SATURDAY NIGHT REDUX

  (I won't mention the "s" word in this post.  I promise)

Once upon a time,

on a dark cold February night in San Diego

it hailed.

It hailed on hubby's car

 It hailed on my car

and it hailed on our back patio door mat

We thought the entire hail event was pretty cool.

The End

ARCTIC GIFT

Saturday night we got something rare for our fair city. The Arctic storm that blew through brought with it, a gift. A gift to the city of sunshine.

It had rained off and on all day, amidst breaks of sun streaming through heavy grey clouds. In the late evening it began raining again, harder this time.  Hard enough to hear the soft tapping sounds on the roof--melodic. 

But soon that sound was replaced with with louder, sharp taps outside against the window glass and cars. The staccato was urgent calling us outside to see.  Out into the cold.  And cold it was.  The temperature had dropped.

Falling all around us were tiny ice pellets--hail covered the hood of our cars and blanketed the flower beds.  A sight rarely seen in San Diego, proper. 

This event was almost as exciting as the dusting of snow that fell at my brother's house "up the hill".  The same storm that pelted my house with hail, dropped snow where he lives at an elevation of 1300 feet.

It was so pretty.

It was also pretty unusual.

And it was pretty cool.

But I am sure this is pretty boring for all of you that get snow
a lot of snow
maybe even too much dang snow

and who by this time, are very tired of snow.

I'll stop now.

BABY, IT'S COLD OUT THERE

A cold winter storm has come to visit. 

We've gotten lots of rain and now the temperatures continue to drop as the sun peeks in and out of the clouds.  Our coastal high for today is supposed to be 45 degrees.  I realize that is probably quite balmy by Midwest and Northeast, even Northwest standards, but those temperatures are downright COLD here in sunny San Diego.

This morning, after a hot breakfast and plenty of hot coffee, we ran to the grocery store (in between downpours) to do our shopping for the week and now we're back home sitting on the couch under warm blankets to ride out the storm.

Wiling away the afternoon watching some TV, working on some writing projects, play a few games of Tetris and Mahjong on the laptop, keeping warm by a fire.

We decided that dinner tonight would consist of delicious comfort food.

Chicken fettuccine with homemade Parmesan sauce

Chunks of warmed sourdough bread (with real butter)

A bottle of red wine

Ghiradelli brownie sundaes for dessert...ahhh, yes. Imagine warm fudge brownies, a big scoop of creamy ice cold vanilla ice cream, rich chocolate sauce drizzled over and topped with whipped cream.

We're going to spend a cozy, quiet Saturday night at home.

While the rain and the temperatures fall outside.

ME TIME SOMETIMES

I was reading another blog today and the topic of her post made me remember a time in my life when a very wise counselor asked me point blank...do you know how many hours are in a week? 
Nope.  I really had no idea because back in those days, "I" was SuperMom. I even had the license plate frame to prove it.  

The correct answer is 168 hours.  I will never forget that question and what I learned, but at the time, it seemed like a crazy question to be asking me.

I was a stay at home mom with four kids 16, 14, 8 and 6 and I was also the CEO of our household.  I was team mom, room mother, chauffeur, chief, cook, and bottle washer. Go, go, go. From rising at  6 a.m. for my morning 5 mile walk--then running the kids to school beginning at 7:00 a.m. til 8:30 a.m., after school karate lessons, baseball games, homework, housework, making dinner, getting everyone to bed...and everything in between.

But I had forgotten one important person.  Me.

There are times in our lives that we all do that.  We forget to make time for ourself, to take care of the person that takes care of everyone else.

It took me a while, but I learned how to include myself on the "to do" list.

Thank you, Wise Counselor. 

signed,

grasshopper

TIME OFF

We are wrapping up our long, lazy weekend. 

My day started early.  Our dog, Kona does not believe in sleeping in.  Usually it is Bruce that she wakes up first.  But this morning she woke me up. At 6:15 a.m. 

We turned the coffeemaker on and made a run to get some doughnuts to have with our coffee.  What to do today?  We decided to see a movie this afternoon. A comedy. The Jennifer Anniston, Adam Sandler flick, 'Just Go With It'. 

My darling daughter, A, said that it was good and that is a good enough recommendation for me.  Today, I just want to watch a movie I can laugh at and I am sure this film will not disappoint in that regard.

I am looking forward to a couple of hours of entertainment induced laughter and a bucket of hot buttered popcorn. 

An afternoon at the movie is not complete without popcorn. 

At least not in my world.