This is my second attempt at blogging! (my first was in the dark of early morning with my tiny tablet and I erased 2 hours of work by mistake!)
Jerry and I set out on our 2013 road trip to the Gulf Coast on Tuesday the 21st after work in Eureka. He picked me up on 4th street with the car attached to our sweet little Casita trailer. The first night was in the Sonoma County Fairgrounds in Santa Rosa. We then started out in the dark to drive through rush hour traffic in the east bay. Our day ended with a 3 hour trek through rush hour traffic on the LA freeways! But our new Magellan GPS (Maggie) led us right to Aunt Jerry's door in Placentia. For those of you who don't have Tom's book or haven't seen my double cousin poster, Aunt Jerry is my mom's sister and Jana's mother. We had a great visit with her and then took off for San Diego on Thursday morning.
Thursday is the day that Jana and Geno feed the homeless on the beach. We watched Geno finish the chicken soup he makes weekly, met up with their neighbors and passed out cups of soup to fifty or so folks. On Friday, I followed Jana to a school and watched her do her thing. She teaches teachers how to use the software her company sells. The software helps students learn and helps teachers keep track of how well they do. She is an amazing teacher! After school we went to have our hair done together and the boys brought our dinner while we were under the dryer. Very pretty ladies emerged.
The weekend was taken up with walks on the beach, football, shopping, football, visiting with friends and neighbors, more football and lots of laughter! Go Niners!
We left Pacific Beach (San Diego) Monday the 21st (Jana and Geno on their way to the Big Island on Tuesday for Jana's work). We arrived in Ajo Arizona later that day. There are lots of Torgersen's here and even a cousin of my mom's side of the family! Ajo is a copper mining town south of Gila Bend, Arizona. (check out Google Earth! The mine is amazing) Most of the houses are company houses and are so cute and tidy! Uncle Carl (my dad's brother) and his wife Dolores started the Northern California exudous 30 years ago. They used to come in their motor home and finally bought a house 24 years ago. Several houses later and still building the dream house they come down every winter. My dad's other brother, Larry and his wife, Audrey, my mother's other sister (this is where it gets complicated!!! but as we say it is legal) moved down once, moved away and returned for good in 2004. Larry and Audrey's daughter Lorna and her husband Doug finally decided to buy a house and become snowbirds in 2009. Carl and Dolores's daughter Carlene and her husband Mike just bought a house and Carl is fixing it up for them. All these folks live within a block of each other and they have rentals nearby also. They are truly taking over the town! My mom, Helen's mother's sister's son, Ernest lives on the other side of town. We parked our Casita trailer in Lorna and Doug's back yard (they even have hookups!) and have made it our base camp.
Cousins, Carlene and Lorna
We have had a glorious time visiting, touring the mine, shopping in antique stores, eating, visiting some more, laughing, reminiscing, and touring the houses. We had breakfast in Why (the town 15 min. down the road toward Mexico) with Larry, Elizabeth and Ernest and Lorna and Doug yesterday. It rained last night (eek, the Mayville black cloud!)
Carlene and Mike are headed back to Ferndale today. We will check out the new cabinets Carl is installing for Carlene and Mike, Visit again with the old timers and then we "kids", Lorna and I and our husbands are taking our tiny trailers and going camping in the desert!!! Should be fun. I'll keep ya'll posted.
Picture above is Karen, Lorna and Carlene on Lorna's front porch.
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