A little insanity before we leave for Turks and Caicos.

Ray and I were totally packed when we left the desert. I had everything I needed. But.........NOT everything I wanted. So Ray and I spent the day shopping, our favorite thing to do. First stop was Michael's where I bought an embroidery hoop to create a diffuser for macro shots. Next unplanned stop was Adventure 16. This is the sporting good store that was a 2 minute drive from where we lived in Tarzana. Kevin, a manager 11 years ago helped me spend my money and get my backpack weight down 5 pounds for my first "real" backpack trip - the John Muir Trail in 2001. A-16 was a great store back then. Not now.

After spending 10 minutes in A-16 while buying some luggage locks we drove to REI in Northridge. Ahhhhhh. A good shopping fix. I bought two pairs of synthetic pants (good for travel - quick drying after a wash!), a new backpacking cookbook (I don't have this one), a little compass and spot light to hook onto my new larger fanny pack.

In the parking lot, on our way to the car, Ray spotted a Penguin Yogurt place. He not only spotted it but he made me aware of it. Now it's nearing lunch time. So I say, "Let's have a yogurt, skip lunch (cause yogurt is less calories than lunch) and later have an early dinner at California Chicken Cafe (our favorite especially when staying at the Courtyard Marriott like we are)." Ray says, "Ok." Three minutes into eating our yogurts outside in the sun at a little table, Ray and I discussed the yogurt. Almost at the same time we said, "This isn't doing it for me. I'm not liking this yogurt and look, the consistency isn't even right." He said, "I'm not going to eat it." I panicked and said," Let's eat half." Ray said, "That's old thinking....that's Fred and Jim in Chapter 3!" I knew at this point Ray was done eating the yogurt. I started taking big spoonfuls of the carobs and French Vanilla yogurt, just in case we weren't going to eat again before the early dinner. Then we both threw the remaining 2/3rds of our yogurts in the trash. You have to understand. Ray and I have a long standing understanding that we aren't going to eat yogurt. So, today there wasn't a cloud on the horizen......

Off to Costco to buy me a cheapo "pretty" watch that I could also swim in - my favorite the Swiss Army Watch.
Heading back up to Ventura Blvd. I almost convinced myself I'd not bought the right watch and I still needed to go look for another.

Ray had his mind set on getting a book, he ended up with two books from Borders. While Ray was in Borders I sat in the car and changed out everything in my small fanny pack to the new larger REI fanny pack, of course attaching the new compass and light-thingy to my new fanny pack set up (that can hold EVERYTHING I'll need at Club Med.

I'd had my toes and nails done at home before we drove into LA but I didn't like the color I'd picked. I wanted red on my toes and a french manicure on my hands. We were right around the corner from my old haunt Rose's Nails when I asked Ray if he minded if I went in for manicure and pedicure? He didn't mind because he had it in his mind he needed a new watch. He'd forgotten to change out the Rolex watch and didn't want to wear it in the sea. So Ray dropped me off and went down the street to the watch place he likes.

I have my nails done, Ray has his new watch. Now I want to go to where he bought his watch and see if they have a different, you know, better watch than the one I bought at Costco. The man in the watch shop assured me my watch would be ok to a depth of 100 feet of water. Good. Now I'm satisfied, but could he please take out a few links in the new watch as it hund too loose.

We were exhausted from our day and now needed to get dinner out of the way so we could go back to our hotel. Yummy dinner at California Chicken Cafe. Dodi called while we were eating. We will be on our vacation when she is having the memorial for Mark. Too bad.

I spared details on all the times I asked Ray to stop the car so I could photograph Complementary Color, my new photo assignment. Tonight I was very disappointed in my shots. Boy is it hard to get the lighting right, find orange and blue, yellow and purple and red and green good shots.

Ray and I are about to go to bed. It's 8:15pm. Our alarm is set for 2:30am. Our flight at LAX is 6am.

Here is the Club Med we'll be at for the next week.

If it's possible I'll upload some photos while we are away.

Gottago!