Thanksgiving Dinner - Thank You Alaska

We had a small Thanksgiving this year - it was just right.
Turkey makes me too nostalgic so a non-traditional dinner made up of Adi's garlic bread, a homemade Cesar salad and Alaskan King crab legs was served last Thursday. I have always wanted to abandon plates and share a table covered with newspaper, cracking into crab legs as big as my arm. I felt like Oprah, flying in her favorite food from another state.

Friends were good sports with my childhood tradition of sharing what we were all thankful for, though I didn't make them wait to eat until we'd gone around the table. We're talking crab here people.

Before and after...

Amtrak

A few years ago I earned the nickname Amtrak. If you will recall, their slogan is 'Why Drive?' and since I have never held a driver's license (by choice - keep your teasing to yourself) it stuck.
Last week I spent a few days on the train heading to and from Westlake to do some work, and back and forth between Los Angeles Union Station to visit my friends Ginger and James. If you have never seen Union Station I encourage you to do so. It is 1930's Hollywood - the stuff entire movies are based on.


















While in Westlake I received the call that my mom's father Norman (known as Papa to his 12 grandchildren) had died on Saturday, November 18. It has been a difficult month for both sides of the family and I think everyone is feeling just a shade older right now.
I bit off all my nails in preparation for leaving for Sam's service in Idaho this Friday. I'm anxious to see my family there, to be together and let it really sink in.

I promise there is a happier blog to come...

Ray LaMontagne at Lobero Theater

Ray LaMontagne says "I'm sad"












Adi bought tickets for the four of us to see Ray at the Lobero Theater on Saturday. If you don't know Ray, listen to his earlier album Trouble (2004) then listen to his latest album Til the Sun Turns Black (2006). You tell me how bad a girl messed this guy up between album #1 and album #2. He's a talented man with grains of inspiration from Janis Joplin, Joe Cocker, Zepplin and Nina Simone. That's what I heard when I saw him live and I don't use those names lightly. I really enjoyed the show but gosh I just wanted to give him a hug and a 'chin-up-buttercup'.

When I was growing up in Canada I used to come home from school and make cinnamon toast and tea and watch re-runs of Dynasty and Cheers. Guess who else was at the concert on Saturday?
Nostalgia made me do it...

Sam

My grandfather died on Wednesday, November 8th. I got the call in the evening while prepping dinner and watching democrats on CNN, enjoying the news for the first time in years.
I know this is a strange thing to write about in this arena but many of you have heard stories about Sam although you probably only knew him as Grandpa. I have written him letters almost every week for the past two years since my grandmother died.
It is Saturday morning now, when I would normally be up this early and sitting at the kitchen window recounting the week's events to him on good paper. I woke up at 6:30am today and for a few seconds didn't remember he was gone.
He is the finest gentleman I have known, one of the last of his kind.

November Mid-Term Elections

Need I say more? Ha!