Syracuse

You can see Josh in the background. Such a nice brother, taking his sister dress shopping though it is his wife Julia taking the pictures. It is her birthday today.

Syracuse..aka Snow Magnet..named after the Greek city that is now part of Italy, scared the daylights out of me yesterday. This part of NY is full of cities with names of the ancient world: Rome, Greece, Troy, Ilion, etc.I was thinking that I was born in NY and now I will die in NY.

I watched the babies one more time the night before I left so that their parents could have a rare night out. Since they left after the babies went to sleep, it was a pretty easy job for me except that Daniel woke up very upset to find himself with Not the Mama.

It was close to 60 when I left. While it was drizzling in the Berkshires, Steve called to tell me that somewhere between Albany and Syracuse, I would run into a blizzard. As it was still quite toasty, it was hard to believe but the temps kept falling and the drizzle turned into a few flakes and then snow coming down so furiously, I could barely see. Fortunately, not many trucks were on the road and I was on the least hilly part of the Thruway. Still when I had to switch lanes, I would hit a wall of slush that would make the car swerve. I went through about a 100 miles of heavy snow. I had stopped to rest at one point just to calm my nerves and to consider how much longer I wanted to drive in it though if I waited until today, it would have been worse. Eventually the plows were able to keep up with the snow and by the time I got to Rochester, I could drive at normal speeds again. I had the fastest border crossings ever this trip. I always have to decide which is the better crossing: Windsor or Sarnia. Windsor may be shorter (1.8 miles, I finally had the trip odometer on both ways) but it involves going through the city for a long time plus there was construction on the 401 and I though on a Sunday night, the crossing would be busier. I opted for Sarnia but it wasn't the best choice this time. The poorly designed 402 has no barriers to protect the west bound traffic from blowing snow. It was sunny but the north winds pushed dangerous amounts of snow onto the road that in parts turned into glare ice. There were 4 cars off the road because of it and the rest of us had to creep slowly on the very bad parts not to join them. The road crews must have thought since it was sunny and not snowing, their jobs were done. Ha. It was worse than the blizzard around Syracuse, plenty of accidents there too.

My satellite radio kept me company. And I had plenty of time to think though I guess I always have that.

I returned to a now empty corner and a zillion e-mails from Naomi asking which wedding dress I like. Above are fronts and backs of 2 that she is considering. I prefer the first..readers? She can focus on nothing else except this wedding.

The public health nurse who last month thought Maya had too low of muscle tone and who sent a team of nurses in to evaluate Maya (who thought Maya was wonder baby) came this morning. I wanted to question her myself. She now says Maya is fine but she said a month ago, she was looking at a different baby and that Maya somehow improved dramatically.

Fortunately the sun warmed things up from the frigidity of this morning so I ran up hills for the first time in a long time (I had been running at the Y and then on flat shorelines in Boston) I was still stiff and tired from the car ride so it was not too much fun.

No more Y. As Steve is working albeit for peanuts I will not qualify for a scholarship. And the money he earns is earmarked for other things.

Scenes from a visit

Oliver climbing the three story maze

Shanna and Daniel making bubbles

Mother and baby gorilla through the glass

Daniel falling asleep with a cookie in his mouth

Daniel and some sort of African chicken

Daniel on his first day at school in his class room

Mike's pastry shop ..Home of the Lobster tails

The baby gorilla through the glass

The Boston Children's Museum

Christopher the Lion

In my absence, Blogger has reverted back to its old picture loader making it hard for me to edit these pictures. Please Blogger, go back. (Note: It is a day later. In my settings I selected the 'old' editor and it turned into the 'new' editor..still can't control the sizes of my pix) Many of the pictures above are the kids at the Boston Children's Museum. Since I can not see the pictures, it is hard for me to caption them. There are some scenes from the zoo. I had to take the picture of the gorillas through the glass but you can still see how cute the baby gorilla is. There are some scenes of Boston taken from the wharf the museum is on in South Boston.

Baby gorilla

It was finally warm enough to take the boys out to the Franklin Park Zoo, a small zoo just a few miles away. As a kid, I went to zoos frequently around the country as my father was a stock photographer on the side. He would have rated FP Zoo, a nothing zoo. Things he didn't approve of were deemed nothing. For instance, the only good school in Michigan was U of M, the others, 'nothing' schools although he probably thought that the engineering school Josh went to was OK. I would like to see him get a degree in engineering. He must have thought Boston was 'unphotogenic' as even though we went to places around it, I never went to Boston until I was an adult. I had come here at least 5 times before Shanna ended up here.
But the crowning jewel of this zoo is the gorilla exhibit. A baby that was born 4 months ago was on display. She is now the size of a human newborn and is quite cute. She has a full set of teeth. The mom sat with her on her lap pressed up to the glass with many admiring kids on the other side of the glass. The baby stuck its tongue out at them which I have a picture of it to be posted after I finally make that mind numbing drive home tomorrow.
It was above freezing finally when I ran this morning. I really don't mind the cold but I do mind the ice. The path is almost clear now. My feet feel dead. I didn't run any more miles here than at home but I ran for longer periods every other day. The cement I think has hurt my legs.

Being a weekend, there were lots of fellow runners today. Many shouted encouraging things to me. In Michigan, runners rarely say much more than Hi. These Bostonians are chatty people.

Usually it is warmer here than in Michigan but not this time. Now that it is warm here, it is cold in Michigan. Hopefully I won't drive into ice tomorrow.
I will watch the boys tonight as their parents go out again. They are so much work. Shanna rarely gets more than a few hours of rest at a time.

Lobster tails

Today is sunny and calm in the land of lobster tails, pronounced by the locals as lobstah. I was able to run to Castle Island without the threat of being swept away by the huge waves slapping over the causeway like the other day. Since it was cold and a workday, I was out there by myself with just the very low flying planes aproaching nearby Logan for company.It is so pretty being completely surrounded by water. The downside of the Harborwalk is that most of it is cement. Since nearby Day Blvd is smooth asphalt, I would jump over to it when there was no traffic to save my poor legs. There is a section near Carson Beach that has a boardwalk made from recycled bottles but half of it is smooth and slippery.

So what are lobster tails? Huge sfogliatelle found in the Italian neighborhood, the North End so named as they roughly resemble loster tails. The city famous for sfogliatelle? Napoli (Naples). We had them at the Caffe Gambrinus there. There are many southern Italian bakeries in Brooklyn but they don't call them lobster tails there. Flaky pastry filled with sweetened ricotta. I also brought some rainbow cookies for Naomi and some macaroons, full of almond paste, for myself. We also bought some panini for lunch but took them home as a certain grumpus needed a nap.

Necesito rioja, por favor.

These were the words I used years ago trying to buy wine late Sunday night in Seville. The only store we could find was one in which you stepped up to a window and told them what you wanted which meant no browsing and a reliance on my poor Spanish. I was asked if I wanted a good rioja?
Si
The bottle cost 3x what we had been paying in Spain but it was good. Last night I sent Shanna out for red wine with no further instructions..just make it red. She came back with the same bottle that we were sold back in Spain (although a different year).
Muy Buenos

Mania

As it is hard to go out with two little boys especially when the windchill dips below zero, I've been watching more TV than usual. I am learning Spanish with the boys with Dora the Explorer and singing along with the Wonder Pets in their pseudo opera as they save baby animals. Occasionally we watch 'adult' TV, news shows, which it being a slow news week, is the CS show, poster child for manic depression.Yep Americans love their human train wrecks. Every morning is a new interview with this poor soul spouting off his grandiose ideas. Yes they should pay you $3 million dollars an episode as you are so worth it.
Back before I was fired with a "P", I worked on a manic depression project.The premise was that manic depression involves a separate set of neurotransmitters than the ones associated with so-called garden variety depression. Who shows up at the doctor's office complaining of manic depression?
No one.
People in their manic phase are on a high, full of energy, full of self confidence..why would they want to end that? They eventually crash and it is not pretty. We had a program of 'meeting the patients' so we would know what we are working for (aside from the paycheck). A patient with manic depression would tell their story and then a family member would tell it from their standpoint, never was it the same story. They will show up in their 'down' state and without family members telling their side, it is hard to tell what kind of depression the patient is dealing with. Yet it is important to tell the difference as the treatment is way different.
Another show not available in Michigan is "Mystery Diagnosis". Yesterday the case wasn't much of a mystery to me..it seemed like a classic case of inflammatory breast cancer and yes, Dr. Sue was right. At one point after treatment, the patient was deemed 'cancer-free'. No! No doctor can ever say that (and mean it). At best they can say you are NED, no evidence of disease.Sometimes when women on BC boards say that they are cancer free, Ms. Pedantic feels like piping in but if they want to live with that delusion, why burst their bubble. I do correct them occasionally when they confuse grade with stage. They are told that their tumor is Grade 3 and get all depressed because Stage 3 is a very short jump to Stage 4 and there is no Stage 5. But I do tell them they can be only Stage 1 or even Stage 0 and still have a Grade 3 tumor.

But to avert cabin fever, we went back to the museum as they have passes. This time I spent most of the time with Danny who never spends much more than a minute on any activity so it was more of an aerobic experience than dealing with Oliver who will spend an hour doing the same activity. Danny does not look like a girl at all but people seeing his pretty curls automatically assume girl.

This weekend it will be warm (but rainy) for my long, long drive home. At least the risk from sliding off the side of a mountain will be minimal.

Pleasure Beach

Pleasure Beach was no pleasure today due to gale force winds. I should have run there yesterday when it was calm and sunny. Finally the sun has melted more of a path in the Ice-MA though I still had to run on the non-icy beach for part of the run, a smaller part though than a few days ago. Running in sand is no fun. Usually I like to run the mile long causeway out in the middle of the bay to get to Castle Island but the tide was coming in and huge waves splashed over the causeway. I narrowly escaped being soaked. During parts of the run, I was sandblasted by the sand the winds picked up. And I saved facing the wind for the way back, also not wise though it made the run to Pleasure Beach more pleasurable.

This week will probably be my last next to the water. If all goes to plan, Shanna et al will be living more inland in the fall. As they are coming to MI for both the baptism in May and the wedding in August, I won't be back here for a while.

Sad news back in Michigan: One of the girl scout moms just died. When Shanna was in middle school, 4 of us moms formed a support group of sorts in which we would go out to dinner once a month and commiserate about the difficulties of raising a middle school girl, not my favorite age group.Two of the moms moved away, though one of them just became my Facebook friend, and our little group fell apart. Mazie did live down the street but I had no idea she was sick. Her house burned badly last spring after being struck with lightning. I run by occasionally and see her husband and son and Naomi is buddies with a grandson but I have not seen Mazie in years.

Right now Daniel is having a tantrum, not enough sleep but he doesn't want to take a nap. I am afraid I am not being much help.

Boston Children's Museum

The boys have a family membership to this interesting place in South Boston: a great place to run around when the weather is bad. However, it is impossible for Shanna to bring the boys by herself as they will run off in opposite directions. Today Grandma shadowed Oliver whereas Shanna chased Daniel. They had a sand table with various shovels, funnels, cups and shovels which fascinated Oliver for a full hour. A man left in his 3 year old there by himself for the longest time. He had already complained about being a single dad whose son was excluded by daycare for being sick. So he brings him to the museum to infect the kids there with his constant snotsicles. Just as one of the moms was going to get security to deal with the abandonned boy, he reappeared.  Oliver did not seem as thrilled with the construction zone with its digging implements but we had to beg him to leave the train table so we could get lunch at the nearby Flour Bakery, home of homemade pop tarts and oreos and other yummy treats.

I've been taking pictures but did not bring my card reader so I will load pix when I return to Michigan.