Our RV Adventures

As I’ve said before, I never really know what I’m going to be doing when I get into work. And this morning was no different, in that I ended up assembling office equipment.

Specifically a new chair like this.

High Back Office Chair

Turned out to be a really nice chair, very heavy-duty. Our office manager liked it so much I ordered another one for the Shipping area. Only took about 30 minutes to put together. A great deal for only $135.

Jan has an Echo Dot next to her side of the bed, but she wanted one with a clock, so I got her this one.

Echo Dot With Clock

One thing I like is that Amazon can preset your Echo so that you just have to plug it in and it’s ready to go. No setup required.

Jan and I have a travel bag for when we ‘travel’ of course. And it contains several items that we’ve come to depend on, based on past experiences.

First up are these shower handles

We find that more and more motel/hotel showers have absolutely no handles of any kind. And both Jan and I are getting to the point where we like something to hold on to getting in and out of the shower.

So these suction cup models are great. They’re really strong and won’t come loose until you pop the levers.

Next up are these large S hooks. It seems like a lot of the hotel luggage racks no longer have any way to hang up bags, clothes, etc.

So we keep a couple of these in our bag just for that purpose.

Also, we have a number of chargers, cables, and cords to connect just about any device.

But after our Killeen Eclipse trip, we added a couple of more items.

For the first night, I couldn’t get the deadbolt on our door to lock. It wouldn’t turn at all. Plus there was a very large gap under the door. Large, as in letting daylight in.

So I ordered a pair of these door jamb wedges.

Door Jamb Wedge

And for a little extra ‘oomph’, I got this alarm that will go off if the door is even moved a bit.

Door Jamb Wedge Alarm

And it is LOUD!

And the next day I was able to get the deadbolt lock loose up by using a pair of water pump pliers to break it free.

Yesterday, I saw some posts about a SpaceX Super Heavy Starship launch tomorrow, April 20th. But now all those articles seem to have disappeared. So maybe not.

Watch The Skies!

Thought For The Day:

“The urge to save humanity is almost always a false-front for the urge to rule it.” – H. L. Mencken

Your Retro-Preview Highlights –

2010- La Brea Tar Pits

2013- Ten Worst Bombings In History

2014- Katherine Ross And Me

And Now On To Today’s Retro-Blogs.™

April 19, 2010

The The Tar Tar Pits…

This late-breaking news just in…

We just found out our upcoming grandchild is a BOY!

His name is Landon.

Today we visited the La Brea Tar Pits, which strangely enough, is in the middle of Beverly Hills. And even stranger, or maybe funnier, The La Brea Tar Pits, actually translates as The The Tar Tar Pits, since “La Brea” means “The Tar”’ in Spanish. Thus the title of this blog.

Anyway, we got there about 11 and decided to eat lunch first at a Marie Callender’s right next door, or as they call it in Beverly Hills, just ‘”Callender’s”. Apparently ‘Marie’” isn’t fancy enough.

And this is not your average Marie Callender’s.

And the food was really upscale too. We both had the Trio lunch plate, which consisted of a gorgonzola-pear salad with walnuts and cranberries, a choice of soup, (Jan had potato cheese, I had chicken tortilla), and a warm turkey/cheese sandwich on focaccia bread. It was all really good. And we were so full we didn’t even have room for pie…then.

After lunch, we walked next door to the Tar Pits. Before we even crossed the street we could smell the asphalt in the air. And walking into the park we could see the results of the asphalt, or at least, the simulated results.

The tar, along with methane gas, bubbles up from the ground and forms large pools. And it’s been doing this for tens of thousands of years. The oldest fossil found here has been dated to 38,000 years ago.

Then rainwater and dirt/grass/leaves accumulate on the surface, masking the tar. Animals come down to drink and get mired in the muck. And sometimes predators come to feast on the “stuckees” and get stuck themselves. Thus a wide range of predators and prey have been excavated from the tar here.

Here is an excavation that’s been underway for years, and tens of thousands of fossils have been found.

Here are the bones of a sabretooth cat that are in the process of being removed.

Many of these animals were much larger than their contemporaries. Here is a medium-sized sloth. And being medium-size, this sloth was only 7 feet high and weighed 1800 pounds!

And again, this ancient bison was much larger than the ones that live today.

This is an American camel, that became extinct over ten thousand years ago.

This is a mother Mastodon and her baby, found together in the tar.

And this is “Zed”, a 13 foot tall Columbian Mammoth, bigger than any elephant alive today

These are the bones of an American Lion, that was larger than any lion or tiger of today, and larger than the sabretooth cat from its own era.

This is the skeleton of a horse. What’s different about this is that horses died out in the Americas thousands of years ago, and didn’t return until brought over by the Spanish explorers in the 1500’s.

This short-faced bear was enormous. Larger than any bear today, it was a foot taller than any grizzly and probably weighed a thousand pounds more.

And this is the sabretooth cat. Sometimes incorrectly called a sabretooth tiger, it is actually closer to today’s housecats, rather than tigers.

This diorama shows a sabretooth trying to munch on a short-faced bear. I think the cat will probably end up as bear chow.

It was really amazing walking around here, thinking about all this going on right where we were standing 20 or 30 thousand years ago.

Leaving the Tar Pits we drove about a mile away to cruise the famous Rodeo Dr.

We saw a lot of expensive cars, and a lot of shops with names we couldn’t pronounce.

Guess I should have been more impressed, but I wasn’t.

Tomorrow we’ll be attending two tapings of the Bonnie Hunt Show that will be shown Wednesday and Thursday of this week.

April 19, 2011

Show Low Eve . . .

Coffee and blueberry muffins started off this ‘Get Ready to Travel” day. Tomorrow we leave the Verde Valley for a few weeks in Show Low, AZ

I had a mental list of things that I wanted to get done, starting with reinstalling the air lifts that hold the cargo bay door open.

Then next I want to air up any tires that needed it, there’s where my problem started. Everything went smoothly until I tried to figure out why I wasn’t getting any reading on the tire pressure sensor on the driver’s side inside dual. I removed the sensor and tried to read the pressure on the valve extension with my gauge.

And got no reading whatsoever.

But since I’d had trouble with tire extensions several times before, I removed the extension and used a screwdriver to press the valve in and heard air, so I knew the tire wasn’t empty.

Now I needed a new extension, so I started calling tire stores. Finally Big O Tires told me that Camelot RV Services stocked them. So off I went to town. It turns out the only ones they stocked that were long enough were the flexible ones, and not the normal rigid ones that I’d used before. So that’s what I got.

Getting back to the rig I installed the valve and got things working again.

My next chore was to finish cutting out the last of my RV Quick Shades to fit my windows.

By then it was about time to meet Dennis and Carol Hill, owners of the RV Driving School, for one last dinner at our favorite local Mexican place, La Fonda.

After a great time at dinner, talking about RV’ing and traveling to Alaska, we finally said our goodbyes, and Jan and I drove over to Camp Verde to check out the Maverik Country Store to see if we can get in and out with our rig to fuel up tomorrow morning. And luckily it looks like we can.

So tomorrow morning, we’ll head out to make the 150 mile trip to Show Low.

More from Show Low tomorrow.

April 19, 2013

How to be Unlucky and Lucky at the same time . . .

Joe Berti is both unlucky and lucky.

He’s unlucky because he was close up and personal at the Boston Bombings.

He’s lucky because he passed the explosion area about 30 seconds before it went off. He was even more lucky (as was his wife) because she was less than 10 yards from the first explosion and came through without a scratch.

He’s unlucky, because three days later he was driving into his hometown of West, TX just as the fertilizer plant explosion took place. His car was rocked by the blast and debris rained down on the roof of his car.

He is lucky because he was once again unhurt.

His wife said they’re going to make him just stand out in a open field for a while in case he attracts any other disasters.

I’ve seen a lot of articles recently talking about how society is coming apart at the seams with all the bombings and other terrorist activities. But when you look a little closer you get a different story.

Would you believe that out of the 10 worst bombings in US history, 5 of them took place more than 80 years ago, and one of them more than 120 years ago?

And 8 of the 10 took place more than 30 years ago.

The 10 Worst Bombings in US History

10) The World Trade Center Bombing (February 26, 1993): A van filled with explosives went off in the parking garage beneath the World Trade Center. Almost unbelievably, although over a thousand people were wounded, only six were killed. It could have been much worse because the goal of the bombing had been to take down both towers. Had that happened, the body count would have been even larger than 9/11. The terrorist behind the attack was Ramzi Yousef, who is now serving a life sentence.

9) The Preparedness Day Bombing (July 22, 1916): The Preparedness Day parade was designed to lift morale in San Francisco in anticipation of the possible entry of the United States into World War I. Before the event, anti-war activists were harshly critical and during the parade a suitcase bomb went off, killing 10 and wounding 40. Labor leaders Thomas Mooney and Warren Billings were convicted of the crime and were both eventually sentenced to life in prison. After the two men spent 20 years in jail, Democrat Governor Culbert Olson grew concerned about whether they received a fair trial and pardoned them.

8) The LaGuardia Airport Bombing (December 29, 1975): Four days after Christmas, a powerful bomb that had been placed in a locker at LaGuardia Airport went off. It collapsed the ceiling and fired shrapnel across the room. Eleven people were killed and seventy five were injured by the bomb. Although a number of groups were thought to potentially be responsible including FALN, the Palestinian Liberation Organization, the Jewish Defense League and also a Croatian nationalist named Zvonko Busic, no organization ever claimed credit and the crime remains unsolved.

7) The Haymarket Affair (May 4, 1886): A protest rally in Chicago led to a clash between anarchists, union members and police. During the protest, an anarchist threw a bomb at the police. A police officer was killed by the bomb and several others were wounded. That led to an exchange of gunfire between the cops and the violent crowd. Seven police officers and four members of the crowd were killed while one hundred twenty people were injured. While no one ever figured out exactly which anarchist actually flung the bomb, seven were prosecuted for the crime. Ultimately, Oscar Neebe received 15 years in prison, Michael Schwab and Samuel Fielden served life in prison, Louis Lingg killed himself while he was jailed and Adolph Fischer, Albert Parsons, George Engel and August Spies were hung.

6) The Los Angeles Times Bombing (October 1, 1910): A bomb wired to 16 sticks of dynamite exploded in an alley next to the Los Angeles Times. The bomb killed 20 employees of the paper and injured another 100. It turned out that two brothers who were members of the Iron Workers Union, John and James McNamara, were angry about the anti-union slant of the Times and set the bomb as retaliation.

5) The Bath School Disaster (May 18, 1927): After losing an election for Township Clerk, School Board Treasurer Andrew Kehoe decided to take revenge by executing what turned out to be the worst massacre at a school in American history. After murdering his wife, Kehoe set off bombs that he had secretly been planting inside the school for months. As rescuers arrived to begin helping the wounded children and teachers, Kehoe drove up in a truck filled with explosives and blew himself up, slaughtering even more people. By the time it was over, 44 people were dead and 58 were injured.

4) The Wall Street Bombing (September 16, 1920): A horse-drawn carriage packed with 100 pounds of dynamite and 500 pounds of iron was detonated outside the headquarters of J.P. Morgan Bank on Wall Street. Although anarchists were believed to be responsible, no culprit was ever prosecuted for the bombing that took the lives of 30 people and injured another 300.

3) United Airlines Flight 629 (November 1, 1955): John Gilbert Graham had a poor relationship with his mother, Daisie Eldora King. After taking out 4 life insurance policies on her, he offered his mother a “Christmas present” that turned out to be a bomb. It went off while United Airlines Flight 629 was in the air, 35 miles outside of Denver. All 44 passengers and crew died.

2) Continental Airlines Flight 11 (May 22, 1962): Thomas G. Doty bought a couple of large insurance policies, purchased 6 sticks of dynamite, and then got on Continental Airlines, Flight 11. Doty then committed suicide via explosion in hopes that his wife and child would receive the insurance money. All 45 passengers on the plane died when the bomb knocked the plane out of the sky.

1) The Oklahoma City Bombing (April 19, 1995): Timothy McVeigh, along with his co-conspirators Terry Nichols and Michael Fortier were responsible for destroying a large section of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building with a truck bomb. They were motivated by anger at the government in general along with the heavy-handed tactics used by the Clinton Administration during the Waco Siege and at Ruby Ridge. There were 169 people killed in the bombing and 675 were wounded.

On a much more cheery note, check out this family with 10 kids in Montgomery, AL.

They’ve all have been, or are being, homeschooled. But the amazing part is that 6 of them started their college studies by age 12. And that’s just the first six to reach that age.

The oldest of the 4 remaining kids, 10-year-old Katrinnah, plans on taking her college entrance exams next year.

22-year-old daughter Serenneh, is on track to become one of the youngest physicians in American history. And the others are no slouches, with one a spacecraft designer and another, a certified architect.

The family says they’re just ordinary folk. The father was an Army helicopter pilot, and the mother dropped out of nursing school to homeschool the kids.

They have a website called College By Twelve that tells more about how they do it.

And the rest of us wonder “Why Johnny Can’t Read”.

A little after 4pm we headed over to J & M II Chinese Restaurant, our favorite local Chinese restaurant.

Every time we go I keep telling myself that I’m going to have something different, but every time I end up having their delicious Szechwan Garlic Chicken. And having tasted mine last time, Jan changed from her usual Combo Pan-Fried Noodles to the Szechwan Garlic Shrimp.

And of course, along with it, we had Hot & Sour Soup and some Crab Won-Ton.

Everything as good as usual.

April 19, 2014

Laid-Back Saturday . . .

Not much at all happened today. Just a nice, quiet day around the rig.

It was nice enough outside that Mister stayed outside on his leash until it got hot enough for the AC in the rig to come on, then we brought him inside, much to his displeasure. He really likes being outside, but we’re always outside with him, or leave the door open, at least. Many times we leave the screen door open and he just comes in on his own. Otherwise, he knows to bang on the screen door to be let in, to either eat or used the litter box. He won’t go outside.

Jan spent part of the afternoon making her Sausage Balls and Squash Casserole for tomorrow’s Easter get-together at Brandi’s. If we showed up without the Sausage Balls, there might be rioting. The first thing some people ask coming in the door is, “Are the Sausage Balls here yet?”

While she was working on that, I went into Conroe to get $5.00 in quarters and ten $1 scratch-off tickets. Jan puts the quarters and scratch-offs into individual plastic eggs that will be hidden for the kids to find at tomorrow’s Easter Egg hunt.

The scratch-offs are for $500 a week for 20 years, I.e. $520,000. I told Jan I wondered how we’d feel if someone won the big prize from a ticket we gave them. Then I figured we could just tell the kid we’d give him this whole bag of candy for that piece of cardboard. Hopefully, he’d fall for it.

For dinner I heated up some of the Rudy’s BBQ we got on Wednesday. Along with that we also had a can of Bush’s Bourbon and Brown Sugar Grillin’ Beans. Even better, we’ve still got enough for another meal.

Later, for dessert, Jan and I split one of the Tres Leches that we got at Randall’s yesterday. Very good Tres Leches.

Tomorrow Jan and I will head down to Brandi’s about 10am for the big Easter meal. Then Monday morning we’ll head back over to the Colorado River TT park for a week or so.

April 19, 2015

Hey! It’s Vegas, Baby!

Jan and I were up about 6am to get ready for our 305 mile trip up to the Las Vegas Thousand Trails where we’ll be for the next two weeks.

Since I had done so much packing away yesterday, I didn’t really have a lot to do this morning. So after having our coffee and the Jack in the Box’s breakfast sandwiches we picked up yesterday afternoon, I first put away all the Satellite/DVR stuff.

Our 32” TV normally sits up on the front console, but when we travel, it rides on the floor on my side of the bed with a couple of pillows around it, so that just takes a minute or so to store it away.

Then I went outside and stowed away the Winegard Satellite Dome and the stand I put it on. I used to just set it on the ground, but a few years ago when we were in Houston for our 3 month winter-over, our satellite quit working. When I checked it out, I found an ant nest that completely filled the dome. So now it sits up on a foldup work stand.

I cranked up about 7:45 and I pulled out about 10 minutes later with Jan following me in the truck. Getting down to the highway, I got us hitched up and we pulled out on the highway about 8:15.

The trip was pretty smooth, at least until we got west of Kingman. Then the road pretty much became one continuous washboard. They did have a couple of long construction areas where they brought both sides over to the same side, and were completely redoing the other side. So there’s hope for the future.

We pulled into the Las Vegas Thousand Trails about 2pm after unhitching about a mile down the Boulder Hwy. Then everything kind of ground to a halt. There was nobody in the guard shack. And no one answered the intercom, either.

So after about 10 minutes of just sitting there, I walked into the park and back to the office. And it was locked up tight with no one around. And by the time I got back to the rig, there were two more rigs behind us. Finally, the ranger showed up, saying she had been leading someone to a site.

We finally got parked over in the new upgraded area in a 50amp site. In fact, it’s so new and upgraded that the 50 amp here is $5 a day extra rather than the usual $3. But when I started to write the check out for $70, I was told there was tax to be added.

When I asked, “How much?”, she hit a few keys on her calculator and said, “78.40.” Yikes!  Some quick mental calculations told me that’s a 12% tax rate. Yikes again.

When I later complained to Jan about it, she just looked over and said, “Hey! It’s Vegas, Baby!

April 19, 2016

Change of Plans . . .

The weather really eased up today with no more rain, at least for the Conroe area. But more is still possible, at least up until this Friday. As it stands now, 7 people have died, mostly from just driving into flooded areas.

Today was a rig cleaning day for Jan so she waited to take her shower until she was done. And a few minutes after she got in, I heard a scream, so I ran into the bathroom to see what was happening.

I found Jan terrified, trying to hide from a tiny spider on the floor of the shower. The spider was crouching at the other side, as far away from Jan as it could get. I figured that the spider was probably screaming too, but probably only a dog could hear it.

But she didn’t want me to kill it, so I had to pick it up in a tissue and throw it outside. So out the door it went.

Now this is a woman who has killed scorpions, large ones, by stomping on them while wearing sandals. But she’s scared of an arachnid half the size of a dime.

But I figure that spider wrangling is one of the reasons she keeps me around so it works for me.

A little before 7pm, Barbara Spade, a ranger at the Colorado River Thousand Trails called to tell me our reservation for two weeks starting this Sunday has been cancelled due to the flooding there. So I guess now we’ll be making our Lake Medina sojourn a little earlier than we had planned. I’ve already changed our reservation from Colorado River to Lake Medina, so we’re good to go.

I’ve done some rearranging and updating of some blog stuff. I set up Jan’s Favorite Recipes as individual dropdown pages.

April 19, 2017

Cruising The Strip . . .

Again, thanks for the kind comments about my Paul Revere screed. I’ve always enjoyed history, especially the misconceptions and mythical parts.

In fact one semester in college I took 3 history courses all at the same time as electives.

One reader asked if there were all these other riders, how come Paul Revere got all the press? I guess you might say he had a better press agent. Or at least had Henry Wadsworth Longfellow write a poem about him.

So why did Longfellow write about Paul Revere when there were other riders, and Revere didn’t even make it to Concord? Well, one reason stated was that Paul Revere was the best-known of the bunch. A well-known and prosperous Boston silversmith, he was well-connected with the Revolutionary leadership, and a prominent member of the Sons of Liberty.

But there are some whispers that Longfellow found the name Revere easier to rhyme than Dawes, Prescott, or Bissell. Or especially Ludington.

And not surprisingly Longfellow took a lot of liberties (artistic license?) with the storyline in the poem.

For example, Revere did not observe the two lanterns in the old North Church tower, saying the British troops were coming by sea. In fact he was the one who ordered the lanterns placed in the tower in the first place.

Longfellow’s poem was not written until 1860, but even then some people were upset that Paul Revere got all the acclaim. Helen F. Moore even penned a parody poem on the subject.

‘Tis all very well for the children to hear

Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere;

But why should my name be quite forgot,

Who rode as boldly and well, God wot?

Why should I ask? The reason is clear—

My name was Dawes and his Revere

But note that she didn’t try to rhyme anything with Dawes either.

I did get my exhaust pipe strap hanger installed this afternoon and it works fine.

So that’s fixed now.

About 4pm Jan and I headed back down to the Henderson area to once again have dinner at Golden Flower Chinese Restaurant, a place that friends turned us onto. And this time we had a dinner companion.

Boots Gibson, a long-time blog reader lives in Las Vegas and wanted to get together. So Golden Flower was the perfect place.

Turns out that Boots and Jan have a lot in common, both having worked in the medical field for many years, so they hit it off pretty quick.

We had our usual great meal and spent over two hours there. I think our waitress was wondering if we were going to start all over and order again.

Later, about 7:30 Jan and I headed over to the Vegas Strip to do our drive from the top to the bottom. We both enjoy watching some of the amazing outfits people actually wear out in public as they parade along the street.

Getting down to the bottom of the Strip at the airport, we head back over to Flamingo Rd. to have a piece of pie at Blueberry Hill Restaurant, known for their homemade pies. And it certainly shows.

And tastes.

April 19, 2018

Neighbors . . .

About 3:30 Jan and I headed up to Webster, first so Jan could get her haircut at her favorite SuperCuts, or at least her favorite stylist at her favorite SuperCuts.

While she was there, I went down the block to the office to pick up some Amazon stuff that came in today, and passed on some info to my client. And when I got back to the SuperCuts Jan was just coming out. Perfect timing.

Our next stop was right down the road to have dinner again at East Star China Buffet, where we ate just last week with Chris, Linda, and Piper. And it was just as good as last time.

But, unlike last time when I had Shrimp, Shrimp, and Shrimp, this time I only had Shrimp and Shrimp. Don’t want to get in a rut.

When we pulled into the parking lot we found ourselves right behind a big tour bus unloading ahead of us, so we thought we’d had a big delay, but except for an initial stampede, it cleared out very quickly, and we had no problems.

Finishing up, and heading home, we made a Lowe’s stop for a few things for a new project I’m working on. I’ll have more details later.

I mentioned over the last couple of days about Katherine Ross, my former next-door neighbor, so here’s a repeat of that post.

Hair Dryers and Hollywood February 17, 2017

This kind of made me think of a new game where you link yourself to another person you know through one or more celebrities.

And with my cousin Joy, she’s met Roy Orbison who knew Johnny Cash and then back to me. So we have a Bacon Number of 3. And I wouldn’t be surprised if she put some thought to it, Joy could come up with some more names that might get us down to a BN of 2. Because I actually have a bunch more too.

It’s fun to thing about.

Now since my friend Tricia spilled the beans on the whole Katherine Ross hair dryer thing and several people asked, here goes.

For the first five Shuttle launches, I was part of the NASA television crew that was set up on White Sand Missile Range at a location called Northrup Strip. Northrup Strip was designated as the backup landing site for the Shuttle.

STS-1 and STS-2 both landed on the dry lake bed at Dryden with no problems. But when STS-3 came along in March 1982, problems. Between the Shuttle launch on the 22nd and the landing scheduled on the 30th, heavy rains flooded the lake bed and made a landing impossible.

At this point the landing strip at Kennedy Space Center was still under construction, so White Sands it was. And when it was announced that the Shuttle would be landing there, it seemed like the entire world invaded the little New Mexico town of Alamogordo where we were staying.

There were only two nice motels there, a Best Western and a Holiday Inn. Located side by side, I think they may have both been owned by the same people, since they shared the same restaurant and the bar.

We probably only had 30 people staying at the hotels, but when pretty much every television crew and film crew in the world descended on the town, they found both motels already full. And that’s because, without a lot of publicity, they were filming part of a movie there. And the stars and the crew were taking up most of the other rooms.

The movie in question was “Wrong Is Right”, a dark comedy starring Sean Connery, Katherine Ross, Robert Conrad, Leslie Nielson, John Saxon, and others. There were other stars in the movie whose names you would recognize, but these are the ones concerned because they were staying at the hotels with us.

The sands of White Sands were standing in for sands of Saudi Arabia which is where part of the movie was supposed to be taking place. So they were here for a couple of weeks to get those shots.

Now before all the Shuttle Landing commotion, we had a nice tight little group, with both the movie and NASA people. We even had several astronauts with us, Anna and Bill Fisher, and Story Musgrave.

We all got along great, trading autographs for Shuttle patches, etc., getting drunk together in the bar, and sometimes some of us eating together in the restaurant.

Sean Connery was full of great stories about shooting other movies on location, including the Bond films, while Robert Conrad and Leslie Nielson were constantly throwing jokes back and forth at each other. Katherine Ross didn’t say a lot, but seemed content to listen and laugh at the jokes, and she had a beautiful laugh.

Then one morning as I’m almost ready to leave my room to go down for breakfast and then leave for White Sands, there was a knock at the adjoining door to the next room. Not knowing who was staying next door, but figuring it was a NASA type, I open it to find Katherine Ross standing there wearing a robe and with a towel wrapped around her hair.

And she was holding up a hair dryer by the cord like it was a dead rat.

“You do electrical stuff, right? Can you fix my hair dryer? I’m already running late and it keeps going on and off every time I move.”

“Let me guess. You always unplug it by just yanking on the cord, right?”

“Well, yes.”

Now luckily for Katherine, I had a side business at the time. I soldered up computer boards for a couple of local computer stores in the Houston area. Back when I worked for the Department of Defense, they sent me up to the NASA Certified Soldering School at MCAS Cherry Point, NC. so my boards looked like they were factory done.

The stores would give me the blank circuit boards and all of the individual parts, IC’s, transistors, resistors, caps, etc. I would then populate them and solder them up. I got paid $10 a board and I could do 3 or 4 an hour. Good money for 1982, especially since I was doing 100 at a time.

But what this all meant was that I had tools with me in my room since I always brought a bunch of boards with me on these trips. And I just happened to have a replacement AC plug to boot.

So it only took me a couple of minutes to snip off the old one and install the new one, which garnered me a Thank You! and a quick hug from Katherine Ross.

Now the next night the bar was kind of quiet, with only the NASA people and some of the film crew there, with the stars all off at some press thing. But things picked up when Katherine walked in, dressed to the nines. Like Academy Award night nines.

She walked up to the big round table where I sitting with 6 or 8 other guys and stopped in front of me.

“Thank you for what you did for me this morning. I really appreciate it.”

“No problem. I was glad I could help.”

Then she winked at me and walked off.

There was dead silence around the table, with all eyes on me.

Well, at least after Katherine left the bar.

And my reputation among my coworkers was greatly enhanced.

It’s hard to top this one

April 19, 2019

This Is Getting Real . . .

This is what Jan said when we started going through the “Goody Bag” that our friend and travel agent, Chantelle Nugent, sent us today.

It contains all the tickets, luggage tags, passport holders, ID badges, itineraries, and information we need for our trip. WOW!

We picked it up at the PO tonight on our way home from our ‘Monterey’s for dinner / Alvin Opry for fun’ evening. Saw a lot of old friends and heard a lot of great singers and songs. And the new venue at the Alvin American Legion Hall is really.

Tomorrow morning we’re heading up to Brandi’s for a couple of days for swimming and Easter dinner. Really looking forward to it.

Wrapping up this short blog, I thought you might be interested in this close-up of the 27 Merlin rocket engines that recently propelled the second Falcon Heavy into space.

April 19, 2020

the fine print . . .

I was back on the phone with our friend/travel agent Chantelle Nugent this afternoon, talking about changing our September 2020 Holland America 12 day Alaskan Cruise to May 2021. And as they say, ‘the large print giveth, the small print taketh away.’

We had been told that we would receive a 125% credit from our canceled cruise to apply toward a new one. So we were looking at about a $1500 surplus to apply to upgrades, excursions, the gift shop, etc. But in the fine print, you find out the 125% only applies to the amount you’ve already paid.

Which was the $600 deposit we made back last October, with the remaining $5600 due this coming June. So we got an additional $125.00 rather than $1500.

But we did come out about another $600 ahead because our new May 2021 cruise is that much cheaper than our September 2020 one. So we decided to take that total $725, add another $675, and bump our room up from an Inside one,

to a Verandah room like this one.

Of course, if we really wanted to splurge, for $3600 extra, we could have bumped up to a Pinnacle Suite.

“It includes a living room, dining room, pantry with microwave and refrigerator, and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking a private verandah with whirlpool. The bedroom features a king-size bed, plus a separate dressing room and the bath includes an oversized whirlpool bath and shower as well as an additional shower stall. There’s also a sofa bed, suitable for two people, and a guest toilet. Amenities include a private stereo system, use of the exclusive Neptune Lounge, a private concierge and an array of complimentary services.”

So it has two bathrooms, one with a whirlpool tub/shower AND a separate shower. And another whirlpool on a private verandah.

And at 1134 sq. ft., it’s the size of some small homes.

For dinner this evening I did an online Curbside Pickup order at Whataburger, and as before, we ate it in our car in the WalMart parking lot. Just as delicious as always.

I’ve been thinking recently about some of the societal changes brought about by the WuFlu, and how many will be temporary and how many will hang around.

Here’s the list I’ve come up with so far.

Working Remotely/Working From Home
Online Food Ordering Pickup/Delivery
Online Grocery Pickup/Delivery
Telehealth Appointments
Doctors Able to Work Across State Lines
Online Education/Homeschooling
TV Remote Productions from Home
Live Streaming of New Movies
  and most importantly
Alcoholic Drinks to Go

What are your additions?

Tomorrow morning on my way to work, I’m going by my doctor’s office to get the WuFlu Antibody Test, and the results should only take 15-20 minutes so I should know before I leave. If I have had it, then we’ll get Jan tested too.

April 19, 2021

And Now For Something Completely Different . . .

Now that Jan’s patio area is finished and up and running,

it’s time to get back to some other stuff around the rig that’s on my list, most of it maintenance chores of one type or the other.

Things like flushing out the water heater, putting the windshield solar screens back up, cleaning out the dryer vent hose, and replacing the sliding window in the rig’s screen door.

Then the biggies are to install a new fuel pump and fuel filter in the rig’s generator and try to get it working again. If that doesn’t work, there’s a nearby company that works on Onan and other generators, both mobile and stationary, so I’ll have them come out and take a look at it. Would have been nice to have in during the recent freeze.

And then, of course, there’s the real big one, getting the engine’s oil leak fixed so the rig is drivable again. Not that we’re going to do any RV traveling, but it would be nice to be able to get out of the way of an oncoming hurricane if necessary.

Then on the Jeep, I want to clean off the discoloration on the headlight lenses, and then probably replace the bulbs with much brighter LED ones, finishing up with new tires and an oil change before we leave on our Illinois/Alabama trip the first part of June.

Tomorrow looks to be another errand day starting with lunch at our long-time favorite King Food Chinese. Really looking forward to a big bowl of their Hot & Sour Soup. Then coming home, Cowboy Coffee and sitting out on the patio for a while.

April 19, 2022

Old Friends and BBQ . . .

I got a new toy the other day, but I won’t be able to really play with it until Thursday.

It’s a Alexa-Controlled Smart Thermostat.

Made by Honeywell, it should be a direct replacement for the Honeywell one we have now.

Which was a replacement for the round one that was in the coach when we bought it in 2007.

Just one more thing that Alexa controls in our coach.

Things like our Power Converter, our Firestick, the fan in the bedroom, the coffee pot, the light over the sofa, the table lamp, our Jellyfish lamp, and the dryer fan motor. And probably a few others I’ve forgotten.

I fully expect that someday I’ll tell Alexa to do something and she’ll say, “I’m sorry, Greg. I can’t do that.”

And then take over the coach.

About 11:30 Jan and I drove over to Pearland to have lunch with Bonnie Horner, an old friend and former hospital co-worker of Jan’s. And we ended up having BBQ for lunch at an old favorite of ours, Central Texas BBQ.

We started eating here back in the early ‘80’s, and it was a regular stop for us. But we haven’t eaten here since before we started RV’ing in 2008.

And it was good to be back, and just as good as always.

And it was good to be able to spend some time with Bonnie again. We’ll have to do it again soon.

April 19, 2023

Expiration Dates?

Back in 2015 while we were staying in Prescott, AZ while our rig was being repaired after our big blowout, we were in Sam’s Club one day and came across a display of this Campbell’s Slow Kettle Tomato and Sweet Basil Bisque.

Since Tomato Basil is Jan’s favorite, we grabbed a box of 4 to give it a try. And that night we both agreed that it was the best ‘canned’ soup we’ve ever had. So we went back the next day to buy some more.

And as happens, the display was MUCH smaller, with only 8 boxes left. So we bought all 8, for only $1.89 a box, 10 cents less than the $1.99 yesterday.

Though we ate them often over the next few months, somehow the last 3 boxes got pushed to the back of the pantry, and I guess we lost track of them.

Until the other day. And so tonight I decided to try one for supper. Even though the Expiration Date was December 2015.

So I figured I’d pop the top, give it a sniff, and then go from there.

And it looked fine, and it sniffed good. So I stuck my finger in and tried it.

And it tasted good.

So 3 minutes later I had a delicious bowl of Tomato and Sweet Basil Bisque. Just as good as always.

And we’ve still got 11 more bowls. So much for expiration dates.

Today was Jan’s follow-up appointment with her oncologist, really just a formality since she had a good report from her mammogram yesterday.

So all we’ve got left is our last consult follow-ups with our GP next Tuesday. Then hopefully we’re done for this year.

Tomorrow we’re heading up to Conroe to meet up with our old RV friends, Debi and Ed Hurlburt, and hopefully Janice and Dave Evans. We’re meeting them at La Pizca (The Pinch) restaurant there, the same location as last month’s get-together. Really good.

Though it’s not definite, don’t forget to check out the possible SpaceX Starship Heavy launch tomorrow morning with the window opening about 8:30am.

Jan and I were on our way up to Conroe about 9:30 this morning, stopping only for gas right down the road from the rig. The trip went really smoothly, with only a couple of slow-downs along the way.

Debi and Ed got there just a few minutes after we did and we got our orders in.

And of course, what’s any visit to Outback without a Blooming Onion? Just as good as when we first started having them 30+ years ago.

I started out with a Side Salad as my second side,

while Jan got double Veggies to go with her Alice Springs Chicken and Sirloin Steak.

She had thought on the way up there that she would have her long-time favorite Alice Springs Chicken, but after getting there, thought she really might want a steak.

So she got the best of both worlds. In other words, Both.

I did stick to my guns and got my long-time fav, the 2 8oz. Pork Chops with a Caramel Mustard Sauce, also with the Mixed Veggies.

We had our usual great time with Debi and Ed, but unfortunately, we won’t be able to get together next month since we’ll be back in Alabama for 2+ weeks.

Thought for the Day:

Humans share 50% of their DNA with bananas. Well, that certainly explains a lot about some people I’ve met.

Your Retro-Preview Highlights –

2011 – Montezuma and Tuzigoot Monuments

2012 – More On Our First Days Of Gate-Guarding

And Now On To Today’s Retro-Blogs.™

April 18, 2010

IHOP and WalMart…

We decided we wanted breakfast this morning so about 10 am we drove over to the IHOP in Lancaster about 3 miles away. The place was busy, but we only had to wait about 15 minutes so it wasn’t too bad.

But before we left the park we stopped by the office to pay for the next four days, thinking we would leave on Thursday. However, as usual, our plans are written in Jell-O, because after talking at breakfast we decided we’ll stay an extra 3 days which will be a full 2nd week here. We’ll see.

One thing we’ve noticed out here in CA is that most restaurant menus have the calorie count on them. And it’s interesting to see that things aren’t always what they seem. For instance, a Garden Omelet has about 1050 calories, but a Belgian waffle with two eggs and two strips of bacon has only about 790 calories. Who knew?

After breakfast, we went by WalMart and stocked up on ‘stuff’. Funny how we never seem to have enough ‘stuff’.

Leaving WalMart, we stopped off at the Sam’s Club gas station next door, since it was 27 cents a gallon cheaper than we had paid in LA.

Then it was home for the day.

Later in the afternoon, I put up our solar shades to help keep the coach cool, since without any shade here, the AC was really working to keep us cool.

Tomorrow we’re going back into LA to visit the La Brea Tar Pits and then drive around some more.

April 18, 2011

Montezuma and Tuzigoot . . .

Today was our last chance to see some of the other sights in the Verde Valley, so we decided to drive a big loop around the area to see the Indian ruins.

But our first stop after the Post Office to drop the tax forms in the mail, was to have breakfast at the Denny’s in Camp Verde.

Important stuff first.

Then it was on to Montezuma Castle National Monument, featuring some of the best preserved cliff dwellings in North America. Only inhabited from the 1100’s to the 1400’s, they actually have nothing to do with Montezuma, the Aztec leader. The ruins were wrongly attributed to him by the first American settlers to discover the ruins in the 1860’s, as the dwellings were abandoned more than a hundred years before Montezuma was born.

The five-story dwelling had more than 20 rooms and housed about 50 people, and was accessed by tall ladders. This made the dwelling safe from most attacks.

It is unknown why the area was abandoned, but warfare, disease, or drought have been suggested.

About a hundred yards down the cliff are the remains of what is known as Castle A. It was larger and more elaborate than the original, but almost nothing is left of it except the foundation.

While we were sitting on a bench gazing up at the ruins, our daughter Brandi called to say how much she enjoyed the pictures I had posted of Landon from yesterday’s Skype session.

The 1/4 mile walk around the loop and along the river was beautiful and relaxing, and worth the trip just for that.

Our next stop was about 15 miles up the Interstate at the Montezuma Well National Monument.

This hike was a little more work, with a climb of several hundred feet to the top of the ridge.

But it’s well (no pun intended) worth the climb. Walking out on the edge reveals a beautiful blue-green pool almost 400 feet across. The Well was created by the collapse of a limestone cavern eons ago, probably eaten away by the two underground springs that feed almost 1.5 million gallons of water a day into the pool.

And talk about your waterfront condo, there are several cliff dwellings underneath the rim. The Well has been in use for irrigating the surrounding fields since the 8th century.

Here’s my sweetie showing off some of the interestingly gnarled trees growing around the top of the Well.

The tree behind her has really been working hard to grow out of these rocks.

Down the east side of the Well are the remains of a 20 to 30 room pueblo, overlooking the irrigated fields below. Dating from the 1300’s it was probably one of the last major structures built before the area was abandoned.

The beauty of this place certainly makes it worth the trip.

Leaving the Well, we next headed about 20 miles back around on the other side of Cottonwood, to the Tuzigoot National Monument.

But since it was on the way we also stopped by Fry’s to pick up some bread, and also scout their gas station access for getting diesel Wednesday morning before we leave for Show Low. Looks like we should have no problem.

Unlike the cliff dwelling at the Castle and the Well, the Tuzigoot pueblo is visible from a long way off.

After parking and making another long climb of several hundred feet (sightseeing can be hard work), we came on these amazing ruins.

At its peak in the late 1300’s, the pueblo consisted of 86 ground-floor rooms, and possibly 15 second-story rooms, with a population of over 200 people.

But life was hard, and the inhabitants seldom lived past 40. Over 400 graves have been found around the site.

A number of the tools they used have been found in the area, including these stones used to grind corn.

I wonder if a thousand years from now, someone will be excavating our ‘cliff dwellings’, trying to make sense of a Mr. Coffee and an Xbox?

I’m always fascinated with the beauty of the many flowers and shrubs found in the areas we visit. Some of the most striking are actually cactus blooms or fruit.

This is a Banana Yucca, and it’s easy to see why it’s called that.

While I was getting this shot of these Penstemons,

I noticed a visitor sampling some of the flowers. Apparently, these are a hummingbird favorite.

And these are Globemallows, used by the Indians in many medicines and treatments.

This is the Arizona Sycamore, that along with Mimosas, Acacias, and Mesquite, grows in abundance in the area.

We finally got back to the rig a little after 3 pm, and while Jan caught up on some recorded shows, I decided a nap was in order.

For dinner we checked out Crusty’s Pizza over in Camp Verde, and boy, was it good. Much better than Stromboli’s in Cottonwood. In fact, it was almost ‘Da Boyz’ in Yuma good.

And that’s good.

After leaving Crusty’s we walked next door to Basha’s to pick up some groceries before heading back to the rig.

Tomorrow is mostly a ‘get ready to travel’ day, as Wednesday morning we leave for Show Low.

April 18, 2012

So Far, So Good . . .

Monday, April 16th

I was up at 5:30 and opened the gate at 5:45 just to be sure that I was ready to go for the first visitor. We’re really lucky that our first gate job is effectively only a 12hr gate, from about 6am to 6pm.

Jan was up about 7, and after puttering in the rig for a while, came out about 8 and we just enjoyed the view. We’ve got roadrunners, quail, doves, and a lot of other birds that we can’t identify yet, but Jan has her Petersen’s guidebook and is working on it.

Finally, about 12:30pm I headed over to Pearsall, TX, to the closest Wal-Mart to pick up some things, but it turns out that it’s not a SuperCenter, so I had to go to HEB for the groceries.

I was looking for a cheapy AT&T cellphone but no luck. The only place in town that sold cell phones was a Tax Preparation office ?? that was closed.

Bummer!

We still don’t have cell or Internet service out here, which is the only downside to the job site.

I finally got back at 5, and after putting things away, I pulled out our Weber Q Grill to do hot dogs. It’s been a while since we used it, so I was afraid we might be out of propane, but the bottle ran out just as the dogs were done, so it was all good.

More propane goes on the list.

The last truck out left about 6:30, so I locked the gate and we were done for the day.

We only had about 22 vehicles come through today, which was nice.

Tuesday, April 17th

Our first truck didn’t come through until about 6:15, but a little before that, the coyotes woke up and started yipping and howling at each other. Thought they were supposed to howl at the moon, not the sun.

About 10:45am I headed about 50 miles north to Pleasanton, the closest Wal-Mart SuperCenter to check for AT&T phones, and they had what I needed. The two GoPhones were $15 a piece and then you buy time as you need it.

Hopefully, this will work for us.

My next stop was the Verizon store across the street to see where the closest cell tower was to our job site, and how far away it was. I want to see about getting an amplifier so we can use our Verizon cell/Internet service that we already have.

And it looks like it can be done. I’ll have to order it from Amazon tomorrow.

My last stop was China Garden to pick up some more of their great food to take back to the rig for dinner.

And apparently, I’m not the only one who likes their food. It was 1pm and the place was jam-packed. The parking lot was full and I had to park on the edge of the street. And there was a line out the door that I thought was to get in to eat.

No. The line was to either to pick up a call-in order, or place a take-out order. So it took me almost 30 minutes to get my food and get back on the road.

Getting home, I got a Big Bummer. The new AT&T cell phones don’t work. I was told AT&T would work out here but I don’t have a signal.

Now I just hope the amplifier idea will work. We’ll see. As it is, I have to drive about 20 miles one-way to get a signal to post this from my laptop and check our phone messages.

That’s about for today. I’ll try to have some photos tomorrow.

April 18, 2013

See. I Told You So . . .

Things have really sped up for Brandi, Lowell, and Landon on the new home front.

Originally they thought they would have to wait until the end of the year before they could get their house built.

But as it turned out, someone else’s deal for the same model fell through and they were able to take it over early enough so that they could still make the design choices.

And it’s coming right along.

As it stands now they should be able to move in sometime in June.

I’ve been checking the temps in places like Cody, WY, Billings, MT, and Gillette, WY. All places that we plan to be in the next couple of months, and all places that I really hope warm up by the time we get there. Last night the temps there were in the teens and low 20’s.

More Global Warming Please!

Tale of Two Cities Chart

I found this chart on Facebook recently and it settles the question once and for all about what causes gun violence.

Based on the chart, the real cause of gun violence is Cold Weather.

More Global Warming Please!

When  I heard about the explosion in West, TX I knew we’d been through there at some point in our travels and it turns out it was just last summer.

We left our Gate Guarding job in late August and headed north on I-35 on our way to Celina, OH. We stayed just north of there at the Lake Whitney Thousand Trails park our first night on the road. So I’m sure we would have heard and felt the blast.

In fact, according to an online diagram, if we’d been unlucky enough to have been passing through on I-35 at the wrong time, we would been within the blast radius.

Today was a pretty quiet, slow day, and we didn’t do much of anything.

Jan and I headed out for dinner about 4:30 and ended up at an Outback Steakhouse.

And, as I mentioned the other day, we went to a steak house and Jan had CHICKEN. Told ya.

April 18, 2014

Two Weeks from Today . . .

Our son Chris and his wife Linda posted this selfie from the Burnet / Inks Lake area today.

Smile, Chris.

And our niece Christina sent over this photo of her older brother Jason and our daughter Brandi with Santa. We’re pretty sure this was Christmas 1976 when we lived in Montgomery, AL.

Then everybody went and grew up. Here’s Brandi with her husband Lowell.

And here’s Jason with his wife Laura, along with Avery Jane, Ella, and Annisten.

Around 3:30 Jan and I drove down to the Woodland’s to have dinner at Grimaldi’s Pizzeria. On the way we dropped off a prescription at Sam’s Club that we’ll pick up on the way home.

This is the 2nd time we’ve eaten at this Grimaldi’s, as well as the Grimaldi’s in Katy, TX, San Antonio, Tucson, Apache Junction, and probably several others we’ve forgotten. And we also ate at the original one in New York in 2009. And it’s always great.

I’ve already talked about how they duplicate New York City water, and use the same Pennsylvania coal in all their coal-fired pizza ovens. In fact the same guy goes around the country to build the brick ovens in every store.

And it shows in the quality of the pizza.

Unlike many of their shopping center locations, the Woodland’s Grimaldi’s is really picturesque.

One thing to remember at Grimaldi’s is that the small $6 house salad is enough for 2 or 3 people. Jan and I shared one and couldn’t finish it all.

After all, we had to save room for this: A large (18”) with mushrooms, pepperoni, Italian sausage, and meatballs.

Jan and I can only eat half of a large one, so we always have plenty to take home for later. After our meal, we talked to the manager, Keith, and he said this location is the busiest one in the country.

Leaving Grimaldi’s we drove over to a nearby Randall’s to pick up one of their fantastic fresh-baked coconut cream pies. Unfortunately, they didn’t have any, so we got a couple of slices of their Tres Leches, as well as a few other things before heading toward Sam’s. Stopping there, we picked up the prescription as well as a couple of other things, before heading back to the rig.

Passing through the gate, I asked the guard on what site Wednesday night’s shooting took place. She just smiled and said they weren’t able to discuss that.

Oh well.

Our hitch itch needs scratching, so two weeks from today we’ll finally be heading north, planning to be up in Goshen, IN for the 54th Escapade that starts the12th of May, where Jan and I will be giving our Gate Guarding for Fun? and Profit seminar.

See you there.

April 18, 2015

Wrapping Up In Verde Valley . . .

After our morning coffee, we heard from blog reader Judy Hughes who’s parked right down the road at the Camp Verde RV Resort. We wanted to get together, and since we leave tomorrow, and and she leaves Monday, today was the day.

Since it was close to both of us, we decided on La Fonda for lunch at 12 noon.

We had a great time getting to know Judy and hearing about her solo adventures in her Winnebago Brave. In fact, we didn’t leave La Fonda until after 3pm, which seems about normal for RV’ers getting together.

Finally saying our goodbyes and making a date to get together again next week in Las Vegas, Jan and I headed on into Camp Verde to pick up a couple of orders of the Baked Spaghetti from the Crusty’s Pizza. We’ll divide them up and freeze them and then be able to have them later as a meal.

Then it was back into Cottonwood to pick up a couple of breakfast sandwiches at the Jack in the Box. Since we plan on leaving for Las Vegas by 8am, we won’t really have time for a real breakfast, so coffee and these sandwiches will be it.

Getting back to the rig about 5pm I spent some time getting everything ready to go outside. So tomorrow morning I’ll just have to let in the awnings, unhooked shore power, bring up the levelers, and we’ll be ready to go.

While I was putting away the water filter, I opened it up to take a look at the filter cartridge inside to see what it looked like after two weeks.

It started like this.

And now looks like this.

Not too bad, I guess, and the water definitely tastes better than with the old little one.

Tomorrow we’ve got a 305 mile trip over to the Las Vegas Thousand Trails where we’ll be for another two weeks before coming back here.

April 18, 2016

Right Story, Wrong Company . . .

Well, it looks like that even when I’m wrong, sometimes I’m right.

After the recent hoax about the guy who supposedly erased over 1500 of his client’s websites, this past Friday it came true for real.

A London, England webhosting company, 123-reg.com was running a maintenance script that went rogue, (sound familiar?) and managed to delete (123 says hundreds, other sources say thousands, or tens of thousands) of customer’s websites. They actually host over 800,000 sites, so it’s hard to tell.

You can read about it here – 123-reg.com problems and check out the 123-req Twitter feed about it here.

As far as the original story, it turned out to be viral marketing hoax by someone who posted the story online to get publicity.

Well, the rains finally showed up – with a vengeance. The Houston area got over 17 inches of rain in the past 24 hours, with 6 people confirmed dead,  mostly it seems, from driving into high water in underpasses and never coming back out.

Here are a few online shots.

In the above photo, those couple of dark lumps in the center left of the photo are car roofs.

Of course the Houston area is no stranger to heavy rains. In July 1979, Alvin, TX, about 30 miles south of Houston, received over 43 inches of rain in a 24 hour period. And 37 years later, it still holds the record as the most 24 hour rainfall in US history. And with Alvin only about 9 miles away, we saw our share of rain in Friendswood.

We had just moved to Houston from Montgomery, AL the previous December so I could go to work at Johnson Space Center on the Space Shuttle project. Our kids, Chris, 12, and Brandi, almost 6, were spending the summer with Jan’s parents down in Titusville, FL, while Jan and I had just moved into our brand-new house a week or so earlier.

I was working the night shift at JSC, but found I could not leave the subdivision to get to work. And when I called to tell them that I wouldn’t be coming in, they said no problem, cause they couldn’t leave.

So Jan and I spent the night watching the water flood the street in front of the house, come up over the curb, and then creep up the yard, finally stopping only about 5 feet from the house, and only about 6 inches below floor level.

Locally here at the Lake Conroe Thousand Trails, I don’t think there were any flooding problems, except to the dock area. But at our other home, the Colorado River Thousand Trails, it was a whole ‘nuther story.

I talked to Marty, the head guy there, this afternoon, and he said they had closed down and turned off power in the ‘C’ & ‘D’ sections near the Colorado river. But that wasn’t all.

Here’s what the bridge looked like back in December 2015, when we were there during the last heavy rains.

But today, Marty said the water was over 4 feet deep here this time, and the railings had been severely damaged, and even ripped away in places.

Glad we weren’t there, but then we don’t know if we’ll be able to get in there this coming Sunday when we’re supposed to head that way. Marty said to call Saturday to check things out.

For dinner tonight, we scratched our Whataburger itch, with double-meat Whataburger Jr’s. Then it was on to the Kroger’s right next door for a few things, and then home.

Unfortunately, the weather people are saying we’re going to get more rain tomorrow, but supposedly, and hopefully, not as much as today.

April 18, 2017

On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five . . .

Two hundred forty-two years ago, Paul Revere, along with William Dawes, Israel Bissell, and Samuel Prescott, and a week later, Sybil Ludington, headed out across Massachusetts to warn the colonists that the British troops were on the move.

And contrary to popular lore, he did not ride along shouting, “The British Are Coming”. First off it wouldn’t have made much sense because at that time everybody was British. Plus Paul Revere and others were riding in secret so they wouldn’t be stopped by the British troops.

Dispatched by Joseph Warren, a physician and early leader in American Patriot organizations at the beginning of the American Revolution, he used four riders to ensure that at least one would get through to warn Samuel Adams and John Hancock that the British troops were coming to arrest them.

And ironically, Revere didn’t even complete the ride but was arrested by the British between Lexington and Concord, a total ride of about 18 miles.

Although the facts of her ride are blurry, Sybil Ludington supposedly outdid them all, when two years later, she rode over 40 miles in the rain to warn militiamen that the British troops were on their way to attack the Continental Army’s supply depot at Danbury, CT.

And she was only 16 years old.

A little after 1pm I turned off all the rig stuff, and then went outside and killed shore power to the coach so I could install the new transfer switch. After I removed the old one, I moved the grommets that protect the wires entering the box to the new one.

One thing nice was that even though it was an 85° day, we still had the front AC to keep things cool since it’s running separately on my AC bypass.

It only took me about 10 minutes to get the new one in, and up and running. So no more popsicle sticks.

Next, I was back under the front of the rig to mount the new exhaust pipe on my generator and it turned out to be pretty easy, everything just sliding together.

While I was under there I noticed a missing hanger strap that should be supporting the pipe, so it’s something else to fix.

Getting out from under the generator, I looked at what I had.

It was a little long, which I expected. So now I marked it with a Sharpie and then cut it to the correct length, ending up with this.

It actually sticks out a little more, but the bin door is partially open because the satellite cables come out from there. I may look into getting a chrome exhaust tip to put on the end.

About 4:30 Jan and I head down to Sunset Dr. in Henderson for another run at Buffalo Wild Wings, Tuesday being their Half Price Wings Day. And this time I managed to get a photo before we dug in.

Once again I went with the Mango Habanero while Jan stayed with the Bourbon Honey Mustard sauce.

Finally heading back to the rig I made a stop at an O’Reilly Auto Parts and found an exhaust hanger strap that should fit the bill. But no luck with an exhaust tip that would fit.

Wrapping up, as I was going over tax stuff today, I found this noticed on one of the IRS forms.

Really glad to know this ahead of time. Otherwise, I might have gotten in trouble.

April 18, 2018

On The eighteenth of April,

in Seventy-five;
Hardly a man is still alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.

Work today was another dip into the repair pool again with a dead machine. In this case, it was completely dead. It didn’t even turn on.

In many cases, dead units like this are often easier to repair than something intermittent, or just not working right. So the first thing you check is for a blown fuse. In this case, the fuse is contained within the AC power cord receptacle.

Normally there is a fuse and a spare one inside the little door on the receptacle, but on this one, there are two fuses, one in the hot leg and one in the neutral leg. Usually, there is just one fuse in the hot leg.

But since this unit is wired to also work on 220vac, controlled by a small switch on the rear panel, it has to be wired with a fuse in both legs. And in this case, both 1 amp fuses were blown. Not a good sign.

But that was where it all stopped because we didn’t have any spare fuses. So I’ll pick some up tomorrow and we’ll give it a try again Friday.

Some follow-up on our trip up to Baytown yesterday. The client has a really nice area along the side of a lake.

And even a nice pond.

But the pièce de résistance is his garage.

And this is not even all of it. I couldn’t get far enough back. On the right is his Monaco Dynasty RV, and on the left is a big Harley and a large ATV. And the whole place is covered in antiques, curios, and memorabilia.

Really neat!

We had several comments about our trip over the Fred Hartman Bridge yesterday, with questions about the old Baytown Tunnel it replaced. The Tunnel opened in 1953 and had already exceeded its designed traffic capacity by the 1970’s. So it was ripe for replacement.

But it was another 25 years, 1995, before the new bridge opened. And just in time too, since the Houston Ship Channel needed to be made wider and deeper. But the deeper part was a problem because the tunnel was in the way.

So in early 1997 they started digging it up, finishing in late 1997.

Wrapping up, so I didn’t get a single comment about this in yesterday’s blog?

And besides Wayne, the film also starred Jim Hutton and my former next-door neighbor, Katherine Ross.

April 18, 2019

I’m 0 for 2 . . .

I spent most of this morning on the phone with success in some things and not much in others.

While I was doing that, Jan was going through our DirecTV DVR deleting stuff to be sure that we have enough room to record all the shows that will wrap up their seasons, and in some cases, the series (Big Bang Theory), while we’re gone.

My first call was to first one and then the other, of my two banks. Though both had notaries and witnesses available, neither one will do wills. They both said that their ‘bonds’ don’t allow it.

So when I Googled ‘Notaries in Webster, TX’,  one the places that came up was the trophy place right next door to my IT client. But when I called, she was out of town and probably won’t be back until this weekend. But they didn’t think she’d have a problem doing our wills.

But my backup is the local UPS store, where Jennifer, our office manager, said her husband had his will signed. So I guess we’ll see on Tuesday.

Last night I logged into Houston’s EZ-Tag Toll Pass website to temporarily add our rental car to our account. And it seemed to go fine, and I got an email acknowledging the addition.

Until I checked back this morning, and the car was missing. So I called them to look into it. And was told that the problem was that our rental car had 100’s of dollars of toll violations listed for the license plate.

But after a little back and forth, the young lady over-rode the system and manually entered the car and it now showed up on our account. But then I noticed another problem.

Our RV’s EZ-Tag was showing up as ‘Inactive’, and not ‘Active’ like our truck. So I sicced her on this problem. Turns that someone (not me) came into my account on 2 April 2018 and inactivated the rig’s tag.

So my question was, why didn’t anything show up when we’ve used the rig on the toll roads since then.  We used the toll road in both June and July 2018 , then again twice in October. And of course, our trip up to Kingsland a couple of weeks ago.

So it looks like I got some free tolls.

Next up I called Enterprise to let them know about the toll violations on that tag, and also to ask them what the WiFi password was for the car. According to the dashboard display, it has a 4G signal and a WiFi signal available, but when I checked the WiFi settings on the display, it showed the WiFi password as just  **********.

But they said they had no idea about it or if it even worked, or could be used. So it was time to ask Google. And, as usual, Google knew.

Turns out that the password can be accessed from the OnStar function. Why there, I don’t know. But when I went to the WiFi settings there it showed me the password. And it did work and flowed data.

Today I also took care of setting up my quintuple backup system for the photos of our upcoming Europe trip. I ordered two 128GB USB3.0 Flash Drives for that purpose.

My idea is that first I will have the photos stored on my Samsung phone and my Panasonic Lumix camera. Then every night I will upload the day’s photos to my Asus laptop. Finally, I will save it all off onto the two flash drives, one for Jan to keep with her, and one for me to keep.

In addition, if the ship’s WiFi is good enough (doubtful??) I will also upload stuff to the cloud. But I’m not counting on that.

Looks like I’m 0 for 2 on rig repairs. First, the continuing saga of my engine oil leak, and now my recent supposed-windshield leak repair.

I was looking forward to this morning’s forecasted rain, but when it came I found I still had my leak, though somewhat less. So I’ll have to look at it again, A.C. (After Cruise).

Tomorrow we’re taking in another Alvin Opry show, this time at the American Legion Hall, with a larger venue,  much better parking, and one of our favorite performers, John Mark Davis.

So, since we won’t be home until around 11pm, there probably be a short blog tomorrow.

April 18, 2021

It’s A Flamboyance . . .

With the weather better than yesterday’s rainy overcast, I went outside, determined to finish up Jan’s patio area. So, of course, Jan had to come outside to supervise, I.e. watch, to be sure that everything was being done to her satisfaction.

One thing Jan had wanted for a while was to put out all of the flamingos that she’s collected over the years of our travels. So while she was house/pet sitting for Brandi a few weeks ago, I set them out around our oak tree, and added a couple of new ones  for her.

But as soon as I saw it I thought it looked kind of ‘blah’, and needed some pizazz, something to make it pop.

So this was the next step.

And then over the last couple of days, I ended up with this today.

So once it was repopulated, Jan finally had her Flamboyance.

You know, how it’s a Parliament of Owls, a Murder of Crows, a Murmuration of Starlings, and a Pitying of Turtledoves?

Well, it’s a Flamboyance of Flamingos.

So of course we had to christen the area by doing hot dogs and sausages on our new George Foreman Grill.

And with this, Jan’s patio area is pretty much finished up.

Now to enjoy it all this summer.

April 18, 2022

On The 18th Of April in ‘75 . . .

Hardly A Man Is Now Alive.

Two things of note that happened today. One was that I stopped off at Due’s RV on my way to work this morning and picked up a new latch for our shower door. The latch itself is cast aluminum, which doesn’t rust. But there is a steel spring inside the handle, the part that’s inside the shower, that only lasts about 5 years or so before it rusts out, and the latch doesn’t latch anymore.

Then getting home this afternoon I had it changed out in about 5 minutes. With Jan’s help, of course.

The second one, and the best one, was that while we were defrosting the freezer this past weekend, we discovered a large bag of Jan’s World-Famous Chili tucked away. So it was a delicious supper tonight.

Yumm!

April 18, 2023

The Girls Are Fine!

SpaceX Update!

SpaceX has said that their next Starship Heavy launch attempt is now scheduled for this Thursday, April 20th, starting at 8:28am CDT.

Jan had her yearly mammogram/ultrasound this afternoon, and got a clean bill of health.

So The Girls Are Fine!

And Jan wants to remind you, Do Not Skip Your Yearly Mammogram!

Since she spent her entire career in the medical field, she always got one every year. But after she retired in 2007 and we started RV’ing, by the time 2014 came around, she kind of thought about skipping it that year since she’d never had any problems. But then at the last minute, she decided to get it done.

And that was the year they found a lump.

But they found it so early that it was a Stage 0 carcinoma, and a simple outpatient lumpectomy took care of it. No chemo, no radiation. Just a few stitches and she was done.

Even today she said she still shivers when she thinks about what would have happened if she had actually skipped that year, giving the cancer another year to grow.

Tomorrow Jan has her follow-up with her oncologist, which should just be a formality since her mammogram today came back clean.

Lunch today was at Torchy’s Tacos once again, after her Mammogram, so not until about 2:30pm. Jan said she was just too nervous to eat beforehand.

Jan got her usual Chicken Fajita Taco’s,

while I got my usual,

The Brushfire, with Jamaican Jerked Chicken, and the Cheese Jalapeno Sausage.

One thing we always laugh about is how my sausage has shrunk over the last six years.

Note how the one from today just barely reaches the edge of the tortilla.

Then here’s the one from 2016.

Quite a difference.

When we were last at Torchy’s a couple of weeks ago, I noted they now had these Table-Trackers

that lets them bring your food directly to your table, rather than wandering around the restaurant looking for the hanging tag on your table. Now that I knew how they operated, I checked under the table and found the RFID coils glued to the underside, covering the surface.

Each one is about the size of 3’ x 5’ file card and gives off a code that corresponds to a particular table.

This way only the Table-Tracker itself has to be powered.

Neat!

We’re possibly related.

Yeah, I know. It scares the hell out of me too.

But only if you have blue eyes.

Every blue eyed person on the planet is a descendant of one single person

Every blue eyed person is descended from a single European who lived around 6,000 to 10,000 years ago, according to scientists.

Luckily, since Jan has green eyes, we’re not related.

Maybe?

Though since we both have ancestors from the Virginia/West Virginia area over the last few hundred years, it’s still possible, I guess.