This is a catch up entry for what has been a hectic week. In this entry: making markers, birthdays by the bunch, earings by email.
1. The Mid Autumn Festival, aka Mooncake Day is this Saturday. Usually this mostly involves getting your hands on some of the extremely sweet pastry. However, it also is one of the big cemetery visitation weeks; the Chinese association that my family belongs hires a bus to take members to the plot that they own. Unfortunately, it was on a weekday, so I couldn’t go. Also, my aunt was freaking out my mom, because the last time she visited, she couldn’t find my father’s site (we don’t have a headstone up yet – it takes at least 6 months for the ground to settle before they can put one up, and someone was just interred on Saturday to the right). P- and I went the day before to check things out and put up a temporary marker so the family didn’t go into total meltdown. Thankfully things worked out, and crisis was averted.
2. Today (Thursday) is my mom’s and P-‘s birthday. P’s brother’s b-day is tomorrow, her dad’s b-day is on Saturday. This is just crazy. Happy every day!
3. Things were crazy at work this week – I’ve been getting home at 8, and P- wasn’t making it easy to get anything for her, first because she’s usually around, and second, she wasn’t taking any of my probing for desired gifts, none of which should promote her fine handbag addiction. I finally got her to say “earings”. With zero time, a need to outdo last year’s present, and absolutely no skill in picking jewelry, I went for the hail mary and ordered online from Blue Nile, after polling the women at work. Yes, it’s something of a risk; it’s something like FreshDirect picking your meats and seafood for you, but the stakes are 10 times higher. I don’t get to see the items in person, and I have to trust these people from Seattle, but they had a good online reputation, the description was detailed, and you get to see the grading ratings beforehand (for the record, they were H color, VS1 clarity). It’s actually much more information than I would have received if I went to the store myself. The audience at work voted for the platnium Princess cut diamond studs. Everything went incredibly smooth, the package arrived on time in a non-descript box, and boy did P- love them. Phew! It was actually a good price, cheap shipping (would have been free, but I was really pushing the envelope), no tax, and the product was actually better than advertised, so I recommend them, but I don’t want to see my Amex at the end of the month.