I'd like to thank Purple Iris for suggesting the SoCal mini-meet of
April 17th at the Rancho Santa Ana Botanical Gardens. I had such a
great time, especially because of the unexpected rainI'm a big rain
lover. The Southern California letterboxers are unlike other
Southern Californians in that they don't let a little rain get in the
way of having a good time; we all sat down in the rain, mostly on the
ground, and exchanged stamps with no rain-related complaints at all!
(In SoCal, the previous sentence deserves an exclamation point.) My
wife called my cell phone in the middle of the stamp exchanges, and I
told her that children were standing among us holding up umbrellas so
our stamp books wouldn't get soaked. Besides myself, attending the
event were Purple Iris, Spacy Holly and her clan: Erin, Sara, Amy,
Lynn, and her husband Dan; and Leslie with her two daughters, Emma
and Claire. Claire's "The Rose" letterbox was my 100th letterbox
find. I gave Emma my first ever hitchhiker, "The Horus Hitchhiker,"
and she reciprocated by giving me "The Arizona Hitchhiker," which I
placed in a box at the Kernville Gathering a week later. Leslie's
folk and I were able to find the Rancho Santa Ana Botanical Gardens
Letterbox (which was one of the first LBs I ever searched for, but
was skunked at the time), so I imagine a great day was had by all.
--Buzzard