With my Maymester grades in, I am done until August 29, a comforting thought. I left last Sunday for Ken and Sandy, who now live in Accomac, Virginia. The drive there took about 6 hours (broken up into two days), with stops for bike riding and golf. I played the Tradition course at New Kent (supposedly rated the 16th hardest course in the US) and did reasonably well (50 for 9 holes) from the green tees, the same length as the white at the Meadows. The course must have 70 traps in just 9 holes and I got in 4 of them but I got out without too much damage. The next day I played the Jack Nicklaus course near Cape Charles and that also had an amazing amount of sand and I get in enough bunkers for four players. My score was about 58 from the gold tees and that wasn’t too bad for all the traps I had to hit out of.
Ken and Sandy have a lovely house right on Folly Creek. There are still getting things in order but we had a lot of fun taking out his 21 foot boat, and catching flounder (Ken had 4 with one keeper over 21 inches and I had 1 fish, a keeper at 20 inches). We ate those for dinner on Tuesday night and both nights we stayed up late playing the Wii games (golf, bowling and skiing). I was pretty good at the first two, but I crashed many, many times in skiing.
The only problem was my knee. I just did too much on Tuesday, particularly 6 hours on the boat, so on Wednesday morning I could hardly walk. I knew I had to rest for probably 2 days so I decided to head home and cancel the visit to Chincoteague. The visit was a great success and I can see Chincoteague on another trip. I am planning to visit Ken and Sandy again soon, perhaps in the fall and they talked of coming to visit me in the fall or spring.
I did a number of small things around the house and then went to my office to catch up on things. I set up with the bookstore the handout that I will be using for my Environmental Literature course, and did some paperwork. My evaluations from the spring were very high, and I am proud of that.
I am at work on getting things ready to help Maddie Gallo build an owl house. Building it will be no problem, but getting it set up in a tree is going to require Mike’s help. I certainly can’t do it myself.
I have started a new poem about my ex-partner and I think it will be an interesting exploration of loss.