Godspeed Tork

From a picture posted on Facebook posted by Sophooey, Melina's mother.  Melina, age 19, is my granddaughter.

Tork Eng, Melina's grandfather died a week or so ago.  A Cambodian refugee fleeing from the genocide, he came via Malaysia with his young family to the United States.  They had 1 son and three daughters eventually.  Sopooey, Melina's mother is their eldest daughter.  My son Danny is the father.

Tork doted on his young granddaughter.  She lived in their home.  I will always be grateful that my granddaughter had a stable place to live.  I never had to worry about that.  Not that everything was fabulous over there, but she always had her family.  They moved shortly before Tork's death to Puyallup (over an hour away from us)

Melina can live there and she's very determined to get her driver's license.

Megan and Suzie - Electric Bikes

Megan and Suzie went out and bought electric bikes.  To ride around on?  Here's Megan with hers.  Suzie's folds up.  She got on it and went blasting down the cul de sac, loudly whooping it up!  I laughed and thought "some things never change."  I wondered if any neighbors had seen her and had the same thought.  But most of the neighbors had moved who would remember the young Susanna doing that in spades.  Always looking for the thrill and taking it for all it's worth.

I hope they have a lot of fun with then.

Cupboard goods....

So we cleaned out our main food cupboards because of some black bug sightings.  We already had thrown out a bunch of things before this.  These items passed the 'really grossly expired' cans and those that could conceivably grow black bugs; better not take a chance.

So what have I learned from this.  Next time I want to buy a sauce or a salad dressing, stop, you already have 20 bottles of these things.  And no more canned tomatoes.  Also no more canned soup!  Refried beans or enchilada sauce?  Nope.

As Ilana says, "Do NOT let this woman buy any more jars of spaghetti sauce!"  Actually I wasn't too bad on those.

Rich people's problems....

July 4th at Harstene Island

We went to a July 4th gathering with Dennis' family at the waterfront cabin on Harstene Island in the South Sound.  We all stayed outside, did social distancing (kinda).  I was the only one wearing a mask and I didn't all the time.  The crowd tended older, we were among the youngest.  I figure me wearing a mask will help people date the picture.  Two older dogs, Shelby belong to Jim and Eliza and our Teddy attended.  Teddy LOVES to go to this picnic, he sticks around and the eats can be fantastic if you're lucky.  Aunt Eliza is partial to Teddy.  Plus, he assures me, he only got into the garbage once and was caught immediately.

On purpose we didn't stay too long.  The water in the background is Pickering Passage.

Bargain Books Back!

This is great news for my daughter Ilana and myself.  Third Place Books is now open!  Pictured is one of our favorite places, the Bargain Books table.  Also appreciated is the Staff Picks display.  This great book store is nearby.  When Ilana is visiting, we go down here and we pick out our books for our Book Club.  Ilana has Book Clubs with quite a few people in her life including me.  When she's here, we buy books for months into the future.  Serious book buying, we do.  The idea is to agree on 5-10 books that we want to read together.  And then we buy them.  Lotsa books.  Very satisfying.  Fill up the bag.

But we're now reading the last book in the bag from our buying trip in December.  What shall we do?  We can just come up with titles.  Ilana's not gong to be back until November or December.  I hope that I'll be able to go down to Third Place Books and through the phone or something be able to pick some selections from the Bargain Table.

It really helps that Third Place is open.

Shoreline's got it going

Today for our Tuesday morning romp; we stayed close.  A Shoreline vacation.  I wanted to do 'forest bathing.'  I admit I got Strandberg Forest Reserve mixed up with Krukenberg Botanical Garden.  Actually first we stopped at the PCC Edmonds and got some special soap and various food items.  We went to the forest reserve first, small but beautiful.  In a neighborhood but still remote.  About two acres in a small gully with lots of tall trees.  I read the forest bathing stuff I had printed out.  About being present and noticing.  Listening and reflecting.  Here I am in the forest.  On the way to find some FABulous begonias we had seen on the way, we ran into the Botanical Garden that I didn't even know was there.  And it was somehow open.  So we stopped and walked around on the trails for awhile.  I could maybe buy a fern there?   The Mexican restaurant I had picked was closed so we stopped at a Gyros place.  Swedish Richmond Beach was there which could be our door into conventional medicine if it would only work out.  Last stop was LFP mall where the jewelry store was finally open and I had my watch battery changed.  Finally.

Our mask collection

This is our current mask collection.  We don't wear them much because we don't get out much.  Less and less it seems with the increasing caseloads.  Many would like to believe Donald Trump that it's all behind us.  But it's stronger than ever especially when things have 'opened.'  But we don't want to get it due to our own carelessness.

Currently we own six cloth masks (and I've ordered a few more).  2 were made by my friend Kolett.  2 were made by Naomi.  2 I bought.  I figured I better strengthen my collection.  Seems like they are getting more comfortable (or I'm getting used to them).

Naomi will be buying my groceries this afternoon.  Susanna just said they were going down to the Farmer's Market, did I want anything?  Yes, I did!  I was just going down there myself.  I asked her to buy strawberries, asparagus and Alvarez pickles.

The only thing in the near future is the July 4th party at the family cabin at Harstene Island.  I know Dennis wants to go to see family members.  The plan is to stay outside, stay socially distant and wear masks.  Maybe it's iffy, I dunno.

Our anniversary dinner

44 years does show its wear no question.  And we have not really mastered selfies.  But we did go to a favorite restaurant Anthony's at Edmonds Marina last Monday evening.  Had their fixed price Sunset Dinner they offer early on weekday evenings.  We went right when they opened and got a waterfront place on their deck.  With our masks, wipes and hand sanitized.  You can see the water behind us.  Our table is right behind us.  We figured this was the safest way in these Covid times.

Happy Father's Day

Dennis recently found this Father's Day card from Danny.  On old WACAP (several name changes hence and I don't think it exists any more) startionery.  But when was it made?  Only shows two little sisters so pre 1989.  Danny went to Kindergarten shortly after we moved here (1987).  Maybe a little post Kindergarten but not much; he was always above grade level in the academic ways.  So maybe 1988?  First grade?  So now for the important question....who are the pets?  Not a dog because we got Shadow later, when Susanna was in 4th or 5th grade.  So it's got to be cats.  Dennis and I think it's Frank (a short haired Tabby who adopted us in the other house and always wanted to be with the kids.)  And the other is Eleanor?  A long lived smaller tabby cat. Who could take or leave the kids. Dennis says Eleanor's main skill was to sit on his lap for every column he wrote until she died.