How I love NCIS

I don't know for how many more ?years ?months there will be NCIS marathons, but at least two stations have marathons all day, from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.  I know all the shows, so I don't need to actually watch the shows, but I have the show on if I'm in the family room.

This is particularly good on days like today when I had difficulty falling asleep at night (didn't fall asleep until about 4 a.m.) so need a good nap.  I turn on NCIS, and within minutes I'm asleep.  Today I slept 2-1/2 hours. 

I enjoy Criminal Minds too, but I end up watching that...and I prefer NCIS because there is less violence.  Not a lot of gun shooting.  I don't need to worry about missing a plot because if I fall asleep, I know how the episode ends and if I wake up in the middle of an episode, I know how it started.

I prefer the episodes when Ziva is in the cast and I actually stopped watching new episodes when Mark Harmon left the show, but lately I've been watching the newer episodes and catching up.  I have to watch the shows on regular TV because Netflix now only has Season 12 and beyond.

Sunday Stealing

Welcome to Sunday Stealing. This feature originated and published on WTIT: The Blog. Here we will steal all types of questions from every corner of the blogosphere. Our promise to you is that we will work hard to find the most interesting and intelligent questions. Cheers to all of us thieves.

1. What takes up too much of your time?
Watching TV or writing letters

2. What do you wish you knew more about?
History

3. What’s the best way to start the day?
Ned makes coffee before I wake up and I start my day drinking coffee and watching the morning TV shows until 9.

4. What mystery do you wish you knew the answer to?
How exactly my son died.

5. What’s your favorite genre of book or movie?
I love crime dramas.  Harlan Coben is my favorite author at the moment.

6. What’s the farthest you’ve ever been from home?
I spent 6 weeks in Perth (Australia), 1,972 miles from California

7. Where is the most interesting place you’ve been?
The Pinnacles in Western Australia.

8. When was the last time you climbed a tree for fun?
The day before Jeri was born, in 1966.

9. What do you consider to be your best find?
Peets coffee.

10. What’s special about the place where you grew up?
Pretty much everything is special about San Francisco.

11. What age do you wish you could permanently be?
Physically somewhere between 35 and 40, but with all my children already born.

12. What fictional place would you most like to go?
Oz

13. Where is the most relaxing place you’ve ever been?
In my recliner, watching the squirrels in our back yard.

14. What’s the most interesting piece of art you’ve seen?
The piece that got me the most was a statue in St. George Chapel in Windsor Castle.  I was so amazed by how realistic the figures were that I fell in love with sculpture and loved going to see statues all in other museums in London.

15. Who has impressed you the most with what they have accomplished?
Whenever I see a question like this, my mind immediately thinks of Jane Goodall.

Saturday 9

Welcome to Saturday 9. What we've committed to our readers is that we will post 9 questions every Saturday. Sometimes the post will have a theme, and at other times the questions will be totally unrelated. Those weeks we do "random questions," so-to-speak. We encourage you to visit other participants posts and leave a comment. Because we don't have any rules, it is your choice. We hate rules. We love memes, however, and here is today's meme!

Saturday 9: Minute by Minute (1979)

Unfamiliar with this week's song? Hear it here. 

1) It's easier to keep track of the minutes if your timepiece has a second hand. As you answer these questions, are you wearing a watch or can you see a clock that has a second hand?
I don't war a watch and if I want to know the time, I check the computer.

2) In this song, Michael McDonald admits he knows his girl has lied to him. Do you suspect any one of your friends/family has fibbed to you recently?
Not that I know of.

3) McDonald's big break came in 1973 when he joined Steely Dan's touring band. What do you consider your first professional success?
"Professional"?  Uh...I guess the publication of the history of The Lamplighters Music Theater in 1977.

4) In 1975 he joined The Doobie Brothers. He was originally supposed to be a temporary replacement for Tom Johnston, but he ended up working with the band uninterrupted for seven years. Tell us about something that's happened to you that turned out better than you anticipated.
See question 3.  I answered an ad for people who wanted to help put together the 25 year history and it ended up with my becoming a regular volunteer for t he company, making my best friends there, and writing a second book 10 years later.  It's still the best 10 years of my life.

5) In 1986 he guest starred on an episode of The Young and The Restless. Have you ever been hooked on a daytime drama?
In the 1960s I was a big fan of 3 soap operas and then at one point all three of them had plots I didn't like so I stopped watching and haven't watched since.

6) Michael and wife Amy raised their family near Nashville, where they had their own pond and a garden they lovingly tended. Do you enjoy yard work?
No.  And if I did, I wouldn't be able to do it now anyway.

7) In 1979, when "Minute by Minute" was popular, movie star John Wayne died. In 2004, the US Postal Service honored him with a stamp. What was in the last envelope you stamped and dropped in a mailbox?
Today.  I have lots of pen pals and usually have at least one letter to mail every day.

8) In 1979, the most popular new car was the Oldsmobile Cutlass. Ads promised drivers the Cutlass could make it easy to get in and out of tight parking spots. Are you good at parallel parking?
I used to be great at it.  Before my father let me get my driver's license, I had to be able to parallel park on our steep hill.  But I don't drive any more.

9) Random question: Did you know your great-grandparents?
I met my grandmother's mother once, when I was about 4.

New Yorker

 

Hatred

 

What has Donald Trump done to this country?  Where is all the hate coming from?  In response  to all the continued false statements about Haitian immigrants eating dogs and cats ... and geese from the parks ...there were bomb threats yesterday and they had to close city hall, the DMV and two schools to prevent Haitians (and others) being blown up.  Apparently nobody believes the people in Springfield who say there is no evidence that anybody is eating anybody's pets.

I read something the other day.  In a segment on Sunday Morning they interviewed Trump supporters, who said that no, they didn't like his lifestyle, realized he was a convicted felon, but were still going to vote for him.  People are wearing "voting for the felon" shirts.  Someone on Facebook pointed out that what supporters like about Trump is that they both hate the same people.  trump has given them permission to hate openly.

One would think that Harris would be the obvious choice, but the polls are close everywhere and all the pundits say it's going to be a very close race.

If he wins, I'm an 81 year old hermit and whatever he does probably will not directly affect me...but what kind of world will Brianna and Lacie see?

* * * *

There are 15,000 Haitians in Springfield--legally--and Trump says if elected he will deport them all.

Not much to say

I haven't written entries in several days, mostly because there's not much to say.  I was going to write about the debate,  but everybody has written about the debate (yay, Kamala!),  I was going to write about Lacie running 5K in Disneyland...but that's all the information I have about that (I'd love to know what the route is for a 5K run).

Mainly I've been answering letters and doing swaps, either through SwapBot or Postcrossing (I sent a postcard to Macau this week!)

Jeri and I are on our third book, "The Things We Do for Love" by Kristin Hannah, which is significantly better than "Annie's Rainbow," which we didn't finish.  Jeri has to return the book to the library, so we are trying to read it fast, so I'm spending time reading and not typing.

It is difficult to keep a daily journal when all you do during the day is answer letters, read, and watch TV!

Difficult letter

 I have lots of pen pals and I love hearing from them.  I especially love hearing from them when they tell me what they are doing in their lives and respond to whatever I wrote.

But I received a 4 page letter yesterday from someone who went to a dinner.  Three pages were about what she ate at the dinner and one page about doing her laundry.

How do you answer a letter like that?

Even the Compassion kids, who write pretty much the same thing all the time, tell me more than this writer did!

Sunday Stealing

Welcome to Sunday Stealing. This feature originated and published on WTIT: The Blog. Here we will steal all types of questions from every corner of the blogosphere. Our promise to you is that we will work hard to find the most interesting and intelligent questions. Cheers to all of us thieves.

1. What shows are you into?
NCIS, Criminal Minds, Jeopardy, Stephen Colbert

2. What’s your claim to fame? 
I am co-author of two books about The Lamplighters Music Theater.

3. How often do you play sports?
Never

4. Are you early or late?
pretty much always early

5. What quirks do you have?
I have ~50 pen pals

6. How often do you people watch?
Whenever I'm out in public

7. What’s your favorite drink?
Water

8. What do you hope never changes?
the closeness of our family.

9. What’s your dream car?
Any car that has air conditioning and a CD player

10.  Where would you rather be from?
San Francisco -- where I am from

11. What songs have you completely memorized?
So many you can't believe it.  I especially knew all the popular music of the 30s and  40s that my father played, any song that Judy Garland or John Denver recorded.  Lots of music from musicals (movies or stage shows), etc., etc., etc.

12. What would you rate 10/10
cheesecake, views of San Francisco, the smell of the ocean

13. What job would you be terrible at?
Bookkeeper

14. What skill would you like to master?
sign language

15. What movie title best describes your life?
101 Dalmatians (except they wouldn't be dalmatians)

Saturday 9

Welcome to Saturday 9. What we've committed to our readers is that we will post 9 questions every Saturday. Sometimes the post will have a theme, and at other times the questions will be totally unrelated. Those weeks we do "random questions," so-to-speak. We encourage you to visit other participants posts and leave a comment. Because we don't have any rules, it is your choice. We hate rules. We love memes, however, and here is today's meme!

Saturday 9: Summer in the City (1966)

Unfamiliar with this week's song? Hear it here. 

1) Now that Labor Day has passed and kids have returned to school, summer is unofficially over. Looking back, share a highlight from Summer 2024.
Our weekend in Santa Barbara, celebrating our son's 54th birthday.

2) Though this week's song is about summer, it was recorded in the spring, March to be exact. What's your favorite season?
While I love spring because of all the blossoms, I prefer fall because summer heat is fading and the next season is winter, which I love.

3) Lovin' Spoonful lead singer John Sebastian sings that he's going to meet his lover on the rooftop. When were you last on the roof of your building?
never

4) The lyrics refer to sidewalks that are "hotter than a match head." What's the last thing you lit with a match?
A couple of months ago we had swiss fondue and I lit the flame with a match.

5) The Lovin' Spoonful was founded by John B. Sebastian and Zal Yanovsky. When the band broke up, Zal opened a restaurant. Tell us about the restaurant you most recently dined at.
We recently went to Burgers and Brew because I was longing for their mushroom burger.  It was delicious.  It was hot and we had to sit outside, but they had sprinkles, so it wasn't too uncomfortable.

6) John went on to have a solo career. His biggest hit was "Welcome Back," the theme to a popular 70's sitcom. The first line: "Welcome back, your dreams were your ticket out ...". Do you recall what show used "Welcome Back" as its theme?
Welcome Back, Kotter.

7) In 1964, when "Summer in the City" was popular, Americans were tuned in to Bewitched. The show centered around Samantha, a witch married to a mortal. Among her supernatural powers were flight, time travel and telekinesis (being able to move objects by twitching her nose). If you could have one of those powers, which would you choose?
time travel.  So many back years I'd like to revisit.

8) In 1964, AJ Foyt earned the second of his four Indy 500 victories. Do you watch car racing?
No.

9) Random question: Is your big toe your longest toe?
Yes

chickens

 I received a wonderful letter from James, in Kenya, who is 19 and not one of the kids I sponsor, but he is someone I write to.  A few months back he told me that their chicken farm had been devastated because disease in the region killed their chickens and they had no more chickens, so I sent him a donation so he could replace the chickens.  

Today he wrote, I am writing to express my heartfelt gratitude for the wonderful gift you recent sent me. It has made a significant difference in my poultry farm as I used the money to buy some chicks and some schooling items.  I am deeply appreciative of your kindness.  Your support means a great deal to me. Your contribution is not only appreciated but also inspires me to continue working hard and making the most of  the opportunities I have.

(I love this picture!)

Our book club

Jeri and I finished "The Elephant Keeper" and are now reading "Annie's Rainbow" by Fern Michaels.  I told Jeri  I'd read a Fern Michaels book and it was really good, so I  thought I'd get another?  I just checked my book reports and it wasn't Fern Michaels, it was Freida McFadden, which may explain why we're having such a problem with this book.  We haven't decided if we are going to finish it or not.

Here is a bit of a summary of the things we're having problems with.  Two friends in Boston are going to move to North Carolina to start a business.  In Boston, they take a walk around the grounds of Boston College...which has no grounds to walk around (Jeri tells me).  

Before they move, there is a bank robbery of half a million dollars in small bills that can't be traced, all stuck in a satchel which nobody can find after  the robbery.  Then Annie finds the satchel on the floor of her car and hides it, deciding to keep it.  The money will help her start her new business...though she never uses it for that, but she spends years concerned that she has this money and trying to figure out how to send it back.

The start their business, which consists of a stand where they sell tuna sandwiches and coffee and it is so successful that within months they are rolling in money and ready to open a second shop. Now...how good are these tuna sandwiches and are people eating them every day?

Annie gets a dog who, while she is napping, find the bag with the bank money in it and chews up about $20,000 worth (that's a lot of chewing!)  Annie was going to send the money back, but can't now until she can replace the $20,000 that her dog ate.

Before she can send the money back, she wants to wash it to remove all traces of her fingerprints.  She puts it in a sack in her washing machine, but it stops the machine from working and she has to find all sorts of excuses why people can't help her fix it.  Somehow she manages to get the money washed 3 times.

In the meantime, she flies to Hawaii to meet with a guy who sells coffee and can give her a good price. . She falls in love with him the second she meets him and by the second day they are planning their wedding until she finds out how he treats his sisters and is so angry with him she refuses to speak to him, cancels their engagement and flies home again.

I haven't gotten any further in to the book, but everything is so ridiculous.  We had our first book discussion on Monday and will have another discussion tomorrow, when we decide if we want to continue reading the book or not.  

Amazon says it's "a thrilling tale of love and justice" and explains, "just as Annie’s life seems complete, the dark history of the money returns to haunt her. Someone is determined to solve the mystery of a ten-year-old bank robbery, and an enraged thief who has served his time is coming to reclaim his loot. Suddenly, Annie is plunged into a deadly chase, using her wits to keep her world from unraveling and to protect the one thing she values most—the priceless gift of love."

John Steinbeck

Why I love John Steinbeck....

John Steinbeck on San Francisco:

“When I was a child growing up in Salinas we called San Francisco “the City”. Of course it was the only city we knew, but I still think of it as the City, and so does everyone else who has ever associated with it. A strange and exclusive work is “city”. Besides San Francisco, only small sections of London and Rome stay in the mind as the City. New Yorkers say they are going to town. Paris has no title but Paris. Mexico City is the Capital.

Once I knew the City very well, spent my attic days there, while others were being a lost generation in Paris. I fledged in San Francisco, climbed its hills, slept in its parks, worked on its docks, marched and shouted in its revolts. In a way I felt I owned the City as much as it owned me.

San Francisco put on a show for me. I saw her across the bay, from the great road that bypasses Sausalito and enters the Golden Gate Bridge. The afternoon sun painted her white and gold---rising on her hills like a noble city in a happy dream. A city on hills has it over flat-land places. New York makes its own hills with craning buildings, but this gold and white acropolis rising wave on wave against the blue of the Pacific sky was a stunning thing, a painted thing like a picture of a medieval Italian city which can never have existed. I stopped in a parking place to look at her and the necklace bridge over the entrance from the sea that led to her. Over the green higher hills to the south, the evening fog rolled like herds of sheep coming to cote in the golden city. I’ve never seen her more lovely. When I was a child and we were going to the City, I couldn’t sleep for several nights before, out of busting excitement. She leaves a mark.”

A Busy Day

 Sunday is a busy day, for a day when there is no mail delivered or picked up.

It's the day when I answer the letters that have come from Compassion students (I am able to write email letters).  I try to answer the letters the week that they arrive.  I have 20 kids that I either sponsor or write to, so there are usually 2 or 3 letters to answer.

Also Sunday is the day when Letters Against Isolation posts the list of organizations that need letters.  I usually write 4 letters to people who are receiving meals on wheels, or who are in nursing homes.  I have to admit that thinking about these "old people," I often wonder how many of them are younger than I am!  (I am so lucky to have Ned living with us!)

Today I learned of www.postpals.co.uk, where you can send cards and post cards to sick kids in the UK.  A Postcrossing partner mentioned it in her bio and I checked it out and really like it.  With all these postcards I have this is a great way to share them with someone that can be made happy by seeing one.

One Sunday a month, I create four or more new Sunday Stealing pages.  I like to have at least two ahead of this week's date in case something happens.  Today's Sunday Stealing is the last of the ones I have made, so I'll be making new ones today,

Today there are two SwapBot swaps that I have to do and four incoming letters to answer (though I can do those tomorrow, since there is no mail delivery tomorrow either)

Sunday Stealing

Welcome to Sunday Stealing. This feature originated and published on WTIT: The Blog. Here we will steal all types of questions from every corner of the blogosphere. Our promise to you is that we will work hard to find the most interesting and intelligent questions. Cheers to all of us thieves.

Stolen from Swap Bot

1. What is your favorite flavor of ice cream?
It depends.  I like toasted pecan but I also love anything with chunks of chocolate (preferably chocolate with peanut butter) in it.

2. If you could invent a new flavor of ice cream, what would it be?
Raspberry fudge

3. Who do you like to eat ice cream with?
I'll eat it with anybody, but I have fun going out for ice cream with Jeri

4. If you were a flavor of ice cream, what flavor would you be?
Plain vanilla.

5. Does your family eat ice cream regularly, or just for a special treat?
Walt and Ned each have ice cream in the freezer, which they eat regularly.  I don't get ice cream because I'm not supposed to eat it.

6. What is your favorite treat from the ice cream truck?
I can't remember what was in an ice cream truck, but probably something on a stick.

7. Does frozen yogurt taste different than ice cream?
Somewhat.  It's been so long since I've had frozen yogurt, I can't remember.

8. If you could make a super sundae, what would it have?
Vanilla ice cream, lots of real fudge, strawberries, toasted almonds, and loads of whipped cream.

9. Can ice cream make a bad day better?
Sure.

10. Have you ever had homemade ice cream?
When the kids were little, we made home made ice cream in a hand crank bucket.  Now we have an electric ice cream maker (but haven't used it in awhile)

11. When is your favorite time to eat ice cream?
Heck--any time I can get it!

12. What is the best kind of ice cream you ever had?
I can't say exactly, but probably some gelato in Italy

13. Do you prefer your ice cream in a cone or in a bowl?
A bowl.

14. Is there such a thing as a bad flavor of ice cream?
Of course.  The ice cream store near our house when I was a kid gave away licorice ice cream on Halloween (also pumpkin) to kids who came in costume.  Licorice ice cream -- yuck.

15. They say an apple a day keeps the doctor away. What does an ice cream a day do?
puts on pounds

16. Is ice cream better when it’s fresh or slightly melted?
I prefer it slightly melted

17, What is the craziest flavor of ice cream you’ve ever seen?
Purple yam, cantaloupe, avocado, garlic