July 99

Yet again, M-t journeys South in the summertime.  My parents still think we have this mixed up, I should go North in the summer, and he should come South in the winter... but... that's not "us"!  Besides which, temperatures aren't really that different between our two locations, when you get right down to it!

After a bit of visiting in the parking lot, including delivering a particular Canuck s'prise to _Ferret (a monster rubber band, too long for M-t to stretch at his full armspan!), we headed out to find a bite to eat.  Problem with that is, the place where Sang wanted to go for huge hamburgers, closed about the time M-t touched down.  So, plan "b", we drove just a little further toward home, and stopped for ice cream at a place called "Maggie Moo".  Anyone who's a native of Kansas City knows about this wonderful place.  After a bit of a walk-about and many licks of fast-melting ice cream, we piled back into the Mudbug mobile and turned our sites toward Pittsburg.  Now, two leggedy adults on the bench seat of an extended cab pick-up is quite the jigsaw puzzle of leg placement, but eventually we settled in, with my head resting on M-t while the two of us sat diagonally across the backseat space.  It was great to have the visiting time with our buds, since the 4 of us had never been in one place at the same time before.   Just north of Ft. Scott, M-t decided that he wouldn't last the 40 miles to P'burg and a washroom, so Smiley pulled over into a 'rest' area.  Necessity is sometimes a MOTHER, especially when the "thundershack" of said rest area is home to more spiders than an arachniphobe's worst nightmare.  LOL!  --->Smiley used the facilities shortly after M-t and concurred that the makers of Raid could make a fortune there.  After the 2 hour drive, we brought in M-t's luggage ( he travels much more lightly than I do), visited briefly, then said our good-nights.

Thursday was spent rather lackidasically, as was much of this visit, by design.  A trip to the local grocery store to rent movies and pick up a couple of provisions, and then back home to stay out of the Kansas HEAT.  M-t did find out later, that he was 'sighted' while we were perusing the grocery aisles.  We did pop over to introduce M-t to two very dear friends of mine, whom we first met through the wonders of the internet, Twylatime and Redneck.

Friday was again a leisurely day, with a bit of yard yachting, though we did manage to put in an appearance at a local flea market to place a few items for sale in Redneck's booth.  Friday night, we had a visit and oven BBQ'd country style rib dinner with _Ferret, Smiley, and _Ferret's two young'uns.  There was much talking again, many moments of laughter and silliness (including the Evil_Twinz jumping on the couch... yes, there's a picture... no, I won't post it! Þ~~~~~* )  Late in the evening, we had a fireworks display in the back yard.  Thanks to _Ferret's Razenettes for supplying the entertainment, since M-t and I hadn't gotten to share Canada Day or Independence Day fireworks the weekend before!

_Ferret, et al, were heading for the balance of their vacation on Saturday, so that night we said our g'byes and hugged all around.

Saturday was again a bit of a slow starter, but we had big plans for the evening. We did make it to Joplin to peruse the big flea market there, and headed back home to prepare for our evening's adventure.  We gathered up Widget, her beau, another friend, a carload of provisions, and headed a wagon train consisting of the Momboat and Redneckmobile toward Carthage, MO to have a BBQ in the park.   Safires joined us shortly after we scoped out a gazebo with nearby BBQ pit, Phacops and RamblineUnicorn motored in from Dallas after car trouble in time to eat dinner with us.  Then it was off to the drive-in to see "Big Daddy" and "Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me".  Okay, they weren't exactly the films any of us would have chosen at first glance, but Big Daddy turned out to have its moments of redeeming footage!  M-t got to show off his newly refurbished director's chair, design ala 'Ness.

The teens that were on the sojourn went with M-t and me for a tour of the projection room, and of course there was a popcorn 'fight'!  In return for the pre-show and intermission interlude tapes made by M-t, the owner of the drive-in gave us a pair of functioning classic speakers from the old days.  Nowadays the drive-in narrowcasts the sound on FM radio, so the speakers are collector's items.  M-t has seen to it that this new pair is properly installed as my computer speakers, and the first speaker we obtained last summer has gone to Canada with M-t to see what kind of mischeif he can get into with it.

Sunday morning was time for brunch with Safires, Phacops and Ramblin' at Chez Ness.  Many thanks to the Twymeistress for supplying us with her world-famous egg/sausage casserole as the main course!  All the attendees were treated to a taste of REAL Canadian Bacon, which M-t had brought with him.  As a matter of fact, our Ambassador of Bacon treated all who ate at Chez Ness to a sample of this delight.  The unanimous pronouncement is "That sure ain't what we have here in the States!", and many speculations as to which meat shop in little ol' Pittsburg, Kansas to train in the art of Canadian Bacon.

While Sang was occupied from 8 to 5 Monday, M-t made his way out to the radio station to touch base.  While there, he was pressed into service as a voice for a few promo's, and had a good visit with the station owners and other talent.   That's when he was informed of being sited in the grocery store... which then lay to rest the station personnel's worries that one of the D.J.'s had gone raving lunatic on them. LOL!!  Lunchtime, he dropped by my workplace and we wandered to a local spot downtown and enjoyed mondo sandwiches in the cool.  Monday evening was dinner with Twy and Red.  Liver and Onions ala Tucker, complete with "regular bacon" and one last taste of the GOOD STUFF from Canada.

Tuesday afternoon was time for a fishing trip to Farlington Lake, about an hour's drive northwest of home base.  After a few confusing moments with the clerk at the local sporting goods store to get bait and licenses, and a short stop at Walmart to pick up cold drinks, we were off to see what was biting in the local puddle.  Unfortunately, the only thing in the lake that was hungry for our worms were some puny bluegill, but we had an enjoyable late afternoon/early evening just sitting in the outdoors and watching the dragonflies do their thing.  Just for the record, I do bait my own hook, tho M-t was quite bemused at my finickiness at cutting the worms in half with my thumbnail.

Then, it was back to the house for more tv watching, lounging on the couch, and savoring our remaining time before the trip to KC to send M-t back to the unfrozen North.  Wednesday was spent in much the same way, just taking it easy, and sighing a lot.  I was a real stickler about keeping this one simple, insisting that we not even try to do the kind of driving we did during last July's whirlwind drive-by sweatfest event.  It's hard enough for us to say the see ya's at all, and even harder when we part and start thinking "oh darn, we didn't remember to.....".  As the days grow shorter toward Permanence for us, instead of getting easier, the waiting/parting gets tougher by far.