Quite a day....

For someone who has been deprived of Starbucks for four days, I almost made up for it by going three times today. At least, I had a different order at each one. The store outside the Biltmore Estates was really lovely. None of the stores here have any Asheville mugs but it was nice to see ye olde Chai tea again.

Went to tour the Biltmore Estates. oh yeah. I could live there. The green, the trees, the expanse. The opulence. And yet, once you've seen maid's quarters, you've seen them all. The library there was awesome. The volume of volumes. And it had my heart's desire of a rolling library ladder and those wrought-iron spiral stairs up to the next level. Oh, be still my biblioheart. And then I had such visions of doing Marion the Librarian from "The Music Man." ahhhhh

By the way, you know you're not in California when: there is smoking allowed, there are no toilet seat covers in the public bathrooms and there are only 3 movie theatres in town and they are showing "Ice Age 2" and "The Bench Warmers." Argh.

took a brief tour of the Grove Park Inn. yowza. What another amazing estate. I am eager to return to this city and locations in Autumn and see a real Fall season. We went to dinner at a swell Italian restaurant called Amici's. It was one of the local restaurants sponsoring an evening of dining with 20% of the proceeds going to the local AIDS fund.

Today, I came across three lucky pennies. I often feel I have to explain my penchant for pennies. Besides their being copper (love copper) and having one of my heroes on the coin (Mr. Lincoln); my dear, dear friend Linda Van used to tell me how her late mother would "visit"her with found pennies when Linda needed a lift or some guidance. When Linda passed away almost 2 years ago, I started paying attention to where and when I would "Find" lucky pennies. When I found the pennies today, I was aksing myself what the heck was Linda trying to tell me? I was having a fine time and not in seeming need of guidance. I tucked away the coins just the same. (Get ready for the cosmic part:) When I got online tonight, the email Birthday Alarm Reminder was waiting for me and it told me that today is Linda Van's Birthday! WOW!
I was unaware of the date until then. It was her birthday and she was reminding me!!
very cool.

Well, it is almost 1 am here in Asheville and I am still operating on So. CAlifornia time. tomorrow, is an early morning business meeting so I guess I should call it a night.

Let's all send thanks to Rev. Sharon for lending me her new Dell laptop so I can stay in touch.

Happy Birthday, Linda Van--wherever you are!

Rev. DD