December 9 to 15, 2018

Sunday ; Sunny and warm. How lovely !

This afternoon we went to a theater performance by Yuma Community Theater. Usually I am fairly satisfied with Yuma Community Theater’s plays, and the value for money paid. But today … well … not quite so much. Today’s play was A Charlie Brown Christmas, with an all child cast. And while the play was fairly well done … paying forty ( American ) dollars ( for a pair of tickets ) to see a group of children perform a forty-five minute, one act play, didn’t seem to be money particularly well spent. Oh, well … it was supposed to evoke Christmas spirit in the audience members, and I suppose it did that.

After the play we ran some shopping errands until it was time to go for dinner. Joanne wanted to have a bit of a celebratory dinner, to celebrate our arrival / return to Yuma. We went to Olive Garden. Good meal. Very good service ! After we returned home Joanne used my old laptop to buy some dog food online. We spent way too much time this afternoon at PetsMart trying to select an appropriate new dog food for Ozzie, since we were unable to find his “Canadian” product. But … we’re dinosaurs ! Taking the advice of the PetsMart store manager, Joanne found that it was available online at Chewy.com, shipped to our door for much less money than we pay for it in Penticton. HMPH … go figure !

Monday ; Los Algodones, Baja California, Mexico

Cloudy and cool.

This morning we left home at 11 AM heading for dental appointments in Mexico at noon. Through Yuma to Interstate 8, west on I-8 over the Colorado River into California, then a mile south on Algodones Road to the Andrade / Los Algodones border crossing. We parked, walked into Mexico, and arrived at our dentist’s office about 11:45 AM. My dental cleaning started forty minutes late, Joanne’s started seventy minutes late. My periodontist was “too busy” to conduct a periodontal examination, despite me having made an appointment, so a young “general” dentist conducted my post cleaning dental exam. In the ten years or so that we have been going to this clinic, there has been a slow but steady deterioration in customer service as a second generation of the Camacho family takes over. With about a hundred and fifty dentists in a six square block area of this town … maybe it’s time to move on to a different dentist ?

When we were finished at the dentist’s we went for a late lunch at our favourite restaurant in town, Tacos Molca. MMMMMM … best shredded goat meat taco ever ! After lunch we went to Tere’s Beauty & Barber Shop. I got a haircut and beard trim, Joanne got a pedicure. 

I was finished before Joanne, so I walked over to the veterinary pharmacy and bought some heartworm prevention medication for Ozzie. On the way back to the beauty salon I discovered a small new panaderia in town. WOO-HOO … mucho pan dulce por grande gringo !

Joanne shopped for a new backpack purse. Found one she liked. Vendor asked for U.S.$48. Joanne offered twenty bucks ! A few minutes of haggling, and … she bought it for twenty bucks. Well done, my dear. My mother would be proud of you. HA HA HA ! I bought some medication that our friend / neighbour Jeanine back home in Keremeos asked for.

The line-up to cross back into the U.S. was seventy minutes long. Just more games playing by the assholes at CBP ! It was a slow day in Los Algodones, not that many gringos to cross back into the U.S. I was amused by the thousands and thousands of feet of new razor wire now strung along the top of the “fence” around the border crossing. Got to keep the “homeland secure” from all them old white folks with fixed teeth trying to cross the border ! HA HA HA < SNORT > HA HA !

On the way back home we stopped at Smart & Final to buy some advertised grocery items ( like “twelve packs” of soft drinks for three bucks ! ) and at O’Reilly’s to pick up a tailgate strut I ordered yesterday. We were back home at 7 PM.

Tuesday ; Sunny and warm.

This morning I installed a new lift strut on the car’s tailgate and a new lift strut on the car’s liftgate ( tailgate window ). And chatted with the new neighbour from two doors down, a woman from Victoria, BC. This afternoon a crew from Sam’s Mobile RV Washing arrived, and washed the fifth wheel trailer, the car, the truck, and the camper. Two young Mexican guys, two hours, done ! A hundred bucks well spent ! Would have taken Joanne and me at least two days to do all that work !

As soon as the car was washed Joanne went shopping. I spent the rest of the afternoon on … < sigh > … the ongoing cell phone drama. My U.S. cell phone is still not reactivated. The new SIM card that was supposed to be sent on November 30 still has not arrived. Finally … after WAY too much time spent talking to way too many “HELP” agents … ( somewhat of an oxymoron there ! ) … I pitched a hissy fit, told them to cancel my account, and refund my money ! Which started a whole new chapter of drama !

I spent the evening shopping online for a new cell phone service. And spinning my wheels trying ( and failing ) to migrate my very old calendar function from my old laptop to my new laptop.

Wednesday ; Sunny and warm.

This morning I set up the Sun Oven to be used for the first time this winter season, and Joanne baked a Saskatoon coffee cake using frozen Saskatoons picked at home six months ago. I did some maintenance work on the trailer. After lunch we headed to the Humane Society of Yuma for our first dog walking / cat cuddling session in a year and a half. I have missed my volunteer work at HSOY, and have been looking forward to our return. Nevertheless … the lack of interest and absence of a “welcome back” by the new volunteer department staff was a bit disheartening and discouraging. The Humane Society of Yuma seems to have devolved into an organization comprised of staff that exist to serve themselves. Volunteers … and even potential adopters … seem to be of little interest to them. My dampened spirits were lifted when a regular volunteer from past years pulled into the parking lot as I was walking a dog. Penny jumped out of her truck and very enthusiastically welcomed me back. It took another volunteer to make me feel welcome and valued. I walked dogs for two hours while Joanne worked in the cat adoption wing.

In the evening we watched Survivor. And I continued to work on “migrating” from my old laptop to my new one.

Thursday ; Sunny and warm.

The roof repair contractor that I hired was here twice today to complete two of the three steps involved in cleaning, repairing, and recoating the trailer’s roof. In the morning he cleaned the roof. He returned a few hours later, after allowing the roof to dry completely, to repair damaged areas. His work looks good so far. I finally finished setting up the fifth wheel trailer on our lot. I installed the king pin bipod stabilizer, lowered the rear stabilizer jacks, chocked the wheels on both sides, and set up and connected the solar panels.

I continued setting up my new laptop. I loaded the software for the printer here in Yuma. The software for the printer in Keremeos would not load. Guess I’ll be buying a new printer next spring ! While 
I barbecued supper I watched a crop duster spray the orchards adjacent to our RV park. I am absolutely fascinated by watching a high powered aircraft work about fifteen feet above ground … in the dark ! It’s done at night because there is no wind to disperse the chemical being sprayed. Nevertheless … the air was pungent with the smell of the chemicals. 
I’ll probably end up with mesothelioma or something from indulging my fascination with watching the process of night time “crop dusting”.

Friday ; Cloudy, windy, cool.

My roofing contractor did not return until almost noon today. It was too cold in the morning for the application of the roofing recoat material. He completed the application of the first of two coats, but does not want to apply the second and final coat until a warm and sunny day. While he worked on the trailer roof I worked on a repair on the trailer’s side wall. A repair that I had done about thirteen or fourteen years ago, shortly after we bought the trailer, needed to be redone. I had used fiberglass reinforced tape to repair a couple of cracks in the gel coat. The sun “ate” the old repair over the last two summers. Today I did the repair again, this time using Eternabond tape.

Late in the afternoon I removed the trailer’s very dead “house” battery and we headed to Wal-Mart to buy a replacement battery. On the way we stopped at the Habitat For Humanity Re-Store and bought a cellular blind for the trailer’s bedroom window. At Wal-Mart I bought a new battery in the automotive department then joined Joanne in the store who was grocery shopping. When we were finished with our Wal-Martin’ we headed to Lowe’s to buy some mounting brackets for the cellular blind we had purchased at HFH Re-Store.

As we returned to our car in the Lowe’s parking lot we found Ozzie just finishing up eating two packages of luncheon meats ! HEY ! BAD DOG ! As we were leaving Wal-Mart Joanne wondered if she should put the perishable groceries in the fridge in the car. I said “don’t bother … we’ll just be in Lowe’s for a few minutes, and home soon thereafter”. We both neglected to account for Ozzie being alone in the car … with food ! HMPH ! Lesson learned ! I wonder how a very old dog with only six teeth can tear open packages like that ? ! ?

For supper I barbecued a large fillet piece of Coho Salmon caught by me in the Atnarko River near Bella Coola in September. In the evening 
I helped Joanne with a computer chore she has been dreading doing. 
I placed an online order for her Christmas gift to me. HA HA HA ! Merry Christmas, Daniel !

Saturday ; Mostly sunny and mild, a bit windy. Joanne cooked a chicken and rice recipe in the Sun Oven today.

We finally got around to doing our Christmas decorating today. Joanne cleaned the cellular blind that we bought at Habitat For Humanity 

Re-Store yesterday. I figured out how to mount it in the bedroom and what hardware to use to mount it. I mounted our Christmas projector light on our side yard brick fence, casting red and green dancing lights on the trailer, the car, the patio and Arizona room, and … some of our front yard cactus garden. HA HA HA … kewl ! I replenished toiletries in the camper. We arranged the trailer’s desk area to eliminate my old laptop and its peripherals, and get my new laptop ( and old printer ) into place.

DSK