Caryl's Mom visits

Well it has been an eventful week or so. Caryl's mom, Lois, came into town from frigid Ohio on Saturday 2/14, and even with it being it a little cold for us (60s), she was glad to be out of the snow. We got her settled in, and went out for a nice Valentines dinner at McCormick & Schmicks - yum! The next morn, we met with Lois and went to the 5 & Diner - a 50s style diner that Caryl and I favor for breakfast.

After that, the girls split to go to an art fair. Me, as I have been having ongoing knee problems, set at home that day nursing it with with ice, etc. The only good thing was it gave me a chance to sit down and watch the Daytona 500. Also, as I have had a bad couple of weeks concerning electronics, it gave me a shot to check out my new surround receiver as well. The second part of the bad electronics is that my computer crashed later that week, so I am doing this post on a new computer as well. My work to keep the economy stimulated, I guess, much to my chagrin :)

Then it was off to work for the week, but that still left time to meet up for dinner a couple of nights. The best was dinner at Pinnacle Peak Patio, a cowboy steakhouse famous in these parts for their food, plus the collection of ties hanging from the ceiling (they cut them off anyone foolish enough to wear one into the place). I will post photos of this as soon as Lois sends me some :)

Then on Saturday we wore Lois out, starting with the Parada del Sol parade, billed as the world's biggest horse-drawn parade. This is a precursor to the rodeo that happens later that week, and provides some cool (and some kitschy) horse groups and floats.

Then it was off to the Fountain Hills Great Fair, another fine art festival to spend the afternoon. I think Lois, who always likes to be on the go, got all she wanted and more, at least on the weekends! Too bad she had to leave on Monday, when the temps here were in the 80s, and it was 14 degrees when she arrived back home in Ohio - brrrrr !!!!!