OIL CHANGE

Today is my cousin Vinnie's birthday. He's around five years younger than I. Raised in & around Buffalo, he's now a policeman in North Carolina. For some reason I always seem to back away from oil changes for my car. Yesterday, though, I made sure I made an appointment at A&A because of my upcoming trip to Middletown, N.Y. on Saturday. I'll probably not even end up driving anyway but I didn't want to take any chances. I couldn't stand the phone call because they kept me on hold for over six & a half minutes. I got there slightly before 8:00 a.m. today. All worked out quite well. I took a biography of Emily Dickinson with me to keep me occupied. It all lasted only for slightly under an hour anyway. Immediately after it was all over I went to the Unimart in Exeter to get the papers. Then I went right over to see Uncle Frankie. It rained violently all last night & the weather's been miserable all day so far too.

MIDDLETOWN TRIP

My big trip to Middletown, N.Y. is coming up. It's for the Carmelites' annual Marian day of recollection. I called Barbara & Ann yesterday to make sure I got all the arrangements right. To my undying chagrin Barbara is entirely too fond of the phone. She talks for an entirely unnecessarily long time. I'm supposed to meet Ann at her house in Pittston at around 6:45 a.m. on Saturday. We have to arrive at Middletown by 8:30. I went there once in 1995, when Fr. Mike Kissane was their vocation director, to see if I should become a friar. I still take the paper over to Uncle Frankie's house each day during the week. Fran is frequently home on weekends so I don't often have to be bothered then. My parents' anniversary party on Saturday went well until the end of the night when my mother got a bit ill. She was feeling very poorly on Sunday too. Mary Anne went back home, on the Martz bus, on Sunday morning. Fran took her to the bus station. Sam's induction into the National Honor Society was last week. Even though spring has been here for quite a long time already, we still have very cold days. It's very easy to get sick & tired of the bad weather.