Dec. 28: Christmas in a hot climate

Monday I finally went to a local clinic to have my shoulder and foot checked over. My ankle is sprained and my shoulder is bruised. Nothing I didn't already know but glad to know there was nothing more. I also got my flu shot while I was there.
The men(?) decided to go swimming Christmas day just to say they did. Here are photos of them getting in (the air was about 75 deg and the water was the same or cooler) and posing for photos. I directed the video and I think they did reasonably well. The two guys on the left end are Guy and Joe and they're saying Merry Christmas in French. Tom, on the right, threw out Feliz Navidad. The guy by Larry is who we call "White Guy" is Richard and he's from Topeka.

Natalie was the lone woman to get in. She is married to Joe and they are both French Canadians. She speaks some English and is always smiling. And then as you can see, the event photographers were plum tuckered so we sat in the shade where it was cooler.


Christmas day we attended the dinner in the club house. The park provided two spiral cut hams and we all brought in the rest. I took Taco Bean Soup. As you can see, there was lots of food and about 50 people in attendance. I had a new dish. It's meat pie - not mince meat pie - just meat pie. It was hamburger browned and then cooked between two layers of pie crust. Then you pour maple syrup over it. Really quite tasty. It's a French Canadian Christmas traditional food. Others said their meat pies were with chicken and pork hunks cooked between the crust.


Caroline cutting the ham in the kitchen.






Friday, Larry and I did laundry. Got back to camp long enough to unload and head out with the group to go play pool. The tables are free - we have to buy drinks but that's sure not a problem.


My first game was sad - I couldn't even hit the ball. By the last game (2 hours later) I managed one simple combo. Larry had Elise as his partner and they did quite well. Tom and I ended up winning the last game so I felt like we were the champions. Guy and Rita did well too. Rita and I had the same problem - actually hitting the ball.






Here's Guy showing Rita where to hit the ball.









Tom making his Minnesota Fats hit on the ball.





And because we needed sustenance, we ended up at D.Q. The boys wanted to go to Hooters but we felt (us girls), at our age, we should spread out the excitement.

Went to Hooters Saturday afternoon. Made the boys happy. This was after we'd gone to Harbor Freight - apparently they were having some kind of a big sale. I spent about $8 (for Bingo prizes) and Tom and Rita spent about $4 - so we got out pretty cheap.

I finally went swimming after we returned from Hooters. Corpus broke their record high that day and it was 90 deg. I felt that was good enough to go swimming, just didn't expect the water to be so cold. Didn't linger long in the water - mostly sun bathed.

I have another assignment to work Monday & Tuesday mornings at the local Valero offices. Just answering the phone while their people are in training.