Meatless Dish

I'm not a good cook. Just ask my son. I'm a pretty decent baker, however. This dish was first prepared for me by my friend, Nana. It's potatoes, tomatoes, eggplant, onion, bell pepper, cilantro (the magic ingredient), salt, pepper, garlic, cheese. I'm not usually a big fan of eggplant (at least eggplant that's not breaded, fried, and comes with marinara sauce on top) but I really liked this dish so I made it myself. Stupid me forgot to take a shot of the baked result. It was good, though. My son wouldn't touch it. "Did you say eggplant?" ha

Early Urban Ride.....

Handmade tiles in support (or memory) of those battling cancer.

Nature's pretty detritus.

The culprit.

Okay, okay! I won't swim or wade!

I'll just walk.

Early morning sun rays.

Thank you, PBA.

Your stream looks fairly clean.

The Foundry at World's Fair Park, but more lovingly known by me as the Strohaus at the 1982 World's Fair. I was a "waitress" there and heard more than my fair share of polka music!

Sprinklers water the brown, winter turf. The homeless are sitting on benches on both sides.

Knoxville's Old Faithful.

In the city, it's not always pretty around every turn.

NO TRESPASSING! (said with some "Happy Feet" sweetness).

Party remnants. Maybe the burglar will be deterred by the trash and not go for the open door!

One of my favorite places in the Fort.

If only there were big apartments here.....I'd move in.

The clean and well-maintained courtyard.

Just needs a couple of ducks.

My favorite.

Okay, that sun's rising and getting hot. It's nearly 9:00 a.m. Time to head home.

I enjoy living in the city. It’s true that Knoxville isn’t a very big city but I still consider myself an urban-dweller. Sunday morning around 7:30, I headed down the street on my bicycle to enjoy what would be the coolest part of the day (Al G., my friend, I’m beginning to believe ya!). One of the first places I headed was World’s Fair Park. I expected the park to be completely empty of people and cars. It was.....almost. As I zipped down the road and under the Clinch Ave. viaduct I was surprised to see nearly all the benches that line the sidewalks and the big playing field occupied by homeless folks, most with their backpacks at their feet. I even recognized a couple. No one was talking. They were just sitting there, very quietly. It really was kind of eerie, like I might have stumbled into the middle of a zombie’s colony. The shelter for the homeless closes early in the morning so folks must get up and get out. I thought I remembered someone telling me that the Holiday Inn at World’s Fair Park sometimes gives out coffee and doughnuts in the mornings. Perhaps they were waiting for some hot coffee. When I rode back through, nearly an hour later, they were all still there.

The Stork is Getting Closer!

Nana knitted this dress for Tracy and Hua's little girl!

Go Vols! No wearing red in Boston!

Smells so........

I'm not looking! I'm just smelling!

With the help of friends, I hosted a shower for my "adopted daughter," Tracy. It was held next door in Nana’s apartment. We all had a great time. In China, it is not customary for a mother-to-be to receive gifts prior to baby’s arrival. Gifts are given to a newborn at around one month and it is customarily cash gifts. Tracy, however, had a wonderful experience with her American baby shower. We played two games, even though folks balked a little at my second game (I wonder why). Okay, maybe the second game was a little "gross" in theory, but in reality we had some fun with it. Surely you’ve heard of the Poopy Diaper game! You melt half of six different candy bars in the microwave and then plop each one down in the middle of a clean disposable diaper. Label the diapers from 1 to 6 and you’ve got yourself a very funny baby shower game. Folks had to smell each diaper and try to identify which popular candy bar it was. The Reese’s Cup and the York Peppermint Patty were the easiest. And let me tell you something. A Hershey’s bar with almonds is not a pretty sight when viewed melted in a diaper. It is, quite frankly, far too realistic! Well, now that I’ve left you with some fine mental images on this Tuesday morning, I’ll leave the matter of the Poopey Diaper game. But I’m just sayin’......my son’s future wife has a lot of fun to look forward to. On the other hand, he probably won’t allow me to host a baby shower after reading this.
Tracy received many nice gifts. Her husband, Hua, has already moved to Boston where he is working at a prestigious university. He will miss the birth (as I may have said earlier, fathers are not present at births...in fact, only medical personnel are allowed at hospital births). Tracy and I have been attending birthing classes together and she is doing just great. We toured the hospital last night with our class and took some photos of the rooms where Tracy will be. She was very, very interested in everything. What have I learned from going through birthing classes after 22 years? Things haven’t changed much. Deep breath, push, push, push!

A Small Slice of Life.....

Yesterday I called my son around 4:30 from work and asked him if he wanted to go get cheap Mexican food for dinner. I told him we could split the bill. He said, "Yeah, but I need to take a shower first." I said, "Well, go ahead and get in the shower and you’ll be ready to go when I get home." He said, "Nah, I have something I want to show you first so I’ll wait until you get here." I said, "Does it have anything to do with getting a job?" He laughed and said, "No." I said, "Well, go ahead and take a shower because it must not be that important!" I got home and noticed the bucket on the front porch but didn’t think much about it. But then I noticed that he had swept and cleaned the front porch (a very large front porch). Wow. Good for him. Good for me! I walked in and then it dawned on me (the bucket, that is). I said, "Oh! Did you also mop the kitchen floor?" He said, "Darn. I forgot all about that!" I said, "Oh, well at least you cleaned the front porch!" He grinned. I whooped and headed to the kitchen where the kitchen floor was shiny clean! "Yes!" Now, the kitty litter wasn’t scooped and he hadn’t taken the trash out, but those are things I would gladly take care of to have someone mop my kitchen floor!
Dinner at Cancun’s was good. Feeling generous, I told N that I would pay for the meal if he would pay the tip. Somehow, as is often the case with parent and child, I ended up paying for the meal AND the tip. As we walked towards the car, N said, "Oh, I forgot to leave the tip!" I said, "Yeah. I left it." After all, I have a clean kitchen floor.

Booooorrrrrrring......

It's been a boring day and I have nothing to say.

I took some photos last year of some pictures on my mantel. They're fairly self-explanatory. That's me at 16 on top of the W T C. And that's me and my college friend, Lynne Galili posing in Brooklyn with the W T C Towers in the background. When I look at these photos, it still seems unfathomable that those two towering buildings don't exist anymore. Sigh.

Did I tell you how bored I am right now? I am. It shows. Doesn't it?

Lucy Blue at the Forbidden City!

You can call me Empress Lucy!

Mad Max

Max is finally getting used to N being back in the house! :)

Reading and Dancing

I finished reading Amitav Ghosh’s The Hungry Tide at lunch today. It was a fine hour of uninterrupted reading. The Hungry Tide is set in the Sundarbans, an archipelago in the southeast corner of India. The story is about islands, tides, mangroves, tigers, river dolphins in jeopardy of becoming extinct (they are already extinct in China), cyclones, culture and history. At times it wasn’t a smooth read for me. I found myself skimming some of the mythological tales the author had a couple of his characters relay to the reader. I wanted to get back to the characters and their intertwining lives. Overall, however, it was a very enjoyable read and I learned a lot about the Irawaddy river dolphin. If you are a cetologist, I now know what you do (a marine scientist who studies whales, dolphins and porpoise).
I went to see the Russian Festival Ballet last night with friends. It’s the last dance event in the series. They always save the Russian dancing for last. The dancing was very, very good but I’m no ballet expert or anything. In fact, of all forms of dance, ballet is probably my least favorite. I’d much rather see modern, interpretive, jazz, etc. The dance group that performed at the Academy Awards this year is called Pilobolus. They made amazing shapes such as a van, a gun and a shoe with their bodies behind a shadow curtain. They came to Knoxville last year. They were amazing.

Longing for the Younger Days

This is my brother’s grandson. It’s so much easier at this age.....


My son is home. My son is living with me. Again. After four years. I thought it would be great to have him home. I do think it’s great to have him home. I don’t necessarily think it’s great to have him living with me. Then again, I’m sure he thinks living with his mother kinda sucks too. He doesn’t really understand the concept of house rules. Never mind that some of my rules were the same rules imposed on him by living with a roommate in Las Vegas. In Las Vegas, he adhered to the rules of living with someone else. Apparently, mothers don’t rate as high as roommates and the rules can be ignored. After all, your mother will never kick you out of the house, right? Or will she?