FOURTH OF JULY

This past weekend Sam, the younger of my nephews, had quite an exceptionally nice & busy time.  He went to his Senior prom & his graduation from Long Beach High School, on Long Island.  He's eighteen years old as of earlier this month.  It's a month of major milestones for him.   Following in his brother Michael's footsteps he intends to attend Hofstra University in September.  He recently got his driver's license too.   Michael is also quite busy too with his girlfriend Erin, job & new life.   Bridget, their sister, the youngest of all, has just finished her time at summer camp.   Mary Anne came in on the bus a couple of days ago to help with all the necessary cooking for the Fourth of July.  Very soon we shall have to face the inevitable crowd in Hilldale.   Unfortunately I missed the big final farewell reunion at St. Gabriel's in East Elmhurst, & shall also be forced to miss the big reunion at St. John the Baptist in West Islip.  It's on July 1.   My parents still constantly pester me to water the plants & flowers for them each day.  There's so much rain lately though that many days it's entirely unnecessary.  Last night at around 10:30, there was an absolutely overwhelming electrical storm.  My cell phone works really well.  My parents now have the one I started out using because they don't want to be bothered with all the extra things.  I was forced to spend an absolutely insane amount of time on the phone with the Tracfone people to get theirs re~activated but other than that all goes quite well.

BLOOD DRIVE

We're having quite an exhausting heat wave lately. Even I'm a little taken aback & I've always been quite fond of warm weather. Today we wish a very happy seventieth birthday to Beatle Ringo. Yesterday, believe it or not, marks the fifty third anniversary of the day when Beatle John first met Beatle Paul. Today we also wish a very happy birthday to Michael, my cousin Mary Ellen's son in North Tonawanda. Unfortunately he didn't get to show up in Hilldale for the Fourth of July this year. At least the weather was much more manageable then. The Depends team were able to beat the Pampers team quite easily. When cousin Larry started complaining about a few things he didn't have to include the weather on his list of grievances. Chris, from the Red Cross blood services, called yet again yesterday to remind me that I promised to got to the Waterfront Inn in Plains at 4:00 this afternoon to give a double red cell donation. As of today we shall have a new pastor at our churches. It was Fr. John Polednak's last day. He celebrated 8:00 a.m. Mass. Fr. Leo McKernan shows up later today. He will be in charge from now on.