Good, But Not Great Yet

We took the kayaks down to our boat launch to try out the new trailer configuration yesterday. The results were good, even very good, but not great. Not yet, anyway. Launching them was a piece of cake, especially since Jesse backed the trailer down the ramp. I really have to work on my backing-up skills.

It was a windy day, which suited me just fine because we did not plan to do any paddling, we just wanted to see how well things worked for launching and reloading and if the wind added a shade of difficulty, even better.

As I said, getting the boats into the water was easy. Getting them back onto the trailer was not a big deal either, except that we quickly learned that pulling their bows up onto the T-Bone did not work as planned. They wanted to go under the crossbar, so we still had to lift them up onto it. The solution to that is to remove the curved part of the T-bone and just use the crossbar flat so the boats will sit flat on the trailer. That should be an easy fix. Otherwise, I like it!

So far, over 50 veterans have requested and been sent a copy of our free guide to Overnight Parking With The VFW. If you want one, just send me an email at editor@gypsyjournal.net. As I said in the question-and-answer post on Thursday, we have not updated the guide in a long time now that we are no longer RVing, so I cannot guarantee how current information is. A few people who are not VFW members but are veterans have asked for a copy of the guide as well, and I sent it to them with a note that it’s up to the individual VFW posts whether or not they will let a nonmember stay there. All you can do is ask.

Speaking of the different guides we used to publish when we were fulltime RVers, my friend Judy Rinehimer, who helps proof all my books, is also a former RV who will be doing her traveling by car in the future. She asked me what hotel chains we stayed in, and I replied that for the most part, we stay at Hampton Inns. They are clean, comfortable, moderately priced, you get a free breakfast, and we’ve only had a bad experience in one of them. I have been compiling a list for my own reference of the places we like and don’t like when we travel, and I sent it to Judy yesterday. Hopefully, it will help her plan some future trips.

I heard from a long-time blog reader and RVing friend who lives in Texas and spends several months a year traveling. He said they have been without power for a couple of days now, and he told his wife he wished they could get in the motorhome and come to Florida and visit with us and warm up in the process. He said they both looked at each other for a long moment and got this weird look on both of their faces before his wife asked, “Why the hell are we wearing two layers of clothes sitting here freezing in the house with no heat or power when we have a motorhome out there with two furnaces, a generator, and a full tank of diesel?” He said they are now snug in their RV parked in the driveway, waiting for things to get back to normal. Sometimes we miss the simplest solutions to our problems, don’t we?

Meanwhile, if the weather is keeping you inside and you need something good to read, my dear friend Mona Ingram has just released After All, the fourth book in her popular Willow Bend Romance series. Mona has a strong following of dedicated readers, and once you read one of her books, I think you will become one of them.

Today is your last chance to enter our Free Drawing for a printed copy of The Trench Coat Chronicles, a short story anthology from several top-notch authors, with a blend of mystery and whimsy, along with characters from detectives, villans, and spies to flashers and femme fatales that you will enjoy getting to know.

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 high the 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 – Doing nothing is hard because you never know when you’re done.