Mama suggested in a comment on my last post that perhaps I have writer’s block.  She referenced this:

(They left out my favorite part: After Blanche says she hasn’t written a word, Dorothy says that isn’t writer’s block, otherwise we’d all have it!)

Although I think she was really thinking about this scene:

I’m hoping this new post will help me break through my writer’s block! 
 
So, hello! And happy 2012!  And there’s no better way to start off a new year (or end an old one, as the case may be) than with a new bathroom!  Right, Mama?

Yes, Mama’s bathroom is finished!  Remember what it looked like before?

I almost miss that wallpaper.

Here’s what it looks like now:

Those pictures don’t do it justice.  It’s really a beautiful bathroom; looks like a spa! 

Anyway, this post comes just in time to say: Happy birthday, Mama! I took today off to spend the day with her, so I should probably go see what she’s up to and what she wants to do.  The rest of you should wish her a happy birthday right now!

Just the second of eight crazy nights!

I hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season.  I have one more day of work this week, then I’m going to enjoy my four-day weekend! Tomorrow is going to be close to fifty degrees here, so it’s a real winter wonderland (and I’d like it to stay this way, thank you very much).  The only thing I’m sad about is that the northern nieces and nephew aren’t coming for their usual December break visit; they’re getting a new puppy instead!  But they were here a few weekends ago when my brother was visiting from Israel.  Good times.  We celebrated Chanukah a bit early by giving the kids their presents that weekend. (Southern nephew: Your presents are on the way!)

Mama also celebrated Chanukah a bit early with a gift to herself: her new bathroom!  I’ve taken pictures along the way (you can see some before pictures here), and I plan to put together a whole post in the next few days to show off the final product.  Spoiler alert: It’s beautiful!

Yeah, I know. What can I do?  So here’s an update on what’s been happening around here.

At the end of October, I went to Tampa to visit JP, my southern nephew (and his parents, of course)!  The weather was beautiful, I ran every day (two days on a nice paved trail for four(ish) miles each time!), and I drank lots of beer.  And I got to spend lots of time with my cute, hilarious nephew.  Did we have fun? Yeth!

At the beginning of November, I went to Toronto to visit The Pie, Mowgli, and The Duck, my northern nieces and nephew!  We had fun times, as usual.  On Sunday, we went to a farm where the kids could feed a bunch of animals.  We even saw Auntie Sara’s favorites!

The big cow tried to steal all the food from the calf.  We had to distract him while Mowgli fed the little guy.

The kids didn’t have school on Monday, so we spent the day together.  We went out to lunch and then watched the new movie I brought them (yay, Phineas and Ferb!) while eating popcorn.  But we spent most of the day in the basement doing puzzles, playing games, and building castles.

I believe this was The Pie’s final castle. Please note the puzzling happening in the background.

Also going on the last few weeks: Mama’s bathroom remodel!

Before:

First picture was the view from the doorway.  Obviously, the picture on the left above is the sink/vanity area, and the picture on the right shows the shower and linen closet.  Here’s a closer view of the wallpaper:

Yeah.  Awesome.

So, we all agree that bathroom was in desperate need of updating, right?  Here’s the first step to a new bathroom:

Zoinks!

That was a few weeks ago.  There’s been a lot of progress since then, and I took these pictures the other day. 

New countertop!

The whole new setup! That cabinet replaces that horrible linen closet.

Yay!  The tiling has begun!  That’s the shower, of course.  Here’s a closer look:

Nice, right?  Super exciting!  It’s going to look fantastic when it’s all done. And Mama’s going to have a lovely bathroom!

Which is better than having a toilet in your bedroom.

Just a quick shout-out to wish a happy birthday to my brother Adam and my cousin Lil. Adam was Lil’s eighth birthday present, which is odd since Lil turns 27 today and Adam is pushing 40 (it’s official now!). I hope you both have fabulous birthdays!

I graduated from college ten years ago this past May.  I spent my freshman year commuting to the university not far from my house, and then I transferred to Binghamton University, which is about two hours from home.  I wanted to go away for my first year, too, but that didn’t happen.  When I did go away, I chose to live in a suite instead of living corridor style so I would only have to share a bathroom with five other people (true story).  I was the only sophomore among five freshman.  I also have four roommates in as many semesters.  My final roommate and I moved to an on-campus apartment with one of our suitemates for our final year (we graduated the same year).  I had my own room, and the two Teresas (T1 for my suitemate, T2 for my roommate…are you following?) shared the other.

From left: Me, T2, T1; on our road trip, May 2001. This is the famous “girls in hoodies” photo.

The year after I graduated, they came to visit me at home, and that was the last time I saw T1!  T2 was working in Syracuse when I was in town last year for Rosh Hashanah (where I am now!), and I saw her then after all that time.  So we decided we all had to get together again…and we finally did last weekend!

                                     T1                                                                                                                          T2

I got to T2’s house in a town right outside Binghamton on Saturday morning, where T1 had stayed the night before.  We spent some time catching up a bit.  We may have had ten years to catch up on, but it didn’t feel like ten years had passed!  It may as well have been ten weeks since we last saw each other, and I mean that in a good way; we could talk just like old times!  After a little while, we went to campus to reminisce.

It happened to be Alumni Weekend, so we went to register and take a guided tour of the new parts of campus.  After we saw those, we went to some old parts.

We lived in Lehman Hall in Hinman College (our residential community) for two years (my sophomore and junior years) in suite 125.  We walked through all the way to the end of the hallway to find our old suite.  The door was open, I declared it much messier than how we kept it, and we moved on.  But not before stopping to take a picture outside our windows!

Point to your old window! Unless you’re T2, who is too cool for that. Do we look ten years older?

Then we walked up the hill to our old apartment in the Susquehanna community.

                    Again, point at the apartment door, unless you’re too cool like T2.  I’m glowing with excitement.

We left eventually to tour the town!  We visited our old haunts: Oakdale Mall, which seemed a lot brighter than it used to be, and Wegmans, which is the best grocery store ever!  Well, it’s awesome anyway.  We saw a lot of damage from the flooding while we drove around the area.  It’s very sad, and I hope everyone is able to get back to their normal lives soon. 

For dinner, we went downtown to The Lost Dog Café, a place I had gone to a few times in college. 

We had a very long wait because they were setting up half of the space for an ’80s dance party to benefit flood victims.  Seriously, a very.long.wait.  I enjoyed a Shock Top pumpkin wheat beer while we waited.  We split an avocado and goat cheese dip for an appetizer, and I had chana masala with tofu for dinner.

                                                                                                          Delicious.

We went back to T2’s and caught up some more.  T1 went to sleep after a little while, and T2 and I had some wine.

Malbec? Yes, please.

The next morning, the three of us went out for a run.  Teresa mapped out a three-mile loop around her neighborhood.  Her very hilly neighborhood.  I don’t have any pictures, but trust me, it was hilly.  We walked up the steep hills and ran down them and around any flat land.  Rough!  Good job, girls.  We rocked it! 

I had a great time with these awesome ladies.  Thanks for your hospitality, T2!  Congratulations on your engagement, T1!  And let’s see each other again soon.  And by soon, I mean let’s not wait another ten years, okay?

So, it seems I have a blog.  Whoops.   I really have been meaning to post an update since I wrote my last post more than a month ago.  (If you haven’t read my previous post, you really should.  It’s a good one.  Totally worth being at the top of the page for that long.)  Anyway, here I am now!

I was in a serious funk after the Paul concert.  I call it the post-Paul-concert depression.  Others call it the Macca blues.  Either way, serious funk.  You know what finally made me feel better?  A visit from the northern nieces and nephew!  They came at the end of July to visit for more than two weeks!  (So did my sister.  My brother-in-law, however, can never say anything about my short visits again, as he has now redefined the stop-by.)  I had to work the first week and a half that they were there, and I managed to get up most mornings to run before work so I had all evening to hang out!  I also took a few days off from work so I could relax and spend some quality time with the kinders.  We played a lot of Monopoly, took walks for ice cream, watched a lot of cartwheeling, and stayed up way too late.  And I even took The Pie to TWO Claire’s stores in one day to find exactly what she wanted (the girl loves peace signs, just like her auntie!).  On their last evening here, we did their favorite thing: We went to Hoffman’s (our local amusement park)!  They’d been waiting their whole visit to go; we had planned to go on one of my days off from work, but it was raining.  This worked out perfectly: It was during the week, it wasn’t too hot, and their father was here to go on the roller coaster with Mowgli (my sister and I hate that roller coaster).  I took (not nearly enough) photos while they were here, and a lot at Hoffman’s, but I can only show you one.  Luckily, it’s one of my favorites:

The Duck and I were riding the train.  I wasn’t sitting as properly as she was.

I was sad when they left last week.  I’m happy we have Skype, but I still miss seeing their little faces in person.

Speaking of little faces, JP, my southern nephew, turned three this month.  Happy birthday, JP!  I can’t wait to see your adorable face in a couple of months.  And I should also send a happy birthday to my Canadian sister, whose birthday we celebrated while she was in town visiting.  Our cousin visited with his family the following day on his birthday, too!  August is full of celebrations!

And that’s basically been the last month or so.  Some exciting things coming up: Mama’s having her bathroom redone!  She told me she doesn’t want to see it until it’s completely finished, so I can’t show any photos here during the reconstruction.  But I do plan on taking photos along the way, so hopefully I’ll do a post on that when it’s done (mid-September or so).  Talks are underway for a trip to meet up with some of my former college roommates.  Ten (plus) years!  Crazy.  And before you know it, Rosh Hashanah will be here. I won’t be here, though; I’ll be visiting my grandmother.  Good times coming! 
 
What have you been up to?  Have you been looking for me?*

*Updated to add: Anyone feel today’s earthquake? I didn’t. I was outside on my break taking a walk, and my coworker called me to make sure I was okay and that a tree didn’t fall on me or something.  I guess our building shook a lot.  I asked her if she was serious, since all I was thinking before the phone rang was, "It’s such a beautiful day!"  I feel a bit left out.  In other apparently much less important news, some dictator lost control of his country or something.  Interesting.

The last time I was in New York City was in 2009 to see Paul McCartney at Citi Field and to spend time with Cousin First (a.k.a. Lil), of course.  This weekend, I spent more time with Lil…and also saw Paul perform the first of two shows at Yankee Stadium!

When the concert was first announced, and for the last two years, I said I would be sitting in the first few rows.  Really!  I would be!  And I really wanted to.  But here’s the view from my seat:

Sadly, this may also be a bit zoomed in.

This is where I should’ve been sitting.

So, I wasn’t sitting where I wanted to sit.  But my seat was considered a field seat, and it wasn’t horrible, although next time I will be back  up in the front section (I managed to get eighth-row seats to a show in Boston in 2002; that was awesome!). 

Anyway, I could still see the preshow from where I was sitting. Paul-related images scroll on the screens while different versions of songs play (such as remixes of Coming Up, Goodnight Tonight, Temporary Secretary, Silly Love Songs, etc.)  Here are some of the images I took pictures of:

And then this:

Which meant Paul was about to appear!

Hello, fine Sir.

The show was amazing!  Of course.  I didn’t expect anything less.  Paul has so much energy!  That 69-year-old puts this 32-year-old to shame!  The crowd was super enthusiastic.  When I wrote about the Citi Field concert, I mentioned that no one in my section stood up at all, no one danced, and that one lady warned me about the sore throat I would have in the morning.  Ridiculous.  This time, besides the one couple in front of me, everyone stood up, danced, and cheered.  When security told us to sit down, no one listened.  The energy from Paul and the band (Paul “Wix” Wickens, Abe Laboriel, Jr., Rusty Anderson, and Brian Ray, who you should totally follow on Twitter because he’s really active, talks to the fans, and is all-around awesome) could really be felt through the audience’s reactions.  Great crowd.

Overall, the set list was fantastic.  Paul opened with Hello Goodbye, followed by an awesome rendition of Junior’s Farm, a Wings song he recently starting playing again.  I guess I won’t post the whole set list (although I kept track of it all on my BlackBerry) since you can find it anywhere online (unless you want me to, then I’d be glad to post it!), but there were a lot of highlights for me. He announced on Friday night that it was the first time he was going to perform The Night Before, from The Beatles album Help!  Whoa.

Not all of my video came out as well.  One of my favorite performances was of the song Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Five from the album Band on the Run.  This was one of the two songs I was hoping he’d keep in his set list from the last round of concerts that I wasn’t able to go to (the other song was Letting Go, which he didn’t play on Friday).  While the sound that accompanies my video is great, the visual is fuzzy.  (Let me know if you want to see it anyway!)  Another song he brought back was I Will, which is a Beatles tune from the White Album that I used to sing to The Pie when she was a baby.  I heard him play it in 2005, but I was expecting it then.  This time around, I didn’t know the set list, so it was a very happy surprise!  I got some of my favorite photos during Maybe I’m Amazed:

Apparently the rest of the band moved super fast, so a lot of my shots of them are fuzzy. Also, the focus on the screens was mostly on Paul, so I got a lot of other great shots.  Here are a few more.  I’m trying to show all the instruments he played: bass, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, mandolin, ukulele, and piano (did I miss any?!). 

Such a great show.  There were the tributes to John and George (Here Today, Paul’s song he wrote for John, and Something), the usual but great as always songs (Jet, Let Me Roll It with the Foxy Lady ending, Blackbird), great versions of I’ve Got a Feeling, Helter Skelter, Sing The Changes, Mrs. Vandebilt…I could go on.  Paul’s voice was strong and is still the best!  Oh, and let’s not forget the fireworks during Live and Let Die:

Paul ended with some Abbey Road goodness: Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight/The End.  When he played the first few bars of Golden Slumbers, I burst into tears.  It wasn’t the first time I had cried during the show, but the moment really overwhelmed me.  And like last time, I’ve been a bit emotional while listening to Paul’s music ever since the show.  I guess it’s the post-Paul-McCartney-show depression.  I wish I had been able to go to Saturday night’s show, too.  He’s only playing a few more shows in the U.S. this summer, but if you can, you should get to one of them.  I really can’t put the feeling into words (obviously).  I know it was the sixth Paul McCartney show I’ve been to, but it may as well have been the first.  It was that exciting, that fun, and that amazing.  Thank you, Sir Paul, for another fantastic experience.  See you next time.

I’ll be watching this guy perform:

See you soon, Paul!  I can’t wait!  Oh, and if anyone is looking to get rid of a front-row seat, let me know.