Unplanned Hiati!

Is hiati the plural of hiatus? Let me go check….

Answer: It is not. It’s hiatuses. OK then!

Anyway, I had no planned intention to take an entire weekend off from posting here, but that’s what happened. Nothing major happened, just a busy weekend full of stuff I felt like doing more than posting here. I’ll write about some of that at some point soon, but for now, just as a quick way of getting back into things, I’ll do something I used to do a lot: a quiz-thing! This one is from Sunday Stealing, which Roger faithfully does most weeks. Here’s this week’s quiz:

1) What is your favorite way to spend a lazy day?

For purposes of this question, I’ll assume that the lazy day is a day at home (i.e., not on vacation someplace) without much by way of expected activities or duties. My answer depends a bit on the weather: if it’s nice out, I might go to a park for some walking or hiking and photography. Also, sitting and reading and writing is always on the docket! Listening to music, too.

Basically, a lazy day is a good time to engage my various hobbies.

2) What do you look forward to every week?

The weekend!

OK, fine, let’s be more specific and less obvious. Saturday night, we usually have a cheese-and-cured-meat selection for dinner (yes, I could use the hoity-toity word Charcuterie for this, but come on, do we really need a fancy French word for cheese-and-crackers?). We also usually stream a movie on Saturday nights, so that’s a pleasure. I also follow some content producers who generate stuff on weekends; their work is always nice to see. One example is Critical Role, which I do not have time to follow in entirety (each episode is like, four hours long!), so I skip through quite a bit. I don’t always know what’s going on–no, scratch that, I almost never know what’s going on, but the geeky energy surrounding that table is always infectious.

3) Name three pet peeves you currently have.

Like, fairly new pet-peeves? OK: well, right now, thanks to some BS unfolding over the weekend, I’m sick of guys issuing challenges for debate. The latest example is RFK Jr., who has become a fountain of complete bullshit, and Joe Rogan, who has yet to find a shitty idea he won’t amplify, challenging a vaccine scientist to “debate”. My general position on debates is that they are always, in every single instance, a complete waste of time.

(Oh, by the way? Remember the 1988 Vice Presidential Debate, when Dan Quayle got the “If you became President, what would you do first?” question three times? And on the third time he dragged out his comparison of his Congressional tenure with that of JFK’s, to Lloyd Bentsen’s obvious delight? The obvious right answer to “If you became President, what would you do first?” is, “Well, it depends, doesn’t it?” Or even “How the f*** do I know?!” I mean, is he taking over because the President had a heart attack, or is it an assassination, or a 9-11 style attack that killed the President, or is it a huge scandal that forced the President to resign, or….” As cloying as it was, probably the most authentic and actual answer Quayle could have given was one he did give: “First I’d say a prayer.” Anyway, the Bentsen “You’re no Jack Kennedy!” line was a delightful piece of red meat for a Democrat like me, but it also started me thinking, “Maybe debates are kind of a waste of time?”)

Moving on…oh wait, I didn’t finish the question. Two more pet peeves: People who don’t clean up their dogs’ solid waste, and people who wear their overalls with one strap unfastened. I hate that last one. It always looks weird to me.

4) If you were to win an all expense paid vacation for two weeks to anywhere in the world, where would you choose to go? What are some of the things you would like to experience while you were there?

Ooooooh…I would not be able to choose, so I would do so randomly. I would roll a d8 (that’s an 8-sided die, for those of you who don’t play role-playing games), with these results, dependent on the roll:

1-2: Finger Lakes vacation, either in Ithaca or Geneva, NY
3-4: NYC
5-6: Toronto
7-8: Waikiki

In each case? Sight-seeing, visiting museums, shopping, eating, drinking, walking around, and folding in a few lazier days. I have no problem filling up time. The Finger Lakes and the Waikiki vacations would present opportunities for nature engagement that NYC and Toronto don’t, but the cities would have live theater and movies to a greater degree.

5) What was one of your favorite toys as a kid? Did you save any special things from your childhood that you still have today?

Check this out:

My parents gave me that little nesting doll set when I was in first grade (I think). I remember wanting nesting dolls because I loved the concept. I remember being a little confused by these because I was expecting the traditional “Matryoshka” style, but this grew on me quickly. I still dig this little sailor family–made in Poland!–and this item has a place of pride on my desk even now.

6) What is your favorite holiday? What is your least favorite holiday?

Favorite? Christmas, Thanksgiving, and New Years Day are all in a big tie. And honestly, Halloween is right up there. I love that the year ends with four months of cool celebratory days, each with its own flavor and air.

Least favorite? Hmmmm. It’s never really on my radar because I never get it off, but Columbus Day sucks and needs to be renamed to something better. As in, not honoring a racist colonizer.

7) Have you ever met anyone famous? What concerts have you attended?

The vast majority of concerts I’ve attended are classical concerts. Outside that area, I’ve heard Celine Dion (that was a great show!), the Trans-Siberian Orchestra several times (always a blast), and…gosh, that’s about it. I do think more about going to concerts moving forward, though. After hearing what I’ve heard about her current “Eras” tour, I’m intrigued by going to hear Taylor Swift.

I’ve met almost zero famous people, but as a kid I once went backstage after a Buffalo Philharmonic concert to get then-music director Semyon Bychkov’s autograph. He was very friendly and gregarious.

8) Are there any expressions that people use that really annoy you? If so, what are they?

Roger doesn’t like “common sense”, and I am in agreement.

Of course, some other expressions come and go depending on what pop culture does with them. Thanks to Letterkenny, I have a new appreciation of “To be fair”.

9) Do you like your name? Are you named after anyone? Is there a story how you got your name? Would you change it if you could? If so, what name would you give yourself?

My name’s fine. At this point, changing it would seem kind of pointless, and anyway, it doesn’t bother me. I don’t love it or hate it…I’ve never been one to find some innate connection between myself and the name I carry around, but it’s fine.

If forced at gunpoint to change my name, though? Hello, Max Power!

10) It is said that it’s the little things that make life worth living. Name five of those little things in your life.

  • Mandarin orange sparkling water with cranberry bitters
  • Sharing a Nutter Butter with the dog after work
  • Walking around the Hamburg Farmers Market
  • When I figure out how to fix something I’d never taken apart before
  • This deer in my neighbors’ yard last week. The deer was determined to eat from their bird feeder, so she (I’m not sure of the gender, but no rack, so…she?) geared up, reared up and stood on her back legs, and balanced there while she ate. I watched her do this twice, and before executing her standing maneuver, she would suddenly wag her tail quickly.

 

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At the Ridge….

Highmark Stadium and the city of Buffalo, looking north from Chestnut Ridge Park

For the first time since Cane died last September, I went hiking at Chestnut Ridge Park yesterday.

Chestnut Ridge is an old park whose development by Erie County began back in the late 1920s, and a lot of the park’s original infrastructure, quite a bit of which still stands, was built by work crews of the Works Progress Administration during the Great Depression. Chestnut Ridge is a very large park–at more than 1100 acres, it is 300 acres larger than New York City’s Central Park–and it covers a lot of rugged terrain, ranging from forested hills to steep gorges through which streams run. The most famous feature in Chestnut Ridge Park is the Eternal Flame waterfall, which is just that: a waterfall behind which there is a small grotto into which natural gas seeps from underground. This gas is almost always aflame, and if it happens to be out, you can literally reach in behind the water and relight it, if you’ve brought a lighter with you.

Chestnut Ridge was a common destination for Cane and I in our weekly nature walks and hikes, and we covered a great deal of the park’s terrain and trail system over our years of trekking there. My last visit to the Ridge with Cane was last July, I think…which was therefore the last time I was there at all. Shortly after that visit he started limping slightly, and that was the beginning of his end.

Yesterday was my first trip there alone in many years.

Being up there yesterday was many things. It was beautiful, obviously, and being in nature was honestly what the doctor ordered after what’s been a trying few months recently. I kept thinking, though, of the presence I was missing; I’d walk a hundred feet and suddenly realized that I hadn’t had to stop three times for a greyhound to smell this tree, that bush, this patch of dirt, that rock. When you’re used to walking those trails with one hand always holding a leash, it’s a bit strange when that hand is unoccupied. And when I made my way down to the side of the stream at the bottom of one of those gorges, there was no watching as Cane found a deep spot to lay in–you know, to cool off–and to drink.

I won’t be staying away from Chestnut Ridge this long again…but it’s not going to feel the same there again, is it?

Photos:

Stream in Chestnut Ridge, from a bridge. It’s been very dry the last six weeks; usually there’s much more water than this, this time of year.

The trees that I call “the Fallen Sisters”. Again, note how dry the stream is. This time of year that whole streambed is flowing.

Inside an old pump house. The pump is long gone.

It was a good day, a good walk in the woods. There was even time for a touch of whimsy, like plucking a few wildflowers and wearing them in the bib of my overalls. One should always strive for a touch of whimsy. At least, that’s how I see it.

 

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Scenes from amongst the lilacs (and a bit of Rachmaninoff!)

The warm months of the year, for us, tend to be bookended by two specific festivals: the Rochester Lilac Festival in May, and the Ithaca Applefest in October. Lots of stuff happens in between, but those are the markers of “outdoor stuff” season. So, yesterday we were off for the Lilac Festival!

Which was, this year, well…we’ve been enjoying gorgeous weather recently. Today is sunny and wonderful. The days leading up to yesterday were also mostly pleasant and nice. But yesterday itself was…a soggy rainfest that started before we even left for the day. Here I am, staring existentially out the back window at the gray rains. (More specifically, I’m waiting for my water to boil for coffee.)

We got to the Festival and tracked down our favorite food truck for poutine, which we were lucky enough to eat out of the rain in a big food tent. So that was nice. Poutine is always lovely.

Pulled-pork Poutine

But then we were out into the rain to try to see some of the lilacs and the various trees in Rochester’s Highland Park.

Reservoir at the crest of Highland Park. City drinking water is sourced here.

We didn’t walk around nearly as much as we usually do, because it was raining. I had an umbrella, but it’s on the small side, and The Wife wore a coat that she believed to be waterproof. (This turned out to be incorrect, so we stopped into a tie-dye clothing vendor at the Festival’s art sale and bought her a shirt just so she’d have something dry to change into. Some years, the anniversary gifts aren’t as romantic as others, I must admit.) I stayed mostly dry, thanks to my umbrella, but I have determined that I need a larger umbrella, probably one of those gigantic ones that some folks carry around. I concluded this because it turns out that the sleeves of a poofy shirt can actually exceed the coverage provided by your small umbrella, with dampening results:

Not one but two wet sleeves. Oh well, live and learn. Onto the shopping list a bigger umbrella goes.

Later on we went to The Chicken Coop in Webster, NY for fried chicken. We love this place and it’s a favorite destination of ours now when we’re passing through that particular part of town.

So, the day was something of a mixed bag, alas.

Up in the title to this post, I mention Rachmaninoff. There is a tie-in here: specifically the lilac flower. In 1902 Rachmaninoff wrote a song cycle, 12 Romances, one of which is a setting of a poem about lilacs. From this sprang an odd gesture of appreciation from one of the composer’s fans, as described here by Bertensson and Leyda in Sergei Rachmaninoff: A Lifetime in Music:

It was about the time of his return from America that the mysterious activities of the “white lilacs lady” began. Rachmaninoff could give no concert or recital without a bouquet of white lilacs among the floral tributes. Bouquets of white lilacs were also delivered on every birthday, every saint’s day; and if he happened to be abroad on those dates, the white lilacs would just as surely arrive at his hotel or the compartment of his train. The notes accompanying this tribute were always brief and tender, congratulating him on his birthday or wishing him success in the concert, and the only signature was the Russian initials of “White Lilacs”; the song “Lilacs” in Op. 21 appears to have inspired this extraordinary labor of love. Rachmaninoff appreciated the lady’s incognito as deeply as the simple, warm words of her notes, though sometimes the gift was a little flamboyant–especially when the everlasting white lilacs arrived on schedule in the depth of winter. Not only did bouquets, wreathes, and other ornamental florist’s designs arrive with these flowers but the gift took other forms, such as an ebony conductor’s baton engraved with a design of white lilacs and Rachmaninoff’s initials. The giver’s identity remained hidden from the composer and all members of his family.

Fortunately, the mystery did not remain so. From the footnote in Bertensson and Leyda:

It was not until 1918, after the Rachmaninoffs had gone abroad, that “White Lilacs” was identified. Sophia Satina [the composer’s niece] tells of this: “As I walked to my laboratory one day I heard a horse galloping behind me: I turned and saw a cabman whipping the horse frantically, with an elderly woman standing in the lurching cab, clinging to him with one hand and waving to me with the other. When they came up to me, this woman, breathless and agitated, said, ‘Thank God! How happy I am to find you! I am White Lilacs–my name is Rousseau.–Where is Rachmaninoff? Is he alive?’ She was overjoyed to hear that he was well and working abroad. When Sergei Vasilyevich heard about Mme. Rousseau, he offered to help her to leave Russia, but she preferred to stay in Moscow with her daughter.”

Apparently when it became clear to Mme. Rousseau that Rachmaninoff would not be returning to Russia at all, in the wake of the Revolution, she ceased the gifts of lilacs. I do not know what became of her after this, but I do wonder if Rachmaninoff missed the constant presence of white lilacs in his later life…perhaps not as a reminder of a specific admirer, but as one more way his beloved Russia of old was gone forever.

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Twenty-six

The Wife and I were married twenty-six years ago today.

The years keep presenting new challenges, on and on and on…but they also keep producing memories, more than a few of which are happy ones.

I used to note that I could imagine a life without her, but it was worse in every way. Now, in what I’m taking as a blessing, that part of my strong imagination is losing its power…or it’s simply saying, “I don’t want to imagine this.” Either way…I’m fine with only imagining this life, with her.

 

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Knox Farm: a bittersweet return

I returned to Knox Farm today, for the first time since last year. I’ve been wanting to return to my weekly nature walks; they were always calming and inspiring and gave me moments of quiet to recenter my life.

The problem, of course, is that I’d have to go alone. Cane is gone and can’t go with me.

The places we go with certain loved ones really hit differently when we go there without them, don’t they? It felt weird just not having a leash in my hand. Being able to walk or stop at will, without having to take into account the desires of a greyhound who feels it necessary to sniff everything, was…weird. That dog was my companion at such places for eight years. (I could take Carla, but she’s scared of car rides and I don’t want to do that to her. Maybe I’ll try again sometime soon, but I want to get my feet wet again, first.)

It’s been warm of late. The weather is about to turn sharply colder for a few days, but this entire week saw temps in the 70s, and today we’re in the 80s. This was enough to jump-start our spring a bit. The forests are still mostly bare, but…distant hills are starting to look slightly frost-tipped with new green. It’s coming. Hopefully sooner than later.

It was a beautiful walk, and there will be more. I’m going to be getting back to all the old familiar places…but they’ll all feel lonely for a while. I used to take a photo of the two of us and caption it “Adventurers!” on social media. Now, for a while at least, there’s only one adventurer.

 

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[insert clever title for post that’s mostly photos here]

I’m friggin’ tired, y’all. Here’s some pictures.

First, cats.

Here’s Remy, who is a big weirdo. Look at those mutant feet of his.

Here’s Remy and Rosa, in the windows. This week is the first time we’ve been able to keep windows open consistently since last autumn.

This is Daisy, my mother’s cat. She lives a life of quiet feline dignity.

It’s not all cats! Here’s Carla, being dignified:

Here’s Carla not being dignified:

How about food?

This chocolate bar was awesome. If you love those Ferrero Rocher candies, this is for you–especially if you can’t have the Rochers anymore because they contain gluten. This includes The Wife! Ferrero Rochers were one of her favorite candies ever. This is that exact flavor, minus the crispy interior that’s likely from the gluten.

Last week, I broadened my horizons: for the first time, I made tempura:

This was my recipe. It turned out really good! Everything was wonderfully crispy and flavorful. If you haven’t had tempura, it’s a Japanese batter that is used for dipping and deep-frying vegetables and seafood. I did cubes of cod, shrimp, onions, asparagus (between this and grilling, I may well be a new asparagus fan!), and small peppers. The batter is made of rice flour and uses carbonated water for moisture, and the result is a very light and crispy batter that in some places is almost translucent…and yet, it’s there. This was a terrific meal. As they say on The Repair Shop, “Brilliant! I’m quite happy with that!”

And finally, drink. Specifically, rum punch!

As for tonight? The weather has been gorgeous–even a cold-lover like myself feels the wonder in the return of warm days when they finally arrive–and tonight I’m firing up the grill for the first time. Steak and shrimp, here we come!

 

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Can it be?

A possible spring-like Spring?

We’re in a stretch of sunny days! After rain for what seemed like seventy-nine consecutive days, we’re finally drying out. Not only does it not look like rain any time soon, but we’re slowly warming up. We may be into the 70s by this time next week. Wow! Today it’s still chilly, but who knows…I may be retiring the sweaters-and-turtleneck look sooner than later, I hope.

Also, a long stretch of sun and dry weather will lead to a less muddy yard, which is always a good thing. Here’s the mighty Carla, sniffing the air for a moment whilst playing with her favorite toy.

And here is one of the cats, staring intently at what she is hoping is a mouse but is really a leaf that had been skittering across the deck in the morning breeze.

It’s also time to switch from knit hats to my wide-brimmed hat. The warm times are coming…I’m sure we’ll have some dips back into coldness in store, but for now, this is welcome!

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Dressing for St. Paddy’s, and seeing Paul Reiser

My observation of St. Paddy’s Day this year was limited to what I wore, as luck had it. The Wife and I went out for fish fry at a favorite joint (Frank Gourmet Hot Dogs, if you must kn0w–photo here, though it’s not the best work I’ve ever done in terms of food photos), and then we went to Buff State to see Paul Reiser doing stand-up. (I love Paul Reiser and he’s been one of my favorite people since “This is not my locker!” from Beverly Hills Cop back in 1984 or so and if you don’t like him, well, feel free to not tell me so.) His performance was a delight and we’re so glad to have seen him. Mr. Reiser is not an edgy comedian who swears a lot (though he did a little!); his comedy is more…well, I’m not sure how to describe it other than “the comedian next door”. There’s nothing in his act to which I could not relate on one level or another, but given how consistently everyone was laughing throughout, I have to admit deep admiration of his craft because he made everything really funny.

Oh! And also, the fact that he could be funny for a long show–he was on stage for about 90 minutes, and there were several times when I was convinced the “Thank you, good night!” moment was upon us, only for him to take the mike back out of the stand and keep right on going for another bit–to me gives the lie to all those comedians who have been caterwauling the last few years about how “cancel culture” means you can’t be funny anymore. Meanwhile, there’s Paul Reiser, just going about his business of…being funny. He even dissed chicken wings! I love that the man rolled into Buffalo and took shots at the chicken wing in his act. He didn’t pretend to love wings; in fact, he openly cast aspersions on them, calling them too bony and needing all that sauce to cover up their deficiencies. Hey, I disagree, but it actually is kind of refreshing to have someone come in to town and not genuflect to the local contribution to world cuisine. (Now, at one point he also mentioned Tom Brady in a somewhat positive light, but nobody in the audience booed, so there’s that.)

Anyway, it was St. Paddy’s Day. Even though it is an option of mine, I did not wear green overalls. Instead I rocked regular vintage blue overalls, but a pair with a green tag! Ooooh! This I paied with favorite plaid fleece sweater, and a green scarf. I think I had the green well-represented. Erin go bragh!

The overalls are by a brand called Ely, another of the old overall-makers of yore; they are almost identical to the Dee Cee brand that I also like a lot, primarily for the difference in the styling on the bib pocket. (Lee also adopted this kind of bib styling in the 90s; I should blog about those at some point, too….)

Oh, it was also a zero-proof day! That’s right, we didn’t drink at all on St. Paddy’s Day. Not for any particular reason, really–mostly because by the time we got home it was pushing 11pm and at that point we’re just thinking, “Meh, let’s have a bit of ice cream and get to bed.” This was a good choice, as we did not rise this morning until 8:30am, which is way later than I usually rise on weekends these days (though not so early as I used to rise when we had a greyhound who always had to pee no later than 7am).

Anyway, after a stressful week on a number of levels, last night’s activities were a much-needed respite. And now, the lake-effect is trying to do its thing again, so there’s that. We’re not supposed to get much out of this one, but we’ll see. I have always maintained that St. Paddy’s Day is my personal cut-off point beyond which I am officially Sick Of Snow, but this winter has been weird: if you take out the three storms that walloped us, the last of which is almost three months in the rear-view-mirror, this winter was actually really puny in The 716. (I realize that this observation has a strong whiff of “Yes, Mrs. Lincoln, but aside from that, did you enjoy your night at Ford’s Threater?”)

Back at it, as they say….

 

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Tone Poem Tuesday

An offering for Roger! Here is “Adagio and Allegro for Piano and Horn”, by Robert Schumann.

What’s the relevance to Roger? Look at the opus number. Happy birthday to one of the finer folks I’ve met online!

(BTW, I actually did a Google search for “List of Opus 71s”, and Wikipedia actually does this! Here’s a handy list of Opuses 70. I thought about the Prokofiev, but it’s late in the day as I’m getting around to this, that piece is 35 minutes, and I don’t like to post stuff without hearing it at least once, so the Schumann will have to do.)

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Happy Birthday My Love

As I keep adding to this post every year, and with cross-posting it and importing it from my old blog to this one, I suppose it gets a bit more ungainly each year. Well, that’s just the way it is. Today is The Wife’s birthday, and I’m celebrating. As always, new stuff added at the end of the list; also as always, I don’t edit what I’ve written before or revise anything that’s out of date. Think of some of that stuff as growth rings on a tree…part of the reason of this post is to preserve memories.

 
Happy Birthday, my love!
The Wife and the Dee-oh-gee at Taughannock Falls. Aren't they beautiful! #wife #Cane #DogsOfInstagram #greyhound #taughannockfalls

Today is The Wife’s birthday! Onward and upward, as always!

A brief slideshow of photos (some of which are already on this post, but I like them and it’s my blog, so there they are again!) follows. The song is “Live Forever” by Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors, a wonderful band.

Birthday video for The Wife

And now, my annual list of memories and things from our years together. (New items on the list are appended to Number 97, alphabetically. I do this because I’m too lazy to renumber all the stuff after that one every year.)

Happy Valentines Day to my beautiful wife! This was taken last summer. We probably need a photo of us with the dee-oh-gee....
Wife and Dee-oh-gee on a nice Christmas walk! #Cane #DogsOfInstagram #greyhound #ChestnutRidge #OrchardPark #wny #winter

Santa, the Wife, and the dee-oh-gee! #Cane #DogsOfInstagram #greyhound

We took the dee-oh-gee for his first ice cream. #Cane #DogsOfInstagram #greyhound

Posing with Patience (or is it Fortitude?)

The Wife and I at the Erie County Fair!

/PHOTO_20151129_213848
The Wife and the dee-oh-gee in Buffalo Creek, West Seneca. #wny #westseneca

I am reasonably sure that I was a placeholder all these years for the eventual dog.

Happy Birthday to Me! VI: The pies go in my face, Huzzah!

1. Her hand fits perfectly into mine, as though our hands were fit for each other.

1a. That said, there’s a good chance that she prefers the dog to me.

2. The first time she saw Star Wars was with me. And ET.

2a. The first time I saw Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty were with her.

3. She used to keep an aquarium before a bunch of moves made us give up the fish. Maybe we’ll do that again someday. But when we started dating, she had two fish, named Ken and Wanda, named after two memorable characters from A Fish Called Wanda. When Ken went belly-up, she called a friend and solemnly informed her, “K-k-k-ken d-d-d-died.” (One of the movie’s running gags is Ken’s stuttering.)

4. I don’t remember exactly when it happened, but I’ve converted her from someone who hated coffee into a regular coffee drinker.

5. For reasons passing understanding, she has always found Erik Estrada attractive. She and I used to have arguments over who could best the other in a fight: Agent Mulder from The X-Files or Ponch from Chips. (I think Mulder would have blinded Ponch with the beam from those giant blue-beamed flashlights he and Scully were always toting, and then beaten him into submission with his eternally-able-to-get-a-signal cell phone.)

6. One of the first things we cooked together was Spanish rice, which is to this day a comfort dish of ours. The first time we made it together was also the first time she’d ever cooked with actual bulb garlic, as opposed to garlic powder. The recipe called for a clove, but she thought the entire head was a clove, so into the rice the entire head of garlic went. That was the best Spanish rice ever.

7. A few years ago she baked a Bundt cake for The Daughter’s birthday, but the damned thing stuck in the pan, resulting not in a ring but a mound. So she just mounded it up, glopped the frosting right over the top, and called it a “Volcano Cake”. Now, every year at her birthday, The Daughter says, “Remember the Volcano Cake?”

8. Our first date was to see Edward Scissorhands. So, Johnny Depp’s been there since the beginning, from Edward all the way to Captain Jack Sparrow and beyond.

9. We used to go out for chicken wings and beer every Thursday night. We didn’t even miss our Thursday night wing night when The Daughter was born: her birth was on a Saturday, and we left the hospital on Tuesday, so at the tender age of five days, The Daughter entered a bar for the first time. This may have made us bad parents, but I don’t think so. A girl’s got to know how to handle herself in a bar, right?

9a. She’s not a huge fan of when I post photos of her sleeping.

Yes, I will get yelled at for this, but she's so cute when she sleeps...even when it's during her favorite teevee show!

10. She insisted on breastfeeding both The Daughter and Little Quinn, which in both cases required lots of pumping. Especially in Little Quinn’s case, since he was never able to eat by mouth. Every drop of breastmilk that entered his body went in via the G-tube, so for as long as her production held up, she pumped six times a day.

11. I’ll probably never completely understand how much of herself she sacrificed in fourteen months to keep Little Quinn alive and progressing. It seems, in retrospect, that every free day she had was given to him.

12. That same instinct in her kicked in again when Fiona was in danger. She didn’t question the necessity or possibility of spending months flat on her back with her feet inclined, if that was what it took. If commitment was all that was needed, Fiona would be here today. (Of course, if commitment was all that was needed, Little Quinn would be here and Fiona wouldn’t have happened.)

13. We used to associate certain teevee shows with the snack foods we’d eat while watching them. NYPDBlue was always chips-and-salsa. ER, when we still watched it, was often good ice cream. Now, good ice cream has been transposed to Grey’s Anatomy.

14. “Our” first teevee show was LA Law.

15. Subsequent teevee shows of “ours” included ER, Mad About You, The Pretender, Profiler, CSI, Firefly, and more.

16. On our first Internet account, we set up our combined e-mail identity after the two main characers on The Pretender. We were “Jarod and Miss Parker”. People familiar with the show wondered what that said about our relationship, since Jarod and Miss Parker aren’t allies. In fact, Miss Parker was initially a villain but as the show went on her character became much more complex.

17. She started roller blading, got me hooked, and then promptly stopped roller blading. Now she prefers biking.

18. It was almost without warning that I met her parents for the first time. We started dating late February 1991; a couple of weeks later was spring break, for a week, so I came home to Buffalo. At the end of that week I tried calling her, only to learn from the old lady she was renting a room from that she wasn’t home because of a death in her family. I remembered her saying something about a sick grandfather, and that’s what turned out to have happened; her grandfather had passed away from Lou Gehrig’s Disease. When I got back out to school, her entire family was there. So I met the future in-laws on the spot. Luckily, I seem to have made some kind of decent impression.

19. Our first long trip together was from Iowa to Idaho, to visit her family, a couple of weeks before school began in August of 1992. She had already graduated college, but I was in my senior year. While we were out there, the infamous Ruby Ridge Incident was taking place twenty miles down the road, so all week there were National Guard vehicles on the roads and helicopters overhead.

20. I am forever amazed at her ability to take some fabric and create a garment. This skill of hers looks like magic to me.

21. Her first pair of overalls were a gift from me. She thought the whole thing was goofy – maybe she still does! – but she wore them for years until at one point they became too small for her, and then a short while later they became too big for her. We didn’t start wearing overalls together until we’d been dating for about a year.

22. Back in the 90s, on two different occasions, we picked out Persian kittens. Both were wonderful cats, both are gone now, and we miss them both dearly. The first was a beautiful tortoiseshell Persian named Jasmine; the second was a red Persian named Simba. Both died in the year preceding this blog’s launch.

23. Adopting Lester and Julio was The Wife’s idea. I’m still unsold on these two giant lummox goofballs.

24. The Wife also took The Daughter to adopt Comet, when The Daughter was only two.

25. Shortly after The Wife moved to Western New York to be near me, she adopted a cat from the shelter she named Lilac. That cat never really liked me all that much. Lilac died a few months after Little Quinn passed.

25a. She is directly responsible for all the animals with whom we currently live.

Indulging Lester
Why they invented hotel rooms

Julio's favorite position

Cats and Wife. (And my left shoulder)

Snowmageddon '14, continued

Day 59: Clear wife, blurry dog. #100DaysOfHappiness #NewDog

The Wife is unimpressed with Julio's uninvited advances. (Notice Lester in the background.)
26. She loves to laugh, particularly at my expense. She is convinced I don’t think she’s funny, but that’s just not the case.

27. Things with which she has a deft touch include: a pair of scissors, a needle and thread, a kitchen knife, the mixer, bread dough, a screwdriver, a lug wrench, and a shot glass.

28. It irritates her that The Daughter has inherited my tolerance for sunlight — I tan, whereas The Wife burns.

29. The Wife likes to read, albeit not quite as much as I do. She always has a book going, and she reads every day.

30. She never used to use a bookmark, until I finally decided I was tired of watching her flip through a book looking for a passage that was familiar to her so she could find her place. I bought her a bookmark.

31. She loves nuts – except for walnuts and pecans, which I love. This makes it occasionally difficult find good brownies and similar items in bakeries, since many people default to putting pecans or walnuts in their brownies or other chocolate cookies.

32. When I first met her, she was a huge Anne Rice fan and read most of what Rice wrote until she decided that Rice’s output wasn’t interesting her much anymore. Since then she’s read a lot of other authors, including a lot of unfamiliar names whose books I’ve plucked from the stacks of offerings at library book sales over the years. Interesting how obscure even the bestsellers of yesteryear eventually become, huh? Currently she really loves Gregory Maguire, the Wicked guy.

33. When we first met, she was a Washington Redskins fan. So of course, the first Super Bowl we were together was the one where the Redskins knocked the Bills on their collective arse. Oh well, at least she hated the Cowboys.

34. She prefers her KFC “extra crispy”, where I’m an “Original Recipe” guy.

35. Movies that are particularly meaningful or nostalgic to us, in addition to Edward Scissorhands and Star Wars are Dances With Wolves, Titanic, The Lord of the Rings, Singin’ in the Rain, and the James Bond movies.

36. For some reason we didn’t take any pictures when we were on our honeymoon or when we were on our vacation to Disney a year later. I think we were between working cameras at those points…but lately I really wish we’d have addressed that at the time.

37. Things we did on our honeymoon to Cape Cod, Boston, and New Hampshire: road a boat out to sea to watch the whales; visited the New England Aquarium; ate dim sum in Boston’s Chinatown; bought lots of kitchenware at an outlet strip (don’t laugh, we still have some of that stuff); visited the Boston Science Museum. While doing two days in Boston we stayed at a hotel about forty miles out and road the train into town; on the second day, on the way back, we fell asleep on each other’s shoulders.

38. Our first argument as a couple resulted from a common misunderstanding between people when one is from Iowa and one is just living in Iowa for a while. I told her we’d meet for dinner, so she showed up at noon and got annoyed because I wasn’t there. Well, duh! I said “dinner”, not “lunch”. Except, remember, she’s a native Iowan, which means instead of eating breakfast, lunch and dinner like most (ahem) normal folks, she ate breakfast, dinner and supper. Thankfully, I’ve converted her since then. Whew!

39. Our first wedding anniversary saw us spending a week at Walt Disney World. What a wonderful time that was! Even if she managed to rip her toenail out two days into the trip, thus requiring me to push her around in a wheelchair the whole time after that.

40. She had long hair when we started dating, and I had short hair. Now we’ve reversed that.

41. Before we started dating, I had a beard. When I became interested in her, I shaved it so I’d look better. Then, I learned that she likes facial hair. So I grew the beard back a while later.

42. Foods I’ve tried because of her: asparagus, squash, rhubarb, grapefruit, and more that I don’t recall.

43. She loves George Carlin.

44. She bought me my first cell phone, and my second cell phone.

45. When we were at the Erie County Fair in 2001, she wandered off to look at the Bernina sewing machines. When I came by ten minutes or so later, she was in the process of buying a Bernina sewing machine. I didn’t complain; I just stood there, kind of looking shell-shocked.

46. Leading up to our wedding, she rigidly adhered to the notion that the groom should not see the bride in her wedding dress until she comes round the corner to walk down the aisle. So I didn’t see her until she came round the corner to walk down the aisle.

47. Starting a family was her idea. Not that I was against it; I figured we’d get there eventually. She just picked the “eventually”.

48. She picked The Daughter’s first name, so I got to pick her middle name.

48a. And now, this:

Old Photos of Little Quinn

49. Since Thanksgiving Break at college was only a four day weekend, I didn’t go home for T-giving my junior year; instead, I spent the weekend with her. We went to see her extended family out in Storm Lake, Iowa, which is on the other side of the state. Since she has family over there on both sides of the family, we ended up having two Thanksgiving dinners that day. Some part of me is still full from those two meals.

50. Iowa delicacies that The Wife and I share are pork tenderloin sandwiches and broasted chicken.

51. Some of our early dates were sufficiently cheap that we had to look for ATM machines that would dispense cash in five dollar denominations.

52. She bought Simba, the above-mentioned red Persian kitten, while we were on a shopping trip to Erie, PA. She fell in love with the kitten as soon as she saw him in the pet store; we then spent the rest of the day walking around the mall with me listening to her as she tried to talk herself out of buying him. (Persian kittens are pricey little buggers.) Finally, while we were at dinner at Red Lobster, she decided to pull the trigger.

53. Before Little Quinn, the most heartbroken I ever saw The Wife was the day we finally had to end Simba’s life. His kidneys were in failure.

54. Great gifts she’s bought me through the years: my current winter coat, a cupboard-full of drinking vessels of all types, candles, incense burners, the Star Wars original trilogy on DVD, my anniversary edition of The Lord of the Rings with paintings by Alan Lee, my star sapphire ring, my current wristwatch, and many more.

55. The first thing she ever gave me: a stuffed bear, around whose neck she tied a lavender ribbon. I think she doused it with perfume. I named that bear “Bertrand”, after philosopher Bertrand Russell.

56. The first thing I bought her: a little two-inch high figurine of a laughing Buddha. I think this confused her a bit.

57. Despite my best efforts for a while, she’s never much warmed to baseball. That used to bother me, but these days that doesn’t bug me much at all. I’m pretty cool to baseball myself now.

58. For a few years we went to Cedar Point each fall. We haven’t been there in a long time, but I always found being there with her in the fall, in the cool air, pretty romantic. I loved riding the Giant Wheel after dark, sitting up there with her hand in mine, looking out over Lake Erie.

59. At Cedar Point, she decided that she liked this one coaster that does loops, so I stayed on the ground while she rode it. I’m terrified of those things.

60. Why don’t we play mini golf more often? We both love mini golf. The Daughter loves mini golf. What gives?

61. One day in 1996, we were eating lunch in Buffalo when we had “The Discussion”. Any guy who’s ever been dating the same girl for a period of time measurable in years will know what “The Discussion” is. So I agreed, it was time for us to take the “next step”. Later on, while she was having her eyes examined at LensCrafters, I bopped over to Penney’s to buy her a ring. I chose a nice emerald one that looked really pretty. Sadly, they didn’t have it in her size, so they had to order it, which would take three weeks. So I figured, OK, I’ll get the ring in three weeks and make this thing official. Yay, Me!

62. The next day, she proposed to me.

63. Three weeks later I showed up to get the ring. They had it, but they couldn’t find the paperwork, so some poor guy at the pickup counter at Penney’s spent his entire lunch hour trying to find the paperwork so I could give my already-fiancee her engagement ring.

64. I don’t remember exactly when we picked out her wedding rings, but we each have an Irish wedding band, and each ring is set with the other person’s birthstone. So my ring is set with four amethysts, which is her birthstone; hers is set with four sapphires, which is mine.

65. For years I wore my ring incorrectly. Apparently there’s one way to wear an Irish wedding band that signifies being married, and another that signifies being single. I was wearing mine the “single” way. I was alerted to this by a guy I worked with at The Store; he said, “Yeah, you’re telling all the women that you’re available.” I replied, “Yeah, and I’m beating them off with a stick.”

66. On our honeymoon, it was important to her that she at least get to dip her toes in the Atlantic Ocean. So she did. The water was very cold, though.

66a. She replicated this moment years later when we took a trip to the Jersey Shore.

To the sea!

66b. We returned two years later.

The Wife enjoys a bit of quiet. #CapeMay

67. It always bugged her mother that she saw Niagara Falls before her mother did. Later we took her mother to Niagara when she was out for a visit.

68. During the summer of 1991, when I was at home and she was still in Iowa, she came to spend a week with me. I took her to Buffalo and to Toronto, on the way to which we stopped to see Niagara Falls for her first time.

69. She was really confused the first time a Japanese tourist asked her to take his picture in front of the Falls.

70. At the time our beer of choice was Labatt’s. It’s pronounced “la-BATS”, but we had a family friend at the time who liked to say it “LAB-uhts”, which is how I said it at college just for fun and habit. So when she visited me that summer, we went to the bar where this friend hung out, and he was so impressed when she ordered a “LAB-uhts”.

71. Our favorite mixed drink in college was the sloe gin fizz. A few years ago I tried making these again, discovering that her tastes had changed and she now found them sickeningly sweet. I like them still, but yeah, they’re sugary. (And pink. When I told a friend at work who knows everything about liquor that I’d bought some sloe gin, he laughed and said, “Oh good! Now you can make pink drinks!”)

72. She taught me the right way to do laundry.

73. I taught her the right way to crack open crab legs so as to not mangle the meat.

74. Our first major mistake of parenting was taking The Daughter to a fireworks display on the Fourth of July in 1999. The Daughter was all of fifteen days old. This was the big display in Lakewood, NY, which is right on the banks of Lake Chautauqua. The Daughter did not respond well to the fireworks detonating right over our heads; the sounds were bad and for years afterwards The Daughter was very scared of loud sounds.

75. We always say that we should go camping. We never actually do go camping. We need to do more camping.

76. Once for dinner I made some frozen cheese ravioli with sauce, a favorite meal of ours that we hadn’t had in a long time. She said that she was looking forward to “eating some cheesy goodness”. Unfortunately, the raviolis were a bit on the old and tough side, and the cheese never got nice and melty, so after the meal, she commented, “That wasn’t really cheesy goodness.”

77. She likes eggs over-easy. I’m not a big fan of those, but I try to make them for her when she’s getting over being sick.

78. She makes fun of my over-reliance on boxed mixes in the kitchen.

78a. I’m much better about this now. Her main kitchen complaint about me is that I make way too big a mess when I cook.

79. In 1993, when Cheers aired its final episode, she bought pizza for my roommate and I.

80. She only swears when she’s really annoyed.

81. She is not happy that her nine-year-old, fourth-grade daughter is now the same shoe size as she is.

82. A while back she had her hair colored a brighter shade of blond than is her natural color. It was awesome.

83. Before that she experimented with red. I’ve tried talking her into doing that again, but no dice.

84. When my aunt met her the night before our wedding, she made a comment to the effect that I was to be commended for adding blond hair and blue eyes to our gene pool.

85. The Daughter has blond hair and blue eyes. So did Little Quinn.

86. I’m not sure there’s a variety of seafood she dislikes.

87. I love the way she looks when she’s just come home from work and changed into her PJ’s.

88. Adopting Lester and Julio was her idea, but she claims the upper hand on that anyway because she was helping out my mother.

89. For some reason, The Daughter and I like to bring up at the dinner table the fact that The Wife, as a kid, had to help the family out on Chicken Butchering Day. I don’t know why.

90. She thinks Orlando Bloom is really attractive. I don’t see it, myself, but you can’t argue these things.

91. For my birthday in 1992 she drove me to Dyersville, IA so I could see the Field of Dreams.

92. If I want to spoil her, all I have to do is buy her blush wine, cashews, olives and chocolate. Cake helps, too.

93. She spoils me by looking the other way when I go to Borders; by making me waffles or French toast or Spanish rice; by cleaning the kitchen after I’ve messed it up; by indulging my love of pie; and a thousand other ways.

94. I’m always game for a pie in the face, but I’m pretty sure nobody pies me like she does. Or better.

If you can't be ridiculously silly with the person you love, you're doing it wrong! Happy Valentine's Day, everybody!! #ValentinesDay #pieintheface #overalls #splat #SillinessIsAwesome
Splat! The meeting of Pie and Face

Patrick Starfish is surprised by my fate. #PatrickStarfish #pieintheface #overalls #splat
95. I know I’ve found the perfect girl for me when she describes our Thanksgiving in 2006 as being perfect because, after dinner, we went to see Casino Royale. In her words: “We had a big turkey dinner, and then we watched James Bond kill people.”

96. We both love laughing at David Caruso on CSI Miami.

96a. Sadly, CSI Miami is long gone, but now we thrill to the adventures of Team Machine on Person of Interest, of Castle and Beckett on Castle, and we enjoy Alton Brown’s delicious brand of pure evil on Cutthroat Kitchen.

97. One time when we were working out at the Y, and she got so engrossed in what she was doing that when I approached her, she didn’t recognize me at first.

97a. She loves lilacs.

Rochester Lilac Festival. #LilacFestival #Rochester

97b. She loves sushi, so for a while our Saturday night dinner tradition was I’d buy her sushi at The Store, and she’d eat that while I had a “charcuterie” plate of my own. (I think we can all agree that “charcuterie” is the fancy-schmancy word for “cheese and crackers,” yes? Kind of like how “grits” turned into “polenta” at some point and started commanding $15 a plate?) But she’d eye my cheese and ask for a bite or two. Over time this morphed into her and I both having the cheese plate.

But she still loves the sushi, and I still have to buy it for her! It just becomes her lunch at work on Mondays. No escape!

97c. While driving once:

ME: Huh.
HER: What?
ME: I know I’ve heard this piece but I don’t know what it is.
HER: [into phone] What is this song? [holds phone to speaker, then looks at phone] It’s the fourth movement of Mozart’s Eine kleine nachtmusik.
ME: Wow, I didn’t know your phone could do that.
HER: I’m pretty sure it’s standard now! Your phone can do it too!
ME: Whoa….

See? She teaches me things.

97d. For years she worked in the restaurant biz, which meant working just about all of the major holidays and struggling just to use her allotted vacation time. Now, she’s in banking, so not only does she get the holidays off, she gets off all of them, including the ones I don’t! (I have to work MLK Day, Presidents Day, and the other “lesser” holidays that are still “No mail and no banks” days. She gets ’em off now.) She is not shy about gloating about this.

97e. She continues to make fun of my previous claims that I “am not a dog person”. To my recollection I never made any claims along those lines, just that I was unfamiliar with dogs, not that I disliked dogs. She just shakes her head and keeps on being amused at how much Cane and Carla like me. What can I say!

97f. Her, a few years ago: “Hey, there’s this event where people who own greyhounds all meet up in the Finger Lakes and then we all tour around to wineries and taste wine and have fun with our dogs! Wanna go?” We just got back from our fourth time on that trip the day before yesterday.

97g. This last year has been different, I’ll say that. We’re eating out a lot and staying home and watching movies in bed and so on. Aside from our not being able to go out to eat or to see movies, and the cancellation of several of our favorite festival events, this crisis really hasn’t impacted our lifestyles much at all. I’m glad she’s the one I’m enduring the pandemic with!

97h. Exploring Oahu with her at my side was wonderful. We both kept getting amazed by the same things!

97i. Sometimes it’s hard to find a teevee show that she likes, but when I do find one, it’s a blast as references from those shows will creep into our vernacular.

97j. We tend to get mutually weepy over the more emotional reveals on The Repair Shop.

97k. This last year has had some difficulties of its own, over and above the COVID struggles, but we’ve weathered all of it and continue to weather it all.

97l. Our opinions differed wildly on No Time To Die. Hey, it happens! Kinda like her distaste for coconut. (Which is weird, let’s be honest.)

New for 2023! 97m. She’s had a couple of surgeries in recent years that led to some recovery time and bed-rest, which meant she watched a lot of streaming shows. I didn’t realize what kind of stuff she was streaming until one night we were watching Saturday Night Live and she started laughing knowingly at this sketch. I asked, “Are you watching a lot of murder shows these days?”

97n. On weekends I usually get up before she does, so I’ll come downstairs and make my coffee and get hers set up to go. My signal that she is getting up for good is when she actually opens the blinds in the bedroom; when I hear that, I’m to get up and turn on the coffee. (Sometimes I’m listening to music on my earbuds and I don’t hear the blinds and then she comes downstairs and gives me the “No coffee?!” look. Fellas, try to avoid the “No coffee?!” look.)

97o. No, it doesn’t bother me at all that Carla prefers to sit with her on the love seat when we’re watching teevee at night as opposed to sitting with me on the couch. Harumph.

97p. If I could go back in time and make exactly one change to our wedding day? Yup. We’re all doing the “Rock the Boat” dance made famous by Derry Girls.

97q: Related to 97n above, I’ve been up for 45 minutes while she was trying to doze a bit more. This was thwarted by our cats, who decided to have rompies all over the upstairs, including the bed with her in it. As I write this she has just come downstairs, called the cats assholes, and is now making her coffee.

97r: Stay tuned, but she has started the ball rolling for adopting another greyhound. Yes, I’m on board, but this one’s going to have some pretty big pawprints to fill. (This weekend is a little bittersweet because this is when we’d be on our annual greyhound-meetup excursion to the Finger Lakes wine country.)

97s. Maybe I mentioned this above someplace, I don’t know, but I love how she has chosen to approach her dietary restrictions with a sense of adventure and discovery. We have found more great places to eat and discovered more terrific foods to cook in the years since her celiac diagnosis than we did before, and it’s not like we were dull sticks-in-the-mud in the food department to begin with! She’s always loved trying new foods and spicing things up, which is a real blessing if you’re at all familiar with the Monument to Blandness that is the usual Iowa spice rack.

97t. I’ve come to really like coming home from work, looking up as I pull into the driveway, and seeing her in her home office. Sometimes there will be a dog looking back down at me, which is also cool.

97u. Apparently she takes some of the chocolate from the home supply that I maintain to her desk at work, and some of her coworkers know she has a chocolate stash, so sometimes that gets shared around. I do the “I’m not feeding all the kids in the neighborhood!” thing, you know, the one where your kid wants to grab a dozen freezy-pops from the freezer for all the friends on a hot summer day and despite your protest you let it happen. Because hey, it’s chocolate and that increases the net happiness in the world.

97v. Our last cinematic disagreement came after watching Top Gun: Maverick, which I really liked (despite my general lack of enthusiasm for the original movie). She was distracted by the impossibility of Tom Cruise having perfectly brown hair at this point in his life. I’m hoping this doesn’t hurt our enjoyment of the upcoming Mission: Impossible flicks….

97w. We have developed a way of simultaneously groaning wistfully whenever an unexpected reference to Hawaii shows up on teevee, like the Netflix show we’ve been watching about American street food, and at the end of one episode the preview for the next said, “Next time: Oahu!”, with a big shot of Waikiki.

97x. Bam! The future of rock and roll! (No, this has nothing at all to do with The Wife, but come on, now.)

98. Maybe this is a personal failing on my part, but I can’t bear it when she cries. It kills me inside. But I’m trying to get better at this, since as Gandalf said, “Not all tears are an evil.”

99. I wish we were living lives that didn’t include so many tears.

100. I love her more than I did last week at this time.

101. Number 100 on this list will be equally true next week at this time. And the week after. And so on.

102. She makes me happier than I thought possible.

103. She…oh, I guess that’s where I need to stop. I love you, honey!

Chilly morning at the Farmers Market. I had to buy The Wife a coffee. #wife #EastAurora #wny
Day 65: Tried taking a photo of my Beautiful Wife looking at Taughannock Falls, but she turned her head toward me at the last second! #100DaysOfHappiness

The Wife, with horse. #eriecountyfair #Wife

Pumpkinville: Happy wife, irritated Daughter

Erie County Fair: A couple

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