Curly Osburn

We left the farm as soon as Linda came home from school and drove to Louisville. I made a small detour to the Apple Store and went inside, bought an iPad Air for Linda. She wasn't happy with the Dell Tablet and was having trouble with it so time for a new tablet. That took about twenty minutes inside the store since I knew what I wanted to buy and they knew how to get it setup quickly. Back to the car and on to Daleville. I-65 was clear of delays with only one stretch where traffic was routed to the opposite side. We picked up our pizza and proceeded to the Daleville house.
Saturday, Linda and Stacey went to visit with Nana. I attended an event at the Daleville American Legion to honor a previous teacher/coach at Daleville High School. Duane "Curly" Osburn had been a track, cross country coach and taught physical education, health, sex education and driver's education while I attended high school. It appeared that around a hundred of his students and athletes showed up to honor Coach Osburn. The death of Dick Stevenson, one of Coach Osburn's premiere athletes and holder of several school and Delaware County records, had prompted this event with several people saying we needed to get together before others pass away.
 
 
This is what I enjoyed the most of being on any sports team, the comradery, the friendships made while on any sports' teams will sometimes last a lifetime. All the game wins soon vanish, but the friendships, hopefully, go on and on. I thank everyone that showed up to honor Coach Osburn, I also thank those athletes that didn't make it to the event for being on the teams and especially the ones that came before me that gave me inspiration.
Sunday morning we went to Lapel and had breakfast with Kim & Kenny at the Legion. Kim's son, Jeremy, brought his daughter with him. After finishing breakfast, we went to a house that Kim & Kenny are acquiring and planning on turning it into a day care. We returned to the Daleville house and took our time closing it, then left about 2 PM. Of course we stopped at Kingfish, picked up carry out and went below to the Rock Patio where there was a live band playing. The weather was perfect for dinning outside with a gentle breeze and a partly cloudy sky.
  
 

Brent's Birthday Cruise

Friday evening, Pauline & Brent dropped off Julie and Kyle along with Poco to stay with us while they celebrated Brent's birthday with several friends at Hidden Cave Ranch. I fixed hot dogs, chips and applesauce for the kids' supper.
Saturday, I fixed cinnamon buns for breakfast and then took the Sea Ray to the State Park parking lot for Brent to take his guests boating. Linda followed in the Equinox with Stacey, Julie and Kyle riding along. Frank Miles, Mike Lamont, Shelly & Jeff Huck had all traveled to KY for the day of boating and two nights stay at the ranch. After dropping off the boat and being picked up by Linda, I drove the Equinox to Twin Lakes Wellness Center in Albany and we went swimming.
 

After two hours in the pool, I felt the kids had been in the water long enough, so we showered and I drove to the closest place to eat, McDonalds. After finishing lunch we headed back to the farm. I must have been right about the swim timing because both Julie and Kyle fell asleep on the ride. Linda took them down to the 'pop sickle' barn and let them play in there for a couple hours. Around 5:30 PM Brent called and said they were done with the boat and we could pick it up. I drove the Equinox to the parking lot and then drove the truck home with the boat. Linda followed me back to the farm in the car and then helped get the boat in the barn. She fixed chicken strips for supper later.
Sunday morning Linda fixed pancakes for breakfast with link sausage. Kyle and I ate four pancakes each, then split the last one after everyone else had what they wanted. A little before noon, Brent came in with the entire crew. Frank, Mike, Shelly & Jeff, Pauline & Brent sat down in the living room and started telling us what had happened and how their lives had been going. We ate some of the sloppy joe burgers that Pauline had made before everyone left for their trips home.

SLN Checkup

Linda decided to take the day off from the school and accompany Stacey and I to Bowling Green for her checkup with Dr Zhu. We left the farm at 8:50 AM and I drove to the Graves-Gilbert Clinic and parked. We went inside and I registered Stacey and gave the clinic our new insurance numbers, then took the registration paper to Dr Zhu's office. We waited in the hall to be called. Dr Zhu had another doctor tagging along on his examinations. Dr Zhu spoke with Stacey for a few minutes, told her he needed her to have a blood test, then talked to Stacey about the Pacers. Dr Zhu asked if we had anything we needed to talk about. We did. We asked and he explained the difference between Depakote ER & Depakote DR to Linda and I, he also assured us that his office would keep it straight. He transferred Stacey's prescription refills to Cumberland County Pharmacy, said good bye and shook our hands as he left the examination room. We made another appointment for one year later. The entire appointment had taken an hour and 45 minutes. We left the clinic and went straight to Cheddars for lunch. After lunch, we stopped at Aldi's for a few groceries and then made it home to the farm at 3 PM.

Pepper Jelly

When we were in Bowling Green yesterday, we stopped at Aldi's and bought several packs of green peppers. We purchased two packs with red, yellow and orange peppers too. After we returned to the farm, I made two batches of pepper jelly.
  
This morning, I finished the job and made two more batches. The yellow, red and orange peppers gave the jelly a little bit of color in the jar. Jalepeno's gave the jelly the hotness. I ended up with 2 dozens half pints of pepper jelly.

Friends At Dale Hollow

Frank Dial had called and asked us to meet them on Dale Hollow Lake. We made plans for a boating trip on Sunday.
Sunday morning we woke up to rainy weather, so we had breakfast and Stacey watched the forecast and through the window. As soon as she saw the least amount of sunshine she busted out of her room and announced the sun was shinning and it was going to be 88 degrees. I said, "OK, we can go boating." We quickly prepared our things and drove the Mule down to the barn, put the stuff in the truck and took off. Most of the boats were headed the other way, back to IN or IL, so when we launched, there were several parking spots for the truck and trailer in the lower parking lot. We headed towards Star Point and found Lana & Frank just outside of that fingerlet. About five minutes later, Susan and Danny Rockhill joined us. Right after them came Barb & Bruce Funk with his brother, Dennis. The stories and beer began flowing as everyone was in the water and having a great time. We all took a ride over to Pusley Creek and got wet again after eating sandwiches for lunch. We made a short hop over to Willow Grove to pick up some ice cream.
 
Then a run down to Mitchell Creek to burn up some gas. I then took everyone to one of my favorite spots, Galton Hollow, where we found some smooth water with nobody else around. We remained there until the day was almost over, then we headed back towards Star Point and stopped just northeast of Lillydale to watch the sunset.
   
A few goodbyes and we took the boat out, tied up the cover and drove back to the farm.
 

Shelter House Construction

Since the temperatures had dropped into the lower 80s during the days, I ordered 10 tons of #8 gravel last Wednesday at Gaddie Shamrock quarry that is about 8 miles from the farm. It wasn't delivered Thursday or Friday, but they finally brought the load of gravel Monday morning about 10 AM. In the mean time I had used the tractor's back hoe to dig out the dirt along the edge of where the pavers will be laid. Once the gravel arrived, I started hauling scoops of it from the pole barn pile to the shelter house. The tractor isn't as small as it looks when it is inside the shelter house dumping or spreading the gravel. I actually had to use a shovel and rake to spread the gravel around the posts.
  
The worst part of the job was shoveling the loose dirt along the edge into the scoop of the tractor. It wasn't very hard work when I dug it out with the back hoe, but loading the two full scoops of dirt with a shovel was more than I like to do, but I got it done.
  
Next I'll need to buy some PVC pipe to lay down and screed the gravel level before starting to lay the pavers. That's a job for later on, when it cools down again.