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July 29, 2005

IT'S FRIDAY, MY FAVORITE DAY!!

I decided to head into town last Saturday to do a little shopping. In September, I have a wedding to attend, a visit to the Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, a trip to San Francisco to celebrate our 40th wedding anniversary and a 45th high school class reunion and I needed something new to wear. Also, I have been slowly losing some inches from my water aerobics class and nothing fits the same. So I spent the afternoon shopping. There are worse ways to spend a Saturday afternoon! I also promised to baby-sit Ashtin and Paige for Leslie on Saturday night. The plan was that after I got through babysitting in Salem, I would drive up to Portland and make an appearance at the drag races where Dave has been announcing. I had to prove that there is really a "Mrs. Bell" to all his co-workers at the track, as I never go out there with Dave and they were beginning to doubt my existence. Racing is just not my thing. I arrived at the track and had just missed all the excitement. Apparently one of the racers had hit the wall with his brand new yellow Dodge Viper and everything had come to a halt. I stuck around until after they got the track cleared and the car towed away and watched a couple of drag races and then I headed for the motorhome to call it a night. Not that I got any sleep. Camping right next to an active drag strip tends to be a little noisy! However, after the races, it was very quiet and we got a good night's sleep. The next morning, after breakfast, we headed back to the coast.

"Fish on! Fish on!" Well, it's that time of year again and the other day was the first time we saw someone actually catch a fish. I heard Dave give the familiar call and stopped what I was doing and grabbed the binoculars. There were these two guys and a dog out in this small boat in front of our place, one with a fishing pole in his hand and the other with the net ready for the catch. The dog was wagging his tail and jumping with excitement, and generally getting in the way. Meanwhile, Dave is in the living room giving the guy with the fishing pole a mini lesson on how to hold his pole. "Keep the pole up, or you're going to loose the fish, etc., etc." If only the guy could have heard him, he could have landed the fish 5 minutes earlier! Finally, after about 15 minutes and missing the fish twice with the net, they got it aboard and what a beauty it was. It looked like about a 30-pound Chinook. Not huge, but still plenty big.
Dave is headed back into Portland this weekend to help announce the American Le Mans races in Portland. It’s going to be 90+ degrees in there all weekend, so he can go in there and get burned. I plan on hanging out down here at the coast and stay cool. Of course, if it's going to be that hot in the valley, then everybody from there will be here...but at least we'll be comfortable. The temperature should be in the mid to upper 70's.