A Blustery Day of a Different Kind

Thursday March 8^th

Didn’t do much today; a few minor fixit projects and rearranged some of our pantry/storage space to make things that we use often, easier to access.

I think we are getting over-exposed to each other; too much time spent together in a limited space. I guess we will have to make an effort to get out more or make sure we don’t spend too much time in our little house.

Got the grill going this afternoon and grilled some salmon that Cathey bought a day or two ago. Had a nice dinner of salmon, baked potato and a salad. Better than crabby patties for a couple of crabby Polacks!

A Blustery Day

Wednesday March 7^th

Still waiting for the GPS gizmo to heal….. Another quiet day of reading, TV and some cleaning chores. We had a call from Terye and set up a meeting at AJ’s for Friday lunch. Later I called Larry and we set up a meeting for Saturday lunch – we’re getting booked up.

Mid afternoon we ventured to the Camping World Store about 10 miles down I-10 from here. I needed to buy some spring loaded bars for the bathroom shelves. The shelves are spaced vertically far enough apart that shampoo bottles and other tall things fit nicely there, but when we move the bottles have to be put inside the cabinet because there is nothing to keep them on the shelf when the trailer hits a bump in the road. So the spring loaded bars are like a spring loaded adjustable shower rod on a small scale that can be adjusted and pushed into place to hold things on shelves or upright in the refrigerator. Also bought some cutesy hummingbird lights to hang on our awning – if we ever use it. At this particular site there is a tree preventing us from using it but it has been far too windy to use it anyway.

Once we left Camping World we went and checked out the ‘Lazy Days’ RV Park adjacent to the Camping World store. We stayed there 3 years ago and it hasn’t changed much although it has changed hands; it used to be called Beaudry’s.

By that time hunger pangs were working on both of us. I remembered a good hamburger place about a mile down the road from the Camping World store, so we headed there. It was called ‘Brooklyn Beer & Burger’ and the burgers were even better than I remembered.

The weather today was kind of blustery with a high of only 55 and it was mostly cloudy until late afternoon when it finally cleared up.

GPS goes on Strike - We Wander

Tuesday March 6^th

Not much action around here today. I took the opportunity to do a few minor maintenance chores – nothing too serious a little super glue here, a little duct tape there and opened a panel to get something that fell behind the stove.

So about the time the rush hour traffic began we ventured out to find a Target. Unfortunately the GPS seems to be on strike or on the fritz. It kept saying we were still at the RV park when we were miles away so we kind of just drove until we saw a K-mart and stopped and picked up a few things. We also found out that the Target was just a few blocks down the street and just before we saw the Target we spied an Olive Garden. So after a brief Target stop we headed to the Olive Garden and had a great dinner.

Hot Day for Snowbirds

Monday March 5^th

Cathey had an appointment to get a perm today at 1pm. I delivered her to the beauty shop and then had two hours to spend. Bought gas at $3.59/gal at the nearest Shell station. Looked over the stores near us and then drove over to Vail and had a great hamburger at Montgomery’s Bar and Grill. Then came back to the trailer and laid down for a little while. I thought I would do some cleaning but it was too hot in the trailer; the outdoor temp was about 85.

Once Cathey was done at the beauty shop, she went over to Fry’s and bought some hamburgers to grill for supper. So it was more hamburger on the menu but it was still wonderful!

Another Quiet Sunday

Sunday March 4^th

Slept in and didn’t really do anything until about 4:00, when we drove over to AJ’s Deli in the far reaches of N Tucson. It was more than 20 miles over there, and there is more Tucson to the W of there. This is the AJ’s that is in the foot hills on the N side of Tucson and the outdoor seating looks out over the city. Very scenic, but I doubt I will be driving 40 miles roundtrip to have lunch there very often. By the time we left it was just about dark so the view from there was even better.

Move to Cactus Country, Tucson

Saturday March 3^rd

Up relatively early and got showered and fed and proceeded to stow things for the move. Then I discovered that we were out of coffee so made an emergency trip to Fry’s for coffee and a couple of cleaning items. We were hooked up and ready to go by about 11:30, unfortunately, I think the check-out time was 11:00.

We bid adieu to Curt and Max and finally got rolling a few minutes before 12:00. Traffic was no problem and I even let the GPS take us through Chandler on a state highway. We stopped around Casa Grande for some lunch at a Dairy Queen.

The RV Park we were going to was way on the E side of Tucson so we finally pulled in a few minutes before 4:00. Setup went smoothly and by 5:30 we set off for the nearby Fry’s for all the things that I didn’t get this morning. On the way back we took a detour to the town of Vail about 3 miles E of here. I was looking for a steakhouse that I had seen advertised along the highway. We didn’t find the steakhouse but we did find a little Italian restaurant that was pretty good. There was more in Vail that I thought; there were several other restaurants there which we may visit later.

Then back to the trailer to “unstow’ whatever we need. Gradually over the course of a week everything gets spread out again and then you have to stow it all again before the next move.

We Get Our Own Mobile Wi-Fi

Friday March 2^nd

For some reason we were both kind of crabby today so we decided today was the day to go and see Verizon about getting our mobile wi-fi service. I wasn’t expecting this to be a very pleasant encounter but Dustin, our salesman, was so good at his job that he talked us out of an additional $70 per month and we left smiling. We added the mobile wi-fi device to Cathey’s contract with 5Gb of data per month for $50 and also bought another dohickey that converts our home phone to a cellular service for an additional $20/month. That will save us from reactivating the phone at home to TDS or Time Warner and lets our home phone travel with us when we are traveling.

Then made a brief stop at Best Buy to buy a cable for my camera. I have been taking pictures but failed to bring the right cable to download the pictures to my computer. The Geek at Best Buy sold me an USB SD card reader so I can take the card out of the camera and read it into the computer. That’s good until the camera battery goes dead and then I will have another problem. I was shocked to learn that despite the cable for the camera being the same size as other cables, all camera cables are unique to the brand of camera. No standardization for camera cables like there is for phone cables.

So after dealing with all that, we had a nice lunch at a place called “The Paradise Bakery and Café.” Then drove out to Lost Dutchman State Park just a few miles north of Apache Junction. There wasn’t much there to look at except great views of the mountains. The park is mostly a campground and starting point for several hiking trails that go up to the Superstition Mountains. The campground there was pretty nice, but like most state camping facilities there are no sewer hookups.

When we got back to the trailer we did some preps for moving tomorrow – we will be going to the Cactus Country RV Park on the E edge of Tucson. That is a place that we stayed at 3 years ago and enjoyed.

Went and filled up the Suburban before it got dark. Gas was $3.89/gallon; hope it doesn’t get too much worse or we will have to start hitchhiking!