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A New Date . . .

If it’s Saturday, It Must Be Wal-Mart.

But first it was lunch, this time at  Monterey’s once again.

Jan’s favorite dish there has always been the Chicken Ixtapa, but it disappeared from the menu a while back. But the last time we were at Gator’s. Jan asked Margie about it, and she said it’s coming back to the menu. And she also said that Jan can just ask for it, and they will make it for her.

And they did.

And the reason Margie knows all about this is that she recently bought that nearby Monterey’s location and is in the process of revamping the place.

I got my usual Chicken Tortilla Soup, pretty much the same thing I’ve been having for 30+ years.

It’s that good.

* * * * *

Well, it looks like the Starship #6 launch has slipped a day, and is now scheduled a day later on Tuesday, November 19th, but still with the same launch window opening at 4pm CST.

Thought For The Day:

Someone said it sounds like pretty much any husband.

And Now On To Today’s Retro-Blogs.™

November 16, 2009

Heart of Dixie…

About 11:30 we drove over to Huntsville to eat lunch at a favorite Mexican place of ours called Rosie’s Cantina.  We first ate here last November and it’s still good.

Next, we went by Sam’s Club and then stopped off at Petco to pick up some new collars for our cats, and also a new feeder.

Right as we got back to the rig, my Aunt Jan and her grandson, Harlan, showed up in the golf cart to say Hi.

A little later I went over to Jan’s house to talk with Glee, her daughter, and my cousin, about a computer project she’s working on, and also get her computer working on Aunt Jan’s WiFi system.

About 5 pm I went back to the rig to bring my Jan over to Aunt Jan’s for a delicious casserole for dinner and had a great time catching up with the family.

November 16, 2010

Amazon and the Landon Cam . . .

My day started with a call for help from a client with a problem he’s having. Hopefully I was able to help him out.

And then while I was on the line, our friends, Al and Adrienne called. When we called them back, we found they’re still in Fernley, NV which is about 30 or so miles east of Reno, where they’re working for Amazon at one of their distribution centers. Amazon hires about 15,000 people a year to work shipping out orders, and they like to hire RV’ers because they bring their own housing with them. In some cases Amazon pays for their site at the RV park.

They said it’s an interesting experience. Not sure exactly what that means. Hopefully we’ll find out more when we see them back in Tucson next year.

Proud papa Lowell sent this picture of Landon at his first full day of daycare. He looks like he’s not too sure about the whole thing, but there’s no way you’re getting a smile out of him, no way, no how.

Brandi went back to work yesterday after her 3-month maternity leave, but she started putting Landon into half-day daycare last week to help him get used to it.

The daycare does have one neat thing, although it’s debatable how useful it is.

The Landon Cam.

They have two cameras that you can log into on the Internet. Normally Landon is in the middle crib on the right. Don’t know where he is now. You can’t pan or zoom the camera either. So you just have to hope he’ll be there when you look in.

Finally, about 12:45 pm we got to take our walk, and it was a perfect day for it. The sun was shining, the temperature was in the high 60’s and there was a nice breeze. Couldn’t be better for a nice walk.

I set the machine so we had coffee waiting for us when we got back, so that was nice too.

Later in the afternoon I went out and set the ladder up next to the slide to check out why it suddenly started leaking. I found a small tear in the inner seal. The heavy black rubber wipers look to be intact on all three sides, but where they join together at the corner, there’s a gap. I plugged it up temporarily with some rubber insulation and taped it over. Will have to see if that fixes the problem during the next rainstorm before doing a more permanent repair.

A little after 5 Jan and I headed over to Dickinson to meet Maria and Bob Sutton for supper at Monterey’s Little Mexico. Then, after dinner, I drove Bob back to his house, while Jan and Maria drove down to La Marque to play Bingo at the Knights of Columbus Hall. They did it last Tuesday, and Jan really had fun, so she wanted to do it again.

She didn’t win anything, but she did come within 3 numbers of winning one of the big prizes where you have to fill in the entire card.

I went down to pick her up and we got home about 10:30 and were in for the night.

November 16, 2012

Jan said she wanted a Nooner . . .

Here’s my Friday blog that didn’t get posted yesterday due to computer problems,

Since this was our last day in Gulf Shores we wanted to eat at King Neptune’s Seafood Restaurant, another of our favorite restaurants in this area.

We’ve been eating here for years, and although it’s on the main drag and popular with tourists, the lunch specials are very popular with locals. And besides being delicious, the prices are extremely reasonable.  Jan had the Roasted Turkey with Pecan Cornbread Dressing, Giblet Gravy, Cranberry Sauce, Mashed Potatoes, Deviled Eggs, and a Biscuit. And Homemade Coconut Pudding for dessert. And all this was $4.95.

I had Seasoned Shrimp with Pimento Cheese Grits, Sweet Potato Soufflé, Turnip Greens, a Biscuit, and dessert. All for $6.95. And these prices also included our iced tea.

Our total bill with tax was only $14.19!

And did I mention it was delicious? All perfectly seasoned.

Leaving King Neptune’s, and after a NAPA Auto Parts stop for some transmission fluid, we made our obligatory tacky gift shop stop at Souvenir City.

This place started out as 8’ x 10’ hot dog stand in the 1950s, and now is a chain of shops all along the Alabama and Florida Gulf Coasts.

When we got back from lunch, Jan said she wanted a Nooner.

Unfortunately for me, she meant a NAP!

So after she napped and I worked on getting everything ready to travel tomorrow, we headed out about 5pm to finish up our Gulf Shores visit the same way we started – with dinner at Lulu’s at Homeport, and as before, we finished off our meal by splitting an order of their Krispy Kreme Bread Pudding. Hmmm! Good!

On the way home we made a Wal-Mart to pick up the ingredients for Jan’s Heavenly Hash (Ambrosia). We saw on Facebook that the Galveston Bay RV Park where we’ll be staying this winter is having their Thanksgiving Dinner Sunday afternoon. And since we’ll be there earlier in the day, who can pass up another Turkey dinner. So the Heavenly Hash will be our contribution.

Tomorrow morning we’ll begin our two-day journey back to Houston.

Here’s hoping the rig starts.

November 16, 2013

Pay No Attention to that Man behind the Curtain . . .

or the inner workings of WordPress blogs either.

The other night I was working on the formatting of an ad that will be going up on the blog, and I was posting it as a private page so I could see how it would look online.

Then suddenly, after about 4 or 5 times, Live Writer and WordPress decided that I really wanted to post this to the whole world, or at least the 200 or so readers who get this blog by email. So that’s why some of you got a blog post entitled “Test-Page” with just an ad on it.

So, as Emily Litella says, “Never mind”.

The only real excitement today was getting hosed down, watered down, or maybe sprinkled on. Well, not sprinkled exactly. That implies a light shower.

This was more of a deluge. Maybe even of biblical proportions.

Semi-irregularly a water truck comes by to spray the road to help keep the dust down. The truck consists of a full-size tanker with a big fan-shaped spray nozzle on the back that the driver can turn on and off from the cab.

I saw the truck turn off the highway and the water came on, spreading out around the rear of the truck. The first thing I noticed was how far out it was going, about 20 to 25 feet on either side, much wider than the 10 or so feet we usually see, so I began to get a little worried. But then as the driver in the cab came even with me, he gave me a thumbs-up signal, which I took to mean he saw me sitting here and would turn off the spray right before it got to me and then turn it on again after he passed as they’ve done before.

WRONG!

As it happened I was on the phone at that time, and so I was yelling at the driver, closing my laptop, and grabbing up the logbooks and any other non-able-to-swim items, like Jan’s Kindle Paperwhite. I think my call thought I was being killed from the way I sounded on the phone.

It seems at the last second the driver realized what was happening and pulled to the left as far as he could. Now this spray is not like a garden hose. Think more like a fire hydrant, but it does have a very sharp cut-off to the spray pattern. Lucky for me.

Because the driver swerved at the last minute, I was only completely soaked from the knees down. And I mean soaked. It was like I had just waded into the ocean up to my knees.

One week from today (Saturday) we will be at the Gate Guard Services yard here in Whitsett getting ready for the 280 mile trip back to Houston on Sunday. Jan’s so excited she can’t sit still.

November 16, 2014

Tired . . .

Kept trying to do a blog tonight, but after a long night with not much sleep getting us ready to travel this morning, and a great meal with Lynette and Gregg McHenry, and Donna Huffer and Bob Parker this evening, I keep nodding off. So this is it.

We’re safely ensconced at the Lake Conroe Thousand Trails, and I will have more tomorrow.

November 16, 2015

Just Do It Yourself . . .

Well, it looks like we dodged a bullet on most of today’s rains, with it never getting very heavy, and pretty much over by 2pm. And even tomorrow’s ‘Heavy Thunderstorms’ have been downgraded to ‘Storms/Wind’. It would be nice to have it ‘downgraded’ to ‘Sunny’ for tomorrow, but that’s probably not going to happen.

But on the upside, this weekend is still looking nice.

Todd, our GGS service guy, came back to top off our diesel tank. I figured he’d wait until he came back on Sunday to service the generator, but he went ahead and did it today. He said he probably won’t be back on Sunday since our replacements, Donna and Joe Shelton, were experienced enough to get themselves hooked up.

Of course when you think about it, with everything already here, and set up and running, it’s no different than pulling into an RV park and getting hooked up.

I had mentioned a while back that as of right now, we’ll be moving back and forth between the Lake Conroe TT park and the Colorado River TT park in Columbus, TX for the rest of the year, into next, depending on park openings down the League City area.

Since I originally set things up on a Friday for some reason, all of our 10 upcoming two week reservations start out on Friday. But since we’re leaving the gate this Sunday and going into Lake Conroe, I had to lop off two days of our reserved 14 days to make things come out right.

But I was thinking this morning that if I pushed everything back two days that it might make things a little easier in a couple of ways. First off, the traffic looping around the top of Houston on Beltway 8 should be a little lighter on Sunday, not that it’s usually that bad in the middle of the day when we travel. But maybe more importantly, by coming in on Sunday when a lot of weekend campers are leaving, it might give us a better choice of sites.

Anyway, rather than me starting at the last of my ten reservations and backing each one up two days, one after the other, going forward, I thought I’d just call Thousand Trails Reservations and let them do it.

Surely their sophisticated reservation software would be able to move all the reservations forward two days, automagically, all at once. But I quickly found that they would have to do it one at a time, just like me.

Geez!  I’ve seen cheap, badly-written campground software that would do this with no problem. So I ended up doing it myself, since the last time I let them change a bunch of reservations, they screwed it up.

Sometimes the only way to get something done right, is to do it yourself.

Of course sometimes I screw it up too, but at least then I know who to blame.

One chore I forgot to tell you about yesterday was to check the water in our rig’s house batteries

I was immediately surprised to see how much dust from the trucks going by, had accumulated in the battery compartment. When we get settled in after our move this Sunday, I’ll pressure wash it to clean up. I also noticed a little corrosion on the terminals which I’ll take care of at the same time.

Because of the internal bracing in the bay, it can be hard to get distilled water into the back set of batteries, so I made up this water hand pump using a well-rinsed-out windshield washer fluid jug and this Pennzoil Gallon Fluid Transfer Pump

This lets me put the hose nozzle in the cell opening and just pump to top it off. No fuss, no mess.

I’ve given you a link to one on Amazon, but I think I got mine at Wal-Mart.

My engine batteries are sealed and on a swing-out tray above the house batteries. And since they’re sealed, they need no maintenance, just like the battery in our truck.

One less thing to do.

As far as today was concerned, I didn’t schedule anything major since the weather was supposed to be pretty rainy. But it actually didn’t turn out bad. So I took care of some small stuff that had been pushed down on my list by bigger stuff.

First up, I wanted to install some grommets on the floor mats in the truck. Unlike a lot of vehicles, our Dakota doesn’t have any way to fasten the mats down and they get scrunched up under the pedals after a time.

So I got out my Lord & Hodge Grommet Kit

and installed two grommets on each mat like this to match up with the hooks I had already installed.

I’ve also used the grommet kit to put some additional grommets in our canopy tarp here on the gate to be able to put tie-downs exactly where I want them.

Finishing up, I liked the paracord boot laces I made for my Red Wing boots so much, I made up a set for my steel-toed boots too. I started wearing these boots again a week or so ago when it was so cold and rainy, and my other boots got wet.

I hadn’t worn them since last year’s gate when we had to wear all the Frack gear, and I’d forgotten how comfortable they were. Especially considering they only cost about $30 vs. $175 for the Red Wings.

The only real downside is that they are a good bit heavier than my others, but I certainly feel light on my feet when I take them off.

FYI the little American Flags are called ‘lace keepers’. They keep your laces from gradually getting uneven over time. Most people are stronger in one arm than the other, usually on their ‘handed’ side, i.e. right-handed or left-handed. So they tend to pull harder with that hand than the other one, without even knowing it.. And so the laces gradually get mismatched in length.

But the lace keepers provide enough drag to stop that from happening.

And you can get them in hundreds of different styles, including military branch insignia, sports teams, car manufacturers, and many others.

A few years ago when we were on a drill rig gate, I was waiting to talk to the Company Man, along with another couple of guys. One of these guys was about 6’ 6’ and built like a pro linebacker.

I happened to look down at his boots and couldn’t resist a chuckle. Seeing where I was looking, he smiled at me and said, “My 6-year-old daughter gave them to me for my birthday a couple of weeks ago.” And then I understood.

And I must say he did look resplendent in his well-worn boots, complete with large pink Hello Kitty lace keepers.

November 16, 2016

A Beautiful Evening . . .

First up, I posted my screed on The 1960 World Series and the Electoral College and the one on Dilbert Predicts Trump’s Win on my Greg’s Musings page.

Check it out.

Several readers have recently asked about a couple of things that we use regularly and recommend.

The one I use most is the one I mentioned the other day during my Splendide dryer repair. It’s the WORX Power Screwdriver

It comes with two different cartridges containing 12 bits of various types and sizes. You can also use standard screwdriver bits and well as drill bits. But the thing I really like about it is the torque it can generate. You literally will not be able to hold on to it if the screw stops. So it can power through just about anything.

The next one is our Porter-Cable 150 PSI Air Compressor.

We bought ours in 2009 when it was being sold under the Sears name. I don’t use it as often as my WORX driver but it’s always worked when I needed it. Even more important it’s capable of airing up rig tires to 120 psi quickly, and with no strain.

As it stands right now Jan and I plan on making the 160 mile trip back to our daughter Brandi’s for Thanksgiving. And somewhere along that trip over and back we’ll reach a milestone.

Our 2004 Dodge Dakota will reach 250,000 miles, that’s a quarter of a million miles!  We bought the Dakota at the end of 2007 specifically to tow behind our RV, and at the time it had 104,000 miles on it. According to Carfax it had been a T-Mobile supervisor’s truck and already had the bed cover on it. With 4WD, it was towable 4-down and perfect for our needs.

And incredibly, it also has another 75,000+ miles being dragged around behind the rig that doesn’t register on the odometer.

Even better is how reliable it’s been. Over the years, we’ve had to replace the AC compressor, the radiator, and a water pump. Right now I need to replace the AC evaporator fan which I’ll do when we get back to Houston.

I’ll also put on a new set of shocks at that time, the second new set since we brought the truck. And that’s about it.

A really good truck. But then I’ve always had good luck with Chrysler products.

Around 4pm Jan and I headed out to have dinner once again at Bella Sera, our 3rd visit. We’re gradually working our way through the menu, and so far it’s all good.

We both started with salads dressed with their delicious Ranch, which Jan and I agree is probably the best Ranch dressing we’ve ever had.

And because we both liked their Chicken Soup last time, so this time we split a bowl as an appetizer, Still very tasty.

For our entrees, Jan went with the Bella Sera Chicken, the same dish I had on our first visit.

With chicken, olives, capers, and sun-dried tomatoes in a white wine sauce over spaghetti, it’s a great treat.

I went with the Chicken Arribiatta, with chicken, red peppers, mushrooms, and onions in a marinara sauce, it was a spicy dish. Very good.

Then after a quick stop at Wal-Mart for a couple of ingredients for the Pasta e Fagioli soup Jan is making tomorrow, we were home for the night.

November 16, 2017

Porker Piglets . . .

I got several comments about the “Support Pig” in yesterday’s blog. What’s next, Support Pythons, Support Piranha?

Woman kicked off AMERICAN AIRLINES flight after ‘Support PIG’ becomes rowdy.

Thought for the Day:

I know I said I wouldn’t click on the story above, but I weakened. Now I have to share the photo of the women and her pig leaving the plane.

No more words needed.

From the size, I guess it’s probably a Vietnamese Pot-Bellied Pig, but even in pygmy size it probably weighs around 100 pounds. So I guess she must be pretty fit to sling it over her shoulder and stalk off down the aisle like that.

During the late 80’s, at the peak of the Pot-Bellied Pig craze, the story was that pig farmers in California would set up road-side stands selling baby Pot-Bellied piglets for $1000 a porker.

But it turns out that they weren’t really PBP’s, but just plain old, ordinary pigs. So six months or so later, the people had a 500# sow in their living room. So you go from this little cutie

to this.

Seems it’s time for a BBQ!

I guess I’m running behind the times since several blog readers commented that their recent credit cards have all been numberless on the front like my new PayPal card. But the new Chase Bank card that I just got a month or so ago, still has the numbers on the front. So maybe I’m not the only one falling behind.

About 10:45 Jan and I headed up Hwy 6 to the Pearland area to visit our long-time friend Bonnie. Jan and Bonnie used to work together in the same hospital years ago and have kept in touch ever since. On our way, we stopped off at the nearby Jason’s Deli to pick up lunch for us all.

While we were there, I got a call from my client that they were having some email problems, so when we left Bonnie’s about 3pm, we drove over to Clear Lake to stop in. Once there I rebooted the server and waited for everything to come back up.

And it didn’t.

No websites, no email, no nothing.

Oh, crap!

So crossing my fingers, I rebooted again. And this time everything came back.

Whew!

I’ve got to get rid of this thing. So back at it tomorrow morning.

November 16, 2018

Mystery Solved . . .

Today was another hardware day at work, so I never did get back on the Shipping program.

We did solve what was apparently a long-running problem though. There are two standard connectors found on the foot pedal controllers for the machines, one rectangular and one round like this.

The problem was that some round connector pedals would work with some machines and not with others. But other pedals would work with those machines and not with the first group. So I was determined to get to the bottom of this.

Grabbing up several machines and several foot pedals, I started running tests by swapping things around, And as I was told, some worked with some and not others. So then I started testing the pedals themselves.

The pedals are just simple microswitches, either on or off, with the switch wired between the two outer pins, while the center shaft is grounded to the metal case of the foot pedal. And an ohmmeter across the pins confirms the switch continuity.

But, confusingly so, other pedals that didn’t show continuity across the pins, worked just fine on some other machines. So, activating the pedal, I checked the continuity between each of the outer pins and the center ground pin. And that was the problem.

Just to be sure, I took apart one of the machines to double-check and found that these machines were wired with the ground pin being one side of the switch, while other machines of the same make and model were wired differently.

Nobody seems to know why this was done. And it’s not just on the machines from one manufacturer. But it does explain why someone can order a replacement foot pedal and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.

Tomorrow will probably be an errand day, WalMart for more stuff, Cracker Barrel to order Thanksgiving Cornbread Dressing, and a few other stops, as well as lunch somewhere along the way.

But a fun weekend anyway.

November 16, 2019

Another Long, Fun Day With The Family . . .

No Blog Tonight. But I’ll try to catch up on Tuesday.

November 16, 2020

Dakota Post . . .

I got my Jeep paperwork off to South Dakota via Priority Mail this morning. Since we’re still driving around with no tags, hopefully they’ll get it turned around pretty quickly, but then there’s the blizzard.

When I talked to Katherine at Dakota Post after she had helped me through filling out the necessary forms that I would need to send them, I asked her about the weather up there in Sioux Falls.

“Well, we’re kind of having a blizzard here.”

So then I said, “Well, it’s going to be 79° here today. What’s your high temp going to be?”

She laughed and said, “Just pick either one of those digits and you’ll be pretty close.”

Brrrrrr!

November 16, 2021

Four This Time . . .

A number of you asked how the DJO Bone Growth Stimulator is used, and how it works.

The unit generates a 70Hz electromagnetic field, a little above the 60Hz frequency used in household AC current. The 70Hz is at the center of the frequency band shown to accelerate bone growth.

That signal, generated in the control box, is fed into the coil of wire that’s mounted inside the plastic ring.

It’s kind of a big electromagnet in a way. And it emits a magnetic field that extends out about 6 inches from the flat face of the coil which projects into the neck area. Actually the field projects out from both sides of the coil, but only the one side does you any good. Though I guess if someone else needed to use one, they could just stand back to back with you. Two for the price of one.

As far as using it, the center of the coil is centered on the back of my neck and held in place with the straps draped around my neck. Then I just press the button on the control box and wait 30 minutes for two beeps.

When I used it this morning, I noticed that the unit is also logging the number of times it is used. When I used it for the second time, the display showed 001/002.

Of course, there’s actually no way to tell if it’s really working, I.e., generating a magnetic field since it’s completely quiet. So, just out of curiosity, I may try to cobble together a field detector of some sort just to see if I got my money’s worth. Of course, since the unit didn’t cost me anything, I guess I will, regardless.

Today at lunch I was able to tear open four Equal packets at one time for my Iced Tea. Double the two yesterday.

Again, it’s the little things.

November 16, 2022

Kounty Katfish . . .

As I have in the past when one of our vehicles is in the shop, I looked into renting a car from Enterprise. And I don’t know if it’s the holidays, or the economy, or a little of both, but the last time I rented a Malibu from them, it was about $265/week.

But right now it’s over $500/week.

Yikes!

A couple of weeks of rentals would probably make a big dent in whatever it’s going to cost to fix the Jeep.

I called Roland’s Precision Machining up in Alvin to confirm that they had gotten our Jeep and spent some time going over the problems with Roland himself. Said he’d call as soon as he knows something.

Tomorrow we’re heading up to Conroe to meet up with friends Debi and Ed Hurlburt at Vernon’s Kounty Katfish for lunch. Really looking forward to it.

November 16, 2023

And Now It’s Galaxies . . .

Jan and I were out the rig door about 9:45 for the 75 mile trip up to Conroe to meet up with Debi and Ed Hurlburt at Kioku Supreme Buffet. Our second month in a row, because it’s that good.

We always have a great time with Debi and Ed, and end up talking long after we’re finished eating.

A lot of fun. And we’ve already got Torchy’s Tacos on next month’s menu.

First, they came for Aunt Jemima, Uncle Ben, the Cream of Wheat box, and the Indian maid on the Land O’ Lakes package. Then it was on to Eskimo Pies, military bases named after Confederate soldiers, anyone with the title ‘Chief’, and ‘Master’ bedrooms. Next up were statues of Washington, Jefferson, and Lee, James Audubon, and even birds named by/for Confederates.

And now it’s Galaxies!

Specifically the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds.

I’ll leave it to the reader to figure out which is which.

Named after explorer Ferdinand Magellan, the satellite galaxies are visible with the naked eye from the Southern Hemisphere. But Magellan’s name is not fitting, astronomer Mia de los Reyes and colleagues argue. The leader of the first expedition to successfully circle the globe, Magellan enslaved and killed Indigenous people encountered on the voyage, which set out from Spain in 1519.

The astronomers are now trying out new names.  One popular suggestion is to call them the “Milky Clouds.” That would maintain the commonly used acronyms, LMC and SMC. And it would reflect the galaxies’ connection to something much bigger than any one person — the Milky Way.

Note the sentence above “The leader of the first expedition to successfully circle the globe”. That’s because Magellan didn’t make it to the end of the voyage. He was killed and eaten by the cannibals living on the Philippine Islands.

So some people might call it a wash.

And actually, only 19 sailors of the original 270 finished the trip anyway.

In addition, before the Spaniards showed up, the Philippines was conquered by the Hindus, the Muslims, and the Chinese. But it’s all Magellan’s fault, right?

And not to be too picky, but astronomer Mia de los Reyes, who is the one pushing this, seems to have no problems with her Spanish surname, since ‘de los Reyes’ means ‘of the Kings’ in Spanish.

Well, I don’t have to get up early tomorrow for the Starship Super Heavy launch.

It’s been delayed until Saturday morning so they can replace a flakey grid actuator fin. But since the 7am launch time hasn’t changed, I’ll still have to get up early.

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Lunch today was at the Sunflower Cafe down in Galveston, in prep for checking out the best way to get to Cruise Terminal #10 where we will be embarking on our RCL Western Caribbean cruise starting December 7th.

But breakfast came first.

Jan got her usual ‘Little Breakfast’, and yes, this is the little one, with eggs, bacon, fried potatoes, and toast. Everything well-done and crispy, just like Jan likes it.

I went with the Huevos Rancheros, with a corn cake, eggs, cheese, tomatoes, and ranchero sauce, along with refried beans, and fried potatoes.

Really good as always.

* * * * *

After a nice, leisurely brunch, we headed right down 14 St. which pretty much dead ends into Royal Caribbean Way.

And following this around takes us right to our drop-off point at the Terminal.

Looks easy, but I doubt it will be this smooth on cruise day.

* * * * *

SpaceX has StarShip #6 stacked and ready in prep for this coming Monday, November 18’s launch attempt.

The 30 minute launch window opens at 4pm CST. One neat thing is that the water landing of the StarShip in the Indian Ocean will be during daylight hours, and not at night like #5.

And they also plan to catch the booster back at the launch tower just like last time.

Thought for the Day:

Note, the easy path in life is often heavily mined.

And Now On To Today’s Retro-Blogs.™

November 15, 2009

Back home in Alabama…

Today was a nice slow day.

We slept late, and then while Jan read, I fooled around on the computer.

About 3:15 pm my Aunt Virginia and Uncle Theo came over to pick us up to go to a late lunch at Greenbriar’s, a BBQ restaurant on the way to Huntsville.  The BBQ chicken was great!

After the meal we went over to their house for a while to catch up on things.

Then, about 7 pm Virginia drove us home.

As I said, a nice slow day.

November 15, 2010

Monkey Butt . . .

The rain was still holding off so we were able to get our walk in without getting damp. I started coffee before we left so it was nice to come back to the coach and have a hot drink waiting for us.

Starting a little before 1 pm I spent about 30 minutes on the phone with AT&T trying to get my email problems straightened out. For the last several days incoming email has been intermittent and outgoing has been impossible. I knew the problem was on their end because I also could not log in to my WebMail through the browser. But sometimes convincing them that the problem is on their end and getting them to look for it, is a problem in itself. But finally I got them to go in and do a complete reset of my email account and that fixed the problem.

At least so far.

While I was on the phone, a gentleman showed up at our door to say hi. Either Jan didn’t get his name, or didn’t remember it, but he knew us.

He’s staying down the road at Green Caye RV Park in Dickinson and found our blog and recognized where we were. Since I was on the phone, Jan did most of the talking to him. Hopefully if he reads this he will leave us a comment with his name.

About 2 pm I drove up to Kemah to pick up some wine for dinner from Spec’s Liquor. They have a great selection and seem to be the only place that carries our favorite. It’s a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc called ‘Monkey Bay’, but after a few glasses, it ends up as Monkey Butt.

About 5:45 pm we headed up to Pasadena, wine in hand, to have dinner with our good friend, Barbara Cutsinger. It seems like I’ve known her forever, but it’s only been about 5 years. She even visited us in Alaska in the summer of 2008 when we were workkamping up there, and she was on a cruise.

I met her when I was doing IT support for the organization she works for, Bay Area Houston Economic Partnership (BAHEP).

Barbara is a fantastic cook and we always have a good time. She got a new laptop and wanted me to get it set up for her.

In return we got a great meal of Roasted Pork Tenderloin, Roasted Vegetables, Green Beans, Salad, and for dessert, Ice Cream with Kahlúa on it. HMMMMMM!

We had a really great time, and didn’t get home until about 11:30.

November 15, 2011

Tuesday in Gulf Shores . . .

Today consisted mostly of just taking it easy. The weather forecast said to expect a lot of rain, but we lucked out with a beautiful sunny day.

So Jan, Mister, and I spent a good while sitting outside enjoying this fantastic view and listening to the ocean waves about 1/4 mile away. Jan was reading her Kindle and I was doing it the old-fashioned way, with paper and ink.

Mister mostly laid in the grass waiting for a passing wildebeest, or maybe a gator.

About 3:30 Jan and I headed up to Foley to have ‘lupper’ at Lambert’s Throwed Rolls, another of our favorite restaurants in this area. And they really do throw the rolls at you, and they’re huge, bigger than a softball.

After we placed our orders, we got ready for the pass-arounds.

Pass-arounds are delivered by servers in big bowls as they walk around the tables. My favorite is some of the best Fried Okra you’ve ever put in your mouth. Hot, crispy, and crunchy on the outside, and melt in your mouth on the inside.

Other pass-arounds include Fried Potatoes & Onions, Macaroni & Tomatoes, Black-Eyed Peas, and Apple Butter & Sorghum. And they’re all delicious. The big problem is filling up before your food even gets here.

I ordered the BBQ Pork Steak with White Beans, Turnip Greens, and Baby Carrots.

Jan ordered her favorite Fried Chicken with Mashed Potatoes and Green Beans.

Lambert’s is one of those places where you can eat your fill and still have plenty to take home. Our kind of place.

On our way home we stopped off at Books-A-Million to stock up on magazines. Jan and I both like BAM because they have probably the best selection around. Always better than Barnes and Noble.

On another note, I was very surprised to find that we have Verizon 4G here, still very fast.

Neat.

November 15, 2012

Big Daddy’s Grill . . .

We got another photo of our new Great-Niece Annisten, along with her sisters, Avery Jane, and Ella. Three beautiful young ladies!

Thought I’d post some more pics of growing up in Gulf Shores.

This one is my father and I right after we moved to Gulf Shores in January 1951. I had turned 2 the previous October.

This is me and my best friend David Duddy. Note that I’m still wearing my favorite cowboy outfit.

I didn’t realize that I got dressed up to play outside.

About 1:30 Jan and I headed up to the Escapees Park in Summerdale about 25 miles north. We were meeting our friends Lu and Larry Tillotson for linner (lupper?), but on the way we made a detour to the Camping World a few miles further up the road.

I wanted to get a new step cover to replace our old one. We got the first one 5 years ago and it’s finally worn out, so it’s about that time.

RV Step Mat

I like these because they’re made from heavy-duty Astro-Turf and do a good job of cleaning off your shoes, and last a long time (or at least 5 years).

Then it was on to the Escapees Park to meet up with Lu and Larry. When we got there, we also met Paul and Margery Zeller, who were parked right next door to Lu and Larry. We were all interested in Paul’s recent refrigerator upgrade where he replaced his RV unit with a residential one. This is what we will probably do if(when?) our Dometic finally dies. Paul and Margery are readers of our blog, and it’s always nice to meet them in person.

Then it was on to Big Daddy’s Grill, about 5 miles away. Big Daddy’s was highly recommended, and boy, were they right.

We all had the Fried Shrimp Dinner, and Lu, Jan, and I started off with a bowl of gumbo. Because we got before 4pm we got the lunch prices. $9 for a Fried Shrimp Dinner, with hushpuppies, Cole slaw, fries and onion rings. Really good, and even better for the price.

Susan, our waitress, was a hoot, and also the baker of the delicious pies they have for dessert.  But after the big meal, everyone was too full, so we all got pie to go, with Jan and I picking the Turtle Pumpkin Pie.

And along with the great food, we had these beautiful views of the Fish River. Lucky for us it was warm enough to eat outside on the deck.

And here’s Lu and Larry, our dinner companions for the evening. One of the great things about RV’ing is running into friends over and over as we travel around the country. We first met them in Cody, WY, and have kept in touch. No telling where we’ll meet up next time.

We saw this sign on the wall at Big Daddy’s. For some reason, Jan thought it was a lot funnier than I did.

November 15, 2014

Saturday Update From The Gate . . .

Well, with our last full day on the gate, we’re all packed up and ready to go. We’ve actually been gate guarding out of the truck for the last several days and it’s worked out pretty well.

I’ve already disconnected water and sewer, so all I have to do is take down the satellite later tonight after all our shows have recorded, and then disconnect from power tomorrow morning right before we leave. I’m going to go ahead and pull out of the way and into the pad so the new guards can pull right in.

Then, once we go over some specifics about the gate, we’ll have the official “Passing of the Logs” ceremony and then we can be on our way. And to Jan’s delight, it’s probably going to be closer to 10am when we leave rather than noon.

Our first stop will be the Buc-ee’s over in Madisonville, for diesel and breakfast kolaches. Then it’s on down to Huntsville to the Two Texans Truck Wash to hopefully get all the drilling mud washed off before we arrive at the Lake Conroe Thousand Trails later in the afternoon.

Jan’s already got supper planned at the El Bosque Mexican Restaurant in Conroe, our favorite local place.

November 15, 2015

Seven More Days . . .

Jan says giddily.

And More Chores, I say kind of giddily.

Jan had a hankering for Chicken Express chicken today, and I always had hankering for their catfish, so a little after 11, I drove into Carthage to pick up lunch.

I also made a stop to pick up some more of the Hot Hands foot warmers, since I only bought two packs the other day to try out, and now I wanted more. But I discovered last night that after I stuck the foot warmers further toward my toes, that my toes were what was really getting cold and needing warming. So instead of the full foot warmers, I got their toe warmers, which were a good bit cheaper.

$5 for a pack of 7 vs. $2 a set for the full foot warmers.

I’ll see how they work tonight.

This afternoon the first thing up on my chore list was to fix my Brake Buddy toad braking system.

We’ve had this one since our very first day of RV’ing almost 8 years ago and it’s been a real workhorse. The only problem I’ve had with it was that the cigarette light power plug started falling apart about 3 years ago. When I called Brake Buddy they sent me a new one for free. In fact they sent me a whole new power cable, which is what makes today’s job easier, since I had to open up the Brake Buddy then too.

The problem today was that the large plastic nut/ring that holds the pressure regulator adjustment knob in place had come off, which let the regulator fall down into the case.

It still worked just fine, but I didn’t want to take a chance on it getting in the way of the pneumatic piston that pushes the brake pedal.

Getting the case open is not difficult, but hey, do they really need 9 screws with 3 different TORX sizes?

Inside it looks like this.

On the right is little air compressor that runs everything, and the big black tank is the air tank that supplies the pressure to the piston. And the black/silver at the bottom left is the pressure regulator that came loose.

Behind that, the green circuit board is the brains of the thing, including the accelerometer that senses that the rig is braking and applies the brakes on the toad.

And on this side,

the big silver tube at the bottom is the pneumatic piston or ram that physically presses the brake pedal on the toad.

Not really complex when you break it down, but a nice clean design anyway.

Once I had the case apart it only took me a couple of minutes to put the regulator back in place and lock it down. Then it was the 9 screws again, with the 3 different sizes.

When I’ve got a job to do that requires several different bits, this is my go-to case.

It’s got just about every different type of drill bit and screwdriver bit that you could want, so I had no problem with T10, T15, and T20 sizes that I needed for the Brake Buddy.

Before I stowed it away until next Sunday, I plugged it into the power socket on the truck, and after it aired up, rocked it back and forth to be sure the piston was still operating.

Next up was to top off the antifreeze in the rig. The green diesel type is getting harder to find since everyone is using the red now. But I had the NAPA Auto Parts here in Carthage order me a couple of gallons.

I had bought some at the Cummins dealership back in Amarillo earlier this year, but ended up using it in the leaky radiator in the truck before I could put any in the rig.

Getting the engine compartment open I was glad to see that my coolant tank repair was still going strong after 6 years.

It had cracked down the side back in 2009 when we were doing the East Coast. I checked with Cummins and found a new one costs $275.

IT’S A DARN PLASTIC JUG!

Made out of the same polypropylene that they make milk jugs from. My next thought was to glue it, but I found that pretty much only a special industrial glue made by 3M would stick to it. And a tube of that was almost as expensive as a new tank.

I had heard however that Eternabond Tape would stick to just about anything, and once you put it on, it wasn’t coming off.

Checking out the RV department at a Wal-Mart before we first hit the road, I had seen a package of this and picked up a couple.

Eternabond Microsealant Tape

So I decided to give it a try. After cleaning the tank with alcohol and letting it dry, I peeled the backing off a piece and stuck it on.

Six years later and it’s still stuck. As the package says, “Peel – Stick – Stuck!”

And I saved $275. Neat!

FYI Wal-Mart doesn’t seem to carry this anymore, at least I haven’t seen it in a long time, but it is available at Amazon above.

Around 3:30 this afternoon I went back around to the generator trailer to check to see if we have enough diesel to last us until Sunday when we leave, and our service guy, Todd, will be here to hook up our replacements. Turns out we don’t, so Todd will come by earlier this week to top us off.

But in checking the level, I found we had another diesel leak, this time from the diesel-water separator attached to the side of the diesel tank. Kinda looks like this.

At first I thought the petcock drain at the bottom was loose, since that was where it was leaking from, but tightening it didn’t help. Next I tried to tighten the nut that locks the petcock in, but that didn’t help either.

About then I touched the plastic bowl and discovered it was wet with diesel all the way around. Due to the coloring of the plastic, it was hard to see, but easy to feel.

I got some paper shop rags, and after drying the bowl off, tried to tighten it down. And it did snug up a good bit. Hoping this was the fix, I dried the bowl off again and left a clean piece of paper rag underneath to check for any more drips.

Coming back about 10 minutes later, I found not a single drop of diesel on the paper. Since it had been dripping about one drop every ten seconds or so before, I decided this problem was fixed.

Wrapping up, although we’ve got Scattered Thunderstorms forecast for Monday, and Heavy Thunderstorms for Tuesday, the weekend still looks good for us packing up and getting on the road to Lake Conroe.

Hope it holds.

November 15, 2016

A Whole ‘Nother Ball Game . . .

Or more Electoral College stuff.  Will it never end?

Last night’s short 11 hour turnaround shift was nice, but not really necessary.

I think I would have appreciated it more if it had been a really busy gate, but I only had two vehicles come in, both before 9pm, and about 10 vehicles left, all before 10pm. Then nothing the rest of the night.  Nice.

There is a cat who lives in this area, I think it’s a barn cat at the farmhouse about 100 yards away,  And once a night, like clockwork, she(he?) comes trotting up the road past the guard shack heading back toward the landowner’s farmhouse, and always with a mouthful of some squirming rodent. I’ve called to her a couple of times, and she’ll look over at me, but never even slows down. Must have kittens in the barn.

I noticed a couple of days ago that the passenger side high beam on our truck had gone out. So I ordered new ones from Amazon last night and they should be here Thursday.

For the last 10 years or so, before we started RV’ing in 2008, I’ve been using the Sylvania SilverStar Ultra halogen bulbs in the truck. They’re very bright, and they usually last a long time. In this case the last time I replaced one was almost 5 years ago. So I get my money’s worth.

Even though only one bulb is bad, these should always be replaced in pairs, mainly because of the way these bulbs age. If one goes, another one is probably not far behind. Although at $31 for the pair, they’re not cheap, but parsed out over 5 years, they’re a real bargain.

And really bright.

About 1:30 Jan and I headed out for lunch, and also to pick up our VISA bank cards that had finally come in. We needed to be at the bank in Karnes City before they closed at 3pm, but we still had time for lunch, so we decided to try TK’s Pizza and Burgers. With 5 Stars on 11 reviews on Yelp, we figured it was definitely worth a shot.

But we actually drove past the place, because there isn’t a big sign out front, only on the building, and the place really looks like a somewhat run-down bar from the outside.

But inside it’s very nice. And the food is very good.

Driving up, they were advertising a Lunch Buffet. My kind of place

At 1:30 we were toward the end of the buffet time, but everything was still hot and delicious. With two kinds of pizza, chicken fried steak, meatloaf, fried okra, pinto beans, and fried cabbage, it looked good. Oh, and cinnamon rolls for dessert.

I think this was the first time I’ve ever had fried cabbage, but I’ll have it again. It was really good.

The pizza was very good too, with a tasty crust. A lot of pizza crust is not very good by itself but needs sauce and cheese. TK’s crust stands on its own, almost like a chewy bread. Everything was very well-seasoned, especially the meatloaf. The cook certainly knows his way around a spice rack.

Jan, on the other hand, was in a burger mood, so she went with their Cheddar Burger with Onion Rings.

After one bite, she said, “This burger’s delicious and there’s something different about it.” Turns out there was something different. The waiter said all the burgers are done outside on a grill/smoker. And it certainly shows.

And tastes.

We’ll go back.

Next we drove over to Karnes City to pick up our bank cards. Glad to finally be able to get some money out of our SiteWatch account.

On the way home we drove a detour out into the country to show Jan where my last gate was. Finally coming home we made a quick HEB stop for a few things.

Todd texted me about 6:30 with another gate job. Or actually the same gate I was at a week a while back at the end of October. The gate where the cow ran off with the sensor cone. But this time I’m on Day shift.

Semi-Bummer.

And now more Electoral College stuff.

I posted the article on Why the Polls Were So Wrong on my Greg’s Musings page. This is from my recent blog post, but with all the extraneous stuff filtered out. Take a look.

A few days ago I came across something that illustrates the comparison between the Electoral College and the Popular Vote.

During the 1960 World Series between the NY Yankees and the Pittsburgh Pirates, the Yankees scored 55 runs to the Pirates’ 27 runs. In addition, the Yankees hit .328 overall to the Pirates’ .256. So the Yankees obviously won the 1960 World Series, right?

Wrong!  The Pirates won 4 games to 3.

So the Yankees had a bigger run total (the Popular Vote) but the Pirates won the most games (the Electoral Vote)

The reason for the discrepancy was that in the 3 games the Yankees did win, they really ran up the score.

Game 2  16 to 3

Game 3  10 to 0

Game 6  12 to 0

while the Pirates won their 4 games by much closer scores.

Game 1    6 to 4

Game 4    3 to 2

Game 5    5 to 2

Game 7  10 to 9

In the recent election, Hillary Clinton really run up the popular vote in the two most populous states, California and New York, winning California 61.5% to 33%, and New York 58.8% to 31.5%.

These wins, totaling over 4.5 million votes extra votes for Clinton, add up to 4 times the present difference between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump in the popular vote.

The argument can also be made that running a campaign to win Electoral Votes is not the same as one to win the Popular Vote.

To win the Electoral Vote, you try to put together a group of states whose Electoral Votes totals 270 or more. You do not campaign in states where you think you have no chance. For Donald Trump that was New York and California. But you do campaign some in states where you’re sure you can win.

But you put most of your effort in states that people don’t think you can win, but your research shows you can.

That can win you the Presidency, but it won’t necessarily win you the Popular Vote.

On a closing note, those of you interested in the Persuasion Techniques used during the campaign, especially by Trump, might want to go back through Scott Adam’s Blog

Adams, the creator of Dilbert, is also a master hypnotist and studies persuasion and its influence on people and their emotions.

Because of his evaluation of Trump’s techniques, and he says they WERE techniques, a few weeks after Trump entered the primary race, and Adams had time to study Trump, he said that Trump would win the Republican Primary.

And after Trump wrapped up the nomination, Adams studied both Trump and Clinton on the campaign trail. And in September 2015 he predicted that Donald Trump would win the Presidency.

At the time he said the win would be by a huge landslide. He later tempered the ‘landslide’ part after some of the Trump ‘shenanigans’, but still said he would win. And his many blogs during the campaign showed you how Trump’s ‘outbursts’, were in fact planned ‘acts of persuasion’.

Whether you believe him or not, he does make a persuasive argument, and he was right about both the primary and the election.

Check him out.

November 15, 2017

Coming Out of The Closet . . .

I didn’t get much done today at work, ending up kind of stuck, and in fact I ended up leaving a couple of hours early.

I couldn’t do anything on my computer because I had started a system image backup to the external HD and the 785GB backup was taking a lot longer than I figured because I found I wasn’t plugged into a USB 3.0 port. And in fact looking closer, this computer doesn’t even have any 3.0 ports.

USB 3.0 is about 10 times faster than 2.0, so it really makes a difference on a 785GB backup. That’s why I just went online and ordered a 3.0 PCI card for $16. Should be here by Friday.

I had also planned to move the Zen Cart/Email Server out of the closet, and onto my desk where I can hook up a monitor/keyboard/mouse to it. That way I can continue trying to hack directly, instead of teleporting in from my machine.

But I quickly ran into problems when I realized that I already had everything running off of one 20amp outlet, and I’m not sure how well it would handle another computer, et. al. The other visible outlet was dead, (not a circuit breaker, I checked), but I was told that there was another outlet behind the big metal desk that I use.

So pulling it out and crawling up and laying across the top I was able to reach down and plug in a power strip. And when I checked it I had power. But . . .

Was it on the same breaker as the original outlet? Since the circuit breaker panel wasn’t really marked, I was on my own. I could start popping breakers at random, but then I’d probably end up cutting off power to one or all of the other computers.

So I gave up, left early, and stopped by Harbor Freight for one of these.

You plug the transmitter into the outlet in question and then run the sensor up and down the line of breakers in the panel until the sensor beeps. That’s the breaker that controls the outlet. Neat.

About 5:30 Jan and I headed back up FM646 to once again have dinner at Pho20, our new favorite places. It was nice to be recognized and greeted by the owner, especially since we’d only been here once before.

We started off with an order of their Shrimp Spring Rolls. Normally these come with Peanut Sauce, but since we had mentioned that we like things spicy, this is what they call ‘J’ sauce. Really good, and REALLY spicy and flavorful.

Unlike other places that make these ahead of time, these are made when you order them. Delicious.

Then we shared one of their Crunch House Salads, big enough for two, covered with Tempura Crunchies.

For her entrée Jan got the Lemongrass Chicken, XX spicy.

And I got the Jalapeno Chicken, XXXXX spicy and very good.

And the owner sent us home with dessert. Nice.

All really delicious and a hidden gem. If you’re in the area, check out Pho 20 on FM646, a little west of I-45.

Looks like it’s a go for our new awnings. Should be about two weeks since they’re pretty booked up.

November 15, 2018

It’s Bacccckkkk!

Today I reluctantly had to give up the 2018 Malibu that we’d rented for the last three weeks. Really sorry to see it go.

Jan and I headed out a little before 11, first down to the Capital One Bank by the Interstate to get the cash for the truck repair. When I asked the other day about a ‘cash’ discount, they made the extra trip worth my while.

Then it was back down to Snider Transmission in Santa Fe to retrieve our Dakota. And since I didn’t have Jan on the rental agreement, she got to follow me over to the Enterprise office in Dickinson to give back the Malibu. Sob!

It took a little longer than normal because the girl checking me in was in training, plus they do all this on iPad’s and they were giving them problems. As usual, it seems.

We saw the same type of issues with them when we HAD to use them while gate guarding last year. Seems like we fought them all the time, when paper and pencil were so much quicker.

Back in the Dakota we headed north on I-45 to the next exit to again have lunch at Slim Chickens, our new favorite chicken place. Jan likes it better than Cane’s because she says the batter is lighter, and we both like it better because they have a lot of other sides, rather than the just fries and Cole slaw like Cane’s.

Jan got the 7 piece dinner with a side salad and her fav mushrooms,

while I got the Cayenne Chicken Sandwich with a side salad.  She said to tell you that she got the 7 piece because she was sharing some with me, not because she was that hungry.

I got the ‘spicy’ cayenne sandwich because it was free. When we were there last time, on opening day, I signed up for their mobile app which came with a free sandwich. Plus we earn points for every visit.

Their ‘spicy’ cayenne sandwich needs a lot more cayenne, believe me.

Driving the Dakota again after the Malibu is kind of like running in lead boots. It just feels heavy. But it’s running, and shifting great, and it’s really nice to have 3, 4, and 5 gears again.

When I asked Kenny if the new transmission would last another 282,000 miles like the first one did, he laughed and said it would probably last longer than the rest of the truck.

He’s probably right.

I’m really disappointed in my recent 16:40 (not 16:39 and not 16:41) experience in the Devil’s Easy Bake Oven. Based on how much it hurt to start with, I kind of expected more obvious results. but so far, pretty much nothing.

After 48 hours, there’s no pain, no peeling, no scabbing, no ‘my scalp sliding down over my eyes’, and I don’t even glow in the dark.

I mean, what was the point? And it cost me $120.

And then I get to do it all again next month.

Oh boy!

I know all of you out there are desperate to know what you can get me for Christmas. Well, Costco has just the thing, and it’s on sale.

And it’s only $15,999!

Even better, it comes with a $3500 Costco Gift Card, as well as $5000 in flight time credit. Of course, that $5000 only buys you 2/3 of an hour of Citation Jet time.

But it’s a steal at $7,495 an hour.

Of course, if everyone gets me the same thing I’ll have plenty of hours to use.

November 15, 2019

Just #$@#$#@# . . .

We pulled out of our site at the Petticoat Junction RV Park at about 8:10 yesterday, 20 minutes ahead of schedule, so the day was starting off on a good note.

Heading up on I-45 and then west on the SH Tollway, the only slowdown was at the US59/I-69 interchange, and then it was on out on to I-10W with our first stop at the Katy Buc-ee’s for breakfast kolaches and coffee about 70 miles along.

But the first thing we did was to check the truck for any oil leakage. We were very happy to not see any sign of oil on the truck, unlike last April when we after ready had oil showing when we stopped here.

So it looked like our long-term oil leak problem was finally fixed. In fact the oil pressure was actually showing a couple of pounds higher at 63-64#, rather than the previous 61-62#.

But then about another 70 miles, the other side of Columbus, the oil pressure started dropping, and dropping much quicker than it ever had before. In fact, within about 20 minutes it was down in the high 40’s, so I quickly pulled over to check things out.

And now I had oil all over the tarp covering the truck’s windshield and streaking down the sides.

DAMN!

I went ahead and added the gallon and a half of Shell Rotella 15W-40 I had with me, and we headed out again. Getting off I-10 at Luling, I stopped off at the Love’s Truck Stop there and bought 4 gallons, all they had in stock.

And then got my second big shock of the day when the price for the 4 gallons was $112 including $8 sales tax. That made it about $26 a gallon, slightly more than double the $12.99 I normally pay at WalMart or Tractor Supply.

OUCH!

Trying to gauge how much oil I was going to need to get to Kingsland, I made another stop at a Valero in Lockhart and got two more gallons. This time it was a little better, at $22 a gallon.

But as it turns out, I didn’t need the last 2 gallons.

We got into the Granite Rock RV Park in Kingsland about 5pm and got set up. Chris, Linda, and Miss Piper showed up about 5:30 and drove us over to Alfredo’s, a really good Mexican place.

Probably tomorrow I’m going to crawl back under the rig to see If I can find any problems. Obviously something came loose or gave way.

Odds are that I won’t be able to do anything about until we get home, but you never know. I sure would like to find a tiny hole punched in the oil filter from road debris, but I’m not holding my breath.

On a better note, we have really enjoyed spending time over at Chris and Linda’s lovely place, including just sitting out in the yard that Chris has worked so hard on.

Brandi, Lowell, and Landon got up here tonight and we’ll all be getting together for breakfast tomorrow morning.

Really looking forward to it.

November 15, 2020

Chipotle Bowls . . .

First up,  to answer several questions about last night’s Alvin Opry performance and any China Virus precautions.

It was pretty much restaurant rules here in Texas. Masks on unless you’re seated at your table. The only difference is that you don’t have to wear a mask when you’re dancing. Of course, you’re pretty much social distancing except for your partner.

About 2pm Jan and I headed out, first for lunch at the new Chipotle that just opened in our area. Unfortunately, it’s a mixed blessing because it opened in the old location of our long-time favorite El Pollo Loco.

We both got a bowl, Jan’s with Chicken and mine with Carne Asada, along with Cilantro-Lime Rice, Black Beans, 3 or 4 different types of Salsas, and Cheese, and well as Guacamole on Jan’s.

Really good, and close by. We’ll go back soon.

Then is on to the nearby WalMart for a few things, and then on across the street to the car wash to give our new baby a wash, wax, and thorough vacuuming. She looks really spiffy now.

I spent an hour or so last Friday on the phone with DakotaPost up in Sioux Falls, going over all the paperwork and money I need to send off to them to get our new (to us) Jeep registered and tagged. I’ll send it off via Priority Mail tomorrow and hopefully I’ll get it back in a week or so.

Hopefully.

November 15, 2021

Out and About, And A New Toy . . .

Since this is the 3rd day since my operation on Friday, I was able to get a shower for the first time since then. Jan wrapped my neck with a WalMart bag to keep the incision dry.

The shower was also the first time I was able to take my cervical collar off which was also nice, though it hasn’t been as uncomfortable as I had anticipated.

Then about 12:30 we headed out for the Denny’s on I-45 for lunch. In addition, we were also meeting the DJO rep who was dropping off my Bone Graft Stimulator.

I’ll be using it 30 minutes a day for the next 4 to 6 months. And ONLY for 30 minutes ONCE a day. It’s got a clock in it that resets at midnight so you can only use it once every 24 hours.

The disc fits on the back of the neck and is held in place by the straps around your neck. Then you just press the button on the control box. It beeps and then starts a 30-minute countdown clock on the display. When it reaches 00:00, it beeps twice, and shuts off. And I’m done for another 24 hours.

Easy Peazy.

As far as improvements, last week before my surgery I could not tear open a single sugar packet with my fingers. Today without thinking about it I was able to tear open two packets with no problem.

It’s the little things.

November 15, 2022

Well, That’s Weird . . .

Our Old Faithful Dodge Dakota truck cranked right up this morning, pretty good for having over 309,000 miles on it. I keep Stabil in the gas tank and a float charger on the battery, so it’s always ready to go.

I forgot to mention yesterday the suspected reason for my Jeep’s engine overheating. When Joe started looking for the problem, he found the radiator completely empty.

And the reason for that was that the radiator drain plug had come loose and was lying on the frame crossmember underneath. And Joe agreed with me that it had to have fallen out along the way, since I never would have made the Interstate without it overheating.

But of course that would have been better since I would have had somewhere to pull over when it first started overheating, rather than being stuck on I-45 in a long section with no way to pull off.

Leaving the rig our first stop was at the Santa Fe O’Reilly’s Auto Parts to pick up some oil for the truck, before heading on up to Joe’s to grab a couple of things out of the Jeep before it gets towed up to Roland’s Precision Machining in Alvin who are going to take the engine apart.

Lunch today was at Torchy’s Tacos with both of us getting our usual. Jan’s 2 Chicken Fajita Tacos,

and my 2 Cheddar Jalapeno Sausage Tacos.

Both really good.

Then I dropped Jan off to get her toes done, while I drove over to get a haircut. Later coming home, we made a HEB stop before heading home.

Another nice day.

Tomorrow morning, in a 2 hr. window starting at 12:04am, NASA is again going to try to launch Artemis I, their version of a lunar rocket.

It recently weathered Hurricane Nicole while sitting out on the launch pad, sustaining some insulation damage. But NASA says it’s good to go. The third time’s the charm.

As usual, we’ll see.

November 15, 2023

Starship Is Go . . .

Starting this coming Friday, Elon Musk’s SpaceX is going to make a second try at launching the Super Heavy Starship, the largest, and most powerful rocket ever launched.

The first attempt back in April got off the pad, but had to be destroyed over the Gulf of Mexico after the two stages failed to separate. Musk said he considered the test a success, because he said before the launch he thought it only had a 50% chance to get off the pad.

These first test flights are not supposed to go into orbit, but are planned to arc around the earth, with the Super Heavy booster landing in the Gulf of Mexico and the Starship splashing down off Hawaii.

Unfortunately, the launch window opens at 7am CT so I’ll have to drag myself out of bed an hour or so early to watch the launch.

Semi-Bummer!

And if they don’t make it on Friday, Saturday and Sunday are possibilities.

Go Elon!

Tomorrow we’re heading up to Conroe once again to meet up with Debi and Ed Hurlburt once again, at Kioku Supreme Buffet once again. We liked it so much last month we’re going back again this month.