February 2, 2006

February 2, 2006

La Feria, Texas

YEAR 2 DAY 230

 

Today was sunny and hot. Today's high was 94 degrees !

This morning Teddy woke me up to be fed, and Bo woke me up to be walked. I gave Teddy his morning pill, fed him, walked Bo, and went back to bed for a couple more hours.

MMMMM ! The farmer the other evening was right. The Rio Ruby grapefruit grown here in "The Valley" is indeed the best grapefruit grown. It's too bad, as he stated, that Florida's citrus marketers are so much better at their job than Texas's. We had a Rio Ruby grapefruit for breakfast. Huge, meaty, juicy, sweet ! Did I mention huge ? !

After morning chores I walked down to the office to pay for another week. The weather here is just too good to leave. Especially when a few hundred miles away, they're having rain and tornadoes. I refilled the fresh water holding tank. I prepared some outgoing mail. We drove over to the Post Office. I bought some stamps, posted the outgoing mail, and picked up our investment mail at General Delivery. Thank you, Bruce. Get well soon ! We refilled a couple of jugs of water. I returned to the trailer and Joanne took the truck into Harlingen to shop at Wal-Mart and H-E-B. I finished updating my investment spreadsheets. The first month of 2006 was a pretty good month in the stock markets.

The elusive Wi-Fi signal was available at the trailer this afternoon, so I got online, retrieved my January bank statements, sent and retrieved e-mail, and updated my blog. I took Bo for an obedience training session. I made lunch for myself when I realized that Joanne was obviously going to be much longer than she had thought she was going to be. She returned to the trailer just as I was finishing my lunch. I read today's Winter Texan Weekly newspaper for awhile, then fell asleep briefly. Joanne woke me up to drive her to the clubhouse with a huge amount of laundry to do.

While Joanne did laundry, I started today's journal entry, and entered an investment trade transaction. We watched the season premiere of Survivor. I barbecued supper tonight. After supper we watched TV, and I did today's accounting.

DSK

February 1, 2006

February 1, 2006

La Feria, Texas

YEAR 2 DAY 229

 

Today was sunny and very warm again.

This morning I did regular morning chores, then took Bo for an obedience training session. Good work, Bo, good dog ! I spent the rest of the morning washing the truck. I washed it a week or so ago, but it was coated with a layer of grimy ash. The local sugar cane farmers burn the sugar cane crops while they're still on the field, to burn off some of the organic matter, like leaves, that interfere with the processing at the sugar mill. I learned that from the farming lecture last night. The result of the field burning is a grimy ash that floats downwind from the field.

We had lunch, then set off for the huge flea market between the towns of Weslaco and Donna, west of here about 20 minutes or so. It's open on Wednesdays and weekends. Finding a parking spot was quite a challenge. I wasn't all that keen on the flea market outing, as we have been to quite a few large flea markets in the last couple of months, but Joanne really wanted to go. I must confess, that each time we've gone to a flea market, I've found something that I absolutely had to have. And it's usually something that I didn't even realize existed until I saw it at a flea market. Today was no exception. Well, well, well ... look at that ! Hanging on a peg board display was a package labelled "KOOLMAT® starter cover shield". A fiberglass and silicone starter heat shield blanket. And me with a brand new starter, replacing the fourth one in 2 years that burned out from excessive, external heat. How serendipitous, and fortuitous ! And it's on sale for half price! ! ! My, my, my ... my good fortune must be a result of all that clean living I did in the early 70's. HA HA HA HA HA < SNORT CHOKE >.

Did you notice how my sense of humour improves when I stop feeling like there's a blow torch up my ass ? !

We browsed around the flea market for a couple of hours, buying a few items. Joanne's big score of the day was RV bed linens, to fit RV "short queen" size beds, which are 6 inches shorter than regular queen size beds. We crossed the highway, rather difficult and dangerous on foot, to the farmer's market on the other side of the highway. WOW ... great, local fruits and vegetables. I bought huge Texas oranges, 5 for a dollar, huge Texas Rio Ruby grapefruits, 4 for a dollar, a huge watermelon, $2, and Joanne bought vegetables. We had driven to the flea market on Business 83, and I decided to take the freeway, Hwy. 83, back to La Feria. There was so much construction on the freeway frontage road and entrance and exit ramps, we drove half way back to La Feria through construction before getting to an open entrance ramp onto the freeway. We've come to the realization that no matter where we travel, it's road construction season. When we're back in Canada during the summer, it's road construction season, because obviously it's too cold for road construction in the winter. When we're in the southern U.S. for the winter, it's road construction season, because it's much too hot here in the summer for road construction. We're trapped in perpetual road construction season.

We got back to la Feria RV Park just in time to head for tonight's potluck dinner in the clubhouse. MMMMM ... good cooks in this park. We usually enjoy the potluck dinners that are common in RV parks, but tonight's dishes were particularly appealing. We sat beside, and chatted with a couple from Indiana who have been full timing for 6 months. HMPH ! Rookies ! HA HA HA ! After the dinner was a presentation by a businessman "pitching" his deep sea fishing business on South Padre Island nearby. Following his "pitch" was a presentation by a woman promoting her dolphin watching expeditions. The man seated beside us at dinner won a deep sea fishing trip presented as a door prize, to the raffle ticket number one number higher than mine. Darn !

Back at the trailer, I dug out the printer and printed the investment data updates I retrieved yesterday. Then I did today's accounting, and started today's journal. We watched a bit of TV, while I worked on updating the investment files. It's now 10:30 P.M., and we're watching the weather report on the late news. It's raining at Livingston, north of here, where we're headed next. Just east of Livingston, in Louisiana, where we're headed after Livingston, there are tornadoes tonight. Oh, screw that ... we' re going to stay here another week. The current humidity here is 96 %. No wonder it feels a bit muggy !

DSK

January 31, 2006

January 31, 2006

La Feria, Texas & Nuevo Progreso, Mexico

YEAR 2 DAY 228

 

Today was sunny and very warm.

This morning I removed the breaker bar from behind the front seat, and put it back into the tool chest where it belongs. The breaker bar has been behind the front seat for the last couple of months, to make it easily accessible when we need it to whack the starter to make it work. Now that the truck has another new starter, we shouldn't need to whack it with a breaker bar to make it start. Hopefully not for awhile, anyway. After regular morning chores, we headed off to Nuevo Progreso, primarily to pick up my new eyeglass lenses.

We drove to the Mexican border at Progreso, Texas, parked, and walked across the bridge over the Rio Grande into Nuevo Progreso, Mexico. We walked directly to Flores Optical, and dropped off my eyeglasses for them to cut the new lenses to fit the frames. They ordered the lens blanks from a lab, then they just cut them down to size to fit the frames. I left my glasses, put on an old pair of glasses that I keep as an emergency spare, and off we went to shop for about half an hour while my new lenses were being cut and installed. We walked back to Farmacia Linda where I bought medications last week. I bought more of two medications that I had purchased last week. I used them for the last week, and was pleased with the results. I also bought a new medication to try. I am absolutely determined to conquer some persistent problems that have kept me in a state of perpetual suffering for the last six months. I've had enough ! I can't enjoy life if I'm in constant discomfort. Since it's possible to buy prescription medications in Mexico on an over the counter basis, I've stocked up on some substitutes for some of my old medications, and I'm trying some new medications.

We walked back to the optical shop, and picked up my glasses with the new lenses. It will take a bit of time for me to adjust to them, I guess. I've never had lined bi-focals like this before. I've always had invisible progressive bi-focals. After buying medications and eyeglass lenses, Joanne thought it was time for some serious shopping. We shopped for, and bought, some Mexican skirts and blouses for her nieces. Last year we bought Amelia a Mexican dress, and it was a big hit, so we wanted to get some pretty Mexican outfits for both Amelia and Madeleine. We were going to get them some western wear while we were in Arizona, but we couldn't find anything we really liked. Girls' clothing in Mexico is quite nice, and it was easy to find something that we both liked. Hopefully the little nieces will like them as well. Mexican girls' clothing is very colourful, and I think the nieces will like that. We went for a late lunch, to a better restaurant than the one we ate at last week. The lunch was quite good, except that I tried something new, and didn't really like it. I had chicken enchiladas with mole ( pronounced "molay" ) sauce on them. I did not like the mole sauce. Joanne said she thought mole sauce was made with chocolate. I thought that was absurd. Back at the trailer, this evening, she looked it up in a cook book. She was almost correct. Mole sauce is made with cocoa powder, amongst other things.

After lunch, we walked back to the International Bridge, and crossed back into the United States. The U.S. Customs people sure make border crossings at these border towns a painless process. "U.S. citizen ? Go ahead. U.S. citizen ? Go ahead. U.S. citizen ? No ? Canadian ? Go ahead." We drove back to La Feria. When we got back to the trailer, we discovered that Teddy had been trapped in the bedroom closet all day. Most animals would be somewhat panicked, stuck in a closet all day, nobody home to hear them asking to be let out. Not Teddy. He's very laid back. When we opened the closet door, he just stretched, yawned, and stepped out. I did today's accounting. We both did a couple of little chores, then took Bo for an obedience walk. I started working on today's journal entry. Joanne put a meat loaf into the oven for supper, then we went to the clubhouse to listen to a local farmer talk about local farming. It was actually quite interesting. He farms milo ( corn ? ), cotton, and sugar cane. We stayed at his talk for about an hour and a quarter, then returned to the trailer before the meat loaf burned to a crisp.

We had a late supper while listening to the State Of The Union Address 2006. George W. Bush sure does have good spin doctors ! I walked back to the clubhouse to get online and retrieve updated investment data as of the end of the month. I also sent and retrieved e-mail, and updated my blog.

DSK

January 30, 2006

January 30, 2006

La Feria, Texas

YEAR 2 DAY 227

 

Today was sunny and hot, temperature in the upper 80's ... again. Second day in a row. The locals are complaining that the temperatures lately have been about 10 degrees higher than they should be at this time of the year. Hey ... no complaints from the Canadians !

First thing this morning I took the truck into Knapp Chevrolet in Harlingen, for a new starter. I wanted to wait for the truck, but they obviously didn't want to feel rushed by a waiting customer. They insisted on driving me back to La Feria RV Park. Back at the park, I did my monthly test of our smoke alarm, then took Bo for an obedience training session. Recently I started making the "stay" and "come" situations much more challenging, and Bo has responded superbly. I'm so pleased and proud of him. Good boy, Bo !

I read for awhile, until I fell asleep. Joanne woke me for lunch. After lunch, I read some more, until I fell asleep again. HA HA HA ... nice work if you can get it. I got online, in the trailer, on Wi-Fi, sent and retrieved e-mail, and updated my blog. I can connect to a Wi-Fi signal in the trailer, intermittently. A neighbouring RV must have a satellite Internet connection, but it isn't on all the time. I check a few times a day for the Wi-Fi signal, and usually find it at least once every second day. Late in the afternoon, I had not yet heard from Knapp Chevrolet, so I phoned them. They had just finished replacing the starter in the truck, but could not find any reason why Dee-Dee keeps "eating" starters. I'm extremely disappointed, once again, that no cause for the problem can be found. Oh, well, at least I have another new starter, and at least this time I didn't have to pay for it, and then jump through hoops trying to get a reimbursement. Knapp processed a warranty claim against the "lifetime guaranteed" ( in the United States ! ) starter replaced in Illinois in September, 2004. They sent their shuttle to pick me up and drive me back to the dealership. I picked up the truck, drove back to La Feria, and stopped at the local Mexican bakery to buy bread. They had already sold out of bread for the day. I stopped at El Centro Foods, the local Mexican grocery store, to buy bread and milk.

Back at the trailer, I did today's accounting, and started today's journal entry. I spent about half an hour working on my new magic trick. It didn't go particularlywell today. This illusion is going to be a real tough one to master. We had supper, then watched some TV.

DSK

January 29, 2006

January 29, 2006

La Feria, Texas

YEAR 2 DAY 226

 

Today was sunny and hot, temperature in the upper 80's. Pretty nice ! Wore just a pair of shorts all day.

This morning I did regular preventive maintenance, drained the waste holding tanks, and worked on disinfecting the fresh water holding tank. Every 3 months, I disinfect the fresh water holding tank by adding a couple of cups of bleach into the tank, refilling it, letting it sit for a day, then running some of the bleach solution through the hot water tank, and all the plumbing lines. I spent the rest of the morning working slowly on a variety of small cleaning and minor maintenance projects.

After lunch we walked down to the office and bought a newspaper. Usually, Sundays are the only days we buy a newspaper. I took Bo for an obedience training walk. I updated and printed some documents. I downloaded and processed the photos I took yesterday at the Texas Citrus Fiesta parade. We spent the rest of a very warm afternoon sitting outside in lawn chairs, reading the newspaper.

Late in the afternoon we went to the clubhouse to participate in the "sing along", followed by an ice cream social. The sing along wasn't quite what we expected. I don't think we'll be going to any more park sing alongs. We had our bowl of ice cream, then sat around chatting with the couple from Chicago. Ice cream socials are a regular weekly event in most "snowbird" parks, and are a good way to get to know other people staying in the park. This park has a fairly busy social calendar in the upcoming week. I think we'll attend a few of their events.

We returned to the trailer, and had a late supper. I did today's accounting, and started working on this journal entry while Joanne washed dishes. We watched a bit of TV.

DSK

January 28, 2006

January 28, 2006

La Feria, Mission, & Harlingen, Texas

YEAR 2 DAY 225

 

Feliz 52nd Cumpleaños to Joanne

 

Today was partially cloudy, very warm, and humid.

Joanne's birthday wish was to spend the day at the Texas Citrus Fiesta being held in Mission, about 35 miles west of here. After regular morning chores, we headed off for Mission, west on Hwy. 83. At Mission we got off the freeway and followed the slow moving traffic, assuming it was all heading for the TCF. We found a place to park, then followed the walking crowd. We came to Conway, Mission's main street, where thousands of people were lining both sides of the street waiting for the big parade. Almost everybody had brought lawn chairs to sit in. We walked for quite a ways down Conway, looking for a good place to watch the parade, somewhere behind the front row of people in lawn chairs. After walking for many blocks, we came to a restaurant that had placed all its dining room chairs out on the curb, and was renting them for people to watch the parade. Best 2 bucks I've spent in a long time ! We had arrived about half an hour before the parade was to begin, and it started an hour late. At least we were sitting for the hour and a half wait. We chatted with the people sitting around us, a couple from Minnesota, and a farming couple from near Morden, Manitoba.

The parade was lengthy, for such a small town parade. It took about an hour and a half to pass by. We were surprised by some of what we saw. There was an astounding military presence, particularly among high school groups, where every local high school had a large contingent of ROTC and JROTC marching cadets. Some high schools still had large marching bands, and large sports teams, and cheerleading squads, but they were all outnumbered by the pimply faced squads of military wannabes. The U.S. has cranked up its "war machine", and it seems like every kid in high school that isn't headed for further education in university is headed for the military. And ( sorry ! ) the kids headed for the military look more like the losers than the winners, if you know what I mean. There was also a large number of Texas Citrus Fiesta Princesses and Duchesses. Each type and sub-type of citrus had a crowned "Princess" or "Duchess". As in ... presenting ... the Duchess of Ruby Red Grapefruit, Melinda Rodriguez ! All these young beautyqueens, each wearing an elaborate gown in the colour of her citrus, and with a sample of her citrus attached to her dress ( I kid you not ), each with a 6 year old male "attendant" dressed in a tuxedo, riding on the back decks of convertibles. Sure were a lot of them ! Only one blonde in the entire bunch. Not too many blue eyed blondes down here at the Mexican border !

When the parade was finally over, we walked about a mile down to where we saw there was a carnival. We thought that was the main venue for the festivities. We were wrong, but didn't realize it until too late. We walked around the little carnival, weren't impressed, then started walking back to where the truck was parked, a couple of miles away. On the way back to the truck, we found a Mexican bakery. How fortuitous ! We bought a dozen assorted large Mexican cookies. As we were driving back to La Feria, Joanne was reading the newspaper article about the TCF, and we realized that the little carnival we were at was not the main venue. We missed the main event, so to speak. Darn !

Back at the trailer, I took Bo for an obedience training session, then rested for about half an hour while Joanne chatted with her sister. I told Joanne I was taking her out for a birthday dinner, and asked her where she wanted to go ? She wanted to go to a barbecue. Barbecue is a noun down here, like Wal-Mart'n is a verb. "Do chew want to go for some barbecue after we're finished Wal-Mart'n ?" I knew of a barbecue restaurant near Harlingen on Business 83, so off we went to Big John's Bar*B*Que. We had a great barbecue dinner, Texas Honky Tonk style. Chew no, some of these places down here seem like caricatures. I expect Clint Eastwood to walk in any minute, wearing a Mexican blanket around his shoulders, chomping on a cigar stub, eerie High Plains Drifter music playing in the background.

After dinner was “the big surprise”. Instead of driving back to La Feria, I drove us into Harlingen, and found the Harlingen Performing Arts Theatre, where my birthday surprise for Joanne was a live theatre performance. I thought tonight’s presentation of Sex, Lies, and The I.R.S. was the worst play, with the worst acting, I have ever seen. With good natured laughter, Joanne disagreed. She reminded me that we once walked out of a performance at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa during the intermission. It was too awful to remain until the end of the play. Fortunately, Joanne enjoyed all of her birthday today, and attending a bad play didn’t dampen that. It was the first time we’ve attended a play in almost 2 years. I miss attending live theatre.

We got back to the trailer in La Feria quite late in the evening. We walked the dog. I did the accounting, then this journal entry.

Happy Birthday, my love !

DSK

January 27, 2006

January 27, 2006

La Feria, Texas

YEAR 2 DAY 224

 

Today was partially cloudy and warm.

Like most mornings here, I took my time getting started this morning. After I did regular morning chores, and preventive maintenance, I culled the medicine drawer, reviewing and tossing out medications that aren't likely to be used again. I took Bo for an obedience training session. Once again, he did superbly. I'm so pleased. Every night, I read last year's journal entry from one year ago, out loud for Joanne and me. Last year at this time, we were WorkCamping at C.A.R.E. in Livingston, Texas, and I was beginning to train Bo. My journal entries from last year showed frustration with how difficult it was to get Bo focussed on obedience training. He's come a long, long way in a year. Good, good dog, Bo. I spent the rest of the morning working on backing up all computer files to CD's, a task I do monthly.

We had lunch, then I began to review the batch of incoming mail we picked up at the Post Office yesterday. Reviewing, and taking action on a month's worth of mail is always a fair amount of work. I spent about half the afternoon working on that, then we headed into Harlingen for some shopping. We went to Wal-Mart, of course. While Joanne started shopping, I went to Customer Service to get a refund, get some information on Wal-Mart money orders, and buy a roll of quarters for laundry. I bought Joanne a birthday card, and took it out and hid it in the truck, before joining Joanne. A propos the area we're in, I bought her a birthday card in Spanish.

We did our shopping, then while Joanne waited in the check out line, I went back to Customer Service to buy a gift card. That's how we pay for diesel at Wal-Mart gas bars. If one pays with a Wal-Mart gift card, there is a 3 cent per gallon discount. With the amount of diesel that we purchase, it makes sense to take advantage of that. I got stuck behind a "customer" who was attempting to fraudulently return a television for a refund. The serial number on the TV did not match the serial number on the box. Guess she didn't know that the box had the serial number of the TV contained within when she decided to pull a fast one on Wal-Mart. When I finally got served, I asked another question about money orders before buying my gift card. The clerk keyed information into the system, as if I was making the money order purchase. She said that was the onlyway for her to find the answer to my question. Then ... < fume > there was a lengthy delay while she waited for a Customer Service Manager to come over and clear the cancelled money order purchase from her system, before she could proceed to sell me the gift card. When Joanne walked by, having finished at the check out, I was so fed up with waiting for a CSM to come over to clear the terminal, I walked away in disgust.

We got into the truck, and pulled out of Wal-Mart. As we pulled away, and were discussing our plans for tomorrow, I looked at the fuel gauge, and realized I really did need to buy diesel today. DARN ! I returned to Wal-Mart, and Joanne ran in to buy a gift card while I waited in the truck in the parking lot. < FUME > She was tenth in line behind the lady with the TV, who obviously was not going to be deterred. It took Joanne about 20 minutes to get the gift card. She finally returned to the truck, and we filled up with diesel.

We drove back to La Feria. We stopped at a local RV dealer, who was advertising that they had 5 used one ton diesel dually fifth wheel haulers for sale. I took a look at a couple of them that were extremely appealing. < sigh > I really shouldn't waste our time browsing for a truck in the United States. I know it's too impractical to buy a U.S. vehicle and have it converted to Canadian standards. But in the United States there are real spiffy fifth wheel hauler conversions that just aren't available in Canada.

Once back at the trailer, I did today's accounting, and began to work on today's journal entry while Joanne prepared supper. After supper, I finished working on the batch of incoming mail. It was getting late, but we decided to go to the clubhouse, for me to get online, and for Joanne to do some laundry. While she did laundry, I got online, sent and retrieved e-mail, updated my blog, composed some e-mail responses, and sent e-mail again. When we returned to the trailer just before 11:00 P.M., we decided to take Bo for a "drivey". It was a warm evening, and I thought that late at night, we could just drive slowly around the area surrounding the RV park, with Bo hanging out the window as far as he can. It must be a dog thing ! We drove slowly around the block, and stopped at the carnival operating on the empty lot adjacent to the park. Joanne wanted a funnel cake, as an advance birthday treat. A funnel cake is somewhat like the Texas version of an "elephant ear" or "beaver tail". We shared a funnel cake, slowly wandering around the small carnival grounds, then drove back into the RV park.

DSK