Country Boy, City Girl Chapter 23

Country Boy, City Girl Chapter 23Tuesday morning I was cuddled with Linda next to Keith and Holly as we all watched the Rose Parade. It was nice, and my dad came in a few times to watch the various floats and bands play. Keith and Holly were going to go over to her house and hang out for a bit, so when they left I spent a few minutes kissing Linda and holding her against me.She asked me what I wanted to do next, and I leered at her, then said I wanted to go shopping. ?What for?? she asked.Well, I knew that Mandy?s birthday was next week, and I had an idea of something I thought she might like. What then followed was about 3 hours of going from mall to sporting good store, to various other places before we found ourselves out in Glendale.We walked into the only skating rink we had found open at that time (we avoided the one on Parthenia because we knew Mandy and Peggy would be there), and it was amazing. The place was huge! We walked over to the ?Pro Shop? and asked about it. It seems this was one of the oldest rinks in LA, having opened back in the ?50s. The floor was still the original maple one, and they still had an organist that would come in and play once a week on the original organ.We had the guy show us several pairs of skates, and got quite a lesson on how the boot, wheel, and trucks all worked together to provide different performance characteristics. Finally Linda and I decided to pool our money together and make this a joint present.A pair of ?medium-level? Reidell artistic skates with a white boot, and a vinyl carrying case to go with it. Thankfully Linda knew her sister?s shoe size. All together this set us back over $100, but we thought she would love it. Even if she decided rollerskating was more of a hobby than anything else, this way she would have a nice set of her own and not have to use rentals.We were trying to decide if we wanted to go ahead and skate when the manager said we could go ahead, since we already dropped quite a bit on skates and it was halfway through the session. So soon with rentals (also free) on our feet, Linda and I went out to finish out the session.Soon we were hand in hand and having a great time. Even though this was a much longer drive to get to, we had already decided that at least once a month or so we would have to come back to this rink. Eventually we headed home so we could get Mandy?s present wrapped.Rosie saw what we had gotten Mandy and thought it was an awesome gift. Mandy was still over at Peggy?s house, and would not be back until 6. ?And trust me, she is more into skating I think now than even D