Our daughter with her dad before we toured Edinburgh Castle in April of 2004.

Hello to our first September Wednesday Hodgepodge of 2024. Thank you, Joyce!

1. Something you’re working on currently? 

I am working on finalizing all the things for our trip to Scotland. Besides packing lists in my head and buying a few extras, I’m filling out 4×6 cards on the different locations we will be in with all the recommendations for sites and restaurants for that city or village. So much to see and do. We are taking this trip with our son Josh and his lovely bride, Laura.

We also are busy making some meals for my cousin’s family. Her husband is being released to Hospice care in their home today, Tuesday. She will be busy caring for him and the least we can do is to offer some meals for her and her sons so shopping for food and cooking won’t be a priority for her. Since we’ll be gone next week we wanted to do some extra meals to freeze, etc., for them to fall back on.

2. Tell us something about your first job?

My first ‘real’ job with an actual paycheck was in my senior year of high school. I was done with my required courses by noon and would get a ride from a fellow student who had a job at the same company, Link Belt. I worked in one of the offices with Dan in charge and Pat his assistant. I helped Pat with paperwork. Pat was a smoker. This was in 1967-68 so smoking was still allowed everywhere. I honestly can’t remember how I got home from this job. I probably got a ride with someone who lived close to me. I started this job to earn money for college. My first year of college was at the University of Redlands, about 60 miles from my home.

My second real job in my Cal-State LA college years was at Montgomery Ward Service Center. I worked in the Parts Department.

Was it a positive or negative experience for you?

The job at Link-Belt was a positive experience for me. Neither Pat or Dan had children and they both were so kind to me and treated me like a daughter. They took me out to lunch on my last day of working before college and they also bought me a gift. Lunch was at a nice restaurant and I remember ordering a steak sandwich.

My job at Montgomery Ward was not as positive but it was something I needed to do. I commuted back and forth to  college and to my job. I worked at least 20 hours a week and sometimes 24. My sister Vera worked there, too. Vera and I were successful in our work and had a good work ethic. One day the two of us were called into the head manager’s office and told we were being watched because we were Russian and we might be Communist infiltrators. True story!! They feared Young Communists were moving up in companies with clandestine motives. We were flabbergasted and in disbelief that we could be accused of this. We told him our parents put their lives at risk to escape Communism and flee Russia and we all were Americans who loved the U.S.A. Thinking back, it is comical to us that he or anyone felt Montgomery Ward was a worthwhile target!

Did your parents insist you work while in school (either high school or college) or did you work because you wanted to? 

My parents never insisted that me or my siblings needed to work. We worked to put ourselves through college and for extra spending money or to buy a car. Our Russian culture did not expect children to leave home until they got married. I lived at home until I got married in 1974. I never paid rent to my folks.

3. Have you ever had a job that required overnight travel? How did you feel about that?

I never had a job that required any sort of travel. The jobs that Greg had did include travel to meetings and conferences around the U.S.A. and some international travel, too. Whenever I could I’d tag along for the free hotel room and go out and about on my own while he was stuck in a booth giving information to other professionals about the Oncology services/medications his company provided. I traveled with him to Chicago, Las Vegas, San Antonio, Atlanta, Washington D.C. and Milan Italy. Besides these cities, he traveled to New Orleans, Denver, Vienna and Marseilles.

Have you ever had a job that required you to wear a uniform?

If you count working hard at being a song leader in high school. A Cheer leading uniform was the only one I had to wear. I never wore a uniform for a paying job.

Do you work better in the morning or at night? 

I will go with morning. I have the most energy in the morning. I never had a night job. Greg has had the night shift in a hospital and that did not bode well with his system and having to try to sleep during the day.

4. What’s something you bake or cook that is labor intensive? Is it worth it? 

Many of our heritage recipes seem more labor intensive and they are worth it. This week my DIL and I will be making some piroshky.

Here are some photos of a Piroshky baking day we had in my kitchen in November of 2019.

Our cousin Cindy who is in the photo above on the right is the one whose husband is in Hospice at this time. For those of you who are Believers, prayers would be appreciated for her and her family.

5. One thing you’re looking forward to in the month of September? 

Our trip to Scotland! We will be in Glasgow, Stirling, Pitlochry, Stonehaven, St. Andrews and Edinburgh. Lord willing, we will visit castles, cathedrals, Highlands, Lowlands, Kenmore, the Old Course St. Andrews, universities, a soccer game, a chocolatier, pubs, good restaurants, lochs, view points, villages, monuments, and many cobbled lanes.

6. Insert your own random thought here. 

The last time we were in Scotland was in May of 2006. Here we are with our traveling friends in front of the Elephant House where J.K. Rowling spent time and had some of her inspiration for the Harry Potter series of books. (Greg is across the street taking the photo). The Elephant House is closed now and boarded up but people still visit the site and then go down to the Kirk where some of the names in her books can be found on the gravestones. In 2006 we and our friends had a meal in this restaurant.

I loaded another Hodgepodge with way more words than you might want to read. I’ll be late getting around to everyone because we left for Spokane early Wednesday morning for my annual eye exam. We’ll be getting home later than usual, too. See ya later!