Our RV Adventures

It seems like that with the last update, Jetpack is no longer alerting me to the fact that people have left comments on the blog. So if you haven’t gotten an answer, that’s why. So now I’m checking manually every day.

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Jan and I were on our way up to Katy about 10:45am this morning, to meet up with Brandi, Lowell, and Landon at a new place, Victoria’s Mexican Grill. Brandi said they’ve heard good things about, and the parking lot is always crowded.

And the crowd was right. It was really good.

Landon got a Chicken and Cheese Quesadilla while Jan got the Ground Beef Enchiladas.

Brandi and Lowell shared a order of the Beef Fajitas, still smoking.

But I think that I had best of the group with the Mar y Tierra. Basically ‘Surf and Turf’ the Mexican way.

It was two large pieces of Fajita Beef Steak, a split Jalapeno Sausage, a Grilled Poblano Pepper, and topped with two Bacon-Wrapped Shrimp.

Oh, and a couple of pieces of Grilled Asparagus.

Really, really good, and we all had leftovers.

After getting our good-bye hugs, Jan and I headed over to the nearby Trader Joe’s. But though she had a list, she didn’t find a single thing she wanted.

Who is this woman?

Getting gas along the way, we headed toward home, making an HEB stop before getting back to the rig.

A very nice day.

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Jan chided me this morning that in yesterday’s blog I forgot to mentioned the gloves I used.

These gloves.

The ones that came in the box with my new LED headlight bulbs.

The ones that you are supposed to use when you install the bulbs.

The ones that you are supposed to use so that you don’t actually touch the bulb itself.

And this goes for both the regular bulbs as well as the LED ones.

When you touch the glass, your skin leaves oils on the surface, which then burn and turn black from the heat. Which in turn, causes a hot spot on the glass and causes it to shatter.

So as Jan says, Use The Gloves!

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Thought for the Day:

AOL News Headline Yesterday –

“Horse Wins Kentucky Derby!”

And they were expecting maybe, turtles?

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Since I know a few of you don’t make it all the way down through the Retro-Blogs™,
I thought I’d repost up here our time on our European Viking River Cruise today in 2019

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May 7, 2019

Bamberg, Germany . . .

5/7/2019

Our ship docked in Bamberg, Germany for about an hour or so, long enough to let off those of us who were doing the daily excursion, Then, as they’ve done before, they sailed off down the Main River, where we will meet up with them again at dockside in Zeil Am Main.

They do this to allow the ship to make better time along the river, while we’re taking in the city.

Our tour started about 9:15 with a walk from the bus stop into town. Luckily our guide was on crutches, and although I think she was trying to hide it, I believe she was a few months pregnant. I say ‘luckily’ because it meant she walked a little slower. Nicer for us.

Bamberg is another one of the towns in this area that dates to the early 900’s. And for hundreds of years it was an important city of the Holy Roman Empire, and for a short time, the main center.

Bamberg sits on the river Regnitz , near where it branches off from the Main. And by ‘sits on’, the old town hall actually sits on a island in the middle of the river.

The story goes that the local religious leaders wouldn’t give the town leaders property to build a town hall, so they expanded a small island in the middle of the and built it there.

Here’s what it looks like from in town.

The view from the bridge highlighted the waterfront and its importance to the city.

Coming across the bridge, the first thing we saw was what’s nicknamed the Wedgewood House, and it’s easy to see why. Known as the Hellerhaus because it was last owned by a famous art collector named Heller, it actually dates from the middle ages. Like pretty much every thing around here, I guess.

Our next stop was the Bamberg Witch Trials Memorial.

During the early 1600’s Bamberg was the location of over 1000 witch trials and executions, peaking between 1626 and 1631. Apparently, one of the reasons it stopped because people started to realize that anyone could be accused and executed, even themselves.

The memorial doesn’t have a lot of impact in the daytime, but it’s more more impressive at night.

We also got a look at St. Martin’s Church.

Built in the classic Baroque style, it was completed in only 7 years and finished in 1693.

Taking a break, we decided to try some of Bamberg’s famous Smoked Beer.

We had already seen the location of the 600+ year old brewery so we had to try it. Or at least I had to try it. Jan had to try the Strawberry Shortcake.

And ‘Smoked’ is a very apt description. It tastes like a wood fire. Very unique, and very good.

By this time it was back on the buses so we could meet up with our cruise ship at Zeil Am Main. We got there just in time to watch the Skirnir dock. It pulled right opposite the dock site, only slightly bigger than the ship,

and then using the Auxiliary Control Panels I mentioned the other day,

just slowly moved sideways until it gently touched the dock.

Then without even tying off, with only the thrusters to hold it in place, they lowered a portable gangplank into place,

and we all boarded.

Fifteen minutes and we were back under way again. They don’t mess around.

Dinner was my favorite Angus Ribeye, one of the permanent items on the menu,

while Jan tried one of the daily items,

the Fried Cod.

Then for dessert we both had this delicious fruit pudding.

It’s easy to see why everyone says you’ll gain 10 to 15 pounds on one of these cruises. Yikes!

A number of readers had suggested we bring along magnetic hooks, since the cabin walls are all steel. So the wall underneath our window became our auxiliary closet.

Or rather my closet since just about everything on there is mine. No room left in the real closet for me.

Also I had mentioned the other day about how the wheelhouse on the top deck can retract down to allow passage under the low bridges, and it suddenly dawned on me where it goes.

I had assumed that this area at the back of the bar was just a storeroom, but actually it’s where the wheelhouse ends up. The door that you see just opens to a shallow closet that holds the controls for the room’s audio/visual equipment.

Tomorrow: Würzburg

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May 7, 2009

Homestead Bound…

Looks like we will be heading further down south to Homestead tomorrow morning.

From there we’ll head down to the Keys for a while.

Still not sure of our exact timing on this since we still trying to sync up with an old friend from Houston who now lives in West Palm Beach.

Tonight we had one last meal at Iguana Mia Mexican restaurant and then went to see Monsters vs Aliens at the movies. We both really enjoyed it.  Seems like many of the best movies we’ve seen lately are animated.

On to Margaritaville…

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May 7, 2010

Napa Valley…

We started out today with lunch at Gourmet Garden Buffet, a really good Chinese Buffet, Jan said it was as good as EAT in Yuma, or the one in Celina, OH.

Then we headed out thru the Napa Valley over to Vacaville, about 50 miles away.  It was miles of rolling hills, wineries, and vineyards. If we had taken advantage of all the free wine tastings along the way, we would have been snockered before we were halfway there.

The reason for going to Vacaville was that it was the nearest Sam’s Club for refilling our prescriptions. Leaving the Sam’s we went next door to the Walmart for some groceries, only to discover that it wasn’t a super Walmart so it didn’t have a full grocery store, And the next one didn’t either. Maybe it’s something about California.

Coming back into Petaluma we stopped off at a Safeway to pick up the groceries we needed before heading back to the rig.

Tomorrow we planned on driving down to San Francisco, across the Golden Gate Bridge, and on down to Monterey and Carmel. But Jan’s been fighting off a migraine so we’ll just have to see.

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May 7, 2011

P-Town and BBQ . . .

After getting up about 10:30, I realized I wasn’t quite back at 100% yesterday, because I felt so much better today than yesterday. Down right perky, even.

So after coffee and half a Cinnamon Crunch bagel I started working on some neglected chores around the rig. I.e. cleaning filters, tightening screws, etc.

Our daughter Brandi called about 11:30 to check in with the latest Landon tidbit.

Then, after lunch, I went outside to tackle my next big chore. . . unstopping the dryer vent hose.

Jan had noticed that it was taking longer and longer to dry the clothes, and the other day when I was outside and the dryer was running, I put my hand up to the vent and could not feel much air coming thru.

So, after setting the dryer for about an hour I went outside to get to work. And using my flexible parts grabber,

and a rotating brush kind of like this one,

I was able to get an amazing amount of lint out of the hose, restoring the air flow to normal.

About 3 pm we all headed out for shopping and dinner. First off was Sam’s Club, where we wanted to drop off our prescriptions to be picked up on Monday.

Then it was next door to Wal-Mart for some more stuff. Seems like we always need more stuff.

After that, it was on to Famous Dave’s BBQ, our favorite nationwide BBQ place. And we really lucked out.

We got there about 4:15 and were seated within about 10 minutes. But people started pouring in right after we did, and very soon after that they were on a 45 minute wait.

Because they were so busy it took a while to get our food, but it was delicious when it came, and, as usual, we had fun just sitting and talking beforehand.

Finally our last stop before heading home, was Ace Hardware, where I needed some screws to repair my computer desk slide-out tray.

We got home a little after 6:30, and then sat outside with Mister for awhile before coming in.

All in all, a very nice day.

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May 7, 2012

Super Moon and Super Storm . . .

Last night was certainly a two’fer. We had a Supermoon, and a little later, a super storm.

A Supermoon is when a full moon coincides with the closest approach the Moon makes to the Earth on its elliptical orbit. It’s about 12% larger and brighter on average. Here’s a comparison photo from the Net.

The photo Jan took looked like this.

But the real fun came later, around 4am when a line of very strong thunderstorms unexpectedly rolled through the area. They came as a complete surprise since nothing was forecast and, in fact I had checked the weather radar a little earlier and nothing showed up then either.

My first clue was the pitter-patter of a light rain on the canopy. Then within about 5 minutes the bottom fell out. However the real problem was not really the rain, but the high winds, VERY high winds, probably in excess of 50 mph.

I’m pretty certain about this because the rig shuts down when the wind exceeds 45 mph, and after the alarm sounded and everyone cleared off, the winds continued to increase. There were lightning strikes all around, and one very close by behind us. But the rig itself never got hit.

Just to be on the safe side, I finally moved the truck and tied the canopy frame off to it.

Even after the rain subsided the winds stayed pretty high all morning. I didn’t realize when I bought this canopy that it doesn’t have a roof vent on the cover so it tends to lift and bounce around a lot. We do have 6 kitty litter buckets filled with water for about 200 pounds of weight to help keep things grounded. So far it’s worked out.

The rig drill bit was at 11,518 night before last, and still only at about 11,600 tonight. They been having a lot of bit problems as well as other things too, so they’re behind schedule. That works out well for us since it means we won’t have to move as soon.

Speaking of moving or not, there’s a new pad cleared right down the road from us, looking like this.

The fenced-in area in the center is where the derrick will go, and then the pad will look like this.

If we’re lucky we might just be able to move to this new site down the road. We’ll see.

I got these rig night shots the other morning. It really has its own beauty.

And this rear shot shows the ramp that’s used to raise the drill pipe and casings up to the rig. You can see the pipe stacked in rows at the base of the rig.

Yesterday I went in to Kenedy, about 10 miles away and picked us up dinner from Polak’s Sawsage Farm Restaurant. (yes that’s the way it’s spelled). A place that looks like this has to be good.

Several of the rig workers had recommended the place and they were right. Although not real busy when I was there on Saturday, during the week the parking lot is full and vehicles are parked out along the highway.

Kind of unusual for a BBQ place (they also have steaks and seafood), they only have beef brisket and sausage (well, sawsage, anyway). No ribs or pork. And their sides include Hot German Potato Salad, and Kraut, along with the usual. Even better, they make all their own bread, and even their desserts, like Turtle Cheesecake and Coconut Cream Pie.

Jan had the Chopped Beef Stuffed Baked Potato and I had the Beef and Sawsage Plate with German Potato Salad, Kraut, and Pinto Beans. Very, very good.

Especially with Turtle Cheesecake and Chocolate Pie for dessert.

On a last note, I’ve seen a number of comments on other blogs and forums about the pay rate for gate guarding, and even a comment on our blog about how when you divided the $125 a day by 24 hours, it comes out to about $5.20 an hour pay.

Here’s how I answered that comment.

Yes, and we knew that going in.

But that’s not the way we chose to look at.  LOL.

We look at it as where else can we make $4000 per month actually working about 45 minutes a day (Approximately 90 vehicles a day at about 30 seconds each)?

The rest of time we talk, read, nap, listen to the radio, eat dinner, and enjoy the outdoors.

And every 8 days another $1000 goes in the bank.

That’s the way we choose to look at it.

And here’s another answer I gave.

Actually we make more here than do couples that work for Amazon over the holidays, and do a lot less work.

Amazon pays about $11/hour, so for 80 hours (2 people at 40 hours/week) that gives $880/week total.

For that same 7 days, we make $875 a week, and for a whole lot less work.

Amazon workers will tell you that they’re on their feet and on the go the whole time and come home pretty exhausted..

We sit outside, talk to each other, read, drink coffee, eat meals, and just enjoy the scenery and the wildlife.

Yesterday we had about 90 vehicles come through, and I went for 5 hours this morning (from midnight to 5am with no traffic.

And of course the company furnishes everything except food. And we even get fed sometimes if they bring in a catering truck.

And even better, for the last few days we’ve only been getting about 60 vehicles a day.

So our workload is down to about 30 minutes a day.

Nice!

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May 7, 2013

Road Kill and Belt Clips . . .

About 12:30 this afternoon I walked over to the park guard house to pick up the Amazon package that had come in for me. I had ordered s new belt clip for my Samsung Droid Charge.

Droid Charge Shell/Holster

My original one had finally given up the ghost and I thought about not getting one since I’ll probably be getting a new phone later this summer, but I don’t like carrying my phone in my pocket. For one thing, I can’t hear it ring in my pocket.

Our daughter Brandi called about 2:30 to check in and let us know that the closing on their new home has been pushed back because all the cabinets haven’t come in, and the mortgage company keeps asking for additional paperwork. Lowell said he wants to know why they don’t just ask for everything need at the very beginning.

We had the same experiences when we bought our homes too.

About 3:30 Jan and I headed out for the afternoon. Our first stop was the Camping World down in Henderson . . . again. I’d been looking for the Bulldog panel latches that I needed, but I didn’t find them. But this time I knew what they were called and had a Camping World part number. And with those I had no problem finding them,

As I was leaving the store, I got a call from Jim Dean, He and his wife Peri are blog readers and just arrived here at the Thousand Trails park today. So we’re going to try and get together for dinner tomorrow

Finishing up at Camping World we then headed up to north Las Vegas to check out John Mull’s Meats and Road Kill Grill. We had seen a Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives episode about this place and wanted to give it a try.

The place is pretty unassuming, and is actually in what seems to be a residential neighborhood.

And as it turns out, they only have outside dining.

They were pretty busy when we got there, with two lines inside, all waiting patiently for this really good BBQ.

The menu is pretty basic, with just Hot Links, Brisket, Pulled Port, Ribs, Grilled Chicken, and BBQ Chicken, and of course, the sides.

Jan had a Brisket Dinner with Green Beans and Mac N Cheese, and I had a two meat combo with Hot Links and Ribs, with Green Beans and Baked Beans.

Really, really good, and the servings were big enough that we had leftovers to bring home.

Well worth the trip up north.

Heading home we made a stopover at a Wal-Mart for a few things before finally getting back to the rig a little after 6:30.

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May 7, 2014

Urinals as Far as the Eye can See!

Off on another busy day, we headed out about 9:30 this morning with the first stop at the Chinese Consulate near downtown Houston. Based on my experience last Wednesday when I dropped off the applications, I was expecting another “Lost in Translation” situation today, but it actually went very smoothly. I waited in line for about 10 minutes, handed the young lady my claim slip and my credit card, and about two minutes later, was heading out the door. All told, I was only in there about 20 minutes.

Like last Wednesday, we couldn’t pass up another chance to have lunch at Katz’s Deli today. I had my usual Rueben, but Jan went with a Chunky Chicken Salad Sandwich this time, which she said was delicious. And this was all topped off with a delicious cupcake.

Then it was off to another client about 35 miles south. They were having trouble coordinating their email between their laptop, their iPhones, and their iPad. I of course blamed the Apple stuff.

We’ve known Tom & Lyn since 1979 just a short time after we moved to Houston, and always enjoy getting together.

As we were coming down the Interstate before turning off on FM517 on our way to Tom & Lyn’s, we noticed that a big Buc-ee’s billboard that previously just said 2014, now said “NOW OPEN”.

So after leaving their house we went a few miles further south on I-45 to check out the new Buc-ee’s.

Buc-ee’s are the world’s largest convenience stores, and this new one is no different. It’s the new ‘largest’. But it’s a split victory.

Previously, the largest Buc-ee’s was the one that opened on I-35 in New Braunfels, TX in 2012. With 68,000 square feet of store and 120, yes, 120 gas pumps, it’s a small city.

But this new one is a little larger, at 69,000 square feet, but a little smaller, with only 56 pumps.

And as it turned out, the new place just opened at 6am this morning. There were TV remote trucks all over.

You walk into one end of the place, and you literally can not see the other end.

And what other convenience store has a big fresh produce section.

When you go in the Men’s Restroom, it’s urinals as far as the eye can see. There are more than 30 of them. Buc-ee’s is known for their large, clean restrooms.

And of course we can’t visit a Buc-ee’s without stocking up on their Cranberry muffins.

Leaving Buc-ee’s and heading back up to Clear Lake to make two more client stops. The second one was to convert two Canon printers from wired USB connections to wireless connections.

I had set these up like that previously, but they had recently changed Internet providers from Comcast to Verizon, and that necessitated a new Wi-Fi router. And that meant setting up a new connection.

Finishing up there, it was time to head over to Ichibon’s in Kemah. This is a place that does the hibachi grill cooking, like Benihana.

It’s been a number of years since we’ve been to one, but we always enjoy the show . . . and the food. We were getting together her to celebrate Chris’ birthday, which is not for a couple of weeks, but we thought we’d do it early since we’re still here.

Here the chef tries to teach our granddaughter Piper how to flip a spatula around a large meat fork.

All she managed to do was send the spatula flying my way. You can see it bouncing off the grill and heading for my head at the bottom of the above photo.

I told Piper she needs to stick with medicine.

And here’s a shot of the every-popular onion volcano.

And how better to finish up with three pretty women.

After a great meal, a good time, and a lot of hugs, we headed back to Lake Conroe, finally getting home about 8pm.

Hopefully tomorrow will be less busy.

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May 7, 2015

Well, It’s A Start . . .

Well, they came by this morning and ripped our mirror off to try and order a new lower one. At least I hope that’s what happened to it.

Since no one said anything to us, it might have just been stolen.

Stan, the Service Manager, said that things are going slow due to trying to find parts and get prices on 16 year old rig stuff.

I did find out that one thing I thought was broken in the blowout, wasn’t. I had thought that some of the wires that were torn out were the ones feeding 120VAC to my computer desk. But I wondered why I never saw any sparking or got shocked when I was fooling with the wires. And this evening I found out that what happened was the multi-plug, like this,

had simply fallen out of the wall socket due to the vibrations from the blowout.

One thing that I was sorry about after our blowout and the subsequent rough ride as we came to a stop, was the fact that I didn’t have my A118 Dash Cam mounted in the rig. I had moved it to the truck while we were driving up and down the Vegas Strip and never got around to setting it up again in the rig.

Too bad. It would have been interesting to relive it, at least on video.

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Several readers have asked me about Jan’s ‘magic’ pill that she takes for her migraines. The pill she takes is Sumatriptan, the generic version of Imitrex. Available by prescription only, it normally knocks out Jan’s migraine in just an hour or so. But as I said, she normally wakes up with successively lesser ones for the next two days and then it ‘s over.

For dinner tonight we drove over to the nearby Red Robin for burgers, one of our favorite burger places. We got there just in time to beat the rush, because by the time we left about 6:30 the place was just about full.

Jan went with her usual Mushroom-Swiss Burger, but since she has them replace the Swiss with Cheddar, it’s actually a Mushroom-Cheddar Burger/

Normally, I always get the Burnin’ Love Burger, but a new addition to the menu caught my eye – The Southern Charm Burger.

It has a Black Angus patty glazed in brown sugar, and topped with candied bacon, honey BBQ Sauce, sharp Cheddar, and caramelized onions. Talk about a burger for your sweet tooth. But oddly, it didn’t really taste sweet at all, just very, very good.

Jan and I were sitting in one of  those part booth/part table things when about halfway through our meal a pretty blonde lady came over and set down right beside me in the booth. I recognized her as having been sitting in a booth about 15 feet away with her husband and son.

Before I could say anything, she leaned over and said in a rush, “My father lives in Colorado, and I haven’t seen him in a long time, and you look just like him, even your mannerisms, and could my husband take our picture together?”

Before I could say more than, “Sure”, she leaned her head up against mine and her husband, who was standing beside Jan, snapped our picture. And then with a “Thank you”, she was gone.

Well, that was strange.

And I didn’t even get to tell her how sorry I was that her father looked just like me.

The other strange thing that happened was that when we went to pay, my VISA debit card was rejected. So without worrying about it right then, I just paid cash.

When I got home, I called Chase Bank and found out that my card had been invalidated due to a fraud alert. Now when I bought $260 worth of diesel last Sunday in Las Vegas, I quickly got a text alert asking me if I had just bought that amount. And when I texted back a ‘1’, I got a text back thanking me for confirming my purchase.

But I’ve used the card 3 or 4 times since we got to Prescott, including yesterday. And I’ve had no problems or alerts during that time, and the bank lady wasn’t able to tell me what happened. But she reset things, and a little later, I made a Kindle purchase and it went through, so I guess it’s all good now.

I’m sure most of you have heard about the tornado that hit the Road Runner RV Park south of Oklahoma City yesterday. Well, after hearing that name a couple of times, I realized that was the RV park I was planning on Jan and I staying in a couple of weeks on our way to Illinois.

As they say, timing is everything.

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May 7, 2016

Landon Sitting . . .

After our coffee this morning we headed into Katy about 1pm to meet up with Brandi so she and Jan could go get mani-pedis (pedi only in Jan’s case). Lowell was doing some trucking stuff, so I was going to be Landon-sitting.

The hour trip was smooth, but there was a lot more traffic than I expected. Hopefully there won’t this much tomorrow when we move to Lake Conroe, since it will be earlier, but then it is Mother’s Day, so you never can tell.

Jan and Brandi headed out a little after 2pm leaving me on guard duty. Landon was playing with his friend Junior who lives diagonally across the street. Luckily I was backed up by Lowell’s sister Sherry, who came home right after Jan and Brandi left.

At least now I’m not outnumbered.

When we got there, Landon and Junior were in the backyard playing on Landon’s waterslide, but then came in and played doing artwork at the table.

Then later, around 4 they were outside playing in the cul-de-sac in front of the house.

About this time Jan and Brandi showed up with pretty toes, so we headed out for dinner, along with Aunt Sherry, to La Finca, a nearby Mexican place that we ate at once before, and really liked.

Lowell was still at his show and wouldn’t be home until late, so he lost out.

Jan had a Beef Chile Relleno, along with a Chicken Enchilada,

while I had the Fajitas Poblanos.

Brandi got the Beef Fajitas, with enough to take home to Lowell, and Sherry, who eaten earlier, only had an ‘Italian Margarita’.

I’m sorry. But that’s just wrong.

After a really great meal, and getting our good-bye hugs, Jan and I headed home, finally getting back about a little before 7pm.

I then spent some time prepping for our departure tomorrow morning. Since we’ll be doing our normal breakfast at Schobel’s before we leave here, I always try to get as much done as possible before then.

Yesterday, on our way back from Peter’s BBQ, we drove down to the recently flooded C and D sections here at Colorado River.

It was really strange to see all these spaces completely empty, when normally they would be really full right now.

Supposedly the problem now with getting sites back open is with the sewer system. So we’ll just have to wait and see.

Finishing up, here’s a interesting video from a GoPro Camera attached to a rocket.

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May 7, 2017

20° !

Well, with 20° last night, we survived our 3rd lowest temperature since we’ve started RV’ing. But it was sunny and 52 today. So, nice.

And tonight’s supposed to be 29 with a 66 tomorrow.

The lowest temp we’ve encountered was in April 2008 when it was 6° while we were at the Riverfront RV Park in Garrison, MT. Not unexpected, as just a couple of days before we had this in Billings, MT.

Our 2nd lowest was 17° a few winters back when we were staying at Galveston Bay RV Park down in Dickinson, TX south of Houston. But with all these, we’ve never had any problems with anything freezing.

About 1pm I walked over to the park office to pick up our revised car tag and pedestal tag reflecting our one day extension to make our stay here a full two weeks. We lost a day due to our transmission problem down in Weed, but we had enough slack in our schedule to make it up.

The other thing I was trying to find out if they had any suggestions about how to receive Amazon packages here. The park itself will accept nothing, no mail or packages of any kind. And there are no Amazon Lockers in this area either.

Bend/Sunriver TT is completely at odds with the Las Vegas TT, which accepts any kind of packages, and even calls you when they come in.

I’ll check some of the mailbox stores in Bend tomorrow, but I’ve never had much much luck with that. It seems like they want you to get a PO Box for mail, but Amazon won’t ship to a PO address

And many of the mailbox stores are affiliated with either UPS or FedEx and won’t accept packages from the other one. So we’re stuck until I work something else out.

I do know that when we were here in 2011 and 2013 that they did accept packages, but don’t know when it changed.

Later in the afternoon I tried to take down the bracket that holds Sony rear camera so I could remount it using rubber washers to hopefully eliminate the rattle when we’re on the road. But as seems to always happen, out of 5 screws, only 4 would come out.

The remaining screw either came pre-stripped from the factory, or a previous owner had wallowed it out for me. So tomorrow I’ll have to take down the TV so I can get a better angle at it, or drill it out if necessary.

Friday I called Jay with Allison Transmission to thank him for all of his help, and to tell him that replacing the sensor had fixed the problem. He was really patient helping me work through the problem, and more importantly, didn’t question my sanity because I wanted to replace the sensor without hooking the transmission up to their diagnostic computer first.

I also made a couple of more reservations for our upcoming travels, all of them under Passport America. By the end of this segment of our trip finishing up back in Houston toward the end of June, we will have saved over $1000.

Not bad for $44 a year.

Several readers have asked for an Karma update.

She’s really mellowed over our last few months of travel. When we first took her in, she would run and hide as soon as she heard the rig engine start  up.

Now she is normally out and about when we’re on the road, sometimes sleeping on the rug on the floor between our chairs.

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May 7, 2018

A Few Things . . .

I talked to my client today about clearing out some of the stuff stored in my office area so I can set up a workbench.

Right now I have a large desk,  but with two computers, two monitors, and two keyboards, one of which is the Webserver, and the other is my office computer,  that doesn’t leave a lot of work surface tor my new machine repair duties.

So I’ll get a couple of those folding-leg tables to set up as benches. Hopefully I’ll get that done in the next week or so.

My recent dryer repair, replacing the over-temp fuse, seems to be holding up, so tomorrow I’ll replace the retainer bar and put the doors back on. Hopefully this repair will last the same three years that the last one did.

I saved myself $33/month today by calling Verizon and cancelling a couple of things. Last April 21st when we were in Las Vegas I upgraded from my Galaxy S5 to the brand-new S8+, getting it on the very first day it came out. At the same time I also added a MiFi to my account to replace the 3G AirCard I had been using since 2007.

But since my AirCard was so reliable, and I know that a lot of people have had trouble with their MiFi’s, I kept the 3G card active. But I’ve never had any MiFi problems, so the AirCard has not been used since. So it’s now gone, saving me $20 per month.

In addition, when I bought the phone, the Otterbox case was not yet available, so I got the $13 per month insurance on it, though I’ve never killed a phone. My thinking was that once I had a good case I would cancel the insurance.

Of course all those good intentions fell through the cracks until today, but since my account starts over tomorrow, I’m good to go.

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May 7, 2019

Bamberg, Germany . . .

5/7/2019

Our ship docked in Bamberg, Germany for about an hour or so, long enough to let off those of us who were doing the daily excursion, Then, as they’ve done before, they sailed off down the Main River, where we will meet up with them again at dockside in Zeil Am Main.

They do this to allow the ship to make better time along the river, while we’re taking in the city.

Our tour started about 9:15 with a walk from the bus stop into town. Luckily our guide was on crutches, and although I think she was trying to hide it, I believe she was a few months pregnant. I say ‘luckily’ because it meant she walked a little slower. Nicer for us.

Bamberg is another one of the towns in this area that dates to the early 900’s. And for hundreds of years it was an important city of the Holy Roman Empire, and for a short time, the main center.

Bamberg sits on the river Regnitz , near where it branches off from the Main. And by ‘sits on’, the old town hall actually sits on a island in the middle of the river.

The story goes that the local religious leaders wouldn’t give the town leaders property to build a town hall, so they expanded a small island in the middle of the and built it there.

Here’s what it looks like from in town.

The view from the bridge highlighted the waterfront and its importance to the city.

Coming across the bridge, the first thing we saw was what’s nicknamed the Wedgewood House, and it’s easy to see why. Known as the Hellerhaus because it was last owned by a famous art collector named Heller, it actually dates from the middle ages. Like pretty much every thing around here, I guess.

Our next stop was the Bamberg Witch Trials Memorial.

During the early 1600’s Bamberg was the location of over 1000 witch trials and executions, peaking between 1626 and 1631. Apparently, one of the reasons it stopped because people started to realize that anyone could be accused and executed, even themselves.

The memorial doesn’t have a lot of impact in the daytime, but it’s more more impressive at night.

We also got a look at St. Martin’s Church.

Built in the classic Baroque style, it was completed in only 7 years and finished in 1693.

Taking a break, we decided to try some of Bamberg’s famous Smoked Beer.

We had already seen the location of the 600+ year old brewery so we had to try it. Or at least I had to try it. Jan had to try the Strawberry Shortcake.

And ‘Smoked’ is a very apt description. It tastes like a wood fire. Very unique, and very good.

By this time it was back on the buses so we could meet up with our cruise ship at Zeil Am Main. We got there just in time to watch the Skirnir dock. It pulled right opposite the dock site, only slightly bigger than the ship,

and then using the Auxiliary Control Panels I mentioned the other day,

just slowly moved sideways until it gently touched the dock.

Then without even tying off, with only the thrusters to hold it in place, they lowered a portable gangplank into place,

and we all boarded.

Fifteen minutes and we were back under way again. They don’t mess around.

Dinner was my favorite Angus Ribeye, one of the permanent items on the menu,

while Jan tried one of the daily items,

the Fried Cod.

Then for dessert we both had this delicious fruit pudding.

It’s easy to see why everyone says you’ll gain 10 to 15 pounds on one of these cruises. Yikes!

A number of readers had suggested we bring along magnetic hooks, since the cabin walls are all steel. So the wall underneath our window became our auxiliary closet.

Or rather my closet since just about everything on there is mine. No room left in the real closet for me.

Also I had mentioned the other day about how the wheelhouse on the top deck can retract down to allow passage under the low bridges, and it suddenly dawned on me where it goes.

I had assumed that this area at the back of the bar was just a storeroom, but actually it’s where the wheelhouse ends up. The door that you see just opens to a shallow closet that holds the controls for the room’s audio/visual equipment.

Tomorrow: Würzburg

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May 7, 2020

Shelley Update . . .

Bringing things up to date on the Shelley Luther situation. After some legal maneuvering, she was released from jail at 1:50pm this afternoon. And ultimately, it took a revised Executive Order from Governor Abbott and a ruling by the Texas Supreme Court to spring her out.

A lot of people had been berating Gov. Abbott wanting to know why he didn’t just pardon her. Well, the reason is, that he couldn’t.

Unlike a lot of states, the governor of Texas doesn’t have unlimited pardon powers. He can only pardon, or not pardon, after a recommendation from the State Board of Pardons and Paroles. He can’t just do it unilaterally.

So what he did was to issue a new E.O. eliminating the jail time as a possible consequence of breaking the rules. And then the Texas Supreme Court issued an order for her immediate release.

So as I mentioned in last night’s blog, once again a little ‘civil disobedience’ changed the law. And starting tomorrow, salons can now open legally.

And in this case, a little civil disobedience paid off for Shelley. I mentioned that a friend had set up a GoFundMe account to help cover her $7000 fine and $20,000+ lawyer bills. And it looks like she’ll have a little left over.

Apparently people all over the country rallied to her cause, and when the account was finally shut off about 11am this morning, her fund had topped out at $500,110.00.

And the judge, Judge Eric Moyé, who is up for reelection this November, has an opponent for the seat. And that opponent, lawyer Jessica Lewis, now has contributions pouring into her campaign as well.

It will be interesting to see how the election turns out in a few months.

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May 7, 2021

News From Around The Web . . .

Lizards and flatworms can do it, so why can’t we?

Persuading the Body to Regenerate Its Limbs

Humans can regrow their liver, and children under the age of 7 or so can regrowth their fingertips. So why not a new arm?

Cost of Colorado’s forced wolf introduction already rising; a ‘circular self-destruction formula’

According to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, after the 1994 forced wolf introduction to Yellowstone National Park, through 2012, elk herds decreased by more than 80%. Most of the natural dispersion of wolves in the west since 1994 centers on the Yellowstone packs. As wolf populations increase and prey species decrease wolves migrate in search of better prey opportunities and open range for the new packs.

And then there’s the moose.

In Wisconsin, Minnesota and Alaska moose calves are a favorite food source for wolves, particularly in winter, and moose populations have suffered under wolf-protection laws.

China recently launched the first 22.5 metric ton segment of their new space station into orbit, using a 23 ton booster. Which is still up there, but on it’s way back down. And experts expect tons of it to reach the earth.

And no one knows exactly where or when it’s coming back down. But probably sometime this weekend. Maybe they should have checked with Elon Musk. He seems to be able to get his boosters back on the ground in one piece.

So Keep Watching The Skies!

Cue the Twilight Zone theme.

From the start, Elon Musk has said he started SpaceX because he wants to go to Mars. He has plans for the first trip in the next few years, and would like to have a colony up and going by sometime in the 2030’s.

Now in one of those really weird coincidences, or maybe it’s one of those Nostradamusy things, but back in 1952, almost 70 years ago, Werner von Braun (yes, that guy) wrote a science fiction novel called “Project Mars”.

In the book, a guy named ‘Elon’ helped settle and govern the Mars colony.

So prophecy, or is Elon just a time traveler, back from the future? That might explain how he’s been able to do all these things at SpaceX that NASA as much as said was impossible.

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One last thing about the Kroger’s Rx Club is that they not only have people meds, but also ones for your pets.

So of course, you have to put your pet on the plan too. That’s why our plan account looks like this.

The pharmacist thought it was pretty funny. Said she’d never seen anyone actually put their pet on the plan before until they needed it.

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Disneyland’s new Snow White ride adds magic, but also a new problem

Apparently some people are very upset at Disneyland’s redo of Snow White’s Scary Adventure.

It seems that Prince Charming should not have kissed Snow White without her consent. And since he didn’t wait for her OK, he was guilty of Sexual Assault.

So Prince Charming should have just let her lie there and rot?

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May 7, 2022

Winning The Toilet Wars . . .

I mentioned yesterday that I finally come out on top in my recent Toilet Wars.

To recap, the flange underneath our toilet had broken at one of the mounting bolts, making the whole thing loose and wobbly. And when I pulled the toilet up, I found that one section had broken off, and in fact, it looked like the material was kind of flaking on and decomposing.

So my first thought was to pull the flange and just replace it with a new one. I did have a little trouble finding the right one because as I mentioned before, my Dometic/Sealand toilet is mounted using 4 bolts, and most new toilets mount with 2 bolts. But I finally found one, but when I tried to replace the old one, I found it was not screwed down to the rig floor, but instead they had epoxied it down. So it wasn’t coming up.

After running through a number of ideas that didn’t work, I finally found this flange extender.

It’s made to raise your toilet if you’re installing a new thicker floor in your bathroom. You can actually stack up to 3 of these if you need to. But the problem was that the holes didn’t line up with my toilet base. So it took a little work with a jigsaw made it work.

I then drilled pilot holes down through the old flange and into the wood underneath, and then screwed down 2” wood screws to hold it down. Then came the next problem. Getting the toilet down while getting the bolts lined up with the holes, since I had to hold up the toilet at the same time.

And after several fails, I laid my drill across the opening, which let me set the toilet on it, then rocked it forward while lining up the bolts and getting the nuts started. Next, keeping the toilet rocked forward, I removed the drill, and was able to let it back down to the rear as I lined up the bolts through the toilet base. Then tightening them down, I was down.

With that part.

My next problem was to hook up the water feed, always a problem with the rigid PEX pipe. The original toilet’s valve was in a slightly different position, making it hard to connect to the new one. But after heating the PEX slightly with a heat gun, I was able to bend enough to get it hooked up with no leakage.

Done.

Today was lunch at Spring Creek BBQ with Ribs and Brisket for me, and just Ribs for Jan. Then it was on to WalMart right next door for a few things, and then home.

A nice day, and so good to have Jan back home.

Wherever she is.

After getting fully caffeinating this morning, I went outside to install my new LED headlight bulbs in the Jeep. And as I had hoped, it didn’t take long at all, mainly because the bulb sockets weren’t hard to access. The ones in our Dakota were much more difficult.

And 10 minutes later I had this.

And in another 10 minutes I was done.

I’ve got a kit to clean the headlight lens,

but it takes about an hour per lens so I’ll wait until after we get back from our upcoming trip.

And speaking about our upcoming trip, next Saturday, a week from today, we’re heading out on a two week trip back to Alabama to see relatives and friends, some of whom Jan and I have known since the early 70’s, and some I’ve known since the very early 60’s. Really looking forward to it, and all the great BBQ places we plan on eating at.

Lunch today was at Pho Barr, the first time in a while, and it was just as good as always.

As always we started off with an order of their Grilled Pork Spring Rolls, with Peanut Sauce.

Jan got her usual Grilled Chicken Vermicelli Bowl,

while I got my usual, the Pho Ga with Chicken.

But we actually started out with a drink that Jan saw another customer ordering, a Watermelon-Lemon Fruit Juice Slushie.

Made with fresh fruit, it was delicious.

Finishing up, we drove over to the nearby CostCutters to get our hair cut.

Jan more than me, of course.

And that was it for today.

Tomorrow we’ll heading up to Katy to get together with Brandi, Lowell, and Landon for lunch at a new Mexican restaurant in their area.

Looking forward to it.

And now back to Sam.

Regular readers will probably remember me talking about the time when my family lived in Colombia, South America. I made friends with a young girl who lived in the same residence hotel as we did in Barranquilla. I was going on 14 and Sam (Samantha) was a little over 14. She was British and said her father worked for the British government.

We had been hanging out together for a couple of months when she shows up one morning all dressed up and says that her mother wants to have me to Afternoon Tea. And to be there at 4pm, and DON’T BE LATE!

When I asked her what her room number was, (I had never been to her apartment and she had never been to mine) she said, “6th Floor”. And when I ask what room number, she just smiled and said, “You’ll figure it out.”

And when I got off at the 6th floor (the top floor in the hotel) it was obvious that her family had the entire floor. And I quickly found out why.

After pulling the bell rope, the door was opened by a British butler who greeted me by name, and then said,

“The Duchess and Lady Samantha are waiting in the library.”

“Wait. What?”

So, trying to get to the point here, it turns out that yes, Sam was a future duchess, and was in fact Royalty. Or at least Royalty-Adjacent, maybe. Her mother, the Duchess was actually Queen Elizabeth’s second cousin, or something, and was somewhere around 12th in line for the throne, this in the early 60’s. And Sam was somewhere around 50th in line. Sam and her mother were both at Queen Elizabeth’s Coronation in 1953, and Sam regularly hung around with the Royal and Royal-Adjacent kids, including Prince Charles.

And it seems that Prince Charles was roundly hated by pretty much everyone, especially the girls. It seems he like to jump out of the bushes, or corner them in a hallway and try to kiss them, and other things, and when they refused, he would threaten them by telling them he would be King someday and that they would be sorry.

So she had a vehement hatred for Charles, and really, really hoped he would never be King. And she almost got her wish.

Until today, about 60 years later.

I don’t know if Sam is still alive or not, as she would be 75 now, and despite Jan’s urging, I have refused to look her up to see. I prefer to remember her as the red-haired, green eyed, 15 year old young girl as she was the last time I saw her.

But wherever she is, I know she’s deeply saddened today.

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Thought for the Day:

Beer Is Better Pain Reliever Than Tylenol, Study Finds

Comments found online:

They had to run a study to learn this?

It still hurts. You just don’t care anymore..

It makes women prettier too.

Is there anything it can’t do.

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Since I know a few of you don’t make it all the way down through the Retro-Blogs™,
I thought I’d repost up here our time on our European Viking River Cruise today in 2019.

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May 6, 2019

When Snow White Needs A New Grumpy . . .

Nuremberg    5/6/2019

I mentioned in yesterday’s blog on our visit to Regensburg how when we came out of the town museum that it had turned cold and rainy.

Well, today wasn’t better. In fact it was worse, with 30° at 4:30 this morning, and only up to 32 by 8:30. So everyone was scrambling, including us, for some warm coats/jackets. Everyone had looked at the average temps this time of the year and packed their clothes according, not planning for daytime temps in the 30’s.

In fact the ship sold out of their fleece jackets like the ones we got (on the left)

and had to get the much more expensive ones on the right.

Our Nuremberg walking tour was in the afternoon, so we had lunch up on the Aquavit Terrace which is kind of a light buffet, with both hot and cold dishes. One of which was listed as “Meatloaf”.

Well, it was meat, and it is in a loaf, I guess. But it AIN’T Meatloaf. It’s more like one of those Hormel canned hams. But I guess that some mushrooms and a little gravy makes it all good. Or not.

Today the Skirnir was docked right in town so we were able to step right off the ship and onto our tour buses.

Looking back at the ship we saw that the Sundeck was still configured for the upcoming low bridges.

Not only does the wheelhouse retract into the the deck when necessary, but so does the ‘BBQ Grill’ on the left side. There’s also one on the right side that’s retracted now.

I call them ‘BBQ Grills’ because that’s what they call them, because that’s what they look like. I thought that maybe the cooks use them for BBQ’ing, but actually they’re Auxiliary Control Panels.

The Skirnir has thrusters that can actually move the ship sideways. So they just pull up besides the dock and then move sideways until they’re perfectly positioned. And the Auxiliary Panels let them keep a close eye on the dockside as they’re moving.

Neat!

Our tour started out by passing by a number of the Nazi stadiums, rally grounds, and buildings, including the Federal Building where the Nuremberg Trials were held in Rm. 600. And trials are still held there today.

Unfortunately I didn’t get any photos because of the darkened and curved glass windows on the bus, so just use your imagination.

After our bus tour, we began our walking tour of the old city, including the medieval Nuremberg Castle.

I will have to admit  that the Castle tour almost finished Jan and I off. The walk up to the Castle was a very steep climb, with largest cobblestones we encountered the entire trip. They were humped up about 4”, very rough, and hard to walk on. And they were wet, due to the on and off cold drizzles we were having.

By the time we were to the top our ankles were screaming for Advil, and we were both hobbling the rest of the day. And we probably wouldn’t have made it to the top with some assist from our friends.

But once we were at the top, the view out over the city was great.

Next up was a couple of very old churches, St Sebaldus, which dates from the early 1200’s.

and the Frauenkirche (Our Lady’s Church), which was consecrated in the mid-1300’s.

The clock in the tower has been ticking away since 1509.

Did I mentioned that everything over here is just OLD.

As we walked through town we passed the Albrecht-Dürer house.

Built in 1420, it was the home of Dürer, a noted Renaissance artist.

We also noticed that a number of houses had these intricate statues mounted on the corner. Not sure what the significance is, though.

We ended our guided tour at the Main Market in the center of town next to the City Hall. Our rendezvous point to meet up later to head back to the buses was the Schöner Brunnen.

A 60+ foot high Gothic spire, the fountain dates from the late-1400’s, and depicts 40 different colorful figures, ranging from leaders of the Holy Roman Empire, Church Fathers, Moses, and seven of the Apostles.

Since we were getting a little hungry, we decided to try the nearby Behringer’s Bratwursthausle, listed as the home of the original Nuremberg Bratwurst. But we didn’t know at the time how ‘original’ it was.

Founded in 1313, the European Union has designated it as the ‘First Sausage in Europe’.

Now I’m not sure how the Old Sausage Kitchen in Regensburg feels about this, since they’ve been around since 900 A.D. Our guide told us that’s there’s a big rivalry between the two cities over their sausages. I guess now we know why.

Our guide told us that Nurembergers are known for being especially grumpy. In fact she said that if Snow White needed a new Grumpy, she’d come to Nuremberg. And we found this out for ourselves.

We ordered sausages with kraut and bread, and this is what we got.

Note: No kraut.

And though we asked repeatedly, in both English and my halting German, we never got it. And in fact, the more we ask, the grumpier he got.

And before you ask, no, it wasn’t just us. Others from our cruise were having the same problem. And when we tried to get our check, it got even worse. He had them all mixed up, with different tables lumped together. And the more we tried to correct him, the grumpier he got.

But finally settling up, we headed over to other side of the market square to buy some of the famous Nuremberg gingerbread. But what we got was kind of disappointing. Turns out that Nuremberg gingerbread has no ginger in it.

Or cinnamon, or cloves.

In fact, it pretty much tasted like an moist oatmeal cookie. But it was tasty, anyway.

How can gingerbread not have any ginger in it? Isn’t that just ‘bread?’

Back at the ship, we took the obligatory nap, gobbled down some more Advil, and met up for dinner.

Jan and I both repeated on our Appetizers and Entrees, with the only new dishes, our desserts.

Jan had a delicious Mango sorbet, so good she almost ordered seconds.

And I had the Blueberry Crumble, also delicious.

Tomorrow: Bamberg

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May 6, 2009

More Lazy, Hazy Days…

Another quiet, lazy day today in Fort Myers, FL.

Had lunch at Sweet Tomatoes again and then picked up some more parts for the solar screens I’m trying to put together.

That’s about it for today

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May 6, 2010

Rut Roh!

We pulled out of Park of the Sierras about 9:30 am, a little later than we had planned, but no problem.

Heading south on SR 41, we cut across to Madera and up thru Merced and Modesto, then west thru Livermore to Oakland.

The one problem along the way was that both cats got car sick. Our cats had never gotten sick until we took the scenic route from Yuma, AZ to Laughlin, NV on our way to Las Vegas.

Heading north along the east side of San Francisco Bay, we could see the Golden Gate Bridge in the distance off to the left.

We took the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge across the upper end of the Bay, passing by San Quentin off to our left as we came off the bridge.

We did have a little trouble getting across the bridge, though. Well, not really getting across it, but getting through the toll booth. I had used the last of our cash, $40, paying the tire guy for his repair work yesterday. CoachNet covered the $100 service call charge, but I had to pay for the actual repair, and he didn’t take credit cards. Normally my GPS program alerts me when it routes me over a toll bridge, but for some reason, this time it didn’t .

So we pulled into the bridge toll booth and tried to pay the $8.25 toll with a credit card.

Rut Roh!

They don’t take credit cards, either.. We have traveled all over the US and Canada, using toll roads and toll bridges and this is the first time we’ve found one that didn’t take credit cards. So Jan and I were digging thru our pockets and purses, still coming up short. Then she remembered her laundry quarters. And after handing the toll lady a large handful of quarters, we were good to go. Leaving the bridge we joined US 101 and headed north.

Note to self: Visit an ATM soon!

We got to Wine Country RV Park in Rohnert Park, CA about 2:15 pm and things went downhill.  I had called the park on Monday and made a reservation for a week starting Wednesday. Then when we had tire trouble yesterday, I called them and told them we would not be there until today. We didn’t have a real good connection, but he seemed to understand with no problems. But, to be sure I emailed him later in the afternoon, confirming that we were coming in today.

However, when we pulled in to the park, and getting in wasn’t easy, I found that we had no site waiting for us. He apparently thought we weren’t coming and was now full. And, when I asked about my email, he said he only checked email every few days.

Bummer!

I could think of other words, but I better stick with Bummer!

And getting out wasn’t easy either. It’s a very tight park with some hard turns getting out.

But finally out, we parked right down the street and hit the Internet looking for a new park. We found a KOA park not too far away, but at $425 for a week, it was way too pricey for a park where we would spend very little time, since we’ll be spending most of our time down in the San Francisco area.

But a little more checking showed that the Sonoma-Marin County Fairgrounds was about 10 miles back down the road in Petaluma, and a quick phone call told us that they had an open site, so off we went.

The fairground’s RV park, although OK, is a big step down from our site in the Park of the Sierras we were in for the last nine days.

After getting set up, we headed out to get some supper. Driving around, we came across Pepper’s Restaurant and decided to give it try. And it was really good.

Getting back to the rig, I got the satellite dish set up and we settled in for the night.

Tomorrow we’ll take care of some shopping before heading down to San Francisco on Saturday.

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May 6, 2011

Casinos and Vineyards . . .

I got up about 11 am, finally feeling pretty much normal again, enough so that I got back on some little jobs around the coach that I had been putting off. Then, about 2:30 we all headed out to run some errands.

We also checked out the Elk’s Lodge in the area that we had heard had RV parking. It did have hookups, but probably was not a place you’d want to spend much time.

Next we headed down I-15 to check out a couple of high-end RV Parks.

But in the middle of that, Jan discovered a nearby World Market that she just had to check out, coming out with large bags of stuff.

We finally got back to the Thousand Trails RV Resort about 5:30, staying just long enough to drop off our shopping results, and then heading back out to the Boulder Station Casino right down the road to have their buffet for dinner.

It was really good, as usual, but the real problem afterwards when Jan turned a $20 buffet dinner into a $40 dinner after she dropped $20 in the slots.

But it was fun, anyway.

We finally got home about 8 after a busy day.

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May 6, 2013

Look, there’s one . . .

Today brought us something we haven’t seen in months – Rain!

It’s actually the first rain we’ve seen since we left the Houston area back in February. It started around 11:30 and went on for a couple of hours, in fact, heavy enough that it knocked the satellite TV out for about 30 minutes. I think over the course of the day we got about a inch of rain.

But with the rain came cooler weather, with it only making it to 73 today, and staying in the 70’s for the next couple of days. And apparently we may still have some more rain coming up.

And on the subject of weather, I was checking the weather in South Lake Tahoe, CA, where we’ll be in a little over a week, and the high today was 46 degrees with 35 tonight. And by the time we get there in 10 days we’re looking at temps in the 60’s and 40’s. Perfect weather for us.

About 4pm Jan and I headed out for dinner and a drive around town. Our first stop was the Macayo’s Mexican Kitchen on E. Tropicana, a place recommended by one of our blog readers, who wanted to know how it compares with Lindo Michoacan where we ate a few days ago.

And, although Macayo’s is good, unfortunately it’s not quite up to Lindo. But as a trade-off, It’s closer to the park and cheaper too. In fact Lindo is about 50% more expensive, but probably worth it.

Jan had the Poblano Chile Relleno along with a beef taco, and I had the Pork Carnitas, one of my favorite dishes.

My Carnitas was good, better than what I had in Apache Junction, but not as good as the Carnitas a la Coca-Cola from Lindo Michoacan the other night.

Leaving Macayo’s we headed down to the bottom of Las Vegas Blvd, aka “The Strip”. I wanted to check out the Camping World there for those Bulldog cabinet latches that I’m looking for, but we got there a few minutes after they had closed at 6pm. The main reason we were late was that I didn’t realize how far down “The Strip” the Camping World was.

But in fact it was so far away that “The Strip” was now a two lane road pretty much out in the desert. So since we didn’t make it to the Camping World in time, we used it as an excuse to drive all the way back up “The Strip”, taking in the sights and doing some people-watching. Always fun in a place like Las Vegas.

In fact, we sometimes make a game out of it.

It’s called “Find the Hooker”.

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May 6, 2014

Made In The Shade . . .

Today was one of those very nice, do-nothing days that it seems like we don’t have enough of. Jan and I still laugh about how we had all these hobbies we were going to start once we retired and hit the road.

And we’ve done none of them. We’re just too busy being retired and on the road.

It was really nice outside and Mister spent most of the afternoon laying out in the shade.

It’s funny to watch him move around. Sometimes he’ll lay in the sun, and then move into shade. Which kind of makes sense.

But sometimes he lay in the shade for an hour or so, and then move 3 feet away, still in the shade, and lay there for another hour or so.

Picky, picky, picky.

Other than making a run to the convenience store for some ice cream for tonight’s dessert, we never left the rig today.

Jan read on her Kindle Paperwhite and napped, while I did Internet stuff. Normally I would be working on my Escapade Gate Guarding Seminar, but that will have to wait until next year’s Escapade in Tucson.

For dinner we just had salads, and of course the before-mentioned ice cream.

Tomorrow will be another busy day. First up we have to stop off at the Chinese Consulate and hopefully pick up my niece’s visas. Then maybe we’ll have lunch at Katz’s Deli once again.

Then I’ve got a client visit out in Algoa, and another couple back in the Webster area, before we finish up with dinner with Chris, Linda, and Piper.

Friday we’ve got Jan’s Oncologist appointment, probably a few more stops, and then dinner with Brandi, Lowell, and Landon.

As it stands now we will probably leave here and head north on Sunday.

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May 6, 2015

Hurry Up and Wait . . . Still

Waiting for our Blowout Repair at Affinity RV in Prescott, AZ.

Still haven’t heard anything from anybody, so we just wait. But at least we’re very comfortable here, with 50 amps and water.

The only problem is the lack of a sewer connection, which is to be expected, I guess, since we’re basically in a parking lot. But it looked like today I was going to have to do something about emptying our grey tank. As I mentioned before, we can normally go two weeks on our 40 gallon black tank, but the grey is another story.

I had dumped our tanks on Saturday in Las Vegas before we left so we already had a couple of days on the grey before we even got here. So I thought I’d go ahead and dump my grey tank using the Blue Boy tank here at Affinity.

But I quickly discovered that this type of tote, even at only 15 gallons (almost 125#) is very hard to move. Using the handle it’s very hard to pull it without it catching on your heels.

Unfortunately it wasn’t one like this which would be much easier to move.

After dragging the tote around to the dump station at the front of the lot the first time, I borrowed one of those metal utility wagons that they use around here. Even with the wagon, I still had to pick up the tote (125#) and put it in the wagon. Otherwise it was up too high for the waste water to flow into it. But it was a lot easier to move, so that helped.

One thing I discovered is that apparently my grey tank is bigger than I though. It’s listed as being 60 gallons, (with a 40 gallon black tank) in all my manuals. But I dumped 5 full totes of waste water, (for a total of 75 gallons), and still had a little left in the rig tank. So I guess I have a 75 gallon grey tank. Who knew?

Besides the beautiful scenery, one thing nice about the Prescott area is the price of gas here. Yesterday, as Jan and I were heading out to have dinner at the Golden Corral, we stopped off at Fry’s Supermarket right across the street to fill up the truck.

I was very happy to find that Unleaded was only $2.69 vs. the $3.31 I saw in Las Vegas last week. And with the 40 cents a gallon discount from my magic Fred Meyer’s Loyalty Card, it was $2.29. Very nice.

And the Golden Corral was really good.

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May 6, 2016

Power Problems?

Sunday afternoon, a little while after we got here, Jan was fixing supper in the microwave, and when the a/c came on, the shore power went off. But in about 30 seconds, it popped back on. Then a few minutes later, it did it again. So I turned off the a/c for a few minutes until Jan had finishing fixing dinner.

Now, since I knew the pedestal breaker didn’t pop and reset itself, my first thought was a problem with my Progressive EMS (Electrical Management System). If it senses a problem it will shut down and reset itself, but when it does, it will display an error code.

But no code when I checked.

So since we were on 50 amps, and this shouldn’t have happened, what was causing the problem? Maybe it was the park power itself? But when I checked with the people in the rig two sites over, they said no problem. And since the problem didn’t reappear, I left it at that.

But the real kicker is that this same problem occurred two months ago when we were here, and on the same inner circle of ‘A’ section.

Two weeks, after the first time, when we returned to Colorado River, we were parked across the street, on the outside of one of the ‘A’ ring circles. And unlike the previous visit, we had no problem at all there.

Yesterday, in the middle of cooking Jan’s Cupboard Casserole in the convection oven, we had the same problem again. Twice, in fact. So now we’ve got the same problem, only in one park, and only in the same small section.

So this afternoon, I called the park office and they sent the electric guy out. My thought was this – since the pedestal breaker wasn’t the problem, and Progressive EMS wasn’t the problem, the problem must be external.

And the only thing that makes sense with that is that there are auto-reset breakers upstream from the pedestal. I’ve seen this at other parks, and I suspect it might be the case here.

But when I mentioned this possibility to  the electrical guy, he said they didn’t have any auto-reset breakers here at Colorado River. But then he stopped and thought for a minute, and then said, “Well, this inside circle was upgraded to 50 amps about 6 months ago so we could put cottages here, and they installed a entirely new panel. And he didn’t have any idea what was in it.

And then the kicker. I wasn’t the first person to report a problem here in the inner circle.

I told the guy that I suspected that one side of the auto-reset breaker was weak and pops at too low an amperage. But I think it’s only one side of the breaker, since it doesn’t pop when both a/c’s are running. But that’s split across both breakers.

And according to my nifty-keen Kill-A-Watt meter, the a/c draws more than the convection oven.

Kill-A-Watt

So I think that one side of the breaker is popping and of course taking the other side with it, since they’re ganged together. But since we leaving here Sunday, hopefully we won’t have any more problems.

About 4:30 Jan and I headed up to Ellinger to have the Friday night buffet at Peter’s BBQ. We do this at least once while we’re here and it’s always delicious.

I posted yesterday’s Cupboard Casserole in the Jan’s Favorite Recipes area, so check it out, and add your own ideas.

Tomorrow we’re heading into Katy about 1pm so I can Landon-sit. Lowell has a trucking show to go to, and Brandi and Jan are going to get mani-pedi’s. So this will leave Landon and I to get into trouble all on our own.

Really looking forward to it.

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May 6, 2017

Clam or Chicken . . .

It was down to 34° last night, with a high of only 47 today, but it was sunny and pretty nice.

Tonight however is probably another story. No snow, but depending on who you listen to, it’s either going down to 27 or 25°.  Either way I’m disconnecting shore water this evening before the freeze.

So for that reason I went outside and topped off our fresh water tank this morning to get ready for tonight. I also unloaded the backseat of the truck before we head out for lunch

As I said yesterday, blog reader Mary Burge had recommended The Sparrow Bakery up in Bend, so we had invited our neighbor Dina Pickens to ride along with us.

Dina was the RV’er that I thought was trying to poach the site I was trying to move into yesterday, and she thought I was trying to snipe hers. So we ended up parked next to each other.

We picked her up about noon and made our way into Bend and the bakery. For some reason it looks like a old western jail.

It’s a small place and was pretty busy, but we were lucky enough to find an table immediately.

Jan started off with a cup of their Clam Chowder,

or maybe not. She was pretty sure she actually got their other Soup of the Day, Creamy Chicken. But she said it was good, anyway.

Dina and Jan both got the Chicken Waldorf Sandwich with grapes, apples, blue cheeses, walnuts, celery, green onion, tarragon, & greens served on a made-in- house croissant.

I started out with a large Cardamom Latte, the first latte I’ve ever gotten with the leaf pattern. And really good.

I got their Bacon Breakfast Sandwich with a poached egg, bacon, avocado, arugula aioli, Havarti cheese, and served on a made-in- house croissant..

As Mary had said, the food was delicious, and we had a great time getting to know Dina (pronounced like Dinah).

She’s a solo RV’er who drives a 36ft Gulfstream Crescendo FRED (FRont End Diesel) and tows a car and has been RV’ing for over 20 years.

What was really funny was all the same TT parks we had both been to, and all the same people we both know at Colorado River and Lake Conroe in the Houston area.

Finally coming home, we stopped off to get gas for the truck, enjoying the $2.55 price over California. And forgetting I was in Oregon, I started to get out to fill up.

Oregon, along with New Jersey, are the two states that do not allow you to fill your own tank, for gas at least. Diesel RV’s are a different story.

About 9 this evening I went outside to disconnect shore water. At that time it was already 33°.

For dinner tonight we had mugs of last night’s delayed Bean with Bacon Soup.

It was delicious and worth the wait.

This afternoon I took down our Sony  rear camera monitor to find out why it rattles when we’re on the road.

Shaking it or wiggling it didn’t make a sound, nor does shaking the monitor itself. So I going to shockproof everything with rubber washers to see if that helps. I’ve kind of been waiting for it to die so I could replace it with a LCD monitor, but it just keeps rocking along. Now if I can just make it quieter.

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May 6, 2018

Oh, The Huge Manatee . . .

About 1:15 Jan and I drove over to the Victory Lakes area to have breakfast at a new place that we just noticed called First Watch. They’re one of those Breakfast / Brunch / Lunch places that closes at 2:30pm.

Jan got the Tri-Athlete with an egg white omelet with house-roasted Crimini mushrooms, onions, tomatoes and green chilies, along with house-made Pico de Gallo, whole grain artisan toast, all-natural house preserves and fresh fruit.

I got the Traditional Breakfast with two fresh cage-free eggs over easy, smoked ham, whole grain artisan toast, all-natural house preserves and fresh, and fresh fruit.

So why would you keep your eggs in a cage, anyway?

In addition, we had to split an order of their Million Dollar Bacon, It’s baked with brown sugar, black pepper, cayenne and a maple syrup drizzle.

Really good. The right-hand strip is for Jan who likes her bacon burnt.

But as good as it was, we probably won’t go back. It was just a little too ‘fru-fru’ for us. A lot of quinoa and kale, and the like. For a good old American breakfast, it’s IHOP or Cracker Barrel. And if we want to upscale a bit, it’s The Egg and I.

After breakfast we drove next door to the Home Depot to look for something I couldn’t find at the Lowe’s across the street. And while I was there I thought I’d go ahead and pick up the duplex box and wall plate that I’m going to use for my Remote Dump Valve project figuring they would have the same one that I got from Lowe’s for my 50 amp tester.

But they didn’t. The only one they had didn’t come with any of  the blank plugs that are used to cover up the unused holes. So it was on over to the Lowe’s anyway.

And there I found an even better box with only one hole that I’ll use to bring in the 12VDC power to the remote control modules. Perfect.

Then it was on to the WalMart next door for a few things. And as we were checking out we ran into some old friends, Sharon and Richard Arnhart. We’ve known them since our early days going to the Alvin Opry, probably the late 90’s.

Of course we just saw them this past Friday night at the Alvin Opry Reunion show at Billy’s Event Hall up in Pearland. But it was nice to catch up without trying to talk over the music.

Richard and Sharon spent most of the their time traveling the country performing their Gospel-Country Music Ministry at churches in a number of states. You can check out their schedule here at the TheArnharts.com.

And as it turns out we know another family with a traveling ministry.

Back in 2014, when we were staying at the Wilmington OH Thousand Trails, we met up with the Boggs Family, Davy, Kelly, and their daughter, Odie, of the Boggs Family Ministries. We got together at a good Mexican restaurant in Lebanon, OH and had a really fun time getting to know one another.

https://ourrvadventures.com/2014/07/two-sets-of-new-friends/

The Boggs travel around the country in their beautiful Prevost Bus holding revivals at local churches. They even have their own tent if need be.

And this is Davy, Kelly, and Odie.

                                              

Davy                                           Kelly                                             Odie

Then in January 2016, we met up again when they were in Livingston, TX, and had a great time catching up on the last couple of years, but finally we had to part company a little after 5pm so they could get ready for that night’s service. Then on Sunday they’re heading down to Sweeney, TX for another revival there.

Really nice people doing great things. Hopefully our paths will cross again soon

After WalMart we got gas and then headed home for the night. Another nice day.

Finishing up for today, RV Mobile Lube called me late this afternoon to ask if they could push my appointment back from 3pm to 5:30, so I told them no problem. They’re really booked up this time of year. In fact they’ve brought over their two techs from Austin and San Antonio to help catch up.

Today In History

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May 6, 2019

When Snow White Needs A New Grumpy . . .

Nuremberg    5/6/2019

I mentioned in yesterday’s blog on our visit to Regensburg how when we came out of the town museum that it had turned cold and rainy.

Well, today wasn’t better. In fact it was worse, with 30° at 4:30 this morning, and only up to 32 by 8:30. So everyone was scrambling, including us, for some warm coats/jackets. Everyone had looked at the average temps this time of the year and packed their clothes according, not planning for daytime temps in the 30’s.

In fact the ship sold out of their fleece jackets like the ones we got (on the left)

and had to get the much more expensive ones on the right.

Our Nuremberg walking tour was in the afternoon, so we had lunch up on the Aquavit Terrace which is kind of a light buffet, with both hot and cold dishes. One of which was listed as “Meatloaf”.

Well, it was meat, and it is in a loaf, I guess. But it AIN’T Meatloaf. It’s more like one of those Hormel canned hams. But I guess that some mushrooms and a little gravy makes it all good. Or not.

Today the Skirnir was docked right in town so we were able to step right off the ship and onto our tour buses.

Looking back at the ship we saw that the Sundeck was still configured for the upcoming low bridges.

Not only does the wheelhouse retract into the the deck when necessary, but so does the ‘BBQ Grill’ on the left side. There’s also one on the right side that’s retracted now.

I call them ‘BBQ Grills’ because that’s what they call them, because that’s what they look like. I thought that maybe the cooks use them for BBQ’ing, but actually they’re Auxiliary Control Panels.

The Skirnir has thrusters that can actually move the ship sideways. So they just pull up besides the dock and then move sideways until they’re perfectly positioned. And the Auxiliary Panels let them keep a close eye on the dockside as they’re moving.

Neat!

Our tour started out by passing by a number of the Nazi stadiums, rally grounds, and buildings, including the Federal Building where the Nuremberg Trials were held in Rm. 600. And trials are still held there today.

Unfortunately I didn’t get any photos because of the darkened and curved glass windows on the bus, so just use your imagination.

After our bus tour, we began our walking tour of the old city, including the medieval Nuremberg Castle.

I will have to admit  that the Castle tour almost finished Jan and I off. The walk up to the Castle was a very steep climb, with largest cobblestones we encountered the entire trip. They were humped up about 4”, very rough, and hard to walk on. And they were wet, due to the on and off cold drizzles we were having.

By the time we were to the top our ankles were screaming for Advil, and we were both hobbling the rest of the day. And we probably wouldn’t have made it to the top with some assist from our friends.

But once we were at the top, the view out over the city was great.

Next up was a couple of very old churches, St Sebaldus, which dates from the early 1200’s.

and the Frauenkirche (Our Lady’s Church), which was consecrated in the mid-1300’s.

The clock in the tower has been ticking away since 1509.

Did I mentioned that everything over here is just OLD.

As we walked through town we passed the Albrecht-Dürer house.

Built in 1420, it was the home of Dürer, a noted Renaissance artist.

We also noticed that a number of houses had these intricate statues mounted on the corner. Not sure what the significance is, though.

We ended our guided tour at the Main Market in the center of town next to the City Hall. Our rendezvous point to meet up later to head back to the buses was the Schöner Brunnen.

A 60+ foot high Gothic spire, the fountain dates from the late-1400’s, and depicts 40 different colorful figures, ranging from leaders of the Holy Roman Empire, Church Fathers, Moses, and seven of the Apostles.

Since we were getting a little hungry, we decided to try the nearby Behringer’s Bratwursthausle, listed as the home of the original Nuremberg Bratwurst. But we didn’t know at the time how ‘original’ it was. Founded in 1313, the European Union has designated it as the ‘First Sausage in Europe’.

Now I’m not sure how the Old Sausage Kitchen in Regensburg feels about this, since they’ve been around since 900 A.D. Our guide told us that’s there’s a big rivalry between the two cities over their sausages. I guess now we know why.

Our guide told us that Nurembergers are known for being especially grumpy. In fact she said that if Snow White needed a new Grumpy, she’d come to Nuremberg. And we found this out for ourselves.

We ordered sausages with kraut and bread, and this is what we got.

Note: No kraut.

And though we asked repeatedly, in both English and my halting German, we never got it. And in fact, the more we ask, the grumpier he got.

And before you ask, no, it wasn’t just us. Others from our cruise were having the same problem. And when we tried to get our check, it got even worse. He had them all mixed up, with different tables lumped together. And the more we tried to correct him, the grumpier he got.

But finally settling up, we headed over to other side of the market square to buy some of the famous Nuremberg gingerbread. But what we got was kind of disappointing. Turns out that Nuremberg gingerbread has no ginger in it.

Or cinnamon or cloves.

In fact, it pretty much tasted like an moist oatmeal cookie. But it was tasty, anyway.

But how can gingerbread not have any ginger in it? Isn’t that just ‘bread’.

Back at the ship, we took the obligatory nap, gobbled down some more Advil, and met up for dinner.

Jan and I both repeated on our Appetizers and Entrees, with the only new dishes, our desserts.

Jan had a delicious Mango sorbet, so good she almost ordered seconds.

And I had the Blueberry Crumble, also delicious.

Tomorrow: Bamberg

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May 6, 2020

Shelley and ‘the law’ . . .

A long-time friend questioned my support of Shelley Luther, the Dallas salon owner who was sentenced to jail and fined $7000 for opening her salon because she was having trouble feeding her children.

Greg, I’d have to disagree with you on funding Shelley Luther after she broke the law. What if everyone took this attitude and disobeyed the law? The virus would spread, hospitals would get overloaded — a real mess because people, like Shelley, disobeyed the law. It’s your right to send her money, if that’s your desire. But I think it sends the wrong message that it’s OK to disobey the law, which it isn’t.

There should be a penalty for breaking the law, and she should pay it. If she doesn’t like the laws in the U.S., let her move to another country.

Jim,

Civil Disobedience goes back to the beginnings of our country, I.e. the Boston Tea Party, Paul Revere’s Ride, the Battles of Lexington and Concord, to more modern events, Rosa Parks, Lunch Counter Sit-ins, Freedom Marches, etc.

All of these were against the ‘law’. But all changed our history, and our laws.

Don’t know if you actually listened to her statement to the judge. She’s having trouble feeding her family, and the same goes for her stylists. She’s not yet received any money from the government. How long would you let your family suffer before you ‘broke the law’?

I take it you haven’t seen the photos online of lines of cars, miles long, stacked up to get food trying to feed their families, over 10,000 at once. Google “Food lines in Texas” if you don’t believe me. These are people who 2 months ago had jobs and no problem feeding their families.

Now, as far as ‘breaking the law’. Legal scholars all over the Internet are debating the validity of these ‘laws’. Mostly because a law by definition has been passed by a legislature and signed by an executive. These are executive ‘orders’ and there are definitely limitations to the them. Note how many of President Trump’s Executive Orders have been challenged in court, some successfully and some unsuccessfully. They are not absolute.

This is why there have been over 150 lawsuits filed, both on Federal and State levels, challenging the validity of these EO’s, some from the governor’s own state legislatures.

Even a Supreme Court Justice and Attorney General Barr have questioned some of these declarations. For her part the governor of Michigan answered mass protests against her edicts by threatening to crack down even harder and keep the state locked down even longer.

Now both the Governor of Texas and the Attorney General of Texas have criticized the Judge’s ruling and said she should be released ASAP. Plus the Lt. Governor of Texas, Dan Patrick, has paid her fine and has offered to take her place in jail.

Also note that Shelley Luther was not convicted of any ‘crime’, or breaking any ‘law’, maybe because the judge is aware it might not hold up. Instead, she was jailed and fined for ‘Contempt Of Court’ because she refused to apologize to the judge for ‘her selfishness’ as in trying to feed her family.

This in a county that’s released 100’s of actual criminals to protect them from the virus, but yet it’s OK to throw her in jail for not apologizing?

And apparently Shelley Luther’s plight has caught the attention of the Internet, since as of 10pm, her GoFundMe account is at about $475,000 with around 13,000 donors, for an average of $40 per donation.

Recently the DOJ had to intervene in several states and localities concerning the complete shutdown of religious services. Even ones where people were parked in the church parking lot listening to the sermon on their radios with their windows up. These people were given $500 tickets from police officers, not wearing masks, who demanded the people roll down their windows to receive the tickets.

See a problem here?

The other thing that is coming up is what are the governor’s limitations in all this. A number of states, Michigan and Mississippi are just two, have 30 day limitations on a governor’s State of Emergency declarations. But these are being ignored. Which is why, as I mentioned above, the governor of Michigan is being sued by her own legislature for overstepping her bounds.

In fact a number of cities and counties around the country have said that they will no longer enforce these ‘laws’ that they no longer think are valid.

Plus some governors have threatened to keep their state in lockdown until there’s a vaccine. So, since some leading epidemiologists say we may never have a real effective vaccine, how is this going to play out? We don’t have a vaccine for the common cold, we don’t have a vaccine for HIV, and even the seasonal flu vaccines are sometimes only 25 to 35% effective.

So what’s to be done about a governor who refuses to reopen their state when the other states around them are opening. An example of this is going on right now in Bristol TN/Bristol VA.

The state line between Tennessee and Virginia runs right down the center of Main St., with stores open for business on the TN side, and locked down tight on the VA side. So restaurant owners on the VA side are going broke while right across the street business is booming.

I guess the virus knows to stop at the state line, right?

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May 6, 2021

Why Take A Chance?

We had lunch at Twin Peaks once again. Yes, that’s twice in one week, and yes, this was completely Jan’s idea. Originally we were going to have lunch at Snooze, but it’s a woman’s prerogative to change her mind, right?

Am I a lucky guy, or what?

Afterwards, we went by the Kroger’s Pharmacy on El Camino to pick up our first 3 month set of prescriptions under their Rx Saving Club, and there were no surprises.

The total was $36, the same as I had figured on. And much less than the $134 for the same ones under Sam’s Plus Card, and the $160 for the same ones at WalMart.

So in one three month order of our prescriptions, I saved more money than the $72 that the Kroger plan cost me for the entire year. In fact it covered that amount and left me $26 over. And once I cancel my Sam’s Club Plus membership, I’ll save another $55.

A really great deal.

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May 6, 2022

Bringing My Baby Back Home . . .

I got up to Brandi’s in Katy a little after 4pm, and about a hour later Lowell got home from work, so Jan and I were heading back toward home by about 5pm.

We were wondering where to stop for dinner, but burgers sounded good. So we stopped off at the Red Robin down in Webster. It’s been a long time since we eaten at one, but it was as good as we remembered.

Jan got the Black and Bleu Burger with the Steak Fries.

With Sautéed Portobello mushrooms, caramelized onions, creamy cheese sauce, Bleu cheese crumbles, shredded romaine and roasted garlic aioli on a toasted brioche bun, Jan said it was delicious.

I had the Scorpion Gourmet Burger,

which has a fire-grilled beef burger topped with melted Pepper-Jack cheese, ultra-spicy Scorpion Pepper Sauce, fried jalapeño coins, lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, roasted garlic aioli, and red onions and jalapeños roasted in Scorpion sauce on a sesame seed bun

Getting home a little after 7pm, even Karma as happy to see Jan again, immediately climbing up into her lap, something she doesn’t do very often.

Tomorrow I’ll catch you up on the recent Toilet Wars.