Stuck!

Well, here we are...stuck in Lodi...no, just kidding, that was an old CCR song. We're in actually in Krum, TX, waiting on parts for our coach. Hopefully, they will be here on Wednesday, and repairs can begin. We are camped at the RV collision place - they have a water/electric hookup, so we are reasonably comfortable. Krum is about 45 miles north of Dallas, and it's a mite chilly and windy here. It will be down in the low 30's tonight, and was only in the low 50's today.

Way back when we lived in California, Donna and I worked at Southern California Edison. One of our friends from that time in our lives, Gayle, moved to Rhome, TX, which is only 30 miles or so from Krum. We got together with her and her hubby Pat last week, and went out to dinner at Babes, in Sanger. Babes is a chicken and catfish place, and the food is very good. It's served home style, with green beans, mashed potatoes, and corn. Mighty good eatin', although it's definitely NOT low-cal!!

While we are here, we plan to do some sightseeing. A couple of days ago, we went down to Fort Worth, and went to the Stockyards. It is in the historical part of town, and has some very interesting old buildings and museums. The streets are made of brick, which isn't fun to drive on, but it looks cool! At 11:30am and 4:00pm, they have a min-cattle drive, complete with longhorns.

Here come the longhorns!

Horny little devils!!

The Dallas Museum of History has the King Tut exhibit going, so we are going to do that this coming week. We also have a trip to Mrs. Bairds Bakery planned for Thursday. It should be interesting. They are a local bakery that's been around for a 100 years, growing from a 4-loaf oven in Mrs. Bairds home to a huge company (the bad news - the Bairds sold the company to a Mexican consortium a few years back). They make the famous "Texas Toast" bread. Each slice is about double that of a regular slice of bread. It should be an interesting tour - you have to get a reservation, and fill out waivers, etc. Stayed tuned for an update.

The Terrible Three's

They (who are they, anyway?) say that bad things happen in three's. We just had our three. Each was progressively worse, and we hope that this will be the end of it, for a long time.

Thing 1. Donna lost her cell phone when we were in the Tucson area. It was a real mystery: she talked to her sister one afternoon, and a while later, we couldn't find it. We searched the car, inch by inch, the coach, also inch by inch, and our RV site. Nada. So we searched again, and then several more times. I tried calling her number, but it immediately went to voicemail. Hmmm. I checked Verizon online for usage. There wasn't any after the call to her sister. All we can figure is that she got out of the Jeep and it fell under a tire. We ran over it and it was crushed and no longer worked. I disabled the phone online, then called Verizon. Next day, she had a replacement. Very very strange.

Thing 2. After we left Benson, AZ, we went to El Paso and did some visiting. Then we headed for Kerrville, TX, with an overnight stay in Fort Stockton, TX. We stayed at a terrible park, but it was just for one night, so no big deal. When we got there, the temp was in the high 70's. That night a storm came in, and the temp dropped to mid-30's, with drizzly, cold, yucky weather. I went out to stow the hoses and electric, while Donna buttoned up the inside. She decided to empty the trash. As she came out of the rig, you guessed it, she slipped on the step, which had iced over. Yes, a repeat of November 2007, when she slipped at our son's home in Colorado. This time she has a couple of cracked ribs. They take a while to heal, but she knows the drill, and is doing pretty good.

Thing 3. This is the big one. We left Kerrville after a week, and headed over to Canyon Lake, where we had a week booked at a Coast to Coast park. This is the same park we stayed at our first winter in 2007. The park where ants got into the 5th wheel. The park where I hurt my wrist cutting the branches off the roof of the rig. I'm not sure why we came back here. Anyway, the road into the park is a narrow 2-lane road, with a narrower bridge over the Guadalupe River. About 50' after the bridge, the road takes a sharp, blind, 90 turn to the right (the lanes on this curve are a measured 10'). The coach is 8-1/2 feet wide. You get the picture. As we finished the crossing, and I began the turn, two cars came around the corner. I had 3 choices: 1) jam on the brakes (we were going 10mph) and hope that the car tailgating me didn't hit the Jeep; 2) hit one of them; or 3) try and cut the corner and avoid them. I chose the latter. Unfortunately, the last 15' of the coach decided not to cooperate with my plan, and ended up scraping the guard rail. We were sick - neither Donna or I have had an accident in at least 25 years. The insurance adjuster came out, inspected the damage, and later put a check in the mail. Now we are up in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area, and, the body shop has revised the amount - and it's 2-3 times the original estimate. Yow. The good news - other than our egos, no one was hurt. And it will take 4-6 weeks to get it done.

We also found out that the rally we were going to attend on Jekyll Island in Georgia in March was cancelled. So, we'll be hanging out in Texas for a while before heading back to Colorado.