Tuesday, August 28, 2012

A vacation day with Isaac



A panini lunch treat for a stormy vacation day
When I woke up this morning, Husband Walter greeted me with, “This is going to be a vacation day.” That could mean a number of alternatives, all enjoyable. This time it meant a visit to Coffee Fusion.

Hubby and I have been scarfing up any information we could about Hurricane Isaac and preparing for the visit of such an unwelcomed visitor for the past few days. Hubby has done the heavy lifting. I have been in charge of staying out of his way and conducting any fretting that I deemed necessary.

As Isaac slowly eased westward, school districts on the Mississippi Gulf Coast announced school closures, usually for today and Wednesday. That meant Hubby was not waking up at 5 a.m. today to pilot a huge yellow school bus full of students on three different routes morning and afternoon.

Isaac’s promised rain and winds had not yet arrived. Sunshine was intermittent with cloudiness so we headed to the coffee shop a few blocks away for the first activity of our "vacation day." A good crowd of regulars was there, enjoying coffee and conversation. We settled in with our coffee, tea and computers.

Several guys from a “regulars” group dropped by our table with questions and observations about my stroke recovery. They volunteered that they would keep me on their churches’prayer lists.

 Another enriching encounter was catching up with Judy. She and I went to church together about 15 years ago when she was a single mom raising two bright little girls who had inherited her dark hair and eyes and her amiable, can-do spirit. I had not seen her in years. The unexpected opportunity for an update on her now-grown daughters, her remarriage and the births of two more youngsters now 10 and 8 was a treat.

Judy had pursued college studies while still a single mom. She recently completed a master’s in family counseling and is now interning at a local residential, faith-based drug and alcohol rehabilitation facility. I am so thankful for and proud of her and her determination, perseverance, and steadfast trust in God’s faithfulness to light her path. That there are parents and offspring like Judy and her family give me such a sense of hope.

We ended our Coffee Fusion visit with a panini lunch. Afterwards I watched and waited inside the coffee shop as Hubby hauled our computers out to our van for our departure. The moment he opened a door and put the computers in the van, a feeder band from Isaac arrived. I burst out laughing at what happened next. Sudden rain had dumped on my hubby in a near solid waterfall then eased to a drizzle.

He returned inside to collect me and to put up with some good-natured ribbing from other patrons who had witnessed that particular rain event. When we exited the van at home, there was no rain, but we were still under a hurricane watch as well as a tornado watch.

My vacation day delights continued with a not quite ready for prime-time rendition of the happy birthday song delivered via phone to grandson Nate, who celebrated his eighth birthday today.

In return I got an enlightening and fascinating education about the Legos of my grandchildren’s generation, including Lord of the Rings sets, dinosaur sets and more. Once the goodbyes ended, his mom Sarah and I spent awhile reminiscing about his one-year birthday party.
Grandson Nate

Thanks to Katrina the large cook-out and family celebration our daughter-in-law Sarah and son Walt had planned for Aug. 28, 2005, morphed into cake and ice cream with fellow evacuees at our evacuation site, my mother’s home in Hattiesburg, MS. Hubby and I had evacuated from the coast and Sarah and the boys joined us from their home nearby. Our son  was at the power company’s Hattiesburg command center.

The birthday boy didn’t seem to mind the small group. The next day Katrina arrived with fury, toppling a huge pine tree across the back of my mother’s home, including the bedrooms where Luke and Sarah were napping. We hustled the very pregnant Sarah, the little boys and my 86-year-old mother into a safer corner of the house. I suspect Nate’s birthday will always prompt me to whisper a thank-you prayer for the lives and well-being of loved ones. 

It is about 10:25 p.m. CST here; things seem calm; and we are waiting for what happens next!

Husband Walter posted more about Isaac here today. 

9 comments:

  1. i did not know where you are or that you are in the path of isaac, i do hope all is well with you. we are watching the storm on TV. i know you will post when you can. sorry you had to evacuate.

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  2. I know these storms are fearful having lived through a few of them in FL. However, I am staying focused on the rain which the Midwest sorely needs.

    Your lunch looks delicious. Enjoy your holiday. Your husband has a wonderful attitude. I think Walter could make any day sunny. Dianne

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  3. What a cute little boy Nate is! With a face like that, what could possibly go wrong? Stay safe and God bless!

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  4. Our daughter-in-law's b'day was the same day as your Nate's!

    I must say, you and Walter sure seem to know how to make the best of a bad situation :) Glad you enjoyed your vacation day, courtesy of "Isaac" :)

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  5. I've been wondering how you are doing with the storm. I hope you stay out of harms way. Stay safe. God bless!

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  6. Hearing from you today on my blog was good news. The scanner you asked about is the Epson Perfection V500 photo. I got it from Amazon for about $150. It took me a while to figure it out, but now it works like a charm as you can see. I am enjoying scanning old negatives, slides, photos, etc. Dianne

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  7. Dear LC, I hope you are all fine and there's no one in danger. I expect you have learned to live with hurricanes by and know how to protect yourselves.

    You have a very handsome grandson.

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  8. Hope you are done bailing.

    RYN: First: I use an older HP scanner because it has excellent fidelity. Just get the best one you can. It does make a difference. Second: I coonfess that I did scan all the older stuff, but now I am in the 2980's shots and find I have many on disc. Also, I made a decision when I got them to use some in albums. The rest aren't very important. It's amazing how much doesn't need to get scanned. Dianne is throwing her slides out, but I am giving everything to my eldest daughter. LOL I did ask her first. I have a tiny pile, marked with dates, that I might scan. Maybe. These from seven boxes. Amazing.

    Thanks for the note and reading me.

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  9. With havin so much content and articles do you ever run into any problems of plagorism or copyright infringement? My site has a lot of exclusive content I've either written myself or outsourced but it looks like a lot of it is popping it up all over the web without my authorization. Do you know any solutions to help protect against content from being ripped off? I'd certainly appreciate it. gmail log in

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