Feeling so fortunate

T and I went for a beautiful walk on the beach, had our usual cup of frozen yogurt and marveled at our good fortune to be here where it is sunny and warm and still beach weather with temperatures in the 70s. Especially with all the posts from many friends in CT with pictures and stories of the nor'easter that came through over the weekend, covering the trees with their leaves still on with many inches of heavy snow. They report 95% of our old home town without power. The church had to cancel the haunted house last night and services this morning. There are trees down in everyone's front/back yards. One of my friends had a tree crush her truck. The trees have taken down power lines and transformers are blowing up. The only silver lining is that the days are still warmish so the pipes hopefully won't freeze. Some of my friends are saying they don't mind the snow and they actually enjoy the shoveling but I can tell you that I really don't like the snow and any of the things associated with it. As I said at the start of this post, we are very fortunate to have moved here!

Kitchen renovation

We are finalizing all the choices for our kitchen remodeled scheduled hopefully to be completed by Thanksgiving. So many choices. Chose appliances,countertop (quartz) and wood and stain for custom cabinets last week. This has been in the works for almost 5 months but the contractor we are working with has been swamped with jobs. He's a family friend and we like what he's done. He totally renovated Aunt L's house after she passed away and before P and K sold it. Then he worked on P's house and then did some work for K in Monterey and a number of other houses in P's neighborhood. As always the job is coming in higher than the budget - sigh! what else is new!

First Annual American Cancer Society Walk

Yesterday was the first annual American Cancer Society 3 mile walk in San Luis Obispo. There have been many relay for the cures and Susan B Komen walks for breast cancer but there hasn't been an ACS walk in SLO before. Girlfriend, D knows the person who was spearheading the event and she pulled a team together and we were called the Cypress Ridge Fitness Striders. There were about 12 of us who walked together and raised money for her team. The event was really moving with the number of women (all women in this case) who have been diagnosed. Some are multiple year survivors from over 20 years to women just diagnosed and starting treatment Monday. The women were asked to go up to the podium and give their names and years surviving. Many walkers had the names of people they were walking in memory of. I couldn't believe the list of names I had well over 20!

Clam Festival

The weather forecast was for temps in the 60s at the shore but we went to the beach anyway to take part in the Pismo Beach Clam Festival. We have tried to go every year we've been here. It runs from Friday to Sunday and we always seem to be busy on the Friday and Saturday and end up having to hurry down on the last afternoon. It was a gorgeous afternoon with temps in the 70s, lots of sun and many people walking around the festival and on the beach. We got a very tiny bowl of clam chowder - yum! They said that the Sea Venture won the judges' competition but that Splash Cafe won the peoples' choice first place. I am always surprised at what people buy at these events!

Theatre, theatre, theatre

This past week has been a flurry of theatre activities. On Thursday we went to the Great American Melodrama in Oceano for a performance of the Werewolf and Dr. Oz. It was a campy loose take off on the Wizard of Oz. The play (original) takes place first followed by a vaudeville act. The theatre was recently renovated and looks very respectable. It has a western feel with sawdust on the main floor where there are 36 tables for 4 set up. The sides and back of the theatre are lined with 3 levels of "balcony" seating each with row with a shelf in front to hold any food/drink purchased. It was fun and entertaining.

Friday we ushered for a local group of mostly women called the Central Coast Follies. Every year they put on a dance and song show to raise money for Parkinson Disease research. It's kind of like watching your grandma's dance recital. This year they added a hula number complete with about a dozen children getting into the act. There was also a silks routine coupled with a ring routine. The young ladies were suspended on a large ring and doing intricate maneuvers on the ring and then also climbing up and down silk ropes suspended from the ceiling.

Saturday was our only night to catch a performance at our local high school. They put on the very challenging comedy "Noises Off" and they pulled it off for the most part. They even put on British accents and most kept in accent throughout the show. They had the comedic timing down pretty well. Bravo.

Finally last night we worked concessions at the Clark Center and had an opportunity to listen and watch the Kingston Trio put on a terrific show with tons of very familiar music - you know, "Tom Dooley", "Charlie on the MTA", "500 miles", "Where have all the flowers gone?" etc. Fabulous show.