Waiting...

Leaving early for the pool has been really great all week but, on the weekends, the gym doesn't open until 8 and leaving home before 7:40 is a waste of time. So I have 30 minutes to kill.

Last night I dreamed about going back to work at the IBM plant in Rochester, MN. I last worked there in 1989. But, a lot of the people I worked with were still there. And bitching about the cold and snow. It always amused me that of all the IBM locations I knew well, the IBMers at Rochester mostly refused to move. I knew many people who's careers were stunted by their unwillingess to move to other locations (like San Jose, San Diego, Boca Raton - nice weather places!). They were glued to Rochester and bitching about Rochester's weather. It was the same last night.

I spent a good amount of time last night and this morning looking for and setting up a browser extension to help peruse Reddit subreddits. Some change they made yesterday rendered my previous reader broken. I really don't like the Reddit site but I love some of the communities there. The sewing community, particularly, is really a great place to learn new things. I needed something I could set up and sync on at least two computers. I think I've got it, now.

Swim first and then breakfast. The new streetcar starts running about 11 this morning. I might just walk over and hop on and ride it to the end and back.

68 Years ago

I just realized that today is my parents' wedding anniversary. 1948. They celebrated 51 anniversaries together.

When I was a little girl I hated this picture taken just after their wedding in Oklahoma City (Crown Heights Christian Church). I was very resentful of the fact that my mother did not have a dramatic white wedding dress that I could play dress up in. This really was a big thing to me and I stayed pissed at my mother for a really long time.

Mom was 24 and had been married before to a guy who was killed in France during at the end of World War II. Daddy had never been married before.

His mother, the tallest one, was a mean, resentful, ignorant woman married to the guy on the far left who was the nicest and funniest.  My Dad was also 24.

My Mom's Mom is next to my Dad. She was The Perfect Grandma. Born and raised one of 7 in central and east Texas, she was also a wonderful hugger.  Her husband, far right, was sweet and nice and taught me to love baseball and suffered horribly from glaucoma for a long time.

I also just realized what today is kind of an odd fact.  None of these six people were every divorced and all three marriages passed the 50 year mark.  (My own marriage lasted about 10 minutes, my brother was married 3 times - the shortest of those was the middle one of 8 years, my sister's husband died after they had been married 20 years.)

None of this group is alive today. My father's father died first, when I was just about to finish college. The rest peeled off one by one. My Mom lasted until 2005.

I was very lucky to have had them all.

Today's Basket

Previous baskets

A street car named Crowded Whaling Babies

I had a nice seat and great view in the second First Hill street car to leave from Pioneer Square.  The first one contained the mayor and dignitaries. Our car even had a few empty seats. The ride was lovely. Pleasant. And fun.

BUT, it stops way short of where I want to go. I decided to walk up to the QFC before coming home. It was raining and crowded and a longer walk than I was really interested in. The people at QFC were clearly not having a good day and taking it out on customers seemed to be a good idea to them.

The walk back was longer and wetter. The wait for the streetcar was about 15 minutes. Not bad but wet.

The car was packed to the gills. With people and strollers and crying babies. And everyone was wet and exhaling so those not crying out loud we creating a steamed box. The windows were too fogged up to see anythig and there were two mothers with strollers pushing against me the whole trip. It was NOT fun.

Now I'm home and dry. AND I've had two delicious chocolate chip cookies.  My fabric says that USPS has it listed "out for delivery" but USPS already delivered here today so I'm not counting on those chickens.

I think I'll go sew a doll.

Another boy

I'm not wild about these boys but I am figuring out how to do them better. The next one will be better yet.

Sorry I doubted you, USPS

USPS made a second delivery today and brought me my fabric!!



Fabulous dolls coming up. This Etsy shop was a real find. Turns out she is in Seattle so shipping is zippy. And her fabrics are high quality, georgous and a joy to work with.  Wooohoo!!