May 18 - 27, 2025 - Mother's Day - Celebrations - Graduation Trip - Waymo Ride - Home

My Blog Reflection

What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness.

George Saunders

Tuesday, May 20, 2025

Daughter, Alexa, brought down for Kelly some Mother's Day gifts from her and her sisters. One was a peach dessert from Japan that was something like Jell-O. Very tasty. Another was a tablet with "Queen of Everything" on it, and another was a "Queen of Everything" mug. Alexa also stopped and bought a hanging basket of flowers, which is beautiful.  

In the evening, as a "Thank You" for looking after the house last winter while we were in Florida, we took John and Carlene to "Celebrations Restaurant" in Cape Girardeau. The meal was wonderful, as was the company. We are headed to California on Thursday for a graduation and family party and Friday they are headed to Minnesota for their annual family fishing trip. Us old folks don't sit around all the time.   

Thursday, May 22, 2025

We flew to California for grandson, Kellen's, high school graduation. We had a non-stop flight to the San Francisco Airport taking off at 5:00 a.m. This meant we had to leave Perryville at 2:00 p.m. to pick up daughter, Alexa, and get to the airport for check in. The flight was fine. We got an Uber to daughter, Annie's, house in Mountain View, California. We spent the night there. 

Friday, May 23, 2025

We rented a house in Mantika so the entire family could spend time together before and after the graduation and the party that followed. The house was huge with a very nice pool. The grandkids loved it. I got in for a short time but it was too cold for me. It also had a hot tub, which I would have enjoyed but the heater was broken.

Saturday, May 24, 2025

The graduation ceremony was at 8:30 a.m. in Tracey, California. I thought that was an odd time but it made sense. The ceremony is held outside and Tracey is in the desert so it gets hot in a hurry. Here is a picture of the crowd waiting to get in at 7:45 a.m. The line was over a block long when we got there.

Here is a picture of the attendees standing and cheering as the graduates filed in.

Before the ceremony began the seniors got to play with the band for one last time. Here is a picture of Kellen. He stands out with his mop of red hair. This day he played the trombone.

Here is Kellen with a big smile on his face after getting his diploma.

 A picture with his aunts, Alexa and Annie.

A picture with Adam and Annie.

A picture with grandpa and grandma.

A picture with mom, Erin.

And a picture with little brother, Freedom.

After the graduation we headed back to the house. Kellen said after the ceremony he was going to get his hair cut off. Here he is with a "post graduation" haircut. What a difference. $90.00 for this haircut! I would have shaved it for $5.00. He sure looks different. He hasn't had short hair since middle school.

Erin put together fabulous decorations and food for the party. In the morning we all helped get it ready. She is very creative.

Early afternoon Kellen opened his presents. He is crazy about Praying Mantis so he got a stuffed one. (He quickly informed us it is a Mantis but not a "Praying" Mantis.) LOL

He got several other nice gifts and a large wad of cash from the immediate family. In this next picture, that's what he is looking at. 

He is going to go to a coding school starting in August. It is eight hours per day, five days per week, for ten months. I hope he likes it. Sitting next to him is his best friend, Kenny. Kenny is going into the electrician apprentice program.

After the gift giving, Kellen and Kenny left to attend a party. We didn't see them the rest of the day. 

Sunday, May 25, 2025

The party started about 1:00 p.m. Erin ordered pans of chicken fingers and pans of fries from "Canes Chicken" to go with the huge veggie and fruit plates the ladies made. I neglected to take pictures of the food. Throughout the day the food was eaten with not a whole lot left over.  

Here is a picture of Sabrina, Kellen's girlfriend, talking to Wren about how cold the water is before she decided to get in.

Kellen's friends were all nice kids and enjoyed the pool and food and drinks provided. Most stayed until almost midnight, several slept over sleeping on the couches and chairs.

Monday, May 26, 2025

We cleaned up the house and loaded all the stuff into the cars. Kellen, Erin and Free headed to Tracey. Annie, Alexa, and Kelly headed to Mountain View in Annie's car. Adam, the girls, and I headed to Mountain View in Adam's car. Once at the house we unloaded everything and hung out for the rest of the day. 

Waymo driverless cars are now available for Google employees in Mountain View and Adam wanted us to experience riding in one. So after a great Taco lunch Adam made he ordered a car. You can watch on your phone where it is. It arrived in about ten minutes. 

I got to sit in the front seat with "no driver". It is weird. All the Waymo cars right now are Jaguars. When you call a car you tell it where you want to go. There is a large screen in the middle of the dash. This is what it looks like when you get in.

As soon as you start the screen changes. It shows all intersections, cars, pedestrians, stop lights, as well as your arrival time. 

It keeps you advised of your arrival time.

Here is a video of the car driving itself. It was a trip.

Our plane didn't take off until 11:00 p.m. so Adam made a nice pasta dish and salad for supper. Around 8:00 p.m. Adam called an Uber for us. 

We arrived at the airport an hour and a half early. United Airlines is strange at this airport. You check in through security at Terminal 3 then you have to walk all the way to Terminal 2. They are connected but it is a long walk. 

Hardly anyone besides us was crazy enough to catch the "red eye" to St. Louis. The plane wasn't even a quarter filled. Once up in the air I moved to three empty seats so I could spread out and maybe get some sleep. In the three and a half hour flight I maybe slept a half hour. I just couldn't get comfortable, even spreading out over three seats. It wasn't just the seat, the compression socks were squeezing my legs.

We picked up our luggage and Aaron picked us up. He drove to Alexa's apartment were we dropped her off and Kelly and I headed to Perryville. At least is was light out now for the trip home. We got home at 7:20 a.m. and hit the bed immediately to try and catch up on some sleep. I slept until noon, Kelly slept until 2:00 p.m. We will probably go to bed early this evening to catch up more on our sleep.

 

Tuesday, May 27, 2025 

It looks like rain is coming so I cut the grass while I had a chance.