Walking In Woodcrest

Started off the morning with breakfast and Little Bear. Little Bear, Duck, and Emily accidentally go "Rafting On the River" when their raft breaks free and heads downstream. Cat, Duck, and Owl race them to see whether land or water are the fastest ways to travel. "Little Bear's Kite" was made by him and Grandfather Bear on a fine windy day. Little Bear has fun imagining all the places it can fly too, until it runs into another kite...one that happens to be attached to a familiar friend. It's the "Night of the Full Moon." After Father tells Little Bear the story of monsters that appear during the full moon, they pretend to be monsters and try to scare Mother Bear. Mother, however, knows what the full moon can do to people and bears...

Headed out after the cartoon ended. Rode straight to the Collingswood PATCO. Fortunately, the train to Woodcrest arrived not more than 8 minutes after I sat down. The train wasn't busy at all. I think there were two other people going there with me. 

I got a very big shock when I got off. The Woodcrest PATCO station is twice the size of the ones further up the line. There was ample seating inside and out, a long row of ticketed swing doors, and someone was even in the ticket booth. I have never once in the 20 years I've lived here seen someone actually selling tickets in the Collingswood booth. It was even nice outside...at least until you turned towards the street, where they seemed to be doing exterior and track work. I had a hard time just finding my way out of the sprawling parking lot. 

As it turned out, the bridge over the train tracks did have sidewalks. I was easily able to walk over them, passing corporate buildings and towering luxury apartment buildings. I was surprised to see sponge manufacturer Scrub Daddy's offices in another building. I had no idea they were a local business. They're sold pretty much everywhere around here, from Dollar General to Target to the Acme. Passed them, then went by tall pine trees and a leaning sidewalk that went around the Cherry Hill Fire Hall. Thank heavens Haddonfield-Berlin Road was the only traffic-laden street I encountered on this trip. I tried to be careful crossing, especially given it was past noon by the time I did. 

Passed by a green-roofed shopping center for the time being, continuing down Browning Lane. Fortunately, the Centura Condominium complex wasn't even a block from the shopping center. Centura is a gated community, so I couldn't walk around the outside like I did elsewhere. I did see two kinds of buildings through the wrought-iron fences. One half the complex buildings were more like generic 70's townhouses. The other half were older, probably from the 50's, with a Spanish theme complete with cream-colored stucco walls. There was a sunken-in brick area with a charming fountain in front of the guard house. 

As far as I could tell, everything was very clean and well-maintained. The balconies sported either porch furniture and small grills or potted plants, no junk. I did hear there's a pool and tennis courts. Couldn't get around to the back to see what the trash areas were like. The lawns were spacious and velvety green, except for under the towering pine trees near the front. The rest of the neighborhood were the 60's and 70's tract houses that seem to be typical construction through most of Cherry Hill. I was a little annoyed that only the house side of the street had sidewalks. While Browning Lane wasn't mega-busy, it wasn't a quiet country road, either.

Backtracked to the Woodcrest Shopping Center after I saw all I could of Centura. This looks almost identical to the Plaza at Cherry Hill before it's recent makeover, a 70's-era outdoor mall with a green roof. Dunkin' Donuts was one out parcel. The other was an escape room that was definitely housed in a former Rite Aid/Eckards. I was so hot, I grabbed a tasty and sweet SunCloud Coconut Limeade at Dunkin's before deciding I was hungry enough for lunch.

I ate at Asad's Hot Chicken. They looked like a more colorful Crown Chicken and Gyro with an all-chicken menu. I went with two sliders with Cole slaw and pickles, fries, and a Sprite Zero. The girl said she gave me mild, but...yow! It wasn't mild at all! It was way too spicy for me! I did manage to eat one slider, but I couldn't finish the other. Too bad the fries were covered in spices, too. The ones I dug around for without them were really good. They were nice, but I don't think I'll be eating there again. Next time I'm in the area, I'll go to the pizza place across the street.

Explored a few other stores in the mall. Bought a gift card for my nephew Skylar's birthday and a box of Orange Cream cheap hydration mix at Dollar Tree. Wandered around an Asian Indian market, admiring the unique fruits, vegetables, candies, and baked goods. Peeked at Top Deck Games, a card and board game store. Most of their stock was overpriced, which was a shame. They had some nifty stuffed Pokemon. I saw a Strawberry Shortcake Candy Land game that I may see if I can pick up somewhere cheaper along the line.

After I left Top Deck Games, I started back...but I was thirsty again, and I really had to go to the bathroom. It was windy, cool, and cloudy, but also thickly humid. I asked two nice ladies sitting at a picnic table where the coffee shop in one of the corporate buildings was. I'm just glad no one called me on not belonging there. I bought a very tasty matcha latte from the dark and tan wood Terry's Cafe. Found the bathrooms not far from the nifty modern lounge area, with its soft dark blue velvet seats and weird chairs made of blue cloth straps and blue and orange wire flowers on the walls. 

Thankfully, I had no trouble after that. I ducked out of the bathroom and returned to the bridge. Spotted a set of concrete steps with yellow railings that went down to the parking lot. Once again, I got lucky and didn't have to wait long for a train. Took an only slightly busier train to Collingswood, then took my bike home.

Listened to the soundtrack from Mrs. Brown, You've Got a Lovely Daughter as I got organized. I reviewed the movie two years ago, and found that it's a charming British MGM musical wrapped up in a vehicle for Peter Noone and Herman's Hermits. You get that sense here as well. In addition to the hit title song and "There's a Kind of Hush," we have the sales pitch "Lemon and Lime" and "The World Is For the Young" as Stanley Holloway, Sheila White, and Marjorie Rhoades discuss how the youth think they know everything about love. 

Switched to Descendants: Wicked Wonderland next. I go further into the latest movie in the Disney Channel fantasy crossover series at my Musical Dreams Movie Reviews blog.

Musicals On TV - Descendants: Wicked Wonderland

Watched Match Game '76 during dinner and after a much-needed shower. Lee Merriweather spent a lot of the week sporting a wig with luscious auburn locks. The others spent it answering questions about what beauty queens do when they get older.

Finished the night at the Roku Channel for The Rockford Files. "The Dark and Bloody Ground" is the first time lawyer Beth (Gretchen Corbett) hires Jim for a case. Here, she convinces him to help a woman accused of her husband's death in a fire accident. Turns out not only was her husband not who he claimed to be, he was the writer of a best-selling book that's being made into a movie. Jim and Beth have to dodge killers taking pot shots and trying to run them off the road when she discovers a loop hole that will allow a company to own the rights to a book if the author's dead. 

Shelter From the Storm

I didn't sleep well last night. I spent the entire time tossing and turning. I didn't sleep until 8:30 in the morning, and then for only two hours. I'd already had my breakfast by the time I met Lauren in the front room. I had no trouble getting a ride to the Maple Shade Goodwill. The driver came in 8 minutes and dropped us off in 15 minutes. 

We did start off at the relatively small Goodwill about two blocks from the Moorestown Mall. Lauren didn't get anything here. I finally found something I've been looking for. I wanted a better drink bottle to bring to school and on my bike, but the thinner metal one I was using got dented in my basket, and the heavier ones tend to be ridiculously overpriced. I found a lovely white and green lilac print that was heavy metal and only cost me $3.99.

It was just starting to shower lightly when we made our way down Route 38 to the shopping centers surrounding the Moorestown Mall. We started off at their massive Old Navy. I didn't find anything here, but Lauren got a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles t-shirt, apparently the last they had in the store. She and a gentleman coming in admired each other's t-shirts as he told us about his class' project that used Mario characters. 

The showers picked up significantly as we put up our umbrellas and headed to Cava for lunch. This is basically "Mediterranean Chipolte." Lauren had a massive pita sandwich. I had a Create Your Own Bowl with "super" greens, grilled chicken, hummus, brown rice, cucumber, sumac slaw, and strawberry vinaigrette. The baked salted pita wedges that came with the meal were delicious, flaky and chewy. Half the fun of coming here is mixing and matching their sodas and juices. I made my own Blueberry Lavender Zero with their diet soda and blueberry lavender lemonade. 

By the time we made our way down the parking lot and across the street to Ross, the storms were out in full force. Our umbrellas were dripping when we finally arrived. I didn't find anything I wanted. Lauren ended up getting two more pairs of shorts. I suggested getting drinks at Shop Rite to wait out the storm, but...as Lauren discovered when she pulled up the radar on her phone, there was no "waiting out the storm." They'd be lingering for several hours. We just hiked back to the Moorestown Mall and got wet.

With construction on the new arcade over there having stalled, there isn't a whole lot to do at the Moorestown Mall proper. The new Cooper Hospital branch doesn't seem to have increased foot traffic or reversed the vacancy rate. We did look at Hot Topic, Go! Calendars and Games, Home Sense, and Boscov's. Lauren found a very pretty pair of workout shorts at Boscov's, but all I did was go to the bathroom. 

We finally decided that we'd just have dinner early. We both got slices from Brooklyn Pizza at the food court. She had pepperoni and mushroom. I had margarita (basil and mozzarella) and mushroom. While she used the bathroom, I got a wonderfully sweet coconut cream water ice from Rita's. 

Our last stop was the huge Barnes and Noble in the East Gate Shopping Center. Thank heavens the rain took a temporary leave of absence when we were walking over there, allowing us to arrive dry. Lauren didn't get anything, but I picked up Curiosity Thrilled the Cat by Sofie Kelly and three CDs, two on good sales:

The soundtrack from the 1989 Batman film

The Best of Bond...James Bond, a 2-disc collection of title songs up to No Time to Die (I do have a Bond CD set, but it only goes up to License To Kill. Oh, and all soundtrack CDs were 20 percent off.) 

Weird Al Yankovic - Dare to Be Stupid

I joined Lauren up front just as the storms returned in full force. Between the storms and it being 5:30 and rush hour, it took me so long to get an Uber driver, I canceled the first attempt, went to the bathroom, then tried again. It didn't cost me any less, but I did finally get us a ride who turned up in far less than the listed 16 minutes.

After we got in and put everything away, Lauren and I spent the next two hours playing dominoes and Pokemon Yahtzee. The dominoes is a typical black and white dot set I think I bought at a yard sale over a decade ago. Pokemon Yahtzee is an old family favorite. It originally belonged to Keefe. He, Mom, and I played it all the time in the late 90's-early 2000's. I walloped Lauren at dominoes 4 wins to 2. Lauren just beat me at Yahtzee.

Finished the night watching Girls! Girls! Girls! at Paramount Plus. I go further into the Elvis Presley vehicle that introduced "Return to Sender" at my Musical Dreams Movie Reviews blog. 

Girls! Girls! Girls!

The Blacktop Bash

Began the morning with breakfast and Spidey and His Amazing Friends. I know this show is popular with the kids at Thomas Sharp, and with superheroes on my mind, I thought I'd give it a look. "Spidey to the Power of Three" has Peter Parker, aka Spider Man, reminding his friends Miles Morales, aka Spin, and Gwen Stacy, aka Ghost Spider, that they all need to work together to stop Rhino from stealing gold coins and get back before his Aunt May brings home ice cream. Peter learns "Panther Patience" when he helps Black Panther recover a piece of vibranium stolen by a female Doc Octopus at a local museum.

Went to the special Spidey and Iron Man: Avengers Team Up! next. From what I can tell, this is a crossover between Spidey and His Amazing Friends and the spin-off Iron Man and His Awesome Friends. Peter joins the Avengers, including Iron Man Tony Stark, Black Panther, Captain America, and super-stretchy Ms. Marvel, to stop the Green Goblin and Ultron from teaming up to wreck havoc on New York's machines and make them all do what they want.

Changed the Cabbage Patch Dolls into summer outfits while the cartoons were on. Dulcie, the girlier doll with the long red yarn hair, wears a red plaid shirt with ruffled sleeves and a boat print on it and jean shorts with plaid bow trim. Tomboy Carrie with the short yellow yarn curls got a bright blue sailor romper. 

Left for Thomas Sharp around 11:55. I called Uber this time. Though it was sunny, I wasn't sure what the weather was going to do. Not to mention, there was the Blacktop Bash later. There wouldn't be anywhere for me to park the bike. The driver going there picked me up in 8 minutes. The one going home came in 7. No problems either way, and I was right on time.

We started off with 18 kids today, 8 at my table. We didn't have that many for long. Many of their parents came in the first hour. Some of them didn't last through lunchtime. For those who did, I read "Goofy, Movie Star" from Storyland and several shorts from Richard Scarry for them. I brought the old Mickey Mouse Memory game that belonged to my brother Keefe when he was their age and broke it out before we went outside. I played with two boys and a girl. The younger boy did by far the best. He had quite a memory! He had twice as many as anyone else before the head teacher announced it was time to clean up, because we were going to the playground.

I'm glad that it was hot, humid, and blustery today, but it never rained. Considering it's supposed to rain all day on Monday, this may be the last chance we have to take the kids out during the current school year. There were only 10 kids left by the time we all made it out there, enough that they could all swing right away. I kept an eye on those swinging while the boys chased after the stuffed Spider Man one of them brought and wrestled with it and each other. We finally brought them inside when it started to get too hot and humid and they began to set up for the Blacktop Bash.

There were two younger kids left when we all went back inside, but I stayed anyway. The head teacher had to leave early, and the afternoon teacher for the older kids couldn't come at all. We did try to go back outside to the playground, but it was brief. There were too many older kids out there who weren't with Healthy Kids. I watched the older kids make snakes with Play Doh, read Richard Scarry stories, and played another round of Mickey Mouse Memory with two kindergartners and a first-grader. This time, the kindergarten girl got by far the most matches. I finally left at 5:15, when they were down to five older kids and the younger kids were long gone.

The Blacktop Bash was in full swing when I got off. Fortunately, the line wasn't long at all. I paid my $6 and got in with no problems. There were three food trucks, a bake sale and pizza table, a table selling Thomas Sharp merchandise, a tent for the kids to have their faces painted, and tables and tables of raffles. I left the raffles to the families and had dinner from the trucks instead. I got a tasty, if messy, cheese steak quesadilla from the Mexican food booth (their specialties also included fried macaroni and cheese balls), then sat down for dinner at one of the many tables set up while chasing my napkins, which all blew away in the wild wind. Cooled off after that with a Pina colada shaved ice from the Kona shaved ice truck. Said "hi" to several of the kids from the after-school program and their parents, then watched kids run around and play games near the entrance to the cafeteria.

Oh, and the kids are so sweet. One of the girls and her parents gave me a $20 gift card to Dunkin' Donuts for taking good care of their daughter all year long. A boy and his family gave me a $20 gift card to WaWa and a card he made himself. I've never felt so appreciated. The kids may drive me crazy when they're together, but I love them all individually.

Finished the night at home with Killer Diller on Tubi. I go further into this tuneful B-movie from the late 40's with an all-black cast that includes Nat "King" Cole and Moms Mabley for Junteenth tomorrow at my Musical Dreams Movie Reviews blog.

Celebrating Juneteenth - Killer Diller

Thanksgiving With the Family

Began the morning with the Thanksgiving material in the Colliers Harvest of Holidays anthology. The long piece for Thanksgiving is a story about a Pilgrim grandmother relating her memories of the first Thanksgiving to her family. There's also several hymns and poems, including "Over the River and Through the Woods."

The original book version of Molly's Pilgrim is pretty close to the half-hour special that debuted in 1985. The biggest difference is it's likely set in what I suspect to be the early 1900's. Elizabeth, the girl who bullies Molly, has long black ringlets rather than straight blonde hair, they go a little more into Molly and her family being Jewish, and Molly doesn't get extra help for English after school. It's still a sweet and charming story, though, a reminder that "pilgrims" continue to search for religious freedom even today.

There's a short story in the Disney Storybookland anthology called "Pilgrim's Party." Mickey takes Minnie, Donald, and Pluto to Plymouth, Massachusetts for a real old-fashioned Thanksgiving dinner. It's all fun and Pilgrim cosplay, until Pluto steals the turkey!

Changed and had breakfast while watching the Philadelphia Thanksgiving Parade. They've gone through a couple of different sponsors through the years. The current sponsors are ABC and Dunkin' Donuts, the latter of whom had an extremely pink donut float in the parade. The only balloon I saw in the air was Clifford the Big Red Dog. There was a modern Netflix Strawberry Shortcake, but I think she had deflated by the time they showed her on the broadcast, because she seemed to be laying down. I saw an Acme float, too, appropriately based around a cornucopia bursting with harvest produce. 

Thank heavens this was broadcast for free on WPVI 6's website. The Macy's Parade is the exclusive domain of Peacock online, but it was more fun to see what Philly did for Thanksgiving anyway. A huge tap group did an enormous number with dozens of kids all tapping together. We had songs from the stage Beauty and the Beast and Here's Love (under the title Meredith Wilson's Miracle On 34th Street: The Musical). The Four Tops, Jordan Sparks, and a group called Cameo performed their hits. There were marching bands from as far away as Indiana. Unlike Macy's parade, which ends with the arrival of Santa, the Philly parade ended with a huge number that included the tap dancers, the All-American Cheerleaders, Santa, and piles of confetti.

Called Mom while the parade was on. We weren't able to chat for very long. She was making pies for my brother's Thanksgiving dinner. Keefe insisted on making the rest of the dinner, including the turkey (though his wife Julia was apparently in charge of the sweet potatoes). There had been a few problems when Elijah came out, but he's as healthy as any darling baby ever born now.

Switched to two delightful Thanksgiving specials from the 1980's after the parade ended. I go further into the charming Paul Fusco puppet show A Thanksgiving Tale at my Musical Dreams Movie Reviews blog.

Thanksgiving Short Subject Special - A Thanksgiving Tale

The 1985 Molly's Pilgrim won an Oscar for Best Live-Action Short Subject that year...and richly deserved it. The story is now reset in the mid-80's. Molly is a young Jewish girl from Russia whose family came to a small Midwestern town in search of religious freedom. Molly is still bullied by children who envy her gymnastics abilities and don't understand her accent or her Borscht lunches. She's upset and feels out of place, especially after her mother makes a clothes pin Pilgrim that looks more like a traditional Russian peasant than the usual Pilgrim. Molly's teacher finally explains to the class that Molly's mother is right - pilgrims still exist today, and they come to America for the same reason the ones at Plymouth Rock did. As her classmate Arthur said, it does take all kinds of pilgrims to make a Thanksgiving.

Since I had food to carry and I wasn't sure how late I was going to be at Rose's, I walked to her house. It was a gorgeous day for it. Yesterday's off-and-on clouds had given way to a beautiful, sunny, if chilly afternoon. It was in the 40's, cold, but really more in line with what it should be during late November.

I was greeted at the door by Rose's two dogs Cider and Oreo barking their hellos. Jessa had already arrived (in fact, she texted me earlier to ask which house was Rose's) as the Green Bay Packers-Detroit Lions game began. It was just Rose, Craig, 8-year-old Finley, 15-year-old Khai, and Jessa this year. Craig's mother apparently went up to New England to visit his brother. 

Jessa played Dinosaur Bingo with Finley and Khai while Craig and I watched the game and we all had appetizers from three huge trays. One tray had sliced vegetables and dip. One had sweet goodies - donut holes, my pumpkin bread, blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, pomegranates (Finley ate most of those - she apparently loves them), Danish butter cookies. There were also bowls of chips and pretzels and a yummy shrimp cocktail.

(Oh, and the Packers did very well against the Lions, who are no slouches themselves. The Packers would run and get a touchdown, then the Lions would get one. In the end, the Packers finally outran them 31-24.)

It was well into the Kansas City Chiefs-Dallas Cowboys game before dinner was ready. Rose apparently forgot to put the turkey in early! Jessa left before dinner, but the rest of us sat down to turkey, ham, green beans with bacon and crispy onions, mashed potatoes. cubed orange and purple sweet potatoes, canned cranberry sauce, tossed salad, and rolls. Oh, yum! The two meats looked like they belonged on the cover of a food magazine or the main page of a food website. The turkey was so juicy, I saw Rose cleaning up turkey juice she'd spilled (with the help of the dogs). Even the white meat was moist and tender. The ham was almost as good.

(The Chiefs-Cowboys game didn't go nearly as well. Their game was also close and well-played, but the Cowboys just managed to push ahead at the end 31-28.)

While Khai disappeared into his "office" (a tiny storage area where he plays computer games) and Craig and Rose prepared dinner, Finley and I played something called Zingo. You get a board containing small words, like what, the, she, if, and or (along with the numbers two and three). Someone pushes a lever that makes two yellow chips with words on them slide out of a slot. You have to grab the word before the other person does to fill your card. I did win a few games, but not only was Finley faster, I was tired and couldn't really focus on where the words were.

It wasn't until almost 7 when Rose and Craig brought the sweets tray back out, along with pumpkin pie, apple pie, vanilla ice cream, and home-made whipped cream. Finley and I both went for pumpkin pie with whipped cream. (In fact, I think Finley mainly had whipped cream. There might have been pumpkin somewhere under the enormous mounds of white fluff on her plate.) Khai insisted that he wasn't a fan of pies, so he had a root beer float instead. 

Finley and Craig brought drove me and a huge bag of leftovers home around 8. I went straight online and into the annual Match Game Productions Thanksgiving marathon. This year's theme was "personal favorite episodes of the channel's owner." The marathon started much earlier, but I did get to see two classic syndicated episodes that were also personal favorites of mine. 

In a 1979 syndicated episode, Joyce Bulifant wears a crazy red fright wig that made her look like a demented Little Orphan Annie to keep from being mistaken for the other blonde on the show that week, Elaine Joyce. A later contestant was almost as weird, giving a very strange answer to what a jock centipede bought along with 100 pairs of shoes. 

Betty White turned up in a much later syndicated episode from 1981 wearing a short, flaming red and gold dress made by a friend of Sharon Farrell's. Sharon was no slouch either in her pink pants outfit. She and Richard Paul inadvertently demonstrated mud wrestling when she landed on him during McLean Stevenson's answer for what form of "wrassling" should be an Olympic event. Later on, a contestant's laugh that he supposedly used to wake up in the morning was so terrifying, it sent McLean hurrying for Gene's entrance doors.

At any rate, enjoy your own feast of favorites with this bountiful showcase!

Match Game Thanksgiving 2025 Countdown Marathon

Walk This Way

Began the morning with a very quick breakfast and Family Feud. We got to see the second half of one of the later episodes with the lollipop trees before it switched to Password Plus. This was one of the later Tom Kennedy episodes, with Marcia Wallace and a thickly bearded Bart Braverman playing. Marcia win the first round, to her shock and surprise, before we headed out.

We always start with a trip to the Abbie Road CD store on King's Highway, but Mt. Ephraim is too far to walk from East Clinton. I ended up calling Uber. No trouble here. He picked us up in 3 minutes, and we were at the front door in less than five. 

Bob greeted us warmly, as he always does, and was happy to hear that we both now had good jobs and were doing better. He wasn't so thrilled with some of his other customers. I heard one guy give him a really hard time over the price of his CDs. I don't know why. Bob's always been more than generous with us. Lauren ended up with two country CDs. I found seven CDs:

Miles Davis - Love Songs

Barbara Cook - Barbara Cook at Carnegie Hall

Aerosmith - Little South of Sanity (2-disc set)

Janis Joplin - Janis Joplin's Greatest Hits

The soundtrack from Honeymoon In Vegas 

Super Hits of the 70's Vol 2 (the earliest I've been able to find)

Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks - 2000 Years with Carl Reiner & Mel Brooks

And two records:

Mae West - The Fabulous Mae West

Andrew Lloyd Webber's Cinderella (The concept album for what would be Cinderella in the UK and Bad Cinderella in the US - this is a three-disc set.)

It was such a gorgeous day, it would have been a crime not to walk down the Black Horse Pike to the Audubon Crossings Shopping Center. This was probably the nicest day we've had in at least a month. The sun was shining but not too strongly, the sky was a perfect pale robin's egg blue, and the raging gales had gentled to soft breezes. It was dry and warm, but not overly so, probably in the mid-70's. Even the abandoned storefronts and generic pharmacies and diners on the Black Horse Pike looked lovely on a day like this!

We had lunch at Futomaki, the Japanese restaurant behind the Acme in Audubon. Though Tang Asian Buffet is good, we didn't feel like stuffing our faces. The crispy salmon doused in sauce, crisp vegetables, sweet tea, and salty vegetable fried rice was just enough to eat in one sitting.

We were in and out of stores for the next hour. Neither of us found anything at Ross or Five Below. I got a pretty rose-print journal for when the purple fabric journal I'm currently using runs out at Marshalls, underwear at Lane Bryant, and two records and a DVD set at Goodwill. The DVD set was a nifty black clamshell case featuring all 7 of the Peter Sellars Pink Panther movies, plus documentaries and Pink Panther and Ant and the Aardvark cartoons. 

The two records were:

The soundtrack from Somewhere In Time

The original cast album for Paul Sillis' Story Theatre (A troupe of familiar actors that include Peter Bonerz, Valerie Harper, Hamilton Camp, Melinda Dillon, Paul Sand, and Richard Schaal enact folk and fairy tales, using then-modern music from George Harrison and Bob Dylan to retell favorite stories.)

(And I should have checked the underwear more carefully when I bought it. All but one of the pairs I bought were the wrong size. They were in the drawer where the right size was. I'll return them after Lauren leaves and be more careful next time.)

Stopped at the Acme next for drinks and snacks. Kind bars are on a good sale again. She got the big oat and honey protein bars, and I got the blueberry "Kids" bars drizzled with icing. The Popwell sodas were on sale for a dollar each. I would have bought a lot more than three if I could carry them! Lauren bought energy sodas. 

No wonder I was able to get those two weeks off of the Acme so easily. They were dead as a doornail when we were there. We got right into self-checkout with not a line in sight. I was even able to introduce her to the floral department manager who has been so kind to me.

We went walking again, this time strolling into Oaklyn and down Kendall and West Clinton to Common Grounds Coffee House. They were a lot busier, though we did manage to get a small wrought-iron table on the side, near the brick wall. She had a vanilla iced coffee and a raspberry chuffin - a cinnamon roll baked in a muffin pan. I had a just-sweet-enough chai latte and an iced lemon muffin that was tart and tasty. We both loved our treats, and they vanished quickly.

When we got home, I took the laundry downstairs, then pulled out The Game Show Murders, a mystery game Lauren bought online to give us something different to do at home together. The host of a popular game show (that's a parody of real-life shows and mini-games) has received a threatening letter and fears for his life. We're supposed to be the sixth contestant and play the mini-games to figure out who has it in for him. The trouble is, the mini-games involved a lot of cutting out and reading stuff online we weren't up to. We did do the second round and "grand finale," but finally decided we'd take a more detailed look tomorrow.

Put on Remember WENN next after I finally remembered to put the laundry in the dryer. Decided to start over from the beginning and show Lauren select episodes of the first two seasons before returning to where I was on the third. "On the Air" brings in sweet writer Betty Roberts, whose quick thinking saves one of WENN's soap operas and impresses erudite station manager Victor Comstock. "Klondike 9366" introduces ingenue Celia Mellon and Hilary Booth and Jeff Singer's tempestuous relationship. Victor creates talk radio when he launches a late-night call in show, but it's a bust until they're able to help a little boy in trouble.

Victor and Betty are caught between "A Rock and a Hard Place" when they have to figure out how to please two very different sponsors. Betty also learns the first of many secrets when she discovers that Ceila may have fibbed about being one of the wealthy Mellons. Patti LuPone becomes the first of three Broadway divas to appear on the show in "There But For Grace." Hilary thinks Grace Cavendish is there to steal her thunder, but she's really visiting her old flame Victor. 

It was so late by then, we decided to enjoy the lovely night and get take-out. We got dinner at a very busy Crown Chicken and Gyro. She had a cheesesteak. I got my favorite fried tilapia sandwich. We both got Diet Pepsis and Crown's deliciously greasy-dry fries.

Switched to YouTube after dinner and I brought the laundry upstairs. The host tournament on the original Card Sharks was so well-received, they did a second one later in 1980 with celebrities who had done other Goodson-Todman shows. Jovial Ross Martin and bubbly Meredith MacRae were the big winners from the first week. Despite her own misgivings, grouchy Vicki Lawrence won the second week, with the ever-nervous Bill Daily right behind. Alas, thanks to several YouTube game show channels having disappeared over the past few years, the second week is almost entirely missing. Most of the first week and part of the third are still available, so at least you can see some of their hilarious dealing with the cards.

Celebrity Tournament Day #2

Celebrity Tournament Day #3

Celebrity Tournament Day #4
Celebrity Tournament Day #5

Celebrity Tournament Day #13

Celebrity Tournament Day #14

Celebrity Tournament Day #15

Continued to edit Land of WENN while the show was on. Betty encounters intrigue, even during the lavish ball at Bedside Manor. She finds Victor Comstock searching papers in Hilary and Jeff's office. Victor reveals that he's Britannica's contact for the Rebel Society, and she can't tell anyone. Betty promises, and Victor kisses her before sending her off.

The next arrival isn't nearly so pleasant. Pavla Nemcova traps Victor in the office, using her sugar-based black witch magic to bind him. She has every intention of forcing him to reveal his secrets...and has a vial of gooey gingerbread that'll make him talk...

Meanwhile, Betty hurries off to the lakeside, where she meets Scott. They waltz together as Scott finally reveals that yes, he is "The Leader" of the Rebel Society as well as the King of Thieves and the exiled Prince Regent. He took over Victor's role as "The Leader" when he (supposedly) died in Britannica. Scott, like Betty, has no love lost for the Shadow Realm. Not only does he remember when they invaded the first time, but their knights killed his woodsman father and stole his treasury when they wouldn't join their ranks, and the King of Darkness murdered his mother after she rejected his advances. No sooner do they kiss than Doug Thompson appears, looking for his date. Scott flees, but Betty knows their magic is bound now...

Oh, and tomorrow, we're going a bit further afield to Cherry Hill for a day of bowling and strolling around the Cherry Hill Mall area. 

Under a Blanket of Blue

This time, we started off the morning with breakfast and Family Feud on Buzzr. They're up to the episodes from 1983 where families can choose a Tootsie Pop off a "tree" next to the desks and get an extra $100. Richard got a shirt from a family who played on a team sponsored by a local heart association...and made a few jokes about the heart and lung seen on the front of the shirt.

Called Uber around 10:30. The gentleman arrived within five minutes. No trouble getting to Cherry Hill, no traffic anywhere. We arrived at The Big Event within fifteen minutes.

The Big Event has apparently existed as Cherry Hill's arcade and bowling alley in one form or another since the 1960's. It got a neon makeover about a decade ago, with bright pink stripes around the pins and all-digital scorekeeping. Neither of us had bowled for years, and we thought it would be something fun and different. We grabbed our shoes, then went to get our balls. I took a red one and Lauren grabbed purple before we headed to the back lanes.

Lauren is a much better athlete than I am in general. I shocked myself by getting two strikes, one in each game we played, but I'd also go whole rounds without hitting any pins. I kept twisting my wrist the wrong way and tossing the ball to the left. Lauren almost never missed pins. Neither of us got to even 100, but Lauren still won both games.

The Big Event was a LOT busier than it should have been on a Tuesday morning. There were kids running around all over the place, in the bowling alley and the arcade. Turns out two local elementary schools were having field trips here. It took 15 minutes for me to just get to the card payment dispenser. Games would often be surrounded by kids. Lauren later reported that there was only one young-ish adult in the room with them, and she was clearly overwhelmed. They should have had far more teachers or authority figures keeping an eye on those kids! They were running and yelling and pushing and shoving. I did manage to get close enough to the prize desk to win the last adorably serious stuffed husky they had.

(Incidentally, the husky's actual name was apparently Harley, but with his very serious expression, I thought he looked more like a cop. Lauren and I dubbed him Harley Rockford, Rocky for short.)

After we managed to get out of that mess unscathed, I called Uber again. They're still working on Route 70, including the sidewalks. There was no way we could walk to the Market Place shopping center. The Uber driver picked us up in 8 minutes and took less than five to drop us off alongside Raising Cane's at Market Place. 

There's been a lot of changes at Market Place lately, even since I was last there in February. Chick Fil' A moved down the road to their own building at the Shop Rite Pavillion. Raising Cane's also opened in their own building. They specialize in crispy, crunchy chicken fingers and crinkle-cut fries. Lauren and I opted for the fries and their sandwiches, which are basically chicken fingers, lettuce, and a pinkish mayo-based sauce. It was tasty, but very messy! The chicken wouldn't stay on the bun. I ended up eating two chicken fingers separately.

Lands End at the other side of the front of the shopping center was our next stop. To my disappointment, it would seem that they're closing on July 14th. More than half the store had already been cleared out. I have no idea why they're closing. The next closest Lands End stores are 45 minutes to an hour away. Maybe there's just too much competition in Cherry Hill in general and the Market Place in particular. I did take advantage of the sales to buy a pair of navy shorts, a pair of khaki shorts, and a maroon fleece jacket for when it's too cold for jackets, and too hot for heavy coats. The navy shorts came to $13, the jacket $15. Even the khaki shorts that weren't heavily discounted were $25.

An experimental small-scale Macy's opened in what used to be Bed Bath and Beyond a week ago today. They really did a nice job remaking that store. The bright white space was now filled with sundresses, Toys R Us stuffed animals and craft sets, designer purses and shoes, and for some reason, tons and tons of summer suits. I didn't find anything, but Lauren picked up a cute white and blue-striped vest for work.

We split up after heading for the Towne Center. I'm not all that fond of Nordstrom Rack, and Lauren's not a big reader. I explored Barnes and Noble on my own. Thankfully, unlike Macy's and The Big Event, they weren't busy. There wasn't even a line at the checkout counter. It took me more than 40 minutes, but I came up with one record and two mysteries: 

Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong - Ella & Louis

Murder Lo Mein - Vivian Chien

Death at High Tide - Hannah Dennison

After I got out, I went to Nordstrom Rack to find Lauren. I peeked around their purses, but didn't see her. Sat down and waited on a bench after I got out...and she came walking down from Barnes and Noble! We must have just missed each other. 

Strolled over to the other side of the Towne Center next. At least it was a gorgeous day to walk around a lifestyle center. The weather remains beautiful. Warm and sunny, with a searing ice-blue sky and no wind or humidity. It couldn't have been more perfect as we made our way to TJ Maxx. Once again, I found nothing, but Lauren picked up another vest for work.

Trader Joe's is on the end of the mall bordering the luxury apartment complexes behind it. We mainly wanted snacks here. I grabbed their almond-peanut butter and PB & J oat bars, dried orange slices and coconut strips, and salted pecans. Lauren picked up chocolate-peanut butter protein bars, mini dark chocolate bars, freeze dried raspberries, and hot and spicy pecans. 

Since it's across the parking lot from Trader Joe's, we had a snack at the Shake Shack. Their snacks and ice cream are far better than their greasy and flat burgers. Lauren had a lemonade and a split grilled hot dog with cheese that honestly looked pretty good. I was fine with the snacks we bought and settled for a small strawberry milkshake that was wonderfully sweet and cooling.

I had a harder time getting us a ride home at 4:30 than I had getting one going to Cherry Hill. It took me 10 minutes to get a ride, and another 18 for them to arrive. Fortunately, when they did finally come, they were smart enough to take the scenic back roads through Cherry Hill, Haddonfield, and Westmont and avoid as much of the traffic on Cuthbert and Route 70 as possible. 

We played Password again when we got home, then watched more of the original Password. Even though I already watched it, I went with the early game between Pat Carroll and Johnny Carson. I had to show it to Lauren. It was too funny not to. Carroll and Carson kept blurting words, using hands, and had the craziest expressions when they couldn't figure out what word they wanted to say.

Switched to Match Game Syndicated while having dinner. Anita Gillette returned to the show for the first time since 1974, and even though she was rusty, she still played better than sweet and towering but slightly dim Jim Staal. Debralee Scott protested jokes about someone's overbite, since she had one. Gene immediately told her it was sexy.

Finished the night after a shower with The Kid from Spain. I go further into this Mexican-set vehicle for comedian Eddie Cantor at my Musical Dreams Movie Reviews blog. 

The Kid from Spain

Sunshine On My Shoulders

Began the morning with breakfast and Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood. It's "Nighttime In the Neighborhood," and Daniel is excited to be attending a pajama party at the library with his friends. His parents show him and Margaret fun things that go on outside at night while they walk there, like fireflies and Baker Aker starting tomorrow's bread. At the library, the kids play Musical Sleeping Bags and hear a story about Trolley traveling all around the world.

Called Uber after the cartoon ended. They picked me up in about 7 minutes, not bad for 11 AM. No trouble on the road at all, not even traffic. They pulled in behind a food truck at the Gloucester Outlets a little over 20 minutes later. 

I was a bit surprised to see the food trucks again. I figured they were there for Memorial Day Weekend. Turns out they have food trucks at the mall from Thursday through Sunday, probably due to the lack of food options there. While not busy like it was on Memorial Day Weekend, there were still a lot of people going in and out of stores and watching their children run around the (Astroturf) lawn. 

And no wonder they were. The weather was gorgeous today. It was sunny, breezy, and bright, probably in the upper 40's-lower 50's. A little warm for this time of year, but not overly so. Certainly an improvement over the last two days!

First stop was Go! Calendars and Toys. They were having a 40 percent off non-character merchandise sale. I found the recent re-release of the original board game version of Password. Thought Lauren and I could have fun being Betty White and Allen Ludden and giving the game a try ourselves when she visits. With the sale, the game came to $10, about the same as it is on Amazon right  now. 

Peeked around Toys and Socks next, but I need more substantial socks than what they have, and their prices on stuffed animals were not great. Had more luck at Hanes. Picked up three bras at 40 percent off each. I realized I didn't have a plain blue long-sleeved t-shirt, so I bought one at Eddie Bauer, along with sleep socks on sale for $7.99.

Dropped into Friendly's for lunch at around quarter after 12. It's a good thing I got there when I did. They were able to seat me the second I arrived. By the time I was eating my BLT and fries, they had a wait time of over 40 minutes and were turning people away. I also had the meal that included a bowl of cheddar broccoli soup and scoop of Viennese Mocha Chunk ice cream. 

Their play-until-you-win crane had stuffed animals again. I thought I'd give it a shot. Ended up with a sweet, wooly white lamb and a stuffed angel doll. I didn't need the doll, so I gave it to a little girl who was waiting for a seat with her mother. The girl was thrilled...and so was her mother! 

Ducked in and out of a few stores next. What I really needed were new work pants. The ones I've bought from Boscov's and JC Penney have gotten holes in the thighs less than a year after purchase. My brown jeans from Macy's are already in bad shape, too. Checked Old Navy, Levi, the Gap, and Express. Either they didn't have my size, or their khaki pants just seemed too thin. 

I have a pair of khaki capris from Lane Bryant that I've used for a decade and are still in good shape. Honestly, the black and khaki jeans I bought there seemed a little thin, too, but I'm willing to try them. They were both on sale, though the khaki pair weren't on as good of a sale as the black ones. Grabbed a wire-free poppy-print bra on sale, too. 

After that, I stopped briefly to use the bathroom and buy a Coke Zero from a vending machine before heading across the parking lot to Dave & Buster's. Same deal as Round 1 with a larger sports bar replacing the bowling alley and the ability to tap your card, not just slide it through. They were also just as busy, though I was able to play skee ball here. I think I'm getting a lot better at these arcade games. I came up with over 2,900 points. Picked up a stuffed giraffe with big eyes and a box of cards with yoga poses printed on them as visual references. 

Hiked back to the mall and called Uber. I think I should have called them at Dave & Buster's. They were still mobbed. I had a hard time seeing the car around all the other cars and the food trucks. I almost missed it. At least that's the worst that happened. They arrived in seven minutes, not bad for the beginning of the 3:30 rush hour, and got me home in a little over 20.

Went straight into writing when I got home and put everything away. Joyce is worried about meeting something worse than bees or lions. Richard admits he knows what the Warlock of the West is capable of, but he won't go further into it, saying it's not appropriate for Joyce's human ears.

Checked my schedule while I was on the computer. In good news, Thursday off along with the rest of my vacation. I have a lot of late days, though, and one really early day. Good thing I planned on spending next week after New Year's Day cleaning and taking down my Christmas decorations. 

Broke for dinner and Match Game Syndicated at 7 PM. Gene starts off the episode by reading a fan letter that scolded them for bad grammar on a bible quotation. Peter Marshall continued to play amazingly well, getting every single answer he put forth right.

For some reason, Buzzr jumped back to Match Game '79 at 7:30. I switched to YouTube for Mysterious Island, which is currently free there, instead. During the Civil War, three Union soldiers and a war correspondent escape a Confederate prison in a weather balloon. They end up stranded on a South Seas island where volcanoes rumble and quake and the animal life has grown to gargantuan proportions. 

They're  not alone, either. They first encounter a British noblewoman and her niece who were also stranded on the island, then are attacked by pirates and sink their ship. Later, they learn Captain Nemo (Herbert Lom) was the one who created the giant animals in an attempt to increase the world's food supply. He agrees to use one of his inventions to bring up the pirate ship if they spread his mission of peace to the world. But there's that active volcano that's still rumbling to worry about...

If you're a fan of Swiss Family Robinson and other stories of survival on a tropical island, you'll probably be a lot more into this than I was. The acting was dull across the board from everyone but Lom, who gave Nemo more gravity than the script warranted. The real interest is the Ray Harryhausen stop-motion special effects. The giant crab is especially nifty, and there's those exploding volcanoes and the huge flightless bird, too. Worth checking out for fans of him or of 60's adventure movies. 

Finished the night with New Year's sitcom episodes. It's "A Night To Disremember" for Oscar Madison and his ex-wife Blanche (Brett Somers) in the original The Odd Couple. Felix treats them to dinner on the anniversary of their divorce. This leads them to relating how they finally called it quits during a disastrous New Year's Eve party...but the trio remember how things went very differently.

The 4077th celebrate "A War For All Seasons" on MASH, via a much-mauled Sears-Roebuck catalogue.  It provides the material for Father Mulcahey to start a garden, Hot Lips's ever-evolving knitting project, and Hawkeye and Hunnicut get a wash basin for a liver transfer. Meanwhile, Winchester puts money on the Yankees when he sees Klinger betting on them, but the World Series doesn't go as well as either hoped.

On The Donna Reed Show, Donna encourages her teenage daughter Mary to "Have Fun" when she goes out on a date with a cute, smart guy from school (George Hamilton). Mary runs home in tears, certain that the date went badly and her life is over. Her parents recall their own disastrous first date at a New Year's Eve party, but like Oscar and Blanche, their memories of what happened are quite different. 

Games People Play

After I barely slept at all on Friday night, I desperately needed to sleep in. Didn't get up until almost 11; it was closer to noon before I finally got to making us Banana Pancakes. We watched more Perfect Strangers as we ate. Balki and Larry are "Piano Movers" when Balki talks his cousin into pushing a piano up 10 flights of steps to their friend Lydia's (Belita Moreno) apartment. Not only is Larry concerned about his bad back, but it seems that the piano keeps following them...

We played two games of Othello after the show ended. I found this pristine 1977 edition of the checkers-style strategy game in the pile Jodie intended for Veterans of America back in the winter. I figured Lauren and my nephews would appreciate it more and traded it for a few piles of my own donations. You have black and white chips, and have to place your chip so it turns over the chip to the other color. To my surprise, since I don't usually do very well with checkers and chess, I won both games. Lauren did help me during the first one...but I won the second one, too. 

Went out for a stroll after we finished. We were originally going to check out a small block party at a church on West Collings, a block from the business district. Turns out they were really small. They had a bounce house, a few games for the kids, a couple of food tables, and not much else. We decided there's better food elsewhere and moved on.

Ended up at Phillies Phatties on West Clinton. Shared a medium half-pepperoni, half-mushroom pizza and Pepsis (mango for me, regular for her) for lunch while watching the second half of the Eagles-49ers game. The Eagles were down 7 to 3 when we came in. The 49ers hit two touchdowns, but the Eagles were just starting to catch up when we loaded the remaining pizza into a bag. (The Eagles eventually lost 17-11, but that's a lot better than many of their games last year, and against a really good team.)

Finally decided we were too full for fancy puddings from the Puddin' Palace and strolled back to my place. At least it was a nice day for walking around. Yesterday's slight humidity was replaced by blue skies, warm winds, and dry temperatures. There couldn't have been a more perfect day in mid-September. 

Since Rose and her tribe were in the pool and we wanted peace and quiet, we played Pokemon Yahtzee Jr. first. This is a basic version of Yahtzee with Pokemon characters instead of numbers. We played for over an hour; I just barely beat Lauren, though it was close. 

Got our swim around 5. The water was a tiny bit warmer than yesterday, and even more relaxing. Lauren enjoyed it so much, she slid in and reclined on the pool steps in her clothes. Jodie came around to say "hi" and that she's putting the house officially on the market Tuesday. We'll have to clean up the apartment then. (Considering I cleaned it last Tuesday, that will basically involve me making my bed and putting away dishes and Lauren picking up her things, which she'll have to do anyway because she goes home Wednesday.)

When it got too cold for us to be lounging in water, I went right into the shower. After I finished, we played a long game of Scrabble. She won this one, but she also kept coming up with longer words. I kept ending up with lots of vowels and no consonants (and a lot of Ys). 

Showed Lauren two Match Game episodes while we played. Since we saw an episode involving a riot over an answer in 1974, I showed Lauren an even more infamous incident involving the producer not matching close answers in 1977. In this case, "school" didn't match "finishing school" after it matched "college." Richard Dawson and Debralee Scott were furious, and even Gene Rayburn couldn't keep order. Richard was far happier during a 1975 PM episode where he and Gene made a bet as to whether his "Color TV" answer would be under "Admiral __" on the Audience Match.

Finished the night on YouTube honoring producer Bob Stewart. He originally created Password and The Price Is Right for Goodson-Todman, but got tired them taking all the credit. After they rejected his latest idea for a show involving celebrities giving clues to categories, he left the company to form his own. 

That idea eventually became the Pyramid franchise, by far his most enduring hit as a solo producer. It started as The $10,000 Pyramid on CBS in 1973. It moved to ABC in 1974 for another five years, becoming The $20,000 Pyramid in 1976. CBS revived it as The New $25,000 Pyramid in 1982. I fondly remember watching the CBS version and The $100,000 Pyramid in syndication in the mid-80's. Went with episodes of 10,000 from 1973 featuring Ed Asner and Sandy Duncan and 20,000 from 1978 with Nancy Lane and Michael McKean. Dick Clark is the host of both versions.

One of Stewart's earliest shows as a solo producer was Personality from 1969. It's basically "solo Tattletales." Three celebrities - Jack Cassidy, Joan Rivers, and Flip Wilson in the surviving episode currently on YouTube - try to guess the answers to what the others will say in a pre-recorded interview. They guess how the celebrity responded to a series of questions about the celebrity in the second segment. In the third, they all have to guess how a celebrity guest answered the questions. This one is especially funny because Shirley Jones was the guest...and she and Cassidy were married at the time.  Larry Blyden is the amiable host.

Bill Cullen hosted Three On a Match, the second of six shows he did for his good friend Stewart. All of the episodes currently on YouTube are of the second format, where the big Match Board has images on it and can allow the contestants to win prizes. We also get to see The Big Match, a mini-game giving contestants a chance to win extra money by matching two halves of a dollar bill. Geoff Edwards makes a cameo appearance towards the end of the show to plug his own program, Jackpot. 

Cullen also hosted Chain Reaction in 1980, which would be his last with Stewart. Here, four celebrities and two contestants call out letters to form words that connect to other words. The first to finish the connection wins. The bonus round would be altered several times during the course of the show's short run; I believe this episode has the second version, with the slightly increased earnings. 

Apparently, Stewart still had Chain Reaction and its "Instant Reaction" bonus round on the brain. Three years later, he debuted Go, a show based around that concept. Here, it's two celebrities (Lynn Redgrave and Richard Gilliland) with four contestants. It's kind of a cross between Pyramid and those "pass the gossip" line games. Four of the team members give clues to a word; the contestant guesses it, rings a bell, and moves on to the next word. It was actually kind of fun, and it's too bad it didn't last longer. Former weatherman Kevin O'Connell was out of his element as the host.

Stewart's last original solo show before his retirement was Double Talk from 1986. Supposedly a revival of another short-lived show of his Shoot for the Stars, it's more-or-less Pyramid crossed with the fill-in-the-blooper of Whew! Celebrities help their contestants help figure out what phrases some similar words represent. The final round is almost a total Pyramid imitation that had the contestant filling in blanks written on "Double Talk" boards.  A bad time slot coupled with ABC's desire to get away from game shows doomed this one; smarmy actor Harry Polic III was hardly the right host to drum up excitement for any of this.

Climb to the top of the Pyramid with the solo creations of one of the most beloved game show producers of all time! (Look for the original commercials on Chain Reaction and Three On a Match.)

Personality (1969)

The $10,000 Pyramid (1973)

Three On a Match (1974)

The $20,000 Pyramid (1978)

Chain Reaction (1980)

Go (1983)

Double Talk (1986)

Rainy Winter

Began a dreary, rainy morning with breakfast and Press Your Luck. At least all three contestants did better than the ones I saw the other day. These actually had money after the first round. This time, it was down to an older man and a college student. The man hit a Whammy on his last turn, allowing the other guy to win a loveseat and a Hawaiian trip, among other prizes. Blockbusters was also pretty exciting, with that mother and daughter going up against a handsome young bartender. Many a female heart was broken when the women finally got past him.

Spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon writing that mall essay. I've never been much of a clothes person. My mother would want me to try on clothes when we went to the mall, but I'd rather spend time at Sam Goody's or Waldenbooks or B. Dalton Booksellers or anywhere else. I'm overweight, and it was hard to find plus sizes in all those silly little "hip" stores like Merry-Go-Round and County Seat. Bookstores, video stores, and music stores were not only more fun, but I easily found movies, books, and CDs there that I would have otherwise had to order from Columbia House before the advent of the internet.

When we ate at the Hamilton Mall, we'd actually go across the parking lot to Red Lobster. It was such a big deal. Sure, there's seafood restaurants in Cape May County, but none of them had tropical slush drinks that came in giant plastic cups or those incredible cheddar cheese biscuits. We always tried to sneak a few of those home with us. Once, Dad put the leftovers on the roof of the car before we left...and forgot they were there until we heard the "thump" shortly after turning onto the Atlantic City Expressway. The only food we retained from that trip was Rose's slice of key lime pie, which she kept with her and wouldn't let anyone else touch.

It was past 1:30 when I finally broke for lunch. On Linda Young's suggestion from the other day, I decided to give Molly of Denali a try on PBS Kids. Molly Mobray (Sovereign Bill) is an Alaskan native who lives in the fictional village of Qyah with her family and her best friends Tooey (Sequoia Janvier) and Trini (Vienna Leacock). In the first short, "Ice Sculpture," Aunt Midge (Adeline Potts) asks Molly's mother Layla (Jules Arita Koostachin) to join an ice sculpture contest, but she's too busy. Molly wants to see her mother make an ice carving, so she and her friends find a way to hold a carving contest right there in Qyah.

Molly's Uncle Jack tells the "Tale of the Totem" when her family comes to see his new version of a totem from 1940 erected. He intends to use special abalone shells to make the eyes extra special. When Molly and her cousin Randall accidentally lose one of the shells, they first turn to shops to find one, then Jack's wife Merna. But it turns out that Uncle Jack has a surprise in store for the kids...

I can see why Linda enjoyed this one so much. The lovely Alaskan setting and Molly's native heritage gives this show an edge that similar coming-of-age tales lack. It's really interesting to learn more about life for modern Alaskan residents and how they combine the traditions of the past with twenty first century technology like the internet. Molly herself is a delight, smart and fun and utterly determined. Absolutely nothing stops her from solving a problem, whether it's a lost shell or finding a source of light for their ice sculpture contest.

Even if you normally consider yourself to be way too old for PBS Kids fare, this unusual cartoon and its strong-willed little heroine are absolutely worth checking out.

The rain continued to fall steadily as I ate. I debated staying home, but finally just opted to grab my library book and coat and head out. It's supposed to rain all week, and I wasn't going to wait until Saturday to go to Haddon Township. Besides, there were a few other things I needed.

The Haddon Township Library was my first stop. Either the rain scared the adults off, or they all had work this week. The kids' DVDs weren't really full, but the adults racks were so stuffed, I couldn't get most of them on the shelves. Didn't take out movies this week - I'm still enjoying exploring online - but I did grab a soul-food based cozy mystery and Carter Beats the Devil, the story of a magician in the 1920's. I originally read Carter in the mid-2000's, shortly after I moved up here, but haven't read it since. Thought it was time I gave it another look.

Made a quick stop at Dollar Tree on the way home. Picked up sponges and a card for Jessa's birthday on Wednesday. As it was rush hour by this point, they had a line going into the aisle. Thank heavens a second register opened! I went in, got what I needed, and went out. The rain was still going as I went home; I just went home and got wet.

A package awaited me on Charlie's porch when I got home. Lauren told me last night she intended to send me a copy of Scrabble for Valentine's Day. We had so much fun playing Roll With It! last spring, she wanted to find other games we could play together. It's even the nifty "retro" version with the original 1949 cover.

Worked on writing after I changed into dry clothes. After Richard breaks for lunch (to Charles' disappointment), Charles joins Brett, Marcia, and Bill in the garden. All three try to ask Bill about their collective dream, but the little wolf hotly denies that they're any more than just the products of their subconsciousness.

Had leftovers for dinner at 7. Watched Sale of the Century while I ate. We had a new champ, a lady who managed to stay two steps ahead of the crowd for most of the game, even with buying one of the Instant Bargains and the Instant Cash game. She had no more luck with the Bonus Round than the previous winner, though...

Returned to Charlie's Angels after a shower. Tanya Roberts replaced Shelly Hack as Julie Rogers during the fifth and final season. She got to put her role as the most streetwise Angel to use in "Chorus Line Angels" when she goes undercover as an agent who gets her dancer, Kris (Jacklyn Smith) a role in a Vegas show trying out in LA. Kris poses as a reporter doing a story on the director putting the show together. The show's star and original choreographer vanished, and its backer wants the girls to figure out why. The new choreographer is disgusted by this, as Kelly has no experience, but she may not be the real problem...

Finished the night on YouTube. The guy who's been posting and cleaning up all the Match Game episodes strung together 25 of Orson Bean's most memorable appearances on the show, including the very first episode of the original 1960's Match Game. Check this out to see even more of his best work on the show:

Match Game - Honoring Orson Bean

Pleasant Valley Sunday

Thank heavens after yesterday the weather was gorgeous when we started out around 10:30. It was sunny and breezy, with a brilliant blue sky overhead. Lauren drove past farms laden with pumpkins and sunflowers and trees just starting to turn leaves red, gold, and sunshine yellow. It was a gorgeous day for a drive into upstate New York to check out flea markets.

Our first stop of the day was a large flea market in New Lebanon, just over the board. I've visited this place before with Lauren...and to our disappointment, it wasn't nearly as busy as usual. There were some booths selling mostly junk (and political t-shirts), but not as many, and nothing of interest in the main building. I didn't get anything, but Lauren picked up one of those t-shirts for her dad.

We did better at other sales down the road. A smaller flea market was being held about a block away. Once again, I saw nothing of interest, but Lauren picked up Piglet and vintage M&M Christmas ornaments and a small figure of Daffy Duck dressed as the Easter bunny.

We both did much better at a nearby thrift shop. It was a lot like a smaller, one-floor version of the Barrington Antique Center, lots of items in tiny rooms, but far better-organized. Things were arranged by items in nice shelves, rather than thrown in helter-skelter. The first things we found after the main room were two large shelves of DVDs and CDs and two more of books. I didn't see any books I liked, but I did find Greta Garbo's first comedy Ninotchka and the original Time Life Treasury of Christmas set (with an extra bonus CD). Lauren picked up a pile of country-western and classic CDs for herself and her parents and a cute purple vest for herself.

After leaving the thrift shop, Lauren drove us back into Massachusetts to just outside of the Berkshire Mall. There's a mini-golf course and driving range that she and her family have been playing at since she was a kid. It's a lovely little course, with the usual wooden house and windmill, bear statues, and rotating rainbow paddle traps. We had a great time, not only playing, but watching an adorable little boy and his grandparents playing ahead of us. They were so funny! The boy was so enthusiastic. He reminded me of Keefe when we used to play each other at the long-gone mini golf course next to the ice cream parlor in North Cape May in the 90's.

I won the game, incidentally, but only by two points. It was close. We both had problems on some traps. I hit my ball into a bush on the very first course, and Lauren got hers caught in a small water trap twice on a course

We wandered around in a couple of stores for the next hour or so. Target is pretty much the only thing at the Berkshire Mall that's still open, so we went there next. They were just putting out their Halloween things. Shelves were laden with candy, princess and Avengers costumes, Pillsbury Funfetti cake mixes, and stuffed dinosaurs dressed as vampires. They weren't busy, but we didn't end up buying anything.

Lauren took us back towards the area with the shopping centers we checked out yesterday. This time, we went across the street to a smaller center that features the area's only Game Stop. Lauren looked over PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Switch games, and I looked over Wii, but once again, we walked out with nothing. I just bought a Snickers bar at Big Lots.

The Millers were working on dinner when we rolled in. After we showed them our purchases, Lauren played something on her Nintendo Switch, and I gave Kirby's Extra Epic Yarn a shot on her Nintendo DS. The "extra" are hats that Kirby can grab that will give him special abilities, like use a sword or make yarn balls without grabbing an enemy. I got most of the way through Grass Land before dinner was called.

Dinner was a feast! Mrs. Miller made crispy tuna croquettes with tater tots, rolls, and amazing glazed carrots sauteed in real maple syrup. Lauren had cookie dough ice cream for dessert. I've had tons of ice cream lately and opted for a super-sweet watermelon fruit bar. Mrs. Miller did the same, only hers was peach.

We watched a couple of first season episodes of I Love Lucy while we ate. Lucy goes on "The Diet" when she needs to slim down in order to fit into a size 12 costume and do a dance with Ricky. She does everything possible to lose that weight, from running around the building to eating nothing but celery. It does slim her down, but it also leaves her with no energy. She joins the act anyway, to Ricky's surprise.

I'm not the only one who gets into her mystery novels. "Lucy Thinks Ricky Is Trying to Kill Her" when he jokes about killing her after she loses her murder novel out the window. She takes his joking seriously, especially after she overhears him talking about what she thinks is a plot to murder her and Ethel reads her cards and claims she's going to die. She does everything she can to hold him off.

She enters "The Quiz Show" in order to win money for household expenses. This radio game show makes female contestants do humiliating things on the air...like claiming another man is your first husband. Not only is Ricky understandably upset, but the stranger Lucy says is her first husband isn't who she thinks he is.

We played games after dinner. I won Roll With It! again by a large margin. Mr. Miller won Uno again, though this time Mrs. Miller and Lauren won rounds as well. (I'm really rusty on that one.) I did manage to win Sorry!. Mr. Miller came in second, followed by Lauren.

Lauren and I are now downstairs, chatting and enjoying skating videos and Match Game on YouTube. We were going to go to the Big E tomorrow, but the weather sounds iffy. We're going to stay inside and go to the Holyoke Mall in Springfield instead.

Rhythm of the Falling Rain

I didn't sleep that great last night. Woke up at 5:30, went to the bathroom, went back and slept until quarter of 9. Read and wrote in my journal in bed for a while. Lauren was already in the kitchen when I made my way out for breakfast. I had Honey Nut Cheerios with a pear that was a bit harder than I expected.

We finally made our way out around 10:30. The day was cool and overcast when we headed to the remains of the mostly-empty Berkshire Mall. They do have enough of a parking lot left to hold a Saturday farm market. Shortly after we pulled in, it started pouring. We sat in the car and waited until it slowed down enough to take in the remaining booths. I found some lovely Macintosh apples to have with breakfast for the rest of the week at the very first table.

Our next stop of the day was a little further down the road at one of several shopping centers about twenty minutes from Lauren's house. Her Barnes & Noble is small - no kids' toys or CDs and DVDs - but it's there, and it had a nice shelf of Star Wars books. I saw a cute new Rey and Friends spoof picture book with Rey and the sequel characters as kids being looked after by the Original Trilogy characters. It was adorable, but I ultimately went with the novelization of The Last Jedi. For some reason, the Haddon Township Library got the novelization of The Force Awakens, but not Last Jedi.

BJ's was across the street. There is a BJ's in Deptford, but not only is that too far for me to go all the time, but you need a membership to get in. Lauren has a membership. The place was HUGE, all industrial pipes and walls. Everything it sold was huge, too, from giant boxes of granola bars to widescreen TVs. We settled for large boxes of granola bars and Nature Valley peanut butter sandwich breakfast cookies and a big container of tiny cornbread loaves for Lauren's parents.

Though the rain was long gone, the clouds remained threatening as we headed down the highway towards North Adams, Lauren's hometown. On the way, we discovered a smaller store called Ocean State Job Lot. No, it doesn't sell jobs, as I quipped when we arrived. It's basically a local version of Big Lots or the Christmas Tree Shoppe, with leftover lots of slightly damaged or out-of-fashion items sold. I didn't see anything I needed, but Lauren bought a pair of comfy plaid flannel pants to lay around in.

I did much better at a huge Goodwill just a bit down the road. Found two CDs, one of which, the original cast of the Broadway musical mystery spoof A Gentleman's Guide to Love & Murder, I've been looking around for. Also picked up the soundtrack for Cocktail, an old favorite from my childhood.

Had lunch at a little place on the highway called Perlin's Dairy Bar. As you can guess, they mainly sold ice cream, but they also had a basic lunch menu that included sandwiches, some entrees, and snacks. Lauren got a grilled cheese with bacon and a soda. I got a chicken Parmesan sandwich. We shared mozzarella sticks. Despite the chilly day and blustery wind, we enjoyed our meal outside on a bench under a wooden roof. My sandwich was sooo tasty! I loved that spaghetti sauce that tasted homemade. The mozzarella sticks were thick around, crusty on the outside and incredibly creamy on the inside.

Finally made it to North Adams around 2:30. Lauren wanted to check out the Peebles that had been there for years. To her disappointment, they seem to be shutting down. They had 40 percent off notices posted. No wonder. Mom used to love the Peebles in Rio Grande in the 90's and 2000's, but this one had nothing of interest for either of us. The little store called Label Maker across the road had better merchandise. Like Ocean State Job Lots, they sold off-price items, only in this case, it was slightly damaged or last-season clothing. I didn't see anything I needed, but Lauren found another pair of plaid flannel pajama pants.

There was a little toy shop down the street that we peered around in. It reminded me a lot of Happy Hippo Toys in Haddonfield, with a lot of the same merchandise, including Playmobil figures, Brio wooden tracks, and Mary Meyer stuffed animals. We didn't buy anything, but we had a nice time browsing.

Jack's Hot Dogs is directly across the street. This is a popular hole-in-the wall in North Adams...and it's almost literally a hole-in-the-wall. It's a sliver of metal-and-lath with a counter in a sagging building, with a tiny room of solitaire video games on one side. Even at almost 3 PM, it was also busy. People sat at the counter, enjoy fries and sandwiches. No wonder. Not only are they tasty, but they're also cheap. The two small burgers I ordered were $1.75 each. Lauren says they're wildly popular no matter what hour of the day. I'll be they're standing-room-only at meal times.

Stopped at what Lauren says is a brand-new Wal Mart on the way home. It reminds me a lot of the store in Somerdale in Camden County, with the same gorgeous view of mountains, and maybe even larger. We didn't buy anything here, but Lauren checked to see if they had several medicines her parents needed. It started raining again just as we got into the car and showered fairly hard for most of the ride home.

Mr. and Mrs. Miller were watching the Yankees-Blue Jays game when we got in. We had our Jack's burgers and hot dogs with Pepsi and Funyuns while the game continued. The Yankees wiped the floor with the Blue Jays, by the way, 13-3.

Played games for a few hours after dinner. Did a long game of Roll With It! first. That game is even more fun with four people. To my surprise, I won. I only got one 15 card, but a ton of 10's. After I took a shower, we did a couple of rounds of Uno. Mr. Miller won all three of them. He also won Sorry! Mrs. Miller came in second, followed by me, and then Lauren.

Lauren and I went downstairs after the game ended and have been chatting ever since. We're going to be a bit more relaxing on a nicer day tomorrow with mini-golf and a local flea market.

Better Shop Around

I rolled out of bed to another hot day around 7:30, then read in bed...and then tried to sleep for another hour. Got up for good around 9:30, wrote in my journal, and got dressed. Threw on a cartoon while Lauren and I got ready to go and I had breakfast. Garfield In Paradise takes the famous fat cat, his nerdy owner, and his dog buddy to Paradise World, where the natives worship 50's surfer culture and the hotel owners spout Jack Benny jokes. Paradise turns sour quickly when they hear a rumble from the local volcano...and realize it's about to go off!

We headed out this time around 10:30 to pick up the 10:57 bus to Cherry Hill. The bus was slightly late, but nothing really annoying. Almost everyone got off at the offices near the Shop Rite shopping center, and there was no traffic.

Since it was nearly noon by the time we arrived, I took Lauren down the concrete steps, past the parking garage, and over the bridge to the Silver Dollar Diner for lunch. The diner is a shiny 50's-style eatery on the edge of a hill with splendid views of Cherry Hill. I had the same thing I had when we went here last year, the Tarragon Crab Cake with cole slaw and Old Bay-dusted fries...and it was just as delicious this year. Lauren enjoyed her turkey sandwich and huge bowl of clam and corn chowder.

We were in and out of Kohl's and Target. I didn't buy anything in either place. I'm only looking for a few things; they didn't have any bathing suits I liked at Target, nor any really decent sneakers, and I'm not a fan of Target's clothes. Lauren bought shirts at Kohl's and a bra from a brand she liked that had been renamed at Target.

Despite the dire predictions of Channel 6 weather man Dave Murphy, there were only a few dark clouds on the horizon when we strolled back over to the main mall around 2. Lauren wanted to check out Macy's; she loves them. I once again didn't find anything, but she picked up a shirt. Browsed at The Disney Store, but she didn't see any t-shirts she liked, and the Star Wars stuff was a bit picked-over. (They're mainly focusing on Toy Story 4 and the Aladdin and Lion King remakes right now. They probably won't restock Star Wars until well into the fall.) She tried on plaid pants at New York and Company, but they didn't fit. Lauren bought a WWE-themed card set at Go Games. Didn't see anything we really wanted at Build-a-Bear.

I finally found something at JC Penney's. I just wanted a simple, relatively inexpensive one-piece bathing suit. Most of the plus-sized suits were either too expensive, had too high of a rear line, or were two-pieces. Finally turned up a black and white wrap suit trimmed with a fringed tassel that was on sale for $39. Lauren got some things for her parents.

Old Navy was pretty messy when we got in. I didn't see anything I absolutely needed, so I opted to rush downstairs and go to the bathroom while Lauren bought a sweater on clearance. We met at GameStop upstairs. I did much better here. Lauren bought a Nintendo Switch game; I picked up Lego Pirates of the Carribean for the Wii for a mere $4.99. I needed change for the bus anyway, and I like the Pirates movies and love the Lego games, so this was perfect.

The bus was only a tiny bit late this time, but the traffic was the real problem. It was really backed up going over the Cooper River and on Haddon Avenue in Westmont. It was past 6 when we finally made it in. Lauren needed to use the restroom, so we stopped at WaWa. She bought Sprite Cherry and Limonade; I grabbed a Vanilla Coke, my favorite soda.

Made a quick dinner of turkey hot dogs and zucchini sauteed in olive oil while we settled down and watched Garfield In Hollywood. Garfield, Odie, and Jon win a big local pet talent show on TV that takes them to the national finals in Hollywood. Garfield's determined to become a star, but Jon worries that winning may mean leaving him behind.

Played Roll With It! again after dinner. That game is so much fun. We only got in two rounds this time. Lauren won the first one with twice as many cards as me. We tied on the second.

I hit the shower, and then we went online and chatted for a while. I've been trying to get a hold of Jessa to see if she wants to come to the Deptford Mall with us, but she hasn't replied to my texts or Facebook Messenger posts. If she doesn't respond by tomorrow morning, we'll just take the long walk to Barrington to pick up the bus to Deptford.

(And by the way...it still hasn't rained here at press time. Looks like it went north again.)

Sunshine On Our Shoulders

Kicked off an absolutely glorious day a bit earlier than we have with a stroll to the Collingswood Farm Market. By the time we got there around 11, they were insanely busy with people buying food for weekend barbecues and college graduations. Saw zucchini for the first time of the year; picked up two of those, along with some plump strawberries.

Next up was lunch at an equally busy Tortilla Press, the Mexican restaurant about a block from the farm market. They have a tasty and very popular weekend brunch. I had the fluffiest omelet I'd ever seen, with spinach, mushrooms, and goat cheese, roasted potatoes and peppers, and a honey corn muffin. Lauren had a huge Smothered Breakfast Burrito with the potatoes and guacamole. I ate all of my omelet (which was fluffy, but not large), the muffin, and most of my potatoes, and I enjoyed them. The breakfast burrito was a lot bigger, but Lauren did finish most of it.

We strolled down Haddon Avenue to take in some of the small shops in Collingswood. Browsed around The Candy Jar, but decided we would wait to buy more candy. Lauren got a couple of shirts for her and her parents at Frugli Consignment; I don't really need much in the way of clothes right now. I did better at Innergroove Records, digging five out of the dollar bins. I met Lauren at the toys and games shop. Lauren bought a dice and card game, Roll With It!, for us to play at my house, and another dice game for her parents.

It was past 1:30 when we strolled down Haddon and across the always-crazy Cuthbert Road to Westmont. Our first stop there was Phidelity Records. Lauren bought CDs for her and her father. Along with five more records, I found two movies I was hoping to pick up soon. I loved The Apple Dumpling Gang as a kid. With Tim Conway's passing, I thought it was time I finally bought that one, along with it's sequel The Apple Dumpling Gang Rides Again.

Incidentally, the ten records I bought were:

George Shearing Quintet - Deep Velvet and Here & Now

Hooked On Swing

The original casts of Carousel, Jamaica, Wildcat, Stop the World, I Want to Get Off, and Jesus Christ Superstar

Operatic studio cast of The Desert Song

Soundtrack for the Rita Hayworth musicals Cover Girl and You Were Never Lovelier

We were going to hit Rocket Fizz next, but...the sign was there, but Rocket Fizz wasn't. The building was empty. I swear it was open the last time I went to counseling and passed through. Just went across the street to check out Good Samaritan Thrift Shop early. Lauren bought shirts for her parents; I said "hello" to one of the Oaklyn Library librarians, who volunteers there. Primo's was so overwhelmed with kids and their parents, we opted for a Peach-Raspberry Mello Yello and Blueberry Pomegranate Smoothie at the WaWa on the corner of Cuthbert and Haddon Avenue instead.

When we got home after the long walk back, we went right into a couple of rounds of Roll With It! while listening to my new George Shearing albums and CDs. It's a pretty simple game. You roll six dice and see if any match the dice on three cards placed in front of you. Blue cards have two dice and are worth two points. Yellow have three dice and are worth five points, green have four and are worth ten, and purple have six dice and are worth 15 points. It takes a while to get all six! Lauren won one round, and I won two. We played again later in the night, and this time, I won one round, and Lauren won two, making us even.

Lauren played her Nintendo Switch while I made us Four Fruit Oatmeal Bars for dessert. I wasn't up for major cooking, and I'd forgotten to take the hot dogs out I was going to make for dinner. We settled for tuna salad on spinach. (All of which came out very well, though I think I put too much jam in the cookies.)

Finished the night with Angry Birds Star Wars. We actually may have done better on the later Death Star rounds than in Tatoonie, getting several two-stars and even a few three-star rounds, and beating my high score several times.

Tomorrow, we're taking it a lot easier after our long walk today. Lauren needs to get laundry done, and we'll likely get pizza and water ice around the corner.

One Rainy Evening

Ugh. It was rainy and dreary when I got up this morning...and unlike last Tuesday, it didn't go away after a few hours. Brightened my morning with Dark Chocolate Chip Pancakes and my Monster Mash Party Music cassette. I bought it from the CVS in Wildwood around 2002, when I was no longer able to borrow the cassette of spooky sounds and rock covers Dad and Mom had owned since the mid-80's. No sound effects, but we do get decent covers of, among others, "Monster Mash," "Ghostbusters," "Spooky," "Abracadabra," "Bad Moon Rising," and for some reason, "Batdance" and "Macho Man."

Spent an hour working on writing, and another hour after I got in later. Luke arrives home, with gifts for all his ladies. Prince Ben and Snoke aren't as happy to see him. He brings Rey a beautiful rose made from gold an enamel...one that cost him more than just a few coins. He'd dropped it in a certain lake, and it was retrieved by a huge frog who walked and spoke like a man. The frog said he'd give it back...if Luke sent one of his daughters to live and eat with him for a year. Otherwise, Luke would have to go back and remain as a prisoner. Rey says instantly that she'll go, but Leia won't let her go alone...

Broke at 1 to get ready for work and listen to another Halloween party collection. Halloween Party Music is basically the same thing as my cassette, only in CD form and with different songs. Along with "Ghostbusters," "Spooky," and "Monster Mash," there's "Purple People Eater," "Rock Lobster," "Werewolves of London," "Disco Inferno," and "Love Potion #9," among others.

It was still raining by the time I finished breakfast. I ended up getting a ride to work with Dad, who needed a few things at the Acme anyway. It was insane when I got in, with long lines down the aisles. I got stuck in the register briefly before they ended up sending me outside. Thankfully, by the time I was helping two other baggers round up carts, the rain slowed down, then ended temporarily.

Once the Eagles - 49ers game began, that was the end of our customers. While it was never empty, it slowed down enough for me to come inside and avoid the rain starting up again. I spent the rest of the afternoon shelving three carts bulging with loose items and gathering baskets.

(The Eagles, despite the rain, did pretty well. From what I gathered, they once again started out badly, but the 49ers are even worse. They were up 17-0 by the end of the first half and went on to win 33-10.)

Jessa picked me up at the Acme and took me over to Dad's. Mark and Vanessa were just walking out as we were coming in. Rose showed up with Khai and Finley just minutes later. Poor Craig apparently has pneumonia, and Rose has had to take care of him and two young children and her job. She wanted to get the kids out of the house while Craig rested. (Oh, and Khai is apparently being a character from the Lego Ninjago series called Khai for Halloween. Little miss Finley is gong to be a unicorn.)

Chloe, Bree, and their mother arrived as I was finishing my lasagna and slice of Italian bread. After I ate, I followed the kids downstairs. Khai dumped out his Pokemon card collection. I watched the kids sort them out as I ate a slice of apple pie for dessert. We all had the Brach's autumn mix candy (including those candy pumpkins I love) from the candy bowl with the electronic hand.

After the kids got bored with Pokemon, they went looking for games in the shelves behind the bar. Chloe and Khai decided they'd rather throw Beanie Babies around, but Bree and I settled in for a fun game of Scrabble. I won, but he put in a really good showing for an 11-year-old and didn't lose by that much. It was actually really cozy, playing board games with the younger kids tossing toys around in the background, as the rain poured even harder outside.

Rose and her brood took me home after the games ended. I spent the rest of the evening writing, looking for my shaped cake pans (I'm hoping to make a pumpkin-shaped cake tomorrow), and listening to more scary music. In high school, it was my tradition to listen to my Broadway cast album for The Phantom of the Opera on Halloween night, after trick-or-treating. While I usually watch other things that night nowadays, I do still like to listen to my CD set around Halloween.

Chorus singer Christine (Sarah Brightman) is coached by what she thinks is an "angel of music" to sing the lead role at the Paris Opera in the late 1800's. He's really a disfigured man who lives under the Opera and calls himself "The Phantom" (Michael Crawford). Not only does the local diva refuse to give up her role, but the new managers of the Opera think the Phantom is all a hoax and won't give in to his demands. Meanwhile, Christine is being pursued by her old friend Raoul, a kind and handsome nobleman who does truly love her. It leads to a memorable climax in the catacombs under the Paris Opera...after the Phantom has brought down the chandelier on those who defied him!

If you have a taste for high melodrama or dark musicals, you'll love this. While one of the major reasons for this show's long-standing success - the spectacle of the Paris Opera in all its splendor - obviously can't come across on a recording, you do get the entire score in all it's grand glory, including the legendary performances of Brightman and Crawford as the leads. Not for those who like their musicals lighter or more subtle, but if you're a fan of Andrew Lloyd Webber's music or the original book and you have a taste for campy romantic drama, this is well worth your time.

Finished out the night with two quieter jazz LPs as the rain continued to pour down. Witchcraft...!, by Ray Martin and His Orchestra, features instrument covers of numbers that involve witches and magic, including the title song, "Old Devil Moon," "Kiss of Fire," and "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered." One Stormy Evening is a unique collection of sounds associate with rain storms and soothing songs for rainy nights. Most of the music are original numbers, but there is a cover of "Autumn Leaves."