End of November

Well I did it, I wrote every day but the 2 days in San Diego. It's been challenging.

Here's the list of the books I read in November:

Dominick Dunne – Too Much Money
Laurie Frankel – The Atlas of Love
Cathy Holton – Revenge of the Kudzu Debutantes
Cathleen Schine – The 3 Weissmann’s of Westport
Cathy Holton – The Secret Lives of the Kudzu Debutantes
Sue Ann Jaffarian – Corpse on the Cob
Lori Lansens – The wife’s tale

Oh, and just in case you are interested...I got my license :)

Happy Day

Yesterday they had elections in Catalunya, CiU won! That's the one all my family voted for and the one I would have voted for had I been there. It killed the Socialist party that was in power.

So that was good news to me, and today there was "El Clasico" which was the game between Barcelona and Madrid, the great rivals. Madrid spend countless millions of euros getting all the big names for this year, Ronaldo, Kaka, etc...but Barcelona just trashed them 5-0 !!!!! I was in school checking the scores once in a while and when the game finished I applauded and went half bananas which of course made my class go bananas also, we had a good time! :)

Tomorrow I'm taking off to go get my driver's test. I have been doing DMV tests online, and I did pretty well. I just need to really read the questions cuz sometimes they are tricky. I am still worried about my vision test, but I hope it'll be OK.

Just finished watching the movie "Bride and Prejudice", I forgot I had already seen it, but it was fun watching it again, lots of music, Bollywood style and gorgeous costumes.

Windy day

It was really windy today, it came from the north, so it was quite chilly too, but really nothing to complain about.
I finally made it to Trader Joe's, yay! I love that store, It was all set for Christmas and I got the Advent calenbdar for my kindergartners, I also got a Gingerbread Man cookie, it's already baked, about 15 inches tall, and it has everything you need to decorate it. We will do it next month in class when we read The Gingerbread Man book :)
Tonight we went out to eat at Carino's, I had chicken Marsala and it was good, but I think I like Sandy's better!
Random note..I am member of a Facebook group called Cuantos Perello en la red? one of the members, is Ramon Perello, he was born in the same town my paternal grandfather was born, I wrote to him saying maybe we are related.. well we have commented back and forth, he's very nice. We usually write in catalan, sometimes in Spanish, but today he wrote in my wall the following:

Handsome congratulations soon touches, i raise the flight to me. A hug from Catalunya

Your guess is as good as mine, lol.

Another quiet day

Today Marvin went to WW, he lost 2 lbs. I didn't go out at all, a few days ago I went to Trader Joe's, I drove around the parking lot about 8 times, it was packed, with cars turning their blinking lights when they saw somebody on the way to their cars, it was madness. So I left. This is a bad week for shopping, I don't enjoy shopping anyway and with all the people even less. I did a little Amazon.com and it was all right.
We were going out to eat, but decided to leave it for tomorrow, so I worked on Report Cards, and used the Jacuzzi, and read. For dinner I made breakfast: hash browns, eggs and sausage.
I have an appointment for my driving test on Tuesday. I need to read the booklet a little more, but I did fairly well with the online tests.
And so it goes.

Musings

I read Lizzie's blog where she writes that we have never been a "traditional Thanksgiving family". She has a point. It's not in my background, we didn't have Pilgrims and Indians, and I really don't need one day to give thanks for what I have, I thank God every day for all my blessings.
When I came to the States, we had Thanksgiving over at Marvin's parents house. It was not very different from Christmas, only we didn't exchange gifts at Thanksgiving. It usually was us, Mary, Dewey, Bettie, grandpa Moore and the boys, and later one Mart and Verna, Lee, and as the family grew, the grand kids. We had always turkey and dressing and gravy, yams, salad, and pies. Opal made the dressing Marvin likes which we haven't been able to duplicate, she also made great pies.
I remember one year we had Grandpa Moore and Opal and Marshall over for Thanksgiving, it was in Dixon in the apartment that had 2 floors. I remember the dress I wore, Sandy was about 3 years old. I think it went OK :)
When we moved to Idaho, it was just the four of us. We did have turkey and trimmings, and I remember going once to Ralph and Rowena's, and another year to Larry and Casey's. Then the girls grew up, we moved to California and Sandy went to college to Idaho State U. She came home for Christmas and a few times for Thanksgiving too...who can forget our Thanksgiving meal of Chinese food???? When Lizzie started college too she came home sometimes, sometimes she spent it with friends.
And now, they both have their own family, so for the last few years, it's been Marvin and I, and since neither one of us are crazy for turkey, we usually have whatever we like.
Sometimes I feel bad because it is a big American holiday after all, but since we sure are not surrounded by friends and family, it really makes not much sense to make a huge meal with lots of side dishes, pies etc. just for the two of us.
This year, we enjoyed the Jacuzzi, the grilled steaks , and each other :)

Thanksgiving

Another quiet Thanksgiving for Marvin and I. It was a nice sunny day, we went to the Jacuzzi in the morning and saw some hummingbirds feeding, love them!

We decided to have steak instead of the traditional turkey since neither of us are crazy about turkey, Marvin loves the dressing his mom made but we haven't been able to make something remotely like it, so steak it was! I grilled them, while Marvin made potatoes, green beans, rolls, and garlic mayo.

I watched two movies, one of my favorite holiday ones, "Love actually", and one I had never seen before "Elf". Marvin has watched some football but mainly he's been reading a western.

It's a day of giving thanks, we are thankful for our daughters and grandson, and for all our family and friends, and we are thankful for our health, and for having a nice house and a nice life.

Here's a picture of Marvin (with a moustache), me and the girls. Thanksgiving 1972.

I hope you all had a lovely day!

Another day

Southern California people are weenies, they are complained about the cold weather, ha! they should be in Idaho, or Utah, or Sweden! But it is chilly for our area. At 10:00PM the outside temperature is 59 degrees brrrrrr lol
I called Bettie today to find out how her cataract surgery went, she said it went well and she's fine, we chatted for a while. I asked her what was she doing for Thanksgiving, she said they were having breakfast with Christina and Rick, and then she and Lee were going to David and Iris for dinner. She asked me what we were doing and I said Marvin and I were just staying home.
A while later, Iris called us to invite us to her house for Thanksgiving dinner. Very nice of her, but we declined. I still have a cold and neither one of us felt like driving to Burbank.
Tonight we went to El Cholo, we had tortilla soup, tacos and enchiladas, and of course, my Margarita.
Have a good night (or good day) everybody!