Saturday, February 25, 2006
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[click on any picture to enlarge] Happy Birthday Billy!!
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Please see Karen's Happiness for a write up on our nice son-in-law's birthday.
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We had a nice time tonight at the Guadalajara Mexican restaurant. Billy, Karen, GC#4, Mrs. Jim, and I were there to celebrate.
Afterwards we went shopping for a while at the Woodlands (a planned community north of Houston with a Conroe and/or Spring, Texas, mailing address), all meeting at the Barnes and Noble before we went home. Not much was spent, mostly just looking or just reading.
....................THE WOODLANDS TOWN CENTER (link)
Billy, I owe you a few nice write-ups. They will come, I promise. In the meantime, y'all, read Karen's Happiness.
We had a nice time tonight at the Guadalajara Mexican restaurant. Billy, Karen, GC#4, Mrs. Jim, and I were there to celebrate.
Afterwards we went shopping for a while at the Woodlands (a planned community north of Houston with a Conroe and/or Spring, Texas, mailing address), all meeting at the Barnes and Noble before we went home. Not much was spent, mostly just looking or just reading.
....................THE WOODLANDS TOWN CENTER (link)Billy, I owe you a few nice write-ups. They will come, I promise. In the meantime, y'all, read Karen's Happiness.
What we did on our 33rd wedding
anniversary 
[click on this/any picture(s) to enlarge]We had a very nice anniversary day. [those crawfish talk if you click on them]First we had coffee and our granola bar, and looked at the paper some. Earlier, I took the garbage out and got the paper.
Mrs. Jim did some planning for our upcoming vacation. I tuned my blog a little and visited some blog buds.
Mrs. Jim had a 9:48 tee time. She would golf with a couple of lady friends. While she was getting ready, I moved the car and got the golf cart ready.
We all drove to the proshop, Adi went with us. Mrs. Jim let Adi and me off. Then we started our walk home.
Adi even had time for a roll on the fairway. (Please note these photos were ones taken previously on a walk such as yesterday.)
The walk was about two miles. We did this leisurely, taking about 50 minutes. I wanted to check myself going up the hill that had exhausted me before my stent placement, a couple of days before. Yes, I was puffing at the top of the hill and it did take a few minutes to catch my breath. But it was so much better than before, when the puffing started half way up the hill.
Adi came home to take a nap, I drank some coffee and worked some on my Sunday school lesson which I will teach tomorrow. Lunch and a couple of long phone calls from well wishers about my surgery slowed the study process.
At 1:45 I got a call. My sister was coming in from Iowa, they were at Fairfield, Texas, on I-45. Yahoo told me they were 113 miles away and they should be here in less than two hours. I picked up some of my messes. All work on the Sunday school lesson stopped.
Mrs. Jim came home at the same time they arrived. Lois had brought her laptop to check out her new wireless adaptor. We finally got it to work but not it didn't start and lock on the way the one in Mrs. Jim's does. Lois will take it too Best Buy and let the Geeks there tell her what she is doing wrong.
Jim, Sister, Lois' hubby, wanted to wait some for rush hour traffic to die down before they went on to my niece's home in Friendswood. Friendswood is on the other side of Houston, halfway between Houston and Galveston We don't get to visit or see each other much with them In Iowa and us in Texas so their longer stay was very welcome.
One more nice thing about their coming was that they brought a rear window for our 1950 Ford. The first of February when I was up there Mrs. Jim and I brought down a couple of bumpers I had bought. They were kept in Lois' garage for the winter. The window was there too. Thanks guys, for the storage and the help in getting them down to here.
When they had gone Mrs. Jim and I got ready to go eat. On the way we stopped for a little shopping at the LifeWay bookstore. Then it was off to Pappadeaux Seafood Kitchen to eat. We got there a little after nine and had to wait for a few other numbers to be called. It was only a few minutes. The crowd was way ahead of us.
We each had a seafood plate. Seniors can eat off the lunch menu there. That was still more than we could eat. Mrs. Jim had the Sampler Platter, I had the Crawfish Combo. The Crawfish Combo was the Mardi Gras special at a reduced rate with larger portions than the usual lunch plate. Half of my plate was fried crawfish, the other side had crawfish etoufee. Dirty rice came with this. We each had a salad. For desert we split a bowl of bread pudding. Everything was excellent, all cooked Louisiana Cajun style. There was so much we each took home a doggie bag.
We had a nice day and came home in time for part of David Letterman. I did more on my Sunday school lesson also, as today would be a still busier day for the both of us.
(Papadeaux pictures courtessy of Papadeaux Seafood Kitchen website.)
Labels: Anniversary, Jim Bunch Eats, Seafood
What's going on here?
Or
What's a lollie?
(Hint: see http://www.arrl.org/arrlletter/06/0224/)
"Do you eat chocolate bars and lollies?" another student wanted to know."Well, we have no lollies," McArthur answered, "but that's only becauseValeri [Tokarev] and I didn't ask for them. Yes, we do have chocolate bars,chocolate candy, other candy, and if a crew wanted lollies they could ask for them, and they would have them up here."
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Next question:
What's a lollie?
(Hint: ask your kiddo or grandkid)
Or
What's a lollie?
(Hint: see http://www.arrl.org/arrlletter/06/0224/)
"Do you eat chocolate bars and lollies?" another student wanted to know."Well, we have no lollies," McArthur answered, "but that's only becauseValeri [Tokarev] and I didn't ask for them. Yes, we do have chocolate bars,chocolate candy, other candy, and if a crew wanted lollies they could ask for them, and they would have them up here."
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Next question:
What's a lollie?
(Hint: ask your kiddo or grandkid)
Friday, February 24, 2006
Look in our microwave
The answer is in the picture.
(click on picture to enlarge)
If you came here from a search, link here to see the Question
If you came here from the Question, hit your Back button
or
Thirty-three years ago
Mrs. Jim and I got married.
We got married in a fever, hotter than a pepper sprout.* ..Our fire hasn't gone out.
It was in Clear Lake City, Texas (that wasn't a real city then, now it is the southeast part of Houston), near the Johnson Manned Space Center. A Baptist preacher (unnamed here), wearing cowboy boots, in a church that wasn't our regular church, married us very well.
Our fire didn't go out, but that preacher sure did. He left town to get rich. The last we heard he was in a lot of trouble with the law.
My best man, Mike, has left town too and we haven't seen him for several years. I do know his ex-wife died. She was cremated, her friends all threw their empty beer cans in after her ashes at their lake.
Someone is telling here. Someone who knows the wedding story.
For the wedding, the groom (Jim) was over an hour late. He had given his little Ford Pinto to his dad and mom to go on to the church. Jim showered, shaved, and dressed in his tux.
He asked his son, Tim, to put his luggage (it had the get-away clothes and the honeymoon stuff) in the TBird. Tim came back in a minute, he couldn't get the car door open. "Of course you can," his dad said, "just unlock it with the key."
But the key didn't unlock the door. Then Jim figured out he had given his dad the wrong set of keys for the Pinto, the set that had both car keys on it.
They called the church. The best man, Mike, would come get Tim and Jim. A little bit later, the future Mrs. Jim called. Mike wasn't at the church yet, she would send Dad.
Dad never came. The wedding was supposed to have started. No Jim, no Dad. The bride was crying. The organ was playing. Mike came and now he would come to the rescue. Oh boy!
Just as Mike, Tim, and Jim were leaving for Clear Lake, Dad drove up. He had gotten lost. Since he had the TBird keys, Tim and Jim could get moving.
They literally flew. There must not have been any cops around because that TBird was over 120 miles an hour most of the thirteen miles. When they got there, the preacher called the people back in, the bride was drying her eyes, and the organist was about worn out.
It was Mr. and Mrs. Jim now. Mrs Jim had promised to obey, Jim promised to love. The wedding went off without a hitch, except for one, pun here, the couple got hitched. Poor Dad and Mike were there too, they were the last guests to arrive, each had been there earlier on.
So now you know. We haven't told this story before because Dad felt like all of this mess was his fault. He felt very badly about the whole thing. Now he is Iowa and is terribly unaware of things. It was my fault, not being careful in giving him the wrong set of keys.
Mrs. Jim and I honeymooned at the Hilton in San Antonio. We have honeymooned there several times since. Did I carry her across the threshold? Of course I did, but that story can't be told.
I do know one thing; rice works. The bird lovers say it doesn't hurt the birds either. But nobody can get rich selling just rice. Ask the farmers.
Mrs. Jim and I were talking yesterday. Neither of us had thirty-three years in mind when we married. That would have been out of range, we just planned for it lasting a long, long, time.
Mrs. Jim and I got married.
We got married in a fever, hotter than a pepper sprout.* ..Our fire hasn't gone out.
It was in Clear Lake City, Texas (that wasn't a real city then, now it is the southeast part of Houston), near the Johnson Manned Space Center. A Baptist preacher (unnamed here), wearing cowboy boots, in a church that wasn't our regular church, married us very well.
Our fire didn't go out, but that preacher sure did. He left town to get rich. The last we heard he was in a lot of trouble with the law.
My best man, Mike, has left town too and we haven't seen him for several years. I do know his ex-wife died. She was cremated, her friends all threw their empty beer cans in after her ashes at their lake.
Someone is telling here. Someone who knows the wedding story.
For the wedding, the groom (Jim) was over an hour late. He had given his little Ford Pinto to his dad and mom to go on to the church. Jim showered, shaved, and dressed in his tux.
He asked his son, Tim, to put his luggage (it had the get-away clothes and the honeymoon stuff) in the TBird. Tim came back in a minute, he couldn't get the car door open. "Of course you can," his dad said, "just unlock it with the key."
But the key didn't unlock the door. Then Jim figured out he had given his dad the wrong set of keys for the Pinto, the set that had both car keys on it.
They called the church. The best man, Mike, would come get Tim and Jim. A little bit later, the future Mrs. Jim called. Mike wasn't at the church yet, she would send Dad.
Dad never came. The wedding was supposed to have started. No Jim, no Dad. The bride was crying. The organ was playing. Mike came and now he would come to the rescue. Oh boy!
Just as Mike, Tim, and Jim were leaving for Clear Lake, Dad drove up. He had gotten lost. Since he had the TBird keys, Tim and Jim could get moving.
They literally flew. There must not have been any cops around because that TBird was over 120 miles an hour most of the thirteen miles. When they got there, the preacher called the people back in, the bride was drying her eyes, and the organist was about worn out.
It was Mr. and Mrs. Jim now. Mrs Jim had promised to obey, Jim promised to love. The wedding went off without a hitch, except for one, pun here, the couple got hitched. Poor Dad and Mike were there too, they were the last guests to arrive, each had been there earlier on.
So now you know. We haven't told this story before because Dad felt like all of this mess was his fault. He felt very badly about the whole thing. Now he is Iowa and is terribly unaware of things. It was my fault, not being careful in giving him the wrong set of keys.
Mrs. Jim and I honeymooned at the Hilton in San Antonio. We have honeymooned there several times since. Did I carry her across the threshold? Of course I did, but that story can't be told.
I do know one thing; rice works. The bird lovers say it doesn't hurt the birds either. But nobody can get rich selling just rice. Ask the farmers.
Mrs. Jim and I were talking yesterday. Neither of us had thirty-three years in mind when we married. That would have been out of range, we just planned for it lasting a long, long, time.
Labels: Anniversary
Thursday, February 23, 2006
Not a family member!!!
. Now
A couple (2) of answers
Question
(maybe not trivia this time)
Who gets psyched up for the upcoming task by riding an exercise bicycle and watching Sex in the City videos? (No, not a sex maniac, at least I've not heard that about this character.)
Answers
(most people guessed # 2)
1. Excercise bike rider is no less than Winter Olympic
2. You were right about my socks. I had the pretty side up, but those pretties were supposed to be non-slip stuff. I did dress my feet like that when I was getting into my hospital outfit. No, the gown didn't have three sleeves to help my rear view dignity.
Wednesday, February 22, 2006
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What is
wrong
with
this
picture? (Check back for the answer tomorrow)
Hint: these are the booties given to me yesterday at 9:15 at St. Lukes hospital when I checked in for an outpatient heart catheterization.
Oh yes, the outcome. I had one more stent put in another major branch of my Left Anterior Descending Artery or LAD, for my second LAD stent. So I spent the night there laying flat on my back until 4:30 in the morning. Mrs. Jim was right there too, sleeping in a chair beside my bed.
One more crunchy bite for the cannibals when they eat me.
I got to watch the whole thing on TV monitors, to the right and the left side of my operating table. No anesthesia for Jim, which meant I got to see all the details in real time, the wire with a hook going up to fish around, the dye being released into the arteries, the stent being pushed up into my heart, and then a balloon pushed up inside the stent to expand it more.
Before the procedure, I had to have a 'bikini shave' on my right upper thigh (inside part). The young lady (??, at least she seemed young to me) RN was using an electric razor instead the usual plastic handled Gillette. She said the electric razor was less prone to causing an infection.
I asked the RN what would happen to all the loose hairs, as she was blowing them away from the shaved area. Not to worry, most of them would get picked up with the towel beneath me and tossed.
I asked her what would happen if a loose hair accidentally got into my artery along with the wires, dyes, stents, or balloons. Nobody had ever asked her that I guess. She thought it was a funny question and laughed a lot. I was thinking they needed a plan 'B.'
I'm ok now, Mrs. Jim drove me home after we got Adi from Karen and Billy's. Adi had missed me a lot and she told me that. Now she is sleeping beside me in the breakfast room.
Billy said Adi has more
Labels: Foot, Health, Humor, Jim Does, Procedure
Tuesday, February 21, 2006
Trivia Question Answer:
All are correct, all are a bit wrong. The correct answer is any or all of the above.
This is per a Burt Wolfe Travel program aired on our local PBS this Monday.
All are correct, all are a bit wrong. The correct answer is any or all of the above.
This is per a Burt Wolfe Travel program aired on our local PBS this Monday.
Trivia Question
When in Switzerland and dipping bread in the fondue, don't drop your bread into the pot. What penalty if you do?
A. Buy a round of wine for the house.
B. Kiss everyone at the table.
C. Carry a slice of hardboiled egg in your wallet for a month.
D. All of the above.
E. None of the above.
When in Switzerland and dipping bread in the fondue, don't drop your bread into the pot. What penalty if you do?
A. Buy a round of wine for the house.
B. Kiss everyone at the table.
C. Carry a slice of hardboiled egg in your wallet for a month.
D. All of the above.
E. None of the above.
Monday, February 20, 2006
One more Mema story
Mema likes to travel. At age 89, she is slowing down some now. Being a widow lady and the only survivor of four younger sisters, living alone in Louisiana until a couple of years ago, and not being able to drive have slowed her down even as well.
Well, she used to go a lot. By car with her former husband or by train using her RR employee spouse pass before she remarried [Mrs. Jim lost her father at age seven].
The story. While in California visiting cousins, she was offered a nighttime glass of beer. Mema said no thanks; she doesn’t drink beer and has never tasted it.
Well, it goes, how about just a little taste then? We always divide a beer before we go to bed, most every night.
Maybe just a little, as about three-fourths an inch was being poured.
Mema raised the glass to her mouth. At that exact time, the floor shook, the walls rattled, and things started falling. It was a California earthquake.
The beer didn’t get drank, then or ever since.
Big question: Did Mema join us for a champagne toast on her birthday yesterday?
[be sure to look at the Mema birthday pictures below]
Mema likes to travel. At age 89, she is slowing down some now. Being a widow lady and the only survivor of four younger sisters, living alone in Louisiana until a couple of years ago, and not being able to drive have slowed her down even as well.
Well, she used to go a lot. By car with her former husband or by train using her RR employee spouse pass before she remarried [Mrs. Jim lost her father at age seven].
The story. While in California visiting cousins, she was offered a nighttime glass of beer. Mema said no thanks; she doesn’t drink beer and has never tasted it.
Well, it goes, how about just a little taste then? We always divide a beer before we go to bed, most every night.
Maybe just a little, as about three-fourths an inch was being poured.
Mema raised the glass to her mouth. At that exact time, the floor shook, the walls rattled, and things started falling. It was a California earthquake.
The beer didn’t get drank, then or ever since.
Big question: Did Mema join us for a champagne toast on her birthday yesterday?
[be sure to look at the Mema birthday pictures below]
(all) Good things
have to come to an end
The good thing is Mema's birthday; but now she will have to wait until next year for another. She is living for the day she will be 90. But then, Susie says, we won't have any octogenarians in the family. I might be next if I live so long.
have to come to an end
The good thing is Mema's birthday; but now she will have to wait until next year for another. She is living for the day she will be 90. But then, Susie says, we won't have any octogenarians in the family. I might be next if I live so long.
She had quite bit of attention this weekend. Her son, Danny, came from Tennessee, Susie and Anthony (my kiddo and husband) came Saturday, they sang for her at Pancho's, and her Sunday school class sang yesterday. Susie gave her money to buy a Bingo card for the next twenty weeks. She had better do this on Friday nights, Mrs. Jim is going to dole it out a dollar at a time on Wednesdays.
After church we ate at Lubby's Cafeteria. Karen and Billy joined us. Then we went to Karen's house for cake. Karen made it from scratch, it was so good that I have my order in for my next birthday.
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Karen frosting the cake
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Mrs. Jim wants to help
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Mema says let's get this show on the road
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But can't have cake until you blow out the candles!
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Who ate the most cake?
Danny, Mrs. Jim, or Mema?
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Amber wants to know, "Where's my cake?"
Karen: "you poor baby"
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Adi said, "I got mine!"
"But now they are leaving me here :-( "
Sunday, February 19, 2006
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MEMA!
HAPPY 89!
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"I was born in 1917, in Poplarville, Mississippi. We came to Louisiana when I was four. We made our home at Camp 19 [near Elmer, Louisiana]. That was in an old logging camp."
"I was born in 1917, in Poplarville, Mississippi. We came to Louisiana when I was four. We made our home at Camp 19 [near Elmer, Louisiana]. That was in an old logging camp."
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"We came by train. When we crossed the Mississippi River, there weren't any bridges at Baton Rouge. Each car was carried across on a barge and hooked up again on the other side. We stayed in the cars, on the barges."
. "We came by train. When we crossed the Mississippi River, there weren't any bridges at Baton Rouge. Each car was carried across on a barge and hooked up again on the other side. We stayed in the cars, on the barges."
Mrs. Viola T. is Mema to us and her grandchildren.
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Today is her 89th birthday. She has one son, Danny, and is the mother of two daughters, Velma and Mrs. Jim. Mema also has seven grandchildren. Her kids and grandkids are scattered from West Texas to Alabama. Of course each is the brightest and smartest and has the best job of any in the country.
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More: "I had two husbands and buried them both. They both died of barbecued lungs. That killed them. I won't get married again because I can't afford to bury another man."
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Mema now lives in Conroe, Texas, fairly close to Mrs. Jim. She moved here from Louisiana and has been here a couple of years now. She likes her apartment but often muses how nice it had been to live in a 'paid for house.'
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Her work was stay at home mother, church nursery worker for 62 years, and a caretaker for elderly or sick ladies. She also worked with the Cub Scouts for a while when her son, now 52, was a Scout.
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In her 89 years, her favs:
Vacation--a visit to the Holy Land in 1980
Food--McDonald's Double Cheeseburgers and Dr. Pepper
Dislikes--mushrooms, she knows where they are grown
Also dislikes--crawfish, they were Papa's fish bait
Thing to do--go to Sunday school, she doesn't miss
TV program--the news, then most anything, she doesn't watch ball games
Scripture verse--Ephesians 4:32, "And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you." She taught every child in the nursery that verse. And she showed them how to follow that rule.
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An observance made by her son-in-law: When she went to the Holy Land, she needed a passport. When her birth certificate came from Mississippi, her name was listed as 'Baby Girl B____.' It bothered her that her mother hadn't given her a name. An explanation that maybe her mother just didn't have enough time to get a name to the nurses worked a little. I know she still wonders.
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Birth certificates lacking names must be a common occurrence in Mississippi, as they were prepared for this situation. Mema just had to tell them she wanted to be called Viola. And Viola, she got a new birth certificate with a real name.
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The Holy Land trip was Mema's first time to fly in an airplane. She watched and watched from her window all the luggage that was being loaded. She remarked that "this plane is going to be to heavy to fly."
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Then too, the plane was full. She just knew that with the full plane and all that luggage we could not leave the ground. But we did.
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Yesterday we celebrated by going to Pancho's Mexican Buffet restaurant. That is her son's favorite place to eat when he comes here. They don't have Pancho's in Tennessee.
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Yesterday we celebrated by going to Pancho's Mexican Buffet restaurant. That is her son's favorite place to eat when he comes here. They don't have Pancho's in Tennessee.
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Some of the wait staff at Pancho's
singing Happy Birthday to Mema
singing Happy Birthday to Mema
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Oh yes, Mema has never held a driver's license. She does have a 'back seat driver's license' given to her by the State of Louisiana to be used as an ID. Mema is good at her back seat driving while telling us her many, many, funny stories.
Plus she had a really nice cake,
made by Karen.
