Sunday ; Today started out a little cool, but quickly warmed up to be a beautiful, sunny, warm day.
Today was the final day of the week long 64th annual Carrot Festival in Holtville, California, about an hour west of Yuma on Interstate 8. In previous years I have wanted to attend the Carrot Festival but one thing or another prevented it. When I woke up this morning the discomfort from yesterday’s periodontal surgery wasn’t too bad so I decided we were going to Holtville. Joanne phoned her friend Eilene at Kofa Ko-op and invited her to join us. We picked up Eilene and headed west on I-8. About halfway to Holtville Lanoire reached 160,000 km. ( 100,000 miles ) and so ended her warranty. Given our experiences with Dee-Dee, that last piece of shit truck that we had, I have anxiety about no warranty.
We like Holtville. We usually go there once a year just to buy burritos
( EXCELLENT ! ) and pan dulce ( also EXCELLENT ). Like any and every town in Mexico, Holtville has a lovely one square block “town square” park. The Carrot Festival was in Holt Park. There were a variety of vendors selling arts and crafts … and typical junk. But most importantly, today was the Carrot Festival’s Family Day and “Cook-Off” Competition. So, for lunch we bought and munched on a lot of “family favourite recipe” small quantity dishes from the competitors. All were Mexican dishes, even though one or two of the competitors were gringos. I wasn’t about to let a bit of mouth pain get in the way of an eating adventure. The food was wonderful ! Especially the carne con papas and the quesadillas. The quesadillas were really more like queso empanadas. But … I did hurt myself eating. Sometimes a man’s just gotta do what a man’s gotta do ! Although … I suppose it’s hard to justify eating until one’s mouth bleeds. HA HA HA ! Hope my periodontist isn’t reading this !
After eating and wandering around the park looking at the vendors’ wares, listening to the music, enjoying the nice weather, we went to our favourite panaderia in town and bought some pan dulce. I was sorely tempted to go to Holtville Taco Shop to buy some burritos to bring home for supper, but I knew that I had already violated what was sensible to eat a day after surgery on my gums. Last week on Sunday, the day after my first periodontal surgery, all I ate was soup, and two soft boiled eggs late in the evening. So … < sigh > … no burritos !
We drove back to Yuma, dropped Eilene off at home at Kofa Ko-op, and returned home. I promptly took some painkillers and went to nap. I had been a bad boy ! Late in the afternoon we returned to Kofa Ko-op to attend their Sunday afternoon ice cream social, specifically to ask some friends there if they would look after Bo on Friday when we go on a bus trip to Palm Springs for the day. < sigh > Our friends weren’t there. We ate ice cream anyway. HA HA HA !
Monday ; Happy Valentine’s Day
Today was sunny and warm. This afternoon we attended the Canadian Snowbirds Association show at the Yuma Civic Center. It was an afternoon of entertainment and useful information for us Canadian Snowbirds. Every year the CSA holds a couple of shows in Canada during the summer season, usually one in Toronto and one in Vancouver, then a few shows in the winter in the popular Snowbird destinations in Florida, Arizona, and California. As we were leaving the Civic Center after the show we bumped into Ed and Lori, friends of ours from the Escapees B.C. Okanagan Chapter 33.
Tuesday ; Today was sunny and very warm, another really lovely day. This morning Bo and I headed out to run some errands. First stop was Wally’s World, a local hardware / flea market type store. They didn’t have the spray paint I was looking for. Next it was over to The Foothills where I went to the RV blind repair business to buy a day / night shade restring / repair kit. Good insurance ! The few times that we’ve needed to have a day / night shade restrung it has always been difficult to find a place that can do it. So … next time … I’ll do it myself … I hope !
I drove from The Foothills to Kofa Ko-op. I wanted to ask some friends there if they would take care of Bo on Friday. But … when I arrived there at 1:15 PM the annual general meeting was still underway. YIKES … long meeting. I thought it was going to be finished by noon. I left a note on our friends’ door and headed home.
While I set up a table and chairs on our patio Joanne prepared fresh guacamole. Our friends Barry and Marty and their Cocker Spaniel Sunny came over for a Happy Hour visit. We spent a pleasant afternoon chatting, drinking beer, eating guacamole and tortilla chips. I couldn’t eat the tortilla chips ! I am having as much problems … maybe even a bit more … with my upper gums ( surgery 10 days ago ) than I am with my lower gums ( surgery 3 days ago ).
Tonight’s movie was “Shine”. Good movie !
Wednesday ; Today was sunny and hot … no shirt required ! This morning I did a “home improvement” project in the trailer, relocating a couple of light fixtures. This afternoon I went out into the farm field beside the RV park and flew my kite. AHHHHH … I find kite flying to be relaxing. Joanne went grocery shopping. I took Bo for a long walk. As we walked by a lemon grove, I looked up into a lemon tree and spotted a mutant / deformed lemon. HA HA HA … it made me think of a recent news article we saw while watching news in Spanish on TV. A crowd of Mexicans gathered around a tree with a huge blemish on the bark … which appeared to them to be an image of the Virgin Mary. They were praying and crying and chanting and touching the blemished bark. I picked the lemon, photographed it, and named it my Virgin Mary lemon. HA HA HA HA HA !
As Joanne was bringing the groceries in from the truck, she tore her reusable Trader Joe’s shopping bag. Apparently her “favourite” reusable shopping bag. She asked if I could repair it ? No, dear … people in our
socio-economic class don’t use duct taped shopping bags ! Sheesh !
Tonight’s movie was The Untouchables. I liked it !
Tonight’s movie was “Breathless”. 1983. Richard Gere. Pretty crappy !
Friday ; Yuma, Arizona to Palm Springs, California and return
Today was partially sunny and warm, partially cloudy and cool, and for awhile, it rained heavily.
We woke early this morning, departed from home at 8 AM, drove to
Kofa Ko-op, dropped Bo off at Mike’s and Sharon’s to be “babysat”, picked up Eilene, and headed for the Sears Mall where we caught a bus at 9 AM for our day trip to Palm Springs for the Riverside County Fair & National Date Festival in Indio. I was a bit unhappy, and felt a bit unsafe, with the speeding of our bus driver. He was passing everything on the road, and for most of the time was driving in the outside / passing / “fast” lane ! And made it from Yuma to Palm Springs in three hours, including a rest stop in El Centro. And the return trip took about the same time, even though it was dark and raining !
The National Date Festival is held concurrently with the Riverside County Fair at the Fairgrounds in Indio, an eastern suburb of Palm Springs. Although it was hard to really see any evidence of the “National Date Festival”. There were some date vendors and a date recipe cooking show in the “food exhibits” building, but that was about all. Otherwise, it was a really large “county fair”, similar to the Navan Fair we used to attend annually just outside Ottawa, but a lot bigger. A large midway with rides and games. Lots of food vendors. Animal shows and displays. Food shows and displays. Arts and crafts shows and displays. Children’s arts and crafts shows and displays. All of everything in “competition”.
We arrived around noon, wandered around displays, watched the pig races, had lunch, wandered around more displays, then headed for the afternoon “highlight”, the ostrich and camel races. When we arrived in the large arena around 3 PM it was sunny and warm but over the next hour or so the temperature plummeted as clouds rolled in and the wind picked up. As the ostrich and zebra races ended and the emu races were about to begin it began to rain. I left Joanne and Eilene in the arena and hiked back to where our tour bus was parked to get our sweaters and jackets and blankets. By the time I returned the emu and camel races were over. DARN … I missed the camel races !
It rained lightly for the rest of the afternoon. We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around from building to building, viewing exhibits and avoiding the cold rain. As the sun set, it began to rain heavily. And the main show of the evening was a musical pageant on an outdoor stage. We wandered toward the main stage getting cold and soaked, debating whether or not to stay. When we arrived at the main stage, there were only a few people waiting for the show to begin, it was cold, and it was raining heavily. We headed for the bus ! We were in the bus for only a few minutes when the last of our group arrived back at the bus. The show had been postponed for half an hour, with a probability that at that time it would be cancelled due to rain. The bus left, heading back to Yuma.
When we stopped for a rest break in El Centro the rain had stopped, although it had been raining in El Centro. There was no evidence of rain when we arrived back in Yuma. The bus arrived back in Yuma about 11 PM, we dropped Eilene off at Kofa Ko-op at 11:30 PM, and headed back home to Rancho Bonitos. It was too late to pick up Bo. We left him to have a “sleepover” with Gypsy.
Tonight’s movie was the 1963 Stanley Kubrick production “Dr. Strangelove”. Forty-eight years later and one has to wonder if its lessons have been learned ? ! ?
DSK
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