You *can* go home again, but the food isn't as good.

I have returned my lovely, gnat-infested city after having spent the better part of two days in the city of my birth. Almost all of my relations still live in CityOfMyBirth, including my father, paternal grandmother, and my maternal aunts and uncles. My grandmother is 86, and I hadn't seen her in a year or two, so I felt we were overdue for a trip "home."

We call it "home", although I have lived in HumidityLikeABrickWall since I was 1 year old. Both of my parents hail from CityOfMyBirth, although my father was a military brat, and COMB was just the last stop in the military junket that was his childhood. I was shuttled to COMB for every major holiday until I was in my late teens. I have many a fond memory of family get-togethers in COMB.

My grandmother is so much smaller than I remember. When you are a child, you always remember the adults in your life as such forces of nature, and my grandmother was no exception. She was one of those old style take-no-prisoners kind of grandmothers. Sure, she *looked* like Mrs. Claus, but that's just her cover identity. Cross her, and you were liable to get whapped upside the head with a rolled-up (metropolitan) newspaper. When you walked into her house, you were immediately nagged to eat something, but woe be unto you who do not finish the vegetables! She'd snatch a slice of cake away from you so fast that you'd fork yourself in the hand.

Her health has deteriorated, but she's still feisty as ever. It was good to see her, even if I did get the "lose weight" lecture. (I'll cut her some slack on that one, as she waited until *I* brought it up on the second day of the visit. Only then did she let fly, since, apparently, I left the door open on that one.) She can still make me laugh. We dug out blackamail pictures of my father, which I plan to use ruthlessly. (Mwahahaha!)

I got to spend some good mom-time with my daughter, including a foray to Target in the early evening to pick out a stunning shade of lipstick. (For my daughter, not for me.) It makes me crochety to think that my nine year old is starting to get interested in lipstick. She also has become waaaaay too attached to her black platform sandals. I fear that I shall have to lock her in a closet soon. JF has already put his foot down and says that she's not dating until she's married. I hope her first date goes better than mine: my father borrowed a friend's shotgun, and was cleaning it on the front porch when my date arrived. Needless to say, I was brought home *early* and my date hardly slowed his car before pushing me out and hauling ass.

My father, daughter, and I had a lovely dinner in one of my favorite places in COMB. We also visited a maternal aunt, and cracked her up with the story of Mom and the fart-as-fight-ender. Since Mom is MaternalAunt's big sister, MA stored that information away for use at some other time. Sibling rivalry is alive, well, and hellacious to contend with in our extended family.

It was a good time, but I'm glad to be home. It's just too bad that I have to leave home again tomorrow. I even had to miss Phantom's whine. I'm glad to hear that P_K finally had Baby E, and I'm jealous that Corndog is the name on every Googler's lips. Hope all is well in BlogBurg!