We both had a taste for BBQ today so our first thought was the Rudy’s BBQ up in Webster, so off we went.
And for once we both got the same thing. Well, at least a different version of the same thing.
Jan got her usual Smoked Baked Potato with the Lean Brisket,
while I got the Potato with Two Meats, Moist Brisket and Cheddar Jalapeno Sausage.
It’s kind of hard to tell from the pics, but these are pushing into football-size territory.
And one thing that makes these different is that they’re not actually ‘baked’, but instead, are smoked along with the BBQ.
And of course, it’s not a visit to Rudy’s without a pint of their Creamed Corn.
As I’ve said before, Jan doesn’t really like corn, but she loves Rudy’s version.
And we both had more than half left over to bring home for another meal.
Nice!
Next up, since we got our usual Saturday Wal-Mart visit out of the way on Thursday, we decided to do our usual Sunday HEB stop today. Finishing up, we got gas and then coming home, made a stop at our local Shell station to cash in what turned out to be $54 in lottery tickets, at $2 and $4 a time.
Tomorrow we’re making the trek up to Katy to get together with Brandi, Lowell, and Landon to meet up at Ray’s Mexican, a favorite local spot of ours.
Family and Good Food. It can’t be beat.
* * * * *
I mentioned before that while SpaceX’s Starship #5 flight had the 1st stage booster return to the launch site to be caught by the Mechzilla chopstick on the tower, the Starship itself came down half a world away in the Indian Ocean.
But it didn’t just into the sea, but it actually made a controlled landing before sinking into the ocean.
And the landing was so on target that there was actually a ship stationed nearby to video it.
Check it out here.
And this ‘accuracy’ is not unusual for SpaceX, since the booster returns to the launch area with an accuracy of 1 centimeter, less than 1/3 of an inch.
WOW!
Thought for the Day:
Apparently, free speech is only allowed until someone else doesn’t like it.
And Now On To Today’s Retro-Blogs.™
October 19, 2008
Chicken, AK
October 19, 2009
A Job Complete…
I wanted to spend the day finally getting the bathroom faucet changed out so we ate a lunch of leftovers.
It took all afternoon and two trips to Lowe’s, but I finally got the old one off.
And, ironically, the Lowe’s trips didn’t help.
It just took a lot of brute force, i.e., a screwdriver and a big, honking hammer.
It turns out all I had to do was just beat the crap out of it.
Finally getting the old one out, I got the new one in and working in only about 10 minutes.
Here’s the result.
The old one was a two-handle model that couldn’t be repaired when it started dripping. This one can be fixed.
About 6 pm we headed out for dinner at Ryan’s, dropping off a bag of garbage at the dumpster on the way out of the park.
We got back home a little after 7, ready to enjoy our new faucet.
October 19, 2010
Liberace and A Tea Party. . .
I read yesterday about the closing of the Liberace Museum. At one time it was one of the largest attractions in Las Vegas, with more than 450,000 visitors a year. Now it has dwindled to only about 50,000 a year.
When we were in Vegas this past Spring, we didn’t visit the museum, but we did take some photos of the outside. Kinda neat, actually.
They say they want to close the museum and put some of the displays on a traveling exhibition.
Personally, I think they ought to move it to Branson. It would fit right in, and the age demographic is certainly right.
I did find this recipe from a Liberace Cookbook for Sticky Buns. Looks delicious.
Ingredients:
1 cup white raisins
8 oz. pecan halves
1/2 cup light rum
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1/2 pound (two sticks) unsalted butter
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon each of ground nutmeg, allspice, cloves, and ginger
3 packages (18 buns) Pillsbury crescent dough.
Directions:
Soak the raisins in the rum over a low flame. Set aside. Preheat oven to 325 F. In a saucepan, melt butter and stir in the spices and the brown sugar until the mixture becomes a bubbling syrup.
Unroll the crescent dough, keeping each package in one flat place. Drizzle one quarter of the syrup over each individual piece of dough, reserving the last quarter for later.
Sprinkle one third of the raisins and spread one third of the chopped pecans on each of the three sheets of dough. Roll up each section of dough, jelly-roll style and cut into 1-inch pieces.
Grease two eight-muffin pans or three six-muffin pans with butter. Put a scant teaspoon of the reserved syrup and a few whole pecans in the bottom of each muffin mold.
Cover with the individual jelly-roll pieces, cut side up. Bake in preheated oven for the time recommended on the Pillsbury packages.
While pans are still hot, invert them on a sheet of heavy aluminum foil allowing the buns to be released. Replace any of the syrup and pecans that cling to the molds on the individual buns.
You should serve the buns while they are still warm and have that fresh-from-the-oven taste.
And that’s your cooking tip for the day.
As far as today was concerned, our son Chris called about 11:15 and said he was up (he works nights this week), so I drove over to his house to finish setting up his new computer. We’ve been trying to recover his iTunes account from his dead/dying laptop without a lot of success, but I’m still working on it.
After stopping by the bank, I got back home about 2 pm. Then about 3 we headed over to Monterey’s Little Mexico for some Chicken Tortilla Soup.
But before we left the park, I had to get a shot of the beautiful view of the water.
The weather has really been great here lately, with temps in the low 80’s in the daytime and in the 50’s at night. It doesn’t get much better.
Leaving Monterey’s we drove about 10 miles down I-45 to the Gulf Greyhound Park in La Marque to attend a Tea Party Rally put on by the Clear Lake Tea Party. We didn’t know what to expect as far as attendance so we got there early to just people-watch.
We knew it wouldn’t be anywhere near as large as the last one we attended in Searchlight NV in late March of this year.
That one was enormous, with over 30,000 people there. It looked like this.
and this.
The traffic was backed up for miles. Luckily we only had to drive down from Las Vegas and got there early.
Some people just parked their cars and walked to the site, some for almost eight miles.
We got to see Sarah Palin, Joe the Plumber, Jerry Doyle, Sharron Angle, Andrew Breitbart, and many others, and had a great time.
Of course we knew this one wouldn’t be anywhere near that big, but it did turn out pretty good, as there looked to be about 1000 people there.
We certainly had a great moon overhead,
and some great speakers, too.
Among others, was Congressman Ron Paul,
Congressman Pete Olsen,
and State Senator Dan Patrick,
but the real hit was Apostle Calver
who brought the crowd to their feet several times. That man can really give a speech!
The event wrapped up about 9 pm and we were home in about 20 minutes. We had fun, but it turned out to be a long day, and it was good to get back to the rig.
October 19, 2011
Man the Lifeboats . . .
We seem to be on day 3 of the 40 days and 40 nights of rain. I expect Ark-Building to commence momentarily.
It’s the Lord, Noah!
Right!
For a real laugh, check out Bill Cosby’s take on Noah and the Ark.
After coffee, and later lunch, I headed back over to the RV/MH Hall of Fame. I think I’m finally on the downhill run on this, and hope to finish Friday, or Saturday at the latest, unless I run into something else unexpected.
Getting home about 5pm I found our daughter Brandi had sent us this new Landon picture. Wonder if he’s also wearing the cowboy boots we bought him?
Since I spent so much time at the RV/MH Hall of Fame, we wanted to eat close by. And our choice was King Wha and their great Chinese food. And they were really on their game tonight with a great meal.
Getting back to the rig, the pond surrounding our rig is getting bigger and deeper. If this keeps up we’ll have to break out our waders.
October 19, 2012
The Post Office Does Something Right . . .
Wednesday afternoon I sent off our absentee ballot requests to the registrar in Madison, SD via a Flat Rate Priority Mail Envelope. And lo and behold, it was delivered this morning at 8am.
Maybe the Post Office should just ship everything Priority Mail. Two days from Virginia to South Dakota is pretty good.
We had planned to drive down to the Gloucester area and sightsee. But when we got up about 8am it was pouring down rain and had been for an hour or so. So after checking and confirming the weather said it would rain all day, we went back to bed. We’ll try it again tomorrow
Only to wake about 10:30 and find it bright and sunny outside.
WTH?
Oh, well. There’s still tomorrow.
For lunch, since we were out of leftovers, Jan fixed cheese toast, and then we finished it off with a slice of delicious Pumpkin-Cinnamon Bread. Yumm!
A little later while I was outside, Charlie Kitchens walked over from a nearby site to say hello. His wife reads our blog and they actually stopped off here due to our blogging, although they thought we had already moved on.
About 3:30 I called the Bass Lake RV Park in Dillon, SC to check if they would have a couple of sites available for us on Sunday night. This will be our stopover point on our way down to Savannah.
It’s also only about 5 miles away from South of the Border, a famous tourist trap since 1949. Never let it be said that we would pass up a place like this. The name refers to the fact that the place is just south of the North Carolina / South Carolina border.
South of the Border does have an RV park, but it’s almost twice as much as the Passport American park right down the road.
We headed out for dinner about 4:30. On our way over to Colonial Beach we checked out the local Moose Lodge to see if they had any RV parking available. There were two RV’s parked there but no hookups, so no such luck.
Our destination for dinner was the Dockside Restaurant, the same place we ate our first night here.
After checking the menu I ordered the Andouille Sausage appetizer with Creole Mustard. Very spicy and very good.
After that Jan and I split the Fried Seafood Platter because we wanted to have room for dessert – the Pumpkin Cheesecake for Jan and the Whiskey Glazed Apple Cake for me.
And I’m glad we did. Both were really delicious, especially my Apple Cake. As much as Jan likes pumpkin anything, I think she was gazing wistfully at my Apple Cake.
Tomorrow we’re going to try our Gloucester trip again, so we’ll see how it goes. The weather is supposed to be better, but of course, they were wrong this morning so who knows?
October 19, 2014
Good Stuff . . .
Our vehicle count seems to have settled down for now, with today’s count of 181 pretty much the same as yesterday’s. We’ve been told that our last remaining frack still has a few more days to go. But we’ll see. Everything always seems to take longer than planned out here in the oil patch.
For the first time since we’ve been at this gate I heard coyotes (the 4 legged furry kind) about 5am this morning. I used to hear them every morning at last year’s gate. They sounded like they were right across the road, and probably were. But I never saw one.
We talked to our son Chris today about his bike trip out west. He and his fireman buddies went all the way out to Monument Valley in Utah. His best description of the trip was “Cold”. Cold on the bike, cold in the tent.
I finally remembered to ask one of the computer support guys for the password to the rig’s Wi-Fi network. My Verizon data signal here is sometimes iffy, so hopefully this will help.
For dinner tonight we had more delicious food from Ama’s catering. Frack Food, as we call it. This time it was really good Beef and Cheese Enchiladas with Rice and Beans. And one more thing that made it even better.
This past spring when we were orbiting back and forth between the Lake Conroe Thousand Trails and the Colorado River Thousand Trails, we met up with Greg and Lynette McHenry. And somewhere along the line Greg McHenry gave us a jar of his homemade hot sauce. Well, as can happen, the jar was put in the refrigerator and slowly worked its way to the back, while we were dealing with all of Jan’s breast cancer stuff.
But recently Jan was trying to clear room in the frig for all the Ama’s we’re getting and came across the jar of hot sauce. So we’ve been using it on all the Mexican dishes we’ve been getting, including tonight’s enchiladas, as well as the fajitas a couple of nights ago.
And this is some Good Stuff. Really good, as in ‘Greg should bottle and sell this stuff’ good. We’re really sorry we didn’t find this earlier. Of course, we would have already run out by now.
So, never mind.
October 19, 2015
Lights and Sheets . . .
Another quiet day, even apparently for the frack up the road. The water guys weren’t around, the frack pond pumps weren’t running, and the big blue hose was flat.
Since they just started fracking last Monday, I doubt they’re finished up, but probably just switching over to the second hole. Neither of these wells are as deep as any of our three were, so they might possibly be finished up next week.
Other than that, we had some tankers coming in hauling out water, and some other trucks hauling out some other stuff.
Later in the afternoon, I started filling our water tank from the well hose. I tried hooking up the hose directly to the rig, but with only about 20psi, it didn’t work out very well. So every week or so I just fill up our 500 gallon tank. Of course with the low pressure it takes two to three hours to top it off.
I’ve noticed a number of y’all still buying the Striped QUEEN Sateen Sheet Sets we mentioned a while back. We came across these a year or so ago and bought two sets.
They’re still very soft, with no pilling or wearing, and they still look great. They come in 9 different colors, and even better, they’re inexpensive (cheap). Only about $25 per set.
Several readers had asked me about how I liked the new Camco Bright White Light LED Bulb that I got for our shower after the old one burned out and blew a fuse.
After a little over a month it’s still working great. One thing I’ve noticed about this one is that there’s been no fade. Many LED lights, especially cheaper ones, tend to dim noticeably during the first few months. But I measured the output of this one when I first installed it, and then again a couple of days ago, and found no discernable difference. The same goes for the LED Strip Lights that I use as fluorescent bulb replacements.
And speaking of the LED strips, I mentioned a couple of days ago that I was going to use these strips to replace the 4ft fluorescent tubes in our kitchen when they died.
And of course, today they did die. At least one of them did, and they won’t work with just one bulb. So I dug into my storage bin and discovered I only had five strips.
I decided to do just a quick and dirty hookup until I could get some more strips. I had planned to use four on each side, but five would have to do for now.
After cutting the 12v wires going into the ballast, I wired up the strips using wire nuts. Like I said, quick and dirty.
I then used clear packing tape to fasten them to the diffuser panel. And when it was all closed up, it looked like this.
Based on the light output, the five strips shown here are brighter than the tubes they replaced. So I’ll just add one more strip when I get some more in. Although the point source effect of the lights doesn’t bother Jan or me, when I get the new ones, I’ll stick them to the top of the fixture using the furnished adhesive tape, which should diffuse the light even more.
I didn’t get to my laptop repair today because I couldn’t find one of my two soldering irons. I did find both of my soldering guns, but they’re too big for this fine work. I guess they must both be out in one of the bays, so that’s where I’ll look tomorrow.
October 19, 2016
Gas Buddy Lies . . .
Today being a travel day, Jan was up about 7:30 while I slept in until 8:30. Since I always get my shower at night, this gives Jan time to get her shower and then get dressed.
While Jan got the Bacon, Egg, and Cheese Biscuits ready, I started the coffee and then went outside to stow some more things away.
It had been foggy earlier and the dew was on everything, including this spider web covered in dew drops.
Pretty neat!
We were hooked up and on our way a little after 11. Friend and Park Ranger Barbara Spade even got a picture of us hitching up before we headed out.
Our first stop was at the halfway point, which turned out to be the Buc-ee’s near Luling for kolache’s for lunch, and Cranberry Nut Muffins for breakfast tomorrow. Oh, and also a large Coffee / Cinnamon Bun / English Toffee Cappuccino for me and a small Coffee / Pumpkin Spice Cappuccino for Jan.
Then a few miles past Luling, we turned south on SR 80 for the last 60 or so miles. I was actually going a few miles out of the way to make a diesel stop at the Stripes Truck Stop coming into Karnes City, rather than cutting directly over to Kenedy.
The trip down SR 80 was smooth and scenic . . . until we got to the last 20 miles or so. Which consisted of two 10 mile long one lane sections. We had to wait for a pilot truck to lead us through each 10 mile stretch, but that wasn’t the real problem.
That was the fact that that had the pavement completely torn up for repaving, and we were just driving on dirt and gravel. And because they were watering the dirt and gravel to keep the dust down, we arrived at the Lone Star RV Park #2 covered in a hard coating of brown mud.
I wanted to top off our tank before we parked for several months, and Gas Buddy said that Stripes had diesel for $1.96 a gallon, noticeably less than the $2.08 – $2.09 at the nearby stations.
I checked Gas Buddy again this morning and it was still $1.96 this morning as well. But when we got there about 1:30, it was now $2.08, but I was there so I filled up.
But to further rub my nose in it, when we actually got in Kenedy, the HEB had diesel for $1.94, and Gas Buddy didn’t even list it at all.
Some Buddy!
After we got parked, I called Nancy Christian, the park owner, to let her know we were here and what site we were in. Then a couple of hours later she showed up at the rig to ‘officially’ welcome us and give us a folder with all the park info.
She said to see how things are going to work out and then we’ll settle up. According to the info packet, the rate is $500 per month which includes electric, Wi-Fi, DirecTV cable with HBO, and a free laundromat.
Not bad at all.
After supper I emailed Todd to let him know we were here and ready to go. He said we’ll get together tomorrow for an hour or so at the local McDonald’s to go over things.
So hopefully we’ll be up and running soon.
October 19, 2017
It’s not the cars, it’s the oysters!
Jan’s feeling a lot better today, and I’m pretty much back to normal. Or as normal as I get, anyway.
A while back, I mentioned UpTimeRobot, a free service that lets you monitor up to 50 websites, checking every 5 minutes to see if your website or blog is up or down, sending you an email for any change.
If you need to monitor more sites (more than 50?), want UpTimeRobot to check every minute instead of every 5, or want to receive text messages as well as emails, it’s only about $5 a month.
Anyway, about 1pm I got two UpTimeRobot alerts saying that both my Clear Lake client’s websites had gone down, so I was immediately on the phone. Turns out that the phone guy was there, and had unplugged the wrong wire, taking the Internet down. And now he was scrambling to get everything back up.
But apparently he did, since while I was on the phone, I got emails telling me everything was now up and running again.
A great service, and it’s free.
While I’m mentioning good deals, I thought I’d pass along this email I received from La Crosse Technology, a well-known maker of weather monitoring and atomic clocks.
They’ve just announced a line of WiFi-enabled weather stations and are introducing them with large discounts.
For example:
A great deal at only $50 and the one I ordered.
And if you don’t want something quite as fancy, check out this one.
Only $25. Both this one and the one above are WiFi-enabled and connect with the National Weather Service to give the latest forecast in your area.
Or for just a plain-jane inside/outside temperature and humidity display, try this one.
At only $19.95, this one doesn’t connect to the Internet, but still show inside/outside temperature and humidity, atomic clock time and date.
Just click on the link(s) and enter the related Promo Code to get your discount.
And just to be clear, I don’t make anything from either UpTimeRobot or La Crosse. Just passing on a good deal.
I mentioned the other day how we were thinking about moving down to the Clear Lake area to cut down on my 450 miles per week drives down there. And as I had thought, it’s going to be hard to get a space. I’ve still got a number of places to check, but so far it’s not looking good. The one place that has responded put me on a list behind 15 other RV’s. But I’ll keep checking.
It’s not the cars, it’s the oysters!
According to a recent article in Scientific Reports, oyster farts are a major cause of global warming, producing “one-tenth of methane and nitrous oxide gases in the Baltic Sea as a result of digestion. Therefore, researchers have warned that shellfish “may play an important but overlooked role in regulating greenhouse gas production”.
“Shellfish flatulence is not the first bodily function to be blamed for having an impact on the climate. EU lawmakers in 2015 decided to exempt enteric methane, mostly found in the burps of ruminant animals like cows, from caps on methane and ammonia.”
It is nice to see someone acknowledge that methane is 20 times more potent and nitrous oxide is 300 times more potent than CO2 as a greenhouse gas.
So eat more oysters, and beef too, just to be safe.
October 19, 2018
Got The Last One . . .
Wanting to get a really early start, we were up at 6:00 and pulling out of our site at the Seasons In The Sun RV Park in Mims, FL at 7:30am
Sunrise was 7:27am.
We circled through the propane fill-up area to hitch up and were pulling out on the main road a few minutes before 8. We were on our way so early for two reasons.
One, with all the hurricane cleanup workers in the area, it was dicey as to whether or not we would be able to get a site at the Beaver Lake RV Park in Quincy. They don’t do reservations and it was first come, first served.
Two, if we didn’t get a site here, it would be another 130 miles to a park in Holt, FL.
We hit a few rain squalls between Mims and Jacksonville, but nothing for very long. And then it was clear and sunny west from Jax. And with temps in the low 80’s, it was really comfortable, even cool enough to turn off the dash fans for a while.
We were about 40 miles out of Jacksonville before we started seeing any hurricane damage, but it was mostly downed trees out at the tree line, none of which looked like they would have ended up on the roadway.
I called the Beaver Lake RV Park (with not a lake nor a beaver to be seen) when we were about 20 miles out and was told that they had one site left, but it was still first come . . . well, you know.
We pulled into the park and I ran into the Marathon station to see if the site was still open. I did notice that there was a work truck parked at the entrance to the RV park area, but didn’t see anyone around it.
When I got inside I got the last site, paid the fee, and also bought Mega-Million tickets for tonight $1 Billion drawing. Coming back out, a 5th wheel pulled past our rig and up behind the work truck.
Turns out that the work truck and the 5th wheel were together and apparently didn’t know that they were supposed to check in at the Marathon station, and instead, were wandering around the RV park beside the station looking to check in.
So we really lucked out.
For dinner tonight we had the Sonny’s BBQ that we picked up yesterday morning just for this meal.
Tomorrow we have a short 188 mile run to Robertsdale, AL. Riverside RV Park is right off I-10 with an easy in-easy out. It really didn’t make sense to make the 40 mile round trip down to the Escapees Park since we’re only staying one night.
We had a fantastic time seeing everyone again. Long-time friends, Carol and Charlee, Bill, and Monica. We won’t wait for another ten years to come down here again.
I told Jan that there was only one thing that could have made this visit better. She asked, “What?”
I said, “Two more weeks.”
Then she said, “Yeah, but it still wouldn’t have been enough.”
And that’s the truth!
Now for the Recap:
Wednesday,Oct 17
There was an Atlas-Centaur launch from the Cape about 12:15am. Checking online I found the launch streaming online, and as soon as I heard ‘Ignition’, I went outside and scanned the trees, not knowing what I would see. But then rising through the tree limbs, I saw this.
It was a couple of minutes before I heard the deep rumble, more like distant thunder echoing on for several minutes.
Nice but not nearly as impressive as the Shuttle launch we saw when we were here in 2009.
With that one you actually felt the physical ‘push’ when the sound hit you a few seconds later.
For dinner that night we made a second visit to the SeaShack up in New Smyrna Beach. Just as good as the first time.
Later, coming back to the rig we decided to check out Frisbee’s Ice Cream Stand. In the daytime, it looks like this.
But it’s even more impressive at night.
Jan got a delicious Pumpkin Parfait, with Caramel and Pecans,
while I got the Coffee. Both really good.
BTW the name of the place, “Frisbee’s’ is not named for the flying disc, but it’s the name of the family that owns and runs the place.
A neat place.
Thursday, Oct 18
First up this morning we drove into Titusville to pick up a to-go order from Sonny’s BBQ to have Friday night after we’re back on the road.
After sitting around talking for a while, we headed up to the Daytona Beach area. Jan and I were up here several times when we were dating in 1967, but except for the Speedway, there was nothing really recognizable to us.
Our first stop was at Hankster’s Hot Rods, a classic hot rod / muscle car showroom / museum.
Now that’s an engine – A 426 cu.in. 425hp Hemi.
Pretty much all the cars here are for sale, with prices ranging up to $70,000. So if you’ve got the bucks, that Hemi ‘Cuda you were drooling over when you were 16, could be yours.
I mean, the Mega-Million’s is up to $1 Billion tonight.
Finishing up, we checked out the Hibachi Grill & Supreme Buffett, just down the road from the Daytona Speedway. Really good, and one of the largest selections we’ve seen.
October 19, 2019
Up In Katy Landon/Dogsitting Most of the Day
while Brandi, Lowell, and Lowell’s sister and parents all went to a family wedding.
L to R. That’s Lowell’s sister Sherry, Lowell’s father, Lowell’s mother, Brandi, and Lowell.
Later in the afternoon Landon, Jan, and I all headed up Mason Rd for a few things at the HEB and then supper at Chick-fil-A.
Tried to get Jan to stick her head in the scarecrow, but she wasn’t having any part of it.
So since we didn’t get home until almost 10pm, this is all you’re getting for today.
See you back here tomorrow.
October 19, 2021
A Gut Feeling?
Jan and I had lunch at Twin Peaks once again, with Jan getting her usual Spicy Chipotle Chicken, with a cup of Tomato Basil soup.
Since they still haven’t brought back my Venison Chili with the Wedge Salad, I had the Green Chile Chicken and 1/2 a BLT, with Sweet Potato Fries.
Delicious as always, and of course there’s the ‘scenic views’.
The last week or so I’ve made good use of Amazon’s Next Morning or Same Day Delivery options.
Last night a little before 11pm I placed an order that said it would be delivered this morning between 7am and 11am. It showed up a few minutes after 6am.
Then this morning I placed an order a few minutes after 10am, that said it would be delivered between 2pm and 6. It showed up about 3pm.
Very nice!
October 19, 2022
Winter Is Nigh . . .
We got our first real taste of winter yesterday with a high of 55° and a low last night of 43. Then a 66 today and a 47 tonight. Cold enough to turn one of our electric heaters on for the first time this season.
But after this initial tease, tomorrow it’s back to 81° tomorrow, and days in the low 80’s for the rest of the week.
That’s Texas weather for you.
A while back I posted a photo of this old truck that was parked in the new area of our RV park where the new sites are going in.
It was left over when the previous occupants moved out. And until recently there was a tree growing out by the rear axle.
Several readers suggested that Rob keep it as a yard decoration, and that’s what he plans to do. Not going to do anything to it. Just leave it as is.
If he was going to get rid of it, I was thinking my son Chris might want to take a shot at it.
This is a previous project of his.
It’s a 1977 18 ft. Century Arabian that also had a tree growing out of the hull when he got it. A friend gave it to him, probably just to get it out of his yard.
It took him two years, but he rebuilt it from the keel up, including rebuilding the 351 Windsor inboard drive engine, boring it out and adding a hotter cam.
Besides repairing the hull and completely repainting it, he also reupholstered the interior.
It’s a great ski-boat, but it’s also nice for just putt-putting around the lake.
Not exactly sure where the name “Little Thunder” came from. Maybe “Big Thunder” was already taken?
Just think what he could do with an old truck.
I mentioned a while back about the new epilator machines we’re importing from Poland. I designed the customized faceplate for the units, and I was anxious to see how they were going to look.
The initial shipment came in today and I’m really happy how they turned out. And even more important, my client was very happy too.
October 19, 2023
Cotton Candy . . .
We were on the way up to Conroe about 10:15 this morning to meet up with Debi and Ed Hurlburt at a new place for us, Kioku Supreme Buffet, though they had been here before and said it was really good.
And they were right.
And a great selection too, including some items we hadn’t seen before like Coconut Chicken and Steamed Heads-On Shrimp.
In fact we all thought it was so good that we’re going back there next month.
We were there for our usual almost 3 hours before we all headed home a little after 2pm.
As we were leaving the restaurant, we saw this in the entrance alcove.
It’s a Cotton Candy Vending Machine, with 6 different flavors and 2 different toppings. I didn’t see any price on it, and Jan wondered if it was free, like places that have a free soft ice cream machine. We’ll check it out next month and see.
Might even give it a try.
And it seems like we now have a much better route up to Conroe that avoids going through downtown Houston. Going up, we take 59/I-69 north up to I-610 and then get right on the Hardy Toll Road up to Conroe.
Easy-Peazy and no slowdowns.
Then last month when we reversed the route, we had a 30 minute slowdown covering the 2 miles to get back on I-45 south. So this time we stayed on the 610 Loop and took it all the way around to I-45 instead.
Easy-Peazy and no slowdowns.
A while after we got home, Amazon showed up with a bunch of stuff for work, and a couple of things for Jan.
First up was this Earring Organizer.
It has 80 compartments, 40 on one side and 40 on the other. Which may or may not be big enough to hold her very extensive earring collection.
Including this pair that also came in today.
On second thought, she may need a second organizer.
