Date Night at Woody's

Meg and Alex, the ranch poodle, spent the night with us so Meg could return to the hospital this morning. We ended up going together, leaving Alex in the care of Gary, Bindi and Vanna. Jack was singing to his nurse when we arrived at his room. Apparently he was enjoying the attention. Assured that he was going to be ok till Monday when the vascular surgeon will do an angiogram, I left at noon to run errands. Meg stayed awhile longer and finally left to pick up Alex and head to the ranch to brace for the big winter storm coming our way from Alaska.

Gary and I decorated our Christmas tree - a little less extravagant than in years past thanks to the economy grinch - but enjoyed it immensely. We had some goofy holiday cartoons on the TV and celebrated with some low-cal eggnog. I will be walking three miles in the rain tomorrow to get rid of that one drink.

We promised Meg that we'd go back and see Jack before bedtime, so at 5:30, we headed out in the freezing cold wind - for those of you in the snowbelt, please know that frost forms on our noses in California when the temp drops below 53 degrees, as it did this evening. Nevertheless, Gary wanted to wear shorts and his Reyn Spooner holiday aloha shirt. Thankfully, I convinced him to wear his jeans because we were going to the hospital.

Even with a gazillion poinsettias and hundreds of colorful wreaths hung in the hallways, the hospital wasn't a very cheery place. Jack was totally out of it, probably from pain med's, so we stayed about 15 minutes. On the way back to the car Gary said, "Let's do date night!" So on the spur of the moment and in the spirit of Santa's reindeer, we drove to Woody's Wharf, a much cheerier atmosphere, no doubt because of the bar.

We were early enough for the "blue hair special" - lobster. I sipped my slightly dirty martini and we watched the boats go by, all lit up with twinkly colored lights. The holiday boat parade doesn't start till next week, so it was a nice surprise to see decorated boats out on a blustery December night. The fireplace was blazing and the TV was tuned to the Heisman Trophy Award, which made Gary very happy. All in all, it was a dandy holiday date night for the Ingram's - just one more thing to be thankful about this December!