April 2013 Erie Report

I guess I didn't share my "Erie Report" from our recent visit out there so here you go!  Unfortunately we could only stay overnight but luckily Paula was available to go with us.  The weather wasn't wonderful, but I'm pretty sure that's not news to you.  We were surprised to see so much snow still on the ground as we headed east on Route 17. 

Upon arrival, we took Paula directly over to Tim and Pam's house--a really cute house on a very nice street. You may know they have a dog.  A kind of big dog.  You may know that dogs often seem attracted to me.  Sigh. 

Amy was working until later so Tim was strong-armed into taking us on a tour of his station.  It was great fun to listen to Tim and watch his obvious pride in his work.  We got onto one of the boats (that's probably not the right word) that Tim explained is 100% watertight so that if it capsizes it will upright itself within a short time.  He knew every single nook and cranny of that vessel.  It was built to withstand 30 foot waves which is hard to even imagine.

You can see the boat here.  Great picture Paula!

We picked Amy up from work and went off to a very nice dinner.

Jim's looking a little shell shocked here because the bartender felt the need to come out from behind his bar to come over to our table and chatise Jim for moving chairs.  None of us has any idea where that came from and it was very odd.  But they had very yummy lemonade martini type drinks.  Yummmmmm.  Just noticed it looks like some kind of ancient bird is rising from the top of Jim's head.  HAHAHA.  Phoenix rising!

Then we went to one of their favorite bars and watched the rest of the NCAA game.  Mike was able to join us there after he was done work so it was nice for us all to be together. 

On Sunday we were able to take a tour of the zoo with Amy.  This is always really interesting!  We even got to see a little bit of real live nature when Mr. Duck mounted Mrs. Duck for a little Sunday morning you-know-what.

It was a short visit but lots of fun.  It does our hearts good to see Tim and Amy spending time together along with Pam and Mike!

Along the way, we got into a discussion about what invention would we find it hard to live without--I said "access to the internet" and Paula said "my glasses" so now we have a running joke about living without glasses.  What invention do you think it would be difficult to live without?  That's a tough question!