Becky's bat mitzvah

Last weekend was my niece's bat mitzvah and we all had such a great time.
At the brunch Sunday morning, my dad brought the album from my brothers' bar mitzvah (Sept 1978) and we had a blast looking at all those late seventies styles. Just had to share...

10 Years

On June 11, Jeff and I celebrated our 10th anniversary.

We celebrated by first taking the people responsible for our meeting (Debbie and Damon set us up on a blind date a little over 12 years ago) to join us in our annual tradition of going to see the Sox play at Fenway Park. Yes, for 10 years, we have been going to the home game closest to June 11. In the past few years, like kismet, it has featured the Red Sox playing the Philadelphia Phillies (Jeff is from Philly) and this year continued that inter-league trend.

Jeff and I wore the outfits we met in: on our blind date, we both showed up wearing a white T shirt, jeans and doc martens. Okay, it wasn't the same T shirt or jeans, but the docs are the very ones we met in ;)

The Red Sox won 12-2. Actually, we had scored 12 in the first three innings, so we really got to enjoy the company more than the game...

On the 12th, Jeff and I took off for our fabulous vacation (thanks to Gaby, who generously offered to watch the kids for 8 days!). Virgin America to SFO. Had dinner at the Great Eastern in SF Chinatown. Had after dinner drinks with Kristen Hull (one of Jeff's Tufts friends). Met up with Lisa Stifelman for breakfast at Sears Fine Foods. Took off in our rented Mustang convertible for Yosemite.

Look at us! Riding out in our convertible looking so cool... It was unseasonably hot and about 30 minutes into the ride we had to put the top up.

Ah, Yosemite. I'd never been there, and wow, is it breath-taking. Cooler, so we put the top back down for the ride into the park, to Yosemite valley. Checked into the Ahwahnee Lodge and walked down to Mirror Lake. Got back and had a nice meal in the fancy Ahwahnee restaurant.




After breakfast (Monday), we went out for our big hike. Went to Curry Village and caught a shuttle to Happy Isles (trail head) and took the John Muir trail up to Nevada falls. Took the Vernal falls trail down and returned via the Mist trail. The granite and waterfalls were truly spectacular. I bemoaned not having a 'real' camera a bunch of times, but managed to get some serviceable shots.

Next, we headed down to Wawona. We checked into the Wawona hotel and the next morning, headed out to Mariposa Grove, where we got to see the Sequoias and hike to Wawona point. Aching legs starting to ease up, just...

More later... got to head off to Brussels.

Winter Classic cont'd

Here are some pictures from my big day. Includes Patti holding her Flames flag, Sue holding her Flames flag, the back of Kelly holding her Sabres flag and me holding my Thrashers flag. I traded that in after the opening ceremonies for a Flyers jersey and watched the game with Jeff. Great start to the year!

Winter Classic

Happy New Year and what a fantastic day I spent ringing it in!
Today I participated in the opening ceremonies for the NHL Winter Classic featuring the Boston Bruins playing the Philadelphia Flyers at Fenway Park. To top it off, I won a pair of seats to the event from Progress, so I got to stay and watch the game :)

Pictures will be coming...

Happy New Year

This year, we usher in the new year amidst a political campaign. I was very sure where I stood about a year ago -- things have gotten significantly fuzzier since then. I am at the point where I am a bit relieved to know that my vote doesn't count, as otherwise, I'd have a lot of thinking to do.

While I still find Obama to be overly arrogant, and more smarmy than charming, the campaign has reached that icky point where the bloom is off McCain's rose, too. At first, I was willing to accept Palin as his choice for VP (well, she's no less experienced than Obama and she's not running for President). Now I kind of have to agree with my MIT girl-friends when they assert that she is an insult to intelligent women everywhere.

Now, even my father is giving me propaganda from both sides (Jews for Obama, Jews against Obama -- how is a Jewish girl to decide?) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m96chUuvoe0&feature=emailhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m96chUuvoe0&feature=email

So, I enter the new year with no solid convictions, economic uncertainty (fear?), but a feeling of hope never the less. Happy new year to all of you.

I blame the 2-party system

I just spent a week in Ventnor, NJ (which is to Philadelphians what the Cape is to Bostonians). I really do wish I lived in a swing state. Anyway, I was reading "The Nine" this week. One of the friends of my in-laws predicted that by the end of the book, I would have the fear of God in me and I would change my mind about voting for McCain. Here we go again.

Well, I really am a democrat, I swear. Well, mostly. I would categorize myself as a fiscal conservative, and in favor of smaller government, so, in that sense, I guess I am a republican. I am also strongly pro-Israel and that will sometimes cause me to vote one way rather than the other. On social issues, I lean way more to the left:

• marriage is whatever two adults want it to mean -- the government should not care one way or the other
• a woman must have the right to choose what is in her own best interest with respect to her own body (even if I or someone else thinks that it's icky)
• we need to save the earth for future generations
• (the list goes on...)

What I really want is a new party -- one for like minded liberals. I don't want higher taxes and I want the government to leave me alone as much as possible. I should be prevented by law from harming other people, but what I do privately should be my own business. It seems to me that the conservative movement is right on in some of that theory -- at least the way it is manifested in the state of New Hampshire (from what I can see). Why is it that the same party that wants smaller government also is in favor of wire taps? That it hates abortion (as murder) at the same time that it endorses capital punishment? I just don't get it.

Somebody help me!

Ramblings from the White Mountains

We drove up to NH on Friday for a "company trip". This is a new concept for me, and I have to say, I rather like it. The way it works is this: If the company does well in year x, then, in year x+1 all the employees get to go on a company sponsored vacation. There is a (limited) choice of dates/destinations and the hotel/resort is paid for for the whole family (extra for food for children over the age of 5, and, for now, all three of mine are 5 or under).

Jeff and I really love New Hampshire. We live in Massachusetts where, in the eastern part at least, the political climate is hotly liberal. New Hampshire is like a cool breeze for us McCain supporters (I won't get started in this post...). On the drive up we passed a car with the driver's political views spray painted on the window:

"NOBAMA"
"The best social program is a JOB"
and others.

So you don't get the wrong idea, I am actually a liberal at heart. I mean, I think I am on the right side of most moral debates. For instance, I am pro-choice, I think that whom a person chooses to marry is completely up to that person (and his choice of partner, of course). I used to be totally into small-scale communism (I don't think it works for political systems governing more than a community's worth of people) and still think that medicine might be better when socialized. But, in the last few years, I have been reading media from the other side. The Wall Street Journal is informing some of my more recent opinions. I am no longer a democrat because I feel my party has let me down.

But I digress.

This post is supposed to be about how amazingly beautiful New Hampshire is.

The White Mountains are breathtaking. I was up there a bunch of years ago to go to my friends' wedding (Jill and Steve) in Franconia Notch. Every where you look are green mountains and the way they interleave themselves in the landscape is just the way you would draw them if you were setting up a fantasy landscape. All the dark green in the foreground, working its way back to the light gray in the distance. Add in some late afternoon shadows and you've got me back to believing in God (well, maybe not the way the Rabbis would have wanted me to, but good enough).

I've always thought that I was the ocean kind of person; I believed myself incapable of living more than 50 miles from the ocean. I am now convinced that mountains may be more to the heart of me.