Our RV Adventures

Jan and I had lunch at Floyd’s Cajun Seafood for the first time in a good while. And although it was delicious, it was also kind of a comedy of errors.

Jan ordered her usual Side Salad, as well as Grilled Catfish along with the Grilled Veggies.

But as you can see, the catfish came Fried, not Grilled. Plus a large part of the Grilled Veggies was three big slices of Bell Pepper, which Jan doesn’t like. The Veggies have never had Bell Peppers in them before.

I started out with their version of the Wedge Salad, which along with Jan’s Side Salad, turned out to be the only correct orders we got.

And I told Jan it was probably the best Wedge Salad I’ve ever had. Really good.

Then, I had a bowl of their Shrimp Gumbo, or at least that’s what I ordered.

What I got was Seafood Gumbo instead.

Note the filé I asked for to add to the Roux.

The reason I like the Shrimp version better than the Seafood, is that all they added to make it Seafood is Crab Meat.

And a lot less Shrimp.

Now if they also added Oysters, it would be a different story.

Then, about the time I wanted a refill on my iced tea, Robby, our waiter, disappeared.

And didn’t show up for almost 20 minutes until we finally had to ask another waiter to find Robby so we could get our check.

And I never got my tea refill.

Then it was on over to Costco for a few things. I was happy to find that the La Crosse Weather Station I bought here a couple of weeks ago was now $20 more.

Several of our readers have asked about YouTubeTV that we use for streaming TV programs.

From 1998 until August 2020, we used DirecTV for our satellite TV service, first at our home, and then starting in 2008, in our RV. We started out using a Winegard foldup dish like this one.

This lasted until July 2011 when the plastic base finally wore out and started coming apart.

So I replace it with a Winegard Carryout like this.

The real advantage to this one was that it aimed itself. I would put it out when we got parked, and usually by the time I got back inside, I would have a picture on our TV.

The only disadvantage was that the Carryout could only receive SD (Standard Definition) video, and not HD (High Definition). Plus there was even talk of DTV discontinuing SD altogether.

This lasted until August 2020 when I finally got fed up with with DirecTV’s regular, excessive rate increases, and cancelled our service. It wasn’t my fault they were constantly losing money.

I had purchased an Amazon Firestick and we started using it to stream all our TV through it. Turns out the free WiFi here at the park is fine for streaming HD, and since they upgraded it a few months ago, we can stream 4K as well, though we don’t normally since it costs extra.

And though I can definitely tell the difference between SD and HD, it’s kind of toss-up between HD and 4K. The difference seems to have a lot to do with the program content.

But after I had switched over to streaming, I had to find a streaming service so we could watch live TV as well DVR programs. And after looking at the six possible choices,

Sling TV
DIRECTV STREAM
YouTube TV
Hulu with live TV
Philo
fuboTV

and after checking them all out, I chose YouTubeTV. At $70 a month, less than half of DTV latest price.

In addition to the 85 channels, including the local ones, it has unlimited DVR’ing of programs. Not only is that unlimited, you can also record as many programs at one time as you want. The only downside is that your recorded programs are only saved for 9 months. But we haven’t found that a problem.

The other neat thing is that if you tell YouTubeTV to start recording something like Law & Order, you will find all 20+ seasons of the program available to you.

To get YouTubeTV you just download the app to your SmartTV, Roku, Fire TV, or as in my case, a Firestick.

The Firestick is a small module about the size of a large pack of gum, and just plugs into your TV.

After we settled on YouTubeTV, we started adding additional streaming services, like AppleTV, Paramount+, Curiousity Stream, Discovery+, AcornTV, Peacock, and Disney+, all of which cost $5 or $6 a month. And then there are a bunch of other free streaming channels, like Crackle, Tubi, Vudu, PlutoTV, plain old YouTube, and a number of others. And even with all these, our cost is only about 60% of what we were paying DTV.

You just have to download the apps to your TV.

If anyone has any more questions, just leave me a comment.

Thought For The Day:

“The easiest job in the world has to be coroner. Surgery on dead people. What’s the worst thing that could happen?

If everything went wrong, maybe you’d get a pulse.” — Dennis Miller

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In last night’s blog I talked about how the list of the 18 oldest restaurants in the US started all sorts of arguments about restaurants some people thought were older. Of course that’s not the only thing people argue about.

Point in fact:
Aggies or Longhorns
Alabama or Auburn

and important to Texans –
Beans or No Beans

Personally I think it’s probably what you grew up eating. In my case, in Alabama, chili had beans in it. If it didn’t have beans in it, it wasn’t really chili, more like hot dog chili.

Chili is supposed to have beans. It says it right there on the can – Chili Beans. Where else would you put them?

Why is there any confusion?

Another example is that in some places in Louisiana when you order a bowl of gumbo, it comes with a scoop of potato salad that you’re suppose to plop in the middle of the gumbo. Other areas never heard of this.

On the subject of chili again, in the Cincinnati area another argument is Skyline or Gold Star. Though not chili in the Texas way, it’s really popular in Oho, Indiana, Kentucky, and even Florida. Skyline Chili has been around since 1949, a few years before Gold Star. And with over 160 locations, it’s the larger of the two chains.

The biggest difference with Cincinnati chili is that it has chocolate in it, not a lot, but just enough to have to give it that special taste.

The other difference is that Cincinnati chili is normally served over spaghetti, like this.

Cincinnati chili is rated in ‘Ways’. Above is Chili 5 Ways.
Spaghetti
Cincinnati Chili
Cheese
Beans
Onions

While Chili 3 Ways is:
Spaghetti
Cincinnati Chili
Cheese

And 4 Ways is with either Beans or Onions.

There is the fabled ‘6 Ways’ that’s kind of undefined. It could be sausage or cut-up hot dogs on top, or anything else you might want.

If you want to check it out for yourself, Kroger sells cans of Skyline Chili.

I mentioned the two new additions to Jan’s Flamingo Flamboyance, and we finally got them put in place the other day.

They’re the two big red ones in front.

And I think that’s about it. There’s almost no room to put any more.

Thought For The Day:

Imagine, if you will, a vaccine so safe you have to be threatened to take it.

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