NEIL PATRICK HARRIS

This afternoon Mark and I will be joining our friends in the Solivita Disney Fan Club at Epcot for a late lunch at Via Napoli as part of a package to see the Candlelight Processional.  Tonight's reader of the Christmas Story is Neil Patrick Harris.  Wow!  We have never gone to this before, mostly because we aren't really too into the Christmas story or carols, but if I had to go, I would totally pick NPH as my STAR to go see!  There will be pictures tomorrow!  I do like music and a big chorus, and I have wanted to go to this for awhile just for that reason.  Since the fan club was organizing this, Mark thought it would be fun, too. YAY!

Meanwhile, this morning we will start off with water aerobics.  It's currently only 70 degrees out.  It might be 72 by the time water aerobics starts, so I am not too enthusiastic about this!  Yesterday, I wrapped a lot of gifts.  I need to go to the post office and mail one off to Evey in time for her to get it by Hanukkah. Although since it's for the last night of Hanukkah, there should be time. I also need to stop at Walmart or somewhere to buy a few boxes for shipping gifts out to Lowell, Emily, Cindy, Flyn, and Jackie.  I have their stuff here all ready to wrap, but there are no boxes in the house to package it all up in.

I did drop those extra pounds yesterday from all the sodium on Saturday.  I was an even 276 this morning, which is what I was when we left for California. It's not a great number, but I will take it.  Now if I could only lose a few more before the cruise on December 31!!  Lunch at Via Napoli today may be okay.  We prepaid for this lunch and special seating, so we are not really sure how the lunch is going to work out.  It's a pizza place that we have been in several times, so I'm guessing we are eating pizza.  LOL

Back home and stayed the same

Jet lag really did us in yesterday.  We flew east on Friday, arriving in the Orlando airport around midnight.  We never really ate dinner, since we had no time to spare in changing planes in Dallas.  We thought we would buy the cheese and fruit plate on the Dallas to Orlando leg, but the flight was too short.  I bought trail mix and pretzels and Mark ate his leftover cheese peanut butter crackers.  By the time we arrived home and unloaded the car, it was after 1 a.m.  We went to bed at 2 and got up at 10:30.  Then we spent the whole day in a fuzzy-headed fog, watching TV, and unpacking.  UGH.

The good news was that my weight was the same yesterday morning as when we left last Wednesday.  I was 276 when we left and the same yesterday.  Unfortunately, I ate a lot of salty, homemade chicken  soup and a large quantity of salty pistachios yesterday, so I'm up two and a half this morning.  Gotta love it.  I expect it to go back down by tomorrow morning.

Last night, Mark finally set up our Hanukkah gift from Evey and Eric from LAST YEAR!  They gave us a sound bar for our TV, but we couldn't figure out where to put it since the connector cords were short.  While in San Jose, we saw that Evey and Eric had basically the same thing and put it right on top of their TV!  Why didn't we think of that?  So now, we have an awesome sound bar on top of our TV and the sound is amazing.  Thank you, Evey and Eric!

Today we are heading over to Disney Springs to see the new Disney animated feature, The Good Dinosaur.  We may also check out the newly expanded World of Disney store to buy a toy for the NARFE meeting on Thursday.  It's our annual holiday party, and everyone brings a toy for the Toys for Tots collection.  Naturally, we always buy Disney toys!  When we get home, I plan to wrap holiday gifts for Lowell, Emily, Mark, Cindy, and Flyn.  Flyn is my person from the holiday gift-giving drawing this year. Then there will be a lot of TV to catch up on again.

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving meal with Evey and Eric, although the turkey should have cooked longer.  We followed the directions and used a meat thermometer, but it was still a bit underdone in the dark meat. Still the 12 pound bird provided plenty of cooked meat for Thursday's dinner and plenty for leftovers.  This was the first time Evey and Eric had hosted a Thanksgiving in their house, and the table was beautiful.

We had a lovely touristy day driving to Half Moon Bay, Pescadero, and Santa Cruz on Wednesday.  We also went to the movies to see the new Bond movie, Specter, on Tuesday.  All in all, we had a spectacular time.

And our fabulous and very smart son-in-law, Eric, did a lot of maintenance work on my computer.  My start up disc was virtually full because of the nearly 50k photos and videos on it.  He was able to move all the pictures to an external drive and clear up the disc.  I now have 75% of the disc space open.  Mark bought me the terabyte external drive as a Hanukkah present this year, but I wasn't really sure how to use it. Thanks to Eric for fixing that.  Then he also got me started on upgrading to the newest operating system, which I couldn't do before because I didn't have enough open disc space!  All in all, he worked very hard to make my Macair run like new!  i can't thank him enough.

Now we are back to reality and a very full calendar of daily events.  Our Solivita retirement life of non-stop activities has returned, and we love it.

Here are some more pictures from our trip.

Monday night we sat around their fire pit in their backyard for several hours, making S'mores, talking, enjoying the bright moonlight, and having Bailey's in coffee.

Eve's black car on her pretty street with the leaves turning.

Picking a lemon off the tree in her backyard.

Eric with their Bird of Paradise plant.

Evey and I went to one of her favorite coffee shops for lattes, carrot cake, and to do the family gift-giving drawing.

I drew the first name out of the box.

Cold, windy, and sunny on Half Moon Bay.

Driving down the Pacific Coast Highway from Half Moon Bay to Pescadero.

Lunch at the historic restaurant and bar, Duarte's, in Pescadero.  Delicious.

Next stop, the Goat Farm

LOTS of goats!

Sitting in the really cool hand made goat chairs in the loft of the barn/store.

Pigeon Point Lighthouse

I was excited to see an actual old-style phone booth at the lighthouse.

Harbor seals were playing around the rocks.

Evey made cinnamon rolls for Thanksgiving morning breakfast.

Hanging out and watching the parade.  That awesome coffee table was hand made for them by Eric's dad from a burl they bought for themselves somewhere in CA on one of their trips.This was the first time we had been to their home since they got the table finished, bought the couch, the rug, and the fancy electric recliner chair.  They have made a beautiful home for themselves.

Eric is taking a picture of his delicious apple pie that he made for us.

About to cook a turkey!

The beautiful table in Evey and Eric's beautiful home.  Thanksgiving is all about family time.  Although we missed Lowell and Emily, we knew they were having a wonderful time with her parents, too.

From San Jose, CA

Last Wednesday we flew to San Jose to spend ten days with Evey and Eric.  The flight was fine and smooth.  There was not one cloud in the sky from Dallas to San Jose, and I had a window seat the whole way.  It was really beautiful watching the country go by below, farmland, mesas, rivers, towns, so much beauty.

We have been having fun, so I have not sat down to write a blog.

Last Thursday we did a lot of errands with Evey while Eric was at work.  We shopped in several stores, strolled the streets of quaint downtown Los Gatos including getting some gelato in the candy store, and then had lunch on the even quainter downtown streets of Campbell.  We had Greek food on the patio outdoors under a heater.  Lots of fun!

On Friday we went to the Apple campus in Cupertino.  We had lunch in the cafeteria with Eric, checked out the new products in the on campus Apple store, took a tour of the campus, and drove past the brand new campus they will open next year just down the road.  The rest of the day was relaxing at home.

Saturday, Sunday, and Monday Evey had to work.  Mark and I went to the Live from the Met opera Lulu in the morning and just caught up on TV in the afternoon.  Sunday was fun!  We drove up to San Francisco to meet Laverne and Kelly for lunch in the Mission District and then wandered around all the new and classic cars at the auto shop in SF.  So much fun!  Today Mark and I are going to the kosher store just down the road to buy our turkey for Thanksgiving.  Eric is going out to ride his motorcycle on a local Motocross court for about three hours and Evey is at work until 1:30, so it will be a good time to wrap all of their holiday gifts without anyone seeing them!

We aren't sure what we are doing tomorrow.  We had planned to go out and do outdoorsy exploring all day, but the forecast is for rain.  Yes, it does rain in California, although not much right around here.  Wednesday we all plan to go see the new Bond movie and bake pies.  Then it will be Thanksgiving day with its parades and cooking and overeating.  Before you know it our trip will be over and we will fly home on Friday.

Meanwhile here are just a few pictures from the last few days.

I was so happy to be there on Wednesday.

Getting gelato in downtown Los Gatos.

Walking around the town of Los Gatos and finding this cute little park.

At the Apple campus

Where we had lunch in the Mission District of SF.

Waiting outside while Kelly and Laverne found a parking spot.

Great food with great friends.

At the car show with a fancy Mini Cooper.

Laverne said she was the same height as Mark and was mad to find out she was wrong!  LOL

Love the classic cars as much as the new ones

With a 2016 model of my own car, a Ford C-Max.  This is a plug-in hybrid, which I don't understand at all, and I'm glad I don't have.  The whole trunk is taken up with a much bigger battery than my version.

Laverne and I met in the summer of 1962 between sixth and seventh grades.  She is my oldest and dearest friend!

I ate way too much.

I had breakfast and lunch at home, and I ate too much at both of those meals.  THEN, all bets were off!  I ate WAY too much at the Enzian theater.  First, as soon as we got to the theater we went right in and got a table.  This special theater serves food during the films.  I ordered a glass of Reisling and an order of spinach and cheese knishes.  Because this was the Jewish film festival, there was a special little menu of "Jewish foods."  There was a kosher hot dog with fries, but we were going to have dinner between the two movies, so I just got an appetizer.  The knishes weren't really knishes.  They were very flaky puff pastry with spinach and cheese inside.  Very deicious.  Whereas Susie and Ed shared their plate of six, Mark didn't share with me and I ate them all.

The documentary, Rosenwald, was about Julius Rosenwald, president of Sears and a great philanthropist who donated millions to build Rosenwald schools in rural African-American communities in the early 1900s, including helping to build Tuskegee U. and supporting Howard U. and other traditionally black colleges.

The theater was cleared after the film, so we went outside to the restaurant attached to Enzian.  I got a cocktail with rums and fruit juices, a cup of tomato cream soup (but they brought a BOWL), and mahi mahi tacos with rice and black beans.  All delicious.  When it was time to go back inside for the second film, we ordered dessert.  Mark ordered the kosher hot dog and fries for his dessert, but I ate most of the fries.  My first two choices of dessert were both all gone, so I got peanut butter ice cream on a chocolate chip cookie, except it was TWO cookies and each cookie was the size of a large dessert plate, HUGE!  I ate it all.

That's why I'm UP two and  half pounds this morning.  Yeah, no mystery there.

This morning I am heading to Nature Hair for "The Works."  This includes a cut, color, and highlights for my hair, gel nails, pedicure, and waxing, all of which will take about five and a half hours and lighten my purse by close to $300.  I'm crazy like that, I guess.

When I get home, hopefully by 4 p.m., I have to start to pack because at 7 I have a Guys and Dolls rehearsal.  When I get back from that, around 9:45 p.m., I will finish packing and go to bed as soon as possible. Tomorrow we are getting up at 2:50 a.m. in order to be in the car driving to the airport at 3:50 a.m. to catch the 6:40 flight to Dallas and then San Jose.  We should be grocery shopping with Evey in our rental car by 4 in the afternoon, her time.  It's going to be so much fun to be out there and be with her and Eric for 10 days. 

Monday weigh-in. Staying the same.

I was 276 this morning, which is essentially the same as the last several reports.  I went to the cruise in the first week of October at 273 and never really lost the four pounds I gained in 9 days.  On Wednesday we are flying to San Jose to stay with Evey and Eric.  It's not like a cruise ship, so hopefully, I don't gain weight on that trip.

We enjoyed the Solivita theater Group' performance yesterday of Over the River and Through the Woods.  It was an amazing cast, very funny and very poignant.  We knew everyone in the cast, and it was such a pleasure to laugh and cry with them as they did such a great job.  We also had a wonderful table of four other couples that we know and enjoy.  Solivita at its best.

Today I will be heading to water aerobics pretty soon, although I'm worried that the water will be COLD. Mark can't swim yet, but he plans to try to write down the routine so that we can do it when the leader isn't there in the summer. Then at 2:30 we are picking up Ed and Susie to head to the Enzian Theater in Winter Park for two more films in the Jewish Film Festival.  I think one is a documentary, but I don't remember the titles of either one right now.  In between the two films we plan to catch a quick dinner at the theater.  It will be another fun day. 

Didn't make it three in a row! LOL

On Tuesday I wrote, saying I was making it two days in a row.  Now it's Saturday.  Weeks are busy here.

I was going steady with my friend Donna this week.  Yes, we saw each other five days in a row.  On Monday we sat at the same table at the Haddassah luncheon and fashion show.  On Tuesday we went to the Guys and Dolls rehearsal, where she sings alto and sits next to me.  On Wednesday, we met at Freedom Park at 8:30 a.m. to sing all the military theme songs for the Veterans Day ceremony.  On Thursday, she came to my house for Mah Jongg and then we went out to lunch with Barb at the Grille.  Friday we had another rehearsal together.  Now I won't see her again until Tuesday night's Guys and Dolls rehearsal again.  Funny how things go like that.

I have maintained my weight all week.  I was 175.8 this morning, same as Monday.  I bet it doesn't change too much this weekend.  At least, I hope it doesn't.  We are eating dinner out today and lunch out tomorrow, so anything could happen.

Today we are starting three days in a row of having fun with friends Susie and Ed.  Ed is driving the four of us up to a restaurant called Cheddar's for dinner.  I won a $10 gift card to it at the Haddassah luncheon.  Then we are going to the Orlando Science Center for the first movie in a series at the Jewish Film Festival.  Tomorrow we are going to the Solivita Theater Group's dinner theater production of "Over the River and Through the Woods."  Monday we are heading up to the Enzian theater for a double feature of films in the Jewish Film Festival series.  We plan to catch a quick dinner at the Enzian between the two films.  Three fun days with Susie and Ed!

Tuesday I will have a five hour appointment at Nature Hair: mani/pedi, waxing, hair cut, color, and highlights.  It's about time.  My nails and hair are horrible right now!

Wednesday we fly to California!  Wow!  I am very excited to go see Evey and Eric.  I will be taking my computer and writing some blogs.  Don't worry.

Hope anyone reading is enjoying life a much as I am.

Trying to write two in a row!

Yesterday went as planned, very well, in fact.  I enjoyed the fashion show although everything was very expensive form a boutique in Winter Haven.  Even though they have things from size 0 to 24W, and even though there were some gorgeous things, nothing was in my price range!

The book talk on Go Set a Watchman was also interesting, as they always are.  Then we had a wonderful rehearsal with 8 people at SOJC followed by Twistee Treat on the way home, compliments of Jonathan.  Ending the day with a cone from Twistee Treat can make even a bad day good.

This morning I am making chicken soup out of leftover bits from thighs that Mark deboned yesterday for a future recipe.  He kept putting so much good stuff off to the side to toss out that I finally had him just save it for soup today.  It's going to be delicious, and it's making the house smell fabulous right now.

I also left my Solivita badge on the table at the fashion show yesterday, but luckily my friend Sandy picked it up and called me yesterday.  I went over to her house this morning to retrieve it and enjoyed talking to her about plants in her front yard.  Mainscape was there and they were discussing things that had died and what could replace them.  It was kind of fun to listen to them for awhile.

At 3 p.m. I have one of the final three rehearsals for the Cove Singers Christmas concert.  My plan is to do half the songs today, the second half next time, and sing through the whole show on the final rehearsal.  We can also run through everything earlier on the day of the show, which is Dec. 17.  Tonight at 6 I have Guys and Dolls. Last week I auditioned for and got a small solo introducing the SSA song.  I will sing it at the Friday night concert.  It sounds easy but is deceptively difficult due to breath control rrequirements.  I have practiced it a lot this week.  Also in the small ensembles the whole thing has to be memorized and there are LOTS of words.  Oy.

Are you tired yet?  LOL

Monday update

It's been nearly a week since i wrote a blog.  Maybe you thought I was on a cruise!  LOL

I've just been busy, as usual.

Today is weigh-in day, and I looked at past blogs and realized I have not posted a weight since the day we went to our primary care doctor's office on October 29.  So now I am up a little bit.  This morning I weighed in at 275.8, which I think is about two and a half pounds up since the doctor's office.  We ate at Sweet Tomatoes yesterday with friends Barb and Al.  We hadn't been together since our day at the Orlando Eye, so it was fun to catch up.  I ate too much as usual, so I'm not surprised I am up.  I really haven't tried to lose weight.  I did go to water aerobics on Friday, which was the first time since Mark's surgery.  What can I expect?

Today I'm attending a luncheon and fashion show sponsored by Haddassah.  I'm going with friends Susie and Marilyn.  Then tonight is my synagogue choir rehearsal.  This is the last one on a Monday because I learned that two of the new members from last time can not make Mondays.  I didn't mind switching them all back to Wednesdays.  That's how we started after all.

Last Wednesday we spent another day at the Food and Wine Festival and got soaked in a downpour.  This Wednesday we will go back for one final time to get our last three stamps and eat the salmon from the Patagonia kiosk.  We will have gone six times, I think, probably the most ever.

Susie and Ed joined us this time.

Mark and I share that flight of Scotch.  He had smoked salmon on a potato pancake and i had the whiskey soaked cake.

Enjoying the Scotch

After getting caught in a downpour, we rode Living with the Land as well as Soarin' and the Lion King environmental movie.

Record Breaking Heat...global warming comes to Florida.

Yesterday the temperatures soared to 91, breaking a fifty year old record.  We were sweating like summer as we tromped around Epcot.  We played the Remy Hide and Squeak game, winning a special Remy pin.  We were there for our third time, so we picked up our free wine glass for being an annual passholder who went three times.  We ate at two more kiosks and had some delicious cheesy foods, wine, and frozen cocktails.  At the end of the day we ran into our neighbors Ken and Luanne and former neighbors, Tom and Dorothy, who were also hot and sweaty from spending a hot day at Epcot.  Mark and I REALLY enjoyed running into our neighbors.  We love the fact that occasionally when we are out and about we do run into people we know.  Everyone we know down here is wonderful!

We started the day by taking Mark up to the cardiologist's office for a nurse visit to check out his nasty blisters.  The incision site from the surgery last Wednesday looks terrific.  He is not allergic to the steri strips they use to close that wound, but he must be terribly allergic to the glue on the see-through bandage used to cover everything else up.  He had two small blisters and three blisters the size of QUARTERS!  When she pulled the tape off, the one at the bottom just popped open and bled, looking like a big, nasty wound.  To our surprise, she did nothing to dress those wounds.  In fact, she said, "When you get a chance, put some neosporin on that."  Hm....a nurse in a big doctor's office doesn't have any of that?  Well, we were going straight to Epcot from there, so we stopped at the closest Walgreen's on the way.  He put neosporin on the three big blisters and actually covered up the worst one with a bandaid as well.  Now he knows NOT to let them ever put that kind of clear bandage on again.

The other good news is that he found out his monitor is working and they are receiving readings.  The machine doesn't really show that at home, so it was hard to know if it was working or not.  We got a lot of clarification yesterday, which was good.  He also is scheduled to go back to her next Friday for her to check on the blisters.  I'm sure they will be fine by then.

Here are some pictures of our adventures at the Epcot Food and Wine Festival yesterday.  Unfortunately, I did not think to pull out the camera and take a picture of our neighbors.  I can only blame it on being 5 p.m. or so after a long hot day.

Trio of cheeses and cheese fondue with sourdough bread.

Putting the sticker on the game sheet after finding Remy in Ireland.

Finding this one in France took forever!

Germany

Completed puzzle map

My pin!

Our free wine glasses.