North Carolina is beautiful!
We have spent the past 5 days visiting with my middle sister, Linda and her husband, Ron Johnston, in North Carolina. The nature in the state is beautiful and full of variety. They have a great condominium home with a forested back yard overlooked by a deck. The local birds which frequent the feeder are a wonderful blend of colorful species: goldfinch, cardinal, eastern blue bird, nuthatch, red-bellied woodpecker, Carolina wren, Carolina chickadee, for example. It has been great fun to whistle or make mouth sounds trying to imitate the various bird calls.

We have been treated royally. Our connecting flight coming into Raleigh-Durham was canceled, so we just rebooked into Richmond, VA, spent the night and met Ron & Linda on their way to visit with their son, Ron Jr. in Ashland. We got to spend some good time there.

We have played golf on their country club course, which makes you feel really spoiled. The amenities are tremendous and the course is kept immaculate. The greens putt fast and make for good scoring opportunities. Linda & I have a championship match play on Wednesday. I won on Sunday afternoon (when she gave me 1 stroke per hole) and she won yesterday (2 and 1).

We have enjoyed meeting their grandkids, who have taught us how to play Wii on the game console. Wanda & I now have our Mii's and have enjoyed both golf and bowling. It is weird how the scores match how we play in real life with Wanda beating most of the time in bowling. It is moderate exercise which makes it ideal for nursing homes or assisted living environments.

We have taught them 10-point pitch and played some bridge last night. All in all the days have been great fun. I wish we had done all this earlier rather than waiting for a tragedy to occur to bring us closer. I couldn't be more spoiled by my family!