I live near the Columbia River. One of big events every year is the Boat Races or the new official name this year: Lamb Weston Columbia Cup. The picture above is one of the boats in action. The picture below was taken as I drove over the Blue Bridge.
I was trying to capture the one of the boats as it raced by but oops…just missed it.
At the races there are all types of booths – food, NASCAR, beer gardens, to name a few. Our location this year was not near a high traffic area, but we had a steady flow of people that stopped by. (Pictured below is what our booth looked like.) 
Many people in our church have taken classes on how to interpret dreams. We also offer life readings (better known as a prophetic word) that would edify the person sitting opposite us.We had many interesting encounters. When words of hope are expressed you see a difference come over someone. They often come back with their friends or family members. Sometimes they come back and sit a different table to get another reading.
There was a couple that sat down and it was obvious that they had too much to drink at the beer garden. Looking past their slightly drunken state, we had some very incredible words of encouragement to share with them. After we started sharing the good we had seen in him, the haze of the beer started to lift. He sat up and listened intently. He thanked us for what we had to say and said that it was time he made a change for the better in life. Not once did we mention Jesus, but He was present in our words.
One young man sat down and I saw a fireman - a person who put out fires in other people’s lives. I saw that he helped people with their problems, but it wasn’t something he was doing presently but will be doing more in the future. He turned out to be a psychology major.
Some people ask the question, “How did you know that?” When they do we tell them, “When you sit down, we simply asked God to show something about you and then we tell you what we see or hear.”
Our purpose is not to grow our church, but it is to love the people that God loves. We want to bless, edify and encourage people about their lives. I love that God speaks to me in my life, but what amazes me is when I ask, he’ll speak to me about the person sitting opposite me in the booth. It was great fun. I can’t wait for the Benton County Fair next month when we do our next major outreach.
© Nadine Z. 2007
Then add tomato paste (fill the can with water and place in pot). 
Then add the meat, grated cheese, oregano, basil and parsley. I used sausage for this sauce. I find my best sauces have both sausage and meat, but this was for chicken parmesan so it wasn’t necessary. Let your sauce cook for half an hour and taste (with some Italian bread of course). See if you need to adjust seasonings. This phase is a trial and error phase. When I first started making sauce I would have Tom taste and ask what was missing. I still do that just because he likes it. The secret to sauce is the longer it cooks the better it tastes.
We started off with a package of chicken breast.
In a bowl add some eggs, milk, salt and pepper. Place chicken in mixture. 
Dip chicken in seasoned bread crumbs and fry in pan with olive oil (you can use vegetable oil). 
Place chicken on paper towels to remove excess oil. This piece looks like a fish.
Place some sauce in a pan. Place chicken in pan and add some sauce to cover chicken but not completely. Sprinkle some grated cheese and cover in mozzarella. 
Thank you Hannah for sharing your evening with me. You did a great job.
My favorite sign was the cow crossing sign. We were traveling through a forest and there was a warning that a cow could appear. After about the third sign I said something. I started to mock the cow signs. Just as I finished mocking the signs in the corner of my eye on the opposite side of the road I saw a pasture with…you guessed it – cows. I just couldn’t believe it. I didn’t see a house or anything else, just the cows. I laughed my butt off. Maybe I was tired, I don’t know, but I had to laugh at myself.
Tom and I stopped at the, “Olive Pit.” You couldn't miss it. There were signs everywhere directing you to it for miles. It was a nice store that stuffed a green olive with every type of stuffing you can think of. The best part was the samples. We walked out with olives we didn’t really need, but they were so good we couldn’t resist. (See the Olive Pit pictured below.)
On the way to California I could not believe the amount of bug guts on the windshield. You expect that on long trips, but this was excessive. It was like glue and it wouldn’t come off easily at all.
What really got to me was that on the way there an entire bug got caught under the windshield wiper. (Pictured below)
Okay, in all my years of driving and we drove cross country from WV to WA state and not once did an entire bug get stuck in the wiper blade that was not moving at the time. On the way back it happened again. (Pictured below. You can see the wings if you dare to look closely enough.) 
So imagine you are a bug on a nice leisurely ride flying around in the country when all of sudden an invisible wall comes up and . . . splat! . . . your guts are all over someone’s windshield. I guess the bugs’ justice is that it’s almost impossible to get their guts off completely with wiper fluid.
Pictured below is the wallpaper in the bathroom. I guess someone measured wrong.
Now you know someplace is old when one of these things is bolted to the desk. I believe it’s where they use to keep the remote so that no one stole it, but I could be wrong. Any guesses on why this thing is bolted to a desk or what it is?
I know it sounds like I’m picking on Howard Johnson’s . . . okay I’m picking on them. But they have given me such good material to write about this trip. So I salute you Ho Jo’s. I choose to never stay in one of you again, but who knows, maybe one day . . . who am I kidding.
I have only one more post about this trip . . . next up – Bug Guts and Sgns.
This is a cool spray paint image of Lucille Ball on a security gate
You can’t forget Desi
Next up was Hollywood and Vine. Pictured is Tom posing for me. The men in my life really know how to humor me. 
Ripley’s Believe It or Not
Grauman’s Chinese Theatre was great. It was smaller than I had pictured it in my mind as a kid. I didn’t see some of the footprints I expected to see. My son told me they exchange them from time to time. It was hard to get a whole cement block in one shot with my camera. But I did manage to get most of it. One thing I found interesting was how many female stars wore high heel shoes when placing their very small feet into cement. Here are a few pictured below.
Who could forget the famous “I Love Lucy” episode when she steals John Wayne’s footprints and then breaks it putting it back? Too funny.
My favorite actor of all time. . . drum roll please . . . Cary Grant.
Thank you son for taking your mom to a place she always wanted to see since she was a little girl.
The two Toms unloaded the van. Of course they wouldn’t let me lift anything. My job was to keep an eye on the van. But I was under strict orders that if someone wanted the van and the stuff inside, to let them have it. (My son is very protective like his dad.) I smiled the whole time watching them work together.
That’s my boy below at In and Out.
And that’s my honey.
Driving around you couldn’t help but notice all the palm trees. The pictures below are for you 
After we bought a bed, we found a couch at a thrift store. Then we went food shopping. What kind of mom would I be if I didn’t cook him a meal? So I made him chicken cutlets and pasta with broccoli. It was great fun for me to cook my son a meal. We really enjoyed doing the mom and dad thing on this trip. We also stopped at this great mall where we checked out the new iPhone. Really cool.