Life at Lake Powhatan-1

Our moss covered front yard is just one of the many reasons we're loving it here.  The 11 acre lake stocked with trout is another.  Frequent campfires from wood we gather from cleaning out fire rings is one more.  We're 17 minutes from down town Asheville and Jubilee! and less than 10 minutes from favorite cousin William's house. 

The dogwoods were in bloom when we arrived and this iris greeted us a few days later.  And then I spotted my first lady slipper in the woods since leaving Boone.  What a treat!

Often my days start by waking before dawn and riding the Burg down to the lake to fish.  It's about a 2 minute ride if I abide by the speed limit, 15mph.  Our commute to the gatehouse takes about 3 minutes. 

Two casts resulted in these 2 beauties and we had supper for that day.  Since then I found a recipe for smoking trout and they are delicious! 

This is our "office", the gatehouse.  Lynn and I work at the same time with her handling the paper work and money and me taking care of customer contact and outside duties.  I greet folks and get the paper work started, then she registers them.  If they need firewood or ice, I take care of that.  It's great working as a team and we both like it a lot. 

Tickets for Brewgrass just went on sale so I gotta go and see if I can snag a couple.  Thanks for stopping by!  See ya real soon...

Jordon Lake Adventure, part 2

On Friday night of our week at Jordon Lake, I managed to gather 14 of us for dinner at Piccola Italia, a favorite, family owned restaurant in Cameron Village, Raleigh.  LaVerne and I went there often, as did she and her sister, Marianne.   On this night there was me and Lynn, sisters Barbara and Nancy, Jennifer and her husband, Mike; daughter Barbara, Trey, Houston and Patrick; Derick and his girls, Lauren and Leah and their Nana, Diane.  The food was terrific, the atmosphere warm and homey and it was so good to be with so much family, as always.  I toasted the absent guest of honor, Jason, because it was his skill and hard work as a baseball player that brought us all together.   Thank you Jason! 

Before leaving Jordon Lake, I went to Chatham County to talk with the DA about my parking citation.  Unfortunately, he wouldn't talk to me because it wasn't yet "in the system".  I'm thinking, "well it's in MY system and I'm having to deal with it!"  But I didn't say it.  I plan to have my day in court May 3 and will take my photos with me.  More later.

It was synchronicity that had me in the area on the Sunday of Bil and Cher Holton's Ordination celebration at their Unity church in Durham.  It was a wonderful ceremony and they were surprised to see me.  I was surprised when they reminded me that I had been the person to introduce them to Unity back in the 80's.  I surprised again when they recognized me during the service that morning.  It was a very uplifting experience to say the least and I'm very glad I went.

The photos of Bil and Cher didn't turn out well, but this one of me and Cher did.  Bil looks great after his heart surgery several weeks ago and is almost back to 100%.  It was so good to see these old friends and be present for their big occasion. 

And finally their was the great family bowling match involving me, Derick and the 4 grand kids.  Unfortunately, I didn't get a good pic of all of us, but this one captures the mood of that morning.  I trailed for most of the match and couldn't remember the last time I'd bowled.  We had a small gallery consisting of Barbara, Barbara, Trey, Diane, Nancy and Lynn cheering us on.  The thought of being beaten by my 8 year old grand daughter really bugged me, so in the 10th frame I relaxed and recalled by game of old.  Finishing with a spare and a strike put me ahead of them all and my honor was preserved one more time.  After all, I couldn't let them think that I let them win, could I? 

Overall it was a wonderful week with family in spite of the parking incident.  It was just too short.

Next time, life at Lake Powhatan.  It is grand!

Jordon Lake Adventure

Barbara, Nancy and Lynn at Top of the Hill, Chapel Hill

We arrived at Jordon Lake campground on March 27 and after setting up, went to find sisters Barbara and Nancy.  We had a nice Italian dinner, did a lot of catching up and got back to the campground around 10.  The gate was locked, no parking signs everywhere and our home on wheels was a hundred or so yards away with Tinkerbell locked inside ready for a pee break, I'm sure.  There was a traffic island in the entry way, not marked "No Parking", so I pulled up on it and we walked in.  I left a note on the dash board with our site number, saying we'd return at 8 the next morning to get the car when the gate opened.

Next morning we got to the car at 7:50 and I dropped Lynn off the scooter to bring it back to our site.  There was a parking citation under the wiper and on top of the note, stating a $25 fine and $190 in court costs for illegal parking!  I was furious!  But since we had a baseball game to go to that morning, so I just put the ticket on a back burner until after the game.

Our main reason for leaving Florida a little early and coming to the area was to watch grand nephew Jason play in the first National High School Invitational Baseball Tournament in Cary, NC.  Only 16 teams were invited and many were ranked, although Sarasota High wasn't ranked at the time.  As soon as I heard about the tournament back in December, I invited all of my family and some friends as well.  Above you see my first wife, Diane, companion Lynn, me and grand daughters Lauren and Leah at the first game.  Later in the week Derick came to some games and daughter Barbara and her family made it down for dinner Friday night and bowling Saturday. 

Sarasota won their first game 14-2 and Jason did very well.  How exciting!  In their next game
Sarasota was leading 5-2 going into the last of the 7th inning (they only play 7) and the other team loaded the bases!  With one out, the batter hit a grounder to the 3rd baseman who tagged the base, threw it to first base (in the dirt!) and Jason scooped it for the 3rd out to end the game.  Whew.  It was great baseball!  Unfortunately they lost the next game and their final game was cancelled due to rain.  Overall they ended up in the top 4 and we were all very proud!

Barbara, Jason and Jennifer

This slow Internet connection is driving me batty so, to be continued...

RV With a Penthouse

We left Florida on March 26, headed back to NC for the spring, summer and fall seasons.  We stopped in Yewassee, SC for the night and this was our neighbor.  It was a home-made penthouse on wheels!  A very clever design, well done and it looked pretty good.  I never figured how they got up to the penthouse and didn't get a chance to ask them. 

Hope to blog more tomorrow or the next day, our days off this week.  We love living and working at Lake Powhatan and have already had a few interesting experiences.  Words can't describe how glad we are to be home.  This morning I caught 2 nice rainbows out of the lake and cooked them on the grill for lunch.  Oh yeah!

Next time: the first invitational high school baseball tournament in Cary, NC; a gathering of my family there; my $215 parking citation at Jordan Lake; 2 old friends become Unity ministers; first days at Lake Powhatan.  See you later...

Birds & Birds

I love birds and always have.  My first parakeet was appropriately named Tweety and he found my grandmother in Miami.  She was hanging clothes on the line when he landed on her shoulder and she just walked in the house.  He was a fine pet for many years.  I'll miss all the birds here in Florida, both the natural ones and the man made ones.  These pics are a tribute to both.

The air show in Punta Gorda was excellent, but an incident afterward left a bad taste.  We were walking down a 2 lane road with one side for pedestrians and the other for cars.  We had just passed a sheriff's car when I heard a sound behind me like someone falling on the road.  I turned around to see a man picking himself up off the pavement and a small, ratty looking car swerving back into the car lane.  The sheriff immediately put on his lights and pulled the car over.  A tall guy in the passenger seat got out yelling at the sheriff "He spit on her!"  I couldn't hear what the officer said, but the big guy quickly turned and got back in the car.  By that time the guy who'd been knocked down arrived at the car.  He was unhurt but very unhappy to say the least.  He was more than glad that the sheriff was right there and had seen it all.  Last I saw the officer was writing a ticket to the mouthy lady! 

My love of birds inspired my love of airplanes and my desire to become a pilot.  This P-51 was always one of my favorites. 

I think this is a green heron but I couldn't find it in my book.  Sure was pretty!

Always wanted to experience the thrill of an open cockpit.  Maybe one of these days...

A great blue heron at Nokomis Beach, FL. 

This Lockheed Electra was so shiny and pretty!  Just wanted to stand and stare at it!  Which I did!

Another blue heron. 

And finally this B-25 that looked like brand new.  What a beauty!  Sure would love to fly one just a little bit!

Tomorrow we leave for North Carolina and it sure will be good to be home for a while.  Watching the Tar Heels play basketball just makes me more homesick.  The game with Kansas is about to begin, which ought to be a hum-dinger, so I'm signing off for now.  Thanks for stopping by!

Class 70-08 Raindance/Gombey Reunion

Recently I flew to Dallas, TX for my Air Force Undergraduate Pilot Training (UPT) class reunion.  It was a blast!  A few people had changed very little while most of us had changed a lot.  Of the 36 who graduated, 31 are still living and 30 attended the event plus lots of the original wives.  Only 1 of us, Frank Egan, was lost in combat in Viet Nam.  We drank a toast to him and our other deceased comrades during the dinner program.  It was the first time I had said the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag in more years than I can remember, and it felt very good. 

Don Smith, Connie Caulfield, Mike Caulfield

There are more pictures from the event than I can ever post here, with my camera and 2 professional photographers capturing  them.  My roommate at the event, Don Smith, and Connie and Mike Caulfield are seen here.  Mike, Joel Walton and Del Williams were my carpool buddies during UPT and we got to know each other quite well.  Plus we all flew missions together at one time or another. 

Gary Hind, Byron Lichtenberg

Gary Hind was our ranking student pilot as a captain and remains "our fearless leader" along with his wife, Dottie.  Byron Lichtenberg finished first in our class and went on to become a payload specialist on 2 space shuttle missions.  His presentation on his experiences in space was more than fascinating, especially some of the pictures.  My favorite was not in space but one of he and Stephen Hawking, the famed physicist, having a zero g experience while flying parabolas.  Hawkins flew 6 of them that day and wanted to do more, but pulling the 1.8 g's to set them up was hard on his frail body.

Byron, Stephen Hawking

This experience reminded me of what a fine group of men this was and still is: smart, well educated, compassionate, accomplished.  And there wasn't a jerk in the bunch - not one!  Of course we all graduated as pilots, but some went on to be test pilots, airline pilots, and an astronaut.  In addition, there was an engineer, a lawyer, an assistant secretary to the army, a major general, a brigadier general, politicians, entrepreneurs and business owners.  What a group! 

Joe Hawes

There is no way this post would be complete without acknowledging the men who made it happen:  Mike Caulfield and Joe Hawes.  These guys got the ball rolling and kept it going until everything was so well done.  Kudos!  Then there was Byron Lichtenberg with his outstanding photos and presentation about space travel, and Pete Blair with his making of a great CD.  Each participant provided bios and pictures which made the entire experience last over months and not just a day or two.  My deepest thanks to all of you!  I'm honored to be a part of this group.  

I left there feeling a lot of things.  Some regret because I didn't go to Viet Nam, while all but me and another classmate,  did.  Feeling good because I discovered 2 new blog readers.  Feeling tired and a little overwhelmed because of all the stimulus.  Most of all I felt inspired.  Wanting to be a better person, to do a better whatever, and very proud to be a part of this special group of people.  Each of you helped make me who I am, which is better than I would have been without you in my life.  Thank you. 

Pilot training was one of the best years of my life and I will never forget it.  In 1969 I became the first in my family to get a college degree, the first to become a regular officer in the military, a father for the first time, and west of the Mississippi for the first time.  I learned to fly jets and "cheat death" every day.  Learning to fly became the foundation for all I did in my life after that.  It taught me good judgement, gave me self confidence and showed me my limitations.  Oh yeah!  Life is good!!!

Party Month

Lynn & me

Life of late has been about parties, baseball, dinners and other fun things.  One of those is a weekly Texas Hold'em tournament played on Buzztime game sets at the Sun n Fun Bar.  Last Monday I won for the first time and got to see my name in lights on the screen!   Yee ha!

Debbie, Lynn & Walt

Lynn's sister, Debbie, celebrated a birthday earlier in the month, with her husband Walt and many others there to help.  Lynn and me took them to Siesta Key Oyster Bar for drinks as a diversion while friends decorated the patio. 

Chico IS the man!

The cake was a highlight of the party, as it featured her chihuahua puppy, Chico, in the center.  He's not much bigger than this picture!

Barbara and I went to Orlando a couple weeks ago to watch her grandson, Jason, play in his first baseball game at his new high school, Sarasota.  He went 4 for 4, with a home run, 2 singles, 3  RBIs and an intentional walk!  Wow!  What a start!  He has verbally committed to play for Vanderbilt after his high school career is completed in 2013. 

The Vespa has become a millstone, as I've had a few good nibbles but no buyers.  So yesterday I went to Granny's Motorsports (yeah, I know, a strange name for a motorcycle place) and talked about a consignment deal.  We quickly reached an agreement so if I can't sell it before we depart next month, it will stay here until it is sold.  What a relief!

Ginger & Lynn

Valentine's Day was another party occasion and did not disappoint.  The turnout was good, dancing was lively and smiles were abundant, as you see here with Ginger and Lynn.

Derick, Barbara & me

For most of February, I've had the blah's (or blues if you prefer) and couldn't figure out why until I looked at some old pictures.  It was then I discovered that I've been missing my kids.   It has been quite a while since Thanksgiving, but it won't be long until I see them again, at the baseball tournament in Cary, NC, in late March.  That'll be kinda like a mini family reunion, which is a rare event on my side of the family.  I also hope to see a lot of them over the spring, summer and fall since I'll be in one place for a while.

I can hardly wait for the Oscars this year, as Billy Crystal is my favorite host, next to Johnny Carson.  The guy is just brilliant and no one ever knows what he might say next.  This year we'll watch from the comfort of our new home instead of the big party at Burns Court Cinema.  It's gonna be a good time!!!

Thanks for stopping by and hope to see you soon...