Tradition

Today is Christmas day and we are headed up to Idaho Springs to go swimming in the Indian Springs pool.  This is a family tradition that dates back several decades when a planned Christmas Day ski trip was vetoed because of extreme cold.  David's sister said, "Let's go swimming instead!"  So most years we head up the road to the pool.  It is fun swimming beneath the palm trees and then letting someone else do the cooking as we eat a non-traditional meal of burgers at the restaurant there.  We usually go with my sister in-law and her husband and over the years we were joined by my parents (now gone) or my granddaughter and/or other good friends.  This year it looks like it will just be the four of us as children and grandchildren are in other places.  I will think of all while drifting in the warm water.

Merry Christmas 

We just got back from Idaho Springs - sad to say that the restaurant in the hotel is closed so we had to search for food.  About all that was open in town was the Subway so we ended up going to Central City where we had dinner at one of the casinos!  Oh, Well.

Getting Published

I was honored to be asked to write about being a Peace Corps Volunteer for a book written by my friends Nora and Nestor Mercaco and Alok Sarwal. The book, "Voices from Colorado - Perspectives of Asian Pacific Americans" has the stories of many Asian Americans here. There were four RPCV's who served in the Philippines who were included in the book. My story "My Life in the Peace Corps - a Summary" was condensed for the book.
The release party was like year-book day at high school. People whose stories were in the book were collecting autographs from the others who were there.

Home to Holly Springs

Home to Holly Springs by Jan Karon

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
I like the stories about Father Tim. This one takes him home to Mississippi after many years. He confronts his past with several surprises. What he finds there shakes him to the core. A very satisfying read.


View all my reviews.

The Appeal

The Appeal by John Grisham

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is another scary Grisham plot. I live near an EPA super fund site in Colorado but not as horribly bad as this one in Mississippi. I don't know what is more awful, the toxic waste or the election of Supreme Court justices?


View all my reviews.

Out of the deep freeze

Today the temperature got up to a balmy 33 degrees (Fahrenheit). Yesterday it only got to 2 above. When I left for work yesterday the temperature was -14 (up from a record setting -19 low for the night) I was working at the airport at a gate which was extremely cold because the doors from that jet bridge and others near it had to be open to let passengers on and off of the planes. (gee, if we could only have kept the doors closed, it might have been warmer!) We were all bundled up but were restricted to wearing official uniform items (or black or blue which wouldn't clash with what we had to wear.) The Starbucks in the boarding area did a booming business. To those who complained about the seeming lack of heat in the concourse I only had to say, "Well it is December and this is Denver." Funny thing is - last week we had a day in the 70's!
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

Candy Cane Murders

Candy Cane Murder by Joanne Fluke

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
Hannah Swensen follows a trail of candy canes and finds yet another body in her Minnesota home town of Lake Eden. Hannah owns a bakery called "The Cookie Jar" there and seems to always find the bodies. This one is Santa, who was just inside the Lake Eden Inn giving presents to children from the County Home. Sprinkled among her adventures in trying to solve the mystery of who killed Kris Kringle are wonderful recipes for Holiday quiche, Peppermint Martini and eight different cookies. Several of the cookie recipes use crushed candy canes as ingredients - yum!



Well worth the quick read.




View all my reviews.

2 of the Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers

I had the honor of talking to 2 of the Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers this evening. They were on their way to a conference in Aspen about Peace and Prayer.  I met sisters Rita and Beatrice Log-Visitor Holy Dance and their son/nephew Nathaniel Blindman when they missed their connection on a flight to Aspen that I was working. Since I was also working the next flight to Aspen I had a chance to chat with them in the boarding area. They are Lakota from PineRidge in South Dakota. Daughter Becca has friends in PineRidge that she made last year as a councilor at the Building Bridges for Peace camp. Talking to the grandmothers was very inspiring and learning about their program was wonderful. They told about some of the trips they have made in their quest for World Peace. This was indeed a "Close Encounter" of the best kind.
Check out the web site http://grandmotherscouncil.com

Yes We Can!

It is 11pm on Election night. I spent the day at precinct 927 in Denver, Colorado. This was a voting place in a Town-Home club house. Most of the 500 some odd voters had already voted either by mail-in-ballot or at Early Voting. We had 64 voters (one lady was 97!); 5 poll watchers including a former Colorado first lady, Dottie Lamb; several Denver Election workers; the city councilwoman who brought us sweet rolls; a couple of UCD students doing a survey; a couple of other young people troubleshooting the election and 6 poll workers. The Election Commission is paying us for our time (a little better than minimum wage) and even gave us lunch this time. I spent the last two weeks working at an early voting center. I am very tired because I traded shifts and worked a number of doubles so that I wouldn't go 'under hours' during these two weeks. But it was worth it. I like working during the elections, I have done it for years. Even though there are always some problems, it is an American institution.
Tonite Senator McCain gave a very gracious speach when he conceeded the election. Senator (President-Elect!) Obama's speach was very inspiring. I sent a text to my daughter Becca who is a Peace Corps Volunteer in Albania. She texted back that she was watching the speech as we were. Rachael, her sister here in Colorado also called us and woke up Ismaat, our 10 year old Granddaughter, to hear President-elect Obama speak. Ismaat has been excited to watch the election. As she says, "This is a historic election." I will sleep well tonight.

I VOTED TODAY!

I have been working at one of Denver's 13 Early Voting sites since the 25th. Yesterday, a reporter from the Rocky Mountain News came to our site. This is a photo of several of the judges that I have been working with. We are open from 11 am to 7 pm each day. Today we served about 300 voters. Each voter comes in and checks in with the Registration judges. They are hooked by computer to the master poll book for the whole city. Then the voter is handed a paper ballot that corresponds to their precinct in the city. Denver has decided have as their election model, paper ballots this year. Because of the HAVA (Help America Vote Act) each center also has some touch screen voting machines. I voted using the machine. It was easy. There is a paper backup for these machines. I am worried about the time it will take Denver to process all of those paper ballots, even with 9 fast scanners working. Some of those ballots will have to be duplicated because of stray marks on the ballot or miss-marked ballots (people who marked with 'X' instead of the little line between the arrows. It was faster. I had my 'cheat sheet' with my choices ready. I am done. I think I will also be working at a polling place on Election Day. I have been an Election Judge during every election for about 30 years. I enjoy doing my part to keep our democracy.
If you haven't already - VOTE!!!!

Election

I have now switched hats and am in Election Mode. I am working Early Voting for two weeks before the elections. Then I will be a judge on Election Day in a precinct. In order to not go under hours at my job at the airport I traded days with other agents and will be working every day until the 11th of November either at DIA or for the election. Most of my days out at the airport will be doubles! I really will be ready for one of our "girl's days out"! that I have with my friends Kathy and Elenna (when she can make it).

Cookie Cutter Collector's Club

This past few weeks have been about cookie cutters. I have been working on an index for a newsletter that ran for 21 years. I finally finished it, all 200 pages of it! Then I was asked to talk at The Brass Armadillo, a local antique mall. I talked about collecting cookie cutters. This past Sunday was the Fall Meeting for our local cookie cutter club. We had a great time. I know that it seems to be a strange collectable but we have a lot of fun and I have friends across the country. More on this later.

Photos from my talk at the Brass Armadillo.

Barak Obama in Colorado Springs

Yesterday morning David and I received an invitation to go hear candidate, Barack Obama at a private event in Colorado Springs. Since I had the day off and David didn't have to go to work until the afternoon, we RSVP'd that we would attend the speech.  We picked up our tickets outside the gym where the event would take place and while in line to enter the arena, we received green dots which allowed us to sit behind the candidate during the speech. (You can even see me in the photo from "thedenverchannel.com")
Obama spoke of the need for all Americans to perform public service of some kind. He spoke of expanding the military and it's benefits, of setting a new "energy" corps and doubling the size of the peace corps. He called for all middle school and high school students to volunteer at least 50 hours a year and for college students to get a government grant if they volunteer 100 hours each year (that's only 2 hours a week)
To read more about the morning see these news reports:

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/16768499/detail.html#

http://cbs4denver.com/politics/Obama.Visit.Springs.2.761994.html

http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx?storyid=94923&catid=188

http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_9763668

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2008/jul/02/obama-visiting-springs-today/

I am a PCVP & RPCV

I am so proud. I am now no longer a PCTP (Peace Corps Trainee Parent) I am a PCVP (Peace Corps Volunteer Parent)! I am also an RPCV (Returned Peace Corps Volunteer). Daughter Becca has started her PCV experience in Peskopi, Albania. She was sworn in a week ago at a ceremony in Elbasan. 

Her Dad and I were volunteers BK (before Kids) back when Peace Corps was still in it's first decade in the lovely country of the Philippines.
Becca is truly a 21st century volunteer.
We had a small portable typewriter and used carbon paper to send letters to our families back in the states. She took her laptop computer with her and is connected by dial-up to the internet. We get email letters from her and are able to read her blog. This morning I saw her latest update just minutes after she posted it.
We had to take a jeepney into town (half-hour ride) in Davao to make an international phone call from the phone company office (or the phone booth at the Apo View Hotel) and we really needed to make an appointment to do it. To make a call from our second site in Bohol, we had to take a 5 hour boat ride to Cebu City to make that call. Becca was given a cell phone by Peace Corps for security purposes. She can call us (an vice-versa) from that (of course international rates apply) I can send her a text message for only 15cents! I just got off the phone with her calling from her computer using Skype. That only costs her 2cents/minute to call our phone and will be free computer to computer when we get our Skype account!
I sent my film home to process and didn't even see some of my slides for 2 years. Now she has a cute little digital camera that she can upload photos from directly to her blog and her online photo album so we can see them almost immediately. Her camera even takes short video clips!
We had a shortwave radio that we picked up in Japan on the way to the Philippines. Becca took one with her. Our neighbors had television and we were able to see some US programs on them around many commercials and blackouts. Becca has inherited Mike's television (He is a PCV who just finished his assignment in Peskopi. She is taking over his rented house.) She told me that she even gets CNN!
Read more about it on her blog. See the link on the right.

Baking without an oven

Do you remember going camping? Did you ever use a "Dutch" oven to make a cake. When I was a Trainer for Girl Scouts Mile Hi Council, I used to help with the Dutch oven training. So the next Christmas I asked Santa for my very own Dutch Oven. I was picturing one that would hold a single round cake pan but Santa brought a much larger one. My Dutch Oven will hold a 12" pan. My folks used to live in New York where they would go over to the Revere Factory Outlet and buy 2nds. They gave us several frying pans that didn't have handles. They work perfectly for deep dish pizza and the 12" one works in my Dutch Oven. We took it on several trips with the "Wilderness Kids", a group for families in the Colorado Mountain Club. I remember making pineapple upside down cake for the whole group (5 families) the weekend that we went to the Great Sand Dunes. There are a number of cookbooks that give directions for baking in a Dutch Oven. Think of it - biscuits, cakes and bread while camping! Makes my mouth water.

These are the photos from the Rocky Mountain Cut-Ups fall meeting in September 2007.

The meeting was in Sterling, Colorado

Working at DIA

Working at the airport is 100 little dramas every day.  Some passengers (pax) are happy when you can get them on a flight.  Others are angry, distraught, totally pissed off, ..... etc. when you can't.  When a flight is overbooked you try to help them - get them out later.  Some pax play the system and like being on one of those flights - free flights help.  I have seen former bosses, former co-workers, movie stars and US Senators.  Believe me, a movie star who can't get to where they want to go, when they want to go, is not a pretty sight.  Some people believe that we should fly into a blizzard just to get them to their party in Aspen on time!  There will be more on this subject another day.

P.S. I Love You

Becca's friend Rachel had screening tickets so we went to see "P.S. I Love You".  Because we arrived a little late, we were seated in the 2nd row of the theater where you have to lean way back to see the screen (a little hard to focus with my tri-focals!)  The movie was great, we laughed, we cried, we ate our popcorn.  We staggered out after the show because of the awkward positions we were required to keep just to see the huge faces on the screen.   The screening was interrupted when a lady started screaming - the seat in front of her had collapsed when a fellow viewer was leaning back to see the screen.  The paramedics had to come take her out.  It was nice to go to the movies with my daughter!

Atonement

I meet my friends Kathy and Elenna (when she can come) once a month for a girl's day out.  We see a movie, have dinner and go to the quilt guild meeting.  This month Kathy and I went to see "Atonement".    I wasn't sure what to expect.  The movie was excellent, if a bit dark and sometimes confusing with the flashbacks.