I read about this on his site. I hope I can get back there hopefully next year. Thanks for the eyewitness account!

Okay, had a great time, got to taste a few really outstanding cultivars. Snapped a few photos that you can see here: Some of the cultivar highlights: 1. EncoreLS - Unreleased mandarin developed by University of California. Late maturing (March) and will hang extremely well on the tree well into summer. Very easy to peel. Excellent flavor, it is very rich and unique. "LS" stands for low seed, and it is a low-seeded version of Encore. Will be available soon in the CCPP budwood collection. This cultivar will be added to my collection as soon as budwood becomes available. 2. Rojo Blanco pummelo hybrid - A very delicate, pigmented pummelo hybrid that melts in your mouth, very soft, smooth vesicles, delicate membranes, and very sweet. Also a later variety, ripens from Jan to May. Available in the CCPP budwood collection. Will be going in my collection. 3. Thermal Tarocco - Similar to Bream but actually I think better tasting, sweeter. Not as pigmented, but sort of speckled. Also available as budwood in CCPP. 4. Powell Navel orange - One of the several Australian navel oranges brought to University of Calif. for evaluation. The latest of the navels, and exceptionally good. It is a licensed cultivar but it is available through CCPP, worth adding to a collection if you're looking for a very late sweet orange. 5. Ellendale Tangor (mandarin) - a natural tangor found in Australia. Rich, very juicy. Deep orange. Very nice mandarin hybrid. Taste reminds me a little bit of the Page mandarin. Monoembryonic, and is used in hybrid trials for good reason, as it has many excellent qualities. Patty S.

I own several Hooker furniture bookcases and an armoire (2001) as well as a Riverside bedroom set (2003). Both have been moved several times and I have no complaints about either one! I should also note that the Riverside bedroom set was used in a rental property. I think both have held up very well over the years.

Vee, I didn't grow up with English boys but I really didn't notice the Englishmen I knew as co-workers, friends, and male relatives of friends as being as allergic to female company as you describe. Maybe the ones I knew had outgrown it. :-) I did notice the shyness of both males and females, though. As for American guys having 'trophy' girlfriends and wives: sure, there are those but I think gals were/are just as likely to collect 'trophy' boyfriends and husbands. The quarterback of the football team was always more popular than a defensive lineman (a necessary but less glamorous position); the guy with a 'hot' car impressed the girls while the poor fellow who had to drive his parents' car on dates was a 'drip'. I was probably a typical snotty female in some respects: I was mortified when I was a senior (12th grader) in high school and a sophomore (10th grader) boy asked me to an important dance. He was too young for me. I think it's funny now that I have a husband six years younger than me. Annpan, it's true that Americans are obsessed with the appearance of teeth. Martin Amis (Kingsley's son) said that before he dared go to the US he had to get himself 'an American smile'. Looking at YouTube video clips of singers such as Robert Plant (Led Zeppelin) and David Bowie before they had their teeth fixed always draws comments from younger Americans nowadays. How could these guys dare sing with such teeth? As if shiny, white plastic chompers are a prerequisite to singing talent...apparently so in their opinion. Americans are just about as obsessed with body hair as with teeth. It wasn't always so, but it is now. Females should have hair in three places only: the head, the eyebrows and the eyelashes. Males are allowed facial hair in addition. If you're wondering about the other region where hair usually grows...that's just ick, ick, ick! Hair removal is big business in the US. Mudlady, I've run across that parental attitude you describe that sons are always more important than daughters. I think it must be a holdover or throwback in American culture and not the norm as it is in certain other cultures. I never felt that I was less important than my brothers, but I was the only girl and youngest child and that probably made a lot of difference. Ah yes, cars had character back then! I can barely tell one make & model from the next nowadays. My first car is only a fond memory but I still have my second car, a metallic-blue 1966 Plymouth Satellite with a 383 engine, 5-speed manual on the floor. Lots of girls never learned to drive a standard transmission, but they missed out on loads of fun! I'm glad I grew up in the heyday of American car culture. As frivolous as it might seem, it signified freedom to me more than anything else could at the time. I didn't think anything of jumping into my car and driving alone from Iowa to Texas. I drove from Paris to Istanbul one time, too. It was marvelous.