Our RV Adventures

This morning was my 8:30 appointment with Junior’s Upholstery in Conroe to have the headliner of our Dodge Dakota replaced. II had started coming loose and fraying around the edges, and even disintegrating in some places.

So about 8:15 my friend and next door neighbor, Ed Hurlburt, followed me down to the shop so he could bring me home. They said they’d try to have it done by 2-3pm so we could head down to Clear Lake on time for our dinner with old friends.

Getting back home I got on the phone to try and solve another credit/debit card problem. Whenever I tried to use the card for our Karnes City / SiteWatch account as a credit card where it ask me for my Zip Code, i.e. gas pumps, it would reject the card for an incorrect Zip Code. But when I called the bank they couldn’t find any problem. The Zip Code on my bank account was correct.

Then yesterday I was trying to set up the Uber app on my phone and had the same problem. When I entered the card number, exp. date, CVV, and Zip Code as requested, it said there was a problem. And since I double and triple-checked the card stuff,  it had to be the Zip Code.

So I again put in a call to the Karnes County National Bank once again, and after going through three people, finally found a nice young lady who figured out the problem.

The bank account there uses our Friendswood, TX Zip Code of 77546, which is the one I had been entering. But, because I had requested that the cards be sent to the bank for us to pick up there, instead of sending them to our Friendswood bank account address, the bank’s Zip Code is what got entered into the computer with the card info.

She said she would correct the problem and then a little later I tried setting up the Uber app again, and this time with no problems. So this problem is solved.

Still working on the iDrive credit card problem.

BTW the Uber app is pretty neat. It shows you where you are on the map, and also shows several free vehicles in your vicinity. Look forward to giving it a try.

Later in the afternoon, our friend Debi Hurlburt took Jan and I down to the upholstery shop to pick up the truck so that we could leave from there on our way to Clear Lake. They were running a little late finishing up due to the rain, so we didn’t get on our way until about 4pm.

Turns out that because of the glue fumes they try to do as much work as possible outside, and the intermittent rain caused a problem.

But the job was worth the wait. It was perfect, even down to the color match of the original to the side trim strips on the truck.

Great Job!  And Junior’s Upholstery is very well recommended.

Though we got a later start than I had hoped, wanting to avoid the Houston going-home traffic, today turned out  to be one of those rare Houston traffic days with no accidents or major construction slowdowns, so we were able to make the 70 mile trip down to Dickinson in only 90 minutes, a new record I think.

Having known them since the mid-80’s, Bob and Maria are our oldest Houston friends, so we try to get together whenever we can.

Maria even got a good picture of Jan and I. Well, Jan anyway.

And as is usual for these things, we once again spent about 3 hours catching up with each other’s lives. And we look forward to doing it again as soon as we can.

After a potty stop at the Flying J, we got back to the rig a little before 10. Finally remembering to do it, I brought our Garmin GPS in from the truck to check it for map updates.

Turns out there were several small ones, an FM traffic info provider update and a Time Zone data update, and one big one, a 2.66 GB map update. The small ones only took a couple of minutes, and even the big one only took about 45 minutes. Pretty good for 2.66 GB on 3G.

So that’s done for another year.

Tomorrow? More last minute chores before we hit the road for Colorado River on Wednesday, and Tucson on Friday.

Since it was already sprinkling when I got up, and was supposed to continue all day, it seemed like a good time to pressure wash the rig to finally get all the caliche mud off hat we accumulated on our trip down to Kenedy last October for our gate guarding stint.

Caliche mud forms a hard crust and will not wash off  with rain, but must be scrubbed off with a brush or car wash, or in the case of the rig, pressure washed with Awesome as a detergent.

It took me a little over two hours to go over the coach, first soaking it with water and letting it set for a few minutes. Then I soaked it again, this time with an Awesome solution, and also let it set too. Finally I went back over the coach with the high pressure spray, rinsing off the Awesome and getting all the debris from the nooks and crannies.

If I have time in the next couple of days I’ll go back over the coach with a spray wax to give it some shine.

After a hot shower to warm up, Jan and I headed out about 4:45 to meet Ed and Debi Hurlburt at El Bosque for some of their great Mexican food.

And as usual the food was great, but the service left something (much?) to be desired. We figured we were going to have a problem when our waiter took our orders without writing anything down, and then kept coming back to the table to double check things.

He got Ed’s order completely wrong, and it took us forever to get plates for our fajitas, flour tortillas, and Jan’s refried beans. Turns out it was the guy’s very first day.

But at least the food was good,  as well as the company.

Tomorrow morning I’m dropping the truck off to have the headliner replaced. The glue has dried out so it’s falling down in places, and when you touch the edges it just disintegrates, so they’ll do a full replacement and have it back in a few hours.

Then tomorrow evening it’s back down to the Clear Lake area for dinner with some old friends, Bob and Maria, who we’ve known since the mid-80’s. Really looking forward to it.

Thought for the Day:

“Show me somebody who is always smiling, always cheerful, always optimistic, and I will show you somebody who hasn’t the faintest idea what the heck is really going on.â€

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