For All the Women in Banking!

I worked in the banking industry for 16 years! For any woman who has ever worked in banking, this one is for you...

Last night as I lay sleeping
I died or so it seemed,
Then I went to heaven
But only in my dream...

Up there St Peter met me
Standing at the pearly gates,
He said 'I must check your record
Please stand here and wait.

He turned and said 'Your record
Is covered with terrible flaws,
On earth I see you rallied
For every losing cause.'

I see that you drank alcohol,
And smoked and partied too,
Fact is, you've done everything
A good person should never do.

We can't have people like you up here
Your life was full of sin,
then he paused as he read the last of my record,
Took my hand and said 'Come on in.'

He led me up to the big boss and said
'Take her in and treat her well.
She used to work in banking
So she's done her time in hell.'

I did not write this, but it sure did make me laugh. Thank you to my friend for sharing this with me!

Still Here!

I have to admit that I have not been too concerned about not posting in my blog for a while, because no one reads my boring blog anyway. For the two of you that do read my blog, I am still here just been really busy. I am playing "catch up" this week. I have a few posts that I want to do and will be doing this week.

Stay tuned!

Vacation - Day 5

I did not think that anything could top the week of sights and experiences that we had, but B had a huge surprise in store for us. The last day we made a slight detour as we were heading for home. We stopped at a place called Wilderness Safari. It was exactly as the name describes, a safari!! Unfortunately, our dog was not allowed in with us, but they provide kennels for pets. The safari was incredible!! You drove through it and went from place to place looking at every kind of animal imaginable. I had to download pictures as we travelled through the safari because there were so many amazing animals there and we just had to get a picture of them. Take a look!

Here are hippos

Baby Yak

Camels

Cheetah

Monkeys

Bull Elk

(Not for hunting, sorry)

There were many, many other animals too, tigers, lions, and bears (oh my!). :) The brown bears were closed the day that we were there, meaning you could not drive through their enclosure, because the buffalo were right next to them and were having their babies! As you can probably imagine, the bears were pretty excited because of the smell of blood in the air. After we passed the brown bears, we saw a newborn baby buffalo. It had just been born, only minutes old. The baby was so cute, still wobbly! (not to gross you out, but the afterbirth was still coming out of mommy!)

I would definitely go back to the safari! The only animal that we did not see was the rhino. Most of the animals were free roaming. Only the lions, bears, tigers were in enclosures; all of the other animals were free roaming. It was so cool!!! I wish you all could have been there!!

Unfortunately, this was the end of our vacation. I truly did not want it to end. B and I loved the coast!!! We both said that we would love to live on the coast. (Cele, I truly envy you!) You live in a beautiful part of Oregon!!!! I wish I lived there too!

Vacation - Day 4

After the Tillamook Cheese Factory, we did not stop until we got to Astoria, where we spent the night. By this time, our daughter pointed out that we had driven the whole coast of Oregon. We stayed right on the might Columbia River. It was fun to watch the big barges and other boats going down the last bit of the river to the ocean.

(this was the view from our room!)

Hey, wait a second, isn't that Washington over there?! If it looks chilly, well you would be correct. That night we ate at a wonderful restaurant and had seafood of course!! I had crab cakes. They were wonderful. They melted, literally, in your mouth. YUMMY!!! We found this really cool house called Flavel House, which I think is now a museum. We did not go through it or look into whether or not it was a museum, but I did take a picture of it. Compared to most of the other houses that we had seen, this house was huge! The house was so big that I could not even get it all in the frame! (Isn't it gorgeous?)

The next day was a little rainy. Go figure, we are in Oregon, what else did you expect!! We headed off to Portland and then down to Salem. Before getting to Salem, we detoured, just slightly to Silverton. Silverton is the home of the beautiful, Cooley's Gardens. Of course, I missed the darn irises blooming, but I did get their catalog!!!! (hmmm, how much money did B say that I could spend on irises??) I haven't forgotten that I still have my irises at by bro's house, but I have to add to them if I can. (there are too many new ones!!) I just can't resist. After stopping at Cooley's to get the catalog, we went to Silver Falls. Silver Falls is a state park which has many waterfalls in it. Most are just a short walk/hike off the road. Here are a few awesome pics from Silver Falls!

(North Falls)

(South Falls)

There was a trail all the way down to the base of South Falls, but we did not venture down there. We did not get to see all of the waterfalls. After spending a few minutes at South Falls, we headed into Salem (just a short drive actually) where we spent the night. We actually got to the hotel early enough that we were able to play in the pool. Barry stayed in the room (too tired), but the kids and I played for a while in the pool. It was pretty fun. Yes, I got into a suit. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the suit that I bought was a little bit too big (always a good thing!). That night we had dinner at a fabulous restaurant called Alessandro's Ristorante & Galleria. The diners are surrounded by some fabulous pieces of art! Can you think of a better way to spend your evening?? (Super food, and beautiful art!) I HIGHLY recommend it! The food was delicious!!

The only depressing part of this day was knowing that our vacation was soon to come to an end!

To Be Continued...

Vacation - Day 3

Day 3 was a blast!! After breakfast, we went to the Oregon Coast Aquarium in Newport. The kids absolutely loved it!! I highly recommend it if you are ever on the coast! We made sure that we saw everything and took a lot of pictures! Here are some of the best...

The kids in the crab tank!

Here is one of their

starfish up close!

They had a tank

which allowed the

kids to touch many

of the animals!

Ok, this picture is not the best, but...I thought it was pretty cool. If you can't tell, it is a picture of jellyfish. (Anyone see Spongebob???) They were in a tank with a blue background. The lighting in the room that they were in was quite dark, so I am glad that it even kind of turned out.


The next picture is a picture of a sea lion that would go from window to window and rub up against it. It was the sweetest thing to watch.

At the aquarium, the coolest thing was a tube that you could walk through. It was amazing !! Ever seen the bottom of a sting ray???

Much to my daughters delight, they had sharks too! Of course, we made her wait until the very last thing that we looked at!!! (he, he, he) Aren't we evil!!

After the aquarium, it was off to Asortia. Along the way, we stopped at the Tillamook Cheese Factory. It was pretty neat to see the factory and try some cheese. I recommend it!! It is a great educational stop for the kids, and best of all...it was FREE!!

Good times, for sure!! We tried fresh curds, yep curds!! They were not too bad, actually. Tillamook had a black pepper cheese. It was really good! I could picture that cheese on a burger. As Rachael Ray would say, YUMMO!

Day 3 was a lot of driving, but it was fun!

To be continued...