Good News!
For no special reason, we just concluded a week with lots of visitors, just about all of them extended family. I counted up the total and got to 15 people. We didn't bunk them all overnight, thank heaven. When we get that many, it's time to pitch the tent in the garage.
I think there's a connection here to our meteorological friend, the seasonal fog. It works like this: we start every day with fog, which, I hasten to add, is not so thick or so low as to keep one from driving safely. The fog blocks our enemy, the sun, until it gently lifts in late morning. It's just over 60 degrees by noon, with light breezes that make it perfect to play tennis. The highs are generally short of 70 degrees, and we're all feeling great except for those poor folks with lousy circulation, who must still wear all kinds of protective winter gear.
About 15 months ago in this space (5/08) I told the story of little JR, the kid for whom I served as Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA). The good news is that he's been adopted by a family he's been with for just over a year. Raising him might not be a walk in the park, but it won't be boring, either. The new family has even agreed to keep me around as a kind of honorary uncle, a title I'm completely thrilled with.
The family had a challenge not encountered by most. For reasons I never asked, the parents had different last names. Add a son with yet another name and things could get confusing. Thus opened the issue - should we call ourselves something completely different and let future geneologists deal with it? And while we're at it, is there anything about "Kevin", "Sarah" and "Jason" that made them insufferable as well?
I wasn't in on the discussion, but according to Kevin, our boy Jason, who'll turn 10 next month, had some ideas. First off, he thought it would be cool to take on a new first name - "Snake". The new parents passed their first test by gently declining this request. Next item of business - new last name. Jason had a suggestion here, too - "Fite". Gosh knows kids today get hung with all sorts of creative names, but the local schools won't have a "Snake Fite" on their hands come fall. Somehow the new family settled on "Emmanuel" for a last name. I think they did fine. It doesn't sound ethnic (like "Shapiro", "Del Vecchio", or "Kuzhnetsov"), isn't hard to spell and places the family in the top fifth of the alphabet. It has a nice beat and you can dance to it, I mean, hooray for Kevin, Sarah and Jason Christopher Ryan Emmanuel!
I think there's a connection here to our meteorological friend, the seasonal fog. It works like this: we start every day with fog, which, I hasten to add, is not so thick or so low as to keep one from driving safely. The fog blocks our enemy, the sun, until it gently lifts in late morning. It's just over 60 degrees by noon, with light breezes that make it perfect to play tennis. The highs are generally short of 70 degrees, and we're all feeling great except for those poor folks with lousy circulation, who must still wear all kinds of protective winter gear.
About 15 months ago in this space (5/08) I told the story of little JR, the kid for whom I served as Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA). The good news is that he's been adopted by a family he's been with for just over a year. Raising him might not be a walk in the park, but it won't be boring, either. The new family has even agreed to keep me around as a kind of honorary uncle, a title I'm completely thrilled with.
The family had a challenge not encountered by most. For reasons I never asked, the parents had different last names. Add a son with yet another name and things could get confusing. Thus opened the issue - should we call ourselves something completely different and let future geneologists deal with it? And while we're at it, is there anything about "Kevin", "Sarah" and "Jason" that made them insufferable as well?
I wasn't in on the discussion, but according to Kevin, our boy Jason, who'll turn 10 next month, had some ideas. First off, he thought it would be cool to take on a new first name - "Snake". The new parents passed their first test by gently declining this request. Next item of business - new last name. Jason had a suggestion here, too - "Fite". Gosh knows kids today get hung with all sorts of creative names, but the local schools won't have a "Snake Fite" on their hands come fall. Somehow the new family settled on "Emmanuel" for a last name. I think they did fine. It doesn't sound ethnic (like "Shapiro", "Del Vecchio", or "Kuzhnetsov"), isn't hard to spell and places the family in the top fifth of the alphabet. It has a nice beat and you can dance to it, I mean, hooray for Kevin, Sarah and Jason Christopher Ryan Emmanuel!
posted by Mark at 3:45 PM
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