California We Are Here!

I promised in the last post to expound upon my comments about an incident at the RV Park.  It happened one very windy afternoon.  David and I were outside grilling chicken breasts in between the two rigs.  The winds are called the Santa Ana winds by the weather folks and it was quite warm.  As we sat, we heard this loud “craaaaack” only to look up and see a huge limb coming towards us.  There was no time to react!

You see there is this large, nice shade tree David has his rig parked under.  One potential hazard of shade trees is the possibility of a limb breaking off and hitting the top of a rig.  Fortunately for us and his rig, the limb had a lot of new growth limbs and leaves helping to cushion the fall as the limb fell on the top of his motor home.

As you have heard before, ‘all’s well, that ends well.’  Besides having to climb onto the top of the rig with a saw and cutup the fallen limb into manageable pieces and being late to eat; the rig was not damaged and we were not endangered.  Oh yes, the meal was fantastic too!

I failed to mention in the previous post concerning Polly’s Pies Restaurant about the cornbread.  Besides ordering the Strawberry Lemonade as your drink, ask the waitress for a bread plate.  You could even tell her to leave off the rolls and only bring cornbread.  The rolls are good but the cornbread is muuucchhh better!  It has a cakey type texture and sweet.  The cornbread is almost like a dessert instead of bread.  This will make your visit a Double Yummeee!!

Now for the other expanded story about our visit with my cousins.  As mentioned in the last post, we were trying to conceal our California presence in order to surprise both of them.  We found out Nancy, who lives in Arkansas, was planning a visit to California to see her sister.  Well that 'sealed the deal' for us and the surprise worked well for Margaret.  I called her to let her know we were in the area and planned on showing up during Nancy’s visit as a surprise for her too.  Margaret thought that would be fun and agreed to keep the ‘secret’ of our proximity.

To spring the surprise, we were supposed to show up one morning (supposedly unexpectedly) in time for Margaret to cook lunch.  David and Sophie are to be with us so they could enjoy meeting and hearing the stories from our childhood.  She did not want to begin cooking a huge lunch before we got there as it might tip off the surprise. 

Before we arrived, Nancy asked Margaret did she know Larry was in California.  Margaret expressed surprise and tried to dismiss the subject to throw her off track.  Nancy was not to be dissuaded.  She is a natural bloodhound and thought something might be afoot.  For you see, she had seen me tagged in a Facebook post David had made about a visit to the Aerial Tramway in Palm Springs, California.  She was not real sure about the geography but California was the tell-tale.

Anyway she suspected we might show up while she was there but was definitely pleased we did and even more so that Margaret and I had not been able to completely surprise her this time.  We will try again someday and this time it will work.  Right Margaret?

We had a swell time and Margaret prepared a superb meal.  We had Fried Chicken (like we used to have growing up), brisket, green beans, roasted potatoes, watermelon, rolls and much, much more.  I was stuffed like a little (okay, okay, a big) pig.  We shared memories and stories galore.  David and Sophie got to meet everyone.  Beverly and I got to meet Bob, Margaret’s husband, and catch up with Gary, Nancy’s husband too.  It was wonderful, especially the stories told on my sister, Elaine.  Beverly said later she had not heard those before.  LOL, Elaine was not there to defend herself so it was PERFECT, just sayin'.

Just like old times!   Fun, Fun, Fun.
(Why am I the only one with white hair?)

As Nancy said though, the thing that would have made it complete was to have our brother and sister (Rick and Elaine) with us.  Hopefully we can do that sometime.  It was simply a great day and the time flew by.  We planned to leave earlier than we did to avoid some of the traffic but even though that did not work out, it was a wonderful time.  But who woulda thunk it?  You drive halfway across the country to visit family you grew up with as children.  What an adventure this life is!  Next posting I will share some of the sights and places we visited during our sojourn in California.