Author: Rudy

We got up at seven and I made some great coffee (fresh French roasted coffee beans). Because it was supposed to be a hot day today, Sue and I decided to go for an early walk. Sue had lost her reading glasses so we headed to Walgreens to see if they had replacements. Sue decided that none of the choices there were fashionable enough to frame her beautiful eyes. When we got home we selected a couple of golf clubs and walked across the road to the driving range to practice for 45 minutes. Then home for lunch.

After lunch Sue went to the pool to read. I talked on the phone with Koop for a while and worked on my computer. Then I got a text from Val saying that they and Rich & Linda were on a boat cruise on Canyon Lake but would be happy to come to our place for happy hour at around five. Which they did. Rich and Linda are visiting Ed & Val for the week. So we had happy hour in our backyard and as the sun was about to set, we took a walk up to the top of Vista Point, the hill behind our place. Another beautiful Gold Canyon sunset.

Upon our return the Peters(es) invited us to join them for supper. And so we all hopped into Ed & Val’s van and headed out to Chicago Pizza at Superstition Springs. Good pizza, good fun, great friends. And Rich paid (thanks Rich).

We got back home at around 9 o’clock, just in time to watch the news. And then I fell asleep.

Crepes and bacon for breakfast — so it was a special day right from the start. We watched our Sunday morning shows and then Sue went outside to read while I played on the computer. After lunch I took a few clubs to the driving range while Sue went to the pool to read. I called Mountain Brook to see if there was a chance for us to go golfing. Yep, come just before 3 o’clock. So that’s what we did.

The group ahead of us were beginners and we had to wait for them for the first couple of holes — but then they ‘skipped’ a hole and after that we moved along at a nice pace. We finished by 5 o’clock. Back at home we had ‘fake crab’ and crackers with our G&Ts (well, I had crab; Sue won’t eat that). Sue made a great stir-fry for supper. I watched 60 Minutes while Sue talked on the phone with Alex. Then we made one last attempt to make it through the 3-hour movie “Inherent Vice”. Sue gave up and went to the bedroom to watch another episode of “Downton Abbey”. I persevered, although in the end I had no idea what it was all about. At 10pm we switched to The National, followed by The Fifth Estate. Then, to bed.

I got up at 7:00, Sue at 8:00. I made coffee and then Alex and Max skyped us. The first thing he asked when Sue answered was, “Where’s Farmer Ed?” (The last time we skyped Ed and Dave were here after our golf game, and I guess it made quite an impression on Max that ‘Farmer Ed’ was here with us in Phoenix!) I gave Max a virtual ‘tour’ around the house, and he showed us how he can ride his strider bike downstairs. After we said goodbye, Sue made bacon and eggs for breakfast. Because of our ‘day off’ from the exercise regime yesterday, my personal trainer had something special lined up for us today. A Gold Canyon ‘Duathlon’: a bike ride on either side of a mountain hike. We were just about to leave when Sue noticed her front tire was flat. So I had to get out my toolkit and patch the tube. That delayed the official start time by about half an hour.

We finally got on our bikes and headed out around ‘our loop’. Just as we were coming down the big hill a big black truck whizzed by, and the occupants shouted some naughty words at us. Too bad for them there were a number of cars ahead of them and they were all stopping at the stop sign at the next intersection. That gave me a chance to catch up to the truck and pull up beside. The driver did his best to crowd the curb, but by now I was staring at him through the passenger door window. “You got something to say to me?” He rolls down the window, answers that he has no idea what I’m talking about. I encouraged him to be nice to people, to drive carefully when daddy let’s him take the family car out for a spin on a glorious Saturday morning. By now the young juvenile passenger in the truck is bending over and covering his face with embarrassment. And then the traffic ahead clears and they’re off. So are we. We cycle up to one of the trail heads, park our bikes on the road, and start our hike up Silly Mountain.

There were quite a few other people who thought a morning hike might be a good idea today. We trudged up the rocky pathway until we reached the main trail. Halfway through the hike there were a number of volunteers building a footing and mixing cement for the pad for a park bench. Once that’s done, we’ll be able to sit down and rest and gaze out across the valley, all the way to Mesa. Nice.

When we got back to our bikes we took the gravel trail over a hill into Mountain Brook. Quite a few garage sales and open houses in the neighbourhood this morning. Lots of people out and about. Highway 60 is a parade of cars heading east to the Renaissance Festival which takes place just about 3 miles from Gold Canyon and will take place every weekend from now until the end of March.

Back home, we changed into golf shirts and went across the road to the driving range. Both of us. And we hit balls for about 45 minutes. Then we came back to the house and had a late lunch. Then, for about an hour, I diddled around with the satellite dish in our backyard, trying to recalibrate it. Some of the channels we used to get now report ‘Receiver has lost satellite signal’. So while Sue stood by the patio door, watching the TV signal meter and shouting the numbers out to me, I was in the corner of the backyard, turning and tightening and loosening that dish. In the end we were lucky to get back to where we started. Oh well. We showered and changed. It was time for us to hurry out for our afternoon matinee. We arrived at the Harkins 25 at Superstition Springs just in time for the 3 o’clock showing of “A Most Violent Year”. Nice. Sue reserved seats while I got popcorn. The movie was excellent. Great story, good performance. And a nice way to get out of the heat for 2 hours.

After the movie we zipped around the block to the Costco on Sossaman Road. We picked up coffee, wine, beer, and pork tenderloin — the necessities of life. That’s how we roll. Grabbed a hotdog and slice of pizza on the way out and headed for home. That sure is a LONG string of headlights coming back into Phoenix from the Renaissance Festival! I sure am glad we’re heading in the opposite direction.

Back at the house Sue put away the groceries. Then at around 7:30 it was time for us to get back to our stations to see to see how many episodes of ‘Suits’ we could stay awake for. Answer: three.

A lazy morning today, especially after my personal trainer decreed that we’d forego the morning hike so that we wouldn’t be too tired to golf in the afternoon. Okay. Dave had booked us for a 1:45 tee time at Apache Creek Golf Course, a course that Sue and I had golfed a few years ago when we were just learning how to golf — and all we remember about it is that it is one huge gopher patch where we lost quite a few golf balls. Dave had golfed there a couple of weeks ago and his review of the experience was about the same as ours. While Sue sat at the pool and read, I went out to the driving range just before lunch — and who shows up? Ed. He’d manage to cancel his tee time at Gold Canyon and had booked the fourth slot at 1:45 at Apache Creek. He tells me that when he had mentioned where he was golfing to his neighbour earlier that morning, the neighbour had said that course was one of the few on his list that he should never golf again. Oh oh. Looks like we’re in for a long afternoon.

After lunch we picked up Dave and Ed and Val (who’d arrived in AZ last night and would come along for the ride while the rest of us scattered golf balls among the gopher holes) and headed to the golf course, just down road on Hwy 60. Our first sign that the game would not be a quick one (like we’d had a few days ago at Mountain Brook) was when the four old guys ahead of us on Hole #1 all took two shots off the tee — from the Professional/Black tees, no less! and then drove their carts 80 yards, down just past the red tees, and circled around the thorn bushes looking for their balls. We’d be spending a good part of the afternoon sitting in 80 degree heat waiting for them at every tee.

But Dave gave us a little lecture about patience on the golf course, and once we’d “adjusted” our attitudes, we had a fun afternoon in spite of the long waits. The weather was beautiful. The views of Superstition Mountain were unobstructed. The greens on the course were as well maintained as they were tough. The gophers did their best to stay out of our way. What’s not to like about that?

Sue and I didn’t play all that well, but we had a fun. Somehow my ball managed to find water (WATER?) on the first hole, and on my worst hole I whacked the ball back and forth ACROSS the green, scoring 8 on a par 3. Sue got into a rhythm on the back nine, shooting a six on EVERY hole! By the time we finally arrived at Hole 18 it was ten minutes after six and the sunset on the mountain was already fading. Quite a few golf carts passed us on their way back to the clubhouse — they would not finish today. But we did. And then we piled our golf bags back into the van and headed back to Gold Canyon.

After dropping everyone off, Sue and I went back to Bashas, the grocery store, to pick up a couple of steaks. We barbecued them and had a late supper. After Sue had cleaned up the dishes we poured ourselves another glass of wine and sat down to watch TV. I cued up another episode of “Suits” and fell asleep. Probably I’d had a little too much sun. Too much fun.

This morning we went for an hour and a half long walk, out to the Fairway Grill on the highway, just to check it out. It wasn’t open yet.

After lunch Sue went to the pool and I worked on the computer. At 3 o’clock the Driedgers were here to pick us up to go see a movie. We had one last ‘big’ movie with lots of Oscar nominations left to see, but ‘Foxcatcher’ was only playing in a few theatres and none of them close to our place. So we had to drive out to the theatre at Talking Sticks. The theatre was very nice, and very empty. Right up until the actual start of the movie (so that’s about 30 minutes of previews and advertising first) we were the ONLY ones there. And the movie was pretty good — eerie story with great performances by the actors. After the movie there was some question about whether we should stay and have supper at the ‘pavilions’ and watch another movie. The Driedgers hadn’t seen ‘Whiplash’ and really wanted to see it, but Sue did not — and anyway, I have it downloaded and we could watch it at our house.

So we headed back to our house. That was good too, since we had a fridge full of leftovers and this way we could start fresh on Friday. Sue warmed up supper. After supper I decided NOT to watch ‘Whiplash’ again, but rather force the Driedgers to watch that ‘Letter to Zachary’ movie that Sue and I had enjoyed a few days ago on Netflix. Which we did. So we sat there sobbing away and eating cookies and grapes. After the Driedgers left we watched the CBC News and went to bed.

We had a late breakfast. After skyping with JP, Sue and I went for a long walk out on Sleepy Hollow behind our place. After lunch I worked on my photo website while Sue went to the pool to read. At around 2pm I headed to the driving range across the road. Ed Peters was already there. I hit a few drives and then it was time for us to get to Mountain Brook to make our 2:52 tee time. Dave, Ed, and I teed off pretty much right on time. Then on the second hole the group ahead of us waved us onto the green so we could play through. Nice! Now there was no one ahead of us, and no pressure from behind us. And although it was warm, I didn’t think it was uncomfortably warm. We had a great nine holes, finishing in 90 minutes. Dave had a great game, finishing with one over par. I parred a couple of holes too and finished with a 42. Ed and Dave came over to our place for drinks after the golf. Then we all headed into Apache Junction to the Handlebar Pub & Grill, where we met Hans and Chris. They’d made a reservation there a couple of weeks ago already — and a good thing, because it was a full house for ‘Bluegrass’ night and the “String ‘Em Up Band” was already in full stride. We ordered our burgers and drafts and enjoyed the music, even singing along (loudly!) with the band at times. By 8pm we were satisfied and tired and headed home. Back at the ranch Sue and I did our best to stay awake for another episode of “Suits” and even started watching one of my cued up documentaries. I believe we had some ice cream for ‘dessert’ at some point in the evening, but that was about as much fun as a guy like me can take in one day, and I have no idea how I made into bed, but that’s where I found myself when I woke up (for the first time) at around 2am.

It’s getting busy at the golf courses now. Great weather today, and the forecast for the next week is more of the same. Sue and I thought we’d maybe like to go to Mountain Brook and walk nine holes late this afternoon. Last time we did that we teed off at 3 o’clock but ended up waiting for golfers ahead of us at every hole. So today, when I called in to make a reservation, the earliest I could get was 3:45. Well, that’s okay — the days are getting longer and that way we’ll probably be the LAST ones on the course and we’ll finish at about the same time as if we started at 3. Oh no, not today. We were paired up with another couple and there were golfers ahead and behind us, waiting to tee off. So it was NOT a fast round. In fact, we had to text Dave and Marylou that we’d be LATE for our own dinner tonight. We’d invited the Driedgers and the Neufelds to come for supper at 6. We didn’t get home until 6:20. But they were good sports about it and we had a fine evening with them. Sue had prepped all the food in the afternoon while I went to the driving range. Not that I actually practiced — no, an old guy next to me wanted to visit the whole time, telling me all about his various vacations. So I went home without even taking out my driver. Sue and I went for a bike ride ‘around our loop’ this morning, stopping at Bashas so Sue could pick up some things for her dinner tonight. I stopped at the driving range on our way back and said hello to Ed and Brian, who were about to golf Dinosaur. Brian’s going home late today, leaving behind some pretty fine weather. Speaking of which, today was ‘Groundhog Day’ so now we all know what to expect weather-wise. I guess a rodent’s forecast is probably about as accurate as that Yahoo weather app on Sue’s iPad. Well, that’s probably enough rambling for one day. Tomorrow I’ll work on that crazy photo gallery script for my website again — so that will be fun. And that’s the news from here. Adios.

Not really a day to recover. We went to bed early last night and we didn’t wake up until 7:30 this morning. But when I checked my email I got a note from Redbox (the DVD rental kiosks) asking me if I “NEED HELP RECOVERING FROM LAST NIGHT’S GAME AND GUAC FEST?” And with the special promo code I got a FREE movie rental. My lucky day.

Sue and I went for a long walk — first to Mountain Brook Golf, and from there to Walgreens to pick up my free movie, and home again. I spent most of the rest of the day working at my computer, trying to get ‘pagination’ on my photo gallery script. Sue read at the pool — finished the book she’d borrowed from Marylou and started on the next one. At 3:30 I took a few clubs and cycled across the road to the driving range at Gold Canyon. The sun was warm, the drives were mostly straight. When I got back I had a shower and then we had happy hour. Sue made another great meal: shrimp and pasta and a salad, while I tried calling my folks — no answer, no surprise — they’re always going out for birthday parties or funerals.

After supper we watched our ‘free’ movie rental, “Calvary”, which had pretty good ratings on RottenTomatoes. It was okay. We switched to the News after that, and the late night comedy/talk shows after that. Then, after Sue went to bed, I went back to my computer project and wrecked and fixed it about ten times until it was WAY too late and I too headed off to bed.

We got up at 7 and started watching ‘Sunday Morning’ on CBS. We switched over to Fareed on CNN at 8 o’clock. The sun was shining — we’d not seen that for a few days. After breakfast I cycled across the road and hit a few balls on the driving range. I went back home for lunch. Susan, the homeowner, stopped by to drop off a suitcase of her clothes — she’s heading home tonight because of a sick grandmother.

Shortly after 12 we drove across the street to Gold Canyon Golf Course. We registered and then went to the driving range for a bit. Dave was there early too. We asked and were permitted to head to the tee blocks about 15 minutes early. The group ahead really never kept us waiting and we felt that we were making great time. We would probably have preferred to make great shots, but you can’t have everything.

Dave was hitting the ball really well. And even though I was not golfing as well as I’d hoped, we had a very good time. The sunshine, the temperature, the pace. By 4 o’clock we were finishing up the last few holes on the back nine. A coyote ran across the fairway — I tried to get a photo of that — the first time we’d seen that here this year. We finished up on 18, tallied up our scores, and then hurried back to our house to watch the Superbowl on TV.

We missed the first five minutes of the game. No score. I didn’t really like either the Seahawks or the Patriots, but I we decided to cheer for Seattle. The score was tied at 2 touchdowns apiece at halftime. I hurried outside to barbecue the pork chops while Sue made rice, corn on the cob, and broccoli and cauliflower. Delicious. We watched Katy Perry’s halftime show while we ate.

The second half of the game was more of the same — a good, penalty-free, close game. The Pats pulled ahead halfway through the final quarter. But Seattle came back, just like they did 2 weeks ago against the Packers. Then, just when it looked like the Seahawks were going to win the game with a last-minute score, THEY LOST! Most people would blame Pete Carroll’s asinine call for a PASS when they could have easily scored a running touchdown, but I knew the Seahawks’ fate was sealed when I decided to cheer for them! Oh well, two weeks ago the Packers GAVE the Seahawks a win; today the Seahawks ‘paid it forward’.

We didn’t waste any time switching over to PBS and another episode of “Downton Abbey” after the Superbowl. The highlight of that show was the chocolate-peanut-butter ice cream we had for snack during the hour. Then the CBC News. Sue sat on the couch and played Scrabble on her iPad while I wrote my journal entry.

Saturday. Cloudy and looks like more rain. Coffee and bacon and eggs for breakfast. Sue wanted to finish her book today. I wanted to go to the driving range. Neither of us managed to attain our goals.

I worked on trying to build a dynamic photo gallery and having PHP extract the geo EXIF data from the file so I could plot the photo on a map. I didn’t finish that project either, but I had fun trying. That is, AFTER I thought I’d fried my drive and would need to buy another one — but I was able to restore to a previous backup and (so far) I’ve not had an issue since.

After lunch the Bishops stopped by — they are leaving for home two weeks ahead of schedule due to a grandmother’s illness. So I guess the car will be back in our garage. We watched a bit of the Phoenix Open on TV before heading out to the Superstition Mall to catch a movie at the ‘cheap’ theatre. “Nightcrawler”, starring Jake Gyllenhaal, is nominated for Best Original Screenplay. It was enjoyable — funny and violent in a ‘Coen brothers’ kind of way.

We came home and Sue made supper. Then we watched “Virunga” on Netflix. It’s about the efforts to protect mountain gorillas in Eastern Congo, and is nominated for Best Documentary. We were going to go to bed after the movie, but I clicked on another Netflix ‘suggestion’ and we ended up watching another documentary — “Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father” — about a child custody battle in Newfoundland that was won by the father’s ex-girlfriend and accused killer. It was heart-breaking and very well made. And so it was midnight when the timer on the dishwasher finally kicked in and I shut down.