I think of this time of year — late May into early June — as the days of honeysuckle and roses. People’s roses are out in full bloom, and I’ll just be walking along somewhere and catch the scent of honeysuckle, and sure enough, there will be a patch somewhere nearby.
This was a fairly relaxing long weekend as these things go. On Friday I went to visit my parents in New Jersey and then went to Princeton Reunions. It is not a major reunion year for me, but the fun of Reunions is that it doesn’t need to be. My class had a happy hour, and I met a friend for dinner, so I caught up with a reasonable number of people. However it was very, very cold, and Reunions is outside so I was back in my car by 10 p.m. to head home.
Saturday featured various kid lessons and hair cuts but one highlight was going biking with my husband and 10-year-old. We were loading the bikes into the cars in late afternoon and it started pouring down rain, but it looked like the rain would pass so we drove about 20 minutes to the trail and, sure enough, the rain stopped. We had an absolutely beautiful 8 mile ride, and I think the 10-year-old really liked it, so this is likely something we will do again.
Sunday I went back to New Jersey, this time with the whole family, to a cookout to celebrate my niece finishing her PhD. She is going to be teaching engineering at Wake Forest University, so this is all very exciting. My entire family was there — mom, dad, both brothers, their wives, my older brother’s three kids — plus all 7 of us. This doesn’t happen too frequently, so hey, a family reunion too.
We hadn’t been entirely sure what we were doing Monday. We’d talked about going into NYC and either going to the Bronx Zoo or the American Museum of Natural History, but the kids kind of rebelled about driving 2+ hours each way. So I did a long run in the morning and then we went to the Franklin Institute in the afternoon, and saw “The Body” exhibit, alongside other things. We were home in time to go in the pool and then out to dinner as a family at our favorite Mexican place. Now that my youngest is almost 5.5, this was reasonably relaxing (full disclosure: the two little boys wind up on screens by mid-meal so the rest of us can interact). A milestone for sure!
Now I need to keep reminding myself that it is Tuesday and not Monday. I did decide to make tonight pasta night — normally Monday is, but we didn’t do pasta yesterday, and this tends to be a family favorite so… pasta it is. I hope everyone had a good long weekend!
Also, May 27, 2010 was the publication date for 168 Hours — 15 years ago today! Back then books came out on Thursdays (they now come out on Tuesdays). So I am wishing that book a happy book birthday.