I have scheduled in lots of fun things to do this week since MM and Blue departed.  I do miss them, but have mostly been too busy to pine.  I tried out a new class at The Courthouse and lived to tell about it.  I met with Connie at the library to work on our book. And this afternoon I met a dear friend Jim Sellers at the Ike Box in down town Salem for coffee and non-stop conversation.   I am amazed that I had never been to this charming spot before and plan to be a regular customer.  Jim said he thinks it used to be a funeral parlor.

I thank him for introducing me to it and for bringing and lending me this beautiful book of the art at  Crystal Bridges Museum of American art, (which he discovered while on a road trip to visit presidential libraries) in Bentonville, Arkansas.  I did not know about this place either and am definitely going to recommend a visit there to all my Oklahoma relatives.

I first met Jim when we were volunteers for an ESL program in my neighborhood.  Always on the go, Jim is next off for a hike in Big Bend in February and will be driving from El Paso to Van Horn and then south.  After the hike, he’ll be heading back to the beautiful Guadalupe Mountains and on to Carlsbad Caverns.  I had to tell him about the Marfa Lights, the Chinati Art Collection, and my favorite Wild-West-Texas movies, No Country For Old Men and The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada.  Lots of blood and violence of which I admit, I am not a fan.  Lots of Tommy Lee Jones of which, I admit, I am a fan.