St. Clare Happenings

Hannah was an Indian last week in St. Clare's production of Peter Pan. It was way cool....four of the kids even flew. You should have seen those sweaty Dads backstage jumping off ladders on the other end of the pulleys. Glad nobody had a heart attack. I helped Lynn and Helen backstage with props. Big fun. Jackson and Ro helped move sets.


Hannah also made her confirmation last weekend. Hannah is here with Joan, her wonderful sponsor and her fab group of friends. She made it early because of our impending move to China. NOT! (I'm still not recovered enough to talk about that!) The girls all took time to come to the Mass to cheer Hannah on even though it was a sunny day and they were all tired from the play the night before. Thanks Ella, Taylor and Rosemary! Hannah took Taylor's name as her confirmation name even after the religious ed teacher kept giving Hannah back the form asking her to look up "Taylor" in the bible. Taylor is going to take Hannah's name next year. I think Hannah and Taylor will always be together. They are starting to chat about what college to go to...the latest is somewhere in Boston. Taylor's Mom and I are taking this same group of girls to Chicago next month to hang and see Wicked. Should be fun!

Bunnell & Company

I had dinner last night with five people that I worked with 20 years ago. My first internship was at the Berline Group working for Pat, Rich and Sandra while I was still at CMU. Sandra got the bright idea to start her own company so we all followed and added Sue and Dan. We spent the first year working out of Sandra's home in Rosedale Park. We had lots of laughs...oh and even did a little work too. Sandra is writing a book about her psychic experiences (don't ask!) and invited us all to get together to help her remember some of the ghostly happenings. (Sue and Sandra thought a painting in the office was haunted with the spirit of a young girl...boo!) The rest of us don't remember a thing but it was a great excuse to raise a glass with some wonderful friends. I learned a lot from this crew. Sandra makes jewelry now. Rich sells auto fabric and does weekend comedy. Sue works for a great research firm and Dan, Pat and I still dabble in PR. ( I think Sandra shrunk!)

CHINA IS A NO GO!

Dan got the news yesterday. We're not going. GM's partner in Shanghai would not bless sending a digital clay model manager so we're out. I'm still trying to digest it all and figure out what the next steps are. Of the four of us, Jackson is the happiest we're staying. He loves Cass, ROTC, driver's ed and baseball.

So any ideas what I should rename my blog?

Lots of time in Windsor

This week has been filled with lots of trips back and forth across the Ambassador Bridge. I am now helping the Bridge folks with some of the PR activities surrounding their efforts to add another six lane span adjacent to the current 75+ year old bridge. (This photo shows what the new bridge will be when complete.) We've had public forums in Windsor every night this week and I held a big news conference for them in Detroit yesterday. Fox National News was out this morning. It's a fascinating issue with lots of NIMBY (Not in My Backyard) perspectives and political intrigue as people debate ownership, permits, trucks, routes, profits, etc. I'm having fun with it.

Still no official word on China so it is good I'm staying way too busy with international work of a different kind.

I have no more babies

Today is my last day with a child. Effective at 4:08 p.m. tomorrow, Hannah turns 13 and I have only teenagers! Heavy sigh....it is a good thing I don't get any older.


To celebrate, we're taking advantage of our neighbors. Lynn made the mistake of inviting us over to dinner on Saturday. (Indian food, yum!) After I quickly accepted, I gave her the guilt trip of telling her it was Hannah's birthday and that we were giving her the honor of cooking way better than I ever could. (I am bringing dessert...Hannah wants an ice cream birthday cake so... oh darn, I'll have to buy it!) We're looking forward to the celebration. Ro and Jackson are helping St. Clare move the sets for Peter Pan in the morning and then Hannah has a softball game at noon. I have my CCS weaving class in the AM so all in all....it should be a great day.


Our birthday girl got a guitar so now she'll never come out of her room!

Easter

Big fun this weekend. My folks on Saturday...Dan's on Sunday. Lots of family and food...doesn't get any better than that. Here's a shot from Dave of the family yesterday at Sue's house.

Hold the phone

OK, I'm at Metro Airport fishing through my briefcase for my wallet to get a credit card and the silly parking ticket I got 24 hours ago so I can get my car and hit the road home. I lean the briefcase atop a trash can next to the rail....open it up....and then...bim, bam, boom...my phone falls out of the unzipped front pocket, cascades over the rail and just misses the Checker Sedan lady two flights below. (I wonder if I would have got sued if the phone had hit her?) I screamed down apologies to my near victim and raced down two escalator flights to check out the damage.

Anyone who knows me knows that that stupid phone is like an adopted organ that is necessary for all human function. It is always with me. All of my clients use that number (usually before they call the office), it has my personal and work email "sync"ed in, my calendar and contact list is in there.....everything. I'm out of my office most of the day so even though all the info is backed up on my computer, it is a lifeline for my insane world.

The glass was broken and it had a huge dent. I tried pushing the button and I had a cool piece of backlit modern art but no service. Heavy sigh.

Even the ride home was weird. I couldn't call Ro to tell him I was on my way. I usually call my Mom from the road so that didn't happen either.

The next morning, I had a meeting with a client and I couldn't call my colleagues to see what entrance they were at....my meeting ran long and I had a 12:30 conference call I was supposed to be on...Normally, I could call from the road but I couldn't get the number off my calendar. I missed it. I was running late for my 1:00 and I couldn't call and tell her.

Luckily, I finally made it to the Sprint store last night and they put the Treo into triage and were able to perform LCD screen replacement surgery. It was fine. Does Hallmark make cards for this kind of happiness?

Hannah and I celebrated with a trip to DSW for some fab shoes and the "Blades of Glory" movie. (Review: it was so stupid that I laughed for almost the entire 90 minutes)

LA Baby!

Greetings from the West Coast....

I'm here for the briefest of jaunts helping out with a satellite media tour. It's kind of cool. We gather in a studio at 4 a.m. with Designers Paige and Eduardo from "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" and we have 25 different interviews with local TV stations across the country in four hours. Ford is sponsoring an Edge giveaway with the show and I sure hope at least a few anchors ask about that...and not all home makeover tips. We'll see.

I left the D at 9:30 this morning (Wednesday) and I'll be back home by 6 p.m. Thursday. I'm reading a good book (19 Minutes by Jodi Picoult) which makes the long boring crowded Easter flights a little easier to tolerate.

Spring is Here

How can April Fool's Day and Palm Sunday fall on the same day? At St. Charles, Palm Sunday is kind of fun. We get our palms down in the basement and then march around the block with the drummer and the choir singing away. (Bet they don't do that in China!) I think we wake up the neighborhood but hey, it's only one day a year and it is 11:00 for goodness sakes. The route is a lot nicer than it used to be....finally some new construction in the hood. Hannah helped the altar servers today so she got to lead the procession. Mass was back upstairs today which was great. Our heating bills in the winter are outrageous so we have Mass in the basement right after Christmas through Lent. So the Tiger's have Opening Day tomorrow....St. Charles has emerged from the basement...add in the tulips in the backyard and Spring is definitely here.