In between shows on saturday was my Grandma Irene's 80th birthday party. She has five kids and they were all there, and also attending were most of the grandchildren [whom my brothers and I grew up with]. Now that we're older it's kinda cool kickin' back and just hanging, which is something we haven't done with any consistency since we were the kids running up and down the aisles at the family parties.

I was telling one of my cousins, "Now I know how freakin' annoying WE WERE when we were little kids!"
And he said, "I know! Since we've eaten now it's time to go run around!"

It's also interesting to see how much people change. Theo, Mr @ss, and JHips are three brothers [similar to me and my two] who we've become quite close with [well at least with Theo and Mr @ss] They attended San Jose State University, while my brothers and I went to SF State. There's another set of siblings, Drea, Ohm and Chris, who moved out to Oakley [near Antioch]. They've been in Oakley since the mid 80s. After they left, there were less and less family functions, and then when Grandma Irene moved out of her house on Murray Street, my family pretty much didn't see any of them. But all of a sudden we were in college, and by hanging out with some of the pin@ys here in SF, we ended up crossing paths pretty often with the SJ crowd, of which Theo, Mr @ss and JHips were a part of. We got reacquainted and found we had a lot in common, and we do kick it every once in awhile. On the other hand, Drea moved to Cincinatti, Chris ended up in Florida and Ohm was doing his own thing. Though we all grew up together it's a lot harder to get through to Ohm and Chris, though Drea is still the 'older sister I never wanted'.

A little later we had a little music/dancing session with Ninong Ted on keyboard, Uncle Czar/Uncle Bobby on drums, Uncle Ted on congas and my dad on bass. Since I've pretty much shed my singing inhibitions I joined them onstage for a round of oldies. They got me to sing "Route 66" and then I stayed [and missed the first Act of Jazzy Josie B] so I could tear it up on "Shout" by the Eisley Brothers. I had so much fun singing and seeing the family that I really had to force myself to leave.

Makes me realize how much family means to me. I told my brother, "Our weddings are gonna be tight!"
Shyah. That's WHEN we get married. Kinda hard to without someone to marry first.

Makin Mine Music

~No Tations~