Dreary Days

The end of December has been very cool and a little bit wet. While looking at the summary for the month, it shows that the high was 80 on December 5. Actually, the last day we were even as high as 70 was on the 9th. There was .61" of rain, over 6 days, for the month. The winds have been mostly calm with a high gust of 20 mph on the 19th and only a total of 6 days with high gusts exceeding 10 mph. It will be nice to see the temperatures at least reach back into the 70's soon. We miss sitting outside which is not very comfortable when the temperatures are low.

Has everybody lined up his/her News Years Resolutions? I think we all know that they are rarely followed beyond the first week of the year. There are some that appear every year - like dieting - that must be followed, especially as we get older. Josie and I both have aggressive targets for our weight loss in 2013. It is a constant struggle for those of us that have a slower metabolism and built-in fat genes - or don't exercise very much. We kind of stopped our daily workouts after Josie started her holiday work at the flower shop and it shows in both our energy level and weight gains over the last week. That will become part of our daily routine again, starting on Wednesday.

Our plans to bring in the new year are conservative. We will have an early dinner (6 PM) at a local restaurant in Surprise with George, Cheryl, Cot and Lois, which will be a nice ending to a very good year for us. We feel blessed that we are both healthy and still able to enjoy our traveling lifestyle and look forward to some new experiences in 2013.

HAPPY NEW YEAR !!

Differences in One Year

One year ago today, we left San Antonio, TX to stay in Ft Hancock, TX on our way to Happy Trails in AZ. We had some great times while traveling on that trip from Campbellsville, KY last year to begin our adventure with the retirement community. We were excited and anxious to get started in what turned turned out to be a sometimes rewarding and other times bad experience. The nearly 5 months we spent with that company could have been longer with better local management in that area. Our efforts to transfer to a facility in AZ were blocked by our area manager who didn't want us leaving his area, offered a transfer to another community within his area, and that led to our resignation.

As we have always believed, things happen for a reason. That led to our wonderful experience in Jackson Hole, WY which will be one of two locations that we have returned to in the 4 years we have been on the road. The only other location was Amazon. It also served to convince us that northwestern WY is a location where we could easily spend summers in the future. The experience we had in Cody the year before last also reinforces that feeling. Cody would be another area that we could return to as the same attractions are there that draw us to that part of the country - easy access to the National Parks and the beauty of the surrounding mountains in a perfect summer climate.

Our arrival in Surprise AZ following a terrific trip which included a stop in Southern Utah to see Zion National Park was the perfect ending to a perfect summer. It's nice to be able to take some extended time to just do nothing but relax before going back to work. In many ways, we are looking forward to settling in one or two locations, and in other ways, we want the variety and freedom to go where we want, when we want, to continue. The one conclusion we've made during these years on the road is that we will settle in the west - somewhere. Another conclusion is that we ruled out CA as one of those places to consider for settling. We've lived there enough - in both northern and southern CA - to know that the state has serious fiscal problems and the cost of living is out of line.

The coming year will bring new and happy experiences for us and we just hope that they are as rewarding as the ones we've had in the past four years, and that we remain healthy enough to continue this once in a lifetime experience.

Eyeglasses

The first of several different appointments was completed yesterday. After a conversation with the office, the Westbrook Vision Center in Peoria had a cancellation and was able to take me at 10 AM yesterday. I could have gotten an appointment at an Optometrist office in Surprise, but I wanted to go to an office that wasn't part of a big chain and had a Doctor on staff to perform the exams. Since Medicare was paying for the exam, I figured it didn't matter what was charged for the exam. Anyway, I got a prescription for glasses, but didn't buy them at this office for two reasons: I would get a better price for the glasses at a large chain store like Costco, Walmart or Sam's Club, and I wasn't sure what kind to get - either bifocals or Progressive lenses.

Since we had a few items that we wanted at Costco, we went there to check out frames and glasses. They had a nice selection of frames and I was able to get a pair of glasses ordered with Progressive lenses. The program that Costco has will exchange the lenses back to bificols within the first 60 days, at no charge, if I cannot adjust or get used to the Progressive lenses within that time frame. They also would reimburse me for the difference in cost if that should happen. With all the coatings, the frames and lenses cost about half of what it would have been at Westbrook where I had the exam. I will get my glasses in two weeks or so.

I need to take our propane tank to be filled today. It hasn't been that long since I filled it, but we have been using the gas furnace exclusively instead of the fireplace to save on electricity. Our first month's electric bill was $100 which is a result of our having the fireplace on just about every day. With propane being so cheap now - $1.99 per gallon - it will be cheaper to use the propane and rest the fireplace. We can still use the fireplace without its built-in heater just to have a visual flame which works as well. That is one reason we are looking at Lake Pleasant for next year - the electric is included in our space rental.

We also took down Christmas in our fifth wheel yesterday - except for the tree. We packed everything in boxes and put them in the shed here until we make another trip to our storage unit. Only 361 shopping days until Christmas...

Storage Visit

While loading up and organizing our new storage unit a few weeks ago, we came across several containers of yarn and incomplete afghans that Josie had started over the years. She hasn't done any work on any of them for at least 10 or 12 years, but she wanted to work on them now since we have lots of time before working again. So, we went to the storage unit yesterday and located the containers. They were easy to locate since we tried to keep things toward the front of storage that we thought we might need to access. The next step was to organize her yarn and projects and consolidate them.

Another reason for visiting the storage unit was to try to locate a couple of the diet books we have. We weren't as lucky locating them, so we stopped at Barnes and Noble and bought a couple paperback replacements of the books we were looking for that are probably in the middle or rear of storage. It wasn't worth tearing out everything from the storage unit to look for those, so buying the cheap replacements was the way to go. We are both ready to hit the diet trail on January 2.

Our "sappy" Christmas movies are all done from our DVR now, so last night we watched an old favorite of ours - Donovan's Reef. That is one of those movies that you can watch over and over and still enjoy. Actually, almost all of the John Wayne movies are good to watch over and over.

I made some appointments before Christmas and one of those is with a Vision Center that is suppose to be for today. I say "suppose to", since I never received a confirmation for my online reservation and will need to contact them this morning to confirm. I desperately need new glasses and want to try a set of bifocals to eliminate the need to carry two pairs of glasses everywhere I go.

We're also watching for the temperatures to rise into the 70's again so we can sit outside and enjoy the sunshine. It looks like we need to wait another few days for that to happen but it will also be nice to see the warmer mornings as we have been in the mid 30's almost every morning this week. It still beats most other places as we heard on the Weather Channel that 65% of the country has snow on the ground...

More Movies

This year we really enjoyed watching all of the Christmas movies that were shown on the Hallmark Channel and on the Lifetime Channel. In all, we probably copied over 20 films and we watched at least a couple each day during the lead up to Christmas. There were still about 5 or 6 left on our DVR so we watched another couple yesterday. There are only a few left at this point, so our backlog will be cleared out today, for sure. This is the first year where we paid any attention at all to the "sappy" Christmas shows, but there are some very good films and they serve to inject some Christmas spirit into even the most ardent Scrooges.

One of the gifts that Josie and I gave to each other was the Dark Knight Trilogy. We watched the last two of those last night, including the most recent one - "The Dark Knight Rises". If you haven't seen the films, they are must-see viewing. The end of the final movie leaves you thinking that maybe Batman (Bruce Wayne) is killed, but there is a shadow of a doubt which leaves the series open to even another episode. Also, Robin was introduced at the end of the final episode which also suggests that another episode is to follow - eventually.

Between watching our films, we went to dinner at Macayo's again. We took our Macayo mugs and had our $3.99 Margaritas with another fine Mexican meal. All in all, it was a different, but fun kind of day.

Today begins a "get serious about weight loss" search for the right diet. I will look for my Adkins Diet book that was so successful for me in the past and Josie is still trying to find a diet that will both keep her interested and work at the same time. We really enjoyed splurging over the holidays, but there is a price to pay now to lose the extra pounds. This is a common problem for most people and is, probably, the most frequent New Year's Resolution for folks. It's not an option for us this year, so it's time to buckle down and do the right thing for our health...

Quiet Christmas

Our Christmas Day was very quiet and simple. It was a good day for Josie to rest up from her nearly two weeks of working at the design center and for both of us to just relax. Most of the day we spent watching movies and tidying up a bit from all the pre-Christmas preparation. We had a small spiral sliced ham that we purchased at Sam's Club and Josie also made a sweet potato casserole and some vegetables that were excellent, which we ate at around 4 PM.

While watching the rest of our Christmas movies that we copied on our DVR, there was a lot of activity at our hummingbird feeder that we have attached to one of our rear windows:

 

 

 

We haven't noticed as much activity before, probably because we haven't spent as much time watching the feeder. Occasionally, we see a large bird fly up to the feeder, and sometimes they will perch there trying to figure out how to get to the contents. It's fun to watch.

Even though the day was cool and overcast, we saw areas in the country where very severe weather was a concern and we are thankful that we are here for this holiday season. We hope that everybody had a great Christmas...

Christmas Eve

It was not as busy as we anticipated on Christmas Eve Day. Josie went into work early at 8 AM and I waited for a phone call to come and help with the deliveries. She said that when she arrived, there were no orders to be filled and they slowly trickled in during the morning. I never received a call to come and help with deliveries, and Josie was done by 1 PM. She stopped at the Salon and had a manicure and also stopped at a store for a last minute gift for me which was sold out. It was 3 PM when she arrived home, a lot shorter day than was normal in the past. The people in the shop indicated that this was the slowest Christmas season they could remember. We decided to go to the 7 PM service at our old church in Sun City Grand. There was also a 5 PM service, but we wanted to take Communion which was only available at the later, Candle Light Service.

We were disappointed with the service. We arrived shortly after 6:30 and, at first, thought the service was cancelled. There were only a few cars in the parking lot that should have been filling up at this point. In years past, the church would be filled with standing room only crowds at this service on Christmas Eve. It was disappointing because: the Pastor we used to see retired about a year and a half ago and there was an Interim Pastor who was just so-so, the program was very different, the Choir was smaller and had all new faces, some of the music was strange to us, the crowd was less than half of what we were used to seeing and the Christmas Spirit seemed to be lacking. There were only two children that participated in the Children's Message at the alter. In years past, there would be ten to fifteen children participating. There is a new Lutheran church in town that opened a couple years ago and we think that may have had an impact on this congregation. We plan to try that new church very soon. We still feel better that we attended.

We watched a Christmas movie on TV and turned in by 10 PM. It looks like Santa stopped here during the night but was probably in a hurry and only left a couple gifts. We feel blessed anyway.

MERRY CHRISTMAS !!

Countdown to Christmas

This is the time of the year when you should have all your chores done and you can sit back and listen to the music and enjoy the season. We're almost there. With Josie's work schedule it has been a little tougher to get everything done. Today will wind up the Holiday schedule for her and we just hope that she can get home early enough to enjoy Christmas Eve. The prognosis is that she will be home sometime in the late afternoon following a stop to pick up a couple last minute items. My delivery schedule has me on standby, based on a call from the shop yesterday. As of late afternoon yesterday, there weren't enough deliveries in the area I have to cover to commit to driving today. Unless that changes, I will be home for the whole day.

We'll keep this entry short as there really isn't much else to report. Enjoy your final day before Christmas...

Day Two of Deliveries

Yesterday was a much slower day as far as deliveries for the flower shop. I went into the shop at 9:30 AM and only took a total of 13 deliveries in two runs to Sun City. I was home again by 1:30 PM. This is the calm before the storm though, as Monday, Christmas Eve, will be the big day for deliveries. Josie said they are keeping up with the orders and they expect to be "slammed" on Christmas Eve Day. We both will probably be going full steam on Monday so that we can relax on Christmas Day.

I will have the day off today so I expect to probably do some last minute shopping since this will be my last full day at home before Christmas. I also need to do some research on local church services so that we can have a time and location ready for Christmas Eve. We most likely will return to our church in Sun City Grand where we attended services while residents there. There is also a new Lutheran church on Bell Rd, not far from us, that we may try.

Just a note on something I have never seen before for the Christmas season. While delivering yesterday, one of the homes I delivered to had a wonderful decoration. It was a Santa Clause face, about 8 inches high, attached to the wall next to her door, that had a motion sensor. When I went to the door to ring the bell I suddenly heard someone singing Christmas carols. This Santa would sing carols every time somebody would walk to the door and it was the coolest thing I've seen this season. The woman said it cost her $5 at Walgreen's when she bought it about 3 years ago.

Other than working these last few days before the holiday, there isn't much exciting news from here. We hope everybody is ready for Christmas...

All About Flowers

For the first time in several years, I signed up to help with deliveries of floral arrangements at holiday time. Yesterday, I was suppose to arrive at the shop where Josie works at around 9:30 AM, but Josie called when she got to work at 8:30 and asked that I come right away as some drivers were already there and loading up their vehicles for deliveries. I made it there shortly before 9 and got loaded up and headed out for my first run before 10 AM.

I ended up taking 3 loads out for delivery and was finished by 1:30 PM. I took some photos between delivery runs to show a little bit about the shop and the process. This first shot is of the production area where there are several designers, including Josie, that put all the pieces together:

I also got a shot of Josie working at her design station:

Finally, this shot was taken of the Jeep with the final delivery (for me) of the day:

My deliveries were made to the Sun City area which, as it turned out, were fairly easy since I am a little familiar with the area from playing on the golf courses in that town. The only problem with any of the deliveries was one that I made to the Boswell Hospital in Sun City. It is a huge campus and the proper entrance to take floral deliveries was difficult to find. The good news is that I will know where to take future deliveries to that hospital.

I get to do it all over again today. I received a call last night asking that I come in at around 9:30 to help out again today. The money isn't that great ($5.50 per completed delivery) but it is a little extra cash to help out at Christmas. I did 18 deliveries yesterday, so I should get almost $100 for 4 hours work. Not too bad.

The days through this weekend should be very busy for Josie, so she should be working full days until Christmas. I'm not sure if my services will be required for the rest of the time, but I'll find out tonight. It's one day at a time...

No Surprise

Several years ago we purchased a Cuisinart Ice Cream maker at Costco. We put it into our storage unit, unopened, when we hit the road in 2009. We've known that we had it but didn't carry it with us because it would take up room that we needed to carry more necessary items. We grabbed it out of storage to use while we are here for the long period of time until April. I attempted to surprise Josie with some fresh, home made ice cream yesterday but the attempt was not successful.

I got out the ice cream maker and read all the instructions and decided to start with just a simple recipe - plain vanilla - in order to try out this new toy. The instructions indicated that the mixing bowl for the device be frozen solid (at least 2 hours) before making the recipe. I placed it in the freezer and went to the store to buy some ingredients that we didn't already have, like heavy cream and whole milk. No problem. Everything went according to plan except for one thing. Our freezer doesn't get cold enough to completely freeze the mixing bowl - not in 2 hours anyway. As a result of that problem, the ice cream never hardened during the process and I ended up placing the mix in the freezer while it was still liquid. Therefore, no surprise as the ice cream still hadn't gotten frozen by the time she came home at 4 PM. Maybe another day. We need to leave the bowl in the freezer much longer than I did in order to make it work properly.

Today we both work as I received a call last night to come in to help with deliveries. I will drive the truck to Josie's work, park it, and take the Jeep to make the deliveries. I start at 9:30 and will most likely be gone for most of the day. Josie said they still aren't getting the volume of orders that would be normal for this time of year, but maybe there is a new normal. I haven't done deliveries in a long time so I hope I remember the routine. It's really very basic but the secret is to route yourself so that there is no backtracking. As long as my deliveries are in Surprise, I should be fine.

We're counting down to Christmas - only 4 more days to go...

Business is Down

Once again yesterday, Josie was home by 1 PM. Unless people are waiting until the last minute to order flowers, business is way off from previous years. Of course, Josie has been away from the business for a couple years, so it could be that the industry has been suffering for a long time. We remember the days when there was no time to rest for at least the final week leading up to Christmas, and there are only 5 days left. We are wondering why they wanted her to start as early as she did. It still might pick up to the point of being crazy which isn't good either. Not complaining though.

The extra time at home gave us a chance to do a little shopping, so we went to Sam's Club to try and pick up some presents. It's actually difficult to shop for someone who is with you in the checkout line. We did buy the Dark Knight Trilogy on BluRay though as we don't have any of those Batman movies at all on DVD. I guess we will still have to shop separately before Christmas to have any kind of surprise for each other. With all of the Christmas movies we have been watching lately, we are beginning to believe in Santa again so maybe we don't have to worry about shopping at all.

It's hard to get into the frame of mind to do any kind of work around the fifth wheel with Christmas being so close. At least that's what I'm telling myself. Every day I think about things that should be done but then get preoccupied with doing some things on the computer. I really like doing the planning for our trips and I have been looking at various options on Mapquest for our planned travels in April and beyond, into the following year. The software today makes it so much easier to plan trips than just a few years ago. I can remember going to AAA to get trip books that they provided for long trips involving driving. They were a nice benefit, and probably still are, but that takes the fun out of planning them yourself. I'll try to do more of that today along with working on a surprise for Josie - if I can only get a full day to do it...

Schedules

Most of the day yesterday was spent planning for the Spring Training games and our trip north to WA in April. There are 27 games to be played at the Surprise Stadium beginning on February 23 and ending on March 29. There are 8 days with no games during that period which represent our days off. We are looking forward to, and are anxious to have our meeting with the GM following Christmas. Except for cleaning toilets, we would be open to most any jobs for those games.

The trip north to WA in April is a different story. That is the month when the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival is held and we certainly want to spend time in La Conner for that. Kristine lives in Spanaway, and Tracy is living near Olympia, so we need to coordinate where and when we stay. There is only one Thousand Trails park in the area where they live which is about 60 miles from them in Chehalis, WA. There is another park in La Conner where we have stayed many times in the past and will stay again during whatever time we spend in the Skagit Valley. The problem is complicated by the fact that nobody knows when the best time in April will be for the tulips to be in peak bloom. Whatever we decide, we would like to spend as much time as we can with our family, so I'm sure we can work it out. The reservations for La Conner need to be made soon, as that is a busy time for that area.

Josie spent a nearly full day at work yesterday and can see the orders beginning to pile up for the weekend. The business is still way off from the holidays of old before the downturn in the economy. It is not a good time to own a flower shop. It appears that I may be recruited to help with deliveries - at least on Friday. My area for deliveries would most likely be Surprise, so that shouldn't be too bad.

We are waiting for the nice weather to return. We had more rain last night and the temps are still down. Yesterday we had a high of 62 and a low of 40 and .10" of rain with some winds - up to 20 MPH. The forecast looks good, so we'll just hang in there and be patient for the nice, warm days ahead...

Scheduling Appointments

There were several appointments that I targeted while staying here this winter. The start of those was performed yesterday when I made appointments with my family doctor for a physical exam on January 3, an appointment for an eye exam on December 28, and an appointment for the truck service on January 4. I haven't been to my physician in 4 years, so that first appointment with him will be treated as a follow up before we do the physical exam in a second appointment. Josie is going to wait a few more months before scheduling any doctors appointments until she is eligible for Medicare. The only other doctor appointment that needs to be made is with my specialist for another Colonoscopy that is overdue. Those are always fun.

As much as we sympathize with the families in Newtown, CT following the tragic massacre of the 26 people, we are getting a little tired of the constant coverage on all the TV stations. It is depressing enough with all the sad details but to be reminded every minute of every day with the same interviews and same photos is a little too much. More "fresh" reporting from the media would be welcome.

 It's the start of another week and Josie had almost a full day yesterday (4 PM). We're sure that as we get closer to Christmas, the hours will pick up so she is enjoying the shorter days for now. She informed them yesterday that she would not be staying over for Mother's Day in May as we will be going to WA to visit our family. That trip is long overdue and we will try to spend several weeks there before heading to Wyoming for the summer. We will plan to visit Patty and her family in Illinois following the summer in Wyoming.

That's about it for now...

Another Early Day

For the second day in a row, Josie was home early from work. They are all caught up on orders and they have enough prep work to be ready for the busy week ahead. Yesterday, she was home by 2:30.

We have talked about the possibility of staying over into mid May so that she could help through Mother's Day, but it still looks like we will be leaving as planned on April 1. There isn't enough incentive for her to stay the month of April to make just enough to cover our rent for the space and the extra electric charges. It isn't a final decision yet, but that's the way it stands right now. We have just about decided that we will return here next winter. What hasn't been decided is where we will stay if we do return. We put a deposit on a very nice space at Lake Pleasant while we were visiting there earlier this month which is the option we are leaning toward. We can also stay here again, probably on this space for more money since the owner hinted that the rent we are paying barely covers his expenses. The commute for Josie to work in Sun City would be a bit longer but the traffic would be less. Also, we would most likely work the Spring Training games again - assuming we do those games this year and get asked to come back. All of those plans need to be worked out but there is plenty of time for that.

Our plans right now still call for the extended trip to Alaska following our stay here next winter. We hope we can pull that off as it is the one destination remaining that is a must-do before we stop traveling. That, plus stopping in New England in the Fall following that trip. We are already gathering information on where to go and what to see for that once in a lifetime trip.

Today is the day I will start scheduling doctor appointments for a physical and for eye exams. There is also some work that I've been putting off on the truck that needs to be scheduled so that is also on the list. It looks like January will be the month to do all those things - plus begin gathering info for - yes, taxes! UGH.

Closing In on Christmas

Sorry I got carried away a little bit yesterday about the CT shooting, but like everybody else, it was a disgusting and tragic event. As more facts become available, we are learning that the shooter may have had a mental health problem and, as I said yesterday, health services is one area where I think we need to make some changes. Enough said about that.

They are not only caught up on orders at Josie's shop, but they let everybody go at 1:30 yesterday. It was a pleasant surprise for us, but she will be back to work again today at her normal time. It appears that they are pleased enough with her work that they are trying to find ways to get more hours for her while she is here in Surprise. Our plan was initially not to stay until Mother's Day since we couldn't justify paying another 6 weeks rent past the first of April in exchange for one week's pay in May. They are trying to get the OK to offer her 3 weeks of work around Mother's Day if she will stay. We'll see what happens with that. The other problem is that we wanted to go to WA before starting work in Wyoming in late May, and by staying over, we would not have the time for that side trip.

It looks like the rain is finally over. We had another .20" yesterday but the sky is clear today. It went to only 54 degrees yesterday with a low this morning of 41. That's pretty cold for here even at this time of the year. The temperatures are forecast to climb which is good news.

We've been watching a lot of Christmas movies on the Hallmark Channel the last couple weeks. All of the scheduled movies we see in the programing are movies we've already seen. Now we just need to surf the stations for more, and different movies. It's almost time for the old standbys - Rudolph, Grinch, Miracle on 34th St, It's a Wonderful Life, etc. - they never get too old to watch. Eight more days to go before Santa arrives...

Changing World

All of yesterdays' activities were, unfortunately, overshadowed by the mass murder - again - of 20 children and 6 adults (7 including the shooter) in Newtown, CT. Just as the President indicated, this is happening far too often in today's world. It is a real dilemma and when the air clears, some dramatic changes should be made in gun laws, health services and security. It is wrong to believe that fixing one without the others will solve this problem. Bear with me while I go off on this tangent.

When we were kids growing up, there were no mass shootings - anywhere. Yes, there was a very rare occasion where a local shooting occurred, but it was usually the result of a domestic quarrel. We could walk to school without fear of being kidnapped. We never worried about deranged gunmen coming into the schools. Gun laws were as relaxed as they ever had been in history. It is the drug impact that has changed our world. Changes have been made to the gun laws over the last 20 years, but they are not being enforced. There are more changes that can be made, but it's not the only problem. The biggest difference that I can see is the proliferation of drugs which were not a problem when we were kids. The effects of these drugs on the younger generation is monumental, if known at all. These drugs can and do impact logical thinking and reasoning in anybody that takes them. Until the drugs are controlled, we will have crazy people doing crazy things.

The other area that needs to be addressed is the lack of security at all of our schools. Granted, states are forced to cut back in areas in order to stay within budget guidelines, but there are other frivolous areas that can be addressed - namely in their own spending habits for travel and events. Every school should have an armed security guard on duty during classroom hours - and stationed at the front entrance. The damage has been done in these shootings by the time the police arrive.

The whole point is that there are several changes that need to be made in our society. The immediate response to these tragedies is always to eliminate the guns. That is just a symptom of the real problems. That is one person's opinion anyway.

It was an otherwise fine day for us yesterday. Josie was pumping out the arrangements and centerpieces for the Holidays at the design center. I went shopping for a roast and did the crock pot thing and made a decent dinner. With a little practice, I could become a crock pot expert.

We're dealing with some wet weather for a change and we've had over .35" of rain in the last 2 days. It is suppose to end today and warm up again by the start of next week. It was the first significant rain since we arrived, so we'll take it for sure...

Work at the Design Center

Josie's second day working at the design center was like she has not had any break from the business. Her work was spot-on and her manager was pleasantly surprised at her designing skills and speed. I asked her to take a few photos at work and she only took two, but one of them was not very clear, so below is the good shot from yesterday:

It is a picture of her workstation, and the cart contains center pieces at the end of the greening stage - called setups. She - or somebody - just has to add the flowers based on the order requirements. She was informed yesterday that there would be no days off before Christmas and she is prepared to work straight through Christmas Eve. I signed up to help with deliveries but there is no word on that schedule as of now. So far she is enjoying the work and we hope that it turns into more hours for her down the road, like in January and February. Since it appears that we both will be working at Spring Training games in Surprise Stadium during March, our time here should be productive.

We heard from our friend Donna in Jackson Hole last night and the snows are beginning to accumulate There is only a small amount on the ground in Jackson (3 inches), but her home which is about 20 miles south now has about 2 1/2 feet on the ground. So far, the roads are being kept clear and she is having no problems spending her first winter there. Business is very slow at the lodge, as expected, and she filled us in on how everybody was doing. There were no surprises.

We had a nice, quiet evening at home and we included this shot below of our Christmas tree in the fifth wheel:

It is a complete miniature of a large tree with all the ornaments and even a star on top. It's amazing how we get (almost) the same feeling with all the Christmas decorations in our small home as we did in a much larger home.

I plan to do a little grocery shopping today to find a nice roast to do in the crock pot to surprise Josie tonight. There's not much you can do to ruin that kind of meal, right? We'll know later tonight...

Time Apart

It has been almost 2 years since our days have been spent apart. That's when I worked at Disney World in Orlando while Josie took care of the rig. In some ways it is good - absence makes the heart grow fonder - and in other ways it's not fun - doing chores I don't usually do. It's only for the next 11 days or so so it's not too bad.

Josie's first day back in the floral business was fine. She got back into the swing of things quickly and spent most of the day "greening" containers to be ready for Christmas floral pieces when they receive the orders. She also brought a form home for me to fill out to help as a delivery driver as we get closer to Christmas. It's been a while since I've done that but it's not too difficult and it is good for a little extra money. It's a bit different in the design center as there aren't the customers coming in and out and there is very little contact with anybody outside.

My day was spent going to the post office to begin our mailings to family and a stop at Home Depot and an auto parts store to try to get a commercial grade of double sided tape. When my windshield was replaced on the truck, the tape that was used to attach my spare tank fuel gauge to the windshield wasn't holding very well. I found some good tape, and it appears to be OK for now. I also did more work on transferring and fine tuning data on my new computer and that about sums up my day.

We get to do it all again today...

Weight Versus Calendar

We had made the decision a couple weeks ago to not worry about dieting until after the Christmas holiday. That's probably what most overweight people do that have weight to lose and still want to enjoy the festive season. It's a race to the end of the year. Between the fruitcake, cookies and eggnog, not to mention other drinks and sweets, we're building to a not too impressive starting point for dieting. We may be borderline candidates for the "Biggest Loser" show. Just kidding, but we need to apply the brakes before it gets out of control. The fact that Josie starts working today probably helps with the required slowdown on eats and drinks.

Our decorations are now at the point where we declared the job complete. We picked up another couple of small items yesterday and a timer for the outside lights, so we are officially done. We did a better job decorating the inside of our rig than the outside. That's probably the norm anyway. Josie did a great job on the inside decorations as they set the tone for the entire holiday season.

As mentioned, Josie begins working today at 9 AM in the design center of Phoenix Flower Shops at the Sun City location off of Union Hills Rd. It is about a 15 minute drive from here, and should work out fine without any freeway driving required. That means I will buckle down and try to get some things done here while she works. There are some projects that I have been putting off for some time. The main one being the completion of the shredding that we started earlier this year and never finished. The boxes were moved from our storage units and are waiting for me in the shed outside. There are also some repairs that have been put on hold that aren't critical, but have caused some inconvenience. For the most part though, the rig is in good shape.

It's time to get some breakfast and to make sure that Josie gets off to a good start today. We should have some info tomorrow on the way things go for her today...

Christmas Shopping Done

It was a marathon day for shopping and decorating, but yesterday has positioned us to enjoy the rest of the season without worrying about shopping. We hit several stores in our area and also stopped at our storage space to do some last minute swapping of Christmas decorations. There are lots of decorations that we just can't use yet until we get another house someday. It is nice - and a huge relief - to know that everything is now located in one spot. The only thing left to do as far as the decorations go is to consolidate the electrical connections somehow so that we don't have so many cords. That will be a project for today.

Everything is transferred to and working on my new computer with only a couple applications requiring more fine tuning. It is a much better choice, as far as I'm concerned, than going with the Windows 8 system. I really believe that it is a mistake - and that Microsoft will pay a heavy price - for force feeding that new system to everybody. It is only going to work as designed on a touch screen system and laptops aren't, for the most part, touch screen systems. They do have their system (called Surface) which is touch screen and operates with Windows 8 but I don't hear about them flying off the shelves.

Today is the last free day for Josie before starting work at the design center of Phoenix Flower Shops. For that reason, not much will be scheduled today except for some local chores and finishing up on the Christmas cards. We don't know about everybody else, but the Christmas Spirit is beginning to grow around here...

Mostly Computer Stuff

I have a computer cable that I purchased with software when I bought my old computer about 7 years ago. It is called Windows Easy Transfer and it was a cinch to use to transfer most of everything from old computer to new. I located the cable yesterday and connected it to the two computers. The problem was that I couldn't get them to recognize the connection until later in the day when I just reversed the connection of the cable. That's all it took. While trying several other methods of transferring data during the day - USB Flash drives, Spare hard drive and CD copying - the discovery of switching the connection was a welcome relief. Just about everything is transferred now that I need to use and it just requires some tweaking to make it efficient.

We attempted to do some Christmas shopping at Costco and at Sam's Club, but just ended up buying a few items at each location that we really don't need. That is the norm when you go to these stores. The secret is to buy stuff you really don't need while keeping your bill under $100. We did accomplish that although we had to renew our annual membership at Costco for $55 which pushed that bill over $100. Other than that, we escaped with minimal damage. With only 2 more days left before Josie begins working at the flower shop (design center, actually) we need to get all the Christmas shopping done by then.

It looks like the weather is in for a major change. It is getting cooler and with a storm forecast for the end of the week, it will get wetter to boot. Last night we had some significant winds which we have been lucky to avoid since we arrived. We'll take out the long pants and long sleeve shirts for awhile. You still can't beat the climate here in winter, no matter what anybody says...

Garage Sale

Every year, Happy Trails conducts a garage sale at the beginning of December and once again in March. People place all the items they would like to sell along the curb for residents to see and buy. Well, yesterday was the day. Carole has been trying to empty the shed on the space we are renting and yesterday was her attempt to try and sell everything that was remaining. I went to pick up my computer in the morning and I took this shot of Carole - with Josie's moral support - as I returned from the FedEx facility:

She didn't have a lot of success in selling what was left of Dick's workshop in the shed, so she just took what was remaining to her rented villa to donate to a charity somewhere. At any rate, we have the full use of the shed now and it enabled us to unload the boxes we brought over in the Jeep from our storage for sorting and shredding. That is a project I will take on when Josie starts work on Wednesday.

My new computer is everything I wanted it to be - so far. Windows 7 is almost a seamless upgrade from my old Windows Vista system. I have already moved the major applications over and the rest, hopefully, will be done today. I can see a great improvement in response times and downloading speeds and I like the new features that are in Windows 7. The Beats Audio is tremendous and the screen resolution is a lot closer to HD (High Definition)  than my last computer screen. With this kind of improvement, it will be a long time before I switch to another platform. I prefer the keyboard and mouse to trying to use a touch screen designed system with the keyboard/mouse combination.

We also heard from the General Manager, ARAMARK Sports and Entertainment about working the Spring Training games at Surprise Stadium in March. We will meet with him following Christmas to discuss opportunities and, hopefully, get placed in a job for that time period. That will end our working commitments for this winter season and we will be leaving on April 1 for a return trip to Wyoming for the summer.

Since we brought all of our RV Christmas decorations over from the storage unit, we will spend most of the day today getting into the Christmas spirit that comes with decorating and listening to Christmas music. Tis the season to be jolly...

Aching Muscles

Contrary to the loading process in Vista on Thursday, it was just Josie and I that had to complete the move. We got an early start (for us) at 9:30 yesterday. We picked up a latte and a few donuts on the way from the local Duncan Donuts shop so we could make sure we had enough energy to complete this job.

The truck unloading wasn't so bad and we had that all completed by shortly after 11:00 AM. Our new space at the storage facility is a 10 x 20 space that doubles the size of the old space of 10 x 10. We wanted to make sure there was plenty of room for everything and we are happy that we went with the larger space. Below is a shot of our new space - taken during an early break:

and another photo, looking down the hall at our old (open) space which shows that we didn't have that far to go to move all of the old stuff to our new location:

It was a long day that didn't end until nearly 4:30 PM. We were physically exhausted by the time we finished but are relieved that this big project is finally over. All that remained was to return the truck to the U-Haul store down the street and to call it a day.

When we arrived back home there was a door tag on our fifth wheel from FedEx. They attempted to deliver my new computer while we were at the storage facility. It was a surprise because the tracking information I saw in the AM before leaving indicated that it wouldn't be delivered until Monday. The computer arrived at the Phoenix location yesterday morning, very early, and they were able to put it on the truck for delivery yesterday. Anyway, rather than wait for a second attempt to deliver on Monday, I will go to the FedEx location and pick it up myself today. That way, I'm sure not to miss another delivery attempt if I have to leave the rig for any reason on Monday.

We don't have a lot of the details yet, but our twin grandsons' football team has won the National Championship in FL. They went undefeated in their bracket to win the title - what an outstanding achievement. We are certainly proud of the achievements of our grandsons on the football field this year. We'll provide more details as we get them.

I'm hoping that our aching muscles from yesterday feel better by the end of the day today. Whatever we do, it will be in slow motion...

Vista Ties Ended

Our remaining tie to Vista, CA ended yesterday. Following breakfast at our hotel, we drove to the U-Haul location, picked up our truck and headed to the storage unit. We met the two "helpers" there and the job of loading up the truck started shortly after 8:30 AM local time. Here's a shot of the start of the effort:

Our unit was a 5 x 20 size which had the same amount of storage space as 10 x 10 space. It looks like a small space in the shot above but we just about filled the truck with the contents. There was no way that we could have completed the job ourselves in the time they took to completely empty the space and send us on our way. The guys that helped us were paid for 2 hours time, even though they completed the job in about 1.25 hours.

We checked out of the storage facility and were on the road back to AZ at 10 AM. Our return trip was on I-10 as opposed to I-8 on our trip out to CA. The distance is close to the same either way, but the different scenery made it a more interesting drive. We stopped twice along the way - once in Palm Springs and once in Ehrenberg AZ just across the state line where gas is a lot cheaper than CA. I will say that the truck got about as bad gas mileage as I get towing our fifth wheel. We averaged less than 10 mpg on the trip.

Our arrival at the storage facility in Surprise was around 5 PM with the one hour time change, so our return trip was about the same as the trip out, using different routes. It was around 6 hours, but with one fewer stop.

This morning we return to our storage unit to empty the truck into our new space, return the truck and move our goods from the old space into the new one. We both will be very happy to see this phase end...

Nice Drive to Vista

We stayed close to our schedule and actually departed Surprise a little early at 9:30 AM yesterday. The drive was uneventful - the best kind - and we enjoyed the scenery and the great weather all the way. We stopped at a few places - once in Surprise to top off the gas tank in the Jeep, again in Gila Bend to have lunch and the last time at a rest stop before the mountains outside San Diego. This was the same rest stop we visited on the way to Vista in January where we saw the Blue Angels practicing. They weren't anywhere around this time.

Our arrival at the hotel was right at 3 PM California time, which was one hour earlier than Surprise. The trip, therefore, took a total of 6.5 hours with stops - not bad at all. The hotel is just off the freeway and is a real bargain. It is called Americas Best Value Inn & Suites:

It is fairly old, but the rooms are all renovated, very clean and super large. We have a king bed and it cost us $52 for the night with microwave, refrigerator, hair dryer and most amenities you would expect in more expensive hotels. It also includes breakfast this morning. Here is another shot of the hotel from our room:

Following our arrival, we went to the U-Haul location and the storage facility to store them in our GPS for this morning. We stopped in the office at each location to confirm our arrangements for today. We are set to go. We then stopped at Walmart and picked up a couple Lean Cuisines and a bottle of wine for dinner and we were content.

Hopefully, all will go smoothly today and we will be back in Surprise tonight, and be ready to unload at our new space at the storage facility where we will consolidate all the items from both places. Sounds like fun, right? :)...

Heading Out To Vista

Everything is a go for our trip today. We have finally reached the (dreaded) day when we go to CA to pick up the goods and close out our storage space there. The trip should be a pleasant one though as the weather will be perfect and we only have the one vehicle to deal with which means we only have to drive separately on the way home. We can still drive both ways in the same vehicle if we decide to rent a dolly for the Jeep to tow behind the truck. That's what we did when we drove to Vista back in January to start working there. The problem with that arrangement was that the truck overheated while going through the mountains. We probably won't chance that happening again.

We did some chores around the rig yesterday. I did some minor things inside while Josie did the laundry. There are a couple more of our shades that need to be restrung but I'll save that for when we return and Josie starts working. I am beginning to line up jobs for that period of time when she will be gone during the days for the last two weeks before Christmas.

One thing we both agreed on yesterday after watching the third ambulance come into the Resort - the average age of the residents here must be at least 80. Everywhere we go we see folks that are barely able to move and it gets kind of depressing after awhile. Every day there are multiple ambulance calls and there has to be a record number of lots available for sale. It's not only the poor economy that has impacted the market here, but also the aging population. It is not a place where we would ever consider buying a space as it has reached the same stage as Sun City. We realize we are also getting older but believe we have a long way to go to reach the near helpless stage that many folks have reached in Happy Trails.

We'll watch a little bit of the Today show this morning and then pack a few things and head out by around 10 AM...

Computer Ships

HP indicated that my computer would be completed and would ship on December 3. By the time 4 PM rolled around yesterday, I still hadn't received an email verifying that it was on schedule. I initiated an online chat with HP to try to get a status on the computer. The girl on the chat said the system was still in production according to the information she had, but that Mondays are the day that HP uses FedEx to ship production from the week before and I would probably receive notice today. Sure enough, an email was sent at 3:30 AM notifying me that the system has shipped and to expect delivery by Friday, December 7 at 4:30 PM.

That was good news. Our plan for the week is to go to Vista, CA tomorrow, pick up and load the truck on Thursday AM, drive to our storage facility in Surprise by Thursday night and then unload and return the truck early Friday morning. We also have planned to do the consolidation of our space on Friday, so I'm hoping that all of the moving can be completed by Friday afternoon.

Most of the day yesterday was spent doing odds and ends around the rig to try to get ready for our trip tomorrow. There is no rush to leave early so we plan to be on the road no later than 10 AM tomorrow. This is a trip that we should have planned last month but we were enjoying our down time from working so much we just let it slide. As we are discovering, many things we are looking for are in that storage unit in CA and we really need to get there now to bring everything here to Surprise. It will be a very busy time from tomorrow until Christmas, so we are going to take full advantage of our remaining down time...

Baking Cookies

We got a "mild" start to the Christmas season yesterday. We put some Christmas music on our boombox and cranked it up as Josie started baking cookies. She made some chocolate chip and peanut butter cookies to start the season. It is only a beginning though. Any thoughts of losing weight before the end of the year are now wishful thinking. It's the same thing every year at the start of December. Too much of cookies, fruit cake and egg nog to have any chance of losing. We just hope we can keep our binges under control.

We also went to town to get haircuts and pick up some Christmas stuff. Most of our good items are in CA and we will bring those back at the end of the week. We really thought we would have had those things back here by now but I don't think we realized just how much of our necessary items were left there. When we started out on that journey to Vista, we had long term involvement in mind.

The main event for me today is to follow up to be sure that my new computer ships as promised by HP. At least when I ordered the Windows 8 system from Costco I received it within 3 days of the order. This new version - the Windows 7 version - was ordered on November 22 and probably will not arrive until late this week at the earliest. Part of that is because this one is being custom built whereas the Costco system was from their inventory. Regardless, I know from further research that all of my applications will run on this new system.

Our neighbors - and landlord - have left again to attend a Beaver Rally in Bakersfield, CA this week. He is a Regional Vice President for the Beaver Motor Coach Club and they attend almost all of the rallies. His coach is a Beaver Marquis and is a top of the line coach - in excess of $500K.  Rett told me that they have over 100K miles on this 2008 coach that they purchased brand new in 2008. That's a lot of traveling. With the two homes they own in AZ and TX, it doesn't appear that this slump in the economy has affected them at all.

That's about it for now as we watch the sun coming up for another glorious day in AZ...

Tis the Season

Our trip to the storage unit to find our RV Christmas decorations was disappointing. There are some boxes there that contain decorations for a house, but our container of goodies for the RV was not there - it is in CA. We did get a few things though, but will have to wait until the end of next week to do any more.

It is important for us to get everything done before Josie starts work a week from this Wednesday. Once she starts, there will be no time off until Christmas Eve day. There is so much to get done. We haven't started any shopping yet, nor have we gotten our cards yet. And, Josie hasn't baked any cookies yet - very important. Usually, we send gifts cards so that it eliminates the hassle from both ends of fighting shopping crowds and taking a chance that what we buy is the wrong size, color or style. Also, the gift cards go a lot further following Christmas with all the post Christmas sales. This year, Josie will try to get some things for the smaller Grand kids since they like opening presents. It is a little different with toys anyway since there are no sizes involved like there are for clothes. It looks like we will get a start on all those things today and tomorrow. Josie got her manicure and pedicure done yesterday, so now she's ready to go.

We are coming up to the 1300th entry in this blog. It doesn't seem like it's that many, but in over 3.5 years, that is a lot without missing a day. I apologize for some of the dull and insignificant entries, but it is important to me to document all of our experiences so that our families always know where we are and what we are doing. Some days are down days, and others are filled with activities and pictures along the way. Those are more fun for us also, but we take the days as they come...

Visit to Storage

The more we talked about the location of our Christmas decorations for the fifth wheel, the more we weren't sure about where we put them after last year. We keep those decorations separate from the house decorations, and for a good reason - the RV decorations are smaller and more compact for travel. The only way to answer the question was to visit the storage unit and do a little searching. We found some Christmas boxes but none of them were the container that we were looking for. It seems like now we will have to wait until after next week and our visit to CA to retrieve our stuff from that storage unit.

That trip will not be a fun trip and isn't intended to be. Everything is lined up for the two day trip including a one night stay at a hotel in Vista that is just a basic room in a very basic hotel there. The trip is sure to bring back some memories of the folks we knew at Arcadia Place, but we decided not to take any time to visit. We would love to see some of the residents we worked with, but do not want to run into any of the area managers that we didn't like. That trip, once again, is scheduled for next week on December 5-6.

I also re-attached my auxiliary fuel tank gauge to the new windshield in the truck When the new windshield was inserted, the guy didn't place the gauge in the right spot, so I moved it. That was no big deal except that it requires a good quality double sided tape to install which I purchased at ACE Hardware yesterday.

There was nothing else of any consequence that we did yesterday except to watch a couple more of the Christmas movies that we copied from the Hallmark Channel on TV. They are all excellent films that we have never seen before. They are running these shows every day from now until Christmas.

Have a great day everybody...