THANKSGIVING AND ADVENT

Thanksgiving worked out reasonably well. Mary Anne & family couldn't come in but the relatives from West Wyoming were here. Fran got here for a little while. The food, as always, was entirely too fattening. The only disadvantage was that at the end of the night I went to bed with a very bad headache. I took an Excedrin migraine pill, though, & it soon went away. A lot of relatives called to say hello. Gary called. He & I spent quite a long time on the phone. The Ronald & Linda even showed up from Washington State to visit Hilldale. They showed up for a couple of hours a few nights ago. Recently I went to a Lay Carmelite meeting in Wilkes_Barre & a men's group meeting at St. Monica's. Those meetings really keep me busy. Recently I saw Alfred Hitchcock's "The Wrong Man" & the famous Humphrey Bogart movie, "The Maltese Falcon". Now that my father's home from the hospital he has to go to the V.A. hospital in Wilkes_Barre frequently. He can't drive for now so I have to drive him there. I also have to do the grocery shopping. That's a major advantage because I always use my Price Chopper card to make sure I get credit for gas for my car. This past Sunday the Church started using the new translation for the Mass. It's a little hard to handle at first because of such an old habit but it should be very easy after a while. It's the same translation as the one they used when I was a kid. I went to a meeting a while ago at St. Monica's where a visiting monsignor explained all about it for us. Advent has begun. Christmas will soon be upon us. Unfortunately today marks the tenth anniversary of the death of Beatle George.

FOURTH OF JULY SHINDIG

This past weekend, starting pretty much on Friday morning, my father's relatives got together for their fifty~first annual overcrowded feeding frenzy in Hilldale.   They call it a family reunion.  Richie's, Sean's & Jamie's families were all missing.  Michael, Tony Sr. & Junior & Scott from Buffalo weren't there either,  but most of the others managed to make it.   Michael even took Erin with him.   I made sure I wore a hat most days & didn't a headache or sunburn.   Yesterday I forgot though, & I woke up very early this morning with a headache.  Because I always made sure I stayed only until around 8:00 each night I never got too worn out.    As always it was a mixture of sports, gossip, intellectual debate, religion & politics,  & picture taking.   My camera & video camera got a lot of mileage.  The food was entirely too fattening so I shall have to spend the next few weeks toning my appetite down.   Mary Anne, Robin & a few others even went shopping for hooch.  I put in a share of the price & got a few swigs to show for it over the course of the weekend.  Most probably I shall not have another drop until the next especially big occasion.   Unfortunately the only thing missing this year was music.  Most years lately we always seem to have an ad~hoc band made up of anyone who can play his way out of a brown paper bag.    There was some bad news on Saturday since the insanely violent electrical storm, that started at about 4:00 a.m., lasted all day & drove us all plum crazy.  It's been raining like crazy for quite a while this past spring & summer.   A few weeks ago Vinnie, Steve & I got the idea to go to Jitty Joe's  for ice cream but somehow we didn't end up going.    Several people only stayed for a day or two so it was hard to keep track of everyone.

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.

HILLDALE

We're all in Hilldale. Today's Larry's & Rose's thirty fourth wedding anniversary. This month also abounds with relatives' birthdays. The festivities started early yesterday. As always there's quite a large unruly crowd of relatives. Mary Anne & Steve are here with the kids. Michael's even brought Erin with him. Last night we spent a while on the patio playing in a sort of ad-hoc band. We shall be playing our annual softball game & taking a picture later today. Unlike previous years I haven't gotten any significant sunburn in recent years because I no longer take any chances like that. With any luck Vinnie & I shall be taking Anthony for ice cream later. All the intellectually inclined cousins are, as always, trying to drive each other nuts with drastically incompatible points of view about life.