Where Are You, Shirtless Wonder?

Living in a small town has some perks. Seeing “interesting” people is one of them.

When Marv and I first moved here, there was a man we called the Shirtless Wonder. I have no clue what age he was. My guess is maybe well in his 30’s in the beginning. We saw him all over town, always walking. He walked with a purposeful stride, like he had someplace special he needed to be. He’d walk in all weather. If it was the least little bit warm out, he would be walking with his shirt off, either in one hand or slung over a shoulder. He was VERY fit looking. Nothing much to look at in the face, but his torso looked like he did weights. As the years went by, we noticed that he would still take his shirt off, but now would be wearing a white tank top underneath. I saw him a couple of times in the grocery store, muttering to himself. I don’t know when it was that we realized we hadn’t seen him in some time. If my first guess about his age was right, he’d be pushing 70 now.

Then there was the couple. Man and woman. Walking everywhere. Many times laden down with shopping bags. They looked to be in their late 20’s. The man was short and on the heavy side and seemed to walk slowly. The woman was the same height and wore impossibly high heels. Always. Couldn’t imagine how she could walk all over town in those heels. She also had jet black hair worn straight down below her waist. I was in line behind them once in a store. She was doing all the talking and pulled out an enormous wad of cash to pay for their purchases. We would see them everywhere for a short period of time. Then they were gone.

And then there was Stalin…

Short little guy with long gray hair and beard and a Stalin hat. Completely dressed in black leather. Always. No matter how hot it was out, he’d still be wearing a leather coat, buttoned up to the top. We saw him a lot at Raley’s. You did NOT want to be close to him in the summer…

I think he was still around long after Shirtless Wonder disappeared. But it’s been many years now since he made an appearance.

By far, though, the one who was around the longest was The World's Oldest Living Cocktail Waitress. There was a "fancy" restaurant where Marv and I would go on special occasions. It had a bar section attached to it, so the cocktail waitress would come around to take drink orders before people ordered dinner. This gal was maybe 97 years old, wearing a short black skirt and spiked heels and had LONG, straggly, blondish (don't know what other color to call it) hair down her back. Absolutely frightening. Wonderful personality of course. But scary to look at. Haven't seen her in a while though, and since the place changed hands we don't go there any more.

Oroville is bigger now, after 34 years of living here. Haven’t really seen anyone out of the ordinary for some time now. I kinda miss the Shirtless Wonder…hope he’s OK.

Back From Virginia part 3

No, that picture is NOT of my little toesies…I don’t do red, at least not on my toes. I went with a nice pearl color. I had never had a pedicure before. The morning before the wedding, the whole female gang went to have their nails done. My fingernails aren’t worth dealing with, but “the mothers” of the bride and groom were treated to a pedicure. What a nice experience! I wouldn’t mind having that done on a fairly regular basis. It’s become increasingly difficult for me to do my toenails anymore, since my knees and back conspire against me. But it was such a pleasure to soak my footsies in the hot water and then have them smoothed and lotioned and the nails filed and painted while I just sat there in a VERY nice chair that had massage capabilities.

Lunch was with Paul and Anne at a local Taco Bell and then it was back to the hotel for a nap. Love my naps!! Then Mr. Garmin led us to the church for the rehearsal and dinner afterward. Beautiful church! Lots of stairs, though. Found out later there was an elevator! The rehearsal went well and then it was time for the dinner in the fellowship hall. Paul had REALLY wanted a Pirate Wedding, and of course, Anne being a SANE person, said no. But she had a surprise in store for Paul…a Pirate Rehearsal Dinner! The wonderful company of Oriental Trading (love them!) had all the supplies needed for such a thing. And a local bakery did the pirate cake. AND Paul and Anne gave presents to everybody! Did not expect that! Marv and I got beautiful scripture mugs and something to put in them: coffee and tea!  

The next day, Marv and I did some sightseeing. We didn’t have to be at the church until 6pm, so that gave us plenty of time. We went to the Museum of the Confederacy, which was right next door to Jefferson Davis’ house when he was the Confederate President. So much history in such a time of turmoil for our nation! Very sobering to consider.

One of my main objects while in Virginia was to find some “tourist souvenir stuff” to take back. I really wanted postcards, too. NOT TO BE FOUND! In the museum they had lots of very high priced things, but I was looking for a Walmart or some place like it that had that stuff. NOT TO BE FOUND! We went to a Cracker Barrel for lunch and there was a store connected to it, but again, it was all very high priced and not necessarily “Virginia”, just normal boutique type stuff.

Then it was back to rest up for the wedding!

Next week’s blog will be from Fresno, so it will probably be something easy for my brain to handle, since I will have been run ragged by then….♥

My Pirate Name

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Every once in a while I will do one of those cute little "quizzes" where you find out what your name is: Pirate Name, Rockstar Name, Hobbit Name...
I revisited this one today. I like this one!

 

    My pirate name is:
   

 

    Bloody Bess Flint    

 
 

    Every pirate lives for something different. For some, it's the open sea. For others (the masochists), it's the food. For you, it's definitely the fighting. Like the rock flint, you're hard and sharp. But, also like flint, you're easily chipped, and sparky.    Arr!
   

  Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network
 

Back From Virginia part 2

OK. When we last left off, Marv and I were being met by Paul and Anne at the Richmond airport. There was some kind of tedious snag involving the rental car, but we FINALLY got it. Paul drove us in the rental car to IHOP with Anne following behind. AWESOME breakfast! Cinnamon pancakes…Oh. Em. Gee.

Then we went to the hotel to get settled in and TAKE A NAP. Before he left with Anne, Paul put his Garmin in the rental car for us to use. What a neat toy! I want one! I certainly don’t need one here in Oroville, but as I told Marv, I would love to drive around in Kelly Ridge, get good and turned around (which is easy for me, sadly) and then ask Garmin to find my way back to Olive Highway. Just to see where he’d take me. Because I would put the Garmin voice to a male one. I became quite fond of Garmin while we were in VA…

After our nap, we went over to Paul and Anne’s house. With the wonderful help of Mr. Garmin. They have a cute house on a very nice lot with amazing trees all over. That was one of the biggest surprises for Marv and I. The land all over the area of VA we were in was either neat and tidy lawn, or forest! And the roadsides were sparkling clean. NO TRASH. We got to meet our new grandkids, Madison and Jordan. Wonderful kids. Although Jordan isn’t really a kid anymore at 17…and Madi is the sweetest 10 year old. A bit on the shy side, but then, so was I at that age.

That night was the bachelor/ette dinner at Glory Days Grill. Awesome hamburgers. Something I had never seen before: there were TVs set up all around the place near the ceiling. Any place you sat, you could see at least 3-4 different screens, all with different channels. On all the tables were small speaker towers that you could set to whatever channel you wanted to watch, and you would be able to hear that channel. Great idea!

After that, it was back to the hotel. Where we discovered that they make FRESH COOKIES almost every afternoon. I was way too full for cookies, but that didn’t stop me from taking a couple back to the room for “later”. Since we ate so late, I had to sit up most of the night, and my inflatable travel wedge failed. But I had asked for extra pillows when we checked in, so I had 7 pillows to arrange and slept quite well.

The hotel breakfast was THE BOMB! The usual cold cereal, fruit and muffin/bread selection PLUS egg patties, sausage, bacon, waffles…and something that looked like mushroom soup with meat in it. Then I KNEW I was in the South…it was gravy for the biscuits! I love biscuits and gravy, but I had already piled my plate with eggs and bacon and cornbread.

One thing I failed to mention last time: Marv did very well with the trip out and back. He took his Dramamine regularly and had no problems. I am so thankful that I’ve never had a problem with motion sickness. If I did, I would NEVER have been able to do my homework. On the school bus. On the way to school the morning it was due…

Next time: manis and pedis for all!

Shopping Solo

* (note important asterisk)

I’ve already written about how I hate shopping alone, especially when it involves a trip to Chico, and how much I’ve enjoyed the last few shopping trips with Paula. This week, I really had to do some grocery shopping, and it had to be in Chico, and it had to be alone.

So I got a couple of CD’s for the trip,** got my reusable shopping bags,*** the cooler, my shopping list, made sure I was fully dressed**** and took off.

It was a beautiful, breezy day and the drive was lovely. Didn’t find everything I was looking for at Target, but got most of it PLUS a new game for Lia. Also found some new patterns of duct tape. GREAT for crafts!

Winco was next, and I got everything except the frozen veggies. Just plain forget ‘em. Obviously, having a list doesn’t do any good if I don’t look at it…

By this time, it was after 12 noon and I was getting a mite peckish***** so I thought I would get a half sandwich from the deli section and go over to Starbucks across the street and have my lunch there. But then I noticed the fried chicken wings. I LOVE FRIED CHICKEN WINGS. I got four of them for under $2 and a bottle of diet Dr. Pepper. I put the cold stuff in the cooler in the trunk and drove to the end of the parking lot facing 20^th. Sitting in the shade with the windows open for the breeze and eating my wings was THE• BEST• LUNCH• EVAR• ******

After that, I went to Trader Joe’s at the other end of town in search of cheese fondue. I wasn’t very hopeful, as that sort of thing tends to be seasonal ******* and I was right. There was none. So I assuaged my sorrow with a jar of cocoa almond spread and some frozen Crème brûlée. I’ll take the almond spread to Fresno with me and share the brûlée with Marv tonight for his birthday dinner.

End of trip. End of story. See ya next week.

*I’ll continue the story of the Virginia trip next week

**Savage Garden going to Chico, kd lang for the trip home

***Remember, you get FIVE WHOLE CENTS CREDIT for each bag!

****Not something to be taken for granted…

*****Spell check does NOT like the word ‘peckish.’ Kept trying to change it to ‘puckish.’

******Yes, I meant to spell it that way. Back off.

*******WHY, TRADER JOE’S? WHY??? Why not all year round?!?!?!?

Thankful/Positive (the end)

As I said  last Friday, this is the final Monday blog posting. The whole reason for it was to get me to focus on one positive thing from the previous week. I no longer need this prompt. I will try to incorporate more thankfulness in my Friday blogs.

So I will leave you with some of the words to my favorite Gaither hymn. Just yesterday we sang the chorus in church.

God sent His Son, they called Him Jesus

He came to love, heal and forgive

He lived and died to buy my pardon

An empty grave is there to prove my Savior lives!

Because He lives, I can face tomorrow

Because He lives, all fear is gone

Because I know He holds the future

And life is worth the living

Just because He lives!

Back From Virginia part 1

Well, as you can see by the photo, my baby boy got married. This pic was taken by Marv. I don’t want to violate any copyright laws, so those will be the only pics I show over the next few weeks while recounting our trip. Unfortunately, that means there are NO pics of Marv and I together. I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me to have someone take our pic with Marv’s camera, but there you go….The only pics of the two of us were taken by the wedding photographer. There were lots of people taking pics at the wedding, but none have Marv and I together. *sigh* Hindsight is indeed 20/20.

BUT…it was a great trip! Too much to do and see in too little time. And way too expensive to do again any time in the near future. I had a little notebook that I wrote in each day with the highlights of that day, and that’s what I will base these next blogs on. 

I’ve decided to drop the Monday posting, after the one on the 23^rd. The whole purpose of that was to get myself to focus on at least one positive during a week’s time. And I’ve done that now to the point where I don’t have to really talk about it each week. So unless I get a LOT of feedback on it, next Monday’s post will be the last. I intend to incorporate thankfulness in the Friday blogs. As the saying goes, “Each day is a gift from God…that’s why it’s called The Present.”

Now…about the trip:

Paula took us to the airport, which was a HUGE favor! Didn’t have to worry about leaving the car in long-term parking and paying big bucks when we got back. That also meant she could just drop us and our luggage off right in front of the terminal.

I was really not looking forward to going through security. I knew my knee would set off the alarms and I figured it was a forgone conclusion that I would be taken aside to have a female agent really check me out. I had worn pants that were loose enough that I could pull up the leg to show them my scar to prove the operation. Guess what? NO PROBLEM! I told the agent right away that I had a metal knee, I went through the x-ray machine, and that was it! After all that worry, the rest of the trip was a piece of cake!

When making the reservations online, there was a general “problem” box that we checked for me, which included difficulty with steps or stairs. We didn’t realize that meant there would be a wheelchair waiting for me at each plane change. That came in VERY handy in Atlanta, which is a HUGE airport. We would have been lost if it wasn’t for that. The gal who was wheeling me (at a very fast pace, I might add) knew exactly where the gate was and got us there after winding around all over, down an elevator, and included a ride in a tram train. I know we would have been able to find our way eventually, but the distance of that walk would have been very difficult for me.

Since we were flying a red-eye flight and knew this would be a LONG trip, we had specified aisle and window seats. Aisle for me and my tiny bladder (sigh) and window so Marv could lean against it and maybe sleep a bit. For some reason, known only to the airline, that was ignored and the long flight from LA to Atlanta had us both in middle seats in different rows. I hadn’t figured on getting any sleep anyway, but I REALLY hate being boxed in by people on either side. But we got through it. We started out for the airport on Tuesday at 3:30 pm California time (and this was after Marv had worked a full 8 hours) and arrived in Richmond on Wednesday at about 9am Virginia time. That’s almost a 15 hour trip any way you look at it.

But at the end of this tunnel was seeing my boy again, and getting to know my new daughter-in-law, and oh yes…IHOP!!

To be continued next week…♥

PS--when I went to post this, I discovered that Blogger had changed a few things. I HATE CHANGE. Just wanted you to know that...