My Peeps

After reading yesterday’s blog in which I said we needed to run into New Smyrna Beach to get the registrations renewed on our vehicles, three blog readers left comments or sent me emails asking why I didn’t just do it online, which would be quicker and more convenient.

When we changed our official domicile from South Dakota to Florida last year, we paid a few bucks extra to get Save The Manatee license plates on the motorhome and our Ford Explorer. As it turned out, they were numbered sequentially, which was pretty cool. Fast forward to June of this year, when we purchased our Chrysler Pacifica, we knew we were going to be selling the motorhome. So I went to the tax office in New Smyrna Beach, which is where you handle those things here, and paid a few bucks to swap the plate that was on the motorhome with the generic plate that came on the Pacifica. So now it and the Explorer have the sequential license plate numbers, which even my often befuddled brain can remember.

When I did that, the nice lady at the tax office told me that when the renewals came the state might not have updated the registrations on the renewal forms, and if not I would have to come back into the office to do it in person. Which is what happened

When we got there yesterday at 11:30, I told Terry I figured it would be crowded, being so close to lunch hour. But there was nobody there! We walked in and right up to one of the service windows with no wait at all. As it turned out, that was good timing, because in the 15 minutes or so that it took the lady behind the desk to renew the three vehicles, my boat, and my boat trailer, 15 or more people walked in. In fact the lady processing our paperwork looked up and asked where they were all coming from at once. I told her I have an entourage that follows me around, and they were my peeps.

Overall, it was a quick and painless process. Well, painless except for the $550 it cost to get everything done. But that was for two years, so we don’t have to go back and do it again anytime soon. And the next time around, we will probably renew online. Although I do have to say that, having dealt with MVD people all over the country, I’ve never been any place where they were as friendly and as efficient as they are in the small office here in New Smyrna Beach.

With that out of the way, Terry and I had delicious blackened grouper sandwiches for lunch at Oceans Seafood, and then came home and got back to work, me at my desk and Terry at her loom. She finished the project (actually I should say projects) that she has been working on late in the afternoon. With her big Glimakra loom she can wind on so much yarn that she can weave for days and days and days without having to put any more on. And yet, by just changing the way she works the foot pedals and the yarn she uses in the shuttles, she can create entirely different patterns.

This is what everything looked like when she took it off the loan. That’s over 17 feet of weaving, folks.

There are five towels here, each with its own individual pattern, waiting for her to cut them apart and hem them all. Then they will be washed and sized so they are nice and square. These are some of the different patterns up close.

Terry is her own worst critic and can always find a flaw in her work that I couldn’t discover if I searched for it. I think these are beautiful, but she assures me that when she gets a little more practice with the loom she will be turning out some amazing stuff. I don’t doubt that for a minute.

As for my part, besides uploading the print version of Big Lake Tragedy, which should go into production any minute now, I cranked out close to 4,000 words on my work in progress. Things are coming to a head and I should be wrapping it up and finishing by the weekend. It’s always exciting to finish a new book and send it out into the world.

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It’s Thursday, so it’s time for a new Free Drawing. This week’s prize is an audiobook of Dog’s Run, my mystery set in a small Midwestern town in 1951. I have written over seventeen novels, and a total of close to thirty books in all, but I have to say that this is my favorite of all of them. I think that’s because it’s loosely based upon a case my father was involved in when he was a young deputy sheriff back when my parents were first married, and I remember hearing the story several times over the years.

To enter, all you have to do is click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name 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.

Thought For The Day – Money can’t buy friends, but it can get you a better class of enemy.