I'm grateful to have been off work for the last weekend before Christmas. I know all the stores were madhouses this weekend. It was still a pretty busy weekend for me, though. On Saturday, I went to the bookstore and browsed through Victor Hugo's Les Miserables. As much as I love the musical (ONLY TWO DAYS LEFT!), I'd never read the novel before, ( Read more... )

Our non-Christmas tree has been a bit sparsely-decorated since I upgraded from a 4' to a 6'. Last year, I bought a glittery red key from the antique store as a new ornament. This year, I made an ornament out my mom's old skate key. Grandma held onto it for all these years, and I found it at my aunt's house when I went over there to do my laundry ( Read more... )

This is me and Grandma, on my birthday three years ago (which I posted about back here). It's not the best photo of Grandma because she's looking at the cake instead of the camera, but I still love it. I love the glow of the candles, and how you can see Grandma's old kitchen behind us. It makes me happy and sad at the same time.


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The weather here has been so nice and cool lately (finally!). From work today, I biked downtown to the Sept. 11 memorial. This day last year was, obviously, the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks; it was also my Grandma's 82nd birthday. We didn't have the faintest clue then that it would be her last birthday in this world. Far from it. ( Read more... )

Well, I didn't cry at the visitation, the rosary, the funeral, or the graveside service for Grandma. I just got home from Shabbat services at the temple, changed into my PJs, and now I'm sitting here crying. I know even if I live to be as old as Methuselah, I will never meet a nicer lady, a better cook, or a person who loves our family so much, in ( Read more... )

Hallelujah, Rebecca survived Black Friday weekend! Friday and Saturday were both looong, hectic days, one of my coworkers quit, we didn't get pizza for lunch (like I thought we would), I forgot to buy the one sale item I'd wanted, the weather was wet and cold, and Sable pissed on the floor! Ugh!

To unwind from it all, I've been writing fanfiction ( Read more... )

My Sassy Jewish Grandparents treated me and another friend of theirs to dinner after services tonight. We had a pizza and "Kentucky Derby pie" for dessert. The pie turned out to be delicious, but none of us had ever heard of it before, and we had a time trying to figure out what kind of pie it was. Our waiter tried to explain it to us, but he was ( Read more... )

After work today, Sara and I went for a walk in the cemetery, then I rode my bike over to Grandma's to pick tomatoes for her. (That's what I love about summer. The days are long enough to pack a lot into them.) Grandma seems to have given up on watering and/or picking from her garden since she's about to move, so I spent about five minutes just ( Read more... )

Yesterday was Friday the 13th, and I had considered watching a scary movie - we have two of my favorites, The Others and The Sixth Sense - but instead I rode my bike to the Redbox after shabbat services and checked out The King's Speech. It was damn good, and it had two child actresses. It also made me feel damn guilty for making fun of Athena's ( Read more... )

I went over to Grandma's last weekend to do my laundry. (Which, as an aside, raises the question of who I'm going to mooch off after she moves!) For some reason, my aunt who lives with her went into a long monologue about how she's proud to have me as her niece and she thinks I bring a lot to the family. Nice, I guess, but it had me nodding and ( Read more... )