Dog Day Ramblings: November 2011

29 November 2011

Happy Birthday Meg!

My best friend,Meg, turns 50 today. Maybe I shouldn't shout out that she is now the big 5-0 but I'm almost 9 years older than she is so I sure don't think that 50 is old. Meg started working in my agency while I was on maternity leave with my son. We met the day I started back to work - almost 30 years ago. We became instant friends and continue to be even now that I am retired. Meg has the biggest heart of any person I have ever met. I am so very grateful for her friendship.

Happy Birthday Meg!

27 November 2011

The Voices of Women : Janis Joplin

I have always been a big Janis Joplin fan. Her rendition of the song 'Summertime' is the best I have ever heard. I have used many adjectives to describe her singing this song but for this blog I'll go with evocative.

Today when I started my walk with Blackie, I turned on my Ipod and 'Summertime' was playing. Just now after finishing a batch of stuffing for turkey day cooked my way (and for the leftovers), I sat down to check my email. I switched to a classic rock channel on cable and the first song was again Janis singing 'Summertime'. I'm thinking this is kismet. I am meant to share this amazing song, and the amazing Janis. So I am going to share her with you. The song is from the amazing in so many ways Cheap Thrills album.

Here's a You Tube recording of the song:

26 November 2011

Sunday Skyping with Rosie on Saturday

Rosie has a play-date planned for tomorrow so we Skyped a day early.

Can you find Gromma?

I love that smile. Bye Rosie!

24 November 2011

Happy Thanksgiving!

This is Thanksgiving 1960 with relatives on my Dad's side. Sitting in back against the wall are the kissin' cousins. Cousin Paula in red is pulling on my collar. Getting us all to sit still (or "to stop fooling around") at the same time was almost impossible. My sister noted that of the 18 people there that day, 9 (including Mom) have passed away. Sadly Mom was the photographer so we have no picture of her.

On 2-14-2012 I found 2 more photos taken on this Thanksgiving Day. If interested, here's the link :

http://ddramblings.blogspot.com/2012/02/happy-valentines-day.html

22 November 2011

Rosie & Dad

Don't you just love this picture!

21 November 2011

Rosie's New High Chair

All dressed up and nothing to eat.

20 November 2011

Sunday Skyping with Rosie

Rosie looks so stylish in her new red sweater.

Rosie is practicing to be a balloon in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Fancy pants to go with her red sweater.

Rosie smiles. Gromma will see you next week pretty girl!

Sunday Miscellany

Another spectacular sunrise.

Sunday is my day for tending the plants. I noticed this morning that the Christmas Cactuses (Cacti?) are blooming.

19 November 2011

Gun Season

Incongruous with this beautiful start to the morning, it is opening day of gun season here in my part of New York.

I understand (or try to understand) the lure of hunting. Dan is off to hunting camp for the weekend. For him, someone who was brought up on a working farm & has hunted all of his life, this is the best time of the year. This is Christmas for him. He is a responsible hunter and never shoots just for a trophy. And yet I walk this beautiful land we live on every day; the dogs and I share the field with the deer and we have a comfortable respect for each other's right to be there.

Normally I would avoid walking at first light on this weekend. We are surrounded by farms, and neighbors who hunt - it is probably not the safest time for a morning ramble. But this year I have no access to the back trails since Hurricane Irene destroyed all of our bridges. And I'm not willing to give up our walks so we prepared as best we could and went up to the field at our usual time. I put Blackie's bright orange collar on him. Lucy was in neon pink. I wore a red coat and off we went.

When out with Blackie, and then with Lucy, there were several gunshots. I'm glad we walked but I missed the peaceful quiet we usually have. Fortunately no change to the beauty.