It Was A Long Day

 Posted by at 12:35 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 202023
 

Yesterday started with a 7:30 AM phone call from our son Travis,saying that his wife, Geli, was broken down in Bessemer, up near Birmingham. Geli works nights as the clinical director at a hospital there, and she had just gotten off her shift, stopped for gas, and got on the highway when her car went haywire. All of the dashboard lights were on and it was losing power and lurching. She was able to make it off the shoulder of the highway and call Travis.

It’s about 60 miles from their house to where she was, and by the time I picked him up and we got there, the poor lady was exhausted and frazzled. I’m no kind of mechanic, but back in the good old days I could usually get a car running if there wasn’t anything terribly wrong with it. Not so with today’s computerized cars, it’s way above my pay grade. After opening the hood and seeing the engine was running smoothly as long as it was idling and seeing that the serpentine belt was in place, I had gone through my repertoire of ideas.

As it turned out, her towing insurance is only good for 20 miles or to the nearest garage, and it being a Sunday and not knowing any of the garages in the area, Geli wasn’t comfortable with that option. So the first order of business was taking her home so she could get to bed because she had to work Sunday evening.

With that out of the way, Travis and I went to U-Haul in Tuscaloosa and rented a tow dolly to go back and pick up her car. Geli’s brother works at a garage in Gordo, so we took it there and dropped it off, then I took Travis home. Terry met me at their house to drop off her Pacifica for Geli to use to get to work until her car is fixed, then she and I took the tow dolly back to U-Haul.

We needed to get some groceries so we stopped at Publix and stocked up with enough to keep us for another couple of weeks. Then we went to Lowe’s and bought ten bags of Black Kow steer manure, a couple of bags of potting soil, and some other things Terry needed for her garden.

It was about 6:30 by the time we got home, and this fat old man was worn out. Once we got the groceries carried inside, I parked my butt in my recliner and stayed there until Terry had dinner ready. Then we watched the new episode of Call The Midwife on PBS, and it was time to write the blog. All in all, a long day for an old fart like me. But Terry and I are glad that we are here and able to help the kids out when they need us, just like they are here for us when we need help. It’s good to be around family.

Congratulations Thomas J Van de Bussche, winner of our drawing for an audiobook of Big Lake, my first novel and the first book in my Big Lake small town mystery series. This is the book that started me on my career as an author.

We had 37 entries this time around. Stay tuned, a new contest starts soon. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books and audiobooks to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Thought For The Day – Sometimes you have to stop thinking so much and just go where your heart takes you.

Another Problem Tackled

 Posted by at 12:25 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 192023
 

Yesterday morning a crew from ProScape was back out here again, tackling another problem related to our drainage issues. Long before we bought the house the area around the culvert under the driveway had caved in on one side, completely blocking the opening. Obviously, if water can’t flow through the culvert, it’s going to back up somewhere and erode the earth around it, so we needed to get that remedied.

They brought out a backhoe and dug it out, and then discovered that the other end was also blocked, so they started on that. As soon as the entry and exit were both cleared, a gush of backed-up water started flowing. The ditch downstream from the culvert was also overgrown and partially blocked, so they opened that up, too.

Hopefully we’re getting a handle on all of this, although when I walked across the portion of the backyard that was covered in hay and seed it was very soft from the rain we got Friday morning, and my feet wanted to sink in. I am hoping that won’t be an ongoing issue with everything we have done.

Our nighttime temperatures have been down in the 20s, and yesterday I think we got up to a high of about 50 degrees. Today is supposed to be even colder, only reaching the low to mid-40s at best. But the weatherman says that by the end of the week we’ll see 80 degrees. Travis and Terry are both eager to get started with their gardens, but the local weather guru says to wait until April 15, just to be sure.

Yesterday was another writing day for me and I got in another 3,300 words or so. Then I printed out some more chapters of A Changing World, my new Tinder Street book, for Terry to edit and proofread.

I honestly don’t know where she gets the energy for everything she does, because while I was writing, Terry was piddling, as she calls it. She hung some more new window blinds, moved some boxes around and put things away, did laundry, and then made a delicious chicken pot pie, completely from scratch, for dinner. Is there nothing she can’t do? If there is, I haven’t figured out what it is yet.

Today is your last chance to enter our latest Free Drawing for an audiobook of Big Lake, my first novel and the first book in my Big Lake small town mystery series. This is the book that started me on my career as an author.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn this evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books and audiobooks to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us. Kite flying is prohibited? Why?

Thought For The Day – Don’t let the answers you want to hear get in the way of the answers you need to hear.

All Done!

 Posted by at 12:45 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 182023
 

When we first talked to Austin Marcum from ProScape about our drainage issues, he said it would probably take his crew a week to ten days to get the job done. It actually took them four days from when they started ripping out the top layer of dirt and grass in our backyard on Monday morning to when they finished up Thursday afternoon. They were hardworking guys who obviously knew their business and didn’t waste any time.

After grading and leveling the backyard to create a natural drainage path, they dug a trench from the backyard along the side of the house to the ditch in front of our property. Then they dug another trench across the front yard to connect with the first one. These would be the basis for our French drains. They lined the trenches with heavy black fabric and then put in big drainage tubes to carry water away.

The next step was to cover the trenches with rock to facilitate drainage into them.

When we woke up Thursday morning, they had sod stacked and ready to go.

By the end of the day they had laid down the sod in part of the backyard and along the drainage trenches, and filled the rest of the backyard with a combination of hay and grass seed.

Austin tells me that we should see a real difference between the sloppy morass we had for so long, and we are really looking forward to that. It rained for a while early Friday morning, and when we woke up there were a few places in the back where there was some standing water, but within a couple of hours, it had drained away. That’s a big difference because it has been a soggy mess since we moved in.

The rain was supposed to last all day yesterday, but instead, it was gone by mid-morning. However, it was downright cold, and except for going out to the road to bring in our trash can and get the mail, I stayed at my computer all day. By the time I stopped about 7 PM I had another 3,700 words done in my latest Tinder Street book.

While I was doing that, Terry was hanging up some new window blinds, doing laundry, and everything else she does on a daily basis to make my life easy. Then for dinner, she made delicious hot deli-style Italian sandwiches. Yes, I know I’m spoiled. Stop being jealous, it’s not going to do you any good.

Be sure to enter our latest Free Drawing. This week’s prize is an audiobook of Big Lake, my first novel and the first book in my Big Lake small town mystery series. This is the book that started me on my career as an author.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn Sunday evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books and audiobooks to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Thought For The Day – I used to care what people thought about me until one day when I tried to pay my bills with their opinion.

She’s Got The Fever

 Posted by at 1:13 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 172023
 

Terry has gardening fever, and I blame it on our son Travis. I’ve told you before that Travis is an avid and successful gardener, and ever since we first looked at our property here in Alabama he’s been telling us about all the options we have for growing vegetables. That’s something Terry has always wanted to do, but until recently all she could use was her small AeroGarden. Now she’s got acres of space to plant anything she wants, and the two of them have been going over ideas and tips for weeks now.

Travis and his wife Geli are very much back to the land type people, and they do a lot of composting to reduce their footprint on the earth and enhance their growing success. In talking to them, one thing Terry decided she wanted was a worm farm to help consume our kitchen waste compost to make worm castings for her upcoming garden. Worm castings are considered to be one of the best things you can do for a garden, and they are also very good at breaking up soil, including the clay we have here.

I guess all of this was an omen, or maybe it was putting out some kind of gardening vibe, because the other day one of our neighbors stopped by and gave Terry three small fig trees, which seem to grow very well in this area.

We decided to have a day out yesterday, and after stopping off at Travis and Geli’s house to visit for a few minutes and see what they’re up to now, which was planting potatoes, we drove into Tuscaloosa. Our first stop was at Tuscaloosa Tractor Company, where I picked up a set of pallet forks for my Kubota tractor. They will come in handy for a lot of projects around here, including building the backstop for the shooting range.

A short distance away, we went to Johnson’s Garden And Café, an excellent nursery with a huge variety of plants and trees, and an exceptionally friendly and helpful staff. We spent a couple of hours there and Terry found quite a few things that had to come home with us, including some blueberry bushes, a couple of apple trees, a nectarine tree, along with lavender, sage, rosemary, and chive plants. I’m sure this is a business we’re going to be spending a lot of time at. I was pleasantly surprised when they asked if I was a veteran, and when I replied that I was, they gave us a 15% discount on our purchase.

By then it was getting about time to eat, so we stopped at the Shrimp Basket on McFarland Boulevard. We first became acquainted with these small seafood restaurants when we were down on the Alabama Gulf Coast during our fulltime RVing days and we always enjoyed going back to them. This one was just as good, and it’s being added to our list of local favorites.

When we left there, we stopped at Tractor Supply because Terry’s green thumb was still itchy. We hit the jackpot there, buying seed potatoes, rhubarb, asparagus, strawberry, and blackberry seedlings, along with two peach trees. I think we’ve got enough to get her started with an excellent garden, along with some trees that will provide fruit in the years to come.

We also made a stop at Publix and Walmart on the way home to pick up a few things we needed, and by the time we got back to the house it was well after dark. Since we have a 100% chance of rain today, along with nighttime freezing temperatures through Sunday, all of the garden items went into the garage for now.

While we were gone UPS delivered several packages, and once the pickup was unloaded I went out on the front porch to bring them in. I left the door open while I brought the first ones inside, and when I turned around to get the other package a small raccoon was standing in the doorway peering around. I guess he was curious and wanted to see who the new neighbors are. I explained to him that he needed to go away, and after checking me out for a few seconds he decided that was a good idea and turned around and scampered out of sight. Country living at its best!

Be sure to enter our latest Free Drawing. This week’s prize is an audiobook of Big Lake, my first novel and the first book in my Big Lake small town mystery series. This is the book that started me on my career as an author.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn Sunday evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books and audiobooks to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Thought For The Day – Never put off until tomorrow what you don’t have to do at all.

Not A Nice Dad

 Posted by at 12:30 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 162023
 

Okay, I admit it. While I may come across as a charming little cherub to many of you out there in blogland, that’s really not the truth. Ask my son Travis and he will tell you that I’m not a nice dad.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I’ve never been an abusive father, although there were a few times when I wanted to poke his eyes out when he was a teenager, but there’s something lacking in me that is going to keep me from ever getting the Father of the Year award. I think it’s called empathy.

Travis will be 46 this year, and since there is a history of colon cancer in our family, he’s reached that age where certain things have to be done to ensure his continued good health. Among those things is the occasional colonoscopy, which he had to have yesterday.

If any of you have ever had to have this procedure done, you know the worst part is actually the preparation, when you have to consume a nasty concoction to cleanse your system for the exam. I don’t know the actual name of the product that is used to do this, but in layman’s terms it should be called Shitzalot. Yeah, you know what I mean.

On Tuesday, while Travis was going through the dreaded preparation, I wanted to show him my concern, like a good father should. So I called him and asked him how he was doing, and asked and if he was feeling pooped. He didn’t see the humor in that, so I suggested he might want to get some rest because he sounded wiped out. I don’t know how your adult children are, but I think his reply to me was really rude. He suggested I do something to myself that is morally repugnant and physically impossible.

The good news is, he survived the preparation and came through the procedure just fine, and when I talked to him yesterday afternoon, he said that he doesn’t have to do it again for five years. He sounded relieved about that until I reminded him that five years goes by very quickly. He told me to do something else disgusting in response. I don’t get no respect.

It’s Thursday, so it’s time for a new Free Drawing. This week’s prize is an audiobook of Big Lake, my first novel and the first book in my Big Lake small town mystery series. This is the book that started me on my career as an author.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn Sunday evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books and audiobooks to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us. Having eaten in open-air restaurant on the beach, I can understand this policy completely.

Thought For The Day – On very bad days, when I’m sure I can’t take anymore, I try to remind myself that my track record for getting through bad days is 100%.

I Got Stoned

 Posted by at 12:40 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 152023
 

There’s always something going on around our place lately, and yesterday I got stoned. A big dump truck showed up in the early afternoon to drop off 26 tons of large gravel. A lot of it will be used by the crew from ProScape who are installing our French drains, and I will use the rest on our driveway and to build up some other low spots. I’m sure before all is said and done, I’ll get another load. This makes me very happy I bought my Kubota BX2680 tractor with the bucket loader, because that would require a lot of shoveling and pushing wheelbarrows around.

About the time the driver finished delivering the load of rock, our daughter Tiffany called from Arizona. She and her husband Kenny are flying to Florida today for a wedding in the Tampa area, and we were almost wishing we were still there because it would be great to see them. But they have to be back home on Sunday, so there’s no time for them to come up here. We’re looking forward to having them come out and visit once things settle down a bit. We also want to have Terry’s parents come out. Since they are both in their 90s we weren’t sure if they would be up to a flight like that, but her mother assured us that they are.

Tiffany has seen a lot of pictures of the property obviously, but while I was talking to her I decided to get on the Kawasaki Mule and drive around the perimeter road while Facetiming her. She really liked that and said it gave her a much better perspective on what we have going on here.

One of the projects on my To Do List is to build a high backstop for the shooting range. Even though there is nothing but forest behind us, I always want to know my bullets aren’t going to be flying around injuring, or worse yet, killing somebody.

I’ve been working on the design in my head for quite a while, as well as looking at different things online. This is similar to what I have in mind, a back wall of railroad ties, and then walls projecting outward from the sides to catch any ricochets or errant shots. But I plan to make it higher, probably six feet, and I will pile dirt up in front and behind it as an extra barrier. Most of the shooting will be done with handguns, so there won’t be many long distance shots.

After Terry finished editing and proofreading six more chapters of my new Tinder Street book, I sent them off to Judy and Roberta to do their thing. I’m really having fun with this story, and it’s already taking some turns I didn’t see coming. Since I never outline a book ahead of time, I just sit down and start writing whatever the characters in my head tell me to, this is the best part of the experience for me. More than once a book has ended up completely different than the way I thought it would be when I wrote the first chapter. That always amazes me.

We have several cold nights ahead of us, and the days aren’t going to be much warmer, except for Thursday, when we might get up to 70 degrees. It’s just as well that I have a book to keep me busy since it’s too cold to go out and play with my toys and start any of my projects right now.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us. When Ray Herron sent me this picture, I immediately thought of several people I would be more than happy to lend a quarter to. Some of them I would even go half a buck. It would be worth it!

Thought For The Day – I know the voices in my head aren’t real, but boy, do they come up with some great stories!

Somebody Stole Our Yard!

 Posted by at 12:40 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 142023
 

Boy, you can’t trust anybody these days, even in small towns. You go to sleep one night and everything’s okay, and you wake up the next morning and somebody stole your yard!

Not really. I’ve mentioned before that we were amazed that companies here actually show up on time and do the jobs they say they’re going to do, unlike in Florida, where we had numerous contractors and other so-called professionals who made appointments and never showed up, or who did come and give us an estimate but then failed to return and do the work on the agreed upon date. More often than not, they never came back even after we signed a contract! But here in Alabama, our experience has been that folks show up when they say they’re going to, and even ahead of schedule, and do the job right.

I’ve written before about the problems we had with drainage on our property due to the heavy clay content in the soil. We had Austin Marcum from ProScape in Tuscaloosa come out and give us an estimate to mitigate these problems, and he said they would start on Tuesday (today) of this week. But bright and early yesterday morning we were awakened to the sound of heavy equipment in our yard, and looked up to see a crew hard at work stripping off all of the topsoil.

This picture is what part of the backyard looked like before they started, and the picture below it is what it looked like by the end of the day.

They have to take all of the soil off the top and regrade the land so that the water will flow better to a drainage ditch on one side of the property, and to French drains they will be installing on the other side. Then they will replace what they removed with new topsoil, sod, and grass seed.

Everything that was coming off the top was taken to the back end of our pasture and deposited there. I will use it later to fill in some low spots on the road back to the barn and the trails surrounding the property.

There was a crew of five young men and they worked hard all day long, only stopping at lunch and for one short break in the afternoon. Once all of the top layer of soil was stripped from the backyard, they started putting in trenches in the front for the French drains.

When we moved here in January we got everything we needed into the house except my big gun safe. It’s the size of a refrigerator and weighs 685 pounds. The front yard was so muddy that we couldn’t get an appliance dolly through it, so it’s been sitting in the garage waiting for things to dry up enough to someday get it into the house. I mentioned that to Austin when he gave us the estimate, and he said he was sure his crew could help me get that job done. And sure enough, when the guys were finished yesterday they used their Kubota bucket loader to move the safe from the garage onto the front porch, and then took it back to where we needed it to be in our bedroom. Talk about going the extra mile!

They will be back again today, hitting it hard. I’m impressed!

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Thought For The Day – A friend is someone who overlooks your broken fences and admires the flowers in your garden.

Rude Awakenings

 Posted by at 12:59 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 132023
 

When you live in tornado country like we do, having a weather radio just makes sense. Except when it wakes you up twice in the middle of the night with a siren and alerts to let you know about bad weather two states away. That’s what our Raynic radio did twice early Saturday morning, once about 2:30 AM and again about 3:15. the alerts were for severe thunderstorms in Arkansas and northern Mississippi. I’m sure there is a way to fine tune it to only broadcast alerts for our area, but nothing in the instructions that came with the radio tell me how to do that. I guess I need to spend some time on Google or YouTube trying to figure it out.

While I’m there, I also need to do some research on how to keep deer out of the garden that Terry and our son Travis are going to be planting. For whatever reason, Travis has not had a problem with deer at his place, but we have anywhere from two or three to as many as fifteen or more grazing in our pasture at night. I’m sure they wouldn’t hesitate to eat everything in the garden as soon as it pokes its head above the soil.

I really don’t want to have to build a high fence around the garden area, and I don’t want to do something to frighten them off the property altogether because we love seeing them out there. We’re just selfish and don’t want to share what we are growing with them. I’m always open to suggestions. If you’re a gardener, what has worked for you?

We had a lot of rain overnight Saturday and into early Sunday morning, and then the rest of the day it was gray and ugly. So of course we had big pools of water in our yard. The company we hired to install French drains and do some land grading to hopefully mitigate that problem it’s supposed to start today or tomorrow. We are keeping our fingers crossed for good results.

And in other news, in less than a month’s time we have a contract on our house in Florida. It is a cash deal and the buyers are in their inspection period now. Please keep your fingers crossed for us that this goes through. We don’t have a mortgage on the property, but it still costs us money in monthly amenity fees for the community, utilities, and taxes that we would like to be done with.

Congratulations Carolyn Ledford, winner of our drawing for a $100 gift certificate donated by Joyce Counts from JG Wood Signs to be used to order one of their custom made signs. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to win a wonderful gift. Check out their website, they have an amazing variety of beautiful signs for your home, RV, or any place else you can think of.

We had 119 entries this time around. Stay tuned, a new contest starts soon. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Thought For The Day – if you want to know who your tribe is, speak your truth and see who sticks around. Those are the people who get a spot in your blanket fort.

Chimes, Chicken, And Crawfish

 Posted by at 12:45 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 122023
 

Terry and I both love the sound of wind chimes and she has a small set of bamboo chimes that hang here in the house. Every once in a while a breeze from one of our ceiling fans or somebody passing by will move them just enough to give us a gentle little sound. But you know how it is in life, bigger is always better, right?

A few days ago we were at the Ace Hardware in Northport and found a display of beautiful Wind River Corinthian Bells. Made with powder coated aluminum tubes that are individually hand tuned, the soft, rich sound of these things is beyond beautiful. Click the link provided and listen to the sample, I think you’ll agree. We bought a set of the biggest ones, in the scale of G, and Terry hung them on the deck behind our garage. Even the slightest air movement makes them hum, and just a little bit of breeze treats us to a symphony of sound. We love them!

Yesterday was another good writing day for me, about 4,000 more words in A Changing World, the fifth book in my Tinder Street family saga. When I finished up for the day I printed out five more chapters for Terry to begin editing and proofreading.

I have been craving some of Terry’s delicious fried chicken, and I must have been a very good boy because yesterday that’s what she made for dinner. Big, juicy, delicious breasts that just can’t be beat by any restaurant in the world.

About the time she was cooking them, our neighbor TJ from across the road sent me a message asking if we liked crawfish. That’s something I can take or leave, but Terry absolutely loves them, so he brought her over a big bag full of hot crawfish fresh out of the steamer/boiler. Fried chicken and crawfish, now that’s a southern meal if I ever heard of one!

The weatherman is predicting storms with quite a bit of rain and wind for our area for part of the day today, which makes it an excellent day to stay home and keep on writing. I’m way behind and really want to get this book out, but at the same time I won’t rush it and cut corners. The story and my readers deserve better than that.

Today is your last chance to enter our Free Drawing for a $100 gift certificate donated by Joyce Counts from JG Wood Signs to be used to order one of their custom made signs. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to win a wonderful gift. Check out their website, they have an amazing variety of beautiful signs for your home, RV, or any place else you can think of.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn this evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Thought For The Day – Based on the look on your face, I’m going to assume that I thought out loud again.

Sammy Has A Home

 Posted by at 12:25 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 112023
 

We met Bob and Lynn Throckmorton from Hemet, California during our first month on the road as fulltime RVers, when we were all students at Life on Wheels in Moscow, Idaho. They were the very first subscribers to our Gypsy Journal RV Travel Newspaper, and we struck up a friendship that has stood the test of time. Whenever we have crossed paths in our travels or at our western Gypsy Journal rallies, we always had a wonderful time with this fun loving, adventurous couple.

Now that we are all off the road, we keep in touch by e-mail and on Facebook. And while I have been using whatever creative talents I may have in writing books, Lynn has shown herself to be an accomplished artist. Every time she has shared some of her work on Facebook, I have been more than impressed. So imagine my delight when she contacted me a while back and said that she wanted to send us one of her original creations, Sammy The Seahorse.

I told her that we would be thrilled to have Sammy living with us, and he arrived yesterday. Lynn told me that Bob had used his engineering skills to pack the box, and there was no question about that because it almost took a demolition expert to get it open without doing harm to what was inside. Now Sammy hangs in a place of honor in our house, a reminder of a wonderful friendship with a wonderful couple. Thank you, Lynn. We love Sammy.

Most of yesterday was spent writing two new chapters in my latest Tinder Street book, and by the time I knocked off about 6:30 I had somewhere around 5,100 words in for the day. Not an award-winning writing day, but not bad either.

During the afternoon, Austin and Manuel from ProScape, the company that is going to be undertaking a major project here to try to solve some of our drainage issues, came by to look over the property, do some final measurements, and to locate underground water lines and the septic tank so they wouldn’t be damaged in the process. We are supposed to have quite a bit of rain on Sunday, but if the weather cooperates after that, they should be starting early in the week. Austin said we are looking at ten days to two weeks to complete everything we need done. It’s not going to be cheap, and I sure hope it works.

So far over 90 people have entered this week’s Free Drawing for a $100 gift certificate donated by Joyce Counts from JG Wood Signs to be used to order one of their custom made signs. You still have time to enter, so don’t miss out on this opportunity to win a wonderful gift. Check out their website, they have an amazing variety of beautiful signs for your home, RV, or any place else you can think of.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn Sunday evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Thought For The Day – Some might call me delusional, but I prefer the term imaginative.

Kind Of Under Cover

 Posted by at 12:05 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 102023
 

After reading about us using my Kubota tractor so much earlier in the week, reader Henry Bowman wrote to ask me if it and the Kawasaki Mule are parked outside since we don’t have the huge garage we did at our Florida house.

No, they are not quite outside, they are kind of under cover, parked in the carport down the hill from the house here on our property. It’s not complete protection from the weather, but even in the heaviest rains we have had, they stay dry. Eventually I plan to have an enclosed steel building put up to hold them and some other goodies.

Though I said they are protected from the rain, nothing seems to protect anything from the heavy pollen that has covered everything in a dusting of yellowish green. The stuff is everywhere. After we finished hauling the manure to my son’s place on Wednesday afternoon, Travis washed our Ram pickup and it was shiny silver once more. But when I took the trash cans out to the road yesterday evening it was already getting covered again. Stand by for heavy allergy season, it’s upon us!

One of the great things about living in the country is that every night we see anywhere from six to twenty deer out in our pasture. I have wanted a way to get a better view of them, and hopefully some pictures. Since I had quite a bit of Amazon credits built up from gift cards and bonus points on my credit card, I used them to purchase a set of GTHUNDER Night Vision Goggles. They can be used for viewing in total darkness and will take both video and still photos. They arrived yesterday and I gave them a quick checkout last night. They definitely work, but the image is grainy. I need to read the manual and figure out how to fine tune them.

At the same time, I also ordered a pair of Meidase P60 night vision trail cameras. I have not had time to try them out yet, and since it is supposed to be rainy today, it may be the weekend before I do. We have some big bucks around here and I’d love to get some pictures of them.

I knew that this week’s Free Drawing was going to get a lot of attention, and I was right. So far over 55 people have entered. And who can blame them with a prize like this one?  Joyce Counts from JG Wood Signs has donated a $100 gift certificate to be used to order one of their custom made signs. Check out their website, they have an amazing variety of beautiful signs for your home, RV, or any place else you can think of.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn Sunday evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us. Remember, Big Brother has eyes everywhere.

Thought For The Day – My wife thinks I’m crazy, but I’m not the one who married me!

Back At The Computer

 Posted by at 12:05 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 092023
 

I spent part of the day yesterday helping Travis and Geli get the last load of manure from our barn over to their place, then stopped at the post office in Gordo to mail out a book order. From there, it was back home and back to the computer, working on my new Tinder Street book.

The first order of business was to make corrections to the first five chapters that proofreaders Judy and Roberta had finished and sent back to me. Once I have that done, I narrated another chapter into my Sony digital recorder and transcribed it with Dragon NaturallySpeaking Premium software, and added the new chapter to the manuscript.

As I’ve said before, I do a lot of research to get the details right in my books, but even so, I almost goofed. The part of the story I’m working on now takes place in the summer of 1935, and I had a scene where the characters were playing the board game Monopoly. But something didn’t seem quite right about that so I went back and checked my notes, and it turns out that Parker Brothers did not release the game until November of 1935. Oops. So instead, they ended up playing Parcheesi. It’s all in the details.

With any luck, I should be able to knock out a couple more chapters today. I’ve got some big events coming up in the next few chapters that are going to dramatically impact the lives of some of the folks on Tinder Street as they try to survive a family tragedy and keep their heads above water in the economic chaos brought on by the Great Depression.

It’s Thursday, so it’s time for a new Free Drawing. I know this week’s prize is going to get a lot of attention because it’s a biggie, folks. Joyce Counts from JG Wood Signs has donated a $100 gift certificate to be used to order one of their custom made signs. Check out their website, they have an amazing variety of beautiful signs for your home, RV, or any place else you can think of. After some spending some time looking over their website and all they have to offer, I’m almost wishing I could enter the contest myself!

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn Sunday evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Thought For The Day – You don’t need to have it all figured out. Sometimes taking the wrong path is all part of the process.

My Kid Is Weird

 Posted by at 12:35 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 082023
 

I love my son but that doesn’t change the fact that he is weird. Very weird. Who else do you know that would actually get excited about a day spent shoveling horse manure? Well, my kid did and he was happy as a pig in, well, manure.

As I wrote in yesterday’s blog, the folks we bought our place from had three horses here, and when they were getting ready to clean everything up for us, I asked them to just leave all of the manure in the stalls and where it was piled up outside of the barn because our son Travis wanted it for fertilizer for his gardens.

Yesterday Travis came over and spent most of the day cleaning out the stalls and shoveling everything out of the barn. That was a lot of crapola!

But before we started on that project, we first took the mower deck off of my Kubota tractor. I won’t need it for a while yet, until the grass starts growing in our pasture, and in the meantime, it was in the way when using the tractor for other things.

I’d read the owner’s manual a couple of times but I still couldn’t quite figure out how to make the quick-release work for the tractor. Thanks to YouTube, we found a video that took us right through the steps, making it pretty easy.

It looks a lot better with the mower deck off, and it definitely handles better.

After Travis had everything shoveled out of the barn, we used the bucket loader on the tractor to fill the back of our Ram pickup. I was a little nervous about that, but with Travis standing in the bed of the truck guiding me, and going slow and taking my time, we got it loaded without any problems. Have you ever seen somebody look so happy standing in a pile of horse poop?

By the end of the day we wound up taking two truckloads of manure over to Travis and Geli’s house, and we have one more to go today. Geli said I am getting so much better with the tractor that we might be able to make a country boy out of me one of these days. This was a win-win situation because Travis wanted the manure and I wanted the barn cleaned out. Even better, he and Geli did all the physical work and I just drove the tractor and the truck.

They say every cloud has a silver lining, and I guess that even included the cloud of manure dust we kicked up yesterday. Whatever it was, I’m glad I was able to capture this view over our place yesterday afternoon.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Thought For The Day – Nutrition fact – if you drink a gallon of water every day you won’t have time for other people’s drama, because you will be too busy peeing. Stay hydrated, my friends.

Horse Pucky

 Posted by at 12:25 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 072023
 

Yesterday was a good day for writing, even if it was frustrating. I had narrated a full chapter in my new Tinder Street book, using Microsoft Word’s narration feature, and I thought I was saving all along. But for some reason, all of a sudden the entire chapter, over 2,300 words, disappeared. It was just gone, and no matter what I did I could not retrieve it. I checked and the auto-save feature was on, but after a good half hour of trying to find where it was, I gave up and started over again. Fortunately, the information was still fresh in my mind so it did not take terribly long to duplicate it.

This has happened before and I still don’t know why. It only does it while I’m actively narrating into Word. From now on I think I’m just going to narrate into my Sony digital recorder and transcribe it into text with Dragon. I can actually transcribe with the newest edition of Word, but it does not recognize punctuation, so it takes a long time to go in and correct all of that.

One of the biggest regrets of my life is that I never learned to type more than with just two fingers. When I was in high school, boys weren’t allowed to take typing. That was for girls. We had to take shop class. And now, at age 70 with arthritic fingers, trying to learn how to type is just about impossible.

While I was doing that Terry finished editing and proofreading the first five chapters of the manuscript. I went through it and made her suggested corrections, then sent them off to Judy and Roberta, my next two proofreaders. I’m always anxious when I start a new book, not sure how it’s going to come along and if it follows the flavor of the other books in whatever series it is. Terry told me not to worry, this one is good and she’s hooked already.

In yesterday’s blog I told you about discovering through Ancestry.com, that my great-great grandfather, George Russell, was doing time in the Ohio State Penitentiary for “hoss stealing” as it was listed on the 1860 census. We’re not going to be stealing any horses around here, but today we’re going to be dealing with a lot of horse pucky.

The folks we bought the property from had three horses here, and when they were getting ready to clean everything up for us, I asked them to just leave all of the manure in the stalls and where it was piled up outside of the barn because our son Travis wanted it for fertilizer for his gardens. Today he’s going to come over and help me take the mower attachment off of my Kubota tractor, and then start cleaning out the stalls and getting everything together to take over to his place before planting season.

That’s not a job I envy him doing. When I was a firearms instructor at West Point, they kept the Army mule mascots there, and sometimes when a young soldier got into trouble he was assigned to muck out the stalls out on his off-duty hours as punishment. One of the reasons I was always a good soldier and avoided things like that was because I haven’t seen a manure fork yet that would fit my hands.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Thought For The Day – Never approach a bull from the front, a horse from behind, or an angry wife from any direction.

Hoss Stealing

 Posted by at 12:15 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 062023
 

I have joked many times before that I come from a long line of riverboat gamblers and horse thieves. I based that simply on the knowledge of the kind of people I come from, but until now I had no proof of that.

So imagine my delight when I was going through some new family tree hints from Ancestry.com and discovered that my second paternal great grandfather, George Russell, is listed in the 1860 United States Census as a prisoner at the Ohio State Penitentiary, convicted of “hoss stealing.” Way to go great, great grandpa! You’ve done your people proud! 😊

His name and his wife’s name were a roadblock for me for a long time, and following new links and records about them takes me back to 1795. I believe I will be able to find  some information on George’s father and mother, but I’m too busy with my new book to get into a lot of research on that right now. However, I’m really looking forward to doing so when I have the time.

We have all heard the term the squeaky wheel gets greased, and apparently that’s true. After I wrote in yesterday’s blog that UPS couldn’t find our address and told me our road doesn’t even exist, even though they have delivered here at least once or twice a week since we moved in, quess what? After I sent them a link to the blog, they found us! I got a message yesterday to contact their customer service person handling my account, who assured me that they were going to redirect the tractor implement I ordered and deliver it to me here instead of  to our old house in Florida. Of course they couldn’t tell me when that might be, but maybe some day it will show up.

Yesterday was such a beautiful day that we needed to get out and do something, so we went to the Alabama Antique Mall in Tuscaloosa and spent a couple of hours browsing through all of the displays. This place is huge and they have something for everybody. We will definitely be going back.

Today is supposed to be another nice day, but I will be seeing it through the window because I have a lot of writing to get done while Terry is busy editing and proofreading chapters I have already completed in my next Tinder Street book.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Congratulations Karen Bennett, winner of our drawing for an RV camping journal donated by Barbara House. Barbara makes several variations of these, and they all have pages where you can list the date, weather, where you traveled to and from that day, beginning and ending mileage, campground information including amenities at RV sites, a place for campground reviews, room to record activities, people met along the way, reminders of places to see and things to do the next time you’re in the area, and a page for notes for each day. We had 41 entries this time around. Stay tuned, a new contest starts soon.

Thought For The Day – I’m not saying I hate you, but I would unplug your life-support machine to charge my phone.

I’m Living A Lie

 Posted by at 12:05 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 052023
 

Yes, I write about fictional towns and people in my mystery novels, but it turns out that my life is fiction, too. At least according to the people at UPS.

A week ago I ordered a toothbar for my tractor’s loader bucket. They are steel “teeth” that bolt onto the bottom edge of the bucket and help when digging or clearing brush and a dozen other chores. Apparently something went wrong and they were shipped to our old address in Florida, which is still the billing address for my credit card, even though I gave the company our delivery address here in Alabama.

They were supposed to be delivered yesterday, and I tried to contact UPS to arrange to have them shipped here instead, even if I had to pay another shipping fee. But when I did, I got a response that I was asking for them to be sent to an invalid address. Huh?

I double-checked to be sure I had entered the correct address, and this time the response was that there is no Salem Road in Gordo, Alabama. I replied that there indeed is, but they would not accept my word for that, even when I pointed out that UPS delivers to us at that address quite often, including that very day. But what the hell do I know, right? Nothing I could do was going to change their minds.

Finally giving up in frustration, I contacted our neighbor and friend Jesse Bolton down there and asked him to pick up the package for me. It weighs 55 pounds and the original shipping cost was $87, so Jesse will hold onto it until we go down to Florida for Terry’s next appointment at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Today is your last chance to enter our latest Free Drawing. This week’s prize is an RV camping journal donated by Barbara House. Barbara makes several variations of these, and they all have pages where you can list the date, weather, where you traveled to and from that day, beginning and ending mileage, campground information including amenities at RV sites, a place for campground reviews, room to record activities, people met along the way, reminders of places to see and things to do the next time you’re in the area, and a page for notes for each day.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn this evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

Thought For The Day – Sometimes you have to let go of the picture you thought life would be like and learn to find joy in the life you are living.

We Got This

 Posted by at 12:59 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 042023
 

We knew when we went to bed Thursday night that there was a chance of strong thunderstorms and tornadoes hitting our area Friday morning. And sure enough, we were awakened by the siren on our weather radio alerting us to a line of storms coming our way from the west, with the threat of tornadoes.

When I looked outside, and in that direction, the sky was dark but not terribly so. We got dressed to be ready in case we had to go into our tornado shelter, but fortunately that wasn’t necessary. A short time later the power went out. We got some rain and wind but there really wasn’t much to it. However, other areas of the state did not fare so well, and three people were killed by falling trees as the storm system marched its way across the northern part of Alabama.

The power was out for about eight hours, but our telephones and weather radio kept us updated on what was happening. Our son Travis called a couple of times, telling me that they had power at their place about 15 minutes away, and telling us we were welcome to come over there. I told him that we had spent a lot of time losing power during the six years we lived in Florida. Between that and all of the times we spent dry camping during our 18-plus years as fulltime RVers, we got this. If worse came to worst I could always fire up one or both of our Honda generators.

The weatherman says we’re going to have at least a little bit of winter come back, but you couldn’t tell it around here right now. All of the trees are in bloom and looking beautiful. Now if it would just stop raining. Yeah, I know about how April showers bring May flowers, but the January, February, and March mud has been no fun at all.

Travis is certainly getting ready for spring and summer. While we were at their house the other day he showed us the grow room where he has all kinds of plants starting. When the time is right he will transfer them to his gardens, and to a garden he’s going to help Terry with here at our place.

This is Clyde, who showed up at Travis and Geli’s house a few months ago and moved in, making himself at home. You may remember when I wrote about being attacked by their rooster back in June, Clyde decided to get in on the fun and bite me on the butt. I have always gotten along with dogs, but this one and I have a strained relationship. He growls every time he sees me, but occasionally he will let me pet him, and last week when Travis and Geli were here with Clyde and their little dog Honey, I fed him some cheese and Clyde was willing to lay on his back and let me rub his belly for a while. Of course, five minutes later he was growling at me. If I wanted to be treated this way I’d still be married to my first wife!

While we were prepared for the bad weather and not afraid of it, I did get a good scare the other day when we were in Tuscaloosa and I went into the bathroom of a business and was greeted by these two characters. I’m glad I didn’t have to go worse than I did or I might have had an accident!

In spite of the fact that we didn’t have power yesterday, Terry kept busy sorting out her office and getting things organized while I was able to narrate 2,000 words in my next Tinder Street book. The weather is going to be better today, and hopefully I’ll knock out another chapter or two.

Be sure to enter our latest Free Drawing. This week’s prize is an RV camping journal donated by Barbara House. Barbara makes several variations of these, and they all have pages where you can list the date, weather, where you traveled to and from that day, beginning and ending mileage, campground information including amenities at RV sites, a place for campground reviews, room to record activities, people met along the way, reminders of places to see and things to do the next time you’re in the area, and a page for notes for each day.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn Sunday evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

Thought For The Day – A winner is just a loser who tried one more time.

Moving Dirt

 Posted by at 12:25 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 032023
 

What seems like never-ending rain has kept me from doing much work with my Kubota BX2680 tractor since we moved here, but we finally had a few rare days of sunshine that helped dry things out a bit. So the other day I loaded the tractor into the back of our fourteen-foot cargo trailer to take it to our son’s place to help him move a big pile of dirt in preparation for gardening season.

It was a tight fit, but with Terry guiding me I got it in, then used Tie Boss heavy duty tie downs to secure it to the D rings on the floor and walls of the trailer. These are a lot easier to use than traditional ratchet straps and can be used for all sorts of projects.

I knew just enough about operating a tractor to know that I had a lot to learn, and that was quickly reinforced when I got to Travis and Geli’s house. Even though I have read the operator’s manual twice and watched a lot of YouTube videos on my model of tractor, that’s a far cry from actually putting your hands on the machine and using it.

Either I had the bucket at the wrong angle and got too little dirt, or I moved the lever wrong and dumped what I had picked up as I was backing away from the pile, but after a while things got a bit easier. Not enough to impress anybody, but somewhat less frustrating.

I knew Travis was itching to get in the operator’s seat, so we switched off.

He was having the same problems I was at first, but then Geli, who is a born and bred Alabama country girl who has been driving tractors since she was a kid, gave us some advice and things started going easier. Travis was soon getting full bucketloads of dirt, and over a couple of hours we whittled the dirt pile down and got it moved to where they wanted it to be.

The ground was still pretty soft, and at one point I buried the front wheels and the back wheels were just spinning, even in four-wheel drive. But with the help of the bucket to raise the front end a bit and some back-and-forth rocking, I was able to get it out of the hole I had created. Then I used the bucket to fill in the ruts and the tractor’s back blade to smooth things out again.

I think Travis summed things up very well when he said, “This thing may be a tool, but it’s the most fun I’ve ever had using a tool!” When your tools are also toys, life is always fun. 😊

Of course, tractors are very versatile machines that can do any number of chores, so the next task was moving a bunch of concrete blocks from one side of their property to the other to be used as raised gardening beds. That sure beat carrying them one at a time or loading them in the back of the truck to haul them. And again, it was fun!

And we all know that it’s important to take care of our equipment, so when we were all done, Travis gave the tractor a bath before we put it back in the trailer for the trip home.

So does this mean we are now experienced tractor jockeys? Not on your life. But we did get the job done, and we learned a thing or two in the process. Now I need more nice days to do some more playing, I mean work, with this thing. But it won’t be today. We will be under a strong thunderstorm warning for much of the morning, with heavy rain, high winds, and the possibility of tornadoes coming through the area. It’s comforting to know that our tornado shelter is just steps from our side door. I just hope we don’t have to use it. I’m sure it won’t be nearly as much fun as the tractor.

Be sure to enter our latest Free Drawing. This week’s prize is an RV camping journal donated by Barbara House. Barbara makes several variations of these, and they all have pages where you can list the date, weather, where you traveled to and from that day, beginning and ending mileage, campground information including amenities at RV sites, a place for campground reviews, room to record activities, people met along the way, reminders of places to see and things to do the next time you’re in the area, and a page for notes for each day.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn Sunday evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

Thought For The Day – Ya can’t fix stupid.  Well, I can, but it’s gonna hurt.

Gutter Talk

 Posted by at 12:06 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 022023
 

Don’t worry, I’m not going to assault your ears with a lot of nasty words this morning. Instead, I’m going to talk about our latest improvement to our home, having rain gutters installed. Last week I contacted Tim from S&S Seamless Gutters in Northport and he came out and gave us an estimate to put gutters on the house and on the garage. We arrived at a price that worked for both of us, and he said he would have someone out in the next week or so to do the job.

Tim texted me on Tuesday saying he would have someone here on Wednesday (yesterday), and sure enough they arrived right on time and set to work. I was talking to one of the installers and he said he’s been at this job for over 20 years and likes it because he’s got it down to a science now.

I believe that, because in about four hours they had the job done, and it looks great. The gutters and downspouts match the color of the house.

The downspouts will be tied into the French drain system that we are going to have installed soon.

We also had them put leaf guards on the top of the gutters so nothing will get into the French drains and cause problems in the future. Thanks, Tim. Your guys did a great job!

There were some tornado watches and warnings north of us last night, and it looks like we’re going to have some rough weather early Friday morning here in our area. But we’ve got our phones set to alerts, a weather radio, and our tornado shelter. We are as prepared as anybody can be, and I’m sure we will be fine if Mother Nature throws a tantrum in our direction.

It’s Thursday, and after a long hiatus, it’s time for a new Free Drawing. As I said in yesterday’s blog, I have not had many authors respond to requests for door prizes, so I am not sure what the future of the drawings will be. This week’s prize is an RV camping journal donated by Barbara House. Barbara makes several variations of these, and they all have pages where you can list the date, weather, where you traveled to and from that day, beginning and ending mileage, campground information including amenities at RV sites, a place for campground reviews, room to record activities, people met along the way, reminders of places to see and things to do the next time you’re in the area, and a page for notes for each day.

To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn Sunday evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

Thought For The Day – I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.

Wednesday Q&A

 Posted by at 12:45 am  Nick's Blog
Mar 012023
 

I’m back with more questions from blog readers about RVing, my writing activities, what’s happening in our lives since we hung up the keys, and all kinds of other things. While I try to answer all questions individually, I also share some here occasionally.

Q. We are looking for a pair of walkie-talkies or 2-way radios to use on an RV trip where we will be caravanning with my brother and his family from Illinois to the Grand Canyon and back in May. I have a CB radio in my motorhome but he doesn’t, and the language can get pretty nasty on them sometimes. Any suggestions?

A. The truckers do sometimes use rough language over their CB radios but they are usually on Channel 19, and most modern CBs have 40 channels so there are plenty of others to choose from. I recently purchased a set of Midland – X-TALKER T51VP3, FRS two-way radios to communicate between vehicles when we were moving from Florida, and they were useless even if Terry was right behind me. I sent them back to Amazon for a refund. However, we used Midland handheld radios at our Gypsy Journal rallies and they were very reliable, so maybe these latest ones I purchased were sub-par for some reason.

Q. Are you going to be restarting your weekly drawings? I keep looking for them. I have never won one, but it was always fun trying.

A. I plan to resume the drawings this week. However, I am finding it more difficult to get donated prizes, so I am not sure what the future holds.

Q. When I read about your tornado shelter, I thought it would be a good idea. But I am terribly claustrophobic and don’t know if I could handle being closed up in one for hours. Do you know how people like me cope with something like that? I keep picture being inside and having the door blocked with debris and being trapped.

A. Unlike hurricanes, which can take hours to pass over, tornadoes usually hit and are gone in minutes. I think (hope) if a tornado was coming through, a person would be too busy worrying about that to feel too claustrophobic. I don’t know about all tornado shelters, but in ours the door opens inward so we can’t be trapped inside. Worst case scenario, we could open the door and dig our way out from any debris in front of the door.

Q. This is a rather personal question and feel free to tell me to mind my own business, but it seems like you are spending a lot of money on your new place, what with the new roof, gutters coming, storm shelter, etc. Did you expect all that or do you feel you maybe got took?

A. Not at all. We knew about the roof when we bought the home and factored the cost of replacing it into the deal and the sellers contributed to the replacement cost. We are making and will continue to make some other improvements as we go along. We never plan to move again, and we don’t mind spending the money to make it what we want.

Q. Now that you and Miss Terry live so close to your son and his wife, do your daughter and her family have any plans to move there, too, and have all of the clan together?

A. First of all, don’t say clan around here. People might get the wrong idea. 😊 As for Tiffany and her family, we would love to have them closer, but they still have kids in high school and they don’t think (and we agree) that it would be fair to uproot them at this point in their lives. As for the future, who knows? If you would have told me five years ago I would be living in Alabama, I would have laughed at you.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

Thought For The Day – Manipulation is when they blame you for your reaction to their disrespect.

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