Twitter is super slow, so I'll say hi here.

Was just over at Twitter trying to catch up n'at and it was dreadfully slow. I would type a sentence and then watch my misspelled words appear on the screen.

Am in the very cold attic office at Kiki's, and the good smelling food is making me hungry. I'm going to have to snitch something very soon.

I'm thankful.

Being here is great for a million and one reasons, top of the list that Kiki is my favorite cousin. We're sort of sister-y, especially when we fight over what year World Cafe went off the air. You can sort of see the darts coming from our eyes and Kiki goes over to get her CD as proof that it was on the air in x year. Grin.

Kiki's house is 113 years old, and be-gorgeous. I hope to take pictures later. (My rechargeable batteries are charging as we speak.)

On the way over, before I got lost three times (or was it four?) I listened to the Fiddler on the Roof soundtrack, to get the image/sound of a non-musical production I saw last weekend out of my head. How I adore those songs. And they should be SUNG, not recited. GAH!

Yes, I got lost three times. First, I was in Denver (not Colorado) then I was in Allentown (not Billy Joel's version) at the Barnes & Noble, then I was on River Road, with no river in sight. Finally I got there, and if the Hallelujah chorus wasn't being played somewhere in heaven, it should have been. I promptly had my own glass of white wine and SUSHI, Kiki and HP's new pre-Thanksgiving dinner tradition. I like.

Being at Kiki's means there are pictures of her neice and nephew (my cousins once removed?) and pictures of my aunt (her mom) and uncle (her dad.) Plus, pictures of our Granny and Pop Pop, and things from Granny's apartment. I'll definately take a picture of the lamp.

While eating breakfast and drinking coffee, Kiki and I reminisced, which was nice. We have a shared history, but see it from different views. She said, I always try to figure out who is the nicest lady in the world, your mom or mine. We finally decided it was each other's aunts, because we bickered with our mothers.

Audio book to catch: Ruth Bell Graham's Pilgrim Journey. I don't generally like multiple voices on audio books but this was well done, and mostly narrated by Walter Cronkite. Babelbabe gave me the book ages ago, and I didn't realize they were linked until I started listening to the audio right as I got onto the Turnpike. Interviews with Patricia Cornwell were especially fun. (Patsy wrote the first biography of RBG.)

Hearing the story of Ruth and Billy and their courtship and then marriage of course made me think of who he might be, my match, later underscored as I sang along with "Matchmaker, matchmaker, make me a match, find me a find..." This morning I journaled about "Great men in my life" (dating-wise) and discovered that I have mostly forgiven Tony, my first beau, when I was 17. What a disaster we were. He was such a player, I had no idea--we were the blind leading the blinded. But he was the first boy to pay attention to me, and I do have some good memories. I wish I had my copy of "Story of a Girl" by Sara Zarr here, oh wait, I quoted the lines in my email to her. Hold the phone.

This is what I wrote to her:

"Love love love the line on p. 181, "I thought about it. He'd apologized, and I believe he meant it. I could look at him and not hate him." No wait, it starts on 166, when Deanna says "I don't hate you anymore...Something about you still pisses me off, but I don't hate you." It was weird, like a part of me was gone.

I'm still working on my crap, but I don't hate "my Tommy" anymore. I haven't seen him since I was 17, and in a few days, I'll be 37. I know I wouldn't like to run into him, but I know I'd be able to pull it off if I had to, and mean it, that I didn't hate him."

So even now, less than a week later, I'm able to smile when I think of him. What fools we were. What love does is cover a multitude of sins, and I'm talking about the love that exists in my life today, allowing me to cover the losses of the past.

I would love to go more into that, craft this post, but I am freezing and hungry. So I'll hit publish after I give this a quick look over and link it up.

Happy Thanksgiving!!