Miscellany Monday

Ma Famille

Homemade Sashimi at our place

So here's the fam over Easter Sunday. Meant to post and just never got to it. Good looking bunch, right? ;]  No, these are not my kids--they're my sibs: three sisters (L->R: Ellie - 5,  Cat Jo -15, and Davie - 8) and my bro, Matt.
Matt actually just skedaddled away to Osaka about a week ago. He's part of a team that ministers in Japan as conversation partners and then recruits college students to come study English in the States. It's pretty awesome. He gets to visit all of our previous home-stay students (aka his "Japanese Brothers" Jungo, Takuro, and Shimon, and our first student Izumii :] ). He absolutely loves it. If you want to follow this summer's month-long adventure, you can read it at his blog "Lost Boy."


My sisters all love hanging out at our apartment, and we love having them. Mostly, I think they come for the DVDs and video games, but I'm going to give my ego a pat on the back and say it's because I'm a delightful hostess and a fab cook. Hmm . . . Yeah, I'll keep saying that.

Mother's Day was wonderful because, really, let's face it, moms are awesome (especially mine ;] ), and they deserve oodles of celebratory days over the year, but instead, they just get one. So we make it special. :] Thanks Moms, for all that you do!

Pup

Things are very much in the works for bringing one of these into the fam.

Photo Credit to California Carolina Dogs

It's a domesticated American Dingo.
Yes, I am insane. And even more insane? I'm really, really excited.
We're saving up money, researching the breed, training techniques, and breeders, but we think we may have settled on a breeder. For all my digging for something incredibly negative about this dog (there's always SOMETHING), I can't find anything. I just can't.Nothing, nadda, zilch.  I've interviewed a couple of owners, and they have nothing and I mean NOTHING bad to say. These dogs shed minimally, are clean, don't smell, aim to please, and are excellent protectors. You have to use unique training, though, because they're "pack-minded." We'll see if all of this plays out.

Car

The air conditioning is dead.
So dead.
Nothing is coming out of my vents, not hot air, not cold air, not anything.
I left the apartment to run errands, returned to my car, started car, realized five minutes in I was warm, started messing with buttons, and it was gone.
So sad.
So hot.
So my car is heading over to its doctor Wednesday morning for a check up. I'm hoping they tell me it's no big deal. My checkbook is demanding it's not a big deal. Oi vey. Just as things start going well, the car always has to ruin it.
Party Pooper.

Age is Irrelevent

 Mother's Day  was also Chris's great-grandmother's 89th birthday.
And you wouldn't think her a day over 70. Seriously. She's spry, spunky, and in awesome health. I wish I could absorb those genes by osmosis. Oh well--at least my kids will have them . . . hopefully.
So for her birthday, Chris's aunts decided to get her a cute pair of pjs with leopard print pants. Oh, and one of these to match.

I am not even kidding.
Yes, it was a gag.
But, golly, seeing an 89 year-old woman holding one of these was never EVER something I expected to see.
Seriously, peeps. The mental images. Wow.