Friendship 2008

A Re-Hash of the Hash

Today I sent out the Round Robin for 2008: It's kind of the same old same old, but here it is:

March 1, 2008

As with some others of you, 2007 was a Golden Year for us. We celebrated our 50th wedding anniversary and the 50th reunion of my class at the Univ. of Mich. I remember that I didn’t even attend graduation in Ann Arbor because I was so eager to go home and get married!

We were married on June 22, 1957 in the First Congregational Church on Washington Street. The church building is now part of T.C.’s magnificent new court building. It was 90 degrees and windy on our wedding day. The reception was in the church parlor, and it was very modest by today’s standards. For our honeymoon, we took a road trip from Traverse City to Detroit by way of Ontario. We crossed the Straits of Mackinac on the ferry because the Bridge was not yet open to traffic, although it was almost finished.

Since we already celebrated our 50th in the best way in April with our kids on the Caribbean cruise, the actual anniversary day was fairly low-key. We went out to dinner, and Dick gave me a GOLF CAR! It was an excellent surprise.

Last summer was an eventful one - we managed to live through another GenFest reunion, the Cherry Festival, the National Governors’ Conference, the Traverse City Film Festival, and best of all, Laurie, Chip and Dylan’s annual month long visit. We did all of the summery things - boating, the sand dunes, the beach, etc.

We lived in Ann Arbor for seven weeks in Sept.-Oct. during the U of M football season. We rented a cute apartment which was very well located, and had a great time getting re-acquainted with Ann Arbor. The football season was set up so that there were 6 home games in the first seven weeks, so we decided to avoid all the back and forth driving. It gave us a chance to renew friendships with old colleagues from Belleville and we were lucky enough to go to two Belleville Retirees Breakfasts, which was endless fun for us.

For the first time in ten years our whole family was together for Christmas. We were all in Florida with Laurie, Chip and Dylan, and it was such a treat. We rented a house in Stuart for six weeks (Christmas and January) which was only 10 minutes away from Laurie so we saw them every day - we had a wonderful time and did such interesting things. I really can’t get enough of watching the ocean! It’s a great thing to spend time with Dylan especially. He’s still at an age where he really likes his grandparents, and it’s a joy to be with him and listen to him. We realize that in another 2 or 3 years we might not be as “cool” as we are now!

Our next adventure will be a cruise to the Scandinavian countries in May. We’ll be going with friends from Belleville, and we’re enjoying the planning stages.

Today I sent an email about our TCHS 55th Reunion of the Class of 1953, suggesting that we meet at the mixer on Friday night at the Elks Club instead of coming out here to the river. I feel it will be easier for everyone since it is so centrally located and simple to find. Our next reunion will be in 2013! Now that I think of it, the reunion will be over by the time some of you get this edition of the round robin!

Dick and I are both well with some slight exceptions, just like everybody else. I still have limited mobility, but I’m still working on it. We have what Dick’s Doctor calls “gray hair disease”, which means that we’re not getting any younger.

Stay well, spoil those grandkids, and keep in touch.

February Collage

It has been such a long time since I wrote anything! I'm not sure why exactly - maybe I burned out from all of the Florida blogging! So this is a brief synopsis of our February, 2008!

It has been a fine month for us. The weather has been cold and snowy since we got home, but it's very nice inside by the fire.

We've been going to the gym again and it's been fun re-connecting with everybody there. The exercises feel good, too. It takes a couple of visits to get back to where we were before we went to Florida.

One Wednesday we had a great lunch with Tim and Susie at the Olive Garden and that was as enjoyable as it always is. They were in town to buy things for the new addition to their home in Grayling.

We had dinner with Sharon and John at Champp's in Dewitt on the Friday evening before the MiGO Winter Social. It was fantastically fun catching up on our nephews' activities and plans. We made plans to have GenFest at the river on August 3, the day after Adam and Melanie's wedding.

The Winter Social was enjoyable. As usual, the part that was the most fun for me was the silent auction. I'll show you my new bracelet anytime you want! It was interesting to talk to Radman's mother - holy cow - none of us was quite sure how much of her story to believe! She's a most unusual person. I enjoyed talking to Tim, Susie, Lydia, Jerry, Justin and Heather and everybody else - it was impossible to touch base with everyone! The business meeting was too late, too long and too boring, but dinner at the Draft House with T&S made up for it! Hooray for popcorn and nachos!

Today we met with Diane at Triple A to finalize plans for our cruise with Sniders in May. I get very excited just thinking about cruising the Baltic and visiting all of the Scandinavian countries! We'll be gone from May 18 to May 30.

Tomorrow is Leap Year Day - kind of like getting a free day :)

Happy Birthday Laurie

Happy Birthday! You were born at 12:29 a.m., 20 minutes after we arrived at the hospital. You just couldn't wait to get here :)

States We've Cached

Home Again

This last leg of the trip was all the way from Charleston, West Virginia to 888 East River Road! We had planned to stop somewhere in Ohio and then make it home the next day. Dick was feeling good about driving, and we had heard that a big storm was up ahead of us. We decided to keep driving until we ran into the storm and then stop for the night. Well, we never ran into the storm! So we just kept on driving along, and we got home sometime around 7:30 p.m.

When we came into the house, it became obvious that the furnace wasn't working. Dick tried all of the suggested things to try to get it going again. Luckily, Bob's Furnace has 24 hour emergency service, and it took Stu about 15 minutes to put the furnace back in business!

So we're home again, the house is freezing, and we'll sleep in our clothes!

Hi Traverse City!

Charlotte to Charleston, WV

Today we found a cache in our 21st State.

We saw a foreshadowing the other day on the Interstate - we saw a double bottomed semi still smoking on the grass past the right shoulder, and long black tire tracks on the roadway where it had skidded to a stop. Dick said that it was a case of brakes locking up.

Today we saw a sign alongside the road that was flashing and it said Accident Ahead Prepare to Stop. I thought I had misread the sign, because how could they know ahead of time that there would be an accident and be ready with a flashing sign?? When we saw the second sign, we knew that I had read it correctly! Traffic was stop-and-go for about a half an hour and the reason was that a semi was buried in the median, which was kind of a ditch, and people couldn't figure out how to get it out! There were about 14,000 men standing around in day-glo vests with their hands in their pockets and shrugging their shoulders. There were dozens of emergency vehicles and police cars parked all around the area - it was quite a big deal!!






We went through one long tunnel, and that's always fun. Dick says there was a second tunnel, but i slept through it. Darn!

This was a mountainous driving day. It was raining, splashing, misty, foggy, with fast traffic and curvy terrain. Not easy driving!

Charlotte (Pineville), NC Day Two

On Sunday morning in Charlotte, everybody goes to church. Everybody! The church parking lots are jammed. They have annex parking lots with shuttle buses. There are police officers directing traffic into the parking lots before church, and out after church. From 10:30 until 12:30 we had the streets to ourselves - no traffic anywhere. We could make U-turns anywhere we wanted.

Observations:

1. Drivers from Virginia seem pushy.
2. North and South Carolina are nicer and cleaner than I expected they would be.
3. Somedays when you're geocaching, muggles get in your way All Day Long.
4. Hobbies can sometimes be as frustrating as work.
5. When you're tired enough, at McDonald's drive-through you order de-coff caffee.
6. Hummers are annoying. They're way too big and some of them have ridiculous
roof-racks.

Charlotte has a really nice Mexican restaurant - it was definitely authentic, judging by both staff and customers.

Rock Hill, S.C. & Pineville, N.C.

Today we drove from Savannah, Georgia through South Carolina to Charlotte, North Carolina. Well really, Pineville is where our Comfort Inn is. We picked up two caches in South Carolina, and that's our 19th State.

2/2/2008 You found Life is Just a Bowlful of Magnetic Cherries (Traditional Cache)
What a fantastic park! The folks here are very lucky. We celebrated our 50th anniversary last June and had a coin created to commemorate the event. We set as a goal to find a cache in each of the 83 counties in Michigan and to launch one of our coins in each one.
Once that task was accomplished, we decided that our next quest is to find a cache and launch a coin in each of the 50 states. South Carolina is number 19 and this is the cache we selected.
Signed the log, traded our coin for a TB from Michigan, and left a geo patch.
Thanks for giving us the opportunity to start our coin off in such a beautiful park.

We stopped for lunch in Rock Hill, South Carolina. They had a nice restaurant called Susie's (how could we resist?) But the most impressive thing that we saw in Rock Hill was Cherry Park. It's an amazing place - a perfectly wonderful, beautiful, clean and shiny park. They have 6 baseball and softball fields arranged in a huge circle. At the center of the circle is a 3 story press box kind of a building shaped like a hexagon with one side for each field. It's quite a deal.
The hiking path was an asphalt boulevard, with one side for walkers, and the other side for bikes and dogs. At the entrance is an impressive statue of Casey at the Bat - he has Mudville written on the back of his shirt. We were everlastingly impressed with this nice park. We liked what we saw of Rock Hill.

We leave South Carolina with the above tribute to the University of South Carolina Gamecocks (!!!)

The battery has died on Dick's Lenovo laptop, and so after we checked into our Pineville Comfort Inn we valiantly tried to work on it. We finally were able to remove the battery from the laptop, so that's at least Step 1 accomplished. We decided to stay here in Charlotte for two nights - tomorrow we want to do some sightseeing in Charlotte, and some geocaching also. We're planning to watch the Super Bowl at The Hickory Tavern.

In Which We leave Florida

We stayed with Laurie and Chip last night. Chip made us great pancakes and bacon this morning and then it was farewell to Saint Creek Drive and Hammock Creek. Dick took these pictures for me - I love the landscaping around the entrance and the gatehouse.



Bye Bye Hammock Creek. It's been great!

We hit I-95 and headed for Savannah. Tonight we're just south of Savannah in Richmond Hill, Georgia. It was a very pleasant travel day, and a lovely Comfort Inn. We ate at Beef O'Brady's, a sports bar (my new favorite venue)! It was comfortable and fun. Beef's is a strong supporter of local athletics, both athletes and coaches. We liked Richmond Hill. The sign said it's a Henry Ford City (?).
These El Cheapo gas stations are all over this area. The cheapest we've seen so far is $2.75.

The Character Cafe

Since Dylan is the Pillar of Patience this month for the PCE character construction project, we all went to lunch at school in his honor. We chose Grandpa to sit on the stage with MisterD, but the PTA ladies said that we could all sit with them and also that we could each have a cup of ice cream!
Things don't get any better than this! We are very proud of Dylan, and he was really happy to have us there. It was a Good Thing.

Dick took this picture just for Sharon. This Lincoln Navigator was parked outside of Dylan's school as we left the building!

We met the realtor at our house in Summerfield so she could do a walk through and make sure that we hadn't done any damage! We turned in our keys and remotes and waved goodbye to Warwick Lane.

I chose to eat our last Florida dinner at Duffy's, which is a sports bar. It's a totally comfortable place and exactly matches my level of sophistication! I had a great time.

Early Release

Dylan got out of school at noon today, so we all piled into the car and drove up to Ft. Pierce to visit the St. Lucie County Historical Museum and the Marine Center. The Museum and Gardner House were the most enjoyable to me. We all really enjoyed the Florida Cowboy exhibit. Those men were called Crackers! I think that's surprising. It wasn't until after WWII that the open range was fenced in and cows were prevented from blocking traffic. The museum also has a very nice display of Seminole life and customs - the actual photographs are stunning to see.
Dylan had a chance to try his hand at printing.


Here's our own Florida Cracker boy!

Favorite fish from the Marine Center.
We had dinner at Norris's Famous for Ribs - It was wonderful!

27 Dresses

Laurie and I went to the movies, and because we were feeling lighthearted we decided to see something fun. 27 Dresses is definitely fun! It was cute, enjoyable, lighthearted and worth it. We both liked it a lot.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Dick, Chip and Dylan got in some street time!

Today Dylan brought home a great report card and an award for being this month's Pillar of Patience (snort!)
We are all very proud of Mister D.

The Lost Day

I'm feeling much better now.

Lookie-Loo

There's a new development opening in Laurie's neighborhood, called Canopy Creek. She has always loved to look at model homes, so that was our quest for today! Here I am calling Laurie from Applebee's to set up our quest. These are remarkable, high-end homes. I really couldn't believe the backyard pools - very spectacular!
Dylan really enjoyed exploring the pools their associated rock formations!
We were in awe of this beautiful house and its great floorplan!
This house had 5 bedrooms and 5 1/2 bathrooms. The space where I'm standing is a playroom/gameroom - a huge space with every amenity you can thing of - big screen TV, lovely sitting area, game table, foosball, and on and on. One home had a kitchen with a double built-in refrigerator/freezer, and two dishwashers! I've led a very sheltered life!

Ah-Tah-Thi-Ki

Ah-Tah-Thi-Ki means "a place of learning, a place to remember" in the Seminole language. The Ah-Tah-Thi-Ki Museum is a wonderful place 13 miles north of Alligator Alley, which means it is literally out in the middle of nowhere! We drove down there today to learn something about Florida Native Americans. It's a terrific museum with lifesize mannikins displaying Seminole life.

My favorite parts were the very well done slide presentation, done in panorama style, and the beautiful and unique items of clothing which were displayed everywhere.
Dylan's favorites were the Legend storytelling and the mile and a half nature walk.

For some unknown reason we were unable to find the tribal restaurant...so we drove back out to Alligator Alley and got a surprisingly good BLT at the gas station there, and Dylan got two corn dogs - he said they were much better than the school corndogs!
Dick took this picture of Dylan and me unwrapping our ice cream - Dick thought it would be a nice contrast to the previous picture of TooJay's! I must repeat, however, that this little gas station had a really really good BLT sandwich!

We stopped at Quiet Waters Park on the way home so that Dick could put a travel bug in a cache. Dylan was delighted by these nesting birds - mostly ibis and egret:

School Lunch

Laurie, Dick and I got sub sandwiches and went over to PCE to have lunch with Dylan! He was surprised! We also saw Kyle and Jessica over there. If you bring in food from outside, you eat at a picnic table in the courtyard. It was a lovely day, the sandwiches were yummy, Dylan was fun, and we were all glad that we did that!

After eating, we went to look at Dylan's classroom. I was so impressed - it was a big, square, light, airy, spacious room with lots of windows and only 18 desks (!!). Mrs. Oset has enrichment materials posted all around the room - I thought that it was very well done - a warm, inviting, enriching place for kids. Dylan is a lucky duck.

The rest of the day was spent running errands, watching TV, reading, eating at Too Jay's, working on my blog (which Dylan calls my blah blah blah), questing on WOW, and just generally hanging out. We stayed at Laurie's until 10 p.m.

We also Love Lake Placid !

If you're ever in West Central Florida, you MUST visit the charming town of Lake Placid! It's a small town that has everything. It's full of parks and pleasantries and especially murals! These murals adorn 42 different downtown buildings, and they are spectacular. The murals are very well done - captivating and unbelievable. One of them, the cattle drive mural, has its own sounds effects - the sounds of a round-up. There are so many awesome murals you really should click on the site above and see some of them. Some are done in trompe l'oeil fashion - a truck with a real bumper and real license plate for example.

In addition to the wonderful murals, there are also various waste receptacle containers which you have never seen the likes of scattered around the parks. Our favorite was the car - when you push in the driver's side window to deposit your trash, the car lights go on, the horn honks, and the engine starts!

We had lunch at Jaxson's, just as Capt. Bud suggested, and we enjoyed every minute of it. Thanks Don!

This was a most successful overnighter. We found 16 caches yesterday, 21 today, and only received minor nicks and scratches, and 4 fire ant bites. Hooray! HomeAwayFromHomeward Bound.