Money Laundering

It’s NOT the type of laundering you might be thinking about, but this instead . . .

That’s what happened after a 2-week trip and getting home after midnight last night, then putting clothes in the laundry, but forgetting to check pockets. It’s a great thing that nearly all cards are plastic, cause everything got soaped and rinsed.

Now, Grenville can boast that he has the cleanest money in town. And, there’s a large sign on the washer to CHECK POCKETS first.

Ever happen to you ?

Can you go home again?????

Going back to where you grew up can be a double edged sword. Some of you may have never left, some of you may have run as soon as you could, and some of you, like me, may have drifted back now and then without really seeing what was there. But heed the warning Thomas Wolfe gives us that "you can't go home again"

 

In his novel of the same name, Thomas Wolfe's character George Webber says "You can't go back home to your family, back home to your childhood ... back home to a young man's dreams of glory and of fame ... back home to places in the country, back home to the old forms and systems of things which once seemed everlasting but which are changing all the time – back home to the escapes of Time and Memory."

 

On the Birthday Party Trip for Beatrice's mother, we went back to the 'Village' where I grew up. Village you say?? In New Jersey??? YES!!!! The Village of South Orange is tucked into the Northeast corner of NJ, one of the most densely populated areas of the country. But as a kid, this was my idea of a small town. We knew our neighbors, our neighborhood, and most of the rest of the Village. We walked everywhere (even adults). To school, to friends houses, to the town pool, the community center, and the stores. 

In my neighborhood we had 2 grocery stores, 2 Deli's, a florist, 2 pharmacies, 2 Kosher butchers, clothing store, candy store (with soda fountain and nickel Cokes), 3 gas stations, a beauty salon, and all within a two block area. No this was not the center of town. In fact this was on the border of the City of Newark, and the Township of Maplewood. It was the bluest of the blue collar sections of the Village (once called 'Pork Hill' due to its proximity to the county 'poor farm' where they raised crops and what else, pigs.). But to me, it was the bestest of places to grow up. My grandparents and 2 aunts lived around the corner, cousins lived next to them. Five blocks in either direction were more cousins. My Grandfather and uncle (his brother) raised tomatoes and veggies in a huge garden. I even had cousins that still lived on a small farm two towns away, right in the middle of a housing development that I never noticed till I was older.

 

I was the third generation in my family to grow up in the Village. My father was a Captain in the Fire Department. His father owned an electrical store (that new fangled fad). My mom was a secretary and eventually a librarian at Seton Hall University. Oh, did I mention that we lived about a block off of the campus of SHU? Yes we went to sporting events there, and knew the students, professors, priests, and campus well. My mothers father (who had the big garden) owned a taxi cab company, and had a stand at the towns train station.

YES we even had a train station. The Delaware, Lackawanna, &Western Railroad ran right through the middle of the Village, could get you to midtown Manhattan in just 38 minutes on a good day. And that included a ferry boat ride across the Hudson River. More on the Train Station in another post.

 

Both my parents three blocks away from each other. They were a year apart in school, and went to the same high school I went to. And the scary part was getting a teacher who had taught your parents and cousins (didn't think folks lived that long back then). And believe me, they remembered. I never knew till then what a rabble rouser my father was, but they remembered. The high school athletic fields were at the end of our street. They were our huge playground that sometimes took hours to cross, especially in the many blizzards we had back then (they've shrunk dramatically since then.)

 

YES, it was a great place to grow up. Good friends, good times, fun things to do. The kind of place that when you reminisce brings a smile to your face.

BUT!!!!!! i just read in the news that no longer will you be allowed to "SMILE" for your drivers license picture in New Jersey. They say it messes up their 'face recognition' software. I think they are just trying to scare us into "Never coming home again". I wonder if Thomas Wolfe is looking down and saying" see, I told ya!!!!!"

 

Not to worry though, I've been assured that the world famous "Jersey Single Finger Wave" is still allowed.

Grenville

Home Again- Finally

As a long trip ends the thoughts of finally getting home take on a special quality. Some call it home sickness, some call it reconnecting, others just bask in the fond memories that it brings. Then you walk in the door and find all of the things that have gone wrong while you were gone, face a mountain of laundry that needs doing, bags that need unpacking, souvenirs that need a home. All of a sudden getting Home Again loses it luster.

After unloading i started plugging in everything that had been unplugged while we were away. That is when i realized that a few ‘electro gremlins’ had been hiding among our bags as hitchhikers and now were running wild.

First they convinced the  Sirius Radio that it could not remember it’s presets, then it didn’t want to reset the presets, finally it got so confused that it just turned off and that was that.       HO-Hum. Amazingly after a good nights sleep it sort of works (fm principal).

Next attacked was the weather station computer. If you noticed the weather bug on our blog has been blank for a number of days. Apparently we lost power during our trip and the computer that keeps the records and sends out the readings to the internet decided that it didn’t want to reboot. As i manually rebooted it the electro gremlins hypnotized it and made it think it was a pomegranate so it couldn’t find the weather station or the software for it. A few re-boots and all was well again.

The final and most devastating elector gremlin attack was on my trusty netbook.Suddenly it was not able to connect to the rest of the network. After two days of trying to find the missing connection i found a server app was not running. A simple check mark in the right place and all was well in Tron Ville.

Well i thought all was well. Tuesday morning Beatrice came upstairs and was not a happy camper. Apparently, in a state of exhaustion, the night before she had scooped up any cloths that looked like they needed washing and threw them in . including the pants i had been wearing that day, and in the one pocket she didn’t check was………….

Have i ever told you what an un-important person i am????? I can leave my cell phone on, in my pants pocket, for days on end and not get a call. And if i do get one it usually is a wrong number……

OK so you guessed what was in the pants pocket. If you ever want to strain your eyes and maximize your frustration all at the same time try disassembling a cell phone, and then put it back together. Drying the circuit board was easy but the LCD display was another story. A trip to the Verizon store in town held the answer, which is pictured to the left.

NO NO!!!!! The answer is NOT throw the phone away and carry a bag of instant rice!!!!!! I mean really, who would answer the wrong number calls?????? Truth is that buried in that instant rice is my cell phone which is having all of the moisture sucked out of it. Well i hope it is.

BUT there is good news. The slight frost we had did not kill our eggplants (there is one with your name on it Possum, along with a genuine NH Rock), or peppers, or carrots.

Somehow we have lost track of where the potatoes went. I’m sure we will find them this weekend as we start clearing the garden and wild flower meadow.

Grenville

Good to be Home

Being home after a week away sure takes a lot of catching up. Thanks, everyone, for the comments on earlier posts from NJ and the good wishes for a safe return. All were much appreciated.

Grenville prepared a wonderful (and delicious) welcome home dinner of Turkish Braised Lamb Shanks. And, he even did the dishes – now that’s a really great Welcome Back! And, the hugs and kisses were wonderful as well. Leaving was hard, but coming home was terrific.

Since my late Sunday return, I’ve been catching up on news reports of tornadoes striking in many states and parts of VA. Grenville and I hope that all our blog reading friends were fortunate not to have sustained any damages and are safe.

Also getting back to the regular routines: exercising at the YMCA, volunteering, and house cleaning. My computer time has been limited and I’m running behind on blog reading and posting. Internet access in my mom’s NJ neighborhood; online activity was limited to a short library trip and an hour of coffee and wi-fi (free) at a Panera Bread near her home.

Here are a few quick updates on recent topics and a new one that’s not so welcome, but very seasonal.

• GAS – back in mid-March, regular gas was $3.39/gallon. Yesterday’s price was $3.75/gallon and climbing. Prices ranged from a low of $3.53 (NJ Turnpike) on 4/10 to $3.69 – $3.85 on 4/17.
• TEMPS – at the end of February, temps signs boasted 70-degree temps. Today we were in the mid-80s.
• FOOD – one of our favorite topics along with cooking. Both Grenville and I have tried a few more new recipes this week (in addition to the braised lamb shanks). We’ll be posting them shortly.
• TRAVEL – this weekend we’ll be at an art festival on Chincoteague Island where Grenville will be exhibiting and (hopefully) selling his wood turnings. It’s a 45-minute drive each way, so we’re staying overnight at a local motel for a weekend adventure.

POLLEN – it’s here and depositing a yellow-green coating on everything outdoors – cars, porches, chairs, sidewalks. It’s indoors too as the windows were open and screens down earlier this week. The winds blew a fine coating on indoor surfaces; vacuuming will be a daily task for the next few weeks. We could use a good soaking ran to wash everything down. It’s in the weekend forecast.
FUN – tomorrow's post will feature a mystery place from my NJ visit.