Category Archives: local interest

The last hoo-ha of the summer

Standard

It’s nice to be home, but of course next Friday we’ll be in central Penna. to help Sean with his move in at PSU. Sean did most of the driving over the last three days. He said he needs to ‘get use to it’ since it’s about 160 miles one way to PSU.

Day 1-It was smooth sailing and we stopped off at the rest stop in Smyrna. This time I was looking for the freebie literature for my art projects. They had quite a few of them. The people working there were watching me, but didn’t say anything. I even got a neat NYC book. We got to Rehoboth Beach in a jiffy, but the traffic was backed up which we sat in for 20 minutes for so. We went to our favorite sandwich shop there called ‘The Arena’. It’s not like it’s name, a rather small hole in the wall with mile high sandwiches. I got chicken salad and actually took the second half apart to eat the filling out of it. Sean did the same with his tuna, but Bri ate his entire sandwich. I swear when that man is on vacation, he eats to his heart’s content. I wanted to go in a cute gift shop and sent them to the bookstore. I got a cute journal with a leaf cover and little handmade sandals as a cover decoration. I went to the bookstore and no guys! Here they had gone to the bookstore way up near the boardwalk. I had to get a bathing suit cover up and found a long sleeveless t-shirt style and got a freebie decal for the front. It was hot walking around and we had a 5 minute walk to the van, which is a long walk for R. Beach.

We got to the Atlantic Coastal Inn which sits in front of the old Fenwick Island lighthouse. This was taken from outside our room.

Fenwick Island lighthouse

Fenwick Island lighthouse at night

Directly near the lighthouse are trailers, a little tacky to have near this historic place. The only downfall was that we had to cross over the wide and highly traveled highway to get to the beach. The place last year was on that side of the road. We went to the beach for about an hour as the wind was like 25-30 mph, so you felt like you were going to get blown away.

Bri and Di on the beach

Sean on the beach

The water was nice after you got use to it. I don’t go swimming, but Bri and Sean do. We went to an Italian place for dinner and had to wait a while. We decided on pizza because of the big lunch. Afterwards, we went to the Country Store where I got a variety of fudge and jams. Sean wanted to drive all the way down to the inlet area of Ocean City (140 blocks) and cross the bridge to an outlet area (HA-I used inlet and outlet in the same sentence!) We had to wait about 20 minutes for the bridge to close. The outlets were a bust-the bookstore was gone and we got there too late to really look in any stores. Sean was happy to get ‘Dippin’ Dots’ ice cream. He’s still a kid in that respect.

The next day we went the same place where we went to breakfast last year and sat at the same table (without telling the hostess even). Later we went to the beach again. Still a bit windy, but hot. It got overcast and started to rain. I haven’t been on the beach for years when we got rained on. When I was little we got caught in a torrential downpour down in Wildwood, NJ and that scared me. We left and hung out a bit in our room. It was too humid to really do anything. We went out to ‘our big dinner’ at Harpoon Hannah’s. It was right down the road and thank goodness we got there fairly early. Sean and I had lobster tails (3 each!)

My dinner

and Bri had swordfish. It was pretty good. After dinner the guys went to find a car museum place and couldn’t and decided to play miniature golf. I got some down time and read up on Lewes, DE. a little town down the road that I hadn’t been to for a while. I wanted to see the actual town, not where you get on the ferry to go to Cape May, NJ, across the bay. We did that when I was a kid and I was seasick for like 3 hours when we got home.

On the last day we went to breakfast again and headed for the Shipwreck Museum. The bottom is a store that sells hermit crabs and lots of souvenirs. They do a great job with the free museum. I asked the woman there if I could take photos and she said yes. I’ll make a slideshow of the photos from there, but here’s a sneak peek:

Boat model with real gold coins, etc.

We checked out and headed for the Rehoboth Beach outlets. Sean wanted to go to Old Navy. It was crowded and the clothes weren’t that great. We didn’t stay long and headed for Lewes. We drove down to the beach area. It’s not huge, but you can see down the shoreline and we saw a few lighthouses in the distance. We headed to where a lightship was and got out and took a few photos. We found the Zwaanendael Museum,

Zwaanenael Museum

erected in 1931 to commemorate the founding of the town by the Dutch back in 1631, it’s 300th anniversary. It’s an unusual building. All the parking was taken, so Sean sat in the van while I went around and took some photos. I did manage to get one of a cross stitch sampler inside.

Dutch Sampler 1976

I really like Lewes. It’s a Victorian town and on the water! There are some retirement places there too. Hmmm! We headed to Dover, DE where my favorite bookstore is located-Atlantic warehouse. I tried to be chosey and concentrated on scrapbooking books and gift items. We headed home after an hour and stopped off at Wendy’s for an early dinner. Cos was glad to see us.

Off to eat lunch and then pick a ton of ripe tomatoes. It’s a gorgeous day here, a little cool and no humidty. I’ve already been outside for over an hour, most of that time with the cat.

I got my Cafepress.com rose t-shirt and it’s pretty. I’ll have Sean take a photo of me in it soon.

Eye can see clearly now…

Standard

I just got back from the eye doctor. What I expected-dry eyes and allergies. My lashes were a bit droopy, but he said not a problem. I saw yet another rather new doctor(my dentist is fairly a newbie). He got out of his gleaming pearl white Cady while I got out of my ’96 fire engine red Windstar. He held the door open for me, etc. I didn’t know he’d be checking out my eyes a few minutes later. He was very sweet and made me feel calmer. So I have to get Panatol (I got a sample) and some OTC drops to keep my eyes moist. That’s that.

I’m taking a break for a few days. Here’s a reminder. I hope to take lots of photos.

Peace and quiet

Merv

Standard

I was sorry to read that Merv Griffin lost his battle against prostate cancer on Sunday. That is the cancer that has left my uncle with a defective bladder from the radiation treatments. What do I remember about Merv-his talk show! My grandmom use to watch it all the time, so I would too. He had a great singing voice and could play the piano, but he didn’t do either that much on his show if I recall. I remember his announcer and sidekick Arthur Treacher (fish and chips guy) and Charo. Why is it that so many talk show hosts need to sit behind a desk? (Mike Douglas, who had his talk show in Philly, which I went to a few times, didn’t have a desk). So Merv thought of Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy! out of the blue and both are still on (I like Jeopardy better). Merv was on some reality show within the last few years, I can’t remember which one, but seeing him again brought back memories of his old talk show and how good it was…and now, the dear boy himself (A.Treacher)…has gone to rest.

Tom Snyder

Standard

Tom Snyder passed away at the age of 71 on July 29th. Back in the late 60s- 70s, he was a newsanchor at the Philly station where my brother is presently employed as an electronic technician (yeah, Dave got all the ‘math brains’ in the family).
Back in 1968 as a Philly newsman
Tom in Philly ‘68

I do remember Tom back then (as I fondly remember Jessica Savitch), but I remember watching his late night show when all the other shows were long over (I’m still a night owl). I recently watched him do an interview with James Taylor and his siblings back in the late 70s that was uploaded on Youtube.com. I can’t help but think back on Dan Akyroyd’s (when he was on Saturday Night Live) take on him…sitting there spewing out questions with a cigarette in one hand.

Dan as Tom

Good television.

Out and about

Standard

Sean and I went down to Hockessin to a little coffee and sandwich shop called ‘The Perfect Cup Cafe’ for lunch-a rather pricey lunch, but we don’t go there that often. He was off today. He had a veggie wrap and I had a chicken salad with swiss that was grilled-not bad. I asked if we could go a few blocks down to the Gateway Garden Nursery as I needed a few plants for an interesting urn I just purchased at JoAnns. I bought one (for about $7), but I’m thinking three would look neat tucked under my hedges out front. You can either hang the urn or it lays flat. Lucky for me the nursery had a 50% off annual sale and I got quite a few plants for under $20. I got my 9th variety of coleus-lime green and white (it’s a good year for it and of course I plan to save some for my experiment!). I also bought another licorice plant (like a variegated one) for the urn so it hangs over its edge). I got some yellow pinwheels zinnias and a couple of variety of ferns (which I like up there on my list with coleus). At the check out, a lady who works there, probably the owner or manager, asked if we had a cat and I said yes, so she handed me a cute little tin that came with cat grass-for free (from the sale table)! A few minutes later as we were putting the plants in Sean’s trunk, I noticed she had a wagon of plants she was tossing. I asked if ‘anything was worth saving (HA) and she handed me a mandevilla, another viney plant and a gardenia-for free. When she went to back to the nursery yard, I snagged some blue lobelia out of the trash too. Don’t ya love when stuff like that happens?

My mom is still trying to work out her problems but she is really using me as a sounding board. I was really stressed tonight and blame myself for not taking charge of her bills and not giving her an allowance. She use to have my uncle to help her, but he’s probably in the nursing home for good now. She doesn’t talk to him that often, but I know he has no appetite and only weighs about 138 lbs (and he’s 5’10”). I haven’t been out to see him either as it’s a trip and he’s so down all the time. I know that sounds awful, but maybe he needs people who don’t know and love him as much as us to talk to. Hopefully things will get better soon.

Locally-so the Phillies lost their 10,000th  game in their over 100 year history beating out all other teams for that honor. So what? I can’t tell you how good a summer and fall that team gave us all in 1980 when they won the World Series and again in ’93 when they tried again. I got to meet Tug McGraw, the relief pitcher in person. He and Mike Schmidt (3rd base) lived in my hometown and I had seen Mike’s house several times. So many fans have good memories like that.

Passings

Standard

I was just checking out my side bar links and clicked on ‘Drawn!’. Their top story was the passing of artist Charley Harper. Many of his whimsical drawings were made into cross stitch charts like this (which I own):
Charley Harper
Last week a fellow high school alumni, but in the class above me (1976) passed on. Milton was neighbor of mine and was a talented student with tons of personality. His mom is a gem who always stopped to talk to you and show an interest in your well being. So my mom read that he was in shows with Merv Griffin and movies like ‘Prince of Tides’ (with Barbra Streisand). I didn’t know this. He was also in Paul DiMeo’s class (Extreme Makeover: Home Edition). Milton hadn’t been in movies since ’92.
I was sad to read about these talented people passing on.