December 26, 2009 to January 2, 2010

December 26, 2009 to January 2, 2010


Saturday ; Today was sunny and warm, as are almost all days in Yuma. I spent much of the day again working on restoring my computer. I finished downloading software, from online and using my new portable DVD/CD drive for the first time. I restored a backup copy of all my files that I had saved on my new portable hard drive before I sent the computer to HP for repairs, and before Joanne wrapped it as a Christmas gift for me. I downloaded and processed yesterday’s photos. I worked on getting caught up on a backlog of data entry, mostly credit card transactions, that accumulated while my computer was away for repairs.

In the afternoon we spent some time in the swimming pool and hot tub, then took Bo for a walk around the perimeter of the dog park. While Joanne did laundry I went to the clubhouse and worked online and updated my blog. After supper we watched a movie ; About Schmidt. Well … wasn’t that uplifting ? ! ? ( tongue in cheek & rolling eyes )

Sunday ; Today was another sunny, warm day. No surprise there … HA HA HA ! This morning I was asked to perform a magic show here on New Year’s Eve. With considerable reluctance I agreed. My New Year’s Eve performance here two years ago was the worst magic show experience I’ve ever had. My magic was going poorly … my fingers weren’t working well … my performance was marred by a 7 year old assistant from the audience … and a drunk a*****e heckler … and halfway through my show an audience member in the front row keeled over face first onto the floor and had to be hauled out on a stretcher into an ambulance … ! ! ! Talk about a show stopper ! ! !

This afternoon we gave Bo a bath, then Joanne went grocery shopping at Albertsons while I napped with Sully and Bo. I took Bo for an obedience session. He had not had an obedience session in a long time, and I thought he was overdue for some practice. He did exceptionally well. Good dog, Bo ! He certainly is not the unruly terror that we rescued in Alabama 5 years ago.

Late in the afternoon we went to the regular weekly Sunday ice cream social. The fellow sitting beside me was celebrating his 88th birthday. HEY … my new life goal is to be sitting here at an ice cream social in 33 years, having Happy Birthday sung to me. He and I were chatting about computers. He said he gets his computer instruction from his “computer whiz kid” daughter. She’s one year younger than me. HA HA HA !

This park is disposing of their library of VCR movies. We picked up six to watch and take back home to the library at Riverside RV Park Resort. Tonight we watched Nurse Betty. Afterwards I reconciled our December MasterCard statements.

Monday ; Today was uncharacteristically cloudy and cool. I spent some time with my new portable hard drive and its instructions manual, learning how to use the hard drive and the ins and outs of its functionality. A few days ago somebody placed a bag of foil confetti on the bargain table. I thought I might be able to incorporate the use of confetti into a couple of my magic routines so I picked it up. Today I experimented with using the confetti in my magic. I used Joanne as a test audience. I wasn’t all that impressed with the use of confetti but Joanne thought it was worthwhile. I’ll use it on New Year’s Eve and then solicit feedback from a real audience. For one thing, it makes a mess. I suppose that if I use it on New Year’s Eve I’ll have to return to the clubhouse on New Year’s Day and clean up the mess I make on the stage.

We trimmed Bo’s and Sully’s claws today. Darn … I clipped the quick in three of Bo’s nails. Just a teensy little bit, but still … ! I’ve hit the quick in a claw or two before, because he has black nails, but not in a long time, and certainly never three at one clipping ! ! ! It was partially attributable to the fact that I lost my computer calendar where I have routine tasks such as pet nail trimming scheduled. I guess it was a bit too soon after his last nail trimming, and they hadn’t grown out as much as usual. I’m sorry, Bo !

I spent some time online in the clubhouse tonight. I did some exploring of Hewlett Packard’s website. I found and downloaded the user’s manual and maintenance manual for my HP Mini. If I had found these before, when the hinge screws first came loose in my new netbook, I probably could have avoided having to send it back for warranty repairs. Why didn’t their e-mail service support link me to the maintenance manual when I first contacted them about the loose screws in the hinge assembly ? ? ? ! ! ! ? ? ? Cynically, Joanne’s answer to that question was that it’s a self serving, make work for themselves project to answer all enquiries with “send it back to us for repairs”.

The only “surprise” gift I got for Joanne for Christmas was some baking moulds to turn fresh tortillas into baked taco salad shells, so tonight for supper we had taco salad in baked shells. MMMMM ! The movie we watched tonight was “Big Business” with Bette Midler and Lily Tomlin. I think they’re both such good comic actresses.

Tuesday ; I had insomnia last night. In the middle of the night, after hours of tossing and turning, I decided to get up and do something productive. The truck needs new front brakes. I got online and researched / learned how to replace front disc brake pads. The process seems within my capabilities. I think I’ll give a try at doing it myself.

Today was sunny and warm. Because I was up until 3:30 A.M. I slept very late this morning. Joanne wanted to go to the new Quechan Casino for lunch. This was the final day for their $8.95 lunch buffet “2 for 1 Tuesdays”. On the way over to the casino we diverted to Bard, California, across the Colorado River from Yuma. Bard is where all the date farms are, and where we occasionally go for date shakes. I wanted to check out the small town Post Office in Bard to see if it’s a viable alternative for where to have my mail forwarded to. The line ups at the Yuma Post Office are terrible ! If I have my mail sent to Bard once a month, we can pick up the mail there and then go for date shakes. Bo loooooves date shakes ! As do I !

From Bard we drove over to the Quechan Casino which is on the road to the Mexican border at Los Algodones. I’m not sure I would go again for the “2 for 1” lunch special. The line up was an hour long ! If I had known that before we entered the line up, I wouldn’t have ! But … after the agony of an hour long wait was over, it was a great lunch. After we had eaten for an hour, and were ready to leave, stuffed to the gills, Joanne had an inspiration ( rolling eyes ). She returned to the dessert bar, picked up a chocolate chip chocolate cookie … and coated it with melted chocolate under the chocolate fountain. SHEEEEESH … can you spell “excessive” ? ! ?

Since we were at the casino, we decided to play the slot machines. About once a year, we play penny slot machines for an hour, or until we lose $1 each, whichever comes first. Big spenders, eh ? HA HA HA ! Well, today we played penny slots for an hour. Joanne won $1.96. I won $4.83. So … applying our winnings to the cost of our lunch, we ate a humongous buffet lunch, then amused ourselves for an hour on slot machines, for a total expenditure of … wait for it … $2.16. HA HA HA !

On our way back home we stopped at Yuma Palms Shopping Center. Joanne went to PetsMart to buy Glucosamine treats for Sully, and I went to Best Buy to look at a computer accessory. Back at Kofa Ko-op we took both Bo and Sully to the dog park. Joanne walked around the perimeter with Bo, and I stayed near Sully as he ambled around sniffing dessert plants and cacti. I had an agenda. I wanted to see if a walk in the desert would cause a recurrence of the rheumy, wet eyes that Sully suffered for about a month after his first walk in the Mojave Desert, a month and a half ago. We just cleared up that problem about a week ago with the administration of antihistamine eye drops for two days. Apparently Sully is allergic to the desert.

Wednesday ; Well, that was exciting ! Big earthquake here today, magnitude 5.8 ! And it lasted a long time !

Today was sunny and warm. We spent most of the day running errands. We started by visiting three different veterinarians to get information and prices on health examinations, inoculations, and dental cleanings for Bo and Sully. One of the vets we had used before, a few years ago. But that was not whom we chose today. We went to a prosthetics store and Joanne got their certified fitter’s assistance to buy a new mastectomy bra. We went to a another prosthetic business and a specialty swim suit store and Joanne looked for another mastectomy swim suit. She didn’t find anything acceptable. I suggested we return to Palm Springs in the spring and she can shop there again for another mastectomy swim suit. Palm Springs seems to have the best selection and prices on mastectomy swim suits. We had a late, very light lunch at Rally’s. First food we had eaten in 24 hours … and we weren’t even hungry yet. Them massive casino buffet lunches last a long time ! HA HA HA ! Joanne went to Fry’s for a few items she needed to prepare her contribution to this afternoon’s “heavy appetizer social hour”. I went to Checker Auto Parts and got information and prices on front disc brake pads for Lanoire. On our way back to Kofa Ko-op we stopped at our chosen vet and made an appointment.

Back at “home” we took Bo for his daily long walk around the perimeter of the dog park, then Joanne prepared her cream cheese and mushroom stuffed puff pastry appetizers. We went to social hour, had an early supper of “heavy appetizers“, and chatted with friends and neighbours. Afterwards I took the computer to the clubhouse, got online, and paid year end bills.

The earthquake hit while I was sitting in the waiting room at Hanger Prosthetics, and Joanne was in the back with a fitter. It was surprisingly strong, and lasted a very long time, perhaps 15 seconds. I was staring at the water cooler, which was shaking so hard it almost fell over. After about a 5 second pause, the strong aftershock hit, and it too lasted a long time, about another 15 seconds. The manager of Hanger Prosthetics came out into the waiting room, and evacuated the building because their air conditioner unit was smoking. The epicentre of the earthquake was in Mexicali, Mexico, about 73 miles west of Yuma. It was felt as far west as San Diego on the Pacific coast, and east at least as far as Yuma. Earthquakes are pretty rare here in Yuma. The earthquake measured 5.8 and the very strong aftershock was 4.9 !

Thursday ; New Year’s Eve ; Today was a lovely, sunny, very warm day. And tonight there was a “Blue Moon”. Until last night, when it was explained on the TV news, we didn’t know what a “Blue Moon” was. A “Blue Moon” is when there is a full moon for the second time in a calendar month. The second night of full moon is a “Blue Moon”. It happens once every 2.72 years.

This morning I worked on the computer. I finished a spreadsheet summarizing our 2009 medical expenses for income tax purposes. I realized that my new netbook computer didn’t have Google Earth software, so I downloaded that, then got distracted and sidetracked playing with Google Earth. In the afternoon I rehearsed magic for my performance tonight. I’ve added a few new wrinkles to some of my routines. Hope it works out well ( I‘m typing this in the afternoon ). Wish me luck ! We took Bo for his daily long walk around the perimeter of the dog park. Then Sully wanted to go outside for a bit of sunshine and exploring.

At 7 PM we headed for the New Year’s Eve party at the clubhouse. After half an hour of socializing it was time for me to perform my magic show. It went reasonably well. My hands / fingers stumbled on one routine. I thought my recovery was … not too bad. Joanne thought it looked sloppy. I use her as my “professional critic”. At least no one in the audience keeled over and fell face first onto the floor, and got hauled out on a stretcher and into an ambulance … like during my performance here on New Year’s Eve two years ago !

One of the odd things about this park … in my opinion … was their decision to celebrate “New York New Year’s Eve” and declare the “New Year” to be at 10 PM local time. By 10:30 PM most people had left to go home. We stayed with about a dozen other people and socialized. And … I had a couple of drinks of Tennessee moonshine with peach slices in it. Made “back home” by one of the people at our table who was from Tennessee. It was pretty smooth. Well, compared to the only other moonshine I’ve had, from Fisher Branch, Manitoba, over 35 years ago. We returned to our trailer at 11:30 PM and celebrated the arrival of 2010 privately, just Joanne and me, with Bo and Sully.

HAPPY NEW YEAR !

Friday ; New Year’s Day ; Today was sunny and warm. I did some minor trailer interior maintenance. I restored my “magic tool box”. It takes me longer to “restore” my magic tool box than it does to perform a magic show. I went to the clubhouse shortly before noon to get some online work done. The Wi-Fi system was going to be shut down for maintenance in the afternoon. I retrieved all my year end investment and banking statements.

In the afternoon we Christmas “undecorated”. I did some minor trailer exterior maintenance. At 4 PM we joined a group from the park on a “taco run”. Every Friday afternoon a group from this park goes to a nearby “Mexican restaurant” for a late afternoon snack / early supper. A local Mexican family, on a small “farm” in the nearby rural area has established an “authentic” little Mexican open air “restaurant” in their back yard. For those who have never been to Mexico, it’s an exciting and exotic outing. We can understand that. But for those of us who have travelled extensively through Mexico by RV, this restaurant outing was … well … okay … and reasonably similar to “authentic” … right down to the long, black hair in my taco … but nothing really to write home about. The place, and food, were a bit … well … Americanized. Joanne just commented, as I’m typing this, that in Mexico that place would have been a “four star” establishment. HA HA HA ! We chatted with a couple from Vermont at our table. She’s a breast cancer survivor. He’s a retired Air Force pilot, and now a semi-retired private pilot flight instructor. Of course, we chatted about cancer and flying.

Saturday ; Today was sunny and warm, as usual. This morning we went to the Yuma Park & Swap, also known as the Dog Track Flea Market because it’s located behind the Greyhound Racing Track. It’s not as good as the Arizona Market Place flea market, but there’s a few things there that we can’t get at Arizona Market Place. From there we went to Pep Boys where I got some prices and information on front disc brake replacement parts to compare with the prices and information I got from Checker Auto Parts a few days ago. I’m now ready to buy the parts and make my first attempt at replacing the front brakes on Lanoire. We went to Albertsons for some groceries then returned home to Kofa Ko-op.
A few days ago I discovered a soft spot on my desk. When I probed it a bit, it was a spot about the size of a dime that was rotten. I think it was caused by the Damp Rid accident three months ago that destroyed my old laptop. I cleaned out the rotten spot, and repaired it with wood putty. Today Joanne sanded and varnished the desk top. We spent some time in the hot tub. We took Bo for his daily long walk. I followed Sully around as he explored outside for awhile. I printed all my year end investment and banking statements. After supper I reconciled the banking statements and began work on reconciling the investment statements. Well, that was interesting. A few days ago I transferred U.S.$1811.62 from my investment accounts to my U.S.$ bank account so that I could pay my MasterCard bill. The bank credited a deposit of $181,162.00 ! HAPPY NEW YEAR ! HA HA HA !

DSK