The football pool

  

 

I've played work or neighborhood pools in the past; everybody chips in a dollar and makes their picks.  The person with the most correct picks each week gets the pool.  It's hard to do well consistently, but I usually finish the season with more dollars than I started with.  This is the first time I've done one with an app on my phone, and it turns out I'm awesome!  I set up a pool and it tracks how well each person is doing with their picks.  I'm in first place this week, and in first place for the year.  I could be really hard to beat.  I'm considering inviting someone else to join the pool too, to find out.

 

 

 

 

 

We got our Moderna booster shots yesterday

  

Neither of us is feeling very good today.  No matter though, we're doing our part to keep the old people safe.

 

 

 

 

 

Go figure

  

I make all the sheets and blankets perfectly even, but then during the night Judy pushes all the covers my way to make it look like I'm the blanket hog.

 

Sometimes life just isn't fair.

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Thanksgiving

  

It was a warm wonderful morning on the deck for coffee and watching the birds.  By lunchtime though the clouds were rolling in.

 

By four, any thoughts of dinner on the deck were gone and we were setting up indoors.

 

Our little house fed seven while it poured down rain outside, no problem.  Judy cooked up traditional turkey dinner with all the fixins.  Pumpkin pie and homemade ice cream at the end.  Football, friends, and a whole bunch of food.

 

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

 

 

 

 

2020

  

That was the year of our Caribbean Winter.  That was the plan.  We made the Alaska trip in 2019.  That was wonderful, but we were ready to drive less the next year.  We have a bunch of Southwest Airlines miles.  We can fly anywhere we want for free.  Let's leave the bus at home and explore places in the Caribbean we haven't been to yet.

 

That was the plan, and that's the way it worked out.  We left the bus at home, and we drove less.  All went according to plan except that part about exploring the Caribbean.  We stayed home and stayed safe.  Okay then, maybe 2021…  Maybe 2022?  We'll get there.  Someday.  When it makes sense.

 

 

 

 

It’s interesting

  

…being married to Judy.  She talks to people.  She talks to people, and we end up in situations we’d otherwise never have been in.

 

One time, many years ago, even before Becky was born, we were at the Denver Zoo, and Judy struck up a conversation with the zookeeper at the big cat exhibit.  Next thing, it was feeding time and we were invited behind the scenes to see how it all worked from back there.  That was way cool.  It was primitive.  As sophisticated as the habitat looked from out front, this was meat being pushed through access holes and iron bars.  A big cat pouncing from just above us on a ledge, from out of our line of sight, to right next to us.  Very high startle factor.

 

I doubt such casual access would happen today.  Way too many procedures and protocols to keep everyone safe.  But what a neat thing to have happened then; getting to see how they moved all the animals around, and getting startled up close by a 500 pound Bengal Tiger.  One of those moments in life that has stuck with us.

 

 

 

 

 

I’ve been thinking about electric RVs again

  

Making an electric RV might be easier (more practical) than we’ve been thinking.  It doesn’t have to be solar powered, it could be an electric van conversion.  It would be heavier than a normal passenger van, so it wouldn’t have as much range, but that might not be as big a problem as it would first seem.  The places we like to camp most are state parks.  Many state parks have campgrounds suitable for RVs.  They don’t all have full hookups, but they all have an electric post and most of those have 50 amp service.  So a person, or family, could go from state park to state park and plug in at night to run their utilities and recharge their batteries.  Maybe the original electric passenger van has a 200 to 250 mile range.  The heavier RV conversion van might only have a 150 to 200 mile range.  But we know from experience that there are a lot of state parks no further apart than 150 to 200 miles.  If there were a gap between parks larger than that, there are plenty of commercial parks in-between, and they all have 50 amp service.  If a person were not in a hurry to cover a lot of miles every day, they could do a lot of camping without ever having to stop to recharge (on the ever expanding grid of charging stations).

 

Smaller all-electric RVs could be developed right now.  And all we need is one more generation of battery technology and that 200 mile range becomes 400 miles, and larger RVs become more practical too.

 

 

 

 

I have an office chair on rollers

  

It has a solid chair pad under it so it will move around easily.  It's a good setup.

 

None of that actually matters though.  I still have to use it as a fixed position chair.  I can swivel it to get up and down, but I don't get to roll it.  Every time I sit down to work, whether I notice or not, the little one glides in behind me and wraps herself around the wheels of the office chair to sleep. 

 

 

 

I'd rather use a chair that won't move than startle her, or worse.

 

 

 

 

Just because

  

I like this photo of a local park.

 

It's close to our dentist's office.  I get my teeth cleaned, then I get in a two mile walk while Judy is getting her teeth cleaned.  A productive day.

 

 

 

 

 

I was just thinking

  

So many countries have been struggling with covid infections.  They shut down, they open up, a lot of people get covid, they shut back down.  They're still having trouble, but at least by now a lot of people have either gotten vaccinated or have already had the infection.  There are less people likely to get infected each time.

 

That makes me wonder about a country like New Zealand.  They shut down and had zero tolerance for covid this entire time.  That has been a great success for the last two years, but does it make sense as a long-term strategy?  At some point in time, do they get to open back up and somehow stay covid-free?  Or did they just delay the inevitable rush of infections when they finally do open up and covid finds a new fresh fertile breeding ground?

 

 

 

 

Did I mention the Trek?

  

Ran across one on our last trip.  It's like brother David had. 

 

They've got a cool feature.  They don't need a separate bedroom.  When you're ready to settle down for the evening, the bed drops down from the ceiling of the living room!

 

Clever engineering.  I didn't look inside this one, but this is how it works.

 

 

 

 

 

A creepy new bug

  

 

I think it's called a leaf footed bug.

 

 

 

 

We found it!

  

The microfiber cloth on a stick to dry the windshield and leave no spots or streaks after I scrub the bugs off.

 

We found it at the flea market in Mesa before we left Arizona.

 

It works great.  In the vertical position like this, it wraps right around the curved glass on the edges.  It has just the right amount of absorbance to finish off the windshield job, as long as I squeegee the flatter parts of the windshield and get most of the water off first.

 

Now I don't have to invent it!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My retirement plan

  

See this Dasani bottle?

 

If a person buys this in California, they have to pay a deposit on it.

 

We bought it in Arizona free and clear.  If we save up all the Dasani bottles we didn't buy in California, we can take them there where they will refund the five cents each that we didn't pay to begin with.  Free money for life!

 

Brilliant!?

 

 

 

 

 

I heard about this bird last year

  

But by the time I went to see it, it was gone for the summer.  Now though, there on the top of the irrigation standpipe.

 

It's a lump.  It's a bump.  It's a burrowing owl!

 

 

Year bird!

 

 

 

 

Have you ever wondered where all those giant wind turbine blades come from?

  

(Yes.  Thank you, Henry.  They're not windmills; they're not milling anything; they're wind turbines.)  Well, we've found the answer and I'll share it with you.

 

They come from ships!

 

 

 

 

You were probably wondering how that billboard on Mustang Island is doing

  

Still doing its thing.

Succumbing to the elements.

 

Final map for this trip.

 

2021 Fall Trip Map

 

Three months.  7,500 miles.  Now we're home at Sandpipers. 

 

2021 total fall trip

 

Texas Counties.  From 38 to go…

 

… to fifteen to go

We did a lot of wandering around Texas.

 

Good trip.  Good to be home.

 

 

 

 

 

Henry

  

 

This cabinet is not a place Henry is supposed to be.  But sometimes, you just get caught up in the moment!

 

 

 

 

One more circuitous route

  

 

2011 fall trip map

 

And we have our final Texas county map for the trip.

 

That's it.  We're done with new counties this trip.

 

Now we're heading for Corpus.  We'll take a couple days to get there.

 

 

 

 

Nailed it!