Tuesday, 09/13/2005 Entry: "Ketchup 12/15/2004 - Unveiling in Suffolk"

For those of you who live either under a rock or in a part of the USA which makes you think no other culture or faith exists: one year after an observant Jew's death, the headstone is unveiled in a ceremony on site.

Since I never attend the family Thanksgiving, here was a prime opportunity to see my mom's side of the family. Following the ceremony we were to meet at a nearby diner; for me it meant catching up on old times.

Well, it was partly our faults. Dad and I have this punctuality-efficiency thing happening. With the simple directions, we were among the first out of the cemetery gate. We drove a few miles and realized we weren't running into Sunrise Highway. I suggested stopping in a service station, but you know males; Dad conveniently didn't hear those times I suggested it.

We went around the area a great deal. Thing is the map seldom resembled the actual junction of roads and landmarks in places. It also didn't help that at times when we were going north and away from Sunrise Highway, Dad insisted we were going south.

I told him I could get us to Sunrise Highway, but not via the roads we were told. With map in hand, I instructed Dad onto a never-mentioned Straight Path Road and we did it. At the intersection - where we were initially told to make a right, I looked left briefly just in case and saw no diner. We made our right turn and naturally there was no diner along our side either. We decided to go to one called The Omega on Lakeville Road instead.

We were heading west, but Dad thought we had to turn around. A brief maneuver up a ramp confirmed that to keep moving towards Queens we had to re-enter the same side of Sunrise Highway in order to continue on our way and catch the Wantaugh Parkway.

After putting on her best behavior for Dad's successful 80th birthday party last week, Mom was back to her old tricks at the Omega: complaining about the food, mouthing off conspicuously, etc. I was too tired and hungry to care.