The Joy of Laundry Day

Doing the laundry at a laundromat has good parts and bad parts. The best thing is that you can do a week's worth of laundry in just 3 hours. The bad thing is that you have to haul all your dirty clothes to the laundry. It costs money at a laundromat but owning a washer and dryer is not cheap either. I love clean clothes but I really dread laundry day.
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Papa is a big help. He loads the car and helps unload it at the laundry. When it is all done he helps me get it all back in the car and back into the Bitty Home
This may look like a large laundry but when you consider how many people live here--there are 600 slots with at least 2 people--so at least 1200 people, and only 4 people could be in there at the same time.


Sometimes I am able to have a grandchild to help me with the quarters. It's winter so I am far away from all my grandchildren: no help with sorting my quarters. Papa and Becca help me. These machines at East Shore RV Resort only take 4 quarters.

This laundry is very basic but some attention has been given to it because a whole bank of dryers was recently added.

After all the clothes are washed and dried and folded, we put them all back in our flexible baskets and put them back in the car.

This story has a happy ending. When the laundry was all done, we went out to dinner at Marie Callender's. I had a great ham sandwich followed by a wonderful Coconut cream pie.

Christmas is coming from Hawaii

We decided to combine gifts from Hawaii with gifts for Christmas. By now most of you have received your box. The moms know the drill. Call me and find out, "What was I thinking". I know every family is doing something different this year and so I felt that the mother's needed to be able to decide when to open the presents. With Gramma and Papa in Needles, this is going to be one crazy Christmas. It never snows in Needles. I'm not convinced it ever rains.

Critters love Hawaii too

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This morning I was up extra early so I decided to work on the computer. While I was seated I felt something bite my leg. I slapped at it then brought my hand up to see if I got anything. I had guts and gore all over my hand. Yuk! It was disgusting, but I got him. I stared at the mess trying to figure out what I got. You remember in Hawaii there are many possibilities. For sure it wasn't a ghost ant that live in this room in abundance. They are called ghost ants because they are so small you can hardly see them. Hard to kill; they are super fast. Then I remembered the day before I was hanging up Dad's pants and a huge silver fish ran over my hand. I shook the pants hoping he'd fall out but I never saw it again. Until...maybe...now. I thought of the Eric and Ganon adventure with a centipede. Maybe another reason not to live in Hawaii.

Roofers on the Roof

On Sister Smith's street a roofing project was underway. We passed by at what must have been break time and all daboyz were perched on the roof like birds on the wire, or maybe fiddlers on da roof. When we stopped take a picture, they waved and one of them sang. "Mama don't let your babies grow up to be roofers."

Tuesday Morning Chores-Journal #2

We ended #1 with Becca capturing the sunrise on Tuesday 11/6. So that’s where we’ll pick up. We are staying in the kitchen wing of Rita’s house. Past the kitchen down the hall are two bedrooms, one with one single bed where Becca stays and the other with two single beds for M&me, and a bathroom in between.* Very homey. The sound of the ocean in Rita’s backyard fills our rooms. We are very blessed to be here.
*Not unlike our bity home.

Still sleepy from our long day yesterday, we climbed back into our rental car. (That's me with my prize nuts from the airplane contest.)

Hertz gave us a GMC Acadia—sort of an SUV. Dad had reserved a “full size” car because we are full size folk. He is happy with the ride. Becca thinks it’s a truck and I agree it rides just like a truck. It’s not as bad as the Limo though.

Breakfast was at Burger King to plan the day. They had RICE and SPAM with their breakfast. Becca loved it.

We went to Long’s to drop off a couple of prescriptions to be refilled then off to Honolulu.
Next should be the Kamaka Ukulele Tour but it is not ready yet. Dad would like us to move on to Wednesday. Dad took the Pictures of the rental car and Becca took all the rest of the pictures in Journal #2. Yes with her camera phone.

Where to Eat Lunch

After the Ukulele tour, it was lunchtime. Mom wanted to go to Ala Moana* to Shirokiya where they have a unique Japanese buffet of pasteries and delicious little oriental sandwiches. We ate outside where the bold doves walked between our feet feasting on the crumbs.
*I know if I just say Ala Moana you are going to think of it the way it used to be and not how it is now.

First of all a water main had broken nearby the entrance and all the traffic had to get in one lane. Do you remember the ramp? Well it is still there but it doesn’t go anywhere. You can’t turn left at the top as you would if you were going to Shirokiya, as we were. Everybody has to go to the right like it or not. We went around Sears, past Morton’s Steakhouse, where we had a fancy dinner with the Bangerters one time,

and then past the new 3 story section.


We drove completely around the mall and up to the rooftop parking to get to Shirokiya. The bakery was no longer on that floor but we did find it one floor down.

After Lunch

The next item of business was to visit the Satellite City Hall there in the mall to correct Bigfoot title and registration. On the way we passed an Arby’s and a bookstore which Becca documented.


We had success at City Hall—I described it in #1. This was very high on my Hawaii to-do list. I’m Very happy to get it done. We bought a shirt for Becca with Honolulu Police graphics on it. Part of the logo was an eagle which she likes.
Back in Kailua we stopped at the Holland’s. Melody was home—she is the lady that has been forwarding our mail for two years. We visited on her lawn some and took our PO box key to collect our own mail while we’re here.
We came home after that and visited with Rita. The college girls that live with her made a nice dinner and we all ate together.

First Limo Ride

Monday was discouragingly full of things to be done on a timetable. Ugg. The rig was readied to be stored. Meaning the propane is turned off and the electricity, among other things, and the contents of refrigerator had to be done with. Auntie Pat was kind enough to take the stuff. The three of us had to finish packing for two weeks--never a happy thing for us. But all got done, the vehicles put in storage, and our limo waiting to pick us up at the appointed time. Incidentally I told Carmen no liquor, we were Mormons and water would be fine.
Becca brought her own "CocaCola Light, just in case. So we had our first ride in a stretch limo. They did have cold water for us, cool AC and surround FM music. Sammy the limo owner told us he thought it would only take 45 minutes to get to the airport. He didn't feel we needed to leave at 2:00pm for our 6:40 flight. We thought about it. We knew it could also take 3 hours to get to the airport. We used to live in Manchester which is just north of the airport. It would take at least a half an hour to get to the airport from there. We also lived close to where Auntie Pat lives now and we knew that the best time to travel on the "freeways" is between 11:00am and 2:00pm. So we told him we still wanted to leave at 2:00. It took nearly an hour and a half to get to the airport. We did not check in to our flight until after 4:00. There was an accident on our route and traffic was backed up. Luckily we had left plenty of buffer time. The ride in our Lincoln limo was a uncomfortable at best (like riding a dragon's tail, Mom said) but we were grateful not to be the driver, who turned out to be Sammy's Mother.

Becca View

On Monday 11/5 we got up in LA at 6 AM. We didn’t drop into bed at Sr.Smith’s until 11/6 3AM (body time). Even with all of our resulting exhaustion, Becca was up for dawn and captured this gorgeous view through her bedroom window with her cell phone. (I’m not making this up) Becca continues to have the ability to compose her shots. Her selection of subjects, however, is sometimes unorthodox (like signs of restaurants we go to or drive by), but sometimes, like this one, she can capture classic glimpses of the world around her. Perhaps as touching to us as the photo, was her pleasantly surprised comment, while looking at the scene, “We’ve come back to where we came from!”

Becca's Halloween

For many years Becca has recognized the meaning of the halloween decorations that go up in stores and houses. She knows that it is time to decide on her costume to go trickrtreating. She makes this decision totally on her own. This year again she decided on "Walker, Texas Ranger". That's what she was last year in the frozen Rexburg. Of course, we couldn't find the little sheriff's badge we bought in IF. So we looked around the SoCal stores like ToysRUs for a replacement. What did we find? There apparently is no interest in dressing up as law enforcement officier. Sad statement. Anyway we used some of Mom's scrapbooking stuff to make up her label. She was happy. I went again as "Walker's Prisoner". Chrissy invited us to come to her nice family-friendly neighborhood to trickrtreat. Becca was pumped. She knew the protocol. She rang the bell and called out "trickortreat". She answered questions about her costume and said thank you when she got candy. She had a fun night, wore out her prisoner, and as we drove home she chatted happily about halloween plans for next year.