Hamster Dancin' Around the World

I've moved to a spa town, where I can do that even better.


(Okay, I live here, but nevertheless ...)

lol Ms. Dag has Penny as of this morning.

I'll post some pics of her in a bit once I get them resized to something that won't distort everyone's screens while viewing.

Hurrah! Spontaneous combustion has been averted! (This time, anyway...)

Glad that Penny survived Abby.

Looking forward to pics!

Look who's here! Me, Penny!. Fishin put on dark shades and drove behind the town, under a bridge. There was a crazy lady on a bicycle. I was a little scared, but it was just Dasha. Apparently that's how she travels everywhere, as I was soon to find out.



She took a picture of me and fishin. I also showed her my new pry bar that fishin gave me as a reward for helping him around with construction. Then, no later than fishin disappeared, we were on a bike bath. We stopped at the Spy Pond. Dasha told me: "You can ride, Penny, if you'd like". I drove around the lake a little but then I gave the bike back to her. I said: "I cannot ride, silly, I don't know where we're going." That, and the bicycle was also a little big for me...

This is us, sitting by the pond:


I was a little scared of the picture on Dasha's t-shirt, but she told me it's art. And some art can be scary and that's OK. Then I wasn't scared anymore.

I was real good on the bike though. I think I'll get one for myself one day, when I settle down perhaps. We rode through Arlington and pedaled on the bikepath. It was beautiful, sunny, warm, and the trees have started changing colors already! Dasha kept being distracted by something. She would slow down and stare at the ground.
"What are you looking for?" I asked.
"Oh, just mushrooms. There should be plenty of them this time of the year."
"I think it's too dry for them, we'll hunting go after it rains a lot" I told her.
"You speak wisely, Penny, plus, I should really get back to work. What do you prefer - that we turn around now and work on a newsletter, or to go see Lexington green, where the big battle was in 1776?"
"Well, I know you have to work, but since we're already here, we might as well ride out to Lexington, I think."
"Good call, Penny. Let's dive into Arlington Meadows for a sec and see if there are no mushrooms there..."
"OK, if we must..." I said, expecting that it will be a bit boring to go look for mushrooms.
But it wasn't. Instead, we did find a beautiful meadow and a swamp with a boardwalk across it.

Yay! Hi, Penny!

I love the self-portrait in the first pic. :-) (Under fishin's arm.)

Sozlet happened by when I was reading and said "hey it's Penny!" and came running over. She enjoyed the narrative a lot -- many chuckles, especially at bike-riding and scary art.

This is gonna be good, I can tell! (Well, it already is!)

(Sozlet's reading over my shoulder and told me that she uses parentheses a lot in her journal. I started to write that, then decided not to, then she said "yeah, tell them!") (She's definitely enjoying this whole Penny adventure business. :-))

Great pics!

and in fishin's sunglasses!

~~~

Elizabeth in my office comments that Penny looks really clean for a grrrl who's been working construction.

It is sooo good to see Penny again!

...Of course we didn't find mushrooms, but we liked it anyways. We have however decided that next time we'll go hiking it will not be in bike shoes and pushing the bike along on woodsy trails. That was a silly idea. We found the bikepath again, eventually and stopped at the bike store. The bike mechanics admired Dasha's bike and that made her real proud, I could tell. She was showing them a special this and a special that on her bike and that made me laugh. I mean...it's just a bicycle! But I'm learning that people like different things - fishin has his big 4X4 truck and a trailer, Dys has that sporty car, whatsitcalled... not Pontiac...not Peugeot.....ah, I know! Porshe. And Montana has the tractor (that one was fun to drive!). So, Dasha has a bicycle. People can be really funny.

After all has been shown and breeze was shot, we ventured on to Lexington. We finally made it! The green was very very green - the grass almost didn't look real. There were many tourists around the monument. Two busloads. The people stood around the monument and were praying out loud. I thought it was very strange. Dasha thought so, too. I asked her if she does that as well, and she said she doesn't.



This is the monument from up close. It's dedicated to eight guys who died in the Revolution of 1776. They call it a war, which sounds a little exaggerated, but what do I know. I'm a hamster. Dasha also laughs at these signs and keeps showing them to me - one says: "John Soandso hid bravely in the ditch here and waited for the British to pass. Then he ran out of his hiding and shot at the soldiers' backs." We agreed that it reminds us of Monty Python movies.



Here is a sign about another big battle. Three guys were wounded there. It was in front of this cool old house - Buckman tavern, which has a funny roof. They call it a saltshaker top, because it looks like a saltshaker.


We went to see it up close. There I met a guy dressed like people used to dress way back in the day during the time of those battles. I was a little shy at first, but we got talking and he wanted to have a picture with me. So I let him.

Penny had already been there in June - didn't she remember

After we walked plenty around and saw all monuments and old houses we could, we rode back to Cambridge. This was a lot easier than on the way here, because it was downhill. But boy oh boy, am I tired! (Dasha must be tired, too, cause she nearly fell asleep on her keyboard!).

I was very happy when we finally got to the house. This is where Dasha and Kris live. They also live in the house with Screech the cat, Duncan and Mackydoodle the Westies, Joan the landlord and Ema the housemate. It's a full house!



It has a nice garden. We kicked back and relaxed there a little. The lawn is a little dry, but everything is these days. I wish it rained a lot, as I am getting curious about these mushrooms that Dasha keeps talking about. Chicken of the woods and honey mushrooms - what silly names for mushrooms they are.



We finally made it upstairs, washed our hands that were real sticky after hours of riding around in the heat. Then Dasha showed me where she keeps her computer. I wanted to see my thread - I call it my portal to the world!



I am real sleepy now. I think I will go snuggle with my new friend Screech. He's very black and sooo soft. Very nice to cuddle with. Screech wanted to hear all about my adventures, so I was telling him , especially how I worked with a big hammer on a construction last week. I cannot wait to see photos from fishin!



And now I think we will curl up and sleep some.

Oh, one more thing!

I did find a mushroom! It just wasn't edible, but it was a mushroom!

Hey, Walter, you can talk to me, I'm right here! Sure I remembered we were there. I showed Dasha the statue of the minuteman from a distance...but we didn't go to it, cause we both have seen it already. It looks exactly like it did in June:

I had better get these pics up before the weekend starts. Anyway, Penny helped me out with a small job I was working on. I put new sheetrock up and she took care of taping the joints.



Then we had to get rid of the old backdoor and she grabbed the sawzall beofre I could get to it.



She did wear her safety googles though! Good for her!

Before I knew it she grabbed the nail gun and had that new door in place!



I asked her to pry the old interior door out while I was working on a few other things but the prybar was a bit to big for her to handle.



We made a quick trip to the hardware store and Penny found a prybar that was just her size!



Once she got the interior door out she replaced it and used the plane to get it to a perfect fit.

hi, fishin!
I so like my prybar. I already pried the frozen chicken apart, I also pried Screech from the chair where he seemed to have been stuck (he wasn't stuck, he was just sleeping. Cats sleep 20 hours a day, did you know that?). It is so handy!

I also have my own account now! Below are the details. I don't know how to work computers very well, so hopefully the people I will be with will help me login every now and then.

My username: PennyAroundTheWorld
My password: (sozlet)

(that's because I miss her, even though I'm having so much fun traveling around all over).

there are no brackets around sozlet... i think i just got carried away. i like brackets a little too much.

Penny,
I'm so happy to hear your posts again!
Fishin' must've kept you working all the time! The door looks great!
I can't wait to see the rest of your adventures. You sure get around every where and meet cool people.
Go take a nap with Screech and get your energy back.
Caribou

Oh cool, Penny has her own account! Great idea!

Wow, I had no idea she was so handy. I'm going to put her to work when she gets home, that's for sure. (Er, don't tell her that, she may never get here...)

Love the snuggly pic with Screech...!


hi this is sozlet I think it is riley cool that penny has her own ackownt

At this rate, maybe I'll see Penny in person next Spring? I've got some super side trips planned for her when she arrives. (One may even involve a certain statue in Pullen Park that is a MUST SEE) Just ask Thomas.

I LOVE this thread and being able to meet everyone vicariously through Penny. (She's such a great writer, and soooo photogenic.)

(((Hi, sozlet.)))

Hey sozlet, hey soz! I miss you guys. I wish you could travel with me, but I think you are both too big to send by mail.
I am going to work with Dasha tomorrow. I can't wait to see the people she was telling me about - Jennifer, who is from Kansas, Adam who lived in Cambodia for a long time, Hillel the rabbi and others. It's also a pretty cool building right by the Charles River. Can't wait!

Penny, can you ask Dasha or littlek if Hillel the Rabbi went to Boston University? In the early 1980s? Because if he did, then I may know him. Hmm. Thanks, Penny.

PS Lovely photos. Every gal should be handy. Heck -- everyone should be.