Must Be May - 2019 - The Mother's Day Adventure

I've said many times that I am not a pet person.  When the kids were little they clamored for a dog.  My standard statement was "When you can care for your inanimate objects (toys, keeping their rooms clean, chores, etc.) then you can get a dog.  Fortunately for me that worked.  Even though my husband had owned animals in the past, he respected my wishes and we never had pets until about 10 years ago when he brought home a stray cat that had befriended him at work.  That was "Whisper" and I tolerated her because she really didn't need much attention.  She mostly ignored me and while I did feed her, I didn't go out of my way much to interact.  She was around for about 5 years or so and then got sick and we had to put her down. 

Not long after came Tiger (although my husband called her "Puppy" because she followed him around like a dog would).  She was also not a lot of trouble because she was an indoor/outdoor cat so we had no litter in the house and she pretty much came in to eat and sleep and then roam outside during the day.  Again, I hardly had much interaction with her except for the times that my husband was away.  Then she would come and sleep on the end of the bed at night.  Last week we had to put her down too after a mysterious illness/injury.  Suddenly she couldn't walk and her tail wasn't moving.  When she started losing control of her bladder there weren't many options. 

I didn't think that it would matter to me and yet I found myself looking for her on our bed or in her favorite spots in the house and I realized that there was something missing.  I also realized that all the objections I had to having a pet were no longer valid since the kids were adults and obviously handling their own lives.  I didn't want another cat though.  I thought that a dog would fit with our lifestyle now and may even help me lose a few pounds if I had to go walk it so for Mother's Day I decided that I wanted the family to go find a dog.  My husband was still a little reserved but told me that if that is what I wanted, go ahead, he'd wait at home.  Our son wanted me to pick a big dog but I knew I couldn't handle a large, slobbery animal and I didn't want a Pitbull or anything like that. 

The people at the Peninsula Humane Society were so very helpful and let us sit with a couple of dogs to see which one would fit our family.  We sat in a room and had the dogs brought to us.  We liked the first one right away but saw both of them just to be sure.  May I present Benedict Hunter Miles (Benedict for Benedict Cumberbatch because I love his portrayal of Sherlock Holmes and Hunter for the baseball player Hunter Pence because he is one of our favorite players).

This is a picture my family thought they would NEVER see!

He is a Terrier mix of some sort and is about 3 years old.  He is so friendly and calm (although maybe the fact that he was neutered just 3 days ago makes a difference in that regard).  He came right to us and although the Humane Society had named him Shorty, when we started calling him Benny he reacted right away.  Now he has just about taken over our living room but we are getting used to each other pretty quickly. 

So there you have my Mother's Day Adventure.  Hope you had a great one too!  

A to Z Challenge - 2016

V is for Venue

We are very fortunate to live in an area with quite a few different venues at which to see our favorite performers.

A bit to the northeast of us is Concord Pavillion.  We have only gone to a few concerts there since we have to drive and it can take an hour or more to get there.  It was, however, the venue at which that first concert was when I won the tickets.  That story is here under R for Radio.  As is usual with venues these days, Sleep Train bought naming rights so they sometimes call it Sleep Train Arena.

Just across the San Francisco Bay is Oracle Arena, home of the Warriors basketball team.  We live close enough to the BART terminal so that we can hop on a BART train and leave the driving to them.  It is just a short walk from the station to the Arena and by doing that we don't have to pay for parking or deal with the stress of traffic crossing the bridge.  A most exciting thing happened there when we met Journey guitarist Ross Valory while we were seeing Bob Seger.  He was in the Club area and he very graciously came over and talked to us and took a few pictures with my husband and I.  He even gave me his autograph.  What a thrill.  We have tickets to see the Who there next month.  That is the start of our season.

We also live close to the train station and we can hop on the train and get to AT&T Park, home of the San Francisco Giants.  We have seen the Giants many times and have been to concerts there to see Sir Paul McCartney and most recently ACDC.  We were on the field for that concert and my husband was able to grab a handful of the outfield dirt where his favorite Giant, Hunter Pence, plays!  We will be seeing the San Francisco Fest there later this year with Journey, Santana and the Doobie Brothers, reminiscent of the old Day on the Green type concerts.  

 

In Hunter Pence territory

To the south of us are three more venues.  The first is Shoreline Amphitheater.  We have seen quite a few concerts there.  It has a large canopy like a circus tent under which are most of the seats, but they also have a lawn area where you can sit and have a picnic.  I prefer the closer seats.  We saw Heart there one year and just as they started to sing the song Reign O're Me, a Who cover, it started to rain!  It was magical.  This year we are seeing Def Leppard and REO Speedwagon there.

Rain falling during Reign O're Me

Next is SAP Center, home of the San Jose Sharks hockey team.  We have seen lots of shows there as well.  We will be seeing Sting and Peter Gabriel there for the Rock, Paper Scissors tour.  We've never seen either of them so it should be great!

Last but certainly not least is the Mountain Winery in Saratoga.  We first went to the Winery in 2007 and the next year they did a remodel of the concert area.  Since then we have seen two or three shows a year there at least and last year it was four, giving us the "Loyalty Club" benefits this year.  We managed to get front row seats last year to see Pat Benatar and my husband was able to bump fists with Neil Giraldo.  That was a real neat experience for him.  I tried to take a picture but he was standing right in front of me.  This year we will be seeing them again along with shows by Boston, Foreigner and Peter Frampton.

Fist bump with Neil Giraldo

And those are just the bigger venues.  We are also close to San Francisco and have gone to Cobb's Comedy Club to see Ben Bailey (The Cash Cab guy) and Roseanne Barr; to the Curran Theater to see Jersey Boys; the Orpheum to see Rain, the Beatles tribute and the Warfield to see Ron White.  

As I said, we are very lucky to be able to have such a wide variety of venues so close at hand.  I definitely have my work cut out for me with scrapbooking all of these special events!  

How about you?  Have any special venues close to you or do you have to travel to see shows?  Only 4 more letters to go!!!  Visit the A to Z Challenge center to see how other members are doing!

2016 Reading Challenge

March 8 -- Book Five!

It didn't take me long to read the book "Night."  It probably could have been read in a day but I usually only read before I go to sleep so it took a little longer.  I also didn't realize until I was posting my completion of the book onto Goodreads that the book is actually the first in a trilogy.  "Dawn" and "Day" follow.  I'll have to put them on my to-read list.  Not so sure I can take any more depressing stories at this point.

However, for now, Book Five is going to be...

"The Summer That Saved Baseball."

This is the story of the two Stanford grads who decided to take a road trip and see a game at all 30 major league ballparks.  That is our goal for when we "retire" and I remember reading about Brad and Dave when they were on the trip in 1998.  They were under some time constraints and made the trip in 38 days!  When Bill and I go, we will not be so limited in our time frame and it may even take more than one season, but I wanted to read this to get some ideas.  Also, since the book was written, several of the old ballparks have been torn down and rebuilt.  

Brandon Crawford

We've actually already been to three parks together (four if you count Candlestick, which has since been demolished), AT&T, Oakland Coliseum and Anaheim Stadium, where we went on our honeymoon in 1984.  Bill has also been to Dodger Stadium.  I'm looking forward to seeing the home of the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Hunter Pence

There have been others who have made the pilgrimage I'm sure.  I know of one couple who went to every one of the Giants games, both home and away a few years ago.

 It takes a lot of planning and organization, but that's what I'm good at.  I think we may even need to get passports if we go to the stadiums in Canada!  I figure I have a few years to get the logistics down, but it will be interesting to see what the boys had to say about their experiences.  They even went to the "Field of Dreams," Cooperstown and a couple of other notable spots.

Since baseball season is about to start, I thought it would be the perfect time to read this book.  I'm going to use it to fill my book about a road trip category.


Are you ready for some baseball?