Barbara's Meanderings

Life is so bizarre sometimes. You never know when or where you will meet someone you know.This happened to me when I spied a name that looked very familiar as a guest on April Robins' Robin Falls Radio Show on Blog Talk Radio - Fran Lewis. Fran taught with me in the NYC Public School where I taught first grade. She was really magic with the kids. It was kind of like the Pied Piper. She'd come into the class since she was the Language Specialist there and she'd captivate the kids with whatever she did. I had no idea that she was an author of several children's picture books too.:) So I listened to the show and sure enough it was the same Fran Lewis. I'm happy to say that we reconnected after nine years and I am very happy we did.:) Fran has a new show on Blog Talk Radio for Red River Writers Radio called, Red River Writers Book Club. It starts tomorrow, Wednesday, March 17th at 12PM Central time, 1PM Eastern time. Each show she will have one author whose book will be discussed and several questioners who have read the book.

So Fran asked me to be on the show and also asked me to be a permanent guest on the show. Tomorrow's author is Dellani Oakes who has written Indian Summer, which is a historical novel set in 1739 in St. Augustine, Florida. If you are interested in what I thought of this book you can read my review here. Tomorrow I will be on Red River Writers Book Club questioning Dellani Oakes about her book, Indian Summer. So here is shameless promotion. Both Dellani and Fran are going to be on the show. There are going to be a few more people besides myself and I am looking forward to meeting them.

I hope you will tune into this first show of Red River Writers Book Club. I know it's going to be fun to hear both Fran and me together. I hope that the other people will get a chance to speak.:)

Now for an update on my life. We are rapidly unpacking most of our things except for the pictures and paintings. The marble table is out of the middle of the living room. Yay!!!! It is still, however, in the apartment waiting for the ServPro people to pick it up and to pay me for it. I got an estimate from this wonderful company Intermarble. Within a few days we had a written estimate from this company and every transaction was done accurately and promptly. It's rare to find such good communication with a company. We were really surprised at the estimate. We had no idea of the value of this table. I gave the estimate to the ServPro guy and I haven't heard back from him since. To be fair, I'm sure he is totally swamped (LOL) with emergency work since the storm. I am not expecting him to answer me for weeks. Also as I unpacked more of my Betty Boop dolls I found one that had cracked it's hand off. Plus I had these antique bisque cherubs and one has lost its leg.:( Added to the antique saucer that got cracked, another antique plate that got cracked and a few other cracked items, there was way too much breakage. I have moved these pieces over ten times and nothing happened to them. What I am very thankful for is that the Hummel figures that I have which come from pre-war Germany and are very rare, did not have a scratch on them!!!

I am ending with a celebration of a wonderful drive up restaurant called Walter's where my daughter and I spend about an hour enjoying their specialty: a hot dog and curly fries. There is even an outdoor eating area where we celebrated the first sunny warmish day in weeks!!! This neighborhood gem has been around since 1919!!! If you live in Mamaroneck, NY you know all about Walter's. Most people in the surrounding area of Rye, PortChester, and White Plains know about it too. But people even in New York City have been made aware of Walter's and are planning day trips up to Walter's. Why do so many people go here? They make probably the best hot dogs I've ever eaten with great sides. The Walter's experience means you get there and stand in line for at least a half hour. We got there at the tail end of lunch time, but you can have a shorter wait time at other times. Walter's is right in the middle of a residential area so parking is always a problem too. The day was so good we even found a parking space! You finally get up to the ordering person and place your order. As you are waiting you can peek through the window at the hot dogs on the grill. Once you pay this guy or woman you move over to the next window to wait for your food. You can see your food being made and your mouth waters. The hot dog is cut down the middle and placed on the bun that is not even toasted. They put the mustard on for you. There is nothing else except ketchup. They wrap up your hot dog or hot dogs, the side you chose, put it all in a brown paper bag and give you a box for the drinks. They serve milk shakes, but we didn't want to get one, because each milk shake has four scoops of ice cream!! I warn you that once you take your first bite of their hot dog you will be hooked and will need to come back as many times as you can. You will find yourself thinking Walter's on the first nice day of spring and making excuses to yourself about why you need to go back at least once a month in the summer. Check out the website and see for yourself what I am talking about and why it is so popular.:) I wish you guys could taste this hot dog.:)