Old Friends

"Make new friends but keep the old, one is silver and the other gold."

These words from what was for me an old Brownie Scout round ( I am almost certain I have referred to it before in this blog) always come to mind when something special like contact with a special friend happens. This week the refrain has been going through my head almost constantly. First we receive the annual Valentine from our friends Terry and Ray. These valentines are among the most eagerly awaited greetings we receive during the year. This year was no exception. The special cards, always crafted by Terry, are beautiful but I like receiving the news of the family . Yes, I am one who enjoys most of the holiday letters because it is the one time during the year that our circle catches up with each other.

Just a couple of days later we received a "Winter Greetings" letter from old friends Ed and Sharon. The day before my old friend Shelia (that's the correct spelling) called and said she would be driving up our way on Wednesday and wondered if she could see us. She arrived Wednesday afternoon shortly after her arrival I got a phone call from my dear friend Robin. She called to let us know her third grandchild, a girl, was born early in the day. How wonderful is that?

Shelia stayed until this morning. She and her husband Ron are dear college friends from Idaho State. She is a sorority sister. They have lived in North Carolina a long while now and they always seemed so far away. Now we are under a day's drive from each other. Shelia and I headed out yesterday morning for a look/see of the area. But first I needed to make a stop at a wonderful soup kitchen. I will write about this another time. Then we drove through the town of Rehoboth Beach for her to get a flavor of our most famous beach town, then on down the coast to Assateague Island. Yes, I had to go there again. That was OK because Shelia loves the beach and she loves horses. It was so peaceful down there yesterday. Most of the ponies were on a point inaccessible by car and quite possibly by foot. We did see a few ponies and managed to get some great close up pictures of two who were quietly munching away in separate access points.

I think I will keep my "golden friends."

Yaaay! My Camera is Back

The camera just got back after sending it to the factory for repairs. It is much better now. There will be no more of my special care for it. The only problem with it now is that there is still a small line that I apparently put on it. I will deal with like that for a while and then decide what to do. All of the other goobers are gone.

We went to Fowler Beach and I took some pictures. This is the beach that had so much damage with the late Nor'easter last year. The big problem then was that salt water had breached into the freshwater ponds and caused some pretty yucky looking areas. That is starting to recover and look more normal. However, there were hardly any birds there this trip. It has been very cold for here and they probably found a warmer spot.

It is always a point of fantasy when we are here that I look at this. I am not sure what it was put here for but it could be a lookout for birders as they peruse the ponds and marshes, it could be a spot to see the ocean without crossing the dunes, or it just be that it is just there. I must make a note of checking it out further.

There were only a few ducks in the ponds on this trip but in the adjacent fields there were hundreds of Snow Geese. I have been thinking that there are not as many as last year and then I come across field after field of these. They are beautiful but they also are creating some serious problems simply because of their large numbers.

Firsts

Since starting this blog I have covered a lot of firsts but mostly they have been "firsts of without" like first time without someone or something. Now I can periodically blog about "firsts with." For you see, almost every day of this year will be a first with our grandson Jacob Elijah. He has now had his first Christmas, first January 1, first Ground Hog Day and as he Dad proudly told him (just 5 weeks old then) "Jake this is your first inauguration." Yesterday, Bill and I went to get him our first Valentine's Day gift for him. I think I will like these firsts.

Buggered Up the Camera

There have been few posts since I did some bad deeds to my camera. Actually, I have been trying to get rid of a spot and in my frustrations I managed to make it much worse. Here I have been thinking I was doing the right thing by very carefully using optical paper to clean the lenses and the mirrors. The spot did not go away. It became two. Then one black blotch. Then one black blotch and a spot. And, finally, a black blotch, a spot and a wavy line. Alas, the camera is back at the fix-it department of Nikon. I hope it doesn't deplete my budget. I miss my camera but will go back to the old one until the other is returned home.