Monthly Archives: May 2023
A Nice Spare . . .
I’ve had a set of these LED Headlight bulbs in our Dodge Dakota since February 2018.
They were rated for 50,000 hours, and as I said at the time:
OK, so let’s see. 50,000 hours divided by, maybe, a half hour a day average, gives you a 100,000 hours. Or over 11 years.
So if I’m still driving when I’m 80 years old, I still won’t need new bulbs.
Nice!
I just hope my warranty is as good as the bulb’s.
So I decided to get a set for the Jeep. The brand I got in 2018 isn’t available any more, so I ordered these.
Like the others, they’re rated for 50,000 hours and have a 12,000 rpm cooling fan in the base to keep them cool. They should only take a few minutes to install tomorrow morning.
Hopefully they’ll last as long as my other set.
I mentioned a while back that an old friend had given me an RV Air-Conditioner for free. It’s a Dometic Penguin II AC.
It’s about 10 years old, but it’s brand-new. My friend Perry said it was originally purchased to install on a new TV production van at the TV station where he was an engineer. But for some reason the guy they hired wasn’t able to get it done.
So it sat around since then until Perry wanted it out of his garage. So now it’s a spare for our RV.
Our front AC unit is a Coleman 15K unit that I upgraded to back in 2015. We wanted more cooling power when we were gate guarding down in south Texas, so I replaced our old 13.5 BTU unit with a bigger one.
Our rear unit is original to our 1999 coach, and is still going strong, but it’s nice to have a spare if I need it some day.
Thought For The Day:
The future’s always uncertain, and the end is always near.
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.
May 5, 2019
Regensburg 5/5/19
As with other towns/excursions along our river cruise, when we woke up we were docked out in the middle of nowhere. Just a dock, some mooring capstans, and a gangplank to the shore.
What happens is that they would dock a ways out from town, let off the people who were going to take the excursion, and then the ship would proceed on into the dock in town where it would be waiting for us at the end of the day.
So today we had a 40 minute bus ride into Regensburg, Bavaria, Germany. Founded in the mid-1200’s, it’s known for having a higher concentration of bars than any other German city.
Coming into town we passed field after field of what turned out to be mustard plants
Which turn out to figure in our lunch.
We met our local guide at the bus park and started our walking tour into town, taking in the many sights.
Though the town itself was established in 1245, it had been a Roman settlement since around 100 A.D. It fact this stone arch was part of a wall that was commissioned in 179 A.D.
Everything over here is just OLD.
Coming into the main part of town we crossed the Old Stone Bridge.
Built around 1135, it was the only bridge across the river until the 1930’s. Originally a toll bridge, two different Crusades to the Holy Land passed over it along the way.
Next up was St. Peter’s Cathedral.
Built in 1280 to replace on that was built in 700 A.D. and burned down in 1273 A.D.
Did I mentioned that everything over here is just OLD.
After we finished touring the town museum, we came outside to find that the temp had dropped into the low 40’s and it was sprinkling.
But we had planned to have lunch at the historic Regensburg Sausage Kitchen.
And by historic, I mean the 900 year old Regensburg Sausage Kitchen
Did I mentioned that everything over here is just OLD.
It is said the Sausage Kitchen fed the workers who were building the Stone Bridge right next door.
When we came out, the umbrellas were up, holding off some of the rain, so we ordered “Sechs und Kraut”. Or Six and Kraut in English.
Which means six of their famous sausages, kraut, and rolls (Brötchen), the same thing that they have been serving all these years.
And it was delicious. Even though by the time our order came, it was 37 degrees and sleeting.
Where did this come from?
But the real standout of the meal was their Sweet Spicy Mustard, made from the same recipe all these years. So good that after the meal, I stood in line in the sleeting rain for 10 minutes to buy a bottle to take home.
Unfortunately as we were packing our suitcases in London before we came home, and swapping things back and forth trying to meet the weight limits, the bottle accidently ended up in one of our carry-on bags, and is now being enjoyed by a TSA guy in London.
But I discovered that I could order some online from a US company, so two jars are now sitting in our kitchen.
By now it was time for us to meet our ship, and we were told it was waiting for us about a half mile down the river at dock 2. So a bunch of us headed out, only to find that the Skirnir had not yet arrived. So there we all stood in the rain.
But the captain of the Viking ship Tor took pity on us and let us come onboard to wait until our ship arrived.
After getting back on board, dry and warmed up, and with a nap, we met up with our usual crowd for another great meal.
Jan and I started with the Sweet Potato Soup,
the Veal Scaloppini.
along with Carrot Cake for me,
and Tiramisu for Jan for dessert.
Later, we were given a talk about the many locks and low bridges that we would be encountering in the coming days. And because of this we were told that the Sundeck would be closed for the next week or so.
Everything is folded down, including the railings, to allow the ship under the many low bridges. And since it takes over 2 hours to complete the procedure, either way, they just leave them down until they’re through the worse of it.
Next up: Nuremburg
May 5, 2009
IHOP and more belts…
After breakfast at IHOP it was off to NAPA Auto Parts to pick up a couple of new AC belts (wanted a spare) and some more washers to try and shim the pulley so I won’t have to keep replacing belts.
I’m also working to make some solar screen covers for the front windshield and side windows to help cut down on the heat load getting into the coach and make it easier on the two coach AC units.
Hopefully I can finish these up tomorrow.
May 5, 2010
The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men, Gang aft agley…
which, of course, is Scots for —
Sometimes things just screw up.
We had planned to pull out from Park of the Sierras about 9 am this morning heading for Wine Country RV Park about 40 miles north of San Francisco. But that was not to be.
About 10 minutes before we were ready to leave, I went outside to double-check a bad tire pressure reading I was getting on my tire pressure monitor system.
The monitor said that the sensor was missing on my driver’s side inside rear dual. In looking at it, the sensor was still there, but I decided to manually check the tire pressure myself. And boy am I glad I did.
The tire was absolutely, completely flat. If I had driven like that I would probably ended up losing both tires.
When I tried to air it up myself, it wouldn’t take any air, and I could hear it running out.
So my next step was to call my Emergency Road Service, CoachNet who said they would send a tire repair guy out. I also wanted him to bring a replacement tire out with him in case the tire had failed.
Because of this, CoachNet said that they would have to get somebody out of Fresno about 40 miles away, and it would be about 3 hours.
No problem for us. I had already called the Park here to extend a day and the park we were going to tell them we wouldn’t be there until tomorrow.
The tire guy showed up about 1:30 and quickly discovered that, as I had hoped, it was just a bad valve stem extension, rather than a $500 tire.
The reason I couldn’t get any air into it was that with the tire completely flat, and the coach’s weight on it, the bead on the tire rim wasn’t sealing so the tire wouldn’t hold air. He had to use his big jack to lift up that side of the coach to take the weight off the tire. This allowed him to air the tire back up.
He showed me the defective extension and said he sees this all the time. People tighten them too tight and that destroys the little rubber O-ring inside it.
So it looks like we’ll be on our way tomorrow, again.
But we’ll see.
May 5, 2011
Slowly but Surely . . .
I’m feeling better. Still not 100%, maybe 85%,
After getting up about 10 am and fixing coffee, I was pretty much exhausted. So I just did the Internet thing on and off until about 12:45 when we all headed out to meet Tom and Barb Westerfield at Buffalo Wild Wings for lunch.
As usual we spent longer talking than we did eating, so it was after 3pm before we were back on the road.
Then, after a quick detour to Lowe’s (snicker, snicker) we headed home.
Later, about 8:30 we all headed out again to cruise the Strip and eat a late supper at the Blueberry Hill Restaurant.
So now I’m exhausted and I’m going to bed.
May 5, 2013
Breaker, Breaker . . .
About 1:45am this morning it got very, very quiet in our bedroom. No, I didn’t tick Jan off again. The power went off.
The reason it got very quiet is that we use a White Noise Generator like this one.
We used one for years, even before we started RVing. In the White Noise mode it generates a rushing noise that does a great job masking outside noises, including cars, trains, loud parties, etc.
This unit has 5 other sounds like ocean waves, rain, babbling brook, thunder storm, and summer night.
But these white noise machines do have a drawback. If you’re used to sleeping with one it’s very difficult to get to sleep without it. You tend to hear every creak of the coach, dog bark, or cricket chirp. But otherwise, they’re great.
As far as what happened to the power, I assumed the power was off in the park because when I looked out the window I couldn’t see any lights, even streetlights, on anywhere in the park. In addition, the last time we were here, two years ago, the park was having major power problems, enough so, that we left a couple of days early.
But when I woke up about 7:30, the power was still off, so I decided to go outside and check the breaker. And the breaker was the problem.
We’re on 50 amps so I’m not really sure what popped the breaker, so I’ll just have to keep an eye on it.
About noon Jan decided she wanted to do brunch so about 1pm we headed back up the road to Boulder Station Casino for their Champagne Sunday Brunch, well, Mimosas for us. Getting there we still had about a 45 minute wait before we got seated. But as usual there, it was worth it.
One thing I did find out is the discount you get with Boulder Station Boarding Pass card. The dinner buffet, and the Champagne Brunch Buffet are both $9.99 with the card, but $14.99 without it. Not a bad discount for a free card.
Later in the afternoon we got the high winds that got sent up our way from Tucson. Around 5:30 it really blew for about 90 minutes before it subsided. Really had the window awnings flapping.
May 5, 2014
Missed It By That Much!
After pulling out of our site here at the Colorado River Thousand Trails a little after 9:30,
we stopped off and got the toad connected at the park hitch-up spot and were headed out a little before 10am.
Our first stop was about 45 miles down the road at the Flying J in Brookshire, the first time we taken on diesel since November 24, 2013. What can I say, it’s been a slow year so far.
We had already scouted out the RV lanes here on one of our trips past here in the truck, but that didn’t prepare us for the problems.
Coming off the Interstate and coming down the side road, you have to make a left turn into the Flying J, and then immediately, another left turn. And before you’re even clear of the entrance you had to make a 90 degree right into the pumps. You can’t really stop because otherwise you’re completely blocking the main entrance to the place.
The first complication came because there was a big delivery truck parked right along the front edge of the lot. For reference, it was right behind where you see my truck in the photo.
Of course this meant that I couldn’t swing left as far as I wanted before I made the right turn into the pumps. Which meant I had to come in at more of an angle than I wanted. Of course as soon as I was parked at the pumps, the guy came out and left in the truck. Of course he did.
While I taking on 96 gallons of diesel, I dumped a bottle of Diesel Kleene in the tank too.
I never thought too much about using fuel additives, until I talked to a lot of the truckers in the oil patch when we were gate guarding. They said their companies had done comparisons between groups of trucks with and without Diesel Kleene, and they definitely saw a difference.
So now it was time to try and get out of here. I put Jan out back by the toad and turned up the volume on the backup camera mic so I could hear her. Then, keeping to the left as much as possible, I started to slowly pull forward, listening for Jan to scream. One problem was the fact that I had the same big concrete pillar on the driver’s side, only a few inches from that side too.
Jan said that the rig came so close to the pillar that she couldn’t have gotten a finger between it and the rig. Then as soon as the rig was clear I had to move more to the left so I didn’t drag the toad across the pillar. Jan said on this one she could have gotten her finger between them, but wouldn’t have wanted to.
Finally, to the amazement of onlookers, and even ourselves, we inched out of the space and got back on the road.
About 12:45 we pulled into the Lake Conroe Thousand Trails, found a 50 amp site, and got set up. We seem to be creating a pattern here. The first time we were here, we were in site E60, next time it was E59, and now we’re in E58.
And this time we’ve got a tree.
One thing I was happy to see was that my shear pin repair was successful. At least so far.
Or, at least twice so far.
It came in with no problems when we were ready to leave Colorado River, and then went out just fine here at Lake Conroe.
Just hope it continues that way.
May 5, 2015
Nothing New Yet . . .
Nothing much happen today on the rig repair front. I did talk to my National General Claims Agent, Kerry, and got things going with her. Now it’s just hurry up and wait.
Stan, he Service Manager here at Affinity, says he’s just waiting to hear back from Fleetwood on the price of the parts needed to make the repairs. Then the repair plan has to be run by the National General Claims Adjuster for his approval. Then at that point the repairs can get started.
Jan commented that we’ve got a really nice site here, better than a lot of RV parks. No loud neighbors, no noisy parties, and no barking dogs. If only there was a little patch of grass for Mister to roll around in, rather the concrete parking lot, it would be perfect.
As it was, we had a nice quiet day with the only downside that Jan woke up with one of her migraines. But one of her magic pills took care of it within a couple of hours. But if her headache follows the usual course, she’ll have two more over the next couple of days, each one less intense.
Lowell sent over these photos from Landon’s graduation from Day School.
Jan remarked how much he’s grown and it’s only been two months since we’ve seen him. Brandi says he just eats and grows.
Brandi also said that she apparently inherited a lot of my ‘repair stuff’ genes. Landon has one of those Leapfrog tablets for kids that he uses.
And he apparently sometimes uses it in the bathtub.
And of course, at some point he dropped it in the drink, but didn’t tell Brandi for a while. So when she found out, she decided to see if she could fix it ‘dad’s way.’
So she started taking it apart, photographing as she went, until she had it down to the bare motherboard. She then let it dry out for a few days, put it back together, and it worked.
Glad she got her mother’s looks and my repair skills, and not the other way around.
But then Brandi also said after our recent unpleasantness, that she wanted us to stop roaming around the country and just settle down like normal retired parents.
I asked her why we should start being ‘normal’ now?
May 5, 2016
Let’s Be Careful Out There . . .
Jan was still a little under the weather today, so once again it was a stay-at-home day for us both. But very, very nice, anyway.
Our weather has been really great the last few days, with day temps in the 70’s and low 80’s, and lows in the mid-50’s. And it looks like its going to hold until we leave for Lake Conroe Sunday morning.
Let’s Be Careful Out There.
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I may have figured out the HDMI problem on my new computer. As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago when I was setting up my new computer, I could not get the HDMI output to HDMI output to our TV.
We normally use this output to view computer stuff and stream movies to our big screen TV for us both to watch. All we have to do is to press one button on the TV remote, and we’re watch and listening to the computer on our TV.
But when I tried to set this up on the new one, just plugging in the HDMI cable to the computer, not only didn’t it work, it kill the computer output to the monitor as well.
So after thinking about it for a while, I decided to download new drivers and see if that would help. But when I went online, the specs said that the video card, a Radeon 7470, didn’t have a DVI port and a HDMI port, but instead, has a DVI port and a DisplayPort.
Apparently you can plug a HDMI connector into a DisplayPort, but it just won’t work. But an inexpensive ($13) adapter is available on Amazon, so I have one on the way. And I’ll know Saturday night how it’s going to work.
The website stuff has slowed down, trying to finish up all the loose ends. Like many things, the first 90% takes 10% of the time, and last 10% of the project, takes the remaining 90% of the time. Plus as usual, I still waiting on content from the client.
For dinner Jan whipped up what she called a ‘Cupboard Casserole’, made from seeing what she has in the pantry, and then combining it with previously cooked chicken breasts
This time she used a can of kernel corn, a can of black beans, a can of diced tomatoes, a can of Rotel Habanero Tomatoes, and a jar of origin-unknown hot sauce. Jan layered the ingredients with pieces of chicken breasts and corn tortillas. After she covered it in shredded cheese, she popped it in the convection oven for about 40 minutes at 350°.
Along with a salad with some of Jan’s homemade lime salad dressing and grilled French bread, it made for a great meal, quick, easy, and delicious.
May 5, 2017
It’s Snowing . . .
Last night it went down to 45° here in Sunriver,, peaked at 58° about noon, and then started falling, heading for 31° tonight. And then 24 to 28° tomorrow night. Brrrr!
On the other hand it was 107° today in Apache Junction. So our temps here don’t sound so bad now.
It’s easier to be cold and get warm, than it is to be hot and get cool.
About 3pm I decide to use the jacks to level the coach. We were pretty level when we parked yesterday, but the ground was soggy, and with more rain last night, the coach has settled somewhat.
So first I cranked up the rig and then lowered the jacks enough to make a depression in the soft ground, making it easier to position the pads. Next, after getting the pads in place, I lowered the jacks again and got us level. It’s nice to not be walking with a tilt again.
Finished with that, I dropped off some garbage at the nearby dumpster and then walked next door to see if our neighbor wanted to go brunch with us tomorrow.
Blog reader Mary Burge told us about Sparrow, a restaurant/bakery in Bend, and after checking on Yelp, decided it was a place we wanted to go.
About 1pm Jan started a big batch of Bean with Bacon Soup in the slow cooker after soaking the Northern Beans overnight. I cooked up some bacon in the microwave while Jan chopped up the onions. Then she spread out the onions and some sliced carrots on the same pan that I did the bacon in. This utilized some of the bacon grease for extra flavor
With the bacon chopped and in with the beans and the cooker on High, we started the pan of veggies in the convection oven for about 30 minutes before we added them to the pot. Based on previous batches we thought the soup would be ready to eat for supper about 6pm.
But for some reason they were still pretty crunchy, although very tasty.
So it was quickly out the door and on our way into Bend to have dinner at Red Robin, one of our favorite burger places.
Jan has been jonsin’ for some claw chowder so she was happy to find it on the menu.
I decided to try their chili,
which turned out that, although it was Oregon chili, and not Texas chili, it was pretty good.
Jan got the Shroom Burger with mushrooms and Cheddar cheese,
while I got the Burnin’ Love Burger with fried jalapeño coins, salsa, Pepper-Jack, lettuce, tomatoes and chipotle aioli on a jalapeño-cornmeal Kaiser roll. That’s a grilled jalapeno on top.
And of course, both with Endless Fries.
Really good.
Coming home a little after dark, I thought I saw something fluttering in the air, but when we got back to the rig, it was definite.
It was snowing!
Not a lot, and not sleet, but real, actual snow.
May 5, 2018
Our New Burrito King . . .
Amazon really came through on my missing Azio Lighted Keyboard. As a reminder, last Monday I got a text message saying my new keyboard had been delivered to the office.
I had ordered it the previous Friday to replace our 3 year old one that had gone wonky on us. But , although the tracking info said it had been delivered and “handed to a resident”, it wasn’t one of the three ‘residents’ who ‘reside’ at our office.
And in fact, after that initial disappearing act, it never reappeared. So, on Thursday, after our mailman told us it was lost and they had no idea where it was, I emailed Amazon, explaining the situation and 15 minutes later, they had credited my account the $29.99. Nice.
And this morning the replacement one that I ordered Thursday afternoon, showed up right on time.
Way to go, Amazon!
My phone’s ‘OK Google’ voice input works again. A couple of weeks ago I noticed saying ‘OK Google’ and then asking a question no longer worked. It worked if I typed something in the Google box, and it worked if I pressed the little mic button and ask my question.manually. So I knew it wasn’t a mic problem.
I had checked it on line a couple of times, and tried a couple of recommendations, all with no luck. But today it fixed itself.
While we were at lunch, I got a notice that there was a Security Update available for my Galaxy S8+. So I clicked OK, and a few minutes later my phone rebooted and it was done.
The RV Mobile Lube people called today and we’re now scheduled for this coming Friday afternoon around 3pm or so. Just one more thing out of the way before our trip.
I’m in the planning/ordering stages for my remote dump system. I think I’ll use the same box to hold the components that I used in my 50amp tester project, along with a blank wall plate. Then I’ll drill holes in the plate to install the two 1/4” phone jacks where I’ll plug in the two actuators. Since they both come with 1/4” phone plugs, it makes more sense to use that and not cut them off.
Inside the box I’ll mount these two remote controller units that I ordered today.
Then it should be just a matter of mounting the actuators and connecting them to the dump valve handles. Easy Peazy, right? Well, that’s the fun of a project like this. You never know what problems will pop up.
Not wanting to take any chances with our newly-arrived keyboard at my client’s office, Jan and I headed into the Clear Lake area to pick it up, and while there, eat lunch. And for the fourth time since Sunday, we ate again at the East Star Chinese Buffet. So that’s Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday, and today, Saturday.
The place is ready good, with everything fresh and hot, and done in small batches. Even the pizza must be really good, since they seem to have trouble keeping it supplied. I think it really says something about a Chinese buffet when people like their pizza too.
Of course, eating at the same restaurant 4 days in one week is not a record for us. That honor belongs to the late-lamented Burrito King back in the early 80’s. In that case we ate there every night for a week.
Yes, seven days in a row. Because that’s where everyone wanted to go for dinner. Over the years we became friends with the owner’s, the Montoya family, who owned other BK’s out in California. At one time there were two her in Houston, and over 20 total in the chain.
But out Webster location sadly closed when the family members moved on to other careers. According to this article, Burrito King, over the years the chain has faded to just two remaining units in California. The piece is an interesting read, with the details matching up with what we knew at the time. And I think a lot of the same problems caused the downfall of the local Ninfa’s restaurant chain here in the Houston area.
A local institution for many years, it crashed and burned due to family infighting, over-expansion, bad decisions, and mismanagement. Another sad loss.
May 5, 2019
Regensburg . . .
As with other towns/excursions along our river cruise, when we woke up we were docked out in the middle of nowhere. Just a dock, some mooring capstans, and a gangplank to the shore.
What happens is that they would dock a ways out from town, let off the people who were going to take the excursion, and then the ship would proceed on into the dock in town where it would be waiting for us at the end of the day.
So today we had a 40 minute bus ride into Regensburg, Bavaria, Germany. Founded in the mid-1200’s, it’s known for having a higher concentration of bars than any other German city.
Coming into town we passed field after field of what turned out to be mustard plants
Which turn out to figure in our lunch.
We met our local guide at the bus park and started our walking tour into town, taking in the many sights.
Though the town itself was established in 1245, it had been a Roman settlement since around 100 A.D. It fact this stone arch was part of a wall that was commissioned in 179 A.D.
Everything over here is just OLD.
Coming into the main part of town we crossed the Old Stone Bridge.
Built around 1135, it was the only bridge across the river until the 1930’s. Originally a toll bridge, two different Crusades to the Holy Land passed over it along the way.
Next up was St. Peter’s Cathedral.
Built in 1280 to replace on that was built in 700 A.D. and burned down in 1273 A.D.
Did I mentioned that everything over here is just OLD.
After we finished touring the town museum, we came outside to find that the temp had dropped into the low 40’s and it was sprinkling.
But we had planned to have lunch at the historic Regensburg Sausage Kitchen.
And by historic, I mean the 900 year old Regensburg Sausage Kitchen
Did I mentioned that everything over here is just OLD.
It is said the Sausage Kitchen fed the workers who were building the Stone Bridge right next door.
When we came out, the umbrellas were up, holding off some of the rain, so we ordered “Sechs und Kraut”. Or Six and Kraut in English.
Which means six of their famous sausages, kraut, and rolls (Brötchen), the same thing that they have been serving all these years.
And it was delicious. Even though by the time our order came, it was 37 degrees and sleeting.
Where did this come from?
But the real standout of the meal was their Sweet Spicy Mustard, made from the same recipe all these years. So good that after the meal, I stood in line in the sleeting rain for 10 minutes to buy a bottle to take home.
Unfortunately as we were packing our suitcases in London before we came home, and swapping things back and forth trying to meet the weight limits, the bottle accidently ended up in one of our carry-on bags, and is now being enjoyed by a TSA guy in London.
But I discovered that I could order some online from a US company, so two jars are now sitting in our kitchen.
By now it was time for us to meet our ship, and we were told it was waiting for us about a half mile down the river at dock 2. So a bunch of us headed out, only to find that the Skirnir had not yet arrived. So there we all stood in the rain.
But the captain of the Viking ship Tor took pity on us and let us come onboard to wait until our ship arrived.
After getting back on board, dry and warmed up, and with a nap, we met up with our usual crowd for another great meal.
Jan and I started with the Sweet Potato Soup,
the Veal Scaloppini.
along with Carrot Cake for me,
and Tiramisu for Jan for dessert.
Later, we were given a talk about the many locks and low bridges that we would be encountering in the coming days. And because of this we were told that the Sundeck would be closed for the next week or so.
Everything is folded down, including the railings, to allow the ship under the many low bridges. And since it takes over 2 hours to complete the procedure, either way, they just leave them down until they’re through the worse of it.
Next up: Nuremburg
May 5, 2020
Getting Stimulated . . .
As I mentioned in Saturday’s blog, we ate dinner at Saltgrass Steakhouse that night, and then Sunday, we had breakfast for dinner at our local Denny’s. And as at Saltgrass there were a few changes from normal.
We were ‘social distanced’, spread out among the booths and our waitress, Shelby, wore a mask. Our menu (we only got one) was printed on paper and thrown away as soon as we were finished ordering, and no salt/pepper shakers, jus the paper packets. Same thing goes with the sugar/jelly/creamers. As soon as we were done, the remaining packs were thrown away.
I didn’t see our usual waiter, Scott, so I asked. Shelby, said he was not coming back for a couple of weeks so he could collect the extra $600/week unemployment for a while longer. And in his case I don’t have a problem since I know he takes care of his invalid mother.
But I have heard of other places that are trying to reopen but can’t get their staff back to work because they’re making more on unemployment with the extra $600 than they can make on the job.
Of course if they wait too long, until the extra money runs out July 31st, there may not be a business to come back to.
Then this afternoon we did Curbside Pickup at our local Whataburger once again.
That’s a Double Meat with Cheese, Bacon, Lettuce, Tomato, Onions, and Grilled Jalapenos, along with Mustard and Mayo
And no, no Ketchup. And not on Hotdogs, either. Ketchup goes on French Fries. And maybe on top of your grandmother’s Meatloaf. That’s it.
We asked Lillian, the young lady who brought our order out if she knew when they were going to reopen the dining room, and she said no one had any idea.
May 5, 2021
Finally . . .
After scrubbing the launch of SpaceX’s SN15 on Tuesday, they said they planned on rescheduling for this Thursday (tomorrow). But in a big surprise, they launched this afternoon, about 5:20 CDT, Starship took to the skies for the fourth attempt at a 10km (6.2 mile) launch and landing.
And after the 3 past flights, SN9, SN10, and SN11, flew perfectly, but either exploded on landing, or soon after, SN15 stuck the landing perfectly, a little more than 6 minutes after liftoff from Boca Chica, TX
You can watch the entire flight here:
Some people have supposed that the SN15’s launch was pushed up until today to mark the 60th anniversary of Alan Shepard’s Freedom 7 sub-orbital flight, making him the very first American in space. Could be, I guess.
I think Verizon is trying to force my hand. Today I received what is said to be the very last Security Update for my 4 year old Samsung Galaxy S8+. So recently I’ve been pondering upgrading to a new Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G.
And yes, the S21 Ultra has FIVE different cameras in it.
So it looks like I’ll finally have to bite the bullet and get a new phone. Jan of course, is all for this, mostly I think because she always gets my hand-me-down phone, and she really wants my S8+ to replace her old S5.
But we’ll see.
They Had Me At . . .
Lunch today was at Twin Peaks, always a favorite of ours, for several reasons. But the main reason is the great food.
Jan started off with a Side Salad,
and then moved on to a first for her, an order of their Wings.
These were smoked and then grilled, and then sauced with Buffalo Sauce.
Jan said they’re her new favorite.
I got my usual favorite Soup and Salad Lunch Special, with a bowl of their Green Chili Chicken Soup and a Salad with Bleu Cheese.
Just as great as always. And Sylvia took great care of us as always.
Then it was on by the office to drop off an Amazon order that had come in.
Even for Amazon orders for work, I have them shipped here to the rig because they get here faster since they deliver on Saturday and Sunday. And often got delayed because Amazon would try and deliver stuff after the office was closed.
Next we did the HEB down on SR96 for a few things. And since they had what Jan was looking for, we didn’t have to do a WalMart stop.
They had me at Peanut Butter.
On the subject of food, regular readers know how much I like peanut butter. I mean it’s the perfect food, right?
It’s got protein, carbs, fat, sugar, and salt. All the major food groups.
You could live on PB.
In fact, my favorite homemade sandwich as a kid (and it still is, actually) is peanut butter, mayo, and banana.
And of course there’s my favorite burger at Texas Huddle, their PB&J Bacon Cheeseburger.
So I was really happy to see that someone created a pizza just for me.
Well, not me, specifically, since the place is in Ohio, but I can dream, can’t I.
It’s got a peanut butter base, traditional mozzarella pizza cheese, bacon and bananas, and then honey is drizzled on after baking.
I wonder if I could talk Grimaldi’s into custom-making me one.
Thought for the Day:
ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ
“Come and Take Them”
What the 300 Spartans told the 10,000+ Persians at the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 B.C. when they were told to drop their weapons and surrender.
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.
May 4, 2019
Passau 5/4/19
After our usual great breakfast, we were up the the gangplank and off the ship about 9:30 for our day visit to Passau, Germany, our first stop in a German city.
We had signed up for the Walking Tour of Passau, the included one for this stop. Unfortunately, so far we haven’t had many, if any, ‘driving’ tours, but I guess it helps work off all the delicious food they keep feeding us.
We started out along the Inn River, with our first stop the Schaibling or Salt Tower.
Built in the mid-1300’s, it was a fortified watch tower to protect and store, what else, Salt. Salt, necessary for preserving food, especially meat, has been a hot commodity since the Roman days. In fact, in many cases Roman soldiers were paid in salt. Hence the term, ‘Salary’.
The salt came from the mines near Salzburg, and was a favorite target of pirates and thieves, so it was protected all the way up the river and then safely stored in the tower.
Next, cutting up through an alley to get into town, we came across this sign on someone’s backyard.
It translates to “My Ball, My House, My Family.”
He looks like he’s serious about all this.
Our next stop was the old town hall which was pretty non-descript on the outside, but another story on the inside. And besides the carved marble staircase
and the marvelous frescoed ceiling,
its other claim to fame was that Mozart played here for the local prince at the age of 6. Mozart, not the prince. But Mozart felt insulted when they kept him waiting for six days before hearing him play, so he refused to ever play for the prince or his family again, since they wouldn’t pay him for waiting.
A little way down the cobble-stoned street, we passed through an archway and into the square in front of the beautiful St. Stephen’s Cathedral.
There have been churches on this site since 730 A.D., with this one being built between 1668 to 1693 to replace the previous one that burned down in 1662. Designed in the Baroque style, it’s over 100 meters long, and even more beautiful on the inside than the outside.
Even the floor tiles are over 1000 years old, taken from Roman ruins and reused.
But the crowning glory is the massive pipe organ, the largest in Europe, and in the top five in the world.
It currently has 17,794 pipes and 233 registers, and is played from six consoles, and even better we got to hear a concert after lunch.
Or maybe I should say after ‘dessert’, since that’s what we had. Jan had the Cherry Cheese Strudel with Vanilla Ice Cream
and I had the Apple Strudel with Vanilla Sauce.
Delicious!
There are very few free toilets in Budapest or Germany, but less so in Germany. You either pay .50 € or 1 €, or you buy something in a restaurant. But this little old lady had a real scam going by setting up right in front of the ‘WC’ next to the cathedral.
Many of these have an attendant to give change, or a change machine, but this one didn’t. So if you had to go really bad, you bought a postcard or a trinket to get some change.
Nice racket!
When we got back into the church for the concert, we were warned that there was no recording allowed. But obviously someone did record it, and you can listen to the opening piece here on YouTube.
And it was all I could do to not laugh out loud on the first few notes. It was Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor, probably one of the most recognizable openings in classical music, except maybe for Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony.
But that wasn’t the funny part. Here we are in definitive ‘Dracula’ country, and this the definitive Dracula theme song. So much so that if you Google ‘Dracula music, this piece comes up.
The organ has one pipe that’s about 2 feet across and puts out a note at 16Hz. It seems to make the air in your lungs vibrate, and you feel it as much as hear it.
They also have a pipe that’s about 1/4 inch across that puts out 16kHz, so pretty much only young kids and probably young dogs can actually hear it. I certainly can’t, but it does make my ears itch.
Dinner back on the ship was as delicious as usual, with my Angus Ribeye with double veggies, and no fries.
Gotta try to cut back somehow.
Jan got one of her favorites, the Roasted Chicken.
Next up: Regensburg
Since it took over 9 hours of start and stop to get the last blog up, I decided to wait until Paris to start catching up again.
May 4, 2009
Lazy, Hazy Days of Summer…
In Fort Myers, FL.
Today was pretty much a do-nothing day.
We mailed off some packages and picked up prescriptions at WalMart.
Deciding we needed another Tex-Mex fix, it was back to Iguana Mia for supper.
May 4, 2010
The Acorn Pole…
Today was another ‘get ready to travel” day. We plan on leaving about 9 tomorrow morning and moving about 230 miles north to the Wind Country RV Park in Rohnert Park, CA, which will put us about 45 miles north of San Francisco.
We plan on staying there a week exploring San Francisco, Monterey, and the Napa wine country.
About 1:30 I dropped Jan off at the park laundry so she could do some heavy rugs.
When I picked her up about 4 pm we drove over to the acorn pole here in the park to see the handiwork of the Acorn Woodpecker.
And this is their work.
What you see above is a telephone pole, and food storage container for the Acorn Woodpecker and his acorns.
He enlarges the cracks in the pole and stuffs his acorns in there to keep them safe. But sometimes that doesn’t work. In Arizona, Acorn Woodpeckers stored 485 pounds of acorns in the sides of a wooden water tower that fell thru to the inside and they couldn’t get them back out.
About 4:30 pm we picked up George and Sandy Stoltz at their RV here in the park to drive into Oakhurst to have dinner at El Cid, a great Mexican restaurant we found here.
Great Friends, Great Times, Great Food. I”m sure we’ll bump into them again somewhere on the road.
More tomorrow from the Napa Valley…
May 4, 2011
Lindo Michoacan and More . . .
I finally dragged myself out of bed about 10:30. I think the worse is over, but I sure don’t have much energy. I fixed coffee for us, but didn’t drink much of it.
The best I can figure based on the symptoms is that this is some sort of food poisoning. But whatever it is, nobody else got it. That’s good.
About 2:30 we all headed out to run some errands and have dinner. We wanted to get some carpet pads for our stairs.
Coming back to Henderson, we talked to our friend’s Barb and Tom Westerfield. They’re here in the Las Vegas area, and we’re going to try to get together soon.
By about 4:30 we were at Lindo Michoacan, our favorite Mexican place here in Vegas. (And apparently everybody else’s too. It’s been voted Best in Vegas since 2004)
After a great meal, (that I still wasn’t able to eat much of) we headed back over to Fry’s Electronics to get a SD memory card for a camera.
Then it was home by about 7. I went to bed about 7:30, slept until 10:30, got up, wrote this blog to keep readers off my back and now I’m going back to bed.
Hopefully tomorrow I’ll have more energy.
May 4, 2012
Yay! Piper, Too . . .
Well, our granddaughter Piper’s karma continues. This girl needs to buy some lottery tickets.
Last night (Thursday) while attending the awards ceremony at Moody Gardens in Galveston for the four year full scholarship she won, they also gave away door prizes.
And Miss Piper won an iPad2!
Should be a lot of help when she starts college in the fall.
Beautiful and smart!
Although we have Verizon cell/Internet service here at this gate, it’s been a little spotty. Sometimes we have 1-2 bars of 3G, sometimes 1-2 bars of 1x, and sometimes no data at all.
Even the cell service would sometimes drop calls. So I decided to set up the Wilson booster that I bought to use at our other gate where we had no service at all.
And it worked there, getting us cell and data service for an hour, only to receive the phone call that we were moving to this gate.
So I set it up here yesterday afternoon and boy, did it work miracles.
Here’s the amplifier itself. It’s about the size of a large paperback book.
And here’s the directional outside antenna on a 10 foot antenna pole.
And here’s the inside antenna.
I set up everything outside since that’s where we spend the most time.
And boy, does it work great. This unit is the Wilson db. Pro 65 and we have now have 5 bars of rock-solid 3G service with no dropouts.
Well worth the money!
And now for some new Landon pics. Here he is with his daddy just being cool.
And here he is with his Aunt Sherry (Lowell’s sister). You can see where he gets some of his good looks.
That’s about it for today. They’re having a big push today to get back on the drilling schedule so we’re not supposed to let any salespeople in.
So I have to disappoint a lot of pretty young ladies.
Bummer!
Certainly wouldn’t be the first time.
Or the last, probably.
May 4, 2013
Powerball . . . NOT!
About 1:30 Jan and I headed just north of our Thousand Trails park to the Boulder Station Casino right next door for a movie and then dinner.
But after getting inside our first chore was to get new Boarding Passes, the Station Casino’s version of the Player’s Card. Every casino has their version of the card, and as far as I know, they’re always free.
The idea is that you scan the card whenever you gamble and whether you win or lose (usually lose!) you accumulate points, and depending on different circumstances, you get extra point multipliers, 3X, 4X, etc. And the points you accumulate can be traded in for prizes, free meals, or even cash. And just having the card gives you discounts at the restaurants.
After getting our cards updated, we headed to the other end of the casino to the movie theaters. We were going to see The Crood’s, an animated film about a caveman family trying to survive the breakup of the supercontinents. (yeah, I know the supercontinents broke up 100’s of millions of years ago, and there were no cavemen back then, but this IS a cartoon, after all)
We’d read good reviews about the movie, and they turned out to be pretty accurate. From a story co-written by John Cleese of Monty Python fame, the movie turned out to be a $500 million success, with a sequel and a TV show in the works.
With voices by the likes of Nicolas Cage, Emma Stone, Ryan Reynolds, and Cloris Leachman, and a multitude of ingenious animal combinations like Piranhakeets, Crocodogs, and ParroTurtles, the story is a lot of fun, and well worth seeing.
After the movie was over we headed over to the Feast Buffet for our dinner. Even getting there a little after 4, we still had about a 10 minute wait to get a table. But as with our previous visits in past years, it was worth the wait. And cheaper than Golden Corral, too.
Coming home I stopped off at a nearby convenience store to get some Powerball tickets since the prize is up to $192 million, and found out something surprising, or maybe not so surprising when you think about it.
Nevada casinos don’t want any competition, so Nevada is one of the few states that have no lotteries whatsoever. They’ve been trying to get one here since 1975, but the casinos have always been able to kill it. Besides the casinos, the other major problem is that the ban on lotteries has been in the Nevada State Constitution since it was ratified in 1864. And it’s a 5 year process to change it.
So now thousands of Las Vegans, Las Vegasians, whatever, make the 40 mile drive down I-15 to Primm’s State Line Lottery and buy millions of dollars of California lottery tickets.
Here’s the line at Primm’s when California started selling Mega-Millions tickets last year. It’s estimated that Nevada is losing 30 to 50 million dollars a year because of this.
Oh, well. It’s only money.
May 4, 2014
Two Bites. And Only Two.
Today’s our last full day here at the Colorado River Thousand Trails before we head over to the Lake Conroe Thousand Trails tomorrow morning. So this morning was also our last morning to have our coffee and muffins sitting outside with Mister.
One thing that’s funny about these times, is how Mister always likes to have some of our muffins. But only two bites.
I will pinch off one piece about the size of the nickel and he will eat it right up. Then I will pinch off a second piece and down it goes too. But never a third piece. If I pinch off one more, he will just ignore it and walk off in the other direction. Then the next day it’s exactly the same thing over again.
Strange Cat.
After pretty much goofing off the rest of the morning, I finally went outside to install the new shear pin in the slide. I mean, I can only procrastinate for so long, right?
I first pulled the slide in a couple of inches, and then measured both ends of the slide from the wall to the outside edge. This distance needed to be equal on each side of the slide to within 1/8”. But to get this set up, it took a lot of jockeying the slide back and forth, and then fine-tuning the position with the manual ratchet.
Then I used pin punch to align the holes between the gear and the shaft. But finally I was able to the new pin started.
Then I used the pin punch to hammer it home.
I’ll wait until we’re ready to travel tomorrow morning to actually try it out.
Keeping my fingers crossed.
Finishing the slide I got out my Air Compressor and topped off my driver’s inside rear dual. It’s always had a small, slow leak so I need to add about 10-15# every few weeks.
Later, about 4pm Jan and I drove into Columbus to have one last delicious meal at Los Cabos Mexican Grill. And, besides being so good, their portions are big enough that we both have leftovers for tomorrow night.
Coming home we made a quick stop at HEB for some salad fixings for upcoming meals.
Then later I packed away all the outside chairs and a few other things getting ready for tomorrow.
Then it’s back on the road again, at least for 121 miles, anyway.
May 4, 2015
Monday in Prescott . . .
First up, I want to thank everyone for their kind thoughts and good wishes after our Big Boom yesterday. It means a lot to us that we have so many friends. Thank you again.
After our momentous yesterday, it would have been nice to sleep in, but that was not to be. We were up about 7:30 because Affinity RV where we’re parked here in Prescott would be opening at 8. I figured things would start rolling about then, so I wanted to be up and ready.
Stan, the Service Manager, showed up about 8:15 and ask if I had a spare tire. When I told him I didn’t, he said our rim was OK, and they were going to put a temporary tire on our rig so that they could move it to a more permanent location where we’ve would still have 50 amps and water, as well as now being able to put our slide out.
While they were working on the tire, I called National General Insurance and put in my claim for yesterday’s unpleasantness. I had already talked to my agent Chris Yust, of C and C RV Insurance to set things up so I didn’t have any problems.
About 10:30 we made our move and got parked and set up in a very nice area behind one of their buildings. We even have a spot to set up our satellite so Jan’s happy.
And there’s even a blue boy nearby to take care of our grey tank. We can go two weeks on our black tank and I hope we won’t be here that long.
They’re having an 18th Anniversary Expo Sale here at Affinity RV this week, and part of that is that they have a food tent set up with breakfast (breakfast burritos) and lunch (BBQ Pork, BBQ Beef, and BBQ Chicken, along with the fixin’s. So around 12:30 I walked over to pick up lunch for Jan and I.
While I was there, I ran into blog reader and friend, Jim Hamm. He was there with his RV club helping out to serve the food. We first met Jim at a rally in Yuma, AZ. He had not yet read this morning’s blog so he did not know that we were here. As for us, we’re always happy to see a friendly face.
Although today was forecast with heavy thunderstorms, all we got was a lot of dark clouds and some drizzling rain. As far as the rest of the week, we’re looking at high’s in the mid-60’s and low’s in the 40’s.
Nice.
Now back to yesterday.
___________________________________________
We left the Las Vegas TT at 7:30, stopping about a mile down the road to take on some diesel. When we got here two weeks ago, diesel was $2.57, but today it was $2.93. Bummer!
While I was filling up, Jan, who had followed me in the truck, went next door to the very convenient Jack in the Box to grab us a couple of breakfast sandwiches. Yum! Then finishing up, we drove another mile or so down to the Wal-Mart on Boulder Hwy where we hitched up our toad and hit the road.
Our trip was smooth with some crosswinds, but nothing too bad. A ways outside Kingman, we pulled off in the parking lot of a filling station for a bathroom break. While there I was surprised to see this sign.
I guess that gives new meaning to the term, “Convenience Store.”
Then about 80 miles out of Flagstaff on I-40E our trip came to a quick stop.
I saw something come out from under the wheels of a passing semi and tumble across right in front of me. And then there was a big BOOM! and the rig headed for the ditch.
Luckily, I was driving my usual 55mph which probably helped. Conventional blowout wisdom says to accelerate to straighten out and then slow to a stop without using the brakes. I didn’t accelerate because that would have just gotten me to the ditch faster. But instead I let off the gas and was able to wrestle the coach around until it was heading straight down the wide shoulder. From the time of the BOOM until we came to a stop was probably about 30 seconds.
The kitchen area looked like an avalanche zone. Both the coffee maker and the toaster/convection oven fell to the floor and then was covered up by all the stuff, spices, bottles, etc., came down until we had about a two foot pile of debris blocking the walkway back to the bathroom.
I was kind of involved at the time, but Jan said Mister freaked out. He had been lying on the floor just behind our chairs when all the stuff started raining down on him. She said he started jumping around, from her chair, then up on the dashboard, and back down again.
She also said, “I think he was screaming, but then again that may have been me.”
If I hadn’t been so busy, I might have been screaming too.
After catching our breath, I went outside to check out the damage. The first thing I noticed, besides the shredded tire,
was diesel leaking out from underneath.
The blowout had ripped the hose off between the fill nozzle and the tank. It looks like we lost 3-5 gallons before the level fell below the tank input.
At the front of the wheel well there was a bunch of wires hanging down where a wire bundle had been shredded.
The only other damage I saw was the bottom mirror on my rearview mirror had fallen off,
and the wrap-around AstroTurf step mat had been ripped off.
That was about it.
Based on some of the stories I’ve heard about blowout damage, I.e. side panels ripped out, brake and air lines torn up, suspension components bent, etc., we were very lucky.
Coming back in, I got on the phone with Good Sam ERS. The closest place that had something big enough to haul us was down in Prescott about 90 miles away, and he was out on a call. A little while later, I got a text message giving me an ETA of 3:09pm.
The guy got here at 3:15. Pretty accurate ETA.
It took about an hour to get things set up, and then I just drove the rig up onto the flatbed, and then we were on our way.
Dennis, of NASTOW Heavy Towing in Prescott, took us to Affinity RV Sales where he knew the manager and had arranged for us to park for the night in their lot.
Getting there, I just backed the rig off the flatbed and around the corner and into our spot. We didn’t have room to open our slide, but we did have 50 amps, so that was great.
Bob Bean, the manager, came by a little later to check in on us, and to see if we needed anything. Really nice guy.
Right before I put the rig up on the trailer, Dennis and I were looking at the tire and I saw something embedded in between the shreds of rubber.
It was what I had seen bouncing across the road, a metal truck tire valve stem, about 4 inches long. I guess I was just unlucky enough to hit it when it was sticking up and not laying flat.
Finally, about 8:30, Jan and I headed over to an IHOP to have a late dinner. Between what happened, the long day, and the late meal, we were both kind of shell-shocked.
But we sure slept good.
May 4, 2016
An Oil Slick Revisited . . .
Things were real quiet at the White household today. Jan woke up with what she called a ‘baby migraine’,so she took a Sumatriptan and then just rested the remainder of the day.
Yesterday when I went into Columbus, I passed the Colorado Country Oil Co-op where we’ve bought diesel several times because the price is usually so good, But not now.
The first part of February this year it got down as low as $1.65 a gallon, but two weeks later it was back up to $1.69. And it’s slowly been climbing ever since. And yesterday, it was up to $1.99, a $.34 gain.
And we saw the same thing last week at the Buc-ee’s in Luling. As we headed from the Lake Conroe TT to Medina Lake TT on Sunday the 24th of April, it was $1.79/gallon. But a week later when we came back to Colorado River and stopped there for coffee, it had jumped up to $1.89.
I’ve got a bad feeling about this.
I crawled under the rig the other day to check out my slobber tube can. Back in early March, after we traveled from Lake Conroe to Colorado River, I found a heavy oil coating, an oil slick, on our truck after we arrived here.
You can read about it more here. Oil On Truck
After some Googling and investigating, I decided it had blown out of my engine’s oil breather tube, or ‘slobber’ tube.
Apparently many rigs have some sort of catcher or collector to handle this, but mine obviously doesn’t. So I made one.
And you can read about it here. Slobber Can Install
So I wanted to check for any more ‘leakage’. I checked before and found nothing, but it’s been a couple of months so I wanted to look at it again.
And like last time, I found nothing. Rather than remove the can to check like before, this time I just used a twig as a ‘dipstick’. And it was dry
So I still don’t know what really caused this. It’s never done it before or since, and I hadn’t added any oil recently to possibly over-fill it.
So I’ll just have to keep an eye on it.
May 4, 2017
Moving Day . . . Again
In Bend, OR.
After trying a couple of more times this morning to get a satellite signal on our Winegard dome, I gave up and checked out a couple of open sites down from us.
And one of them D3, looked perfect for us. But there was another RV lurking nearby, looking like they wanted to park in the space I was now standing in. So I quickly called the office and told them we wanted to move from D24 to D3 and she said she’d switch our sites.
But not wanting to take a chance on losing the site to a squatter even though it was now assigned to us, I called Jan to walk over with the tag that goes on the pedestal.to hold the space for us.
But as it turned out the lady was not trying to steal my site, but was afraid that I was trying to steal her site right next to ours that she had already reserved at the office. We had a big laugh about it and I helped her back in her 36ft Class A coach.
Moving two sites over to our new space, I again decided to pull in straight rather than back in, giving us a windshield looking out over the open field, rather than looking at the Jayco right across the road.
A great view, and now we have DirecTV again. Jan is giddy.
Because we got here a day late on our reservation, I’m going to add a day at the end so we’ll be here for a full 14 days, and then readjust our schedule down the road.
Now to a recap on our recent transmission unpleasantness.
First off, by the time we got back from Redding with the part and, moved the rig down to the Hi-Lo RV Park, and then had dinner, it was getting dark enough that I would have had to have some sort of lights under the rig to work.
Second, I figured that if it was going to die again it would do it very quickly. And it did. Remember as I said yesterday, I always play the odds.
Several readers commented, wondering why I don’t have diagnostic software/hardware for problems like this.
Well, I kind of do. My Silverleaf display lets me see fault codes from our Cummins engine, but it showed no codes from the Allison transmission problem.
Of course I was able to get a fault code from the transmission at the console. That’s what gave me the 2-5-1-1 code that indicated that the problem was the Speed Output Sensor.
Now as far as the full computer diagnostic package that the dealer uses, the one that everyone thought I should be hooking my rig up to before I tried to fix anything. Well, that one starts at $3200 and goes up from there depending on how many bells and whistles you want.
So, no thanks.
I can throw a lot of parts at a problem before I come anywhere near that amount.
BTW When you leave a blog comment, please leave your real email address. No one can see them but me, and I don’t do anything with them. I do however often use them to reply to your comment via email, as well as on the blog itself. I regularly email someone back and it bounces with an incorrect address.
A few days back, I posted this photo from Truck Village just south of Weed,
CA.
As I said these are in-service fire pump truck that are assembled on site for CalFire. The owner just likes bright colors.
But it’s kind of hard to get a good look, so I thought I post this Google Satellite View.
A lot more colors from this angle. Supposedly there are not two trucks exactly the same color.
We’ve got some wild weather coming up while we’re here. Yesterday and today’s high was in the low 80’s, but tonight it’s going down to 47°.
Then for the next two weeks we’ve got most days in the 50’s and 60’s and nights in the high 20’s and low 30’s.
And a chance of snow later in the week.
May 4, 2019
Passau 5/4/19
After our usual great breakfast, we were up the the gangplank and off the ship about 9:30 for our day visit to Passau, Germany, our first stop in a German city.
We had signed up for the Walking Tour of Passau, the included one for this stop. Unfortunately, so far we haven’t had many, if any, ‘driving’ tours, but I guess it helps work off all the delicious food they keep feeding us.
We started out along the Inn River, with our first stop the Schaibling or Salt Tower.
Built in the mid-1300’s, it was a fortified watch tower to protect and store, what else, Salt. Salt, necessary for preserving food, especially meat, has been a hot commodity since the Roman days. In fact, in many cases Roman soldiers were paid in salt. Hence the term, ‘Salary’.
The salt came from the mines near Salzburg, and was a favorite target of pirates and thieves, so it was protected all the way up the river and then safely stored in the tower.
Next, cutting up through an alley to get into town, we came across this sign on someone’s backyard.
It translates to “My Ball, My Haus, My Family.”
He looks like he’s serious about all this.
Our next stop was the old town hall which was pretty non-descript on the outside, but another story on the inside. And besides the carved marble staircase
and the marvelous frescoed ceiling,
its other claim to fame was that Mozart played here for the local prince at the age of 6. Mozart, not the prince. But Mozart felt insulted when they kept him waiting for six days before hearing him play, so he refused to ever play for the prince or his family again, since they wouldn’t pay him for waiting.
A little way down the cobble-stoned street, we passed through an archway and into the square in front of the beautiful St. Stephen’s Cathedral.
There have been churches on this site since 730 A.D., with this one being built between 1668 to 1693 to replace the previous one that burned down in 1662. Designed in the Baroque style, it’s over 100 meters long, and even more beautiful on the inside than the outside.
Even the floor tiles are over 1000 years old, taken from Roman ruins and reused.
But the crowning glory is the massive pipe organ, the largest in Europe, and in the top five in the world.
It currently has 17,794 pipes and 233 registers, and is played from six consoles, and even better we got to hear a concert after lunch.
Or maybe I should say after ‘dessert’, since that’s what we had. Jan had the Cherry Cheese Strudel with Vanilla Ice Cream
and I had the Apple Strudel with Vanilla Sauce.
Delicious!
There are very few free toilets in Budapest or Germany, but less so in Germany. You either pay .50 € or 1 €, or you buy something in a restaurant. But this little old lady had a real scam going by setting up right in front of the ‘WC’ next to the cathedral.
Many of these have an attendant to give change, or a change machine, but this one didn’t. So if you had to go really bad, you bought a postcard or a trinket to get some change.
Nice racket!
When we got back into the church for the concert, we were warned that there was no recording allowed. But obviously someone did record it, and you can listen to the opening piece here on YouTube.
And it was all I could do to not laugh out loud on the first few notes. It was Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor, probably one of the most recognizable openings in classical music, except maybe for Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony.
But that wasn’t the funny part. Here we are in definitive ‘Dracula’ country, and this the definitive Dracula theme song. So much so that if you Google ‘Dracula music, this piece comes up.
The organ has one pipe that’s about 2 feet across and puts out a note at 16Hz. It seems to make the air in your lungs vibrate, and you feel it as much as hear it.
They also have a pipe that’s about 1/4 inch across that puts out 16kHz, so pretty much only young kids, and probably young dogs, can actually hear it. I certainly can’t, but it does make my ears itch.
Dinner back on the ship was as delicious as usual, with my Angus Ribeye with double veggies, and no fries.
Gotta try to cut back somehow.
Jan got one of her favorites, the Roasted Chicken.
Next up: Regensburg
Since it took over 9 hours of start and stop to get the last blog up, I decided to wait until Paris to start catching up again.
May 4, 2021
May The Fourth . . .
Be With You.
And in honor of May 4th, Star Wars Day, Elon Musk tried to pull off a doubleheader launch today, with a Falcon 9 launch from the Cape carrying another 60 Starlink satellites into LEO, and another test launch of the Starship, SN15, from Boca Chica, TX.
The Falcon 9 blasted off on schedule, and landed on a barge out in the ocean about 9 minutes later, its 9th successful launch and landing.
BTW Musk says that the Falcon 9 series is named for the Millennium Falcon of Star Wars fame, and the Dragon crew capsule is named for Puff The Magic Dragon. That Dragon capsule has taken two groups of U.S. astronauts up to the International Space Station and brought one group back, the first time Americans had traveled to the ISS on American rockets since the Shuttle was retired in 2011.
But unfortunately the SN15 launch was scrubbed until at least Thursday due to weather concerns.
With another 60 Starlink satellites joining the constellation, hopefully they’re close to rolling out access to the general public. Musk recently said they have over 500,000 preorders (like mine) on the books, which at $100 each, totals over $50 million.
About 10pm last night I got an email from PayPal saying that I had received a refund of $153.82 to my PayPal account from some place called Air Can. I spent some time racking my brain trying to figure out who Air Can was and why they were giving me money back.
I searched through my Amazon account looking for AIR CAN or a charge for that amount, but I found nothing. So I started searching back through my PayPal charges all the way back through 2020, and still found nothing.
I even Googled to see if it might be some sort of scam, but still nothing.
But then this morning it all made sense.
I got an email from Expedia telling me that Air Can was Air Canada, and the refund was for our tickets to Fairbanks, AK for our FIRST Holland America Alaskan Cruise. And the reason it didn’t turn up in my PayPal charges is that I had made the reservations back in late 2019 for our May 2020 cruise.
When I cancelled the flights in March of 2020 due to the China Virus, they were the only one that didn’t refund all of our money. But apparently they got so much pushback that they finally refunded the rest of the money.
So not a scam.
I signed up for Kroger’s Pharmacy Club this morning, doing it all online, so I could drop off almost all our prescriptions there this afternoon when we were out and about.
I said ‘almost’ because, strangely enough, of her two Levothyroxine scripts that Jan takes since her thyroid was removed, one was $6 and the other one was $26.82. The difference is that one was 150mcg and the other one was 175.
She takes a 150 one day and then a 175mcg the next, continually alternating them. This gives her the 163mcg average dose that her doctor wants her to take.
So I gave the 150mcg one to Kroger’s, and I’ll give the 175mcg one to WalMart, where it’s only $10, saving me a whole $16.82.
But, hey. It’s $16.82.
This was the only prescription where Kroger’s wasn’t the cheapest by far.
Jan and I headed to Webster about 1pm, first to have lunch at Twin Peaks, with Jan getting her long-time favorite Spicy Chipotle Chicken with Broccoli and Mashed Potatoes,
as well as a cup of their really good Tomato Basil Soup.
I got my usual Half Wedge Salad and a Bowl of their Venison Chili.
One thing that makes the Wedge Salad so good is that the bacon on it is thick cut and marinated in brown sugar, red pepper flakes, and paprika. So it adds just touch of sweetness and heat.
So good food and scenic views, just like the ads say.
After lunch, besides our Kroger’s, WalMart, Kohl’s, and office stops, I made a quick stop at Harbor Freight to pick up a small pick axe. I needed it to dig out the rock-filled dirt between the rig door and the patio so I could lay some paving stones as a walkway.
When I got to the lady cashier to check out, she looked at down at the axe and said, “Got some digging to do?”
I looked at her with a perfectly straight, serious face and said, “Got a body to bury.”
Then she said, again very seriously, “Need some help? I know a couple of good places.”
Then we just looked at each other, both of us wondering I sure, how really serious the other one was. Then without another word, I paid my bill and walked out.
And I’m sure she went home tonight and told her husband her side of this same story.
So now we’re both wondering.
May 4, 2022
A One Year Update . . .
This morning I noticed a $72 charge come through on my PayPal card for the yearly renewal of our Kroger’s Pharmacy Plan. So I decided to go back through our prescriptions to see how much I had actually saved, and it turns out to be a lot.
Previously, we had always used a combination of both Sam’s and WalMart’s discount plans, and it always seemed to be the cheapest around. And it worked well transferring prescriptions as we traveled around the country. But when I heard about the Kroger plan and checked the prices, I was really surprised.
Very pleasantly surprised, actually.
Every one of our prescriptions that I checked was much cheaper.
And when I looked at the year-long total, we had saved almost $1100 over Sam’s/WalMart. So minus the $72 membership fee, we saved a little over $1000.00
Very Nice!
