Saturday, April 1…Family Affair (Sly and the Family Stone)

    I’d say my knee is about 95% normal right now; still a twinge if I move it just right but the limp is gone. Of course, I can’t watch myself walk so maybe the most I can say is that it feels like I’m not limping. Walking on the gravel around camp requires an adjustment in foot placement but that gravel hasn’t been my friend for the past 4 years so I’m not basing level of recovery on that.  Still don’t know exactly what caused my knee to get so mad at me but I firmly believe that I received the small miracle that I prayed for in the middle of a sleepless night. 😎

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   The last three nights have been too cloudy to do any imaging; Kim packed his telescope gear today and wouldn’t you know it, the sky is clear tonight. Mother Nature can be cruel that way. But the scope had to be taken down today because it takes a couple of hours to dismantle, pack and stow it in the truck; tomorrow morning our time will be taken up with making sure the camper is travel ready because 11 a.m. is check-out time. Already said our good-byes to Felicia because she won’t be working tomorrow; missed saying good-bye to Audra because Thursday she flew to New York for the weekend; haven’t seen much of Ryan during our stay because he was helping his Grandma in Florida but he’s back and we should see him tomorrow. Coming out here to Picacho KOA is like visiting family.

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   I almost forgot to put pennies on the railroad track this year; wrote myself a note last night and got to it this morning.  Put out 4 pennies, a nickel and 2 or 3 dimes. Heard a couple of trains go by so we headed back to check out the results. I found two coins still stuck to the track and a third coin had fallen on one of the railroad ties.  No sign of the others but I didn’t spend a lot of time looking either.  Just grabbed the three coins and got out of there before I got caught.

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   We had originally planned to start our journey back toward the Mitten today but instead went to Phoenix to spend time with family and friends.  Ezra, Anna and Juniper flew into Phoenix yesterday for a weekend visit with Elise, Mike and Violet, who live in Goodyear and Bill and Mary, who have been snowbirding out here since early January. In addition to the Trupiano family, Anna’s aunt and uncle (Cathy and Bill Brodie) and Mike’s parents and brother (Tim, Nora and Rob Hart) were going to be there also, and they invited us to join them for the afternoon. We were able to extend our stay an extra day, so it worked out well…especially for Violet and Juniper who each had two sets of grandparents there to cheer on whatever cuteness their one-year-old selves could come up with. Lots of good food and good conversation…and there was even a surprise pumpkin pie with candles on it for me. In an effort to not spread germs, I thought I would ‘wave’ the candles out instead of blowing them out. To my surprise it worked.

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   When we got back to camp, Mom and I started doing some preliminary packing; Kim’s first priority was putting the hitch on the truck. To his great surprise, he discovered that the hitch was a little smaller than the receiver. That meant an unexpected trip to Wal-Mart in Coolidge to find an insert that would make it all good. Thankfully he found what he needed and life is back on track for getting out of here on time tomorrow.             

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40 Days of Lent opportunity: Fast from all technology today. I knew this one wasn’t going to happen as written because we were going into Phoenix for the afternoon and needed to use Rapunzel.  So, I decided to do without technology until 8 p.m., except for my phone for the use of Rapunzel. But then it took a fraction of a second to decide I wasn’t going to ignore an incoming text from a 14-year-old grandson…if he was reaching out then I was going to respond. So, this challenge got away from me. 

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