I was just thinking today how I used to know a stevedore.

"What's a stevedore?"

JfC, msbelle. Hoping the kinks shake out of that timeline a whole lot better than at the present.

Survived a two hour meeting and then dinner with the people who pay me. Woot.

Cool beans! Was he a visiting Honk-er?

A roustabout is a real job?! Huh.

Yes and yes!

Oh man, argh. My sister has started dating again (her husband of 30 years died 2 years ago) and her adult daughters aren't happy about it. Everyone is unhappy and I'm just trying to be supportive and acknowledge everyone's feelings. Bah. Do not want.

Yikes, Suela, that's tough.

Just landed back in the states! But customs doesn't open for three more minutes so they can't let us off the plane yet.

Time for an auntly talk with your niece? Acknowledging her genuine feelings, but pointing out that her father would have wanted her mother to go be happy. (I'm presuming on the kind of person a sister of yours is likely to have been married to for 30 years, of course.)

I'm sorry, Consuela. That is hard. My mother was married to my dad for 39 years. A couple years after he died she was dating the man who became my step-dad. They married and were together for over 30 years. I have zero doubt that my mother would never have lived to 95 if it were not for the devotion and care provided by my step-dad. My siblings NEVER accepted him and all 3 of them have been horrible to him before and after they married, and since my mother passed. It has nearly cost me my relationship with my siblings. It has been very painful to try and be the person in the middle all the time.

That sounds really painful, Laura, sorry.

Good luck with the job and job search, msbelle.

I'm helping a friend of my daughter try to find a new job by using my network. It still feels weird to think I have a network and I can use it for things like this.

Speaking of my daughter, I have entered a conspiracy with her. She managed to break the outside of one of the side-view mirrors on her car and she asked me to keep it from my wife. I have a replacement on order, but I'm still not sure how I'm going to replace it without my wife noticing what I'm doing. Guess I could say I'm doing something else to the car. I don't like lying though.

My mom has said she doesn't see herself ever dating anyone again. She was either married to or dating Dad for her entire adult life, which made for a very soulmate-y situation. I'm of the mind that if she does meet someone who makes her feel good, she should go for it, though I did look askance at the guy from her congregation who asked her out a few weeks after Dad's funeral. I'm not worried about having to call a new beau "Dad" in my fifites.

My mother is trying to date online! And it's kind of hilarious since she's having all of the experiences we have all had -- the guy who just says "Hello beautiful," the guy who wants to have extended email correspondence before meeting, etc.

The two-year anniversary of my father's death was yesterday.