Counting our Blessings

Just for your information:  Cows release some one hundred million TONS of hydrocarbon annually, by releasing gas.  To give you an idea of how much gas a cow emits; if the gas of ten cows could be captured - just 10 - it would provide heating for a small house for an entire year.  This sounds like an opportunity to me.  Honey, can we get a cow?

Country Tonight was the regular show for the first half, but after the intermission, the Christmas part kicked in and it was really beautiful and Christmasy.  Glad we went one more time. 

Monday was departure day for Donna and Ron.  Sad faces all around, but 6 weeks will go faster than 6 months and we will see them again in S. Padre Island in January if all goes to according to plan. One blessing...

Tuesday was our Jeep travel day to Raleigh, NC, but we weren't expecting much traffic, so we didn't leave until 9 am.  The whole drive was uneventful, but the traffic was a little heavier than expected.  We arrived in time for dinner to our daughter, Mandy's home just after dark.  It was so great to see the kids again.  We hadn't seen them or Gary's mom since Memorial Day and they had grown again!  Jack is now 7 and in second grade and Ainsley is 4 and in preschool. 

Jack has a BB gun and Gary brought his BB pistol and they spent the next afternoon hitting the target and knocking cans over.  Can you see the can falling?  Then Gary helped Ainsley put on her new nail polish with sparkles and glitter.

There was lots of preparation for Turkey day as 18 people would be sharing a meal with us, so two pies and black raspberry bars were made for dessert.  The turkey was ready to go in after Joe and Mandy participated in the Turkey Trot, a 5 K race for MS.  Here they are with their TT shirts, and happy with their finish time.  Proud blessings.

We cooked the turkey, made mashed potatoes, made a table centerpiece with a pumpkin or two:

When the guests arrived we ate and ate till we busted, took some photos and then relaxed.  Mandy and Joe do not waste time.  They are always busy, and on Black Friday, Mandy was up and gone by 7:30, while I took my time getting up.  When she came home around 10, we were ready for Gary to drop us off at the mall, while Joe took the kids to his dad's nursery to choose a Christmas tree.  By the time we got home, it was up and watered so he could go out hunting for deer.  Here's Ainsley helping mom decorate it.  Precious blessings.

Gary was a happy camper:  he had breakfast at Bruegger's on Wednesday, Thanksgiving Day, Friday for lunch and on our way home.  The boy loves his bagels, fortunately, so does Jack.  Fun blessings.

On saturday we needed to check out the Bull Chute for western wear and Jack wanted to go too.  He tried on his first cowboy boots and hat.  Cute little dude.  We didn't buy, just looked.  I did get all my Christmas shopping done for the Raleigh crowd - hooray!  A couple of blessings.

By the time we arrived back at Mandy's, the whole outside was decorated with bows and wreaths, and later that night we went to visit our dear friends, Dick and Diane Auxer.  I worked with Dick in 1998 for a few years and we became good friends.  We always make it a point to visit when we're in Raleigh.  More blessings.

Joe went hunting, so missed our Ruby Tuesday dinner out on Saturday night.  I wish we could be with our families for Christmas, but at least we will get to see them before we leave for the West.  We're hoping they can come out to visit us for some fun times on a school break perhaps.

Sunday came all too soon, and bad weather is forecasted for west Tennessee - with snow and ice!  We scooted home, but took a detour to see my Mom and Dad's old house in Columbus, NC.  It was sold in 2005 and is for sale again!  (Just a little curious to know what the asking price is.)  Entering Tennessee we decided to take a shortcut onto the Foothills Parkway where we took this picture of the Smokies from yet another angle.  We love the Smokies and we will return someday.  They wiggled into our hearts.

Before I could get my camera ready, we saw a bear foraging for his Thanksgiving leftovers,  but we didn't see any more.  After 9 hours on the road, we entered our campground driveway.  Home sweet home.  Bella looked good from the outside, but when we entered we heard a warning beep.  Something was wrong with the fridge.  It was flashing a 'no AC' 'no FL' warning.  Huh?  The inside was cold, the frozen food was still frozen, so we were perplexed.  The power hadn't gone off, and we had propane.  Gary checked the AC connection, the fuses and other stuff while I asked our neighbor, Graham, to come and take a look.  He brought his current detector tool, and everything checked out OK.  We messed around, checked the manual, and got it to run on LP for tonight.  I'll call Norcold tomorrow to see if they can help.  We are supposed to leave for Florida on Tuesday, but you know, the best laid plans get messed up, but plans made in pencil just get erased.  Hopefully we can figure this out and not have to call an RV repairman. 

So as not to use any propane, we had soup and toast for dinner.  It will be so good to sleep in our own bed, but we sure had a great time in Raleigh!  Thank you, dear daughter and family.  You are our best blessings.

Getting Ready to Go

Yesterday morning was drizzly and C-O-L-D (at least for Floridians).  We waited until afternoon to work in the 'yard' vacuuming the basement and washing chairs, the bird seeder, the rug and the grill.  We put them in the sun to dry while we had a little lunch.

After lunch I wanted to take a few photos of the solution to our sewer hose dilemma.  When we arrived in April, it was a long way from the valve to the sewer outlet.  And it went uphill.  We used our little accordion hose holder, but the weight of the grey water kept forcing the hose off the holder.  Anyway, when Ron arrived he saw the problem and solved it like this:

Yes, those are rocks near the outlet as the holder is too short to make it to the top of the outlet.  This ingenious idea is a 4 inch PVC pipe cut in half lengthwise and hollowed out on the end like so:

This allows the pipe to get right up to the elbow.  So at our daughter's house, we will use our son-in-law's saw to do just this.  But how to fit it into the Jeep?  Cut the halves in half again.  Then they will fit in our coach easier and we can use up to four pieces if needed.  Brilliant!

We were wet and muddy, and it was time to head inside to make dinner for Ron and Donna tonight.  I chose a crockpot meal recipe, but didn't know it used the crockpot until I read the whole recipe.  It was 4:30, but if I put it on high, it would be ready by 6:30 or so.  No problem.  I threw all kinds of stuff in the pot, boiled some angel hair and ta-da, dinner was ready. 

After dinner we talked about gate guarding again, weighing the pros and cons.  Personally I am looking forward to doing whatever I want whenever I want for weeks.  Donna is scared of the snakes, and Gary is a little wary of 'travelling Mexicans'.  Ron is fine with it.  Donna and Ron have done this before filling in for a couple who had cancelled last minute.  Our hesitation is of course Gary's treatments.  We don't know if he will still be having them, and if he is, a center will be far away from where we will be parked.  We don't even know where we will be parked at this point, and won't know until we are ready to start work in March.  Then we will be assigned a gate, and probably not with Ron and Donna.  But hopefully we could be.  Even if we are, we will probably be a few miles apart.  We'll keep you posted.  Right now we need to fill in the application, take tests and get finger printed.


Friday was treatment day, so we went through that.  It was a long morning waiting though so we didn't get out until noon.  We found out that our Physician's Assistant, Sonya, had been the greeter belle at Dixie Stampede for years.  We're glad she decided to go into medicine - she's a sweetheart here, too.  We stopped at Walmart to drop off prescriptions and pick up some more phone minutes.  Although we'd like smart phones, we opted for Tracfones.  You buy the phone with double the minutes for life for $30, and purchase minutes when you need them.  This works out to about $40 per month for 400 minutes and lasts about a month depending on how many people I talk to.  We have internet and text available on the phone if we need it, but that uses up more minutes .  For as long as we've been on the east coast, we've never had no signal, but I'm sure that will change once we head out west.  So far, so good.

Saturday was a work day for me at the office, and six people came in - two couples for a tent site!  Brrrrr - too cold for me!  Gary did some more work on the coach, checking fluids and batteries, etc.  We are checking our departure list daily to make sure we will be ready to go.  Five o'clock came around finally, and I locked up and headed home.  The CG owner assured me that I'd have a job next year if we chose to come back.  Nice to know that I can use her as a reference.  We had a little dinner and tried to make some more plans in pencil, then headed to bed.

Sunday we woke up and wanted Cracker Barrel for breakfast.  It's down the parkway some, right next to Krispy Kreme Donuts - and the HOT NOW sign was lit!  First time we've ever seen it lit up!  Did we want donuts before breakfast??  Noooo.  I might as well have just smeared them on my hips.    Cracker Barrel was delicious and we did some Christmas shopping, too!

Since that put us in the shopping mood (much to the chagrin of the boys) Gatlinburg was our next stop.  We enjoy parking in the Welcome Center and having the Trolley drive us into the center of town.  We walked on the far side of the street and the arts and crafts stores had some delectable items.  A little more shopping done, we decided we needed a cheap lunch at McDonald's.  The McChicken sandwich for $1 is plenty big and just the right price.  The boys did a lot of sitting on benches as we walked around and around looking and buying. 

As soon as we got home, we put away our new purchases and our neighbor, Kelly, came over to ask if we were ready to have our fingerprints done for our gate guarding job.  Kelly is a retired Police Detective from California and offered to help.  It was fun and very messy, and we appreciate Kelly's expertise enormously. 

After a quick dinner we are going to see Country Tonight's Christmas show.  We'll let you know how that was tomorrow.  

Another great day in the Smokies.  We will really miss those beautiful mountains, but look forward to some bigger ones!   Thanks for visiting!

Dixie Stampede and New Friends

Monday was a work day at the campground office and it was windy and cloudy all day.  It is so slow here that I had three phone calls all day and made one reservation.  A lot of people choose the weekdays to travel so we had 8 checkouts this morning.  Gary and I choose to travel  Mondays through Thursdays, too; the traffic being a little lighter after the morning rush hour.  We plan to leave this campground on the 29th if the weather is good.  If not, we have a couple days leeway before we have to be in Florida on December 5th.  Travelling over mountains demands good weather, doncha know. 

We're very excited to get back home (home meaning warm weather, palm trees and the beach).  But we don't plan to stay very long.  Just a few million things to do, and then we'll be on our way to TEXAS!  We don't know where we'll be spending Christmas this year,but it will be the first one we've ever had without family. 

Tuesday was a better day to return my wedding outfit that I didn't use, and everyone sat in the Jeep while I ran into two stores and convinced the salesgirls to please take them back.  They were both understanding and gave me a refund.  Of course we were hungry again and since it was a cool day decided on our favorite sandwich/soup shop McAlister's.  After a really good feed, we returned to Stage West western wear so we could check out belts and stuff.  A company named Justin makes western wear and Donna and Ron got a cool belt and buckle with Justin printed on it for their grandson, Justin.  He will be the envy of all in school.

After that, we headed home to rest for Dixie Stampede's Christmas show.  It had started raining, so Gary dropped us off at the front door, and got to park just 25 yards away near the buses.  The place was jammed - every seat was taken and for a good reason.  The show was great as it had a lot more Christmas in it including sheep, goats, donkeys and three Wiseman camels!  There were the regular games with the audience: kids chasing chickens, and dads throwing toilet seat covers as giant horseshoes to determine whether the North or the South pole teams were winning.  Since you eat dinner completely with your hands (no utensils) sometimes it's impossible to applaud.  Therefore you stamp your feet - thus Dixie Stamp-ede.  It was a lot of fun and we got out around 8 but stopped at the French's Boot store to check out their footwear.  Gary found another pair he liked but we didn't buy them - that 10% tax is tough to swallow.

Donna and Ron's neighbors Judy and Norm Black from Texas came to visit on Wednesday around lunch time.  They moved from California to Tennessee a few years ago as a retirement place and love it.  We talked and talked, ate subs, talked some more, went to No Way Jose's for dinner, returned home and we said goodnight. 

Judy and Norm and us

Thursday Ron had to work in the CG office instead of Sunday and I only have a few days left to work there, too.  I can't believe how fast 7 months has gone, but April does seem like a hundred years ago.  When having fun...doncha know.   Friday we will return our outfits to Wardrobe and turn in our ID cards to Dollywood.  We don't know if we'll be back, but the Smokies have gotten into our blood.  It was a good experience working for Dollywood, and I'm glad we did it just to see the Smokies and the beautiful area of East Tennessee.

We are looking forward to getting back on the road, visiting Grandchildren and our children before heading west and brand new adventures.  Stay with us!