About Me
My background
I have traveled around the United States most of my life but is has only been in the past fifteen years or so that I became interested in keeping and documenting the photos that I have taken. It was just never important to me when I was younger. I would take the picture, have it developed (wow, that was a long time ago), and then never look at it again. I was given my first camera in 1967 and yes it only took black & white photos. I actually have a few of them from back then. Now I can take as many photos as I want and I do take a lot of them, come back home and go through them to relive my travels as I load them onto my computer. I have used some of the pictures to make calendars for family. There has been interest in having them printed out for others to frame, so I decided I would give it a go to see if there are more people interested in my pleasures.I have been very fortunate the past several years to see as much of this beautiful country as I have seen and look forward to seeing more of it in the coming years. I am at a point in my life where the memories are more precious than they used to be. My adventures are being shared with some wonderful family to make it even more wonderful. My wife, Lisa, has been with me for all of my travels for the past several years as we are about to celebrate our 14th wedding anniversary. She puts up with a lot from me and I love her dearly. Then my father, Bruce, was with us most of our travels. It was usually Dad and Lisa coming up with the ideas of where to go and when, I am just along for the ride. After growing up as a "teenager", those of you that have them will know what I mean, my Father had become my best friend, even if he has trouble letting anyone else pick up the tab for dinner. Thanks Dad. Then on our last trip my sister, Cheryl and her husband Steve went with us. Imagine the surprise to everyone that my sister and I actually did get along together. I have a lot of photos that will be going up on the site and I will be rotating them from time to time so be sure and bookmark FruitoftheLens.com and come back often.
Thank you for visiting
Douglas Gould
We Have Retired ! ! !
This site has not changed in a very long time for far too many reasons. However, that is all about to change.
I have retired and we have moved. After working nearly 50 years I am done. Looking back on my working life, it has not been too bad. Yes, I made some very stupid mistakes. I could have gone into the military in high school, missed out on that one. worked on the railroad for seven years but quit that one. Now after all of these years I can say it all worked out fine.
Our Move
Not only have we retired but we have also moved. When you decided to move, think long and hard about how you want to do it. Our 3,000 mile move was the move from hell. I thought how hard can this be? I got a large pick up truck and bought a new 24' cargo trailer to haul all of our stuff.
First off the trailer was not big enough so I ordered a shipping cube to put the excess stuff in, but that was still not enough so we sold some stuff, gave stuff away and left stuff.
Left Washington July 15th. We made it 40 miles that day. It became clear to me real quick that I needed sway bars and weight distribution on the truck and trailer. We got that all installed and got up the next morning to fine that the truck would not start. Called AAA, who sent out a truck . The driver gets out of the truck and the first words out of his mouth are "I don't think that I can help you". He said that he had jumper cables but that was all. He hooked them up and still nothing. Since I thought it was the started I asked it he had a hammer or something. He did, I took it, crawled under the truck, tapped on the started as Lisa turned over the key. It started and I thanked the driver.
On the road and away we go. That day we made it to Kellog, ID. Stayed the night in a hotel, got up the next morning and the truck will not start. This time I called Dave Smith Motors in town. They got me in, checked out the truck and found that both batteries were dead. Well not knowing how long it would take to fix the truck I extended our stay at the hotel. The truck was ready faster than I thought and we only had to get to Missoula, MT so that we could visit with Lisa's sister we gave up the room and reserved another one in Missoula. No refund though from the one we did not use. Blade Chevrolet in Mt. Vernon, where I bought the truck did offer to reimburse me for half the cost of the two new batteries (2011 Ram 3500). I would have thought that they would have offered to pay the entire bill for the batteries since that is something that they would have caught when servicing the truck before putting it on the lot. At least they did offer something.
We got to Missoula in time to take Lisa's sister out to dinner. We got back to the motel and decided we would get a good nights sleep and hit it in the morning. A new day and we would be on our way. We did not get 300 miles. We had a tire on the trailer blow out. New tire on new trailer.
This day would be the only day on the entire trip that we did not have a problem. By the time that we finally got to Pennsylvania we had purchased 9 new tires, 5 new wheels and had to have the "U" Bolts that hold the axles to the trailer replaced two times. When the last blowout happened we were 15 miles into PA from the Ohio border. At this point I said "SCREW IT"! I contacted the PA State Patrol and a towing company. The towing company would take care of getting the trailer off of the side of the freeway and back to their impound yard. We left and headed to our new home.
August 23, 2019
We have been here a few weeks now and things are going ok. Yes, I did drive back to where the trailer was and get it a week later. It had all of our stuff in it and I had to get it here. We have not fully unloaded it yet but it is getting there. What is the hurry, we are retired not and have plenty of time. Yea right........lol.
The house that we bought is 107 years old and is showing her age in places. this is keeping us busy. We have found some things that need immediate attention that the home inspector did not find. Things like some mold in the basement, a leak in a part of the house that appears to have been added on and has a flat roof. these are things that you would think an experienced inspector would notice but I guess not. I have asked two others and they agree that this should have been caught. Maybe I am just expecting too much since I have been inspecting for far too long myself.......NOT. He finally returned my calls after suggesting to my real estate agent that it would be better for him to call me and come talk with me about this rather than ignore me. He called, came to the house and tried to explain how he could have missed these things. Not buying any of it asked for our money back that we paid him to inspect the house. He agreed to give it back but that was a week ago and I have not heard from him. Must be time to call him again.
This house definitely has character and she is showing us. Lisa came here about a month before me and got started with having some work done. All of the carpet was removed to fine wonderful hardwood floors. The floors were sanded and re-finished. Looks beautiful. Most of the walls have been repainted. Looks great. We are now in the process of making everything into how our house is becoming a home. I have got the mold taken care of and need to take care of the leak in the roof this week. Found a small leak in one of the pipes going from the boiler to the radiators which I need to get fixed also very soon.
Lisa has been busy shopping since we have been here and is finding some incredible pieces for great prices. She found a great old four poster bed for our king size bed for $200. Granted we had to drive an hour to where it was but it was a nice afternoon drive and we have plenty of time. When she saw it and the condition it was in it was a done deal. Got it home and put it together and it is beautiful.
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