Wear Grey

Today is the day we're supposed to wear grey for World Elephant Day, to raise awareness of the plight of elephants worldwide.  I read about elephants a lot, but I was not aware that 90 elephants a day are killed for their ivory tusks.

If we don’t all get involved the time’s going to come when the elephants are gone
Dr Jane Goodall

There are only 40,000 Asian elephants and 400,000 African elephants now, and at a death rate of 90 per day, that number can be reduced significantly very quickly. I would hate to think that the elephant could become extinct in my lifetime.

So I wore grey today, though I'm not sure my shirt is exactly conducive to raising awareness of the plight of elephants.

My shirt is more a "save the pinatas" shirt!  But it is grey...and by telling you about it, I am helping you understand the scope of the problem.

I wore my grey shirt to another lunch today.  This was mostly the lunch group with Grainne last week, with a slightly different make-up.

What a delightful lunch.  We were eating at the Jade Garden.   I thought I had been to every Chinese restaurant in town, but had never been to this one.  It may have become my new favorite Chinese restaurant. For starters there was that fabulous honey walnut shrimp.

Grainne shared that she was overseeing an exam in Ireland awhile back and started dreaming about this honey walnut shrimp and had to text someone in Davis about it...it was one of the things she has to have while visiting Davis.

But of course any meal is only as good as the group of people attending, and if I were to put together a group of people for an interesting meal, I couldn't choose better than this.  One of the people was someone I hadn't seen in a couple of years, who recently moved and has become somewhat of a recluse.  Another was a guy I may or may not have met 30 years ago.  It seems likely our paths have crossed, but I didn't recognize his name...or him.  And of course we are both 30 years older and while I haven't changed any in the past 30 years, it's possible he may have.

..

It is always so refreshing to be able to discuss current events with like-minded people and release some of that frustration that builds up inside the more one watches the news each evening, including the shocking and appalling rise in hatred in this country.  The "them vs. us" mentality and what it is doing to our country. And this was part of what went on at lunch, along with lots of good-natured taunts and lots and lots of laughs.

Grainne was pleased to hear that I had gone to Central Park to find her bench, sitting in front of the city carousel.

(The insert is what is written on the placque attached to the bench.)

I was sitting next to my friend Joan, whose daughter was the very first person I knew to die after we moved to Davis.  She was very young, in grammar school, and was killed in an auto accident on an icy street (one of the 2 or 3 days when it has snowed in Davis over the past 40 years).  In the "getting caught up" part of our lunch, someone asked Joan about her children.  She said "I have three girls...well, actually four girls, but Katie is deceased" and then went on to give an update on the remaining girls.

After I commented to her that the most difficult question I ever have to answer is "how many children do you have?" we agreed and shared how we handle that seemingly simple, innocent question. 

Grainne leaves in a couple of days to return to Ireland, so this was our last chance to see her.  But she will be back in December, so we will have a chance to do it all over again around Christmas time. 

Day 43:  Happiness is another lunch with long-time friends