mojosmom

I have one thing to say:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CYjE9Gv3A4&feature=emb_logo

We hit 102º today, and may get three in a row. Other than that, it's been in the '90s. Ugh. Way too hot to do much of anything.

The neighborhood 4th of July parade goes right in front of my building, so we went down to enjoy that. The usual politicians, kids on bikes, etc. There's a party in a park a few blocks away afterwards, but I didn't feel I could handle the heat. But my sisters walked down to check it out.

Cathy came in on Saturday, and on Sunday we went up to my friend Margaret's for dinner. We hung out and grilled, and Cathy had made gluten-free cream puffs which were excellent. When we got home, we were just coming off the Drive when we saw Stacey trolling for a parking spot. It was pretty tough because so many people were hanging out in the park down the street from me to avoid the heat, so she ended up a few blocks away.

We mostly just hung out inside because of the heat, but yesterday went to have dinner with some old family friends.

Stacey left this afternoon as she has to be at work tomorrow, but Cathy will be here until Friday. It's good to have them visit!

It really was delightful.

I went to our local farmers' market on Saturday and picked up, among other things, lamb for shish kebab, an old and honored 4th of July tradition in my family. In the afternoon, I went to see David Henry Hwang's play, Yellow Face, by the Silk Road Theatre Project. We are having quite the DHH festival here this summer. I'll be seeing Chinglish (world premiere and Broadway-bound) at the Goodman tomorrow, and an early work, Family Devotions will be performed later in the summer.

Sunday I made my usual trek up to Waukegan for their parade, and a cookout afterwards. We are usually at my friend Julie's for that, but she fell and hurt her back a short time ago and wasn't up to having people over, so we went to Margaret's instead. M. has acquired a screened room for her backyard, similar to this one, so it's a very pleasant way to sit outside and enjoy the weather while not being bothered by bugs. We had the requisite hot dogs, hamburgers, baked beans and watermelon, and I brought champagne to celebrate my retirement.

On the actual holiday, I again followed tradition by sitting on my front stoop to watch the neighborhood parade, and then going to Nichols Park for jazz, ice cream and family fun. They had a petting zoo this year, and I think this boy wants a new pet:

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Then I came home and for dinner made the aforesaid shish kebab and had that with a green salad.

I have settled my plans for New York. I'll be flying in on Saturday, July 16 and coming home on Wednesday, July 20. So I'll observe my birthday in the Big Apple! I'm staying (as usual) on the Upper West Side, at 76th St. I will definitely save the Morgan Library for Tuesday, as that is the day the Xu Bing exhibit opens. I was happy to learn that the Neue Galerie's Vienna 1900 exhibit has been extended, so I will be able to see that after all. I expect I'll combine that with a visit to the Jewish Museum, as they are relatively close to each other and both are open on Mondays (unlike most NYC museums). Unfortunately, Born Yesterday, which I was hoping to see, has closed.

the Internet issue may have been resolved, no thanks to Earthlink. Or, I should say, thanks to some bad advice! Last night, they conferenced in an Apple rep, who finally said, "Might need a new network card." Idiot me. I don't connect wirelessly, so no network card on my computer. So I haul the computer to the Apple Store after work today, the guy says, "Can't be that. You don't have one. And the hardware looks fine." But he figured out (we think) that the new modem requires me to connect in a different way than I'm used to. I've been on now long enough to upload a bunch more photos, and I can now show you how I spent the Fourth of July.

I watched the parade go past my house:

Then I went to the park and listened to jazz (though I didn't stay long - it was way too hot!):

After dinner (veal burgers with a mint/lemon/butter sauce, golden beets, and a cucumber & tomato salad), I wandered down to the lakefront to watch the fireworks. Instead of one monster show, the city had three sets of lakefront fireworks this year: one on the north side, one downtown and one near me. I got to the park about half an hour before they started, found a nice spot on the rocks, and enjoyed the show:

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Entries tagged with fourth of july

July 4, 2012

My Holiday Weekend

Fingers crossed . . .

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