This rainy spell brings chilly mornings.  After a leisurely wake up and breakfast at the hotel, daughter, grandson, and I headed toward the east end of Albuquerque, an area we rarely reach when we come here.  We ended up at Coronado Mall (I think that is its name but not sure), walked around for a while, and found a clothing shop where my daughter bought two dresses for upcoming weddings we will all attend.  At one end of this mall a huge Barnes & Noble resides.  My grandson and I ended up spending nearly two hours there–so many books, so much to browse.  The lady who waited on us wore a semi-precious stone skull necklace hanging around her neck, a dress the print of which displayed numerous characters from rather dark movies, including more skulls, and patent leather dress shoes.  She informed me she usually wears combat boots, but for some reason decided to wear dress shoes on this particular day.  She owns six pairs of Doc Martens, her favorites.  I remain clueless as to the reason why I frequently discover all sorts of personal things about people whom I have never met before.  Actually, my goal was to find one or more of the 2013 Man Booker short list books.  I picked one by a Nigerian woman.

Later we headed to the Nob Hill area to find a place the lady and a guy at the Barnes & Noble recommended, Astro Zombies.  No, I am not a gamer, but my grandson loves Magic, Yugioh, Pokemon, all that sort of thing.  He found a new game, Munchkin.  It sounded like a kids game to me, but the 21 year old young man at the store informed me that he and all his friends play it.  While there, who appeared but the grandparents of one of my grandson’s best friends.  Next came dinner at Nob Hill–the restaurant.  Delicious.  Of course, since grandson continues his vegetarianism, any place that actually manages to create good vegetarian food is always a hit.  As we walked back to the car, I happened to glance in the window of one of the endless restaurants on Central.  There sat a former student, Casey Ball, who was part of the group of eight of us who went to Costa Rica together the summer of 2012.  After we tried to mouth a conversation through the window, she ran outside; we hugged and played a quick catch-up on news.

Finally, back at the hotel room, guess what?  We learned to play Munchkin.