Fresh fish. Man, it's just something missing from our diet. Who knew that in one fast year we would still be looking for good fish. OK, let me back track a little here.
Since this weekend marked our one year anniversary moving to UT we wanted to have a little celebration dinner. We have a real nice bottle of chardonnay from Napa that is just yelling at us to have for dinner so we thought it would be good to get some halibut and have a nice dinner. I figured I would pick up some halibut from Costco as that's been the best looking for as long as I can remember. (NOTE: the halibut I remember was seen in AK Costco) So I wasn't really anticipating problems when I stopped at Costco to pick up some for dinner on Saturday till I looked at what they had to offer. ICK. like as in REALLY ICK. So, I mulled the salmon and decided to go over this with Terry.
We figured there MUST be a seafood market in SLC. After all, the grocery stores actually have fish selections, but I wouldn't buy fish there as they have NO idea how to handle it and who knows how long it's been there. So we look on line and decide to find one that had very high ratings in downtown SLC near Temple Square. This is really downtown. We left our house about 11 am and headed out. Once we get to town and to the area we are supposed to go (cause we did certainly look this up on Google and had the map in hand) we realized it's Saturday market at the Pioneer park and you can hardly get near the fish market. We only had to drive around a few blocks before we could even get in the parking lot for the business but we managed.
So the fish market is on the end of this fancy market/deli place that basically you need to have the right shoes on, carry the right purse, etc to even be in the place and be taken seriously. This was not boding well. Then we find the doors to this place and walk in. UGH. First instinct was to turn around and walk out. Ever smell the bottom of a dock? This was worse. And while they list tons of types of fish, there was hardly ANY display. What a disappointment. One of the guys was trimming a large tuna and couldn't even cut it his knife was so dull. The halibut selections sucked. Plus were the tail pieces with skin on still so by the time you trimmed them you would have paper plate thick pieces. We quickly backed out and went to the car.
So, we figured we would find ourselves a burger and a phone book and try for another market. We got ourselves situated in town for the proximity for where we needed to go and had lunch. Found another market and after several times of flipping back and forth in the phone book maps we had an idea where we needed to go. After lunch we headed out and for the most part drove right to the area. There are large business clusters on both sides of the road so we have to figure out where in the world this place was. Course we picked the wrong side of the road first and had to back track and cross over to get to the other side.
This market was attached to a restaurant and also VERY high end. The fish at least didn't stink which was nice, but they had the halibut pre cut in small pieces, skin on, and were priced $6.99 and in very small print EACH. WHAT THE HECK? This fish was priced out at like 18.99 a pound. OH MAN were we ruing the day we could pull out a chunk of fish from the freezer that Terry caught and enjoy it!
So we headed to one of the Costco's in SLC to see if their selection was any better. At $10.99 a pound it's still pricey but it's a celebration and we weren't feeding anyone but us so we made our selection and headed home. Home by 4:30 in the afternoon. Home after trucking all over the west end of SLC trying to find our way around. Home after driving in all new areas we hadn't ever explored before. (and will likely not again) ; - )
So, we get home and open the fish and whew what a smell. It was all I could do to not chuck it. I rinsed it well, and trimmed it, and Costco's was ever so clever in packaging it and tucked a good 8 inches of thin tail meat that you really can't do a whole lot with under the filet making it look bigger. SUCK HEADS. This piece was at least without skin, but I still have to clean it up and slice it up. We ended up with 4 measly pieces that I put in a baggie with some olive oil and spices till the grill was ready. ALL the garbage went out immediately. baahh. ICK.
Got our salad made, got the wine out of the fridge so it had a chance to warm up a bit, had a white table cloth and napkins and made the little green folding table outside up to look extra special and we had dinner. The BEST part was Terry absolutely outdid him self with the grilling on the halibut. Once it was seared he moved it off the heat onto the foil and closed up the grill (with the holes still open for the heat) and we sat and enjoyed our salad first. Then the fish came off and it was PERFECT. Absolutely PERFECT. It no longer smelled or tasted or even hinted of fishy it was delicately seasoned and done PERFECT! Man you couldn't ask for a better meal. The salad was good, the wine was better, the fish was the best.
Here's to one year land locked in UT and hoping our son gets the fish sent soon. !!!
And to all you folks in AK! RELISH THAT WILDLIFE! Eat hearty, savor each and every bite, cause we are jealous!
ME
Monday, September 28, 2009
Thursday, September 24, 2009
to Acclimate
we are approaching our one year anniversary here in UT. In fact Saturday at about 5 pm will mark one year. whew, several days drive on the road with the cats. Several stressful hotel rooms, the poor kitties being boarded for like 10 days while I was in Montana, Terry had to travel to Vernal UT, and then back to Montana to then have both of us travel for a few days in NE MT to visit his family in Sidney. Poor poor kitties. they were sick, tired, lost a lot of weight and still purred when we held them. They must have had the strangest thoughts.
Not unlike ours as we viewed our new home. At least our new area, and man it was gorgeous. Trees of every variety, flowers blooming, ornamental grasses of all types I can imagine everywhere. Lucky for us the local BYU (yup, that is THE BYU) was having away games cause our landing spot was across from the stadium and they had a room that would take cats. For all of 5 days we were there. SO GLAD our Realtor located a condo in Sandy UT for us on short term. We got it for a month and then weekly after that. We only needed a month.
In that time we have made decisions that will affect us for awhile. We set up banking (and changed our banking since then) we bought a house (and remodeled it already with more to come) I had work (and for my safety and sake left that and looked for something else) I found great work and am still there (Thank you God) We made a February trip back to see family in AK (cause EVERYONE in AK is Family no matter what) We have agreed to foster our daughters two cats (and haven't killed them yet cause we learned never to say "what's the worse that can happen cause it will ) We travelled to Napa CA to see our daughter and son in Law and on up to Oregon for a dear friends 60th birthday, And we have seen a great deal of this state and really enjoy this a lot!
But back to acclimating. We now feel that 80 isn't so bad cause it's better then 100. And we are realizing that when you have 80's to 100 + that 50's and below are chilly. It may have to do with the fact that you are now in tank tops and shorts where you wouldn't have been in AK but again with the acclimating. The weather is exactly what we had when we moved here and with that it's much cooler than a month ago so it's Divine! A year ago we were suffering and VERY glad we had air in the car. The other night we did make the decision to close up the house cause the lows would be in the low 40's for the night. In AK the house would still be wide open with fan's on to bring in the breeze. We no longer travel with coats in the car all the time but have to remember that we'll need them in the near future. We no longer travel with rain coats either cause for one thing the rain is warm, and it won't last all day for sure only a short time no matter what and afater that you will dry out and not get hypo thermia. Another cloud may come by and rain some more, but in general you only have to wait it out.
We still marvel at some early termination dust on the mountain and every one here didn't even really notice. The snow melted the same day probably before noon, but it was there, and a special sight when you watch and follow the intricate cycles of weather. We appreciate that when you travel from home to the southern part of the state is gets hotter even though it's well past sunset. We are eternally thankful to experience all of this.
So acclimate we will, I hope we can handle the cold this year, cause it's nothing like we are used to and promises to be yet another fun winter, but oh wait........ it won't be for another two to three months. ; - )
Mag
Not unlike ours as we viewed our new home. At least our new area, and man it was gorgeous. Trees of every variety, flowers blooming, ornamental grasses of all types I can imagine everywhere. Lucky for us the local BYU (yup, that is THE BYU) was having away games cause our landing spot was across from the stadium and they had a room that would take cats. For all of 5 days we were there. SO GLAD our Realtor located a condo in Sandy UT for us on short term. We got it for a month and then weekly after that. We only needed a month.
In that time we have made decisions that will affect us for awhile. We set up banking (and changed our banking since then) we bought a house (and remodeled it already with more to come) I had work (and for my safety and sake left that and looked for something else) I found great work and am still there (Thank you God) We made a February trip back to see family in AK (cause EVERYONE in AK is Family no matter what) We have agreed to foster our daughters two cats (and haven't killed them yet cause we learned never to say "what's the worse that can happen cause it will ) We travelled to Napa CA to see our daughter and son in Law and on up to Oregon for a dear friends 60th birthday, And we have seen a great deal of this state and really enjoy this a lot!
But back to acclimating. We now feel that 80 isn't so bad cause it's better then 100. And we are realizing that when you have 80's to 100 + that 50's and below are chilly. It may have to do with the fact that you are now in tank tops and shorts where you wouldn't have been in AK but again with the acclimating. The weather is exactly what we had when we moved here and with that it's much cooler than a month ago so it's Divine! A year ago we were suffering and VERY glad we had air in the car. The other night we did make the decision to close up the house cause the lows would be in the low 40's for the night. In AK the house would still be wide open with fan's on to bring in the breeze. We no longer travel with coats in the car all the time but have to remember that we'll need them in the near future. We no longer travel with rain coats either cause for one thing the rain is warm, and it won't last all day for sure only a short time no matter what and afater that you will dry out and not get hypo thermia. Another cloud may come by and rain some more, but in general you only have to wait it out.
We still marvel at some early termination dust on the mountain and every one here didn't even really notice. The snow melted the same day probably before noon, but it was there, and a special sight when you watch and follow the intricate cycles of weather. We appreciate that when you travel from home to the southern part of the state is gets hotter even though it's well past sunset. We are eternally thankful to experience all of this.
So acclimate we will, I hope we can handle the cold this year, cause it's nothing like we are used to and promises to be yet another fun winter, but oh wait........ it won't be for another two to three months. ; - )
Mag
Monday, September 14, 2009
Zion National Park 2009
WOW. What a great weekend we had. The weather was grand, the vistas were astonishing. Here we are in Springdale with a view of the cliffs.
We arrived in Hurrican UT Friday evening in time to settle in for the night. It's a 3 to 3.5 hour drive so since I could skedaddle out of work a little early that made for getting out of town easier. A decent enough room at the Travel lodge for a great price. Funny though, we had to stop off in a little town Toquerville first to drop off some paint to the local dealer. He lives in Toquerville and the store is in Cedar City but since we were coming through later we just dropped it off to him direct. We met at the 'little' post office and made the exchange. It was dark by then and the temps outside had been as cool as 72 degrees, until we started descending from Cedar City. We watched our outside temps go back up to 85 degrees. Welcome to the southern Utah climate. So from turning the air conditioner to warmer for a while, to more cold later was very weird.
On Saturday morning we went into Cedar City for the horse parade. I was expecting a lot of horses but need to remember it's a small town out west and they do the best they can. We found the most perfect place to sit and enjoyed ourselves just the same. Apparently Cedar City has LOTS of parades. It's a great little town with a lot going on and we had a good time.
From there we went to the park. For the first day we just took the drive through the park, tunnel and on to the other side. Stopped along the way to take pictures and admire the amazing views. Yes pictures will come soon.
Saturday night we went out to dinner with the dealer we delivered the paint to. What a fun night, good food and lots of laughter!
Sunday we got up early so we could take advantage of the cool temps and better light. It wasn't quite the gronk of doom but 5 am is early. Got a hearty breakfast at the local JB's and on we went to the park. Our goal Sunday was to park at the lodge and take the shuttle bus up Zion Canyon. You can not drive your cars into the canyon during peak season but the shuttle is free, and while not a whistle stop has lots of stops you can get on and off at your leisure.
We opted for some of the easier hiking areas as we aren't exactly versed in hard core hiking. The Emerald Pools hike went very well and we pushed ourselves up to the middle pool before descending and taking the Kayenta trail out. it's about a mile and a half and in places you are climbing up stairs that have quite the steps to them. We saw dear, birds, and a little lizard's tail. He was too quick to see him entirely, just saw his tail.
From there we hopped back on the bus to the end of the road and walked the trail to the Temple of Sinawava. We made it most of the way back and decided to call it quits as we were hot and tired and sore so we headed back to the bus for the ride to the lodge. Probably another couple of miles of just walking on cement that is covered with sand on my poor foot didn't do it a world of good, but the sights were amazing!
Off to work today, I'll work on some more pictures later this week. We had three cameras along and I need to figure out what all to compile. Plus Terry took some really nice little video clips I'm hoping will post on the Gmail account. I'll be sure to give it my best shot.
Till then, Happy trails to you . . . .
Friday, September 11, 2009
8 years ago today
I had planned on taking the day off as we just got our newest member of the four legged crew spayed and I didn't want to leave Goldie home alone.
Terry's co worker called at an ungodly hour to have us turn on the TV. At that point the towers were still standing but certainly not for long. As the phone was ringing, I had no idea what ungodly hour really meant. It wasn't long before I knew.
The horror as we watched was over whelming. We called our children, we prayed for people we never knew. We prayed for ourselves and our country.
We are still at war with the evil people in the world to keep America and others safe from this kind of terrorist act. Even at that the liberal front thinks we have gone to far.
Do you think the family, friends, and co workers of the people in the Trade centers, pentagon, and jets think so? DO YOU??
Get up AMERICA, WAKE UP America. Freedom, liberty and justice are at stake here. Also the lives of MANY MANY service personnel. They are out there for us.
Fly your flags today and always!
Thank a service man for their service!
And for heavens sake be thankfull of EVERY THING YOU HAVE.
ME
Terry's co worker called at an ungodly hour to have us turn on the TV. At that point the towers were still standing but certainly not for long. As the phone was ringing, I had no idea what ungodly hour really meant. It wasn't long before I knew.
The horror as we watched was over whelming. We called our children, we prayed for people we never knew. We prayed for ourselves and our country.
We are still at war with the evil people in the world to keep America and others safe from this kind of terrorist act. Even at that the liberal front thinks we have gone to far.
Do you think the family, friends, and co workers of the people in the Trade centers, pentagon, and jets think so? DO YOU??
Get up AMERICA, WAKE UP America. Freedom, liberty and justice are at stake here. Also the lives of MANY MANY service personnel. They are out there for us.
Fly your flags today and always!
Thank a service man for their service!
And for heavens sake be thankfull of EVERY THING YOU HAVE.
ME
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Wow a year ago today we were heading to St George Canada
Well on our way to America and new things. Geeze we fixed up painted stained and sold the house in AK. Spent a couple of nights in beautiful downtown Spenard in Anchorage figured out what to do with the cats that were coming with, sprained my ankle at 6 Rob Lees (thank you very much and please fix your friggin entry way. )
We made it to Destruction Bay and spent our first night under the most incredible stars I've ever seen. It was a miserable night however, freaked out cats, I had caught a nasty cold, and it was down right freezing cold. However, I would go back just to see the stars.
Funny, when we drove up to AK 19 years ago I swore I wouldn't do that drive again. But I would do the drive we did coming south again in a heart beat. The Cassier Hiway was definitely worth it.
Now Utah is feeling familiar. It's almost a year that we arrived here since we spent some time in Montana catching up with Family so on the 26th we'll officially be here a year already. But the weather is more familiar, not quite as hot as the last couple of months and the evenings are cool. Plus we are used to it getting dark at night all year round. LOL so we aren't adjusting for that anymore.
We are presently planning for a garden next year. This gives us several projects this fall to help the time go by. I want to take out the chrysanthemums that are along the front of the house and put in some purple sedge grass. It's not supposed to be a perennial here but I've seen it in some major plantings so I'm willing to give it a try. There is a cute blue grass clump as well I want in front of the sedge grass. These stupid mums are just too big where they are and I believe the neighbor would LOVE them. He has the stupid bushes with thorns, and equally hates them.
Also the rose hedge between our houses is going to get a major overhaul. Like cut it down to about a foot tall, cover with leaves and apparently here a plastic bag and let them set for the winter. They are too tall and unruly when left to their own devices.
We continue with our big plans to finish the basement here. This will include a half bath at the bottom of the stairs, a master on the other side and finish the bedroom and laundry area. We need to fit a closet in and still have room for laundry. The master bath will be a 3/4 bath with a shower. We'll leave the tubs upstairs. One of our thoughts is to look on a local real estate site to see what the value is of homes that then would add up to 5 bedrooms and 4 baths. That's only finishing the basement. If we get good reports on that we may try something even more daring.
The garage here sucks and needs a lot of help. Size is a major concern as even though it was supposed to be a 2 car garage you couldn't really get two cars in here. Even with our less is more change of pace. SO Depending on the market and all we'll look at extending the garage 8 feet into the side yard. Doing some cement work, changing the front of the garage to have two doors with a fair space between them, finishing the garage right, then move the shed over so it's still in the same proximity to the back of the garage that it is now, and fix the back patio and increase the size. As long as we are going to have cement work done, have it all done. The back step out the patio door is horridly designed and seriously I don't think it's legal. so that needs addressed, and the increased patio would be a huge welcome addition to the back yard.
Well we can still dream can't we?
It's been good here in UT! It should only get better!
ME
We made it to Destruction Bay and spent our first night under the most incredible stars I've ever seen. It was a miserable night however, freaked out cats, I had caught a nasty cold, and it was down right freezing cold. However, I would go back just to see the stars.
Funny, when we drove up to AK 19 years ago I swore I wouldn't do that drive again. But I would do the drive we did coming south again in a heart beat. The Cassier Hiway was definitely worth it.
Now Utah is feeling familiar. It's almost a year that we arrived here since we spent some time in Montana catching up with Family so on the 26th we'll officially be here a year already. But the weather is more familiar, not quite as hot as the last couple of months and the evenings are cool. Plus we are used to it getting dark at night all year round. LOL so we aren't adjusting for that anymore.
We are presently planning for a garden next year. This gives us several projects this fall to help the time go by. I want to take out the chrysanthemums that are along the front of the house and put in some purple sedge grass. It's not supposed to be a perennial here but I've seen it in some major plantings so I'm willing to give it a try. There is a cute blue grass clump as well I want in front of the sedge grass. These stupid mums are just too big where they are and I believe the neighbor would LOVE them. He has the stupid bushes with thorns, and equally hates them.
Also the rose hedge between our houses is going to get a major overhaul. Like cut it down to about a foot tall, cover with leaves and apparently here a plastic bag and let them set for the winter. They are too tall and unruly when left to their own devices.
We continue with our big plans to finish the basement here. This will include a half bath at the bottom of the stairs, a master on the other side and finish the bedroom and laundry area. We need to fit a closet in and still have room for laundry. The master bath will be a 3/4 bath with a shower. We'll leave the tubs upstairs. One of our thoughts is to look on a local real estate site to see what the value is of homes that then would add up to 5 bedrooms and 4 baths. That's only finishing the basement. If we get good reports on that we may try something even more daring.
The garage here sucks and needs a lot of help. Size is a major concern as even though it was supposed to be a 2 car garage you couldn't really get two cars in here. Even with our less is more change of pace. SO Depending on the market and all we'll look at extending the garage 8 feet into the side yard. Doing some cement work, changing the front of the garage to have two doors with a fair space between them, finishing the garage right, then move the shed over so it's still in the same proximity to the back of the garage that it is now, and fix the back patio and increase the size. As long as we are going to have cement work done, have it all done. The back step out the patio door is horridly designed and seriously I don't think it's legal. so that needs addressed, and the increased patio would be a huge welcome addition to the back yard.
Well we can still dream can't we?
It's been good here in UT! It should only get better!
ME
Monday, August 31, 2009
Moving right along
After we got back from vacation we started concentrating on what to do with the living room area. It presently has three chairs, a coffee table, a couple of stands, a lamp and two litter boxes that accommodate the little fosterlings we have. Our living room in this house is hardly more than a pass through from the front door. While it's not a main room of the house it is expected to be used for receiving guests. Yes, I know the litter boxes could pose as quite a distractant but we do figure that's better than the alternative.
So the window wall will hold a respectable sofa at 72" long. Bigger than a love seat but not ginormous. So off we went on a search. We stopped at our IKEA store and found a nice little sofa that would pretty much work. Rather than just getting that, we also looked at a few other places coming to the conclusion that we liked the one at IKEA best of all. By that time of day we were pretty beat and headed home to do some figuring on how on earth we were going to get the sofa home. After all, we are back from the vacation that we took our little pick up truck and sold it to our daughter in California. We took measurements and started looking at the cars.
We figured my car would work and it would fit. It would require shoving the drivers seat all the way forward so you can hardly drive but for one shortish trip figured it would be worth it. So the next day we headed to town only to find out the sofa we selected was over sold. AS IN HERE YESTERDAY, GONE TODAY. But there was some good news in this. We discovered we had confused the tags on the display model and we thought it was the size we wanted, well we knew it was the size we wanted but thought it was the love seat. WRONG. The display model was indeed the sofa. That was OK cause after seeing it again we still felt it was what we wanted. So we put our name on one and were told it would be about a week that there were some in transit. Or we could look on line and watch for the shipments coming in.
OK so we tried looking on line only to realize that particular model is not in their computer. I called customer service and was told an entirely different story about the sofa's. They had been on order or in transit for like 3 - 4 weeks not days and now they didn't know what the deal was. We should call back every day to see where the order is. And NO they can't take an order over the phone but once the sofa was in the ware house, they could hold it for 24 hours.
OK so not being highly encouraged by this I basically blew it off figuring we'd go to plan B. what ever that might be. Till last night at 6:15 we get a call from IKEA that the sofa is in. Must have been instant transportation but heck it's in, and no we can't hold it. Can't do a phone transaction etc. By then it was almost 6:30 and the store closes at 7 pm. We didn't even have a good idea which car to haul this home in. So Husband threw in several tie down straps to his Escape and off we DASHED to IKEA. It's 33 miles on the highway and we missed three lights to get there at about 5 after 7 on the car clock. Luckily there were tons of people streaming out loading stuff etc, so I snuck in the entrance / exit cause the main doors were locked already.
There I walked back through the cash lanes to our sofa. The sales person had our name on one, and had it loaded on to a couple of carts so all I had to do was roll it to the check out and go. Man! that was AMAZING!!!!!
So we hauled the couch out and shoved it into the Escape, strapped it in and then strapped the tail gate down as far as we could. Ran the air conditioner on high all the way home to keep fresh air through the car and from 6:30 pm to 8:15 pm we did the turnaround including loading up. Course we drove the speed limit home. LOL And saw no less than 4 people pulled over for what ever reason. Thankfully they did not see us on our way to IKEA.
The sofa is now safely in the garage till tonight when we'll so some major moving around of our meager selection of living room furniture. The litter placements still are a concern for me, as things have been going so well. We'll just have to see.
And to the nice exceptional person at IKEA! Stand proud. You did a great customer service act and it so worked out for us and while it totally sucked to get the call that late at night and to have to scramble like we did, you had that ready to go. APPLAUSE!!!!!!! and THANK YOU!!
ME
So the window wall will hold a respectable sofa at 72" long. Bigger than a love seat but not ginormous. So off we went on a search. We stopped at our IKEA store and found a nice little sofa that would pretty much work. Rather than just getting that, we also looked at a few other places coming to the conclusion that we liked the one at IKEA best of all. By that time of day we were pretty beat and headed home to do some figuring on how on earth we were going to get the sofa home. After all, we are back from the vacation that we took our little pick up truck and sold it to our daughter in California. We took measurements and started looking at the cars.
We figured my car would work and it would fit. It would require shoving the drivers seat all the way forward so you can hardly drive but for one shortish trip figured it would be worth it. So the next day we headed to town only to find out the sofa we selected was over sold. AS IN HERE YESTERDAY, GONE TODAY. But there was some good news in this. We discovered we had confused the tags on the display model and we thought it was the size we wanted, well we knew it was the size we wanted but thought it was the love seat. WRONG. The display model was indeed the sofa. That was OK cause after seeing it again we still felt it was what we wanted. So we put our name on one and were told it would be about a week that there were some in transit. Or we could look on line and watch for the shipments coming in.
OK so we tried looking on line only to realize that particular model is not in their computer. I called customer service and was told an entirely different story about the sofa's. They had been on order or in transit for like 3 - 4 weeks not days and now they didn't know what the deal was. We should call back every day to see where the order is. And NO they can't take an order over the phone but once the sofa was in the ware house, they could hold it for 24 hours.
OK so not being highly encouraged by this I basically blew it off figuring we'd go to plan B. what ever that might be. Till last night at 6:15 we get a call from IKEA that the sofa is in. Must have been instant transportation but heck it's in, and no we can't hold it. Can't do a phone transaction etc. By then it was almost 6:30 and the store closes at 7 pm. We didn't even have a good idea which car to haul this home in. So Husband threw in several tie down straps to his Escape and off we DASHED to IKEA. It's 33 miles on the highway and we missed three lights to get there at about 5 after 7 on the car clock. Luckily there were tons of people streaming out loading stuff etc, so I snuck in the entrance / exit cause the main doors were locked already.
There I walked back through the cash lanes to our sofa. The sales person had our name on one, and had it loaded on to a couple of carts so all I had to do was roll it to the check out and go. Man! that was AMAZING!!!!!
So we hauled the couch out and shoved it into the Escape, strapped it in and then strapped the tail gate down as far as we could. Ran the air conditioner on high all the way home to keep fresh air through the car and from 6:30 pm to 8:15 pm we did the turnaround including loading up. Course we drove the speed limit home. LOL And saw no less than 4 people pulled over for what ever reason. Thankfully they did not see us on our way to IKEA.
The sofa is now safely in the garage till tonight when we'll so some major moving around of our meager selection of living room furniture. The litter placements still are a concern for me, as things have been going so well. We'll just have to see.
And to the nice exceptional person at IKEA! Stand proud. You did a great customer service act and it so worked out for us and while it totally sucked to get the call that late at night and to have to scramble like we did, you had that ready to go. APPLAUSE!!!!!!! and THANK YOU!!
ME
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Home at last!
Wow, what a darn good trip. We got home at about 5:30 last night and had 4 kitties very glad to see us. However, we were more glad to see our neighbors that took care of our house. The girls mowed the lawn while we were gone. It was a fantastic surprise to come home to. I've downloaded some 300 pictures to the computer and will have to take some time to go through them to send them on the way. The Kitties all did well with NO horrible surprises for all the time we were gone. This is a good thing.
We had so much fun celebrating our friends birthday. It was his 60th and he partied like a youngin'. Their home sits in a secluded area on the edge of Cottage Grove with a river behind them and yards on both sides and great big pine trees around. I'm not sure how many folks were able to come celebrate but he was congratulated by all the best. His daughter from Washington came down with a close family friend that I believe was pretty much another daughter, and the best surprise ever was his daughter from Hawaii was along for the trip. Everyone kept the secret and the surprise was complete.
The house is so nice and I know they have done several projects to it to make it this way. Just a charmer of a home. I think my favorite is the 4 season room they enclosed on the back side. What a wonderful space all in all. We were made to feel like family and really felt it while we were there.
Our drive from Arcata to Cottage Grove was calm and beautiful. There is some really pretty country side out there.
The speed limits in Oregon suck. The main highway is 65 but the secondary highways are 55 and that is frankly too darn slow. The impact of this really didn't hit us till we left our friends and headed on our merry way home.
Not only that, but we got caught in the old, we aren't familiar with where we are so we'll just follow the map and hope it works out. Well, the little 36 mile cut across that was slated to be a scenic byway was the most windy road with zero scenic to it we have ever seen. Two lane only with a center double yellow line striped. The trees were tall and right up to the edge of the road and there were bicyclist all along the way. I really do not have anything against folks out on their bikes, but this road was not meant for both cars and bikes. It was probably the most challenging technical drive yet. Speeds up to all of 20 as you muscled your car up the road, a lot of the curves were 15 mph and they meant it. It was so bad I was buried under anything I could find cause it made me horridly car sick. The tall trees and the sunlight added the strobe affect with the lights. IT DID NOT HELP in any way. It was the most miserable 36 miles we've ever driven. And once committed we couldn't do anything but continue. Solid traffic both ways.
This road did come over some incredible landscape. We crested the pass at the Deschutes National Forest near the Three Sisters wilderness area. This is geological wildness. Total old lava flow from God knows where. I'm definitely going to be looking this one up. If I hadn't been so car sick we may have stopped but the visitor center was solidly packed so on we went. The lava flows are certainly old, but man, sure makes you glad you weren't alive then, and more glad that what ever volcano or event caused this has calmed down. The lava flows continue well through Idaho. Amazing landscape.
Once past that we had a much more normal drive over to Bend Oregon, and on to Burns and stopped for the night in Ontario Oregon. It's right on the border to Idaho and a nice little town at that. Our goal was to get to Nampa ID and we made it to within 30 miles. Close enough.
We left Cottage Grove at about noon and got to our hotel rest at 9 ish. We were beat. Found a Best Western that was probably the nicest place we've stayed in for a long time and crashed for the night.
Up and out of there around 10 am and home by 5:30. Not a bad day of it.
whew, back to work. gots to run.
I know, Pictures are coming. I'll work on them between laundry loads tonight.
ME
We had so much fun celebrating our friends birthday. It was his 60th and he partied like a youngin'. Their home sits in a secluded area on the edge of Cottage Grove with a river behind them and yards on both sides and great big pine trees around. I'm not sure how many folks were able to come celebrate but he was congratulated by all the best. His daughter from Washington came down with a close family friend that I believe was pretty much another daughter, and the best surprise ever was his daughter from Hawaii was along for the trip. Everyone kept the secret and the surprise was complete.
The house is so nice and I know they have done several projects to it to make it this way. Just a charmer of a home. I think my favorite is the 4 season room they enclosed on the back side. What a wonderful space all in all. We were made to feel like family and really felt it while we were there.
Our drive from Arcata to Cottage Grove was calm and beautiful. There is some really pretty country side out there.
The speed limits in Oregon suck. The main highway is 65 but the secondary highways are 55 and that is frankly too darn slow. The impact of this really didn't hit us till we left our friends and headed on our merry way home.
Not only that, but we got caught in the old, we aren't familiar with where we are so we'll just follow the map and hope it works out. Well, the little 36 mile cut across that was slated to be a scenic byway was the most windy road with zero scenic to it we have ever seen. Two lane only with a center double yellow line striped. The trees were tall and right up to the edge of the road and there were bicyclist all along the way. I really do not have anything against folks out on their bikes, but this road was not meant for both cars and bikes. It was probably the most challenging technical drive yet. Speeds up to all of 20 as you muscled your car up the road, a lot of the curves were 15 mph and they meant it. It was so bad I was buried under anything I could find cause it made me horridly car sick. The tall trees and the sunlight added the strobe affect with the lights. IT DID NOT HELP in any way. It was the most miserable 36 miles we've ever driven. And once committed we couldn't do anything but continue. Solid traffic both ways.
This road did come over some incredible landscape. We crested the pass at the Deschutes National Forest near the Three Sisters wilderness area. This is geological wildness. Total old lava flow from God knows where. I'm definitely going to be looking this one up. If I hadn't been so car sick we may have stopped but the visitor center was solidly packed so on we went. The lava flows are certainly old, but man, sure makes you glad you weren't alive then, and more glad that what ever volcano or event caused this has calmed down. The lava flows continue well through Idaho. Amazing landscape.
Once past that we had a much more normal drive over to Bend Oregon, and on to Burns and stopped for the night in Ontario Oregon. It's right on the border to Idaho and a nice little town at that. Our goal was to get to Nampa ID and we made it to within 30 miles. Close enough.
We left Cottage Grove at about noon and got to our hotel rest at 9 ish. We were beat. Found a Best Western that was probably the nicest place we've stayed in for a long time and crashed for the night.
Up and out of there around 10 am and home by 5:30. Not a bad day of it.
whew, back to work. gots to run.
I know, Pictures are coming. I'll work on them between laundry loads tonight.
ME
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