Getting Ready for our Trip South

Earlier this weekend, Ken called on a Craigslist ad for an enclosed cargo trailer that seemed like a good deal.  We had been planning on getting our flatbed trailer stored at a friend’s house in Idaho for taking things south this winter.  There would have been a lot of preparation work to get it ready to go, but it would have been okay.  An enclosed trailer seemed like a much better idea though.  Today we went to look at the cargo trailer and decided to make an offer on it.  The offer was accepted and we will be picking it up in a couple of days.

Friday Night Lights–Lakeside High School

Friday night we drove to Lakeside High School to watch our grandson Demetrius (#23) play football.  Here are some of the photos from that game.

The coach had Dominique (#14) get ready to play also.  However, since he had played a game Thursday night, he wasn’t allowed to participate.

From left to right:  Hayley (Dominique’s girlfriend), Dominique, Bob, Laura, and Demetrius.

Dominique’s Lakeside High School Football Game

Thursday night we drove to Medical Lake High School to watch Dominique’s football game.  He’s on the freshman team (player #3) and is their quarterback.

They played hard, but unfortunately lost the game.

Moses Lake to Spokane, WA

Today was a short travel day.  We left Moses Lake with plans to stop at the first rest area to dump our holding tanks.  The first one was closed, so we decided to continue on and try for the next one.  We pulled in to the RV area and parked next to this truck.

Ken talked with the driver for a while and he said he had to be in Nashville in 4 days…that’s a fast trip!

We arrived at the Spokane Elks lodge and got set up in our site for the next 4-6 weeks.  In the afternoon, we visited Ken’s brother Ron in the hospital who was recovering from a surgery earlier that day.

Our blogs will be less frequent during our stay in Spokane as we visit with family and prepare things for our trip south later in the fall.

Barbecue and Birthdays

Saturday was the breakfast buffet as the closing of the 50th class reunion in Moses Lake.  The only photo we got was this one of Glenn and Linda packing and getting ready to leave.

Later in the afternoon, we were invited to join Don and Harriet and their family for a barbecue celebrating September birthdays at their son’s house.  After filling ourselves with hamburgers, and whatever else was available, it was time to bring out the birthday cake.

Ken took some photos of Don and Harriet and family on the front porch.  Unfortunately, they were all looking into the bright sun and having to squint.

Before we went back to the RV for the evening, Ken did get this great photo of Don with three of his granddaughters.

We had a great visit not only with Don and his family, but also with all of Ken’s classmates during the weekend reunion.

Moses Lake 50th Class Reunion–The Dinner

Saturday evening was the main event of the Moses Lake 50th class reunion.  We started the morning by joining several other volunteers at the motel to help decorate the room.

There were some hot rods for the outdoor décor.

This photo is of Steve on the left (attending a reunion for the first time) and Jim on the right is the Congressional Medal of Honor recipient from Ken’s class.

John and Charlotte at the golfer’s table.  John organized the golf day for those who wanted to play in the heat of the day.

Wally and Sharon

Glenn and Linda

Gerriann and Tom

Paula

Don is lighting a candle for each deceased member of the class during their memorial.

Paul sang a couple of songs.  He is currently choir director at Abilene Christian University in Abilene, TX.

Karen is the organizer of all the class reunions.

Glenn (with Linda), Ken (and Jan), Don (and Harriet) were best of friends growing up in Moses Lake.

Ray and Susan

Lee

Les

Of course, we have several additional photos and don’t want to get too carried away.  It was a wonderful evening, but the reunion would be continuing in the morning with a brunch at the motel.

50th Class Reunion–Pizza Party

Traditionally, the first day of Ken’s class reunions start with an evening at Chico’s Pizza in Moses Lake.  Earlier in the day we met up with Glenn (another classmate) and his wife Linda and we all went to visit Don and Harriet.  Early in August, Don went into cardiac arrest while shopping in a local store.  Fortunately, officers trained in CPR were also there having coffee, and they were able to get to him right away.  He got a trip to Sacred Heart Hospital in Spokane in a helicopter, had angioplasty, and was back home in a couple of days.  He’s looking pretty healthy now (considering that experience) here with his wife Harriet.

At Chico’s, we didn’t get any decent photos.  The lighting wasn’t very good on the photos Ken did take, and besides he was way too busy visiting with former classmates.  This photo is of a rickshaw Ken built for his Junior Prom.  Ken is sitting in the rickshaw and his classmate Steve is holding it.  We met Steve at the pizza party last night and this is the first class reunion he has attended.

We had a great evening visiting with everyone and then went back to the RV to get rested up for another day.

Moses Lake, WA Has Two Congressional Medal of Honor Recipients

This morning, we did our usual solving puzzles and reading blogs on the internet.  A little after noon, we met one of Ken’s best friends Don from high school at the local Subway to catch up on what’s been going on in his life.  We spent a good hour and a half with him and are hoping to also have some time with his wife Harriet tomorrow.  After that, we just did a lot of driving around  town to see what all has changed over the years.  Some things haven’t changed too much such as this house that Ken and his family lived in when he was in elementary school.

On second thought, the tree has probably grown quite a bit since Ken lived in that house.

Moses Lake High School has two graduates who have earned the Congressional Medal of Honor and the city built a memorial in to honor their service.  It is named after Joe Hooper who was a graduate of the class of 1957.

The second recipient is Jim Fleming who is a member of Ken’s class of 1961.  Jim attended his first class reunion five years ago and is extremely humble about the award.  His risk taking saved the lives of an entire Ranger squadron in Viet Nam.  Jim…please accept our thanks for your service to our country!!

Jim is supposed to be at the reunion again this year and we’re looking forward to visiting with him as well as all the other classmates of Ken.

An Evening with Friends in Moses Lake

Other than a couple of errands, we spent the majority of the day in the RV avoiding the hot temperatures of Moses Lake.  Ken’s high school friend Karen is the coordinator for the class reunion and he talked to her yesterday and made arrangements for us to bring dinner to their house tonight.  I prepared some sockeye salmon from Alaska to put on their grill, and took along some potatoes, salad makings and rolls.  Karen made a fresh fruit salad to go along with what we brought.  We had a great visit with Karen and her husband Wayne.  As an interesting side note, Wayne grew up on the west side of Washington state and I worked with his mother and sister at the phone company in the early days of my career.  It’s one of those “small world” coincidences.  Here’s Wayne and Karen.

Tomorrow we’re hoping to get together with another of Ken’s former classmates Don who still lives in Moses Lake.  The actual reunion activities will begin on Friday night with their traditional no host pizza at Chico’s.

Conconully to Moses Lake, WA

We’ve been having a problem with our driveline disconnect disengaging, so after we did a quick repair the other day, we decided that I would drive it following the RV to Moses Lake today.  Ken took a couple of photos of the local buck in Conconully.

We traveled a little over 130 miles to get to Moses Lake.  We arrived at the Columbia Basin Elks lodge in Moses Lake and set up for our six night stay.  We will be here for Ken’s 50th class reunion.  We did a little shopping around town after lunch and later Ken took the truck to a friend’s service station to put it on the lift and look at the driveline disconnect.  It looks like it may need to be replaced, so I’ll be driving the truck to Spokane and when we’re there we can take it into the repair shop that does that kind of work.  Here’s our site at the Elks…we’re the only ones here.

On the Friday night of Ken’s class reunions, we always meet everyone at Chico’s pizza parlor shown in this next photo.

That’s it for tonight.