Hey, folks, I’m sorry. The freezing stuff went south of us, okay? It’s not that you were cursing or even growling and I appreciate that, but there was gloom. Now I know it took a lot for you to work yourself up to silent gloom and disgust and I hope the trend continues until being left off of the 2 hour delay list is greeted with a shrug.

But I think I am going to allow myself the luxury of pointing out that this grandma did not look at the back of your pants and see a sticker as you stomped  across the parking lot and let you go on into school. This grandma opened the door and softly called your name, knowing that you would probably glower as you looked back. And thanks to this grandma you did not go into the building with a new pants sticker reaching all the way from your butt to your knee.

And I am going to give myself a gold star. A BIG one.

Okay, carry on everyone.

Last weekend Der Bingle came back from Scott’s with a container of Jarlsberg cheese dip and I had a taste and now I am addicted to it. I bought another container today and when I put it on a cracker and then in my mouth, I realized it wasn’t as intense as I wanted it to be. So I put some on a cracker and turned the cracker over so the cheese would hit my tongue and that was pretty good. However, I am worried about the coordination required to get the cheese dip on the cracker to my mouth without it falling off first. I am now contemplating taking a bit of the dip on a spoon, dropping it on my tongue and then taking a bite of cracker.

I spend time thinking about such things. I don’t think it is a curse, but I’m not certain it is a blessing. I’d say I’m an outside of the box person.

My mother was told in October- specifically on the day after her birthday  – that she had advanced pancreatic cancer and “very little time” left. I think I heard the words “three month” but even I knew that was optimistic. As it was she died on the 17th, a week after she found out the diagnosis. We had prepared for a longer time – prepared by getting things; I don’t know how I was preparing to get through the actually process emotionally – Mother’s and mine.

But she died. And that was that. Only it wasn’t that. It wasn’t a step-by-step powering down; it was a quick brownout and then, like that, it was done. It was not a Tuesdays with Morrie situation. Had she made it three months, she would have passed away this month, this January and I don’t know what we would have gone through or what she would have endured.

I wonder if we had not told her the diagnosis right away – if we had put her on the sofa and told her she just had to sleep and rest and watch DVD movies and the Colts games and plan for when she had built herself back up. Probably she would have pushed it, not rested, tried to hurry building up her strength and caused herself intense discomfort and eventually the emotional agony of knowing we had deceived her.

She was not one to take things lying down; she was so feisty. I wish she could have a had a couple of weeks of comfortable interaction with the world, the saying of things that maybe she wanted to say. But I suppose that was not her nature.

I just sneezed and it felt good and I feel better and it was just a small ah-choo, not one of my famous “blow the little pig’s house down” sneezes. I had a restless night with nightmares and brief awakenings and then an early final awakening and a lie in bed period while waiting for dawn. I didn’t make dawn; I gave up and got up and grabbed a coke/diet coke, aspirin, a peanut butter foldover and my computer. I sat here looking at the news thinking many judgmental thoughts and had a good idea this was going to be a grumpy AJ day.

And then I sneezed. My spirits lifted. I know you can cry out stress chemicals, but can you sneeze them out? Probably not; more than likely I sneezed out part of some evil magic spell. Some things are just so obvious – like hitting your aching thighs with an antique meat tenderizer to simulate a massage.

I’m just spitting out these words to cover the fact I am faced with washing my hair for the first time since it was cut on Friday in a layered bob. When the stylist dried it and curled it, it looked so vibrant and sophisticated. I am concerned my attempts will end up in a mutt look. Well, having confessed, here I go to do the deed.

Crate & Barrel. Wait a minute, this is not all I got; I left a wee bit more, but not much at all and I left some at the Ohio Redoubt.

I think these are great and the price . . . yea!

Page reference is HERE.

And I got one of these for me.

Thank goodness for open stock. Read about them HERE. I like my glass a lot. A whole lot. Maybe I should write on it what I have put on my scissors – “Touch and Die”.

Look at THIS LINK to see these glasses – I bought one.

The cute high ball one.

Then you can look at THESE and read about the two taller ones I got.

Okay, I’m bored doing this; I wasn’t when I started, but I am now – bored, that is. So I will just do the happy dance and song about open stock at Crate & Barrel. Can you hear my tap shoes and my singing? You are soooo lucky.

Alison’s mother suffered a stroke Monday night and so this morning, I drove her down to her sister’s in Cincinnati. It was a long trip with I-75 squeezing three narrow lanes between abutments in a construction zone that stretched through Dayton and a good part of the way to Cincinnati. In this part of the Ohio River Valley, settlements and streets followed the ridge lines and it is often quite possible to not know where you are.  I wasn’t real certain where I was when we left I-75 to get to Alison’s sister’s house, but, yes, I-74 did lead to Montana which led to Boudinot which led to the street her sister lives on. It’s just there were many intersections and often a four lane street would become a two lane with parking lanes. So, while watching the street signs I had to make certain I didn’t whomp right into a parked car. It’s not like they were lined up – just here and there. Little signs announced parking lane when it occurred.

Then when I backed out of the driveway, I did get lost. I had no idea where I was and was very tired with squinty little eyes so I adopted a driving style known as “go with the lights and the flow” and eventually I saw the downtown skyline of the city. I knew I had not crossed the Ohio River  so I was somewhat concerned but as I flowed along I found myself crossing a valley filled with railroad tracks.

Do you know that the downtown streets in this old river city are very narrow? Yes, they are. A lot are one way. I knew I-71 had to be out there somewhere and just a little north of Mount Adams I caught up with it. I could have just followed it to 275 and then 75 but I thought, “I know there is a Crate & Barrel here and I can do this without wrecking the car.” And I did.  That lifted my spirits a lot.

I decided I’d stop by my friend Joan’s house but she wasn’t there so I called her phone and left a message to look on her patio where I had written my name in the snow. This pretty much convinces me that if you are born a little odd, you are probably going to die that way. I guess I could have left a note stuck on the door – but the snow thing . . . it was so AmeliaJake. You know once Joan was riding in the passenger seat and looked out her window and asked if the double yellow line was supposed to be on her side? Yeah, I think we were lost then too.

Then I took the wrong exit on 675 and re-enacted a previous Fairborn excursion just like the one we had in the dark of night coming back from Kings Island and my duel with death on the Diamondback, followed by the unceremonious hurling on White Water Canyon.

I am now sitting on the sofa in the Ohio Redoubt with my feet on the coffee table and I am drinking Coke and Diet Coke in my new Krosno Made in Poland glass. I also have a Made in Mexico and Made in Turkey glass. Maybe next time I go there, I will get a collection of many countries – but not China – China is scary. Oh, by the way, this was a really upscale Crate & Barrel – I sort of felt like a frump going in and coming out, but I got my stuff  so HA! The San Diego store was more casual – it cried for you to come in and buy mismatched glasses.

I wonder if my rambling is an extension of my tendency to get vaguely lost in certain areas. I mean I am not really ever LOST; I’m just a little not certain of the GPS coordinates sometimes. I am pausing to think about this. Maybe I’ll get an aspirin as well.

Oh, about the time LZP broke his arm, he sent this picture of his daughter, his oldest child and our niece – well, she and Der Bingle share the DNA, but I’m proud to be her aunt. It came through on my email when we were grappling with getting Der Bingle re-established in Fairborn and then getting the school schedule going again. So, I’m late in sharing it.

This is Miss Jody Vance and the apple of her dad’s eye:

LZP says, “I really think it captures her spirit and sense of rascalism.”