Live from CousinFest '09!

It is 8:30 in the morning and I am sitting here in Susie's living room looking out at an absolutely gorgeous morning complete with SUNSHINE, which was notably absent in Indiana last week. The big windows at the rear of the house look out on a golf course and a golf cart just whizzed up to the green beyond Susie's pool and several happy looking golfers got out, chaffing each other.

Susie jus came in from a shower combing her wet hair. She has to teach a yoga class at 9:30 and Aisling (and I think Meelyn) are going to go with her. I asked her if we were going to have breakfast after yoga because I didn't think they'd want to eat breakfast before getting all bendy; Susie just replied -- no kidding -- "Yes, but I did have a little breakfast anyway....I had a brownie and a cup of coffee."

That's my girl! Combining healthful exercise with calories, fat and caffeine! Now if she could just cut out the healthful exercise......

Carol just came downstairs with wet hair and a comb, looking for moisturizer. That shouldn't be too hard to find here since Susie is a crack Arbonne consultant. I have never used such luscious bath products as I used this morning n my own shower. Arbonne love!

We got here at around 11:30 a.m. yesterday and Susie made us a fabulous grilled chicken salad with leafy greens for lunch, only Carol wouldn't eat one bit of lettuce that she said looked "hairy." I just mentioned this to Carol and Carol said dismissively that it looked like something Susie picked out of the yard.

Susie is cajoling Meelyn to come to yoga class (the one Susie teaches) at the club's fitness center. Meelyn is unconvinced, having gone to yoga with Susie and Aisling last night. Susie said, "You need to get stretched out and blah and blah and blah..." I'd like to tell you what else she said, but I blacked out when she began speaking of exercise.

Susie said, "Now, we can get a rolled towel to support your neck and a rolled mat to support your knees and you don't have to do anything you don't want to do, so go upstairs and get dressed."

Meelyn replied, not unreasonably, "Well, then, I don't think I'll go."

This went back and forth for a while and it was finally determined that Meelyn would not go and that Aisling was Susie's favorite little cousin.

Last night I made a thick, garlicky ragu for dinner with whole wheat pasta and bread with garlic butter. Carol made a spinach-artichoke dip that was packed full of cheesy goodness -- we're back on the cheese again this year. Of note: Susie had a cream cheese and green chili spread ready for us to snack on. It looks as if again this year Susie will bid us goodbye with a kiss and a colon cleanse tablet.

The only sadness of the whole day came when Carol and I were home alone while the others were yoga-ing and Carol, who was making strawberry daiquiris in he blender, somehow managed to take the blender's pitcher off incorrectly, allowing strawberry daiquiri to flow, like, everywhere. We found out that strawberry daiquiri is not very fun to clean up.

Carol scooped some into a teaspoon and held it out to me. "It was going to be really good," she said, crestfallen. I opened my mouth and she tipped the mixture on the spoon into it; she was right, it was really good. Only I'd been oping for, like, a glassful.

Neither one of us had the brains enough God gave a goat to figure out how to put Susie's very expensive Cuisinart blender back together, so we had to remain dolefully unbuzzed until they got home. There was cussing involved. We explained to Susie that we'd broken the blender and Susie said, "Ohhhhh nooooooooooooes!!! Howwwwwwwwwwww????"

Carol held out the pitcher. "This came off and it won't go back on."

"It won't go on," I elaborated. "It came off."

Susie gave us a strange look, performed a split-second twisting motion with the pitcher and he blender base, and whooaaaaaaaaa!! There was the blender, magically restored!

Carol and I won't be applying to Purdue University's engineering program anytime soon.

Lunch today is birdseed salad and more bread and a veggie pizza to snack on. Grilled salmon for dinner! Swimming and sunning this afternoon! More later!