China Buffet with Cedar Hills Gang

Monday, December 28, I sleep like a rock and get up at 7:20. It is sunny with a low of 34 degrees. I cut up my desserts and wash up the pans and dishes. I make tea in spite of the water being on the pump. I relax with my java. Bob and I have Maple Pecan Loaf toast for breakfast (thanks Elaine and Steve--those breads are heaven!) I check email early but no new message from Jo.

I stretch after cleaning up the kitchen. Then Bob goes out to hook up the water and fill the fresh water holding tank. It is getting low after shutting the water off for several nights in a row due to close to freezing a.m. temps. I have a quick vacuum and we both clean ourselves up. Around 11:30 a Bastrop Sheriff's car cruises slowly around the Park. By the time Bob realizes it might be Doug, one of his old employees, he can't catch him. Maybe he'll come through again. Several times we've seen the Sheriff cars cruise through. Nice that they patrol; I guess anyway--it could mean they've had some incidents. Who knows?

At 11:45 we go down the hill and get a paper at Chevron to circle back around to China Buffet. We go in the lobby and I stick my head inside looking for Jo, Bill and Glenda but don't see them. A few minutes later they pull up and Jo asks if Joyce and Dan are here as she's sure that's their car. I'm surprised. As of yesterday's email they weren't coming. But Jo sent another email later this morning and I never got back on-line. We all go inside and sure enough there they are.

I am so glad they made it. Joyce is feeling better today. She looks great except for a slight favoring of her leg. So nice to see both her and Dan. We give our beverage orders and cruise the buffet lines. They have so many choices here. What a fun lunch visiting with all of our Elgin neighbors. We move the party to our home-on-wheels up the hill. They all follow us and come inside for a grand tour. Well, except for Glenda. She's already had the grand tour so she gets out of the way.

This is our first time to entertain seven. We had six at Thanksgiving at Lake Texoma. Seven was doable for visiting, dessert and coffee. Maybe a meal would have been more of a challenge but I think we could have managed. It was fun to show them our new digs. We had a nice chat. They are a fun bunch and always make me laugh. Joyce brought the cutest photo of her new puppy Titch. I can't wait to see him.

They all hit the road mid afternoon. Hopefully we'll see them all again while we're still here. My fortune at the Chinese restaurant was "The principle business of life is to enjoy it."
Bob goes down under to install his latest two storage units. I take a walk in spite of the chilly air (high of 57 today but wind out of the north.) One half of the double-wide on the far side is gone and they have the other half ready to pull out. It leaves as I return home. We put the awning out to dry it out but it is a bit windy so we don't leave it out long. Bob gives me two of his old storage drawers and I try to make them work for the shoes in the bottom of my closet. I may rearrange after we go to our local storage unit.

We read the paper, have leftovers and watch TV. I catch up on the past two day's journal pages. It's 7:26 p.m. and 45 degrees with 41% humidity.