Recently in Home Life Category

Today, my third grandparent passed away after a long struggle with a variety of health issues. Doris Holgate was my maternal grandmother, and the last of my mothers parents. It's tough for my mom - not only losing her last parent - but also because they had a very close bond, especially after my grandfather passed away back in 2006. In the last year of her life, Doris' health took a turn for the worse after she had some issues with her Dick Cheney Pacemaker/Defibrillator which had to be re-implanted.

My mom would tell me often to call and send her messages via the Presto machine, and I'm glad I did. I am also glad that in the last 10 days of her life, I was able to visit her for her birthday as a surprise, and got to watch an afternoon of Family Feud and enjoy some BBQ. With both my grandpas, I was not able to make it to see them "one last time" and even though it was not my intent for my last visit to be the "last visit", I have learned that with your parents and grandparents, it is better to take the time to visit them since you do not know when you will get to see them again..If ever.

I will always remember my Grandma Doris for her love of cooking. She used to make sure that I was well fed when I visited - whether it be a dessert or a steak or a French Dip, she always had something for me to eat. In later years, she would make sure she gave me some money to get myself something from Outback since she was no longer able to make a big meal. I also owe her my love of game shows. No one else in the family could sit there and recite the current state of The Price is Right or other game show like she could. One of the things I cherish about our last visit was that we watched one of her favorites together.

One final thing I will remember about Grandma was that she could spin a yarn! She always would tell great stories from her days at Buffums or MGM or Posey. She also would tell stories about relatives who I remember as a kid, but sadly had already passed away. It was a way for me to keep their memories alive as well.

We will have a funeral at the end of the month and then sometime in July it will be back up to Paradise to put her in the wall with grandpa. They are already re-united in Spirit (confirmed by the sightings of my grandpa in the days before her death), but now their ashes will be together.

You may be gone from this Earth and on to whatever is next, but you are always in my heart.

It seems the first three months of 2012 were full of uncertainty, but things have really settled down into some normalcy. Looks like I won't be moving again this year (thank GOD!) and really, the only thing out there is whether or not I will be able to stay in my current position at work past September. Fortunately, I have a lot to do before then, so I can't really focus on that.

The 17th birthday of Club Josh the web site is this June, and I FINALLY have a new site design. I think if I start working on it a bit every day, I can actually get something done. My problem is I get distracted at home and as I have mentioned, end up doing stuff not related to the web site.

My latest distraction/time waster is Instagram. I joined way back at the end of 2010, but only recently have I really started posting on a regular basis. I am now also archiving the best ones on my Flickr page, so those who don't have an iPhone or Android Smartphone can see my handiwork. I don't think I am Instagallery worthy yet, but we shall see!

At any rate, with new design in hand, I am hoping to get the new site up on the new server (sitting unused since September 2011) soon. Again, the biggest stumbling blocks are the Gorn and Trip Diary pages, so overcoming those obstacles will take the lion share of time. The good news is that I finally added the Gorn photos from Puerto Rico to the site, and if I actually get a chance to go somewhere this year, I will post them as well.

2012 has been a real pain so far. I have been unbelievably busy at work and really haven't had any time to move the site over to the new server. So here it sits rotting away.

Other than work, Daniel and I managed to do a day trip to the central coast of CA and I finally went on the section of Pacific Coast Highway that goes near Vandenberg AFB and Lompoc so now I can say I have driven Highway 1 all the way to Eureka! It was a great day out and we originally planned to spend the night near San Luis Obispo and Morro Bay, but in the end we decided to save the $100 and just drive home.

The other big event was the Doctor Who Convention last weekend. It was our Fourth time going to this particular convention and one of my favorites since I had some friends going it made us feel more like we knew what we were doing. I also managed to get autographs this time, unlike last year when we were shut out of getting one from Peter Davison. I was certainly glad I had the day after off of work since I was fighting a chest cold all weekend - so much so that I am still sneezing up copious amounts of lung butter.

Looking ahead, big decisions await as my lease is up on my CR-V and I haven't decided if I am going to take Honda's generous lease offer on a 2012 one or if I will finally decide to go hybrid and get a Prius. I like driving Daniel's Prius a lot, but the people at Toyota dealers can be such a pain.

I have lots of Gorn photos and photos to upload to Flickr when I get the chance, but I really need to get the site moved over first. Need to make it a priority and just do it!!