment seeing those damn spires of Cinderella’s Castle, and Suzy shed a few tears.

S: Yes, I’m a giant weenie.

C: Walking onto main street, seeing the castle and the newly erected Christmas decorations was an amazing site.

S: And, I cried again. It’s just so GORGEOUS! And huge. Huge, huge, huge. And Gothic. Preeeeeety.

C: We got there for “Extra Magic Hours” around 6pm and thanks to our ticket package were eligible to stay until 11pm that evening.

S: Per tradition, we started with Pirates (our review of the Captain Jack additions is that you can barely tell. The animatronics are very, very good, and I didn’t feel that the storyline had been compromised. We went next to Big Thunder, which just so rocks…

C: … and then we ran onto Space Mountain, which turned out to be an excruciating experience of “almost but not quite.” We were all buckled in and heading down the track to the main coaster, when the ride shut down due to someone unloading too slowly, and stopping the whole ride. The long and the short of it was that they had to reset the ride, and turned the lights on to do it! It has been one of my dreams for the last few years to be able to see Space Mountain with the lights on. Unfortunately, we were still in the dark tunnel and stopped at the top of a short, dirty tunnel that led into the actual ride area. All I could see was a few tantalizing feet of wall at the end of the tunnel, bright in fully-lit glory! We sat in our little toboggan-like spacecars for about 20 minutes before the ride was reset and we could ride…with the lights off! If we had only walked a little faster…Ah well. I suppose the magic would’ve been ruined…

S: We unfortunately were kept company by CM Manly Cheesy Guy McKnowitall, who was quite the blustering buffoon. He didn’t even know that Rockin’ Rollercoaster goes from 0-60 in 2.8 seconds, not 2.3. Sheesh.

We had time for Buzz Lightyear (seriously pathetic scores all ‘round) and were so exhausted that we stumbled to the Monorail and back to the TTC to head back to the resort. Apparently, there is a gate slightly to the right of our view of the savannah and the animals migrate back and forth from our savannah to the neighboring one at night and in the early morning. We had gotten very lucky in that, every time we are in our room, we see giraffes and zebras and antelopes of all kinds and wildebeests and other wonderful creatures. Not the same thing as moving them from game park to game park, but the closest we’ll ever get without having to actually get dirty and sweaty.

I just can't bear it.

I know I'm a hypocrite. When I read a story like this, and get so crushed by it that I tear up whenever I think of the tiny parrotlets which were the first ones I ever saw in real life, I know that I should give up eating meat. I mean, a story in a David Sedaris book about how he tried to drown a mouse that had been injured but not killed in a mouse trap made me cry because of the mouse's suffering, so how can I still consume animals that are killed in more terrible ways than these poor creatures in either story? This is particularly timely the DAY BEFORE THANKSGIVING. I love turkey, to eat, I mean. I don't love turkeys, per se, as pet-like animals in their own right, but how do I reconcile the love of one type of bird for my disregard of the welfare of another type? Maybe this is why we should all hunt for our food. If we had to look our dinner in the eye before shooting it, we'd eat a lot less meat. Of course, we'd never have to HUNT cows, as they are, well, stupid and would just stand there, but can't we kill them humanely? I could eat them, then. Raised humanely, killed humanely...wouldn't that solve the problem?

Walt Disney World, November 11-18, 2006

What will follow in the next few days is a day-by-day diary of our wonderful trip to WDW last week on our belated 5th anniversary trip. The "C:" is Christian's entries, the "S:" is mine.



Day 1
Saturday, Nov. 11, 2006
C: Whew. We made it. The travel went mostly without incident. The alarm rang at 5:30, and we stumbled out of bed. Rich and Shelly were nice enough to drive us to the airport. Unfortunately, after grabbing the boarding passes out of Suzy’s purse, I didn’t zip it closed and when she swung it ‘round, her Treo cell phone fell out onto the floor, pieces skittering in all directions. I quickly put it back together, but alas the screen now had a giant diagonal crack going through the middle of it, and the “touch screen” function was damaged so that only parts of the screen could be clicked on…Oy. We did enjoy a healthy breakfast of Wendy’s sausage muffins.

S: We then bought 4 magazines and 5 books for reading material. I’ve apparently been out of the book loop for a while as I had NO IDEA that Susannah Clarke and Jasper Fforde each had new books. The downside is that we now have to schlep the books around. One thing we learned was that we should always print our boarding passes at home from the internet. We got our boarding pass for “Group C” which boards after groups A and B, each of which have around 50 people. So we were forced to squeeze into the second to last row for flight #1 from Seattle to Chicago. If we ever manage to sleep on a flight, the heavens will crack open and pour down manna. And everyone needs to take a shower and wear clean clothes when they board a plan. The androgynous girl next to us had obviously not changed her enormous men’s jeans in weeks and she smelled faintly of poo. Yay.

C: After a lunch of hot dogs in Chicago (S: With neon green relish! Hooray for regional cuisine), we parked in the “B Group” line for the hour wait before boarding. We were miraculously rewarded with seats in the second row, thank God, as getting off at the end of the disembarkation process is very traumatic for me. All went well and we enjoyed watching Spinal Tap, while excited Disney World-bound children kicked the back of our seats (S: over, and over and over).

Our triumphant arrival in Orlando came some 12 hours later (3 hours added for the time change). We were supposed to use the “Magical Express” service to take us to the Animal Kingdom Hotel, but after asking two different people in the airport for directions, we were getting frustrated. But we pressed on and by the third person we were able to find it, in another concourse at the very end of the (very long) hallway. Suzy was ready to call a cab, but I wasn’t about to blow $30+ bucks when the Magical Express was already paid for in our package. So a 30 minute bus ride and inspirational video later...

S: which is what FINALLY pushed me over into intolerable excitement, we were dropped off at the AKL, and oh heavens, it is so beautiful!

C: And lush and dramatic. The main lobby is an amazingly gorgeous slice of Africa, especially beautiful at night, due to the muted light from the Masai warrior shield light fixtures. We were upgraded from 3rd floor pool view to 4th floor Savanna view, which was a pleasant shock, and utterly unexpected. The only down size is that the room is at the very end of one of the enormous “octopus” arms of the hotel, so it’s a bit of a hike from the lobby, but we’ll be in walkin’ shape by the end of the week.

S: When we got our room assignment, I could see us in a few days, sobbing and weeping from exhaustion, footsore and weary, stumbling to our distant room, but it’s really not such a bad walk. We also have already seen a giant giraffe and big-horned cattle ambling by in the night! It’s actually a smoking room, but surprisingly not that stinky. There’s a faint whiff of smoke but the view is worth it. Man, seeing a giraffe amble out of the trees not 30 feet below you and no fence to peer over was just astonishing. And thus ended our first day of vacation, with the giraffes and zebras and Watusi cattle lowing outside of our room.

I swear there were brains in that tissue.

Have you ever had so much snot in your sinuses that when you blow your nose you feel as though you must be getting grey matter as no one person could ever possibly contain that much mucus in their head? I mean, it has to be stored somewhere, and the cavities aren't that big. It MUST be brains.

I got sick the day the show closed. Opening night went fantastically well, we were all very pleased, as was an audience member from another opera company who gave me her info and told me to call her for an audition. Does that really happen? I thought I had to be the eager young soprano clawing her way to the top to get that blessed phone number, not the 30-something mezzo who plays everything for laughs. Go figure. I woke up the morning of the closing matinee with that ominous feeling of needing to drink a lot of anything in the vicinity as my throat felt oddly dry and scratchy. I honestly didn't know if I would make it through the opera, but I did, only to have nothing left by the final note. Nothing. I couldn't even hum in the car on the way home. Thank God I had Monday off. Every night this week with the coughing and the heaving from the coughing. I got codeine cough syrup yesterday and had to restrain myself from chugging the entire bottle just to ensure that I would get enough sleep. I infected Christy when she came to commiserate with me on Monday and now she is feeling the snot love. I have a fear that I'm going to get to the airport tomorrow and start coughing and they won't let me on the plane because I'll sound like a plague carrier. I'm not contagious anymore, I swear by all things Godly.

Another blow to the ego.

I just read my new boss' CV. Harvard, Oxford, Phi Beta Kappa, Rhodes Scholar. I'm going to take a nap now.

Feeling fractured.

There is no better way to ensure a crushing blow to your overinflated sense of self that to start a new job and and tech week at the same time. Not only am I pathetically stupid at the office, I can't remember a damn thing about my blocking on the actual stage. Ah, I'm such a professional.

I started the new job last Wednesday, and everyone was unnervingly happy to see me. As I was getting the tour and being introduced to the other staff, every person I met greeted me with, "God! We're so glad you're here!" And apparently it's not my reputation that precedes me. I could be a reformed sociopath and they'd be thrilled to have a full contingent of staff able to count to 100 independently. However, as so often happens in new jobs, I feel pathetically stupid and woefully unprepared. My new job is several steps lower on the UW ladder in terms of both pay and responsibility than the last, but I feel as though I suddenly assumed the CFO position and am expected to have the company out of the red by next Tuesday. My God, these people are organized. They have levels of checks and balances the fussiest CPA would weep and rend his shirt over, and my nervous and over-wrought brain simply couldn't keep up on that first day. I was feeling a little concerned about expectations regarding my ability to function at a long-timer level right off the bat, so I addressed my concerns to the lovely woman training me, and she suggested I take it up with the manager, also new, and new to UW, as well. I was expecting to be told that I should be able to function fully independently by the end of next week, and was prepared to work some extra hours to make sure I wasn't letting anyone down. The manager paused after hearing my question and said, "Well, I would think six months would be enough time. Statistically speaking, even an employee coming from inside the same company needs six months to get up to speed." I must have had a look on my face of disbelief and bemusement, as she shot a glance at my co-worker and said, "Is that not enough time?" I started to laugh and told her that I was expecting a response more along the lines of, "Get your ass in gear by next Friday and you'd better have all those acronyms memorized or get out." We all had a hearty chuckle over that. I'm a little amused by my new boss, who is charming and lovely and has never really had an "assistant" before, and doesn't quite know what to ask of me. It feels odd to tell a woman with more letters in her degrees than I have in my name ask me to give her suggestions on how to best utilize me. What a change. Why did I wait so long to leave? Oh yeah, I'm chicken shit. Oh, and the whole Monday off thing? Fucking awesome.

We got into the Rialto last night, where we'll be performing this weekend. The house is this gorgeous old movie theater built in the teens, with walls the color of our dining room and plaster friezes encrusted on every immobile surface. Apparently, the dressing rooms are up some precarious and noisy stairs and there have been horrifying moments of, "Holy crap, that was my cue," with neck-breaking sprints down the clacking steps. As I'm on stage almost the entire opera and have no costume changes, I don't think I'll quite ensure my never being rehired by this company by missing a cue. I don't know what the future will hold for me with this company as I don't feel as though I'm singing my best, and the other cast members are pretty exceptional, but it has been a great and extremely well-run experience. One thing that can be God-awful frustrating for performers is working for a company that wastes time, both in rehearsals and on stage, and I certainly don't feel that way about this organization. I'm so damn paranoid, though, and I haven't heard any comments, negative or positive, about my singing, so I, of course, assume the worst. I expect comments from you all, dammit, after you come on Friday.

And now, I'm going back to sleep, because I can.

I don't want to file.

I don't, I don't, I don't! I've put it off for a reason. It sucks. I get paper cuts and end up dusty, cranky and sweaty. However, it's my second to last day and I don't want to leave this enormous pile of shit for anyone else. But, the thought is tempting.

Oh, and I got flowers today. I'm special.

Knitting for the Criminals

Miss Clara, a wonderful regular poster on the Singer's Forum (see sidebar), teaches a class full of underprivileged kids (lovingly nicknamed The Criminals), and some of us are going to put our yarn stashes and needles to good use and whip up some winter hats, scarves and mittens for these kids who sometimes go without even coats. I've gone to a couple of favorite free pattern websites and found these:

http://stitchcafe.com/freepatterns.html
http://www.knitroomboston.com/benshat.html
http://leftinstitches.blogspot.com/2005/12/dobby-hat.html
http://kisknit.wordpress.com/2006/08/31/fo-second-chemo-cap-plus-the-pattern/

And there are hundreds more here.

Let us know if you can help! I'd love to see enough hats for more than her classroom, or to provide enough for even next year.

Notice

I officially gave notice today. I'm finally quitting my job to work half time. Yes, HALF TIME. There are no two more glorious words in the English language to me right now. As a topper to the glory of working HALF TIME, I'll be working with the ever-fabulous Christy and will finally not be sitting in a hallway anymore. I'll have a door. A real door. Like a real adult.

Let the celebration commence!

The high price of success.

I have to sing a preview on Friday night at the SAME TIME as the season premiere of Battlestar Galactica. It's almost enough to make me give up singing altogether.

A remarkable woman.

We celebrated my great aunt Lois' 90th birthday this last Saturday. Lois is my father's father's sister, the youngest, and only surviving, of four children born in Butte, Montana to another incredible and independent woman and her adoring husband.

While I've known Lois and her husband Bob my entire life, I had no idea the true woman she was and didn't appreciate the life that she has lead for its bravery, uniqueness and dignity until I saw all of her friends and family gathered around her, heard their tributes and stories and watched the documentary Lois’ daughter Betty hired a filmmaker to record in which Lois told the story of her life with astounding detail and nearly unbelievable humor.

Lois is incredibly intelligent, and has lost none of her facultative abilities to age. In the documentary, she recalled with perfect clarity the Butte of her childhood, a city that in no way exists in the same form today, a beautiful and vibrant place of diversity and elegance. The city thrived on the livelihood of the "richest hill on Earth," the copper mines that brought immigrants from every part of the world and saw a social scene akin more to cities like New York and San Francisco than most small Western towns. One interesting aspect of Lois' idyllic memories of her childhood and teenage years is that she remembers the miners as dignified and gentlemanly men, men always clad in suits and ties who Lois says she never heard utter a swear word. But behind the veneer of civility laid the truth that Butte was known for being a city of easy vice, housing the longest running bordello in the history of the United States. It is a testament to my great grandparents that they allowed their children to only see the kindness and beauty of their city and kept them removed from the sordid. This must have shaped Lois’ character as she seemingly sees only the good and beautiful in those around her, and not the frailness behind them.

Lois was, I believe, and early and unwitting feminist. She was a basketball star, the only girl in her college class and a woman of moral certainty, as evidenced by the story she told of her first date with Bob, where he asked her, in succession, if she wanted a smoke, a drink or to get in the back seat, all three to which she said no, a feat hereto unmatched by any woman in our family.

Lois has lead a life that I could live only in the most ambitious of my dreams. She moved to New York to marry Bob in a ceremony that will be recorded in the annals of slapstick for an appalling cold with laryngitis, an exceptionally kind hairdresser, misplaced guests, shockingly cold weather and a never-to-be-forgotten announcement by Lois at her wedding dinner that all she wanted to do was go home and go to bed, said in the approximately thirty seconds she had her voice that day and during one of those lulls that appear in conversation at the most inopportune time. All of the bachelor guests of the wedding were thrilled by what they thought was a moment of ribaldry from an otherwise dignified woman and never let her forget her willingness to commence her marriage.

Poor and young, Lois and Bob lived a Bohemian life in New York where they would spend Saturdays touring the city with $.50 in their pocket and a candy bar for lunch. New York was cheap then, she said, and, since Bob had lived there for several months before their marriage, he knew how to show a girl a good time for free.

My favorite story that Lois told, though, had to do with the reason they left New York. She was home during the day and listening to a radio drama. The heroine was a young girl from a western mining town, which was amusingly appropriate. The heroine lived alone in New York waiting for her fiancé to return to her from his overseas travails. One day, she heard a knock at her door. She opened it to find her fiancé, who then tumbled to the floor. He told her that he had returned from India with backwater fever and had come home to die in her arms. Shortly after listening to his program, Lois welcomed Bob home from a day at the office, where he worked for Ingersoll Rand selling mining equipment. “Lois,” he said, “the company has decided where we’re to go! We’re being sent to India!” “No!” Lois replied, “you’ll die of backwater fever!”

But, to India they went, traveling on an ocean liner to Plymouth and then from London to Calcutta via boat and train. I can only imagine a girl, 22 or 23, having moved from Montana to New York and than to Calcutta, being asked to represent a major international company as the wife of the only American salesman, managing a house of servants and suddenly dealing with the outbreak of the second World War. They fled on the last boat from Delhi, captained by a friend who let them know, in code, that they had to be on his boat or risk being trapped in India. A 49 day voyage around Africa followed, with blackouts every night, the threat of torpedo attacks and the addition of 500 wounded rescued from Japanese U-boat attacks to add to the 1,800 already on board ship. They returned to New York and Lois found a phone to call her father, who cried in relief that she was alive. They decided that it was time to return home and drove cross-country on rationed gas with barely enough food to eat as the war raged on.

At this point the first half of the documentary ended, leaving me desperate to know what happened next. What I do know from this point on is only from what my father was told in one long evening of astonishing communications from the usually taciturn Bob. After their return to Butte, he was recruited by the Secret Service and joined the war effort. What followed were a series of the most remarkable and well-neigh unbelievable adventures that the two of them shared, almost always together.

I did not expect to come away from Saturday’s party feeling as though I had just witnessed a great and defining moment in my life. I also did not expect to be welcomed by Lois with such love and kindness, nor did I think that I would be given the gift of having her share stories of me from our times together in my childhood, times that I wish I could remember. My memories of Lois and Bob are always of a very kind and gracious couple who seemed to be somehow above my plane of existence, living a life of elegance and detachment. I had no idea that we were as loved as we are, and as valued, that their memories of my parents’ generosity in opening their house to visits gave them such pleasure.

Lois and Bob have moved now, from their large home on Bainbridge, and are living in a retirement home not 20 minutes from me. I cannot let this time go by without taking the opportunity to be witness to more of the remarkable woman that is my aunt Lois. What a rare and precious opportunity I’ve been given.

I've learned! I swear I've learned!

Please don't make me repeat this history:













I'll never get another perm, I promise.

This is what happens when you have a cousin (Camille, ahem, second from the left) who NEVER THROWS ANYTHING AWAY. This picture should have died a quiet and unmarked death.

The Other Side of the Stroller

As one half of a childless, married couple who spends the majority of vacations at Disney parks and has Lion's Lair membership at the zoo (comprising two adults, no children) I have come to despise the Stroller Commandos. Not your average baby transport engineers, but those who pilot their Gracos and Bebeloves, their Bugaboos and Peg Peregos with no regard for my ankles or personal space. They are the ones who use their offspring's conveyance to clear a path, to hurry dawdlers along, to make the point that they, the breeders, have more right to be wherever you both are than you do. "It's a children's park," they cry, "adults with no children should relinquish all right of way and prime seating to us, the NUCLEAR FAMILY!" They use their three or four wheeled mobile nap inducer to save spaces for parades, for fireworks, for the best view of the animals. They leave their nylon and aluminum perambulators in aisles for everyone else to trip over on the way to their seats in the front.

I am not fond of these people.

However, I found myself on the other side of the wheels this weekend while pushing my one-year-old nephew around the zoo while my four-year-0ld nephew toddled alongside. I found myself getting irritated when people wouldn't get out of my way. It was hard to maneuver that little Jeep wonder of collapsible convenience around slow moving adults traveling uphill, and I'd make annoyed, "Uh!" sounds in the back of my throat and sigh in the manner of a petulant teenager if I wasn't allowed to push to the front of each exhibit so the sweet lad in the seat could see. I didn't understand why everyone was taking so long to look at the gorillas when other people were obviously waiting, people WITH SMALL CHILDREN, children who had more right to see the animals than the obviously infantile adults who were there without children and who apparently needed to find some more adult hobbies, like football and scrapbooking. I nodded and smiled sagely at other couples pushing one child with another dawdling behind, touching and grabbing everything within reach, a fine pasttime as how else will they learn what will burn them if they don't pick up things that are shiny and red?

In other words, things that would normally cause my innards to reach temperatures only measurable by laboratory methods and boil out of my facial orifices became sources of mild amusement and patient understanding in the presence of my nephews. After all, the zoo is for KIDS.

Maybe I can take this new experience with me to Disney World in November, and not mind when I feel the plastic drink cup on the front of the rented yellow four-wheeler larger than my first car filled to overflowing with an obese five year old pushed by Wanda May from Kentucky who came down in her fifth-wheel with her seven other kids plow into my Achilles'. But I don't think my memory is that good.

Nail by Nail

We'd be done with the porch ceiling by now, except I gouged one piece of trim with a scraper trying to remove paint drips, which was one of my more brilliant ideas.














This is the best vista as it looks like it's done:















It is best to not forget to cut out the hole for the light fixture. Christian did a bang up (har har) job.



















Now, just more touchup. Please God, kill me now.