Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Our 50th wedding celebration weekend!




Location, at Home, CA

What a weekend!

We celebrated our 50th wedding anniversary on Saturday Oct 20th which was our actual wedding day 50 years ago.

Our son Tim came from Houston on Wednesday evening and we had a nice visit before all the other activity started. Clyda’s sister Candi and husband Mark arrived Thursday afternoon as well as Tim’s and our friends Thomas and Debbie who are staying with other mutual friends.

Meanwhile, very early Thursday morning Tim and Craig drove to Morrow Bay for a day of deep sea fishing on a charter boat.

Tim and his Jackpot winning Ling Cod.
 Tim and Craig above and Tim with bags of fish to freeze.

Friday morning Mark and I made a champagne run to the new local Bev-Mo liquor store. I had preordered magnums of champagne for a toast at the party. The reason for the magnums was to reduce the corkage fee. J

However, we were told that the champagne was on back order. Can you imagine that? The final agreement was that the store would send someone to all the local Bev-Mo’s in nearby cities and collect the required amount for the party. This was done by 1:30 in the afternoon and the champagne was delivered to the restaurant and placed in the liquor cooler to chill.

Friday Clyda, Candi and a neighbor Sharon spent most of the day doing decorations for the party on Saturday. By the amount of the bills I believe we now own part of Michael’s craft store.

While they were getting all the table decorations done, Debbie and Claralyn worked on steaming Clyda’s wedding dress to get all the wrinkles out so it could be display at the party. Claralyn had worn it for her wedding and it had been stored for the last 45 years in a cedar chest.  

Friday evening Tim and Thomas BBQ’ed, baked, and fried a delicious fish dinner caught by Craig and Tim on Thursday with dill-lemon-butter sauce and wild rice-orzo salad followed by a boysenberry cobbler for dessert. Outstanding dinner!

Saturday morning the ladies left for the restaurant to decorate while Mark, Tim, and I drove to a local store to pick up a pre-ordered sheet cake before also going to the restaurant.

All the decorations were done in time for the first guest to arrive by noon.

At 1 pm lunch was served followed by a champagne toast followed by cake for dessert.

All who attended said they had a great time. By 4 pm we started to clean up the room and were home by 5 pm.

Thomas and Tim again cooked a dinner of BBQ’ed Tri-Tip, beans, bread, and salad followed by a trifle made by Candi for dessert.

Sunday after church several of us were invited to Don and Bev’s for breakfast so we could spend some time with friends Cindy and Gary who came for the weekend.

Sunday dinner was leftovers.

For the Thursday through Sunday dinners we had between 12 and 14 people here. Lots of wine was consumed.

On Monday morning our niece Chelsea brought her 22 month old twins for a visit. Oh my goodness, are those babies active! It keeps 2 people busy following them as our house is not BABY PROOF by any means.

Later, Mark and Candi left for the airport and home. Tim’s flight was delayed but eventually he got home late last night. Thomas and Debbie’s flight was also delayed but we haven’t heard how late they got home.

Yesterday afternoon and this morning we did laundry, tried to pack our suitcases, and get all the other things done for our cruise tomorrow to Hawaii and back.

I think most of the items are done on my to-do-list and we are looking forward to the trip.

It was a marvelous weekend with time well spent with friends and relative to help us celebrate 50 years of marriage.

To all our friends and family who sent greetings and to all those who came for the party to help us celebrate we thank you.

A special thanks to all those who helped with decorations, cooking, etc.

Two photo albums of the weekend can be viewed at


We only go around once, but boy, we did it in style!!!!!!

Thursday, October 11, 2012

Working with Picasa.



Location, at Home, CA

On Monday I took the truck in for the smog test. It only took about a half hour to complete the test and cost $72.

Tuesday I had a follow up appointment with the surgeon who did my gall bladder surgery. I was in his office all of 2 minutes. He looked at my scars and pronounced me “good to go” with no restrictions.

So with that behind me I came home and started moving some dirt Craig had piled up in the back yard. I just wanted to get that one area cleaned up. I still have more to do in the area and will slowly peck away at it.

Today we had the carpets cleaned in the house as well as the carpet in the RV. All of them needed to be cleaned especially where the dog lays. Even though we have a rug for her to lie on in her favorite spot between the living and dining room she doesn’t always stay on it. Consequently, that area was the dirtiest.

Recently, Clyda had a bunch of photos printed for her scrap book and some she wanted to use as greeting cards, however, the colors were just not correct. Using some hints I picked up on a couple of RV blogs I played with each photo in Picasa, Googles free photo software. I straightened, sharpened, and color balanced all the photos then took them to Costco for printing. At Costco I used their software to select which area of each photo I wanted printed and declined to use their “color correction” software. The results were much improved over the first prints. It took me most of the morning to correct 20 photos but now that I have done it I believe I can whip through most photos fairly quickly.

Photo before enhancement.
Photo after straighening, sharpening, and color balancing.


Some of the changes are subtle but they all improve the quality of the photo.

Friday, October 5, 2012

Bringing the blog up to date.



Location, at Home, CA

The after effects of my gall bladder surgery have been nonexistent. The healing has gone well for the four holes they poked in me.

In a few weeks Clyda and I will celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary. To that end we have been planning a party with our friends to celebrate the occasion. It just so happens that the party is on our 50th anniversary and so we have invited about 75 people to the event. We are not going overboard with this but wanted a gathering of friends to help us celebrate.

It will be at a local restaurant as we don’t have room for that many people at our house. Besides, there would be no place for everyone to park on our street.

I think we have all the details firmly in hand with only a few remaining details to do and some last minute items to buy.

We will have family staying with us and several others will stay with mutual friends nearby so it will all work out.

Monday I need to take the truck in for a smog check. It really frosts me that I have to pay $70 for a smog check on a diesel pickup. I expect the state put this law in place because diesel owners weren’t paying there share as regular car owners pay. The only thing they check is to see if you have tampered with the computer by adding a high performance chip. It bums me out.