Monday, January 23, 2017

I woke up late this morning and feeling quite out of sorts.  Sharon seemed to be getting over her cold as I seemed to be getting it.

After Breakfast this morning Sharon took off with the laundry for this week.  She didn’t go until about 11 since there were already people using the machines earlier.

The day was quite nice today with the sun shining, no rain, and barely a whisper of wind.  Except for the temperature, this would have been the perfect day since we’ve been out west this year.  It’s also remained cold in Desert Hot Springs this year for the most part.

I sat around for most of the day today just watching TV.  I didn’t feel like doing anything so I didn’t, including eating.  When Sharon asked me at Suppertime what I had for lunch I couldn’t think of a thing.  I did have a few naps in my recliner though.  That’s pretty much all I was good for today.

Sharon stripped all the meat off the Country Ribs we had the other night and we made it up as sandwiches.  The sandwiches were fabulous with the very tender meat.  We also had some leftover fried potatoes that she heated up for me.  I can never turn down fried potatoes at any time.  We also had potato chips and Bread and Butter Pickles to finish off the meal.

Needless to say, we planted ourselves in front of the tube tonight.  It only lasted til about 10 however as neither of us was interested in staying up any later.

Tuesday, January 24, 2017

We got up this morning with absolutely nothing to do today.  I had already struck out with my Breakfast option at Golden Corral.  I had been to the Market and managed to find WD40 but nothing else.  This trip to Yuma was slowly becoming a total bust.

I decided to call Clay Nye since he was most of the reason we were here anyway and found out that he was still at home.  He was supposed to be an inpatient in a rehab facility this week.  When we found out his situation, we decided to go over and visit him near the Foothills.  The Foothills aren’t very far from our campground here at Yuma Lakes. 

After our lunch we headed over to his housing unit.  They live in Park Models in their park.  The park itself is relatively new which makes all the park models new also.  We spent about 2 hours over there and sat through his rehab while we were there.  We did have a good time catching up over the past two years.  It had been two years and a couple of girl friends since we had seen him last. Clay is an old friend that we met several years ago at a Rally in Gold Canyon near Apache Junction, AZ.

After our visit we stopped at Duncan Donuts on the way back home.  After all these years I had never had a Duncan Donut.  I found that the “donuts” that we bought were Bismarcks with different flavored filling.  They were good because the filling was quite tasty.  I have always loved Bismarck anyway.  My Dad, the baker, used to fill his with flavored fruit jelly.  Sometimes even Chocolate Pudding or Vanilla Custard.  My particular favorite was the lemon filling.  A little powdered Sugar on top or chocolate frosting and voila, Bismarck.  So I give Duncan Donuts a C+ for their Donuts.  Good but really nothing special for a commercial outlet.  But they didn’t last long under my nose anyway.

We had Chicken Salad Sandwiches for Supper tonight.  Sharon makes a mean Chicken salad and it goes in sandwiches very nicely.  We topped it off with potato chips and donuts for dessert.  What’s not to like about that?

We settled in for our usual entertainment tonight by planting ourselves in front of the Television.  We watched some regulars tonight as well as taped programs from the off-network channels.  We stayed up late tonight mostly because both of us were feeling  quite good health wise.  Besides we were both rested enough over the past few days we could handle the late night.

Wednesday, January 25, 2017

We lit out this morning intending to have Breakfast at JB’s on 4th Avenue

And we found ourselves with the GPS telling us that Coco’s Restaurant was JB’s.  Apparently JB’s was out of business.  We’ve been coming here for years to have their buffet and now it was closed.

  We went to Coco’s anyway and had a very delicious Breakfast.  Very much food and way too much for the average person to eat.  I had Chicken Fried Steak along with Hash Browns, Eggs, and Pancakes.  Sharon had Pancakes, Scrambled Eggs and Sausage.  It was all very good and we almost didn’t miss the Breakfast Buffet of JB’s.

After we left the restaurant we went down to City Hall Plaza to visit the City of Yuma airplane that set the flying endurance record in 1949.  It was displayed at City hall hanging from the ceiling of the building, with the Buick refueling car sitting underneath it.  It was quite the story at the time as the refueling car handed the gas cans up to the pilots as the plane flew low to facilitate the transfer.  They’ve got the actual movie of the event running contiguously in the closed atrium.

After our visit to City Hall we came back home having had a very nice day indeed.  All the years we’ve been coming here we never heard about the plane before.

We spent the rest of the afternoon just lazing around the hacienda.  We watched a little TV in the PM and Sharon heated up the pulled pork from the Country Ribs for another couple of sandwiches for Supper.

After Dinner she pulled out an old Cross-Stitch and worked on that for most of the night.  I, of course, sat and watched the Telly until it was time for bed at 10:30.  We both went to bed tonight at the same time, an oddity of late.

Thursday, January 26, 2017

We actually waited until noon today before we went into town.  We had the Mi Rancho Restaurant on our minds for lunch.  We always make it a point to go there for lunch while we’re here.  And today is the day since we’re leaving tomorrow morning.  The prices at the Mi Rancho are a little high but the portions are huge.  I usually divide my Shredded Beef Chimmichanga in half and take it with me when I leave. Today was no different for me even though Sharon ate all of her meal.

After lunch we gave Clay another call wondering if he wanted visitors today.  He said yes and as long as we were coming over, he asked if we’d stop at Arby’s and bring him a sandwich.  Arby’s was across the street so the request was easier than he thought.  He wanted a Turkey Sandwich from a Beef place.  And since we don’t usually eat at Arby’s, just ordering the sandwich was an event.  I think the girl who took the order was tired of dealing with us by the time she was done.

We found out after arriving there, that he was going into inpatient rehab tomorrow morning.  The timing turned out to be perfect since we’ll be gone tomorrow morning.

We stayed for a couple of hours and since we needed a few items from the grocery store we asked if he needed anything.  And since he did, we left to go just up the street to Fry’s.  We picked up some stuff for us and a couple of things for Clay and dropped them off before we headed back home.

Our visit to Yuma had been successful since we saw Clay, went to the Flea Market, did a little Sightseeing, ate at Mi Rancho Restaurant and generally had nice weather to do it all in.  It could have been much warmer but at least there wasn’t any snow to shovel.

We sat and watched TV for the rest of the afternoon but it wasn’t long before Supper arrived. Neither of us was hungry for anything to eat so we just fended for ourselves for the night.

We were camped out for the night in front of the TV with a few of our regular shows on tonight.  They took us up to 10:30 before we caved for the night.  Tomorrow was a moving day so we’ll be up early probably.

Friday, January 27, 2017

We woke up this morning intending to return to Desert Hot Springs but with a long-standing threat looming ahead of us.  We’ve always said that we’ll just stay where we’re at, if the weather turns bad.  We’ve never done it before, except for today.  When we got up this morning the wind was blowing pretty hard.  Gusts of up to 25-30 miles per hour.  And it would be blowing in our faces all the way north.  So Sharon made some phone calls and in about 10 minutes arranged for us to stay another day under RPI and we finally carried out the threat.  We’ll be here another day and probably have to drive in wind, just as bad as today, tomorrow. But for the time being, we’ll sit for another day before we head back to Desert Hot Springs to squat for 2 months.

At Breakfast we discussed what we were going to do today now that we’re staying for another day.  We were wondering if we wanted to go out for Lunch or Dinner, and whether it would be Olive Garden or Red Lobster.  We never really did make a decision until we drove into the parking lot.  I thought we were going to Olive Garden, and Sharon thought Red Lobster.  When she told me to turn here, into Red Lobster, I knew then where we were at.

We both had a very nice lunch.  I had Lobster Tacos and Sharon had Crab Linguini with Alfredo Sauce.  The Lobster Tacos were great but I missed the combination of Lobster soaked in butter.  Sometimes you just have to try something different.

After lunch we went to Target in the sam Mall to see if we could find a Shout squeeze bottle of stain remover.  Target didn’t have it so we decided to go to Wal-Mart and check them out on the way home.  Sharon got a bonus at Wal-Mart.  She found Coke for 99 cents in racks right in front of the door, and picked up 4 bottles.

We got back home about 5 but it really didn’t matter, because we had just eaten lunch, and weren’t eating anything more for the night, except snacks.

The wind pretty much continued all day and into the night today, and staying for another day turned into a stress reducing maneuver.  We got into our regular programming quite easily tonight.  Unfortunately all the shows were re-runs tonight and I wondered why.  It didn’t seem like they were avoiding any major awards shows.  We hung in tight tonight until 10:30 watching Drive-ins, Diners and Dives on Food Network.

Saturday, January 28, 2017

We were on the road on this bright sunshiny day with no wind to speak of, and a couple of hundred miles (178) ahead of us.  We were headed back “home” to Desert Hot Springs, California.

Our first stop was at Fry’s for gas, since we had a discount that we wanted to use, that would afford us 10 cents off for 35 gallons.  We’d get the first 35 gallons for under $2.  Fry’s was a couple of miles from our campground and the station was crowded with motorhomes and vehicle with camping trailers, but who could blame them since they are all “gas-users.”  The problem was the area to maneuver at the station itself.  We were held up for about a half hour but it was easier to get back on the Interstate from where we were at.  So we saved some time just getting back on the road again.

We got as far as Niland, CA, the home of Slab City before we started getting hungry for lunch.  We pulled off the road when we got to the restaurant, the Buckshot Diner and Deli, and had lunch.  We both had the Patty Melt and it was very good.  They serve it on Cardamon Bread which gives the sandwich an additional taste. We also had

french fries and onion rings to go along with it.

After lunch we got back on the road and arrived in Desert Hot Springs without a hassle.  When we ran into trouble was at the new campground.  We pulled in and there was a car parked in our site.  The office was closed and the manager seemed to be nowhere in sight.  Sharon called the manager on the phone and noone answered. It wasn’t until someone came out from the clubhouse to help us that we got the whole situation resolved.  We got settled in but I was waiting until tomorrow to hook up the utilities.

We called Henry and Arlene Leduc as they had texted us earlier to come over for cocktail hour after we got settled.  So we left and went over there for a couple of hours.  We sat a talked and caught up for the past week.  We told them that we were meeting Terry and JoAnne on Monday for Breakfast and asked if they wanted to go.  Henry has  been golfing on Mondays so they were unsure of their plans.

After we left we came home and settled in front of the TV for the night.  It was Saturday and the networks offerings stunk to say the least.  We managed to find enough to watch by surfing the channels.  And one of us managed to stay up until closing time, and the other caved in from the “cocktail hour virus.”

Sunday, January 29, 2017

We awoke this morning to a lovely sunshiny day and Sharon was off to church this morning early.  I settled in front of my Sunday shows for the next 2 hours or so.  She had intended to stop at a few places on her way home this morning including K-Mart and Walgreen’s.  I also got a phone call right after she left telling me they seemed to be setting up for the sale of Tamales at the church, so she’d pick them up on her way home.

She stopped at Walgreen’s on her way home but the eye gel that I use at night was not on sale so we’ll try again next week.

While she was gone I got all my instruments up to date and updated including publishing the Journal to the web. The Journal is getting harder and harder to publish because of Homestead, the place that hosts my Journal.  They always seem to be changing things and making it harder to publish.  This year has been horrible and may be the last year that I attempt it. 

This may also be the last year that we come out west.  We’ve had some issues with our campground and they seem to be alienating the membership this year, and this situation may be terminating our affiliation with them.  Over the past 17 years we’ve lived with a plethora of promises that have been broken.  Only to accept them in subsequent years.  It will cost us $56 more per week to remain a member of Catalina Spa and RV Resort.  I think they’ve pretty much priced themselves out of our realm.  We’ll go again tomorrow and try to speak to the manager and get some information about what’s happening.

We stayed home tonight and camped out in front of the Telly for the night.  We had a couple of shows on tonight but most of it was just pure crap.  We watched Alaska: The last Frontier for three hours straight tonight.  We ran out of shows at 10:30.  Right on time.