About Me

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Delray Beach, FL, Westport, MA, United States
Undergraduate degree, Colby College; MA in English, Columbia Teacher's College; former high school English teacher in three states; former owner of interior design co. with MA from R.I. School of Design. Barking Cat Books published my first book in 2009 titled, MINOR LEAGUE MOM: A MOTHER'S JOURNEY THROUGH THE RED SOX FARM TEAMS. My humorous manuscript titled ELDERLY PARENTS WITH ALL THEIR MARBLES: A SURVIVAL GUIDE FOR THE KIDS was published in June, 2014. In 2015 A SURVIVAL GUIDE won a gold medal in the self-help category at the Florida Authors & Publishers Association conference. In 2018 Barking Cat Books published my SURVIVING YOUR DREAM VACATION: 75 RULES TO KEEP YOUR COMPANION TALKING TO YOU ON THE ROAD. See website By CLICKING HERE.

Monday, December 18, 2017

The Ten Most Embarrassing Questions Santa's Been Asked This Year

   

An author's list for Santa
  

     Another year brings another crop of kids sitting on Santa's lap working their Iphones for selfies, pulling on his beard to see if it's fake, or screaming because the gargantuan in red is going to eat them up.
     Here are the ten most embarrassing questions Santa's being asked this year, in ascending order.
Thank you, SaturdayNightLive, for a couple of ideas! Merry Christmas to all, and to all a healthy, happy 2018!


 #1. Why don't you get a cell phone so we wouldn't have to write those long letters and could email what we want?

 #2.  How many hours a day do the elves have to make toys, and do they get paid overtime?

 #3.  Why doesn't Mrs. Claus put you on a diet?

 #4.  Have the animal rights people ever reported you for abuse of Rudolph's nose? Why don't you just get a GPS?

 #5.  Why does your breath smell like Grandma's after she's had the eggnog on Christmas Eve? 

#6.  Who is this Grinch person that mom says is Dad's relative?

#7.  Is there a gift you could bring my mom so I don't get any more brothers or sisters?

 #8.  Is it true if you deny you did something wrong, you can keep your job? My dad just got laid off.

 #9.  Is Roy Moore on your "naughty" or "nice" list?

AND THE WINNER IS:

Ho! Ho! Ho!
#10. What was the toy Matt Lauer gave to the lady who worked with him?



Friday, November 17, 2017

Grandma's Thanksgiving Invitation

Adapted from something that came across the internet. Don't know the author...

Dear Family,                                                                             

I know some of you probably think I left this earth, because you haven’t heard from me in a while. Maybe if you’d picked up the phone, you’d have discovered I’m still around.

Thanksgiving is important to me. If being in my Last Will and Testament is important to you, you’ll probably want to be here to celebrate that I’m still above ground.

Dinner is at 2:00. Not 2:30. Not 3:00. The only thing reheating in the oven after we sit down will be the pies.

Last year, Marshall heard from his neighbor that frying a turkey in one of those contraptions made the best turkey anyone ever tasted. He almost burned the deck off my house. This year, the only peanut oil used in the meal will be the secret scoop of peanut butter I add to the carrot soup.

Jonathan, don’t arrive at someone’s house on Thanksgiving with a new wife we haven’t met who has to run to the bathroom to put on her makeup before she’s even introduced. Honest to God, I thought you’d learned after two wives – date them longer and save us all the agony of another divorce.

There will be paper plates and red Solo cups this year. They might be bad for the environment, but most of your kids have never eaten off good china, except at my house, and things always get broken.

The television stays off during the meal. I don’t care whose alma mater is playing in a bowl game!

There will be no soda cans for the kids. We will use 2-liter bottles because your children open a third can before finishing the first two. Parents, fill your children’s cups when they are empty. The cups will have names on them so there’s no excuse for anyone drinking from someone else’s cup.

Cloe, last year I looked the other way when your marshmallow fluff salad showed up. This year, if that salad comes in the front door it will go out the back door with the garbage. Save yourself some time, honey. You’ve never been a good cook and you shouldn’t bring something that wiggles more than you. Buy something from the bakery.

Grandmothers give grandchildren cookies and candy. That is a fact of life. Your children can eat healthy at your house. At mine, they can eat whatever they like as long as they clean their plates.

I cook with bacon and bacon grease. Your being a vegan doesn’t change the fact that stuffing without bacon is like egg salad without eggs. Even the green bean casserole has a little bacon grease in it. That’s why you like it. As far as being healthy – I’ve lived longer than all of you and I have bacon every mornin’!

Green salad at Thanksgiving is a waste of space on your plate.
Cell phones must be left in the car. No-one’s going to try to reach you from work because no-one will be at work. The important people in your life won’t be trying to reach you, either. They’ll be sitting right next to you.

Being a parent means you’ve got to pay attention to your kids! I won’t hide my stuff because toddlers are coming over. Mary, teach Gregory not to touch anything that isn’t his.

Rhonda, a cat that requires a shot twice a day is a cat that’s lived too many lives. I think staying home to care for the cat is your way of letting me know that I’ve lived too many lives. Will your cat be naming you in its will?

Words mean things. Consider the consequences of your words before you speak. I don’t want any yelling at the table or grudge matches after the holiday.

If I tell you I really don’t need anything, it means you really don’t need to bring anything. If you are bringing something, please listen when I tell you the quantity. Really, this doesn’t have to be difficult.

Dominos and cards are better than anything that requires a battery or an off/on switch. That was true when I grew up and it’s why my generation had so many geniuses.

Showing up for Thanksgiving guarantees a gift at Christmas. Not showing up guarantees a card that may or may not be signed.

Discussion of election results anywhere in the U.S. or anything that has to do with politics is forbidden.

In memory of your grandfather, the back fridge will be filled with beer. You’re welcome to indulge, but one from each family will be responsible for driving without drinking.

And that’s about it for ground-rules. Don’t forget what you’re thankful for – I’ll be askin’!

I hope everyone has a great turkey day.
Love, Grandma

Friday, October 27, 2017

More Travel Photos


Reviewing photos for my book, A Survival Guide for People Who Travel Together: Tales from the Road.


Streetside barber shop, Soweto, Johannesburg, So. Africa

Zulu woman's headpiece, So. Africa
Thornybush Preserve, So. Africa

On the road to Machu Picchu, Peru

Trulli houses, Puglia, Italy

Ice Sculpture, Vermont

King of the island, Galapagos, Ecuador

Which is a statue and which is a mime? Dublin

Human statue, Park Guell, Barcelona

Lifeguard station, Barcelona 

Gaudi's mosaic ceiling, Park Guell, Barcelona

Art exhibit on footbridge, Paris
Foundation Louis Vuitton Museum, Paris
Class learning about Monet in Musee D'Orsay, Paris

Luxembourg Gardens, Paris
Lake Orta, Italy
Bonding in Naples harbor, Italy
 A granddaughter's selfie
Tree root sculpture, Dreher Park, West Palm Beach, Fl.
Universal Studios, Orlando, Florida

Tuesday, October 10, 2017

A Photo Trip

I think we're all in need of an escape at the moment from the ravages of weather and man's inhumanity to man. I'm posting some photos below of our travels, with more in succeeding weeks.

Zambezi River, Zambia

Hungry Hippo on Zambezi River, Zambia

Thornybush Game Preserve, So. Africa

Siblings in Kirstenbosch Botannical Gardens, Capetown, So. Africa

Wakodahatchee Wetlands, Delray Beach, Fl.

Berkshire Mountains Music Festival, Mass.

A sapling for dinner, Thornybush Game Preserve, So. Africa

Turtle Rehabilitation Center, Juno Beach, Fl.

Climbing Mt. Vesuvius, Naples, Italy

Campers, Casamicciola, Island of Ischia, Italy

School kids, Ardmore, Ireland
Cards on the beach, Casamicciola, Ischia, Italy


Conch shells, Harbour Island, Bahamas



La Mortella Botannical Gardens, Island of Ischia, Italy

Sunset, Key West, Florida





Westport, Mass.

Monday, September 4, 2017

Introduction to A SURVIVAL GUIDE FOR PEOPLE WHO TRAVEL TOGETHER

I'm about 90% finished with a new manuscript titled, A Survival Guide for People Who Travel Together: Tales from the Road. Most of the anecdotes are Charley's and mine, but at least a dozen other travelers have contributed. Thanks to all who so willingly recounted their stories with great laughter or nostalgic affection! I might add, there are no children on these journeys. That is another whole book, probably not mine.


Introduction


     Charley and I have done a lot of traveling together over more than fifty years. It started while we were engaged. I was still in college and he was an Air Force officer assigned to Dover, Delaware.  For two years we drove back and forth between Colby College in Waterville, Maine, and Dover Air Force Base in his white VW “Beetle,” shouting fraternity and sorority songs to stay awake:  “Give a rousing cheer/For the boys are here/Lift your glasses high…”
Saigon, Viet Nam 1967
     After we’d been married a year, Charley was assigned to Viet Nam. We met in Honolulu halfway through his year-long tour in ‘67. He arrived at the agreed-upon hotel at 3 a.m., but the desk clerk swore his Rolodex didn’t have any record of my being there. “Try under my name,” Charley said to the man.
     "No, sir, nothing under 'Charles Carey.'"
Honolulu, 1967 
     “Try again under ‘Pamela Carey.’ That’s spelled C-A-R-E-Y.”
     ”Wait a minute! Here she is! Her card was stuck to the card in front of it.”
     “Honey, it’s me,” Charley said quietly, knocking on my door. Since I was expecting him the next morning, I was sound asleep with my hair in curlers and a mud-gunk mask all over my face. Today cell phones would prevent such tragedies. “Open the door!”
     Half asleep, I stumbled to the deadbolt and slid it back. Thirty seconds later, bits of my mud mask hung all across Charley’s stubble.
     We began to travel with another Air Force couple, but he was a pilot and none of us stayed in one place very long. Eventually we traveled with friends from each town where we settled.  We learned quickly there are close friends you can travel with and close friends you can’t. After we had kids, we gave up travelling with other couples. It was too exhausting to make decisions for more than four, and some of the other females qualified in the “bitch” category, were ALWAYS thirty minutes late, or simply couldn’t make up their minds. Charley and I needed our “quiet time,” without any explanations for the hours we might be missing-in-action.
Buzios, Brazil  1982
     Travel is one of the things we enjoy doing together most….unless there’s an argument. And on foreign trips, especially, one of us will always get pissed off, probably from a lack of sleep. Let’s face it – we all dream of an idyllic trip before we leave, but no trip can be perfection. There are often mis-communications, unforeseen emergencies, as well as plain old physical discomfort. No accommodations are quite like home. A sense of humor and the ability to “roll with the punches” are indispensable, even if the punches come in the form of a stolen car or poison ivy surrounding your torso. As we age, "rolling with the punches" has become more of a "get on your feet before the countdown."
Baldissero, Italy  2005 
     When our sons were playing amateur and professional baseball (college ball and the Red Sox organization), we traveled across twenty states to watch them play. During Charley’s professional life, we traveled around the world on business. In retirement, we devote several weeks a year to international travel.  In addition, we drive from Massachusetts to Florida and back as “snowbirds” each year. On one of those trips, we didn’t speak from Massachusetts to South Carolina.  It wasn’t smart to have an argument before leaving on a 1200-mile ride together in a small metal cylinder!
On the equator    2008
Galapagos Islands, Ecuador  2008
Machu Picchu, Peru   2008

   When we travel we are on a figurative journey without a map. We know memories of the unexpected, the funny, the touching, and the exasperating will remain with us long after we get home.  We will always have that! It’s mind-blowing to immerse ourselves in another culture, even if it's within our own country. It teaches tolerance and respect. It’s about “crossing borders into foreign regions of the soul,” as Sue Monk Kidd said in Travelling with Pomegranates.
Sampling the lagers in Castlebar, Ireland  2017
Our date with the raptors, Ireland  2017
     I've developed some unwritten "rules" along the way to help us survive our trips. Sometimes we 
follow them; sometimes we don't. May those who journey together do so in reverence, excitement, and 
never-ending repetition of the mantra, "Zip it!"
                                                        Athens, Greece  2014
Dubrovnik, Croatia   2009
Puglia, Italy   2010

Monet's Giverny, France   2011
Zulu headpiece   So. Africa      2011
Relaxing in Key West 
Oia, Island of Santorini, Greece   2014
Island of Majorca, Spain   2015

Utah Beach, Normandy, France    U.S. Navy Memorial
Disney World   2014
Bonita Springs, Florida
                                      Harbour Island, Bahamas    2015                                 
Cape of Good Hope, So. Africa   2011
Photo below Las Vegas, 2007 

Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris   2016
Lacco Ameno, Island of Ischia, Italy    

 Amsterdam, Netherlands    2016