Moving Day

We're moving again. For the seventh or eighth time. Although we've been in the same house for seventeen years. Every so often we pack up and move each room into another room. The dining room becomes a bedroom, the bedroom a den, the den a laundry room, the bedroom an office and so on and so on. It's great to clean and paint and make a new start every so often. It's a lot of work, but it sure beats the hassle of selling the house and uprooting everything time and time again. Someday we'll move for the last time, and I have a feeling it will be right here where we are now.

Gone Fishin'

It took me a month to get back here, but I'll make it worth the wait. My family spent the afternoon at a barbecue at our friend Jeanne's house. The weather was awesome, blue blue sky and big white puffy clouds. Ideal. Dinner was great, barbucued chicken, rice and green beans with Jeanne's specialty dessert Coconut Cake. Delicious.
Fishing at the pond was terrific. Max's friend Alex caught a 12" large mouth bass, I caught a small bass, and Jeanne was the winner with a 14" 7lb. large mouth bass. Jeanne was so excited as it was the biggest fish she ever caught. We had lots of fun. Jeanne's neighbor, nine year old Aris, came over to give me some fishing tips. She's a great fisherman and her advice really helps. I don't know why everyone in the world doesn't fish at sunset on a pond somewhere. It would solve a lot of the world's problems.

Away and Back Again

Priscilla and I went away for the weekend to New Hampshire. Joe stayed with Max for us. Since Joe is so trustworthy, we hardly worried at all. We went to see the new Harry Potter which was okay, not as great as the reviews make it out to be, but still very entertaining. We went to a homeowners cocktail party at Waterville Estates. Great hors d'ouevres but a sucky band. All in all it was a very relaxing weekend. Our drive home was topped off by seeing an ice cream truck crashed into the guard rail on Rte. 93 south on our way home. It was on fire. I called 911 to report it. The weekend is over and now we are watching John From Cincinatti on HBO trying to make some sense of it all. Five episodes in and I don't know if I like it or not. I keep coming back to it on Sunday nights, though. It's no Sopranos, but us TV junkies have to take what we can get.

Fourth of July, 2007

The fourth of July has changed quite a bit since I was young. It was hotter then. There were more firecrackers. We got up early to stand in line at the public school to get a free Hoodsie cup ice-cream and a wooden spoon. I couldn't eat with a wooden spoon without wrapping the handle in plastic because I didn't like the touch. And the wooden sensation from the spoon on my tongue wasn't the best sensation in the world but I could tolerate it to taste the chocolate-vanilla mix of processed ice-cream that I stood in line so early for. Some kids got in line for second helpings. Others asked for two or three for their absent siblings or their dogs. Then it was on to the parade. Balloons, pop-guns and my favorite, a monkey on a stick. I got one every year. The parade was long with band after band and clowns and floats of doll carriages and flowers, war veterans and politicians, shriners and fire-eaters. The sound of the big bass drums echoed in my stomach giving me an uneasy sensation, the horns blaring loudly as the brass section passed and faded in the distance. The Revolutionary tribute soldiers shooting their blank muskets in the air always stopped directly in front of us as we seeked shelter behind our parents and blocked our ears before the blast. There were always balloons being launched prematurley into the blue sky. Afterwards, the crowd filed home carrying their chairs and armloads of cheap toys destined to not last inot the afternoon.
After a few stops along the way we made it to my aunts house overlooking the hospital hill. Weeping willows for shade, family cooking, kids running around, music and festivities all afternoon into the night when in the distance we would see the foreworks and my mother would tell the story of how she was still in the hospital on the fourth of July after I was born, and she could see the fireworks from the window in her room, wishing she was with her family at the cookout on the hill.

Ship Of Fools

Cilla took me on the casino boat out of Lynn Harbor. We had a few slot hits at the end of the day so we broke even. We may take our money to the CT. casinos in the morning. We met an interesting couple in the ship's dining room who sat with us while we ate and waited to reach international waters.

Tomorrow is my birthday. Happy Birthday to me. My favorite birthday quote is by Laurie Anderson: "You were born. And now you're here. So Happy Birthday." Sheer genius.

If This Is Thursday, I Must Have Missed Wednesday

Oh that's right, I spent Wednesday working all day then going to the wake of the captain of my bowling league's mother in Everett, grabbing a bite to eat with Joe and then coming home to Cilla's gift of a huge-ass air-conditioner that will cool off the entire downstairs. Getting home at 9pm and finishing installation by 11 pm was a pain but it was worth it. Tomorrow I'm taking a vacation day to make up for the last one when didn't make it to the casino boat. We'll see what tomorrow brings. The heat wave is just about over. Max's Xbox returned from its second time out for repair. Hopefully it will work for longer than a month this time.

If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium

How fitting this movie title pops into my mind. I haven't seen it since I was a kid at the Park Theatre in Everett, but that's another story. The movie was about a whirlwind tour of Europe, fourteen countries in seven days or some such nonsense. I'm on that whirlwind tour now, only it's my life I'm visiting. My last post here was on Monday, June 18th. I turn around and it's Tuesday, June 26th. And everything in between is a blur. Stop the world, I want to get off.