ABOUT THE PROPRIETORS OF A&J RANCH

Al Lumas

Some of my current interests & activities:

• Enjoying my retirement from STRAUBE associates, inc of which I am still an owner, board member, and webmaster.
• Cruising in our 2005 Mercedes E320 CDI diesel car that we purchased in 2006 to replace our 1984 300SD which we gave to June's 90 year old mother. Driving the CDI to Las Vegas requires only 15 gallons of diesel fuel.
• Playing my 1938 Gibson J 35 guitar.
• Identifying & cataloging the insulators I inherited from my dad.
• Restoring old western saddles and making new ones. My first new one was an endurance saddle using an original McClellan saddle tree.
• Fishing. Mostly for Trout, Bass, and Catfish at Sandy Wool Lake in nearby Ed Levin Park.
• Playing golf one day a week with three fellow retirees. I have now broken 100 on four of the local courses.
• Managing horse manure and cutting weeds using our new Kubota mid sized 4WD diesel tractor which replaced our 40 year old Ford diesel tractor. Thanks to the new tractor / loader and the old International Cargostar dumptruck I bought two years ago, we no longer have to hire anyone to haul the manure away. Instead, we advertise the fully composted manure on Craigslist. Free if customer hauls it or delivery of 8 cubic yards in our dump truck for a nominal fee.
• Restoring fences and retaining walls that I should have done right the first time. By April of 2011 we hope to have the steep portions of our property fenced well enough to contain goats that will keep them clear of weeds.
• Still thinking of hot-roding my 1950 Dodge pick up truck but haven't done anything about it yet.
• Maintaining this and the Straube Associates Inc. web site.

June Lumas

Some of June's current interests & activities

• Getting used to my being around the house most of the time.
• Reading, but a little less since finally going on line with her own email account.
• Playing games, doing the ranch books, and corresponding with friends and relatives via the net on her own computer.
• Managing her diabetes and MS which resulted in loss of her driver's license more than a year ago. We still have her low mileage (26,000miles) 1993 Camaro Z28. Hoping she'll be able to drive it again one day. We plan on racing it in the May 2002 SSCC Nevada Open Road Challenge.
• Refusing to clean any fish I catch such as the nice Cabazone I caught one day in the surf at Martin's beach.
• Chasing our flock of wild peacocks away from her patio plants. Three peacocks appeared one day, now there's at least 50. Each year after mating season, the 'cocks' lose their long tail feathers. New ones grow back several inches longer than the ones of the previous year. Hmmmm, do longer tail feathers help 'claim' more hens?
• Enjoying the Carousel horse in our living room.
• Cooking.

The Lumas Kids

• Kate and her husband Bruce are professors of Wildlife Biology at Oregon State University and own a nice home on 3 acres near Corvallis, Orgeon.
• Lisa now lives and works in Honolulu, Hawaii.
• Rob, his wife Faletolu, sons Situe and Pisi, daughters Luse and Sessa, live in Hawaii. Fale is a school teacher. Rob is a registered nurse and a civilian manager for the US Army.

Email us at AnJRanch@hughes.net