Taking the back roads

One of the things I've missed most since I moved from Southern California is the ability to be close enough to visit my long time friend, Judi Hussain.  Judi and I have known each other for almost half a century... unbelievable as it may seem.  We were both newly married when we lived next door to each other on Kamuela Drive in Huntington Beach.  We became friends by virtue of each of us being the only working wives in the neighborhood.  It was the middle 60's and women didn't work outside the home that much, especially in a new middle-class neighborhood.  However we did so we became the oddities in the neighborhood. And then we had our children.  Her girls are just about a year older than my son and daughter.  They played together as children and went around together for a while with the same neighborhood kids. Things changed and life continued but not necessarily in the same environment.  We both divorced and Judi moved up to Oakhurst in the...

It was so much fun to spend a few hours with my dear friend, Liisa, and catch up on her life and activities. We didn't have nearly enough time together, but with the busy holiday season and her getting ready to go to the river for the holiday, a few hours were all we could manage.  But it was nice anyhow. A few days later, I got to spend some fun time with friend and former across-the-street neighbor, Linda.  We had a great lunch at our favorite place, the Mongolian BBQ on Brookhurst Street.  We've had many a fun lunch there over the years and it was delightful to do it again.  Then we went to Ikea.... how much you miss the stores you were so used to when you live in a new area.  But, I've heard tell that an Ikea is coming to the Orlando area sometime in 2014.  I shall look forward to that. Managed to find the red wine glasses I've been trying to replace for my daughter-in-law. I've broken quite a few of them over the past year, so I thought it appropri...

Yes, Southern California will always be "home" to me. After all, I lived there for 44 years, raised my children there, earned my education there, and just felt like I was "living" there.  Now that I reside in central Florida in a very nice little house and have begun to make a new type of life there, It's not quite "home."  Maybe at some point a few years from now, it might feel like it.  But right now, SoCal is home and feels that way to me. In any case, with the holidays approaching and after a week's visit with my son and family for Thanksgiving I decided to make a visit to SoCal for Christmas and New Year's.  Of course living on a very restrictive retirement budget, I wondered if I would be able to do it. I had thought about going back for a while and fortunately, one nite while I was roaming around the Internet, I found a great flight on United from Orlando to Santa Ana with a change of planes in Houston.  Just my kind of flight and at j...

I have a lovely sun room on the side of my house.  The room is relatively small, about 8 feet wide by 14 feet long.  It is right off the living room via a sliding glass door on the side that goes into the house.  The other 3 sides of the room are all windows/screens which can be opened by moving one or two sections. It's not the most efficient kind of windows/screens and the windows aren't glass but a type of glazed plastic.  Be that as it may, the room has an east view and gets sun from early morning till late afternoon. Generally I have my breakfast in the sun room and it has been very comfortable.  I get to look out on the street and watch all the morning dog walkers.  Since I'm not an early riser by anyone's standards, by 10:00 or 10:30 AM when I'm having breakfast, there are just a few walkers.  One morning I was sitting there at 7:30 AM and could not believe all the people and all the dogs walking up and down the street.  Cali, my ever f...

Here I sit, with an ice pack on my left knee, recovering from the final knee replacement.  Generally, I don't make New Year's resolutions or those kinds of things but I tend to make goals throughout a year.  But I did make two specific goals for 2013 and I've accomplished both so far and we are only into the 3rd month of a new year. My first and foremost goal was to get my left knee replaced so I could start to live a life pain-free from most physical activities.  I had been walking around on a badly damaged knee for almost 2 years, not being able to walk very much and being in constant pain.  In 2007 I had my right knee replaced and it was such a change in my lifestyle and how I did things.  That recovery seemed to go very well and within a month I was back to my regular life and walking with no pain or limitations.  Looking back on it and comparing it to this recovery I have to remember 2 very important things:  (1) I was 5 years younger and (...

Nor is it the same in Florida.  Having lived in Southern California most of my adult life, I am used to rain, or usually lack there of, in California.  Not so in Florida where I now live. In CA if it rains at all, it's during the raining season... it is a semi-arid desert there after all. The rainy season usually starts the week before or week of Thanksgiving in late November.  It can last till sometimes March but more likely late February.  I remember one year where it rained for 17 days straight in February.  That was really strange cause normally there is not that much sustained rain.  Also, January usually tends to be the best month in CA because it rarely rains and the temps are always warm. But back to rain. When it does rain in CA especially Southern California, Huntington Beach specifically, it is usually a predictable kind of rain.  The weatherperson shows rain and gives you a day or two when it will happen. Sometimes it does, general...