Visiting the Ellen Trout Zoo

We went back to the Ellen Trout Zoo today, this time taking Ed and Julie along too. It's a nice sized little zoo, with lots of greenery and shade, and many nice habitats.

We saw lots of peacocks displaying for the peahens and making a racket. We watched a male displaying at very short range. His display included making a clicking sound with his plumes as they were spread out.

Sam and Jesse both liked the tapir, as did I. Very odd looking face. Cate liked the tiger. We all enjoyed the giraffes.

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Big Hero 6

We finally got the bikes down today and headed out for a ride in the neighborhood. Of course when we passed a garage sale, we had to stop. It turned out to be an estate sale. We looked at a lot of things, but we successfully resisted collecting stuff we don't really need. We ended up buying only a roll of masking tape.

It's fortunate that we got out on the bikes this morning, because the weather deteriorated later. It's been raining on and off, with occasional thunder.

This evening we joined Ed and Julie and the kids at St. Patrick School for a showing of Big Hero 6. It was a fundraiser for the middle school field trip to San Antonio, which Cate will be part of. She helped set up and run the concession stand.

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Cate Turns Eleven!

It was eleven years ago today that I flew to Dallas and was picked up by Blake's mom, Jan McBride, and rushed to a certain labor and delivery room where Catherine Elizabeth Shaffer was about to enter the world. Her first moments were among the most thoroughly documented events in world history. Her proud father was getting everything down on video. It was an exciting day.

Fast forward eleven years, and today is another exciting one, because we're celebrating Cate's eleventh birthday.

Cate's birthday dinner was at the Cafe del Rio, a popular Tex-Mex restaurant.

Earlier today we decided to explore Lufkin's Azalea Trail. It's a 1.9 mile path that winds along a creek and through the forest from the Kiwanis Park to the Grace Dunne Richardson Park. It is asphalt all the way and an easy trail, except for one dip under the highway. That's not a problem for us on foot, but might be on our bikes.

Most of the spring azaleas are past blooming, but a few still grace the path.

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Sunday

We went over to visit again after our brunch and walk. Ed rescreened a screen door, with Ken's help. Adzi had torn the top completely up trying to get in the house. Ed added a complete layer of heavy metal mesh on the outside of the screen: guaranteed to stop Adzi (we hope).

Ed and Cate and Ken and I played a game of Ticket to Ride, the deluxe anniversary edition we gave him for his birthday. It has little tins to hold the trains, which are much more detailed than in the basic version. It also incorporates some of the 1910 version trips and rules. Ed beat us all by quite a bit (he had both longest train and globetrotter). I was a distant fourth.

Jesse was very proud of the array of planets hanging from the ceiling over his top bunk. He is very enthusiastic about astronomy and space exploration, so of course he knows the names of all the planets. He's a traditionalist--still including Pluto.

Cate will be going to Dallas in May to compete in the Private School Interscholastic competition in the spelling bee.

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Lufkin Visiting

We made it from Austin to Lufkin yesterday and set up in the field behind the VFW hall. This time we even got 50 amp electricity (always good if we plan to run two air conditioners at once, or a microwave and air conditioner). Post commander Al Navarro came out to make sure we had everything we needed. He and a couple of helpers figured out how to turn on the main water valve for our row of hookups.

Today we went over to Ed and Julie's house. Both of them were out working, so we got to spend some quality time with Cate and Sam and Jesse. They hugged us and took us on a tour of the house, eager to show us their rooms and the rest of the house.

Sam was very excited to tell us all about the juggling/comedy show they attended last night.

Sam watching a screen

Sweet Jesse!

Cate reading

When Julie came home, we left to spend the afternoon resting and recuperating, especially me. Ken is  much better. We went over to visit after dinner again. They presented us with our belated Christmas presents,  a shiny red Starbucks stainless steel straw cup and for me some cute slipper socks, [photos later] Read more!

Visiting Loretta

I started out this morning driving to a Target parking lot to leave the truck. Loretta picked me up (that big gold truck is easy to spot), and she drove to the Texas Rowing Center on Lady Bird Lake. She kayaks weekly with the 60+ Keeping it Fun group. John usually comes along, but this time he decided to give Loretta and me plenty of time to talk.

We kayaked for almost two hours with a really friendly and helpful group. It's been a while since the last time I kayaked any distance, so I was very glad of the support.

After the kayaking, we went back to the car to get our picnic lunches.

Afterward we had a leisurely stroll on the trail around the lake. Occasionally mountain bikers whizzed by, but we managed to dodge them. When we finished the hike, MapMyHike said that we had hiked 4.11 miles in an hour and a half. We needed to get started on the drive back to the Target and to home before the worst of the rush hour traffic, so we reluctantly walked back to the car.

I went into the Target to get some applesauce and chicken soup for Ken. Although he is better, he's definitely not well. By the time I got home, I wasn't feeling very good myself. Maybe Ken's ailment isn't food poisoning, but instead something communicable. Thanks, Ken! Pretty soon I was feeling quite wretched. Read more!

On to McKinney Falls

We had an uneventful trip to Austin and arrived at McKinney Falls around 12:30 p.m. Check-in time is 2:00 p.m., but they will let you in early if space is available. We're in site #9, a really nice long pull thru.

Along the way we saw banks of Texas bluebonnets, including some gorgeous ones in the park, and lots of yellow and orange wildflowers. It's been very warm and sunny, but we're expecting rain and clouds later in the week.

Tomorrow I've made plans to join Loretta in her weekly kayak paddle and a picnic lunch and hike around Town Lake. I'm looking forward to all of that, but especially seeing Loretta.

Unfortunately, Ken has been ill today, probably with food poisoning from some bad grapefruit. He's feeling much better tonight, but still tired and not quite up to snuff. We're hoping he'll feel better by morning. Read more!

On the Road Again!

We hitched up this morning to begin our journey north. As we waved goodbye to the Rio Grande Valley, our home for the last four and a half months. As usual, we feel a bit rusty at the towing and traveling skills but excited to be on the road again. As we head out from any stay, we play Willie Nelson's On the Road Again and remember the call of the open road.

Along the way today we saw lots of wildflowers, fields full of yellow and orange and magenta. Then we finally saw some beautiful expanses of Texas bluebonnets, always a spectacular sight.

Tonight we're at the Walmart parking lot in Pleasanton, TX, where we stayed last spring. Tomorrow we'll head north to Austin where we have reservations at McKinney Falls State Park. Read more!

Exciting Show

While we were out on our walk around the park today, we spotted this disaster. The owner had tried to back across a grassy area to get to a 220v plug in order to do some welding at the rear of the coach. Big mistake! The driver side rear wheels were sunk up to the hubcaps, and the side panels were resting on the ground.



After a bit, a huge tow truck arrived. We could hardly believe that these people would be able to extricate the motor home without doing major damage. However, they did it! These folks are professionals. They used a wide fabric band and some chains in addition to the tow cable. We and the rest of the audience were warned to stay back in case the cable snapped.

It didn't, and the coach rose smoothly and quickly from the hole it had fallen into. The coach wheel had broken through the soil overlying a septic tank.

The show was over. It looked like the only damage was to a side panel access door behind the wheels, though there may be more damage to the undercarriage. We didn't stick around.

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Last Dance

Today was our last dance of the season: Darryl Lipscomb's C-2 dance. We had five squares plus three spare couples. Many people have already left the RGV, and more of us will be leaving shortly. Jan and Steve were there, so we got to see them for one last time. Steve has a severe sinus infection, but he didn't want to let it get him down. Get well soon, Steve!

We enjoyed dancing with everyone. Darryl played around with some once-removed calls, but mostly called a smooth dance for our last chance dance!

We spotted this flag while we were out walking earlier today. It reminded us of our friends, Tom and Nanci, only both of them are cat lovers--no "normal" people in their house.

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The New, Improved Ken and Lee's RV Adventures

After having maintained a very nearly daily blog for the last seven years, I've decided to try a new approach. From now on, Ken and Lee's RV Adventures will feature occasional posts, mainly when something of special interest has occurred in our traveling lives. I (Lee) will continue to write the blog posts, and Ken will continue to provide photos to enliven the accounts.

I'll post at least briefly whenever we are on the move, so that friends and family will know where in the world we are. A visit to a national park will definitely rate a post or several, but spotting an interesting bird might rate a post too.

Anyhow, we did move yesterday, after spending several days preparing, wrapping up our tasks at Green Gate Grove. We had been settled there since November 19, over four months, so our hitching up and moving skills had gotten a bit rusty, as usual. We used our checklists, but I still overlooked an item, which Ken caught. He reminded me that that's why there are two of us!

We had a problem with our rooftop satellite dish. It refused to stow itself, and we had to call Winegard tech support, but the fix was relatively easy. The tech support person walked us through some menu items on the control box to recalibrate the dish, and voila! all was well. We stopped at Bert Ogden to get our annual refrigerator maintenance done and have the RV safety inspected. Then we went to Costco and headed north--but not too far. We're in Edcouch for a week.

Last night we went to our final McAllen Community Concert. The program was titled "Simply Sinatra," and the vocalist provided some enjoyable renditions of hits recorded by Sinatra and some of his contemporaries. The backup band played big band sounds to complete the illusion of being transported back to the 50s and 60s.


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Behind

Yikes! I've gotten behind on my blog posts. We've been really busy, but I promise to catch up tomorrow. Read more!

Call the Midwife!

The new season of Call the Midwife started this evening. It was a real treat to sit down with a cup of tea to watch it.

Today is our friend Nanci's birthday, so we were thinking of her today. We hope it was a good one, Nanci!

We had a very busy day working on preparations for our move tomorrow. We did some laundry and cleaned the rig inside. Ken pounded in fertilizer stakes around all the trees. It was easy to do this spring because the ground is soft from the rain. He also greased the axle and hitch zerk fittings (a very messy job). He checked all the tire pressures and put air in two of the truck tires. We draped all the furniture in the Texas room, set out containers of water to maintain some humidity over the summer, sealed all the drains, and set off bug bombs. We moved some items from the shed to the cargo bay and reorganized the cargo for travel.

We need to make a checklist for closing up the place--and start earlier in the week next year. It's too much to do in one day.

We got in only a half hour bike ride around Green Gate Grove as it was beginning to get dark. Read more!

Friends

We biked 13.5 miles today at the state park. A lot of families were around, and a Segway tour was at the Nature Center when we passed.

This evening we went over to Jan and Steve's to play cards. Jean and John and Sandy were there too. We played "Play Nine" which Jean won. We had some veggies and cheese and crackers, but the real hit was the Moo-llennium Crunch Blue Bell Ice Cream that John and Sandy brought over, with chocolate topping. Yummy, but Ken says it's not quite as good as he remembers it. Maybe it used to have more crunch??? Read more!

Another Quiet Day

We biked around the state park again, racking up a little over twelve miles. We are both trying out some padded biking underwear we ordered from Amazon. Tomorrow I'm going to wear my biking shorts that I've had for years. The advantage of the padded underwear is that it's lightweight, so it can be washed out at night and be dry by the next morning, so we'll see.

We had warm clear weather for our ride, but this afternoon a cold front blew in, and we had some rain. The temperature dropped 15 degrees, but then started to rise again. Over the next several days, we're expecting sun and temperatures in the upper 70s and low 80s.

We did some more trip planning today. The park we've been staying at in Tyler is booked solid now. We've been afraid that would happen. It's a nice place and conveniently located right by the new toll road. The best alternative we've been able to identify that will fit our rig is almost twice as far from Carol's house, and we don't know yet what their availability is. We did get a site in Lewisville, but not one of our preferred sites. Moral of the story: start to plan sooner!

Ken's granddaughter, Cathy, is graduating from high school on June 4. She's attending an online school, and the commencement ceremony is in Long Beach. He's planning to fly out for the occasion but needs to coordinate his visit with Rebecca and Cathy's schedules. Read more!

Last Joe Dance

We went to Joe Saltel's last Wednesday night dance for this season. We had five squares and lots of fun. There were lots of goodbye hugs and wishes for safe travels, as many people are heading north in the next few days.

At the dance yesterday, Linda was offering to sell one of her two Vitamix machines. Several of the dancers chimed in with how much they loved their Vitamix, and I ended up deciding to buy. I've been intrigued by them for some time, so we shall see. Linda brought the machine to the dance tonight, so I am now the proud but uncertain owner of a Vitamix. It looks quite imposing.

We did a twelve mile bike ride today and spent some time packing and preparing for our upcoming move. Read more!

Biking and Dancing

Today was a great sunny warm day. This morning we biked around the state park for a total of 11.5 miles. We need to up our distances to get in training.

We also got some things done around the rig and lot. Ken swapped out our water filters (one for sediment followed by one for lead and other nasties). I treated our citrus trees with Bayer Advanced  Fruit, Citrus and Vegetable Insect Control Concentrate to prevent citrus greening (we hope). We cleaned up some leaves and removed grass growing where the driveway meets the street and sprayed some weed control. We realize that our time in the RGV is getting short and we need to get things done.

This evening we went to Darryl's Tuesday C-2 class dance. We had three squares plus one couple, which worked out well. Darryl walked us through some things, including a new C-2 level rotate call that he said is almost never called. We probably won't remember it if anyone ever does call it at a dance, but it's good to know about. Jan and Steve were there too. They had forgotten that they had tickets for the band concert tonight, which was just as well. We all need the floor time, especially with Darryl explaining things.

Darryl is just back from Bakersfield and had photos. They had a good crowd. The callers all wore suits and ties. (Maybe that's what inspired him to get his haircut--no ponytail!)  Vic Ceder had to buy a white shirt and go online to find out how to tie a tie! Wish we could somehow magically transport ourselves to Bakersfield to dance with all our old friends. Read more!

Happy Birthday, Jeff!

Today is Jeff's 43rd birthday. He took the day off work to celebrate. Ken said Jeff was out shopping when he called and sounded good. Jeff and Sabrina went to Southern California for his mom's memorial service last Saturday.

We borrowed Steve's tall extension ladder to climb up and reach the cacti growing on our canopy. Jean was at the Texas room picking up the rest of her stuff and dropping off keys. She's staying with G.W. and David this week. John and Steve were working on installing the replacement side panel on Steve and Jan's trailer where a tire blowout had ripped up the side of the trailer. The replacement looks very nice.

Cactus removal was easier with the longer ladder, but still not really easy! The darn cacti are very tough and have their roots twisted down into the frame, so it was difficult to hack them out. Chuck from next door came over and offered to help. I was glad to let him wrestle with the second group of plants.

We got to talking about modifying the steps we had bought. Chuck helped me move them over to see how the rail fit with the assist handle. It fits perfectly, and Chuck and Ken pointed out that we could use our top rig step along with the portable steps. Great idea! Now we have a much more stable entry, with a wide platform--and no need to modify the steps. We will have to sand and paint them, but that's a project for our return in the fall.

Chuck and Carol

We went for a bike ride this afternoon at the state park. It was warm and sunny--too warm, actually. We'll try to get out earlier tomorrow.

We got together with Walenters at the Spauldings house for an impromptu shared meal. Jan had made German potato salad. We took along some cole slaw and some fish bites dredged in corn meal and fried. They were good, but unexpectedly crunchy. The corn meal was a bit coarser ground than I've used before.

This evening Todd Fellegy was still calling for Darryl. We had nine squares at TVA. Everyone had fun. We stopped at Home Depot on the way home to pick up some more Bayer Advanced to treat the citrus trees. Read more!

Friends for Cards

We played cards tonight with John and Sandy and Steve and Jan. First we played Walenters' favorite game, Sevens from Hell, with two three person teams (men and women). The women were so far ahead after the second round that the men conceded.

We moved on to playing Five Crowns. It's a fast moving, easy game, so it's easy to chat and eat. I tried to pop some popcorn in the Texas room microwave, which was a disaster. It must not have much power. The next bag popped in the rig microwave just fine.

Steve and Jan brought over some nice fish filets for the Walenters and us. Steve had filleted them and put them in quart freezer bags in salt water. They'll need to be rinsed off tomorrow. They are all sheepshead, which I don't remember eating before, so this will be a treat. Read more!

A Hard Rain in the Valley

We are used to rain; we've had plenty of rain and clouds this winter. But hard rain is more unusual. The streets get large flooded puddles, and our patio is a mess, again. The rain did stop in time for us to walk today. We are hoping that tomorrow the weather will be pleasant for the folks going fishing at South Padre.

We did some more trip planning today and got reservations for a few campgrounds. We signed up for Romney Tannehill's June Fling outside of St. Louis. We attended this weekend in 2011 and again in 2013 and had a great time. It's always a pleasure to see Romney again and to dance to his calling.

We found a good campground to stay at when we leave Indianapolis on the way to Cleveland. It's located "WHERE THE CLEAR FORK RIVER AND THE B&O BIKE TRAIL CROSS." That means we'll have plenty of opportunity to get on the bikes and stay in shape for our bike and barge trip in France. They offer a good discount for Passport America members, and since we'll be staying for two weeks, we'll save enough that we've finally decided to join, after thinking about it for some time now.

We also finally finished our federal income taxes and got the forms ready to mail. Yay! Read more!

Busy Day

We had a treat today: Todd Fellegy is filling in for Darryl for a few days. Darryl is off calling in Bakersfield, where many of our good friends from Southern California are no doubt having a great time.

Todd called an interesting and challenging C-2 session. We had nine squares, which is good considering that dancers have already started heading north. Randy and Darlene even came to dance. Todd didn't call anything especially difficult--except that we are not used to his voice and unfamiliar with his choreography. We had a couple of exceptionally good tips and some others that were a bit less so, but all of it was enjoyable.

We stopped at the 99 Cents Only store on the way home. There is only one in the area, and it's near the dance location. I used to shop at these stores in California, where they are more numerous. This one opened here a couple of years ago. Things have changed, as I knew they must. Much of the merchandise is still priced at 99.999 cents, but they now carry some things at higher price points. Read more!

Tough Day

We have decided that we must be getting old. Today we went for our ten-mile bike ride to the state park. When we got home, we decided to borrow the neighbor's tall ladder and see about removing some cacti that are growing in a channel along the edge of our canopy.

The ladder isn't really quite tall enough, so I was reaching overhead, getting cactus spines in my hands, and cussing the cacti. I finally managed to break one off, unfortunately leaving the roots intact. Admitting defeat, we decided to wait until we had a taller ladder so we could see what's going on up there. At least three more of the darn things are flourishing up there.

Next we moved the ladder over by the rig to replace some burned out bulbs in our exterior lights (referred to as "scare lights" on an RV--what we do not know). Of course this also involved reaching overhead and wrestling with recalcitrant hardware. Between us we finally got the bulbs changed and all of the lenses washed, so now we have lights again.

At that point we barely had enough energy to return the ladder to the neighbor before going inside to collapse for a while before fixing lunch. We did manage to go through our recent package of mail to figure out which required action and which could be recycled.

Texas is in the process of integrating its vehicle registration and safety inspection sticker process. We got a notice that we will not be able to register our fifth wheel until we get a valid safety inspection report. Then we have to take that report and the notice to the tax office to renew our registration. The new registration sticker will include and supersede the former inspection sticker. In the long run this will simplify life, since we are always in Texas in the spring and will be able to have both of our vehicles inspected and then registered at the same time. (For some RVers who are not in the state in the 90 days before their vehicle registration expires, there might be a problem. The online information doesn't address that possibility.)

Finally we spent some time on planning our getaway--er, our itinerary when we leave our winter home and head north. When we pull out of Green Gate Grove, we will go to Bert Ogden RGV RV Center to have our annual refrigerator maintenance done and get our Majestic inspected. Then we can get our new registration sticker before we head north.

Ken juiced the remaining lemons from our tree. He's been making some great lemonade. I don't know what we'll do when we no longer have a seemingly endless supply of delicious citrus fruit.

We had a very unusual dish for dinner tonight--and Ken pronounced it excellent! I had some cauliflower left over after making an Indian fish curry. What to do? Ken does not care for cauliflower. I checked online and found recipes for cauliflower "fried rice." Interesting concept, and it turned out delicious. I used Gina's Skinnytaste recipe (modified a bit of course). We always like her recipes. To make it a meal, I added turkey ham cubes, slaw with peanut dressing, and fresh pineapple chunks. I think I'll buy cauliflower again! Read more!

Guests

Today we spent some time cleaning and cutting citrus fruit, doing laundry, and cleaning up the patio and the Texas room. Jean's daughter, Connie, and grandchildren, Brooks and Brandt, arrived today. Two of them will be staying in our Texas room. Jean and the other person will be staying in Jan and Steve's Texas room. It's conveniently just a block away.

Cleaning up the patio is an ongoing issue, especially since it's been raining so much. The tiles get wet and puddled, which makes the dead leaves stick. It's a good thing I have a mop with detachable microfiber pads. That's the only thing that works to dry the patio up a bit.

I talked with Terri today. She met a woman in Singapore, Nora Marks, whose husband, Ken, is an aerospace engineer. So Ken has a doppelganger. The couple hail from Connecticut, so if they are related to Ken, it's a distant relationship. His ancestors came from Germany to Michigan, with no stops in Connecticut.

This evening we went to Joe's C-1 dance. The number was 18, then 19, and by the third tip, 20. Mike Hall was nice enough to come over to fill that last square, so we ended up with five squares. People have started leaving. Next week will be Joe's last Wednesday night dance for the season. The time has just flown by. Read more!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

This morning we went to Darryl's C-2 dance. One of the dancers, whose name is (coincidentally?) Patrick, celebrates his 80th birthday, exactly two minutes after midnight. He and lots of other dancers were wearing the green.

This afternoon we went to a St. Patrick's Day party at Hardy and Judy's. Judy made some really delicious corned beef with cabbage and potatoes and carrots, and everyone else brought a contribution. We had a wonderful time, great food and great company. After dinner some of us played cards. Of course the beginner won. Congrats, Bob!

Attending the party were Steve and Jan, John and Sandy, Bob and Pat Boyink, Jim and Pat, Jean, and Ken and I. Read more!

Dull Day

Today was another day with no sunshine, but it was in the 60's, so we were able to walk around our park. We didn't bike because Ken wasn't feeling great. He seems to have a cold and maybe a tummy problem, but he's not looking very ill.

He did take a nap, which he never does. We decided to give the dance tonight a pass so he could rest and just in case he's contagious, but we're hoping to dance tomorrow and go to the Pottingers' St. Patrick's Day party.

We did a bit more trip planning and bought some train tickets. It's difficult to figure out when the tickets will be available, and we missed out being able to get the schedule we wanted on one route. Tickets were not yet available a few days ago. We are definitely making progress. Read more!

Quiet Day

We had a quiet day today. Skipped breakfast at Rosie's in favor of sleeping in a bit and fixing breakfast at home (tomato juice, citrus fruit, organic free-range eggs, turkey sausage patties, and actual whole wheat toast with soy milk and coffee, yum!).

We thought today might be very rainy from the forecast, but the rain held off, so we rode our bikes to the state park. We ran into Judy as we were leaving the park. She had been walking but decided to cut her walk a bit short because she felt a little off.

This evening we watched the first episode of Mr. Selfridge, Season 2. We missed watching it last year, so we've recorded the rebroadcasts over the last two Sundays in preparation for the beginning of Season 3. We recognize our old friends from Season 1, but the situation is complicated for all kinds of reasons, including the outbreak of WWI. Read more!

Fish Fry!

Today is Pi Day (3-14-15) and the date of the annual fish fry at our friends the Spauldings place. The weather cooperated, fortunately, since tomorrow another cold, wet front will push down to South Texas. Steve is an avid angler who regularly heads to South Padre Island to go fishing on one of the charter boats. He saves and freezes his catch, and every spring before everyone heads home, he and Jan put on a great fish fry. This year Tim brought some red snapper throats from fish he caught yesterday. You have to fight with the bones, but it's delicious and well worth the effort.

Chef Steve manages frying, deep frying, and plank grilling some delicious fish!

Our official dessert chef Pat with the apple crisp, cherry cheesecake pie, and chocolate chip cookies she brought for the party.

This morning we went for a bike ride to the state park, taking advantage of the mild weather. The park was crowded with other cyclists, bird watchers, and lots of kids. That's always good to see. Read more!

Friday the Thirteenth

It's Sam Frith's fifth birthday today. Happy birthday, Sam!

Tonight's movie at the hall is The Haunted Mansion with Eddie Murphy (probably in honor of the date).. We gave it a pass.

We went to Darryl's C-2 dance this afternoon. We always learn something: Darryl can easily find calls and positions that the floor needs to work on. Today's was Invert the Magic Column, which caused lots of head scratching.

On the way home we stopped for groceries. When we had those put away, we set out on a rather late bike ride. We decided to stay close to home, so we did most of our riding at Bentsen Grove, our neighbor park to the north. Here's an unusual name sign that caught our attention (actually made us groan).

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Tree Trimming Success

We had Steve's electric chainsaw, our neighbors' tall ladder, and a bright sunny day. We finally got to finish our tree trimming, at least as much as we are going to do this spring. Ken piled heaps of branches by the curb again. It almost looks like we've taken down a whole tree. These trees are so fast growing that it's a race to keep ahead of them.

We trimmed the grapefruit tree back from the shed roof (again) and took out as much of the tall top as I could reach.

The orange tree looks nice and symmetrical now, and it isn't too tall. We're trying to discourage the trees from growing straight up to the sky, which is their natural inclination. Fruit at the tip top of tall trees is very difficult to harvest, even with a long handled picker.

We still have to apply the Bayer Advanced Fruit, Citrus, and Vegetable Insect Control. That's what the USDA recommends to prevent citrus greening disease, which is invariably fatal to infected trees. It's spread by a tiny insect called the Asian citrus psillid.

After we recuperated a bit from our labors, we biked down to the state park before heading home for dinner. Read more!

We All Scream for Ice Cream

Steve and Jan picked us up along with Jean to go to Joe's C-1 dance tonight.

After the dance we all went over to Jean's temporary home (Steve and Jan's Texas room) for some ice cream. Jean had bought mint chocolate chip and we brought Bunny Tracks plus blueberries, chopped toasted walnuts, and whipped cream. A yummy time was had by all!

Earlier we worked on our income taxes, an appropriate activity for a rainy, dreary day. We actually paid what we owed online, but we still have to print up the return and attachments to mail off  by snail mail.

We also checked into some possibilities for touring caves with prehistoric paintings while we are vising Sarlat. Read more!

Live From Nashville

Our McAllen Community Concert this evening was Live From Nashville, described as a song and dance spectacular. They played and sang selections from Today's Country, Early Classics Medley, 1990's Country, Great Country Duets, New Country Classics, and American Country. (I'm not really sure how God Bless America and America the Beautiful got to be a country songs, but the audience loved them.)

The entire cast was talented and lively. Both of the women singers had great voices. But the star of the show was the fiddle player, Katie Keller. She played an amazingly mean fiddle. Steve and Jan rode with us, and we all agreed that it was a very entertaining show.

Earlier in the day we walked and  danced C-2 to Randy. After the dance we went to Subway for lunch and then to the dermatologist's office. I got a clean bill of health. Ken had some spots frozen. We both got samples to try and advice to use products for sensitive skin and to wear gloves when washing dishes.

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Unexpected Sunshine

We woke up this morning to rain, and it seemed that the interminable drip, drip, drip of raindrops on our roof would continue all day. But the rain let up, so we took our "morning" walk around the park (it was just after noon). Then later the sun appeared. We were delighted to be enjoying a balmy, sunny day.

We spent more time today on our travel planning. Sometimes it seems that we are trying to punch our way out of a paper bag--unsuccessfully. We tried to set up an account on the SCNF site (for trains in France), but we were unable to figure out how to enter a phone number in the correct format. Every way we tried led to the same error message: "The phone number is incorrect." We searched in vain for help on the website and tried to send a message, but apparently you can only ask questions about rail trips for which you have a reference number. Sigh.

We found a way around that problem, we thought. We'll just purchase tickets without an account. But at the end of the process, we had to provide an address to send the tickets to. The final step: select a country. But the USA was nowhere to be found on the drop down list. Foiled again!

Finally we discovered a great workaround: Capitaine Train, a very customer friendly website. Finally. But then when we tried to pay for the tickets, our Capital One card was declined. Why? After approving three international hotel charges recently, Capital One decided that this international charge warranted a fraud alert and blocked the transaction. Fortunately, we were able to use Paypal. It's a good thing this is going to be a marvelous trip!

This evening we went to Darryl's C-2 workshop. For the second week in a row, we had twelve squares, this time with three out couples, over one hundred C-2 dancers. Darryl had the middle row of squares checkerboarded, which helped a lot on the tidal wave formations. He worked on Once Removed Lines. Just when we figured we had this thing down, he said, now let's work on some shape changers. Hmmmmm. I'll have to put on my thinking cap for sure. He gave us directions, so I know how to do the calls (like Once Removed Lines Wheel and Deal), but I'm still scratching my head about why it should work that way.... Read more!

Big Plans

We had some big plans for today. We were going to borrow a tall ladder and prune the tops of the citrus trees. Using that same ladder, we would remove the cactus growing on the canopy over the patio.

We were also going to take a bike ride to the state park. The weather had other plans. The whole day was intermittently rainy.

So we ended up spending more time on our trip planning and putting off the tree trimming for a drier day. We walked around our park instead of biking.

This morning as usual we had breakfast with the gang. We were expecting twelve people, so Bob and Pat snagged a long table for us. When we ordered, three seats were still empty. Ray and Pierrette and Carol hadn't joined us yet. Then something different happened. A couple we did not know walked up to our table and sat down. They didn't ask, they just sat. It turned out that our missing friends had forgotten the time change, so we didn't need the chairs, but it was still quite odd. As we were leaving, Carol showed up, planning to eat by herself. Read more!

Biking to the State Park

The weather relented a bit today, so we took advantage of the mild weather to bike down to the state park. Lots of other folks were in the park too, including some serious birders. A female blue bunting had been spotted at the Green Jay blind. A notice was posted on the Texas RBA (Rare Bird Alert), and that always draws the crowds. We didn't see that bird, but we did see an Altamira oriole, cardinal, lots of red-winged blackbirds, chachalacas, grackles, and mockingbirds.

We did a bit of tree trimming, but we need a tall ladder to finish the job. We did some trip planning and may have found a really nice place to stay in Nice.

This evening we played cards with Jan and Steve and Jean. Steve was in a lot of pain this morning, and they thought maybe he had overdone it by walking to the movie at the clubhouse last night. But during the day it eased off, and by this evening he was doing much better. We played some Five Crowns and some Play Nine. Amazingly, I won both games handily. We had fun. Jean shared a bottle of Cul-de-Sac Cabernet Sauvignon. Steve wasn't drinking because of his meds, and Jan found it too dry. The rest of us found it okay for a $3 a bottle wine. It's HEB's new house brand. Read more!

Dentist and Dancing

Ken's first mission this morning was to call the dentist. One of his crowns fell out yesterday. Fortunately Dr. Canales was able to see him this morning, and he was home in no time. The crown just needed to be re-cemented. Meanwhile I did some laundry.

This afternoon we went to Darryl's C-2 dance. Jean was there and actually danced two tips. She said afterwards that her ankle felt fine. We are so pleased that she is making such great progress.

Steve had his ESI (epidural steroid injection) this morning and found out that it is one of a series of three at two-week intervals. He definitely seemed to be doing better today, although he says he is still in pain. He walked over to the hall for the Friday night movie without his cane. He's hoping to be able to dance Monday, and we're cheering him on.

The movie tonight was Rumor Has It. Despite a great cast, both critics and most viewers panned it, though some people enjoyed it, including Roger Ebert. I gave it a pass (just not my cup of tea). Ken went over, but came home before the end of the movie. The rest of the group stayed and said they had some laughs. Read more!

Arctic Blast!

Last night we could hear the north wind howling around us, bringing the temperature down by nearly 40 degrees overnight. Of course we didn't get the blizzard that hit farther north. We went to the mall to walk this morning and stopped at Target on the way home. After lunch we tackled some more trip planning. We now have a hotel for our three days in Paris before leaving on the bike and barge trip. Read more!

Sad News

Jeff called today to say that his mother had passed away. This was not unexpected, as she had been in hospice care suffering from leukemia, but it is very sad news for the family and all who loved her. Rebecca posted this on Facebook

Nancy Marks (1946-2015) will be missed dearly. She was ready to go home to be with family and friends and with God, whom she cherished. Those of us left behind will miss her dearly. May we all remember her giving soul and her cheerful spirit.

We enjoyed the lovely sunny weather, with a gentle south wind and high of 80°. This morning we did some further trimming of the grapefruit tree, using an electric chain saw borrowed from Steve and Jan. It's a marvelous tool on a long handle, but heavy, and it took a lot out of me using it, so we put off further tree maintenance until the next decent weather day--which looks like it will be a while. Read more!

Travels with Jan

Jan picked me up at a quarter to 9:00 a.m. for our trip to Nuevo Progreso. She had a delayed appointment to get her new permanent crown installed. While in Mexico, we stopped in at Jessica's Pharmacy so that Jan could pick up a few things. On the way home we stopped at Subway for lunch and Costco.

This evening we picked up Jan and Steve to go to Darryl's C-2 workshop/dance/class. It started as a class level dance, but now the class has graduated. They still want floor time to solidify their skills.

'The 2015 graduating C-2 Class in Mission TX. Left to right are: John & Nancy Nicholson, Bill & Marlene Dunmire, Dennis Lord, LaDone Will & Bob, Carol & John Petro, Jane & Jim Booth, Linda & David Olfers, Judy & Bill Bash, Art Wilding & Lynne Mault Wilding, Barb & Gord Whitson, Beverly Bublitz & Bill Bublitz. Caller Darryl Lipscomb is in the back.

During a break, Ken caught Larry and Kathy with their mobile devices.

Earlier in the day we managed to do some tree trimming and took a bike ride to the park.
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Twelve Squares of C-2 Dancers

Tonight at Darryl's C-2 workshop we had twelve squares of dancers, pretty much the capacity of the room. When we walked into the hall, we were surprised by the crowd. What happened? The C-2 class has graduated and is now invited to attend all C-2 sessions. They are very eager to get plenty of floor time and are doing quite well.

We also managed to do some more trip planning. We made reservations at two more of our stops. Many of the places we are visiting are smaller towns, and July is a very popular month for travelers in France, so we need to get our hotels and train tickets and tours nailed down early. Read more!

March (Comes in Like a Lion, Goes Out Like a Lamb?)

It is hard to believe it is March already. Actually, March here came in pretty mildly. It was chilly and overcast this morning, but sunny and 63° this afternoon.

We started the day by picking up Jan to go to Rosie's for breakfast. (Steve was fishing with his buddies at South Padre). We had twelve at our table, squeezed in companionably. Rosie's is getting busier every week.

We spent some time today trying to make reservations in France. We expected to need to make reservations early in Paris and Nice, but it turns out that all of France is popular in July!

We stopped by this afternoon while we were out walking to see how the fishing went. It was okay, but unfortunately after he got home, Steve had twisted something wrong and really hurt his back. Jan was waiting for a call back from the doctor. We hope he has gotten some relief.

Chris was traveling from Portland to DC today, via DFW. He got stranded there for a while. The northern parts of Texas have had icy weather. Fortunately he got a flight out to DCA, so he was relieved. I talked with Terri and Ed and Carol, and all are doing well.

Tonight is the final episode of Season 5 of Downton Abbey. Grantchester finished last week. We'll have to look for something else to watch on Sunday evenings. Read more!