Suzanne’s First Award; Everybody Run - Here Comes Rudy! Dropping in on Mom; Saving a Turtle; Arsters and Knives

I was going through an old family album and found this postcard showing Suzanne as a child with her very first award. I particularly liked the helmet with the spike. It matches the sash and petticoats perfectly. Now I know how she won all those Navy Expert Marksman awards... er, sorry, Markswoman... uh-oh... 

Okay, Suzanne asked me to explain that it isn't really her holding the rifle. It's actually an historic postcard sent to her by someone in Rochester where the J. & P. Coats Thread Co. had a factory. She is too young to have known about Coats Thread, but my mother was a seamstress, so I knew the brand.

Here’s our lanai’s gecko sentry; over the past  few days there has been a sentry posted on a tall chair, watching the sliding glass door that Rudy uses to get to the lanai. The sentry has just sounded the alarm that Rudy the Gecko-Buster is getting ready to come outside. “Danger! Danger! All geckos run and hide!”

We dropped in on Ruthie, Suzanne’s mom, while on a bike ride. Most people think we followed Suzanne’s parents here to The Villages. Au contraire, we found our house in Mallory and Ruthie and Bill flew in a week later and bought their house in Duval. It’s great being only 3 ½ miles from her mom because Suzanne can drop in for a hug any time she wants (well, at least when Ruthie isn’t at one of her daily bridge matches; or her mahjong games; or the movies; or bowling.... oh, yeah, this is an active adult community!) It's also good to be close so Your Correspondent can grab a piece of cake or the occasional chocolate chip cookie; My Lovely Bride rations them in our house, but Ruthie's Bakery is usually good for a handout.

On that same bike ride, we came upon a turtle trying to cross a main road, and he wasn’t moving quickly enough to be safe. We stopped to pick him up and relocate him back to the pond where he lives. I think I heard our daughter Susan thanking us. She was always kind and considerate to people and animals alike, and would have been the first to stop and help an injured critter. Fortunately this guy wasn’t injured; he swam away like a rocket as soon as I placed him back in the water, none the worse for his experience. (Might be another synchronicity; this is the fourth turtle we've saved this way over the years since Susan passed.)

We had a delightful evening with our good friends Sharon and Joyce; they joined us at our house for sundowners, bringing delicious olives, a loaf of bread, a beautiful handmade plate, and homemade pesto (they know the way to my heart). 

Then we moved to a local establishment for oysters (or “arsters” as they are called in rural Maryland). It was a busy night there for the servers, and one of the other diners helped us clear and set up our table. The oysters were very good, but I wasn’t too sure about a couple of guys at the next table who were showing off their knives. I think their conversation went something like this: “My knife is bigger than your knife.”... “It might be bigger, but mine is sharper!” "Oh, yeah? Let's see if it can shave the hair off'n my arm!" "Hey, Josh, you got a first aid kit behind the bar?" (Talk about not growing up.) This was actually more of a biker bar than anything else, but it had character. We were gratified that Sharon's Lexus was still there in the parking lot after dinner, but I suspect that the high likelihood of the bar's patrons carrying knives, guns, clubs, chains, and tasers keeps any potential carjackers away....

What we didn't know was that Rudy and Gretchen had stowed away in the trunk of the car and were at the bar having BIG oysters on the half shell and Yuenglings while we were on the patio having the small ones. Joyce happened to catch them with her camera for this candid shot... boy, are they in trouble!