Tag Archives: summer
Active retirement
A few weeks ago, while driving north for the Great Camping Adventure with Katie, I noticed a car. We passed each other a few times. It was the same make and model and even color as my car. But that’s not what made me notice it. What was special about the car was this:
Adventure mobile
Perched on the top were two kayaks, on the back hung two bicycles. It seemed to epitomize the kind of retirement I hope my husband and I have. The kind where you explore and enjoy and especially stay active.
I glanced at the couple in the car once when they passed me. Seemed to be people pretty much like myself. I wished them well and forgot about them. Until I pulled into a fast food drive through line and saw the car parked next door at another fast food restaurant. So once I got my taco I swung over there, parked, walked over and snapped the picture. Turning I realized the couple was sitting at an outdoor table looking alarmed.
So I walked over to them, smiling, and told them I wanted to be them when I grew up. Old enough to be retired, young enough to enjoy it and off on adventures every weekend with your life partner. She smiled, pointed at her companion and said “Him? We just met a few months ago!” Then we all had a good laugh.
But in my heart I still hope I get to have that kind of retirement. The kind with two kayaks on the roof, two bikes on the back, two voices laughing in the front seats.
Happy trails everyone.
Follow the road.
Karma’s photo challenge: Whimsy
Whimsy on a summer evening…. time to sit out in the soft evening light enjoying a glass of wine and the heady scent of old fashioned roses.
Table for two.
Care to join me? Oh wait! It looks like I already have some visitors stopping by!
We are thirsty!
Looks like I’m going to need a bigger bottle!
Check out other entries in Karma’s whimsical photo challenge. Everybody needs a bit of whimsy don’t you think? And what better time than summer to look around and find some. There’s still time for you to share a photo of something whimsical in your life.
Join the fun! You never know what you’ll find until you look.
Smells nice..
Safety update. And turtles
Who you lookin at?
Today was a busy day as volunteers, including some of you, made phone calls to Senators in Washington, asking them to consider safety before profits — to strike down the Collins Amendment that would gut the Hours of Service Rule just instituted last summer, and to watch out for amendments that would prohibit any attempt at raising trucking company’s minimum liability insurance requirements. And as the day went on some Senators stood up and voiced concern over trucking regulations. In particular there is now another amendment, the Booker-Menendez Amendment (both are Democratic Senators out of New Jersey) that would strike down the dangerous part of the Collins amendment; the part that would cause the hours truckers are allowed to work to increase back to 82 a week. The Booker-Menedez Amendment would allow a study of the ‘unintended effects of two consecutive nights off’ for drivers who work 70 hours or more a week but would not make changes in the rule until after that study was complete. Seems like a good compromise to me. I called my Senators again late this afternoon and asked them to cosponsor that amendment. We’ll see.
I’ll keep you posted. I truly appreciate all your support, in all its different manifestations, from calls to writing, to hugs, to concern. It’s all important. And the more you talk about it with friends the better chance we have of making our politicians understand the importance of not letting profits compromise safety.
Scoping the lay of the land.
Meanwhile. I came home to find a Blanding Turtle (no I didn’t know the name, but a friend on Facebook did!) in my driveway. You know those things can move pretty fast when they want to. By the time I got inside and hooked the dog up for a walk to the mailbox it was nowhere to be seen. But I knew where it was, under some shrubs along the edge of the driveway. Because Katie wanted to go over there really bad. But I wouldn’t let her and we high tailed it back inside. Almost instantly I noticed it had moved up to the garage and was looking around. I think she’s trying to decide where to lay eggs. I watched and took pictures through a tiny bit of beveled glass in the front door.
She walked all the way up the driveway, along the garage door, then back past the front porch and under the car. Who knows where she went after that, but there’s a lot of garden for her to choose from. Katie and I went out on the deck to watch and listen to the birds. I fell asleep until the frogs began to sing. It would be a good night to camp out but sheer exhaustion precludes me from lugging the tent out and setting it up. Plus tomorrow is another day.
I hope Capital Hill sees fit to make the right decisions tomorrow. I hope they aren’t like my wandering turtle, just exploring and looking and ending up headed right back where they came from. Or hiding under a metaphoric car.
Wandering off to look for better places.
I’ll let you know. For tonight I’m pulling my head into my shell and getting some shuteye.
Katie says night too.
But Mama, I don’t want to go to bed yet!
The grand camping adventure
Katie here. Mama says she’s had a very long and emotional week and she’s exhausted and too tired, she says, to write a blog about our camping adventure last weekend. But I know that many of you are waiting impatiently to read all about it, so I have taken over the blog! It should be my blog anyway if you ask me; I can not imagine what would be more interesting or more important than yours truly. I am, of course, the center of the universe.
Ahem.
Mama took last Friday off so that we could go way up north and set up camp for a two night stay at a luxury state park. I thought it was luxury anyway, as mama gave me my regular big pillow and then two of hers just so I could see out the little vent in the front of the tent any time I thought I heard something. I like to know what’s going on. That way I don’t have to bark at stuff. And I don’t get yelled at. It works out.
My princess bed.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Our drive up north took about 4 hours and I was an incredibly wonderful traveler! Mama put my crate on the back seat and I could see her all the time which made me very happy. Plus she stopped at all these wonderful rest stop places that had really cool smells. I never wanted to get back in the car after I did my job, so mama let me walk around for awhile.
Vacations are like that you know, no reason to rush. Right? The best rest stop was the one only a couple of miles from the exit for the state park. It had this little path going back into the woods from the dog run area and it was so green and wonderful in there! Except for the mosquitoes. And the fact that mama put her foot into a gopher hole and fell and hurt her hand. But other than that it was all fun!
We’re up north now!
Mama says she knows she’s ‘up north’ when she starts to see the ferns on the forest floor along the freeway. They make her smile. And when my mama smiles, I smile too. It’s sort of contagious. You’ll notice I smiled a lot on this trip.
We got to our campsite a little early but that was OK, it gave us time to set up camp and blow up mama’s bed without annoying anyone with the noisy pump. Then we walked around the campground. It was pretty empty that first afternoon. In fact, all weekend I bet the campground wasn’t half full, which worked out fine for us! We had a cozy site tucked back into the woods which would have been really cool. Did I mention mosquitoes?
Friday evening we tried to go do one of the hikes that are in the park, through old pine trees, and we got about 100 feet in and had to race out of there. We were getting eaten alive and mama was wearing bug spray! Mama says I looked like a bug cloud in the shape of a sheltie. There were several short hikes we would have liked to do during the weekend but the bugs were ferocious.
Luckily mama had plans Saturday for us to go over to Elk Rapids, a town about an hour west of where we were staying, to visit her blogger friend Gerry who gave us a tour of the town. We saw old houses and churches and we walked through town and let people admire me. I even got to go inside a store because the owner thought I was beautiful. What can I say? I get that a lot. This is a bridge over to the library in town, isn’t it cool?
The princess goes to the library.
We went down to the beach too, and watched a bunch of guys in a big canoe replicate an historical landing. I wasn’t sure what was going on, but I knew I was hot, so I took my mama over to the river to get a drink.
Ah…..
This was a big deal for me as I don’t generally get my feet wet and I never drink out of a river. It’s just not something a princess does. But you gotta do what you gotta do…right?
Then we went to a park that a lot of beautiful and interesting sculpture in it. I liked it because there was shade on most of it, except those that were out on the beach. It was all interesting and I got to sniff a lot of new stuff!
Shade and color is good.
Then we went to Gerry’s house and I got to meet her duo…Cowboy and Sadie. I didn’t like that my mama kept saying how adorable Cowboy was and what beautiful eyes Sadie had. She’s my mama and I want her all to myself. Plus I had a hard time keeping track of them, they were so fast and there were two of them and only one of me. So I got up on my mama’s lap while she and Gerry sat and talked a little bit. Mama was really glad she got to meet Gerry and the gang. I liked Gerry a lot but I’m not so sure about those furry ones…maybe next time I won’t be so nervous about the whole thing.
The duo.
I slept all the way back to camp, and when we got there we escaped into the tent where I slept some more. All this traveling wears a girl out!
Zzzzzzz…..
Sunday morning we did a little walking around the campground and then mama piled everything into the car as fast as she could to get us away from the mosquitoes. I really didn’t want to go home.
Where did my pillow go mama!?
I stood in our empty camp site a long time until she made me get in the car. But then I slept a lot on the way home.
And where did my tent go?!!
Once I made it into my house I was the old Katie girl — full out barking for a long time just letting my mama know I had a good time and thanking her for taking me with her on the big camping adventure. I was a really really good girl. I didn’t bark once on the trip up or the trip back. I slept all night both nights, though I did get my mama up by 5:30 every morning. But then we went back to bed for a bit. I sat around the camp while she was working on stuff and didn’t whine, and when she asked me to do something I did it right away. Sometimes.
Can we go again soon mama?
Yep, I’m hoping my mama makes reservations for us at another campground soon! Maybe one that doesn’t have so many mosquitoes though. This is way more fun than sleeping in the back yard and I can’t wait to go again! Mama failed two nights at making a campfire, she blames the wood. I think she needs more practice. What do you think?
Where should we go next?
Me and my mama.
Weekend song
This is the song Katie and I are singing on our drive to an adventure:
I can do what I wanna do, be who I wanna be
I got no one to answer to, soon as I turn the key
A cash machine, gasoline and we’re outta here
Call it an early weekend, call it goin’ off the deep end
Baby, you and me,we can leave it all behind
I don’t have to be me ’til Monday
Friday, Saturday, Sunday
I ain’t gonna face reality
Three days without punching a time clock
Three nights of goin’ non-stop
No work and all play
I don’t have to be me ’til Monday
Yeah
Thanks to Steve Azar for putting down exactly what we’re thinking.
We’ll tell you all about it soon!
Gonna be fun!
Wordless Wednesday
WordPress photo challenge: Split-second story
We were on Belle Isle, in the Detroit River, enjoying the day and standing out on a fishing pier. I was talking about the years I used to live on the Houghton Canal way up in the Upper Peninsula where I could watch freighters pass from my apartment window.
We turned to go back to the car and there it was, almost silently gliding through the cool blue waters.
Magical.
Check out these split-second day photos here, here, here, and here. Or go to this link and browse among the 300+ photos for yourself. Don’t miss this one!
Weeding? Really Mama?
Katie here. Did you know my mama had 3 days off work? I expected a GRAND ADVENTURE because of course it’s all about me. I am entirely disappointed.
Friday night mama put up the tent and said we were going camping. I love camping, but it was darn cold out. A princess does not like to be cold, so after we got all settled in the tent I told mama I wasn’t staying out there and I barked and barked and finally she got smart and we went inside to sleep. Mama should pay better attention to the weather. I ask you; does a Princess wear plaid? I think not!
A little chilly
And do you know what she and dad did on Saturday? They weeded! I don’t know what that was all about. They just pulled up some green plants, but they left other green plants. If they wanted them gone, why didn’t they get rid of all of them? I think they are fickle. I tried to supervise them but it got to be so boring that I went inside and took a nap.
I figured I’d need to catch up on my sleep cause that darn tent was still up and I knew my mama would want to camp again. But you know what happened? She went to work after dark! With a pillow and a blanket! I’ve never seen anything like it, but she said ‘bye bye baby’ just like she does every day when she goes to work and she went out the front door. Huh. I waited by the door a long time but I finally just went to sleep with my dad. Mama didn’t come back from work till the morning, and she came home through the back door. She said she slept great, but I don’t know how she did that at work. I’m smelling a scam. Yes I am.
Well I figured we’d do something exciting Sunday. But no way! They were still pulling green stuff up. I was disgusted and spent most of the day inside napping. And it was definitely not fair when they went out that evening and got ice cream and left me behind.
Much better. No plaid.
But I did get to camp with my mama Sunday night. It was a lot warmer and I did pretty good, I only barked a little bit. And I got my mama up at 5:00 a.m. so she could fully enjoy her Monday off from work.
Monday mama said she was too sore to weed anymore and we spent some quality time out on the deck. Plus I helped her put away the camping stuff. Well mostly I just watched, but I’m sure she couldn’t have put it all away so fast without me.
And then this evening mama took me to my park!!! That was the best part of the entire weekend!
My field of yellow flowers..ummm…
So all in all I guess I got to do some fun stuff. But my folks need to focus on me more don’t you think? Three whole days and all I got was one and a half nights of camping and a walk through fluff?
I think you will all agree that I deserve more.
Pay attention mama!
Come on summer
Katie says:
Let’s get moving people!
I think my park ranger people should set these picnic tables up and get this summer started!
And guess what? Guess what, guess what, guess what?!!!
Mama made a reservation for us at Hartwick Pines State Park! For two whole nights in June! She’s got a campsite in the woods and there are trails for us to explore!
You remember I had so much fun when we went camping at a real campground last summer, right? Well, this will be even better! I can hardly wait! She says we can explore stuff, and people watch, and go for a walk, and then we can take a nap and then we can do it all over again!
I am so excited!
Change Is Hard 