Bonnie Gamelli:  

After 13 years of trying to get pregnant, Jimmy gets hired by the airlines and 'Bingo' a month later, I was expecting.The first year with the airlines, you make zilch-0-hardly enough to keep food on the table and pay commuting expenses. But, all was worth it! Alicia was a joy and had quite an imagination. When she was 3, she saw the 'Annie' movie once and remembered all the songs and dances. Started doing an 'Annie' show for everyone. Having copper colored hair, I just had to cut and perm it so she'd look like Annie. Made her an Annie dress and she'd dress up and carry her portable record player wherever we went. Dressed up one night, grabbed her record player and went to the door. I asked where she was going. She said "To Downing Street to do a show with Daddy". She inherited Jimmy's voice and will be cutting a CD shortly.I want her to record some 30, 40, 50 and 60's tunes. She asked me why I wanted her to record all those 'boring' songs.She just doesn't get it!! Going to get a band together so they can do some shows. Jimmy wants to do his 'Legends' show. He does 60 impersonations. Alicia will do her 'Pop' tunes. After Jimmy retired from the line at 60, the airlines asked him to be a Sim Instructor. He called me one afternoon and said the company had time left on the sim and had to pay the $700.00 an hour whether they used it or not. Said if I wanted to fly it, to get to D.C. right away. I was on the next flight out and in the sim that night. On take-off, I was struggling while pulling the yoke back, even while trimming. Jimmy said, "Bonnie, you're flying an airliner now, not a Yankee!" What a treat that was! I flew a lot in the 70's. After flying one night, I got in my car to go home and found myself driving down the white line on the 4 lane highway by DuPage County Airport. I believe that is Rt. 64. Thank god there were no cars near me! I was getting ready for another 'take-off'. When Alicia was 3, we flew with Jimmy on his trip to Detroit. While there, I came across an article in the newspaper 'Daughter Grows Up Too Fast'. Jimmy put that to music. Using a song his stepmother wrote then going into the talking rendition of the article. He recorded the tune for the Dad and Daughter dance for Alicia's wedding. The owner of the studio where he recorded it told him they had to do a 'serious' recording of it. We finally got in touch with the author of the article and will be using the video of the dance in the background while Jimmy sings the song with just his guitar. The name of the song is 'Little Hands' and people were laughing and crying throughout the song. Even the groomsmen had tears in their eyes. One of my friends was crying a half hour after the song was finished.We're hoping every dad who has a daughter will buy it. I've invented about 10 things so far and need to either go to the patent office in D.C. to do my own research, or, go to a patent attorney and pay $3,500 per invention to do the search.I know Jimmy won't be letting me go to D.C. and stay for a few days, so,the attorney is my only choice. Hoping the record sales will help me out!! Hint..Hint!! Thought I knew how to decorate my house 'country' until I moved to Virginia. A pilot friend had a woodworking shop in his garage and gave me use of it. Gave me all the manuals to the machines and told me to read them.I took them home and they sat on the table. I'm a 'hands on' person and took the books back to Dan. Started collecting scrap wood at building sites. The carpenters were nice enough to cut the long boards I couldn't get in my car. One of my friends and I were bored one Sunday and decided to go out collecting wood. Good wood and appliances were being stolen from the building sites. Someone saw us hauling wood to my car and called the contractor. The next morning, I was still in bed when I heard Jimmy yell up the stairs to me, "Bonnie, the cops are here. What did you do, Bonnie?". I threw on my robe and came down. There stood the officer and the contractor. They asked me if I had been at the building site yesterday and if we took any wood. I told them "Yes, scrap wood". Then the cop told me I was being arrested. I said, Wait a minute, I've got to get a cup of coffee!". Went into the kitchen and poured a cup of kava and went back to the foyer. They had called another squad to come take pictures of the wood that I still had in the back of my station wagon. Thank god I didn't remove it. The contractor saw that it was scrap wood. I w...Expand for more