Still Trying to Catch Up

My backyard Iris's with homemade bird perches

I knew when we went on our trip south last week I would fall off of my regular blogging routine.  Then I had the curve ball thrown to me of the regular full-time front desk clerk quitting at work.  I had to take her full-time shift until the hotel hires her replacement.  Resumes are received and interviews are being conducted but no clear candidate is in sight.  In the meantime I'm working every day except Mondays and Tuesdays.  Of course this comes at the worst time of the year.  Spring time is when I do most of my major yard work in preparation for the summer and fall season.  Thus, when I'm not working I'm out back, frantically and furiously taking advantage of the mild spring weather before the hot, muggy and mosquito infested days of summer are upon us.

I am a very orderly person.  Also referred got as very anal.  Guilty as charged.  The result of the disruption of my routine is that everything is thrown off.  The only thing I can advise is that if you're a regular reader of my blog, be patient.  I will be back to my routine.....eventually.

Back to the Routine

I am so glad to be back home.  While our trip south was great, both of us are very happy to be at our home in Delaware.  I think Bill has a new appreciation for the flatlands of coastal Delaware after all those twisty, winding, "wiggly" roads through the mountains of Georgia, Tennessee and North Carolina.  

Our trip has provided me with a lot of new fodder for future blog postings which I am looking forward to writing.  But for now our goal is just to get back to our regular routine.  

Tomorrow I begin a regular work schedule at the hotel.  I'm filling in for the full-time front desk clerk who gave her notice a couple of weeks ago.  She stayed an extra week last week while I was on vacation.  Now I'll fill in for her until the hotel hires a new full-time front desk clerk.  So this means I probably won't have as much time to devote to my blog postings.  That may be good news to some, but I'm just putting it out there.

Also, now that the nice weather has arrived I'll be spending a lot more time outside doing yard work, which I love.  Yard work and blogging are perhaps my two favorite pastimes.  

So for now I must leave to wash my car (exciting stuff) and visit the East Coast Gardens for purchase three river birch trees.  Bill finally gave his approval to plant an island of those trees wright outside my bedroom window to cutdown on the hot, afternoon summer sun.  Also to provide me with a beautiful view outside my bedroom window.

Oh, one more thing, the bluebirds have build their nest and are carefully watching their five baby bluebird blue eggs.  This is such good news because last year the sparrows ran them out.  The two years previously we had two batches of bluebirds raised in that birdhouse.  I am glad they got their routine back on track too.  It's all good.

Back Home In Delaware

Well folks, we arrived home (thank goodness!) yesterday morning safe and sound.  What a week!  We're still recovering.  Now to get settled in and renew our regular routine I am posting this video that I took last Thursday at the Tipton-Haynes Historic Site that we visited in Johnson City, Tennessee.  Bill and I were waiting around to meet my cousin Anne Tipton (who I've never met face to face) at 1 pm.  In the meantime we had time to kill so I wandered into one of the activity rooms and videotaped this adorable telling of the story of "The Big Bad Wolf and the Three Little Piggies" to a group of second graders who were out on a class field trip.  This is what I like about taking a Road Trip, you never know what you're going to run into.  That reminds me of Forest Gump and why he liked a box of chocolates "You never know what you're going to get."  

Let me just say this, we had a fabulous and very interesting trip.  Was it tiring?  Absolutely.  Are we exhausted?  For certain.  Hey, it will take us at least a week to unwind and get back in The Rut again.  But, no matter how much this trip pushed us to the limit, it was well worth it.  Now we have a whole new set of memories. And oh boy do we ever!  I will share many of those new memories with you in some of my future blog postings.  

Front Royal, Virginia

I'm sitting at my desk at my room in the wonderfully clean and comfortable room at the Front Royal Hampton Inn. What a huge difference in hotel accommodations from the cavelike room I had at the Red Roof Inn in Johnson City, Tennessee.

We decided to check out early in Johnson City in order to shorten the miles we would have to travel to get our rental van back to Enterprise on Saturday. There was just no way we could drive 10 hours tomorrow and get back to Delaware in time before Enterprise closed and we would have to wait until Monday and incur an extra day's charge.

We both got up very early (4 am) and were the first customers for breakfast at Burger King, just down the street in Johnson City from the Red Roof Inn where we were staying. Of course the Red Roof Inn doesn't offer breakfast. No surprises there.

After breakfast we had to kill five hours before I met up with my cousin Anne Tipton, who I have talked to on the phone many times but never met face to face. I disappointed her last year by not meeting her when I was in the Johnson City area. I didn't want to disappoint her again. But oh we had all these hours to kill while we were waiting for her to finish her brunch at her nieces graduation at ETU.

We waiting at the Tipton-Haynes Historic site in Johnson City for here. I surprised my friend Penny McLaughin who is the site director. She was busy with a bus load of second graders who were on a field trip. Those kids were so cute as their teacher was telling the "Three Piggies" story. I video taped that on my Flip video camera and will post it on You Tube when I get home tomorrow.

Oh yes, HOME! I am so looking forward to skipping in my own bed and getting back to my regular routine again.

Anne did show up at 1 o'clock and We fi ally met. I am now glad I waited because I liked her immediately. And.....she showed me new Tipton graves which were right down the street from the Historic Site. She showed me her parent's grave and her brother's graves. I took pictures and can now check off those folks whose pictures of graves I have to take for Fi d a Grave.

It's late and I'm making more typos than usual. That's a sure sign I am exhausted. I see a big, comfy king sized bed beckoning to me.

I'm coming, I'm coming!

Johnson City, TN

Here I sit in my $64.95 a night room at the Red Roof Inn in Johnson City, Tennessee. Bill and I arrived at noontime after a long (4 hour) ride from Townsend, Tennessee. We are exhausted.

I think I took too much on this trip. Yesrterday I decided to skip our visit to Knoxville and to visit my cousin Tim Tipton because we just don't have enough time and I want to minimize the amount of driving that Bill has to do in city traffic. Johnson City was bad enough today.

Driving up to Johnson City, Bill was enthralled by the mountains. He so misses geographical topography. He hates living in the flat coastal land of southern Delaware. I thought this would be a treat for him. He does like the scenery but the driving is just too much.

Today we took a drive over to the Pisgah Mountains of North Carolina where my father was born and raised until his family moved to Pennsylvania when he was 10 years old. I tried to climb the mountain to the graveyard where my great-grandfather and great-grandmother are buried but I couldn't find it. Their graveyard is located at the top of the mountain on Upper Pigeon Roost Road. My heart was pounding out of my chest as I climbed that mountain for over an hour. I finally gave up after I kept coming around another curve only to find more to climb. I took pictures and videos of this whole adventure and will post them when I get home. I don't know how to put those pictures on my iPad. I suspect I can't. Another one of those mysteries that I have to learn about my Apple products.

Today we also visited with my cousin Daisy Buckles. She has an interesting history. Her father was born in 1856 and is my great grandfather. It was his grave that I was looking for. My great grandfather Isaac Lewis married Mary Alice Hughes. After his first wife died he married Daisy's mother, Rissie, who was 40 years younger than he was! Thus, that is how Daisy is the half sister of my grandmother Hester Lewis. Daisy is 85 years old now.

We had a very nice visit. Daisy is recovering from a gall bladder operation. I was glad that I had the opportunity to visit her one more time in her lovely, modest home on the edge of Johnson City. She is a lovely lady. Southern gentility. Pictures will be included when I start blogging from home again.

I'm getting used to not having music on my blog. How about all of you? I do miss my picures though. So far I've taken 403 pictures on my iPhone! I've taken some with my Cannon 360 digital but I am gradually moving away from that camera for my picture taking. I've also taken about an hour an a half of video. I may post some of my videos. No slides though!

Well, I'm rambling now so I better quit. I am so looking forward to getting back to my regular routine after my 'field trip.'

Bill Returns Home

Bill - Toccoa Georgia - 1933



Bill returned home today, perhaps for the last time in his life.  Bill was born in Toccoa, Georgia in 1928.  I recently received this picture of Bill as a little boy with his mother, two older sisters and half brother from the half brother's son who happened upon my blog posting of Bill's visit to Toccoa last year.  I had never seen a picture of Bill as a little kid before.  Bill had never seen this picture of himself before either.

Bill's father died when Bill was only one year old in an automobile accident.  Bill was raised by his mother and a step-father.  He did not have a good relationship with his step-father.  That is a long and sad story that I won't go into here but will only say that Bill left Toccoa as soon as he graduated from high school and joined the Air Force.  In that respect Bill's history and mine are very similar.  I didn't get along with my father either and I left home and joined the Army as soon as I graduated from high school.

Today I accompanied Bill while he visited some of his old haunts in Toccoa and surrounding areas.  We visited his grandfather's home where he once spent several weeks after his mother and step-father had a ferociou argument and farmed the kids out.  We also visited the Stephens County Courthouse where I stepped into my first ever courtroom. What a fabulous experience that was!  The court room was almost exactly like the one featured in the movie "The Scopes Monkey Trial" or whatever the name of that movie was.  I even sat in the judge's chair and banged the gavel!  What a thrill that was.  I have video of that which I will post when I get home.  I'm at my brother and sister-in-law's home in Greenville now.  I can't download any of my pictures or videos to her computer.  That will have to wait until I get home. 

It was quite hot in Toccoa this afternoon.  Just like last year when we visited.  We're going back tomorrow to visit Curahee Mountain, Toccoa Falls, and the cemetery where I'm going to meet with one of my fellow Find a Grave volunteers who graciously took picture's of some headstones for Bill a couple of years ago.

When our visit to Toccoa ends tomorrow afternoon we're off to Townsend, Tennessee and Cades Cove in the Smoky Mountians National Park, one my absolute favorite places in the world. 

It's late now, I have my journal entries to make yet then it's time to go to bed.  No naps on this vacation.  My right eyelind is dropping.  A sure sign that Ron Is Tired.  I'm feeling good though because that evil incarnation that was Osama bin Laden is now gone from the face of this earth and now whopping it up with his forty virgins. 

Day One of the Trip South

Here I sit in a hotel room at the Hampton Inn in Mebane. North Carolina. I'm trying to update my blog with my iPad and my teeny, tin keyboard working in HTML code. Maybe this is a blessing in disguise because this posting won't be too long. One thing I noticed right off the bat, no spell check. Watch out.

Sorry about the double pictures of the tulips. I only meant to post one but I had to put the pictures in draft form and I can't remove them from this post because I'm CONTRAINED! Bear with me.

We left early this morning. I did most of the driving (about six hours) until we got to Durham, North Carolina. That's when I started losing it. I just cannot drive long distances anymore. This will probably be my last road trip where I drive unless I can talk someone into driving (I'll rent the van and pay the hotel rooms plus meals! HINT! HINT!)

For those of you who know me and Bill, yes we started to argue only ten minutes into the ride. He wanted to go back. "TURN AROUND!" I worked it through (my life isn't easy believe me) and we managed another forty or fifty miles before we were screaming at each other. I won't bore you with all the gritty details but suffice it to say we're here now. We both agreed this will be our last road trip together. This is actually Bill's Farwell to his hometown of Toccoa Georgia. He wants to see it one more time before he departs this earth. The last time (last June) we made this trip it was to see my Mother for what I was pretty sure was the last time I would see her alive and it turned out to be true because she died three months after wse visited her. That's a sad story so I'll leave it.

By the way, this is tough typing without the use of a mouse. Hmmmm. I'm managing.

We had lunch at Shoney's. So, so. The iced tea was good and the hamburger was real although it wasn't cooked well done the way I prefer it. This evening we had dinner at Ruby Tuesday. Ruby Tuesday may be a chain restaurant but I find its food as good and usually better than the fare offered at pricier restaurants where I'm from, Beach Resort Town of Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. Bill had Chinese dumplings and I had Chicken Florentine (yes, no SEAFOOD again for moi).

Bill's in his room now and I'm here attempting to update my daily blog despite numerous obstacles which I'm not used to dealing with including this teeney, tiny iPad screed and teeny, tine keyboard (for my big fingers). We decided to get separate rooms this time because we're on different sleeping schedules. Bill goes to bed at 7 or so and I usually go much later. We truly have very little in common. Bill even eats at different times that I do.

Tomorrow after a sumptuous breakfast here at the Hampton Inn we're off to Greenville, South Carolina to spend a couple of days with my brother John and his wife Barbara. I'll be sleeping in the same bedroom (and bed) that my Mother died. That probably should bother me but it doesn't When I stay with my brother Isaac in Pennsylvania I also stay in our Mom's bedroom and her bed. That freaks my brother out. Doesn't bother me, probably because that was my bedroom before it was hers. One of my bedrooms in my house in Delaware I have set aside as a shrine to my Mom. She never slept there but I kept it for her. I've put a basket if ger teddy bears on the her bed and I have her funeral book and sympathy cards on a bench next to her bed. That is the room I feel like she is there. She left those other rooms. It's my turn now.

But I'm getting off the subject. You know me and my blogs. I write just what comes into my mind. You all never know where I'm going. Sometimes I don't even know!

Just a couple of more things off subject before I leave you all tonight. Did anybody see Donald J. Trump get skunked last night at the White House Correspondents Dinner. President Obama, with aplomb, style and class easily handed The Donald his ass on a platter. Then Seth Myers (the comedian master of ceremonies) then proceeded to rip Trump an New One. Trump wasn't laughing. I LOVED IT! I live for this kind of Theater.

There was one other thing I wanted to talk about but I forget what it was now. My brother just called me on my iPhone to check in on me. I'm being 'eyed' out here! Talking on my iPhone while typing on my iPad. Techno Wizard here folks! Who would've thunk?

I had to come down to the business center here at the hotel to complete this blog.  It's great to be back to a regular keyboard even if it is one of those clunkly Dell keyboards (brings back bad memories). 

I removed the double posting of my orange tulip pictures (one regular and one in HD).  I wish I could post some of the pictures I took today but I don't know how to do that.  There is probably a way but it is beyond my skills right at this time.  I'll figure it out in time though.  Just another challenge. 

The worst part of this trip is over with.  The Big Haul down through the Delmarva Pensinula ending with going through Virginia Beach and Norfolk - an absolute nightmare.  And I hate the Chesapeak Tunnel.  I get very nervous going under the bay in that narrow tunnel with oncoming traffic.  SCARY!  I'm pretty sure this is the last time I am making this trip.  We're going back home a different way.  Either we'll take 81 up to Pennsylvania to visit my other brother or we will go directly home to Delaware by way of Washington DC which is what I was trying to avoid all along.  It can't be any worse than Virginia Beach/Norfolk. 

So that folks is my First Day on my Trip South.  More tomorrow!