Mimi and Grampy's Big Easter Adventure

In some locales Easter brings large rabbits who arrive at your home at night, leave you eggs and chocolate, and vanish with the light of day. In our case our visitors arrived a full couple of days early, hung out for a week afterwards, and had a decidedly different idea on who gets the eggs and chocolate. That being said, we'll take a hundred Mimi and Grampy visits over some flea-bitten rodent any day!

The Maine grandparents' visit is always highly anticipated. The kids are a-buzz for a month beforehand about what endless "Gladys and Gurtie" stories they'll force Mimi to tell, and worry over whose dessert or ice cream will be taxed with a "Grampy bite." They'll plan out all their exhausting outings and movie nights and card games. Stacy and I are thrilled too because we know the dishes will get done sooner and the kids will safely burn off their insatiable energy in someone else's direction for a while; we might even get a night out alone out of the deal! Come to think of it, I'm not exactly sure why Mimi and Grampy keep agreeing to come out here. There doesn't seem to be much upside for them... But come they do, and even seem to get some sort of masochistic thrill out of it. Go figure.

Mimi and Grampy got a day to sleep in before the Easter onslaught proper. The kids were up at the crack of dawn, as expected, and found a rather odd assortment of decidely non-Easterish gifts left for them. Rumor has it that Santa Claus had made a bag full of Christmas presents for the kids late last year, had hid them away, and then forgot about them. They were found, much to his chagrin, in the spring by some elf doing a cleaning spree. Ole Saint Nick evidently made a deal with the Easter Bunny to ship them down with him. Evidently union rules allow for that sort of thing.

Nothing like a blood-thirsty monster of the sea
to bring home the true meaning of Easter.

Donned we then our May apparel -- OK it was still April... -- and headed to church.

This year we had Easter Dinner at our house and we had quite a crowd. The four of us, Mimi and Grampy, Gramlynne and Poppa, Uncle Kyle and Miss Sara, Aunt Joyce and Mr. Jay started us at ten. Then we also invited our favorite Japanese family, the Tanakas, so they could see what a typical American holiday was like. (Though with this crowd "typical" might be stretching things...) Thirteen people in our little abode made for a nice, dense-pack. We had ham and honey-roast duck, sweet potatoes and pineapple dressing; string beans and Brussels sprouts,... the list went on and on.

Stacy's roommate from college was in town with her family.  Barbara and Neil MacMillan and their two children G and F now live in England, but she and Neil had both lived in Japan for a while and they were very interested in seeing Stacy and meeting the Tanakas.  They swung by for a quick visit.

We thought we'd be brilliant and manage the cramped quarters by eating outside. It was a fine idea for the 35 seconds the food stayed warm in the brisk spring weather. Oh well. Some people like cold duck.

Someone, I won't mention names, seems to be having
a little jealousy-thing with Miss Sara over Uncle Kyle.

When Mainers are wearing parkas, that should be telling you something.

After dinner there were the requisite Easter egg hunts, and then, in yet another example of holiday diversity, we co-opted the event to celebrate Aunt Joyce's birthday.

Additional events held during Mimi and Grampy week included a quick rainy-day day trip to Lake Cachuma and Solvang.  The rest stop at Cachuma is always good from some aerial exploration, whereas for Solvang itself, it's pretty much limited to shoes and pastries...

Then there was a whale watching excursion to Point Vincente. We even spotted some whales!   (Yes, the aquatic kind...)

We got a lot of Gladys and Gurtie stories from Mimi, but she got a couple from L too...

And then there was the old-faithful stand-by: Cards! L and N had been learning and practicing "Progressive Rummy" for a couple of months in anticipation of showing off for Mimi and Grampy. They got plenty of opps!

Stacy started winning game after game and got all uppity.  Made me want to pound on the table, scream, and go pout in my room.  I hate immature sore winners.

We had marathon sessions just about each night.

Ganging up on the adults.

Clearly wondering why they keep letting themselves get roped into this sort of thing.

 I mean, every night!

Mimi also taught L and N how to play "King's Corners," a game I grew up playing. N was so enthralled with it he managed to find an on-line version and spent the next month glued to the computer whenever he was given the chance.

Eventually the week was up and Mimi and Grampy had to go back to the wild and woolly North.  We miss them and the kids miss them.  They keep hanging all over us asking to play cards or tell Gladys and Gurtie stories.

I think we miss them more.

Of Brass Bands and Bear Hugs

Every year the City of Torrance holds an annual Armed Forces Day celebration, which exceeds its eponymous time allotment three-fold, with parades and exhibits and events all weekend long. It's a pretty big deal, locally speaking, being one of the few cities still holding such an event. Our usual focus is the military band concert at Armstrong Theater held on Friday night - generally filled with enough live Sousa to rouse even the most uncivil of civilians. The concert is one of the big-wig affairs of the weekend and draws a brigade of military brass each year. The top-ranking officers from all the branches across Southern California are represented and all show up at the theater in an armed cavalcade of presidential proportions. The rooftops of the theater and all the surrounding buildings are decked out with snipers and you can bearly make your way through the courtyard for all the bald behemoths in sunglasses and ear pieces looking like they're posing for an Oscar^® statue.

The opening act for the band is always a pre-show drill team demo in the theater courtyard. Twirling rifles and flashing bayonets - these guys are tight and precise and a ton of fun to watch. L and N, not being able to see too well through the wall of dignitaries, were invited by one of the officers to come stand up in front in the midst of all the military VIPs, much (I'm sure) to the chagrin of all the secret service folks trying to keep the riff-raff at a bay. Afterwards the kids were invited to meet the cadets and shake their hands, and both L and N were given the chance to hold one of the rifles.

This year's concert was by the United States Air Force Band of the Golden West hailing from of Travis Air Force Base in the Bay area. Commander and conductor Captain Haley Armstrong headed up the team with humor and a great smile, leading works from Russia (Shostakovich's "Festive Overture"), Italy (Julie Giroux's "Italian Rhapsody"), and Ireland (Leroy Anderson's "The Girl I Left Behind Me"), as well as a healthy plethora of the not-to-be excluded Sousa marches. I love band music and this was indeed a tight, disiciplined, drill-team of a band, so it was a pretty fantastic concert all in all.

After the concert as we were leaving the theater, we saw the conductor being escorted across the lobby by a secret service agent. N immediately shouted "The conductor!" and took off across the crowded room. To my horror a second later I saw him tackle her around the thighs in a big hug. She looked momentarily shocked, and the SS guy stiffened visibly, but Capt. Armstrong, evidently understanding it was friendly fire, returned the hug. My blood pressure, which had shot off the charts in my panic, started to trend downward, but only for a moment. The next thing I knew N had turned and plunged himself into a heart-felt embrace of the secret service agent. I think we'll never know just how close my son came last night to being dropped by a dozen sniper rounds.

Ten o'clock and way past all of our bedtimes, there was still a little Americana left in each of us, so we had to finish off the evening (and celebrate the positive outcome of N's tender terrorism) with a stop at the most patriotic place on earth: