I have a friend who has a lot going on in her family all the time and it's hard for her to get away to come for a cup of tea and a good visit. She finally got up here today, this was probably our only visit of the summer. So we did it all.

When she drove up, we were loading stuff out of the garage into the truck to take it over to the storage cabins. She admired how organized our garage is compared to hers.

Then, I took her inside and gave her a canned margarita on ice, one of those Budweiser Lime-a-Ritas, on ice. She told me about her mother's funeral and settling her estate. Then, I dumped the rest of her drink in a beer cup and we set out to go help Mr. TBend unload the storage stuff, but here he came, all done.

So we all went out and stood on the bridge looking for fish for quite awhile. There was a lovely brown trout in the middle of the current that kept surfacing to catch flies and another lurking around next to the end of the bridge. Diane always loves watching the fish.

Next was a visit to the picnic table over where the fishermen park, and we sat on the bench that was damaged in the flood, but is now repaired.

It looked like rain, so we went over to the Brown Palace to take in the laundry and she helped me put sheets on the beds and fold the towels.

All this time: talk, talk, talk. She told me what her bi-polar granddaughter's latest shenanigans. Diane raised her as a daughter because the girl's mother just handed her over and disappeared for 20 years.

Then, back in the house, and I gave her a piece of sour cream cherry pie and a hot dog and a cup of tea. After some conversation about what her adult children are up to, we went outside to the back patio to sit on the nice furniture to talk some more.

Pretty soon, we had to get up and check out the giant mushroom on the edge of the yard and the vegetable garden.

That was a whole summer's worth of the things Diane likes to do when she comes here accomplished in 90 minutes. If you want the same sort of tour, just show up any time.