Ahhhh...... Retirement: Day #10 Yosemite after church, but first....

Thinking about machines

      I am often confounded by machines. There was a day that a lawn mower could drive me to tears. (Ask my family how many times I hit the corner of the house on Route 244 and the day the lawn mower ran away, heading towards the pool!)
     More recently, I queried Tom about how batteries work. (I did not pay attention in science much. Even then I didn't care to understand how things worked beyond a mild curiosity, but certainly I wanted them TO WORK and have someone else fix them when necessary.) Ions in, ions out. Waves through the air. Multiple chargers hanging from the dashboard keeping two start phones and the Garman juiced up.
     When I moved to Auburn for my last year in CNY I was back to the mercies of a communal laundry room and the requirement of quarters. So at age 57ish I was always gathering quarters again to do my laundry and go up and down the three flights of stairs to my apartment.
     Tom's apartment facility has a communal laundry room. No quarters needed here. Instead a credit card is used to put money on a laundry card. Good idea! Tom and I went together to get the wash started and I was given the lesson on how to use the card, select the preferred water temperature (or dryer heat for phase two), and watch the balance go down $1.25 when START is pushed.
     Feeling confident, I volunteered to move the clothes from the washer to the dryer myself. Tom was tasked to go get them once they were done drying. He came back empty handed. "Mom, the clothes are still wet. You paid for and ran two empty driers on the top for an hour. You put our clothes in the bottom." (Notice in the photo above the top dryers don't have any card readers. They are right and left sides of the bottom dryer, albeit marked upper and lower. I did not see the instructions.) Tom continues, "We will need to put more money on the laundry card to dry the clothes." Confounded machines. :-(
Note: I did not cry, only shrugged and said, "Oh, well. I will get it right next time." Now that is maturity!

Tom's Pastor Debra, greeting parishioners after services at the First United Methodist Church of Modesto. Tom sings in the choir, plays in the bell choir, leads youth and sits on the church leadership counsel. He is loved there and has MANY west coast mothers!

Tom's friend, Matt, played the special music.

At 1 p.m. PDT we headed back into the Sierra Nevada Mountains en route to Yosemite National Park, just a couple of hours from Modesto. These foothills are carpeted with lush grasses and grains.

Evidence of forest fires along the way


When I said it was just two hours from Modesto to the national park, I should have clarified that was to the entrance gate. It is another 23 miles to the more famous points of interest. There are many photos ops along the way. Amazing tunnels as well.	(I made Tom promise not to tell anyone that I was wearing the top to my new two piece bathing suit. He is better at keeping secrets that I am! I like it. I wore it!)