Memories

 Jim determined we were in NYC with Don and Elaine in 1992 since he was at an MLA Conference and seeing his publisher so pre-blog and I don't seem to have any photos of that trip. I think there may be some more photo albums in our storage locker. I wasn't big into taking photos at that time but Don had a fancy camera and would have taken a lot. I do have some photos from another later  trip to NYC but we were on our own. Jim was doing some research and we also went to Boston and Princeton in New Haven and to New Hampshire and Portland, Maine on that trip.

In 1992 we all went to see the ball drop and were there by 10:30 as we were advised it filled up long before midnight. They do crowd control by "penning" groups of about 50 people together with rope. I was two inches away from some guy talking about being on parole for an attempted murder charge. I also am a little claustrophobic so not really enjoying being penned in. Then the police officer said if you wanted to get out you needed to get out now. I grabbed Jim and we got out of there. We went to a piano bar and saw it on TV. It was a very pleasant experience. Don and Elaine stayed. During our trip they had dinner with people they had met on a cruise who lived in NYC. When they told them they had watched the ball drop they said, "Yeah, you do that once."

While trying to find photos of that NYC trip I found these in an album I labelled "Grab bag"...sounds rather typical of my way of organizing things :) Lo and behold there are photos of the ski trip at Manning Park with Roger and Kerry and also some photos of us at my parents' place on Gabriola Island. Some of these are very faded. The time period was in our university days of the late 60's. I've included the descriptions of the photos in the album.

 I put the photos in albums not that long ago. Before they were all in a big box. I remember telling Patty they were all in a box and rather mixed up. She replied, "I bet they were!". We had shared a classroom at some point in our teaching careers. That's another story to do with thumbtacks for another time.

"Me in front and Kerry behind. Good thing time has faded the bright lime green ski pants!"

"Roger and Kerry after hot rums in the afternoon"

"Jim in front of the cabin at Manning Park we all shared for $10 a night. Those were the days of very long skis. To get the measurement for the right length you put your arm straight up above your head and that was the size of ski you bought."

"Roger and Kerry in front of my parents' place at Gabriola. Roger is filling the outboard with gas before we went fishing. Kerry catching the big one." (I don't remember if we caught any salmon that trip but we never got "skunked" because there was a big kelp bed and we jigged for rock cod if we didn't get salmon. I remember getting rock cod one day and Roger made batter and fried it and it was delicious.)

"When did I meet Liberace?"

"Me, my brother, and my cousin, John Denniston." (They both still had their hair so that must be about 50 years ago.)

"Richard and Jim playing their Christmas chess game." ( I don't think they knew about the Queen's Gambit.)