No, It’s Both

I lived in Arizona for many years, both down in the desert and up in the White Mountains. I remember people in the desert saying, “Sure, it’s 112°, but at least there’s no humidity.” My response was always that there is no humidity in an oven, either, but I don’t want to spend the day in one. Now I live on the coast in Florida, where people say that it’s not so bad except for the humidity. No, it’s both. Hot is hot, and I don’t care what percentage of heat versus humidity makes it so, I just want it to go away. And, of course, we’re just getting into the start of the season, so we have a long way to go.

But putting things in perspective, the summer before we bought our house here, we were still fulltime RVers, and we spent the summer at Elkhart Campground in Indiana. We knew that we wanted to settle somewhere in the New Smyrna Beach area of Florida, so I checked the weather every day online in both Elkhart and New Smyrna Beach. It was always about 5 to 7° hotter in Florida, and the humidity was 5 to 10% higher. But whether it’s 85° in Indiana, with 65% humidity or 90° in Florida, with 70% humidity, what does it really matter? I’m not going outside in either one if I can avoid it!

Speaking of Elkhart Campground, I received some bad news just the other day from my friend Al Hesselbart, the former historian at the RV Museum in Elkhart. The nice old gentleman who everybody referred to as Grandpa, the father of Bob Patel, who owns the campground with his wife Gita, passed away last week. For most of the 18+ years that we spent as fulltime RVers, Terry and I always spent a few weeks and sometimes two or three months at Elkhart Campground in the summer. We got to know the family very well, and we consider them friends, even family. Grandpa was always a gracious gentleman, and I enjoyed visiting with him. Rest in peace, sir.

Another friend of mine, who is still very much alive, is author Jason Deas, and he just released the second book in his Burt Bigsley mystery series, titled unravel. Do yourself a favor and get a copy. In fact, get both books in the series if you haven’t read them. Jason’s a fine man and a great writer.

My new book Tinder Street is finished and going through the proofing and editing process with Miss Terry. From there, it will make the circuit of my other proofreaders before it’s ready to come out. And while they’re doing that, I have started on the second book in the series, which has not been named yet. I’d like to bring the two out fairly close together to get the series off and rolling. Then I’ll be jumping back into the John Lee Quarrels and Big Lake mysteries. As they say, no rest for the wicked.

Besides proofing my books and doing everything else she does to help me with the writing process, and to keep our home running smoothly, the other day Terry made delicious homemade biscuits and sausage gravy for dinner. Yummy!

She also took a couple of recently completed projects off her of loom. There are three shawls here, each over 90 inches long, plus a small table runner. Nice, don’t you think?

Here is her weaving studio. It’s bigger than the RV we lived in fulltime for years.

And, because she’s like the Energizer Bunny and keeps going and going, she also made a delicious meal of biscuits and gravy the other night, and yesterday she was busy making some loaves of banana bread. If this damn pandemic doesn’t end soon, I won’t fit through the door when it finally does.

Speaking of the pandemic, a gentleman who owns a business in the Orlando area has been expressing his thoughts on what we need to get things reopened again, one of them being to wear a mask for the protection of yourself, and more so, for the people around you. He has taken to flying along the beaches up and down the coast towing this sign behind his airplane. Knowing what it costs to operate even a private plane, it’s obvious he is committed to getting the word out. But I fear way too many people still won’t get it.

Today is your last chance to enter our Free 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. 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.

Thought For The Day – My wife let me remove all her clothes last night. From the dryer.