halloween redux

Halloween was more than 2 weeks ago, yes, and I am just now getting around to blogging about it, yes, and this is my blog and I can do whatever I want, yes.

"Why even bother?" you ask. "What was so great about Halloween that you feel compelled to share more than 2 weeks later?"

Although the pumpkins we carved were pretty rad (see above), and my sisters' costumes were pretty rad (see below), that's not what I'm here to talk about.


I'm not here to talk about the frighteningly disgusting, bright orange-with-green-plastic-fingers-stuck-to-them cupcakes I bought and failed to take a picture of, or the fact that I fell asleep watching "It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown", or the fact that Bear fell asleep watching the original "Halloween" with Jamie Lee Curtis after wondering aloud how she ever made it in show biz.

No, I'm not going to tell you about the free pizza RLD picked up (as he does every year) by going late to the neighborhood Halloween gathering at the playground and saying "oh, I missed it?" in a bewildered and disappointed sort of way, and having an entire box of pizza foisted on him because they ordered too many (as they do every year).

No, none of that. The reason I am blogging about Halloween, even though it was more than 2 weeks ago, is because I could not let you live your lives never having seen the greatest photograph ever taken in the history of photography:


That, my friends, is the raddest thing of all: my 88 year old Gmaw wearing Lil Sis' werewolf costume at the nursing home.

the last of the kid pics

These are the last 3 childhood snapshots that I have of my dad, but I'll post more if I ever come across them.

He told me that when he was a kid, he went sledding one day without his gloves. It was so cold that he didn't really feel it when he somehow got himself in a position where the runners sliced off a chunk of his thumb. He showed me the scar.

He's on the left - he looks just like Granna in this picture!

My dad is on the left again in this picture. They're on a sidewalk, on their knees (it hurts just to look at them), playing some kind of game that I've never seen before, and that looks like a really long version of checkers. Any guesses?



Here he is trying hard to smile and act like he doesn't hate ties more than anyone who has ever existed.

unexpected adventure

First of all, I GOT MY HARD DRIVE BACK and that is why this post has pictures.

Second of all, this past weekend, Bear and I went to New York (upstate) to visit the kids. We'd been planning to go up there for awhile, but the dates kept changing because of all these different work obligations, and job obligations, and occupational obligations, and employment obligations, so we didn't make a hotel reservation till the last minute. We weren't that worried about it because we always stay at the one hotel in town, and it's always totally empty except for us. But when I called to reserve our room, they were all - "we're sold out, and we're pretty smug about it". Turns out, it was parents' weekend at the college.

So, we had kind of a dilemma, which I punted to Bear to deal with because I felt sort of ill at the thought of spending $200/night for 4 nights at a B&B, which equals $800. Interesting things happen when you punt a dilemma to Mr. Bear.

I've mentioned the house that Mr. Bear owns in New York, but if I take the time to dig through all the old posts to find it and link to it I'll never get through this post so you'll just have to take my word for it. Point is, it needs a lot of work before it can be sold, and so we have the town handyman working on it (there is totally a town handyman). Bear called him to arrange a time to meet and go over all the work that needs to be done, and mentioned in passing that we weren't sure where we were going to stay since the hotel was full. Well. Handyman's sister, who lives down here in Northern VA, recently bought a house up there to turn into a B&B and she was willing to let us stay in it for $60/night. It was a "big empty house", but one of the rooms was "more or less ready for guests".


It's hard to describe my feelings about this arrangement, but, barring any alternatives whatsoever, I went with it. Quite good-naturedly I might add. So, we drove up there and pulled into the driveway of the "big ol' pink Victorian that looks like it needs a paint job" at around midnight. We went into the kitchen and here is what we saw:



So, we thought that was cool and all, except the whole part about it being in the middle of the night in a haunted house. We went to bed, working hard to maintain our flippant skepticism, and drifted off. But, I swear to you, I was falling asleep, and I heard a female-ish whisper close to my ear, and it said "Look!" It could have come from outside I guess.

Anyway, we explored the house the next day and it was gorgeous, but in a dilapidated, creepy, old kind of way. It gave me new appreciation for only having Gmaw's house to work on - boy do they have their work cut out for them with this thing.



One of their projects, which I'm not sure has anything to do with the B&B project, is collecting old National Geographics. The floor of one of the rooms was completely covered with stacks of them, starting in 1912. Scott's son HCP got a kick out of the old photos, and was all - "those ones from the early 1900's make the ones from the 80's look modern".




The house had 5 levels, I think. The basement, which was pretty frightening; The lower level with the kitchen, dining room, parlor, and sitting rooms; The floor with the bedrooms - 5 of them, I believe. Then there was a humongous attic with a few small rooms and a giant dance hall (so the handyman said) which to me looks more like some sketchy place where a bunch of frat boys used to hang out in the 80's. And the attic-attic was above that, accessible only by climbing up onto a crate and pulling yourself up through a hole in the ceiling. Throughout the house, there were small rooms with no discernible purpose, and there were 2 staircases - a beautiful front main staircase, and another, creepier one that went from the kitchen to the attic. Maybe that was the servants' staircase? (pictures of all this stuff are on Flickr)

There was also a garage out back that maybe used to be a little carriage house. It had a hay loft upstairs, and 3 little holes that looked like they could be for birds or something (what else would they be for?). We had the pleasure of meeting the cats that lived underneath the garage (sort of) and in the process getting covered in "burdocks" as HCP calls them, and which, according to Wikipedia, is probably the right word for them.

So, our New York trip was a little more adventurous than usual. And, it reminded me to be glad for changes in plans and unexpected adventures.

Go look at the Flickr pics!

lap cat

Are you guys sick of my cats yet? Real post tomorrow, I promise.

good news and bad news which is really good news

First, the good news: today is Meana's birthday! She is 29.

Also in the good news category: I AM GETTING MY HARD DRIVE BACK TOMORROW.

The bad news is that the delivery requires a signature (but really that's good news because what if they left it on the door step and somebody took it?) which sucks because I have a meeting in the morning that I have to make a personal, physical, actual appearance at (it's my 6-month assessment, so it could be good news or bad news) but I will go home directly afterward and stare out the window for hours, waiting for the UPS man. He will think I am deranged when he finally arrives with my Precious.

The other bad news is that even though I will have my hard drive, I won't be blogging for a few days still because I'll be out of town, away from my hard drive, unable to revel in its contents. But the good news is that we are going out of town to visit Bear's kids! The other good news is that we will not be in this house, looking at all the home improvement that hasn't been done yet!

So, I will see you on Wednesday!