Adios Winter, Hello Spring

The season that passes for winter here in the Valley of the Sun has dissipated and spring has arrived with a vengeance so it’s nearly time to think about heading north with the rest of the flock of snowbirds.  Spring, as others may know it, doesn’t happen here – the air temperature goes right from “somewhat chilly” to “somewhat hot” with barely a glance at “comfy”.  A combination of warm temperatures and winter rainfall has produced a bumper crop of vegetation and a higher-than-normal count of allergens.  Even those who normally don’t suffer from hay fever-type complaints are sneezing their heads off and using up large quantities of Kleenex.  But even stuffy noses can distinguish the heady scent of citrus blossoms and runny eyes can appreciate the fabulously colored cacti blossoms which come and go almost before you know it.

And, being spring, the birds and bees are busy doing what birds and bees do.  The hummingbirds have apparently gone elsewhere and aren’t hanging around the feeders these days.  But they’ve been replaced by acrobatic Gila woodpeckers who hang their enormous bodies from the tendrils of the fake flowers on the feeders and gorge themselves with nectar, stabbing their jack hammer beaks into the small sipping spots and causing the sugar water to run out.  For a time the bees seem to have been attracted to the feeders, too, but they’ve also gone elsewhere.  There seems to be a rabbit hiding under every shrub and tree and quail constantly flush from nooks and crannies whenever we venture into the yard.  It’s a real pleasure to be able to sit out-of-doors in the evening without being bombarded by stinging, biting insects.  However, we have been advised to stay on the alert for scorpions but so far haven’t seen any.

The bookcase project undertaken by Russ and Howie for the “Arizona room” has been completed and the boxes and boxes of books have been unpacked.  The cases  reach nearly to the ceiling on either side of a large south-facing window  with a shorter section holding the two taller sections together.  That provides a nice shelf for plants and do-dads.  Before and after photos are included so that you can see what access to a well-stocked woodworking shop will do for a person.  Except for a nasty abrasion on a finger, thanks to a belt sander, Howie emerged from the project unscathed.  Ditto for Russ who knows enough, thanks to long experience, not to pet the belt sander.

We’ve had a fair amount of company over the past month or so.  It was good to see David and Shirley again when they ventured over to the West Valley for a quick visit.  It’s at least an hour’s drive from one side of the city to the other, with heavy traffic the norm, so we are all reluctant to make the trip and we are so happy they chose to “drop in” to see our new digs and visit a bit.  Gloria and Jerry finally escaped Iowa and have been tootling around in milder climes, landing out in Gold Canyon for a long stay, so they ventured over to spend a Saturday with us touring around town and just catching up on chit-chat. 

I wasn’t altogether certain how I’d feel about venturing back on the road in the motor home.  After all, we’ve been having big fun just hanging around in Geezer Gulch, participating in the wide variety of activities and entertainment.  We had planned to meet The Kinfolks in Casa Grande for a few days of reunioning and then head down to Tucson for an FMCA rally at Lazydays.  Being slightly out of practice, it took us a bit longer than usual to button up and get ready to roll (especially since everything we needed or wanted was not where it was needed or wanted) but eventually we got our act together sufficiently to hit the road.  Seeing Casa Grande RV Park again was a pleasant surprise; it has new owners and an excellent new manager so the unpleasant memory of our last visit was soon erased.  Physical improvements have been made as well but can’t compare with the improvement in attitude.  Our site was right next to Gail and Ruthee’s so we were able to handle happy hour(s) with no difficulty at all.

Ruthee had planned an outing for us  to St. Anthony’s Greek Orthodox Monastery near Florence so off we went to spend the day, car-pooling with Barney and Mary.  (We met them several years ago and hadn’t seen them since so it was great to be able to get together again).  Unfortunately our visit coincided with the first day of Lent on the Orthodox calendar and so most of the chapels were closed to visitors.  We were able to stroll the grounds and visit the interior of the largest chapel.  Church law requires visitors to be appropriately garbed which means long skirts and long sleeves and head scarves for the women and long pants and sleeves for the men (hats optional but suggested to ward off the desert sun) and, oddly enough, fully covered feet…no sandals.  The gift shop keeps a variety of shapeless skirts and tops on hand for those visitors who are not appropriately dressed.  We all looked like refugees who just stumbled off the boat at Ellis Island.   About forty monks live at the monastery where they raise olives and press their own oil.  We were told they also operate a bakery in town.  After strolling around the grounds and enjoying the serenity of the oasis we headed to Florence for lunch at Mt. Athos Restaurant.  It was Gail and Ruthee’s first experience with Greek food and they cleaned their plates.  We all did.

Barney had discovered the game of pickle ball while visiting Casa Grande and he was good enough to share his newly-acquired expertise.  What a fun game!  Yes, it’s a bit more athletic than we’re used to but certainly do-able for the older set.  Reminder to self – sign up for lessons next fall.  Because the doctor wasn’t able to cure my leg pain, it came as a big surprise to me that I could bounce around the court without hurting myself but apparently the starting and stopping is less of an issue than plain ol’ walking.  Now if we could only find a cure for the large invisible hole that develops in the middle of the paddle whenever the ball comes near.  Hand-eye coordination seems to be less good than it once was.

It’s not much of a drive from Casa Grande to Tucson so we dawdled with our departure and arrived at Lazydays shortly after noon, got settled into a large pull-through site and prepared to enjoy our vacation.  And enjoy it we did!  There were a number of folks from the Full Timers Chapter at the rally so we had a good turn-out at happy hour.  Lazydays has an on-site restaurant and they catered most of the meals for the rally and did a very fine job of it.  The chef and banquet manager got standing ovations from the appreciative campers.  In the evening we had entertainment in the rally building.  The first night was a delightful troupe of young mariachi musicians (I can’t remember the Spanish name but the translation is something like Little Ugly Monkeys), ranging in age from 13 to 16.  It was a shock that they’d only been performing together for seven months; they are so poised and professional.  The second evening found us listening (and dancing) to a country-western trio and the final performance was a jazz vocalist and her group.

More entertainment awaited us when we returned to Geezer Gulch.  The Recreation Association sponsored a night of Dancing With The (Rec Center) Stars.  The professional dancers in this case were a troupe from Utah and they were most enjoyable to watch.  The rec center folks…not so much.  But you have to give them an A for effort.  And chutzpah. 

We spent Easter with Russ and Rochelle, digging in to a ham dinner with two desserts including a lemon meringue pie made with fresh lemons from their very own tree.  After dinner we sat out on the patio and watched the multitude of birds coming and going.  The hummingbirds haven’t abandoned their yard just yet and one particularly aggressive little devil came and hovered right in my face.  It wasn’t a one shot deal, either, he kept coming back buzzing furiously.  Maybe he was attracted by my bright yellow shirt, or angry because I was too close to his feeder.  Or maybe he was just eyeballing my hair as a good place to build a nest. 

And now it’s time to begin developing our itinerary for the travel season.  We expect to see a great many of our favorite folks this summer and are really looking forward to it.