Monday Mirth :: that was easy

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Happy Monday

Monday Mirth :: business as usual

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Happy Monday

Spring and all the things

Jordan Peterson and our Audrey, on her birthday

I checked and it's true: It has been two weeks since Audrey and TG went to Jacksonville to see and hear and meet Jordan Peterson.

It was Audrey's birthday.

TG and Audrey at the venue

They set out mid-morning for the four-hour drive and got to Jacksonville in plenty of time to check into their hotel and have supper before making their way to the venue.

Which was across the street from their hotel, so that was easy.

Audrey told me that the event was everything she had hoped for, and then some.

This will be on display for the foreseeable future

Even a few minutes in the presence of Dr. Peterson was awe-inspiring, she said.

TG enjoyed it too, and now it's a splendid memory for the two of them.

As VIP ticket holders, in addition to their event badges on lanyards, they each brought home a small poster that had been signed by Jordan Peterson. 

Grilled chicken ... one of TG's specialties

I'm displaying TG's on the refrigerator until I get tired of looking at it, which won't be any time soon.

Dagny stayed with me while they were gone, and we went shopping. She had some money to spend on her mother for a birthday gift, and we did get that, but we looked at lots of stuff and had a great time.

Wavy and BBQ chips ... Erica said the BBQ ones were super hot

The next morning, we got busy getting ready for Audrey's birthday party, which was set to take place that afternoon.

TG and the birthday girl were back in town by three, and by four we were having a cookout.

Got to have burgers and dogs

I'd made the standard go-withs: baked mac and cheese, deviled eggs, cole slaw with tangy homemade dressing, and celery sticks with ranch dip. Erica brought two kinds of chips.

In addition to hamburgers and hot dogs, we had chicken tenderloins done on the grill. All I do is marinate them for several hours in straight soy sauce. TG grills them and they come out phenomenal.

Best dip: just mix the ranch powder with sour cream

I didn't get any pictures of it -- were were too busy eating it -- but for dessert, in lieu of a birthday cake I did the same thing we did for TG's birthday in late January: a Costco plain cheesecake.

Dagny had helped me slice and macerate four pounds of strawberries, and there was lots of whipped cream to go on top of everything.

Homemade slaw dressing of mayonnaise, apple cider vinegar, and sugar

It was heavenly and Audrey said it was exactly what she wanted for her birthday dessert.

She opened her gifts and was happy with everything she received. In addition to giving Audrey a lovely present, Mike brought the balloons.

Kraft Deluxe but add milk and shredded cheddar, and bake

Aren't birthdays grand? We enjoy ours to the fullest, I believe.

Once that festive occasion was concluded, we were cruising towards Easter.

After supper it was time for birthday presents

But first, Baby Elliot turned six months old. Cherica (Chad and Erica) celebrated that happy time by having a special cupcake for him after their family's lunch on the day.

As Easter loomed, it was decided that we would go to Mike's house for Sunday dinner after church.

Audrey received gifts large and small

On the day before (last Saturday), I made all of the food and TG and I took it over to Mike's.

I also took along some decorations for the table, and set all of that up so I wouldn't have to do it the next day.

Baby Elliot turned six months old :: photo courtesy Erica Porter

Mike was game to help with the cooking so I left instructions for him and on Sunday morning, he put the ham in the oven and started up the crock pots after adding to them what I'd told him to add.

Mike's mother joined us for lunch and spent the day, as well as our friend Andrea from church.

Our menu was maple glazed spiral cut ham, apple pie baked beans (if you haven't tried those yet, you really must), pineapple casserole, mashed potatoes, slow cooker creamed corn, seven layer salad, and rolls. 

Our Easter table decorations

For dessert, Erica had made a lemon blueberry trifle and we topped our individual servings with whipped cream.

Yowza. Wish you could have been at the table with us.

Erica's dessert trifle was no trifling thing

While still at the church on Sunday morning, we got some pictures of the families and almost-families.

There was TG and me, Cherica with Rhett and Baby Elliot, and Mike with Audrey and Dagny.

I don't remember who I was waving at

Our weather was perfect: sunny and balmy.

It was a tad bit cooler in Western North Carolina where our Stepanie and her family live, but still nice, with sunshine. They sent us a family picture later in the day.

Chad and Erica with Rhett and Elliot

Our son-in-law, Joel, is a pastor in Lenoir, North Carolina, and they had a big day at their church, with more in attendance at a single service than ever before since he became the pastor there in 2007.

Back here in Columbia, Mike's house is on a golf course, so after lunch, when we weren't all sitting on the deck drinking coffee, some of us took a walk onto the links.

Audrey, Dagny, and Mike

There were hardly any golfers on Easter Sunday.

Rhett had a bottle of bubbles and when he wasn't getting into minor skirmishes with Dagny (they behave just like a brother and sister), he busied himself with that.

Stephanie, Joel, Melanie, Allissa, Andrew :: photo courtesy Stephanie Bixler

Mike asked his neighbor if he could borrow his golf cart, and of course the answer was yes, so he took Audrey and Dagny and Chad and Erica for a ride.

Next thing I knew, he had jettisoned Cherica and Dagny, and made off with Audrey by herself.

Rhett busied himself blowing bubbles :: photo courtesy Audrey Weber

Clever chap. Eventually he brought her back.

Back here at home, I am still decorated for spring, but with the exception of a small selection of my many bunnies, I have put the Easter decorations away.

Bunnies will be on display throughout April

Because here we are in April, and Easter is already done. Next stop, Mother's Day -- only five weeks hence. Time to start planning your gifts and get-togethers to honor all the moms.

That holiday will coincide with another pretty spectacular event, but I will not give any of that away just yet.

A bit of bovine levity

All I know is, you will be delighted and amazed and you'll say so. For now though, keep your powder dry and be patient.

TG is already talking about getting the pool ready for opening day, which, if the weather cooperates (as in, if it's not raining), will be Memorial Day.

Sheep dog and sheep

But wait. First we will celebrate our second-eldest granddaughter Allissa's sixteenth birthday next week. 

She was born on Tax Day but as is our habit, we'll get together next Friday evening up at the North Carolina / South Carolina line and have a meal at the Cracker Barrel there, and a birthday party for sweet Allissa.

Allissa and Piper :: photo courtesy Stephanie Bixler

How can she be sixteen? Five minutes ago she was five, and then seven, and so on. You know the drill.

We've got special things in store for that momentous birthday in a girl's life, and you know that I will tell you all about it after the fact.

Meanwhile, tell me all about how your Easter went, and your upcoming plans for this glorious springtime.

And that is all for now.

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Happy Friday

Monday Mirth :: run

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Happy Monday :: Happy Easter Week

Savannah ... it was a trip

I was aiming for those birds up there

I cannot believe it has been two whole weeks since the pirate had a birthday.

We did go to Savannah G-A, for two nights and parts of three days.

It was much as we'd left it the last time we visited, several years ago.

I bungled part of my birthday in that I picked the wrong place to eat supper. I won't go into details but my choice, though based upon a past good experience, turned out to be not what I anticipated.

I won't be making that mistake again.

The main gate at Wormsloe ... not an entrance

Next time we visit Savannah, I will make it a point to dine at The Pirates' House, which will be a whole new culinary adventure.

Can you believe I've never been there? Me neither. We have our heading.

I'll let you know how it goes.

Meanwhile here's what we did: on my actual birthday, we traveled to Savannah -- a trip which takes under three hours -- and walked on the waterfront.

The fireplace outside Wormsloe's gift shop

Though not even among the top ten oldest cities in America, Savannah is an old city. Thus the architecture is fascinating.

Also there are cobbled streets and perilous sets of stone steps to climb, to get from River Street down to Riverfront Plaza.

I have long had a penchant for pointing my camera upwards to where roof lines of impressive buildings meet a pretty sky.

That's how I came up with one of perhaps a half-dozen pictures I took on my birthday.

TG concluded that the building, featuring massive iron X shapes at both ends, apparently is held together by iron cables that run the length/width of the building, under the floors or above the ceilings, connected to the iron X's.

I could have spent an hour in here

At least that's what appears to be going on. I just liked how it looked, although at first, I was aiming for the birds perching at the top against the blue.

The shops and establishments along the waterfront, in addition to the nice hotels, are your basic restaurants, bars, souvenir shops, and huge candy stores.

We did buy some candy. It was good. TG is inordinately fond of chocolate-covered pretzels, and they were available in abundance.

I even got one. The chocolate coating had been dredged in Butterfinger crumbs. Excellent.

I walk on Oak Alley one day after my birthday

We bought postcards and fridge magnets like we do everywhere we go. That's how boring and predictable we are, hahaha but somehow I enjoy doing that.

I send the postcards to the grandkids. Our Stephanie, when she was little, loved receiving postcards in the mail, and I think that kids still do.

By far my favorite store on the waterfront is The Mad Hatter. I bought a hat there many years ago that I have worn slap out, except it will survive me -- it's a quality soft woven straw with a huge brim and a black chiffon scarf. 

I wear it when I walk in the summer, and I wear it in the pool to keep the sun out of my eyes, and I love it.

No picture could do justice to the beauty there

But on this visit I bought a fancy hat, which I plan to wear on Easter and you know I will share a picture of all of us in our Easter finery, at church.

Can you believe that's a week from Sunday? Early this year.

Speaking of early, we returned to our hotel on my birthday at what would likely seem an early hour to most, but I was weary of roaming and wanted to rest.

The next day, a Friday -- two weeks ago tomorrow -- was a beautiful day with perfect weather.

I had my coffee in the room and TG brought me a bagel from the breakfast bar, but when we headed out I was in the mood for a nosh.

TG beside an old silo

We stopped at a place called The Diner (open 24 hours) and I enjoyed peach French toast and more coffee, while TG had scrambled eggs and bacon.

From there we navigated to Wormsloe Plantation.

Wormsloe was built on a 500-acre grant from the Crown to Noble Jones, who arrived in Georgia in 1733 along with James Oglethorpe, and the rest is history.

On Wormsloe is the oldest standing structure in Savannah: the ruins of Noble Jones's tabby mansion.

There isn't much left but what there is, is interesting enough if you're into that sort of thing.

And then there's me

It's been on my radar for many years to walk Oak Alley at Wormsloe, and after admiring an outdoor fireplace and plundering their fantastic gift shop, we did that.

Oak Alley -- a mile or more of Southern Live Oaks that line either side of a dirt avenue, their Spanish-moss-festooned branches arching overhead to touch one another -- is one of those things you must see to appreciate.

We were told that direct descendants of Noble Jones still occupy forty acres cheek-by-jowl with Oak Alley. You could look to your left and see the outbuildings on their estate.

Other than the alley of oaks, there is not a whole lot to see at Wormsloe. There are the ruins, and a single grave marker that is more of a monument to the Noble Jones family than an actual resting place.

The tabby ruins: oldest standing structure in Savannah

After doing all of that, we were tired and opted to ride the trolley back down Oak Alley, back to the gift shop and parking lot and so forth.

On the way we received a strident and vaguely accusatory lecture on slavery. We were urged to buy a book in the gift shop that would further educate us on the subject.

We were semi-shamed for coming there just to see some oak trees.

The driver pointed out that when Wormsloe was turned into a historical site that folks could visit, sometime in the nineteen seventies, tour guides placed heavy emphasis on the Colonial aspects of life there back in the day.

And while she didn't come right out and say it in so many words, her tone suggested that such emphasis proves how racist we are as a country.

Monument to Noble Jones and his kindred

And implied that the emphasis should have been placed heavily on slavery, from day one.

(Because it's our job now to constantly emphasize everything America and Americans have ever done wrong, and to not just ignore anything we have done right, but deny that we have ever done anything right at all.)

I looked around and saw that everyone on the trolley, by my estimation, was at least fifty years old.

Leading me to conclude that everyone on that trolley was aware that slavery existed in the antebellum South, and that in visiting a plantation that predated the Civil War by over one hundred years, we were walking on land where there once were slaves.

But the female trolley driver, as she guided the multi-car vehicle over the bumps and ruts of Oak Alley, delivered what amounted to a sermon, for practical reasons omitting only the altar call where we would be invited to prostrate ourselves and repent.

Rhett, doing his coloring at Carey Hilliard's Restaurant

Of something that we ourselves did not do.

No thanks. I believe that I am sensitive enough to the issue of slavery -- no, it wasn't right. If I had my way, no one would ever have been, or ever be, enslaved by another human being.

No one in their right mind would say, or think, or desire, anything different than that.

But slavery was abolished in the United States. A long time ago. And no, I cannot do anything about something that happened more than a century -- and even longer -- before I was born.

I can't do anything about something which has existed practically since human beings were created, but in which I have never participated.

Two cousins and a phone box

For that matter, slavery exists all over the world, to this day. But hardly anyone seems to ever want to talk about that. 

Because you can't blame America for that. Oh wait. Yes you can. It's Trump's fault.

At any rate, we endured the bumpy ride and the self-righteous faintly rebuking monologue by the trolley driver, then exited said conveyance and went back to our car, none the worse for wear.

That same day, in the afternoon, Audrey was loading up daughter Dagny and nephew Rhett (two of our eight grandchildren) in Columbia, and heading for Savannah to join us.

I would have bought this if it had been for sale

We met them for supper that night at Carey Hilliard's, a local restaurant chain known for their fried chicken.

There we had a wonderful meal and talked about our schedule for the next day.

Originally the plan had been to take the children to Wormsloe on the Saturday.

But the weather forecast stopped us: Saturday was to be nothing but rain, and Wormsloe is ninety-nine percent an outdoor activity.

The B-17 City of Savannah

Besides, the kids would not have liked Wormsloe; it was nothing but walking, and not much to see.

So we changed tactics and decided to take the kids to the National Museum of the Mighty Eighth Air Force in Pooler, Georgia.

After dinner we went to our respective hotels, having set a time to meet at the museum the next morning.

The rain came as promised, and we met up as promised.

This is the first exhibit to meet your startled eyes

The museum is very well done, and I would recommend that history buffs -- especially those of the World War Two variety -- make plans to visit there, if you can.

Museum exhibits as a rule don't necessarily thrill kids, but there were interactive features which Dagny enjoyed, and small theaters here and there showing documentaries, and several gorgeous airplanes, including the City of Savannah, a B-17 bomber.

Before we even set a foot in the exhibits, though, we spent twenty minutes in the gift shop.

I bought a magnet commemorating D Day, and a small toy plane for Rhett. He carried it carefully for the rest of the trip.

This was my favorite exhibit of them all

TG picked out two books, which on the spot I ordered for him on Thriftbooks, saving at least fifteen dollars.

Just call me Clever Clogs.

Flags and banners were everywhere. If I could have, I would have bought the banner of the 44th Bomb Group.

But it was not for sale.

(My favorite number is 44, and my father's initials were BG. He was trained as an Air Force fighter pilot, although he never saw combat.)

Dagny with cousin Elliot on the Sunday at church

About halfway through the tour, I found my favorite exhibit by far: remnants of a Nazi flag that was captured upon the liberation of six thousand American prisoners of war at Stalag VII-A in Moosburg, Germany, on April 29, 1945.

The POWs signed the flag and put their home towns, and whatever else they wanted to write.

The flag is displayed like a huge table, under glass, so that you can walk around it and read what the American heroes wrote.

I read many of the entries; there was no bitterness, no cursing, no blame, no vitriol inscribed there.

Only gratitude, and love, and joy.

Elliott's big brother Rhett posed with my balloons

How I wish we could get back to that, as a nation.

By the early afternoon, the kids were done but TG still wanted to wander amongst the exhibits, so Audrey and I took the children to the Cracker Barrel next door, and fed them.

Rhett, after one bite of a chicken tender, fell sound asleep on his Aunt Audrey's lap. We had worn the boy out.

Shortly after that, we collected TG and both cars headed for home. We pulled into our driveway right around seven o'clock and went inside to set the clocks forward an hour.

There was a luscious cake under glass ...

The next evening, after our hour-long Sunday night service at church, we all repaired to Chad and Erica's house for my birthday party.

There was a splendid cake, and the requisite birthday balloons.

But hold your horses. First, I'd made Naughty Hammie Sammies and Erica had made a tangy slaw, and we all chowed down on that.

Mike, Audrey's beau, had returned from his two-week business trip to China and had brought gifts for everyone.

There were luscious silk scarves from Hong Kong, and precious mother-of-pearl inlaid purse mirrors.

... to which we laid complete waste

In addition, my children had bought me some lovely things for my birthday.

We tucked into that cake and it was scrumptious, and then we visited some more before heading for home.

Goodness. We do drag it out, don't we?

I haven't even told you about our party (it's been a month ago now) to celebrate our grandson Andrew's turning twelve.

Our grandson, contemplating what it means to be twelve

Andrew belongs to the North Carolina contingent, and we met as usual at the Cracker Barrel on the line where the two Carolinas meet, for a meal and a birthday party.

He was born on two twenty-two twenty twelve, at two thirteen in the afternoon. How the years fly by.

That about covers it until Audrey's birthday this coming Friday, which will be celebrated with a cookout here at Casa Weber on Saturday.

We cannot do it on Friday because that's the day that Audrey and TG are traveling to Jacksonville, Florida, where they have VIP tickets to see, hear, and meet Dr. Jordan Peterson as part of his We Who Wrestle With God tour.

It's not a birthday without balloons

They'll be back on Saturday afternoon and they'll have lots to tell us at the party.

Then, on Tax Day, our Allissa turns sixteen. 

There will be another party, as well as a full report to follow.

Meanwhile I hope you are doing well and that you'll tell me all about it in the comments.

And that is all for now.

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Happy Thursday

Monday Mirth :: think again

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Happy Monday

Monday Mirth :: I get a kick out of you

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Happy Monday

I'm humming something

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Our daughter-in-law, Brittany, sent me this candy dispenser for my birthday.

Which is today. Can you believe? Again? Make it stop already.

The dispenser holds three different kinds of candy. In case you're wondering or cannot tell, what's currently in there are Peanut Butter m&m's, Skittles (the original lime-up), and Jelly Belly jellybeans.

At this early stage in the game I will only say that it's a tad bit too easy to depress the lever and dispense several delectable treats into your hand.

Once a day would be too many times. But who's going to do that only once a day? It's a delicious dilemma.

Be that as it may, we're off to Savannah for a few days, leaving my candy dispenser, for the most part, unattended.

We plan to visit Wormsloe Plantation and the National Museum of the Mighty Eighth Air Force.

The alarm will be on here at the domicile, so don't try anything.

If you do decide to come in anyway, heed a pirate's advice: keep to the code.

p.s. Thank you to those precious blog buddies and friends who have sent birthday cards. I treasure them and you.

And that is all for now.

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Happy Thursday