Sunday night dinner, UFO happy meals and Aunt Phyllis, RIP

Judy made a roast for us on Saturday. Perfect timing, as Rick and I came home hungry from the Big 12 Championship!

Adrianne got the whole thing served and we devoured it. Roast, potatoes, celery, carrots and onion. I love the onion in the roast! So good!

Rick was like, "This is like what my mom used to make!" and we told him Judy made it, so it was likely the same recipe (or at least something inspired by Virginia.) So he wasn't far off. Pretty cool.

I ate the small bowl of leftovers as a lunch the next day. Ate the whole thing.

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I'm listening to a band called "Highly Suspect," The Boy Who Died Wolf. I've heard them before on Sirius (on the Octane channel) and I just now heard them on 96.5 FM. "My Name is Human" is a solid song, I'll have to check them out....

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I went out with some colleagues tonight. We're clearly getting old, as I got home at midnight.

I could have another cerveza, but... Evey made chocolate chip cookies! OH WOW!!!! Evey, can I eat 12 of them?!?

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I had a memory today that I haven't had in a long time. 

I remember when I was a kid I was obsessed with McDonald's. When I said this out loud, Adrianne said she was too.

I saw that Boyd had a really cool drinking cup from McD's, with a Lego Batman theme. It reminded me of a cool toy from my childhood that I went nuts for.

You know how Happy Meals are typically in those square cardboard boxes? Well, I remember when they were, for a short time, in plastic UFOs. 

For some reason I went nuts for this. I wanted to eat out of the plastic UFOs desperately. Which reminded me of a story Grandma Joyce used to tell — that if they saw a McDonald's in the distance, they'd take an abrupt turn, in hopes that I wouldn't freak out and beg them to take me there.

Huh. Funny that I had forgotten all about those UFO happy meals until I saw Boyd's drink...

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Speaking of lost memories...

My Aunt Phyllis died recently, she was 91. Jess mentioned it to me the other day. 

While I know some of the Senas, notably Nicky Jr. and Greg, I couldn't remember if I had really been around Aunt Phyllis in years... I don't think she made it out to the graduation party in Seattle that I crashed a couple years ago (it was coincidentally the same weekend as the U.S. Open, so I was in town.) Honestly, I wondered if I ever even met her (apologies if I hung out with her for a month in 1982, I just don't remember.)

Then I saw Martin post on Facebook this photo of her and Nick Sr. from a trip me and Mom and Dad took to Seattle back in... 1991?

Grandma Joyce had a big family. Sad to see it shrinking. Aunt Josie and Uncle Bob are still around. I remember Aunt Lena and Uncle Richard vividly. 

Neat to see an old photo like this. Look how big my dad looks!