Author Archives: kzmclain

Seeing Red

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7fa6c4dae8070e069915e71a14ef253cThe second I walked into church on Sunday, I knew that once again I had blown it. I looked at the bright red banner that draped the ceiling above the altar, the red ribbons that festooned the front pews, and then looked down at my white sweater and black pants. Just like every Pentecost Sunday of my life, I forgot to wear red.

I don’t know why it’s suggested we wear red on Pentecost. Corpus Christi I could understand.  You know, the Blood of Christ. Pentecost, I don’t know; it seems a stretch. It apparently is to represent the fire of the Holy Spirit, but to me, fire is yellow. But no, we wear red. As it happens, even if yellow had been the color of Pentecost, I would still not having been appropriately attired. Sigh.

I tell this story every Pentecost, but it’s my blog, so I can tell it again! Eight years ago we were in Barcelona on the Monday following Pentecost. We didn’t know, however, that it was Pentecost. We had, in fact, attended church the day before, but it being in Spanish and all….. Well, what can I say?

So we wandered around town for almost three-quarters of that Monday wondering why nothing was opened. We finally approached a tourist information place and, in very rudimentary Spanish, asked that very question. And in very rudimentary English, she told us it was second Easter, and so, a national holiday. We nodded as if we understood, but really didn’t. And then I began leafing through my Rick Steves guidebook and learned that in fact, Pentecost is (or at least was) a national holiday in Spain, so important, in fact, that the holiday continues on the Monday after Pentecost. Who knew?

And it wasn’t until this past Sunday that I finally understood why the young women called it second Easter. Easter Sunday is the beginning of the Easter season, and 50 days later is the official end of the Easter season, according to the Catholic Church, and many other churches. So what I believe the young woman was saying was not that Pentecost was in any way Easter, be it first or second, but that it was the END of the Easter season.

As I contemplated Pentecost on Sunday, and my not-red-clothes, it occurred to me that up until the Holy Spirit descended upon the apostles, the friends of Jesus had sort of sputtered around, unsure of what to do next. Jesus knew they needed a little boost to get into the, well, spirit of their task. And the bible tells us that the Holy Spirit came down to the apostles looking like tongues of fire. Whoa! That must have given them a start. And then there was the whole idea that they were speaking in such a way that everyone could understand them no matter from whence they came.

I’ve never quite understood the Holy Spirit. God is complex and mysterious, but understandable. Jesus is easy to figure out as long as you have faith. But what about the Holy Spirit? What’s up with that?

And yet, it’s the Holy Spirit to whom I pray whenever I’m asking for help in something that seems insurmountable, which is, frankly, every day. Holy Spirit, give me courage to face the next obstacle. Holy Spirit, bring my boy back to his faith. Holy Spirit, give me strength each day to accept Bill’s Parkinson and bear my own health issues. Holy Spirit, help us to love one another and give me the patience to forgive.

I think I pray to the Holy Spirt because somewhere in my faith, I believe – just like Jesus’ apostles – that I need a little boost, and the Spirit is the one to give it.

Holy Spirit, help me remember to wear red next Pentecost.

Chillin’

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There are three reasons why a new refrigerator currently lives in my Denver kitchen.

First, the ice maker stopped working in our old refrigerator. For a while before we left for Arizona, I made do by purchasing ice from the grocery store. That worked reasonably well, though it was admittedly kind of a pain in the, well, you know. But for some reason, since we’ve been back in Denver, I have been wholly and completely unable to remember to buy ice. I put it on my grocery list and still don’t buy ice. It only becomes a crisis when I go to make a gin and tonic and I don’t have ice. Similarly, a martini cannot be either shaken OR stirred without ice.

Second, it came to my notice several months ago that on the television program Elementary, the refrigerator which Sherlock and Joan Watson have in their PURPOSELY VINTAGE NEW YORK CITY KITCHEN is the exact same refrigerator in MY VERY OWN KITCHEN, which is not vintage. Or at least not meant to be vintage.

And third, Bill and I moved into this house 23 years ago. One of the first things we did was to replace the existing appliances. Since I can’t remember what I did yesterday, I certainly can’t remember why we were so hell-bent on replacing the appliances, but we were. And the first thing we replaced was the refrigerator.

“Let’s be cutting edge,” either I said to Bill or he said to me. “Let’s not get a white refrigerator. Let’s do something a bit different.”

Back in those days, stainless steel was not really an option unless you were purchasing appliances for a restaurant. Black may or may not have been an option, but we instead chose to go with a sort of off-white beige color, thinking that we would then buy all of our appliances in that color. Live like it’s your last day!

What we didn’t account for was the fact that there were NO OTHER APPLIANCES sold in that color. In-wall ovens, dishwashers, range tops – none of them were made in that particular color. And so for a 23-year period, we have lived with a refrigerator that doesn’t match any of our other appliances. While it hasn’t bothered me all that much, I’m sure every visitor I’ve ever had to my kitchen has cringed when they noticed that my fridge was a peculiar color.

Old Fridge

But given the no-ice thing and the fact that the refrigerator looks like Ma and Pa Wilder might have used it in their little house on the prairie, we elected to bite the bullet and purchase a new refrigerator.

We made a couple of trips to the Sears Outlet Store and eventually decided on a nice, contemporary-looking, WHITE refrigerator. I hear the gasps that we didn’t go with stainless steel, but I’m old-fashioned and I like my white appliances. I just don’t like my off-white appliances. And besides, last summer we purchased a new dishwasher in white, and I didn’t want to go off on the same tangent as 23 years ago. White it is.

new refrigerator 2016

It was kind of sad to see my refrigerator go on Saturday when the extremely nice and extremely strong refrigerator delivery fellows took away our old fridge. Still, I don’t have a list of fond memories of the thing, though it has served me well. In fact, about the only refrigerator-specific memory I have of old Mr. Chiller is an incident that took place shortly after Bill and I got married. It’s safe to say that we had a bit of a difficult time figuring out just who wore the pants in the family for a while, until we realized that neither of us did. Anyway, one day I got mad at Bill for something, what, I don’t even recall. But I was MAD. So mad, in fact, that I took an as-yet unopened Taco Bell burrito and threw it at him, as hard as I could. He, being quite agile, ducked. The burrito missed him and went under the refrigerator. And so, rather than having a satisfactory ending to our fight, it just sort of petered out as we had to work as a team to move the refrigerator away from the wall and find the burrito. Not one of my prouder moments.

My rangetop and my double wall ovens, though they will likely show up on some television show or other (maybe Antique Roadshow), are here to stay for a while. They work fine, and we always come back to our same mantra: WWWD. That is: What Would Wilma Do? And as long as something works, she would keep it.

And we will too. Unless it somehow comes between me and my martini. That’s the death knell for appliances in our household.

This post linked to the GRAND Social

Saturday Smile: Go State!

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Early one morning this past week, my telephone dinged early, indicating a text message. I wondered who would be texting me at 6 o’clock in the morning. I, of course, expected bad news.

So I was delighted with what I saw.

Joseph and Micah, though far away in Vermont, have been indoctrinated by their mother Heather, and their various aunts and uncles, all who attented Colorado State University in Fort Collins. While I am a graduate of the University of Colorado, and therefore a foe of CSU at least one day a year (when the two teams play each other in football), I like the CSU Rams. After all, some of my money went there for two years when Court attended CSU as well.

So this picture made me smile, if for no other reason than I can’t get enough of seeing these two lovely boys’ faces….

Joseph and Micah CSU

Have a great weekend.

Friday Book Whimsy: The Queen’s Vow: A Novel of Isabella of Castile

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searchAs long as I remember that I am reading a NOVEL (and therefore take things with a grain of salt), I think learning history from fiction works best for me. Because of this, when I became familiar with The Queen’s Vow: A Novel of Isabella of Castile, by C.W. Gortner, I was eager to use it as a basis to learn about this renowned queen of Spain. After all, all I really knew was that she was the mother of Henry VIII’s first wife Catherine and the monarch who sent Christopher Columbus on his mission that ultimately changed the world.

Oh, and then there was that whole Spanish Inquisition thingy.

For someone who loves historical fiction as much as I, it is remarkable that I had never heard of Gortner, who, in addition to Queen Isabella, has written novels of real-life characters ranging from Queen Isabella of Spain to Coco Chanel.  To the extent I can tell, this novel was well-researched and stuck fairly close to the queen’s real life.

This isn’t to say, however, that it wasn’t a sympathetic version of Isabella, but as they say, context is everything. And it IS a novel.

No one believed I was destined for greatness.

These are the opening words of the novel, which is written in first-person.  Isabella becomes Queen of Castile in somewhat circuitous fashion, and after much drama involving sex and lies. But not sex and lies from Isabella, who was a loyal soldier of Christ and a supporter of the people of Castile.

Isabella’s story is extraordinary, to say the least. She was an independent woman, committed to ruling Spain and her subjects as she believed God willed. The book is a love story about Isabella and her beloved king Fernando of Aragon. But it is also the story of sheer will, good intentions, and misguided loyalty to God in times that were tumultuous at best.

The author provides context for what ultimately resulted in the Spanish Inquisition. As it is a novel, the actions aren’t approved or disapproved, just presented in an interesting manner. But there is much more to this interesting queen and the impact she had on the entire world, which ended up being much larger than anyone imaged.

The novel is lengthy, and dragged in parts. Overall, however, I enjoyed this novel very much, and recommend it to anyone who likes to become acquainted with history via novels.

Here is a link to the book.

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Thursday Thoughts

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Tick Tock
My first thought for this Thursday is HOW IN THE WORLD IS IT ALREADY THURSDAY? What happened to this week? It flew by.

Power Lunch
I had lunch yesterday with the newly-appointed Director of Product Programs at Pearson, the world’s largest education company. I got that verbage from their website, and the director with whom I had lunch is my son, Court. While we have lunch regularly when Bill and I are in Denver, this was our first opportunity since his promotion. I’m pretty sure he even looked different. I think he is wearing his hair in a more director-like style. I remember when I used to change his diapers.

NanasWhimsiesShop
Business hasn’t exactly been booming at NanasWhimsiesShop, my shop on Etsy. My lack of sales is likely due to the fact that I stink at the marketing aspect. My sister-in-law tells me it’s all about the tags. For me, it’s all about the crocheting. While I would love to be actively selling the things I make, I seriously just love crocheting and looking at my finished results. Perhaps I am somehow exuding negative energy because I’m so annoyed that I can’t put an apostrophe in my shop’s name. I did, however, have my second sale – or at least am about to. A friend ordered sun hats for her great niece and great nephew, and I am happy with the result…..

norma's hats

Seventy-Six Trombones
Last night we attended the Hamilton Middle School spring band concert. We are not simply gluttons for punishment with an unceasing desire to see how the youth of today spend their after-school hours. Rather, our granddaughter Adelaide plays clarinet in the band. In fact, last night, not only did she perform, but she conducted the band during one of their performances – March on a Welsh Air, and did an outstanding job. There is, of course, no blood relationship between Addie and my father; nevertheless, it makes me very happy that she plays clarinet as did he. Here is a photo of the band, and one of Miss Addie conducting….

seventh grade band addie

 

Addieconducting 5.16

Russian Joy
It will not surprise you to learn that once the 7th grade had concluded their performance, Bill was hard-pressed to stay awake during the 8th grade portion of the show, though he admittedly did quite a fine job. At one point, I nudged him to tell him that the next song was a Russian folk melody and so it would likely be zippy and wake him up. Ha! I forgot that Russia doesn’t do cheerful. The song was slow and somber, and reminded me that, by the end of both the movie and the book Anna Karenina, we were all begging her to jump in front of the train just to end our own misery.

Wild Kingdom
We have gotten used to seeing foxes in our back yard. In fact, since we have been gone so many months, there are three foxes that act like the yard belongs to them instead of us. So much so, in fact, that Bill carefully walked around the yard to see if he could find signs that their den was in our yard. Thankfully, there is no evidence. But last night as we were eating our dinner, I looked out and saw two Mallard ducks swimming in our pond. A male and a female. And let me assure you, while we do, in fact, have a small pond, it is nothing to write home about. There are much better ponds and/or lakes within an easy duck flight. We have seen raccoons, coyotes, foxes, the obvious squirrels and birds, and now our own little Wild Kingdom has been increased by two.

ducks

Ciao!

Forge Ahead

Posted in Main Course, Recipes, Whimsies by

Much as we love spending the winter in Arizona, we are always happy to be back in Denver, for a number of reasons. We are lucky enough to be able to enjoy a second springtime. We see the cactus flowers in Arizona in March and April, and we are back just in time to see the end of the forsythia blossoms and the beginning of the lilacs and the iris. I love to get my garden planted – mostly herbs and a couple of tomato plants – and will put in my petunias just as soon as the tulips die completely back and make room for them.

The pitiful end of my forsythia blossoms

The pitiful end of my forsythia blossoms

Tulips with their BFFs, the dandilions

Tulips with their BFFs, the dandilions

This spring, I have made a few resolutions. It makes sense since most of the resolutions I made in January have been forgotten. Not just neglected; I can’t even remember what they were. Sigh.

I have been feeling like a slug because we got out of the habit of exercising, something we had done faithfully for a long time. And I have been putting on weight, something I conveniently blame on my low fiber diet (rich in carbs and sugar), forgetting that one can eat low fiber without eating ice cream every night after dinner. Sigh again.

So I am facing the upcoming warm months with renewed energy and commitment. I started by going to the gym Monday, and plan to go every Monday, Wednesday and Friday beginning right now. Tuesdays and Thursdays I will lift my measly little weights at home. Hey. It can’t hurt.

Furthermore, while I’m not going on a diet (diets don’t work for me; all I think about is food), I am simply going to cook healthier meals.

While in Mesa, I walked over to our nearby Basha’s most every day of the week. I am determined to walk to the grocery store here as well. King Soopers and Whole Foods are a bit farther away than Basha’s, but no matter. Even if I don’t do it every time, I can do it regularly.

There are simple things around the house that will get me better organized. For example, when I want to remember to take something upstairs, I put Whatever-It-Is on the steps. And then I step over them again and again because heaven forbid I would bend over to pick Whatever-It-is up. And then I would just have to PUT WHATEVER-IT-IS AWAY!

No more! Whatever-It-Is will go up with me the next time I climb the stairs.

And speaking of the stairs, I am determined to stop thinking of walking up the stairs as undertaking the Bataan Death March. The other morning I used the last tissue from the box in the kitchen. I found myself using paper towels or toilet tissue to wipe my nose until I finally realized that it wasn’t going to kill me to walk the exactly 14 steps up to the linen closet upstairs where I keep my boxes of tissues. Our house in Mesa is small, and 14 steps will get you practically anywhere in the house. But I don’t live in Windsor Palace, so the stairs will become my friend.

Sometimes I come to the sudden realization that my glasses are so dirty I can practically not see out of them. I am going to use my handy-dandy microfiber cloth to clean my glasses each and every morning before I put them on.

As part of my healthier eating, I found a recipe for a casserole that uses ground chicken for the meatballs. I halved the recipe and we enjoyed it for dinner, with plenty for leftovers.

Chicken Parmesan Meatball Casserole, courtesy Buns In My Oven

chicken parmesan meatball casserole

Ingredients
For the meatballs:
1 pound lean ground chicken
1 cup panko bread crumbs
1 egg
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup milk
For the casserole:
1 pound campanelle pasta (any small shape is fine, such as ziti)
1 jar (24 ounces) marinara sauce
2 cups grated mozzarella cheese
1 teaspoon Italian seasoning

Process
Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add the pasta. Cook for 1 minute less than package directions state.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

While the pasta is cooking, prepare the meatballs. Add all of the ingredients to a large bowl and use your hands to mix them together well. Form into small balls, about 1 inch in diameter and place on a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake for 10 minutes or until cooked through and no longer pink. Remove from the oven and reduce the oven temperature to 350 degrees.

Add the pasta sauce to a large bowl and stir in the cooked pasta and meatballs. Stir gently to coat everything in sauce.

Spread half of the pasta and meatballs into a 9×13 baking dish. Top with half of the mozzarella cheese. Repeat layers. Sprinkle with Italian seasoning. Bake for 20 minutes or until the cheese is melted. Serve immediately.

Hachi? Gesundheit

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Bill Kris Wilma 5.16We are back in Denver following our visit to Chicago to see Bill’s mother. She is in assisted living in an extraordinarily nice retirement community that offers accommodations ranging from independent care all the way to memory care. I’ve mentioned before that she found Smith Crossing all by herself, and subsequently made the decision to sell the house where Bill spent his formative years on the south side of Chicago and move to this retirement community in Orland Park, a far-south suburb.

I have always been proud that she was so wise and recognized that the house in which she lived was going to become unmanageable for her before it actually was unmanageable. Oh, that I should be so wise when I’m in my 80s.

As Bill and I have become older, there have been a number of times in which I’ve looked at our big back yard that takes Bill literally several hours to mow and trim each week, or faced having to come up with something interesting for dinner when nothing sounds good, and thought, hmmmm, maybe Smith Crossing wouldn’t be so bad. The food is good and someone else plans the meals, cooks the food, and cleans up after. The grounds are nice and Bill doesn’t have to break his back caring for it.

“I’m thiiiiiis close to being ready to move into something like your mom’s place here in Denver,” I have told Bill several times.

Until this recent trip.

I’m not sure exactly what the difference was. Maybe it’s that she now lives in assisted living rather than her own independent apartment. Maybe it’s because we stayed in the guest room right in Smith Crossing, and so we saw many of the goings-on as we walked back and forth from our little guest room to Wilma’s unit.

All I know is I’m not quite ready to throw in the towel yet.

This is the conversation I overhead at which time I firmly decided we will stay put right where we are: A husband and wife were walking down the hall together – dueling walkers — and I was behind them. The husband said to his wife, “I recorded the dog show today.” She answered , “What dog show? Was the Westminster Dog Show on today?”

He quickly explained, “No, I recorded Hachi the Dog.” She looked puzzled. “You recorded what?” she asked. “Hachi the Dog,” he repeated.

“Spell it,” she commanded.

“H-A-C-H-I,” he said. “It was a movie. I recorded it.”

“Was it the Westminster Dog Show?” she asked again.

About that time, just as I thought my head would explode, they turned the corner and I could no longer hear their conversation. I therefore have no clue just how long this conversation went on. All I know is I don’t think I’m ready to have this be the conversation at my dinner table yet.

Hachi: A Dog's Tale

Hachi: A Dog’s Tale

Westminster Dog Show

Westminster Dog Show

I mentioned in my Saturday Smile that there is a pub. I noticed one day on the list of events for the day that at 6 o’clock, there would be Pub Games in Smitty’s Pub. I was curious about what kinds of games were being played. Did they play poker? Maybe some kind of trivia. My curiosity forced me to go down a little after 6 that evening to see what game was being played. What I saw was a group of woman playing what was basically Bingo; however, instead of calling out B-6 or N-4, they called out Manhattan or Cosmopolitan, or Draft Beer. Apparently Bingo = pub games as long as you use names of adult beverages. You can take the 80-year-old woman out of the bingo hall, but you can’t take the bingo hall out of the 80-year-old woman.

Residents were, however, selling chances on the Kentucky Derby. Having not purchased one, I can’t tell you what they were charging for a chance. But there was a card table set up outside of the dining room staffed by a woman wearing a cardigan over her shoulders and sensible shoes, hawking chances.

“Buy your Kentucky Derby chance right here,” she called as folks walked by. I’m not sure it was all entirely legal, and the staff people were walking by quickly with their eyes decidedly looking at the floor.

One day I went to chair aerobics with Wilma. There were about 10 women sitting in chairs doing a variety of stretches, sometimes using bands to provide resistance. As little exercise as I have gotten of late, I can’t say anything bad about this activity. And God bless the exercise instructor who could be working at LA Fitness but has chosen instead to keep seniors healthy.

All-in-all, Wilma lives in a really nice place, but not one that I aspire to very soon. And now I’m going to go watch Hachi the Dog. Bill recorded it.

That’s a Wrap

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imagesThe pastor at the church with which we are affiliated in Denver doesn’t have much of a sense of humor, I’m afraid. He’s pretty important, at least within our archdiocese. He’s a monsignor, and told us Sunday that he had been appointed by Pope Francis to be some kind of muckity muck for our archdiocese during the pope’s Year of Mercy. But he doesn’t seem to laugh much. To his credit, when he does laugh, it’s usually at himself.

Nevertheless, he started his homily Sunday (on which we celebrated Christ’s ascension into heaven) by saying that Jesus could have shortened his remarks to the apostles prior to his ascending to heaven by simply saying, “And that’s a wrap.”

I’m not sure why, but that tickled me.

That’s a wrap. I’m all finished with everything. I successfully did all the stuff my Father asked me to do. I came; I saw; I conquered.

And it wouldn’t have been a wrap at all if he hadn’t ascended into heaven, because that, like the rest of his human life, is a model for our own lives. We are born. We live a good life. We die. And through the grace of God, we go to heaven. At the end of the day, just as Jesus, we are only here for a short time. And though we feel as though we are in control of the world, the world belongs to God, and we are only in the world, not of the world. We are really of God.

We flew home from Chicago on Saturday after spending a few days with Bill’s mom. We knew the weather in Colorado was going to be iffy, but the plane left on time and we kept our fingers crossed.

A few hours later, the pilot came on the intercom with words to this effect: Good afternoon. This is your pilot speaking. The good news is that we are only 80 miles away from Denver. The bad news is that the airport is socked in with a severe thunderstorm and DIA is closed until the storm passes. So we are going to fly around Colorado until it reopens or they send us elsewhere. It’s going to be bumpy, so suck it up.

Seriously?

I began my usual panic.

What if the plane runs out of fuel? What if we run into one of the other planes that is flying around Colorado awaiting the reopening of the airport? What if the turbulence is so strong that one of the wings falls off? Does this mean I’m going to miss watching the Kentucky Derby?

Poor Bill has his hands full.

But behind us was a mother traveling with three children. One was a babe in arms who slept through the entire thing. The other two were maybe early elementary school, and found the whole thing to be very exciting rather than scary. Oh, to be a child again.

At some point they began to entertain themselves by singing, in rounds, a song that they must have learned at church or maybe from a Christian school.

Praise be the Lord, we sing hallelujah. Praise be the Lord, we sing hallelujah. Praise be the Lord, we sing hallelujah.

That was it. There might have been other words, but those were the only ones they sang, over and over and over.

At first I thought, “Oh no. They’re going to drive me crazy because I’m already stressed.”

But suddenly I realized what they were saying, and I realized it was a prayer, whether they knew that or not. So I began singing it quietly to myself.

Praise be the Lord, we sing hallelujah.

We made it down safely. The plane had enough fuel. The wings remained firmly attached. I didn’t see a single other plane.  I missed the Kentucky Derby, but so what. We lived.

He is risen and is back with his Father awaiting all of us.

Praise be the Lord, we sing hallelujah.

This post linked to the GRAND Social

Saturday Smile: Tee Martoonies

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The retirement community in which Wilma resides might be somewhat unique in that it has a pub. The pub was added a few years ago during an extensive expansion, presumably to try to attract younger retirees. From the looks of it, that attempt has been unsuccessful to date. From what I can tell, the average age of residents seems to be in the neighborhood of 80.

Having said this, I will tell you that Smitty’s Pub seems to have acquired a loyal clientele. Around 4 o’clock in the afternoon, just before their regular dinner hour of 4:30 or 5, 10 folks or so gather in the pub for a drink. The men drink beer; the women seem to prefer white Zinfandel. They gossip and talk politics and catch up on who is in the hospital.

Since the pub is only open two hours a day, they don’t bother to hire bartenders. Instead, they pull whoever isn’t acting busy from the kitchen whether or not they know a thing about tending bar.

Last night Bill suggested we go to the pub for a drink. We entered the pub and saw a frightened-looking girl tending bar who was hoping like hell I would order white zin. I decided to be kind and not order a martini. Instead I ordered a gin and tonic. She can’t screw that up, right? An ounce or so of gin poured over some ice, topped off with tonic water and finished with a squeeze of lime. Easy peazy. And Bill ordered a Heineken.

She quickly poured Bill’s beer, and then began working on my gin and tonic. First she got out a martini glass. Then she got out a shaker. I was hoping she was making someone else’s drink. She poured a jigger of gin into the shaker and added a little tonic, closed it up and began shaking. She happily poured it into the martini glass and gave me my drink — gin and tonic, straight up!

Gin and tonic, ala Smitty’s Pub…….

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Have a great weekend.

Friday Book Whimsy: The Nest

Posted in Book Reviews, Whimsies by

searchA debut novel can be hit or miss. Gathering from the range of emotions generated by Amazon reviewers, The Nest, the debut novel by Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney is a bit of both.

For the record, however, I liked the book very much.

The four Plumb siblings have counted on receiving the inheritance set up by their father to become theirs when the youngest turned 40. Mr. Plumb’s idea was to just leave his kids a bit of money to give them a boost at a time when they would most need it. He hadn’t counted on the mortgage market boom (and a wise money manager who reinvested the money just before the market plummeted) to turn the small inheritance into a sizable amount. But the Plumbs had certainly counted on it, and lived their lives accordingly. They weren’t worried, because they knew “the nest” would be coming to them soon.

And then one day, the eldest Plumb – Leo – makes an irresponsible decision that results in the need to use the nest to settle a lawsuit. The other siblings are furious and waiting for Leo to tell them how he is going to fix their problems.

The Plumbs are dysfunctional and selfish and BESIDE THEMSELVES with anger toward Leo. As it becomes apparent that Leo has not learned from his mistake, the tizzy into which they’ve worked themselves begins to flatten out, and the family begins to discover what is really important and the need for family and the importance of taking care of oneself.

The publishers describe the book as humorous, and I can’t quite concur with that assessment. While their dysfunction was somewhat comical, it didn’t generate anything in the way of laughs. But despite the characters’ dysfunction, I found them to be likable once they stopped feeling entitled.

I found The Nest to be a good enough read to make me look forward to the author’s next offering.

Here is a link to the book.

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