Dale met some old

friends in Roswell.

Cindy getting down at

Carlsbad Caverns

Julie “sledding”

at White Sands

The rarely seen long-tailed weasel

Dylan graduates from Mizzou Last May Dylan and his girlfriend Lindsey Paydon (“Luna”)

graduated from Mizzou. Dylan graduated summa cum laude & with

honors; his major was math and his minor was philosophy. We were

very proud! He was also was inducted into the academic honor

society Phi Beta Kappa, and got to sign his name in the same big

book that Dale signed 39 years ago when he graduated from

Mizzou.

Dylan was accepted into the PhD

program at the University of

North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He

and Luna moved there in July.

Chapel Hill is 2-3 hours west of

the Atlantic coast and several

hours east of the Smoky and Blue

Ridge Mountains, so they have a

lot to explore.

Just what we needed—more cats! Last spring Dale started feeding a couple of stray cats. A short time

later, he noticed them frolicking in the field in such a way that he

deduced that Blackie and Goldie were male and female. Blackie

came and went, but Goldie got used

to being fed daily. To show her

appreciation, one day she left a dead

weasel for us. In the cat world, dead

weasels represent the highest form

of gratitude. Goldie got bigger and

bigger, and gave birth to kittens as

soon as we left on our New Mexico

vacation in June. She hid her kittens

under our neighbor’s home. Julie, who had been begging for a kitten

for the past year, naturally volunteered to climb under the house and

rescue them. It was an intense

rescue operation on a typical

105 degree Missouri day. We

wound up with six kittens and

Goldie living in our basement

for several months. Good

homes were found for all of the

cat family: Goldie and her

daughter Meiko live with us;

Marzipan and Cirrus are Riki’s;

and some cat-loving friends adopted the other three.

Travels As you may know, the Midwest suffered a terrible drought

this summer so our vacation was a chance to escape the

heat. So where did we decide

to go? New Mexico!! Our

first stop was Cadillac Ranch

in Amarillo where we added

some graffiti. In New Mexico

we stopped at Roswell,

where we learned about the

famous alien landings. We

figure we’ll be prepared in

case the Mayan predictions

come true and we are once

again visited by aliens.

The highlight of our trip

was probably visiting

Carlsbad Caverns National

Park. We went on a tour

that was so dangerous each

person had to swear (in

front of U.S. Government

Park Rangers) that they

were entering the cave of

their own free will. We

had to wear hardhats and

headlamps, and descend

into the lower portion of

the main cave using ropes and ladders! We also got to

watch the bat flight one evening, after getting caught in a

desert rain and seeing a

complete double rainbow. We

visited Guadalupe Mountains

National Park, where we went

hiking and then camped for a

night. In Cloudcroft we stayed

in a historic lodge that Al

Capone once owned and where

Clark Gable and Judy Garland

enjoyed staying. We were the

only famous people there this

summer. Finally we travelled

to White Sands National Park,

where we spent a day playing

in the sand and watching the sunset.

December 2012 Volume 19

Riki at the Golden Gate Bridge after her escape from Alcatraz

Julie gets her own animals Julie completed her freshman year at Mizzou and moved back

home for the summer. Then in

August, she moved into an apartment

with 3 of her friends. Unfettered by

dorm or her parents’ rules, she and

one of her roommates adopted a

puppy named April. Then the two

adopted a rabbit whom she named

Frankie. What will it be next?? The

girls also like to have dance parties at

their apartment. Julie

continues to work at

Boone Hospital Center,

where she delivers

patients’ trays sometimes,

but prefers to work in

the kitchen or as a

cashier in the cafeteria.

Julie recently decided to

major in Psychology to

become a counseling

psychologist. In her

free time, Julie enjoys painting, dancing, attending MU football

and basketball games, and training her rabbit to walk on a leash.

Riki We all know the world is full of sh__, but Riki is doing

something about it with her work at Environmental Dynamics

International, where she helps design waste water systems that

are used all over the world. At home she keeps busy taking care

of her three cats and her German Shepherd Dax, making crafts

and sewing, gardening, and keeping in touch with old friends.

She and Darren travelled to San Francisco and got to see the

Cardinals-Giants baseball game there. They went to Alcatraz,

but were able to escape. While in California, they also visited

Yosemite National Park. This fall they travelled to Sanibel

Island in Florida where they collected shells, watched dolphins,

and saw a sand sculpture contest and other sites. Darren had

pretty good luck fishing from the shore.

Dale tends garden and watches tv Despite the horrible drought we had—our pond is down 3-4

feet!—, Dale did well with his raised

bed garden. He added a bed to grow

pumpkins behind the house but, alas,

the Great Pumpkin did not visit it.

Also, in his never-ending quest to

explore weird vegetables, he grew

kohlrabi this year. The blackberry

plants he put in the ground a few years

ago produced about 25 quarts of

berries this year. We still have lots of

them in the freezer.

Dale still works in Facility Operations

at the University. He works at a very

high level job at the University…at least sometimes…because

he has to climb up on campus building roofs to explore potential

safety problems. In his spare time, Dale likes to exercise in the

basement while watching tv shows on Netflix. This year he has

been watching Monk, Breaking Bad, and Star Trek-the Next

Generation while burning calories, building muscle, and

maintaining flexibility.

Cindy Cindy is still a speech pathologist at Hallsville Primary School.

She gets to do fun things

like supervise 5 and 6 year

olds at breakfast and lunch

& amaze them with her

ketchup artistry. Cindy

visited her family in Akron

four times this year and also

saw her OLD friend Neva.

In April Cindy (aka

“Thelma”) and her friend

“Louise” went to Eureka Springs, Arkansas. Not a state she had

ever expected to visit for anything other than a coon dog, but

she had a great time. Cindy also enjoyed having all of the Bells

(except her mom) visit this summer. Cindy still likes to go bike

riding with Dale on the Katy trail, and go “antiquing” (looking

at junk) with Dale or her brother Jeff.

Julie and Dylan at White Sands

Julie and Frankie

Cindy and Julie also have jobs now

modeling for the Burpee Seed Catalogue

Dale with artistic

contribution to the

Cadillac Ranch

Dale and Cindy at White Sands