We are Family

Started off a gorgeous spring day with Chocolate-Chocolate Chip Pancakes and the Beatles on WOGL. "The Beatles' Break-Up" was the theme today, which mostly meant songs from The White Album, Let It Be, and Abby Road. Fine by me. The whole break-up thing got ugly, of course, but those are some of my favorite Beatles albums.

Called Mom after breakfast. We didn't talk for very long. She and Dad were planning on meeting Rose, Keefe, and me around 7:30 at Applebee's in Vineland, in front of the Cumberland Mall. They wanted to treat Rose and me to a birthday dinner, especially since Daddy hadn't seen us in a while.

I got in and out of work on time. Work wasn't bad today. It was busy all day, but never overwhelming, about par for a normal, non-football-season Sunday afternoon. We sold a lot of cakes and party food. In addition to a lot of sports action at this time of year (the Flyers just made the playoffs and the Phillies started last week), there's also many birthdays in April, including my own on Wednesday. There were no major problems, and my relief was on time (which, given he was one of the young men who are usually late coming from a second job, I appreciated).

Went straight home after work. I was going to do some work online until Rose and Keefe picked me up, but it was just too nice to sit inside for very long. I changed into shorts and a t-shirt and went for a walk in Newton River Park. It was a lovely day for it. The park was crowded with people boating, having picnics and birthday parties, walking dogs, pushing strollers, and riding bikes.

I worked a little on editing this month's role-play after I got back in. Rose said she and Keefe would pick me up around quarter of 6, but it ended up being more like quarter after 6. They'd gone to the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia to see something called "The Body Room," an exhibit about the human body. Thing was, all of the displays were taken from actual, preserved human bodies, some of which had been taken apart for the display. I understand that they were excited about it and it's helpful to science and nice to know how our bodies run...but it's kind of gross to hear people talk about it, especially half-way to going out to dinner.

They got so caught up talking, Rose missed the exit for the Cumberland Mall. She took the next one, which landed us in Millville. They turned Rose's GPS on to get us back on the right track. Thankfully, it didn't take us too long to figure out where we were going. Ironically, we arrived around quarter after 7-7:30, which is when we were originally going to meet in the first place.

We had a nice dinner. Mom and Dad were both in exceptionally good moods, and so were Rose and Keefe. Rose and Keefe had spent their Saturday joining Audubon's city-wide yard sale. They'd apparently made a tidy sum from it, too, including selling a stack of Rose's old law textbooks for somewhere between $50 and $60. Rose has been craving milkshakes and took Keefe to the best milkshake place around, the Pop Shop in Collingswood.

We shared an appetizer sampler and a bowl of spinach-artichoke dip. I had the Garlic Herb Chicken. Dad had a small strip steak. Rose had the Grilled Portobello Chicken. Keefe had a huge chicken Parmesan (he was the only one who couldn't finish his). Mom had the Fiesta Lime Chicken, though she claimed it was too spicy for her. Afterwards, everyone but me had coffee; I had tea.

Rose and I had a nice chat about her problems and mine going home. I don't often get to discuss my problems with many people who aren't a psychologist or a customer. Rose basically said that I need to be less hard on myself and more accepting, and that I need to push myself further and get past my fears. She says she's doing well with the pregnancy, after having put her foot down about Craig trying to push her into doing too much last month. She does have a man, two dogs, and a cat to take care of, not to mention trying to finish law school on top of it.

We're going to try to get together on Friday to pick a comforter for my birthday, which I really need.