My Texas In-Laws’ visit has come to a close. They left this morning about 8:00. My niece’s boyfriend had never left Texas before going with her family to Branson, MO this time last year. When they invited him to come to Florida to stay with my wife and me, he jumped at the opportunity.

They arrived Sunday and stayed all week. We fed the family at Lambert’s Restaurant Foley, AL where they throw the rolls across the room to the diners. Brandon, the boyfriend, couldn’t believe that they did stuff like that. Then we took them on a ferry ride to Dolphin Island just south of Mobile, AL. Brandon couldn’t hardly contain himself.

On the way back, my Brother-In-Law and the youngsters stopped at the U.S.S. Alabama while my wife, Mother-In-Law, and I came on home and had a good visit.

Here I need to point out that none of this has anything to do with beekeeping. BUT —- a little background to my frame of mind. Since Nov., I have had 2 eye cataract surgeries, a knee surgery, went to the Emergency Room with suspected heart attack, and I have been on weight restriction (5# lifting max and staying off my knee with only PT movements) until just 2 weeks ago. I was so far behind on my bee work and home work that I had to choose to work on the home front getting ready for my Texas relatives’ visit. All the time I was entertaining, I was thinking of what I needed to do when I got back in gear. I found out that while I was convalescing, I was getting weaker and weaker and when I did start to work this afternoon (I went to our Beekeepers Association meeting from 10 until noon), I found out that I gave out rather quickly. I have to get into working the bees and equipment gradually.

Anyway, I was supposed to go canoeing at Adventures Unlimited with the family, leaving my wife and her mother to run around on their own. I found out that the young lady I had promised to take canoeing for her graduation present, had to work. So I spent the day on the computer with my son to get this site set up.

Needless to say, there were trips to the zoo, Florida’s Gulfarium, Beaches, and swimming every evening in our pool in the back yard. All in all, we had fun this week and they were already discussing their trip next year. Maybe at that time I will have gotten my boxes cleaned and ready to go to the bee yards. With Brandon as a willing helper, I can get my bees into cleaned and painted boxes, and give him a chance to get his feet wet enough to start a hive or two of his own.

I have bored you long enough with trivia, now my next post will be about bee stuff. Come back and visit again.