December 29, 2004

December 29, 2004

Rainbow's End

DAY 194

 

Today was cloudy, warm, and humid. Very warm ! We were up early, to be in time for the "magazine party" that started at 9:00 A.M.. Once every 2 months, when the Escapees magazine is published, everybody at Rainbow's End is invited to attend the magazine party at the Activity Centre. At each of the fifteen or so large tables in the Activity Centre, six to eight people, in assembly line fashion, stuff an insert into each magazine, stuff the magazine into an addressed envelope, the envelopes are bundled into batches of 2 dozen or so, the bundles are loaded into Post Office bags, sorted by zip code, and the bags are loaded into large wheeled carts, ready to be loaded into the Post Office tractor trailer truck. A hundred or so volunteers, working for less than 3 hours, get all the magazines ready for mailing. When done, pizza is served for lunch. It was fun. And very productive. I think there are about 40,000 copies of each edition of the magazine mailed.

After the magazine party and pizza lunch, and, of course, lots of socializing, we walked over to the C.A.R.E. Centre to confirm that we are moving Harvey over to the C.A.R.E. side of the park on December 31, and to see if they have work schedules for us for next week. As soon as we got to C.A.R.E., Carol, the volunteer co-ordinator, said they were getting desperate for more help, and asked us if we could start work tomorrow. We agreed, so we had to go back to the trailer, get it ready for travelling, check out of Rainbow’s End RV Park, hitch up, and move over to C.A.R.E.. Their RV sites are separate from the regular Rainbow's End sites. They have 38 sites for their program "participants", and 4 sites for volunteers / WorkCampers. Each participant site has a paved walkway to make them wheelchair and motorized scooter accessible, and a storage shed for wheelchairs and scooters.

By the time we got moved over to C.A.R.E., and all set up, it was time to head for the daily “social hour” at 4:00 P.M.. We don’t go every day, but Joanne wanted to go today. For the second time since we've been here, an elderly gentleman with a Cajun accent got up at social hour, and contributed a few "Boudreaux" jokes. Boudreaux is a popular Louisiana Cajun name. Louisiana jokes here in the deep south are like "Newfie" jokes in Canada. The essence of the jokes is that people in Louisiana, like Boudreaux, are about three fries short of a Happy Meal. Most of the Boudreaux jokes also involve Boudreaux's buddy, Gaston. Politically incorrect, but hilarious, especially when told by an old man with a Cajun accent and speech cadence.

By the time we returned from social hour, it was almost dusk, and were feeling tired. We worked pretty hard this morning at the magazine party, then rushed to get Harvey ready to move, hitched, moved, unhitched, and set up. Bo was excited about getting hitched up and departing. He was ready to “move on” after being in one place for 11 days. Bo has already developed the Escapees’ malady known as “hitch itch”.

DSK