Hello Family,
I think it’s about
time for another update on what’s going on with us.
We really enjoyed
having everyone here in Colorado during the last week of 2012! We
hopefamily get-togethers like this can be coordinated on a somewhat
regular basis going forward.
On New Year’s Eve we
had a few friends over to welcome in 2013. Our neighbors across the
street and a couple rallycross buddies were in attendance. Since we
don’t have live TV we counted down using our atomic clock. General
merriment was had by all. I had to work the next morning and went to
bed right after midnight. Susan entertained the others until much
later the next morning.
It was a few days
later that Mr. Bailey got really sick. On Friday January 4th Susan
took him to the vet where the prognosis was very grim. He had
pneumonia again and this trachea was very small (the vet said it was like a
straw). I met Susan at the vet’s office and they put him
down. Right after it was done we agreed that we wanted to adopt
Sophie. Susan reached out to the Colorado Pug Rescue as soon as we
left. A family in Nebraska had already submitted an
application to adopt both Mr. Bailey and Sophie but was also interested in a
different male foster. We were thinking the family was
really looking for a male pug as they had two others in their house and had adopted
a male previously. The people at the pug rescue were very gracious
and let us adopt Sophie.
We haven’t taken on
any more foster pugs yet and now just have Satchel, Tweetie, and Sophie in the
house. With the cruise coming up we didn’t want to take on another
pug just to have to part with him/her for a week and a half so soon
afterward. The three girls get along very well.
When Mom was at our
house for our mini-reunion she was able to give Susan and myself some crochet
pointers which helped a lot in getting us started on our new
hobby. While I’ve dabbled a little here and there Susan has leaped
in with both feet. She’s already completed a few projects and has
plans for many more. So far Susan has made a potholder, a blanket
for Sophie, two scarves, a stuffed pig for our neighbor, and a little stuffed
bumble bee for her sister. I’ve managed to make one very ‘special’
scarf and will probably work on a hat in the near future. It’s been
a lot of fun and I urge all of you who haven’t tried it to give it a
go. ;-)
On February 2nd we
went bowling to benefit the Colorado Pug Rescue. The event seemed to
be a success and we had a great time. Several years ago we used to
bowl quite often with Susan’s sister and pre-Alvin boyfriend and bought bowling
balls and shoes. Having our own equipment is a double-edged
sword. It is nice to not use the house bowling balls and old shoes
but everyone there thinks we’re really good. This is really not the
case but we did manage a few respectable scores at the benefit (Susan won the
first game with 125 and I managed to be in the 150s for games two and
three).
Later that night we
went downtown to attend the Colorado Rallycross Award Banquet. It
was held at a karaoke bar named El Charrito (don’t get too excited – neither of
us sang). Most of the regular rallycrossers were there and it was
fun to see everyone again. Much of the evening was spent conversing
and passing around a self-published book of pictures from the 2012 season that
our neighbor and fellow-rallycrosser Sandra made. She raced some at
the beginning of the season but later just came out to take
pictures. The book came out fantastic and we ordered one
ourselves. Trophies were distributed later and we received one each
(1stfor me and 5th for Susan).
From that day until we
flew to Florida most of our thoughts were directed at the upcoming
cruise. We went out to do some clothes shopping but found ourselves
flummoxed with the lack of summer apparel selection (shouldn’t be too
surprising since it’s February I suppose). It was decided
that we’d plan on going to the Ron Jon’s by the port while waiting for our ship
to come in. Even with Susan’s careful planning and copious
list-making our packing experience was still frenetic with the majority occurring
the day before we flew to Florida. Satchel and Tweetie stayed with
their Puskas grandparents and Sophie went with my band’s bass player
Mark.
The flight out to
Florida was uneventful and Mom and Janice picked us up at the
airport. We immediately went to a Vera Bradley outlet store nearby
so the ladies could pick up some new bags. After this brief
excursion we went to the hotel.
We had dinner that
night on the pier at Marlin’s. The food was great and Greg had fun
prodding our poor waiter. There were pelicans flying about and
landing on the pier. Janice saw someone get pecked as they went in
for pictures! After dinner Greg, Susan, and myself had a drink at
the bar at the end of the pier. Later that evening Susan and I went
shopping for clothes and other last minute supplies.
The next morning we
ate continental breakfast and headed for the ship. Carnival had sent
an email to everyone saying to not try to board the ship until after
1:00PM. We decided to disregard the email and arrived at the port
around 10:30. It turned out to be the fastest boarding we’d ever
had. There was no waiting at all and we zipped through security and
had our ship pictures taken.
I’ll sum up the rest
of the cruise here: good food was eaten, laughter broke, dice was played, yarn
was crocheted, trivia was won, songs were sung (karaoke), excursions were had,
shopping was performed, decks were wandered, shows were watched, and tips were
paid. A wonderful time was had by all.
It was hard to come
back to Colorado but the clean dry air was welcoming. We try to
always take an extra day off to recover from our vacations and ended up giving
ourselves two this time (Sunday and Monday).
On Sunday we finally
were able to autocross the new (to us) Miata. It was so much
fun. That’s all I have to say about that.
I think that’s enough
for now. I hope this finds everyone happy and healthy!
Max and Susan
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