Epcot

We had a wonderful time at Epcot yesterday.  After arriving at noon, we had lunch at the Scotland, Ireland, and Japan pavilions.  We also had a chance to watch the music group Albert Bound on the stage in Canada while sipping an alcoholic iced coffee.  Nice.  Then we met Barb and Al at Journey into Imagination for the ride and some time in the DVC Member lounge followed by riding Soarin' and the Finding Nemo ride at Living Seas.  Dinner at the Coral Reef was better than we expected.  Barbara and I both ordered from the prix fixe menu which included a wine pairing for each course.  Delicious.  Then we picked up our Passholder tumblers from this year's Food and Wine Festival before heading home.  What a lovely Disney day!

Today we are watching movies on TV and just catching up on some chores in the house.

Tomorrow we will begin another crazy week of rehearsals, Mahj, and who knows what else!  Hopefully, Mark can easily get his car towed by GEICO up to All Cars to try to get a new battery and new keys and clickers.  We really need that done.

Alberta Bound performed for thirty minutes.

Enjoying his iced coffee with Jameson's.

Barb and Al with us up in the DVC Member Lounge.

Magic Kingdom and Epcot

I forgot to take my camera Wednesday night after all, so there are no pictures of the Trail's End restaurant or the hayride.  It was our third time, and it was great fun.  There are probably similar pictures from last year on this blog somewhere!

Thursday after play rehearsal we spent about five hours at the Magic Kingdom.  It was great because we hadn't been there in so long.  We probably have not been there since early last summer because of our big trip. We had fast passes for three things, saw the parade and two other live shows, and got on three other attractions easily.  What a wonderful day!  I do have some pictures here of that.

Today we are having lunch at the Food and Wine Festival.  Since it's Shabbat, we have put money on gift cards in advance.  It's also our third time, so we can get our free Festival glasses today.  Around 2:30 we will meet up with our friends Barbara and Al, whom we have not seen in many months either.  We are taking them up to see the new DVC Member Lounge in Journey into Imagination.  Then we have Soarin' Fast Passes and a dinner reservation at the Coral Reef restaurant in the Living Seas pavilion.  I see another great day coming!

Weight is up another pound, but I'm not surprised.  I ate way too much the last three days.  Today does not seem to be different what with eating lunch and dinner out.  Tomorrow should be better.

Our timing for the castle show was perfect.  It started just as we got up there.  We wanted to see the Alligator from The Princess and the Frog back in the show.  He had been replaced with Goofy for awhile.

Next we strolled into Liberty Square and our perfect timing held up again.  The new live Muppet Show was just starting.

Heading to Peter Pan for our first Fast Pass, we ran into our synagogue friend Leslie, who is also a long time cast member in Fantasyland.

Mickey's Philharmonic has this cool poster in the lobby.

Hall of Presidents is always a favorite.  

Haunted Mansion and Pirates of the Caribbean were our other two Fast Passes.  We also went to Country Bear Jamboree and Tiki Room.  Mark used the shooting gallery, which was free for some reason, and we caught the afternoon parade.

After the park, we went to shop at the Winn Dixie and saw this awesome Coke display!

Bingeing and more bingeing

I am remiss on not having a Weigh-in Wednesday report since October 5.  In between we have been busy with hurricanes, Succoth, and rehearsals.  And BINGE EATING.

Evey first called it to my attention while she was getting her Masters in Applied Nutrition from Northeastern University.  I'm sure she is right.  I had never heard of this eating disorder, but once I read about it, it is totally me.  She has suggested that I go to therapy about it, but I have not done that.

The last few weeks have not been good for my calories.  We have eaten out a few times, but it's mostly bingeing on snack food between meals that is doing me in.  It's so hard to stop once it starts.

Even so, I have not gained any significant weight since the last report.  October 5 I had gained weight, up to 271.5.  This morning I was 270.2.  That looks like a loss, but actually the Wednesday before October 5, I was 265.  I gained six and a half pounds that week and have basically stayed the same.

Today will not help much because we are eating out for dinner.  We are going to join the Solivita Disney Fan Club for dinner out at the Trail's End Buffet at Fort Wilderness and then the Halloween Hay Ride.  This is the third year in a row that we have done this.  It's a lot of fun, and we will be going with Susie and Ed.  I hope to have some pictures to post tomorrow.

I might be able to help myself a little tomorrow with lots of walking.  We are going to the Magic Kingdom for the first time in a long while.  We have THREE Fast Passes booked: Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Peter Pan's Flight.  It will be so much fun to walk around there and see all the Halloween decorations.  There should be plenty of pictures from that, too!

Succoth, Surgery, and Shabbat

Mark put up our succah, and we have enjoyed eating our meals in it.  Yesterday he also had a weird mole removed (for the second time) from his shin.  It's bothering him a little bit today.  It was Shabbat today, but we stayed home except for the time that we went to see Don Giovanni, Live from the Met, at Disney Springs.  It was excellent!  Tonight we watched Dead Poets Society for our Saturday night Disney (Touchstone Films) movie.  It came out in 1989, and we know we saw it, but we didn't really remember much about it.  Better than I remembered.

This past week was busy with rehearsals for Art, Cove Singers, and Guys and Dolls.  We had two days of Yom Tov services at shul, blood tests for the oncologist, Mark's surgery, a mani/pedi and hair color appointment for me (too dark this time), a 50th anniversary party Thursday night, and guests in the succah last night for dinner.  Hardly a minute to sit down and write a blog.  It looks like next week is shaping up to be the same.

Meanwhile, Mark's car still won't start.  The battery died because he left the key in the ignition in the accessory position for three days in the garage.  He ordered a machine to give a jump, but it didn't work.  AAA came on Wednesday and jumped it.  It started, and he drove around for half an hour, but it didn't start again on Thursday.  Now we are just waiting until the first available free afternoon to have it towed to All Cars for service and probably a new battery.  That is going to be a week from Monday, Halloween.  That's our crazy schedule!

I have sunk to new lows.

For at least the first 30 years of our marriage, Mark wore the same size pants, 30-36.  That is not an easy size to find in the stores, but I always either found it or ordered it.  He never went shopping for himself.

One day, I brought home a couple of pairs of new jeans to replace his threadbare ones.  They were the usually size, 30-36.  They did not fit!

I was shocked, but I decided to measure his waist.  Much to our surprise, it was 34!  Well, no wonder they didn't fit.

So, I went back to the store, returned the 30-36 jeans and exchanged them for size 34-36.

I took them back home, and he tried them on.  They did not fit!  They were way too long.

Eventually, we settled on 34-34, which fit perfectly, and he is still wearing that size today, more than a decade later.

They say that when a couple is married long enough they start to look alike.  We joked that I always dreamed that I would get taller and thinner, but instead, he got shorter and fatter.  LOL!

Well, now I have gotten even shorter!  Today was the first time I bought and wore PETITE size slacks.  I have always worn regular length at my usual 5'4" frame.  I know that about five or six years ago, I was told I was only 5'3".  Then one doctor actually measured me at 5'2", although I never say that's my height.  At any rate, my favorite pair of navy slacks, probably 30 years old, finally disintegrated a year ago.  It took me 9 months to get around to ordering a replacement, so I ordered a navy pair as well as a white pair.  Both were dragging on the ground, completely unwearable. I had also ordered a pair of capris and matching top.  The capris nearly reached my ankles and the top looked like a knee length dress.  YIKES.

So last week I ordered a pair of navy pants in petite and wore them for the first time today.  They fit perfectly.

Yes, I have sunk to a new low...petite length pants.

Restful Shabbat; short blog post.

The week has come and gone.  Yom Kippur has come and gone.  All in all it was a good week.

We went back to the Food and Wine Festival for lunch on Thursday before doing grocery shopping.  Thursday evening we went to Susie and Ed's house to play Rummycube.  Mark won for the first time, so he was excited about that. Friday we had a rehearsal in the morning and the afternoon at the Cove.  I played Mah Jongg there and won one game.  At least there was ONE game that I won.  LOL!  The lady to my right won FOUR.

Today we are staying home all day to catch up on TV and reading.  If we go out at all, it will just be to get a little exercise.  Tomorrow Mark will build the succah in the back yard.  Last year (and next year) it was only up for a few days, but this year it can stay all week.  Although it's small by our standards up in Maryland and not fun to stay out in after dark, he still likes to build it and have his meals there.  We are only having Susie and Ed over for dinner out there on Friday night.  Otherwise, it's just us.  Once it comes down, the entire fall holiday season is finally over.

I hope everyone who might read this and celebrate these holidays has had a good season so far.

It's a new week, and it includes Yom Kippur.

We spent Saturday just relaxing and watching TV all day, one of my favorite days!  Sunday was back to being busy.

We went out in the morning to take the hurricane shutters down.  They come down a LOT faster than they go up.  We got them down in an hour, and since we started at 9:!5 a.m., it wan't even that hot or sweaty.  Around noon we headed over to Epcot for our first time at the Food and Wine Festival.  If you go three times and are an Annual Passholder, you can get a free glass.  Last year it was a wine glass, but this year it is more like a highball glass.  No matter what it is, we want it and plan to get it.

We ate ravioli and peanut butter mousse from The Chew.  Mark also had a cabernet.  Then we went to the Greenhouse Guru where we shared a bag of fresh tomatoes and I had a Riesling.  Next we went to Wine and Dine for the Artist Palette, which was a trio of cheeses with three wines to go with them.  There was a Red Blend from Mondavi, Goldie (a Chardonnay from the Kurt Russel vineyard), and Conundrum, a crisp white.  I have had Conundrum before and like it.  Neither of us cared for the other two.  The Goldie is a VERY expensive wine, which Mark had been wanting to try, so he was happy to taste it and glad he hadn't bought the whole bottle!

We then hung out in the DVC Member Lounge after riding Journey into Imagination.  It is beautiful and includes free coffee, soda, and snacks.  It was delightful, and we programmed a Fastness for Living with the Land while there, which we rode next.  Finally, we walked around to the South Korea  kiosk, between China and Africa, for the Vegan Korean BBQ.  We had that last year and knew it was outstanding.  I had TWO!

Then it was time for the concert, Plain White T's.  We had never heard of this group, but we listened to three of their songs on YouTube before coming to Epcot this morning.  We like them.  I may have to become a fan and buy an album. Also, they must be very popular because this was by far the most crowded concert we ever attended there.  Mark also bought hummus fries from Morocco with a lager to eat during the concert.

Mark bought a bag of Joffrey's coffee, too.

Once we got home, we watched the second presidential debate.  CRAZY!  Enough said about that.

This morning Mark has gone to his rehearsal for the fall play while I'm waiting at home for the piano tuner to arrive.  In the afternoon, I will play Mah Jongg, and after dinner we are going to Susie and Ed's house to play Rummycube.  What a great day!

There will be no blog for the next few days.  Tomorrow morning I have a fasting blood test on Oak Street, which means about a 35 minute drive.  So I will be leaving too early to take the time to write a blog.  Then we are going to the Comfort Inn and Suites near our synagogue because Kol Nidre is Tuesday night and Yom Kippur is Wednesday.  We like to spend those two days near the synagogue.  Hopefully, we can swim in their nice pool complex before having an early dinner at Landry's prior to Kol Nidre services.  Thursday we will check out and go back to Epcot for our second trip to the Food and Wine Festival to eat lunch before doing our usual weekly shopping.

Are you tired yet of just reading our schedule?  HAHA!  I think I am.

Yom Kippur is the finale of the Ten Days of Awe.  We have had ten days to ask for forgiveness from anyone we have wronged during the year.  In the synagogue we will spend the day asking for God's forgiveness.  In order to receive forgiveness, we must first admit our sins.  The prayer book is full of long litanies of all the sins we might have committed against people in general and God.  We recite them aloud multiple times and ask for forgiveness.  None of that removes our obligation to actually ASK people we know for forgiveness if we have wronged them, either knowingly or unknowingly.

If you are reading this blog, please, I sincerely ask for your forgiveness if I have offended you in any way this year.  I might have written something that you found to be offensive, and if that is the case, I did not intend to do it, and I am very sorry if it happened unintentionally. I ask your forgiveness.

If you are reading this blog and you are a family member or a friend to whom I see or speak to regularly, there is EVERY chance that I have said or done something to offend you.  I promise to try harder to think before I speak or write next year; it is an ongoing process.  I sincerely ask for your forgiveness.

If you are observing Yom Kippur, I hope that you have an easy yet meaningful fast. And may you be sealed in the Book of Life for another year.

We are fine.

Around 11 p.m. last night Hurricane Matthew took a slight wobble to the east and kept the landfall off the coast.  It was close to the coast, so they are having some hurricane winds and lots of damage, but it meant that our area only received tropical storm level winds and rain.  And not even much of that.  It's pretty much over now for us, so I'm putting things back on the lanai.

It took Mark and me two, hot, sweaty hours to get those shutters up, and we probably didn't even need them up.  We have joked that because we put them, we saved our entire town from any damage! I admit that I'm not looking forward to putting them back because I am sure it will take at least as long to get them down and stowed away as to get them out and  installed.

We cleared the lanai of most things, as well, and had all our supplies and hurricane foods on the island in the kitchen.  I have put the food and supplies away for the next time.  Once I finish this blog, I am going to put the lanai back, too.

We are very glad we dodged this bullet.

Hurricane Matthew arrives tonight!

The hurricane track and strength have become the worst case scenario.  It keeps moving west to Florida.  Currently, the eye should make landfall right on the coast around Palm Beach and head straight up to Jacksonville with significant damage along almost the entire east coast of Florida.  Mandatory evacuations have been called for all barrier islands and low lying coastal areas in Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina.  The newscasters are saying this is the biggest, worst hurricane Florida has EVER seen!  That's saying something!!!!  It's going to be a category 4 when it hits.

Hurricane strength winds should reach even our area of Poinciana over night tonight.  5 p.m. Thursday through 5 p.m. Friday, with landfall around 3 a.m., is the current prediction.

We made sure our supplies of food, water, batteries, and other hurricane kit items were all updated and handy yesterday.  We also put our hurricane shutters up for the first time.  It took us about two hours and was hot and sweaty work, but we are very happy we did it.  We are wishing we had sandbags for the garage door and the screen door out on the lanai.  We expect water could come under those doors because they are not sealed tightly by any stretch.

We will be bringing everything in from the lanai except for the furniture.  Plants, microwave oven, and all small objects will be moved in to the dining room this afternoon.

We have cancelled all of our plans through Sunday and will just hunker down beginning this afternoon.  Mark is currently out for his Art rehearsal and then has to go to Publix to correct a mistake with one of his prescriptions.  Once he gets home from that, we will just spend the next three or four days inside.

It's currently only 9:15 a.m., but it is raining like crazy all of a sudden!  I am not sure if this is just another random little storm that pop up regularly in central Florida or the earliest edges of the hurricane.  Interesting.  I'll be happier once Mark gets home, which won't be until at least 1:30.

We are not really worried about the integrity of our house or even the roof.  We are concerned that the lanai screens will not hold up and that water could come into the lanai.  If the lanai screens are damaged, then the kitchen window is at risk since there were no shutters provided for it.  Also our front door and our kitchen door to the lanai as well as the French doors in the dining room that go to the lanai have no shutters or other protection.  Garage doors are also at risk in high winds.  They have been known to collapse or be ripped off in really heavy winds.  If it goes, then all the contents of the garage could be damaged.

Those are worst case scenarios and probably not likely to happen.  Anyway, there's nothing we can do to prevent it, so we will just see what happens.

Tornados can be spawned with a storm this big.  We have our emergency weather radio and a hand crank radio to keep up with information.  If tornados are coming, we will hunker down inside the walk in closet in our bedroom.  Other than the powder room in the kitchen area, it is the only place with no windows.  Again, this is an unlikely event, but the newscasters keep reminding us that it could happen.

The only thing they say is a DEFINITE is the loss of power.  They expect the power to go out tonight and stay out for about three days.  We will lose all the food in the fridge, which is sad but not fatal.  We have plenty of food to eat that does not require cooking.  We also have a grill and charcoal in case we do want to heat something or have to boil water.  We have plenty of bottled water and will also fill up the bathtubs with water just in case the water supply becomes compromised.

We have full tanks of gas in both cars and will have our devices fully charged at all times.  We have car phone chargers, so once the storm has passed and we can open the garage (which can be opened manually if the power is out), we can run the cars and recharge cell phones.  We are hoping the cell phone towers still operate!  Landlines always work when power is out, but we cancelled that about year ago.  Oh, well.

In any case, if the power goes out, there will be no more blogs for awhile!

Having said all this, I will admit that even though this sounds scary, I am not afraid.  I believe our house is well constructed and will not sustain any damage that would be threatening to our safety.  I believe we will be uncomfortable in the heat and humidity for a few days once the storm has passed and the power is out.  That is not threatening to our safety either, just our comfort!  We can safely, albeit uncomfortably get through this historic storm.

When I have power and the ability to write a blog, I will certainly let you know how we did.

If you are reading this from anywhere that expects to see the hurricane, then I hope you are prepared to hunker down and stay safe, too.

Eating and eating and more....

Weigh-in Wednesday is BAD today, up SIX pounds, from 265.5 to 271.5.  All I can say is that I ate a lot, including candy.

We ate the hibachi dinner out with my Thursday mahj group, so that put me up a pound or two last Friday.  We had no other meals out, but we had Rosh Hashanah dinners Sunday and Monday nights that included a lot more food than usual.  It also included a lot of higher sodium foods than usual.  And both days I finished the round raisin challah myself within 24 hours except for the small pinch that Mark ate.  So I basically ate two entire challahs between Sunday night and Tuesday afternoon.  In addition, we bought Halloween candy at BJs on Sunday.  Mark will make his little chocolate bars last a year, literally.  He still has some left over from last year.  I, on the other hand, ate seven or eight pieces every day since Sunday when we brought it home.

Exercise?  Not at all.

So....I am not surprised that I'm up six.

Now we are facing Hurricane Matthew.  It is going to skirt the eastern coast of Florida, but the cone extends through our county.  In fact, we are literally on the Polk-Osceola county line.  Osceola is listed as a hurricane and we are listed as a tropical storm.  Who knows what will happen!  We are trying to decide if we should put those hurricane shutters up this afternoon.  It will start raining here by Thursday afternoon, but the brunt of the category FOUR hurricane will be overnight Thursday into Friday morning.  We cancelled our Friday morning appointments.  I still have a 3:15 p.m. mani/pedi scheduled for Friday afternoon, but if we lose power, then obviously I will not go.  My salon is in Osceola county, six miles east of us.

Anything can happen with this storm.  After our first rehearsal this morning for the fall play, Art, Mark will go shopping for any hurricane kit supplies that we might be lacking like more water, food, and batteries.  I am going out to fill up my car with gas and be sure my portable cell phone charger is charged up.  Other than that, it's just deciding about the shutters and then hunkering down tomorrow night.  I bet no one gets much sleep!

Rosh Hashanah begins tonight. Happy New Year!

To all my Jewish friends and relatives who may read this blog, Shana Tovah, have a wonderfully happy and sweet New Year.

Mark and I were talking this morning about the holiday.  It seems surreal to us that it's here.  This has been a very busy and a very good year.  We hope and pray that the upcoming year will be just as good.

Every Shabbat and holiday, there is the silent Amidah prayer, a time to put in our own personal prayers during the service when so much of it is proscribed and read off the page the same exact way time after time.  During my silent prayers, I always thank God for the same things: my Judaism, my husband, my children, my children's spouses, all of my many wonderful family members and friends all around this great country, and the health and prosperity that allows Mark and me to enjoy our retirement years.  I have no doubt that I will be continuing this prayer for the next two days at Rosh Hashanah services and throughout the year.

From now through Yom Kippur it is also the time to ask for forgiveness from anyone and everyone we might have wronged this year.  This is part of doing teshuvah, repentance.  I never really know who might be reading this blog, but if you are out there and reading, and I have written anything here or said anything to you in person that you found offensive, please accept my most heartfelt apology.  It is never my intention to deliberately offend or insult anyone.  I am sorry and apologize and pray that I will do better in this upcoming year.

Last year's Rosh Hashanah dinner table.  We had another couple here to celebrate with us.  Apples and honey and a round challah are on the table.  It will look the same tonight only with just two place settings.