Another reader thing!

Yippee kiaaaay! Get lost in books. Hattie, have your mom tell you her secret way to read after it's bedtime and lights out (bring a flashlight for under the blankets).

Because everything the gov touches works the bestest

Puja at Akanksha and Sudeep Nagpal's home

Akanksha and her husband Sudeep are Indian and both work for Hospira. Akansha is part of Rick's lead team (Phd analytical chemistry) and Sudeep works for the corporate office in Chicago but mostly telecommutes.

In the Hindu religion, they have a ceremony called Puja: Pūjā is a prayer ritual performed by Hindus to host, honour and worship one or more deities, or to spiritually celebrate an event. Sometimes spelled phonetically as pooja or poojah, it may honour or celebrate the presence of special guest(s), or their memories after they pass away.

Since they have moved into a new house, they needed to have a Puja. And to do it properly, they read from their sacred writings for 2 1/2 days, 24 hours a day; they can take small breaks. Akanksha was waiting for her parents to come from India to help with this ceremony. It began on Thurs and ended on Sunday. On Sunday a priest came, who is skilled in knowing procedure and the special chants and prayers necessary. They invited Rick and me, and Peter (another member of Rick's lead team, who has actually spent a lot of time in India working for Hospira's facility there, and appreciates Indian food and culture).

We also were allowed to participate in the last 30 min as guests. Symbolic water is offered, a sacred thread tied on the wrist, incense and a burning lamp are waved before the image, red and black bindi on the forehead. Rick and I had the black bindi and the sacred thread put on. Rick and I felt very honored to have been invited to participate, even in such a small way, in this special occasion.

Then a traditional meal of Indian foods, which was delicious. Hindus are vegetarian; Akanksha still is but Sudeep and the kids will eat meat.

This is their temple. They bought it in India and shipped it here.

Akanksha's mother, Anya and Akanksha

 

Macy is a sandwich thing

Paige loves sandwiches; that was her lunch meal of choice when growing up. Her daughter is the same and will chose a sandwich everyday for her lunch. Must be genetic - Nano loves sandwiches also.

Hattie's a toddler now

Oh, my. She's growing up much too quickly.

Richfield and Jerome

Lemmon Hardware in Richfield, this was a thriving business when I was growing up. It was also in a film about Ernest Hemmingway's life (since in his last years he lived in Ketchum).

This man and his followers thought he was the Christ and didn't have him buried after he died. Finally gov officials forced his burial; as youth we had scary stories about looking down at his headstone and seeing eyes, etc. We loved to go to the cemetery after Mutual and scare ourselves. (I might have already blogged this years ago.)

Richfield canal - that water was cold!!

Jerome canal, where I learned to swim

Cold

Austin must be getting hit with some of the artic weather that is holding the Midwest and Northeast in its grasp. The Northeast is breaking snow records, and add to that the cold, and you have some miserable conditions. And that is even considering that the New England states expect cold and snow.
Last week we were in the 60s and high 70s; I was out shopping and got a few of my bedding plants but didn't put then out. Good thing. This morning it is 35*.

Supposed to be back in the 70s by the end of the week. But I won't be fooled into thinking I can put out my bedding plants.

Nothing in my dreams that I remember ever works out (I hope in the ones I don't remember things go well for me). Last night I dreamed I had bought clothes for Paige and Stella, but they didn't like anything I had bought. Then I couldn't find the receipts.

Hattie's not a baby anymore

I remember when I was 17, 18, etc., someone would ask me my age and if I was even close to my next birthday I would give the older age. Now, of course, I would gladly give the younger age.

Hattie is like her Nano: she wants to be and do older. Yesterday Hattie somehow let Paige know she wanted something to eat, so Paige was giving her a fruit leather. She usually opens the package, breaks off a small piece and hands that to Hattie. This time Hattie was saying, ugh ugh ugh, indicating she didn't want it broken off. So Paige handed her the whole piece. Then she was saying ugh ugh ugh again, so Paige handed her the broken off part. Hattie walked away happily with both pieces.

Two things: Hattie sees how the big girls are treated and wants to be a big girl. The other is it must be frustrating to know what you want but not have the words to say it. As I mentioned in an earlier post she can say a few things, but then is limited by her spoken vocabulary even tho she understands most everything. Understanding comes before verbal skills.

When Paige was around this age I was in college for Education of the Hearing Impaired (nice way of saying Deaf Ed), taking a SEE class (Signing Exact English, which is different than ESL). I was signing all the time to the kids and at one point Paige could sign more words than she could speak.

These little ggrrls are growing up too fast for Nano and Papaw.

Nano is a Finder Thing

This Chucky Cheese token is from 1990; that year we took the kids up to Chucky Cheese (this is long before the parents started their beat downs on each other, thinking some other kid was cheating their kid out of cheap plastic widgets) in Chicago Heights. We didn't use one token and Rick has kept it all these years, usually in his small pocket wallet. A few weeks ago he emptied his pocket wallet into the center console of his truck, meaning to get the Chucky Cheese token and put it back in his pocket wallet, but didn't get it done. Then the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad thing occurred - a person was holding out a sign asking for money (begging) on one of the interstate underpasses (people are always there, we saw one nicely dressed man reach in his pocket and pull out a Smartphone) and the ever nice Rick reached into the console, dug out a bunch of change and gave it to him.

A few hours later Rick was getting in the console to return his token to his pocket wallet and couldn't find it!%$#&&^* No amount of searching would produce the Chucky Cheese token. He moped around for days.

Then today we were out driving and I was getting my sunglasses out of the console, pulled out Rick's also, and a coin flipped out and landed in the map holder on my door. Rick said, What was that? I said it was a coin and looked down into the holder and what did I find - it was his Chucky Cheese token. Happiness and joy.

Yvonne in 6th grade and 7th grade

6th grade - Find Yvonne



7th grade - Find Yvonne

Yvonne in 8th grade

Which one is Yvonne?

Hattie gets hungry

Macy and Hattie were downstairs and Paige was upstairs getting ready for Joy School. Paige heard some noise and asked Macy what was going on; she was told that Hattie was hungry. So Paige went down to see and found Hattie sitting in her booster chair, tray on and seat belted, munching on cheese puffs. Evidently somehow Macy ascertained that Hattie was hungry and put her in the booster chair. Paige found some gold fish on the floor in pantry, showing Macy had first tried giving her gold fish which she didn't want, then gave the cheese puffs.

I asked Paige if Macy wanted to get out the cheese puffs so she could have some also. Paige said, no, Macy doesn't like cheese puffs. What a kind heart Macy has for little sister!! I think I already blogged this, but on Christmas Day at the Upstills dinner Macy sat beside Grandmother Deeney and held her hand while I went to get something to eat. Very sweet.

When I get old I hope Macy takes care of me and gives me cheese puffs (I love them).

Life

I just read on my Austin homepage that Texas had executed a 52 yr old man who was involved in the murder of a 29 yr old policeman who responded to an armed robbery (and then ran over his body with their stolen SUV.) Seven of them had broken out of a Texas prison 11 days before, all were caught within a month.

The whole story made me so sad. The man who was executed, Donald Newberry, made the prison break with the leader, somebody Rivas, who was serving 19 life sentences for his crime. Rivas must have been a sadistic, hardened criminal, don't know what he did but 19 life sentences is severe. The sad thing about Newberry was all the chances he had been given. He was born in 1962, claimed that he had a very hard, abusive childhood, which he says should have been taken into account when giving him prison terms and then the execution. But it sounds like it was.

I don't know when he was first sent to prison, but he had committed aggravated robbery, given a 10 year sentence and paroled in 1985 when he was 23. Sent back to prison in 1987 for aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon for 15 years, then paroled in 1992. In 1998 he committed another aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon and was sent to prison with a sentence of 99 years. Broke out of prison in 2000, was part of the gang that ambushed and murdered the responding police officer, and was sentenced in 2002 to execution, which finally happened yesterday 2015.

He always served very little of his time before parole, committed the same crime, returned to prison with increasing sentences, before ending in murder of the policeman. Not sure who actually did the murder, but if you're part of it, you get the same consequences. And society has a right to be protected from someone like him and his cohorts.

Just so, so sad. From the little I read about any comments he made, he never accepted responsibility for any of his actions, always a blame about his rough, abusive childhood (which I don't doubt, but many others have had rough childhoods and don't rob and murder), the horrible prison conditions (then don't return), and his last words: "I would. That each new indignity defeats only the body. Pampering the spirit with obscure merit. I love you all. That's it." I'm not sure what he meant, but maybe there is some repentance, some acknowledgment in the words I love you all.

I do know that God created him, and loves him. I wonder if any other person cared about his life, doesn't seem his parents did. And it all makes me sad.

Mailing tube

I lived in NC from 2007-2011, and some place there was going out of business and I got a mailing tube for $.57. I didn't need one, but thought if I ever need one I will have it. So I have packed that mailing tube from NC to PA to TX. Finally I had a need for a mailing tube; couldn't find it. I went to Office Max/Depot, Walmart, Target, 4 ship/mail it places. I could find tubes but they were much bigger than I needed and quite expensive (at least more than I wanted to pay, around $4). Finally I unrolled the paper and put it in a really big flat, bubbled mailing envelope and sent it to Fred and Barbara on Fri.

(It was a pic of Rick with Fred in the hospital with his IV sack, made at Rick's site. They like to take pics of people they help that have a personal connection, or unusual story, and send it thro out the corporation.)

This weekend we were organizing and cleaning in the garage, Rick opened a box, and there was the mailing tube. Now I have a mailing tube, but I'm sure it will be lost for the next time, 5 years from now, that I need one.