Senior Fair Fun!

We decided to take Mom to the Senior Fair even though she'd already gotten her flu shot.  There's a lot of exhibits there with some freebies that add to the fun.  Art was the one who felt she needed to get out of the house into a different environment to stimulate her mind.  He's a wonderful son-in-law.

I think we've usually gone on Sundays in past years.  It was never this crowded!

One of the first booths we stopped at was Travelon which sells a lot of travel aids.

Several friends had mentioned compression socks as being great to prevent DVT (deep vein thrombosis).

Mom's legs swelled up horribly when we got back from Hokkaido.

I figured I'd try them out first and then get some for mom before we take her on another trip.

The stockings were $22.

I looked that the RFID shielding wallets, but decided to wait.

Art bought some travel laundry soap which was really super compact.

Mom enjoyed watching dance presentations.  We know the one on the right is Japanese, of course.  However we couldn't figure out the one on the left.  It looked like Chinese or Mongolian.  We couldn't be sure.

HMSA is a health insurance company in Hawaii.

They had us post what made us happy.

I said, "Seeing my granddaughter happy."

Mom said, "Living with my family."

Art said, "Jogging."

Then they gave us free reusable bags that fold into a strawberry shaped bundle.

At the traffic booth, we took the pedestrian pledge and learned that jaywalking in Hawaii is not $75, but $130!  It's also illegal to start crossing a street once the signal starts to blink.

Here's a photo of the In-flight stockings I bought.  They're not as tight as I thought they would be.  I think they'll be quite comfortable.

You can see how compact the laundry soap we bought is.  It's good for 50 washes in a hotel sink.






And here are all the freebies.  There were Vitamin B12, Alka Seltzer, Aleve caplets, packets of lotion, the reusable bags, blinkers for walking in the dark, a little flashlight, and rain ponchos.

We then took Mom for a short visit with her sister and had a noodle lunch before going home and taking a nap.

Ah yes... This is the life of a senior.

Celebratory Luncheon at Gyotaku

I posted last week about the genealogy Mom and I worked on for Art's Auntie G.  Needless to say, Auntie G was beyond thrilled, beyond satisfied, beyond happy.  She said she'd held that piece of paper for 12 years and tried unsuccessfully to find someone who might be able to decipher it for her.

A couple of years ago, mom and I worked on Art's mom's family history and presented it to all of that side of the family.  That one took us months and months of work because there was so much documentation Uncle F had found.  Uncle F is Auntie G's husband.  We gave albums of photos and DVDs of all we had translated and discovered to each of the cousins.

Therefore Auntie G knew mom and I could do this.  However, she was hesitant to trouble us with more daunting work.  I confess I was initially exhausted just looking at that sheet of paper too.

Now that Auntie G is getting older, I believe she just needed to have this done for  her children so she asked Art to approach us.

We brought the completed work over to her house and I was able to show her all the connections she had through her mother. Auntie G says she will now be able to clearly explain to her children and grandchildren who she's been talking about all their lives.

As we were leaving her house after explaining everything, she handed us a card that she said merely expressed her thanks and nothing more.  When we returned home, we found a beautiful letter of heartfelt appreciation and a generous gift.  Too generous!  Art called her immediately to say it was unnecessary, but she insisted vehemently that we spend it.  She wanted to especially thank mom.  So we did.

I bought a whole bunch of face lotion, etc. that mom had been needing and then took mom out for a celebration lunch at Gyotaku, her favorite restaurant.  Mom had said before that she was happy to do it, and didn't need any compensation, but she had to admit this was sure fun.

And it was.

Product of China After All!

I wrote a post on Monday about the edamame we found at Costco.  We were so happy.  I guess the happiness was short lived.  Sigh...

YJ very kindly wrote a comment yesterday:

"Hmmm... We just bought the exact same bag at Costco and ours say Product of China but packed in the USA. I'm absolutely no fan of buying any consumables from China but this was the only organic we could find that is affordable."

Sigh...

Well we still had the bag so Art dug it up.  We just couldn't believe it.

Look!

YJ is right!

There mixed with the photo of the soybeans are the words "Product of China".

Art says he'll take the responsibility for this mistake.  He got fooled by the "Packed for Globalinx Food, LLC, Newport Beach, CA 92660".  He missed the Product of China on the side.

Thank you, YJ!

You don't think they did that on purpose do you?  They wouldn't deliberately make "Product of China" hard to read?

Oh aggravation...

Deciphering Genealogy

Art's aunt asked him if he could ask my mom for help in translating her family genealogy.  Mom said she'd be glad to help.  She's one of the very few people we know who can read the old Japanese characters.

When I saw the 11x17 inch sheet of paper with a web of scrawls and lines, I was stymied.

"How can you write what I translate?" Mom asked.  "This is actually a big job.  A lot of the kanji (Chinese/Japanese characters) are badly written and indecipherable.  How can you fit everything on such a small paper?"

It was a  quandary.  I thought of breaking it up into quadrants but thought it would be too confusing for Art's aunt to read.

I finally decided to enlarge it on a huge, thick, brown kraft paper I had.  Then I scanned the genealogy, enlarged the Japanese words and pasted it on the  kraft paper.

Once I got it set up, I asked Mom to start translating.  I wrote what she read onto little green and yellow post-it type paper.

Dates were also difficult because Japanese years change by death of Emperor or a bad luck calamity happening. 

Hence in 1865 it was changed to Keio.  In 1868 it changed to Meiji.  1912 was Taisho; 1926 Showa and since 1989 it's been Heisei.

Keio 2 would be 1867.  Taisho 10 would be 1922.  Heisei 26 is 2014!

Thank goodness for Internet.

The last step was to print out the post-it note English translation and paste it next to the Japanese family names.

The funny thing about working on this was the magic of suddenly making sense of all the lines and squiggles.

We saw that one relative in the 1800's when divorce must have been frowned on had three husbands!  Mom was shocked.  Then we understood why that must have happened.  She was from a family that unfortunately had only girls.  Her first husband wasn't able to give her an heir so she had to get a divorce and took another husband.  It was probably her duty to do so.  She and her second husband also were not successful so they adopted a boy which apparently didn't work out so that led to another divorce.  The third time was the charm and she was able to give birth to three children.  The first (happy days!) was a boy! 

We could see when Art's aunt's relatives moved to America and became citizens.  Another relative had a 1st born son and then produced 6 daughters.  Another relative's last name was winter, and they named their child Haru which means spring.  Suddenly all the lines and squiggles on the paper meant real people with lives full of happy, sad, exciting, striving, loving times.

At first the work of putting this genealogy together seemed like such a daunting task, when I've got too much to do, but having worked on and completed it, it leaves Mom and me with such a wonderful, exhilarating feeling.

We can't wait to bring it to Art's aunt's house tomorrow.  There are so many stories to tell her.

Staying Dry

I don't know what it is about Hawaii, but there's a lot of moisture in the air.  We bought a firesafe to store some personal papers and my journals.  After several months, we checked and found that my journals had mold on them.  It was really upsetting!  I cleaned them off as best as I could and wondered if putting anything in the safe was a good idea.

Then when we were at Home Depot, we saw this container called DampRid.  We figured it was worth a try and stuck it in the safe.

Then we promptly forgot about it.  I can't even remember when we put it in there.

When Art checked the safe the other day to look for something we misplaced, he saw the DampRid and picked it up.  What a shock to see that it was almost filled with water!

We couldn't believe it.

Well, we went back to Home Depot and bought another one.  We know it works!

Why We Continue to Make Our Travel Albums

I know people wonder why we work so hard making our photobooks.  It takes an enormous amount of time.  It wouldn't if it weren't for the fact that Art and I are such fanatics about getting all our experiences and information recorded accurately.  The trip might take two weeks, but our album takes about a month and a half to compile and publish. 

A lot has to do with our wanting to preserve our memories.  I forget too much.  Art remembers more, but after putting so much time, effort and finances into our trips, we don't want to stick our many photos into a file and forget about them.

But the most important thing for us now is that it brings back the memories and the pleasure for mom.  She is constantly looking at all the albums of the trips we've taken with her.

I saw her sitting in her room the other day looking again at one of our trip albums.

"Look," she said.  "These gardens were so much more beautiful than Hokkaido."

I was surprised.  Shocked.  Mom loves Japan and has always marveled at the beauty we often see when we travel there.

What album are you looking at?  I asked her.

"This was our best trip," she said.  "I loved Canada and Seattle."

"Do you remember Skagit Valley?" she asked with awe.  "I'll never forget all those tulips that seemed to go on forever."


This is a sampling of the photo pages from the album we made for her.

One of her happiest memories is of the "hana fubuki" or flower blizzard.

We were at a park in Vancouver when the cherry blossom petals started swirling and falling around us.

Mom said she'd read about this in poems, but had never experienced it.

"I can die now," she said.  "I think I've seen everything."

"Not yet," we told her.  "There's Butchart to see yet."

We visited Butchart Garden twice while we were there and mom was in awe the entire time.

We took her to the doctor for a check-up last week and she actually told him she wanted to go back to Washington state and Vancouver!

What?  I distinctly remember her telling us after returning from Hokkaido that she was too old and too tired to travel anymore. 

Art is rather dubious about taking her back there because her memories are so great now and if everything doesn't work out perfectly like it did then, she could be disappointed.

Hmmmm....

Edamame Grown in the USA!

We like to eat boiled or steamed soybeans, known here as edamame.  However we've only been able to find them in the frozen section of supermarkets that are grown in China.

I'm sorry to say this.  We really loved our trip to China and the people we met there.  However I would prefer to buy food that are more carefully monitored.

We happened to be at Costco and found this gigantic bag of edamame.  The word Organic caught our eye.  Non GMO also sounded good.

But then I saw that it was grown in the USA!

Wow!  Amazing!  Edamame grown in the USA!

We bought it right away.

One problem...

Would you believe the giant bag (filled with smaller sized bags) takes up a third of our freezer? 

No, Art says I cannot buy a chest freezer just to store edamame.

That's OK.  I cooked some, gave it to my brother and we're eating a bunch for snacks.  So all's good!  But you know what else I saw?  A giant bag of organic blueberries!

Hmmm...

Pneumonia Shot

Having turned 65, I asked my Nurse Practitioner, Kathy on Tuesday if I should get the pneumonia shot.  I forgot to tell her that I'd gotten a pneumonia shot in 2003 in Illinois.  Actually, it didn't concern me until the LPN who administered the shot said that I would never have to get it again.  I didn't know it was a lifetime shot.

The shot was administered in the fatty tissue of my arm instead of muscle (not that I have any muscle).  I barely felt it.

However, later in the evening I found that a rather large area near the injection site was warm, hard and achy.

Wednesday morning, it hurt to lift my arm over my shoulder and the redness had spread.

I wrote to Kathy and asked her what to do.  She advised Advil or Aleve and/or Benedryl.  I used Motrin since that's what I had and then took a Benedryl later in the evening.  I also iced it as Kathy suggested.

It was a little better on Thursday.  Kathy wrote to ask how I was doing.   I could reassure her that it was getting better.

Today (Friday) it's even better though still achy and just a little red.

I understand most people don't get much of a reaction at all.  I guess I'm one of the rare 1% who did.

The shingles vaccine that I got at 60 was so easy.  I'm glad this is over with.  I just have the last dose of Hepatitis B that we're supposed to get soon.  We were advised to get the Hep B because of our travels.

I told mom she should consider getting the pneumonia shot too.  She said no because from everything she's heard, people who die from pneumonia die in their sleep and that's what she's hoping for.

I told her she needs to consider staying healthy for a long time because if she goes, her grandchildren won't be able to eat her lemon chicken, gobo, macaroni salad, etc.

She laughed saying, "That's true."

To be perfectly honest.  Mom had her blood tested recently and her numbers were MUCH better than mine.  She might outlive me!

The Ugliest Bonsai

At the last Bonsai New Years party, someone won an evergreen tree that was pretty... ummm... hopeless looking.  They offered it to Art since they knew he was just starting and needed plants to work on.

Well... as you know, we've been awfully busy and the little tree was neglected.  Mom tended to it and kept it alive and thriving though she couldn't do much for its rather sad shape.  We were thinking of entering it in the Ugly Bonsai Contest, but were out of country at the time.

We brought our sad tree to a bonsai meeting and people did say we could very well have won.

The experts at the class said we had a Foemina Juniper.  One of the kind teachers looked on this as a challenge and teaching opportunity.  I thought the best thing about this bonsai were the little weeds that grew under it.  My opinion was to chop it down to about the second branch and start again.

 After quite a bit of work, our new friend and teacher sent us home with this made over tree.

So here it is!

It looks happier now.

Art is confident that he can take care of this Foemina and continue to enhance her shape.

This should be interesting.

I Love You As Far As the Universe

We finally finished the photobook of our family gathering this summer and sent it off to Costco to print.  It is almost 100 pages covering five weeks of being together.  I've written the book in KC's voice.  Now that she's able to read well, I thought she would enjoy reading it herself.

And now... I guess I'm able to have that closure and can write this last e-mail about their stay.

They were leaving on a Sunday evening and KC wanted her last day to be a beach day.

She loved directing her dad and granddad in building a sand fort.

I watched from underneath a shady tree with my daughter, Tiffany.

It was good to have that time together.

Once the fort was completed to her satisfaction, they let the waves claim it.

I asked her why she didn't build it where it would be out of reach of the waves.

She said she thought it should go back to the ocean and they could build another one when they returned to Hawaii.

So the fort was returned to the ocean and KC and her family returned to Chicago.

The hardest thing for me to bear were the tears overflowing from my granddaughter's eyes.  But when I looked at my daughter, I could see her tears brimming and dampening her cheeks as well.  The hard hug my son-in-law gave us almost broke me too but I waved as cheerfully as I could as we drove off. 

When we returned to the quiet house, we saw this message from KC on our weekly schedule white board in the kitchen.  On Friday and Saturday, she drew small faces showing her dread of the final farewell.  On Sunday was a sad face.

And down at the bottom was a message that is still up after a month and a half.

It might still be there when they return again next time.

Too Young to Help?

When our 7 year old granddaughter, KC first arrived at our Hawaii home from Chicago I wanted to childproof the house.  I had a child gate put at the top of the stairs.  I got our plastic bowls and cups ready for her to use.

On seeing my preparations, our daughter, Tiffany said, "You really didn't have to do all this, Mom.  KC is usually quite careful."

Wasn't it just yesterday that she was a toddler? 

Their last visit was two years ago.  When I look back at the photos from that summer, it makes me tear up to see how much she's grown.

Now she couldn't wait to help Art deliver Meals on Wheels lunches.  All of Art's "clients" were thrilled to see a little girl delivering their food and showered her with attention and little treats.  Ummm... sometimes, they weren't exactly little treats.







At home she insisted on putting the trash bin back from the roadway.

"It's too heavy for you," I told her.  "Let me do it."

"I can, Grandma.  You'll see." she said.

And she did.

She helped me with baking and Art with cooking breakfast French toast.

What she really loved to do is work with plants.

Art let her help with planting pineapples and trimming bonsai.

I was surprised to see him allowing her to do some of the trimming.

As often as she could she would help her great grandmother water the plants in the morning.

I asked Art to get our family photos framed while I was gone and was happy to see them beautifully done.

Art said KC's dad was quite surprised to see his little daughter handling a power tool.

Art showed her exactly how to drill tiny holes for the eye hook on which the hanging wires would be strung.

He took these photos to prove she'd done it.

Eventually, I got used to KC helping with all sorts of chores.

Granted Tiffany said sometimes it takes quite a bit longer to get chores done when she's helping.

Still, I think we're all savoring these times hoping they continue into her teenage years.

And you know what?

KC did not break a single glass cup or plate during her entire stay.

I just wish she wouldn't grow up so fast!

Bloggers Learning From Each Other

I joined our weekly Zumba friends luncheon and learned from several others that they had also gotten that supposed call from Microsoft by someone with an Indian accent telling them that something was wrong with their computers.

Then I got a comment on Friday's post from theimarket saying: 

"Got a call like that from a 202 phone number. The scammer tried to make it sound like it's urgent and important for him to fix the problem. But I knew what he was up to and I hung up. I also reported the phone number to Callercenter.com to warn others."

I checked Callercenter.com and sure enough the number we got was listed.  Then I googled the same number and got all kinds of information with a whole lot of people who did do as the caller directed them which produced a lot of error messages on their computer.

I thought this information was very helpful!

Then I saw several website notices for that same number with a FACEBOOK webpage that looked like this!  Puh-leeease!  A computer doctor?  What they'll give you is more likely a virus!

They say their office is in the UK and they purport to be able to fix your computer. 

It's a scary world out there to think that a long poisonous arm from way across the ocean can come in and snaggle our computers if we're not careful.

As you and Art and everybody else has told me, let the answering machine take the message if we don't recognize the name on our caller ID.  Sheesh!

Another Telephone Scam!

An early morning call woke me a couple of weeks ago.

"Hello", I answered sleepily.

"Madam, I am calling from Microsoft to inform you that your computer has a malfunction in Windows that needs to be corrected."  This fellow had an Indian accent.

This jarred my brain awake.  Could it be?  Would Microsoft be calling everybody to tell them their computer has a problem?  I'd just gotten a new computer with  Windows 8.1.  Was there something to fix?   Should I call my techie son-in-law?  Should I call my brother?

After a few more replies, I realized it was a hoax and was furious.  I used my strongest teacher voice and told him, "Young man, you need to get an honest job. You should be ashamed of  yourself!  Stop this immediately" and hung up.

When I mentioned this episode to my brother, Dennis the other day, he laughed.  He said that when he got that call, he played along with the fellow for 15 minutes to see what he was up to and to lessen the scammer's time to call other potential victims.

The fellow told him to go to his computer and type in some numbers.  Dennis didn't, but said he voiced surprise at what was supposed to be on the screen.  The scammer said all the error messages that popped up could be fixed for a price.

Eventually, Dennis said the scammer realized he was being played with and said, "Bollocks!" and hung up.

Bollocks?  Who says, "Bollocks" in the US anyway?

There are so many of these horror stories going around these days, often targeted at seniors.  It's a scary world out there.

Please be careful.

POSTSCRIPT:  I'd already written this blog post when Art answered the phone and heard an Indian accent again.  I'd mentioned the phone call I'd gotten earlier so he was more prepared than me.

Art used a very local, rather uninformed accent to see what the fellow was really up to.

"What?  You say you're calling from Microsoft about a problem with my Windows?  What do you want me to do?

I should go to my computer?  But I can't.  My computer is in the other room.  No, the cord is too short.  Can you just tell me what to do and I'll do it?  No, I don't have a speaker phone.

Where are you calling from?

UK?  UK what?

England?  Really?  Can you tell me your name?  Ahhh... hello, Sam Smith.

How about I go to my computer turn it on and I call you back.  Can you give me your phone number?  OK, Let me write it down.  1/800-247-0830... So that's a direct number to you, Sam Smith?

Uhh oh... Have to go, it's my dinner time."

The phone call was much longer as the fellow tried over and over to get Art to our computer to type in whatever he was going to direct Art to do.

I was laughing so hard for half that call that Art was having a hard time keeping a straight tone of voice.

And if that fellow calls again?  Art says I should tell him I only have Apple computers.

Be careful, everybody!

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Pho Kapahulu

Ever since our trip to Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and Bangladesh in March-April, we've been on the look out for good pho.

Here's  description of photo from Wikipedia:

Pho is a Vietnamese noodle soup consisting of broth, linguine-shaped rice noodles, a few herbs, and meat.  Pho is a popular street food in Vietnam and the specialty of a number of restaurant chains around the world. It is primarily served with either beef or chicken. The Hanoi and Saigon styles of pho differ by noodle width, sweetness of broth, and choice of herbs. The origin of pho and its name is a subject of scholarly debate.    --Wikipedia

I've been taught that pho is correctly pronounced fah. 

After our chocolate lesson in Waikiki we decided to grab lunch in Kapahulu before picking up Mom who we'd dropped off at her sister's house for a very happy visit.  Auntie Grace enjoys cooking for Mom and Mom LOVES to eat Auntie Grace's food.  Auntie Grace is an amazing cook.

Art discovered Pho Kapahulu on Yelp with our smart phone.  It's a very small restaurant, but it had gotten good reviews.  Small family restaurants always remind Art of his parents' Sweet Shoppe.

Our friendly waitress and cook, (perhaps owner?) was adorable!  She also sells little tubs of very crispy cinnamon toast which we couldn't resist.

And the pho?

Excellent!  It really was!  We've tried pho at several places and they've never measured up to the ones we had in Vietnam.  This did.

This sweet lady asked us to please come back again.  We sure will!

Chocolate Candy!

I was surprised this year to get a Groupon for my birthday from our son, Keola.  The groupon was for a chocolate candy making lesson at Ricard Chocolat in Waikiki for two people.  Keola laughingly said it would give me something to blog about.

When I called to make the reservation, I learned that Ricard Chocolat is at the Queen Kapiolani hotel in Waikiki. I worked for a Japanese Travel Agency there during the summer while I was going to the University of Hawaii.  I hadn't been back since.  That old photo is one a tourist asked me to take with him.

Our travel agency used to have a table set up right there by the escalator.  I sat there answering questions as best as I could.


Here's just a little something about Queen Kapiolani of Hawaii.

Kapiʻolani was born December 31, 1834 in Hilo on Hawai'i Island to High Chief Kuhio Kalanianaʻole of Hilo and High Chiefess Kinoiki Kekaulike of Kaua'i, the daughter of King Kaumuali'i, last King of an independent Kauaʻi before its amicable cession to Kamehameha the Great. She was named Kapiʻolani, after her great-aunt High Chiefess Kapi'olani, who defied the goddess, Pele in the name of Christianity. Her name, Kapiʻolani, means "Rainbow or Arch of Heaven."

Ricard Chocolat is a small shop selling high end chocolates.  I was wondering how they could hold a chocolate cooking class in such a small space.

There was a Wisconsin family who was also part of our class.  They bought their lesson from Living Social.

We were shown what a cocoa pod looked like and tasted the beans.  It was crunchy and a little bitter.  I was surprised that I couldn't taste a stronger chocolate flavor.  It needed sugar.

Ricard Chocolat uses chocolate grown in Hawaii.  I didn't even know we had cocoa trees on Oahu.





We were able to choose the chocolate mold that we wanted for our chocolate pieces.






These plastic sheets were dyed with cocoa butter which would melt on to the bottom of our candy pieces.

The chocolate had already been melted and was poured onto the cool counter. We were then encouraged to moved it about to help cool it down.

I thought there would be some sort of thermometer to see if the temperature of the chocolate was at around 80 degrees F from the 115 degrees F it had been.  Nope.  We had to apply a bit of the chocolate to just below our bottom lip to test it.

Art then poured some of the chocolate into the mold and I scraped off the excess.

We then added marshmallows, nuts, bits of fruit and Oreos to decorate the tops of the chocolate pieces.  The chocolates were put in the refrigerator to cool further.  Meanwhile we got to taste a piece of chocolate from the candy counter.

Once cooled, they tapped the chocolate out of the mold and had us pack the morsels into plastic packages with a little ribbon to tie it.

 This was certainly a new, sweet experience for me and definitely bloggable!

Thank you, Keola! 

Do You Recline?

The news has been reporting some pretty terrible instances of airplane rage.  Aside from jet lag, the worst thing about travel these days (unless you are rich and can travel First Class) is the airplane ride.  Airlines are making more money in so many more uncomfortable ways.  They're charging extra for luggage, don't provide meals, charging for blankets?, etc. The absolute worst thing they're doing is putting more seats into cabins and giving you far LESS leg room.  It's sometimes a challenge to just get into your seat.

If someone in front of you reclines all the way, you have to recline a little too or you won't have room to move.  On long flights, I have to recline a bit if I'm to have any chance of dozing.  Now I hear that they've come up with devices being sold to attach to the seat back tray that would prevent the person in front from reclining at all. 

Apparently there was a woman who was so angered at this device being attached by the person in back that she threw water on him.

Ummm...now that's rather extreme.

I've not encountered that kind of rage by anyone yet on a flight, but maybe it will happen more now that airlines are packing people in like sardines for 5-10 hours.

OK... now I AM feeling a bit of a rage, but it's at the airline carriers who are only interested in how much more money they can squeeze out of people... literally.

Feeling More Secure

I'm departing a little from posting about our summer of family happenings just because other things have popped up in my brain.

I've been preoccupied with making an almost 100 page photobook for our granddaughter of their five week stay with us as well as our trip to Hokkaido, Japan for Mom.  It's consumed so much (if not all) of my computer time. 

I did want to share something I've learned and done to the Settings of my Blogspot (Blogger?) blog though.

A certain family member let me know that even though I purposely do not put our last name or pinpoint location to our home on my blog, when his name was googled, photos from my blog popped up... including baby photos I'd posted.  That was rather startling.

Blogger is Google.  Google has very strong web crawlers that search the web for information.  It's good in many ways, but if it's privacy you want... well...

So I searched my settings and went to Search preferences.  Then I disabled the robots.  There is a warning that doing this would cause search engines to ignore me.

Sure enough.  It's done that.  When my techie son-in-law, Ed was here, he was surprised that I actually managed to do this on my own.

Blogger friends can still find me on their side bars.  However, if someone in cyberspace were looking for a topic I may have written about... say melons... my blog won't pop up anymore.  And that's OK with me because it's connections with actual friends or potential friends I care more about.

Web crawler is also leaving my baby pictures alone.

The side benefit to all this for me is that I'm not getting spammed.  It's the strangest thing.  Spammers are also not able to find me.... for now. 

Yes, I'm rather sorry that people can no longer see what I may have written about a topic they're interested in, but privacy for those I write about are more important and that's the main thing.

I don't advocate everybody doing this.  I'm just saying it's something I've discovered and for now, it's working for me.

POSTSCRIPT:  Doggone!  Wouldn't you know it?  As soon as I wrote this post I did get a couple more spam messages anyway.  Still... it's only two... so far, in several months which amazes me.

KC's Wounded Knees

We did have a calamity when my granddaughter, KC and her parents were here last month.  KC was outside blowing soap bubbles with her dad and fell on her knees.  Art and I were not there at the time and came home to find a shaken father.  Ed just can't bear to see his little girl hurt.  Tiffany, however has been through all kinds of bumps and scrapes with her little brother when they were growing up.

KC's knees did look terrible!  Her left was a scratch that scabbed and eventually healed well.  This photo was taken almost a couple of weeks after the injury.

Her right was scary.  It seemed like the top epidermal layer had been completely scraped off.

I was ready to take her to the emergency room since Hawaii does have cases of flesh eating disease.

My daughter, Tiffany was calmer. 

She washed and put Neosporin on it.

Art and I have both been to the dermatologists to have some suspicious lumps removed on our faces and chest.  The Physician's Assistant (P.A.) and nurse said we should not put Neosporin on the healing skin.  They told us to put Vaseline on it instead and to not let it dry out too quickly. 

My son-in-law looked on line.  We all tried to figure out the best way to deal with this.  Neosporin or Vaseline?  Bandage or air dry?

We finally decided to put Vaseline on the injury and cover it for the first couple of days.  Then we periodically air dried it (with a dab of Vaseline) when we knew she would be in a cleaner environment. 

Each night, KC asked me to hold her while Tiffany cleaned her knees with soap and water.

Eventually the left scrape healed pretty well.  After more than a month we're not sure what the scarring will be on the right knee.

I asked Tif to send me a photo of what her knee looks like now.

Did we do the right thing?  I sure hope so.

But... what's that other band aid for?!?

It seems she scraped it on a loose screw.

Sigh....

Sugar Kissed

I'm going to take a little break from writing about our family happenings to tell you about this melon I've discovered.

I learn so much from the friends I spend time with in Zumba class.  I'd mentioned how we had Yubari melon in Hokkaido and how super sweet it was.  It was also super expensive.  Just buying one slice to share cost almost $4.00.

I told them that much as I love cantaloupes and honeydew melons, I  had a hard time judging if they would be sweet.  My Zumba friend, Chris said I should try Sugar Kiss melons.  "Trust me," she said.  "Once you try it, you'll never go back to the other melons."

Chris explained that I should press the navel side of the melon, not the stem.  If it feels a little soft, it's ready to eat.

Art and I saw it at the market and decided to give it a try.  Oh my gosh!  Chris is right!  It is the SWEETEST melon I've ever had in the U.S.

When mom ate the melon for dessert tonight, her face broke out in a surprised smile.  "This is just as sweet as the Yubari,"  she said.  "It's amazing!

OK, Chris also mentioned the Envy apple.  I looked for that too, but didn't see it.  I'll be keeping a look out.

POSTSCRIPT:  We did try the Envy apple.  They were very good, but we're not sure we're willing to pay so much more for the Envy when a good Fuji will do.  The Envy apple is crispier, but I'm not sure it's much sweeter.  We also tried the Honey Kiss and Summer Kiss melons, but they were not quite as good as the Sugar Kiss.