Lunar Eclipse

Last night was the night of the lunar eclipse and people hereabouts were frustrated to find clouds obscuring the eclipse. Instead, we had a good old fashioned desert thunderstorm roll through the valley. Lightning was flashing, thunder bouncing off the walls and a good downpour to wash the dirt away. Grandma was at a neighbor's house playing Scrabble and called to have me come pick her up because of the storm. (She won 2 out of 3.) It was well after 11:30 before the storm subsided. More on the way tonight, but we're not planning to go anywhere.

Friday, 10 February, 1978

It was cold and snow on the ground when Grandma and Granpappy said their vows in front of family. Daughter Gail was maid of honor and son Mark was best man. Daughter Chris had just had a son Jacob on Monday so wasn't able to attend. So on that date 30 years ago, Grandma became a wife, mother and grandmother all in one fell swoop. Grandma's parents and her brother and family were there to witness the blessed event. An article appeared in the Webster paper a while later relating an incident that happened during the ceremony: son Jamie was manager of an apartment complex at the time and half way through the ceremony his beeper went off and he had to get to the phone to answer the call.

And who knew when we went back to Bailey Road for wedding cake that 30 years later we would be living in Scottsdale and celebrating at Ruth's Chris Steak House. It doesn't get any better than that!

Taxing Our Brains

Grandma and I spent the better part of Saturday working on our taxes. This year, Grandma had everything all listed with supporting documents to make the job easier. Why did it take so, you may ask. It turns out that we were using last years Turbo Tax program and didn't realize it until we were about half way through the forms, having input a lot of information. When we discovered the problem, it took a while to find where I had hidden the new software and to get it installed. (We call that a "senior moment" around here.) Some information was copied automatically, but we had to go back to square one to enter our financial information. So now we're done and the reports have been printed, ready for checks to be written and returns to be mailed.