anyone past 50 on here?

[daveb]

My migraines aren't that bad. Migraines seem to run in my family, and some get worse ones and/or with auras. That sounds scary what you went through! Good to be aware, though, and even better that your awareness saved you!

[Shawn Louis]

I'm 55 now and so glad to be back on the AVEN site. I was away for awhile, and then mostly I was a kind of lurker. :-) Looking forward to chatting and getting to know some of you folks.

[Tja]

Welcome back, CoreyStevens! :cake:

[dakdoc]

Hey! Big welcomes to gems500, jksummer, and CoreyStevens! How is everyone today?

[Spotastic]

Today is my wife's birthday, so we've been celebrating it by doing as little as possible. :D We went out for lunch and dessert, and now we'll be relaxing for the rest of the night after I make some porkchops for her for dinner.

[dakdoc]

Hey Spotastic! Got your message too. I'll write soon - been super busy so very big apologies from me! Have a great day with your wife! Pork chops sound delicious!

[Debster]

I have no idea what I'm doing either, but that's nothing new.

I'm 51.

[daveb]

Welcome, Debster, and welcome (back), CoreyStevens! Have some

[cramos3]

52,female in the Los Angeles area.This is kind of hard to do from a mobile phone. I'm too lazy to get up and get my laptop. Lol. I'm new to the group.funny, I just figured out yesterday that I was asexual.I couldn't figure out why I've never enjoyed sex before.Anyone here from Los Angeles area? My name is Carol. :)

[dakdoc]

Welcome Debster and cramos3! Enjoy and explore. Unfortunately, I'm nowhere near Los Angeles, but you do have some cohorts in California. Have a great day!

[daveb]

Welcome, Carol. Have some

There are one or 2 of us in the Bay Area. I'm out in the Inland Empire, near San Bernardino. I believe there are sometimes meetups in LA, but I don't like the long freeway drive so I only went once.

[cdrdash]

Back in internet land. I paid $3.14 for 24 hours of internet access at Motel 6 in Casper. This motel is a little seedy but I'm only here for one night. Tomorrow I'll be at Super 8 in Chamberlaine, South Dakota. Hopefully it will be a little nicer than this hotel. The next night I'll be at a bigger nicer hotel in Bloomington, MN (near Minneapolis) that is better rated than the more economical hotels like Super 8 or Motel 6. Anyhow, for the die hard photo viewers, here are all my photos for the past five days. I'll eventually start commenting on them but I'm getting sleepy tonight and will soon turn in.

https://picasaweb.google.com/105234689104952250166/To_Yellowstone_9_1_14?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCPzN58mXzurvxgE&feat=directlink

https://picasaweb.google.com/105234689104952250166/Mammoth_9_2_14?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCJ_J5NPBgMHgEA&feat=directlink

https://picasaweb.google.com/105234689104952250166/Old_Faithful_9_3_14?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCKqb1-u0uMjSXQ&feat=directlink

https://picasaweb.google.com/105234689104952250166/Canyon_9_4_14?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCKmqz8ubwbqNQg&feat=directlink

https://picasaweb.google.com/105234689104952250166/Tetons_to_Casper_9_5_14?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCJOgnMjpg_XGQQ&feat=directlink

I had a great time at Yellowstone and Tetons. Going on ranger led stuff worked out pretty well although the ranger at the Tetons was so into animals that she spoke at length about ospreys, bears, and wolves and I grew a bit bored. But it was nice to have company on a hike in bear country (both grizzly and black bears) and listening to the talk was my payment for getting to hike! The drive to Casper on highway 26 was cool. Wyoming is so big and spread out. I did not see one fast food restaurant the whole way until I got to Casper. The traffic was great for me. I could just pop my cruise control to 65 mph and drive and admire the views. No one was going slower than 65 so I never had to pass anyone. This was good since it was a two lane highway nearly the whole way. There were occasional passing lanes. So anyway, time to sign off as I'm yawning my head off and should get my tablet plugged in to recharge the battery.

Cathy

[daveb]

I took a quick scan through the pics. Looks great! How did you get so many pics with so few people in them? Was it really that uncrowded? (had to chuckle at the "snowfall" - digital equivalent of a snowglobe souvenir?)

[cdrdash]

I mostly avoided crowds by getting up at the crack of dawn to do things. The crowds started showing up around 10 am I also got some uncrowded pictures at Mammoth Hot Springs by walking the upper terrace road. Most drive this road. I would get about 2 to 5 minutes of solitary hiking on that road before a car would show up. Folks did get out of their cars at the hot springs but not as many as on the lower terrace which is extremely popular. Also the crowds would thin out just a smidge if you walked further than .5 miles to get somewhere. It was also easy to get crowds out of the pictures taking pictures of the ordinary landscape rather than the attraction like the geysers.

Cathy

[Tja]

Fantastic, Cathy! How did Frodo get on with the chipmunks? :P :D :lol:

[cdrdash]

Fantastic, Cathy! How did Frodo get on with the chipmunks? :P :D :lol:

Well Frodo was napping in the car when I did the south rim hike so he didn't see the chipmunks. Frodo was excited to meet a strange wolf in our hotel room at Mammoth Hot Springs and delighted that the wolf is now part of our team. Any suggestions for names for wolf? Maybe Wendy ... I like alliterations ... Frodo the Fox ... Wendy the Wolf. BTW, wolf was on my bed when I opened my hotel room door at Mammoth. I little present from the hotel :-)

[Tja]

How about Wilona the Wolf. Female version of Lone Wolf. Lone...Wilona? I like Wendy also. :)

[cdrdash]

Mt Rushmore was fun today and I also enjoyed driving in the fog in the morning in Wyoming. I also stopped a very touristy place called Wall Drugs that bykenut (my friend Sharon) insisted I needed to see. It was indeed a very big touristy drug store and all sorts of other stores and food places. Not really my kind of place at all but worth a look since it was right off highway 90. I left with an iced mocha in hand which kept me alert for the rest of my drive to Chamberlain, SD. Here are pictures.

https://picasaweb.google.com/105234689104952250166/Mt_Rushmore_etc_9_6_14?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCLTU_bCy2vjH4QE&feat=directlink

The Super 8 hotel I'm in is much nicer than the motel 6 in Casper. I have a lovely view of the Missouri River out of my window. Also the clerks were more spiffy and more efficient than those at motel 6. This place doesn't seem seedy at all like the motel 6. My room is also right near the laundramat and the pool. We will see if that results in noise for me or not. Right now all seems quiet despite observing folks doing laundry. I don't have enough dirty cloths to do laundry yet and besides when I visit my parents in 2 days, I can do laundry there!

Cathy

[daveb]

Cool pics! Reminds me of the great old movie, North by Northwest. I've heard of Wall Drug (but didn't really know much about it). I hope you don't get too much noise (that's one reason I always travel with earplugs). Sounds like a much nicer hotel.

There aren't many LOTR names that start with W, so Wendy seems like a good choice from a different work of literature (Peter Pan). Another tack you could take is to name the Wolf Samwise, Frodo's companion. :)

You made a wise choice to bypass my area on your trip. Still too hot here!

[Cayce]

Cathy, Oh Boy, what great pictures. I will be enjoying these thoroughly for quite a while. Are you using a different camera? They seem really crisp. I put an extension on my browser so that when I mouse over it makes them big so I get to see them all large instead of a selected few, what a treat. :) I can't wait (well, until next summer) to see Yellowstone in person. You are making really good time too especially with getting so many side trips in.

How nice that Frodo now has a companion as well. :P

It looks like a great road trip as well, I know what you mean about just setting the cruise and watching the country roll by, much nicer than the rush-rush of the larger freeways.

Keep those pictures coming, I can't wait for the next batch. :D

daveb, I love North by Northwest and even have a copy of it (rare for me) it is one of my all time favorites, especially for the architecture and train sets.

[daveb]

(re: Wolf naming - You could also go with Virginia or Thomas... :P )

So, the oldies radio station I usually listen to when I'm out driving around has started playing newer oldies (from the 80's and maybe even 90's). I miss my older oldies (60's and 70's). I guess I'm getting older when the oldies are too new! :P

I ended up on a radio station playing Johann Sebastian Bach - now those are oldies! :lol:

(how many times can I use older/oldies in 1 post?)

[Tja]

Don't worry, daveb...it never gets old. :P

[cdrdash]

Hello all. I'm safely in my hotel room in Bloomington, MN. In a couple hours I'm meeting up with Deja Vu!

Pictures from todays trip: https://picasaweb.google.com/105234689104952250166/To_Mineapolis_9_7_14?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCNT28v-A4f-MEg&feat=directlink

I stopped for lunch at a fast food place in Mankedo, MN and a local clued me in to road work being done on the roads I had planned to travel. I took his advice and went a different route and managed to avoid the road work.

Cathy

[daveb]

Are you staying in a hotel with bunkbeds?! (that's actually kind of cool, for people are that are traveling in a group/family, as long as they like sharing a room)

I hope you and Deja Vu have fun! :)

[cdrdash]

Yes there are bunk beds in my room which I found odd enough to be worth a picture. I did not request them. The hotel is associated with a neighboring water park so I imagine it does cater to folks with families who come to play in the water park.

Dinner with Deja Vu was marvelous. We ate at a steak place and talked and talked for 3 hours or so. Now I'm back and should be heading to bed soon. Tomorrow I drive to Houghton Michigan for a 2 day visit with my parents. I'm anxious to see how my Dad is doing. Last time I saw him was Christmas when he was still in the hospital. Now he is home and seems to be recovering well mostly based on the fact that Mom has not reported anything unusual to us, the kids. It will be good to see for myself how he is.

Cathy

[Blue Cat]

Just checking in during my brief stop home. My college buddy arrived Friday night, and we headed to Mt. Rainier Saturday morning with a couple of my friends. The weather up here is unseasonably fantastic -- mid 80's, sunny, and not a cloud in the sky. The following day, after a very late start because of a dead battery in my friend's SUV (thank heavens for AAA), we headed to Mt. St. Helens. This is the first time that I have gone to the Windy View Point on the "back" side of the mountain, rather than the more popular Johnson Observatory, and I was blown away by the view of Spirit Lake, a place I hadn't set eyes on since I last camped there when I was 7 years old, before the eruption. It is now filled with logs.

Tomorrow we head off to the Olympic Peninsula for 3 days! I'm not sure what, if any, connectivity I'll have over there either!

Cathy, I hope to enjoy your photos when I return! I'm glad you and Deja Vu had a nice visit!

[Cayce]

daveb, I know what you mean on the radio situation. They took my 60-70s station off the air and replaced it with 80-90s. On the other hand, I think we are showing our age by the simple fact that we still listen to 'radio' over the air. It seems that streaming has replaced that by and large now. I am learning how to work with Pandora but prefer to just turn on something and not have to keep tweaking it. And of course the thought of paying a monthly fee sticks in my craw for something that has been free my entire life. I just use the free version of Pandora and it is fine, but still...

Cathy, sounds like you are making good time and I'm glad you will get to see your folks shortly. I hope your Dad is doing well. :)

Blue Cat, I am envious of your trips. Last summer I was on the backside of Rainier at Tipsoo Lake and loved it. :D

[Deja Vu]

What a great time with Cathy last night! You know how sometimes you can just sit down with someone and talk, and the words are just there without effort? That's what it's like when she and I get together. Pretty cool!

On another note --- seeking help from the creative folks out there in Aven-land. I need a clever name for my new english cocker spaniel puppy, that is coming from Canada this weekend. It's been a major fiasco because of new Customs requirements involving the Center for Disease Control. So off again, on again, multiple times, and in the end I'm going to have to drive a few hours to go get him in Wisconsin because we couldn't get him here directly from Vancouver. By the time he arrives, he will have had quite the voyage! So... I'm looking for a name that is unique, fun and clever. His breeder likes musical themes, but that isn't an absolute requirement. It needs to be easy to say (think about me calling his name while running around an agility course), and generally short as well - one or two syllables are best. Besides his amazing journey, he is solid black in color so it could be color related. I don't know anything about his personality except he's supposed to be very sweet tempered.

[cdrdash]

Pictures from today's drive. I stopped at a restaurant Deja Vu recommended in Duluth and had a nice raspberry chicken salad.

https://picasaweb.google.com/105234689104952250166/Duluth_9_8_14?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCNOtzIO26NCAnwE&feat=directlink

I'm at my parent's house feeling drowsy and tipsy and full. I arrived in time for happy hour and had two glasses of white wine. Then we had dinner of meat loaf and mashed potatoes and salad. Quite content. My Dad seems to be doing really well and can talk if a bit slowly.

Cathy

[daveb]

Great to hear from you, Blue Cat! Sounds like you and your friend are having a great time. And then there's Cathy on her road trip seeing all sorts of cool stuff and hiking and all. I'm envious! :)

Cayce, yeah, you're right about all of that. I do use Pandora when I'm on the computer or have an e-reader/tablet handy, or I listen to my mp3-player. I usually only turn the radio on when I'm in my car driving around locally, because it's convenient.

Deja Vu, congrats on the new puppy! With all of the journeying I was thinking something along the lines of one of the old explorers, like Magellan or maybe Hudson or Raleigh or something (seeing as how he is an English Cocker Spaniel).

Raspberry chicken salad actually sounds good. I've had turkey cranberry sandwiches and they were quite tasty. (meatloaf and mashed potatoes sounds good, too) Good to hear your dad is doing pretty well, Cathy!

Not much news here, just a little bit cooler (mid to upper 80's) with some clouds the last day or so. And probably some localized rain in the local mountains. I guess there's still some warmer days to come though. But we're on the downside and heading in the right direction to cooler days and longer nights. :)