I have to think that Diane and I are to blame for the near-record temperatures we’ve been having lately.

The Thanksgiving Day Parade this year was run in

balmy temperatures. I have been in all but two of the parades since it began in 1984, and this was one of the most moderate in temperature I can remember.

I had a light jacket on when we checked in at 8:45 a.m. But it came off as we were approaching Saguaro Boulevard. Many in the crowd along the parade route were wearing shorts and T-shirts. I remember many Thanksgiving mornings when I wished I had gloves and a stocking cap to wear.

I say Diane and I were to blame, because the warm weather followed us on our recent cross country trip.

It seemed wherever we would go, they were setting records for high temperatures.

The day we took the grandkids to the zoo, it was in the mid-80s and humid. It finally cooled off just before we left New Jersey.

The drive to upstate New York was pretty with the changing leaves. And it was only 48 degrees during the noon hour.

We left New Jersey Nov. 2, headed for our next destination, Washington, D.C.

We arrived at rush hour and traffic is everything they say it is. We didn’t move for about 20 minutes.

Finally, we saw our hotel, the Holiday Inn. It turned out to be a good choice. I told Diane, I wanted to see three things in Washington with the limited amount of time we had. They were the National Gallery of Art (I love the Rembrandt paintings), The Air and Space Museum and the Capitol building. And all were within easy walking distance of our hotel.

If we had time, I wanted to see the Lincoln Memorial at night.

I have been to Washington a number of times with the National Newspaper Association, but this was Diane’s first time. Since we’re in the nation’s capital, we should spoil ourselves for dinner. We ended up at the Hay Adams Hotel. It featured the Lafayette Restaurant and the ‘Off the Record’ Bar. The bar was described as a place for Washington’s elite to hang out.

Its walls were covered with drawings of famous politicians, both current and past.

It was so packed, however, literally elbow to elbow, that I started wondering if there was a fire code in effect. Neither of us felt comfortable in the room, so we went upstairs to the dining room.

Now, this was more like it, the service was superb. A man played a grand piano as background music.

I ordered the lamb chops, while Diane had the scallops. Both were excellently prepared. It was a true dining experience.

We headed out for the next stop on our itinerary, Bristol, Tenn. The drive our next day was probably the most scenic of our entire trip. We were headed to Huntsville, Ala.

The leaves on the trees were the most vivid oranges, reds and yellows of anywhere we had been.

There were green hill- sides with farm houses dotting the landscape. Some had red barns. Cows were feeding on the green-grass pastures.

Several had lakes on their property and some were on the shores of big recreational lakes.

“Now this is what I expected when I said I was looking for fall colors,” Diane said.

From Bristol, we headed for Huntsville, Ala., home of the U.S. Space and Rocket Center. You’re driving along the highway with its rural setting, when suddenly you see a large Saturn 5 rocket in front of you. As you get closer you see a variety of rockets. I’d love to take our Las Vegas grandson, Camden, there some day.

The space center was not the reason we included Huntsville on our trip. We went there to see our friends, Pam and John Zeller. Pam and Diane struck up a friendship when Pam became a patient at the Mayo Clinic some 21 years ago. When she came out for treatments, we would get together for dinner.

When Diane called her to tell her we would be passing through Huntsville, she became so excited and said we would have to meet for dinner. The evening went by too quickly.

Our next destination was Granbury, Texas, about an hour’s drive south of Fort Worth. We stayed in Monroe, Louisiana, on the night in between.

We scheduled Granbury because my good friend, Jerry Tidwell, is the publisher of the Hood County News.

We met about 12 years ago at a National Newspaper Association convention. He owns a twice weekly newspaper that has won numerous awards, both from the Texas and National Newspaper Associations.

One thing that is different about our operations is that he prints some 40 community newspapers from around Texas every week.

We remembered how sad we were when we heard about his wife Vana’s untimely death due to a heart attack about two years ago. They had been together since they were high school sweethearts.

The four of us had vacationed in San Antonio several years prior to that. He has a new sweetie now named Lula, who also went to high school with them. And she’s just as sweet and pretty as Jerry said she would be.

Our final two nights on the road were spent in Amarillo, Texas and Gallup, N. M.

During our 55 days on the road we put some 5, 900 miles on our new car. We were amazed that the closest thing we saw to an accident was an 18-wheeler that had jack-knifed in the rain in Texas.

But there were many near misses, also in Texas. In fact, we’re going to give the Texans the worst drivers award.

This week we are going to get moved in to our condo in Henderson, Nev., just outside of Las Vegas.

I tell you, this retirement stuff isn’t easy.