Here's a helpful tip, if even this font size isn't big enough for you: I know that you can go to the "VIEW" menu at the top of your screen, select "Text Size" and then select "Largest".
David has always wanted to meet my Great Uncle John and Aunt Fran Hamlin, who are my dad's aunt & uncle on his father's side. (Uncle John is my late Grandpa Cy's brother.) He is a brilliant theologian with a Ph.D. who has written several books on Christian theology. In fact he has a blog of his own! As soon as I find that link I'll add it to this blog so you can check it out.
Anyway, David requested that the four of us (my parents and David and I) make a trip out to Waverly, Ohio, to visit Uncle John & Aunt Fran. The drive out was uneventful (we weren't so lucky on the drive back, but more on that later!) and we just had a lovely time visiting with them.
There aren't any pictures with Aunt Fran because these days she likes to keep to herself, which we of course respected. She did join us for a very festive dinner at Ponderosa and enjoyed a very hearty meal with all of us, and she enjoyed it very much. I sat across the table from her and it was so nice to see her and Uncle John again.
Oh, I forgot to add that Uncle John & Aunt Fran were missionaries in Thailand and other areas of the far east, and have accumulated quite an impressive collection of eastern artwork for their new apartment walls. Uncle John gave us the tour: they have gorgeous paintings, etchings, and tapestries from Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, China, and Tibet (and probably some I'm forgetting!).
Here's Uncle John with my parents, in their apartment. You can see one of the many pieces of fabulous original artwork behind them:
Uncle John and Aunt Fran have lived in this lovely retirement community in Waverly, Ohio, which is mostly east and a little bit south of Cincinnati, for several years. They recently moved from a single house in this community to a fantastic living arrangement, still in the same area but providing even more amenities and community access. They now have a newer, well-equipped apartment with all the independence of a private first floor entrance from the parking lot, yet its also connected by a neat walkway to an entire retirement community! There was an aviary with brightly colored finches and birds, a greenhouse, a dining hall, a library, a room with tables to play games and cards, and even a computer internet access station! We were duly impressed and so happy for them that they had found such a "best of both worlds" living arrangement for themselves.
Here's Uncle John with me and David:
Now, the ride home from Waverly back to Cincinnati in my parents' van involved both good and bad news. The bad news was that a deer walked in front of my dad's van when he was going 65 mph. on the west-bound route. The damage was extensive: one of the headlights was completely trashed, and the metal between the hood and the bumper was dented in severely.
Miraculously, no one in the car was hurt. Even more miraculously, the car (an Oldsmobile Silhouette van) still drove without problems, all the gauges reading normally, handling just fine.
I had not heard of accidents involving deer that harmed the people in the cars affected. I think if I had heard of these stories prior to this happening, I would have reacted less emotionally.
The thing is, I saw the whole thing happen. I saw the deer's face, heard and felt the impact. I just cried and cried for the deer. This really made my mom mad because my first reaction wasn't to be grateful that we weren't hurt (which of course I was). It's just that I had never seen anything like that happen and it made me really sad to have witnessed the killing (accidental and unintentional though it was) of a living being.
My dad and David, who was in the front seat and who weren't mad at me for my reaction, reassured me that the deer was hit at such a high speed so directly that it never knew what hit it and it didn't suffer. That made me feel better and I was able to then be more overtly thankful that we had not been harmed.
More good news! My dad's insurance said that this is covered under comprehensive, for which he had no deductible, so it's all completely covered. The damage was extensive and will take about a week to complete. I think it's in the shop now. If the deer had leapt in front of us, it would have gone through the windshield and things would have been incredibly bad. Also, if the deer had hit one of the airbag sensors in the front bumper, the airbags would have been deployed, opening huge accident possibilities with other vehicles and incurring much more expensive repairs.
On to more pleasant subjects! The day that David and I were to leave to travel back from Cincinnati to Milwaukee, we went to Skyline upon my request. For those of you non-Cincinnatians who don't know what Skyline chili is, it's Cincinnati-style chili. The chili is mild, sweet, and thin in consistency, and tops cheese coneys (small hot dogs with mustard, onions and chili crowned with loads of finely shredded cheddar cheese) and "chili spaghetti", otherwise known as a "3-way", "4-way" or "5-way", depending on what you get on it.
Want to see if there's a Skyline near you? Check out their website here: www.skylinechili.com.
David and me enjoying our cheese coneys:
Here's Dana, my sister, with Tim Bates. Dana, in the capacity of Tim's nanny, helped to raise him since he was an infant. He's now 7, and Dana makes sure that she continues to spend time with him even though she stopped nannying due to her own family obligations.
Here's David with my mom:
Shortly thereafter, we left to head west and north back to Milwaukee. On the way one of David's tires blew out, which ultimately only set us back a few hours (we were really lucky with AAA and the tire people we found!). Again, we were very thankful for our safety, physical well being, and of course our cell phones! :)
Ciao for now!
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