Recently, my cousin told me about some people who read my blog regularly but don’t really know me that well. They remarked to her that, “Everything with Carey is an event!“. I chuckled when I heard that but laughed even harder this week when I watched the TV show “How I Met Your Mother“. If you haven’t seen it, it’s a great show that stars Neil Patrick Harris and an ensemble cast. It’s basically a 21st Century “Friends“. In this week’s episode, Marshall is derided by his wife Lily for creating another photo montage that drove his friends away. It seems that Marshall was addicted to creating photo slideshows with music, documenting the most mundane events in his life; like pet-sitting or ordering Chinese food. LOL, remind you of anyone?? Take a look at this clip, it’s hilarious:
Heck, I admit I’m a narcissist, but isn’t every blogger to an extent? (By the way, it’s not narcissism if you truly are better than everyone else!) It’s baffling to think why total strangers should be interested in looking at my pictures and videos, but yet I post them and expect feedback like any good narcissist. So I guess Marshall and I have a lot in common. (I could be in worse company.) Though, if I start adding my own signing to too many of my videos, feel free to tell me to stop. I’ll try to spare my readers that indignity! So without further ado, here are the photos from Lisa & Shelby’s birthday celebration tonight (hardly a mundane event!), set to the tune of Lisa’s favorite singer (and a narcissistic song!). (YouTube wouldn’t let me post the slideshow with the music, so you’ll have to look at the pictures and listen to the music the old school way!) Happy Birthday Lisa!! xoxo
Five years ago this very second I was in the hospital in Mission Viejo filming the first video below of a crying baby boy who would come to call me “Ca-wee”. Five years later, little Andy is the light of all of our lives. In ten years I’m going to show him the second video and wonder if he still has his soap and ketchup bottle collection? Let’s hope so! HAPPY BIRTHDAY ANDY!! xoxo
Andy, minutes after birth and 5 years later “eating wind”!
For his birthday, Lisa hired “The Lizard Wizard” and Andy’s dream of holding an alligator came true. He even liked the tarantula and the cockroach (unlike some of the kids…and adults)! What a brave little boy!
Happy Birthday Andy Bear!
Even Mommy got in on the action!
A princess and three handsome princes??
Direct from Madagascar came this cockroach!
The expressions on this little boy’s face were priceless!
In August, less than 2 months before he died, my Uncle George visited his hometown of Iron Mountain, Michigan and went fishing with his brother. To say my uncle loved to fish was an understatement. I think the only thing he loved more, was his wife, his grandkids and his brother! Despite a cold rain that day, my 81 year old uncle and his brother hiked more than 100 yards through the woods, carrying a heavy canoe to a secret fishing hole. They had quite an adventure that day, and his brother wrote a story about it that was published in the local paper:
IRON MOUNTAIN – It was tough, but the end reward was worth it all.
Let’s just say our fishing trip seemed doomed from the start. It was a bright shining day when I picked up my brother George. Then things started to go a little bad.
While in the truck, we noted we both forgot sunglasses – number one mistake. We picked up the canoe at the camp and drove a few miles to a lake in the Republic area.
Then, two senior citizens still had to carry the canoe 100 yards through the woods to the lake. Got to the lake, ready to launch the canoe. We soon discovered that the paddles, life jackets, and fishing poles were back at camp.
Back to camp we go and we were back to square one.
Once again, back at the lake, ready to go. Then the minnow bucket tipped – minnows all over the ground. Hand-picked them up (a few even lived); now we are on our way.
While pushing the canoe out, we sank in mud up to our knees. Two seniors stuck in mud. But we got out and soon were floating across the lake. We paddled quite a ways and got set to put a dead minnow on the hook.
One hour into fishing and not a bite. We figured it was the minnows’ fault. We would not give up just yet.
Brother George decided to have a sandwich, took a couple bites and it fell out of his hand into the bottom of a slightly wet canoe. It seems things were getting worse.
But then the perch started biting.
In five minutes we had three 12-inch perch on the stringer.
Somehow, stinger and all fell out of hand overboard. All perch were gone.
Now for sure he was ready to call it quits. I talked him into staying because the fish were starting to bite.
Bottom line, 30 jumbo perch (10 to 13 inches) in a couple hours of fishing. We were happy and finally did call it quits for the day.
Getting the canoe back out of the woods to the truck was harder than getting in. Somehow that canoe got at least 100 pounds heavier.
I should mention on the way out I lost my pocket knife and Brother got poked in the eye with a tree branch and we crushed the minnow bucket.
We were glad to get back to camp in one piece.
But the doomed trip turned out to be a great success. We will both remember it for a long time and George now has a fishing story to tell when he gets back to California.
I’m sure it was the highlight of his vacation.
I’m staying with my aunt this week, and obviously there are reminders of Uncle George everywhere. I smell his cologne in the bathroom when I shower. I’m sleeping on his pillow, which I find comforting. Tomorrow, friends and family will gather to celebrate his memory. We’ve been trying to keep this week as normal as possible for the kids. Last night we made caramel apples which they loved:
Tressa, Andy, Dar & Tommy
Great Grandma (Aunty LuLu) with kids
Andy likes taffy apples!
Oh Brother let’s go down…down to the lake and fish
And finally, I couldn’t let today pass without acknowledging a birthday. Chazz turned 1 year old today!! In that year, I’ve taken over 700 photos of him:
Update: Despite yesterday’s incredible news, which I still encourage everyone to read below, my beloved Uncle George passed away peacefully this morning, with none of the extraordinary, damaging measures that he had to endure for the past week. I fully believe that is the way he wanted it. He made the most of his last night with us, and it rivaled the best of our family parties…and we throw good parties! Had he survived, his quality of life would have changed drastically and he wouldn’t have liked that. He fought until the end and surrendered on his own terms, enjoying time with his family. I’m so glad that I began making videos of his stories lately. He was the best story teller I ever knew, and I will always look back at these videos fondly and remember a life well lived. As I left the hospital last night to take my aunt home, I told him I loved him and he grabbed my hand and said “I love you too Care.”
Click Play, Above Right. “Now don’t forget, this is going on Internet.” “That’s all right!”
Uncle George remembered so much about his life and loved to share his memories. When I told him that I wanted to start recording him on video, he laughed, but I think he really liked the idea. The first story told in the above video is actually pretty funny. It involves a drunken train conductor and some young girls hitting on my uncle (who was even a stud back then) when he worked in a hotel after coming home from the war. The second story involves my aunt scouting for Nazi & Japanese war planes in Iron Mountain, Michigan (of all places) during WWII when she was in high school. The third story is a retelling of a joke they used to play on their (less favorite) nephew.
What a roller coaster of a day…from the time I took my aunt home on Sunday night and Lisa stayed the night with him wiping tears from his face, to when he extubated himself and started talking, saying it was the happiest day of his life, to twelve hours later when he died.
I posted the following blog at 2 AM this morning, a few hours before my uncle passed away:
Regular readers of this space know of my fondness for my Uncle George. You’ve watched him celebrate his 79th, 80th and 81st birthdays with me; laughed at the stories he told on his 60th wedding anniversary to his 82 year old “cougar” of a wife, my “Aunty LuLu“; and listened as he regaled me with stories of the “old days” that always ended with a hearty laugh. At 81, he’s far more fit than I am. In fact, he still works as an usher at the Angel’s baseball stadium, a job he loves. My aunt and uncle spent several weeks in Michigan over the summer while I was in Italy, and while there my uncle contracted a mild case of pneumonia. When they came back, he had lost a little weight, but since he’s strong as an ox, he didn’t let it affect him much and he continued to work around the house and go to his job at the ball park.
When I went to their house for my regular spaghetti dinner a week ago Thursday, he said he was feeling much better and even gave me an inhaler for my asthma that had been prescribed to him for his pneumonia, which he said he no longer needed. We all laughed and remarked that it was pretty sad that I was sharing medicine with my 81 year old uncle, because HE didn’t need it and I did! I didn’t take a photo that evening (like I usually do), as I remember thinking he still looked a little thin.
Fast forward to last Tuesday. My uncle was working the Angel’s game, but asked his boss if he could leave early in the 7th inning. As he went to leave, he collapsed and fell backwards hitting his head. As it turns out, there was a nurse waking by in the stadium. She immediately began giving my uncle CPR until the paramedics arrived. They determined he had gone into cardiac arrest due to a fatal arrhythmia, and shocked him back to life with a defibrillator. He was taken by ambulance to University of California, Irvine Medical Center where he went into cardiac arrest a second time and was paddled again.
Sunset from the hospital window
When I arrived at the hospital Wednesday, on my way to San Diego for a business trip, things didn’t look good. He was hooked up to a ventilator that was breathing for him, and his blood pressure was dangerously low. An angiogram revealed that a bypass he had more than 20 years ago was nearly completely blocked, and his heart was only pumping at about 15% capacity. Though there’s not much they can do about the heart problems at his age, they were hoping to wean him off the medicine so he could breathe on his own. And the waiting began. We all tried to keep a positive attitude and make the best out of a bad situation by laughing and letting him hear us laugh.
I was even able to get quite a bit of work done Friday afternoon
Back on the chain gang
The kids never went in, but they were a welcome distraction!
By Friday we all had to wear scrubs while visiting due to the possibility of infection. Also, he was beginning to develop pneumonia again. I stayed with my aunt, and as each day wore on, my uncle looked sadder and sadder. Because he was intubated (had a tube down his throat breathing for him), he couldn’t speak. Things culminated this morning as his medicine wore off and it became increasingly clear that he did not want to be there. It finally got so bad, that the doctor asked the family leave for two hours, and that’s when something remarkable happened…
Auntie holding Uncle’s hand…
When everyone was out of the room and the doctors thought he was sufficiently restrained and sedated, my uncle proceeded to pull the tube all the way out of his throat! Alarms sounded and the family was called back to the hospital. I had actually taken Tommy & Andy to see the movie “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs“, and by the time I arrived back at the hospital, my uncle was sitting up in bed, talking and breathing on his own with no IV or additional medicine! This is one really strong man! His first words to me were, “Now that you’re back, we can start the party!” I pulled out the inhaler he had given me the week before and he laughed! Obviously his heart is still very sick and my aunt understands that; but it was so nice, after a week of interminable waiting and hoping, that we were able to talk to him and laugh with him tonight. He’s still sharp as a tack, and as we left he was trying to get out of bed to close the blinds (a definite no no!). We’re taking it one day at a time from here, but I think my aunt will be able to sleep well tonight!
Earlier today while he was still intubated
Enjoying a little 3D normalcy with the boys
We called him “Doctor Doom & Gloom” but the comments on Facebook are trending in his favor (in the looks department at least)! He had nothing on my uncle though:
Move over Doc…you could have never competed with this!
Laughing, smiling and breathing again! After a stressful week filled with a literal Nurse Ratched, lots of Diet Coke, gallons of hand sanitizer and more than a few tears, a family gathers around its patriarch.
One of my favorite photos of me and my uncle, taken on his 80th birthday last year
Today, September 2nd, is Claudio’s birthday, as I am sure many of you know. I wanted to get more ideas about his new professorial life and, bingo, found some delightful quotes at RatemyProfessor.com. Here are some highlights, in my view…
“He is very knowledgeable in the subject matter, and even if he is sometimes slightly unclear with his initial explanations,…”
“His accent can be amusing at times, but in a good way. He is perfectly comprehensible.”
“Dr. P. is a world class professor.”
“One of the best professor [sic] I have ever taken in my life.” (lovely insinuating were it not for the obvious sign of poor grammar…my favorite quote in the group)
“This man is helpful, knowledgable [sic] and is willing to help you in whatever way possible.” (Do tell, Dr. World Class!)
“He really knows what he is talking about,…” (Ha! This one had me rolling on the ground)
Happy birthday to you, old friend!
I am looking forward to seeing you all in a few days! Luisao, any chance you can plan a last minute trip to SoCal this weekend?! Claudao, nao se preocupe que vamos falar mal de voce esse final de semana, com aquele carinho de sempre.
Abracos, m
From: Carey Anthony
Wed, Sep 2, 2009 at 11:18 PM
To: Marcelo
Cc: The GLY Gang
Many of you don’t remember that back in the early 90′s, before the Internet or ratemyprofessor.com, I used to collect Claudio’s evaluations from when he was a T.A at University of Illinois, because he spent summers in Brazil. My all time favorite went something like this:
Q: Did you learn a lot in Professor P’s class?
A: I didn’t learn a thing. I was too busy looking at his dreamy eyes!
15 years later, the eyes are more cloudy than dreamy and we won’t talk about the hair…
I was looking through my old diaries last night, and found this and sent it to Claudio. He wrote this in my calendar in 1991: “Birthday of the nicest Brazilian ever”. I’m sure Marcelo might have something to say about that my dear!
His reply:
From: Claudio
Wed, Sep 2, 2009 at 9:23 AM
To: Carey Anthony
THANK YOU!!!!
The scheduler was funny! To imagine you still had hair to cut… good times!! :) Ugh, Vicious!!
From: Carey Anthony
Wed, Sep 2, 2009 at 9:39 AM
To: Claudio
Ugh! You want to talk about hair!!?? Be careful darling. It may be YOUR birthday, but my old calendars hold lots of other secrets as well. Feliz Anniversario
The weatherfinally broke today. It was a little cooler with a touch of humidity in the air. We needed a break! Saturday it was 105° F (41° C) when Lisa & the kids and I took Aunty Lulu & Uncle George out for ice cream:
The fires did make for amazing sunsets all last week:
Whenever I need to smile I’ll just look at this picture of Buster!
Joel and I went to see District 9 over the weekend and we both enjoyed the movie. It was about 1/2 hour too long, but entertaining. Kind of a cross between Close Encounters and The Fly! There were a lot of blatant racial parallels that I won’t go into now. As someone who has been to Johannesburg though, it was a sadly appropriate setting for that movie.
The fires are far enough away that my home isn’t in any danger, but they’re still too close for comfort:
On the way home last night this is what I saw from the car. I’m surprised there weren’t more accidents on the freeway from people looking. It was an amazing sight to see:
The air today was an eerie, quiet yellow making the sky look like Dijon mustard. About 6:00 tonight I went up to my roof and shot this photo.
After taking this, I went back inside with my mask!
And finally, I got some very sad news today from Margie:
From: Margie Sent: Tuesday, September 01, 2009 6:34 AM To: Carey Subject: Daisy
I had to have Daisy put down today. I am very sad. She fell off the bed & broke whatever was misplaced in her back. When I picked her up she immediately lost her bowels & her head started rolling to the side. When I took her outside she tried to stand but could not. Later I will pick her up – couldn’t bear to be with her when they put her down – and bury her on the farm. Can’t stop crying every time I think about it, so I’m going to try not to think about it.
I’ve got a bunch of good friends flying in for the weekend starting Thursday. It’s going to be non stop. We’re going to the Hollywood Bowl for my 44th birthday Sunday. I’ll try to post as I have time. Have a good week everyone!
ON THE LIGHTER SIDE “The state of California is $30 billion in debt, and there’s no way we can pay it back, so what we’ve decided to do is set it on fire and collect the insurance.” – Jimmy Kimmel
Little Andy banged his big toe in the door today, and the toenail was hanging by a thread. He was crying at dinner, so I told him that when the nail fell off, he should put it under his pillow and the “Toe Fairy” would come overnight. His parents immediately shot me a “what the hell does the Toe Fairy bring!?” look! Andy instantly stopped crying and started laughing! As we said goodbye from the car, he was still talking about the Toe Fairy as the following video will attest:
“Bye Blog Weaders”
So the question is, what do you think the Toe Fairy should leave under Andy’s pillow??
Even though I’m not home this week, the Hotel Careyfornia is booked to capacity. Luis and David arrived in L.A. last night sent me this wonderful, albeit staged, photo to let me know they were having a great time in my home! I love it!
Meanwhile, it’s the start of baseball season in California, so Rob had coaching duties tonight which left me the delightful task of taking my cousin Tressa to the “Me & My Guy (that’s a “u” not an “a”) Luau” for the Girl Scouts. It was quite well attended and Tressa seemed to have a really good time with her favorite cousin I’m working this weekend, so this was the highlight for sure! Have a nice weekend everyone.
Tony (generasianx) was nice enough to invite Albert (owbert) and me to a showing of “The Secret Life of Bees” on Sunday night. After the movie, there was a panel discussion with the director, Gina Prince Bythewood, and one of the stars of the movie, Dakota Fanning. (They were also joined by Dr. Barbara Rico, an English professor from Loyola Marymount who discussed some of the central literary & multicultural themes in the movie.) Dakota Fanning, who’s not even 15 yet, blew us all away. She is a remarkably poised young woman, seemingly unaffected by the spotlight and the falseness that permeates this town. Her performance in the movie was riveting. She kept pace with her fellow actresses Queen Latifah and Jennifer Hudson. Quite frankly, I’m surprised the movie didn’t get more buzz (pun intended). Roger Ebert writes:
There is such a thing as feeling superior to your emotions, but I trust mine. If I sense the beginnings of a teardrop in my eye during a movie, that is evidence more tangible than all the mighty weight of Film Theory. “The immediate experience,” one of the wisest of critics called it. That’s what you have to acknowledge. I watched the movie, abandoned history and plausibility, and just plain fell for it. If it had been a bad movie, it would have been ripe for vivisection. But it is not a bad movie.
I have some video of the panel discussion if anyone’s interested, I’ll post it on YouTube. If you haven’t seen this movie, it’s worth watching. If you don’t like it, I’ll pay you double.
BFF’s!, Carey & Dakota. She reminds me a lot of Jodie Foster
I had to go to San Diego for a meeting yesterday. Got to see a bunch of old friends & colleagues, and it was a picture perfect day. Parvesh and I had lunch at the Del Coronado, and it was just as gorgeous as when Vivek and I were there last summer. Such a pretty place! Afterwards, I drove up to meet my cousins for dinner.
Boo yah!
Chocolate chip faced Andy
It was a long day, but a good one! Certainly better than any day in an Oprah-less world!
Recently, my cousin told me about some people who read 
my blog regularly but don’t really know me that well. They remarked to her that, “Everything with Carey is an event!“. I chuckled when I heard that but laughed even harder this week when I watched the TV show “How I Met Your Mother“. If you haven’t seen it, it’s a great show that stars Neil Patrick Harris and an ensemble cast. It’s basically a 21st Century “Friends“. In this week’s episode, Marshall is derided by his wife Lily for creating another photo montage that drove his friends away. It seems that Marshall was addicted to creating photo slideshows with music, documenting the most mundane events in his life; like pet-sitting or ordering Chinese food. LOL, remind you of anyone?? 
Take a look at this clip, it’s hilarious:
the camp and drove a few miles to a lake in the Republic area.
Now for sure he was ready to call it quits. I talked him into staying because the fish were starting to bite.
I’m working this weekend, so this was the highlight for sure! Have a nice weekend everyone.
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