JPHarr's Fotothing

If you have been to Jen's or Petra's page in the past couple of days, you have read about a recent in-person Fotothing meeting. The JP family is traveling from Michigan to Maine, taking a northern route through Canada on the way there. This took us at one point sorta close to Jenylew's place. I didn't know how close, but it turned out to be only about 20 miles off our intended drive on the 401.
I broached the subject of a possible get-together, leaving lots of room for either of us to back out if that was for any reason a bad idea. But, frankly, I thought it sounded great. Every time I see a Fotothing get-together, I think it's the coolest thing. It seemed to me that a thing that cool could only enhance our vacation. So we made a plan....
But I did still wonder, what if the JP family and the Jenylew family just didn't get along? There was going to be a bonus: Petra and William happened to live nearby and would be there, too, which I thought was excellent. But who knows...?
So on the way there, I had a bit of the butterflies. The kids and missus JP were all about it, and Jen had given some great tour guide advice. Everything seemed to be lining up perfectly. Were we going to say "hey" for half an hour, then hit the road? Spend a couple hours and then leave during some awkward pause in the conversation? Would somebody start glancing at their watch, signaling an end to the fun?
We ended up staying for about eight hours! Hahaha...! What a great day we had. Back in the van to head to the next hotel about an hour away, missus JP said, "That was nice. There were really easy to spend time with."
Here's how it went down: Jen's directions were perfect, directing us along the scenic route, which is just about the only kind of route there is in Canada. We pulled up into the driveway and it was like deja-vu all over again. There was that sidewalk that gets shoveled perfectly, there's the cornfield, here came some faces I recognized, a little white dog came out to sniff our ankles, there was the nerdvan.... It was Petra and Jenylew who came out, we shook hands and hugged and smiled. The kids came to the door and led us inside, drawing us into the kitchen, where a spread of delicious snacks were waiting. Cold drinks were served as mister Lew and William met the JP family.
We settled in and had lunch and polished off a large bottle of wine (or more?) and had snacks later. The kids played and chicken-fought in the pool, soaked in the hot tub, took turns riding the pony. We adults talked about work and play and boating and careers and retro parties and travel. We laughed and cracked jokes and smiled and I think we already knew so much about each other that truly we were friends before we met, and are even more so now. You all should know that those are some good people.
Jenylew and mister Lew, Petra and William, Zoop and Kermit ~ thank you all. It was a wonderful thing to do, this meeting of the Fotothingers. =)
Don't forget about next year's Strictly Vinyl, and thanks for the records! Camping ~ tent camping ~ sounds like a great idea. We'll show you how easy it is. ;-)

Sorry for the delay in posting; my hotel wireless connections have been super-duper crappy. And, this morning, I typed all this stuff and then clicked upload before attaching a foto, losing all that I had written, but it was time to go, so I hadda wait till now.