The town I'm from is so small, Charles Kuralt has been there twice.
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Last night I joined 17 other people from the Orange County Outdoors Singles Meetup group for calamari, pizza, and beer (I drank water) at a restaurant in Vails Gate (or as my GPS knows it, "Huh? Where?"). I found the place entirely by accident.
Getting there involved taking the Thruway to Newburgh. The state had been working on the Thruway near that exit for months, and I didn't realize that they'd changed where the ramp exited. The intersections in that area had always confused me anyway, and last night when the Thruway dumped me out onto the highway, I had absolutely no idea where I was. I recognized nothing. The man in the GPS had fits, because he thought I was in the middle of a field. Not that it mattered much what he thought, because he didn't know where I was going. I knew Vails Gate was south of Newburgh, but I went two wrong directions before I found south.
Someone had commented on the website that the restaurant was "on rte 32 after the second light after Five Corners", which name the GPS also didn't recognize. I was just bopping along following the road signs that said "Vails Gate thataway -->", hoping I'd find some clue, and happened to look up at the GPS as I was going through a weird intersection, and noticed that the intersection looked like a perfect five-pointed star! Ta-rah!
And people don't believe me when I say I almost never get seriously lost.
The group seemed like nice folks. The man across the table from me was about my age and seemed interested, looked at me and caught my eye and smiled a lot, but he's an avid downhill skier. I said I hate winter, and then the divorcee sitting next to him brightened and spent the next half hour rhapsodizing about skiing. That's one of the things I dislike about singles' groups - there's a sense of competitiveness. I'm not interested in competing.
This group has a dog hike on Saturday, followed by dinner at a steak house, followed by a movie at an art house with the producer there for discussion. I had signed up for it, but it looks like the hike part may be canceled - there's SNOW predicted for Saturday, and nobody's ready for that yet. Not even the avid skiers.
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I did six loads of laundry at the laundromat today. Now my upper back hurts. I made sure the bags weren't so heavy this time, but I've about concluded that it's not the weight, it's standing at the folding table with my arms out in front of me that kills my back.
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