Quartzsite

Yesterday we drove down to Quartzsite, AZ for the day to attend the annual RV Show as well as the Craft & Gem Show. We first broused part of the Gem & Mineral area. I bought these agates, amythists, & hematites with the intention of attaching them to the top of golf tees for custom P&J pegs. Teddy bought some quartz crystal specimens.Then we drove over to the "BIG TENT" area where the RV show was being held. We oohed and aahed several expensive MHs and 5W trailers.

Then tireing of that we went (Teddy walking, me on my Segway) into the big tent to brouse some of the vendors. There are literally thousands of vendors hawking their wares and I don't think that we saw half of them.
Finally tireing of the croud we ducked out and headed back to Havasu City; stopping on tha way back at Parker, AZ to dine at a delightful little Scottish restaurant called McDonalds.

Steak Fry

Last night the park had a steak fry at the clubhouse. Been planning for it for a couple of weeks and ended up with over 100 people signed up.











For $5.00 you got a steak, baked potato w/choice of toppings, grilled bread, salad & coffee.








Then afterward we had live entertainment followed by dancing.

Entertainment was provided by The Korte Family Singers. They are a family group of 5 natural sisters from Saskatchewan, Canada. They regaled us with folk, gospel and old standards, interspersed with humor.At one point they picked Jim Babcock (shown here) from the audience to pantomime a song with them.

Cuckoo

Back in Appleton before we sold our house we had both a Grandfather clock & a Cuckoo clock and we sort of miss the hourly announcements of the passage of time. We realized that we now cannot accommodate a Grandfather clock...but... what about a cuckoo clock? Well, I researched cuckoos on the web and we found this owl cuckoo that we liked, ordered it, and it arrived this Monday. We like the carved owls & log design in that it is a little different from the traditional "chalet" style cuckoos.
Nazzie was quite interested in it at first but thankfully, like me, his attention span is quite short and he has gone back to his ongoing study of the hummers that daily visit our feeders.

Margarita Monday!

About once a month or so we have what we call a "Margarita Monday". The ladies all go down to a local watering hole for Margaritas at 4 pm and then we men drive down and join them at five.
However last week the ladies proposed that we do it in the clubhouse and the men would come at five and cook dinner.





So last evening we accepted the challenge. We bought burgers, cooked (heated) up a "Nesco" cooker of beans, bought chips, etc. As you can see everyone appeared to have a real good time. Afterward we played cards for the rest of the evening.
Of course the ladies got to eat first. You can see some of the guys lurking in the background waiting for their chance to belly up to the bar.
Click on photo to enlarge and see if you can find Teddy.

IT's COLD!

Snapped this pict when I got up yesterday morning. Had to break out the long-johns. Seems that the world has turned topsey-turvey. Unseasonably warm in the north and cold in the south. I told Teddy that if this keeps up, folks from Arizona will be going to Canada for the winter. Oh well... as Mark Twain once said, "Everybody talks about the weather but nobody does anything about it."

Memory Foam Mattress

The mattresses that manufacturers put in new trailers are generally bottom of the line mattresses and the one in our new Cardinal was not an exception.
Teddy had been complaining of backaches and I was waking up with my arms going to sleep. So we decided to upgrade to a better mattress. After extensive internet research and talking to other owners we decided to go with a "Memory Foam" mattress. If you aren't familar with memory foam it is a foamlike material developed by NASA, that contours to your body and temporarily holds it's shape when depressed. I researched brands & vendors and we finally purchased on-line from Healthy Foundations.
The mattress that came with the Cardinal was king size but we decided to go with a queen so before the new one arrived I had to cut down the bed platform to queen size. The mattress ships vacuum packed and rolled up so that it can be shipped by UPS. When I cut the binding, it rolled flat still in it's vacuum pack and was about two inches thick. Then when we cut the plastic vacuum sleeve and removed it, the mattress swelled to 10" thick in a matter of minutes. It was an amazing process to behold.
Well...we have now slept three nights on it and are quite pleased. Back in Appleton we had a "water bed" for many years and it feels something like a waterbed on steriods; sort of like a waterbed that you sink into. The feeling is hard to describe...It feels firm but yet soft, which doesn't make sense but I cannot think of another way to describe it. At any rate we think that we are going to enjoy our new mattress and look forward to many restful nights on it.

BCS Bowl

Last night we had a big "BCS Bowl" party in the clubhouse.






We had snacks & drinks with the game between Florida and Ohio State projected onto the big screen.




There were two "dollar a square" pools going that payed $25.00 per quarter as well.






Needless to say, neither Teddy nor I won anything.







From these picts you can see that everyone was having a real good time.











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Shopping

Teddy made her daily walk down to the Wal-Mart plaza and back today, a distance of about 6 miles round trip. She isn't much into shopping but always comes back with a few small incidentals. Today, though when she came back she asked me what I had been doing and I said that I had been shopping.
She said, "Where?".
Me, "Maine".
She, "Maine?".
Me, "Yup, L.L.Bean."
Gawd, I love shopping on the internet. I was able to buy a couple of polo shirts and never leave my chair. And they'll be delivered right to my door. In the past three months I've bought a TV mounting arm, shoes for Teddy (twice), a camera, computer software, some books and a mattress. All over the internet. Welcome to the 21st century, folks.
And yet...I feel that I was born a generation too soon...what wonders will my son, Mike see in his lifetime?

Da Wind she blow, blow, blow

It was a beautiful warm day yesterday...high in the 70s. Sat out and basked in the sun, warm overnight but high winds and cooler temps moved in today. The trailer was rockin' but alas, it was only the wind! ;-).
When I came back from morning coffee this morning I snapped these picts of the sun coming up.Looking southeast from the park across Hwy 95.
"Dawn's Early Light"
Looking due west from our trailer. The Colorado river (not visable) is just the other side of the houses in the forground and the mountains in the background are on the Californis side of the river.

Goodby 2006--Hello 2007

Today is the last day of 2006. The guys have a morning coffee every morning from 6:30 to 8 am and I took this picture at about 8 this morning as I was coming back.
It is now about 5 pm and we just finished dinner. Yesterday we were at the grocery and they had these great looking NY strips. We wern't dissapointed, they were delicious.
Tonight we are going to have a New Year party in the clubhouse from 7 till......? Everyone is supposed to bring munchies, I'm bringing hot pork cracklins and pickled eggs (I love "bar food"). Teddy is bringing some little pizza squares.
"Till.....?" will probably be no later than 10 pm as most of the "senior" set here in the park are usually in bed by then. Now that I think of it, the ball in Times Square will drop at 10 our time anyway.

Waffles

Every Saturday from 7 to 9:30am we "Snowbirds" here in the park make breakfast in the clubhouse. We staff it with volunters and charge a $5.00 (donation) per person to cover expenses. We offer scrambled eggs, sausages, biscuts & gravey, pancakes, waffles, coffee and juice. From the profits we have been able to buy two restaurant style waffle makers, hold Christmas & Valentines dinners and sponsor other various activities. Ross Peterson (from Ontario) and I are the waffle makers. Here we are hard a work this morning. Photography by Teddy.

Country Music USA

Last evening a bunch of us here in the park carpooled up to Laughlin, NV to go to the "Country Music USA" show at the Ramada Casino. I think that there were 25 of us in five vehicles.





But first some of us went out to dinner. Teddy & I had dinner at the "Colorado Belle" casino with Jim & Irene Over (on the left) and Ross & Carol Peterson (far end and far right).

The show consisted of several sets featuring country music star impersonaters including...
Hank Williams

Garth Brooks


and Shania Twain.

Had a real fun time.

Morning coffee

Every morning from about 6:30 to 8:30 a bunch of us guys get together for a BS coffee session in the clubhouse. Conversation usually centers around trucks, fishing and lies about our sexual prowess. Clockwise from the Christmas tree are Jerry Brown, Michigan; Laverne Schumacher, Iowa; Larry Weber, Minnesota; Ross Peterson, Ontario; Jim Babcock, Oregon; and the empty chair in the back is mine as I'm taking the picture.
Wednesday morning the park springs for sweet rolls and the pastry of choice are these apple fritters. They are huge, loaded with grease and unbelievably good. I always bring one back for Teddy. She tells me not to bring one back for her but I notice that she always eats it.

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Christmas is icummen'

Sunday afternoon some of us got together and decorated the clubhouse for Christmas. Here are a few shots of us plying our artistic talents.



Some of the guys hung lites outside









While the rest worked inside.


















This was a long reach for Teddy
Afterward we all got together for a chicken (turkey?) soup supper.

$$$

Teddy has an uncanny talent for finding money. She enjoys taking long walks and usually takes walks of from three to six miles every day. She often walks round trip from the park to the Wal-Mart plaza which is about three miles south of us or about two miles north to Home Depot. Without fail she always comes back with money that she has found along the way. It is usually small change but twice she has come back with folding money. Once it was a twenty dollar bill and the other time it was a ten. She has been keeping track of her finds on her computer and so far this year she has found $57.21. She also sometimes comes back with various new items (towels, clothes etc.) which have apparently flown out of the back of pickups after they leave Wal-Mart.
Her secret...keep your eyes open and your head down!

Brrrrrrrrr!

It has been unseasonably cold here in Lake Havasu with nighttime temps dipping into the 40s. Fortunately becasuse of the cloudless sunny skys it usually warms up during the day. However.............................. Yesterday when I got up it was really cold! And today it was worse!
But I see on the TV news that folks back in the Great Lakes area are really getting hammered so I'm not complaing too loudly, at least I don't have to shovel snow.
???? Hmmm...come to think of it...I didn't much shovel snow back in Wisconsin..........TEDDY DID!

Nasdaq

Ever since our cat Simba passed away last summer Teddy has been wanting to get another cat. I have been resisting saying, "I don't want to get another pet that will outlive me!" However I finally caved in and today we went to the local humane shelter and adopted a 6 month old black and white kitten which we named Nasdaq or Nazzy for short. He is a frisky little fellow and has quickly made himself at home, running up and down the trailer with full kitten enthusiasm.














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Anna's Hummingbird

We have been feeding some visiting Anna's Hummingbirds since arriving here in Lake Havasu last month. Snapped these picts through the window yesterday.

Pack Rat...the rest of the story

We at first thought that the Pack Rat that we encountered when we first arrived here in Havasu was a local guy. However, it soon became evident that, NO...he had hitched a ride with us up in Colorado and was living happily in the ceiling of the trailer. Every night we could hear him running around up there. This proved to provoke a lot of discussion among us and other RVers here in the park as to our best course of action. We knew that he came out on nightly raids for food, water and shiny things so we visited the local Home Depot and armed ourselves with snap traps, sticky traps and DeCon snacks. This was war and we were determined to win. For the first week he snapped the traps w/o getting caught, avoided the stickys and ignored the DeCon. However he must have been getting hungry as the DeCon disappeared one night and several days later we stopped hearing from him. So now, a fortnight later, we assume that he has gone to Pack Rat heaven and is now enjoying the pleasures of seven virgin Pack Rat ladies. We haven't noticed any odor but were told to not worry about it as out here in the dry Arizona air they mummify so quickly that it isn't noticeable.
Thus ends the saga of Larry, Teddy and the Pack Rat.

Pegs & Jokers

We played cards last night (Pegs & Jokers). More and more of the "Snowbirds" are arriving so we had enough players for two tables. I played at a table of six players and Teddy played at a table of eight. As you can see, she holds her cards close to her chest...no-one is going to get a peek at her hand.

Sunsets

The sunsets here in Lake Havasu are georgous. Brilliant reds and yellows usually reflected off the clouds over the California mountains.This is from last night (Sun 11/5/06).
**The mountains across the river are in California.***

Football

Another lazy day in Lake Havasu City. Watched Wisconsin at Camp Randall beat Penn State 13 to 3 this afternoon. We generally don't get to watch many UW or Packer games here in Arizona but we were able to watch the Packers last week as they were playing the Arizona Cardinals.

Teddy took one of her long walks today and found $10.00. It's amazing how she manages to find money all the time. Last week she found a $20 dollar bill somewhere between here and the mini mall about 3 miles down the road. She generally walks there and back every day. I generally ride my Segway over to the clubhouse and back every day. But...guess what...my cholesterol is lower than hers. Go figure!

Ribs

Tonight (Wed.) was ribs night at the local American Legion hall. We went with two other couples, Jim & Carol Babcock and Don & Carol Dingman. They were falling off the bone good.




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Neotoma cinerea

Suprisingly (at least to us), we were once again visited by a Neotoma cinerea aka Bushy Tailed Wood-rat aka Pack Rat. Albeit this time it was a somewhat pleasant & amusing encounter. We were sitting in the Cardinal last evening about 8:00 p.m. with the door open including the screen as there are no misquotes or flies to worry about. Teddy was working on a jigsaw puzzle and I was in the midst of the daily newspaper crossword when out of my peripheral vision I saw a little furry animal scamper into the door. I yelped at Teddy, "What was that!". She turned just in time to see him turn around and hightail it back out of the door. We chuckled in amazement & thought that that was the end of it, but to our amazement he/she popped in and out three more times in the next ten minutes as we sat quietly and watched. At that point I fetched my camera but as is always the case when you are ready with camera in hand, he didn't appear again. They are cute little animals but can be quite destructive with their nest building activities so we aren't going to invite him back again. Needless to say, we closed the door before retiring.

Lake Havasu City

We arrived at Havasu Falls RV Resort in Lake Havasu City, AZ Tuesday afternoon about 4:00PM. http://www.havasufallsrvresort.com/
Drove about an hour through a snow storm south of Salt Lake. There appeared to be about five inches on the ground near where I-70 ends at I-15. It wasn't a lot of fun but at least I didn't get sleepy driving! Anyway we were happy to get here with mid 70s temps. and hugs from friends that we met last year here. (Snowbirds are starting to arrive)

Pack Rat Woes

Last Friday I went out to start the truck and oops! the batteries were dead. So I got out my trusty battery charger and opened the hood. And...what did I find...a nicely built pack rat's nest stuck down in the engine compartment made with insulation material from the firewall, insulation from a wire and lined with cacti, ouch! I pulled the nest out, wraped the wire with black tape and charged the battery. Then I borrowed an animal trap from one of the rangers, baited it with a piece of shiny tin foil and caught this little fellow the next morning. We were going to Vernal, UT the next day so now he is a resident of Utah. I released him at a rest stop in Utah about 20 miles from here. Here is his picture.Pack Rat aka Bushytail Woodrat (Neotoma cinerea).