A New Beginning

Today was a big day around here, and it wasn’t all about our trip. I planned to sleep in but didn’t succeed. My first task of the day was to seal and then mail another package to the grandgirls—to be opened later this month when we’ll be away. I try to send them something every month but obviously I have to be a little creative this month.

When I got back from the post office I made a big breakfast before heading out to Aldi. Mostly I tried to stock up on things I know Jasper will use—tortillas, rice, milk, and tater tots! He has a serious tater tot habit.

Walter helped me put the food away and then got going on his project—to learn how to use and test our folding solar panel. The instructions were so tiny that I took photos of them and then enlarged and printed them. He laid the panel out on our patio table and then tried charging his phone. It was a cloudy day, so not ideal, but his phone charge level did increase significantly in one hour, so I think/hope it’ll be worth taking, since it weighs six pounds.

Speaking of weight, I have Walter’s suitcase half packed, so we weighed it to see where we stand. It was 28 pounds. So I feel we’re in pretty good shape. We don’t mind paying the extra baggage fees; we just need to be sure both cases are under the 70-lb limit for overweight baggage.

I also spent a considerable amount of time jumping through a series of hoops in order to set up a hotel room for us during our layover in Doha. It sure beats spending ten hours in the airport.

At 2:30 we (including Jasper) set off for Nacogdoches. My plan was to stop at a KFC on the way to buy coleslaw. According to Google and my GPS, there is a KFC in Henderson, which is right on the way between here and Nacogdoches. Except that the address it sent us to is an empty lot. Hmmm . . . Fortunately there IS a KFC in Nacogdoches!

Our first stop in Nac, though, was a place Lina had recommended to us—the Fortney House:

What a spectacular old house. Look at those porches! It is kind of a cross between a museum and a boutique selling an incredibly eclectic array of objects. Here are just a few of the things we saw there:

Lina had said it would take us at least an hour to see it all, and she was right. We didn’t buy anything though. We are not in acquisition mode at the moment and most of the items were well out of our budget.

After leaving that place (and finally getting some coleslaw at the Nac KFC) we drove to the library where Lina works so that Walter and Jasper could finally see it:

My lovely librarian daughter in her library!

She was just getting off work, so we all went back to her place and packed both cars with stuff to take to her new apartment. We have loved visiting her here at #11:

But the time had come for her to find a different place, and in her new place her next-door neighbor is already a friend and coworker at the library. So we got a tour of the new place (and Walter fixed a broken doorknob) before setting up the table and chairs while I cooked hot dogs on the stove. I had planned to grill the sausages, but it appeared likely to rain at any moment, so I had to cook indoors.

We have a family tradition, you see, of having hot dogs for dinner for the first meal in a new home. It dates back to 1994 when we returned from Zambia and moved into a rental home on this same block. We had very few possessions and very few options for creating a meal, but we did have hot dogs and I could boil them on the stove. Ever since then the kids have insisted that hot dogs must be the first meal.

So to save Lina having to make anything, I took our whole dinner tonight—including the cake I made yesterday. I had bought soft drinks for the others but made some green tea for myself, only to realize too late that green tea is caffeinated . . . sure hope I’ll be able to get to sleep tonight. We had no condiments for the hot dogs, and utensils were in short supply, but we still had a very enjoyable meal.

After supper we drove back to Lina’s place so she could give me a small item to take to Zambia, and then we said our goodbyes and headed home. When we return from our trip we’ll be eager to see her new place after it’s all set up.

Parting Shot:

It’s that time of year again. Both Lina’s old place and new place are decorated with drifts of pink crape myrtle petals.