Poinsettia - promised blog

Our guests arrived shortly after 4:00 PM today. Dinner was all ready as it had been in the slow cooker since 8:00 this morning. (Kim brought some wonderful tasting pumpkin bread.) We went out to the dock to feed the ducks, feed the fish, shoot wrist rockets and take some pictures after we ate dinner today. I tried to take a picture of Jalayne and Chris. I was going to put them in profile against a bright sky, but alas, a dark row of houses appears right where the profile of their faces should have been. Elliot gave me a wave that covered part of his face as I took his picture, AND the promised picture of the beautiful poinsettia mentioned in my previous blog is now included. gwh

Having spot and blemish

This week Clarine and I visited the dermatologist. He abused the top of my head and the side of my face somewhat. He cut out three samples from her that were biopsied and found negative. They were on her back and a little risque to show in pictures. But we seem to have a good bill of health in these pre-cancerous matters.

With regard to my previous blog: I still haven't got my new mouse and keyboard, but Phil, Sheridan, Zach and Max came out on Friday. Among other things Phillip literally scraped some stuff off the ball in my mouse as well as swabbing the mechanisms inside with a que tip and alcohol. It worked. My mouse now moves as freely as ever. So eventually I will have three mouses. One was for my lap top, but Phil says I need Bluetooth in my lap top for it to work. So I have a very nice little laser mouse that I am not able to use. While they were here the children (us kids) went out on the dock and shot sling shots and fed the ducks. We shot many pieces of smooth glass far out into the lake.

We have been on the entertainment circuit the last two nights. Friday night we attended a musical that had been written for our stake to perform in lieu of the road shows this year. It was about Alma and Abinadi and was excellently done. Last night Clarine and I went to the tabernacle to witness a production by the orchestra and bells on temple square. It was professionally done and the presentation was beautiful to see and hear.

We expect Kim Chris and family and Jalayne to arrive momentarily for a visit. We will dine and visit and enjoy each other. Clarine's grandson, wife and two kids are staying a lot of the time for the next week as well.

Our Christmas cactus is blooming again. I have included a blurry picture of it. Two days ago Clarine bought a great, large poinsettia. I took a picture to show you it's beauty. Alas! my computer and camera are doing some conspiracy theory, because under today's date the picture I found was one from last fall which I think I already included in a blog. Oh, well enjoy it again! I am not going to go through all of the hassle to get another picture of the poinsettia and include it with this blog. I suspect there will be a time before the plant withers and dies that I will send you a picture. Anything else I was going to say has evaporated. Perhaps it can be reconstituted and forwarded at a later date. gwh

Mouse

My mouse is not happy. It is not dead, but some times I would like to shoot it, as it is quite intermittent and jerky as I try to maneuver my icon. One can tell that I am desperate for blogging material when I have to pick on a crippled mouse. Anyway an ad from buy.com came in my e-mail and advertised a mouse and keyboard made by Phillips for $12.99 with free shipping. I made a management decision and ordered it yesterday. It should arrive soon. I don't need another keyboard, but for that price and the chance of eliminating my frustration with my mouse, I couldn't go wrong.

I have been doing things that are really quite routine, and we are leading quite a mundane life. We have gotten back into visiting the swimming pool that last two weeks. Things are all winterized and ready for the bad weather. Clarine got me to put up some Christmas lights yesterday, because the weather was nice and warm. There are still more to put up. Maybe tomorrow. I am not putting any power to them until at least after Thanksgiving. Even then I may be able to hold out for a little longer. The Canadian geese that are staying for the winter did not migrate with the larger groups that took off earlier in the fall. There are some ducks. I don't see the turtles any more. I wonder if they have hibernated in the mud. Perhaps my next blog will be really exciting. What else can I say but, "GO COUGARS!" gwh

Lava Hot Springs - Edition 2

The ATTENTION sign says that the number of trout limit on Chesterfield Reservoir is 2. I stood by the sign designating the historic restoration of Chesterfield, Idaho. There were several old red brick homes, a red brick school and a red brick church that have been restored along with a mercantile shown in the previous blog. It is shaping up to be a very nice restoration project. Two more photos of the Soda Springs area are included. One is of Hooper Spring where oodles of naturally carbonated water comes forth in a very nice stream. We made some root beer with it, but it was a little flat. A picture of the geyser mentioned in Edition 1 is included. Now you can tell me who was closest in their estimate of the height of the geyser - Clarine, 100 feet; Dan, 35 feet; or George, 50 feet. I lost many photos of the restoration in the transfer process, as well as some other pics in the area. The bottom line is that it was an excellent week. We are now back in the usual mode of operation.

Lava Hot Springs - Edition 1

Karen Hill Restored Mercantile - Chesterfield, Idaho

The condo - Lava Hot Springs, Idaho

Dan's office - Pocatello, ID

Last week Clarine and I went to Lava Hot Springs for a visit of one week at a condo in Lava Hot Springs, Idaho. We did a lot of things. One day we drove to Pocatello to visit Dan at his place of work. His sister-in-law, Karen Hill also works in that office. Dan, Clarine and I went to lunch at the Sizzler. We had a fun visit before driving back to Lava Hot Springs. It is only a short 30 minute drive between the two cities. We drove to many cities (towns) in the southeastern part of Idaho during the course of the week - Soda Springs , Montpelier, Ovid, Paris, St. Charles, Garden City, Grace, Treasureton, Oxford, Clifton, Dayton, Preston, Bancroft, Chesterfield, Round Valley, and several other places that don't come to the top of my mind just now. Dan drove down to Lava and spent some time with us Thursday. Among the places we went besides Lava were the Dempsy Creek area, Soda Springs , Hooper Springs, and we tossed some bread to the fish in the Portneuf River. At Hooper Springs we shot sling shots at some steel charcoal grills. We saw the geyser erupt in Soda Springs. It spews for about ten minutes. Clarine says it goes a hundred feet high. Dan said 35 feet and my projection was that it goes about fifty feet. Someday perhaps we will read how high it goes. This is only the first edition of the trip summary. I have some more pictures for which I will include another blog.

We returned home on Friday, and I mowed my lawn and winterized (burned out the gasoline and changed the oil) in the lawn mower. That night was Halloween. Clarine had about a hundred young visitors to whom she gave out a can of soda and a Twinkie or a Hostess Cup Cake. I told her word would soon spread, and surely enough we ended up with only a few Twinkies. She gets a real delight out of having all of those young people come. Her brother-in-law works for Hostess and provides her with Twinkies and cupcakes. He says that all she needs to do to repay him is to make some of her good potato salad, and bring it with her on a visit. We went right back to our temple assignments the next day. When we got home that night, I drained the sprinkler system and got it ready for winter. My timing was about right as it turned cooler today and stormed. gwh