Tag Archives: Steve & Karen

2016/01/06 (W) -10 (N) Websites, Woodwork, and Wildlife

2016/01/06 (W) Filtered Article 

The temperature dropped into the mid-50s last night and made for excellent sleeping conditions.  Never-the-less, Linda was up at 6:30 AM and read quietly until I got up at 8 AM.  I used the last of the current batch of coffee beans yesterday so I opened four fresh bags this morning, a half-pound each of Ethiopian Yirgacheffe (regular and decaffeinated), Seattle Blend (regular), and Sweet Dreams Blend (decaffeinated).  Teeko’s Coffee and Teas back home roasted and vacuum packed the beans for us in 1/2 pound amounts so they would stay fresh through the winter.  I made a full pot of the Ethiopian Yirgacheffe (half-caffe) and Linda prepared toast and grapefruit for breakfast.  One of the things we bought yesterday at Joshua Citrus was orange marmalade so Linda opened it and we had some on our toast.  It was not as bitter as most orange marmalades I have tried and I liked it.

Charlotte Harbor Event and Conference Center, Punta Gorda, FL.

Charlotte Harbor Event and Conference Center, Punta Gorda, FL.

Tonight was the weekly Powerball lottery drawing and the amount was approaching 400 million dollars so we agreed that we should buy a few tickets.  Since there was a possibility of rain this afternoon Linda wanted to get her walk in early so she walked to the Winn-Dixie supermarket in search of lottery tickets.  The Winn- Dixie is in a shopping plaza with other stores on the same (south) side of US-70 as the Carefree Big Tree RV Resort about 1/2 mile west towards downtown.  There is a very wide sidewalk along the south side of US-70 that is used by walkers, bicyclists, and folks in golf carts, from our resort and the much larger adult community just to our east, to get to the shopping area just west of us.  The Walmart is immediately across the street, with a stop light and crosswalk, but golf carts cannot go there as far as we know.

I’ve needed to change the water filter under the kitchen sink for a while so today I finally did.  I installed the GX1S01R GE Drinking Water Filter housing in fall 2014 to replace the Everpure unit that gave me no end of difficulty whenever I tried to change the filter cartridge.  It turned out that neither of our two filter wrenches fit the housing and I had to get my large slip pliers out to get it off.  The inside of the housing was dirty so I boiled some water in the microwave, added a small amount of dish soap, cleaned it thoroughly, and rinsed it out.

The GE drinking water filter element is a Class I media (0.5 – 1.0 micron) that reduces or removes more things than most filters, including:  MTBE, VOCs, Chlorine (taste and odor), Lead, Cysts, Mercury, Turbidity, and Asbestos.  The capacity of the element is listed as 500 gallons* (*depending on water conditions) and the useful life is listed as 6 months.  The filter feeds a special drinking water faucet in the kitchen sink that is only used for cleaning food and cooking so I doubt that we run anywhere near 500 gallons of water through it in 6 months, or even in a year.  Given how we use our motorcoach, and the cost of the filter elements, I will probably change the filter once a year.  To that end I wrote the date on a piece of Frog Tape and attached it to the housing.

I continued to focus on my article for BCM about Ronnie and Diann Mewbourns’ 1969 Model 07 Eagle bus conversion.  I thought I might get it done by lunch but I did not get back to work on it until after 11 AM.  I worked on it most of the rest of the day and into the evening and still did not get it finished.  By 9 PM I had the photos selected and processed but deferred integrating them into the article until tomorrow.  I will then upload it to our Dropbox and e-mail Diann that it is available for review.

Lunch was left over black-eyed peas, fresh fruit, and hummus with sourdough pretzels for dipping.  Dinner was salad and pan-seared tofu with caramelized onions in BBQ sauce with fresh strawberries for dessert.  We went for walks after both meals and Linda got in 10 miles today.

If we watch TV at all on Wednesday evening it is usually PBS and so it was tonight.  Nature was on cross-species animal bonding, Nova was on an archeological investigation of WWI trenches and tunnels, followed by a two hour program on the CERN LHC (Large Hadron Collider) and the search for the Higgs bozon particle and other, possibly more elementary ones.  It was after midnight by the time I got bed.

2016/01/07 (R) Jam Session

We were both awake around 7 AM.  Linda read for a while and got up around 7:45.  I drifted back to a light sleep and finally got up at 8:15.  By the time the coffee was ready to drink it was 8:45 AM.  Linda washed off some blueberries and poured our cups of Joe.

Linda bought 10 tickets yesterday for the Powerball lottery.  Our $20 investment returned $4.  The good news was that no one won and Saturday’s drawing will likely approach $700 million.  I know the odds of winning are astronomically small, but any non-zero chance to win even a piece of that pot seems worth another $20.  After all, you can’t win if you don’t play.

Linda by the signposts at the Charlotte Harbor Sheraton Four Points Hotel, Punta Gorda, FL.

Linda by the signposts at the Charlotte Harbor Sheraton Four Points Hotel, Punta Gorda, FL.

We had granola with fresh berries for breakfast.  I then e-mailed the Geeks on Tour to see if we could arrange a meetup.  That’s the name of Jim and Chris Guld’s business and they are currently just up the road at the Thousand Trails Preserve (RV park) in Zolfo Springs.  They are full-time RVers who do seminars and in-depth training classes on a wide range of technologies at RV rallies, parks, and other venues.  You can find them here:  http://www.geeksontour.com.  They also do a weekly podcast and have an extensive catalog of video tutorials.

I spent the morning and early afternoon finishing my BCM article on Ronnie and Diann Mewbourn’s 1969 Model 07 Eagle bus conversion.  I uploaded it to a folder in our Dropbox for them e-mailed them the link and some instructions.  I also sent the link to BCM publisher Gary Hatt.

We had hummus with sourdough pretzel nibblers and fresh fruit for lunch around 1 PM.  Our plan for the afternoon was to go watch a practice session of the Royal Lipizzan Stallions.  The U.S.-based stallions’ facility is just up the road in Myakka City and they have practice sessions open to the public at 3 PM on Thursdays and Fridays, and 10 AM on Saturdays.  They ask (charge) a $5 donation per person.  The facility has bleachers but you can bring your own chair.  We had planned to go today because the forecast for this afternoon was pleasant.

We want to order some fresh citrus fruit from Joshua Citrus here in Arcadia and have it shipped to our children in Michigan.  It will be much more economical for us to have it shipped to one place and Meghan agreed to receive it and distribute it.  We were going to stop there on our way to see the Lipizzaners but at 1:15 PM it was still overcast.  I wanted to take photographs so we decided not to go and will visit the facility another time.

With the change in our plans we took a long walk around the resort.  I then had to figure out something else to do.  I was tired and decided to take a nap.  The sofa was not available as Linda was working on her counted cross-stitch project so I curled up on the bed next to Jasper (the cat) and dozed for a couple of hours.

For dinner Linda fixed a side of mixed grains, steamed some broccoli, and sautéed a package of Gardein Orange “Chicken.”  The orange chicken is a soy-based dish and it is very tasty.

After dinner we turned on the TV and I worked on the bonus content photographs for my article on the recent Arcadia converted bus rally.  Perhaps because of the distraction from the boob tube, was trying to clean up a slightly complicated situation I had created for myself, was just not in the humor, or some combination of the three, I found the work a bit tedious.  I stuck with it long enough to get it better organized and then stopped at a somewhat logical point and watched TV.

2016/01/08 (F) Touring Geeks

There was rain in the forecast for overnight and I heard the first few drops before I went to bed just before midnight.  The rains came in earnest sometime between 4 and 5 AM and it rained hard around 7 AM.  I was awake at that point and decided to get up and check for leaks.  Fortunately there was no sign of the leaks we had during the last rain event.  I fed the cats, plugged in the charger for our Verizon Mi-Fi, and made the coffee.

Bruce by the signposts at the Charlotte Harbor Sheraton Four Points Hotel, Punta Gorda, FL.

Bruce by the signposts at the Charlotte Harbor Sheraton Four Points Hotel, Punta Gorda, FL.

After checking the user manual we determined that it is OK for the Mi-Fi to be plugged in and charging while it is turned on and operating.  The issue with the device is that it really wants to be unplugged from the charger once the battery is fully charged and can overheat if left connected.  Since we do not have a usable RV park Wi-Fi signal at our site it simplifies our online life if we can just leave the Mi-Fi on with the Wi-Fi Ranger connected to it.  The Mi-Fi battery is very slow to charge, especially when the device is turned on, but it eventually reaches full charge.  The battery will not even operate the device for 12 hours but it will operate long enough to get through the night.  What I am still trying to figure out is when to plug it in during the evening so that it is fully charged just before we go to bed.  That is a trial and process.  Once I have it figured out I need to make a habit of plugging it in when I get up in the morning and again at the right time during the evening.

After a little more discussion I e-mailed Jim Guld to confirm plans for a visit and dinner this afternoon.  We settled in with our coffee and iPads for a while and finally had breakfast at 9 AM.  Linda had two frozen toaster waffles she wanted to use up so we had those with peanut butter.  I also add a little apricot preserves on mine.  We split one of the Ruby Red grapefruits we bought at Joshua Citrus the other day.  Yum.

With company coming later today we took showers.   While Linda was getting her shower I copied recent photos from the Sony SLT- a99v to my ASUS laptop.  An updated version of the Play Memories Home software was available, so I downloaded and installed it.  After I showered, shaved, and got dressed Linda cut my hair.  We then cleaned the coach, putting away things that did not need to be out and sweeping/mopping the floor.

With the cleaning of ourselves and the coach completed, we went on an errand run.  After dropping off a small bag of trash our first stop was the Winn-Dixie supermarket.  We then drove to the Turner Agri-Civic Center to drop off recyclable plastic.  We swung by El Pirata Mexican restaurant to check out the menu and then drove to Joshua Citrus Company.  While I picked out some Sugarbelle oranges and Ruby Red grapefruit Linda ordered a three tray box of mixed citrus fruit that included Honeybelle tangelos, Meyer lemons, Navel oranges, and Ruby Red grapefruit.  The box will be shipped to our daughter and she will divide up the fruit with our son.  That arrangement allowed us to send more fruit at a lower cost than shipping to two addresses.  Our final stop was at Walmart for a few food items we did not find at Winn-Dixie.

Back at our coach I spent some time updating the Participants Database for our FMCA Freethinkers chapter (FTH) website.  I also spent some more time trying to recall just how I set up the WP-Members plugin for the SLAARC website so I can recreate it for the FTH website.  I was not able to do that in the time I had available and I think that might be due, in part, to changes that have been made in newer versions of the plugin.  I set up a WordPress User for Linda using the WP-Members registration form and it did not work the way I remembered it in the SLAARC website.  Apparently I am going to have study the user manual in detail.

Christine Guld called at 2:30 PM to let me know that she and Jim were on their way to our resort.  They arrived around 3 PM and we quickly settled into an easy conversation covering a wide range of topics.  Jim and Chris are the “Geeks on Tour” and do technology training (edutainment) at RV rallies and other venues.  They have seen and done a lot of things and are interesting, fun folks with whom to share time.

At 4:30 PM Jim drove us to dinner at Magnolia Seafood and Grill in downtown Arcadia.  The restaurant was almost empty when we arrived and we got a nice corner table by the front picture windows.  Today was Jim’s birthday and we enjoyed sharing it with him and Chris.  We lingered over dinner for almost two hours and by the time we left people were waiting in the lobby for a table.  I don’t like to wait for tables, but it’s usually a good sign when a restaurant is that popular.  Everyone said their meal was excellent.  Jim drove us back to our coach and dropped us off.  There was a music jam back at the Thousand Trails Peace River Preserve in Zolfo Springs starting at 7 PM. They wanted to cap off their evening there and we certainly understood.

We walked over to the resort office and picked up our mail.  My driver license renewal paperwork was there but nothing else.  Back at our coach we turned on the TV.  PBS/Create was airing the Las Vegas BeeGees concert from 20 years ago (again). With that as background we doodled on our iPads and eventually went to bed.

2016/01/09 (S) FTH Website Work

Our plan for today was once again to go watch the Royal Lipizzan Stallions practice session at their facility in Myakka City.  Fog moved in last night and was still thick by the time we finished breakfast at 9 AM.  That was when we needed to leave in order to get there and set up our chairs in time for the start of the session at 10 AM.  For the second time this week we decided to defer this event to a future date with better weather.

Black Crested Night Heron at the Peace River Wildlife Center, south of Punta Gorda, FL.

Black Crested Night Heron at the Peace River Wildlife Center, south of Punta Gorda, FL.

Linda resumed work on her counted cross-stitch project and I worked for a while on photos for the BCM article on the Arcadia Rally 2016.  No one won the Powerball lottery on Wednesday and by this morning the top prize had exceeded 800 million dollars, an all-time record for any lottery in the U. S.  Linda needed a few grocery items for our dinner and we wanted to buy a few more lottery tickets so we walked to the local Winn-Dixie supermarket to take care of those errands.  It was approximately a one mile round trip and on the walk back the cloud cover broke up into partly sunny skies.  Back at the coach we opened all three roof vents, turned on the exhaust fans, and opened the windows wider.

Linda settled back into her counted cross-stitch project and I turned my attention to our FMCA Freethinkers website.  I checked the SLAARC website (WordPress) to see how I set up the quick registration page through the WP-Members plug-in and then set up a similar (hidden) page for the FTH website.  I cleaned up a lot of other things on the website as well, including the member directory.  This work occupied the rest of the afternoon except for a lunch break and a brief walk.

Lunch was grilled “cheese” (non-dairy) and tomato sandwiches–very messy but very good–with grapes and orange slices.  The walk was brief because we stopped to visit with a couple from Ithaca, Michigan.  While we were chatting we watched low, thick white clouds moving towards us from the southwest against a dense, dark gray sky.  A couple of drops of rain was our early warning to return to the coach.

We got back before the rain started but once it did we closed the roof vents and reduced the window openings.  The forecast a few hours earlier had a chance of a thunderstorm at 9:15 PM but by 2 PM it was raining hard and an old leak around the bedroom exhaust vent/fan reappeared.  I also found a small leak at the lower outside corner of the new lower passenger side windshield.  We were both pretty discouraged at these continued leaks having hired people to fix them.  The heavy rain continued off and on for hours prompting Linda to track it in her iPad and eventually turn on the TV.  Lee County, which includes Fort Meyers about 45 miles due south of us, was under a tornado warning.  Arcadia is in Desoto County, which is the next one north, but the weather here was not severe, just wet.

While Linda was preparing dinner I e-mailed the members of our FMCA Freethinkers chapter to let them know that the public portions of the chapter website were now open for viewing and that I would be e-mailing each of them a unique username and password for the Members Only area in the near future.

For dinner Linda made a quinoa dish with julienned carrots, diced green onions, grated ginger, edamame, diced cucumber, and diced bell pepper.  She served it at room temperature and it was another fabulous dish.

After dinner Linda put on the Bengals-Steelers NFL playoff game while I started generating the usernames and passwords for the Freethinkers website.  I finished that work in about 90 minutes with the process of creating users automatically sending an e-mail to each member with their login information.  With that done I settled on the sofa with my iPad to finish up blog posts while we continued to track the weather.  The frontal system responsible for the wet/severe weather stretched from out in the Gulf of Mexico ENE across the Florida peninsula and was drifting to the east as storm cells raced along it.  Fort Meyers got 3″ of rain and sustained some wind damage from a rare January tornado.  The system was due to pass over Naples between 9 and 9:30 PM.  Our friends, Barb and Chuck, are there so hopefully they will just get rain like we did.

We did not have any more rain after dinner so we opened the roof vents and turned the exhaust fans on.  The forecast for Arcadia kept changing through the evening with the probability of rain around midnight bouncing up and down.  By the time we went to bed it looked like we might be done with precipitation for the night.

2016/01/10 (N) Wood Art

We made it through the night without any further rain or threatening storms and got up around 7:30 AM this morning.  We got dressed right away but I did not make coffee.  Our main objective for today was a visit to the Florida Winter National Wood Art Expo and Competition (FWNWAEC) in Punta Gorda.  We gathered up raincoats, camera gear, and a list of addresses for places we might visit, and headed out around 8:15 AM.  We stopped at the Dunkin’ Donuts in Arcadia for coffee and bagels and then continued west into downtown where we picked up US-17 and headed south to Punta Gorda.

The island at the Venice Rookery, Venice, FL.

The island at the Venice Rookery, Venice, FL.

We had a pleasant drive down and arrived at the Charlotte Harbor Event and Conference Center in Punta Gorda just after 9 AM.  The FWNWAEC opened at 9 AM so our timing was good.  The parking lot was mostly empty so I got a spot near the building and we finished our coffee before going inside.  Admission was $7 each and we got wristbands that allowed us to come and go all day if we wanted to.

We spent a couple of hours looking at all of the wood carvings on display and I photographed a few of them.  There were also lots of vendors selling tools, materials, supplies, and finished products.  At one of those tables we met John, who heads the woodcarving group at our RV resort, and learned that there will be woodcarving classes at the Turner Center February 8-11 and another exhibition there on February 20.  He invited us to stop by when the woodcarving group meets at the resort on Thursday mornings.

By 11 AM we had seen everything we wanted to see.  On our way out of the building the ladies at the entrance table were explaining to someone else some of the other things to do nearby and I heard mention of a Farmers Market.  I asked about its location and got directions.  Before leaving the event center area we walked the grounds around the Convention Center and Tiki Bar that is part of the Sheraton Four Points hotel next door.  We then headed south on Retta Esplanade through a nice area of wonderful homes on our left and waterfront parklands on our right.  There was a very large craft fair in progress but we passed it by in favor of finding the Farmers Market.

The market was inland a few blocks and was located in a smaller, but lovely, park where the vendor canopies were spread out along a winding pathway that led to a historic house which was open for visitors.  There was also a group of about eight musicians with guitars, fiddles, and such.  Linda bought a large Miatake mushroom after we sampled some and decided it was one of the best mushrooms we had ever tasted.  We found another vendor selling turmeric in root form.  She said it would keep for months so Linda bought a large piece.  At another vendor she bought sesame seeds and flax seeds, so the market turned out to be a good stop.

From the market we continued south in search of the Peace River Wildlife Center.  It was a small, private facility but had quite a collection of animals, mostly birds, that were being rehabilitated (if possible) for release back into the wild or living out their lives’ (if release was not possible).  A small donation was requested on entrance and willingly paid.  Most of the birds were in enclosures that made them difficult to photograph but the pelican area was open, and wild birds came and went, so I was able to get a few photos there.

From the Wildlife Center we drove back north into downtown Punta Gorda and the headed northwest on the Tamiami Trail across Charlotte Harbor towards Port Charlotte.  Our destination was the Earth Origins market in Port Charlotte which was, conveniently, located on the east side of the Tamiami Trail.  I say conveniently because the Trail was basically a 20 mile long strip mall.  It was six lanes divided plus left and right turn lanes, and choked with cars, so having the store on the side of the road we were already on was definitely convenient.

We were done with our shopping by 2:30 PM and realized that we were only 36 miles from Steve and Karen Limkemanns’ place in Nokomis (near Venice).  We called and got Karen on the phone.  Steve was out riding his bike but was due back soon.  They had no plans for the rest of the day so we headed their way.  We had been to their mobile home park (Bay Lake Estates) two years ago but had not been there since they bought their own place this past March.  It took about 45 minutes to get there, by which time Steve had returned from his bike ride.  We got a tour of their new place, which was one of the newer units in the complex and very nice.  We also walked up to see a unit that had caught fire and completely burned.  It was stunning to see how little of it was left.  The unit next door did not burn but the vinyl siding facing the fire melted and sagged.  Most RVs are built much the same way as mobile homes and park model trailers and they do not do well in fire situations.

Before going to dinner we decided to drive to the Venice Rookery.  We saw a sign for it driving up and wondered just what it was.  It turned out to be a large pond with an island that was a favorite resting and nesting area for egrets, herons, Anhingas, and other birds.  The island provide natural protection from land-based predators and locals told us that a large alligator protected them from any threat that might try to swim across.  I took what photos I could but had not planned on doing wildlife photography and did not have the correct lens(es) with me.

The temperature had been moderate during the day and our shorts had been appropriate clothing.  The best time to view the birds is apparently at sunset when large numbers of them return to the rookery.  As the sun sank towards the tree tops it got decidedly chilly and we finally had to call it a day.  We will be back on the 18th to see The Capitol Steps at the Venice Theater and made plans to return to the rookery with appropriate clothing and photo equipment.

From the Rookery we drove directly to Cafe Evergreen for dinner, an organic restaurant not far from Steve and Karen’s winter home.  The Café is not specifically vegan but always has some nice vegan selections.  Linda and I both had roasted beet Reuben sandwiches.  She had an edamame salad as a side and I had baked sweet potato “fries.”  We both had lots of decaffeinated coffee but no dessert as we were quite full by the time we finished our meals.

We went back to Steve and Karen’s place and visited a while longer before finally leaving a little before 8 PM.  Linda wanted to see Downton Abbey at 9 PM and we figured we had an hour drive to get back to our RV park in Arcadia.  The GPS wanted to take us south on I-75 but we went north 10 miles and took FL-70 due east through Myakka River State Park.  About half way to Arcadia we encountered an accident scene and had to wait for 15 minutes before we could continue our trip.  We got home a few minutes after 9 PM so we were still able to watch the show.  The Abominable Bride episode of Sherlock was rebroadcast following Downton Abbey so we watched it again.

The weather had cleared out behind the strong cold front that pushed through the area yesterday and temperatures overnight were forecast to drop into the upper 40’s.  We closed down all the windows before we went to bed.  I turned on the electric heater pad on my side of the bed before climbing in.  It had been a long day and neither of us felt like reading or writing so I turned off the lights and we went to sleep.

 

2015/07/07 (T) Field Day Photos

We did not sleep well last night, were slow to get up this morning, and slower to get going.  A cold front was pushing in from the northwest with the promise of cooler temperatures and sunny, blue skies, but first we were in for a day of overcast conditions and rain, which started around 8:30 AM.  It was a perfect morning to sit quietly in the living room, reading, writing, and drinking our coffee but too warm to turn on the gas fireplace logs.

Yesterday Linda started researching RV parks in southern Florida for this coming winter and we spent some time this morning looking at them online.  There was one in particular, Riverside RV Resort and Campground, which caught our attention.  Located on the Peace River near Port Charlotte and Punta Gorda, it is a short distance southwest of Arcadia where the annual Buss’in rally is held.  We went to the rally two years ago and had a great time so we will go again this year if we decide to winter in Florida, which is our current inclination.

One of the reasons for us to winter in Florida, at least occasionally, is our many contacts there.  Our friends, Steve and Karen, bought a mobile home near Venice; our friends, Chuck and Barbara, bought a lot at Pelican Lake in Naples; our ham radio friends, Bruce and Linda, bought a house on 25 acres near Brooksville; our GLCC fiends, Ed and Janet, bought a place that I think is near Sarasota; our FMCA Freethinker friends, John and Marian, bought a place in Dunnellon; and our other FMCA Freethinker friends, Ed and Betty, bought a place in Bradenton.  In addition to all of those folks quite a few of our RV friends, like Pat and Vicki, spend the winter in Florida, and the state has a lot of things to see and do, including one of the best state park systems in the nation.

Linda left for her appointment with the dermatologist and I got to work at my desk.  I continued to deal with e-mails related to the SLAARC domain transfer and an ongoing conversation with BCM publisher Gary Hatt.  I got a Dropbox link to some Field Day photos from Steve (N8AR) a few days ago and downloaded them.  Last night I got a similar e-mail from Mike (KE8AGY) with a Google Drive link and today I got one from Jim (N8HAM) so I downloaded all of those photos.  I spent most of the rest of the day selecting and processing the photos I took and then processed all of the ones I got from other people.

I took a break to chat with Linda when she got back from her appointment.  I then removed the defective Morgan M-302N VHF/UHF Lightning Arrestor from the cable entry box and boxed it up to ship back to Morgan.  I took another short break for dinner, which was an excellent Farro and kale dish, and then worked until 8:30 PM when we had agreed to watch a movie.  This evening’s choice was The Imitation Game, a film about Alan Touring and the concepts he invented that allowed the British to build a machine that broke the coded messages generated by the German Enigma machine during WWII.  I spent another hour at my desk after the movie before going to bed and finishing this post.  Tomorrow morning I plan to finally upload some blog posts and then get back to work on the design of the custom desk for the bus.

 

20140821 (R) Words With Friends

With a dry morning on tap I took care of chores after breakfast while Linda worked on preparations for dinner.  First I photographed trees around our entire property that were dead or obviously distressed and not doing well.  Next I took all of the sections of our Heights aluminum tower off of the back deck, where they have been stored since we bought it in May, and laid them out in the yard in the order in which they go together.  I then photographed all of the pieces, including details of how they interconnect, along with the fold-over assembly, fold-over motor, and bearing plate.

Thrust bearing plate for ham radio tower.

Thrust bearing plate for ham radio tower.

I transferred the photos to my computer and then processed a selection of the tower photos, resizing and sharpening them.  I put them in a folder in my Dropbox and e-mailed the link to Heights Tower Systems along with a description of what we have, what we intend to do, and what we think we need to do it.  I also gave them the name of the amateur radio operator we bought the tower from.  He was the original owner.

20140821-07952

The gear-motor for the fold-over mount. Mast rotor in the plastic bag to the right.

Fold-over mount standing up on hinge end.

Fold-over mount standing up on hinge end.

 

 

One meaning of having “words with friends” suggests that they might not be your friends anymore, but in this case it’s the name of an online game from Hasbro that Linda plays with Karen Limkemann.  Karen and Steve came to visit this today and arrived around 3:30 PM.  We all talked for an hour and then Steve and I went to my office to look at our Linux computer while Linda started pulling dinner together.

 

 

 

Ham radio tower sections laid out in the yard end-to-end.

Ham radio tower sections laid out in the yard end-to-end.

Linda spent much of yesterday and this morning preparing this meal.  She made a salad dressing from scratch, crushed red lentil soup from scratch, pita bread from scratch, mixed up a small batch of garlic butter, and made Koshary from scratch.  We had a semi-dry white wine from Leelanau Cellars with the meal, and red grapes for dessert.  The meal was truly outstanding.

Heights Tower Systems aluminum tower sections laid out in the yard.

Heights Tower Systems aluminum tower sections laid out in the yard.

After dinner we took a stroll around the property and showed them the landscaping work, the (disassembled) ham tower, the proposed location of the barn, and the natural gas and HVAC projects.  Back at the house we discussed past travels and future plans at some length before they needed to head for home.

 

2014/06/04 (W) Indian Street Food

After working hard on our fire pit project the last three days we took it easy today.  I put a load of laundry in to run while we had breakfast and browsed our blog and news feeds.  A couple of recent installments from NutritionFacts.org reminded us yet again why we are following a whole-food plant-based way of eating.  I made follow up phone calls to various contractors and left messages as no one seems to answer phones anymore.  We often do not answer our phones if we don’t recognize the number or the caller ID is blocked, but we are not running businesses.  I did get hold of Ed and we had a nice chat about the restricted water flow problem in his Aqua-Hot and what he did to fix it.  I’m starting to form the impression that these are “fussy” high maintenance units.

I got a call from Chuck in reply to my e-mail to him yesterday.  He is working on a project to replace the conventional bulbs in his side cargo lights with LEDs.  He found a source for a double contact base that fits in place of an 1157 bulb.  He can solder the wires from the LED arrays to the base and plug it in; no modification of the cargo light housing or wiring needed.  I like those kinds of solutions.

I got a call back from Darryll Mech at DCM Heating and Cooling.  Darryll installed a garage heater and a furnace/air-conditioner for the addition to our previous house.  He is going to schedule a time to come back to the new house and figure out exactly what we need to do to prep the house for natural gas.  It is going to involve running additional black pipe, installing a garage furnace and a small furnace/air-conditioner for the library, and then converting the kitchen stove, whole house generator, and hot water baseboard furnace to natural gas.  We have a local guy (TOMTEK) who services the hot water baseboard furnace, so we will probably have him do the conversion on that unit.  We also have a company that installed and services the whole house generator and will probably have them do the conversion on that unit along with the annual maintenance.  We would like to have all of this done, except the appliance conversions, in August.  The natural gas pipeline and hookup is scheduled for “late summer to early fall.”  When I talked to the contractor it sounded like that meant the end of August to early October.  I hope it’s closer to the former than the later.

Scott Barnes from The Renewal Group in Hartland, Michigan retuned my call.  He wasn’t able to work today due to the rain so he came over to discuss our pole/bus barn project.

We got together with Steve and Karen Limkemann for dinner this evening and then went to their house in Westland to visit.  As we moved to being vegetarians and then vegans Indian food rose towards the top of our list of favorite cuisines, and one of our favorite restaurants in all of SE Michigan is Neehee’s in Canton.  Neehee’s is a small, unassuming semi-fast food place that serves “Indian vegetarian street food.” As the name implies, you will not find any dishes with meat, fish, or fowl.  You will, however, find dishes made with paneer (an Indian cheese) and yogurt.  They also serve ice cream.  They have a nice selection of vegan dishes, however, and some of the vegetarian dishes can be made vegan on request.  It’s a long way for us to drive just to have dinner, but very much on our way to Steve and Karen’s place.  They were good sports and agreed to try it.

The menu had changed since the last time we were there.  The “Indo-Chinese” section was gone, and with it one of our favorite dishes, a fried cauliflower in a spicy sweet and sour sauce.  We had the Special Gujarati Thali which consisted of nine different curries and sauces, two types of puri (crepes, thin breads), and rice.  It was very good.  Steve and Karen were not as thrilled with their dishes, but the issue seemed to be a bit too much “heat.”  Almost all Indian food (that we have had) is spicy, in the sense of being pungent and aromatic, and some of it is “hot”, in the sense of having a burning sensation in the mouth.

We drove to Steve and Karen’s house after dinner, looked at photos from trips, and talked at length about past and future travels.  Steve had resurrected some very old computer games and had them running on his Raspberry Pi and displayed on their large screen TV.  We played one for a while based loosely on A Hitch Hiker’s Guide To The Galaxy.  It would have been a trip down memory lane if I had any memory of having played it years ago, but I didn’t, so it was a new old experience for me.  He also demonstrated their Roku device, which connects to their WiFi network and streams a wide variety of programming to their television.  Much of it is free, some of it involves a monthly subscription, and some of it is “pay-per-view.”  It might be part of a solution for us at home.

 

2014/01/28 (T) Myakka River SP, FL

Myakka SP Visitor Center.

Myakka SP Visitor Center.

We had a leisurely start to the morning, with a light breakfast and coffee, before packing up and heading to Myakka River State Park with Steve and Karen.  We took two cars as we planned to head home directly from the park.

L-to-R: Steve, Karen, and Linda study the maps and park info.

L-to-R: Steve, Karen, and Linda study the maps and park info.

Myakka River SP was one of the first Florida State Parks.  Although it is not that far from Venice and Sarasota, it encompasses many square miles of marsh, pine flatwoods, Sabal palm forest, and a long stretch of the Myakka River, including two lakes.  Like Paynes Prairie, it is a wild place on the doorstep of urbanity and a major sanctuary for a diverse ecosystem including birds, alligators, and other animals.  I have placed all of the wildlife photographs in a separate gallery post with today’s date.

Entrance tower to canopy skywalk suspension bridge.

Entrance tower to canopy skywalk suspension bridge.

Our friends from St. Petersburg (Michael and Donna) had recommended Myakka River SP to us earlier this month as one of the best places to see lots of very large alligators.  They had also said that the best way to see the park was by kayak or canoe, and once we were there we saw why.  The roads through the park and good, and there are some excellent trails and viewing areas, including one that takes you to an 85 foot long skywalk (suspension bridge) through the forest canopy 25 feet above the ground with a 75 foot observation tower at the end that gets you well above the treetops.  But the park is mostly about water and most of the trails do not go to the water’s edge because it is marsh and there are snakes and alligators.

Linda on the skywalk 25 feet above the ground (she does not like heights or bridges that move, but she did just fine getting across.

Linda on the skywalk 25 feet above the ground (she does not like heights or bridges that move, but she did just fine getting across.

Linda on the skywalk.  It is 85 feet between the support/access towers.

Linda on the skywalk. It is 85 feet between the support/access towers.

Steve photographing from the skywalk.

Steve photographing from the skywalk.

There are two different campground areas, and they appeared to be older but very nice.  Older in this case means winding roads and sites that are too small to accommodate an RV the size of our bus.  We knew when we bought our bus conversion that one of the tradeoffs we were making was a higher-end travel and living experience at the expense of staying in state and national parks and forests.  Even so, we were tent campers for many years and always enjoyed the less refined experience of state/national parks/forests campgrounds and their locations and adjacent activities.

The 75 foot observation tower at the end of the skywalk.

The 75 foot observation tower at the end of the skywalk.

One of the campgrounds is near the entrance off of FL-70 and the other one is at the Myakka Outpost concession area on the south shore of the north lake.  There is a café there, a gift shop, and concessions including a tram, an airboat, and bicycle, canoe, and kayak rentals.  The boat launch is here and there is a nice picnic area where we stopped to have lunch.  As we were parking we noticed people staring up at a tree.  We quickly saw what they were watching; a large raptor eating a fish it had just caught.  I put the long zoom lens on the camera and spent about 20 minutes photographing this bird from different angles.  We eventually determined that it was an Osprey.

Karen and Linda resting at the base of the observation tower.

Karen and Linda resting at the base of the observation tower.

By mid-afternoon we had done what we felt we could do for the day without renting a canoe or kayak.  We had a three hour drive to get home by which time the cats would have been on their own for almost 36 hours, so we said our farewells to Steve and Karen, agreed to meet again while we are both in Florida, and started the drive back to Williston.  We made good time, arriving at 6:15 PM even with a rest stop and a fuel stop.  The rain that was forecast for tomorrow started about 45 minutes before we got back to our motorcoach and it was obvious when we arrived that it had already rained heavily.  We settled in for the evening, checked e-mail, and went to bed early having had two very full and satisfying days of visiting, sight-seeing, and entertainment.

 

2014/01/27 (M) Venice, FL

We were up a little earlier this morning to finish packing and get on the road.  Our destination was Nokomis, Florida where Steve and Karen Limkemann are renting a unit for part of the winter in Bay Lake Estates mobile home park.  Nokomis is south of Sarasota just west of I-75 and borders Venice which is on the Gulf Coast.  We passed a lot of mobile home (manufactured housing) parks in this area; our first exposure to this iconic aspect of Florida.  The drive down took just over three hours, most of it due south on I-75, and into a different climate zone.  We arrived just after 11 AM, unloaded the car, and relaxed for a while before going to lunch at Café Evergreen.

Bay Lake Estates, Nokomis, FL.

Bay Lake Estates, Nokomis, FL.

Café Evergreen ( http://cafeeergreen.net ) has only been open for about six weeks and was not yet listed on Happy Cow.  It is an all-natural, all-organic restaurant and market, with a nice variety of menu choices, some of which are vegetarian and a few of which are vegan.  They serve breakfast on weekends and also have a coffee/juice bar.  Linda had the Grilled Eggplant Wrap sandwich and I had the Vegetarian Burger with the Napa Cabbage Slaw as a side (both of which were in fact vegan).  Both sandwiches were excellent.

Our table at Café Evergreen.

Our table at Café Evergreen.

Café Evergreen dining room.

Café Evergreen dining room.

From lunch we drove to Casey Key and parked at North Jetty Park.  We walked down the beach to the Jetty and watched people fishing, bird-watching, and sun-bathing as boats came and went.  It was warmer and dryer here than we have been experiencing up in Williston and very pleasant.  We soaked up some of that sun and took lots of photographs, mostly of Pelicans and Snowy Egrets.  We then drove to downtown Venice, parked in a public lot near the Venice Theater, and walked around downtown window shopping and taking photos.

L-to-R: Steve, Karen, and Linda.

L-to-R: Steve, Karen, and Linda.

Karen and Linda walking back from the beach, North Jetty Park, Casey Key, FL.

Karen and Linda walking back from the beach, North Jetty Park, Casey Key, FL.

We were originally planning on going to a Thai restaurant for dinner as it was the only restaurant in Venice listed on Happy Cow, but decided to return to Café Evergreen instead.  Linda had the Kelp Noodles Stir Fry and I had the Vegan Butternut Squash Ravioli.  Again, both dishes were excellent, and Linda decided to do a review for Happy Cow went we got back to our bus.

We went back to Steve and Karen’s place to relax and change clothes before going to the Venice Theater to see the 8 PM performance by The Capital Steps.  We had seen them several times before at a theater in Canton, Michigan, but they had not been to that theater in the last few years.  Laughter really is the best medicine, and The Capital Steps had us laughing hard for almost two hours.  We returned to the mobile home, chatted for a while longer, and turned in for the night.

 

2014/01/12 (N) More Visitors

Steve and Karen were headed to Deltona to visit relatives of Karen’s and were expected there around noon.  With a two hour drive ahead of them they needed to be on the road by10 AM.  We were all up before 8 AM, had a leisurely breakfast and set up a tripod to get a few photographs of the four of us before the left.

Linda, Bruce, Karen, and Steve at site 439, Williston Crossing RV Resort (FL).

Linda, Bruce, Karen, and Steve at site 439, Williston Crossing RV Resort (FL).

The more time we spend living in the bus the more normal it seems, but we are still very much aware of the fact that for most of our friends it is an object of considerable curiosity.  I think many of them are also fascinated, perhaps even a bit perplexed, by the idea that we live in even part time, and seeing it in person helps them understand just what it is that we are doing.

Last March (2013), while on our second Holistic Holiday at a Sea cruise, we became friends with a retired special education teacher from New York City named Norma. We exchanged e-mail addresses and phone numbers and have stated in touch with her since then.  Norma has a daughter who lives in Winter Park, Florida north of Orlando and not that far from where we are staying.  Norma has been down visiting, and e-mailed us yesterday indicating that family was headed to a state park for the day and would be close enough to stop in Williston for a visit.  A quick phone call this morning confirmed the arrangements; they would come to the RV resort on the way home so everyone could see the motorhome.  🙂

Linda, Norma, Anna (Norma’s daughter) and Anna’s children in our coach.

Linda, Norma, Anna (Norma’s daughter) and Anna’s children in our coach.

As of this morning our Dropbox client software was still unable to connect to the Dropbox cloud servers.  I was able to log in to our Dropbox account through various web browsers and upload a file, so that was some sort of progress.  I was not, however, able to access my settings page, so the Dropbox servers/accounts were not yet fully restored and functional.

Linda made pan-fried firm tofu with grilled onions and Bar-B-Q sauce served on a whole wheat hamburger bun.  The tofu has something of the texture of a fried egg, and the sandwich, while simple, is simply delicious.  A side of Brussels sprouts and broccoli provided our greens.

I worked on getting the blog up-to-date while we watched Downton Abbey.  I then transferred all of the photos for the Arcadia Bus Rally BCM article to a flash drive.  I need to put it in the mail to the editor tomorrow.

 

2014/01/11 (S) The Swamp Trail

This is a small image gallery from our day at Silver River State Park in Silver Springs, Florida.  Left click once on a thumbnail image to see a larger version.  The maximum image dimension is 640 pixels.

2014/01/11 (S) Silver River State Park (FL)

We finally had a day with some sunshine and no rain and Karen suggested that we go to Silver River State Park.  Karen had been there many years ago and had fond memories of the place.  The park is in Silver Springs, Florida on the eastern edge of Ocala, Florida, about 35 miles from our wintering grounds at the WCRV Resort in Williston, Florida.  We left around 10 AM and were there by 10:45 AM.  I have posted a photo gallery with today’s date in addition to this blog posting.

Silver River SP is large for an urban location and has two entrances.  We went to the west entrance first.  This is where the water park, springs, glass bottom boats, concessions, and entertainment facilities are located.  There was also a major Ford car club show going on.  We could not buy an annual pass at this entrance, however, so we drove to the east entrance.  The east part of the park is where the campground, hiking trails, historic Cracker homestead, education facilities, and museum are located.  We bought an annual park pass, good for admission of one vehicle with up to eight people at most of the Florida State Parks, went in, and parked at the trailhead area.

Silver Springs SP, Silver Springs, Florida.

Silver River SP, Silver Springs, Florida.

We had a leisurely stroll on the 1.9 mile Swamp Trail.  The trail took us through pine Forest and cedar swamp to the south bank of the Silver River.  There was a variety of interesting flora along the way (with an occasional explanatory placard) that Steve and I stopped to photograph.  When we finished the hike we explored and photographed the Cracker homestead recreation, although none of the buildings were open.

Steve and Karen Limkemann., SSSP (FL).

Steve and Karen Limkemann., SRSP (FL).

While we were on the trail Linda got a call from our daughter.  She was at our house and said the road was icy and the driveway had not been plowed.  We had contracted with someone to take care of this in our absence and apparently they had not been there since the most recent heavy snows and extremely cold temperatures.  I called the phone number we have and got a Verizon message indicating that the number had been changed, disconnected, or was no longer in service.  Great (not).

Us at SSSP (FL).  (Photo by Steve Limkemann.)

Us at SRSP (FL). (Photo by Steve Limkemann.)

We had gotten a referral for this snow removal service from the realtor who helped us by our house so I gave him a call.  I made it clear that we understood that this was not his problem and we did not consider him in any way responsible, but if there was any way he could contact this guy and determine if he was still in business we would appreciate it.  I thanked him, indicating that we really did not have anyone else we could call and appreciate any assistance he could provide.  This is one of the potential downsides to being away from home in the winter, but no reason to spoil a good hike.

The World Famous Glass Bottom Boats, SSSP (FL).

The World Famous Glass Bottom Boats, SRSP (FL).

Our hiking done we returned to the east end of the park.  This part of the park was once a private/commercial enterprise but is now a Florida State Park.  The water park wasn’t open this time of year, but we were there to ride the famous glass bottom boats.  The 30 minute ride gave us a great view of seven of the 20 springs that feed the Silver River.  The water was crystal clear, so light penetrated easily to the bottom (as much as 55 feet down in the spring openings) and was teeming with aquatic life.  A variety of birds were also there, especially Anhinga.  We did not see any alligators, but we did see plenty of warning signs.

Ford car show at SSSP (FL).

Ford car show at SRSP (FL).

The springs have been used for many years to film underwater scenes for movies, including one of the James Bond films.  Most famous, however, was the Sea Hunt TV series starring Lloyd Bridges.  All of the 120+ episodes were filmed in one particular spring that we were able to see.

Linda and Karen on the Swamp Tail, SSSP (FL).

Linda and Karen on the Swamp Tail, SRSP (FL).

The Ford car show had a lot of vehicles and a lot of people looking at them.  One whole area was high performance Shelby Cobras with a Ford GT nearby.  We wandered around and took a few pictures.  The wind started to come up and when Linda checked the weather there was a storm front moving our way with severe thunderstorm warnings for Williston.  We decided to head back as we had a couple of stops to make on the way and wanted to be back at the coach before the storms hit.

 

 

Steve photographing palms on the Swamp Trail, SSSP (FL).

Steve photographing palms on the Swamp Trail, SRSP (FL).

Sometime on Friday the Dropbox service developed a major problem as the result of some maintenance they were doing on the system.  Our desktop clients were suddenly unable to connect with the Dropbox cloud servers and I was also not able to log in through the web interface.  I had planned to upload photos for the BCM Arcadia Rally article and couldn’t.  Plan B was to put them on a flash drive and mail them.  I found a 16 GB unit for $9.99 at Staples and bought a padded mailing envelope to ship it in.  We then stopped at the Publix supermarket on US-27 to pick up some things Linda needed to make risotto.  It just started to rain as we got back to the coach, so we quickly got our groceries and ourselves inside.  Moments later the thunder, lightning, wind, and rain began in earnest.

Linda, Karen, and Steve at the Cracker Homestead, SSSP (FL).

Linda, Karen, and Steve at the Cracker Homestead, SRSP (FL).

Although Saturday is also fire pit night at WCRV Resort but they do not build a fire when high winds are forecast.  We heard voices over by the fire pit later but decided to hunker down for the evening.  Linda made a traditional Arborio rice risotto with mushrooms, onions, garlic, Pinot Grigio (which we also drank), and four different greens (kale, Swiss chard, spinach, and arugula).  It was truly excellent.  We had fresh strawberries and dark chocolate covered almonds for dessert.  We four people in the coach for dinner everyone has to hold their plates on their laps, but Steve and Karen were good sports about it.

2014/01/10 (F) Visitors

Steve and Karen Limkemann e-mailed yesterday that they were in Macon, Georgia and thought they would arrive at Williston Crossings today between 2 and 3 PM. They left S. E. Michigan Wednesday around noon and got as far as northern Kentucky before stopping for the night.  We had planned to do weekly chores this morning anyway, but that became necessary once we knew their ETA.  My chores included doing the laundry so we would all have clean linens, and dumping the waste tanks and refilling the fresh water tank.  Linda’s chores involved interior cleaning (vacuum, mop, dust, glass and mirrors, sinks and toilet, etc.) and de-cluttering.

Steve and Karen arrived on schedule and came in the new/rear entrance off of FL-121.  They phoned me and I drove over to lead them to our site which is near the original/front entrance on N. E. 5th St.  I had not finished filling the fresh water tank, so I gave Steve a tour of the bays while the tank filled.  Eventually the chores were done and we gathered inside to visit.

Being a Friday it was fire pit night at the RV resort, but first we went out to dinner.  We decided to try Angelina Mia’s, the Italian restaurant and pizzeria we stopped at the other day on our walk to town.  We ended up ordering a thin crust northern Italian veggie pizza, no cheese, and it was OK.  Steve had lasagna and Karen had seafood linguine, and they both said it was OK as well.  By the time we got back to the RV resort a large group had gathered around the fire pit and the fire was blazing.  There were no vacant chairs, and we did want to stand, so we retired to the coach and settled in.

We have had overnight guests in the bus prior to this, but only one person at a time.  Steve and Karen were the first couple to stay overnight, and the first guests to use the sleeper sofa pulled out into its two-person configuration.  In spite of the noise and vibration from the auxiliary air compressor, the refrigerator, the vent fans, and the water pump, they said they were comfortable and slept well.

 

2013_11_01-07 (F-R)A Busy Week

The first week of November was very busy, enough so that I was unable (unwilling) to do daily blog posts.  Covering the whole week in one post makes for a longer post, but probably shorter than seven separate ones.

2013-11-01 (F)

We were supposed to get our bus back from the shop on Friday, November 1.  We didn’t.  That meant I could not take it to Phoenix Paint in Edwardsburg, Michigan on Monday the 4th.  I was reminded yet again that a true traveler has no fixed plan.  With that off the table temporarily, we turned out attention to other things; Ham Radio Breakfast on Saturday, for instance.  It was good conversation, as usual, and we finally arranged to have one couple over for dinner in a few weeks.

2013_11_02 (S)

Saturday afternoon Steve and Karen came over to visit and have dinner.  They were not able to attend our open house/warming because they were in Arizona where Steve had made arrangements to hike to the bottom of the Grand Canyon from the south rim and back up to the north rim.  Alas, the park was closed and they had to adjust their plans and find other things to do; which they did (true travelers have no fixed plan).  We don’t see them very often, so when we do we have a great, long visit.  We had a wonderful dinner of enchiladas and Mexican rice, finished off by chocolate cake with raspberry topping made from raspberries that Linda and I picked ourselves at the Middleton Berry Farm back in September.  All vegan, of course.

After dinner we looked at some of their photographs (digital) and they looked at some of ours (also digital).  Steve brought along a Raspberry Pi computer.  It was slightly larger than a deck of cards and had a 16 GB SD Card that served as its solid state hard drive.  It had a couple of USB ports, an HDMI port, and some other connections.  Steve had a wireless network adapter in one of the USB ports and a wireless keyboard transceiver (Bluetooth, I presume) in the other.  We already had an HDMI cable on the TV so he hooked up to that and voila, pictures.  He was even able to control the Raspberry Pi using our TV remote!  Now you have to admit, that’s pretty cool.  We were also delighted to find out that they have spent part of the last few winters in the Venice, Florida area and are returning again this year.  We shared our Florida plans and agreed that we would get together.

2013_11_03 (N)

Sunday we worked around the house and on our computers until late in the afternoon when Chuck and Barbara, our friends and fellow Prevost H3-40 converted coach owners, showed up to visit and have dinner.  Although they did make it to our open house/warming we did not get to visit with them very much that day.  We talked buses, of course, but we discussed a lot of other things too, including Florida, where they have spent the last six or seven winters, most recently in the Naples area.  Again, plans were made to meet while there.

As long as I am on the subject of Florida, we started thinking about extending our stay for at least another month because of potential problems with “seasonal weight restrictions” on the roads around our house.  I found out from Phil (of the pull-though driveway) that the restrictions usually go up March 1 and stay up until April 15.  Most of the roads in our county, and all of the roads we would have to use to get to our house, are subject to these seasonal weight restrictions but the signs never say what that means.  As it turns out, it means a weight limit of 8,400 pounds per axle.  Our drive axle (four tires) weighs 20,000 pounds and we have over 7,000 pounds on each of the front/steer tires, so there’s actually no legal way for us to get the bus to our house during that 45-day window.  What to do?  Stay in Florida for another month!  Problem solved.  New problem: where to stay?  New solution: the same place we are already staying, if they will let us extend our reservation.

2013_11_04 (M)

Monday came and went without the bus being ready.  While this delayed my plans yet again, it also provided more time to work on WordPress projects.  I checked on the WordPress Backup To Dropbox (wpb2d) plug-in and it appeared to be correctly backing up all four of the sites I am working on to our personal Dropbox account.  That was good to see.  I also started soliciting “beta testers” for each of the sites.  I continued working with the WP-Members plug-in and it appeared to be functioning correctly to block access to selected pages/posts behind a user login.  Given that, I started generating user lists for each of the sites to generate usernames and passwords and keep track of when I have created those in WP and provided them to each user.

2013_11_05 (T)

On Tuesday Linda was able to extend our stay at Williston Crossings RV Resort until April 1st (no fooling).  We will figure out later how to manage our trip back to Michigan so that we do not arrive before April 16.  Sometime during the week I received an e-mail from the Prevost Owners Group, to which we belong, that the Prevost Motorcoach Show would take place in Tampa, Florida on January 13 and 14, with a reception hosted by Prevost Car Inc. the evening of the 13th.  That sounded like an opportunity to finally meet some folks from Prevost in person, and to admire brand new conversions (that we will never buy) from the likes of Marathon, Millennium, Liberty, Parliament, and Vantare.  Sometime during the week it also came to our attention that the Prevost Community group we belong to is planning a rally for the first week of April 2014 at LazyDays RV Dealership in Seffner, Florida!  Well Bob’s your uncle.  It looks like delaying our return until at least April 16 won’t be that difficult at all.

I needed to make an appointment for my annual physical, so I got on the Henry Ford Health System website.  They have a new “feature” called MyChart.  When fully functional, which it is not yet, you are supposed to be able to directly book an appointment, and see all of your lab results.  But first you have to set up your account.  I called the number and got an activation code which I then used to create a Username and Password, and was finally able to log in.  The direct scheduling feature wasn’t available for my primary care physician, but there was a “Request An Appointment” page.  So I did.  I asked for an Adult Physical on Mon., Tue., Wed., or Thu. afternoon between Monday November 25, 2013 and Friday December 6, 2013.  Less than 24 hours later I received an e-mail informing me that I had been scheduled for a 1:00 PM appointment for an Office Visit on January 15, 2014.  Huh???

I used to program computers for a living, and I used to do systems engineering, and I used to do sales and marketing of these things, and I ended my career as a consultant.  This didn’t strike me as bad programming; it struck me as bad policy that got translated into a bad systems specification.  So I wrote back to HFHS customer service and told them, as politely as I could, that their system was stupid, that is to say, the policies behind the implementation of their system were not “customer-centric.”  If I had wanted an appointment in mid-January I would have requested one.  So as of now, I do not have said appointment.

The bus was ready to pick up on Tuesday, so Chuck drove me down to W. W. Williams to get it.  I took care of the paperwork and left with Chuck following me in his truck.  I no sooner hit the highway than I got a Check Engine Light.  It came on and stayed on, so I phoned Chuck and let him know that I needed to turn around and take it back if he was willing to follow me and take me back home.  He was, so this we did; my plans further delayed.  There are worse things that can happen on this bus; the Stop Engine Light, for instance.  This light means exactly what it says, the engine is going to stop and you need to get to the side of the road, now, before it does.  I’ve only seen that once, shortly after we bought it.  We took care of some key maintenance issues and have never seen it again (and I hope that we never do).  I figured I wouldn’t get the bus back from W. W. Williams until Wednesday afternoon at best, so any trip to Edwardsburg was now delayed until Thursday.  I called Michele to let her know.  She had Pato and Tommy lined up to look at it on Friday, so I was getting anxious to get it down there.  But there’s nothing you can do until the mechanics (they are now called technicians) are ready to give it back to you.  And frankly, you really don’t want it back until they are sure it is fixed.

While I was gone dealing with the bus, we got a call from Steve (mentioned earlier) wondering if he had left his Raspberry Pi computer here on Saturday.  We checked.  Yup, it was here.  Rather than meet him somewhere, we agreed that he would come back to the house on Wednesday to get it and do some work on our computers while he was here.

2013_11_06 (W)

Steve arrived late Wednesday morning, Linux “tools” in hand.  The principle target of the work was to install Linux on one of our machines and then install/configure the Apache web-server program.  This would allow us to have a “virtual web-server” that I could use to build duplicate installations of my WordPress sites, allowing me to develop and test them before making the same changes to the live sites.  That sounded cool.  Steve has been trying to get me interested in Linux for 10 years but I never saw a real need for it until now.  It turned in to an all-day project (of course, don’t they all?) due to the age of the machine we decided to use, but that was the machine I wasn’t using for much of anything else, so that’s where it needed to go.  Steve got Linux installed and then installed Apache2.  We ran out of time to configure the Apache2 program, but that was OK as it will give Steve a reason to come back.

While we were working on the computers we talked some more about Florida.  It turns out that the Capitol Steps are scheduled to appear at the Venice Stage Theater in Venice, Florida at the end of January.  Our annual get-together with Steve and Karen has often involved dinner and a performance by this group, which specializes in political satire, much of it musical.  They said we could stay overnight at the place they rent for winter in Venice if we wanted to go to the performance, which is at 8:00 PM on a Monday evening.  The nice thing about traveling with cats is that you can leave them for 24 hours and they are fine.  They sleep for 20 of those anyway.

I checked Wednesday afternoon and the bus was reported as “ready to go.”  I decided to pick it up early Thursday morning and head directly to Edwardsburg.  That meant towing the car so I had a way home, but it also meant that Linda did not have to drive me to W. W. Williams.  That worked out well as she had to head in to the bakery on Thursday anyway.

I sometimes get a bit anxious the night before I am going to drive the bus as I don’t drive it every day and we are still finding a fixing “issues.”  I used to experience the same thing when we would book one of the Southgate Flying Club airplanes and go flying.  Again, I didn’t fly every day.  Does this ever happen to you?  As I was drifting off to sleep I suddenly remembered that I had planned to fill the fuel tank at the Mobil Truck Stop on I-96 between Howell and Lansing.  But that was based on leaving from home.  Now wide awake, I got my iPad, pulled up the map application, and zoomed in on the I-94 Baker Road interchange west of Ann Arbor.  There are three truck stops there, two Pilots and one Travel America.  I was able to examine each one carefully, checking in/out access and pump locations.  I decided the Pilot station on the north side of the highway was my best option.  I knew I had enough fuel in the tank to get that far easily, so I was then able to go back to bed and finally fall asleep.

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I must have been sleeping lightly because around 4 AM I was awakened by the faint sound of running water.  That’s another one of those sounds that will jolt you awake once you become aware of it.  The new flapper in the master bedroom toilet wasn’t quite sealed and the water was running ever so slowly trying to keep the tank full.  I was finally able to adjust the flapper a couple of days later and get it to seal, but between the truck stop research and the running water, it turned out to be a short, fitful night’s sleep.  Not good preparation for a long day of driving.

I would like to say that the trip from W. W. Williams to Phoenix Paint was uneventful, but Check Engine Lights are definitely an event, and I saw ours come on four times.  It eventually went off each time, finally staying off after the 4th time; once it’s come on I tend to be a bit on edge wondering when I will see it again (or worse).

I stopped for fuel at the aforementioned Pilot truck stop on the north side of I-94 at Baker Road and pulled in behind a truck at the last pump, or so I thought.  I sat there for a while until the driver came out and moved it, at which point I pulled up only to discover that there wasn’t a pump at that position.  So I pulled out of the truck stop onto Baker Road, came back in the entrance, and got in line behind a truck that was putting fuel in its tanks.  That truck finally moved and I was able to pull up to the pump.

Getting fuel at a truck stop isn’t like putting fuel in your car.  The gallons and dollars involved are usually an order of magnitude larger and you usually cannot run a credit card at the pump.  I went inside, waited in line, and was finally waited on by a nice woman.  I told her I probably needed 150 gallons and I failed to recognize that she ran my credit card for $150.  I was only half done washing the windshields (the bus has four) when the pump shut off.  It had put in 37.9 gallons for exactly $150.  So I went back inside, stood in line again, and had her run the card for another $350.  Back outside, I restarted the pump, waited for it to finish, then went back inside, got back in line, and got not one, but two, receipts with the dollars and gallons on them.  By the time I got back on the highway the fuel stop had taken about one hour.  More delay.

No sooner was I on the road then I got a call from Chuck checking on how my trip was going.  That was both thoughtful and reassuring; it’s comforting to know folks are aware of you and concerned for your well-being.  In some ways, owning a converted coach makes you part of a “fraternity”, if you care to join.  While we were on the phone the Check Engine Light came on for the 3rd time since I had left W. W. Williams.  It went off and came on again.  I discussed it with Chuck and decided to pull off at MY FAVORITE REST AREA to check the coolant level in the overflow reservoir.  (I talked about this rest area in my article in the February 2013 issue of Bus Conversions Magazine.  This is the same rest area where I was stranded while Linda and I repaired the patio awning that came loose a few miles earlier on westbound I-94.  Ironically, I was on my way to Phoenix Paint at that time as well.  I’m not superstitious, but I don’t like unlikely coincidences.)

The rest stop in question is near Grass Lake, Michigan, about 12 miles east of Jackson, Michigan.  It’s a very nice rest stop; I just seem to end up stopping here for less than nice reasons.  I popped the rear engine hatch, improvised a dip stick, and checked the level in the overflow reservoir.  It was up to the bottom edge of the filler tube, so no obvious problem there.  I looked around the engine bay for any sign of a coolant leak, but everything looked dry.  I took some comfort in the fact that Bob, the service manager at W. W. Williams (Dearborn) had told me that he and the technicians were very impressed with the condition of our engine; that it sounded good and ran well.  They’re real experts, so that’s no small thing.

The rest of the trip really was uneventful.  The Check Engine Light did not come on again, the transmission shifted well, the cruise control worked properly (as it always has), the engine coolant and oil temperatures ran normal, and the speedometer suddenly decided to work again!  I took I-94 W to I-69 S to M-60 W to M-40 S to US-12 W to M-205 W and pulled into Phoenix Paint just a mile north of the Indiana border around 1:00 PM.  I’ve done this trip many times, but it was a very pleasant drive with fall colors still in evidence, light traffic, and nice weather.

Michele got me into the building and parked and had me air up the suspension so they could have easier access to the inside of the wheel wells.  She and Pato got right to work removing the damaged panels while I hooked up the electrical shoreline, got the house battery charger turned back on, and activated some circuits for the inside of the bus including the auxiliary air compressor.  I stopped to look at things and answer questions as I unloaded some items from the car, and then moved stuff from the bus to car that had to return home with me.  What started out as a trip to have paint scratches buffed out had become a trip to also find and seal roof leaks and repair/repaint damaged body panels, so Michele and I looked the coach over and discussed the work to be done. I was there about 90 minutes—a really short visit for me and Michele—and got back on the road for home around 2:30 PM.

I had originally planned to spend a few days at her shop working on some small projects of my own, but that was based on a Monday arrival.  We had plans to meet up with our friend Kate in Ypsilanti on Thursday evening to see Roy Blount, Jr. at Eastern Michigan University’s Pease Auditorium.  I made it home with just enough time to change clothes, but not to eat, and we headed off to Ypsi.  We got there just as Kate and her friend Teresa were arriving and got four seats together.  RBJr was very interesting to listen too when we could hear him and understand what he was saying.  He speaks somewhat softly, and the PA system for the auditorium was not adjusted properly to compensate for that.

After the event we headed over to the Sweetwater Café, just a short walk from the auditorium, for coffee.  They had some nice looking veggie rollup sandwiches, so Linda and I had a late/light dinner.  We finally got home around 11 PM, a long day for me.

Although my health is better than it has been for the last couple of decades, I do not pretend that I am not in my 6th decade.  I can still do the all-day-drive thing, but I am much more tired at the end of it, and it takes me multiple days to recover from it.