Our RV Adventures

After our coffee this morning, Jan and I walked over to the Market Building to look around some more. Then since it was getting close to lunch time, and Jan wanted to eat before the 11:30 seminar she was going to, we decided to have quesadillas from the food truck parked in front of the building, so Jan had a plain cheese one and I had a really good Chicken and Bacon one.

Jan’s 11:30 seminar was Nick Russell’s “The Fugal RV’er”, and was so popular that they ran out of seats and had to open up the sides of the room to allow for more people.

I  would have gone too, but I was working on my own seminar, “Gate Guarding for Fun? and Profit” that will be held Wednesday at 11:30am in Old Pueblo Hall’s Seminar Room 1. I haven’t given this seminar since Nick’s Celina rally in September of 2012. And we’ve gate guarded twice more since them, and learned a lot more, too.

Jan came back to the rig for a while before heading back over to her next seminar, another of Nick’s. This one was his very popular, “Highway History and Backroad Mystery”. And Jan said this one was very well attended too. Nick always does a great job on these, and he’s still got three more to go, so check’em out. You won’t be disappointed.

When Jan got back about 2:30, we headed out on some errands, dropping a big bag of trash off as we left the fairgrounds. Sure hope they empty the dumpsters soon because the one we used was brimming over with trash.

Our main chore was to get the truck washed. We got it washed a day or so before we left Houston, but with about a thousand miles since we left, and a lot of rain and mud along the way, a wash was really needed.

The place we used, Octopus Car Wash, did a really nice job, especially the wheels and the fender wells, places a lot of places don’t do very well.

Coming back toward the park, we stopped off at the new Dunkin’ Donuts to pick up a couple of dozen Munchkins (holes) to have for breakfast with our coffee over the next week or so

Getting back to the rig, I carried the shower bucket over to a nearby bathroom to empty it. A shower bucket is a kitty litter bucket we keep in the shower when we’re boondocking like this with no sewer connection. You’d be surprised how much water runs down the drain just waiting for the water to get warm in the shower. So we run it into the bucket until it’s warm, and then every 3 or 4 days I dump it out. Works for us, and keeps our grey water tank from filling up so fast.

A little after 5pm we drove over to Nick and Terry’s to pick them up for dinner up at Brushfire BBQ. We’ve really liked this place in the past, but for some reason it just didn’t click with any of us tonight.

It wasn’t  bad, it just wasn’t as good as we remembered. Or maybe we just remembered it better than it really was.

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Thought for the Day:

“The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?” — David Sarnoff’s associates in response to his urgings for investment in the radio in the 1920s.

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Today was the first ‘real’ day of the Escapade. Thursday (when we arrived) and Friday are considered ‘Early Bird’ days for those who want to come in a couple of days ahead.

It was also the first day that the vendors were open, so about 10am Jan and I walked over to Old Pueblo Hall to check things out. They have coffee and donuts available, and lucky for us, we got the last two donuts from Dennis Hill. Then we spent some time walking around the Market, checking out the new stuff and saying ‘Hi’ to a lot of old friends, most of whom are from the days of Nick Russell’s late, lamented Gypsy Gathering Rallies over the years.

A little later I walked over to the other side of the building to check out the facilities of the room where Jan and I will be giving our Gate Guarding Seminar this coming Wednesday at 11:30. Later we came back to the rig and Jan heated up last night’s Luckie’s Thai leftovers. Still delicious.

While Jan read, I went back over to the hall about 1pm for the Seminar Presenter’s Meeting so that all of us could get familiar with the equipment we’ll be using, like the sound system, wireless mics, and the video projector. Looks pretty much the same as what I used for Nick’s rally’s so it shouldn’t be a problem.

About 3pm Jan and I walked over to Thurber Hall for the Escapade Opening Ceremonies.

There are almost 900 RV’s here, so we probably had 1600 – 1700 people there, a pretty good size crowd. The first thing they did was to draw tickets for the 4 $200 door prizes to open the show. And No, Jan and I didn’t win.

Later, after the ceremony was over, we connected up with Bob Parker and Donna Huffer, as well as Nick and Terry, and we all headed in toward Tucson for have dinner at the Silver Saddle Steakhouse, one of our favorite local places.

They grill their steaks right in front of you, on a open pit, my favorite way of doing a steak.

But one thing that has always disappointed me about the place is the lack of a Ribeye on the menu. I don’t think I’ve ever seen another steak place that didn’t serve a Ribeye. But tonight we were in luck.

They had a 17 oz. Bone-In Ribeye on special, and boy, was it good.

Tomorrow starts the first day of seminars so Jan and I will be checking out the many choices. Really looking forward to it.

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Thought for the Day:

“I don’t know what use any one could find for a machine that would make copies of documents. It certainly couldn’t be a feasible business by itself.” — the head of IBM, refusing to back the idea, forcing the inventor to found Xerox.

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