Welcome to Dullsville: Yes, I'm Still Here

I went a whole year without posting! Quite an accomplishment.

The last post was for last years Iris Festival Garden Tour, and this years just took place this past Sunday. We didn't go. We had planned to, but I worked something like 14 hours on Saturday and so had a bunch of chores to do, so it just didn't happen.

Lots of stuff has happened in the last year. In July we went to Cape May for a final vacation with all four of us. Cape May was beautiful, and I got to see two very good old friends that I had not seen in years.

Our daughter went off and joined the Air Force, she made a 6 year commitment. She is currently in training in a classified field that she is not supposed to talk about, and neither are we. I'm proud of her. She turned 19 in February and is making the typical mistakes that 19 year olds make, but there is not much that I can do about that. I am hopeful that the coming 5 years will see many changes and maturing in my little girl.

We went down to Lackland AFB to see her graduate from basic training. It was a moving experience. Seeing all those great young people committing themselves to defending this wonderful country was fantastic. It made me appreciate how much I love my country, and how lucky I am to live here, and how lucky we all are that there are people willing to put their lives on the line to defend our freedom. She graduated on the weekend of Veteran's Day, so I had thoughts of my father fighting in Normandy going through my head.

We are still working on the new house. The backyard is going very slowly, it will be years in the making. Still love this town, we have made many new friends, and have a social life beyond anything we have ever had before. Makes me wish I hadn't wasted 18 years in the last place.

We threw a New Year's party for a bunch of folks and got invited to a couple of great Christmas parties. In March we hosted a professional bike team that competed in the Redlands Bicycle Classic, a local 4 day stage race. It was the women's Wachovia team. The race organizers ask for local families to provide housing for some of the teams. It was an interesting experience, given my love of cycling. I had never had an inside look at bike racing before, it was intriguing and a bit disillusioning. Perhaps I'll elaborate on that another time.

Went to the Grand Canyon for my birthday a couple of weeks ago and tried out my new camera. I have lived in southern California now for 30 years and never visited the Grand Canyon before. Quite spectacular.

I need to post some of these events with the pictures that accompany them.

Who knows, maybe I'll actually do it.