baby lissa

I drew this from a photograph of my baby sister when I was taking art classes my sophomore year of high school. My mom recently gave it to me and I think I'll have it reframed and hang it in my guest bedroom.

after the storm

It seems that here in WNY we often have days that are gray all day long. Such was today. I glanced out the window as I was leaving work. It looked like rain was on the way again. The coldest, rainiest July in 65 years. By the time I got off the elevator it was coming down in buckets. Then just before evening comes, as is also very typical here in WNY, the sun peeks out again and fills the sky with the afterglow of the storm.

fattening up my tapeworm

After workouts I always need to stop at Wegman's for something. Tonight we needed turkey breast for sandwiches and then I wandered all the other aisles and bought these three chocolate bars with wrappings too adorable to pass up and flavors to delectable to miss out on.

what jay and i did

front flower bed with Jay working on side front bed

B and I went to Jay's this weekend armed with every tool a general contractor might need to perform any work that may need to be done. Jay wanted me to work on the flower beds. Jay and I cleared the two beds in front of the house which were mostly giant weed gardens. B trimmed bushes and then went inside to start priming the basement paneling for painting later. We were able to salvage a rose bush, some flowering bush that we are waiting to see what flower is produced and a beautiful Oriental day lily. We ripped out everything else including a gnarly old cedar bush. After turning the soil until it was fine the three of us made a trip to a giant landscaping store near his house. We decided on barberry, boxwood and hydranga and nine bags of red cedar mulch.


Oriental day lilies




side front flower bed

another view of side front flower bed
We are hoping that we can nurse this sickly rose back to health


break for lunch at Wegman's


wildflowers in Jay's woods
After working most of the day I took a glass of tea to the back yard where I sat on the log pile (remember the tree that was trimmed with the moving van) and enjoyed the wind from the approaching storm blowing the tree tops. Then I went into the woods at the back of the house and picked black raspberries and enjoyed these pretty wildflowers while thrilling to the now rapidly approaching storm and hoping that Iwouldn't get struck by lightning. Sara enjoyed the berries on Sunday morning on her cereal.


Sara's bed
This is Sara's bed brought to the guest bedroom. Her dad made this bed to match her antique dresser. Sara was working a 7:00 pm to 7:00 am nursing shift while we were visiting so she and Jay took turns sleeping in this bed and Jay gave the master bedroom bed to B and I.


Saturday night we had dinner at The Wokery. My battery pack in my camera needed to be recharged and I had one picture left. I had my camera perfectly focused on Jay and he looked so handsome. Just as I snapped the shot he made his rat face as Sara calls it. One shot left and this is what I get.

black raspberry pie

made with berries from my yard on Friday
Only two tiny slivers had been removed by Monday morning due to fears of getting fat. So I took it to work this morning and like the movie....it was Gone in 60 Seconds.

i vant to suck your blood

When I was in college I started donating blood. I see by my cards that my first donation was 11/17/71 and I continued to donate through 1980. Occasionally I would get rejected for being anemic and once for being underweight. Once I nearly passed out in the quad and had to lay on the ground for a few minutes until my light-headiness passed. I stopped giving when I became a very regular runner. I wanted to keep all my oxygen-rich red blood cells for myself.



Then in 1993 I decided to start giving again. The American Red Cross tested my blood and found that I was a CMV donor which meant that my blood was free of this herpes virus. Cytomegalovirus is a common virus that infects 50-80% of the population worldwide and is the virus most frequently transmitted to a child before birth. This means that my blood can be given to newborns and on top of the fact that I am O Neg (the universal donor)I became a hot commodity with the Red Cross. I was hounded night and day with calls begging me to donate. I abruptly stopped donating in 1995 and endured several more years of vampiric begging of my blood. Now I no longer get these calls. I saw on the news recently that there is a severe shortage of blood....especially...you guessed it....O Neg. So I am wondering if I should man up and donate again. I'm still a regular runner and don't like giving my red cells away. Guidance here please? What do you think?

debbie

Happy Birthday to a good sister and a best friend. We are so alike in many ways that it is scary. Hope you get your gift on time. I've had everything forever then may not have gotten it mailed on time.


Both of my sweet sisters. This one was taken on Lissa's birthday.

dinner tonight

For the table...sunflowers inspired by the Tour de France and because Wegman's featured them at $5.99 a bunch.


a salad with Asiago Pepper Creme dressing for starters


followed by Mahi Mahi with roasted yellow pepper sauce and basil and chives from my herb garden

I was liking this meal until I huffed some rice grains up my nose, coughed and blew them across the counter. Not so appetizing after that.


Sunday night I fried up these zucchini squash blossoms that I found at Wegman's. Not exactly diet but good comfort food for the Sunday Evening Blues.


Apricot Melba made with fresh black raspberries from my yard and served over to-die-for PJ Madison's kashmir cinnamon ice cream.

an unexpected gift

Last night B and I watched "Knowing' with Nicholas Cage. It turned out to be better than expected...even excellent. This morning I was sitting at my computer reconciling my bank account when B came up the stairs with a gift for me.....this rock that he found while he was working in the yard. I was thrilled. I don't think he realized that I have actually collected meaningful and unusual rocks over these many years. He asked me if I knew why he gave it to me and I said "Sure, because of the movie last night". I added it to my collection.


This has to be one of the most unusual in my collection. It looks just like a heart with valves and the whole works.


Another view


Every one received a lump of coal from R&S,my first employer, a company that built coal mines.


some more of the collection

special request

Yesterday a guy that I work with came to my cube with a special request. He had a folded up page from a calendar. It was a picture of green flowers with a blackish background. He said that it looked liked a dress that his wife was going to wear to a wedding next week. He thought I always wore such unique pieces of jewelry and looked so nice and was wondering if I could match something up to the picture and let his wife borrow it for the wedding. It was a nice compliment for me but even more so such a sweet gesture for his wife. I don't have a lot of green in my vast collection but managed to come up with these pieces for him to choose from. Hope she finds something here.

On a funny note....I came back from the bank to find a couple I knew in our reception area. We were surprised to see one another. I knew him from when our sons played baseball together. She was the breadwinner and he was the housedad. He and I would chat during practise. I knew her from workout class at the BAC so we were used to seeing one another in shorts. She said " I didn't recognize you at first with your clothes on."

mona in wonderland

A Facebook quiz told me that if I were a Disney character that I would be Alice in Wonderful. That suits me fine because I wouldn't want to be some wimpy girl waiting for her prince to come. I recently fell down the rabbit hole but instead of having tea with the Mad Hatter I found myself having tea with my mom and sister.




We were joined by the owl and the pussycat.


Curiouser and curiouser