RV Trip - Stop 4 - Trafford and Pirate Ballgame

Jim lived in Trafford, PA his first 18 years of life and then went to college for 3 1/2 years and the Navy for 3 years. After the Navy there was only one year he lived in Trafford. When we went back for the Peduzzi's birthdays (next post) we drove around every street in town to see the changes that have been made. There are many improvements and there is still much of the "old town" remaining.

Here is the senior high rise that now rests between Brinton and Cavitt Avenues. McBride's Market used to be on this site on Cavitt and Matesick's Store was on Brinton. I am sure if Jim had looked at the list of residents in the high rise he would have seen that some his classmates now live there!

The old borough building is in process of being removed. Even the steps that ran up the hill that were adjacent to it have been closed for years. The new borough building and Fire department is a showcase building visible as you enter Trafford coming across the bridge.

  You are also greeted by a large mural painted on the rear walls of buildings on Cavitt Avenue.

The real showcase improvement is the war memorial park on Edgewood at 5th, overlooking Trafford.  It has 5 monuments for the wars since WW1 up to and including the current War on Terror. Memorial benches are also in the park.

So there a lot of improvements to Trafford and the entire town should be thankful they have a great Mayor in Rey Peduzzi. 

We also found improvements in the Pirate PNC Stadium. The last Pirate home game Jim saw was in Forbes Field and PNC Stadium is a wonderful stadium.

One on our "must" stops in the Trafford area is Delallo's Italian Store on Rt 30 in Jeanette. If you can't find the Italian food you want in this store, it is not made!! Just look at the olive display!!

 

Naturally when we left Trafford we had a good supply of my favorites, Sandwich size pepperoni, Hot sausage and other goodies.



RV Trip - Stop 5 - Peduzzi twins birthday party.

The original reason for us to make a trip north was the 80th birthday of the Rey and Ron Peduzzi. Jim has know the Twins for 75 years as they were neighbors. At Rey's 75th birthday party, Jim told Rey that if he was not planning an 80th birthday party, that we would come to visit and have one for him.
Well, the families decided to have a party for both of them. Rey is the Mayor of Trafford and they were able to arrange the use of the Manchester Room in the new Borough Building.

This is Ron, Bob Mikan, and Rey. If you look closely, you can see the 3 of them in the picture behind them. That picture was taken when they played football together for Trafford High School. 
Naturally at a birthday party there has to be a "roast" and this was no exception.

Here they are being roasted by a college football friend. Since Rey lives in Trafford and has a lot of his family nearby they had a good crowd for the family picture, shown below.

And here is Ron's family picture.

There was the cake and candles that got blown out and this little girl got her share of the cake.

Again, a very happy birthday to Ron and Rey and many more.

RV Trip - Stop 6 - Charleston Visit

Our last stop on this trip was in Charleston, SC to visit with our daughter Joy and family. Naturally we got out to dinner together and here they are.

Of course one of our major reasons to visit them was to spend time with our grandson Kismet. He loves swimming and we went to the water park in the county park 2 days in a row. This was in the park where we stayed in the motor home.

That was a lot of fun but then we went to Folly Beach on James Island. A very nice beach but the day we were there the wind was strong and that caused the surf to be equally strong. Waves were 3 to 6 feet and the current close to shore was at least 5 knots at an angle to the beach. Jim even got knocked down once in knee deep water!

As you can see, Kismet had a ball in the surf but it was too strong for Jim to join  in.


On our last evening we had some time that allowed us to relax and go to dinner ourselves. We found a great place to have a drink and a light dinner, The Charleston Crab House.

Carol got an appetizer of Calamari which was as good as any we have ever had. Jim got a bowl of She Crab Soup. If you have never had She Crab Soup, it is made with crab meat of course and they add crab roe (eggs) for additional flavor. A delightful dish that you should not miss if you see it on a menu.
The next morning we departed and headed home, driving about 10 1/2 hours to make it in one day. Overall for the 24 days we were gone, we put 3,429 miles on the motor home. A tiring but enjoyable time.

OMG - Jim turns 78

Well, Jim had a birthday recently and turned a ripe old 78. He may be old in body but the mind is still young. The body is not doing too badly because last week he was SCUBA diving in the Keys for lobster. He did catch 2 but one was a female with eggs and had to be left on the bottom. Carol and I  had the one for dinner when we got back and based on the total cost of our 3 night trip and the weight of the one tail, it cost about $2,000.00 per pound!!! Not economical but a lot of fun.

Carol and Jim had planned to go to the American Legion with Gus and Marilyn for Jim's birthday but when we got there Carol had arranged for many others help to celebrate his birthday. In total there were 7 couples plus the rest of the Legion membership who were also there for dinner and dancing as we were.

There were even balloons at the two tables we had for our group. That is the streamer holding the balloon in this picture.

 The reason we had planned to go to the legion was because pour favorite entertainer and dance music provider was planning there. We follow him around to the various places he plays.

Yeah, we have become senior citizen groupies.

Marilyn, our "cake maker extraordinaire" made a cake decorated with a bikini "babe". I don't know who she used a model but we all started calling it "the boob" cake.

Naturally you can guess which part I got served!

So another year has been chalked up and we are looking forward to the next one.

 

 

PASSOVER SEDER

This is the week before Easter and Passover and we were invited to attend a Passover Seder at the home of George and Helene Fuchs, friends of ours.
The Seder is a ritual feast that marks the beginning of the Jewish holiday of Passover. It involves retelling of the story of liberation of the Israelites from slavery in ancient Egypt. The story is in the Book of Exodus and is based on the Biblical verse commanding Jews to retell the story.
Seder customs include drinking 4 cups of wine, eating matza, partaking of symbolic foods placed on the Passover Seder Plate and reclining in celebration.The Seder is performed in much the same way by Jews all oveer the world.
This was the first Seder Carol and I ever participated in and we found it to be very informative and a pleasant experience. We were joined by our friends Gus and Marilyn Lopes and Phyllis Lustgarden plus some friends of George and Helene.

Here is Marilyn Lopes, Carol and Phyllis Lustgarden at the table. The sheets on the table contan the ritual and story which was read in part by each of us in attendance.



Here is Phyliss, Helene and George and you can see the Passover Seder Plate  in the right center with foods on it.

The after dinner storytelling by Helene was really the highlight of the evening as she was able to keep us in stitches most of the evening.

 

 

 

ANOTHER CRUISE !!!

Yes, we just got back from another cruise!!  This was a 5 night cruise out of Tampa FL to Cozumel and Key West. We went with our friends and neighbors Gus and Marilyn Lopes. We were on a cruise with them this past December and had so much fun we decided to do it again!!
Of course you may think I had more fun than the others after I met this beauty in Cozumel. I think her name was Senorita Frog!

But Carol had a great deal of fun also. One evening they served Caribbean Lobster tail for dinner along with shrimp. All of us enjoyed the lobster so much we all got a second serving of the lobster tail. As you can see Carol really enjoyed her first serving.

In Key West, I met a group of young ladies dancing around and having some fun. But Carol would not let me join them!! At least she joined them but would not agree to wear the same outfits they had on (or off!!). She did let me take her picture with her dancing friends.

We had so much fun on the 5 nights of this cruise, drinking champagne, dancing and eating fine meals that I don't think we could have lasted any longer!! We now get to spend about a month at home before we go on our next adventure which is the reunion of the Hazelwood crew. Jim Served on the Hazelwood, a destroyer and they have a reunion every 2 years. This year it will be in the Newport RI area where Jim served his tour of duty.

NORFOLK VA TOUR

Last week Carol and I went to Norfolk, VA to attend a familiarization tour in anticipation of the possibility of having a Hazelwood reunion there. Jim served on the Hazelwood during his 3 years of active service.There were about 50 others attending the tour also. The purpose was to show all of us the sights and tour possibilities in the area.
We arrived on Tuesday afternoon and got right into the events with a reception and dinner at one of the hotels. On Wednesday and Thursday we started at 9 AM and did not end until about 8 PM. Each day we had breakfast, lunch and dinner at a different hotel. Between meals and hotel tours we visited the sightseeing spots around the city.

Here is Carol getting ready to have dinner at our first evening dinner. you can tell by the setting of the table it was a very fine event.

Some of the tour sites we visited included the General MacArthur memorial, the battleship Wisconsin (BB64) and a harbor tour of the Naval Base. Jim served his first midshipman cruise on the Wisconsin in 1954 and this is the second time he has been back on board.

 

 

This one of 5 super carriers that were in port in Norfolk that we saw while on the harbor tour. Sort of reminds me of battleship row at Pearl Harbor and makes me hope that no one hijacks several airlines and tries to hit them .... like Pearl Harbor.
In the 3 days, we visited 8 hotels and 8 tourist sites. We certainly had full days and got to see a lot of Norfolk. When we finished at Norfolk, we made the short drive to Virginia Beach to look at and stay at one hotel that was not included  in the Norfolk tour. We then started our 2 day drive home on Saturday morning and arrived home tired on Sunday.