Amy Currioman

Sue decided to spend a week in Chicago, visiting with Aunt June.  Aunt June hasn’t been feeling well lately, and wasn’t able to come visit with us like she usually does.  We’ve been quite unhappy with air travel of late, so Sue decided to drive up instead of flying. So Sue borrowed my EZ Pass and drove her Toyota Corolla to Chicago.  We figured that was the best idea because that would make her departure and arrival days and times flexible.

While Sue was in Chicago, she was driving Aunt June around town to run some errands and her car overheated.  She took it to a Chicago auto repair shop and they told her that she needed a new water pump.  I had to give Sue my credit card information so she could get the car fixed.  That’s one of the drawbacks to taking your own car on a trip!  Maybe next time she’ll rent a car for the trip.  Getting a rental with unlimited mileage just might be the best way to go; if it breaks down you don’t have to pay to get it fixed, you just trade it in for a different rental car and you’re on your way!

There was a terrible earthquake in Chile. The news reports say that the earthquake was almost 1,000 stronger than the one that hit Haiti 2 months ago. This earthquake was an 8.8 magnitude! I sure hope that there is not the same level of devastation and loss of life that Haiti has suffered. My heart goes out to the good people of Chile.

My hubby has been talking about buying a new car next year.  If everything goes right, we should be able to trade in our scion on a new vehicle.  The biggest problem (besides the money!) is picking out which new car we would like to get.  My hubby says that he really wants either a saab 9-5 or a 2010 vw golf.  He’s never owned a saab before, and he is really impressed with the history of the company.

The saab company is a Swedish company, and they got their start making air plane engines.  When I was very young my parents bought a saab.  It ran a very long time and they ended up giving it to my older sister for her high school graduation present.  I always thought it was a funny looking little car, and it only had three cylinders, which made it sound funny.  My parents loved it though, and it served the family well.  When they gave it to my sister they bought a new one for themselves.  I remember learning how to drive in that car – it had a feature in it that my father called “free wheeling” which meant that even though it was a manual transmission if it was put in “free wheeling” mode it would not stall out if the driver wasn’t using the clutch properly.  Looking back, I think that was a fantastic car to learn to drive in!  I wonder if all the saabs still have that feature!

I’ve always been partial to suvs, though.  The biggest drawback to them is that so many of them don’t get good gas mileage.  I think that the reason I’ve liked them is that they are roomy, like the station wagons we had when we were growing up.

Because I fell in love with downhill skiing when I was a teenager, when I became an adult and went to work and got vacation time, I spent all of my vacations on skiing holidays during the winter!  Before I managed to move to New England, I joined a local ski-enthusiast singles only club and went with the club on group vacations to various ski resorts.  As a single lady, I had more fun than you can even imagine!  We would rent out townhouses right on the slopes so that we could ski right out of our townhouse right onto the mountain!

The very first time I went on a group skiing holiday like that the other skiiers encouraged me to take skiing lessons.  Since the cost of a couple of lessons was included in the cost of the entire trip I readily agreed.  I could not believe how much my skiing improved after only one lesson!  By the end of the first lesson I had moved from the bunny trails to the intermediate trails.  By the end of the second lesson I was introduced to the expert trails.  If I had known that taking a few lessons would have improved my skiing so much, and so quickly, I would have tried to take lessons much sooner!

If you love golf, you would LOVE to Golf Myrtle Beach!  My neighbor Jeff just returned from the latest of his annual Myrtle Beach Golf Vacations.  He’s been playing Myrtle Beach Golf  every year for the past twenty years.  It seems that every time he goes, he’s found some great Myrtle Beach Golf Packages that include green fees to his favorite Myrtle Beach courses.  I didn’t think it was possible to play every single course in Myrtle Beach, but Jeff says that since he’s been going there for twenty years, he’s pretty sure he’s played them all at least once!

His wife Sara goes with him every year, but she doesn’t play golf every day the way Jeff does.  She likes to spend some time on the beach and going to some of the dinner theater shows and theme parks in the area too.  They try to take some of their grandchildren with them some of the time so that they can go to the amusement parks too.  Jeff and Sara have been trying to talk us into going with them on their next vacation trip.  I’m not a golfer, but I think I’d like to spend some time on the beach and go to some of the shows!