22 June 2014: Sunday ... High Clouds, Brilliant Sun Thru Window Shades ... TED Radio Hour on iPhone ... breakfast at a packed Crossroads ... lunch @ Hartefeld ... Doug leaves minutes after 3 p.m. for 7 p.m. flight

It's the GUY Radio Hour, I'm Ted Roz. (I found that spoonerism amusing this morning.)

MOM HAS TAKEN HER OWN SHOWER this morning (Hallelujah!). She also made her bed and folded clothes from a dryer load I placed their prior to her shower, but she has a "kink" in her back. Think she feels good about her accomplishment, though. 

"It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see."  ~ Henry David Thoreau 

I saw an elderly couple, similar in perspective (they looked alike), stoic, seated in a booth at Crossroads Restaurant this morning as Doug and I ordered our breakfast (Doug waffles and assorted pork sides, moi a broccoli scramble). Unspeaking, they turned to leave at the same time and got up from their seats, at the same time, and then, she smiled, which broke the frieze.

Hartefeld National, a premier Avondale golf club, features 18 challenging golf holes
designed by renowned architect Tom Fazio.

Great walk today with Dancer at Carousel, almost all off leash, we walked exactly 3.0 miles when we got back to the car, the lone one in the parking lot for Bark Park off Skyline Drive. Where was everybody? Watching Team USA tie Portugal, 2-2. The game was over when I began my walk -- Portugal tied it, literally, in the last seconds of the game on a cross and header (a beautiful goal) -- so USA now has 4 points and missed an opportunity to head straight into the Round of 16 and eliminate Portugal. But back to the reason for this cutline, our walk. It was wonderful and different, a trail that took me through the woods and back out onto a walk leading over the bridge, where Dancer plopped down and drank (I caught a photo of

her on the bridge from below ... ).

20 December 2013: Friday ... the day Mom was put on hospice ... shower/bath nirvana ... back washing ... called Bobbi Stenstrom ...

 

Today, it was celebrated with a Google Doodle (it was an ingenious crossword which I figured out with a lot of Web assistance), (actually tomorrow) is the 100th anniversary of the first Crossword Puzzle to appear in a newspaper in the United States. I just posted a piece on YouTube from CBS' Sunday Morning on the event ... very nice piece. I wrote in my post:

"Happy ***Centennial*** Crossword Puzzle and thank you Arthur Wynne, its creator, for publishing the first in the Sunday edition of The New York World on December 21st, 1913."

But today is the day that I called Delaware Hospice (the number is ensconced into my

 iPhone) and they responded, as always, quickly with a visit. This time by two RNs,

 Amanda and Oji (Nigerian), who both felt, unequivocally, that mom met all the criteria

for hospice care. Mom had no problem with the designation, it was actually a relief for

 all ... I've informed Doug, Susan, the kids, and even called Art Steele with the news. It

was the best choice and I will now have their invaluable assistance in her care. 

12 November 2013: Tuesday ... what a day of parental care finalized by mom cooking her famous flounder and carrots and dad eating two helpings ...

My Dancer post for the day during the dinner prepared
by mom tonight. Liz loves her and calls her "Princess".

• Carol Taylor Well, it's about time you posted a Dancer pic!

  16 hours ago · Edited · Unlike · 2
• 

  Rudy Nyhoff You, Ms. Taylor, are the reason I take blood pressure medication. You keep the pressure on and I feel it, daily, literally. But it's good for me ... keeps me going.

  16 hours ago · Like · 2
• 

  Carol Taylor Don't you know that Daily Dancer pics are you number one priority???

  17 hours ago · Unlike · 2
• 

  Rudy Nyhoff I know that now, THANK YOU VERY MUCH! 

  16 hours ago · Like · 1
• 

  Carol Taylor I'll let the couple of days of no Dancer pics slide this time. . . Just don't let it happen again. 

  16 hours ago · Unlike · 1
• 

  Rudy Nyhoff Yes ma'am.

Love of my classical music life ... Hélène Grimaud ... liked her many Facebook pages and made some
extolling comments about her artistry and her beauty and her humanity and love of nature.

I posted this YouTube link on FB --

            Hélène Grimaud plays Mozart (Trailer French)

Watch this trailer about Hélène Grimaud's new album marking two 'firsts' for Hélène Grimaud - her first live DG recording and her first ever Mozart concerto recording. 

Hélène Grimaud considers the concerto in A major "probably the most sublime concerto Mozart ever wrote", with a slow movement that is "an extremely deep and painful expression of longing, where you find the real Mozart." The concerto was a 'must-have' for this collaboration. The concerto in F major K459 is less well-known, but with a very special vitality and a virtuosic finale that is for Grimaud, "pure pianistic pleasure".

Besides the two concertos, the album includes the beautiful concert aria for orchestra, soprano and piano 'Ch'io mi scordi di te', sung by Mojca Erdmann. The aria was Mozart's declaration of love to the soprano Nancy Storace, his Susanna in the world premiere of "Le nozze di Figaro". It was composed in 1786, the same year as the Piano Concerto No.23 which it joins here.

Had the privilege of helping dad with shaving (he did it all, I just got his water ready and watched over the process) and with helping him into the shower in mom's bathroom, that claustrophobic chamber where the water temps are switched and where the pressure is so sensitive.

Clipped mom's toenails this morning. Helped make her bed after Liz ran the sheets in the washer and I placed in the dryer and then she washed the big quilt and we finished making the entire bed that evening, after mom's preparation of the fish and the carrots. More to come with photos.

Mom prepares her special sauce for the flounder and the carrots.
A rare but welcome event ... gathering around the dinner table for mom's flounder and carrots. 

Good walk tonight with Dancer ... walked into Maplecrest and Owen Drive to Milltown and left past St. John Church and School for a total of 2.67 miles. The night is chilly as a cold front moved into the region today and we actually had a few snow flurries but nothing on the ground as it was too warm.