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Trimming Palm Trees |
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| Have you ever wondered how they trim those skinny, fragile-looking palm trees that soar way up into the sky? This is how! Someone actually climbs up there, chain saw dangling from his belt and slashes away. I caught these photos in late July when my neighbor had his trees trimmed. In the left picture below the worker had just swung from the left tree over to the right tree. No way. In the upper right you see him as he was finishing pruning the left tree, and at the lower right, when he was beginning to trim the right tree. I still haven't figured out how he attached his rope to the top of the tree, firmly enough to swing from one tree to the other, and then merely pulled the rope to release it. Looking for a part-time job? | |
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Dru's Birthday |
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Uncle Frank's 80th
Uncle Frank came to visit! He made his drive down from his home in Seattle for a visit on the eve of his 80th birthday. We had a little dinner on Sunday, October 7th in celebration of our near octogenarian. In the photo above are, left to right: Lynne, Peggy, Dru, Mark, Michelle, Chris, Jeremy and Uncle Frank. (He really doesn't look like he's about to be 80, does he?) We had a great time visiting with each other. (Oh by the way, Peggy will be celebrating her 80th early next year; she doesn't look like it either, does she?)
As you might expect, as a part of Frank's visit, we did go down for a visit to the USS Midway museum. Since he had been there before, we just focused on those displays that have been added since his last visit: the gedunk, Admiral's quarters, the War Room, Captain's quarters, XO's cabin, chaplains' staterooms, officers' mess, officers' galley, officers' dirty shirt locker and ship's laundry. And, of course, the new Top Gun exhibit.
It was a nice, leisurely visit, just seeing what we wanted to see. Afterwards we had a very nice dinner at Anthony's on Harbor Drive overlooking the San Diego harbor. As we dined, we got to see two cruise ships depart and a third arrive. Anthony's is a long-standing San Diego tradition and is arguably the finest sea food restaurant in town. A fitting capstone to a wonderful visit.
Special Visitors
In August 2007, we had the pleasure of meeting for the first time Dave's grandniece, Leigh-Ann (shown on the right with Dave and Dru), and her dad, Dan. Leigh-Ann just finished her college work at the Art Academy in San Francisco, taking a degree in photography. She and her dad drove down from the bay area, spent a day with us before heading out for the east coast.
It was great meeting them and getting to know them. Naturally, part of their brief stay just had to include an excursion down to the USS Midway Museum. But we certainly did spend a lot of quality time together just talking about the family.
On the left Leigh-Ann and Dan are stuffing everything back into the car for the hot drive across the desert in August!! Their visit illustrates one of the nice features about the web. Our families were separated years ago. A month ago Gwen (Leigh-Ann's mother and my niece) was surfing the web doing a little genealogy research. She came across some familiar names, followed the links and came to my web site with its genealogy. She put the pieces together, made the connection and a month later we were meeting her husband and daughter. We look forward to meeting more of the family during our future visits back to the east coast. Dan promises to serve up North Carolina's finest roast pig.