Ma'am, do you have a tuba on your front porch?

How many times have we heard that; can I get an Amen?  I've been a wife and/or mother for 32+ years now-that's a lot of cooking if your men aren't cookers.  And they aren't.  Two husbands, three sons, two fathers-in-law-no happy cookers.  So, a couple of years ago I made a stand.  I no longer found thinking of appealing meals, gathering recipes, making a list, driving to the grocery store, spending an hour going through picking up the items, going to the check out and transferring the items onto the belt, then (if I haven't used self-check and bagged my own things) transferring the bags back into the cart, transferring the bags into the car, driving home, carrying the bags inside and putting them all away, then cooking, which I lost complete interest in about 30 years ago, interesting.  And I have some picky eaters and they all have different desires.  And, they often call audibles after the meal is made or feel the need to enhance what I've done.  They can't figure out why it pisses me off.  I'm of the mind that there are the two classic choices-take it or leave it.  The one who makes the "bacon" to buy the bacon is one of the worst offenders.  A product of the fifties, when it comes to anything other than sex, he wants me to be his mother-ugh.  Uh ha, ya, then I want to have sex.  Soooo, this stand I made?  I'm having the groceries delivered.  Paul is dying (mmm...) to crunch the numbers on the price of this form of grocery shopping but not badly enough to actually do the experiment himself so, until that day comes, I have most of my groceries delivered.  Not only does it save time and gas but I have lots of time to go over recipes and several hours to add items that I've forgotten which, of course, occurs several times during the process.  It also keeps me from grabbing those Twinkies or cookie dough roll that might catch my eye while in the store.  I do purchase a lot of things from Target since they expanded into full grocery store mode a while back; they are cheaper and I don't mind going there so much.  See, where we live (a planned community-don't get me started) they hide such unattractive places like gas stations and food stores so one must drive far to get to these places whereas Target was built after Mr. Rouse lost control and it's near us.  A Wegman's is being built and will open down the road in June.  It's like Harrod's without the clothing or huge prices.  It's a gourmet grocery store; mood lighting, all the different kinds of food that you have to scramble all over town to get but in one place.  Great health food section.  Peapod no more when W's opens.  Anyway...the tuba...last week after I ordered my groceries, I did it so late that I had the 4:30-9:30 time slot.  We always get the last delivery when I do this.  I had to pick up Matt and his buddy from the mall (Friday night) when I saw the guy turn onto our street.  Only Justin and "Woof Woof Woof Woof, you get it" were home so I stopped the guy to tell him just to drop the stuff on the porch and not ring the doorbell because Justin was ill and Boh would scare the crap outta him.  I signed the paperwork and drove away.  He was at the end of our not-that-long block.  TEN MINUTES LATER he called me back.  I felt terrible.  We had a new front porch installed a couple of months ago and I can't seem to remember to put new numbers on the house.  And we share a driveway with our neighbors whose house is turned ever so slightly enough that you can't read their house numbers, so...my cell phone rings TEN MINUTES LATER and the guy says, "Ma'am, do you have a tuba on your front porch?".  I sheepishly said yes and apologized profusely for not having house numbers (and it was dark anyway).  Matt wondered why he didn't mention the sink in the front flowerbed...

Mary, may I?

Oh Mother Mary, I am so not full of grace.  Not even a little.  When I started this post three hours ago it was going to be pretty much solely about Pinterest, my latest down falling.  But the new (as of this very morning) doorbell rang and the Enterprise guy was picking me up...just as they advertise.  So I dropped him off.  Then things went off track.  There were many post topics going through my mind as I worked my mini spinout.   As I left a troubled spot, caring a heavyish set of drawers out of the door, the woman ahead of me walked out and let the door shut on me.  When she heard me say (louder, obviously than I intended), "Oh, hell no.", she immediately turned back, apologized profusely, and opened the door for me.  Craaaap (Reba).  Then she complimented me on my keen taste.  Craaap.  See, sometimes I get so pissed off that,  not only don't I live in Texas but, I live in one of the most unfriendly places in the U.S.  I'm saying this fully aware that the lion's share of my handful of readers are my sweet peeps from here.  Please don't take offense, my dear friends.  We all know that this area is known as a "city of strangers" meaning that, while you can find fab friends as I have been blessed to, if you don't know someone you don't speak, nod, and NEVER make eye contact.  If you accidentally make eye contact, look away asap to make amends.  Soooooo, the point?  Do I have to have one?  I shall not toy with my shrinking audience...I tend to jump to negative conclusions about people when I'm on auto-pilot comparison-with-Texans mode.  But Karma is pretty good about kicking my ass quickly when I slip; usually within minutes, just as in this most recent case. 

Okay, I know blog readers.  Posts should not be longer than a potty sitting.  We have other blogs to get to or, in my case, back to Pinterest before I miss that next great pin-oy.  That will lead to another post here because this one is going past my readers' attention.  No offense, again.  Y'all have always been patient with me unlike my family who likes my stories to be in haiku form.  My usual stories can barely squeeze into a yellow pages book size area.

Okay, well I was going to talk about my shrink and my intervention needs but I shan't push it this time around.  Funny from Pinterest above.  Also, quickly, if you haven't seen my post on FB, a light, oh so funny author (I find akin to Miz Juney but perhaps even more prolific, if possible, and she gets paid...and so should Miz Juney), Celia Riverbark.  She is a riot.  You can pick up any one of her books anywhere and get a buzz of giggles.  She was apparently a columnist who published her articles.  She's the kind who can make the sad truth hilarious (like Anne LaMott only with Marshmallow Fluff).

Great play if you can get there.

Believe it or not, as many times as we have been to NYC and that Paul was born and raised there, none of us had seen a Broadway play.  My parents and, especially my mom, took me to a lot of plays and cultural events in general as I was growing up.  Paul and Matt had always resisted when I begged to go to a play many times-every time we went to Da City.  When our next door neighbors told us about all they had scheduled for their trip (see us having dinner with them on one of the other posts), I could see Paul felt a little shamed that we had never done many basic things one should do while there.  Then we went to dinner with our friend Ron, also from NY, and he so put the shame on Paul about us never having seen ANY of the endless, fabulous show proffered there.  Booyah.

They have three sites in the city where you can get same day tickets.  It's a long line.  Fortunately, or unfortunately (I don't know who had it worse), I had to stay at the hotel because we were being moved from an ant sized room to an anthill sized room and someone needed to be there for the move.  So, as the line got shorter, so did the list of options and Paul was calling every 5 minutes as he got closer to the front of the line.  In the end, two of the top choices we had talked about were available-Jesus Christ Superstar and Nice Work.  I was the only one who had seen JCS (at the movies) but, at the last minute I felt that JCS would be somewhat intense and we really needed light.  And I had seen or read about Matthew Broderick and the show and I had thought at the time it sounded good.  Good thing that seeped through my fog of my short-term memory at decision time.

The show doesn't technically open until April 24th; this was a preview performance.  Although MB needed to work on his moves a little more (he did well, but looked slightly labored), the talent was amazing.  The music was Ira and George Gershwin, classic great songs, and the story was an amalgam of the classic 1920's bootleg stories.  On top of that was the cherry that was hilarity.  The first song I thought, uh-oh, Matt's not going to like this, but seconds later a huge grin came across his face.  This, my friends, is the ultimate compliment; this guy is not at all easy to please.  Check his clothes and, especially, his shoes.  Hey, it's all new to me; I didn't have any of this with the other two-we was po and they were skateboarders who wore Chucks and torn jeans.  But I digress.  

The main theme here is that if you get to NY, go see it.  And if you go to NY and don't let me meet you there (or go with you), you are in big trouble.  Six thumbs up from here.

Okay, enough already.

Matt and Paul went to the new Ground Zero Memorial.  The inscriptions are deep enough to place flowers.  This person had place four.

As promised, just one of the many photos of flowers around the city I took.  This has a beautiful carousel in the background.  Okay, I'm on break until I can unpack my art goodies and post photos of my awesome meeting experience in mecca...coming soon.

 I warned that this might be repetitious and a little mixed up. This is back in Central Park.  The fountain above, with the pond behind where you can rent a boat or hire a gondola ride.  One of the castles in the park, below.

 This is the part that allows me to be able to enjoy NYC, the open parts like this one of many huge expanses of grassy park in Central Park.  Times Square is usually very open (it was blocked off after 9/11) with bistro tables and chairs to sit and relax, talk, people-watch.  There are many parks in the city like that.  Apparently I can't upload any more than these photos on this post (the machine rules the human-I am submissive); you will see some of my flower photos from other parks in another post.  Yeah, we aren't done yet.

 At Carnegie Deli, one of the most famous restaurants in NYC, this is an 11 year old girl singing opera for the customers.  The owner (behind her) had heard she was singing at Carnegie Hall that night and had her perform; she was amazing.  Just as the last time we were there, we ate next to a table of Texans.  You can't spit anywhere...she had on a Texas Tech sweatshirt, him a UT t-shirt.  It's all good when it's Texas.  That's the little Red Raider/Longhorn spawn in the forefront of the photo.

 This guy on the left is the brother of the young opera singer.  We're gonna be seeing him on the tee vee one day soon.  I don't know if you can tell but he's HUGE.  And check out that sandwich-also huge; the owner made sure he got the house special.  His legs were bigger than my waist-big.  They were right across the isle from us.  Lunch and a show.

 Back in Central Park.  Remember the fountain?  This is a tunnel going from the fountain to the other side of the street from there.  Beautiful painting on the ceilings and wall and fab arches, as you can see.  If that wasn't enough, these two dudes pull up and start playing Vivaldi.  Inside that tunnel...well, it was amazing.

 This is the start of Strawberry Fields, the area that John Lennon had dedicated to the countries in peaceful treaties; this is the plaque for that.  (That's my boot-I had to prove I was there-I was not trespassing)

 Me at the official John Lennon memorial-Imagine.

 He's the official mayor of Strawberry Fields and gives the spiel on all things SF and John Lennon.  He pointed out The Dakota behind, where John was shot (I wouldn't look), the window where the white room is, the shutters where...I didn't keep up-Yoko still lives there-I felt the need to respect her privacy.  Yep, we found a boundary for Stephanie and celebrities.  Who knew?

 Immense respect and reverence for a man who was so dedicated to peace.  That drew a line for me.

This is the stage they were building in Times Square Friday afternoon.  Mum was the word as to what it was for until late that day then it was revealed that Nicki Minaj was performing that night but the reason was still secret.  Matt and I decided, after much waffling, that seeing NM in TS would look pretty good on our life resume so we went.  It turns out she sang to promote the lauch of Nokia's new touch phone.  She started out with Super Bass, of course, then sang a new song that Matt actually liked because it hadn't been worn completely out via radio.  We were glad we went; it was very crowded but we are pros at navigating and did very well.  I forgot my camera, took a photo on my phone, and sent it out.  Justin replied back, "Miley Cyrus?".  Ya, easy to get them mixed up.