Priorities

Yesterday, I was going to do our taxes.

Instead, I took the Mama to the annual Easter BBQ fundraiser sponsored by the local Filipino American  club. Purchasing the chicken lunch is the Mama's way of "making" the Easter meal since she no longer has the stamina to do it herself. It's also her unspoken way of giving me a break from cooking. Well, that's what I like to think.

Yesterday was a beautiful afternoon for a picnic. As the Mama likes to say, "Lot of people there." The lunch line was long, about 45 minutes long. I didn't mind standing in it at all, especially when I ended up talking with the guy behind me who turned out to be the nephew of Alice, a friend of my mom's from long, long time ago. What did he and I remember so well about Alice: Her cookies!  I also recall that it could be hot, hot, HOT outside, but so cool, cool, COOL inside her house. Dark, too. But, then that's what made it so cool.

While I stood in line yakking away, the Mama hung out at the tables talking with her lady friends. Some of them had seen her at a party the week before, so, she didn't get many of the usual questions: How old are you now? ("100," she says.) What do you eat? (In other words, how do you look so young? And, it's not because of the hair dye job.) Do you hurt? (As if she would tell anyone but me. And even then).

Once I got the BBQ chicken and side dishes, I went over to collect the Mama. Yes, we just purchase the food and head home. The Mama likes doing the social circuit, as long as she doesn't stay too long. That's okay with me. I usually drop her off and pick her up when she tells me. Except for the Filipino American community picnic fundraisers, where I hang out with her until she is ready to go.

As I laid out the food on the table at home, the Mama sat at her place, alternating a bite between a chocolate cookie and a Filipino dessert. Mama essentially endures the questions, which she and the Husband consider quite rude, at Filipino parties for the Filipino desserts. Comfort food. I started to make a fuss about her ruining her appetite for the BBQ, then thought whatever for. It was Easter and the Mama is after all, as she says, 100 years old.

It turned out the desserts did not take her appetite away. The Husband and I happily noshed away with the Mama—BBQ chicken, chili, rice, green salad, and garlic bread. Molly the Cat also enjoyed her morsels of BBQ chicken.

After the dishes was washed and put away, you would've thought I'd start the taxes. Of course not. Now, the Husband and I needed to work off our almost-stuffed tummies. We got on our bicycles and pedaled against the wind for a good work-out.

As for the rest of day and night, between dinner, watching TV,  and sleeping, I decided to finish a chunk of work instead of doing the taxes. There was (or should I say is) tomorrow.

So, here I am at yesterday's tomorrow. I have still another chunk of work that needs to get done to make a deadline next week.... Definitely tomorrow—the taxes.