What Happens in SLO Stays in SLO (May 23)

After breakfast, I used the computer in the library to show Jeanne some of the photos Hannah posted of Stari Grad. It so happened she was online when I checked my email, so we arranged a to chat by phone which was fun.

We drove downtown and poked around in a couple of stores. Jeanne was looking for a handle to attach to a cushion so it would be easy to carry it down to the dining room for meals. I saw a fabric/craft store and offered to make a handle, so we bought needle, thread, and cotton webbing.

When we got back to The Villages at 12:30, it was time to pick up cards for bingo that starts at 1:30. You don't want to get there one minute after 12:30 if you want to be sure you get your special numbered cards from the stack. Each card costs $1, and Jeanne treated us to 2 cards each while she managed her usual 3 (being a more experienced bingo player plus playing the same cards all the time has enabled her to memorize what numbers are where).

I sewed and watched my cards at the same time. Jerry won $8 with “9 around the corner”, then I won 50 cents when someone picked my ticket for an additional door prize. Then I won $8 by putting together a block of 6 and a block of 4 on the same card. I am sure there were some unhappy residents as they watched us take ¼ of the prize money, but someone else won the pot for the final blackout game which was a whopping $21. I finished my sewing project before the game was over, so it was a productive hour and a half.

Immediately following bingo, we attended a slide show and talk on the elephant seal rookery at Piedras Blancas near San Simeon, not too far north of here. The residents are going on a field trip there on Wednesday, and we had stopped there five years ago on our way here.

We walked across the street to a shopping center and had dinner at Nucci's Pizza. It was Monday night...Jeanne plays Rummikub on Saturday and Monday nights, but this is not for money (darn, was hoping to offset more of the cost of this trip). Risking the wrath of the women waiting to play, we took one of the games upstairs and played at the kitchen table. Jerry and I hadn't played in years, but each of the three of us won a couple of games. Maybe we'll have to dig out our game from the closet when we get home.

My plan was to do some Internet work before going to bed, but the library was locked up tight as was the place where we needed to return the game. We brought it upstairs, hoping to sneak it back without anyone realizing we had kept it overnight (the Christian Motorcyclists Association might be under contract to these residents to take care of ex-patriot hooligans who take bingo money AND keep games from the cupboard).

Update: After an unsuccessful second attempt to return the game (this time we were too early and the door wasn't yet unlocked for the day), we returned the game to its rightful place without getting caught in the act.