It was Christmas week and we weren't celebrating, so we recorded what we did including the long wait in the traffic jam and the continuing progress of the penny project. We also recorded the New Year's Eve gathering and the results of Suzanne's knitting binge.
The pennies
were one of the central themes of this holiday season. We had lots of them
and were sorting them first by decade and then by year. Images such as these
represent our progress and are meant to show the different distributions of
pennies from different sources. In capsule summary, Sovereign Bank on Nassau
Street (image to follow) gave the worst pennies. They had lots of Canadian
pennies and their rolls often had only 49 pennies. Fleet Bank on Nassau
Street did an honorable job -- many fewer Canadian pennies, no
rolls were short and the pennies had a respectable, if boring, distribution.
The
PNC Bank I went
to with DrLen was the most interesting of all. Some of the rolls were
just shiny new pennies. But, others came with character. You could
read the person's account number on the side of the roll and feel
like they were sharing a part of their life with you.
In the days before Xmas, I made the mistake of journeying out to Sam's Club and getting caught in an horrendous traffic jam. Fortunately, Jane was with me at the time and reminded me that I had the camera and so could record what it was that I was seeing inside the car and out and around the lot. If you had been here with us, these were the scenes you would have seen from my vantage point
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Xmas eve, The Gespass'es from Pittsburgh
came to visit and we lit a fire
though we could not interest them in the penny project
Then it was back to Princeton life and Andy came by to help Sarah
find something in the refrigirator as Rosie, Kaylen and Jane
admired Kaylen's new cell phone
that lights up
but is not immune to other problems as we would later learn
in many excursions. The next day, Suzanne came home
so we recorded the snowfall
before Ben and I headed out to PJ's
where the menu was as always
and Ben's burger
looked as good as my buttermilks
for a fine meal that made him quite happy
so that we could march on and see Sarah and her gang
at the toy store.
On Friday, as the girls sat on the couch
Melissa
came to visit and chat though Ben
thought there was too much chatting
and too many people sitting around
to even admire my feet
as the conversation continued
and Kaylen arrived
so that I made this sandwich
for Ben and once fueled up, he went back to his playing
and didn't seem to mind the conversation
as we made our way to Melissa's cookies
and Jane and Kaylen
finished their games. Melissa posed for the obligatory photos
then with Josephine
and Suzanne
as Kaylen and Jane
got ready to go on our excursion which began (as do all
good excursions)
at the gas pump. Driving further on, we ran into Matt and Ned
playing hoops in a photo that brought forth Ned's Dad
as a fan of this sight. After making our way to the video store
we followed this truck
on our fresh tank of gas
and admired the bumper sticker
as we went into the phone store
and brought the broken phone
to this gentleman
who could fix one but not the other.
We followed this car home
where Willa
one twin
Martha
and Jane
were waiting for us as Martha drank her tea
and the other twin emerged
to her mother's delight
as the orange peals
accumulated. Before their departure
we caught another picture and one of Jane
before noticing Willa's Bling Bling shirt
and going back to the penny sorting project
where the towers were getting too big
for stability
even as we moved new distributions
into the ever extending chain
of pennies
we had sorted. We should have known that Suzanne's arrival
home
gathering of the garbage can
and to the amazement of Ben
cleaning of her car
would not bode well for the towers some of which collapsed
leaving this mess
to be cleaned up and resorted with these displaced pennies
into the big histogram.
The next thing we knew, it was New Year's Eve. The Kramer brought the
champagne
and we added the hors de ouveres
to Sarah's amusement
as Suzanne tried on her scarf
and let the fabric
be admired. Next course
came as the chili
and peanut sauce
got ready fro the chili (vegetarian, of course)
to find some light
and get warm enough to take it's place with the other
foods
as the presents waited
for the appropriate moment and more food
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Suzanne continued to model scarves
as did Sarah
and then the Justs arrived
and felt the scarves
until Lizzie warmed the new year
by trying one on.