Hello there.
I see you’re back with us now.
It seems one of my recent stories has a following.
I’ve written a couple of stories the last few days, and the one I thought that would have generated the most “likes” (because of the “hook” used, of Lailah dropping by, after stealing GMR’s car) only received a couple of “likes”. Whereas, the other story of my dinner with Rick and his friends received not only several “likes”, but also, a couple of comments too!
The lot of you are a finicky bunch, aren’t you??
Ok, because of all the clamoring, I’ve decided to try to now write part three of the Rick, Lois, Nancy story (that concluded Sunday afternoon), instead of waiting until Friday.
The one thing I was trying to allude to, in part two, (but, I don’t think I did an adequate job of), was that, both Lois, and Nancy, were these two highly extroverted, very entertaining, as well as quite interesting people. Truly, the most interesting people I’ve met in the last few years. They (mostly Nancy), broke out in song, both at our table at the restaurant, and also during intermission at the Guthrie. And, they both shared a lot of great stories that evening.
So, Sunday morning arrives – I’m in kind of a quandary. I was invited to spend the afternoon with GMR and little Lailah, perhaps to swim in GMR’s pool, as well as to spend the afternoon with Rick and his friends, at Nancy’s cabin ON Lake Minnetonka.
I think, most, if not all of you, are aware: I have a strong allegiance to both Lailah, and to my best friend Rick.
I chose to spend the day with Rick, since it was a B-day party for him, and I had just seen Lailah the day before. (I was told later on, She said “I love coming over to your house (to swim) Grandma but I wish Grandpa was here with us…”)
Yeah, I know.
Gut-wrenching.
Ok, back to Rick, Lois, and Nancy.
The party arrival time is 1pm. Due to various things, I didn’t plan adequately, and got there at 1:30.
I’ve never been to Nancy’s cabin before, so, I’m using GPS to find the place.
As I’m driving along this rural/lake road, the GPS indicates I’m pretty close. So I start looking for house numbers and with my eye sight, it’s really hard for me to see them. I see a mail box on the curb, for 1234, and I was looking for 1289. I’m going slow on this one lane rural road, and there they are:
TWO FIRE TRUCKS.
With several firefighters gathered around the street and driveway.
Again, I’m not familIar with which lot it is, or even what the house/cabin looks like, but, according to GPS, I’ve arrived.
I’m hoping that this isn’t Nancy’s place, so I slowly drive past, and pull into the next driveway, and as I’m pulling in, I see the house number of the mailbox, and it’s now 1303.
Yep, that house, with the fire trucks parked in front, was Nancy’s.
I really don’t know what to do, but I back out of the driveway, and head back, going very slowly, not wanting to get in the way of the fire fighters.
Now, this time, I see a couple of people not wearing fire fighting helmets, and ordinary clothes, like shorts, etc, and they are waving me into the driveway.
I’m kinda wary about do that, but the fire fighters are just standing around, and no one is shouting “what the heck are you doing?” at me.
So, I guess I’m ok, and that this is the place.
Turns out, as Rick and John were arriving, they saw a tree across the street from Nancy’s cabin, on fire. Seems as if a tree limb hit a power line. Either Rick, John, or Nancy got on the phone and had called the fire dept., who came by to douse the tree, and then had to wait for the utility company to send someone out to cut the tree away from the power line, just in case, a second fire started before the utility company guy arrived.
Well, that was the first excitement of the day.
Once I pulled into the drive, Lois, nice gal that she is, felt it necessary to direct me to my parking spot.
I almost ran her over.
Just kidding.
Got out of my car, and gave her a hug.
Nancy was on the porch, and welcomed the hug I gave her.
“Thanks for inviting me out to your place”, I said.
Everyone then explained about the fire fighters, etc.
I brought my stuff from the car, inside.
Boy, cabin is right.
The kitchen was perhaps, 7′ wide by 8′ long, and 4′ of the width, was sink/counters on one side, and the appliances on the other, leaving only a 3′ walk through, into the main room, which was a combined dining room / living room, about 8-10 feet across, and 15-18 feet long, leading out to the lake, and the deck, facing the lake.
There were two “bedrooms”, one which had a full size bed, and leaving only enough space to walk in the room, and the other room had some nice looking vintage antiques in it, but not even large enough for a twin bed.
Everyone was on the deck outside.
Hello!
Rick’s best friend Cheryl, was there, she and Nancy are cousins. I’ve met Cheryl, oh, about a dozen or more times, in the 25 years I’ve known Rick. Cheryl’s 95 yr old father “James”, was there. I had attended his wife’s (Cheryl’s mom’s) funeral a year ago. He is the nicest man. And, while he needs a walker, he is still sharp as can be.
There were two other women too. Ellen, and another whose name I’ve now forgotten.
A few minutes later, a man come into the backyard, Nancy goes to meet him.
It seems this is Mike. Mike is a handyman who has helped Nancy with some small projects around the cabin, and Nancy is kind enough to let him park his (broken down, really old) pontoon at her dock, during the summer.
He speaks to Nancy about the pontoon, and other stuff, and then walks down the stairs off the deck, toward the pontoon and dock.
Nancy explains that Mike’s here to take us out on the pontoon, and wants to know which of us are interested in a boat ride.
ME! ME! ME!
I said.
Turns out, Lois, Ellen, Mike and Brian are going out on the lake.
Rick seems to have an aversion to being on the water (“if God meant for us to be on the water, she would have given us the ability to float”, or some such profound nonsense). So, Rick, John, Cheryl, Cheryl’s dad, James, and Nancy are going to stay, and play cards, or something.
First thing, before we actually get on the pontoon, we learn from Mike, that there is something wrong with either the engine controls (near the steering wheel), or with the steering cables (under the boat).
Huh.
He tells us, “that’s ok, we’ll be ok”.
As with most boats in dock, the front of the pontoon is facing land, and the back of the boat is facing the lake.
Turns out, the engine controls only allow going forward.
Now, let me say this up front: Mike seems to be the nicest guy ever – he looks about ten years younger than me, but it turns out he’s about my age, if not a couple of years older. Again, nicest man, and seems to be a handyman. Recently early retired, but does handyman stuff to keep himself busy.
Well, Mike, apparently forgot the pontoon doesn’t go into reverse, and he puts the engine in gear (at idle speed), and rather than head out from the dock onto the lake, we edge closer to land, before he realizes he needs to shut off the engine or put it back into neutral. Once that’s done, we essentially push ourselves off and away the dock, so that we are then able to clear the dock, and spin ourselves around to face the lake.
Mike, it seems has had a variety of jobs and careers, highly successful ones at that. Early on, he was a salesman, and that was evident by the amount of talking he did.
He began by telling us his college life, and how he nearly blew himself up by lighting a propane heater, not realizing the propane had accumulated in the basement cellar he was in, and received burns over a good portion of his body.
He also told us about how he met his wife, and their honeymoon, where he took their rental car, and somehow accidentally drove it onto a beach in cape cod (at night time), getting stuck in the sand – the first night of their honeymoon. He asked his newly married wife, to get on the trunk of the car, to add weight to the rear axle (rear drive car, apparently), and while she is holding on for dear life, he gets the car out of the “sand trap”. She must have really loved him!
While telling us these hilarious stories, we’re out on the lake, going from one bay to another, without issue.
Eventually, we are in this narrow channel, with six foot high reeds on both sides. Mike decides that we really don’t want to be in this channel, but rather than go thru it, out to the open water, to turn around (in one big long half circle), he decides to try turning around in the channel, like doing a three point turn, if you were driving your car.
Problem is, Mike seems to have forgotten we don’t have a reverse gear on this engine.
We run into the six feet tall reeds (again at idle speed – no big deal).
(but, I got to say this, yes, he knew what he was doing, but there were two women on the boat, both of whom, were of an age where they weren’t used to all of this “adventure” with this non-reversing engine).
Mike gets the oar that happens to be sitting on the deck of the pontoon and pushes us off the six feet tall reeds, back into the channel, with us, now, going the way we had come in.
We’re back in the open water.
Mike is now sharing the time when he drove his four wheeler (ATV) onto the ice one winter, and apparently the ice was thin, and he went thru it.
He got himself out, and decided to call the sheriff’s dept., to let them know what had happened, and that he was safe, and that they didn’t have to send any divers out to retrieve any dead bodies.
Minutes later, several cop cars show up, lights and sirens, just to see the spectacle – and to write him a ticket.
No, I’m not making this up (not sure if Mike was or not).
We’re still on the water.
Going at a pretty nice clip, for a pontoon.
Lois has a baseball cap on, and the wind causes it to blow off her head.
Mike decides Brian needs to move to the front of the pontoon, past the safety railing, onto the three foot wide front area, to lean over to grab the hat, as Mike maneuvers us toward the hat.
Although there are enough life vests for each of us on the boat, none of us have them on.
I lean over, and fortunately was able to grab the hat without falling in, much to the relief of Lois, since it has a lot of sentimental value to her (it was her husband’s).
(Much to the relief of Brian, since he still doesn’t know how to swim.)
By this time, we’ve been on the water for a couple of hours and it’s time to head back.
We get back around 5pm, all of us starving, since we thought the ride was going to be a much shorter one.
Rick, Nancy, John, and Cheryl have been cooking on the grill, setting up the food, etc.
We eat the food everyone’s made, or brought, or burned on the grill, and had a great time talking with each other.
During the meal, I lean over to Nancy, who’s sitting beside me, and I ask her:
Nancy, what was your profession before you retired?
“Oh, well, I once was a Miss Minnesota, USA, I was such and such at a TV station in L.A., and same for here with WCCO TV, and then I eventually became a commercial spokesperson for certain products on TV.”
(forgive me, there are not Nancy’s exact words, and I might have added or missed some of what she told me, but this was the gist.)
Now, Rick had mentioned to me, probably the first time I met Nancy, who she was, but I really didn’t pay attention at that time. Also, in my defense, I was more of a KARE11 kind a guy, watching Paul Majors and Diana Pierce, rather than WCCO.
Ok, back to eating on the deck (and such a nice deck it was, overlooking the lake). Once everyone was done, and plates removed, Nancy brought out the birthday cake for Rick. We tried to light the candles, but the breeze wasn’t cooperating. We all sang “happy birthday” to Rick, and Nancy gave him a couple of bags full of individually wrapped presents – mostly specialty kitchen items, such as peppered jams, gourmet spices, etc.
He had a great time opening all of them.
Rick is originally from a small town in Tennessee, and has now lived here as long as I have, if not a couple of years more than me. Cheryl, and Nancy, are his closest friends, and has been his family now for at least twenty five years. I am so glad he has these wonderful, and very loving people in his life. You can tell they love him so very much.
So that was my Sunday…had a great time being with some new friends.
(If you’ve figured out who Nancy is, I’m requesting that you not reveal her last name in any comments, please. Thank you.)
