Sorry about that....

...I've been a little busy.

November 3rd I went out to Sedona, Arizona to visit Jolea.  It's an awesome place and we had a great time.  We mostly just hung out, walked around, hiked a bit, did a little sight seeing and shopping.  It's definitely a lot more laid back than Key West, a WHOLE lot.

The drive down was beautiful. (If you are in the area and need a shuttle ride from Flagstaff to Sedona or vise-verse, call Going My Way Shuttle Service, Sanna is awesome and so nice! Very reasonable too.)

My view from the balcony in Jolea's room.

The view from the living room.

We went on a Pink Jeep Tour, we did the Broken Arrow tour.  So glad we did, Pink Jeeps are the only tours allowed in that area. Not that you can't go there in your own vehicle, but I wouldn't do it.

I did some knitting while I was there.  Can you see Snoopy Rock in the background?  He's just below and right of the rock that Jolea and I thought looked like the man in the movie UP! The Fall color was awesome!

We hiked up Airport Mesa.

I knitted and charged my crystals in this tree that had a rock in the middle of it.  The twisted trees mark a strong vortex area.  They are everywhere around Sedona.

The view walking down Jolea's street. Guess what the name of this rock is?

We went to the ghost town of Jerome one day to spend the night in the Grand Hotel aka the 'haunted hotel' which was originally a Insane Asylum.  I know what the strange lights in the top of the photo are but we have no idea what that big white blob is... ghost maybe?  The views were incredible, lots of good restaurants too.  The locals wear shirts that read "everyone in this town is really high."

"Ghosts hate when you do this." Dr. Peter Venkman - Ghost Busters.  Jolea tried hard to piss a ghost off but the most we got was people screaming in the halls in the night.  Pretty hokey if you ask me.

The next morning on the ride back to Sedona we went to Tuzigoot.  Pretty cool Native American ruin site.

The weather was fantastic most of the week, but Thursday afternoon it unexpectedly turned much cooler with rain and cold wind.  The front had started moving in a day early.  We were caught out shopping unprepared, Jolea in shorts and a t-shirt, I only had a good sized scarf to cover my bare arms with.

While we ducked into an Irish Pub to get out of the pouring rain while waiting for our bus back to Jolea's side of town, she struck up a conversation with the Bartender/Owner and before we knew it she had interviewed for a job!  He text her later that evening and asked her to come train for the job Friday at 5.  She stayed until 2AM and netted a couple of hundred in tips.  Miss Congeniality rocks!!!!

We were able to do a little walking and shopping on Saturday morning before I left.  Sanna called to see if we could head to Flagstaff early, the weather up there was quickly worsening with snow on the peaks.  In twenty minutes we went from low 60's and sunny in Sedona to low 30's and snow flurries in Flagstaff.

My flight was scheduled to leave at 5:55PM, but no sooner had it landed and everyone got off, it started snowing harder.  Then I noticed that the pilots and flight attendant got off, without coats... and then the luggage that had just been put on the plane was removed.... Yeah, we didn't leave on that plane.

Everyone was given new options as this was the last flight in and wasn't leaving until the snow melted and the de-icer  was checked out.  My option was to take a taxi to Phoenix and spend the night in a hotel.  I took it, because it meant that I'd surely get home by Sunday afternoon and I wasn't looking forward to sleeping in the airport. 

That was a taxi ride from Hell to Phoenix.  We (me and an older  couple and the man's even older sister, who dropped F-bombs like a sailor) walk out of the airport with the taxi driver headed to the taxi.  The driver immediately slips on the snow and busted his butt.  Great, he can't walk in snow and now he's going to drive!

I had been given a hotel voucher by US Airways and wasn't in any rush to get to Phoenix, but the others wanted to make their flight.  So the driver thought he needed to drive 80MPH!  After the Old Gal had grabbed my arm too many times to count and screamed FU%K with every grab, I told the driver to slow down.  I was prepared to kill him with my bare hands if we crashed... no I wasn't going to die in the crash because my goal was to live to kill him because I didn't have a big warm coat and I didn't want to die of hypothermia! He slowed down and they made their flight on time despite the fact that he didn't even know how to get to the airport in Phoenix!  Next time I'll drive to Sedona.

I got home Sunday afternoon (a week ago), flew through that same storm that dumped all the snow on Flagstaff.  Rough flight and landing, almost as bad as landing with the two front tires flat, I started to assume the position but the little guy next to me was already freaked out by the plane rocking from side to side and going up and down in and out of the clouds.  

My crystals are charged to protect me against any negativity and to help bring me peace and prosperity.  And my little Secret Pal is still having flowers and candy delivered to me.  She's too much!

Have a great week and a Happy Thanksgiving.  

Whoosh....

...we just made a big ole triangle around the center of Texas.

Monday morning Jolea and I took off from home around 7.  We were southbound on I-35. 
Checked in at Gruene Hall in Gruene, Texas around noon. 
Boy, was that Lone Star Long-neck good.  Something about the beer in that old dance hall....

Too bad Jack Ingram wasn't there doing a sound check, he could have sung the Barbie Doll song to Jolea, again!

After a little browsing in our favorite Gruene shops, picked up my favorite hand cream and Jolea needed a new Gruene Hall t-shirt, we scooted on over to Grandma and Grandpa's house.  They were doing quiet well, had a nice calm Christmas with only Jody's twin sister and close friends in for the holidays.   We visited, watched our fair share of Judge Judy, People's Court and those other court room dramas, Grandpa even has his own gavel that he can rap when everyone is out of order or in contempt. 

Then the next morning we were up and on the road again.  This time winding our way down the back roads heading East. 

We were working our way, small town to small town in search of a DPS office that didn't have 57 people standing in line for driver's license renewal.  Jolea's had expired on her last birthday so it was her only chance to renew.  First to Seguine, no luck.  So on to Shiner. 

Well Shiner didn't have an office so we went to the brewery instead.  What???? Isn't that what you do when you can't get your license renewed?  Not just any brewery, the Spoetzl Brewery, famous for Shiner Bock beer. 

We went in to the gift shop to check on the tour schedule and learned that we'd just missed the 11am tour.  They gave us 4 wooden tokens so that we could get 4 little 4oz samples of the different brews.  I found that I prefer the Shiner 101 to the others, we also learned that Shiner Blond was the original Shiner Bock beer.  Very interesting, and tasty. I'm sure the tour would have been very interesting, oh well...

We were on a schedule, couldn't wait for the 1pm tour.  So what do we do when time limits us?  Jolea does her own tour... it wasn't the first time.  We had people follow us all over Savannah for her walking tours.  She is practicing to be the next Samantha Brown on the Travel Channel you know.

Up a flight of stairs and into a glowing Mecca for a beer drinker.

I had my story planned... "Officer, I was taking pictures for proof that there was indeed a break-in, I have no idea who that crazy looking red-head is.  Frisk her, she probably doesn't even have I.D."

Once back down,  I had the brilliant idea that we should have had someone down in the parking lot taking pictures of her...
Not a problem!  There she goes again...


"Put your drinks up!!!"

Our motto is "let's give them something to talk about."  And I believe they were, we got several looks from people as we walked through the parking lot, could have been because we were laughing and making funny remarks.  There were even two girls (Jolea's age) watching us with that look in their eye as if saying "if only I wasn't with my parents." 

We'd worked up an appetite and needed to move on to the next town that may have a DPS office, so off we went to Halletsville.  You know the town in that song Armadillo Jackal by  Robert Earl Keene Jr.   No, we didn't eat armadillo, well at least I don't think we did.  We had Mexican food, tacos al carbon, OMG... they were awesome.  

After lunch we went to the opposite side of the square, behind the courthouse to the DPS office where Jolea was told by the clerk, in a honest to goodness deep Texas twang "oooh we don't do that here anymore.  We just didn't have enough peeeeple comin' in for renewals.  We quit a cupple of months ago.  You could just drive on pronounced own down to Victoria or over to Columbus to git that done." 

Uh, Victoria?  No, Columbus... it's on the way to Houston... OK.  So around 3:30 after I got a tan and knitted 10 rows on a sweater Jolea comes walking out of the DPS office in Columbus, TX with photo copy of her new license, mission accomplished, we hit the road again.  East bound on I-10.

When we arrived at Nita's Jolea got a quick tour of the house, we unloaded our stuff and we were out the door to La Hacienda.  Yeah, we can do Mexican food twice a day... it's who we are. 

Early the next morning we headed  toward home.  Winding our way down the back roads again.

With a stop at Buc-ee's in Madisonville.  Jolea had never been to a Buc-ee's.  She had to model one of those bald-man hair hats and tour the most unbelievable restrooms in the world, in a truck-stop that is. 

We rolled in to Dallas around noon, and pulled into the driveway shortly before 1pm.
Bright and early this morning we drove back into Dallas to put Jolea on a flight to Ft. Lauderdale.  Her friend Judy was picking her up to drive her on down to Key West.  She had a bag full of goodies for her apartment, her need for Taco Bell, Whataburger, home cooking and Tex-Mex food met, and many good visits with old friends in the memory bank.  It was a good visit. 

Now she's going to want to top it the next time she comes home.

 Yee haw... I can't wait!

It's hard to believe...

... that 29 years ago yesterday we were decorating a Christmas tree.  A much smaller tree than what we put up yesterday, that one was a little wild cedar tree that had been growing in the back of the property at Uncle Jimmy and Aunt Shorty's house.  Dad had cut it down and strapped it to the top of the car.  Mom and Aunt Shorty had rummaged through a couple of centuries of odd-ball ornaments that were tossed in the backseat of the car for the trip back to Oklahoma City.   We spent the evening setting turning that little lopsided tree into a true Charlie Brown Christmas tree.

The next morning, after 3 weeks of waiting and resigning to the fact that I would live my life with a huge rotund belly and proving that even with that belly,  I could still hurdle the couch... I went into labor.

Long story, short labor 4hrs.20 mins a cubby cheeked little girl was born at 2:12 in the afternoon.  We named her Jolea Michael, after her 3 uncles three wise men, maybe in their own way. 

It's hard to believe that 29 years ago today, we received our best gift, and we didn't even have to wait for Christmas. 

Happy Birthday Jolea!

Just like 29 years ago, we we are awaiting her arrival, she's coming home tonight!

Happy Birthday Jolea!

Have a great birthday!  We love you.

They made it!!!

Jolea's boat docked in Matanzas, Cuba this afternoon.  It's been a long couple of weeks since we were able to talk to her. We can't wait to hear all about her visit to Cuba. She's been wanting to go there for a long time. Can the kid set some goals or what?

What a relief.

 

Jolea's T-shirt drive brought in a lot more shirts than we expected.  I had to put a sign up yesterday so people would stop bringing things in.  We were only allowed to run it for two weeks.  We had to leave the boxes there until we get a shipping address, and with the boxes there the kids just kept dropping things off.  We have 14 boxes of Tshirts ranging from 'Onsies' to XXX large.  Many of them are NEW!  

Now all we need is an address to ship them to.  Jolea should be docking in St. Thomas later today.  I'm hoping she'll have something for us when we talk to her tomorrow. I hope the web page has up dated by the time you check that link.  Or check this link www.amistadamerica.org

This morning I'm hearing on the news that Santiago Chile has suffered an 8.8 earthquake.  I wonder if we have students at the school of Chilean decent?  I'm sure we do.  

I wonder if we'll do a Penny War or a personal hygiene drive for the people of Santiago? Something light weight, not Tshirts.  One of the things bad about raising money.... have you heard how much of the money actually makes it to the point of the disaster?  Only about a 1/3!!!   And they wonder why people don't want to write a check to Red Cross?

The Kids

I just got off Skype with Jolea, they made it into Bermuda yesterday morning at about 8:30 EST.  She was quiet well.  Said they were preparing for a storm, it was windy as you can tell by the picture.  She said the seas were "quiet large" but it wasn't too bad (I guess she's judging it on her scale.)   They will be in Bermuda for a week before leaving for Dominica.  She managed to go aloft!  It was a huge deal for her, but she did it.  She'll probably post about it later.  I'm so proud of her for not giving up, I knew she could do it.  She just needed a little warm weather. 

Jeff be-bopped in yesterday evening to have dinner with us.  He'd been in Corpus all week.  He was here when Mark showed up for the Saturday night Pickin'. 

 

Mark started doing what Mark does.... he teaches, any and everyone how to play something.  My NEW electric bass was sitting there and Jeff was sitting there, so Mark taught Jeff to play the bass.  He did quiet well.  Oh yeah, Jody thought we should have an electric bass.  (Remind me to tell you the story about the first time I drove a Tony Kart)  I came in from work Thursday night and there was a bass in the living room and he wasn't even wearing his "Yes Honey, it's another guitar" shirt.

Then it was my turn, my fingers have a mind of their own and they have a natural tendency to do knitting.  This was very foreign to them.   No we don't have or need any pictures of this.  

Later, one of Jolea's dear friends from her Junior High School and 4-H days came over.  What did Mark do?   "Hey... do you think you could just take those brushes there and give us a light little tap on that snare drum.... Come on, any chimp can do it."  That's how Amanda became a drummer.  He didn't even give her time to take off her coat!

Y'all have a good week, tomorrow is the 1st of February!!!  I was promised a new car in February.... I'll be holding him to it. 

Keeping up with the kids.

Are you tracking her progress?

http://www.amistadamerica.org/content/view/437/83/



Who knows where Jeffrey is, last we heard he was headed to a power plant in Corpus Cristi.

Special Project

Jolea was up late last night completing her special project.  

More details later. 

Weekly Updates

The weather:  It's still unbelievably cold here?  13 degrees right now.  This is not normal for Texas.  I talked to a vendor in Wisconsin Friday and she said they are hearing more about the Texas weather up there than they are hearing about their own.  I asked why and she said "we're just having normal stuff, like a foot and a half of snow on the ground.  But you guys are colder than us with the wind chill."  I could believe that... our wind chill temp Friday morning was 1degree.  ONE! UNO! and I was out on the curb with a couple of the TAs doing car duty....  I now know that pins and needles feeling that you get when frost bite starts.  I'm over this... Christmas break is over, now I want to see a definite warm up.

Jolea:  We talked to her for about 20 minutes Wednesday night.  She was in Norfolk, on the boat and freezing.  But she was supposed to go pick up some Foul Weather gear and a few more articles of clothing at the 'REAL' mall after dinner that night.  She seemed excited that there was a REAL mall.  I guess she hasn't seen a REAL mall in over a year.  She said the boat was great and hoped to have pictures up on her blog really soon.  There is no internet on the boat but they make frequent trips to the library.  I'm hoping she'll have time to do that before they set sail some time this next week.  They may leave as early as Wednesday instead of the 15th like previously planned.  I should probably go check the GPS to see if they are still there. 

She called with a quick question Thursday morning,
Jolea: "Mom am I still on your Sam's card?"
Me: "No Jolea, Jeffrey bumped you off to buy beer last summer."
Jolea: "Can I bump him off? We're a non-profit organization here and we're on a really tight budget and we need to provision the boat.  We really need a Sam's card."
Me: "If you can wait until tomorrow to provision, I can go to Sam's tonight and get you reinstated."
Just like Jolea.... got a problem?  Let me take care of that for you, I have resources.  I haven't heard how their Sam's trip went but I have a feeling Jolea is now helping the cook and will be sleeping in the salon and not in the Forecastle with the rest of the deck hands before this trip is over. But then again, maybe not... she was so over the whole chef part of cruising when the last charter ended.

Jody:  The 15th will be his last day at the current company.  He's taken a job with a larger company (hint: it's an instrumentation company that is named for our state) that is more like the company he had been working for when he was laid off from his job of 8 years back this time last year.  A person would think it would be easy to put in your two weeks notice when you are offered a dream job with all the bells and whistles.  But not for Jody.  He put in his notice with G.T. and before we could have dinner that night he received a call from the Human Resources person at the New Company saying that GT was not going to let him leave.  (NC is a MAJOR company that provides computer components to companies all over the world) Yeah, GT were trying to hold him hostage.  They said they would not provide NC with the product that GT provides NC if Jody were to leave GT to go to work at NC.  GT would cut NC off and they would loose production.  All because of a guy who has only worked for them for 3 months and doesn't even have his own set of keys to the building.  So the leave date for Jody was put on hold!  He had to stay!  He had to push his leave date from GT back by 2 weeks and then he had to help them find his replacement!  I have yet to find anyone who has not said "WHAT?" when I tell them about this.

It's crazy I know, but he will walk out of there this Friday and hand them his non-existent keys and be done with them.  It's not like they were a horrible company to work for, it's just that a better deal with better benefits came along and he felt he needed to go for it.  But does GT ever think he'll return to work for them again?  Hmmmm, I'm sure he'll think long and hard about that.

Jeff:  I mentioned to him last weekend as I was making out my weekly menu that we didn't have anything listed on the menu that he really liked to eat this week, but if he'd let me know I'd rustle him up a taco ring or something.  We never heard from him again after Sunday....  Thursday I asked Jody if Jeff had checked in and he said he hadn't heard from him.  I guess I'll have to work one of his favorite meals into the week so we can see him more than once a week.  But then we got a call Friday night that he was still working in Houston.  Hopefully he had time to run by Nita's for a favorite meal.

Me:  The last pair of Christmas socks flopped.  It's a good thing the recipient hasn't come around to receive them yet.  Unless he wears a size 6 1/2 shoe he won't be able to wear these felted beauties.  I'll still give them to him, but I'm in the process of making him another pair.  He can do what ever he wants with the felted pair.  The second pair will be regular socks.  I'm going back to felting bags and leaving socks to later when I have more experience, and I can find a tried and true pattern to use.

I'll leave you with a few pictures from 'the pickin' last night.  We went to Chris' house instead of them coming to Allen.  For the past few weeks, Mark has been forcing Dawn and I to take up learning to play something.  You remember how he forced me into 'chopping' on the mandolin?  Well I guess he thinks I'm a pro at that and it's time to move on to the bass.  Dawn somehow got out of it last night, I'm still trying to figure out how she did that. She didn't take any pictures of me on the bass, but dug through my purse and used my camera to take these pictures. 

I was 'chopping' on Chris' Ukele, notice my knitting in my lap.... I don't leave home without it. They forced me to play the bass earlier, and I forced them to have a Uke in their Bluegrass as payback.  They even said it sounded good in the end...  they are really nice guys, and I think they are kind of scared of me.

Mark giving Jody some pointers on the mandolin and Chris on the guitar.  (Jody's mandolin playing was amazing last night!)  

Then Mark had the great idea that one of us girls get on the snare drum....  "come on! It's real easy... a chimp can do it!"  In other words, get over here and make a monkey out of yourself and TRY to play the drums.  Well you know I'm going to jump on that challenge..... 

.... just like all musical instruments, it's not as easy as it looks.  Can you tell I was cracking up, I always crack up laughing when I feel like a fool.  Mark is trying to give me pointers on how to do it.... lol. 

Jody is going out today to shop for monkeys, if he doesn't find one it will be Dawn's turn on the snare next week, I've got my eye on that African drum there behind me in the picture.  They'll wish they hadn't suggested I put my knitting down.  

Have a great week! 

She's off again like a leaf on the wind.

She's miles away and I'm still helping her pack.  Hope these wool socks bring her good luck on this leg of her voyage. These are the VERY first pair of socks I knitted back in 2000.  Yeah, they are still good and warm. She's going to need them....    Brrrrrr!

Gotta get this box in the mail today. 

Just found a box to mail it all, it was in Jolea's room.  Her friend Stephanie R sent her boots back to her when she forgot them in Rhode Island.  Bless her heart, Stephanie that is.  This box is perfect, unless she tells me she needs something else.  

Good deal, I always liked these boots, I'll just start wearing them. 

I'm off to the Post Office. 

Happy Birthday Jolea!!!

Hope you have a great day! Love Mom, Dad and Jeff