I am writing this on Saturday, October 4. There are a couple of pics.
A is for Australian Alligator
It wasn’t perfect, but it was a very nice week. Sunday, the garage door spring broke. These things always happen on Sunday, when there is no hope of getting help. I was able to get Danita’s car out of the garage, but when I went to close the door it got away from me. Now we have a slightly dented door. Fortunately, the car was *not* under the door at the time. The garage door man came on Tuesday at the appointed time. We have two doors. I figured the spring on the other door would fail pretty soon, so I had him replace both springs.
Anemone
We had a practically perfect evening Wednesday. To start the evening off, I met Danita at work and we went to a local bar for reuben sandwiches. They were quite good, and they certainly hit the spot. But there’s a Friendly’s Ice Cream place right down the street, so after we finished our sandwiches, we got a couple of Sundaes. Then we went to the National Aquarium. There was a nice crowd there. Everybody was having a good time. It was a friendly, exciting, good-time vibe. At the same time, the exhibits weren’t crowded. We had plenty of opportunity to see everything we wanted and even snap a couple of quick pics.
Fish
Friday I went with a couple of our neighbors to the Western MD Rail Road Trail. There’s a tourist train that runs between Cumberland and Frostburg. Next to the train is a very nice biking trail. (Actually, the trail comes all the way from Pittsburgh, and joins up in Cumberland with the C & O Tow Path to go all the way to Georgetown.) We rode our bicycles 15 miles from Frostburg to Cumberland, which is a down-hill ride. The fall foliage was much in evidence. The path is in excellent condition. The weather was cloudy but nice. It was a beautiful ride, with several “wow” moments where we would come around the bend and be presented with a spectacular view. The ride was a little disorganized, and we were racing storms moving in from the West, so we ended up riding pretty much straight through, then having lunch about 2. It didn’t start raining until we started driving home. I had a great time, but I probably won’t to do this trip again. When I analyzed the day, I found I spent:
5 hours SOMB (Sitting On My Butt) driving.
2 hours SOMB eating (including all three meals)
1.5 hours SOMB coasting downhill (there’s not much exercise in that)
$50 for gas and lunch (but I did get free parking, thanks to a busted parking lot gate)
After spending all day SOMB, Danita and I went downstairs and watched TV
Western MD RR Trail
That’s a lot of stuff for a short bike ride. And not a very healthful day to boot. It turned out I was quite lucky. The bike shop didn’t get my gear hub locked in correctly. It worked fine for a few rides I did earlier this week, plus 13 of the 15 miles of the trail ride. Fortunately, I realized what was wrong right away, and was able to coast downhill to the car without stopping. Imagine how embarrassing for me, the neighborhood bicycle king, to be the only person who had to stop and effect a bicycle repair on such a short and easy trip. Once I got home, I was able to fix the bike in a few minutes.
It looks like we will attend fewer neighborhood parties. We used to have 2 or 3 parties a month: one free “happy hour”, one $10 dinner, and often one $10 entertainment with deserts. But they’re running out of money in the entertainment fund, and they’ve doubled the price of the dinners. The dinners are a good time and the food is decent. But we don’t think they’re worth $40 for the two of us. I’m thinking we’ll find other things to do.
Next week promises to be quite exciting. We start out Sunday with a Church turkey dinner at the parish we are visiting. Monday is a retirement planning seminar and “free” dinner. Thursday we are driving to NC to visit the Reeds. We will drive back Monday, so my weekly blog will be a little late. But there just might be some cool grand-kid pics!
I hope this finds everybody doing well.