FINALLY, SOME LOVELY WEATHER IN FLORENCE

The weather is improving nicely these last few days and they are forecasting highs in the low 70sF for the next week with mostly sunny days. There are only 12 more days until our departure for points north. We’re hoping the mild weather being experienced in Salmon Arm continues as we have a lot of work coming up moving everything from storage back into the house. We went to Casa Grande this morning to buy some 1/2 inch foam board to put under the mattress to see if we can solve the mattress sweating problem. We also bought a bigger plastic tote to conceal the generator from prying eyes in the open truck box. After a quick stop for gas and groceries at Safeway we were home for lunch. Since it was pretty warm, we left Mitzy home. The gas was $2.419 per US gallon which, I think, with exchange works out to about 66 cents per litre.

Our friends Ken and Marie were here for supper and Mexican Train last Friday night and the ladies whomped us guys. 216 for Aileen, 217 for Marie, 349 for me and 439 for Ken. And I was the scorekeeper! I had a different ATV ride on Saturday as a small group of us went south and west of Florence. We went by a large memorial to a pilot who crashed and died there in 1975. The next was an 1879 restored stage coach station then we saw a large hillside of rocks with lots of pictographs. The ride was all flat except for the washes we had to cross. Usually we have lots of up and down when we ride to the east. I checked my gas consumption and got just over 28 miles per US gallon. That’s more than double what the truck does.

On Sunday, both my aunts and their spouses and sister Wendy and Randy took two vehicles and went to Superior for lunch. From there we went south on #177 past the huge Ray copper mine. We stopped a few times for pictures but the big problem was all the power lines that were in the way. We came home via the Florence Kelvin highway which was gravel for about 1/2 of the distance. We stopped several times to admire the scenery. Aileen had been telling Eleanor about Crown Saguaro cactus and only minutes later, an excited Eleanor had me stop and there was a beautiful crown specimen right beside the road.

On Monday night our friends Ken and Char brought their friends over to chat as Tom is looking for a newer and better digital camera and wanted my input. We had a good chat and I sent him away buried under a mountain of info, poor man. I went to the PhotoShop Elements special interest group on Monday at the next door park. There’s only a few of us but we try different tools and approaches so it’s a good way to get better at it. I bought a foot of 2 inch Velcro and have replaced the old Velcro in the dining room valance in the Arctic Fox travel trailer. The old Velcro, we discovered, had so many staples in it that it didn’t have a chance to mesh properly.

Wendy had us over for supper last night which was nice. Eleanor and Ron are away to Yuma for a couple of days. When they return we plan to go to a highly rated Chinese bistro for supper.