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September 21, 2007

IT'S FRIDAY, MY FAVORITE DAY!

We left Wheeler on Saturday as we had a funeral to attend in Hillsboro. My cousin's husband had died of cancer and we wanted to pay our respects. Weddings and funerals are about the only time I get a chance to see some of my relatives. Isn't that sad? It seems odd to attend a funeral of someone of my generation, when in the past, it has always been for the "older" generation. I guess we are the "older" generation now.

Since we were in town for the funeral and didn't want to drive back to the coast to turn around and leave again on Monday, we decided to spend the night with our kids and visit with them. We spent Saturday night in West Linn and then took some time on Sunday to see Leslie and her family in Silverton. Leslie loaded me up with a bunch of tomatoes from her crop, which I mentioned in my journal last week. Lara, Leslie and I also picked a whole grocery bag of grapes that Leslie has on her vines and that Lara took home to make into juice.

Before we left for Ashland on Monday, we did some shopping at Costco and Target. I needed to stock up on groceries and stuff that I won't have time to get before we go home this weekend. You know you are getting old when the first thing you look for when you enter the store is the restroom! It also seems like we are doing most of our shopping in the pharmacy section these days instead of the sporting goods or clothing departments.

We continued on our journey down south to Ashland and we traveled as far as Cottage Grove the first night, this is about half way to Ashland. After settling into our hotel room in Cottage Grove, we decided to try a Chinese restaurant that was advertised in our room's directory. We used Dave's new GPS system on his cell to find our way. Unfortunately, the GPS didn't rate the restaurant. Our first hint should have been when we got there that we had to hold both doors open, as there were tons of people leaving. Actually the tons of people were only six very large ladies! After we were seated and we were waiting for our food we were entertained by the various types of people who were also dining in this fine establishment. That was the strangest room full of people I've ever seen! I think the gene pool in Cottage Grove is limited and it looked like a lot of people had married their first cousin!

IT'S A GIRL!! We got a call from our daughter Lara while we were on our way to Ashland. She had gotten the test results from the doctor and it looks like we will add another girl to our collection of granddaughters. Her name will be Jordyn Leslie Lynn and her arrival date will be February 14th, give or take a week. We are so excited and don't mind one bit that it will be another girl. We decided that we wouldn't know what to do with a boy anyway, so why break the routine!

When we got to Ashland, we picked up our tickets and ate a quick lunch. Then we saw the afternoon production of "Distracted". This was a play about a very common disorder these days of ADD among children. This play is a little bit of a comedy and yet a compassionate look at parents who are struggling to find the right answers to help their high-strung child to be happy. It was very well done (as are all the productions here in Ashland) and had us laughing one minute and crying the next. That evening, we saw Shakespeare's "Taming of the Shrew" which was also very well done. We have seen this play before and each time it seems to get better and better. I don't know if I am becoming a well-versed critic of the theater, but I seem to know what I like.

The weather has a fall feeling to it with some sun between the cloudy skies and rain showers. We are glad we brought along sweaters and raincoats, as the evenings sitting outside in the Elizabethan Theater have been a bit chilly after the sun goes down. The first night, we didn't take a blanket so my legs were pretty cold by the time the play was over and it took me a while to get them warmed up.

We had more plays to see the next day but first, after breakfast, we headed off to one of my favorite shops, the Nature Store. They have so many things I could buy, if I had the extra money. We did get some more reflectors for the windows to help keep the birds from killing themselves and also a birthday present for our daughter. I won't mention what it is, because she reads this journal and I want her to be surprised. We also wandered into the local bookstore and spent some time checking out the books before the afternoon play began. It has been raining off and on all day so it has been the perfect day to just browse around all the stores. We saw another play that afternoon, Moliere's "Tartuffe". This was originally a French play and was done in rhyme. It was a classic example of good over evil, the evil in black and the good wearing white. It was a very funny play and we enjoyed it very much. After a dinner of fish and chips at a local restaurant, we got ready for the evening performance of "Romeo and Juliet". It was really cold that evening watching this play outdoors and it was hard to stay concentrated. It was so cold the guy sitting next to me was shivering. We got back to our room and had just settled into bed when someone next to us started their air conditioner. It was 40 degrees outside and I don't think an air conditioner was necessary. After about an hour, it was shut off and I finally got to sleep. We asked about it the next day and apparently, the person who was in that room decided to run the air conditioner to disguise the fact that he was smoking cigarettes in his room. That's a no-no. We wished we had gotten out of bed and complained at that time.

Being on the road and making my deadline for the Friday Journal is a bit of a challenge. Instead of sitting at the home computer, I get to sit on the edge of the bed with the laptop. Oh, well. That's why we got it - so we stay in touch while we're traveling.

On Thursday, after making the rounds of all my favorite stores for some last minute shopping, we saw two more plays, "The Gem of the Ocean" which portrays the struggles of the African-Americans gaining their freedom after the Civil War. It was a very emotional play. Then that evening, we finished off our marathon of plays this time with Shakespeare's magical play "The Tempest". All in all, I can't say which play I liked the best as they were all very well done. I am already looking forward to next year.

We headed back home today (Friday) and will stop and visit with some steamboat friends who live in Eagle Point. After that, we are planning on spending the night with some other old friends, Ed and Diane Avila who live near Eugene. We hope to be back home on Saturday.