Chris's Guitars

My dear friend Chris is a professional musician.  He writes his own music all the time, plays guitar and signs the songs he's written.  I truly love listening to him playing his guitars.  Yes, plural, more than one, several in fact. I've noticed that every one of Chris's guitars are the same, though I suspect they are all tuned differently for different songs he plays.  I don't know what kind of guitars they are, though am sure if Allen and Heath at Guitar Center were to see them, they would know right away what kind they are.  I know enough about guitars to be able to say they are acoustic, though not enough to tell you what brand they are. Whatever they are, I can tell you that they make extremely nice music when Chris Madsen plucks or strums those strings.  It is truly a blessing to sit quietly and listen.

My guitar is not a thing. It is an extension of myself. It is who I am.
~Joan Jett~
 

An uncle of mine emigrated to Canada and couldn't take his guitar with him. 

When I found it in the attic, I'd found a friend for life.
~Sting~

Happy December Holidays!!

 I wish you and all your loved ones

 on this day

2012!!

May you all have a VERY

If you don't celebrate Christmas, that's okay!

I honour you and whatever it is you choose to celebrate.

 

Do you celebrate any of the following?

December

5 - Ashura (Islamic, Muslim)

6 - St. Nicholas Day (International)

8 - Bodhi Day - Buddha's Enlightenment (Buddhist)

8-16 - Hanukkah* (Jewish)

12 - Virgin of Guadalupe (Mexico)

13 - Santa Lucia Day (Sweden)

16-25 - Las Posadas (Mexico)

25 - Christmas (Christian, Roman Catholic, International)

26 - Boxing Day (Canada, United Kingdom)

26 - Kwanzaa (African-American)

 Or, do you celebrate none of the above??

Whatever you do or do not celebrate in December, I wish you

 

My Great Day

Today was very hectic at the Food Bank where I love going to do Volunteer Work.  I always feel better when I leave there than I did when I arrived.  Good people doing good work seems to lift one's spirits, I find.  With the rush on to get Christmas Hampers for the needy, there is a lot to do, and there are loads of people coming in wanting to be sure they will get their free food for the occasion.  We usually are out of there by 4:30pm, though today it was 5:00pm and we did leave some things undone to get out then.

My plans were to go to visit a friend after helping out at the Food Bank, but then I decided to come to Tim Horton's to treat myself to a relaxing cup of Pomegranate White tea and to get onto the internet  through their wifi connection... then I will go visit my friend. Since the battery on my laptop is now nearly dead, I must soon be off of here.  I think I will go to one store in the nearby mall to do a quick bit of shopping too.  I want to get a coffee filter set for Mom's coffee maker, part of her Christmas gift this year, and I want to see what they have for cd mailers as I want to send some CDs to a few friends of mine.  Then, with these things done, I can go visit my friend, ready to relax and enjoy the evening visiting with nothing on my mind except the things we want to talk about.  It is important to be 'present' with the people in our lives, and to 'live in the moment'.  So... off I go.  Enjoy your evening as I will mine.  

Christmas Gift List

I know most people by now have already bought their gifts for Christmas giving, some even have them all wrapped and hidden away, while others, like myself, have barely begun to even think about this topic. Who should I buy for this year? Which siblings are going to be home for Christmas and which of their children will join the family gathering?  This all plays a part in the decisions to be made by me at this time of year.  I always, of course, buy for Mom!  This year it has been especially difficult for me to know what to get for her, though.  It's not like she will use Ski Gear or any other type of sports gear, not even dishes or small appliances like mixers or blenders, etc.  She is now 89 years of age so has everything she needs or wants and if she needs or wants anything else she is in a much better position to buy it than I am. The other day when I was visiting her, she did mention that she was having problems with the mouse on her computer and that someone had said to check the batteries, they might need replacing.  It's a corded mouse so has no batteries.  I told her it was worn out and I'd pick her up a new one.  I so wanted to wait until Christmas to give it to her, but she needs it now.  When I went to visit her yesterday I did give her a new corded mouse and told her "Merry Christmas".  She had also mentioned that she doesn't have a water bottle to carry her drinking water with her, so I've picked her up a stainless steel water bottle.  Since she recently got one of the new style coffee makers, I plan to get one of the baskets that go in them so she can use her own coffee and the amount she wants rather than using the pre-measured little cup things of coffee that are sold for this type of coffee maker.  Mom finds the coffee it makes to be far too strong for her tastes and I think that using her own coffee will save her a lot of money compared to buying the pre-measured coffee things that are sold in the stores for this type of machine. 

So, now that I have Mom's gift planned out, what will I give Terry & Alana? Who else do I need to buy for?  YIKES, only 11 days to go and most of those days are fully booked already!

Volunteering at the Food Bank

The last while I've been working more in the back at the Food Bank than I was previously.  When I first started doing volunteer work at the Food Bank, I worked exclusively in the kitchen area where we portion out food that comes in large quantities and has to be put into smaller containers to be given out to the needy. After awhile, though I was still portioning, I did some work sorting food items that were donated as this all has to be sorted to be put away where it belongs on the shelves.  This led
helping to put together the food hampers that are given out to people. Eventually, I started working at the front desk answering phones, making appointments, dealing with people that come in, and doing various small jobs on the computers. I also became the 'filing girl', doing all the filing of time sheets and other things that need to be filed.  This latter is something I just do about once a month as it can pile up and still only take me an hour or two to get it all filed alphabetically.  The gal that used to work in the back doing the food hampers isn't there any more, she had some health issues and had to leave. This has left us short handed, leaving Ron to do the hampers all by himself as well as the several other jobs he has to do.  Because of this, I have been working mostly in the back again, doing hampers, sorting when needed, restocking shelves, etc.  I also still do the filing.  For the most part, I drop in whenever I am in town and have a few hours of my time to give, though I do sometimes put my name down on the employee attendance calendar, indicating when I will be there to work.  I like to be free and uncommitted during motorcycle riding season, although now with the summer behind us, I will most likely settle down a bit and commit to a specific day each week when I will be there, as well as drop in for another day if I happen to have to opportunity.  Some of my friends doing see why I work for free, but I really enjoy my time at the Salvation Army Food Bank and I have no plans to stop working there any time in the foreseeable future.  I have formed new and wonderful friendships with people I work with there, we have a lot of fun and do a lot of laughing while working at doing something important.... feeding the needy.

“We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give.”
― Winston Churchill

 “I slept and I dreamed that life is all joy. I woke and I saw that life is all service. I served and I saw that service is joy.”
― Kahlil Gibran

 “For it is in giving that we receive.”
― St. Francis of Assisi

“As we work to create light for others, we naturally light our own way.”
― Mary Anne Radmacher

“The only gift I have to give, is the ability to receive. If giving is a gift, and it surely is, then my gift to you is to allow you to give to me. 
”
― Jarod Kintz  

Staying Home

Most of the time I tend to be out and about, doing numerous different things with my life. I rarely ever stay home and when I do it's only for 1 day, maybe 2 at the most and then I get stir crazy and have to get out of this house or go crazy!! Now, the last while I want to just stay home. I stayed home last Sunday, had to go to town for an appointment on Monday or would have stayed home. I planned to go to work at the Food Bank on Tuesday or Wednesday yet couldn't bring myself to go out so didn't. Again I had to go out for an appointment on Thursday and to get some pellets for my stove as it was about 55°F in my house since the stove ran out of pellets on Wednesday.  I knew I should go get pellets, yet couldn't bring myself to leave home, so combined reasons I had to go out on Thursday.  Friday I planned to go do some Volunteer work at the Food Bank, and again stayed home.  Today is Saturday and I stayed home all day again even though I had planned to go get some groceries. I have run out of some important staples in my diet: apples, bananas, peanut butter... and I am low on Nutritional Yeast. Maybe I will push myself to go out tomorrow, we'll see.

So, you might be wondering what I have been doing all day at home alone. I have been playing a lot of Spider Solitaire on my computer.  I also have been doing some much needed work in my home and have given away lots of 'stuff'.... freezer burned meat from when I was still eating meat; 3 boxes of quilt batting, 2 of them carded sheep fleece and 1 was a mix of small store bought pieces; 4 huge bags of yarns of various colors and kinds (I can't remember what I got it all for so was time to let it all go); 2 huge bags of material bits and old clothes that I had planned to make into a patchwork quilt and know now it will never happen... all through Freecycle on the internet, and I gave a bunch of recipe books, some drinking glasses, and a couple big bags of women's clothing to a thrift store.  My goal is to purge everything that has been here for years and is not being used.  I have stored this all for way too long and it is time to admit to myself that I won't likely use it, and let it all go.

I also have been surfing the internet, looking at all sorts of different web pages on all sorts of different things... the Desert Bar in the Buckskin Mountains of Arizona because my friend Mike told me about this place.  He plans on going to Arizona in his motor home for 2 months next winter and we have been talking about me going along too. He said we will go check out this bar he heard about out in the desert.  He has been doing lots of research on making this trip.  Mike even would let me take my cat Mewsic with me, though I will have to find someone to critter sit the rest of my animals. I don't know what I will do about leaving my home for 2 months in the winter, but I will figure that out too.  

Speaking of my home, I have never liked my kitchen.  There are so few cupboards and they are so old as well as high. I have to always get up onto something like a stool or ladder to get anything out or put things away.  I have most of my dishes and food in storage cupboard things I bought that stand alone in my kitchen. This kitchen is small and over crowded and even when I had my home clean and uncluttered the kitchen was still not at all to my liking.  I dream about having my entire kitchen redone... new cupboards, new sink, new fridge and stove, stuff like that. I sometimes surf the net and look at different web sites about kitchens.  Today I looked at  RTA kitchen cabinets. Someday my dream will come true and I will have a nicer kitchen, whether it is in this home or another one.  I must admit, though, that my dream to have a better trike does take priority. As long as my health allows me to ride my trike (3 wheeled motorcycle) I will do so all summer long... and I will be taking the one I have to Arizona with me on a trailer behind Mikes motor home next year.

Headphones

I can not sing well, nor can I play a musical instrument... unless you include banging on a native style drum.  I sure am grateful that other people not only can sing and play instruments, but that many of them also record their music so the rest of us can enjoy listening to it at our leisure. I don't think I know anyone that doesn't enjoy listening to music. For me, because I live alone with my animals, I mostly can listen without needing to use headphones of any kind. There are times, though, when I am traveling with someone or when I have company and I want to listen to my music while they try to get some sleep, watch television, or just relax in the quiet. For this reason I decided to check out some headphones on the internet and I liked what I saw at Sennheiser studio headphones.  I wonder if these would work in my computer and I think they likely would since computers are an important part of recording things like music.  I think I will do some more research.

Memories.....

Have you ever noticed how little things can trigger memories?  For example, a smell such as fresh hay drying in the field or of bread fresh from the oven.  For me, the hay reminds me of growing up on the farm as well as riding behind Marcelle on his motorcycle, a black Yamaha, though I forget the CCs it was. Those at least are the first two things that come to my mind, and there are others.  The smell of bread baking makes me think of my Mom and how she always baked so many things for us while we were growing up.  Between her 5 children we went through a lot of food, so growing her garden and baking went a long way to feeding us healthy food while keeping the costs down. Earlier, when I read the words "Les Paul guitar", my mind went back to a boyfriend I used to have... no... make that 2 boyfriends that I had over the years who played guitars in bands. So many evenings listening to the band play while I served drinks in the cabaret, or while I danced the night away.  I really loved those days when I was young, loved music and dancing, and had the world by the tail with a down hill pull. I wonder what ever happened to those boyfriends, hmmmmm.  Now an advertisement that is playing on the TV reminded me of when I had horses in my life and rode them a lot, along with friends.  That memory reminded me that while riding motorcycles with friends today I saw a horse that looked soooo much like Wonder. I would have loved to stop and call the horse over, call it Wonder and see if she/he came to the name, and if it is a mare, if it has the same spots that it so loves to have scratched. Could Wonder even still be alive after all these years since I last saw her? I mean, she was already up in years back then.  But this horse is a 'dead ringer' for Wonder.  I must call PatZ and see if she remembers how old Wonder would be now and if she would like to take a drive out to see this horse, to see if it is Wonder, and maybe take my great-niece Nicole who, from age 5-7 or 8, rode Wonder all over the ranges with us. Wow.... memories sure can lead one down an interesting lane of thought.  I am so very very grateful to remember these memories, and to have lived through the events that the memories reflect.  I am so grateful to have had horses in my life and the dear friends that shared my life on and off horses at that time.

Tuesday Ride

After washing dishes and doing a bunch of cleaning in my bedroom, as well as doing some laundry, I was dirty and all sweaty.  I was so happy that this is the night that the All Canadian Riders Club ride is on, and I fully planned to go riding with the club this evening.  I haven't ridden with the club for a few weeks now due to other things keeping me busy and getting in my way. This time, just in time, I remembered I have some important projects to do online before 9pm.  This is a commitment I made and must follow through on. The ride starts at 6pm each Tuesday and at this time of year the ride would be shorter than during the hot evenings of summer, but I doubt I would be back home in time to do the work if I went riding, so again I have missed a club ride.  I wish them all a great ride and I look forward to riding with them again. I wish I had done the work sooner to meet my commitment in time to be able to go out riding. Something to work on for next time!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!

Today, my sister Marcy turned 60!!  WOW, it is hard to believe, time really flies by so fast, seems like just yesterday we were still kids.  I hope you are having a fabulous birthday, M!! Wish I could celebrate it with you.

Today, my dear friend Brooks turned 48. Hard to believe... seems like just yesterday he was only 47.  LOL. Here's hoping your day has been awesome, M' Lord. I wish I could be there helping you celebrate!

Family Stuff

My sister and her husband are traveling across Canada then the United States.  They spent 2 weeks in Newfoundland, a province of Canada, and while there, a very bad storm blew in... loads of rain and wind!! While they were going through that, out in British Columbia we were having hot, dry weather and wild fires all around us. It is so crazy, the different extremes of weather happening at the same time in the same country.

So, now Marcy & Randy have left Canada and are traveling down the eastern seaboard of the US. Maybe after them going through that storm I should tell them about carpet cleaning Chapel Hill NC, they probably tracked mud into their RV and will want it cleaned long before they make it home next spring, and they are going through North Carolina. 

A Great Friday

Yesterday my plans were to go to the chiropractor, then to the food bank to do my volunteer hours. I don't have a regular schedule for this, just drop over to the food bank whenever I have time to give. Well, when I came out of the chiropractor's office, I saw my buddy Phil having coffee out on the picnic table at Chevron, just across the street, so over there I went, got a tea and joined him.

When we were leaving, a car pulled up and it was my friend Lorraine whom I haven't seen since last summer. She had seen my trike so stopped to say Hi. As we were finishing a short visit, a guy on a Harley comes in, backs in beside my trike, right where Phil's Harley had been, and just sits on his bike. Lorraine leaves and this guy starts talking to me about my trike. That led to other topics of conversation. He lives in the town where I grew up, where Mom still lives as do some of the other family bits and pieces. He knows my sister Marcy, used to work with her husband Randy, knows many others I have known or have heard of over the years. He bought me another cup of tea, himself a coffee and cigar and we sat there chatting. Since I missed the time frame I'd have to be at the food bank, I decided to ride out to visit an elderly friend of mine, on Gerald's way home, so we rode out together. I decided to stop at a view area, a nice little park over looking Otter Lake. Gerald pulled in behind me "I was hoping you'd stop here!" So we sat there talking for some time too. Finally, we rode together to Armstrong, then he continued on. I had called Glen from the view area and had to kill a bit of time for him to get home, so treated myself to a ice cream cone at McDonalds then rode out to Glen's. Had a nice visit there. By the time I got back it was later than I had planned, so I didn't make it to the Spiritual Gathering I go to each Thursday evening. I phoned friends in Lillooet, planning to ride over there (about 5 hour ride as I have to stop every 100km to fuel up the trike's little gas tank), but there was no answer. SO... today I made it to the food bank. I am once again all caught up on my filing there, and I printed out some recipe labels that were needed for our food bank as well as the one in nearby Enderby. It was all in all a great Friday.

Dreaming of Travels

I just got home from a most wonderful day.  I rode my trike out to a friend's home and had a very good afternoon there. Since Kathy's home is very near the small town where my Mom lives, upon leaving Kathy's I rode down to Mom's. We had a very nice visit, as is the norm for us, and I rode down town to pick up Chinese take-out for dinner. It was such a warm, sunny, beautiful day for riding, yet when I was leaving to head home the sun had gone down and the warm had left the area. Being as it is September, the nights can be rather cool here.  Last night I was out at a friend's home and had to bundle up for the 20 minute ride home as I had to tonight for the 1/2 hour ride. I carry the appropriate gear with me, knowing I will need it, so am relatively warm. However, it saddens me to no longer have the hot days and warm summer nights, to know that the riding season is soon coming to an end. I wish I could go shopping at custom swing sets richmond va or some store in some other southern US state.  Why? Well, one of my dreams is to spend winter riding my trike in warmer places.  I would so love to go visit Facebook friends in North & South Carolina, Florida, New Mexico, California, and to spend some time in Arizona where my sister & her husband spend their winters now. If I had the money to do it, there is only one thing that would make it hard for me to just head on out.  I have pets, my family (1 cat, 1 rabbit, 4 chinchillas, 3 birds) that would not be able to go along and it would not be easy to find anyone to take them in and care for them for the 6 months I would be gone, or to give some of them a new 'forever home'.

More Trike Bling

 In my last post, I showed you some Bling I put on my trike. Here is a bit more.  Phil drew the eagle heads, at first with 2 feathers, but I wanted 3 (one for each wheel of my trike) so he added one more.  He did a lot of the work, and I did a lot of it too... lots more than I did on the feathers because, as I said in the previous post, I do more and he does less on each of the pieces made for my trike.  I am blessed to have a friend who is teaching me this kind of work.

The dull, ugly aluminum is transformed into something so shiny it's almost like a mirror! This is me with my camera.

We made 2 eagles, one for each side of the box. Next year, I hope to have a new box on it too.

Each year I will do something to change the look and to improve my trike. This year I did a lot and it looks almost like a totally different machine.

Bling for my Trike!!

 My friend Phil has been teaching me how to make what I call 'aluminum pretties' or 'bling' for my trike.  He has made a lot of this kind of thing for his Harley Davidson motorcycle, out of aluminum and brass. I don't want to do brass for my trike as it is too hard to keep looking good, so will just be doing aluminum.  With the first piece, Phil did most of the work to show me how to do it, and with each piece made now he does less of it and I do more of it.  He's really good at this sort of thing.

Here, Phil is cutting out a feather from a sheet of aluminum.

Now he's showing me how to file the edges of the aluminum to take off the rough stuff left by the saw blade. 

You are now seeing Feather #1, all shiny... and Feather #2 which has been sanded though at this point still needs a lot more sanding with finer and finer grits of special sand paper.  It take hours and hours of work to make these.

In this photo, you can just see the engraved spine of Feather #1. Feather #2 has been sanded and polished. It is now ready to have its spine engraved onto it, and #1 needs to have the spine engraved again as it has been partially polished off at this point. 

Both feathers have been attached to my gas tank.

These took a lot of work but wow, they sure look good on here!! They will require a lot of work to keep them looking good too.  Phil's show bike doesn't get ridden as much as my trike does, so no problem for him.  Aluminum is a soft metal so it is able to be cut, sanded, polished and bent to fit like this, yet it also damages very easily.

I will Miss Dan

Don't walk behind me; I may not lead. Don't walk in front of me; I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend.
Albert Camus 

I will miss my long time friend, Dan. We met about 12 or more years ago and became good friends.  We agreed that we would never try to be any more than good friends because that would not work for us, but we have grown to love each other a lot.... just a close friends love. Over the years, Dan has helped me in many ways.  He is a professional dry wall installer with knowledge in many other areas. Some of the things Dan has helped me with:
- I bought a pellet burning stove which he helped me to install.
- he cut a doorway into the wall between the room the pellet stove is in and my bedroom so the warm air can come through.
- I bought laminate flooring and he installed it for me... living room, kitchen, hallway, bedroom and loom room.
- I brought home some old bathtubs to use as raised bed gardens and Dan helped me to set them up.
- Dan has helped me with other yard work too, has helped me to take trailer loads to the garbage dump.
- Since he has lots of knowledge of computers and loves working on them, he has been my pc mechanic.
- When I have wanted to rearrange my home he has helped me to move heavy furniture.
- Dan has set up my Audio/Video system.
- There are many other things to tha Dan has helped me with over the years.

Dan and I have not always seen eye-to-eye on everything and we have had some bad arguments,  but we have always gotten past all that in the end and stayed friends.  We will still remain friends and will talk regularly over the internet and I am happy and grateful for that..... though it won't be the same as actually seeing him, going for drives with him, and he won't be around to help me with all these things I can't do by myself.  This last scares me.  13 years ago I was used to doing things myself, now I have become used to having help.  13 years ago I had physical problems, especially Fibromyalgia, now I still have that and more (deteriorated discs, arthritis, diabetes to name a few). I will very much miss my friend Dan... and I will miss having someone to help with all those things I need help with.

A friend is one who knows you and loves you just the same.
Elbert Hubbard

 

Getting Some Better

I told you the other day that I have been quite ill lately. Today makes it 9 days now and finally I am starting to feel just a wee bit better. I was given 6 antibiotic pills to take, one each night before bed and I will be taking #5 of the 6 tonight. I am still coughing a fair bit, but not as much as I was and the phlegm I cough up is a healthier color now than the brownish mess with spots of blood in it that it was even yesterday. At first, I continued to live my life, out here and there on my trike, doing whatever I wanted/needed to do.  I was determined that I was not to be kept down. However, I was not getting any better and finally had to settle down, stay home and give my body the change to heal itself. 3 days in a row now I have been staying home and I don't mind telling you I really think it is time to get out of here for awhile. The weather forecast for this week looks pretty good for the most part, though the temperatures will be 10°C cooler than what we have had for some time now. I actually won't mind a bit cooler weather, though the evenings/nights are now rather cold for riding the trike, not as much fun as it has been.  However, that just means I will have to carry warm clothes with me so put on for the ride home. The other night, when I was in town and rode home at night, I sure was glad I had my hooded sweatshirt along. I put it on under my leather jacket and did up the hood before putting on my helmet. It really helped a lot as it was very cool, especially coming past the lake.  Tomorrow, if I am feeling up to it, I will ride to the small town where my mom lives, about 1/2 hour ride.  It is her 89th birthday and I do so much want to be there with her on this special day. There was a small family party for her this evening and I had to miss it. I want to visit her and take her out for dinner tomorrow.  I will be coming home early, right after dinner, so that I can be home before the temperatures drop too much.  For people who are walking or driving, it is still very warm, it's just if you are riding a motorcycle you are not protected from all the wind so it is a lot colder.

New Places

Have you ever been to, or heard of a place called Granite Houston?  Neither have I and to tell the truth here, I've never even heard of such a place!! So, why do I mention it?  Well, last night I was talking to a really great lady I met at a friend's home, and we were talking about places we had been and some I have been to she has never heard of before and didn't have a clue that these places even existed! And some she talked about having been to I had never heard of either.  So, by being open to listening we have each discovered new places that we may someday get to explore.

TOPS Today

Today instead of having our usual TOPS meeting (Take Off Pounds Sensibly), we just had our weigh in and then went over to the Seventh Day Adventist Church tot watch a video. They chose to show us one my Dr. McDougall  about weight loss, a very good choice I'd say.  It was a fabulous video with great information, including how 500 calories of rice, vegetables, grains, fruits can fill the stomach where are 500 calories of butter, meat, cheese still leaves your stomach mostly empty. It talked about how if we over eat vegetables our bodies will burn them off as it takes less energy to do that then to store them, while if we over eat fats our bodies store the extra calories as fat. It was a very informative video.

After the video, we all went downstairs to the kitchen where we were fed a wonderful and very healthy meal. I have always loved going to the fall fair and always made a point of going to the Seventh Day Adventist booth in the Food Fair, just especially to have a Haystack.... and that is what they fed us today. Mostly vegetables with some beans, salsa and a sauce that I'm not sure what is in it, it is not just very yummy, but is also very healthy and filling.  Today there were carob cookies for desert and I ate 3 of them.

I know all my TOPS friends there very much enjoyed it and we are planning to go for another video later in the fall when hopefully more of our members can attend.  There were only 8 of us there and we have over 20 members.  I am sure most of the missing will be sorry when they hear what they missed lol. The ladies from the church, also among my list of friends, obviously love putting on these videos and feeding people. They are such great ladies.

A Great Ride

I went on a 3 day trip on my trike last weekend. I rode to Westbank and met some friends, visited them for awhile then 3 of them on 2 motorcycles joined me for the ride to Penticton (Hwy 97).  We stopped at a Pub for a very nice lunch after which we said our goodbyes and they went to float down the channel while I grabbed a few things at the Dollar Giant (I love discount stores and clearance sales) and rode to Princeton (Hwy 3A then 3). After I fueled up I asked if anyone at the gas station knew Denise who rides a trike.  Being such a small town I knew they would.  I was given directions to her home, as well as to the Coalmont Hotel where I knew she likely was.  She wasn't home so I rode the 20 kilometers to the 100 year old hotel and sure enough she was there keeping an eye out for me and recognized me as soon as I walked in.  We met for about 1/2 an hour last year at a Brothers of the Third Wheel trike event and she's wanted me to go over to visit her ever since.  It was a nice weekend there, we rode around the area on Sunday and on Monday I rode home by way of Merritt (Hwy 5A) and the Coquihalla Connection (Hwy 97C) back to Westbank and Hwy 97 back home.