November 17th – November 22nd, 2007
My sister Maureen and her husband Fred were gracious enough to visit with friends in Santa Monica so that they would be able to pick us up at LAX (Los Angeles airport) on Saturday. Everything went really smoothly, except for a bit of traffic for them on getting to the airport, and we were in Santa Barbara by dinnertime. We were so exhausted after our rockin’ and rollin’ in Seattle that we spent a lot of time sleeping and sitting around quietly. Maureen got us out almost each day walking on the beach – Fred and Maureen are only a 20-minute walk from the bluffs overlooking the beach. That was heaven.
We also put our bikes up for sale on Craig’s list, and that was a huge step forward. Fred was kind enough to loan me the temporary use of his guitar, so I got to practice some chords, and managed to pick up about 4 chords in only a few days. In case I haven’t mentioned it yet, I am going to get a guitar to bring along on our trip, and I plan on being pretty proficient by the time we return. Anyone have a decent guitar that he/she would donate to the cause?
Our big news was getting our bikes from New Hampshire the day before Thanksgiving. Chelsea had those babies put together in record time, and we celebrated T-Day by going on our first ride in many weeks – we went with Maureen down to Goleta Beach.
Thanksgiving was very pleasant – we got to see family – in addition to Maureen and Fred, my brother Barry was there, with his wife Nora and daughter Claire (just 3 months younger than Chelsea), Maureen’s son Todd and his wife Cora, and Fred’s mom. As usual, there was lots of great food and drink.
Since Todd and Cora had prior reservations on the room we were in, our long-time friends Kathy and Gary and Kevin picked us up at Maureen’s house after T-Day dinner and brought us up to Santa Ynez. We certainly have to give Maureen and Fred a Hero of the Week for picking us up in LA and for hosting us for those 5 days.