Visitors! Some welcome and some not

It is quite possible that we've had more visitors in our 4 months here than in 4 years in Las Vegas. We love it!! Today, some "welcome" friends from Santa Rosa drove 2 hours from Nashville to visit with us for the afternoon. We meandered around the downtown area and then drove part-way up Lookout Mountain to see a view of the city. (Note - the "mountain" is probably all of 2000' high. I know our Western friends will appreciate that.)

Then, these welcome friends of ours helped us get rid of some unwelcome guests.

If you saw the post about toppling the gazebo then you may recall that it was being chewed up by Carpenter Bees. When we toppled the gazebo we left the base for another day. Larry started to demolish it over the week-end and discovered the Carpenter Bees were nesting in the base.

On Monday he tried spraying the wood with insecticide but it didn't slow them one bit. He bought wasp spray which worked, but only when he could actually spray the bee. These guys are really big bees and they fly very fast. He managed to kill two with the wasp spray but there were several more where they came from.

Then, Ken had a great idea for getting rid of these unwelcome guests. Burn them out! That seems pretty smart because it would kill any larvae and stop the cycle. Little did Ken know that Larry doesn't wait when he hears a good idea. While we were sight seeing, Larry went to the fire station to ask about permits. They said we needed a permit for a control burn but not for a campfire or to cook food. So, we had a really big campfire! You should have seen the size of those marshmellows! ;-)

Boy, did those bees get a surprise! Amazingly, some stayed quite a while before buzzing out of there. There was one bee in particular who just did not want to leave the area. It hung around for the longest time. Eventually, as it got dark it finally disappear. Our friends disappeared about this time too, going back to Nashville for a week of conference. Larry and I watched the glowing embers for a little while longer and then came inside, bringing the wasp spray and gloves in with us. But, the story doesn't stop there.

When Larry set the gloves down by the door to the garage he heard a loud buzzing sound. OH NO!! That stubborn bee had decided to bed down in Larry's glove and now it was in the house! Larry quickly stomped the gloves and silenced the buzz. This is what he found.

It looks like a bumblebee right? The only visual difference between them is Bumblebees have fuzzy abdomens and Carpenter Bees have smooth ones. This tummy is smooth. Bumblebees don't eat houses, Carpenter Bees do.

Little did I know... (a.k.a. Monster Fig)

Little did I know when I looked at that little fig tree what was hidden from view. This 4' high tree that volunteered to come up behind the shed was reported to be tough. The seller of our house said it was unstoppable. My garden book said fig trees get to be 15 - 30 ft tall and wide. It had to go. I've dug other things out by the roots before so after cutting back the twigs growing off the stump I took my shovel and started digging.

I followed one root over to the gravel where I knew it had grown into some hay bales that had been left to decompose. That went pretty well. A couple roots headed under the shed. I cut them off under the building.

Then, I follow another root that headed toward the neighbor's yard. It got bigger and bigger the further from the stump I dug. Then it split into three. Oddly though, it didn't split as it went away from the stump but rather toward the stump. It's as if the stump came from some mother tree somewhere - which makes a lot of sense - except there's no mother tree to be found. Rather than dig into the neighbor's yard we took an electric saw to the 3" root and cut it off at the property line. By then, I was six feet or so from the stump and had created quite a hole.

There were still more roots to dig out so I proceeded to dig. That was 3 days ago. I'm still digging. In the photo below you see about half of what I've dug. The stump I have referred to is way in the background. You can't even see it really. It's about 3' this side of the gravel.

What I found from this point on is even more amazing. More often than not, as I followed a root like this along thinking it would get smaller and I'd come to the end, I would find just the opposite. The more common experience is that it gets larger and goes deeper and probably crosses under another larger root. I suspect the really large root in the photo below is from a different tree that was on the neighbor's lot but had been chopped down. That stump is about 3 feet across so I know it was one huge tree. If I can get the fig root out from under it, I'll just cover up again. It's about 3' deep.

I'm now 25' or more, and around the corner, from that stump. They criss-cross all throughout the garden area. Some roots run just inches below the surface, others are deeper. Most of the shallow ones go deep at once point or another. After taking these photos, I continued to dig. The smaller root you see in these two final photos took a steep downward turn. By then, the sun was going down and I was getting tired. I wonder what I'll find tomorrow; assuming I can dig tomorrow. Possible thunderstorms are in the forecast.

Little did I know...

Timber!

Today, Larry and I got ambitious today and tore down the gazebo. It was wobbly to begin with and was being chewed up by some sort of bee (in the summer time) that bores holes.

Larry first took a circular saw to the upright 2x4's to free the roof and then he started pushing. He pushed and pushed. It wasn't until he removed some side supports that it finally came down. My cool camera has a rapid shoot feature so I got some action. It's too bad you can't watch it in quick succession because it looks pretty cool.

Oops

There are those who will get quite a kick out of this... (Rene' for one).

I spent an hour or two on this egg, only to break it when trying to seal it a new way. Usually, I take them outside and spray them but it was raining. So I sprayed sealer into a small zip-lock bag and rolled the egg around in the bag. It was working quite well until I tried to transfer it to the drying rack. That little booger was slick as snot on a door-knob. I hardly knew what happened! Crack! Oops. Oh well. Back to the drawing board.

We love visitors!

David swung by our house while on his way through with a delivery. It was great to see him for all of 10 minutes or so.

Unfortunately, Larry missed him as he was out of town at the time.








Our good friends, Carl & Karen spent the week-end with us recently. We had a lot of fun - going to lunch and then to the aquarium (someday I'll share photos from there). Later that night we went to a comedy dinner theater which was a lot of fun.

On Sunday we went for a lovely drive to through NE Georgia and visited Carl's parents. The week-end went by very fast.

We love having visitors. When are you coming? :-)

2/1/07 Snow Day

It's barely light enough outside to take a photo - at 7:45am. This is about the time of day it starts getting light here.

Oodles of school districts are closed. My employer is opening one hour later than usual. Snow is a big deal here! I like that. We don't have to deal with ice very often but we get the treat of snow from time to time. The temperatures are rising and it's suppose to rain later today so it won't last long.

Here are a couple more views.

Okay, so you think I'm too old to be making snowmen? Oh well. 50 still likes to have a little fun. Besides, snow is a novelty to me. Even after the snow turned to rain during the day, there was still enough wet snow after work to form a sorry looking snowman. This one was concocted on our deck which I believe was more wet than the snow on the lawn, however, this way it didn't have grass and dirt mixed with it. Ta da!

(If you ever want a better look at a photo you can double click on it and get a bigger version of it.)

Gatlinburg

We had heard that the lights that Gatlinburg puts up for Christmas were due to come down after this week-end so we high-tailed it up there this week-end. It's quite a tourist town and it's called the Gateway to the Great Smokey Mountains. We agreed to listen to a time share presentation in exchange for a $100 "gift".

We figured that would pay for a hotel room and food so we stayed.

This morning we woke to find it snowing!! Ordinarily I'm leery of snow but this wasn't sticking to the streets so I wasn't worried about driving in it. It turned out to be a light dusting.

We briefly set foot in the Great Smokey Mountains, enough to know we need to go back again - maybe in the Spring.

Company! - and more.

These posts have slowed way down... have you noticed? That's partly because it's Winter and partly because we've been busy settling down. There's so much to do!

However, we did have some fun recently when Ben and Laura came to visit. Laura flew in Thursday and Ben followed on Friday after he got off work. They spent a lot of time checking out the city and surrounding areas.

On Thursday afternoon, Laura and I got to toddle around town a bit. We went to the Art District and to the Chattanooga Choo Choo. Check out the photos. The time with them went all too quickly as they went home on Sunday but we look forward to the next time - whenever that is.

Our weather has been wonderful. We did have just a touch of a cold snap when the rest of the country had a huge touch of that same snap. We get frost every few days but Larry clears a spot in the garage for me so my ride is dry and warm. I love it!! Days have been in the 40's and 50's. Occasionally we get rain but we get blue sky in between - or at least patches of blue sky. So far, this is easy Winter weather.

Work is going well. My department worked a lot of overtime the first month but starting this week we're back to 40 hours a week. We're allowed to start work any where between 7:00 and 9:00. I've been starting at 7:00 lately so with a 30 minute lunch I can get of as early as 3:30!! I'm lovin' that too.

I'm currently reading books on lawn care and composting. That's something I haven't done since 2000! It feels good. I may even get my hands dirty this week-end, clearing out the remains of last year's garden.

Hey! The local scrap yard man gave me two more license plates for my collection. We had to get rid of the refridgerator and dishwasher so I traded them for two plates. Well, not exactly but that's more or less the end result. He did also give me $13.80 got the metal. So now I have Montana, South Dakota, Tennessee and Georgia!! I also found some people that want to trade plates so when we change ours from SD to TN perhaps I'll make some good trades. :-)

Our computers are finally up and running (as I'm sure you've guessed by now). If I don't email you first, then send me an email!

PS (I don't know why this is all smooshed together at the end. Hope you don't mind it being compressed.)

Getting Settled

Hello to y'all,

It's been a while since I've been in touch. The last couple weeks have been busy with moving and getting settled. Larry has been working very hard every day fixing things, organizing stuff, and all that goes with settling into a new residence.

We brought the RV to our property last week-end. It's sitting on the grass behind the rental house and - to tell you the truth - I haven't seen it since then. The windows in our house don't look that direction and I can't see it from the drive-way. It seems odd to me. Larry tells me it's still there. :-) We're going to sell it. In fact, Larry placed an ad in the Boat and RV Trader magazine for their next issue.

While Larry has been working so hard at getting settled, I've been spending about 9 - 11 hours a day at work. This is the busy season in payroll. We just finished preparing W-2's this week. I'm told that pretty soon we'll be going back to 8 hour days. We have what is called flex time, which means I can start my day anytime between 7:00 and 9:00 and go home accordingly. I can work a little more one day and a little less another. It's very nice.

We finally got connected to the internet via cable modem this week but our in-house computer system is still being worked out. Larry got our computers networked (if that's the right term). My "office" is the last to get settled so doing email has been a little inconvenient. That's okay though because I come home pretty tired.

Laura and Ben are coming in a few days!! They going to scope out our community and see if this is a logical place for them. We're quite excited about seeing them.

I'm still trying to talk my parents into coming. Dad's ready to move here but Mom doesn't want to budge. If you have any contact with them, feel free to encourage her.

So far, Winter has been easy. It seems to go back and forth from nights in the 50's to nights in the 30's, depending upon whether the skies are cloudy or clear. One day it was actually rainy and cold and someone said they saw snowflakes and someone else saw slush but I didn't see either.

Cindi sent me a license plate from Montana!! Larry had discouraged me from making the US license plate map (See previous blog for talk about the map.) out of real license plates... and he might still be the smartest one here... but I couldn't help but love getting the real plate in the mail. It's a great reminder of our travels (we have seen a lot of plates!!) For now, while building the 50 state collection, I'm thinking of using plates as a kitschy kind of wall art. So, I may renew my efforts to collect the 50 states. If you have the opportunity to get your hands on a license plate please think of me! You'll probably hear me talk about this more.

That about wraps up the last couple weeks. One of these days I'll get some photos going again.

Moving Day

Well... Escrow has finally closed and the move has begun. To tell the truth, the furniture that we bought for the house has been there for two weeks already. Over the last two days Larry has moved some of the bigger stuff.

Escrow closed Wednesday but the RV has still been home... up until this week-end. Starting tomorrow morning the kitchen gets moved, then the bedroom, then the rest. We've decided to leave the RV in the RV park for the rest of the pre-paid term (a couple more weeks) and move the old fashioned way - in our vehicles back and forth (rather than pull the RV to the house). It's much easier to keep the rig protected against the cold nights with it being plugged in and all.

It supposed to rain late in the day tomorrow so we'll get as much done as we can before the rains begin.

Give us a few weeks to get settled and then ya'll come see us now, ya hear?

New Job

Hi Everyone,

It's official. As of Wednesday, Dec 13th, I (Shirley) will be employed with one of the largest employers in Chattanooga: Blue Cross Blue Shield of Tennessee. This is the building that I'll be working in (it doesn't really lean). Right now the 4500 employees are housed in six different buildings. I understand they're building a new building somewhere nearby. I'm unclear whether it will house everyone or not. I'll learn more about that later.

My position is called "Kronos System Administrator" which means I'm in charge of the time and attendance system (called Kronos) for about 4500 employees.

I'm thrilled to get this job because the pay is very good and the benefits are excellent. I've never seen better. The payroll department has about six people in it and they use an in-house payroll system. They cross train so I'll learn a lot!

License Plate mania - updated 12/13

Sometime after our first RV travels and we landed in Las Vegas, Larry and I saw a map like this at a local casino. This last week-end I found out that the casino completely remodeled. I called them to see if I could buy the map but they had already liquidated all their old art and furnishings. Laura suggested we check out the internet. That's when we found this photo and learned that to buy an original art piece would cost in excess of $3000!! That's when Laura suggested I make my own. Um... I think I could do that! I could at least try. With the right tools, why not? Mine will include Alaska and Hawaii.

So, I'm on a quest to locate license plates from 50 states. It'll take two for CA and three for Texas. I think one will do it for all the rest (New York is iffy). Do you have any resources for salvaging license plates? Do you have any plates lying around that you would like to donate? If so, please let me know by adding a comment to this blog entry.

Laura has one from NV and I have one from South Dakota. Two down, 51 to go.

Dec 13th

Larry has talked some sense into me and has offered some alternatives to actual license plates. One suggestion is to make color copies of plates on paper (perhaps from DMV web-sites for each state). One advantage is that I can shrink the little states and enlarge the large states. Another advantage is the ease of cutting out the shapes. It makes sense.

One other idea is to use a pack of USPS post cards, one of each state, that Suzie gave me. I do want to use those for something unique but I'm not yet sure this is it. I have a couple other ideas for those too.

In any case, I'm putting a hold on the quest for actual license plates from all over the US. If you're one of those who offered plates I appreciate you very much!! You're the best!

Trip to LV & CA

This last week Larry had jobs in both Las Vegas and CA. Since I can fly for free when I go with him, I did just that. We got to spend some time with Ben & Laura.

Ben has set up a wifi system in their house so here are the two guys simultaneously surfing.

Laura saved the Christmas decorating until we got there. Jingle Bear was among the things unboxed. Jingle Bear is only 3 years younger than Laura. :-)

We got to visit with some friends in Las Vegas and Santa Rosa and also spend a little time with my parents. Unfortunately, I didn't take photos the rest of the trip. Silly me. So, this photo of my parents is from 3 years ago. (Better that than none?) Though we were away from home a whole week, there didn't seem to be enough time at any one place. We were on the go a lot!

Christmas in Chattanooga

It seems that everytime we go downtown and see something worth photographing, I don't have my camera on me. So, here is a photo of Chattanooga in the summertime taken off a web-site.

I show this picture so when I tell you about Christmas arriving in Chattanooga you'll have an idea of what I'm talking about.

On Friday evening, Chattanooga celebrated the beginning of Chrsitmas in a big way. People started gathering in late afternoon. Many ate dinner at one of the downtown restaurants, sitting inside or out. It was a lovely evening. As it grew dark, people headed for the riverfront. The festivites started with a parade of boats (I think I counted 35 of them). They were decked out in lights from bow to stern. While they paraded on the river, a bell choir played carol after carol. There was also a live nativity scene, sponsored by a local church on city property! That surprised us. There were food vendors and such too.

Then Santa arrived, along with some kids and dancers also decked out for the holidays. There was some song and dance. Did you know that Santa has an excellent singing voice!?! ;-) But, then Santa did something amazing. He paused in the middle of all the song and dance and took the opportunity to remind the crowd of the real meaning of Christmas and drew attention to the nativity. Imagine that. I didn't know any city in the USA had the fortitude to put Christ in Christmas.

They finished the evening with a grand fireworks display over the river. It was spectacular. I sure do wish I had my camera with me.

New Address

Believe it or not, we now have a house in escrow. Here's a photo. It was built around 1950 and is one-bedroom, one bath with a small kitchen. Actually, we haven't even seen the inside of it yet because it's being rented. We'll continue to rent it out because we're going to live in...


The big house that came with it. Here's a photo of it.

This one was solidly built about 1992 and has 3 bedrooms, 2 baths. The kitchen has solid oak cabinets. It has a 1600 sq ft basement/garage below. Larry thinks he could squeeze six or seven Saturns in there. Ha! While I will admit it's big, he'll have to prove that one to me. We got both of these on a huge lot for $155K.

Oh yeah, and in addition to a couple of maples, it has 5 Dogwood trees on the lot! Flowers in the Spring, red leaves in the Fall. So cool. (Did you know you can click on the photos to get a larger version?)

For one final photo, here's a view toward the Southwest. This is one of those parts of the country where fences don't exist between neighbors but it doesn't seem odd to us at all. We're on a corner so there is only one neighbor to one side, separated by our driveway (the one you see here) and two behind us which wouldn't be obscured by a fence anyway because we're higher than them on a hill.

I'll post more photos in our online photo album over the week-end so you can check there in a day or two (or three).

We plan on having a guest room, so y'all come see us now, ya hear?

Florida highlights

If we don't leave Florida later today then we'll be leaving early in the morning. I have a job interview in Chattanooga Tuesday afternoon. It's for a HR/Payroll Manager for a natural foods grocery store.

Before we go, I'd like to share a couple things. First, unique to Florida alone (for us) is the unusual wildlife. There are several of these cranes making themselves at home in the RV park. They walk around like they own the place. It may be difficult to tell in the photo but they're about 4 feet tall.

On Friday we went to Disney's Animal Kingdom and Epcot Center. The safari ride is one of my favorite things because every ride is different. Five years ago a Rhino walked in front of our truck. This time, giraffes did the same thing. However, the ostriches made even more of a scene. They held up our truck for about 15 minutes while they pecked at it's trimmings. They were probably within touching distance of the people on the first row. We were on about the fourth row. Seeing an ostrich up close like this was pretty neat.

Then, in Epcot I saw a new egg art. Well, the art itself is about 2000 years old, but it was new to me. It originates in Germany. For those of you who know about the Ukrainian Egg Art that I've done, it's similar in that the design starts with a pencil drawing. The artist then paints on the egg using water colors. The end result is just as amazing with as much, or as little, detail as Pysanky (Ukrainian).

Saturday we went to one of Disney's water parks called Typhoon Lagoon. We had a ball! My camera stayed home so I can't share any photos but I'll try to share some highlights. First, there is the wave pool which is a lot of fun. Secondly we snorkeled (briefly) in a tank with lots of colorful fish, small sharks and some stingray. So, this is the second time I have swum with sharks! I was exiting a very large stingray was on the platform in front of me. Not to worry though, their barbs were removed.

Then, of course, there were water slides. I declined to do the really steep fast one but the others were all great. Finally, there was the creek filled with inner tubes. When our feet would start to get sore from walking we'd float on the creek for a while. Sometimes we just relaxed but most of the time we'd play bumper tubes or try to push each other into the different streams of water designed to get you good and wet.

The temperature was just right for playing all day. It started getting cool about closing time so it was perfect.

It may have to wait until we get to Chattanooga but I'll post more photos in our online photo album. Feel free to check it out. http://travelingturtles.myphotoalbum.com/

Chattanooga for keeps

The Traveling Turtles are taking a big turn in the road. We've decided to settle down again. Are you surprised?

This has been brewing for a while. Maybe you've been able to tell. As I look back at our blog it's not a total surprise because I've talked about housing in Sioux Falls, Evansville, Nashville, and who knows where else. The idea of the "best place to live" has been a topic of many conversations. It still seems odd to us because we were so enthusiastic about traveling again. However, now that we've done Autumn in New England and visited the sites in the Eastern Time Zone that we missed last time, we feel as if we've completed the trip. This surprises even us!

As you know, we checked out Chattanooga a couple times in the last few weeks and we like what we see. The size is nice: about 175K in the city but serving about 500K in the area. The community has revitalized the downtown area, complete with a riverwalk. They have 4 seasons but the winters are not bitterly cold like up North. Housing is affordable, especially compared to what we're used to seeing. There would be family on both sides - a cousin in Atlanta area and a brother in Memphis. Oh! and more cousins in Virginia. In fact, that's another benefit. Chattanooga is within a day's drive of 75% of the US population. There are so many places to enjoy on the week-ends. We're excited about making this move.

We're going to visit Disney this week-end and then end that way next week. We'll continue to live in the RV while we get to know the area and eventually get into some housing.

Please continue to check the blog as I'll continue to update it.

Hello Again!!

It's been an interesting trip from North Carolina to Florida. I'd love to share a bunch of photos here but the blog is slow to load. I'll include a couple here but please feel free to check out our photo album. I'll load some photos before I go to bed tonight and let them download while we're sleeping.

When we left North Carolina we drove to Brunswick, GA. We stopped in Savannah on the way. Larry noticed that the distressed stucco with brick exposed on this building in Savannah was authentic.

Here's where our path takes a turn. We left the rig in Brunswick and took the car back North and then East to Knoxville. Larry and I have been talking alot about jobs and our plans. Since Accountemps didn't serve me so well in New England, we're thinking we may have to settle somewhere in order for me to work. We were thinking about Knoxville so decided to check it out. The drive there, through the mountains in Western Carolinas, was beautiful. The autumn colors were spectacular - better than New England (believe it or not). This photo is from Georgia but it's indicative of the whole area.

Knoxville was nice but it wasn't what we expected. Larry had been there before but I hadn't. We decided to keep going and check out Chattanooga. We had just been through there a couple weeks before and liked what we saw. Again, the drive was beautiful. It turns out we like Chattanooga enough to think about settling there.

In the meantime, we stayed with our original plan and have come all the way to Florida. First though, I spent some time with my cousin and her family in Georgia while Larry went to St Louis for work. We had a great visit. Here are (from left to right) Casey, Linda, Joel (me) and Jamie. Let's not forget Max, the toy Schnauzer. :-) They have 3 more kids who are living in other parts of the country.

So, we arrived in Orlando yesterday and I started looking for a job right away. It may be a temp job or even a permanent job. Depending upon what happens, we may live in FL for a while (even a year or two) or maybe not. The next week to month will have a great influence on our plans.

So, stay tuned for more news. And check out our photo album: http://travelingturtles.myphotoalbum.com/

See you in Florida!

Once we unplug and move out (this morning) it's going to be a while before we plug back in again because we're not going to set up out internet satellite dish until we get to Florida on Nov 5th.

We're spending a couple days in South Carolina and several days in Georgia (we get to have a long visit with my cousin and her family!!) and then we'll get to our destination.

Sorry, no photos of North Carolina. It's wooded and pretty here but nothing photo worthy. Fall colors here are not what they are in New England. Maybe we're just too early for it but I suspect things turn more brown than red or yellow.

So... Check back in a couple weeks to see what's up.

Zippin' Around (and a "small world" story)

As you know, from the last posting, I went with Larry on his business trip last week. We first flew to Nashville in order to drive to Atlanta (because Southwest Airlines doesn't fly to Atlanta). The next day we drove back to Nashville to catch a flight to Tampa. However, we had a couple extra hours in our schedule to do something different.

We decided to drive to Turtletown, Tennessee!! What a fitting place for Traveling Turtles, wouldn't you say! It's about an hour from Chattanooga, very close to the North Carolina border. The drive was beautiful as we drove along a lake and then along a river where autumn is still approaching peak color.

As it turns out, there isn't much to Turtletown. There were plenty of country homes in the area but not much in the way of business.


A post office is about the only thing open. There is a good size school but it appears to be closed. Ducktown, about 10 miles away, is where the businesses seem to be thriving.

Tampa was a repeat city for us but Ft Lauderdale was new - at least for me. You may have enjoyed some of the sights had I taken some pictures but I didn't. It all seemed like repeat and I wasn't motivated to use the camera. Sorry ya'll.

On Saturday we went to Colonial Williamsburg. Now that was interesting. This is the actual site of the colonial town and includes 88 of the original buildings. We learned about certain trades such as blacksmithing, book binding, shoe making, saddlery, wheel making and more along with details of how life was back then. Then, of course, there were the turbulent times just prior to the revoluntion.
Here's a photo of a brick kiln. What is unique is that the kiln is built once a year using the bricks that they have made all summer. It takes five to six weeks to build the kiln and several days to get the fire up to full heat. It burns for about a week before they seal the ends and let it cool down for several weeks. Finally, they'll take the whole thing apart and repeat it again next year. The outside is skimmed with mud to help hold the heat inside. For more photos, check out http://travelingturtles.myphotoalbum.com/ (but look tomorrow because it takes hours to download and I'll do it tonight).

Finally, at the end of the day, we headed back to our car via the visitor's center. That's when I saw someone I thought I knew. I looked twice and I still wasn't sure. I thought hard to remember her name. This would be going back 6 years and more to when we lived in Santa Rosa. Laura and their son went to Santa Rosa Christian School together from Kindergarten to 8th grade. I remembered Paul's name just fine. It took me a moment to remember his last name and finally his mom's first name.

She and I talked often in the parking lot at school. We both went to Bible Study Fellowship. We went on field trips together. Ah yes! I remembered her name and hurried to get within calling distance and called her. She looked up; it was her!! The first thing she said was "What are you doing here?". That's exactly what Larry's cousin said to us we when ran into her at a public pool in Washington. The four of us chatted for a while, catching up on what we've been doing for the last six years. It truly is a small world after all.

On Sunday morning we had breakfast with some friends (and distant relatives) who live in Virginia. They graciously drove an hour from home to meet with us. We had dinner with them 5 years ago when we made our first trip back East. We could talk for hours so of course breakfast just wasn't long enough - but at least it was something.

By the way, we are definitely in the "South" now. Larry heard someone cheerfully say to someone else, "Ya'll have a good rest of ya'lls week." That is my salutation to you; uh, I mean to ya'll.