My Computer is Home Again!

Wow! I had no idea how my life revolved around my computer - til my computer decided to allow a virus to enter its life. As it turned out, this was a major virus that apparently attempted to eat everything in sight. Ao I took it to my local computer doctor - he, became quite ill with the dreaded swine flu and so my computer sort of got ignored as his fellow workers were so worried. This all started on Tuesday, October 13th - and sort of dragged out until today-October 29th.
In the meantime - no blogs - no reading about everyone's good and bad days - or some with nothing to say at all. Also, no exploring sudden inspirations to explore - like how to bake this or that - or create something wonderful - egads! I couldn't even play hearts.
Fortunately, in a fashion, I was extremely busy with out local bridge tournament - three and a half days of total craziness as I tried to play bridge while attempting to keep all the bridge player's tummies full of the goodies our local players had made. My days were long and my bridge partners had to be extremely patient.
Then, on Monday the 19th I departed with friends who came up from Lake Isabella for the tournament - I spent the rest of the week down there and then came back via the train and a bus (from Stockton to Sac) and Barry was there to greet me, followed soon after by Karen and Jen. Lake Isabella is rather depressing - it is located in a high desert area above Bakersfield and the lake itself is very low and the mountains very barren. I fully unerstand why my friends do not understand how they could have ever left this area.
Back to my computer fun and games - once home I did find out that the virus had been nasty - and after attempting to make a wise decision gave up and took the least expensive way out - i.e. revive my computer.
So, life is good. I have caught up on the blogs - I have a ton of e-mails waiting for me and so will end this and attack the worthy and not so worthy and the zap without further adieu communications. Love to all, M-G

Terry and Tools

Terry "earned" the opportunity to do something special. He announced (after great thought) that his idea of something special was to come to my house. So yesterday afternoon we had our special time. First we went out for a "sundae" on Saturday - he was not familiar with sundaes and really liked the idea such as having a sundae on Wednesday etc.
So from the great sundae adventure we headed for the really special time - we went to a hardware store and spent quite a long time enjoying the tools. His admiration for tools goes way back but this was his first opportunity to really look them over. He was truly in tool heaven - and we both were amazed at the sizes of some hammers and even screwdrivers. Of course, the very best was the pocket knives - especially the one that was packaged to look like a shark! Did you know that you can even hang that one from your belt? Wow! - or "Woweeee!" if you are a five year old.
Needless to say, it doesn't take much to make a great grandmother have a very special day!

The tree that became a trampoline

Many years ago during Palo Alto days I recived a lovely check for $400.00 - a dividend based on the previous years profits that my Dad's cement plant had earned. (My Dad had given each of his kids stock in the cement business he owned.) Since we had not lived very long in our tract home and had a treeless backyard I decided that we needed a tree for Russ and Karen to climb - i.e. a very large tree.
We located a nursery that actually did sell very large trees - how exciting. But then came the logistics of placing a very large tree into our fenced in back yard as among things the project would have required a crane - if we could find a way to get the tree back there it did seem that getting a crance where needed was beyong possibility.
On to plan two - no tree to climb, how about about a trampoline? We not only got a trampoline, we got a Nissen trampoline - a size smaller than the size used at gymnastic events. It was positively a glorious thing. Both Russ and Karen jumped into immediate mastery of it - as did their friends. One could say that they flipped the days away.
There was only one injury that I recall - not among the droves of kids but a grown man who had indulged in too many cocktails and had more courage than sense. Fortunately his was not a serious injury and this was pre-sue at the drop of a hat days.
Shellie and Rich joined the Towle's Trampoline Team at very young ages - in fact, I learned not too long ago that Karen was bouncing with Rich in her arms when he was a baby - and not just bouncing, but doing flips etc.
I recently heard a discusion on insuring one's property - home etc. - it was pointed out that such insurance is almost impossible to get if you own a trampoline.
And so goes the story of the tree that became a trampoline.

It Was a Very Good Day

Off in the morning to Karen's so that we could have a shopping advventure. Both of us did some lamenting that our favorite store for "bumming" no longer exicsts (i.e. Gottschalks). However, we settled for Kohl's - neither of us were into looking for clothes so we just roamed in household stuff and both had some success. We had lunch in downtown Roseville and then we off to the "$Ten Dollar Store" as nothing is over ten dollars. That is not its name but certainly fits. I found two little books for Gavin (the book lover) and Karen found a huge ball for Terry (the keep moving lover) so we both left there quite happy. One of my books, by the one, Janet, features a bunny that ends up with a "needle" in one foot and then he meets up with a hedgehog that has lost a needle.
On my way home I stopped off at Jen's and ended up being there for about four hours - which meant four hour of playing with Gavin and Terry plus a very nice dinner prepared by Jennifer. I "read" numerous books to Gavin - chatted quite abit with Terry and got in a few conversations with Jen. I also got down on the floor multi-numerous times which meant I had to get up from the floor multi-numerous times. Amazingly, I left there with such wonderful joy in my heart - proving once again, that laughter is the best medicine.
Yes, it was a very good day!