Saturday, December 26

We were up by 6:30 a.m. this morning, but I skipped my exercises so we could do last-minute household chores and food preparations for when family visited.



The first group arrived around 10:30, and by noon everyone was here. Thirteen of Hubbie's family came, including Daughter and her husband, Grandson and his wife and three daughters, Sister and her two sons and two granddaughters, plus Nephew's girlfriend.



They came with healthy appetites on this cold, windy day, and enjoyed the three choices of hot soup (11-bean with ham and Rotel, potato, and chicken noodle), plus barbecued pork on hamburger buns, and cole slaw. There was also a choice of dips and cheese balls with crackers. Daughter brought several kinds of homemade candies to add to the desserts we set out...fruit salad, various homemade cookies, rum cake and rum-soaked fruit cake. Drinks included wine, tea, soft drinks, and coffee.



Following lunch, Nephew and I adjourned to my office upstairs, where Nephew downloaded a program to use in transferring cassette audio books to CDs. He also showed me how to use the program, and then spent time cleaning my computer. In order to use the new program, I needed a special jack to hook my tape recorder/player to the computer. So Nephew and Hubbie went to the WDCS to buy one. Now I can begin getting books recorded on CD, and play them in the van when we travel. Yippee.



Nephew has also volunteered to clear my old word program out and download an updated version, as well as add memory to my computer. He needs to order something or other to do this, so as soon as he has what he needs, we'll take the computer to his town and let him work on it. He's very enthusiastic to help me, because he's a natural at technology and a born teacher.



Around 3 p.m., after Nephew had finished working on my computer, the family was ready to go home. Grandson and his family had left shortly after lunch to go visit with his wife's family in another town.



A few minutes after the family left, I got a call from a high school classmate. She was contacting class members to see how many of us might be able to attend a 50th class reunion at the end of May. That time-frame would be perfect for me, since we usually camp in the area on that weekend, anyway. So I hope the reunion committee nails it for that time.

We had a small class...only about 30 of us...and sadly, five of us are gone. So of the 25 of us remaining, there will probably be only 20 or so, plus spouses, to get together (some live too far away to attend). We will probably have the reunion at one of the classmate's homes, like we did ten years ago.

Mother, who slept only a couple of hours last night, was pooped by the time family left this afternoon, so she was plenty ready to go home and crash. Hubbie and I are feeling the effects of a busy holiday season, too, and are glad to just sit and veg for the evening.

After an eggs and toast supper, with cottage cheese, and fresh oranges and prunes for dessert, we watched the movie "August," that I'd recorded on DVR. Two brothers try to keep their start-up dot.com business alive after the 9/11 attacks. The movie is rated "R" for language.

The second movie we saw was "Spinning into Butter," an R-rated (for language) movie starring Sarah Jessica Parker and Beau Bridges. A black student is the object of hate crimes that turn a small, ethnically diverse, New England college into a tailspin, as racism is examined on campus.