Catching up with Cousins!

Though I grew up in Massachusetts, I have lots of relatives in California and since we're touring the west coast this month I've had the chance to see some of them. John, Frances and Tyler took me to lunch at Google where John and Tyler work. The Google-plex is pretty awesome (complete with a beach volleyball court and an herb garden) and the cafeteria food was delicious. Sorry no pictures - Google is very security conscious and made me swear I wouldn't leak any company secrets. Little did they know I'm not tech-saavy enough to understand any secrets....

This week we caught dinner with Jeff, Steve and Donavyn in Long Beach after flying in from Seattle. Donavyn is growing up fast and he already knows how to show off for the camera ;-)

And then yesterday after our afternoon concert in Victorville, we drove out to Pauma Valley to stay with our cousins Mim and Earl on their amazing orange and avocado farm.

Although we caught them at one of their coldest and rainiest days of the year (!), it was really beautiful and amazing to smell and taste the fruit when it's so fresh.

With more than 2000 trees on the property (including some grapefruit, kumquat, and pomagranate in addition to about 1500 orange and 300 avocado), Mim and Earl keep track of irrigating, pruning, fighting off pests and weeds, and manage to make a profit selling their produce on the global market.














Anybody who knows Emily knows that she eats a lot of grapefruits. We learned that they're called grapefruits because they grow in clusters like grapes (unlike oranges that grow individually). Emily was in heaven being able to pick her own grapefruits!














There were four great dogs on the farm - here's Earl with his big dog:


















And Donna picking an orange:



















It was a great break from chain hotels!