Little Monkey Business

Jillian with the sock monkey my sister Lynn made for her.

Yellow -

not banana,

butter, or Crayola.

Sunflower yellow, bursting bright

with seeds.

Sunflower Rising

Sunshine starburst peeks

between green broccoli leaves;

rising and shining.

Fall Fruits of Labor

Finally, the first lemons fell from the tree today! The green beans are so bountiful, I've spent the past two days picking them by the fist-fulls. Yesterday, I flash-froze three 1- gallon bags and there are still more to pick.

This year, I'm drying most of the herbs and so far have jars and jars of rosemary, basil, lemon basil, parsley and sage.
Next up is broccoli, peppers, red-leaf lettuce and tomatoes. I just love this time of year!

Holly Goes Over Rainbow's Bridge

Uncle Jim's sweet Boxer, Holly, will forever be in our hearts and at our heels. Her nightly nudging, with her graying muzzle will always awaken Uncle on time when the alarm clock isn't enough. To know Holly was to know her playful eyes while begging and bending sideways for treats; a memory that will always make us smile.

Her spirit will always be waiting at the door for Uncle to come home, while wiggling her stubby little tail. Even in her absence, Uncle's forehead will always be a little damp from Holly "giving Daddy kisses". And, her chair will never really be empty of her big Boxer body curling up like a cat. In our dreams, she is still splashing and running circles in the Gulf of Mexico, just on the other side of Rainbow's Bridge. Holly was rescued by Uncle via Florida Boxer Rescue in 2002. She showed her gratitude everyday by being the most delightful, loyal and constant companion a human could wish for until cancer took her life. She is at peace now and we miss her terribly.

Vacationing a la Left Coast

Our end of summer vacation took us from the left coast of Florida to the left coast of the United States where beautiful northern California was its stellar self . Our hosts, Cathy and Feather, helped us eat our way through the grape-dappled countryside, and guided us through the steep hills and colorful culture that only San Francisco has to offer.

Every morning, our Santa Rosa alarm clocks rang with the sounds of gaggles of geese flapping across foggy morning skies. At dusk, the living room picture-window brought us the novel view of deer nibbling their dinner across neighborhood lawns.




Getting used to the time change was a breeze, especially when our first dinner (midnight EST) was at Skates on the Bay, in Berkeley. I have never had a more divine tomato soup, and would have gladly licked the bowl had there not been tables full of other diners to witness my gastronomical gluttony. Cathy and Feather treated us to delectable delights found only in California from crab sandwiches to Thai to tapas and the most incredible macaroni and cheese I have ever had. Even New York Style pizza tasted better in California!

We spent one day driving from Santa Rosa to Calistoga, through Oakville, Yountville and Napa Valley, and Sonoma. On the way to Calistoga, we stopped at the Petrified Forest and walked the mile loop in awe of trees 10-feet in diameter.
Most people might drink their way around the Napa Valley, but we noshed our way through with stops for coffee, lunch and treats from Dean and DeLuca. The drive through wine country was scenically stunning with mountains divided by rows upon rows of glistening vineyards.
















We met a dear old friend of Jayne's in San Francisco, and with Feather as our tour guide, we hit the hilly streets. Who better than a native San Franciscan could guide us through the best San Fran has to offer. We ate lunch at an Italian restaurant where I'm sure, my father's spirit was in the kitchen cooking! We walked China Town, ate hot (and flat) fortune cookies and drank espresso in a side-walk cafe. Visiting the fantastic Palace of Fine Arts was one of the day's highlights.

Golden Gate Bridge in morning fog.

Chinese Fortune Cookie baker, and Chinese Laundry.
















We spent our last day touring the Pacific by driving through sleepy little sea-side towns. We stopped to scavenge for sea glass and take in the salty, chilly air of the Pacific. Even though we've been home for a week, it's still taking a while to finally adjust to Florida time. I feel like I'm getting up way too early (to the sounds of cardinals, not geese), and dinnertime cravings start to kick in about 9:00 pm for California food. Until next year, I'll be California dreamin'.

Last week, our friend Terry, spotted this Flordia Bob Cat and snapped a great picture. Terry had first seen the Bob Cat scurry through his front yard, and later found him lazing in the shade just outside of his pool cage. Talk about an exotic guest!

Lemon Abstract Art

Inside
lime-green lemon
sprouts star burst shooting stars -
eggplant tears dollop a citrus
canvas

What's Going On "Down There?"

One of our regular customers is a homeless man. I know if I were homeless, a bookstore would be the first place I'd call home away from the streets. This man usually wears nasty old green scrubs and carries a winter coat with him and a few bags of newspapers. His shoes are the kind of slippers with Velcro that you would wear if you'd broken your foot, and his socks have run out of toes. He's always polite and makes light conversation. He generally sits in the same chair in the Community Room everyday, but on Tuesdays and Fridays, story-time leaves him to use another part of the store to read his pile of meticulously folded newspapers and snooze. Yesterday, he rushed into the store and I almost didn't recognize him. He bounded towards me in a bit of a hurry. He had on a "new" dirty t-shirt and fleece sweat pants instead of his regular "uniform", and was carrying a faux leather computer bag instead of his ratty old shopping bag. As he rushed by me, the stench of urine and sweat wafted after him, as did my shocked eyes. His pants were completely split and ripped up the rear, flapping in the wind and leaving nothing to the imagination. Not only was I horrified, but it was 10-minutes before story-time was about to start and pretty soon there would be a store full of toddlers eye-level with "Look, mommy! No Fruit of the Looms!"

We fortunately found him a longer shirt to wear, which barely covered the scene of the crime. He gratefully took the shirt and then settled down into the cushy chair and cracked open his new case full of papers. Remind me to never, ever sit in those chairs again.

On a more fragrant note, tonight, while shopping at Publix, I made a quick stop by the pharmacy to check my blood pressure (112/69 in case you're interested). While waiting for my arm-cuff to exhale, I noticed a woman-of-weight in one of those motorized shopping carts beep-beep-beeping backwards down the aisle towards me as she tried to parallel park next to the feminine hygiene display. I wouldn't have given her a second glance except that she was rather loudly ordering her 20-something-year-old son to hand her can after can of Summer's Eve aerosol. Each canister he diligently offered her, she opened, sprayed liberally into the air several times and then sniffed, stating..."No, that's not the one I like! Give me another." And he did. After about the fifth one, she exuberantly exclaimed..."Yes, that's it! That's the one I like!" Now that she'd found her fruit of the loom, she threw the winner in her basket. She then revved her engines and rolled away leaving the air behind her sneezing with an odoriferous blend of "Baby Powder Fresh", "Intimate Whisper", "Island Splash", and "Tropical Rain". I think my blood pressure shot up a few points after witnessing this absolute disregard for the store's inventory. Not to mention the poor woman who unknowingly buys one of the pre-spritzed cans. Hopefully she won't get caught with her pants down expecting a month's worth of deodorant protection only to fall short by the weekend.

Aerosol-Chick-on-Wheels was spotted a few minutes later on yet another mission. This time, with her son on the floor rummaging through a display of beans, looking for the kind she likes. I sure hope he didn't have a can opener handy. As they were headed for the paper products aisle, I conveniently made my exit; I just didn't want to know.

Tuesday's Roses

sunshine, peppermint -

cotton candy white and pink

red rose's neighbors

A Week of Wounds

Traveling always seems to upset my sense of balance. I feel like a snail toting all of my daily necessities on my back. And, although I always enjoy my time away, coming home sweet home and re-centering is a real treat; it makes me appreciate home and all its creature comforts all the more.

After a pleasant trip up north to visit Granny, Jilli, and company, I returned home to a garden full of weeds, grass six-inches tall and email/voicemail/snail-mail/junk-mail/interoffice mail all piled high, not to mention errands to be run and literally thousands of books to be sorted at the store. I got right to work.

Monday - I pulled creeping weeds and ailing old tomato plants before work. As I was walking from my yard to a neighbor's yard, I rammed the top of my big toe  into a precariously misplaced pointy piece of driftwood. Ouch. Band-Aid #1.

Tuesday - While restocking a table at the store, a paperback decided to leave its impression on me by slicing a good-sized paper-cut between my thumb and index finger.  Ouch. Band-Aid #2, only to be followed by Band-Aid #3 when yet another book sliced and probably redesigned my fingerprint on the opposite hand's middle finger.

Wednesday - I'll save the best for last. Read on.

Thursday - Accidental wounds are bad enough, but self-inflicted wounds really ire me. While opening my car door, the same car door I've opened for the past 10 years, I pinched the top of the finger with a paper-cut leaving a huge red welt the size of a bee-sting.  Band-Aid #4 not necessary;  I should just wear steel-plated gloves at this point (I wonder how that would work teaching sign language??).  Thursday night, I burnt the roof of my mouth while eating dinner. Great, now I can't talk, sign or apply Band-Aid #5.

Friday - I need to start scratching things off of my errand list.  After work I planned to go to the laundromat to use one of those quadruple  loaders to clean a very pricey king-sized comforter that Felix used as a cat bed and Bebe used as soft place to throw up on.  Jayne splurged on this comforter and ever since we've placed it on the bed, it's been a catch-all for all things pets can do to destroy something nice. Then, off to the pool supply store for a million different chemicals to balance the pool (where are my chemicals to balance me??), then to the health food store to restock for the week, and finally to the farmer's market and home.  Things didn't quite happen in that order, and half of my errands never got done.  I went to the pool place first. The charming multi-pierced teen who assisted me, insisted on carrying out the jugs of chlorine to my car, so I gave him the keys and told him to put them in the back seat on the floor.  I left there and decided to hit up the farmer's market next, and while turning onto the farm's bumpy road, the chlorine bottles tipped. When I looked back to see the damage, there were no canisters in the backseat! He put them in the back with, oh my God, the comforter! I slammed on the breaks, popped the hatch and sure enough, chlorine was bubbling out of the container and all over the deep-blue, now white, comforter.  I am in big trouble.  Oh..did I mention I was driving Jayne's precious Envoy that looks as new as the day she bought it 4 years ago? There isn't a Band-Aid #6 big enough for this "ouch". Big trouble doesn't even cover it, and neither will the comforter ever cover the bed again.

I should have prefaced all this by explaining that this horrid string of self-inflicted wounds started in Michigan when, while trying to light the grill, I discovered the starter was broken. So, plan B dictates manually igniting it with a match, which I did. In so doing, I managed to manually ignite my entire right arm as well - singeing off every last little strand of hair from my wrist to the crook in my elbow. Think that was a signal of my week to come?

Back to Wednesday - The lawn service comes every-other-week. In between, I mow if needed. Well, it needed mowing. Our mower is fairly new and gets more use by a neighbor than by me. To his credit, he always refills the gas, oil and leaves its fire-engine red coat sparkling.  I primed the mower, bent down to pull the cord and on the way up, it snapped out of my paper-cut fingers, half-pull, slapping the handle smartly on my left breast. If I were a man, I'd be bent over in pain grasping my cojones and gasping for air. I took a quick peek, saw a reddish welt rising like a second nipple, cursed and went on. Round two: re-prime, pull the cord gently and then let it rip. Again, the cord violently sprung from my fingers and again, slapped me right there on the same breast as it recoiled with a satisfied click to its position. My welt now had a partner and my now already throbbing breast was budding yet another.  My pain was beyond words that even the most creative cursing couldn't quell.  Third time's a charm, right? Indeed.  I situated my body as far from the pull-cord as possible while still being able to get some leverage.  I leaned in, pulled with all my might, and up it comes like it should, all the way to the top and then WHAM, it caught once again, only this time spun itself around the handle of the mower and slapped me silly one, two, three more times with the speed of light.  I cannot write here the words that escaped my lips, nor can I possibly explain the searing pain my punching bag of breast felt. Totally inexplicable. I was defiled, defeated and deflated.  I now have what looks like a purple/yellow/green/red tie-dye star burst splotch the size of a tennis ball tattooed on my left boob with a very clear indentation of the pull-cord's handle as its center.  I swear if I look closely, I can almost make out the "TORO" outline.

If only there were video of this, I'd be $100, 000 richer today.  I'd send it to America's Funniest Home Videos and call it "Titty-Titty Bang-Bang." (Leave it to Kim T, the queen of books and music, for her so very appropriate and creative title suggestion!)

Sign Me A Book

This is 18-month old Jilli being a squiggle-butt. We spent a few days reading every book she could get her hands on and learning signs. She knows how to sign MORE (or her version of it), FINISH and PLEASE, and she recognizes quite a few signs! This week she learned to sign SHOES, CHEESE, and AIRPLANE and was exposed to about 50 other signs like COOKIE, CRACKER, WATER, MILK, STARS, SOCKS, HORSE, CAT, DOG, BABY BIRD, TRAIN, CAR, TRUCK, EAT and tons more. She's fascinated with a deck of sign language cards and loves to point to them and have someone sign them to her. Oh, and she also said "NaNa" (her version of Nancy). As for spoken vocabulary, she's great at "mine" and "nite-nite" as well as "shhh", "mama", "knock-knock", and "what's that?" among others.

I think she got tired of me signing. At one point she came up to me and just flailed her hands wildly in the air pretending to sign for about 15 seconds. It was hysterical! At least she had some elements of the signs I taught her and had great facial expressions!!

She's our little whirling-dervish!

Colorful Summer

Summer comes alive -

hummingbirds buzz, blackbirds sing 

Jilli takes it all in!

Airplanes, baby birds -

summer's here, no time to sleep

peonies bloom, frogs leap!

Outside, play all day -

blue skies end with moonlit nights

Summer comes alive.

(double click on the Michigan Colors slideshow on the right sidebar to see more pictures)

Gypsy Queens

Finally, Steph (right), Nan (center) and Amie get to meet! After communicating on-line on my-calorie-counter.com together for two years, we met face-to-face today in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Nan flew in from Tampa and Amie and Steph drove from Ohio. Amie, the twin Queen, Steph, the Gypsy Queen and Nan, the Las Flacas Queen, shown above share drinks at the Barnes & Noble Cafe. We chatted about our pets and partners, saw twins-to-be baby pictures and browsed B&N. After book shopping we went to Whole Foods and had a very healthy meal (not sure the dessert was low-cal, but it came with an folding spork which intrigued us all). We sampled super salty cheese, Steph bought fig yogurt (ewwww) and some healthy cereal (let us know how the cardboard tastes)! A great time was had by all! It so nice to put faces to names and avatars!

May Does Away with the Garden

With mixed joy and sadness, I pulled up our vegetable garden today. The now skinny tomato bushes were struggling to hold on to the last few red bursts of fruit and the onions were splitting at their seams. The peppers were so long, they were standing on their tippy-toes while tethered to their stems. And although pretty, the yellow flowers sprouting from the broccoli only made great places for snails to nest like earring posts.

For now, all that's left growing are fragrant white flowers on the lemon tree soon to be huge yellow orbs. I couldn't help but to plant a few pumpkin and squash seeds today, just to have something to watch sprout over the summer. And, of course, the roses are doing a fine job of keeping the cacophony of colors going as long as the rain keeps coming. Here's a little silly "thank you" ditty I wrote to commemorate the past nine months of the garden fresh food we've enjoyed.

Thank you broccoli, thank you peas,

ugly tomatoes - fill my plate, please!

Thank you onions, peppers, too.

When I slice your skins, I cry boo-hoo!

Squirrels say thank you to the corn.

Where once there were ears they're now all shorn.

Thank you green beans sleek and long.

We ate our fill 'til your rows were gone.

Thank you herbs, oh basil tall.

Mint, dill and chives, I ate you raw.

Rosemary, sage and parsley,

You garnished our platters so nicely.

On this, the last day of May,

I pulled out deep roots and turned the clay.

No more rows of sprouting green,

just pumpkin seeds for next Halloween.

Destination: St. Barts

The Newlyweds

Miss a family wedding? Never! So, when my niece decided to get married on the beach in St. Barts, I of course, said "yes!" St. Where? And, how do I get there? Apparently, if I lived up north like most of my family, I could have easily taken a plane non-stop from Newark to St. Maarten and then caught the ferry to St. Barts. But instead, from Tampa, I had to fly to San Juan, and then to St. Maarten and then hop the ferry to paradise island (or should I say the roller-coaster boat from Hell. But, I'll get to that later after ample Dramamine, Xanax and some liquid pink stuff).

I generally travel everywhere by car, so I must have had "international travel-newbie" written all over me when some nice guy showed me how to swipe my passport to get my boarding pass. I'm sure my lovely mug is now in some government data base for the rest of my life.


While waiting for my flight, I splurged on a bran muffin and latte from Starbucks and read the New York Times, all the while looking like a seasoned traveler, but feeling like the road before me was never-ending. Once aboard, the guy sitting next to me, Pablo, said a prayer in Spanish before we took off and I somehow, felt comforted. I noticed out of the corner of my eye, another woman crossing herself when we got above the clouds. The first leg of this flight from Tampa to San Juan, I lucked out by not having to sit next to a super squirmy pre-ADHD two-year-old who didn't understand "no", "stop it" or "sit" in any of her native languages. She was two seats down from me so that when she had an "accident" and later tossed up a gazillion undigested Cheerios, my lap was spared. Too bad for the poor guy sitting next to her.


When I got to San Juan, I was making a mad dash to the multi-lingual, multi-symbol labeled, gender-neutral, shower-available-for-$12 lavatory when I noticed a flight boarding to St. Maarten. My flight wasn't for another four hours, so in Spanish, I asked if I could get on. Si! They let me! It boarded outside and one of the flight attendants took my baggage and loaded it in the nose of the plane so I could get up the wobbly, narrow set of steps barely suspended from the exit door to the ground. The flight was ear-numbingly loud and only about 10,000 feet in the air. When we landed, we all waited outside for our baggage, in the pouring-side-ways, spit-ball rain. My baggage was no where to be found. The attendant told me to go to baggage claim. I told him that I had seen my suitcase being loaded into the nose. He looked and said they must have given it to someone else. I stood my pudd;e-forming ground and said it had to be there. So much for my quad-lingual talents. No amount of English, Spanish, Sign Language or Greek would help me. I was at a grave linguistic disadvantage since he spoke mostly French and smiled through his apologetic English. They looked until I was saturated with fear and soaked with pelting rain. Finally, the captain looked and found it. Apparently, they thought it was the crew's baggage since it was small, black and had American embroidered into the cloth. Relieved, I took my soaking self into the airport where a long line snaked from one end to the other with people waiting to go through Immigration. I stood there dripping and thought I heard my sister's unmistakable voice. Sure enough, about 50 people in front of me was my sister Lynn, brother-in-law Ron, nephew Justin, and his wife Cheryl. Reunion! We got through Immigration, ate lunch and waited for four more members of our party (the Bannisters) to arrive before catching a taxi to the ferry to St. Barts (not knowing what was in-store).


Henri, our Taxi driver gave us a bumpy, whirling-dervish, stop and go tour in his French sing-song cadence while negotiating the narrow streets of poverty-stricken St. Maarten. He speaks Dutch, French, Spanish and English. St. Maarten reminded me of Cancun where the sea-side scenery is spectacular with lush resorts and the outskirts of the country were thread-bare poor. He was such a happy guy; friendly and welcoming and explained the history of the island with pride.


The Ferry: We met Francesco's sister, Christina and the photographer, Shiloh at the ferry dock. Then we ate. Big mistake. After having our passports checked for the 5th time, we boarded the ferry. It was stormy and the seas were rough. Cheryl doled out Dramamine to everyone an hour earlier, so we were prepared for the ups and downs of a 40 minute boat ride. I'm lucky enough to be alive to tell you that an entire bottle of Dramamine could not have prepared us for this ride. Most of our party went outside. I stayed below with my sister and Mr. Bannister. Bad idea. He faced front and would preface an upcoming dip by saying things like "holy shit" or "oh my god". My sister and I sat with our backs to the waves. Not five minutes into the ride, Lynn started saying "I'm going to throw up". Great. I tried to comfort her by making her talk about Tammy's dress or her grandchildren, to no avail. And what did I do? I closed my eyes, put my head down with my chin nuzzled deep in my cleavage, hummed some song I made up and rocked the entire time. My inner autism had surfaced big time. At some point, I did look up to see my sister grab a white plastic garbage bag out of one of the attendants' hands just in time to save her outfit. Why they offer white, transparent garbage bags for churning stomachs on churning seas, I have no idea. Forty minutes later, we all said our prayers of thanks and stumbled off the boat. My sister looked like she'd died and come back to life, only barely. She was sweating and cold, shaking and crying, ashen and green - almost. A total mess. We all vowed to take a plane back. I finally stopped humming and rocking but kept wondering how I was ever going to get back home.


Once we found our land-legs and our stomachs, and showed our passports yet one more time, we were greeted by the rest of our party. Tammy and Francesco (the wedding couple), Jason, Aschley and Aiden (my nephew and his family), best man John, Francesco's mom and his aunt Teresa. Hail, hail, the gang's all here with the exception of Evan, my other nephew, who would arrive tomorrow via the same ferry. Poor thing. I would have texted him, but once in St. Barts, I had no Internet or cell service. I do think someone warned him, though. He arrived in much better condition than we did. So, let the wedding begin!


After a hair-raising drive above daringly high cliffs on what seemed like one-way-only roads, we found our stunning villa, dipped in the pool, watched the sunset and readied ourselves for another spin on the crazy French blacktop. Dinner started at 7 and lasted until 11. Euros were converted to dollars and at the end of the night, 18 of us had dinner for $1400. I was too tired to wrap my brain around my $100 dinner, but giant shrimp on steroids, grilled to perfection may have been a good bang for my hundred bucks. As I discovered, six pounds later, meals are late, long and luscious on St. Barts.


Christina and I were the first up and the first to find coffee and pastries on our first morning there. We spent most of the day on the beach and driving around the island. While floating in the Caribbean, we saw a complete rainbow circled around the sun; we were awestruck. In town, I bought little bottles of vanilla, spiced and coconut rum at a great little "rhum" shop only to have customs confiscate it in St. Maarten. I was not a happy camper, but I am sure the customs agents had a great happy hour on my dime (or my 87 Euros).


The wedding was sweet, simple and classy. Tammy's dress was entirely vintage lace and entirely stunning. The happy couple was married against nature's backdrop of blue skies and a peach sun dipping into the Caribbean. The wedding dinner was an eight course feast that seemed never-ending with delicious blends of island flavors, laced with lots of love and laughter.


The last day was spent traveling. We all were dreading the ferry ride back, but it was a beautiful morning and the waves were calm. We said our good-byes and skimmed across the sea without incident. This time, we all went up top and thoroughly enjoyed the ride.


At the airport, everyone scattered off to their respective flights home and I felt a little orphaned as I watched my sister fade into the airport crowd. Family is a nice place to visit. I got to meet my nephew's son, Aiden for the first time, I saw the last of my sister's children get married and I even learned that my father had a twin who died when they were two years old; a tidbit of family history that escaped my knowledge for all this time. I also learned that no matter how exotic a destination, there is no place like destination: home.

Think we're sisters?? We drove way too fast past this place in St. Maarten.

Most of the gang (Ron, Aiden, Jason, Aschley, Jason and Aiden
Aschley, Nicole, Jason, Tammy, Mr. B.,
Cheryl, Justin, Christina.

An everyday view. A critter on the path.








Heading into a storm on the ferry. They call this a road?


Ron, Tammy and Francesco, Lynn. At last!





Sunset view from our villa. Justin & Aunt Nancy