Where The Hell Have I Been?

I've been looking for an apartment while painters and contractors have been crawling all over this house to prep it for selling.

I found a place and will be officially living there as of April 11.
Until then I exist in this uncomfortable world of boxes and bubble wrap; anxious cats and noisy workers and endless phone calls turning stuff off, turning it on and wondering why I had it to begin with,

The development I am moving into is pretty. It's an H shaped, 2 story apartment complex surrounded by trees on 2 sides, a small development of one family homes in front and a country club behind.

The groups of units look like this 

I have a 2nd floor apt. with a balcony. When I told Hope we could play Romeo and Juliet she said "It's Gnomeo Nana, Gnomeo"

My son set up the new TV and got stuff ready for Verizon to come run lines.

This is the kitchen

This is at the bedroom window, looking out toward the hall that leads to the bathroom at the left and to the front door straight ahead.

I hope to have many happy things to share with you once I'm settled.

The Help

My closets have needed to be cleaned out forever. Change of seasons is usually a perfect time but this year winter seems to want to hold on while spring is tentative and now summer just wants to blast on through.

Saturday it was raining and 40 degrees F
Tomorrow it's supposed to near 90

How does one dress?

Layers I suppose

I started closet cleaning this weekend.

Isadora helps. 

She gets very insulted if I move her so she is the perfect excuse to walk away and leave the closet for another day.

Is It Snow Yet?

A few shots of the snow that took three days to get here and all day Friday to fall. We didn't get much accumulation; a small comfort after the high winds and flooding.

Have a good weekend everybody

The Three Tenors

These guys are often in the tree right behind the house.

My granddaughter Hope says good morning to them from her bedroom window as she gets ready for school. My bedroom is right below hers and I can hear her. 

One day I was helping her get dressed and I called the birds the three tenors. Hope is interested in opera so I explained a bit about the three tenors and we listened to a recording of their Central Park concert.

Days later I heard Hope saying good morning to them and then I heard her Mom asking her to please hurry and put her shoes on.

"I'm talking to the three tenors" Hope replies. 
"Where did you learn about the three tenors?" Mom asks.
Hope's answer had me smiling all morning - "From the CD Nana played for me, we do more than just princess you know".

Merry and Hopeful

I'm off to Brooklyn The Motherland tonight. I'm sure I'll return with some good traffic stories as well as at least one profound Guido quote.

Whatever your celebration style may be ...

Grand

Fancy

Whimsical

I wish you all good things.


And as always, there is Hope

Thanksgiving

After my town survived Hurricane Sandy it seems even more important to be grateful.

I'm grateful for the safety of my family.

I'm grateful for the people who always show up to help

I'm grateful for Siren and Isadora. They brighten any day and love unconditionally.
In their own way of course - they are cats.

I'm grateful for all of you. I realized it again when I couldn't share the storm with you and I worried about you worrying about me.

Most of all I'm grateful for Hope.

And on we go ...

Hope Says ...

Nana, you have to play in the snow before it's gone

Hope and Friends

Hope entertained her best best ever friend Daniel and his baby brother Brian a couple of weeks ago. Before they headed out back to the pool and the bikes and the swing they let me take a few shots.

"I don't think we can stop moving", Daniel told me. I did my best.

Have a great weekend everyone.

It's Not That Big A City If You Live Here

At 9:07 this morning a man started shooting people on 33rd Street near 5th Avenue. They’re still sorting through who that man was (he was killed by police) and why he started shooting.


That’s not what’s going through my mind.

As soon as I saw the breaking news report I called my Daughter-In-Law; she has family who work on 35th Street and 5th Avenue. Then I called my brother to find out if my nieces were in midtown.


Between those two calls a neighbor called me to tell me her daughter was OK. She knew I’d be worried. Her daughter was in the World Trade Center on September 11th, 2001 and still has serious anxiety and depression issues as an aftermath of that day. She now works in the Empire State Building – on a low floor she tells people – and we were all concerned that this would be too much for her to handle. Thankfully her co-workers are also survivors of 9/11 and they all helped each other stay calm.

While we spoke on the phone and compared notes of TV coverage of the event, my brother and I started to reminisce about all the times we’d been on that street. I walked down that street almost every day when I worked on 33rd Street and Lexington Avenue (about 4 blocks from the shooting scene); we used to meet at the Houlihan’s in the base of the Empire State Building; my niece worked one summer at the Duane Reade drugstore on 33rd Street. We each know people who work in the Empire State Building now or in any one of the hundreds of stores and offices and restaurants within those few streets.

If you don’t live in New York City you probably see it as the huge mecca for business and tourism that obviously it is.

If you don’t live in New York City it must be difficult to comprehend that streets full of thousands of people milling about are also neighborhoods.

While we navigate the crowds on the way to and from home we pass many strangers.

Yet we also pass the doorman we see every morning; the guy we get our paper and coffee from; the Mom who takes her baby to the park at the same time each morning; the elderly woman who goes to Food Emporium as soon as it opens; the pretty young girl who works in the sportswear shop; the janitor who pulls in the trash cans from overnight pick-up; the woman who walks her dogs before leaving for the office …

These are our neighbors and our friends. New York City is our home in exactly the same way that any smaller city or tiny town is home.

That’s what I was thinking as I watched what seemed like a movie unfold in my home town.

There are already hundreds of photos online of the shooting scene.

I’ll share with you some scenes of the NY I know.

    Be careful out there; wherever you are.

Some Summer Stuff

It is so freakin' hot. Triple digit heat index expected today.


I haven't been feeling all that perky this week.

Isadora loves it when the laundry piles up

She discovered by getting stuck in the hamper that she must wait for the clothes to reach critical height before settling in

I took a drive down to the beach early one morning before the temps reached sizzle

Good heavens were people being crucified!

The well part of my mind assumes banners for some summer something

Stay cool everybody

Hope is Three

Hope Mia was born on Friday, July 3, 2009 at 10:19 PM. I remember her Dad saying that if she could just wait a little bit longer she'd be a July 4th baby. Mom wasn't amused.

the Mother Goose poem says

Fridays child is loving and giving

Hope celebrated her birthday this past Saturday. First with a "kids only" party at a small amusement park. Later that day family and friends came by for BBQ and cake.

Hope couldn't decide between Toy Story and Rapunzel as a theme so she got both.

Cars is another favorite. Tita Geli and Nana combined forces to get lots of Car stuff

Surrounded by adults Hope searches her gift bags for toys while they admire the clothes.

Mom brought out the cake and Hope supervised the cutting so that she could be sure to "get all of Rapunzel's face on my piece"

In between gift opening and cake cutting there was lots and lots of fun

Taking care of her new pup with her new vet kit
Aunt Denise lends a hand. Denise has been a family friend since she was a teen.

Pup is all better and takes a ride on Mater the bubble maker
It was about 9 PM at this point and the birthday girl had been awake since 7 AM

Three is a good age