Apricity West 4

December 1, 2023 - Friday
Look what arrived today - a Cozy Cottage Sampler Afghan from Annie’s Club. Daughter, Shannon, expressed interest in my making this (for her)!

December 2, 2023 - Saturday

Crawled out of bed on this cold, crispy day since I wanted to experience the Biscuits and Gravy breakfast that Rich has on Thursday mornings with the guys. It was indeed a very good and plentiful 1/4 biscuit from the Horseshoe Cafe.

I haven’t been to this end of town yet this year, so these pictures help tell the story of Wickenburg downtown.

When we got back to North Ranch, I was glad to hear that Lu was looking for a good walk. We made several stops on our route to chat with friends.

 

Richard and Pat stopped by to invite us down for a beer. We obliged and sat in the sun in their yard - Margarita for me since I don’t drink beer. I didn’t realize that little Pat has her CDL license and drove big rigs on the highway. Richard drove in town; she only did highway. She grew up on a dairy farm so has had plenty of experience with horses, cows, pigs, etc.

December 3, 2023 - Sunday

Nice two-mile walk with Lu at 9am. Stopped to talk to Jerry and Larry along the way. 

...followed by church, crochet, laundry and puzzling in the afternoon.

 

Rich and I took a ride down to Dee’s for a short visit - Margarita Sunday. 

December 4, 2023 - Monday

Changed things up today since I have a haircut appointment tomorrow. We will not go to lunch at the Elks today, but will tomorrow. So I went to cardio-drumming for the first (and last) time. It turns out that the lack of decent internet here at North Ranch prohibits using YouTube for the classes. 

 

December 5, 2023 - Tuesday

Did our warm-up walk before yoga; then went to Wickenburg for my haircut. I asked Stephanie to spike it up this time so I can comb it down or spike it up. Then walked down the block for Taco Tuesday lunch at the Elks. 

 

Happy to have Dot and Rich join in with their harmonicas in the safety of Dot’s living room. Hoping for a Yuletide surprise debut at the jam session - coming soon. 

 

December 6, 2023 - Wednesday

Went into Surprise today to see John and Eileen for lunch at Wolfhounds. The boys love their Guinness. Also planned to drop off Rich’s U-Bass at Musical Surprise to fix the tuner that doesn’t seem to engage. The gal looked at it, tuned it, and sent him on his way, after selling him this super-duper tuner by SNARK.

The traffic was backed up 2 miles coming towards us due to a crash on the other side - people were waiting more than 2 hours to get through. 

There happened to be a veterinarian in the stalled traffic who checked out the horses. A car collided with a horse trailer carrying a young family and 5 horses, pitching them into a ditch. I was so concerned about the horses, but thankfully only one was injured. This picture shows the father with a fractured back trying to help them with his son looking on. The driver of the car was air-lifted out. The red truck and black car were totaled. 

Bob and Eddi stopped over to chat. Bob always has a special piece of music to share with me and today it was Tim Waurick - one man, four parts overlaid, fantastic sound. I put a link in the body of this email for you to enjoy.

 

December 7, 2023 - Thursday

Slept late today so no pre-walk before yoga. We went into town earlier than usual today for Elk's lunch. Each day the first person there draws a number which is posted on the chalkboard. If the last number of your membership matches this, you get one drink for $.25. Well, we were the first in, and Rich drew a 4 which happens to be the last number of his ID. Go figure...

 

There is so much heavy vehicle traffic on the road due to construction on new roads here. Here you see Oversize Loads coming and going. 

We had a great jam session today. Heather, our neighbor, did come with her guitar. The crew got her set up with a mic and music stand. Boy, were we impressed to hear her sing. She took up guitar to accompany herself singing and although she says she only knows 4 chords, she sounded fantastic! She has a beautiful trailing trill in her voice. 

She and Bella, the Lab, stopped over to visit after their walk. It was nice to learn more about her. She grew up in Florida and her family is still there. She is driving her truck there for Christmas week, leaving her casita here. She is doing all kinds of work to winterize it for her journey to Grand Canyon in February to drive a tour bus. Amazon and Federal Express do not deliver there; just General Delivery for mail. So she is loading up on supplies for Feb. - Nov. while here.  

This is the progress on the afghan this week…