Friday, June 22

Up at 6:30 to get ready to go to water aerobics. Pleasant walk to the gym. Water still high and cool. Seventeen of us showed up, an unusually large group for a Friday.

Our old lifeguard was on duty, because our new one is on vacation. I asked how his wife is, and he said she's no longer working at the medical clinic that I use. She is a technician, who was in charge of the lab at the clinic. While I didn't particularly like having blood work done, I always enjoyed seeing her, since she was a student in a college photography class I taught several years ago.

As soon as I returned from aerobics, Hubbie commandeered the van to take the cases of liquid refreshments downtown to the church fellowship hall, where the arts council will be holding a Summer Celebration fundraising event. He also delivered a baggie of colorful wrist bands with tags, to be used for the silent auction. The council director had dropped the bag of bands and tags, plus wire, by our house Wednesday night, so we could assemble them.

Sis arrived for a visit while I was getting ready for the day. Later, we fixed a lunch of leftovers, and then Hubbie and I changed into clothes suitable for attending a retirement reception later.

Around 1 p.m., we went down to the church fellowship hall to help prepare for tonight's fesivities. Hubbie and another man went to a local grocery store, where they filled a large rolling ice chest with donated ice.

While they were gone, I helped the ladies put tableclothes on the tables to be used for silent auction items, and then helped them set the items out on the tables. I didn't try to arrange anything...there is a lady who thinks this is her exclusive job, and I'm willing to let her do it. One year, I dared to try to arrange some of the items, but later, at the event, I found that everything had been rearranged.

We left around 2 p.m. to attend the reception in honor of a lady we worked with before we retired. The ladies who decorated for the reception did a good job of pulling off a Hawaiian theme, with purple, pink, and yellow plastic tableclothes, topped with colorful leis. An inflatable coconut tree was at the door, and pink flamingos decorated the wall.

The tiki hut cake was really cute. I was told it was a white cake, but it looked pretty yellow to me, so I only took a couple of bites of it. I also passed on the punch made of orange soda and orange sherbet. The punch was served in orange solo cups, and included a straw deocrated with a paper flamingo.

We were back home around 3:30. Sis was in charge of preparing supper for Mother and herself, since Hubbie and I were scheduled to go to the Summer Celebration, where heavy hors d'oeuvres were to be served.

Hubbie and I arrived at the event shortly after 6 p.m. Hubbie was hungry, since it was well after our usual suppertime, so we headed for the refreshment table right away. Food choices included sliced pork or beef on slider buns, meatballs in sauce, various exotic dips on homemade chips, a watermelon basket filled with melon balls, fresh pineapple chunks, and grapes, and an assortment of cookies, brownies and the like. Drinks included various brands of bottled beer, and various wines, and bottled water.

The tables were decorated with white tableclothes and centerpieces of new paint cans filled with colorful handmade paper flowers.

There were lots of items in the silent auction, but we only came home with an umbrella, and an oil change and tire rotation. We tried for the sail boat excursion for four, but were outbid. I bid on several items...movie tickets, dinners at local restaurants, live theater productions, etc., but didn't get anything. I was pleased, however, that the photo I donated sold for $40.

Oh well, we enjoyed the live music, anyway, though this year it was out in the courtyard, where it was a bit warm. Also, there was no place to dance, unless folks wanted to dance on the grass, and they didn't.

We anticipated getting back home by no later than 9 p.m., but after the event, we stuck around and helped clean up, so we didn't get back until around 10:30.

We finished the evening by watching our favorite college baseball team in the last couple of innings of the College World Series. Unfortunately, we lost this one, so that ends the team's run at the championship.