Weighed and found wanting...but not too badly

Today marks our final "work week" before we head to Wisconsin on our long, long vacation (i.e. retirement). We're back in Dakota Meadows until Friday morning. I'm very happy to be here. Even though I really enjoyed the ambiance at Lebanon Hills, I came away from it with a dozen or so very torturous mosquito bites...the kind that "keep on giving," flaring up over and over for days. Dakota Meadows is more like a city environment than a country one. We're parked next to the pond, but I hope there's enough of a blacktop barrier to keep those villainous bugs at bay.

One of the things on our agenda, before we hit the road, was to get our rig weighed. We did that on Sunday at a local truck stop. Mark calculated our maximum weight to be 30,000 pounds. We came out at 30,040. This was great news, considering we're hauling around an extra mattress and about a hundred pounds of family stuff, "out for delivery."

Once I let go of some of my iron and glassware and we lose the excess stuff that doesn't belong to us, we should have a pretty comfortable buffer between our actual weight and our maximum weight.

The new mattress is out of its constraints and expanding nicely. Tonight it will go on the bed and the old mattress will take its place in the middle of the floor until it finds a new home at the Bridging charity. We'll be dropping it off tomorrow. (Last chance to speak up if anybody needs a very, very firm queen size mattress. It's in excellent condition.)

Foam mattresses are notoriously stinky, a fact I had forgotten from the last time. The information sheet that came with it assures us that the acrid, nearly overpowering...I mean "slight 'fresh foam' odor" will disappear in a couple days. Hopefully I won't choke to death tonight while I'm waiting for it to disappear. Mark is safe at least, because he can't smell anything. It is comforting to know that the mattress is not "toxic"...aside from potential asphyxiation, that is. Anyway, provided I can breathe, I should be sleeping much better after tonight.

Tomorrow morning, we pack up for the day and deliver the motor home to Noble RV, where the leveling jack and the slide-outs will be repaired as needed and resealed. I will be tooling around town in the car with the cat for the day while that work is done.

Then on Thursday, the "new" A/C unit is installed. Please pray with us that that goes well, because we're heading out of town on Friday morning and don't have time for unexpected delays. Cutting things that close is never a wise idea, but in this case, we didn't have too much of a choice.

That's our RV work week. Now Mark's employment work week is going to look less like a work week and more like a party week! ;-) He's getting three out of five days of "fond farewells" from his company and coworkers, and is not likely to do much in the way of actual work. I'm very excited for him. It's certainly well-deserved.

In all, it will be a good week...for us.

I would be remiss not to mention the hardships of everyone in dread Harvey's path suffering from the ongoing rainstorms and flooding. Our prayers are with them all as they deal with this tragic event. It will take a long time to dry out and put their lives back together. May they turn their eyes to God, who is the only hope and help in this life and the life to come.

    "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble at its swelling." Psalm 46:1-3

A Day at the Zoo

Well, we're coming to the end of our time at Lebanon Hills. It's been a very nice stay. In spite of the rain and the mosquitoes.

We are camped in the blue circle.

Yesterday Mark took a short day (for lack of work) and we went to the Minnesota Zoo, which is only about a mile from our campground. Actually, as the crow flies, it's just across the street. But since we're not crows, we took the car.

It was a beautiful day for walking-- breezy and not too hot. The Minnesota zoo has no elephants, no zebras, no giraffes, and no lions. But it does have plenty of monkeys, bears, and local animals, such as wolves, bison, and moose. And one tiger. It took us about three hours to see all the exhibits. Then it was off to Dolittle's for supper (the price paid for forgetting to take meat out of the freezer). Excellent food, by the way.

Our transition from house-living to motorhome-living is still ongoing. This week we purchased a new mattress for our bed. We've become accustomed to sleeping on a Tempurpedic mattress, so the very, VERY firm mattress we inherited with the RV is just not hacking it. The mattress we bought to replace it is not a Tempurpedic brand, but we're hoping it will be close enough to give us a comfortable night's rest. After a little bit of research, we decided on a Mattress America brand "cool gel" foam mattress. It contains no harmful chemicals and comes with a lifetime warranty. The only problem is that this mattress, which came in a very manageable box, takes 48 hours to decompress into its proper shape. So we can't just throw it on the bed and call it good. Consequently, we'll be navigating around an expanding mattress for a couple days while we allow it to do its thing.

The other item we purchased this week was a portable vacuum cleaner to replace the giant, cumbersome Hoover we got rid of when we moved. Again, after some research (always research first!) I decided on a Deik brand for a couple reasons. It's lightweight, easy to transition from upright to hand vacuum, it has a HEPA filter to trap dust, and it takes very little space to store. It does a great job on both carpet and hard floor. (You can click on the link to see what it looks like.)

Things are beginning to shape up.

That's all for now. For you fellow zoo-lovers out there, here are some photos of the day...

A Week At Lebanon Hills

This week we are comfortably snuggled into a spot in the Lebanon Hills RV Park in Apple Valley, MN. We've met the neighbors - a couple from San Diego, here for a few weeks visiting their children and grandchildren on one side, and full-time Escapee members, like ourselves, from Texas on the other.

Over the weekend, we pulled out everything in our "basement," did some needed redistribution, and threw away a bunch more stuff. Yes indeed, we're still purging. One of the very important things we need to keep in mind is weight. Every motor coach has a recommended weight it is designed to carry, and going over that weight maximum can create problems for the motor home as well as potential fines - especially should we ever be involved in a roadway accident (God forbid!).

So all that heavy glass, iron, and pottery in my kitchen will have to be carefully scrutinized and no doubt significantly downsized. After all, how many glass jars does one really need for food storage? In my "brick and mortar" days, I might have answered - "How much empty space is there?" But, when weight is suddenly an issue, and plastic is not an acceptable alternative, the answer is more like, "How much do I really need to store?" And the answer to THAT question is, a much smaller amount than I used to store when I was buying in bulk.

The moment of truth will come next week when we drive this baby onto the scales. Our allowable weight is about 3,500 pounds. I'm not optimistic.

But that's next week.

Yesterday we had a lovely Sunday. We "went to church" online at Wooddale, which streams all its services, and then took a walk and enjoyed the beautiful creative work of God. In the evening, we thought it would be nice to light a fire in the fire pit and sit outside for a while to close out the weekend with some quiet relaxation time. We managed a pathetic little fire that lasted about twenty minutes before going completely out. It started to drizzle about half way through. Eventually, the bugs and humidity and the sad dead little smoking fire pit sent us back inside. But, it was all good nonetheless, and gave us a taste of what's to come, when the work-a-day world no longer defines our life.

Time to go. I have to sit outside for the next couple hours and experience the Great American Eclipse. In my neck of the woods, it will be approximately 85%.

Now, where did I put those glasses?...

Water Tight and Towing

What about this August weather?! Today, at 10:30 in the morning, the temperature is only 68 degrees. With all these cool temps and rain, it feels more like September. It's raining again today.

But we passed a very important test this week. The coach is water tight! After Wednesday's downpour, we found not the tiniest leak throughout the whole coach. Praise God!

We happened to be out doing our first major grocery shopping since setting up housekeeping in the motor home when the storm hit. We heard the rain pounding down and before we knew it, the sirens were blaring and the phone alerts were telling us to "take cover." And, of course, like all good Minnesotans, we ran for cover.... umm, I mean we continued to shop since we didn't see any actual tornadoes, the roof was still intact, and none of the plate glass windows in the store were broken. By the time we finished, the rain had died down enough to get from the store to the car without getting drenched. 

Arriving back at the RV site, cars were lined up near the shelter because apparently they are NOT from Minnesota and were taking cover, and there was absolutely no place to park, even if we wanted to. The wind had calmed, but the sirens were still going. And honestly, by the time it starts raining, the tornadoes are long gone, right? Well, that was our rationale, anyway, and so after a moment or two of indecision, we finally just went "home," put away the groceries and checked for leaks. What a sigh of relief to learn we were high and dry.

One less thing to worry about fixing.

This morning it was time to leave Dakota Meadows for the second time  (so the weekend campers could have our spot). We were up before the sun to button up the house and get it ready to move. Mark had received enough of his mail-ordered hitch necessities to connect our tow dolly for the first time, and now the car is trailing behind us where it belongs when we move from place to place. Another victory! 

Now since we can't check into our next site (Lebanon Hills, Apple Valley) until this afternoon, Mark drove his motor home to work today. We parked our rig in the parking lot of the TCF building in Plymouth. Mark gets to show off his home to his colleagues, and I am comfortably passing the day with some nice scenic trees on one side of me and a giant parking lot on the other. Such is the nomad life we live.

What other adventures await us? ...

I promise this blog will get a little more interesting once Mark officially retires and we start our real travels. Stay tuned.

Waterworks... and three lessons

Word to the wise -- RV living is not for the absent-minded.

One of the most important things about traveling in an RV is making sure all your loose items are stowed. This is a rule that must be followed, whether you stop for the week, or the night, or just a few hours. When you break this rule, you suffer the consequences.

This past Saturday, we had stopped at the home of our nephew and his family, after our slide-out ordeal. They were gracious to offer their very long and level driveway to us. Thank you, Joel & Beth!

The next day, after a wonderful visit with the family and with my brother and his wife, George & Bev, we took off back to our camp site for the week, Dakota Meadows (again). Mark was driving the RV, I was driving the car. Eventually, we'll have the car on the tow dolly, but not yet.

Upon arrival to the site, Mark notifies me that the coffee pot had fallen off the counter...and spilled water everywhere. And since we couldn't move things too well because the slide still has problems, we spent the next five minutes mopping up water behind and under boxes and furniture. I tried to blame this all on Mark (after all, he was the one driving), but the fault was equally mine for not looking around and noticing that nothing had been put away before hopping in the car and driving down the road. We are still stuck in "landlubber" mode.

Lesson number one:  Always - ALWAYS - do a walk around inside to make sure everything is stowed before moving out.

Once that was all put right, I proceeded to wash up the dishes, which I should have done before we drove away. But, nobody's perfect, right? So I'm washing and rinsing, and rinsing...and rinsing. And I'm just about done. I empty the wash water from the tub into the sink and I notice it's rather slow to drain. In the meantime, I look back toward the bedroom and I notice there's water pouring out of the the shower stall onto the floor! The grey tank was full! And there was no place else for the water to go. So out come more towels, and the tile floor (thankfully it's tile) gets mopped up.

We were connected to the sewer, but we hadn't opened up the grey tank to drain directly into it. Another side lesson learned-- we now leave the grey tank open to the sewer until the day before we're ready to leave the site. For non-RVers, there are two waste water tanks:  a "black" tank that holds toilet waste and a "grey" tank that holds the rest of the waste water (from laundry, shower & sinks). These tanks must be flushed when they begin to get full. First the black water is flushed, then the grey water is flushed, which helps clean out the hose. So it's important to make sure there is enough grey water built up to flush out the hose whenever the black tank is flushed. These tanks, as well as the fresh water tank, have sensors in them, and a panel on the wall allows you to monitor the tank levels. Unfortunately, if the tanks get too mucked up, the sensors don't work and the tank monitor is more or less useless. We are employing some tactics to clean out the tanks in hopes the sensors will become more accurate, but so far they are not.

Anyway, lesson number two for the week is:  I can't wash dishes the same way I used to. Water conservation is pretty much forced upon me in this kind of living arrangement. No doubt a good thing.

"Filter must be fully closed to avoid flooding"

So after barking at my poor frazzled husband with that notorious sharp tongue of mine, Mark went out and opened up the grey water to the sewer, and I proceeded to wash up all the towels we used to clean up the flooding. I remembered that I first needed to clean the lint filter in my washer, since I had done a few loads of clothes the week before, and it probably needed cleaning. Sure enough, I was right. I cleaned it out, screwed it back in, and started up the washer. Before I knew it, water was spewing from the filter all over the floor and under the washer...and behind the washer... and into the bedroom shelves, and drawers containing things made of paper (I have since moved the paper). I had failed to close the filter completely. After my initial dismay, I had to laugh. I'm convinced the good Lord allowed this to happen to teach me a lesson...

Lesson number three:  Nobody's perfect - especially me. And I need to take responsibility for my part and be more understanding and forgiving when others make mistakes. "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

Sunday night, as I laid my head down onto the pillow to rest my very weary body, a beautiful gentle rain began to fall. How apropos, I thought.

Buying Used

Whether you're buying a house or a vehicle, or anything else for that matter, when you buy "used," be prepared for the unexpected. "Used" = Problems. 

Mark assures me that there are just as many problems when you buy new as when you buy used. But since I don't have $250,000 to test out his claims, I'll have to take his word for it. Our pre-owned motorhome came with a bundle of hidden problems that made themselves evident in the first week-- starting, of course, with the "basement" air conditioner. 

For the uninitiated, the storage area underneath a motorhome is called a basement. Our coach has two air conditioners, one in the basement that supplies heat and cooling to the entire coach through floor vents, much like a house, and a roof cooler that provides supplementary cooling when needed. The roof cooler only cools the front. 

Well, once we settled into our first RV site last week, we called out the repairman. He came out promptly the next morning and after about ten minutes, he was ready to deliver the bad news. Out of two condensers, only one was working, and that one not very well; he could try to fix it, but couldn't guarantee that after we put money into repairs it would actually work. "And, by the way, there's a dead mouse in there." The recommendation was to buy a new one, and he could order it and do the work for the tidy sum of $4,500. It will take two weeks.

If only that were the end of the story. The next day he calls back with further bad news. They don't make it anymore. Can't buy new. BUT, there's a company in California that refurbishes old ones and will sell us one for $4,500 with a one-year warranty. Tack on another thousand or so for installation, and we'll be good to go. Poor. But good to go.

So, okay, we're thinking. We got a good price on the motorhome. Even with this expense, we still come out under budget. Breathe, smile, and move forward. Yay...we're living the dream.

It wasn't too long before the next problem presented itself to us... I think it was the afternoon of the same day. Mark was leveling the coach when he discovered that the left rear jack had no pad on it. It was nothing more than a pipe. It used to have a pad on it, so were' not sure where or when it went missing. So he made a trip to Camper World and came back with a hard plastic pad that might work as a temporary solution until we could replace it properly. No sooner had the jack hit the ground that it failed completely, spewing hydraulic fluid and chunks of yellow plastic all over the cement parking pad. Unlike the air conditioner which can be replaced right here in the RV park, the jack requires a lift. So at the end of the month, we will be driving the motorhome over to Noble RV to replace the broken jack and check all the others. 

That brings us to this past weekend, where problem number three reared its ugly head. It was the day of the Pierce Family Reunion (Mark's mother's side) in Anoka. We were parked there with our slides out so family and friends could look at our new rig. When it was time to button up and leave, the living room slide, the big one, refused to come in. Something was very wrong with it, but we couldn't tell if it was a bad switch or a bad motor, or just corroded rails. After struggling with it for ten or fifteen minutes, we realized we'd better call CoachNet, our roadside assistance. You can't drive a motorhome down the road with the slides out. We were stuck. 

Buying the CoachNet service turns out to be one of the smartest things we've done so far, though we never dreamed we'd be using it so soon. Within a couple hours, they had someone out to our location and got the slide pulled in so we could get moving again. 

That was Saturday. As of today, Monday, the slide is still not working. We will add it to the tasks for Noble RV. In the meantime, Mark has to manually crank it closed, poor guy.

They say troubles come in three's. I hope to goodness that's true, because I'm not sure we can cope with another one...not just yet anyway.

Tomorrow, we're taking the motorhome to a truck garage to have the "motor" part of the motorhome checked out. Hopefully, we'll get a clean bill of health and no more bad news.

This baby's gotta be ready for the road by the end of the month! That's when the real adventures start.

Finally Home

Where to begin...

Last I wrote, we were sitting in a hotel room in Houston on a Friday night, hoping for good news the following day. Not having heard anything from PPL (the dealer), we checked out of our hotel at about 10 a.m. Saturday morning and headed over to find out if our home would be ready. A sheepish looking Mary (our sales rep) met us in the lobby and explained that the part they ordered for the air conditioner did not solve the problem. They would have to call a repair technician, and nothing more could be done until Monday, at the earliest.

Well that wasn't going to work for us. There had to be options. After talking it over with Mark, I asked Mary if we could close on the motor home "as is" and let us handle the repair of the "basement" AC unit once we got back to Minnesota. After all, it had a roof unit that cooled the front of the coach, and it should be enough for Minnesota weather. They agreed. We had our walk-through, got a basic "how to" on most systems and headed to the office to finish the paperwork. Since the owner had authorized up to $400 for the repair, PPL gave us a letter stipulating they would pay that amount toward the cost once we got it fixed. Win-win!

Next stop was to their insurance broker down the hall to get the insurance policy finalized. Then to the parts store to pick up some hoses and other necessities for hooking up to water & power at the RV sites.

By about 4:30 we were ready to go and headed for home... oh, wait a minute-- we WERE home. I meant headed for Minnesota. :-)

We were hoping to make it home by Sunday evening, but with such a late start on Saturday, it wasn't humanly possible. We "boondocked" both nights at Walmarts along the way. Walmart has a policy of allowing RVers to park in their lots--with permission, and (of course) we did some shopping while we were there.

The first thing we did upon arrival in the Twin Cities was to pick up our car in Brooklyn Park (Thank you, JoAnn and Terry, for allowing us to stow our car and bikes at your house while we were gone!) Then we drove down to Chaska to collect our stuff that was packed like sardines into a tiny little storage unit. We managed to get most of it into the motor home. Another trip will be required to clean it out completely.

And finally, we rescued Sweetie from her care provider, Miss Sadie Sage, whom I highly recommend if you need pet sitting services. Sweetie was noticeably bent out of shape at my having left her in a strange home for five days and refused to come near me for the first five minutes. So I had to pull out the big guns...the kitty brush, which she cannot resist. But she got over her funk as soon as we let her loose in her new home...something to explore, which is always intriguing.

With the family and family stuff all together (mostly), we headed to our first RV site, Dakota Meadows, right next door to Mystic Lake Casino. It's a beautiful facility, and much cheaper than hotel rooms. We arrived at about 4:30 on Monday, and Mark got busy hooking us up to power and water.

We're finally home! I've been ever so busy unpacking and figuring out where to put everything, but it's going to take another day or two before there's more clean than mess.

It's been a long and grueling business trip, and Mark and I have both been on the emotional roller coaster ride of happy, aggravated, excited, terrified, and occasionally grumpy. We're both exhausted and there's still much to do, but we're trusting God to provide all that we need to get our home ready to travel in. I'm reminded of the old hymn, "Day By Day"...

  Day by day, and with each passing moment,
  Strength I find to meet my trials here;
  Trusting in my Father’s wise bestowment,
  I’ve no cause for worry or for fear.
  He, whose heart is kind beyond all measure,
  Gives unto each day what He deems best,
  Lovingly it's part of pain and pleasure,
  Mingling toil with peace and rest.

It has felt very much like trials, and there's been more toil than rest. But I've no doubt that we will look back on these weeks of waiting and rushing and waiting and rushing some more with a sense of joy that we have been able to embark on our dream retirement, by God's grace.

On the next installment, I'll share more about the adventures and misadventures of setting up the motor home.

Until then, back to unpacking...

His Mercies are New Every Morning!

If wishes were horses...we would be in our motorhome and on our way back to Minneapolis. But they are not.

Funny story...
We were sitting in the home of my dear friend, JoAnn, who had offered to drive us to the airport. We had arrived at her house a little bit early and were enjoying a nice visit when Mark gets a phone call. It's the finance manager at PPL telling us that the parts for the RV were NOT in house yet, and the RV was NOT ready to close on Friday after all, and we should probably not come down quite yet.

We looked at each other and exclaimed, we're getting on a plane in a couple hours! It's a mite late to be getting notified that we probably shouldn't come just yet! Anxiety ensued. Should we cancel the tickets? What would THAT cost us? Then we'd be looking at another week of hotels and restaurant dinners. And of course we threw around some blame for our predicament, which was much more comfortable than admitting we'd jumped the gun and booked our flight too soon.

In the end, we decided to go as planned and figure out our next move on the fly...literally.

So off to the airport we went. Our airline was Spirit, which we KNEW must be at Terminal 2, and we arrived three hours early...at the wrong terminal. Spirit Airlines flies out of Terminal 1. Who would have guessed that?! "We can take the light rail train to Terminal 1," Mark says. So we purchased our tickets ($0.75 each), went down to the platform, and noticed the sign informing passengers that the light rail ride between terminals was free. Too bad that sign wasn't next to the machine we bought our tickets from. Another dollar and a half of our money down the drain!

Fortunately we arrived three hours early, which gave us plenty of time to recover from all of our mistakes. Then (of course), the flight was delayed an hour. We finally arrived in Houston at about 12:45 a.m., and by the time we rented a car and made it to the hotel, it was nearly 2:30 in the morning.

What a day!

But, as the Good Book says, "The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning: great is your faithfulness." (Lamentations 3:22-23) And in the morning, after a rest and breakfast, we were discussing what to do next when the phone rang. It was the service department at PPL letting us know that the parts were in and they would be fixing the air conditioning unit today. Once that was done, they would complete the checks on all the systems and notify us one way or another as to whether the coach would be ready to go.

 Now, all we had to do was wait...again. And where better to wait in 90 degree humid weather than at an indoor mall. The Uptown Galleria in Houston is huge and reminded us of the Mall of American. Only instead of a theme park in the center, they have a roller blade rink on the bottom level and a French pastry cafe. Well, there's other stores, too, but what mall doesn't have stores?

At about 3:00, we headed over to PPL for an update. Yes they were working on it still. No it wasn't done yet and probably wouldn't be done before the end of the day. They promised to contact us and let us know one way or the other-- ready or not ready. We got a hotel room at the Crowne Plaza and walked over to a nice nearby steakhouse for dinner. The room is beautiful, by the way-- a very spacious suite. For about the same price as the Plymouth Red Roof Inn. I guess location is everything.

So here we sit for the evening. We never did get our promised call. But we will be darkening their door in the morning with every hope that God's mercies will be new yet again and our home will be ready to take ownership of. In the meantime, we're in a very comfortable and lovely hotel room, smiling over another package of misadventures, trying to capture the lessons God wants us to learn, and practicing patience.

Will tomorrow be the big day? Stay tuned...

To Houston... Again

We finally got word yesterday that our motorhome will be ready to drive off the lot at the end of this week. Hallelujah!

Booking airline tickets the day before you plan to travel is tricky, though. We will be flying Spirit Airlines for the first time ever, because it's the only airline that offers prices somewhat less than a monthly mortgage payment for next day flying...pray for us. The name "Spirit" for an airline doesn't instill a lot of faith in the material physical integrity of an airplane. But, as always, our faith is in God, in whose mighty hand our spirits (and our bodies) safely rest.

We'll be arriving in Houston at midnight on Thursday and closing on our new home-on-wheels at PPL on Friday morning.

Now that all the repairs have been made, we are able to order our upgrades that Mark wanted for the home. At the top of that list was the We-Boost, which will give a boost to our telephone signal and help with reception in those areas where the signal is weak. We wanted to trade out the sofa for a double recliner, but we didn't have time. We'll have to do that after we get it back to Minnesota. Anybody need a sofa sleeper?

Sweetie goes to her sitter this evening. One more night in this lovely hotel room, and then it's time to pack it all up and get back to our adventure.


On an unrelated note, does anybody know if these laundromat tokens work in all public laundries? Or just "Megawave"? That dastardly place gave me four of these as "change" for a $5 bill, along with four quarters. I didn't even look at them, thinking they were the dollar coins (talk about not paying attention!) Now I have to decide whether to do nothing and waste four dollars or drive all the way back to the laundromat, the one with the sign on the coin changer that says, "If you just need change, go somewhere else!", and ask for my money back. I guess I should at least try.