Shining Through Rain

Wake Up with First Blog Reader

I’ve found it extremely hard to blog when I’m in the actual company of the First Blog Reader. She’s not very understanding if she is not the sun center of my attention if we are in the same house. As a matter of fact neither am I. My wife and I drove down last night after work for a long New Jersey weekend. By the time we arrived our granddaughter was down for the night but this allowed for a couple of nice hours with our daughter and Wingman for some rare adult conversation.

Abuela Too

I got up early to drive my daughter to the train station and then waited with semi-baited breath for the sun center to arise. She seemed a little shocked to have the faces she sees so often on video screens in the room with her but that soon succumbed to the required hugs and showing us around. We came downstairs and she immediately keyed in on the box containing her new kitchen as well as the gift bag holding the numerous gifts my wife had acquired for her as well.

Presents

Of Course!

Wingman reluctantly left for his trip because he could see how much fun we were all having. My granddaughter supervised the assembly of her kitchen when I wasn’t required to push her around the first floor in her new toy wheel barrow. Abuela was teaching her how to lift the plastic cookies out of the oven as the First Blog Reader took her new kitchen duties very seriously. It was so welcome to have the gifts appreciated so well. My wife once again redeemed her reputation as a world class shopper.

Abuela Brought Ketchup Too!!!!

And Pink Gardening Gloves

Giving Friends Rides in new Wheel Barrow

Too Many Laps to Count

This will be a short blog because she’s down for a nap right now and I want to be ready to continue to fully enjoy our time together. First my daughter has cooked up a huge surprise for my wife that I have to execute in a few minutes. I have to leave the house to pick up the surprise which should elicit a memorable reaction. You’ll have to tune in tomorrow for details.

I’ve fallen behind on my reading recently due to work both at the office and at home. I’ve used an extra half hour sleep each morning instead of my early morning reading sessions. I’ve still waded through an old Stephen King novel that had somehow passed me by unread, Lisey’s Story. As usual the Master was on top of his game weaving a fantastic story of a Maine novelist’s widow dealing with her grief and a crazed fan bent on murder. It wouldn’t be the Master if an alternate world didn’t creep in as well. King does such a fabulous job with human relations and his subordinate characters always feed the story line without distracting from the well-formed leads. Lisey, the title character, shows immense courage and depth dealing with a half-forgotten key to her survival while also telling the heartbreaking story of her dead husband’s early life. Can’t believe I missed this one when it came out but everything in its time and this was well worth the wait. 

Pick Me Up Grampa

Abuela Giving Barrow Rides Too

Not as Easy as it Looks

Loving the New Kitchen

Helping Abuela Get Ready for the Day

Pile Driving Grampa

The Cook is In!

Always the Fashion Plate

Supervising Grampa Building her Kitchen

The Gloves

Planting Season and Road Trip Prep

Get to Spend the Weekend With These Two - SCORE!!!!

My long, back bracing duel with my wife’s new front yard gardens is finally approaching the final phase. I completed my bucket brigade approach to the huge pile of loam yesterday after work. We’re still waiting for her big shipment of flowers from an online order but she had acquired a number of plants that had been languishing on the back deck awaiting my earth moving exercise to conclude. As soon as I finished dumping the last wheelbarrow load behind the wall I summoned the architect outside to pinpoint where the plants should go. She was not a happy camper since it was fairly brisk outside and we were getting scoured by some hefty wind.

The New Gardens With New Loam Coat and Minimal Plants

Site of Former Loam Pile

This may have helped her usual glacially paced decision process along because I only had to move each plant three times before she agreed to their position and stole back inside out of the wind. I got all the plants into the ground and had to only chase empty flower pots down the hill twice after the wind took off with them. The plants look a little lonely but the incoming shipment should remedy that in no uncertain terms.

I finished all this in time to sneak my wife away for a guilty pleasure type movie – How to be a Latin Lover. I figured my wife would love it which she certainly did. She told me going in that I should take notes. She backtracked on that guidance when she learned the plot concerned an aging gigolo kicked to the curb by his millionaire wife and sets out to conquer another meal ticket. I can’t blame the guy for trying since the target was none other Raquel Welch who has lost nothing off her fastball in her senior citizen years. There were some absolutely hilarious bits including one where the guy, trying to be sexy, dives into a swimming pool at a large party and all of the black dye he used on his hair disperses into the pool creating a very suspicious black cloud. I couldn’t stop laughing. He moves in with a sensible sister played by Salma Hayek, who, talking about fastballs, is still Salma, ‘nuff said. A very silly movie with an impressive comedic supporting cast that kept me laughing even though I knew I probably shouldn’t.

Someone's Going to Miss their Daddy

My wife and I are very excited because we head south to the Garden State after work today. We’ve been summoned for child care duty through Monday as Wingman is winging off somewhere. I just hope there’s room in the car for me after we pack all my wife’s granddaughter purchases over the past couple weeks. She knows it’s an area I’m not going to restrict funding levels within. It’s been a  while since I’ve had a break from work so I’m excited for that as well, but it’s mostly about seeing my daughter and, of course, the First Blog Reader. 

Grampa and Abuela Are Coming to Help

Empty Circle

She Loves the Slide

After a couple weeks of continuous abuse my body may finally be lodging a persistent complaint. The lower back has been pretty sore since last night’s continued front yard ditch digging. It was a little more complicated since I was transferring the dirt to behind the new wall out back. The hill was too steep for the wheel barrow so I devised a system where I filled large pails with dirt, used the wheel barrow to move them to the back yard, carried the pails up the hill to the wall and dumped the dirt behind it. This was not as much fun as it sounds. I did make a serious dent in the pile though and should finish that exercise off tonight.

Before

After Last Night's Shoveling

My Favorite Panamanian is making progress in returning the downstairs to habitable state. She used the recent wall painting to indulge in one of her favorite activities – redecorating. I couldn’t complain about the back because I was too busy moving furniture into the new locations. Her mom is coming back from Panama with us for an extended stay and she’s trying to get things “perfect” before maternal inspection. Buddy and I know it’s smart to keep our heads down during one of these exercises; much easier for Buddy than for me.

Date night last night had us at a movie theater of all places. While that is my designated spot for nights such as these it was further enhanced by a quick FaceTime call from the granddaughter. Her mom was late getting home and caught us as we were headed for the popcorn stand. The call turned out to be the highlight of the night as I’ve finally lived to see Tom Hanks make a bad movie. The Circle is terrible. The heavy handed plot and minimal use of Hanks and the late Bill Paxton may be part to blame but the real villain is lead actress Emma Watson. She’s clearly out of her depth and demonstrated none of the screen presence she’s achieved in some of her other work. She went with a wan, mouth breathing victim mode which eradicated most of the sympathy her character was supposed to garner. The British sci fi series Black Mirror did a much better job lampooning the dangers of social media in one of their episodes than this clumsy effort. Watson was thoroughly dominated in whatever scene she appeared which was a problem since she was in virtually every scene. They would have done much better casting her friend in the movie, played by Karen Gillan, who delivered. A huge disappointment – avoid this if you haven’t already been sucked in by the theory that anything with Hanks in it is worth watching.

Late Night Shoveling

The Worcester to Auburn Drive Savior

A very prescient friend commented on yesterday’s blog entry that since I was finished with the wall that a certain Panamanian was bound to have additional tasks queued up. He was so right. She reminded me that I promised her new soil for the front yard gardens and that I was supposed to contact Deckzilla Dude about installing a backsplash in the kitchen. Working around one of those Mondays that earned that foul day its reputation I arranged for a load of garden soil to be delivered and for the dude to meet us after work.

Pile Last Night

I’ve said before physical labor is a great sedative following a challenging day behind a desk. When I pulled into the driveway I saw my wall-sore back was not getting a rest. I may have over ordered because the pile was huge and we were expecting some significant rain over night. That meant I had to move the portion sitting on the driveway if I didn’t want it to end up washed away. I was into the fifth or sixth wheelbarrow load when Deckzilla Dude showed up and the fun began. My wife wanted to know if he could move the center island he installed six inches. After that discussion they both got down to designing the backsplash which expanded to under counter lighting before I had a chance to catch my breath. He then suggested we all go to Home Depot so we could decide on the tile and buy what was needed.

This Morning

It’s at times like this that my life passes before my eyes. I have to forgive Deckzilla Dude because he’d never been in a situation where my wife has to make a decision in a retail environment. I resigned myself to my fate as we spent nearly an hour and a half in the Worcester store where my wife found a sheet of tile she liked but insisted the rest of the box was darker. We eventually abandoned efforts there and moved on to the Auburn Home Depot.

She's Getting So Big

I was not high in the morale department at this point and the Good Lord sent exactly what was needed as we drove down to Auburn – a FaceTime call from my granddaughter. It was the perfect tool I needed to avoid answering spousal questions that would have only gotten me into trouble. The medical effect lasted for the rest of the evening, impossible to be angry when confronted with her image. Another hour in Auburn and my wife was finally coaxed into making the necessary decisions. This was not work for the faint of heart. We got home around 9pm and I finally had my dinner before returning to the pile of dirt.

And Happy

One of my mother’s favorite expressions growing up whenever we didn’t excel in the educational arena was, “Keep this up and you’ll end up being a ditch digger.” This was a depression era saying as ditch digging was the lowest rung of the employment ladder. Mom was probably looking down last night and nodding a “told ya so” as I whittled down the pile. My wife, to her immense credit, was out there with me raking the piles of dirt I dumped into her future gardens. As a side note I got high marks from her on the quality of the dirt which had compost mixed in, so I’ve got that going for me. I’m sure the neighbors appreciated our late night driveway scraping. 

Walled In

With my Faithful Assistant by the Completed Wall

I’m still trying to figure out why the fairly large consumption of beer seemed to have no effect during our dancing date on Saturday night. I remarked on this to my date, the dancing queen herself – my Favorite Panamanian (note – a lady came over to our table Saturday night specifically to compliment my wife on her dancing – she said nothing to me). It may have been from excess thirst from wall building time but I literally felt no effect despite a very busy waiter servicing our able with repeated rounds. I still had my wife drive home because I didn’t trust the evil intentions of demon alcohol but it was weird.

From Another Angle, Swing at Top of hill Will Move Down Once Filled in

The Pile of Stone

Also Finished Off Front Yard Mini-Wall

Weirder still – no excess pain on Sunday from all the yard work and hours spent dancing afterwards. Maybe wall building is some convoluted fountain of youth. At any rate I will never know because I finished the last wall yesterday. I made two more trips to Home Depot loading and unloading bricks, including one during a thunder storm. It’s a lonely feeling pushing a metal cart across a large open parking lot while thunder starts rumbling. I think that was the fastest I’ve ever loaded the car. Now that the wall is finished I can move on to filling in behind it, creating the staircase between the terraces, and replacing the dead grass area with patio stone. There’s also an outdoor fireplace hiding in the pile of rocks sitting on the hillside. I left them there so I would be motivated to actually build it. I’m guessing June.

I Didn't Ask

A very busy day elsewhere as well. Wingman was conducting his own backyard excavations down in New Jersey. As the temperatures warm they are meeting a lot of their neighbors and learning some of the back story surrounding their new house. Wingman’s excavations have revealed a lot of major tree roots which a neighbor related belonged to a huge tree that came down over the past year. The First Blog Reader was energetic last night demonstrating some new dance moves and modeling her go to outfit which she wears when she’s helping dad outside – she’s almost criminally cute. The upside – we get to see them for an extended weekend starting on Thursday!

Ready to Test Dad's Reflexes