Sunday - Santa Monica beach

What a lovely day for a drive up the coast. Over 70 flights were camcelled at Limburgh Field today. Fog. Inland it was all beautiful. We drove up to Santa Monica because we heard about a group that places crosses on the beach every Sunday as a tribute to the fallen in Iraq and Afghanistan. They call it Arlington West. We got there and were able to dedicate a cross for Jeremiah. Actually, we were surprised to find one was already done. Two others had been here before us. One just left initials on the sign he made, and the other was made by Sgt. Huff, who served with Jeremiah. He's presently back in Iraq. The display is moving. They do this every Sunday.

They have a table for more information and offer a lot of materials for returning vets about many services available, including medical, schooling, etc.

The group who sponsors this is Vets for Peace who advocate bringing everybody home now. I personally do not agree with their viewpoint but do appreciate any tribute to the fallen.

Saturday

The weather has been pretty normal for SD since we've been here. Morning overcast and nice days as it burns off. The coast has been foggier, though, so not really beach weather. Saturday we met with Gary P. and Stephen and Zina and played miniatue golf at Boomers in El Cajon. Lots of fun. Afterwards, we went to a decent sit down Mexican restaurant in downtown El Cajon, called Por Favor. Laurie's sister Linda met us there and we ate. After that everyone went their own way and Laurie and I went to Pacific Beach and strolled along the beach. There is this place called Crystal Pier that has been there since the 40s or longer. It has these bungalows along the pier where you can rent and the rest of the pier usd to be for the private use of the renters. It's open now for the public and we walked out to the end of the pier and watched the surfers below waiting for their waves to come in. After the sun sank into the ocean we left the beach and drove down Garnet to where all the beach night life was. We strolled through some shops and rested at this local pub with outside tables and ate some rolled tacos and margaritas. A very nice day and evening. I promise to post some pictures after I get home on my computer. Really.

Vacation.....Gotta Get Away

I wonder if this is what the Go-gos meant? Thanksgiving was fun, and we all ate a lot. Most of Laurie's family was there and everybody behaved. Later we played Mexican train and had dessert. Just a typical holiday, but we haven't been home for this time of year since we moved to ND so it was kind of special. Friday Laurie and I went to Old Town and walked around a looked at the shops. It has kind of grown up. It was always a tourist draw, but now it's more apparently commercial. Not bad though. Walking down the street, we passed the Whaley House, a landmark and famous haunted house. We didn't feel like going in this time. Later we passed the Chuck Jones gallery and found it pretty amazing. There were a lot of Dr. Suess paintings on display as well as Jones' work from his Warner Bros. days and his work on Dr. Suess' animated stories like the Grinch. There was also some great work by a few other artists. One amazing set of paintings and scuptures were by Markus Pierson. His work is centered on this coyote character. It's ahrd to explain, the work is kind of dark but not negative. A lot of hope, dreams, and love. I'd suggest visiting the CJ Gallery website or Pierson's to see more. They are really amazing. After all this we walked around the Old Town Square and saw some great shops as well as a Wells Fargo exhibit. Pretty cool. We met later with Gary and had dinner at Chevy's in Mission Valley. An okay restaurant. They don't serve shredded beef so that was disapointing and the Carnitas (hsredded pork) was a bit fatty. I thought it was better last time when we went there about two years ago. Oh well. I'll try to post a bunch of pictures soon. Later.

Beam me up, Scotty!!

We went to the Air and Space museum today. We took Richard and Armin with us. The museum is hosting a StarTrek exhibit right now. It cost a bit more than it should but was a cool exhibit. You walk down corridors like on the Enterprise and see Picard's room, the Transporter deck and lots of displays of coustumes and equipment from the show. We had a good time. Out side was many vistage aircraft from all ages and many displays of replicas and engines and such. The museum was also hosting a Bonnis and Clyde exhibit. Inside were many things from the time of the two outlaws. A Will Rogers dispaly, a Dirigible display, and many other things. Some was a bit grusome as thet had the car the ooutlaws were killed in. Also the shirt Clyde Barrow was wearing at the time. ick. We spent a couple of hours at the museum and enjoyed it a lot. Laurie and I walked around famous Balboa park and made plans for a return in the next couple of weeks. They have a package you can buy that allows you into all the museums there for about half the price. It also gives you 7 days to use it. We are thinking about it. Some of the museums were free back when I was in high school and Jr. high and I spent a lot of time there, but some I've never been to. Yeah, we're just trying to have fun.

The adventure continues......

I'm typing on Laurie's laptop, and I'm really not comfortable with it. I'll post some pictures after we get home. We were able to get our car on Monday so now we're mobile. We drove around a bit and visited my old friend Richard and his wife. Also this older ex-school teacher who has been a friend to my family forever. Her son and daughter went to high school with my brother David and I and her daughter was even married to David for a time.

We've landed!

We landed on Saturday and were driven immediately to a favorite hole-in-the-wall taco shop. There I inhaled and beef and bean burrito. Except for what we've eaten here in Laurie's mom's house, It's been all mexican. Sorry, ND there's nothing mexican going on there. Sat with her folks Saturday night and played Mexican train.

Sunday we did some shopping and went to an open house of a couple who have been married for 66 years. They are friends of my in-laws and their son, Cliff, was the minister at Jeremiah's funeral. Then we went home and that night play card games and vivited with Laurie's niece and her two boys. My hapless Cagrgers dropped another one they should have won. Once again by less than five points.

I'm Leavin... On a Jet Plane!

We are almost out the door on our vacation to California and South Carolina. It's -7 windchill here and 70 there. I'm not sure if I can take it. If you need me, I'll be at the beach!