Today in My History

2001:   Eye on the World
2002:  This and That
2003:  Super Australia Bowl Day
2004:  Quiche and Cookies and Chips, Oh My!
2005:   Gay Puppies
2006:  Up and Down the Silverado Trail
2007:   She's Home! She's Home!
2008:  Michele and Gautami!
2009:  Go See a Play
2010:  Love Those Appliances
2011:  A Cuppa Tea

Bitter Hack
Updated: 1/17
"Ruthless, the Musical"

Books Read in 2012
 Updated: 1/17
"Making of The African Queen"
"Akubra is Australian for Hat"

CARPENTER'S EYES

27 January 2012

When you play the game of 65, the idea is that the person with the smallest score wins.  Ideally, you try to get a low score on each of the 11 rounds.  You can also have 10 points subtracted from your score by cutting the deck of cards with exactly the number of cards that are needed to deal out the hand.   9 cards for the 3 round, 12 cards for the 4 round, etc.

Cutting the deck is Peach's specialty.  I never guess right on the number of cards.  I may cut anywhere from one card too many or one card too few or a whole bunch too many.  Peach has an uncanny ability to cut the cards with just the right number and this Cousins Day it led to her winning most of the hands we played.

She says it's "carpenter's eyes."   Her father, my uncle Frank, was a carpenter, and apparently this has left her with this skill which works to her benefit in playing 65.

We have had our second cousins day since Kathy died.  We did all get a bit teary at one point, talking about her.  But it passed.  Instead we started invoking her assistance in playing the game.  Heck, if Gilbert can find me parking places for 25 years, why not ask Kathy to help with playing 65.  Except, of course, that we were all asking her and we would hate to force her into taking sides.

We continue to set her place at the table.

This was my turn to bring drinks and hors d'oeuvres.  I went out early the morning we were driving to my mother's and bought drink mixes and crackers to go with Brie.  Then I stopped at Trader Joe's to get their frozen chocolate croissants, which are so good!  I decided I would bring breakfast and save my mother the trouble of cooking breakfast.

So Peach gets to my house and we pack up the car.  I used my new insulated lunch bag to pack the croissants in so they would stay frozen.  And we drive to my mother's.  When we get there, I go to unpack "the croissants" and discovered I had packed the wrong box and instead I had packed some bacon-wrapped steak pieces which were meant to be hors d'oeuvres.  No croissants.

We played our afternoon of cards and around 4 I started getting ready for the cocktail hour.  I put the steak pieces into the oven and within minutes, the fire alarm was going off.  It turns out someone had cooked something in my mother's oven (she doesn't know who or what) and it had spilled into a thick puddle on the bottom, which was now smoking.  The override button on the fire alarm didn't work so we were running around opening windows and flapping at the firealarm with a towel. 

The hors d'oeuvres were good, but not worth the fuss of all the smoke and fire. 

Peach cleaned out the oven before she tried to cook dinner later.

We had a few more games after dinner and then my mother went to bed early since she had a cold and wasn't feeling well.  Peach and I sat up and played with her cool new iPad, a surprise Christmas gift.  I keep saying I don't want an iPad, but I could be enticed....

There were 2 more games this morning after breakfast (without croissants) and then we packed up and headed home.  The end of another fun Cousins Day, though I supposed it will all now be bittersweet with only three of us each month.

I miss Kathy.  We all do.

PHOTO OF THE DAY

Lady with the carpenter's eyes
beaming over her many wins.

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