Category Archives: Family

Le jour de gloire est arrivé

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And if you can tell me what song that line comes from, I will personally send you a big fat lovely Hershey’s chocolate bar. Why?

BECAUSE IT’S HAMSGIVING

Happy Hamsgiving to one and all this day! While I’m at school, Mavis will be making all the preparations (a big shout of thanks to her — there is no way I could have done this alone with having school all day), and I will fly home by 3:45 to assist in last-minute things before company arrives at 5:30. Big gracias also goes to the Thriller for his role in cleaning, pitching and carrying. All I have to do is frost a cake when I get home, and help with final preflight preps, and then it is ON. Thirteen of us will party down on the roast beast and fixins, and there will be much love all around.

I will check in with you later this evening, and of course tomorrow, to see how your holiday weekend is shaping up (except for Suzanne, who lives in a place where turkeys roam free…wait, are there turkeys in Holland?). Report!

Fink, over ‘n out

Deeper meaning

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What must it be like, going to basic training? It’s nothing like sleep-away camp, I’m certain. Unless you’re the Thriller. Here’s a story.

He still calls his basic training at Naval Station Great Lakes “Boy Scout Camp.” Coming from a difficult adolescence (he and his step-father had some issues, as is often the case in those situations) and wanting to break free, he was ready for anything that might help  him “get out of there.” The Navy offered him a ticket to independence, and after graduating high school in 1969, he went for it. He repeatedly enlisted, and served a total of eight years.

I say here today, as I said on Facebook this morning: thank you to the Thriller, for your years of service to your country. While he was shorebound (a jet aircraft mechanic), his service was integral to the cause.

There is a deeper issue that I wonder about with regard to our servicemen and women. It takes some real mental fortitude to deal with the possibility of dying a violent death — not to mention the loneliness, uncertainty, and utter despair they must certainly feel at times. It is no wonder that some people return from war and are never the same. So the deeper meaning here today is that soldiers/sailors/airmen don’t just go off to war, do the job and come back to parades. They willingly alter their lives — sometimes permanently — defending tens of millions of people they will never meet. For that, I salute them all. You have more courage than I can imagine.

Yay for our vets! Share a shout-out in the comments today if you love a veteran, too.

Looking back, looking ahead

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What a nice weekend.

Everything turned out to be as perfect as could be, from the decorations to the ceremony to the reception to the day after. Even the music was decent. :-)

Although we obviously didn’t get any candids from the wedding itself, here are a couple of before-and-afters.

Fink at the church, playing ancient Chinese ballad called Too Ning.

The reception hall was a 100-year-old school building in a small rural town nearby. This photo was taken mid-setup (decorations beautifully designed by BFF Kay).

Jake and Justin, being great helpers as Kay and I cleared the center table so the dancing could start.

One of the best pictures of the night: the Thriller, lost in conversation with his little girl.

And we danced (and danced and danced) the night away.

Their joy was contagious.

Last I heard, they were about halfway to their honeymoon cabin in the mountains. It was a fantastic weekend of reuniting with family and great times with friends.

After the marathon clean-up of Saturday night, the Thriller took me on a day trip to Cleveland yesterday. It was lovely to get away one last time before the true madness of the next 14 days begins (that would be today).

We had some casino fun (and came home with more bones than we left with — score!), had lunch out, then stopped at the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory on the way home. What day that ends with chocolate cannot be called fabulous? I ask you.

So now: the look ahead. Kent State class begins tonight, and the push to opening (and Suzanne’s impending visit, YAY) begins tonight. Gonna be an interesting couple of weeks. Let’s roll!

:-)

On yer mark…

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…git set…

WEDDING WEEKEND.

The frenzy begins (for the Thriller, anyway) today to get ready for Simone’s wedding, which happens 48 hours hence. Family is in from Texas, excitement mounts, hanging details are snipped, and in between teaching and practicing and two unrelated appointments tomorrow, I am preparing my own bad self for the festivities.

Truthfully? It’ll be nice to forget about school for a day. Well I won’t actually forget about it, but I will file it in the back of my reptilian brain for 24 hours. Big bonus: I will get to see all three of my grandchildren for a somewhat extended period of time. Score!

In the meantime, we practice. And practice.

Double duty

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This post serves two purposes today: thumbs-up progress report and movie review.

Update on The Visit: the pies (chocolate and coconut cream) were awesome. Daddy and I waited at Lyn-Way while they assembled them fresh. LEKKER. There was great conversation while we waited to hear about Mavis’s hospital test (turns out there wasn’t a radiologist there to read it, so we have to wait some more).

Then, while Daddy and the Thriller went out to the garage to figure out what’s wrong (again) with the Finkmobile, Kathy and I decided to drive out to the county fair. Turns out, the boys had the problem figured out by the time we got our shoes and coats on — bonus! We saw lots of horses (her favorite, and every horse she petted and talked to knew it) and sampled the incredible food on the midway. When we got back, they left so Daddy could nap at the hotel (he’s still recovering from shoulder surgery).

BFF Kay, Seamus and Hannah stopped by around dinnertime for a chat. The boy ended up out on the porch with his Granddaddy for over an hour, talking about cars. It was awesome, and Mama Fink was six kinds of happy and proud. Can’t wait for Lars to meet him tonight, where the conversation will no doubt turn to guitars.

After K and the kids went on their way, we rented Cabin in the Woods — something Daddy and the Thriller wanted to see. As usual, I had the pillow in front of my face for much of the time, so this review will be based on sound as much as actual viewing.

It’s a satirical twist on the slash-and-gore genre. And there is a reason why the cabin is suspended in mid-air on the poster. There are puppeteers. That’s all I’ll say about that.

Of course, there was the obligatory and ubiquitous head lopping and skin ripping that make these movies so ooky to me. The men in the room laughed at the gory parts; I, however, take them all too seriously, which significantly impedes my ability to “enjoy” films like this. Still, I will say that it was somewhat satisfying to see an ending — however bizarre — that didn’t follow the standard slasher story recipe.

With plenty of jump-out-and-BOO! moments, some smart-aleck comedy provided by one of my favorite actors (West Wing‘s Bradley Whitford), and the requisite pretty boys & girls, it’s a rather interesting variation on what is, to me, an old, tired theme. But you horror fans might dig it.

On the Rat-O-Meter scale of five cheeses, I give Cabin in the Woods:

Happy Saturnday to all! The grand finale family get-together is tonight — can’t wait. :-)