Birthday Girl

As yesterday was Josie's XX birthday, we made it a kind of special day. The weather cooperated for most of the day and we went to the swimming pool at the Rec Center to hang out:

We took a pitcher of margaritas and some snacks and were there long enough to get more tan for Patty and the start of a tan for us.

The plan was to try something a little different for dinner and the original choice was a restaurant in North Scottsdale. We decided that we didn't feel like traveling so far for dinner, so we opted for the Longhorn Steakhouse in Surprise. Josie had salmon while Patty and I ordered steaks. It was a good choice as we all enjoyed our meal. After filling up at dinner, it was decided we would wait until today to have Josie's cake.

The evening was exciting as we had a huge monsoon storm go through at around 7 PM that lasted over an hour. We had the high winds that are associated with these storms and we watched branches -broken off from the surrounding trees - fly around the golf course.  One of our tall potted plants blew over, but other than that, there was no damage to report.

We have a neighborhood search in Scottsdale scheduled for today. Patty wanted to get some ideas on homes and prices to consider when they eventually move here from Illinois within the next year or so. The plan is to end that "tour" with a visit to Josie's new job location - AJ's in south Scottsdale...

Emotional Trip to Yarnell and Prescott

We left at 8 AM yesterday to drive to Yarnell and to Prescott. The movie "Only the Brave" portrays the lives and events of the Granite Mountain Hotshots who all perished - except one member - in the fateful fire on Sunday, June 30, 2013. What an emotional experience. We arrived at the State Park that was built as a memorial to the group.

You are able to follow a trail that is over three miles long and ends at the fatality site where a monument is constructed showing the locations where each of the firefighters was discovered. We started out to hike the trail but, because of the heat and the elevation of the climb, we turned around early into the hike. We plan to return again in the Fall when it is cooler and we will perhaps be in better shape for the climb.

Following are some of the photos we took at the site:

There is a bench at the top of this hill that overlooks the location where the monument is located and you take another .75 hike to get there from the top.

The trail was all switchbacks to get to the top and there are markers for each of the Hotshots at about every 600 feet in elevation. This one is of the leader of the group, Eric Marsh:

These other shots are just a few that we took along the way:

Following our time at the State Park, we drove to Prescott to try and locate the place where the Hotshots hung out - Matts Saloon:

We had a drink at the bar and proceeded across the street at the town square where there was a Fair in progress:

We walked around the Fair and decided to grab a bite to eat for lunch. Gurley's Grill was the choice we made, and it was a very good one:

We returned home at around 5 PM and were glad we made this trip to learn more about this special group of young men. Following is a shot that was taken at the start of the trail at the State Park and shows the group at a Juniper tree that they saved at another fire location near Prescott, shortly before they perished:

...

Heading to Yarnell Today

We had a great time yesterday on Patty's first full day of her visit. We started with a trip to the Pottery Place in Surprise where Patty wanted to get something for our house and she also wanted to see the place for future reference when she and her family move here from IL in about a year or so. This shot was taken while walking around the grounds:

Our original plan was to go to the Rec Center and spend some time in the pool. It got too hot to go anywhere in the afternoon, so we watched the movie "Only the Brave" in the afternoon. It is the true story of the 19 Granite Mountain Hotshots who perished in the fire in Yarnell in 2013. That is where we are headed today. We will follow that with a stop in Prescott and then head home. We decided to do Sedona another time when we have can dedicate a day to that area.

We are headed out now, so see ya tomorrow...

Nice Start to Visit

Patty's flight from Chicago arrived on time yesterday - actually, a little early - and we were back at the house by around 12:30 PM. After getting settled and going to the store for a few last minute items, we ordered the pizzas from a new (to us) pizza place in Sun City West which was only 10 minutes from the house. Florencia Pizza had great reviews, so we gave it a try.

Patty and I went to pick up the pizzas at 4:15 PM so that we could have them home when our guests arrived. Our other guests - George, Cheryl, Brian and Amy and family - all arrived between 4:30 and 5 PM. We immediately had the pizzas and the reviews were very good. It looks like we will again get pizza from this location in the future. Once again, I forgot to get photos of the evening but we had a fun time visiting and now everybody has been to our new house.

The plan for today is to do local stuff at the rec center and to visit the Pottery Place in Surprise where Patty wants to go to see the great selection of pottery and other outside items. For dinner tonight, I will do a pot roast in the instant pot. Yes, I will do the cooking. A report on that will be in tomorrow's entry...

Moving On in the Heat

Just when we thought the temperatures would be closer to normal leading up to Patty's visit, it stays over 110. The forecast now is for temps in the 106-110 range for her entire visit. That's OK as we will stick to our plans.

Tonight we will have a pizza dinner at our house with all the family members that are in the area. I hope to get some shots of the occasion and share them tomorrow. We are pretty much ready for visitors and will try to make everybody comfortable as the heat will probably force us all to stay inside.

We have been looking forward to Patty's visit and look forward to some fun trips and some fun activities in the area during the week...

115!!!

For the third consecutive day, we set a new record for high temperature. It reached 115 again yesterday and to make it even more significant, we set a new record for the highest "low" temperature for the night - 93. The A/C is churning away trying to keep up with the heat. It appears that we will begin to see more normal temperatures beginning today when it is expected to reach only 111.

The long range forecast for the week that Patty will be visiting is in the normal range of 105-109. That will seem like a cold spell, for sure.

We are trying to put together a "family" visit for Friday night when Patty arrives. She had Brian and his family visiting with her in Naperville the other night and they talked about coming over to our house on Friday night when Patty arrives for a pizza night. I am trying to get ahold of George to invite him and Cheryl, but have not heard back from my email. I will try to connect with them via phone today. It would be nice if it isn't too hot so we can at least sit outside a little bit.

Today will be a shopping day to get as much of what we need as possible for the week. The plans are about complete to have a great time during Patty's visit...

116!!!

If Monday wasn't hot enough, we had another record set yesterday - 116. Hang on, because we expect another record high today.

I went to my Audiologist yesterday to get one of my hearing aids checked and the earpiece has a problem so it was sent back to the factory. While there, my Audiologist said she has lived here for 24 years and this year the summer has been a problem for her for the first time. Some relief is expected starting tomorrow - just in time for our visit with Patty.

We also took a drive to the American Furniture Warehouse to pick up a couple side tables for our family room. It was close to Avondale, so we made a visit to our old home in Crystal Gardens. That was a very nice home and we took these shots to update the changes - which aren't too many:

It's nice sometimes to reminisce about good times we had at other locations.

There is a lot of last minute effort required to get things in order for Patty's visit beginning Friday. The heat has not been a friend in our attempt to get things done. We start on a project and then have to sit down and drink a bottle of water before continuing. Then, we don't feel much like continuing. The cooler temperatures will arrive just in time to get us going...

115!!!

Yes, it was 115 yesterday to set the first record for the week. The old record of 114 is history and it is only the beginning. Today will equal or set another record as will tomorrow. There isn't a whole lot that you can do when the weather gets like this except stay inside.

We went out for a short time in the morning and then spent the rest of the day inside watching shows we had taped on TV. Today will be much like yesterday and we have no plans to go anywhere. I watered our plants extra early this morning and the overnight temperature never got below 90 so it seemed like it was later. Some of our plants are showing the effects of the hot weather as even sun loving plants are starting to show brown, baked edges. I feel sorry that our cars have to sit out in these temperatures but we have no choice. All we can do is to make the best of the situation...

Oven Door Open

Starting today, and for the next several days, we expect the temperatures to be in record high territory. The range will be 112-116. We had the final taste of decent (?) highs yesterday which was around 109. It has been a tough summer so far with the heat and the chores to get all of our boxes emptied and things organized in the house. It would have been better to start all this in the Fall, but we had little choice in the timing.

The weather is expected to get back in the "normal" range by Friday, just in time for Patty's visit. We understand that Debby will not be coming as a result of work conflicts which is too bad. We were looking forward to having her visit with us while Patty is here. We are starting to line up the activities for the visit beginning Friday and lasting through Tuesday of next week. We hope the monsoon storms take a long break over the next two weeks as we are planning some fun places to go and nice things to see...

Errands Day

There were some errands that we had to run yesterday to help organize our house and to begin our happy hour prep for next weeks visitors.

Our first stop was at the St Vincent DePaul donation area to drop off a couple boxes of items we sorted through at the house. The next stop was supposed to be at BevMo to do our booze pickup. That's when we spotted the Oregano's restaurant right next to BevMo. We had never been to this BevMo, so we were surprised to see the nice restaurant next door. So, we decided to have our lunch and also call it an early dinner at this great Italian restaurant:

We each tried something different this time and we were a little disappointed with our choices. Josie tried the Shrimp Scampi and I had the Italian Flag Lasagna. Neither was what we expected and were sorry we made those choices. But - it is still a nice Italian Restaurant and we will return.

We then walked next door and did our BevMo thing.

The last stop on our schedule was at Home Depot where we picked up a recycle trash can to use on those special days that are designated for recycle items.

One last shot for today that was taken late yesterday afternoon of one of our quail families:

We never get tired of watching them walking around our yard. We expect to see more newborn chicks soon as there is another nest by our front door. This time, they are pigeons and they don't seem to hang around like the quail. Once they hatch, we will take steps to permanently remove that nesting location...

End of a Long Association

Josie's ten year stint with the Phoenix Flower Shops came to an end yesterday. They were very accommodating for those years allowing her to work seasonally and also full time on occasion. The biggest problem with that organization was that they didn't believe in giving raises to employees - ever. In ten years, Josie had zero pay increases, and she was not alone. That is now history.

We now have the full week to prepare for our guests next Friday. In the middle of the week - Mon thru Wed - we expect to equal, or break high temperatures for the dates. It will be between 110-116 each of those days. Let's get those out of the way so we can enjoy some outside time in more reasonable temperatures. Actually, none of the summer temperatures in this part of AZ are ever reasonable for outside activities.

We were awakened this morning by another monsoon storm. There was lots of lightening but not much rain. We are still getting these storms as I write this entry. Supposedly, we will not get these storms during the high heat period next week. These shots were taken this morning as the crews still had to get their work done, monsoon storms or not:

Thankfully, these storms tend to cool things down, at least for awhile...

Testing New Commute

I took Josie's phone into the (dreadful) AT&T store yesterday morning to have some issues resolved on her new phone. It was an OK session with the staff, but the issues were easy ones. The only remaining problems are with passwords for the apps on the new phone and trying to remember them. It has become a real hassle handling passwords for any phone or computer now as every application has its own rules for passwords and they result in having to keep track of many, many different passwords. The secret is not to lose your phone or change computers.

Josie got off early from work yesterday so we used the late afternoon to take some paperwork to her new job location and to do her drug test and citizenship verification. We took the preferred route to get there which is mostly freeway the entire way. That route works really well during off-peak traffic hours. We made it to her new job location in 30 minutes from home. All of the tasks were completed and we left the new location at 4:15 PM which would coincide with rush hour traffic. The route we used coming home was on back roads using no freeway access at all. It took just less than an hour which isn't too bad considering we didn't use any freeways.

 It is a much longer commute for her starting out but we hope she can get a transfer to one of their store locations closer to home in a few months...

New Phone Arrives

Josie's new phone arrived yesterday at around noon. We waited at the house until it arrived and immediately went to the AT&T store to have it activated.

There was good news and bad news. The phone number stays the same - good news. All of the contacts and photos from prior to Feb 2017 were lost - bad news. We spent much of the rest of the day trying to sync our phones with the same settings and trying to get as much working as smoothly as possible. I asked Josie to leave her phone home today so I could return to the AT&T store to have some issues addressed - SIM card not recognized, some apps are not working properly, etc. Hopefully, by the end of today our phones will be synced with all the same settings.

The monsoon rains have apparently resulted in our cactus blooming again. These shots show our plants as of yesterday:

I'm sure that the season is now over for those beautiful blossoms.

We also had a nice sunset last evening and these shots were taken with Josie's new phone:

The work week -as short as it is now for Josie - started today. She will work today through Friday, have Saturday thru Tuesday off and then work her final two days at Phoenix Flower Shops next Wednesday and Thursday. She begins her new job at AJ's following the visit by Patty and Debby which will be on August 1. We are looking forward to that nice visit...

A Different Experience

Among all of the other events that have been consuming us lately, we were attacked by ants on Sunday morning.

There are two swimming pools next to us in our neighborhood. One next door and the other two doors down on the same side of the street. We had never seen the second one up close although it is visible through the fences and past the pool next door. Josie and I decided to take a walk along the fence line on the golf course to get a close up of that pool since the owners seem to be gone for the summer. It is a very nice pool but seemed to have water that was turning green from lack of attention. We were leaning on the fence looking at the pool and backyard when I discovered ants all over my arm that were on the top of the fence. Josie also had ants everywhere. We rushed home, took our clothes off and did the best we could to eliminate all the ants that were crawling on us. As near as we could tell, they were red fire ants and they bit us all over our hands, arms and legs.

Josie had a more severe reaction from the bites than I had. Her hands were swollen and her feet were swollen and we could see the effects of the venom or whatever they injected. We spent the day Sunday treating the bites with alcohol and hydrogen peroxide but Josie was not responding very well to that treatment. Yesterday, we went to our (new) doctor who was just down the street - another story. It seems that our newly appointed Primary Care Physician changed office locations  two years ago. My rant from yesterday about the AT&T incompetency carried over to later yesterday when we discovered that our insurance provider - United Healthcare - gave us an address for our new physician that was two years old. As it turned out, the new location is actually closer to our house and is only about a mile away from us. Anyhow, the Nurse Practitioner saw us and gave Josie a shot to help with the itching and swelling. She is recovering nicely today but what an experience.

Life is never dull for us...

Paying for Mistakes

There were basically two main reasons for our switch to AT&T service from Verizon. The first one was that every month with Verizon we were experiencing slower data speeds after reaching 15GB of data transferred, even though we were on an unlimited data plan. The second reason was because AT&T now owns DirecTV and we got a huge break on that service by combining the two services - phone and satellite.

We are so sorry we made the switch as now we are experiencing the wrath of much inferior customer service with AT&T. So far, we have made about 8 or 10 visits to an AT&T store to have problems addressed . Not once have we left a store feeling satisfied that our issues have been resolved. The latest is with Josie's phone. The incompetent staff at these stores have no idea what effect a stolen phone has on your security. Yes, we know that by suspending the service there cannot be access to texting or calling, but what about the other apps and data on the phone, including email and Facebook to name a couple big ones. Nobody knows just how they are affected. Also, when we had to have a phone replaced with Verizon, we had the new phone in hand the next day. AT&T is taking 4 days to get the new phone to us.

As further indication of problems with AT&T there is the broken promise of reimbursement of all charges on our final Verizon bill. It seems our AT&T rep never submitted the paperwork from our final bill and now - it is late being paid to Verizon, and our reimbursement will only be a fraction of the bill. I had to submit all the paperwork myself and it is now to the point where I was forced to pay the final Verizon bill to avoid a late entry on our credit report. The icing on the cake is that we are being charged for Josie's phone - a promised FREE upgrade - at the standard going price for the phone. So far, we have spent over $1000 in unexpected fees with AT&T and the service SUCKS! We now have to wait two years to switch back!

Sorry for the rant, but we are fed up with incompetent people performing inferior service and producing poor results at every turn.

The good news is that Josie is on track to join her new company and that process IS going smoothly - so far...

Phone Gone

Josie and I spent over 5 hours yesterday morning driving around and tracking the location of her stolen phone. The address we started with produced nothing. The application that I was using - AT&TFamilyMap - was doing a great job identifying the address where it could get a "hit". The problem with the application is that you can only get a reading when the phone is turned on. As a result, we would have to wait between searching each location until we got another reading. We guessed that the individual was constantly moving as we got 4 different readings during the morning, all within about a 5 mile radius. The last reading we got - and the best one - was at a Seven Eleven in Peoria. We arrived there and walked around the store and saw nothing except for a kid that was sitting outside the store, next to a trash can and leaning against the store, with a phone in his hand and listening to something using ear plugs. Josie and I both walked past him. I didn't think the phone was Josie's since the case didn't match hers. Josie walked past him and immediately noticed that the phone was hers with the case removed. She came over to me to tell me it was her phone and the kid ran off. He most likely recognized Josie from the shop and he took off.  We called the police to get some help and waited over an hour for them to show. They arrived after we left as we received a call from them about 15 minutes after we left the area.

Following that experience, we went to the nearest AT&T retail store and had them suspend all service to the phone. We believe that the thief will eventually throw away the phone when it becomes useless to him and we can't wait any longer to have Josie go without a phone. We submitted a claim to the insurance - thank goodness we took out insurance on the phone when we got it a couple months ago - and we expect to have the claim accepted today and a new phone delivered within a couple days. Of course, Josie has to start over again with all her contacts, pictures, passwords and other applications. Some of what she lost will be recovered from the cloud, but we don't know how much at this point.

With the great news of her getting the new job at AJ's Fine Foods and the horrible experience with her phone at the same time, we are both ready to get off of the roller coaster...

Incredible Events

The last day and a half have been incredible. First of all, I missed the entry yesterday for a good reason - we were involved in a desperate search for Josie's phone. More on that later.

I picked up Josie at work as scheduled on Thursday for her 1:30 PM interview for a new opportunity that she was presented with and wanted to pursue. The interview went well and she was suppose to hear back from the manager that interviewed her later in the day or in the evening. The manager indicated that she needed to get approval for the salary that was offered to Josie. As Josie hurriedly left for home at the end of the day on Thursday, she forgot her phone at the shop. She sent a message through Facebook to the manager and it was agreed they would talk on Friday AM after Josie got her phone. That's when the incredible events really began.

Josie could not find her phone anywhere in the shop yesterday - even with the help of the rest of the staff. I did some research on the ways to locate a phone. I found a program which I subscribed to called "AT&T FamilyMap" which is a program for folks to locate where their kids are located. I thought it would also work for locating a lost or misplaced phone. It does work. The phone kept coming up as being located at 650 W Bell RD, which is a good distance from Josie's shop. We thought that the location was probably that of the nearest tower as her phone was probably out of charge by then. It also suggested that the phone, maybe, was still in the shop somewhere. They spent all day looking for the phone with no success. Of course, Josie could not talk with the manager about the new opportunity from the shop phone.

I drove to the address where the phone was supposedly located. I didn't see any towers but thought perhaps they would be on top of a building in the strip mall at that address or on a telephone pole in the area. So, Josie came home yesterday and finalized her new job with AJ's Fine Foods:

It is a terrific opportunity for her as she will get her full time hours - 40 - and a nice hefty pay increase. The location is pretty far away - about a 50 minute commute - but we expect that to be temporary, as AJ's has store locations all over the Valley and she can transfer to any one of those at some time after she starts. She will start her new job following the visit by Patty and Debby at the beginning of August.

Now, the phone was traced last night to a different address - Indian School Rd in Phoenix. That was the indication that the phone was stolen from Josie's shop. Josie said she had her phone on the counter (something she never does) while helping a customer pay for an order at closing time. Another customer came in at that time and wanted to make a call so Josie let him use the store phone. Evidently, he walked out with Josie's phone without her knowing. The phone still comes up this morning at the Indian School address. Josie and I are going to drive to that address, call 911 for police assistance, and confront whoever is in that home. Wish us luck...

Deluge Number 2

The day was pretty quiet yesterday morning as far as monsoon activity. Once we hit the late afternoon, the storms formed and, of course, we got our taste of another heavy storm. This one didn't have the high winds that we had before, so it was just nice to watch the heavy rain:

It didn't stop there though. During the night we had a couple big thunderstorms that had lots of lightening and very heavy rain. Tis the season. We are thankful for the rain which is so desperately needed.

Josie has an interview scheduled today for what could be a fantastic opportunity for her. I will pick her up at the shop and take her to her 1:30 appointment. The results and all details will be presented tomorrow. We don't want to jump the gun on this one, but it is such a giant step over where she is today and we are hoping that it all comes together.

It appears that we will get a break today from the monsoon storms. That is good news as I had to clean up all the debris from the last several days and I may get a little reprieve from those unpleasant tasks...

Storm Recovery

A good part of the morning yesterday was spent cleaning up the mess left by the massive storm we had on Monday afternoon and evening. I got out the blower and cleared both patios in the back and the front entry. There were leaves and other debris everywhere but it is all gone now and we are ready for the next one. Fortunately, we had no damage - except for the flagpole - and everything is back to normal. I did pick up a replacement for the flagpole yesterday afternoon for $6 at Walmart.

Josie was approached yesterday by a former coworker of hers who is now managing a nice, high end store in the East Valley, to come work for her. She has scheduled an interview with Josie for Thursday, so we will see how that goes. A lot more will be said about that as we learn more about the situation. She has been searching for better opportunities for quite awhile now.

I am planning to visit the AT&T store again today to attempt to iron out the billing problems that we just can't seem to fix. Commitments were made to us when we switched from Verizon that are not being reflected in the billing. I hope we can wrap that up today.

I have one more cute shot that Josie took last night of our newest quail family that hangs out in our yard:

Nature is sure fascinating...

Deluge

I kind of thought it would happen this way. Once we did get the much needed rain from the monsoon, we would be sorry. It reared its ugly face late yesterday afternoon and came through with a vengeance. I was tracking the doppler radar beginning at about 3 PM when it became very obvious that a massive storm was working its way west from the far east valley. Josie was working until 4 PM and I could see that the storm was going to hit her location head-on by about the time she would leave. I tried frantically to warn her and tell her to get out as soon as possible.

At 4 PM, I received a call from her that she was leaving work and I told her about the storm bearing down on her. She made it home at around 4:30, just in time to watch the dust storm blow through which precedes the rain storms. Then it hit:

Our agave plant blew over immediately and the winds started to blow at about 50-60 mph. we caught this shot of a woodpecker that was holding on for dear life against our palm tree on the opposite side from the wind:

The temperature took a huge drop during the storm - from 100 degrees to about 70:

If you enlarge the top photo you can see the thermometer as it began to fall.

We lost power at about 5 PM and didn't get it back until nearly 9PM. We weathered the storm pretty well - our flagpole was the only casualty as I forgot to take it down prior to the storm. We have leaves and debris everywhere outside which means a cleanup effort today. I hesitate to do too much in the way of cleanup as we most likely will have another visit form the monsoon storms later today.

The golf course workers were out early this morning picking up fallen branches from trees and trying to get the course in shape as quickly as possible. It looks terrific from our house.

I'll end this entry with a photo I took earlier in the day of the newest quail family in our yard. These two chicks must have been born recently as you can see how small they are:

Our fingers are crossed that we have a much more calm day today...

Still No Rain

It has been since early March when we have seen any measurable rainfall. The monsoon has started - about a month ago - and we have yet to see any rain at all in this area. It appears that the storms are coming, but so far have remained either just north or just south. Today is suppose to be the day. I'm not counting on any so I watered the plants anyway.

We will try to iron out the changes in our health care plan today. It should be an easy transition as United Healthcare has left messages for us to contact them and we suspect that the subject is the change in our Primary Physician.

Furniture in the two bedrooms was moved around yesterday and we swapped TV's from the bedrooms. It appears that something was screwed up with the transfer as we weren't able to locate some of the shows we know we copied. I will investigate those today, but the rooms look much better now and we are getting closer to a final arrangement. The TV issue should be an easy one to resolve. With all the work we are doing inside, the garage is being, pretty much, ignored. Of course, it has been way too hot to do any kind of work in the garage so that will have to wait its turn...

Insurance Changes

We received a letter yesterday from our health care insurance - AARP Medicare Complete Insurance  coverage through United Healthcare. They informed us that our Primary Care Physician (PCP) is no longer in the plan network. He has been our primary physician for at least 15 years. The health insurance has appointed another doctor - pending our approval - who will take over the plan coverage for us. Of course, we know nothing about the replacement but we knew nothing about our present physician either when we started with him. Our main concern is that all of our records are transferred over in a timely manner so that there is no question about any coverages. We will follow up on that situation on Monday when the doctors' offices are open.

I made some Philly cheesesteaks for dinner last night. Yum! It has been several years since I made those and, surprisingly, all went well and they were delicious!

Our plan for today is to get some furniture changed around in the bedrooms. We have guests coming at the end of the month (Patty and Debby) and there are some pieces that would work better if swapped around . I also have to attach one of our TV's to the wall in our bedroom which is always a fun project. Ho hum...

Max Heat

Actually, there hasn't been much of anything to report the last couple of days. The heat is excessive and every time I try to do something around the house, I have to quit because I perspire so much. That's even with the A/C on. Once I sit down and drink some water, I'm OK again. I'm sure everybody is going through the same problem. The sad part is that we have this nice, new house on the golf course and the high heat has prevented our sitting outside on the patio to enjoy it. We can't wait for Fall.

We have to keep up with the watering of our plants that aren't on the sprinkler system and our bird bath totally evaporates every day during these high temperatures. Most of our plants are doing well except for a few of the cactus plants that are showing the effects of the heat. That is surprising to us as they are plants that should thrive in this weather.

We expect to see a little relief in the temperatures beginning on Monday...

AT&T Disappointments

We were a bit concerned about six weeks ago when we made the switch from Verizon phone service to AT&T. The promotions were too good to overlook and the savings - with both DirecTV and phone service - were too much to ignore. So far, we have been disappointed with AT&T - not for the  service, but for the handling of the transfer. We received another bill from Verizon with a huge outstanding balance that is suppose to be paid by AT&T. Also, they haven't yet credited us for Josie's new phone which is suppose to be a free upgrade for switching. We are running out of time to get these balances corrected before we begin to think about credit "dings" as a result of not paying the balances. I have lit a fire under the rep that sold us the new package, so we will give him some time to fix the issues. Sheesh!

Our landscaper didn't stop by yesterday to pick up his check for the work he did on Tuesday while we were gone. Hmm. Maybe he doesn't need the money (Ha Ha).

We arrived home from Show Low just in time to enjoy the hottest days of the year so far. It was 114 yesterday, will be 113 today and 112 on Saturday. I received our second electric bill yesterday. The first one we received for the first month was only $107. The one we received yesterday which was for the first full month was only $147. We must be doing something right with the A/C and fans combinations...

Nice Stay in Show Low

Our short stay in Show Low ended with some better luck and a nice surprise from the Casino. Josie and I both enjoyed some better luck at the slots and we played for several hours before the Casino accepted our final donation at around noon. We had a nice buffet breakfast at the Casino restaurant (before hitting the slots) that only amounted to $20 for both of us. The nicest surprise was a 4th of July gift to each Casino player that had a certain number of points for the day. Josie and I each qualified for one of the holiday folding chairs:

It was a nice touch to a fun stay.

As the previous day's exercise of looking at ownership RV spaces was a disappointment, we were hoping for a better experience at the second stop on the way home which was Juniper Ridge RV Resort that is located between Snowflake and Show Low:

This was a much more attractive option for what we were looking at to keep our fifth wheel at a nice, cool location during the hot Arizona summers. The spaces were large and it was a complete resort with all the amenities. The prices were not out of line for the properties, but had a couple drawbacks. The big one was that there is an annual charge of $2200 for the HOA. That is almost a curse word in our language. We don't want anymore experience with an HOA. The second problem was that there were no hard covers allowed for motorhomes or RV's on the spaces. That was a killer for us as we would want to have our fifth wheel covered, especially during the monsoon season. Most of the owners leave during the winter months, but we would want to have the option to keep our RV there for the entire year. A cover in the winter would prevent any snow from accumulating on the RV. Anyway, we passed on that one. We will probably limit our searches to lots that might be available in the desired areas that have utilities to the lot line and go from there.

The landscaping work was completed while we were gone and I will have a check ready for our landscaper to pick up sometime today. It's back to a normal (?) schedule again...

Arrival in Show Low

First of all, our landscaper showed up just as we were getting ready to leave for Show Low. He was given his instructions and told that he would be paid for the repair work when we returned on Thursday. He will not get paid for finishing the work on the palm trees as that was suppose to have been done when he originally trimmed them. We'll see how he did later today when we get home.

The drive to Show Low was very nice, as usual. We took the Beeline Highway to Payson and then Route 260 to Show Low. Prior to checking into the hotel, we stopped at an ownership RV park to check out the options. We could have skipped that stop as the spaces were not very large - although in the woods - and there was only one space remaining for sale which was way too small for us. There is another ownership park that we will investigate today on the way out of Show Low.

The Hon-Dah Casino and Resort was just about as we remembered it several years ago. I took these shots to show how it looks.

Starting with the entrance:

And then the foyer and stairway to the rooms:

They had done a very good job modernizing the rooms and stocking them with nice amenities. These shots show our room:

The Casino was much as we remembered except that the play was not quite the same. We played for a long time, winning some small jackpots, but ultimately the Casino got our stake for the night. We saved some money to try again this morning before we leave, but we never confuse the casino play with pressure to win - we play for the enjoyment, and not to get rich (although that would be a nice effect).

Our plan is to leave around noon today and head back to Sun City. We are really happy that we took the time to enjoy this little vacation and step away from our stressful routine over the last several months...

Off to Show Low

It was a quiet day yesterday. The landscaper missed his scheduled appointment - again - and has now scheduled his repairs to take place today. Of course, we will be gone, so he will have to wait to get paid - if he even shows up. It is frustrating dealing with these landscapers. They are all Mexican, and they are, for the most part, unreliable and undependable. I wish we could find a good, honest landscaper that has some values and takes pride in doing his work - on time and with good quality results. Fortunately, we should not need their services too much while living here.

We are preparing for our trip to Show Low today and look forward to a nice change in our routine. I'll get some shots along the way and hope to have some good ones for tomorrow....

Planned Trip

We made reservations yesterday for one night - Tuesday - at the Hon-Dah Casino and Hotel in Show Low, AZ. Since Josie had to work today, it kind of spoiled the holiday week as far as taking a longer trip. That will be a nice break for both of us from all the stress and hard work relating to our move into the house. That is, as you may recall, an old favorite of ours from when we first moved to AZ in the early 2000's. We used to go there for our anniversary celebration to see the fall colors in the white Mountains along with having some good fun in the casino. This trip, we will also be looking around at potential sites to keep our RV where we may be able to enjoy some summer weekends in the future. It is a beautiful area and we also have our good friends (Caroline and George) in Snowflake - up the road from Show Low - whom we visited earlier this year. We are definitely looking forward to this trip.

Speaking of travel, Patty has made her arrangements to visit us - along with Debby - the last week of July. That's another visit that we are looking forward to. We expect to have lots of fun going to different places and enjoying some time at the pool at our rec center.

Our landscaper is expected this morning to complete the repairs on our water line. He also needs to finish up on some "missed" trimming on the palm trees. I will be glad to get the water line fixed so that I can stop the manual watering program...

Still Hot and Dry

I just know that once the monsoon rains and severe storms arrive I am going to wish they would stop. We so desperately need some rain, but the storms that accompany the rain can cause some serious damage. The latest word is that the monsoon rains are moving into southeastern Arizona and there is a slight chance we will get some rain by the end of this week. The other part of that equation is the temperature. The last couple days have been reasonable - 104-106 - but the dangerous heat - 110-112 - is also expected to return by the end of the week. At any rate, I snapped another photo of the early morning view of the moon while enjoying our coffee outside:

The landscaper did not show up yesterday to fix our sprinkler problem - no surprise there. As a result, I have to continue to do the watering manually which is already getting old. He is now expected tomorrow AM to perform the work.

We have been trying to put together a mini trip (or vacation) for the holiday but Josie has to work on Monday - right in the middle of her days off. We may still find some short trip to take somewhere, so stay tuned for that...