Our RV Adventures

A week or so ago, while we were still on the gate, our Mr. Coffee didn’t want to make coffee one morning, not something you particularly like in a coffee maker.

The problem was that it heated up OK, and then water started coming out of the spout onto the coffee grounds. But after a few minutes the water just stopped flowing. You could hear it still bubbling in the heating unit it boiled away and the until beeped to signal it was finished making coffee. To finish it up manually , I heated up water in the microwave and poured it directly on the grounds. So at least we had coffee.

Later in the afternoon, I took the Mr. Coffee outside to flush it out with the hose, figuring it was stopped up somehow. And in washing it out, I did find some coffee grounds in the bottom of the reservoir. I’m not sure how they got there, but I was hoping that it would fix the problem.

And it did for a few days.

At least until yesterday morning when the problem reoccurred. And again I finished up our coffee by pouring in microwaved hot water. But with our leaving at 1pm and not getting home until after 9pm last night, I forgot about the problem until this morning.

Not wanting to put up with this again, and desperate for coffee, I decided to take the thing apart and either fix it or trash it. And ‘trash it’ is what Jan wanted to do with it. “Just buy a new one.” is what she said. But I’m cheap.

You do remember I’m cheap, right?

Anyway we just bought this one back in July, and I wasn’t ready to give up on it yet. So getting out my screwdriver set, I tore into it.

First off I removed the spout after taking out one screw.

I disassembled the tube and the spout , but found no blockage there. So turning the unit upside down, I took out the six small screws, including the two hidden under the removable rubber feet., something you see a lot in equipment.

Note I’m once again using my trusty WORX Power Screw Driver.

Opening it up I found the heating unit and the associated plumbing.

The first thing I noticed was some sort of blockage in the lower tube.

At first I thought it was a clump of grounds doing the blocking, but when I looked closer,

I found it was something mechanical. So I removed the tube and tried to blow through it, finding nothing would go through in either direction. Probably not the way it’s supposed to work.

Using a screwdriver I pushed the object out and found this.

Getting a closer look, I saw it was a check valve of some sort. Perusing the layout of the unit I figured out that the water pressure in the reservoir pushes the water down past the check valve where it is heated up and pushed up the tube leading to the spout. The check valve keeps the heated water from being pushed back into the reservoir, only letting it go up the spout..

But since I wasn’t able to blow through the tube from either direction, it was obviously stopped up, and cleaning it out, I did find a small bit of coffee grounds in it.

Hoping this was the problem, I put everything back together and crossed my fingers. And a few minutes later I had this.

Ahhhh! Coffee.

About 3pm Jan and I headed out for a late lunch and some shopping. I wanted to stop back by the Convenience RV Store to pick up the bulbs and the latches I ordered yesterday. We had also decided to eat at the adjoining Fish Pond Restaurant while we were there. We’ve eaten here twice before and always enjoyed it, and it was no different this time.

Jan had the ‘small’ Catfish Platter.

and I had the Grilled Chicken Club Sandwich.

What I want to know is if that’s the ‘small’ platter, how big is the big one?

My Grilled Chicken sandwich was maybe one of the best chicken sandwiches I’ve ever had, possibly because it also had grilled onions on it, not a usual ingredient on a Club sandwich. We both also had a small salad with our meal, made even better with their delicious homemade dressings.

After our great meal, and picking up my parts, we headed back down I-45 to the Kroger’s in Willis to pick up a few things before finally heading home for the night.

Another nice, non-gate day.

Wrapping up, I have a favor to ask of our readers around the country.  Our daughter Brandi received this email from Landon’s Kindergarten teacher. Boiling this all down, his teacher would like people to send picture postcards from around the country reporting a Gingerbread Man sighting.

I would really appreciate your help with this project. Thanks.

Gingerbread Express

In early December, our Kindergarten class will have a Gingerbread Man unit. We will do a variety of activities with this unit. We will read and compare the various versions of the stories. We will sequence the story. We will follow directions to create a Gingerbread Man for decoration. We will graph, measure, and describe our gingerbread men. These are just a few of the activities. J

I would like to teach a bit about geography during this unit. THIS IS WHERE I COULD USE YOUR HELP! I will be reading The Gingerbread Man in class. I will have a Gingerbread Man in our classroom at that time. When the children go to specials, I will remove the Gingerbread Man from the classroom and tell the students that he ran away.

Hopefully, with your cooperation, we will begin receiving postcards from all over the world telling about sightings of the Gingerbread Man. We will then track them on a map to see where the Gingerbread Man has been. At the end of the unit, our Gingerbread Man will return and the students will make and decorate their own Gingerbread Man to take home.

Here’s how you can help. Contact relatives or friends living outside of Houston. (Hopefully with email, this will be easier!) Ask them to send a picture postcard telling about a sighting of the Gingerbread Man. We will track the postcards on our map as they get mailed in until Friday, December 11^th 2015.

Mail Postcards to:

Traci Blocker
Keiko Davidson Elementary
26906 Pine Mill Ranch Drive
Katy, Texas 77494

I know that this will be an exciting and educational adventure for our class! Thanks for your participation.

Working Together
The Kindergarten Team

PS. This is a secret, so SSSHHHH…don’t tell your Kindergartner about it!

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Thought for the Day:

Men are like steel; when they lose their temper, they lose their strength. –— Chuck Norris

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