Zeno's Bar & Grill

Wow, a lot happens in almost a month - End of school, a new phone, a ballet recital, book club, a trip to Florida, a Philip Glass concert, a visiting relative...

I'm not sure why the end of school became so busy for me, but it did. I think because there were so many one off things to my schedule that I had to remember. Lucky for me my old beloved Razr phone died and I got the new Moto Q which has a QWERTY keypad and a calendar built into the phone.

Piper's ballet was cute, but LONG! Her song lasted for all of 45 seconds, but we had to stay for the entire 90 minute performance because they wouldn't let us backstage to pick up our kids. I really need to find a new place for her to take lessons. You'd think by the way they act they're training the next Anna Pavlova, but believe me, from what I've seen of their long term students (and it was a LOT) they ain't. Can you say out-of-sync (with both the music and each other) after ten years of lessons.

Book club was at my house. We read Veronica by Mary Gaitskill. I really enjoyed it though it was a bit too racy for some of the other members. It was about a former model with hepatitis C. It was incredibly well-written and her use of description was amazing.

Next month we are reading Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. It was so good that I finished it already and book club isn't for another month. I'll probably read one of the other picks that got voted down: Drop City by T.C. Boyle.

Two days after book club we were on the 6am flight to Fort Lauderdale to visit my father-in-law. His wife of 57 years passed away in February, so he is obviously sad and lonely, but seeing his grandkids cheered him up a bit. The kids had fun and we saw wild iguanas stalking the grounds of his retirement home.

Returning home it was errand, errand, errand with kids in tow preparing for the visit of my grandmother. We were able to take a break on Wednesday evening and (finally) go to Ravinia (a beautiful outdoor concert venue) to see Philip Glass. His new work, Book of Longing, puts music to a selection of poems by Leonard Cohen. We had dinner at a restaurant on-site before going in and I was nervous we would be late. I didn't want to miss a single note. My husband reassured me that if we did we would hear it again, and again, and again. The concert was wonderful and it was exciting to see Philip Glass actually there.

The next day my grandmother arrived. It's great having her here, and she'll be staying with us for the next two weeks, so it might be a while before I'm able to update again. Luckily Melanie's been great about posting, so I'll see you all at the end of the month!

--Kelly