Visit to NJ

I had a lovely visit with my folks this past week.




I took up the new car, and took my dad out for a ride.  It's such a beautiful time of year in northwest New Jersey!

 The sunflowers were blooming in the farm up the street, so that was our first stop.

Then, since we were out anyway, we decided to go down by Paulinskill lake to see if the purple loosestrife was blooming.


 It was!


This is an invasive plant here because it has no natural predators (it's a garden escapee originally from Europe). 

It really does cover acres and acres of boggy land, and I'm sure it's crowding the native species, but the bees love it!

And when we came back, Dad looked over the car, topping off fluids, vacuuming the interior, and giving it a good wash into the bargain- the car did not look this good when we bought it!!

Then I helped my mom with rearranging her office.

Mostly this involved sorting out computer cords and trying to reconnect everything correctly.

Happy Mumpy!

I considered calling Bill, my favorite network engineer, but, for the life of me, I couldn't come up with a question beyond, "Where do all these cords go?" That hardly seemed a fair question to ask over the phone!

 In a minor miracle, we figured it out and everything works!



Last, but not least, I got to play Mumpy a few hands of Pig's Knuckles, and, if you can believe it, I skunked her twice!

I won her paper towel holder!

My sister thinks Mumpy might have stacked the deck, but it was Mumpy's special paper towel holder, so that hardly seems likely, now does it?