I am in the Big Apple, writing this in Kat's great patio off her cute studio apartment. The patio is close to be as big as her apartment. I arrived on July 7th, around 6 PM, after having spent about six hours on the road, driving from Grove City, Pennsylvania. It was an easy drive on I80, not much traffic, few trucks, and I was listening to THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN, as I drove along. NOTE: Books on tape are a great way to cover the miles if you are on interstates.

I had called Kat for directions to her place about ten miles outside the city, and arrived at her apartment about twenty minutes later, no problems.
As I walked down her hall (fortunately she has a first floor apartment, hence the patio), I could smell something good baking somewhere. As she opened her door, this is what met my eyes:

OMG! And looking up at me, with big eyes and wonderful large ears, was Sergeant Pepper -

This is our first actual meeting, and he smiles at me, and jumps up to greet me, and give me a kiss. I have a feeling we are going to have no problems at all. Kat had just finished baking cookies for a friend with breast cancer, and about to mix up German chocolate cookies for Scott, her significant other. I am amazed. She has taken on my position as cookie baker, and she is a great baker! I am very proud of her.

Speaking of cooking, I have raised four children who, along with their spouses, are wonderful cooks and bakers. Siobhan and Scott love to test gourmet recipes from magazines Siobhan subscribes to, and Scott is at such ease in a kitchen and a grill, that it boggles my mind how fast he cuts and chops. Together they prepare wonderful, creative meals for family and friends, and love to do it.

Frank and Janice are also fine cooks and bakers, as well their daughter, Rae. Janice is a baker of cakes and cheesecakes to die for. She supplies all their friends' wedding cakes, and now Rae is doing the same. Janice also like to find new recipes in her magazines and test them out on family and friends. Frank is the grill master, and takes after his dad in his enjoyment of bringing to the table grilled meats, veggies, and fish.

Kat, as I have said already, has taken over my position as cookie baker in the family, a position I gladly hand over to her with joy and love in my heart. She is creating her own list of cookies that she likes to share with others. Kat is also a great cook, and over the years I have eaten many of her delicious dishes; the outdoor grilled turkey for Thanksgiving; a housewarming dinner she gave, with mouth watering grilled veggies, and poached pears.

Phil and Gihan are both good cooks. The genes of Bob and me, and others, have infused my kids' love of cooking and baking. Gihan is a vegetarian, and so is Phil, although he does eat fish once in a while. Phil has taken over being the omelet king, which title Bob had. Phil also does great stirfrys, and also uses fresh fruits and veggies in his cooking, as well as creating wonderful dishes from beans and grains. With Gihan's limited diet right now, because of her chemo, Phil is always testing dishes that are tasty and she can eat.

However, NOT ONE of them have been able to master the seasonings and flavor of Bob's incredible grilled steaks, although many have come close!

Back to NYC - After Kat puts Matilda in her parking garage, she comes back to get me, and leaving Pepper to guard the premises, we walk over to get a salad. I am not doing much walking, more riding, and I find myself terribly out of shape. I am ashamed to admit this, but it is true. We each have a great salad and then Kat had planned for us to walk up to the movie theater and see MIDNIGHT IN PARIS. It was sold out! So we walked back to the apartment. And we talked and talked. We slept in until 11AM the next day. After a quick breakfast, and Kat taking Pepper for his long walk, we again go to the theater, and this time we get in - what a great Woody Allen movie. In my opinion, the best he has done in years and years. If you haven't seen it, and you love great music, books, art, Paris, imagination, and great acting, this is a must see movie.

We walked back to the apartment, where we each worked on our computers, outside in the patio. I sat and was fixated on a wall of bricks six or seven stories high attached to the building Kat is in -

Can you see my fascination? All the bricked up fireplaces? I wondered what these building had been? Kat told me that she had concluded that at one time these building were individuals brownstones, and when the new owners bought the properties, they had cut off the back half of the houses, leaving the bricked up fireplaces showing. I found them fascinating and unique! Fire escapes had to be built...

There are three sets of fire escapes along the back of Kat's apartment building, with separate patios on the first floor below them, creating small oases of patios for first floor renters. Kat's backyard is truly an oasis -

Later we walked to a Vietnamese restaurant for dinner. Best Pad Thai I have ever had. Afterward, we came back, and Kat got me started watching DOWNTON ABBEY, a BBC production, with 7 episodes. I watched four episodes the first night, and then read. What am I reading you might ask? Casey gave me THE HELP, which captured me in the first couple of sentences, and which I started right after I finished AHAB'S WIFE. I am now about two thirds through it, and want to throw down everything, and go in and read, but I have made a pact with myself, to get some writing done today, and my blog is one of those pieces of writing! I think it was 2:30AM when I stopped watching those first four episodes of DOWNTON ABBEY, and had read a couple of chapters of THE HELP, before I shut off the light and went to sleep.

We got up around 10:30 or 11AM yesterday, and after getting ourselves together, and packing up Matilda, and Pepper on my lap, we drove out to Riverhead, on Long Island, where Scott has his recently purchased houseboat. The drive wasn't too bad, and we got there about an hour and half after we left. Riverhead is an old vacation spot for New Yorkers, and still exhibits some of the yesterday charm in its downtown stores and old houses. However, and unfortunately, some folks evidently want it updated, and there, plopped between great little building is a cookie cutter major motel, not even trying to resemble its surroundings. It looked disgusting and totally out of place. We drove in to what I called an alleyway, and into a small parking lot, where houseboats, and motorized craft of all sizes, were tied up.

Pepper was very happy to get off my lap, and out of the car, and get his leash removed. He ran around everywhere, making his mark. This was one of his homes. We walked down to Scott's houseboat, and went in. It is a work in progress. Scott was out shopping, and came in as we went up to the patio area of the marina, bringing with him a mango smoothie, which I claimed as my own, but shared with Kat and Vanessa, who Kat woke up. Vanessa is a good friend of Kat's, a find vocalist, and also maintains a houseboat in Riverhead as well as an apartment in NYC.

It was very peaceful, with kayakers soundlessly paddling along, ducks quacking, and powerboats, coming in and leaving their slips, to go out from the river to the New York Sound.

Kat needed to do some writing

and Scott

had given up his day of boat restoration to show me around the area. So with Pepper once again on my lap, and Scott driving Matilda, we went out on a road trip. We first drove down to a nursery that Kat and Scott love. Unfortunately it was already 5PM and it had closed, but it sounded like a retreat for people from the heat and noise of the day. A huge estate, with a small cafe, benches to sit on and read, all kinds of botanicals everywhere, mown lawns down to the river, and of course, all type of plants, from trees, flowers to herbs and vegetables, for sale. I hope to revisit it another time. Then we drove out to a state park, where we were given permission to drive around, as we would have had to pay to park, and we didn't want to do that. It was a huge park, much of it bounding the beaches of the sound, where the river that flows by Scott's marina, flows into the sound. It was beautiful, well used by families, campers, cyclists, and walkers. Happy smells and laughter were all around us.

We got back to the marina, and I took some pics of two houseboats tied there that were very fancy, and I think were permanent homes -

The weather vane of the second houseboat shown...

I sat on the patio and talked with people and read my book, when Scott appeared to say that Kat would like us to critique what she had written. So I walked to the houseboat, and she read her piece. Kat is taking a writing course, and needed to get this piece finished for her class tomorrow or Wednesday night. We talked over what she had written, and she listened to our comments, and thought they were good.

We talked about dinner, but were interrupted by one of the other houseboat occupants who invited us up to the patio to have steak with them. Kat's and my eyes lit up, as Scott said that he had been marinating a pork loin, and he would take that up also, and make a salad. Kat was sharing the German Chocolate Cookies she had made for Scott. Scott went up to put the loin on the grill, only to come back and say that they told him to take it back, there was a lot of steak. So up we went, with our plates, utensils, glasses, and water. Scott had made a great salad. And we had a marvelous shared dinner, with four fascinating people - the owner of the first houseboat shown, her friend, Mike (who had owned Scott's houseboat), and a couple from Copenhagen, Denmark, who were visiting them. The Danish husband was a fascinating man. He was a doctor, working in finding cures for viruses. I was awestruck about what he was doing, and his knowledge in the field. He didn't look old enough to have done all that he had and was doing.

After a while, Kat and I decided to pack it in and drive back to the city. We had planned to stay, but after seeing Scott's place, and also Vanessa's, both without a "head", I was a little flummoxed to say the least. I would have to walk quite a distance, in the middle of the night, to get to the Marina's bathroom facilities! And it was a little scary to think of what might happen getting there...I will not go into any details!!! Kat too had decided that she really needed to get her writing done and sent to her teacher and classmates. She was already late in submitting it. So we hopped into Matilda, me at the wheel, Pepper in Kat's lap, and headed back. It was 11PM. Other than a short traffic jam taking us onto a short detour, the ride back was easy, as we sped down I495 into the city, the top of the Empire State Building coming closer and closer, and the moon shining brightly in the sky. We unpacked Matilda, took her over to the garage, and walked back. It was 1:30AM. What did I do, why what any normal 72 years old, free spirited woman would do...I watched two more episodes of DOWNTON ABBEY, and was going to watch the last one, when Kat said to me (she had been reading in bed), "Mom, save it for tomorrow night, it's 3:30AM." "Couldn't possibly be that late," one part of me said. "Oh yes it could", said the other part of me, so I reluctantly shut off the TV, put on my PJs, brushed my teeth, made up my bed, and then read THE HELP, for another hour!

This morning I was up at 11:30AM. Kat was up shortly before me, and was getting ready to go to the library and write in peace and quiet. I sat down and wrote out my seven steps to writing about William Henry Hawley, my Civil War uncle, and came out here, in the heat of the day, and wrote to you all...Life is beautiful...

I love you all,

A hui hou,
Sally

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