Queen Anne's Lace and Lilacs

Happy Birthday, Marlane!

My sister-in-law, Marlane, and I share the same birthday.  Happy birthday, Marlane!  I hope the day is ending a little better than it started.  The day began in what turned out to be a rather comical situation, although it didn't look that way for a while.  But, all's well that ends well, you know.

Tim has been busy cooking a mostly Paula Deen dinner:  Corn Casserole,  Southern Style Steaks, Potato Casserole, and Paula's Volcano Cake.  We've never made these steaks or the cake before, but the other items are very wonderful.  The cake looks pretty wonderful, too - can't wait to taste it.  And, Tim made it all by himself! 

Bethany made one of our favorites, corn casserole, last night.  She's got basketball tryouts today, so she won't be home until evening.  She should get home around the same time that Brett should be showing up.

Evan sent a beautiful bouquet of flowers with some Ghirardelli chocolates.  The flowers actually have a very nice fragrance (you know, how sometimes, those bouquets don't really have much of a scent).  I'll have pictures later.

I have to wait until everyone's home and dinner is eaten to open the rest of my presents.  Tim seems very happy with the items he's selected.  I did get the glider/recliner that we ordered off of the internet this morning.  It's very pretty, dark brown leather.  Perfect timing on that!

Today was a little different than usual.  In connection with Marlane's morning, I ended up having a running email/chat with Erica for several hours.  I enjoyed that, as we don't get to talk very often, although it might have been more fun in a happy situation.  Actually, Erica has quite interesting and often humorous takes on most situations, so it's always going to be good!

I've lucked out and have two basketball games to watch:  the Rockets and the Kings.  It would be so nice to end up with two wins.  And this year, it's even possible!  The Kings have already won a few games (which didn't happen for several months last year, you might recall). 

"Take Me Out to the Ballgame"

(click photo for a larger view)

One of the advantages of having an ex-baseball player for a dad is that you end up knowing a lot about baseball - even if you're a girl (what am I saying!  I'm more athletic than either of my brothers!).  Now, my boys may take issue with that because, for the last few decades I haven't watched a lot of baseball - except for them, when they were in Little League - and they think I'm clueless.  But if they could have known me when I was growing up, they would discover I knew just as much as them about, not only the rules of the game, but about who was playing and how they were doing.  With just the one TV, all we watched on the weekend was sports - and any other time of the week that they were on.  I was familiar with basketball and football, too, but since my dad specialized in baseball, that's what we played just about every day after supper, in good weather. 

As an aside, I don't know if Evan and Brett remember, but I was the assistant coach one year for their baseball team.  Their dad was the coach.  He didn't know diddly about baseball, but with my instruction and guidance, he learned quite a bit - as did those kids he coached.  :)

Each summer, my family embarked on a vacation.  Many of these vacations included a major league baseball game.  (They also often included visiting Indian places, i.e., Anadarko, because Jerry Mark was into that.  I don't think we ever took a vacation based solely on my interests, but I wasn't one to complain.)  During our Haysville era, we went to quite a few Wichita Aeros games (AAA).  I loved those games.  Every night, I listened to the Aeros game on the radio.  If I got in trouble, one of the punishments was grounding me from listening to the game.  Torture!!   

It was in Haysville that the Kansas City Royals acquired George Brett and Hal McRae.  I loved these guys.  (In fact, Brett is named for George Brett.)  We often watched/listened to the Royals games, so, with Brett and McRae, they became my official team.  I also liked the Pirates and the A's. 

After Haysville, we moved to Norfolk, NE.  My dad bought the APBA baseball game.  Each player selects a major league team to manage.  Mine was the Royals, of course.  My dad's was the Phillies, of course.  Timmy also had the Royals, Jerry Mark the Dodgers, and my mother, the Rangers (although, she rarely played, and why she picked the Rangers, I have no idea).  Because I don't remember having trouble with this game, I purchased the game myself a couple of years ago.  Well.....there are so many rules!!!!  And playing with Tim!  Bless his heart.  He's not just a few decades behind - he never did baseball.  Oops.  I'm sorry.  He saw the Senators play back in the 1800s when just a wee lad.  That's about it.

So, I'm still the Royals.  I don't know a single one of the players.  I've been told they've had terrible teams the past few years.  Tim's the Phillies.  Now, we do know a little about some of them - we did watch the World Series last year.  But, you know, I have to explain the infield fly rule, errors, pass balls, home plate, etc.  We're trying to finish our first game.  I can't wait for Evan to get out here to deal with all of this.  We've gone three innings in a week.  And, I curse myself for not learning how to do the scoring back in the day.

You know, nothing unusual stands out in my mind about those games we used to attend.  I do seem to remember some drunk guys a couple of times.  More recently, Tim took Bethany, Erica (Tim's daughter) and me to a Dodgers game.  The people sitting above us were seeming to be dropping an excessive amount of debris down on us.  At first, it was just popcorn and trash.  Erica (27 at the time) had never been to a ballgame before. She wasn't appreciating this.  I was a bit surprised, myself.  I had to explain this wasn't normal.  Indeed,  it wasn't happening anywhere else.  Erica took her place turned backwards in her seat, looking up, warning us as things fell down.  As time went by, she began to get a bit upset. 

If you know Erica, you know this is not good.  For example, when I get upset with strangers, I complain to my family.  When Erica gets upset with strangers, she takes it to them.  Well, when the ice and liquid started flowing down, I knew I would not be able to keep her in her seat.  Sure enough, the next time - there goes Erica!  Meek and mild Tim was right behind her!  Little Bethany (6 at the time) and I are sitting there like, "Now, what do we do."  We finally grabbed the purses - after another drenching - and went to find Tim and Erica.  Come to find out, you can't go to a level unless you have a ticket for that level.  That was probably a good thing.  The stadium workers did get an earful!  For some reason, I'm seeing Erica swinging the little souvenir bat around.  Could that be right?  

The reason for all of these meandering reminiscences about baseball is this You Tube video of Bernie Williams that I saw today at The Riddleblog:

Tough

(Click photos for larger view) Bethany is a tough girl, due, in large part, to Erica, Evan, and Brett (not me - I tried to go the ballet route - only lasted a few months).  Evan and Brett took it easy on Bethany, because she was a girl, for about the first three hours of her life.  After that, she was just another one of the guys.  Erica didn't come into Bethany's life until Bethany was nearly 6.  Erica was in her 20s.  Erica didn't get on the ground and wrestle with Bethany, or threaten Bethany's life if she looked at her or breathed on her, but it was mostly Erica's attitude.  Erica is one of the sweetest, friendliest people I've known.  But, she grew up in Detroit.  I believe she and Eminem attended the same school.  To survive in that town, you have to be tough - you have to be willing to fight.  Erica learned how to defend herself at a young age.  And for a couple of years, those formative years, she taught Bethany the same.  (We lived in San Pedro at the time.  A skinny white girl had to be tough, simple as that.)

Bethany began playing basketball in second grade.  It was just the local basketball league.  The league played for a couple of months during the winter.  In fourth grade and fifth grades, a girl named Ali played on one of the opposing teams.  I didn't like Ali.  She was such an aggressive, energetic player.  After fifth grade, a couple of the coaches of these teams formed an AAU team with some girls from several of these local teams.  They asked Bethany, she accepted.  I learned that Ali would be on the team.  "Yea!!!!!" I exclaimed, clapping loudly.  Bethany said, "But, you don't like Ali."  I said, "When she's the opposition, I don't like her.  When she's on our team, I love her!!  Yea!!!!!"  Of course, we've gotten to know Ali much better over the years, and she's a sweet, fun young lady.  Just not so sweet and friendly on the basketball court.  Seriously.  And I think Bethany has learned a thing or two from Ali, too.

I don't have a problem with this.  When you are playing a sport, you should be focused and tough, mentally and physically.  Bethany is these things.  She has suffered a variety of injuries, of course:  Sprained ankles, sprained wrists and fingers, a blow to the chest that is taking a while to heal.  But, she's never had a concussion. 

The other night, we learned from Ali that she had a concussion, resulting from a fall in a basketball game.  After I had calmed down a bit from this news, I thought, "Uh oh.  Whenever Ali has a serious injury, Bethany does the same thing."  I dismissed it as being highly unlikely.  Well, I shouldn't be so quick to dismiss myself.  Tuesday night, while playing basketball, Bethany and another girl went for the ball and fell to the floor.  Bethany's head hit the floor, like it has many times over the years.  Only this time, she lost her vision.  Then, her vision came back, but everything was blurry and only in black and white.  Tim and Evan threw her in the car and hurried to the emergency room.  Eventually, the color came back, but even today, her vision is blurred.

At the hospital Tuesday night, they did a CAT scan and took x-rays.  Everything looked fine.  She came home, as they could see nothing wrong.  We had to check her every two hours for 24 hours.  Yesterday, she went to the eye doctor, and again, everything looked fine.  Except there's the blurriness.  Today, she went to her doctor.  They have scheduled an MRI for this afternoon.  Nothing unusual is happening, they just want to make sure nothing else is going on, and an MRI is more complete than those other tests.  Which begs the question, why didn't they do the MRI in the first place?!

It's quite frustrating, thinking you'll get the final diagnosis when you get to the next doctor, only to have them send you on to the next.  I'm hoping this MRI settles the matter and we're told something definitive and, most certainly, positive.

The Fourth and the Fifth

Everyone had a good Fourth of July evening.  The rodeo was entertaining, according to Evan and Bethany.  The fireworks were a little disappointing.  I read in the newspaper that they would be doing only aerial fireworks - no out-of-arena fireworks, I'm sure, because of the fire danger and fire department resources needing to be available to the entire area.  Tim and I actually enjoyed the show up in Placerville.  It wasn't a long show, but it was nothing like the one a couple of years ago that lasted five minutes.  Brett didn't go to see the fireworks anywhere.  He says, "Until they invent some new ones, I've already seen everything a million times."  So, yes, "Happy Fourth of July to you, Mr. Scrooge!"

I came home to watch "A  Capitol Fourth," which was nice.  I'm not really into Huey Lewis, Taylor Hicks, or Jerry Lee Lewis, but that's OK (I was most impressed with Jerry - he did a pretty decent job).  Then, I watched the "Boston Pops Fireworks Spectacular," which was totally awesome.  I've decided I would like to be there for their show in person before I die.  (Well, I guess there's not much chance of getting there after I die.)  I would like to be in a boat on the Charles River watching those fireworks.  You've got to see this:

In the midst of everything yesterday, Evan reminded us that he wanted to go to Stanford, today, for the Drum Corps International (DCI) West Finals.  This would be a pretty decent show, with the Blue Devils from Concord, CA, Phantom Regiment from Illinois, and Santa Clara (CA) Van Guard. 

Because I knew the show wouldn't end until about midnight, I told Tim he had to go - two drivers, I always say.  Tim isn't a big drum corps fan, but then, he's never been to one of the shows (Erica laughed so long when I mentioned that Tim was attending a drum corps show, I wondered if I should call her back when she'd had time to compose herself - she said she needed a good laugh, and leave it to her dad to not let her down).  I thought this would be a good experience for him.  He'll understand me so much better after this.  So, Tim, Bethany, and Evan drove to Stanford this afternoon (a three-hour trip that, miraculously, only took two hours). 

They're on their way home now, so I'll have to wait for all of the details.  Tim did mention he took many photos, so I can post them tomorrow, with a short history of how we became involved with the whole drum corps thing in the first place.

Tim said that the rumors had already begun that the only reason the Blue Devils won is because they're the local corps, so to speak.  My corps, Phantom Regiment, came in second.  I'm pretty sure that I agree with those rumors.

Slow News Day

It's time for a new desktop, it being April for several days now.  This is good.  Most of the time, I get it made about the middle of the month.  Click photo for a larger view.

Not a lot happening around here today.  I don't even remember any news items that were particularly interesting.  I suppose that's good.  If it's interesting news, that usually means "bad," and I just want to scream at the top of my lungs.   Once Tim gets home, though, I am able to release my frustration.  He often finds himself in the midst of a debate, yet I can sense his heart is not in it.  How can this be?!  He's the one that got me started paying attention to the news in the first place.

Saturday is the funeral for Erica's Oma, Patricia.  I found out that I was, indeed, wrong about several things that I mentioned in an earlier post.  Patricia and her husband were both born on Java.  Opa did serve in the Dutch Navy in WWII. 

Erica and Oma

We heard from Erica today that Oma died.  I know that Erica is distraught.  She and Oma were very close.  This was a bit unexpected. Erica was with Oma when she died.  I never met her, but Tim and Erica have shared a number of stories about Oma.  I don't think there was ever a dull moment if Oma was around.  She was born in Indonesia.  I believe she was in a concentration camp during World War II.  Oma and Opa met when he was a Dutch soldier stationed in Indonesia.  I'm having to remember this story, so I may be getting some information wrong. Oma and Opa are Erica's mom's parents.  They are a large, close family.  Please remember them in your prayers.   

Something unusual did happen this evening.  I received an email from Timmy, my brother.  This is a rarity, so it's always quite exciting.  I don't often hear from Jerry Mark through the email, but it does occur from time to time.  Plus, if I want to talk to Jerry Mark, I can just call him on the phone.  This cannot happen with Timmy.  I wish he would explain this to me.

I still don't have the pictures of Bethany driving yet.  She's only driven in the high school parking lot.  I don't know if she's topped four mph yet.  The old Toyota has made it through Evan's and Brett's learning to drive.  It should last through Bethany's learning, too.  I am still just stunned that she's 15.  I haven't stopped shuddering from riding in the car when Evan first started driving! 

I made another couple of scrapbook pages today.  The first was for a scraplift challenge.  It's not so much my usual style, so it took a couple of days, which, considering there are really not any elements, is longer than what it would take a normal person.

The second was my avatar that I'll use for a couple of months at Mo Jackson's place.  I just  threw it together tonight pretty quickly.   It doesn't have much on it, either.  Still,  two layouts in two days is possibly a record  for me.  Click on photos for a larger view.