Turning51

Let me tell you why John shouldn’t be allowed to go to Albertsons alone. First of all, he bought Captain Crunch “because it was on sale.” In my opinion, no one in their right mind buys Captain Crunch cereal ever, for any reason.

Secondly, it was on sale because it was OVER A YEAR PAST ITS EXPIRATION DATE! Seriously. He bought it yesterday morning! Sunday, September 27, 2026, at the Albertsons on West State St in Boise, ID and it’s dated September 8 2025. How could Albertsons even be selling something that old? They must have known it was that old because why else would they be selling it for 60% off?

Thirdly, (as if we even need a thirdly), John was eating this badly expired Captain Crunch FOR DINNER. And continued to eat it even after he noticed the expiration date. He said it didn’t taste stale. Maybe chemicals and sugar don’t go stale?

And fourthly (believe it or not, there is a fourthly), he was eating this badly expired Captain Crunch for dinner while I was heating up homemade cinnamon rolls that Guen had just dropped off for us, that she had made using Grandma Wood’s recipe!

I need to explain to you about these cinnamon rolls. I am willing to bet you’ve never had cinnamon rolls this good. Thirty-some years ago when I was only 26 years old, I made the mistake of divorcing my husband prior to getting a copy of his mother’s cinnamon roll recipe. Of all the things I lost in that divorce, that was one I never forgot. Every few years, I would ask one or the other of my kids to please ask their grandmother for her recipe, but it never materialized.

All these years later, Guen married Callan and became a bonafide member of the Wood clan – with access to the treasured family cinnamon roll recipe. And not just access to the coveted recipe. Guen is an accomplished baker. She knows how to bring that recipe to life. So there is no excuse to be eating ANYTHING ELSE, much less handfuls of over-a-year-expired Captain Crunch, when Guen had dropped off genuine Wood family cinnamon rolls a few minutes before.

Helen Wood’s cinnamon roll recipe is based on a bread recipe, so here are both recipes, the bread first and the cinnamon roll recipe below it. If you decide to make them, let me know and I’ll get on a plane to come out and help you eat them.

Grandma Wood’s Bread:

4 cups boiling water

1 cup rolled oats

½ cup shortening

1 T salt

¾ cup molasses

Mix and let cool to 150°F to 115°F

Add:

2 T yeast

9-10 cups flour

Add flour until cannot mix in anymore.

Knead until smooth and elastic, about 5 minutes.

Place in a greased bowl and let rise in warm place about 1 ½ hours.

Punch down dough.

Separate into 3-4 loaves and allow to rise.

Bake at 425°F for 20 minutes then 325°F for 20 minutes.

Grandma Wood’s Cinnamon Rolls:

¾ cup margarine or butter

1 ½ cups brown sugar

6 T corn syrup

Heat butter until melted. Mix in brown sugar and corn syrup. Pour half into each of two large greased pans.

Grandma Wood’s Bread dough

6 T margarine or butter, softened

¾ cup sugar

⅓ cup cinnamon

raisins

Separate the dough into thirds. Flatten dough with hands or rolling pin on floured surface. Spread third of margarine on dough. Mix sugar and cinnamon and sprinkle third on dough. Sprinkle raisins on dough. Roll up tightly. Pinch edge of dough into roll to seal well. Stretch roll to make even. Cut into 1 ½ inch slices. And place slightly apart in pan with butterscotch mixture. Let rise until double, about 40 minutes.

Bake at 375 until golden brown, about 30 minutes. Immediately upon removing from oven, invert pan on heatproof serving plate. Let pan remain 1 minute.

Here’s the last of the Puget Sound vacation photos – the last bit of our 4 Fun Days and 4 Packing Days. Day 1 of the Fun Days was our bike ride at Point Defiance.

Day 2 we went to the state fair. We got there early before the crowds. The midway hadn’t opened yet, which is the way I like it. It was fun to walk through the silent midway, imagining the rides. I’m easily amused (and don’t much like screaming crowds and rattling contraptions). And I certainly don’t ride the rides myself. I find life to be plenty enough intense without adding to the excitement with unnecessary near catastrophic death mimicking experiences. In some ways that’s a curse because I get overwhelmed easily. But in other ways I feel very lucky. I am easily entertained, enjoy the little things, and am almost never bored. It doesn’t take much to make me happy. I am a cheap date! Lol.

We looked at the farm animals, the quilts, and ate fair food. I didn’t take photos of the quilts or our food, so here are a few pictures of some of the animals.

These are alpacas, which are smaller and softer than llamas. They are raised for their wool, like sheep.

I thought the markings on this pig was like a work of art.

I think these next photos were all types of goats. These first two were ridiculously cute, begging for handouts.

These two were more chill, bored with life at the fairgrounds.

Ha ha, the cute energetic ones again.

These look like babies to me, but who knows, they could just be little ones, I am not a goat expert and I did not read, much less memorize all the signs.

Yum, yum, hay for brunch everyone!

On Day 3 of our 4 Fun Days we went sailing.

There were lots of crabs near the dock, here is a brief video of scurrying crabs (it’s short and very boring, like all my videos are boring, except the whale, that wasn’t boring.)

Here’s John messing around with the mainsail.

Under John you can see the hatch that goes down to the cabin in the bow of the boat. Here’s what the cabin looks like:

You can’t see in the picture, but those two bunks on either side in the foreground extend down along the side of the boat, and they are long enough to be slept on. You can also sleep on those bunks in the bow. The contraption in the middle is a retractable keel.

There is also a composting toilet hidden under a cushion to the forward right; it’s not a marine toilet, which are messy and smelly. Our composting toilet is the same as we have in the van (not messy or smelly). It doesn’t release anything to the water; we just dump it when we get home.

Here we have the mainsail and the jib up. We are barely healed over at all and barely moving. Turns out we hardly ever have good strong, steady wind in this particular part of the Puget Sound. It’s gusty and can unexpectedly quit. It’s not ideal for sailing.

But John’s happy, so I’m happy:

On Day 4 of our 4 Fun Days we went to another small outdoor blues festival, this one in Puyallap, near where we went to the fair. The music was good and the weather was great, but not very many people were dancing.

That’s it for summer vacation! Then we sorted and packed and cleaned and cleaned and packed. The interior of the cabin is all set.

Here is John’s boat, all buttoned up, mast down, full of bins of stuff, on the trailer for the winter on Allie’s property behind the cabin. There’s even a kayak under that cover, waiting until next year.

We still had two weeks left on the cabin reservation. But did we want to be here? After my dogs and I were attacked by Allie’s dogs at the beginning of September, I had meant to leave immediately. But Allie moved her dogs to her boyfriend’s house (which helped enormously) and John and I got the flu and by the time we were over our flu bugs and in shape to travel, September was half over. We had a decision to make – head to Garden City right away, or try to salvage our vacation?

Biska was still recovering from being bitten by Allie’s dog. She is not fully healed yet, but she’s out of the woods. She’s been wearing a onesie to keep her from licking her scabs. It’s working very well – so much better than a cone.

John had groused that our vacation was “a bust” and I didn’t want it to end that way. Yes, we had a really rotten two weeks, but we were finally feeling better and I didn’t want to just pack up and leave. We decided to stay in Vaughn a few more days in order to try to end on a good note. First 4 days of fun! Then four days of packing, and we’ll be on our way.

It doesn’t actually take four days to pack, but it apparently does take four days to pull the boat out of the water and prep it for leaving it on the trailer on Allie’s property all winter. After being in the Puget Sound for two months, the hull is thoroughly fouled. John has to acid wash it, and then wax it to protect it.

That’s just the hull. He also has to pull the mast down. Then there’s all the drying and stashing of sails and innumerable other boat items. Plus the interior needs some sort of major mold and mildew prevention treatment. The winters here are cold and perpetually wet, but not frozen solid. Not only is mold and mildew ubiquitous, I’m pretty sure we could grow moss inside that boat in a month. Definitely mushrooms. 10 months of slime growth. It’s man against fungi out here. Not to mention rust.

Plus, we keep a certain amount of household stuff stored in the boat so we don’t have to drag a bunch of stuff out every year. The rental cabin comes stocked, but not always stocked with the things we actually want for 2 months. For example, I pretty much can’t live without an iron frying pan and a coffee press. And an air purifier. And a hand vac. I could go on. All that stuff needs put in plastic bins which John then double seals with plastic bags. Two layers of plastic, minimum. All that goes into the boat, with the boat on a trailer on Allie’s property.

It’s not just my kitchen items that we store on the boat. Most of the bulk of the stuff we leave behind is boat related. Sails, life vests, tools, buckets, various things I don’t even recognize. And the kayak, that’s the biggest thing. Allie has a few old kayaks for guest use, but we keep our tandem kayak with the sailboat. We already have a couple of cheap solo kayaks taking up space in the side yard in Tucson. As if we need kayaks in the desert.

So yeah, we put down our deposit and we’re going to come back next year. Allie promised her dogs will be in Gig Harbor with her boyfriend, Chuck (apparently they are back together). So assuming that her relationship is continuing to work out next year, then I guess we won’t have to worry about her dogs trying to kill mine.

But before we leave, 4 days of fun. John and I talked about what we each most wanted to do that we haven’t had a chance yet to do. My top choice was to bicycle along the waterfront in Tacoma. John’s first choice was to go to the state fair. My second choice was to go to a small blues festival in Puyallup. John was also hoping I’d be interested in sailing (I hadn’t actually been out on the sailboat yet, just the kayak). So that’s what we did. 4 days of fun.

I posted my drafts in the wrong order, so you already saw my post about Day 1 at Point Defiance.

I’ll post photos of the next three fun days in my next post, but meanwhile, here’s some amazing dog photos John took on the kayak at sunset one evening.

We never got tired of that sunset over the water.

It’s day 1 of our 4 fun days before heading home. We parked in Point Defiance Park and started by biking south along the waterfront.

This art installation commemorates Tacoma’s logging history. They called it The Mill, which at first confused John, who is from the midwest where mills refer to flour mills. The equipment didn’t look right somehow. Lol, out here, mills are sawmills.

The rusted cylinder represents a log. The logs used to be that big – much bigger even.

It was a beautiful clear day, with signs of fall in the leaves.

We ate lunch at this cute restaurant on the water and had a good time, but I don’t actually recommend this particular café.

For truly excellent food in the area, I recommend the nearby waterfront restaurant, Woven Seafood & Chophouse. That’s where we went for my birthday dinner. Woven doesn’t review any better than any of the others in that stretch, but I thought the chief at Woven was creative and inspiring.

After lunch we biked back north back towards the park. Here’s the ferry loading.

Next we rode our bikes through Point Defiance Park, which is a huge and amazingly incredibly beautiful park.

This region is so full of hills! At least it was flat along the waterfront.

I keep being astounded by Tacoma. It’s never had a good reputation, but suddenly it seems like a beautiful city. I raised the kids in Olympia and never gave Tacoma half a thought. Seattle was where it was at. Right? Who knew Tacoma was so beautiful? Was it always this beautiful, or did this just happen in the 25 years since I’ve lived out of the region? I asked a friend of mine who grew up around here, many years ago, and she said, “Tacoma was a shit hole.” So yeah, sort of what I remembered. But maybe Point Defiance was always beautiful.

I was supposed to be riding my bike, but I kept stopping to take photos.

We had parked right next to some flower gardens, so we put our bikes back on our car and walked the gardens.

What a beautiful place.

I am miserable. For those of you who have heard from me during this last week, you may be surprised to hear that we are still in Vaughn. We were indeed originally scheduled to still be here through all of September, but things changed and I started packing to leave early, and now I am currently feeling a bit stuck. A lot stuck.

So that you don’t worry too much, let me reassure you that the problem at the moment is simply a bad cold, or flu, or covid, or who knows, whatever. Emily diagnosed it as either covid or the flu (diagnosed long distance, based on my descriptions of symptoms. I have no intention of getting a test). It hardly matters, John already had it, and I am staying isolated in the cabin until I’m better. Yes, this will pass, I will get better. Eventually. Once I do get better, I am hightailing it home. But (surprisingly, once you hear my story), we are still considering coming back again next year.

It all started when John left to fly home to Tucson for a few days to check on the house. I had originally been noncommittal when he first mentioned his intention. It seemed pointless and unnecessary to me, because we hire a competent couple to go to our house weekly and check it over, water the house plants, make sure the pool vacuum and filter are working, etc.

But as the time approached for his departure, I grew increasingly unhappy that he was leaving. I didn’t have a logical reason to worry (anymore than he had a logical reason to make the trip). None of it was logical – my concern or his travel plans. It came down to just letting our spouses be their inscrutable selves.

So I waved a cheerful goodbye. Actually I gave him his goodbye hug the prior evening, because I had no intention of getting up to see him off at too-early o’clock the next morning. The first day or two he was gone went uneventfully. It was cold, and off and on raining (welcome to Washington in September), and I spent it in the cabin, doing some cooking and cleaning, reading, working on some dance steps, nothing much to speak of.

By day two, the dogs were getting bored. They have their toys, and a large deck to lay in the sun (except it was raining) and a little grassy patch that John temporarily fenced for them for their potty needs, accessible from the deck, so they don’t actually need walked. But they had gotten accustomed to daily morning excursions with John, where he would load them into the Jeep and go in search of exciting new trails, leaving me to rest at home alone until the coffee kicks in. (After a year of his retirement, we are slowly learning how to live together 24-7. Part of that recipe is nothing important happens before the coffee has kicked in.)

On about day two, after the dogs had bumped their leashes with their noises for the umpteenth time, in the middle of the morning, after coffee and during a break in the rain, I agreed to take them for a walk. I leashed them and headed up the driveway, intending to walk them on the local country road. I’ve walked them out there before – it’s not ideal. The cars travel rather fast and it’s overgrown along the side of the road, but I didn’t want to fire up the van, and John had left the Jeep at the airport.

Our cabin is at the base of a steep gravel drive, shared by about four houses. Allie has a small cabin above us, and her son and daughter-in-law and their kids have the house above her cabin, up near the top where the drive meets the main road. There are also a couple neighbors on the other side of the gravel drive.

The dogs and I had gotten just a short distance up the drive, about even with Allie’s cabin, when suddenly her huge dogs rushed us. One is a rottweiler and the other is a rottweiler-lab mix. Allie had indicated that one of them wasn’t particularly friendly, so we hadn’t ever scheduled a doggie play date, but I certainly had no idea they were dangerous.

As the big dogs ran towards us, I instinctively picked up JoJo who had started squealing. Then I realized with astonished horror that one of Allie’s dogs was attacking Biska. I started screaming for help as the dog tore into Biska. Biska was leashed and could not run to safety. I tried to drop her leash but it was tangled in JoJo’s leash and increasingly tangled around my legs. I could not free her. I screamed and screamed and attempted to pull the dogs towards the neighbor’s back door, hoping the neighbor could help me. I also attempted to unleash Biska so she could run, but I couldn’t reach her, as she desperately strained at the end of her leash, trying to run away from the attacking dog. Biska was wisely making no attempt to fight back, and was trying to flee.

The leashes were wrapped around my legs, trapping us. I fell on the pavement of the neighbor’s back patio, wrenching my hip but somehow miraculously managing to hold onto JoJo. I was down on the pavement, with JoJo protected under me, my eyes now at dog level, with a close up view of the rottweiler mangling Biska. I have the most horrible visuals seared into my mind of that dog’s mouth sunk into Biska’s pelt, just pulling and pulling. It looked like the dog would tear Biska’s skin right off. I screamed and screamed.

Finally Allie came running out and grabbed her dog, but she did not have the strength to pull her dog away from Biska. Allie was screaming and pulling at her dog, JoJo was out of her mind, I was out of my mind, and Biska finally managed to slip her collar and run. Allie’s dog did not chase her, and Allie managed to get her under control. Then she asked me what I needed and I howled, “I need to find my dog!”

Some of you may know, over a decade ago, something similar happened to me in California – I was jogging with my two small poodles on leashes, and two off-leash pit bulls rushed us. They may even have been friendly dogs, but one of my poodles, Kira, who was only about JoJo’s age at the time, panicked and wiggled backwards out of her halter, and ran into a busy 4-lane street. I ran down the sidewalk screaming like a crazy lady as I helplessly watched my little dog disappear from sight as she dashed down the middle of the street, dodging the fast moving cars. About 4 awful hours later, John found her alive about two miles away, bedraggled and terrified. For the rest of her life she was so afraid of other dogs that we couldn’t even take her for walks.

Luckily Biska had run back down to the far side of our cabin, and was trying to get through the gate onto the deck. She was terrified and did not appear too badly injured. I could see what looked like rug burn marks on her skin, but wasn’t sure what all her fur might be hiding.

I asked Allie and her kids for the nearest vet. They didn’t think I needed to take Biska to the vet, offering antibiotic cream, but I didn’t listen to that for one moment. They gave me the name and location of the local veterinary hospital and I loaded both dogs into the van. As I was about to drive off, Allie came towards the car to say something – and my dogs went wild. They were clearly completely terrified of her. I wondered how mentally scarred they would end up from all this.

Later I remembered how only a few days prior I had loosened both dog’s collars. It seemed like they had both gained weight. JoJo is a food-loving chunk, still growing a bit, so hers needs regularly checked and loosened. For whatever reason I decided to loosened Biska’s collar a tad while I was at it. That minor momentary thing a few days before might have saved Biska’s life.

I drove to the vet and followed the instructions posted in the parking lot – calling to let them know I was here, instead of bringing the dogs in. They asked me the extent of her injuries, determined that she was not in imminent danger of dying, and gave me a 2:00 appointment (about 3 hours later). At that point, still on the phone with the receptionist, I burst into tears.

They told me to hold on, and managed to send a vet tech out about 5 minutes later. The vet tech reassured me that Biska was going to be ok. The woman in the car next to me gave me a hug. I cried in the parking lot. JoJo barked at everybody and everything. Biska just tucked her tail and wondered about this new strange and dangerous world.

We drove home, had lunch, called John, drove back again for our appointment. They shaved great patches of Biska’s fur so they could adequately see her injuries. The vet said she was “lucky” meaning she could easily have been much worse, and even so, had several puncture wounds and much bruising. The vet prescribed antibiotics, anti inflammatories, and pain meds.

That night, I started packing. It was Tuesday night. I figured I could get the van packed and loaded on Wednesday, and leave with the dogs on Thursday morning. John was still out of town, but he had his Jeep waiting at the airport, and was fully able to get his boat out of the water and towed home without me. But it’s an 8.5 hour drive to Boise, and Biska was in pain and I wasn’t sure if her injuries would become infected. JoJo was traumatized and barked and cried at every noise. I was daunted by the thought of doing the journey alone with the dogs.

John and I considered him driving me and the dogs home, and then him flying back out to Washington to collect his Jeep and boat. But that seemed like a big nuisance for him, and I don’t like to be a burden. In the end, I decided to wait the extra few of days for him to get here and get his boat out of the water, and then we’d caravan back to Boise together.

Meanwhile, a couple of days after the incident, Allie checked up on me. I told her my dogs and I were just cowering in the cabin traumatized. She and I ended up having a shouting match, part of which John heard over the phone and was appalled. But then later Allie and I were able to talk it out and fix our friendship, because actually we had been friends before this happened.

Then she surprised me by taking her dogs all the way off the property. Instead of just keeping them in their kennel, she took them to her boyfriend’s house in Gig Harbor and we haven’t seen those dogs since. I’m not sure how sustainable that is, because I thought she and her boyfriend had broken up earlier this summer, so he may now be her ex-boyfriend. But however that is working, the dogs haven’t been here.

My relationship with Allie has been confusing. Everyone, including the vet, have asked me if Allie paid the vet bill (no, she hasn’t). She didn’t offer, and we didn’t ask. The vet bill is nothing compared to my fear that my dogs will be permanently traumatized, like Kira was all those years ago.

After two days of the dogs and I laying low in the cabin, John got back to Vaughn. When the dogs and I ran out to the deck to greet him, I took one look at him and blurted, “You are sick!” He was so sick I could see it in his face from across the deck. Sure enough, even though he is a very determined, hard working and tenacious person, he spent the next couple of days sitting on the couch with a vacant look on his face.

I made a half-hearted attempt to keep the cabin aired out and to socially distance, but it’s pretty hopeless in a 500 sq. ft. cabin in cold wet weather. Particularly given my chemo-damaged immune system. I could guess we wouldn’t be going anywhere anytime soon. And sure enough, by the time John was feeling better and ready to think about packing, I was in bed with a fever.

Labor Day weekend came and went. For us the highlight (not) was when a presumably friendly, large, half-grown black lab puppy wandered over near our deck, and JoJo panicked. She doesn’t just bark, she squeals, screams and ky-yi’s like nothing I’ve ever heard. It sounds like she is being killed. JoJo refused to be comforted, even safe in John’s arms. The off-leash and wandering overgrown lab puppy just stood there, 20 feet away, watching in puzzlement. The family with the labs were weekenders, gone by the next day, but I’m still unhappy with the prevalence of off leash dogs in the area.

So here we are, 9 days later, and I’m still too sick to even go down to the local post office to pick up a package that’s been sitting down there, much less get myself and my dogs safely home. I have no idea what the package is or who it’s from. If any of you sent me a slightly late birthday present and I haven’t thanked you, it’s because it’s still down at the post office. Yeah, some of you know I had a milestone birthday recently.

My birthday was actually a good day. John planned a thoughtful Tacoma outing that we enjoyed. It turns out that Tacoma is a far nicer city than I ever imagined when I lived in Olympia 30 years ago. Tacoma has always been in Seattle’s shadow and has never had a good reputation, but we are becoming surprisingly fond of it.

Since then I’ve been mostly stuck in this tiny cabin for almost 2 weeks now (that’s including the rainy weather while John was in Tucson), with nothing except the amazing sunsets to take my mind away from here.

But there is one rainbow to this story. During a brief window of time, when John was still sick but not as sick, and I was clearly getting sick but not yet feverish and exhausted, we took JoJo to the dog park. Those can be dangerous, but this one has a section for little dogs only and we wanted to start the long road to socializing her as soon as possible, so she doesn’t end up permanently traumatized like Kira did.

When we got there we were relieved to see only one old man with one small dog. We were even more relieved once JoJo got in there and she wasn’t starkly terrified of the one little dog. Wary, but not terrified. Soon a cavapoo about JoJo’s size arrived. At first the cavapoo tried a friendly game of chase, but JoJo put her tail between her legs and bolted in fear. The cavapoo read the signs and stopped trying to play chase. Then JoJo was ok again – not playing with the dogs, but not terrified either. It’s a start.

Now we have to decide if we’re returning next year. We like it here and had put a deposit down for July and August next year. I was excited to have gotten July and August rather than August and September because the weather is likely to be better. And the 4th of July fireworks over the water should be excellent. And Allie and I had made plans to go to a festival together in July. It’s the Winthrop festival, that John and I tried and failed to attend on the way out this year. Next year Allie and I were going to drive out to Winthrop from here together, and she has already reserved the hotel. But John and I would only consider returning next year if Allie’s dogs continue to be away from the property.

Complicating things is our new house in Garden City (Boise area). That seems like the simple and obvious place to spend our summers. But it turns out John and I had a certain amount of miscommunication and misunderstanding about that house, and he is, in the end, not particularly happy that we bought it. I know some of the rest of you are also unclear why we bought it. But it seemed like a no-brainer to me. Tucson summers are not for the feint of heart. The simple sentence, “We have kids in Boise,” entirely and completely explains the purchase to anyone who lives in Tucson. Snowbirds (as we’re called) are sometimes gently mocked, but mostly envied.

I don’t want to spend summers in Tucson, but John emphatically doesn’t want to spend summers in Boise. Even though some of the most spectacular mountains in the entire country are in northern Idaho! And a river runs through Boise and Garden City, just a block from our townhouse!

And the people in the Boise area are the kindest I’ve ever encountered in this country. Genuinely kind and caring people, not just a sugar-coating act. I adore Garden City. John resents it. We haven’t worked that out yet. Meanwhile I want him to be able to have his boat on a mooring buoy – which admittedly, can’t happen out the front door of our Garden City townhome.

This particular mooring buoy is not the only one in the Puget Sound region, but finding a new rental that includes a dock or mooring buoy would be a daunting task. John and I have liked it here. And Allie and I were (still are?) friends and dancing buddies. We seem to have survived a dog attack and a shouting match. I don’t know if I have very many friends whose friendship would survive me shouting at them. Then again, I’ve never had any friend’s dogs attack mine.

Ok, that’s a lot of words; it’s probably time to stop writing and post this. This is what happens when I have too much coffee, sudafed and cough drops in my system. I still don’t have enough energy to get up off the couch, but my brain is zinging around.