Daily Archives: November 13, 2022
Huddle Up . . .
For Two Reasons.
Though it got up to 82° on Friday, that night it went down to 42. And the last two days it never even made it to 60. And we’re looking at low 40’s at night for at least the next week or so. So it was finally time to deploy both of our space heaters and turn on our heated mattress pad for the first time this season.
BRRR!
And lunch today was at Texas Huddle once again, though we didn’t have Juana, our usual server, since she was working the patio area. And though we like her a lot, it was not enough to sit out in the open patio, even with a bunch of those big propane heaters scattered around.
Jan got her usual Cheddar Mushroom Burger with a side salad, the Keto version with no bun.
But I went a little different this time with 10 wings, half Flaming Raspberry and half Mango Habanero, their 3rd and 5th hottest sauces.
But I did want to try their hottest, Flamethrower, which is what is in the small container at the very bottom. It was hot, but not as hot as the Blazin’ sauce at Buffalo Wild Wings.
And I wasn’t a big fan of how it actually tasted. Just kind of strange.
The past Friday a string of dump trucks started bringing a lot of fill dirt for the new area of the park.
Turns out that due to new flood plain regulations, the entire new part of the park has to be raised about 2’, which explains why the new garage is built up so high.
So I guess there’s going to be a ramp up from the street into the park, and a retaining wall between us and the new part.
What’s funny about this is that none of this area flooded even during Hurricane Harvey back in 2017. In fact as far as anyone remembers, it’s never flooded in this area.
Jan and I watched A Christmas Story for the first time this season, and probably not the last. But Jan and I both agreed that something’s changed with narrator’s voice. Parts of it sounded OK, but other sections just sound funny. Like maybe they had to redub part of it with another actor.
And for a little bit of trivia, Bob Clark, the director, only got to make A Christmas Story because his previous film, Porky’s was such a big success. So without Porky’s there probably would be no Christmas Story, since every studio had turned it down.
Also Bob Clark is in the movie as Swede, the neighbor who’s out on the street looking at the leg lamp with Ralphie’s father.
And Jean Shepherd, the writer/narrator, is in the movie as the man who points Ralphie to the end of the line in the toy store.
On that note, WalMart will be happy to sell you your own personal Red Ryder Carbine BB Gun, complete with a compass in the stock. But WalMart’s version is better, because, according to the movie, Ralphie’s model only held 200 shots, while this one holds 650.
Thought For The Day:
You’ll Shoot Your Eye Out!
November 13, 2009
It sure was Friday the 13th…
Today was not a good day, travelwise that is.
It started out pretty good, though. We pulled out of the Turkey Creek RV Park in Branson right on time at 10 am, heading for Memphis about 265 miles away.
But things went down hill fast after that. Less than a mile from the park, we encountered a steep climbing right-hand turn. I was only going about 25 mph, I mean, I was still in 3rd. The problem was that, although the turn was to the right, the road actually was banked to the left, because another road came in from the left at an angle.
As I went around the corner, this caused the coach to rock pretty far over to the left for a few seconds. And of course a lot of stuff came loose and went sliding over that way as well. What we didn’t realize was that this caused the slide to lift up from the floor slightly, just about time that one of the cat food bowls went sliding under it. And then the slide came back down, trapping the bowl underneath it.
But we didn’t know this at the time. We had other problems.
The road I had chosen (Well, the GPS had chosen…) turned out to be much more hilly than I had expected. The GPS can show you curves, but not hills. So as soon as I could find a place to pull over, I tried to find a new route.
I found another way to go that was about 40 miles longer, but didn’t appear as curvy as the original route. Luckily we had only come about 8 miles, so it wasn’t a big deal to turn around. And 30 minutes later we were passing back in front of the RV park going in the opposite direction.
Well, the new route was a little less curvy, but turned out to be just as hilly. The only real plus was that the road was better, even 4 lane in places.
But because of all the hills and curves, it was still slow going. Finally about noon we stopped for a bathroom break. Walking back thru the coach I notice that the slide was tilted back off the floor about two inches. A little hands and knees inspection reveal the culprit…the aforementioned cat food bowl.
And boy was it wedged in tight. After moving the slide in and out slightly didn’t help, Jan as finally able to break the bowl with a basin wrench. Thinking ahead, I had positioned a thick book under the slide so we could clean out the broken glass before letting the slide all the way down.
But now the book was stuck. And nothing we tried would free it. This was starting to look like an Abbott and Costello routine.
What I need was a pry bar of some sort to give me enough leverage to lift the slide slightly to free the book and then move the slide out, letting it come off the pry bar. But I just didn’t haven’t anything that big.
After spending about a hour fooling with this, we decided to wait and try to fix it when we got to Memphis…actually West Memphis, AR.
We finally pulled into the Tom Sawyer RV park about 2 hours late, after dark, in fact. After we got hooked up, I unhitched the truck and drove about 10 miles over the river to a Home Depot in Memphis and bought a 3 ft. long piece of 3/4 inch galvanized pipe.
Getting back to the rig, it took about 10 seconds to free the book and set the slide back in place. And all it needed was the right tool…a honkin’ big piece of steel pipe.
The slide still works just fine, so hopefully no harm done.
And hopefully, tomorrow will be a better day…
November 13, 2010
Friday Night at the Opry . .
As I posted early this morning, we didn’t get back from the Opry until almost 1 am, so this post is a combination of Friday and today.
We started out Friday morning with a walk around the park before coming back to the rig to get ready to head out.
Jan and Brandi were going to have a Girl’s Day Out while Landon is in Day Care. Brandi starts back to work this coming Monday after her 3 month maternity leave and she’s had Landon in day care for a few hours each day to get him used to it.
I think it’s really more to get her used to being away from him.
While Jan and Brandi were having fun, I got to work on the toilet.
I had two tasks in mind. First I wanted to work on the the seals so that the bowl will hold water again, and second, I wanted to work on the mount some more.
Well, one out of two ain’t bad.
I disassembled the bowl from the base and clean the ball and all the rubber seals. Finally I used a tip I saw on RV.Net a while back. Someone had suggested using plumber’s grease. Plumber’s grease is 100% silicone grease, the consistency of Vaseline. It’s waterproof, non-toxic, and unlike Vaseline, it will not harm the rubber seals. I coated all the seals, the mating surfaces, and the ball with the grease.
Then it was on to the second problem. This toilet is pretty new. I replaced it while we were out in Las Vegas this past March.
Thinking the easiest thing to do would be to replace the old one with a new one of the same type. Wrong!
Although the toilet itself is the same, they changed the mounting holes on the base. The original base had 4 mounting bolts, two on the front and two on the back.
The new one has only two mounting bolts, one on each side. I got a new flange that fit over the old one and provided the correct mounting holes, but it also raised the mount up about 3/8 inch. This made it hard to get the toilet seated correctly so it wouldn’t rock. I’ve tried using different types of shims, but the construction of the toilet base makes it hard to get the shims to fit.
After fooling with it for about an hour I made it better, but it’s still not perfect. I have an idea on how to fix it, but it’s going to take some more work, and I ran out of time today.
But the good news is, that after remounting the toilet, it now holds water just fine.
After taking a shower I picked up Jan at Brandi’s about 4:30. I did get some Landon time of my own, feeding him a bottle. By the time he was finished, he was falling asleep again.
Leaving Brandi’s we headed down to Dickinson to eat a light supper at Monterey’s Little Mexico before heading to the Alvin Opry. We usually just a bowl of their Chicken Tortilla Soup beforehand, because we always go out for a bite to eat after the show.
Which is why we don’t get home until around 1 am.
We were really looking forward to tonight’s Opry because it’s Legend’s Night. This is where the singers dress up like and imitate their favorite stars.
First up was Rhonda Walters doing a dead-on imitation of Kitty Wells. Rhonda is known as “The Queen of the Alvin Opry”.
Then we had Abby Gough doing a great Reba McEntire.
Next we had Earl Epps doing George Jones (before his hair turned white). Earl looks and sounds like Jones, and has a number of records to his credit, including this cut of Be Bop Blues.
Then Rhonda was back, along with Kim Lanier doing a hilarious take-off on The Judd’s, Naomi and Wynonna. They’ve done this several times before and it’s always a hoot.
Ruben Perez is always a surprise because he’s someone different every time. This time he did a great send-up of Little Richard doing ‘Lucille’ If you click on the link above you’ll get a 30 second clip of his performance.
Finally we had Julianne McBride as Brenda Lee. Julianne is only 13, but has a great stage presence, and a fantastic voice. She can really belt out a song.
What stunned me about her performance and appearance was that in 1958 I saw Brenda Lee on the stage of the Grand Ole Opry at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville. She was just 13, the same age as Julianne. Pat Boone was the emcee that night, and what’s amazing is that Julianne looks just like I remember Brenda Lee looking then.
After the show we went to the IHOP in Pearland, along Rhonda Walters, her husband Ron, and our long-time friend, Maria Sutton.
That was about it for Friday, a long day and a late night.
Today, Saturday, was a Girl’s Movie Day with Jan, Brandi, Linda, and Piper, going to see the new movie “Morning Glory” at the 11 am showing, and then after the movie, Chris and I met them at Mario’s Italian Restaurant in Seabrook at 1:30.
Before meeting everyone for lunch, I went by the office and paid the rent for the month, and then made an trip to Home Depot looking for new toilet shims. Part of the problem is finding something that will work and still be hidden by the base of the toilet. I’ll keep looking.
Had something real strange happen this evening. Jan and I were just sitting here watching TV and the generator suddenly started up all by itself. Took us a few seconds to figure out what that loud rumbling noise was. There were some pillows kind of laying against the dashboard where the switch is, but I sure don’t think they were close enough or heavy enough to cause the problem.
Will have to see if it happens again.
November 13, 2011
. . . and I didn’t wake up screaming even once!
Since we had a 375 mile trip to Gulf Shores, AL today, we wanted to get an early start. So I was up at about 6 am, started coffee, and then went outside to hook up the toad and stow the satellite dish. Then after checking the air in my tires and letting in the window awnings, I went back inside to wake Jan up, but found her already up and in the shower.
A little later Jan fixed us a breakfast of some of the banana nut and sourdough bread Aunt Virginia had given us last night.
Dee – Licious!
We pulled out of my cousin’s Northgate RV Travel Park about 8am, got on I-65 and headed south.
A little south of Montgomery Jan decided she wanted to drive for a while, so at our next rest stop we traded places and Jan drove for about two hours until we turned off I-65 onto AL59. I Kindled and kat-napped for a while, and just enjoyed the scenery.
And Jan did a really good job. As I said, I didn’t wake up screaming even once. In fact Jan is one of the very few people I feel comfortable sleeping while she’s driving. But she doesn’t like to drive in traffic on city streets, so I took over for the last 50 miles.
I’d been a little worried about whether we could get a site at the Gulf State Park since it’s very popular with snowbirds this time of the year. But apparently we beat the rush this year because we had no trouble getting a spot.
We got into our site about 4 and got set up. The only problems was when we tried to start the truck and found the battery dead. I guess there must be a problem with my charge wire, as it should keep the battery charged from the rig. I’ll have to check it out.
About 5 we headed out for supper at one of our favorite local seafood places, DeSoto’s Seafood Kitchen. Jan had Shrimp and Oysters, and I had the Seafood Platter. You can’t get seafood much fresher than this.
When we got back from supper we found this email photo from Lowell and Brandi. They said it was a early test run for Landon and Santa.
Here’s last year’s photo. Santa seems to have aged well.
Looks like Landon’s not going to be one of those kids that’s terrified of Santa.
November 13, 2012
A Real Cutie!
We got a photo of our new great-niece, Annisten Morgan Robinson. She’s a real cutie!
I’ve started getting calls from computer clients wanting to schedule some help when I get back to Houston. So it looks like I’ll be busy again this winter just like last year.
After coffee for breakfast, we heated our some of our Lambert’s leftovers from yesterday. And we still have enough for another meal. At $12.50 for 3 meals worth, that’s a real deal.
It was a busy morning on the phone. We talked with our daughter Brandi a couple of times working out some details of our Thanksgiving trip to Marble Falls, TX. Then we talked with our grand-daughter Piper to see if she will be able to join us in Marble Falls.
About 3:30 Jan and I headed out for some shopping and then dinner. Our first stop was Tallulah’s Treasures in Orange Beach.
Tallulah’s is another of our favorite shops. Formerly known as Tootie’s Yellow Broom, this is another place we’ve been coming for years.
Just a fun place to walk through, even if you don’t buy anything.
Our next stop was for dinner at The Gulf, a new place that just opened last week. Located down at Alabama Point / Perdido Pass, it’s the first business in what’s to be a beach boardwalk attraction.
Built from shipping containers, its novel construction frames a beautiful view of the bridge over Perdido Pass and the Gulf.
The only problem with this beautiful location is its history. There used to be a large restaurant/hotel on this location, and we ate here a couple of times over the years. But in 2004 Hurricane Ivan wiped it off the beach. The only thing left was the foundation.
I hope The Gulf has better luck.
Jan and I both had their Angus Burgers and shared an order of fries. Both were really good, not quite Five Guys good, but good.
And of course the view was fantastic.
Leaving the restaurant, we headed home with a quick stop at a CVS for a few things.
All in all, a very nice day.
November 13, 2015
Happy Friday. . .
Well, today’s promised ‘Mostly Sunny’ never appeared, not even a peek. But it was in the 60’s, and nice enough to finish up reinstalling my outside door handle.
Yesterday afternoon I left the job like this, with the toothpicks sticking out like little spikes.
I warned Jan about it going in and out of the rig, and then last night I tripped over the door mat in the dark and almost impaled myself. But luckily no skin was broken.
Remember, I do these things so you won’t have to.
So the first thing I did today was to use a pair of nippers (end flush cutters) like these to cut off the bundles flush with the rig.
I was happy to see that it took some effort to cut through the bundles of toothpicks. But I was quickly ready the next step.
Pilot holes.
So out came my favorite power tool: My WORX Power Screw Driver.
I bought it a couple of years ago, and it’s held up great.
With its lithium-ion battery it holds a charge for months, so it’s always ready to go when I pull it out of the bag. Plus it’s strong enough, with enough torque to twist it out of my hand if I don’t hold on tight.
The WORX also has two ‘cylinders’ that each hold six screwdriver bits. The cylinders snap into place and allow you to quickly change bits. One cylinder holds standard bits, like slot, Phillips, etc., and the other one holds TORX, and Star type bits.
When I ordered the WORX I also got a set of these, a 1/4-inch Hex Shank Drill Bit Set.
These bits chuck right into the driver, and stay in the bag with the WORX.
I first drilled a pilot pilot hold into the toothpick bundles, using a 5/64” bit and then a pilot hole with the 1/8” bit shown about. I put a piece of tape on the bit as a depth stop, since I didn’t want to drill all the way through the wall and out the other side. That would be bad.
The holes done, I mounted the hardware and started putting in the screws. And I quickly discovered that it was very difficult to screw the #12 screws into the wood by hand. So out came my WORX again.
Unlike a large drill, the WORX is very controllable so I didn’t have to worried about over-tightening and stripping out the screws. Which as I said is what I think happened at the repair place in Prescott.
It turned out that even my driver had a problem with the toothpick-Gorilla Glue combination. Not from too little power to do the job, but me holding it against the torque. But I quickly had the 5 screws in place and here is the result this evening.
Today being Friday, it was time for a Whataburger run, with a little Wal-Mart shopping thrown in. Funny, but it used to be a Wal-Mart run with a stop for Whataburger on the way home.
But unfortunately we were once again back to the same routine with the same cashier. I tell her I want a #6 with Cheese with only these ingredients, Ketchup, Mustard, Tomatoes, and Grilled Onions. She looks at me and says, “You want lettuce on that?”
“No. Only these four things.”
Finally it looks right on the little screen and we moved on to my burger. And after I tell her my order, once again stressing the ‘only’, she looks at me and says, “So, no lettuce?” Sheesh!
Back in the early 70’s when Jan and I were both in college, we worked together as the Grill Team at the then busiest McDonald’s in the country, which was in Birmingham, AL. They had the first playground, the first Ronald McDonald Birthday Parties, and we were one of the 5 locations that tested the Quarter Pounder before it was rolled out to the rest of the country.
It was really a great job, Jan did the buns, and I ran the grill. There was no breakfast then, and they didn’t open until 10:30am. Jan and I would walk in the door a few minutes before 11am, put on our aprons and paper caps, and hit the grill area. Then at 2pm, we would hang up our aprons and walk out the door. So no cleaning, no mopping, etc., Occasionally on weekends we would work other hours if there was a University of Alabama game in town that weekend. Then it was a real madhouse when multiple buses would pull into the parking lot.
Anyway she wouldn’t have lasted 10 minutes at that McDonald’s, or any other place I worked over the years in college.
One thing I picked up at Wal-Mart was some more of the these Hot Hands Hand Warmers.
I discovered last night, when it was 43 degrees, that I didn’t have another package like I thought. So that was a necessary item to pick up.
But while I was doing that, I also found these, much to my joy.
These are adhesive foot warmers. You just peel off the film, put them on the floor and then step on them in your socks (they warn you not to put them on your bare feet).
And boy, do they work. My feet have been warm and toasty all night. The only problem is that I only picked up 2 packages to test, and since it’s supposed to be in low 40’s every night until we leave next Sunday, I want some more.
So it looks like another Chicken Express run is in my future.
With a stop at Wal-Mart.
Wrapping up, Brandi and Landon say, “Happy Friday!”
November 13, 2016
Back to College . . .
The Electoral College, that is.
or they didn’t tell me there would be math on the test.
Several people commented on Facebook about yesterday’s dryer repair. Our friend Chris Yust suggest that I just buy a new dryer.
Well, as long as I can fix the old one for a $2.65 fuse and 3 hours of work, I figure I’m making $333/hr. for my time, since a new one costs around $1000.00. And it gives me something to blog about.
Our friend Donna Huffer suggested we just go to the laundromat and be done in an hour and a half.
First off, I’m pretty sure Jan would get rid of me before she would get rid of her washer/dryer. She delights in throwing a load in, getting it started, and 5 minutes later she’s back on the sofa with her Kindle, 40” TV, and the computer.
Plus those times we have gone the laundromat, it’s usually 3 or 4 hours, not one and a half. I guess maybe if you go at 3am, but not any time we’ve been.
Jan and I headed out about 1pm to have the Turkey & Dressing/Fried Chicken Lunch Buffet. Just as delicious as usual. If we have one complaint it’s that they don’t have mashed potatoes enough. If you have gravy on the menu, today’s Turkey & Dressing, Chicken Fried Chicken, Chicken Fried Steak, etc., there should be mashed potatoes.
Just sayin’
When we got back a little after 2, I took a nap for a couple of hours since I’ll be on a gate tonight, 6:30pm to 6:30am. So back to work.
November 13, 2017
Monday, Monday . . .
I spent a good part of the weekend and all of work today on the phone with Godaddy trying to straighten out my client’s email problems. If I had any hair left, I wouldn’t have any hair left.
And I’m really glad I have unlimited minutes on my phone. I was finally able to get our incoming email working again, but not our outgoing ones. It all just bounced back, so customers were not getting their order confirmations.
I’ve done a clumsy work-around using a Gmail account, but I need to get this fixed. Of course, my ultimate objective is get the email completely off our in-house server, but to do that I need to get root access to it, which I don’t yet have. It’s the only password I haven’t figured out, but I’m still working through all the different combinations of the list I found on one of the machines.
Then I’ll not only move the email, but also the shopping cart itself, completely eliminating the in-house server and then everything will be up on Godaddy.
Tomorrow Jan and I are heading over to Kemah to have lunch at Stomp’s, another of our favorite local hamburger places. We’ve been eating here since they first opened six years ago. And their burgers look something like this.
And their fries and onion rings are great too.
After that we’ll check out Sundowner Canvas on up 146 in Kemah to see if they can make our new window awnings. It would be nice if they have some large pieces in several blue colors, so we bring them home and drape them over the old awnings to see what they look like on the coach.
Assuming they will do them, I’ll have them make two of the small rear window awnings, then I’ll take the two bigger awnings over and have them duplicated.
So we’ll see how it goes.
November 13, 2018
The Run Around . . .
Today was my day for getting my head BBQ’d, so we were out the door about 9:15, heading for the Dermatologist’s office up in Webster.
At least that’s where we were told to go when we made the appointment last month at their League City office. And the text I got yesterday morning confirming my appointment said to go to the Webster office.
But when we got to the office about 9:50 for our 10:15 appointment, we were told that we were at the wrong office, and should have been at the League City one. She offered to reschedule our appointment, but I said, “No, call them and tell them we’re on our way.”
And by pushing the Malibu a little more than usual, we made the 10 mile run from the 3rd floor of the Medical Building at Clear Regional Hospital down to the League City office just off FM-646 in just over 15 minutes, arriving at 10:13, two minutes before our 10:15 appointment.
Only to be told that the first receptionist was wrong, and our appointment WAS at the Webster location. So while she called the other office to tell them, Yes we were supposed to be up there, we turned around and headed back up to Webster, a little more sedately this time, much to Jan’s relief.
Getting back there once again, they took me back to a treatment room, and after wiping my head down with acetone to prep it, the Physician’s Assistant used what looked like a large Sharpie pen to cover my scalp with the photo-reactive solution.
Then instead of the 30-60 minute wait for the solution to dry like I had read, I found out that is was a 2 hour one. Lucky that I brought my Galaxy Tab 4 and Jan brought her Kindle Fire to keep us occupied out in the waiting room.
Back in the treatment room, the technician wheeled the Blue UV Light over and positioned it over my head.
She said it was on a timer, and noting it was set to 16:40, I said, “So 16:39 is not enough and 16:41 is too much?” She said, “Well, we don’t want your head to burst into flames.”
See I told you that might happen. And then, after giving me a pair of goggles to wear, she turned it on.
And I would have sworn my head WAS on fire. I didn’t realize they had it set on ‘Extra-Crispy’
The tech said that some people said it felt like a million angry fire ants were feasting on their head.
That was an understatement.
But finally it was over, and after getting the post-op instructions, and getting an appointment for a second shot at immolation a month from now, we headed up to Bay Area Blvd. to have brunch at Snooze, only to find that it wasn’t really open yet. That’s tomorrow.
What we had been seeing was a series of pre-opening meals given for community leaders, so we headed right up the road to once again have breakfast at The Egg and I.
Coming home about 2:30 we first made a stop at the Santa Fe PO to check the mail. I was hoping my new permanent SD driver’s license had come in, and it had. So now, thanks to the revised Vision Statement I got from the ophthalmologist last week, I can now legally drive at night.
And while on the subject of ophthalmologists, I’ve got my follow-up appointment with a cornea specialist to check out the slight yellowing of my left cornea that the Sam’s Club optometrist mistook for a cataract.
Then it was on to Snider Transmission to check up on our Dakota. Kenny said it was done and they’d done a short test drive, but that he still wanted to a longer one, maybe an hour or so, to double-check everything. So I told him we’d pick it up tomorrow afternoon.
November 13, 2019
Just In Case . . .
My main accomplishment at work today was to order a new high chair for my client. Well, not him personally, but for his baby.
I did leave work about a couple of hours early since I wanted to wrap up all the outside travel-prep this afternoon, rather than do it tomorrow morning like I usually would. But since it’s suppose to be 40° and a 90% chance of rain tomorrow morning, I wanted to get pretty much everything down now.
(Weather Update: It’s not going to 40° with 90% chance of rain tomorrow morning. It’s now supposed to be 38° with a 95% chance of rain.)
OH Boy!
It only took me about 90 minutes to get everything packed away, disconnected, and tarpped. The whole ‘tarpped’ thing was a ‘Just In Case’ job. As in ‘Just In Case’ the oil leak is not fixed.
This way we don’t have a oily mess to get off the windshield before we can drive around in Kingsland.
And since it’s supposed to be in the low 40’s overnight I also plugged in our RV’s engine block heater so the oil will be all warm and toasty tomorrow.
Our first stop tomorrow will be at the Buc-ee’s up in Katy, about 90 minutes on the way, for coffee, and we should know then if the problem is fixed. Or at least we already had oil on the truck by then last time. So we’ll see, I guess.
I plan on pulling out of our site by 8am, and hooked up and on the road by at least 8:30, but hopefully earlier. We want to get up to and around the bottom of Austin before the rush hour gets going.
November 13, 2021
Back Home–A Quick Update . . .
First off Jan and I want to thank everyone for the large outpouring of the prayers and well-wishes. They really meant a lot to us.
Besides fixing the 3 deteriorating discs, the neurosurgeon said he found and removed several ‘major’ bone spurs impinging on the spinal cord.
And this morning I’ve already noticed some improvement in my hands, arms, and legs. But we’ll have to see how it goes down the road.
I haven’t needed to take any the pain meds I was given so that’s good.
Once again, thanks to everyone.
Greg and Jan
