Never Too Vieja for Children's Books...

I've never outgrown a love of children's books, whether reading them aloud to others or just having the fun of looking back over them myself.  It's been a while since I read ones for primary age kids.  I always love comparing the pictures and the different ways the artists have of illustrating the same classic stories.  This little stab at learning some Spanish is becoming a fun excuse to read more children's books aloud.  And, for myself, to familiarize myself with how letters sound, the musicality of the language, to recognize here and there some words.

To find out that in the Three Billy Goats Gruff that the Spanish word for troll is Gnomo.  (Hey wait, isn't there a difference between gnomes and trolls?  Or maybe there are no trolls left in Spanish speaking countries...they are extinct?)

 More trivia about differences... the sound the three billy goats make as they trot across the bridge, in Spanish, is not Trip-Trap Trip-Trap, but ¡Cric! ¡Crac! ¡Cric! ¡Crac! <---note that half the punctuation marks must be made upside down.  Who invented that...people standing on their heads?  You SO know I'm about to google the "origins of the upside-down exclamation point"

Ah.  Now I can rest easy knowing the reason Spanish punctuation marks are far more creative than the ones I'm used to...here's some illumination from the Ask.com folks  (It makes for some fun with the ALT key plus the numbers 174 and 0161)

Short summary, it helps make sense of who's saying what when, and where in the sentence. 

See, ¿don't you feel it's more clearly a question now with the additional standing-on-your-head question mark? 

¡Woo!

Now on to the book Margaret and Margarita...let's hear it for books that are easy enough for even ME to understand.  And why do I suddenly have an urge for a cold frosty mixed drink?

This is the last book Jack could handle today.  After I read as many kid books to him as he could endure in one sitting.  After a very long shift last night at work.  Well, it never hurts to be read to before bedtime.  I have a stack of twenty or thirty more Spanish children's books from the library just waiting to be read aloud to him when he recovers from the first fifty.  But I think if I had tried to press for one more reading today, the man would seriously have contemplated teaching wee Quinito how to become airborne, minus the airplane...a term I learned right inside the book.  Up = sube.  Down = Baja.   As in "sube, sube, sube...baja, baja, baja..."    I can't wait to ride the elevator with Jack now (he can run but he can't hide...hey it was HIS idea I learn Spanish...I'm just cooperating, haha)

Can I just say that the sound of some words just cracks me up?  As in the word for swingset, which is "columpia."  Columpia reminds me of the sound swingsets make when you swing way too high and the actual metal legs of the swingset begin clumping up and down out of the ground the higher the swing goes back and forth.  It DOES sound like coLUMPia coLUMPia.

Yes.  Deep thoughts. 

Sleep tight, Jack.  Buenos Noches for now, Quinito.

And thank all of you out here for your great feedback and advice!  Yes, I've decided to be fearless and to happily blunder and bludgeon my way through conversational attempts without grammatical correctness, as much as it goes against my grain. 

And to indulgently type incorrect accents on the keyboard...

¿Tíll maybé threé ór four yéars fróm ñow?  ¡When I know better!

¡Ók, off ñow to pláy wíth my ALT cómmands...!

Stranglish

...what happens to a language when an English speaker married to a Cuban Spanish speaker determines to learn SOME Spanish, ANY Spanish, no matter how little natural language ability is knocking around the ol' DNA.

I'm looking at it as "free language immersion," or "the tutor who cannot escape"...hahaha

Yes, after failed attempts at becoming proficiently illiterate in both French and Russian in my younger years, I realize this is a missed opportunity...why not actually learn a language in my lifetime, or if not actually learning it, why not drive others totally to distraction trying to learn one, when I'm so good at doing that?  Because I'm all about fulfilling my real potential at creating international incidents.

So I've asked Jack to only speak to me in Spanish, unless he's complaining to the management about something related to survival or locating his clean clothes in a timely fashion.  So far, we've done ok because the first phrase I've written down (and carry in a notebook with other phrases, everywhere I go) is "how do you say_____?"  and  "I have no idea what cotton pickin' word you just said...please repeat."

Today I expanded my horizons and visited the library in hopes of perusing their vast Spanish language selection.  Then I found out that although I live in Florida, my library stocks about as many Spanish language materials and books as I'd guess some outpost in Wisconsin might.  Truly.  The children's book section was not much better.  But I did get the Spanish language version of Curious George.  That will be a real relief for all those real life situations in which I'll need to point to a monkey on a bicycle or say "the man in the yellow hat."

But it's truly a fun experiment!  I've decided to be fearless and not worry about grammar up front, and just learn like a little kid by putting words together in ways I hope gets the point across, and letting Mi Esposo help me polish it to some level of understandability.

I'm already really getting good, after just one day.  I tuned in to an AM band radio station while driving today, and in some broadcast from Cuba, understood the words "Frank Sinatra" and "Clark Gable."  I sure have an ear for those Spanish words...ha!

Got any war stories about learning another language...any advice?  I'm all orejas!

Happy Sukkot!!

Tonight marked the beginning of the Feast of Ingathering, or Sukkot (sue-KOTE), named after the temporary shelters we camp out in to commemorate the dependence of the Israelites on the Almighty, specifically remembering the 40 years He sheltered them while in the desert after delivering them out of Egypt before bringing them into the Promised Land.

It's a reminder of how fragile our lives are and how every day we're dependent on Him...it's also timed with the ingathering of the harvest yearly and is a time to gather, be happy, camp out as a community, and celebrate for several days!  We've wanted so much to join in one of these gatherings since we were married in 2004, and each year we've been unable to.  But it's always in our hearts.  Hopefully next year!

A life dream would be to be in The Land (Israel) during one or more of the special feasts/holy days...Passover, Shavuot, or the High Holy Days (Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, Sukkot).   I cannot explain this desire other than to say that it's fueled by the verses I read, something probably foundationally laid from the time I was a really young child and could picture the stories read to me as if I were right there in the middle of the narratives.  I want to see Jerusalem in person, and I pray for the day the temple will be rebuilt.

What this has to do with the rest of our lives is hard to explain.  Sometimes I hesitate to write these things here on the blog, and yet they're inseparably a part of me and a part of Jack.  I've been led to this point through a set of circumstances I participated in, and yet it has come at a cost, so I value it all the more.  I feel lonely sometimes in this spiritual place, but at the same time would not choose to undo any part of the journey.  It's in fact something I'm putting into a journal, perhaps even book form.  I was an avid student of the time period of pre-christianity where there was seemingly a gap of silence between the obvious diverse Judaism of the first century and the later advent of an entirely separate religion (christianity) directly linked to it foundationally, yet declaring itself removed from its tenets.  This subject has fascinated me since my late youth, and in the last couple of decades has been one of the most hotly and avidly discussed/debated/studied subjects in many circles of students and scholars.

Anyway...that's beyond the scope of this blog.  Just noting the side current that parallels our other life interests.  It provides the ever present theme around which the other notes dance in variation... la la la, as usual, I wax Off Topic  ;-)


Happy Sukkot to all who celebrate it, and blessings to all our friends out here...may your harvest be overflowing!

Hey! What Are Some of Your Favorite Songs?

Little known fact about me --
when I was growing up, I was not allowed to listen to the radio or buy popular music that had lyrics.  The very few exceptions were a couple of John Denver albums, a Chuck Mangione or Wynton Marsalis, and Barry Manilow.

Yeah, I completely missed the entire decade of the 70s and much of the 80s.

I'm THAT person who can recognize a melody but has no idea of the lyrics past the first three words.  Or gets them wrong because I never saw the lyrics in print, and got the lyrics NEARLY right (but oh so wrong).

I've never really caught up, but am having fun now going back and listening to ohhhh DECADES of music I've missed out on.  I did sing in choirs, play an instrument all the way through early childhood to early adulthood and love to sing.  But I'm still musically deficient..

Which leads me to this question...I very curious...

What are some of your favorite songs?  I've discovered I have favorites now in nearly every genre, but I'd so love to know yours, no matter what genres or how popular/unpopular (or any other term), or even quirky.  I'm having fun collecting favorites now, and they're all over the page.

So I'd love to know some of yours, to expand my repertoire!   It seems my "inner child" is somewhat of a barefoot centrist-libertarian hippie redneck classical lyrical percussionist gypsy celtic world folk blues soul zeideco operatic israeli aussieoutback honkytonk chant symphonic R&B rockabilly gospel liturgical bluegrass mountain music person rolled all together.  

More recommendations, please!  :)

The Goodness of God

We are so grateful to God for so many things, and at the top of the list are our friends near and far, in person and on the internet.  It's been a really big encouragement to be a part of praying for specifics goals, dreams, and concerns alongside such wonderful people (you know who you are!)

This week we received a really big answer to one of our longterm prayers, the details of which need to remain private for the time being, but the acknowledgement of our gratefulness does not need to wait!  So YAYYYYYYYYYYYYY to the realization of things Waited For and for special friends who have encouraged us and prayed with us about not only our requests, but theirs as well.  We rejoice with you at your every success, too!

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to all who have lent an encouraging word here and for your prayers from afar...they have been heard and answered in wonderful ways!!

We, too, continue to pray for blessings for those we know here on the internet and closer to home as well. 

Tonight ushers in Yom Kippur, and we don't have time right now to write about its significance for those who keep its observance.  But it's a season of gratefulness and renewal and heart-searching.

YOU are our special blessing from His hand...thank you for coming here and making our lives richer for sharing yours with us.  We genuinely care and are very very blessed as a result.

We have such a wonderful God.  He delights in goodness, justice, renewal, mercy.

We THANK Him for His blessings.  They are too numerous to list.  May they extend to all the wonderful people we have come to know (you!) through this website and your own websites and comments shared.
Shavuah tov from our family to yours...



Jack and Robbyn

Your steadfast love, O LORD

is in the heavens

and Your faithfulness

reaches the clouds...

from Psalm 36

Chaya as an Edible Hedge

This week we ate our very first chaya leaves. Here's a brief introduction to Chaya.   Our chaya plant was ordered from a nursery and planted about a year ago, melted down in this spring's freezes, and came back  from the roots when the weather warmed.

Chaya loves hot weather and can tolerate some drought and some very wet conditions as long as the roots are not constantly waterlogged.  The plant is now more like a small bush.  The leaves are broad and remind me a little of the shape of papaya leaves.  There are small white flowers, nothing stunning from a landscaping standpoing, BUT...from a butterfly's, a true magnet.  This small bush is constantly visited by butterflies, moreso than any other  plant we have.

Chaya leaves washed and put into pot with sea salt before cooking

There are a couple things to bear in mind with the Chaya plant before I emphasize the ease with which it's grown and harvested.  First, some varieties of Chaya have stinging properties similar to stinging nettles.  I found this out with my bare hands (ha!)...the feel is not unbearable but would have been if I had continued collecting the leaves barehanded.  The rash is immediate and feels like ant stings.  I went inside and immediately rinsed my hand with lemon dish detergent (my downhome remedy for stopping certain types of irritants) and only had slight irritation after that.

With that said, if you have a choice, plant the non-stinging variety.  The stinging variety is just as edible as the non-stinging variety...there is no sting after cooking.  ECHO carries the non-stinging variety, and we'll try getting some starts from them next spring if all goes well.

I didn't find much in the way of YouTube vids for this plant, but this one shows the irritation the stinging variety can produce when touching it:

The second important thing to remember with Chaya is that in order to be eaten, IT MUST BE FULLY COOKED...in a non-aluminum pan.  Cooking it in aluminum cookware produces an irritating effect when eaten. The leaves need to be boiled/simmered for 20 minutes and then are deliciously edible (and the cooking liquid by then is safe, too.) It's compared to spinach in taste, but I think the taste is unlike spinach and is tastier ...and I do love spinach!

 This is NOT a plant that is safe to eat raw.  There are cyanides present that boiling a few minutes immediately removes and renders the leaves safe while remaining nutritious and making the nutrients available to our bodies.  The nutrient count far exceeds nearly all in-ground greens commonly found in the garden...amazing.  But the leaves MUST be cooked.

...and when they ARE cooked (here is tried our first batch with chopped onions and a pinch of sea salt), they are mild, hearty, and delicious.  We now mix these with our moringa leaves for a powerpacked pot of greens and serve them with a mix of cooked black beans and small red beans seasoned with Creole seasoning.  The beans, the greens...are unbelievably satisfying.  Jack does not feel the need to eat red meat after eating those, and I never thought I'd see that day!  It energizes him with strength for his physically-demanding job in a way he seldom feels otherwise.  We're SO thankful we've tried this.  Chaya is packed with superb nutrition and is great mixed with other favorite greens.

Here's what the small bush looks like.  When we get the non-stinging type, we'd like to grow enough of them for a hedge...and edible hedge...that doesn't need weeding, oh Yeah!!

The plant can be propagated from cuttings.  We'll be sure to include this anywhere we want to enjoy watching those colorful pollinators.  The plant is not invasive since it doesn't spread easily by seeding.  The plant is amazingly disease-free and isn't bothered by pests or fungus.  The plant is very clean and harvesting is as simple as cutting the leaves (with gloves on, if it's the stinging variety), rinsing them, and cooking them.

A closeup of the small white blossoms...

...a bud?  I don't know the plant well enough to know yet.  I know this is a great plant for some of the hotter areas of the South.  Contacting an organization like ECHO would be great for learning to customize it to the South's growing conditions.

Picking super-nutritious leaves from a hedge and having them for dinner...is the BEST :)

Moringa/Molunggay: Part Two

(all pics can be enlarged by clicking on)

Here is a harvest of some fresh  moringa branches.  With about a dozen or so trees, we can pick some daily rather than have to try to preserve them, although we still want to learn to dry them and pulverize them into powder to store for winter use in foods.

They are easily snapped right off the trunks, or cut with a small knife.  The fibrous stems are inedible, but are a nutritious mulch.  We discard them by placing them around the bases of other plants needing fertilization.

A closer look at the branches.  We discard  yellowed leaves.  The foliage is remarkably insect and disease-free...very, very clean leaves need only minimal washing before eating.  The leaves have to be stripped by hand.  The scent is pungent and "green."  The leaves are good eaten fresh, and have a very peppery bite.  We prefer them mixed into other fresh greens rather than by themselves.  The taste is akin to watercress.

This is a picture we took a couple years back when we toured the ECHO global test farm in Ft. Myers, Florida.  This is one of their Moringa patches, showing how closely they can be planted and kept  cut back for harvesting multiple crops of fresh stems/leaves throughout the year.  The  nutritional content of the leaves is remarkable, and all parts of the trees have constructive uses.

Here is part of our wild and woolly patch, obviously doing well despite the naturalized conditions (not kept cultivated around the bases) and left pretty much to their own devices.  They have performed well in drought and monsoon as long as their roots are not in standing water for long periods of time, or kept soggy.  The water drains well from this area where they are planted, so we've had no problem other than keeping up with their fast growth!  We've intended to keep them cut back, and every time they shoot on up really quickly!  They are to about 12 plus feet in height at this time.  They are thin and fairly bendable, and not a good wood for building things.  But they withstand all sorts of weater extremes.  In the freezes they died back all the way to the ground and then returned by sending up shoots from the roots when it warmed back up.  These plants are the results of two such freezes and full die-backs.

Here is a batch of leaves stripped from the stems.  From here they can either be used fresh, cooked, frozen, or dried.

At first, we tried freezing them after stripping the leaves from the stems, and of course washing them well.  We drained them to get them as dry as  possible and then froze them in freezer bags.  I'm not sure how well we prefer the frozen yet.  I do  know they do not keep long in the refrigerator when bagged...some of them basically melt into mush, resulting in being dumped around outdoor plants needing fertilizer.  We have had success so far more in using them fresh, but still have yet to try drying them.

The taste?

Our FAVORITE green so far.  They are one green my husband actually likes and feels so full after eating that he said they satisfy him like meat usually does, and he's a true carnivore.  I've made black beans/Mexican red beans from scratch with a little Creole seasoning and served it with cooked Moringa leaves, seasoned only with sea salt and chopped onion (cooked along with)...simply delicious, and when I say simply, it truly doesnt get much simpler than that!

Moringa experiments continue...

And I leave you now with some more great YouTube videos.  This first is about how the Peace Corps grows moringa for easy harvests:

More on Moringa as worldwide malnutrition preventive:


And this video shows the ease with which the branches are stripped of leaves by hand:

Anyone Out There With Stirling Engine Advice?

This is the experimental ST05G 500 Watt Stirling Engine plan, one of the plans available thanks to Creative Commons in Europe at this site.

This is a modern version of a Stirling engine, and in Jack's research he's found this one to be simpler than a combine motor, safer, and able to be run on multiple types of fuel. There are versions in Europe that are even run by heat produced by pellet fuels made from waste, wood chips, and other cellulose type materials, even grass. They can also be run on hydrogen generated from photoelectric panels.

WhisperGen Stirling CHP (combination heat and power) units are already time-proven and popular for home and marine use in Australia and New Zealand. They have now expanded to the European continent via production in Spain.  WhisperGen units have on and off-grid applications.  Here's a peek at their video...


Researching stirling engines is one of the ongoing side projects Jack continues researching for the longer-term to figure out some viable options for generating electricity for our future home (wherever/whenever...down the road...) so we can be less dependent on the grid, and maybe even completely off-grid.

If you know anyone out here doing similar experimentation or had some successes with Stirling engines, we'd sure love to know how to contact them. Just passing on our ongoing questions for our ongoing quest...and wanting to learn from those who've already been forging ahead in this area already!

Shana Tovah!

May those who put their hope in Him be written and sealed for a good year!

Mandatory GM Foods Labeling Petition

Here's one way to quickly and easily add our voices to petition our current government to require mandatory labeling of all genetically-modified foods...which is the barest of minimum standards and should actually be our right to know, as consumers.

Here's the link to the petition, from Jeffrey M. Smith's (author Seeds of Deception) Institute for Responsible Technology. 

It only takes seconds to send.  It's a start, and we have to start somewhere.

Losing the Right to Grow Our Own Food? Stop HR2749 and S510 Food "Safety" Bill

If we give the government control over our food rights, we are in a state of national collapse. That's not overstating the case. We really must make sure this legislation does not pass.



Here is a great article with the specifics of these proposed legislations that are now on the table and must NOT be allowed to pass.

We cannot give up our individual rights to grow our own food or allow a government institution to regulate citizen rights to freely decide what and how to perpetuate the basic human right to preserve our food supply. Something as basic as saving seeds, selling to others, privacy, promoting local growers and small farms. These are fundamental to a life that will never look the same if we allow this legislation to pass.

We do not NEED YOUR PROTECTION, government regulators..."protection" is just another word for "government control"...and that is something our nation was founded to OPPOSE.

Freedom. We still have to fight for it right from our own backyards.

Moringa Series: First Recipe

The Edible Moringa Plot (clicking on pic will enlarge)

I bopped around the internet looking for recipes utilizing moringa leaves and had the most success after googling with the term Molunggay rather than Moringa.  Molunggay is the term used in the Philippines.  I saw several variations on a basic soup, so this is what I tried last night for our first trial run:

Chicken and Corn Soup with Molunggay (Moringa) Leaves

Boneless skinless chicken breasts (I used three)
Corn cut from cob, or frozen kernel corn
Sea salt, black pepper to taste
De-stemmed fresh or frozen Moringa leaves

Chicken breasts, corn and seasoning go into medium pot with enough water to cover about an inch or two.  Bring to boil and then simmer a while, covered, till chicken is cooked through.  Skim off any "scum" from liquid surface, and reduce heat to low.  Add water any time it gets too low, keeping level just above the other ingredients.  Remove chicken breasts and  refrigerate until almost ready to serve.  About ten or fifteen minutes before serving, bring soup back to a low boil and add moringa leaves.  Allow to cook ten or fifteen minutes, till color is still bright but leaves are completely tender.  We added about the same quantity of leaves as there was corn in the pot, but proportions are whatever your preference is.  Add water as needed to keep soup from getting too thick.  Serve hot As Is, or take refrigerated chicken breast portion and slice thinly against the grain and serve in soup bowl with soup poured over in individual portions.  (we use the other leftover chicken for slicing for sandwich meat).

This recipe is very basic.  Improvise as desired.  I had to restrain myself from adding other favorite herbs, peppers, hot sauce, onions, etc, and will play with them another time.  But it was delicious simply with those few ingredients!

The interesting thing was that this is not typically a soup that Jack would consider very hearty.  But I used a lot of moringa in it so we could really get a taste of the flavor.  He loved it and could only eat one bowlful...and wanted nothing else afterwards, which is unusual.  It is very satisfying and filling!  We're pretty happy it's as simple to pick as getting leaves off a tree...

Tryin' Out the Moringa/Molunggay Leaves As a Cooked Green

We've had the frozen leaves (our own) in smoothies, but we don't get the benefit of a taste test that way, since the green flavor is masked by the sweet ingredients.

SO...tonight I'm trying our first ever Moringa dish for supper, a Filipino style soup, and I'll saute some in a little oil and garlic, too, to get a feel for our preference one way of the other as far as the taste.

More on that...there are storms moving through intermittently and it keeps giving us power surges...don't want to deep six my computer, so shall be back...after the taste test, woo!
-------------------------------

Update...quickly (Jack gets to be at home tonight, so I'm opting to be with him rather than the computer) :)

The cooked moringa...is...DELICIOUS !!!

It tastes like no other green I've eaten, and is at THE top of my taste preferences of any greens.  I know that might sound like heresy especially from a girl raised in the South, but this is in another whole category...better than turnip greens, collards, kale, cabbage...even by a slight margin chard.  My husband, who is the original meat-and-starch man...LOVED it...and will require no persuasion to eat them regularly.

I am SO HAPPY we tried these cooked!!!  We felt so full after a single bowl of soup with the greens the prevalent featured ingredient that we couldn't eat anything else.

In future posts, I'll go into detail about the benefits of Moringa, which are legion, and the ease with which it can be grown even if you don't have a garden or TIME to garden...in any growing zone at all except maybe the Arctic...in the South it's a perennial and further north it's an annual.

You have no idea how excited we are about this...the leaves we just ate have the same amino acids found in MEAT protein and the highest nutrient counts in every other category of about any food we've ever seen.

OK, I'm shutting up, but only long enough to spend time with Jack.

I'll be back, and will be posting more about this!


Here's a teaser video from YouTube...

Lovin' My Man

Happy Anniverary to my favorite person in the whole world, my husband, best friend, hero, co-conspirator, champion, sweetheart and lover.  I love you, Jack.

My world is amazing because you're in it, and I thank God for you every single day.

You never leave me guessing whether you're crazy about me or not...you are.  And I never leave you guessing.

Life is better because it's shared with you, and because God brought us together, I have family.

Thank you.  To God and to you.

Six years, gone in a snap, just like that, and another year ahead of us...I am blessed!

Thank you for the hard work you have put into our relationship, the way you protect our family and give solid advice to our daughter and have helped her as she embarks on her own adulthood for the first time.  Thank you for keeping Respect one of the most important rules for how our household is run.

Thank you for telling me you want me to be myself, and actually WANTING me to be that.  Thank you for inviting my opinions, even if we don't always agree, and caring what they are.  Thank you for being every inch a mighty man, but not relying on ego to be your motivating factor. 

Thank you for making sure I have a spare key, there's gas in the car, I've locked the house if you're gone, that things around here are in good repair.  That we have the clothes we need, doctor visits, medicine, even if we have to get creative about how to pay for them.

Thank you for working reliably, not being late to work, being the guy who does his job right even if others don't.  Thank you for the times you've filled in for others even if they don't especially want to reciprocate.  Thank you for being the kind of man who doesn't degrade others, even if you've been wronged or misunderstood in some way.  Thank you for being the man who really would punch another person in the nose if they so much as laid a hand on someone you love.

Thank you for always, always, without exception, sitting on the same side of a restaurant booth beside me...even when we're the only ones at the table.

Thank you for helping facilitate our goals in getting healthy, and eating a green smoothie nearly every single day for the last few months straight.  Thank you for caring that I get healthy, too.

Thank you for doing the bills.

Thank you for not spending money we don't have.

Thank you for knowing when it's the perfect timing to take a break and to go to a movie, or an ice cream sundae, or a walk on the beach, so that the everyday doesn't become without the joy of our stopping and sharing..and sometimes getting away from the house even if for a few hours.

I would say you're the man of my dreams, but really, you're  more the man of my prayers.  I could never have dreamed you up the way you really are.  But God brought you and you're better than I could have hoped.

I love your eyes and I love that we lasted through some things that would have crushed other couples.  I love your laugh.  I love our holding hands.  I love that you love to get outside and work hard and actually like to sweat and get a little sore.  Did I mention I love your beautiful eyes?

I love that I can't fit all the things I love about you into a blog post.

I just made you a nice dinner, some baked goods to freeze for later treats (and some to sell), and the house is quiet and mostly clean.  You're sleeping because you worked last night.  I'll slip in next to you before too long.  I'm happier than if we had some glamorous event planned tonight to mark our wedding date and could go paint the town red.  I have everything I want...you.   Color me happy  :)


Happy Anniversary, my Jack