RV Travels With Huggy

Weather. Yes we have had unusual weather this year and every time I start to gripe about ours I realize that other parts of the country have had much worse. We don't have tornado's (well, occasional small ones have been reported but they don't do any damage) but I am more than ready for Spring to finally arrive. Today looks like it has with sunshine, blue skies and temperatures in the mid-60s in most areas, but clouds are due back overnight with rain (again) tomorrow. We drove out through some of the tulip field areas yesterday (Mt. Vernon's annual Tulip Festival runs all the month of April) and some other farming areas today and there is still a lot of standing water in fields and pastures. Tulips are finally up although in most years they burst out in early April. Some fields have been plowed but it is still too wet for them to do much in the way of planting. Pat has been hardening plants in the garage, some that should have been planted outside a month ago. Oh well, May is just around the corner and maybe Spring will finally arrive with it. The picture above is from one of the commercial tulip growing farms here, where the bulbs are actually the main product.

Gas prices have gotten worse since my post on March 17th about being happy that I bought a Prius. We are seeing regular gas locally at prices over $4 a gallon at some stations but can also find it in the $3.85 range and we do get an extra 10 cents a gallon off at Safeway and Fred Meyer because of our purchases at those stores last month. Where will it stop? Pat's VW New Beetle uses diesel fuel and it is running $4.15 now at those two outlets.

Thursday of next week, the 28th, will be our Fourth Wedding Anniversary and we do have plans. More about that later. This year also marks my 50th anniversary of graduating from Lewis & Clark High School in Spokane, WA. There will be a reunion in Spokane during the summer and we are going. I don't think I have ever stayed in a 5-star hotel but with a pretty good discount for LC-61 class members I think we will stay in the Davenport Hotel which is the headquarters for the reunion. There were about 520 in my class who graduated that June day in 1961. I still am in contact with a few of them and look forward to seeing more later this summer.

Labels: Festivals, Flowers, Griping, Reminiscing, Weather

I thought I'd better mention here that Tim from Handy's Heating came back last Monday, checked out our new fireplace and replaced the control module on it. Now it is working fine, but our weather has been warm enough that we haven't needed it since then. The forecast calls for a high temp of only 61 on Monday so maybe that day we will be able to use it. I do know it will get a lot of use over the winter and am glad that we did go ahead and have it installed early enough that it will be ready when needed.

Time really seems to be flying. I can't believe that it is already October. It really is true that the older we get the faster time goes. Annie has been gone over five years and this month will mark four years that Pat & I have known each other. In fact, we will be visiting good friends over in the Lake Chelan area of Central Washington on the 22nd which will be our exact four year anniversary. Roy, if you read this, we will have to plan on something special that day.

We are planning that trip for about the middle of the month. To get there we cross Stevens Pass which reaches an elevation of about 4100 feet, on US 2 and go through one of our favorite towns, Leavenworth. We should get to Leavenworth about the right time to stop for lunch. That time of the year the fall color should be brilliant. I hope the weather will also be great. October is usually a good weather month with fairly warm days and cool nights. It should also be ahead of the snowfall in the mountains. The long range forecast is calling for a return of the La Nina conditions in the Pacific Ocean which usually means colder temps for us. Winter always brings more precipitation and if it is cold, that can come as snow. Two years ago when we last had a La Nina winter we had close to 24 inches of snow here around Christmas and we usually have none all winter. Spokane in Eastern Washington, where I grew up, had four feet of snow that winter, much of it on the ground at once. They always have snow but not that much! See why we wanted to have the fireplace installed before winter? When we come home we will probably go to Winthrop and come home across the North Cascade Highway (WA State Route 20) if it hasn't yet been closed by snow. It is over a mile high and it has so much snowfall that the State Highway Dept doesn't try to keep it open through the winter. But when we come out on the west side we are right in our own backyard. And by going that way we can stop for lunch at Duck Brand Hotel & Cantina in Winthrop, another of our favorite eating places.

Enough for now. I still have some photos from our Oregon Coast trip back in May to post, especially those of our visit to the light house at Newport. I'll get to that before much longer.

Labels: Annie, Friends, Pat and I, Reminiscing, Small towns, Weather

I have been busy and not gotten to the other photos from the Oregon Coast trip. I will try to get to them before too much longer.

One thing that I've been up to is moving my small stock portfolio from a full service broker to one of the discount brokerage places. Since then (at the end of June) I have been having fun making some small trades and a couple of somewhat larger ones that I have wanted to do but was unwilling to pay the high broker fees to sell and buy more.

Another thing that I wanted was to have the dividends paid to me buy more shares of stock rather than paying to me in cash. The place where my former broker was when I started with him did allow that but then he changed companies and the new one allowed that only on mutual funds. The new place allows that at to happen with most securities as I understand. So far only one of them has paid a dividend since I changed (at least that didn't still go to the other place as it was my brokerage on the day they based the dividend on) and that one did buy more shares. It pays monthly, as does a new one I bought in my IRA that will pay its first dividend to me next Tuesday, so I'll find out then if it will also buy more shares. This is kind of play money that I don't need to live on so I'd rather have them buy more shares, which helps the portfolio grow quicker.

Anyway, I have been having fun with it now and am learning more about how to track investments. I also have my Honda moped scooter listed for sale on Craig's List. I have had it almost five years and it still has less than 800 miles so is not even really broken in yet. I have the electric bike which I have been storing in the sun room but Pat would rather I get it out into the garage, so the scooter needs to go. When it does sell I will probably move that money into the stock market. With the much smaller cost of making purchases with the discount broker, I can do that.

Our Old Coots did get together again this summer in Spokane (WA) and Pat agreed to go even though it was in July. She doesn't like hot weather and all three days we were there the daily temps were over 90. It was fun. The Old Coots is a group of us who went to school together in Spokane many years ago. In fact, it is so many years ago that next year we will celebrate our 50th high school graduation reunion. I definitely want to go to that. Since we no longer have the RV, we drove the Prius over and stayed in a motel. The car averaged right at 50 miles per gallon of fuel use so it is running right about where it is supposed to.

I will try to post a little more often and get around to reading those I like to read but I just don't seem as motivated to blog as I used to be. No promises.

Labels: Cars, Events, Friends, Reminiscing, Weather

I thought I'd report back on how the Prius is doing for us so far. We have over 800 miles on it at this point and our average mileage for that distance is right about 51 miles per gallon. I've filled the gas tank and will soon do it again, but it wasn't real low when I filled it. The tank was full when we got the car and I've read that you do not want to let it run out so, not knowing how accurate the gas gauge is, I filled it at only about 3/8 of a tank indicated. Most of our current mileage has been here around town with a couple of short freeway trips of 20 - 25 miles each direction. But, next week we will be driving to Spokane, about 320 miles away, so that will be a good road trip to see how it does on the highway.

So far the only negative we have found is that every time Pat gets out of it, either from the driver or passenger seat, she seems to build up a static charge and gets a spark that is very noticeable when she pushes the door closed. I keep telling her that it just indicates that she is a very electrifying woman but somehow I don't think she appreciates those little (or maybe not so little, according to her) jolts. We did add a static strap that drags on the ground but it didn't seem to help very much if at all. She has a static spray that she sometimes uses on certain clothes like slips and she sprayed the passenger seat with it. That, combined with the static strap, did seem to help. Now we need to see how long it will last. I'll have to post this as a question on the Prius Chat forum that I belong to and see if anyone else has this problem and if so, how did they resolve it.

It does look like our fantastic summer weather is over. We have had some rain over the last couple of weeks and rather than temps in the upper 70s, most days have been in the upper 50s or 60s. Right now we are in a few days of sunshine and daily high temps in the mid-60s, which is sure something we can't complain about. I just kind of hate to see the summer end.

A Blogger friend asked after my last post if I was going to change the name of my blog, now that I don't have an RV anymore. That is something I've wondered about before as Huggy hasn't traveled with us in the RV since we bought this new one in March of 2007, so the name hasn't been totally accurate for two and a half years. I probably should change it, or maybe just stop posting. All of these blogs seem to eventually end and perhaps that time has come for mine. My original purpose for starting it was to keep my family and friends informed of where I was and what I was doing as Huggy and I traveled around the Western United States in the RV. That has all changed, totally. I'll ask those who still bother to check my rare posts what you all think. Should I end it now? Or maybe just rename it and continue with no real direction?

Labels: Cars, Huggy, Reminiscing, RVing

All the Back To School sales that are going on and articles in the local newspaper would have me thinking that summer is about over. School seems to start earlier and earlier as time goes on. In our area we usually don't have very reliable summer like weather until after about the 10th of July but this year has been different. We had rain the day after we got back from our North Cascades Loop trip in mid-May and almost none since then. The temperatures have been pretty consistently in the 80s with a few days actually into the 90s. Until about a week and a half ago. Since then we have had some rain and cooler temps. But, now the thermometer is heading back up with talk of maybe into the 90s by mid-week.

Often I prefer to take trips after school has started in the fall as our September weather is usually beautiful, but that is also when I hope to go to the Spokane area for a week or so. Eastern Washington is cooler and more comfortable then than it is in the summer and we coastal residents are not used to hot temps. Maybe we will go there and down to the ocean for a few days. But we do need to rebuild the tow dolly in order to safely take the Beetle along and you got to have a tow car.

We did go to the local Skagit County Fair this past week and Pat was a lot braver than me and had a caricature drawing done of her by a artist who was there. I'll post it here and see what you all think of it.

I guess it is okay but I think I like some of my photos of her a lot better. But these things are not done to try to make them an actual portrait. And this was done just two days before she spent the morning at her hair dresser. Oh well.

Labels: Festivals, Griping, Pat and I, Reminiscing, RVing, Weather

There is a group of us old school buddies who have been getting together each summer in Spokane, WA, where we all grew up, just to stay in contact, find out what all has been happening in each others lives and just plan have fun. This summer the group, which we loosely call "The Old Coots Club," decided to take a road trip to the Seattle area from Spokane for a couple of days rather than the Seattle area bunch going to Spokane. That trip was this last weekend and on Saturday, after a breakfast in the Kirkland area, four of the group came up to Skagit County, my home stomping grounds.

We met at our house which was an opportunity to show the place to them, three of whom had not been here before. Then we went to lunch together at the Garden Cafe inside the Skagit Gardens retail sales greenhouse, followed by a tour of part the area.


Our tour went out the Fir Island Road to La Conner. This is a scene looking down the channel toward the Rainbow Bridge. The eagle is an example of some of the public art that is on display in this town. It is very tourist oriented and has some nice things on public display as well as many galleries.


Another must see place is the waterway known as Deception Pass. Here is found some very fast tidal flow when the tides are moving into or out of Puget Sound. All of the water does not go through here but enough does to make this somewhat hazardous to boat traffic, especially if you are trying to go against the tide flow. Don't try this in a canoe or sail boat under sail! You won't make it as you can't go as fast as the tide. This is one of the two Deception Pass bridges, the longer one that goes from the small island in the middle of the channel to Whidbey Island. The only access for autos to Whidbey is via this bridge or one of two Washington State Ferry System boat routes. The island is long, extending south to where the other end is just off Mukilteo, where the ferry goes out to the town of Clinton.


This is the shorter of the two bridges, the one that goes from the mainland to the small island. The photo has one of our Old Coots Club walking back from the bridge where he went to take a photo. The traffic was very heavy on this day. With beautiful weather on a Saturday, lots of people were out and about both in autos and boats.


We finished the day off with a dinner together at Grazie, an Italian restaurant in the north Bothell area, between Mt. Vernon and Seattle. We prevailed on our waiter to take this photo with my small Sony camera and he did a nice job of it. Pat went along to lunch and dinner, but stayed home puttering in the garden rather than going along on our tour. I drove the Smart Car on the Coots Tour and three of them got a ride in it but since Pat doesn't want to ride in it on the freeway, we took our big car to Bothell, the VW New Beetle.

Our group does a pretty good job of staying in contact via email. I think we are finding that it is good to stay in contact with old friends as we grow older. We are all retired now so have more time to travel. One of us comes all the way from New York, two from California, three from the Seattle area, one from Vancouver, WA and three are in the Spokane area although one of them is a full time RVer so does move around. They will all have to change my email address after this next Saturday as we are changing our ISP. But they will figure that out.

Labels: Friends, Landscapes, Pat and I, Photos, Reminiscing

We keep thinking that we are going to slow down but that doesn't seem to happen. I was lucky enough to win two tickets to a show that we attended last Friday night at our local Skagit Valley Casino called "Ricky Nelson Remembered." It featured his twin sons, Gunnar and Matthew Nelson who have had more than one top ten hits on their own but in this show they were mostly playing the music of their Dad, a singer that I have very fond memories of both as a singer and for his role of a kid in his parent's TV show, "The Ozzie and Harriet Show." Ozzie was a band leader, Harriet was a singer in the band, and they also had at least one number one song during their performing years, so these sons represent the third consecutive generation in the Nelson family to have number one hits. I was lucky enough to win these tickets on our local oldies radio station, KBRC but I'd have gladly paid to attend. It was good.


This is the slide that was displayed on the large screen on the stage when we entered the Pacific Showroom at the Skagit. The show used this screen to display various slides and video clips during the show of various things in Ricky's life.


Gunnar at the left side, Matthew at the right, with an image of their father Ricky displayed behind them on that large screen. Gunnar originally was a drummer, as was Ricky, but he has since taken up the guitar which he played that night.


For at least this show the Nelsons (the name of their own band) performed with a group known as the Stone Canyon Band, the name of Ricky's band. Here they are with, from left to right, the lead guitar player, the drummer at the rear of the stage, Gunnar, Matthew and at the far right, the keyboardist. I am sorry that I don't have the names of the band members.


Gunnar playing and singing, with his eyes closed just as Ricky often did. The boys don't sound exactly as Ricky did but it is pretty close.


Matthew playing and singing. I think this is a bass guitar.


At the left is the lead guitarist, who has been with the Nelsons for a long time. Next is Gunnar and Matthew at the right. You can just see the drummer above the cymbal at the rear of the stage.


I liked it when the two boys sung together but they didn't stay in this position very long. They did this maybe half a dozen times but I think I only got two good photos. Here is one of them.


And here is the other one.


It was a bit of a challenge to get the skin tones close to correct. They used a lot of both red and blue lights onstage and neither of those light colors leads to good skin color, as far as I am concerned. The corrections are not perfect but they look better than they did uncorrected. Anyway, here is a last photo from near the end of the show of the two boys together. It was a show that I'd go to see again.


Here is a photo of the main part of the Skagit Valley Casino that I took as I was getting into our car. The multi-story hotel part is out of the photo at the left. This is a pretty big complex and quite striking, looking like a large castle. The freeway exit from I-5 that is closest to our house is #226 and this casino is just off the I-5 at exit 236 so I guess it is about 12 miles from our house. We are not late night people and my free tickets were to the second show that didn't start until 21:30 and we didn't get home until after midnight. But it was good and exciting enough that there was no problem staying awake. Here is another show that if you have the chance to see, especially if you are old enough like us to remember Ricky Nelson, Do It!

Labels: Entertainment, Photos, Reminiscing

Last Sunday Pat and I drove south to Auburn to attend a birthday party to celebrate the 12th birthday of my oldest granddaughter, K. I can't believe that she is almost a teenager already. She was born while my older son was on his first deployment in his Navy career so she was about three and a half months old when he first was able to hold her. The Navy lets those sailors who's wives have delivered babies while they were deployed be the first off the ship, and B was about the second of the bunch of a dozen or so.

K is now 12 and I guess that makes her kind of still a kid but not yet quite a teenager (I know teenagers all think they are adults but we know better.) I have no idea what a girl of that age wants in the way of birthday presents so I took the easy way out and got her a gift certificate for a store where I know she likes to shop. She did get quite a few gifts and I think mine was the only gift certificate, but much of the rest of the family lives closer so were able to know more about what she would want. I did take a few photos-


Here's the birthday girl looking through a bag with a number of gifts inside. Yep, she is still enjoying this opening gifts thing.


This is the card from Pat and I. It is a funny one. She is still young enough that funny birthday cards work, but she is young enough that they are not "aren't you getting old" themed. It was fun picking it out.


She sat across the table from Pat and I for awhile and I got what I think is a pretty cute photo of her snuggled against the shoulder of her other Grandpa. When she was a small baby until when Annie & I moved to Mount Vernon, K would spend most Saturday nights with us and go to sleep on my lap in my recliner chair. She was so cute and sweet then. She is still cute and sweet, but not small enough to go to sleep sitting on Grandpa's lap in a recliner. One more year and she will be a teenager.

I guess wonderful memories like that is a part of the fun side of growing older.

Labels: Birthdays, Family, Grandkids, Photos, Reminiscing

50 years ago I was 15 years old and a fan of the new "Rock 'N Roll" music. One of my favorites was Buddy Holly, a guy only seven years older than me but already becoming famous in the music world, or at least in my music world. There isn't much about death that comes home to roost when you are 15, but that day one of those rare things happened. Very early that morning Buddy Holly, along with two other budding Rock 'N Rollers, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper, along with the 21 year old pilot of their chartered airplane, were killed when that plane crashed in an Iowa corn field just after takeoff. A few years later singer Don McLean released a song called, "American Pie," in which he came up with the phrase, "the day the music died." This was in reference to that plane crash and the deaths of these three early Rock 'N Rollers.

Much has been written over the years about these deaths and the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa where the last performance of these three occurred the evening of February 2nd. There was a large get together with some famous people last night to remember these three. I've done some looking online today and one of the nicest remembrances that I've found is in the Des Moines Register newspaper. It is a video that has been setup to play online and takes about 8 minutes and then there is a lot of other material there on their site to view, if interested. As long as you have a broad band connection, go check this video. It is great.

Labels: Entertainment, Events, Reminiscing

On Wednesday, after my blog post Tue about ordering my RC airplane, I got an email from an old friend (I can say that since he is a few months older than me and we've known each other since about 1957) with the subject line, "I KNEW IT." Gary R and I used to do a lot of things together: archery weekly at the local field archery club and at least once out in the desert where we could chase the arrows as far as they would go, water ski in the summer, talk about cars and girl friends, and more. Over the years we have come to know each other very well. Here is the bulk of his note:

"Hi, there, John Richard,

You know, many things in life change---but some do not. I was just on your "blog," and I KNEW as soon as I read your last week's entry with the photos that the guy took of your neighborhood with his Radio Controlled plane that it was only going to be a matter of time until you decided that you HAD to have one of these gadgets. When I did not see any other blog entries from you, I knew as sure as the sun rises in the east that you were on a "mission" to identify and purchase what you needed to get started in that new activity.

I was laughing to myself as I read your account of the process you went through: head to the nearest hobby store; talk to store owners; BUY all the magazines you can get your hands on that describe how to get started and what to start with. The only difference between 1959 and now is that you were able to find simulation software to allow you to learn without crashing and burning..... Can you imagine what it would have been like back in 59-60 if we had been able to "test drive" new race-ready Porsches, Cobra 429s, and the like simply by pooling our money and buying a simulator?

Of course, we probably would have also tried to find (or find someone to program)
simulators for: a "date" with Annette; sky diving; bow hunting for Alaskan Kodiak
bears; and, of course----a simulator for C***** so he could "learn to drive" without
going out into the neighborhood killing trees with his parents' new Chevy."

I guess there is a lot of truth to the idea than you really can't fool people all of the time. To those who know you well, we are all pretty transparent.

I am having fun with the simulator and looking forward to later this week when my airplane should arrive at the hobby shop. Now if I can figure out a place to store it where it will be safe from the cats.

Labels: Flying, Friends, Radio Controlled Airplanes, Reminiscing

I don't know where the time has gone. I don't think it has ever before been two weeks between my getting at least a text only post made here. Until now. We have been busy, seem to be on the go most of the time. I have gotten involved again with my genealogy project for which I have moved my data from the old DOS program Roots III I used in the past, to Roots Magic which is a Windows program. Of course everything didn't transfer cleanly so I am spending many hours trying to straighten out the source records. I'm making progress but it sometimes seems to be awfully slow.

Anyway we really have been doing a few things. On Father's Day we drove out to Sedro Woolley (how is that for a town name- spell check burped at both of them) to attend a car show at United General Hospital there in town. It was pretty good, 40-some cars in attendance on a day when the weather was kind of iffy. Today we went to an even larger car show in the neighbor town of Burlington, part of their Berry Dairy Days celebration. I took some photos at both shows and have a couple to post here.


Here is a classic hotrod, a Ford Model T roadster pickup. I would love to have one of these things and when I noticed Pat standing there by it, looking into her purse (see the left side of the photo) I thought maybe she was checking her cash to see if she had enough along to buy it for me. No such luck! But it is a nice car.


I am partial to these cars as my first car was a 1938 Chevy 2-door sedan, much like this 1939 model. Mine was even painted about this color. My parents had the car from 1940 on and whenever they would get another car I managed to talk them into saving this one for me when I was old enough to drive (legally.)


Here is my car shown in a snapshot of it taken in front of a friend's house, probably over Thanksgiving weekend in 1961. We had just the month before finished installing the Oldsmobile V-8 engine that I had rebuilt over the past year into the car and got it running again. It was a fun car to drive, with it's big engine, rolled & pleated Naugahyde upholstery, etc. But it only got 12 miles to a gallon of ethel gas which at that time usually cost about 35.9 cents per gallon. I commuted about 40 miles a day to and from college in the nearby town of Cheney so I did use a bit of fuel. Happily, it wasn't nearly $5 per gallon like it is now!

School is out now in our area so there are no more school buses to delay traffic- we live almost next door to two schools. The weather is finally starting to be more like it should be for this time of the year so we feel like doing more outside. I think we are even going to take the motorhome out for a trip in a week or so, just a few days to a fairly close destination, but it will be an outing. I really do enjoy those trips even if they are short. And I'll try to do a better job at getting things posted here.

Labels: Cars, Events, Photos, Reminiscing

My little house in Little Mountain Estates is looking different again because something has been added to the "For Sale" sign in the front yard. It is a "Sold" sign.


While we were in Spokane things finalized on the house my buyer's are selling and they wanted a couple of things signed by me. They faxed over an acceptance of the inspection report that calls for replacing a small amount of the siding at the rear of the house. We have gotten a bid on that for about $250 plus tax and it has now almost been finished. The other thing was that they would like to take possession of the house on Aug. 1st, although the sale won't close until the 10th when they get the money from the closing of the house they are selling. They also asked to be able to get into it this weekend to start painting, especially on the outside, as the weather report here is favorable for the next week or longer. I signed and faxed them back.

We decided that we should be here to see things through on this sale, plus the forecast in Spokane called for temps that could be as high as 100F starting today. As I have said earlier, Pat doesn't like hot weather and three digit readings are definitely HOT. So, we got up early yesterday, left the campground at 08:00, bought $115.75 worth of gasoline to replace what we burned driving over and were on the road by 08:20 for home. We stopped in Ellensburg about 11:30 for lunch, then turned north to cross Blewett Pass on US 97, heading for US 2. We stopped in Leavenworth at Prey's Fruit Stand for fresh apricots & peaches, then headed west over Stevens Pass. We found quite a bit of construction causing two long delays, so we wouldn't have arrived at I-5 in Everett until about 16:30 and that is rush hour. So, we turned north on SR 9 and came home the back way, arriving here at 17:07. We unloaded a few things then went out for dinner and crashed in our recliners when we got home.

This morning I got the rig unloaded, then took it to Safeway to fill the gas tank before parking it. This time it took more gas as we drove farther and crossed two mountain passes, both higher than Snoqualmie that we crossed while going over there, but we got it for $2.719/gallon so I only spent $116.50. I brought it home and washed it, then parked it in it's storage lot. I did figure our mileage and from the time we filled it just after buying it to the end of this trip, a distance of 808 miles, it averaged almost exactly 8 miles per gallon. That is not too bad of mileage for moving a house.

Speaking of houses, here is another photo of mine with the Sold sign:

I will miss this house and it sure holds a lot of good memories for me. But I live only about two blocks away and have some very good friends living next door to my "old" place so am sure I will be still seeing quite a bit of it.

This sale about closes a major book in my life and Pat & I can get on with building our book of life. We have some plans for this house we live in, like adding a sun room on the SW side, fencing & landscaping changes in the back yard, etc. There may even be a trip to Hawaii this winter. For us, not the house. If I can convince Pat there is no other way to get there except by airplane. That genie hasn't built the bridge yet to drive over there.

Labels: House, Pat and I, Photos, Reminiscing, RVing

A year ago today I made my first post to this blog and am now doing the first of my second year. It has been a year with a lot of changes for me. The first full year without my Annie. I learned RVing alone isn't as much fun as it was with the two of us. I also finally got to the point in moving through the greiving process where I could start giving away Annie's clothes and some of her other posessions. This is a necessary step in moving on in my life, although it has been a hard one to do. Our two grand daughters are getting some of her favorite stuffed bears this Christmas. I know she would like them to have those bears.

Family and friends have been wonderful. Getting reaquainted with my high school friend, SW, has been great and I think helpful for both of us. She has had a rough year too but I think our friendship has helped us both through some of those hard times. The summer reunion time with the "old gang" in Spokane was fun and I look forward to seeing them again, perhaps next summer. Buying the Miata and getting started again into car club activities has been good, but I need to stop getting those pesky speeding tickets!

Without a doubt the biggest and best thing that happened with me was meeting my Pat on Oct. 22nd. We have been together part of each day since then and I think that is the way I want it to be for the rest of my life, except being together even more of the day. Pat and I each experienced what I feel is one of the two worst life experiences a person can go through and both wondered if we would ever find anyone else to spend the rest of our lives with. I think we have and we feel it was with some help from on high, like maybe Annie and Sherm were leading us to meet each other. I am really looking forward to 2007 and what it may bring in my life.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all who read this!

Labels: Annie, Pat and I, Reminiscing

I have returned to a class I started last year that is offered through the local YMCA, called "Memories to Memoirs." Tomorrow is the second class this session and our assignment is to write something the teacher has called, "What's My Voice," where we write something about a favorite song, with it's lyrics. I have the assignment ready to turn in but decided I'd try to put it here as a blog post. I don't know how this is going to work as the original is on an 8 1/2 X 11 page, too. There is a B&W photo embeded in the original that I am sure I can not put in the same position here that it is on the assignment page, but I'll see what I can do with it. No, the photo is not in the same position but here we go:

Memories to Memoirs – 25 Sep 2006
What’s My Voice…
Dick Phillips


“Jeremiah was a bull frog.” It’s hard to come up with a single favorite song as there are so many that have special meanings to me over the years, but I think that one of the top ones would be “Joy to the World” by Three Dog Night. It was a number one song for six weeks in 1971 and it brings back some wonderful memories.

This was in our BK era, Before Kids. We were young, had comfortable incomes, and occasionally liked to party. I was the President of the Vashon Island Jaycees, Annie was an active member of the Jaycee Wives Club. Every summer the Vashon Jaycees raised money and put on the Island Festival. One of the fixtures of the Festival was the Beach Party that we threw for ourselves and Jaycees from around the area. It was a true beach party in the early years but by 1971 we had to leave the County Park where we had been holding it, due to the many beer kegs we went through during the night. In 1971 we moved it to a private park in the interior of the Island, so there were no legal problems with our favorite beverage.

The dinner menu was clams, salmon, corn on the cob, coleslaw, garlic bread, ice cream and some times other things, along of course with the beer. We also had live music to dance to. The party started about 5 in the afternoon for dinner and talking and tended to go almost until sunrise. Sometimes we did make it to sunrise. Our favorite band was led by Skip who was a Jaycee in our chapter and they would continue to play as long as anyone wanted them to continue. Their music was pretty good for a local band.

I still remember dancing with my Annie to Joy to the World. Skip & the band could make that song last ten minutes or longer. It was fantastic in the warm night of summer, dancing on the lawn in the light from a bonfire with the one I loved. I suppose the beer didn’t hurt the mood, either. There were other songs that were great from that era but this one I especially remember and love, probably partially because Annie also loved it so. Good vibes, even thirty-five years later.


Ann and I at Crystal Mountain Ski Resort in Washington State, photo in 1969.

Here are the lyrics:

JOY TO THE WORLD
- written by Hoyt Axton
- lyrics as recorded by Three Dog Night (#1 for 6 weeks in 1971)

Jeremiah was a bullfrog
Was a good friend of mine
I never understood a single word he said
But I helped him a-drink his wine
And he always had some mighty fine wine
Singin'...

Joy to the world
All the boys and girls now
Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea
Joy to you and me

If I were the king of the world
Tell you what I'd do
I'd throw away the cars and the bars and the war
Make sweet love to you
Sing it now...

Joy to the world
All the boys and girls
Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea
Joy to you and me

------ electric piano ------

You know I love the ladies
Love to have my fun
I'm a high life flyer and a rainbow rider
A straight shootin' son-of-a-gun
I said a straight shootin' son-of-a-gun

Joy to the world
All the boys and girls
Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea
Joy to you and me

Joy to the world
All the boys and girls
Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea
Joy to you and me

Joy to the world
All the boys and girls
Joy to the world
Joy to you and me

Joy to the world
All the boys and girls now
Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea
Joy to you and me

Joy to the world
All the boys and girls
Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea
Joy to you and me

I wanna tell you
Joy to the world
All the boys and girls
Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea
Joy to you and me

Joy to the world
All the boys and girls
Joy to the fishes in the deep blue sea
Joy to you and me

(fading)
Joy to the world
All the boys and girls

Labels: Annie, Photos, Reminiscing

Today's post by Rain is about daydreams. I think we all do some of that and she talks in a way that is easy to understand about the difference between daydreams and dreams that occur as we sleep. I like her thoughts on the subject. One that I do occasionally is to buy a single lottery ticket. I'll buy it when the winnings get fairly high and figure it is worth the $1 to dream a little for a couple of days. All I ever seem to get are the, "Sorry, not a winner" type but it is fun never the less and I feel I can afford an occasional dollar for that fun.

But there are other daydreams I have. One is that perhaps there is another lady who I could spend the rest of my live loving and living with. I will never forget my Annie but I really do want to try to get the magic we had back into my life. Maybe it is just a daydream, but someone does win those lotto prizes rather than just getting "Sorry, not a winner" and maybe it will eventually be me. I think you have a better chance of winning if you buy a ticket.

Recently I connected with a lady who I attended school with. Our high school had over 600 graduating seniors so the chances of really knowing someone there was not real good but I do remember her. I found her on Classmates.com and we have exchanged email and a few phone calls since then. It turns out that we also went to the same grade school for a year or so but I am pretty sure we were not in the same classroom there as I don't remember her from that time. We did go to the same college where she finished & became a teacher but I transfered from after two years.

Anyway, in the spirit of having a better chance of winning if I buy a ticket, I have a motel reservation in her town for tomorrow night and will drive there tomorrow to meet & spend some time together. Will S.W. be the one I am looking for? I dunno, but if I don't try to reach for the gold ring I know I'll never get it.

Here is a quote from Rain's post of today and I think she is right on:

"Are we ever too old to dream? I think as we age, we may have to adjust the dreams for what is physically possible; but there can, and I believe, should be dreams at any age. To follow a dream sometimes does have risk attached. Some would say forgetting your dreams will make you happier, but for me, I will hold onto mine and take my chance to make them real if the chance comes."

I hope I am not like Don Quixote, tilting at windmills. More later.

Labels: Reminiscing

While on my recent RV trip to the Spokane, WA area, a group of friends who attended Lewis & Clark High School together until we graduated in June, 1961, got together to reminise in Spokane. One came from New York where he is a chemistry prof at a university there. Another works for the State of California in Sacramento in the education field. One is a public school teacher who retired a few years ago but still teaches about 60 days a year to finance his travels. One works for the City of Spokane. Four of us are retired. I have known some of them since we started Kindergarten together and the others since 1955 when one of them moved into a new house two houses away from where I lived. Three of them I have stayed in pretty close contact with over the years, the other four have just been occasionally when our schedules happened to put us together at the same time.

We spent Saturday going around looking at the houses we lived in at the time, or at least those that were still there. We also visited our high school but since it was the weekend we couldn't get inside the building. The current Lewis & Clark HS building was built in 1912 after the previous building was destroyed in a fire. My Mother graduated from there in 1931. Her favorite history teacher was the principal when I was there from 1957 - 1961. The building is a historical thing so when it was to be replaced, the basic shell was kept with much of the interior rebuilt. It has a second "cornerstone" that says it was "Rededicated in 2002." This building is almost in downtown Spokane. Here is a photo of a part of it that gives an idea what it looks like:


This photo shows the group (less me as I took the photo) standing on 4th Ave. in front of the school:


My parents were married in 1938 and bought this house in 1940. It is the only home I knew while growing up. It was in the family until the death of my Mother in 2000 when it was sold to a young lady who grew up across the street & had always loved it. Her Mother still lives in the house across the street:


I have already posted the photos from our dinner at the Hot Rod Cafe in Post Falls, Idaho. We gathered a few more times at different places. I had wanted to stay a couple more days to go to Newman Lake with this group on Sunday, July 29th, but the campground had reservations coming in right after me so I couldn't get those extra days. I checked out of Yogi Bear Campground about 09:00 that morning and drove home that day, but I took some photos of my Sea Breeze RV in it's space there before leaving. This photo was taken about 08:30 before I moved out of that space.


This was a wonderful get together and we hope to do it again on a fairly regular basis. As I have said before in my blog, I think friends & family are a great thing to have and cultivate, especially as we grow older. This group was pretty close during high school, then drifted apart after HS with some of us going to different colleges and a couple into the military. Now most are retired & all probably will be within two or three years, so we want to stay in contact & not let so many years go by before we gather again. In five years we will have our 50th reunion. I know I'll see most of these guys before then.

Labels: Friends, Photos, Reminiscing, Trips to see things

I'll start this with a photo taken inside the Lincoln Heights Starbucks store that we visit while at my brother's house in Spokane. This is a large store and on these hot days it really feels good inside with their air conditioning. There are a lot of windows off to the right of this area, in the front of the store, that face south:


On Thursday we went back to Cheney (the town) to visit my old college, now known as Eastern Washington University. It has been around since 1882 in it's various forms, mostly related to training school teachers. Annie graduated from the western Washington equivalent on our side of the mountains in Bellingham. The school is much larger now, with more than three times the number of students that were there when I was from 1961 to 1963. It also has a lot of new buildings & some that were there with me are now gone.

Two of those that are gone were what we called the cardboard dorms. They were never intended to be permanent and the grass field around them became a sea of mud when it rained. The area where they were is now a beautiful lawn with trees, fountains, brick walkways & circles and ampitheaters. This photo was taken from one of those walkways with a fountain, a circle & a sign with the school name:


One of the earliest buildings that is still in use is Showalter Hall. It has a large lawn in front that is well shaded by trees & was a favorite place to go to study when I was there. I guess that newer central planting area is more centrally located as Showalter is at an edge of the campus but it is still as beautiful as it ever was. Here is a part of the lawn with the building in the background:


Here is the front door of the building in a closer view. It is pretty typical of buildings constructed in the early 1900s:


As I said this school has a background of training teachers. This little building is an orginal one-room school house that has been turned into a museum:


This view includes the same fountain that is in the first photo but it was taken looking in the opposite direction. The building in the background is the John F Kennedy Library, which has been built since I attended school there:


The central green space area is quite large, as shown in this photo of just a part of it:


When I was there the student union building was known as the SUB & had the bookstore located in one end of the building. The student union building is now known as the PUB. I don't think they sell beer or wine there, even though it is called a pub, but they do have at least two mocha outlets. Showalter Hall & probably other buildings have their own mocha outlets. This photo shows a part of the bookstore, that I think is about as large as the whole SUB used to be:


There are two of these buildings that are co-ed dorms. When I was there & we were out on the ROTC drill field, they were starting construction on the first of these, with pile drivers putting pilings down. My older son attended school here one year in 1993-94 & he lived in this dorm, called Pierce Hall. They are about a dozen stories tall & offer a nice view of the surrounding countryside:


My brother is planning to return to school here this fall to take some classes just for the fun of it. I live too far away to do that but it does sound like a good thing to do. I think I may take another class or two this fall at my local college.

Labels: Photos, Reminiscing, Trips to see things

I left the campus at the University of Idaho, Moscow, Sunday about 11, stopped to fill the RV gas tank (42 gal at $2.969/gal) then drove to Spokane arriving at Yogi Bear Campground west of town about 12:40. I checked in & was assigned to space R-13, a pull through spot with full hookups including cable TV & hot phones, so I have a telephone in the RV plus expanded basic cable TV! I tried calling my brother on the cell phone but it wasn't working right. So, I called him on the RV phone & we agreed to meet for lunch at Arby's in town.

I called Verizon Wireless about my phone problem. The tech person was very helpful but we came to the conclusion that my phone had a major problem. It connects to their system, every thing looks normal, I can place calls that go through (or receive them) but I cannot hear the person nor can they hear me. The good news is I have had the phone about two years so could go to a Verizon store on Monday & replace it with much of the cost covered.

I spent the rest of the day with L & had dinner with he & S when she got home from her bike ride. On Monday I met him at his house & we started out for a Verizon store but with a much needed stop at a do-it-yourself car wash to clean the dirt from towing my car from home to Moscow, then up here. I got a new LG phone & they transfered my old phone number to it along with my phone book so I didn't even have to enter those.

Boy, those phones have changed in just two years! This one has a higher quality camera, will take a memory card, has GPS built-in that, if I subscribe to the service, will allow me to enter a location I want to go to and it will give me directions both verbally & on the screen. It will do music & I guess I can even get TV shows & movies if I want to pay for & watch them on that mini-screen. I don't have those extras but did add a Bluetooth device so I can wear it on my ear and talk & control the phone within about 30' of it via the Bluetooth thing. Now I have to learn to use it.

After the phone L & I went out to visit our aunt & uncle who live fairly close to the phone store. They are both in their 90s & doing pretty well. She is our Mother's sister. I had dinner again with L & S, then back home to feed Huggy her special dinner & spend the rest of the evening at home.

Tuesday L came out here & we drove on to Cheney, about 6 miles away. Cheney is the home of Eastern Wash. State Univ. where both L & I attended school in the 1960s. It sure has changed over the years & is close to three times as large as when I was there. L is planning on taking classes there this fall, just for fun. We were able to buy our mochas for the day at the student union building & ate lunch there. I shopped at Safeway for a couple of things I needed, then came home. L headed for town while I spent the rest of the evening here. I got a phone call that evening from A, a friend I went all the way through grade & high school with. I'll see him Sat at the Grant Elementary School reunion potluck at a park near the school.

Yesterday L & I went to Costco where I managed to escape without spending money! Well, we did have lunch there, their Polish dog & pop combo for $1.50 plus tax & I filled the gas tank of the Saturn for $2.949/gal. Back to L's house to leave the food, then off to Hasting's Books. I like that store but I can't get out of there without spending money. But, all but one (I bought seven) were from their discounted books section and three are early Christmas present purchases. Dinner was again at L & S's, then I came home to take care of Huggy & read.

The weather has been warm although not as hot (yet) as in much of the country. But the TV news this morning is saying they expect to break record highs over the next few days, with temps over 100 on Sat & Sun. My biggest concern is that while I leave the AC on in the RV to keep Huggy comfortable while I am away, if anything goes wrong with that system or power source, the RV is closed up & it would get very hot inside with no ventilation. By the first of the week it is supposed to cool down to the mid-90s. The humidity will be low so it won't be as bad as in some parts of the country where the temp & humidity have both approached the 100 mark.

Enough for now. It is time to get ready to go back to Cheney, this time with my camera, to get some photos of the campus. I'll probably post some of them later. The park here has a good miniature golf course & maybe I can talk L into trying it with me later.

Labels: Reminiscing, RVing, Trips to see things