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I'm a Recovering Drama Queen. I got tired of the same old lines.

Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Travels with Fishducky

The ever popular Fishducky sent a story my way for me to use as a guest post. This woman needs no blog of her own and is in high demand these days. She has become such a lovely addition to my bloggerhood. Thank you, Fishducky.

Now, on to her story:

TRAVELS WITH FISHDUCKY


Bud & I love to travel--& take family & friends with us. Thank heaven he’s been successful & we can afford it. (I did NOT marry a rich Jewish attorney. When we got married in 1955, he had about $200.00 & I was the rich one—I think I had about $500.00.) I’d like to tell you about some of our trips.

In 1971, while we were still poor, we borrowed my sister-in-law’s station wagon & loaded my other sister-in-law’s 3 kids & our 3 kids (all aged 5-11) & drove to the Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, Bryce & Zion National Parks. People would ask the kids if they were all one family. They’d tell them yes, but that we had left the little ones at home. They were also asked if their parents had no TV. They assigned imaginary horses to each of us. Bud’s horse’s name was Dammit. My niece once told him, “Uncle Buddy, that man’s calling your horse!” I had been to the Grand Canyon once before, when I was about 10. My brother, who was 12, wanted to spit into the canyon because that was the only place he could spit over a mile. My mother panicked. I laughed. When our brood got there, I turned into my mother. They could be 50’ from the rim & I was terrified. I told Bud to watch them & I waited in the car so as not to spoil their trip.

For both my 60th & 65th birthdays Bud took me & a bunch of our friends on an overnight flight to Las Vegas & gave them each $50 in silver dollars to play with—I got MUCH more.

In 1982 we took about 18 family members (& 2 secretaries) to Hawaii for 2 weeks. We had Tshirts made with my duck wearing a lei. The shirts said FISCHER’S FLYAWAY. If you’re familiar with Maui, you’ll know the Pioneer Inn. We went there for their famous macadamia nut pancakes one morning. They had broken our group up & had seated us at 5 tables throughout the patio. When it was time to pay, Bud got 6 checks. He asked the waiter who told him to give us their bill. The water pointed to our other 4 tables & to one with people we didn’t know. When we confronted him, the guy laughed & said, “Hey, it was worth a try! When your kids got their checks, they told the waiter to give them to you. So did I.”

Two years later—1984—we took our whole group on an Alaskan cruise. There were 4 generations represented, from Bud’s parents to their first great-grandchild, who celebrated his first birthday on the ship. We had baseball caps & windbreakers made with my duck on a cruise ship & the words FISCHER’S FLOTILLA. What a blast!!!

There have also been many smaller trips throughout the years. We’ve had MANY, MANY people ask if we would adopt them. Bud says that we can’t afford to have more people in our family. Sorry, but RESERVATIONS ARE CLOSED!

Check back this afternoon for photos!  I wanted to get this posted and was running out of time.
Hope you enjoyed your travels with Fishducky!!!!!

8 comments:

  1. I can't wait to see photos too! Your travels sound like a blast! I'm excited to start doing my own some day!

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  2. Yay for photos! Those sound like fantastic trips. Sounds like fishducky's brother and I think the same way. {spits}

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  3. Dear Stephanie and Fishducky,
    I always enjoying learning more about the redoubtable Fran. Every story reveals her love of and enjoyment of life and all it tosses into her journey. Thank you, Stephanie, for inviting her to post. It's a treat to read her stories.

    Peace.

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  4. Your blog was one I couldn't access for a bit so now I've downloaded Google Chrome on this pc and it seems to be ok (no jinx I hope). This was a great post. Love the people who tried to get over on you with their bill~!! Wow.

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  5. I love travel stories. Particularly ones that involve strangers attempting to get their bills paid. :)

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  6. That woman is a hoot!

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  7. Fran, I love to travel, too. I bet traveling with you is fun.

    Love,
    Janie Junebug

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  8. it was worth a try, huh? that's a riot:)

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