Twain and cats

27 August 2016: Slept in a bit today and when I finally went outside, I found a package on my doorstep. Inside was today's good thing: this amazing birthday present from Rita, Mikeee, and Ainsley.

It reads: "A home without a cat--and a well-fed, well-petted, and properly revered cat--may be a perfect home, perhaps, but how can it prove it's title?" --Mark Twain. 

 Bing approves.

Veronica likes the packaging.

Meeting Ainsley

On the last Friday in June, I got to do something I've been waiting to do since September: meet Rita's baby girl, Ainsley. Rita and company were down in the DC area visiting family, so we met up in Frederick (and visited Wonder Book, which was also super fun).

Some pictures from that day:


Check out the red hair and blue eyes. What a cutie she is! And she was so sweet and friendly. Within minutes of meeting her, I was carrying her all over the store and listening to her baby talk (which was mostly laughter and squeals of delight).


Mommy and baby. Mikey (aka "Daddy") was there, too, but I didn't get any pictures of him. Sorry, dude.


Yet another baby-napping in progress? It was hard to let her go and say good-bye to her, Rita, and Mikey again. I need to get myself up to MA for a nice, long visit.

Cape Cod Trip, Part Three: Visiting Rita

One evening, Vogel and I drove over to Plymouth to meet Rita, who lives outside Boston, and is, as I've noted earlier, expecting a little girl in late September.


Vogel and I had a bit of time to kill before Rita joined us, so Vogel did her best impression of a lobster.


After dinner at the Cabby Shack (which was pretty yummy despite an awful cover band playing in the backgroud), we took a walk along the water and ended up down by the Mayflower 2. You can see the back of it here.


Once again, we were blessed with beautiful weather, and I took some nice shots of the boats on the water.



Another picture of the boats and sky.


A friendly woman volunteered to take this picture of the three of us. I think we look pretty cute in it. And check out that pregnant belly Rita's sportin'! By the way, we couldn't get to Plymouth Rock (it was closed for construction around it), so we pretended that the rock we were sitting on was Plymouth Rock.

After some more walking and some delicious ice-cream, we said good-bye. It was awesome to see Rita and have the three of us together again, if a bit bittersweet since she lives so far away these days. It was also great to see her before the baby comes, but again, kind of bittersweet since we won't be there when she is born and all that. At least she's not all the way in Azerbaijan, like some of my friends, but it's still tough.

4Cs Panel

Just a preview of a longer post to come: here's a picture of our panel, taken right after our presentation. We look happy, right? (Well, Rita doesn't look happy, but pregnancy is doing a real number on her digestive system and we had quite a few "Hold on, I need to run to the bathroom" moments, so maybe that explains the look on her face.)


Left to right: Kari, Rita, Vogel, and Heidi.

Happy Birthday, Jonesy!

Sundays tend to make me a bit homesick--for my Roanoke friends, my Greensboro friends, and, of course, my family back in New York. Spending yet another weekend grading papers only exacerbates this feeling. And yet, I have to wonder how people survived before relatively cheap long-distance phone calls and, of course, emails. After all, today we really aren't ever all that far from the people we care about. I can even talk to my friend Jane (all the way in Azerbaijan) for about $0.34 a minute (given the right phone card company).

Anyway, this is all a long set-up to the main purpose of this message--to use this (relatively) new means of communication to wish a happy birthday to one of my best friends, Dr. Rita Jones-Hyde, all the way in Massachusetts. I miss ya, Jonesy, and I hope you have a great day!

Here's a photo of Jonesy and I in our "nerd glasses" (as if we needed them) courtesy of Liz W., who bought them for me to celebrate my first tenure-track job and for Jonesy to celebrate her successful defense.

Birthday Dinner

As some of you know, one of my best Greensboro friends, Rita, just moved from GSO to Bridgewater, Massachusetts, where she'll be teaching at Massasoit Community College. Rita actually moved into her new apartment on Sunday, August 5, and then drove almost two hours on Monday, August 6, to meet up with Vogel and I in Chatham. How's that for a sign of devotion from a friend? She rocks.

On Monday night, Rita and Vogel also took me to dinner to celebrate my birthday a bit early. We went to this really lovely restaurant called the Cape Sea Grille. The food was awesome and the ambiance was quite nice as well--quiet and relaxed. Everyone loved what they ordered. Rita and Vogel got seafood (salmon and bass, I think) and I got this delicious summer vegetable stew. (If I were Amber, I would have taken lots of pretty shots of the food, but I'll leave that niche to her). Afterwards, we drove back to Chatham and got ice-cream. Not a bad way to spend an evening.