Enjoyed my cousin Tom's 80th birthday party yesterday. Brother Jim and SIL Therese were there, as well as cousin John, and Tom's DIL Pattie, whom I had met for lunch several times when I worked at Rider. It took more than two hours to drive there--much longer trip than when we lived in Ewing--but I made it fine. Terrific food, two beautiful cakes, and lots of fun talking to relatives, trying to figure out who was who in our large extended family. Jim said he had sent me a copy of something that may have been written by our father when he was quite young--but I have reservations that he actually wrote it. Will elaborate more in another entry.
To cover while I was gone, Alison came down again. She took her Dad to his eye doctor appointment and I'm happy to write the eye is improving, but he has to bathe it four times a day with ointment and baby shampoo. She took him to the bay, then bought flounder and cooked it for him--she's so good! And she does all this so cheerfully and offers to do more. It's such a relief for me to be able to get away and not worry. Luckily, I'm able to run errands, meet people for lunch, and so on in the afternoon, as Pat is okay by himself then. As I said to Alison, it isn't so much the time I'm away, but the distance. If I'm just tooling around the area, up to Manahawkin, say, I don't see any problem. I just don't like to go too far (such as Ambler yesterday) without having somebody with Pat.
Have decided to update this blog in the morning, rather than the afternoon, as I never seem to get back to it.