Karen and I had a nice drive down, but we did get a late start... we got to Wichita about 16:45, so we only visited with Betty until about 17:30 when she had to go eat supper.
I got worried about the car early on in the trip, it started vibrating at about 70MPH going up hills... did this for a few times, then quit. Only thing that I can figger is that something wasn't seated right and finally got in place. I'm not going to worry about it any more, since it quit doing it.
Anyway, we got to Deb and Rics' about 18:15. Ric was in the garage playing with his new tool, a giant tile cutter. Soon after we got there, Deb and Jeff showed up with Jeffs' girlfriend Robin. Jeff has turned fourteen, and he has a learners permit for driving. And, evidently, one for girls too. He will probably do much better with the former than the latter, if personal experience has any meaning...
Deb had made a lasagna, and we sat down to eat about 21:30 or so. I'd been helping Ric cut tiles for the bathroom that they are remodeling. Actually, they weren't tiles, but slabs of marble... very pretty. Actually, all that I did was watch Ric do the work, it's pretty much a one-man operation. As was nearly everything associated with this project.
After supper, we tried to hook up Jeffs' laptop to Rics' machine using the direct cable connect and a parallel cable that I'd brought along. Unfortunately, we couldn't get it to work, I think because it was one of many bugs in WIN98... I'm pretty sure that I got it to work with WIN98SE... anyways, it was a disappointment. I'm gonna send him a serial cable to try it with... dangle, dammit, just dangle.
Then Jeff played a coupla pieces for us on his clarinet, he's very good. Robin also plays clarinet, and she's a year ahead of him in school.
So we got to bed pretty late, and I had a lousy night trying to sleep. I have acquired a cold, and I just couldn't breathe. It was reported that I coughed and snored all night. Karen finally woke me up about 10:30, I guess that I settled down and slept about four hours.
It rained all day, sometimes light, sometimes very heavily. After I had breakfast and several cups of coffee, I helped Ric tear the old floor out of the bathroom and take the toilet out. Karen and Deb and Jeff had been out shopping and they got back about 14:00 or so and we had a sandwich for lunch, then Karen and I went out to see Betty.
They always have some sort of entertainment on Sunday afternoons, and today it was an older guy with a old Gibson flat-top guitar and a harmonica and a playlist of old songs... he was really pretty good, but his voice needed some amplification. All of the old women there really loved him, and he was obviously enjoying himself.
When the show was over, we sat in the fireside room for a while talking with Betty, then they decided to go for a walk around the building (on the inside, of course, it was still raining!) and I sat there and read an entire issue of National Geographic. Well, not the whole thing, but damned near.
We left before supper again, getting Betty out into the dining room first.
She was, as always, so glad to see Karen and I... but this time she didn't remember my name, and her memory does seem worse than the last time that I saw her. Karen is going to come down and spend four days with her sometime next month, that'll be good for both of them.
We go back to Ric and Debs, and Deb had made a pork roast and mashed potatoes and green beans... we didn't get to eat until later, though. Ric was laying the marble tiles, a slow and exacting job, and he got done a little after 21:00.
I need to mention again that Debbie is an excellent cook... she majored in home ec (I don't think that they still call it that) and worked at the county extension office in Wichita for years before they had Jeff. She also subscribes to all of the gourmet magazines with all of the recipes, and I think that she tries them all.
After dinner, I watched a little of the XFL football... didn't impress me much, but then very little does any more. Then Karen came in and we watched some show about lawyers. I didn't realize that it was a serial-type thing or I wouldn't have consented to watching it, dammit.
So... earlier to bed, and I got some fake Nyquil to help with the night.
Sunday 11 MARCH 2001