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Friday, February 29, 2008

Friends, I have some very bad news to report that breaks my heart to tell you. Our good friend Dave Baleria passed away last night, Thursday, February 28 in Benson, Arizona. Dave’s wife Sandy called me just after it happened to give me the news. My heart is broken, he was my friend and I loved him very much.

They had been working on their Life on Wheels presentations, and decided to take a break and go for a walk. Sandy said she was a couple of steps ahead and heard him fall, and he was gone before help could get to him.

Many of you knew Dave from Life on Wheels, our Gypsy Gathering rallies, or crossed paths with him in their travels around the country as fulltimers. Dave was a retired police officer and the most Type A person I have ever known in my life. He was passionate about life, RVing, the Life on Wheels program, the issues facing RVers and our nation as a whole.

Dave was not afraid to ruffle feathers or step on toes. Maybe that’s why we got along so well. You may not have always agreed with Dave. I didn’t always agree with him. But at least you always knew exactly where he stood on any issue. Dave was one of the handful of men in my life that I was proud to call my brother.

Dave believed in living life to the fullest. As a police officer, he knew how tenuous it is. His passing reinforces that message for me. We just saw Dave a few days ago at our rally and he was feeling fine. We had made plans to have dinner together at our rally in Casa Grande, but we got so busy that there was not enough time to do it, so we decided to do so while in Tucson for Life on Wheels. I can’t remember what it was that got in the way of that dinner, but I wish I had the opportunity to go back in time and make it happen.

The last words Dave spoke to me, as they were getting ready to leave the fairgrounds in Casa Grande were “I love you, brother.”

I love you too, Dave. Rest in peace, my brother.

Thought For The Day – My thought for today is to live every day of your life as if it were the last one, and to tell the people you love how important they are to you now, because tomorrow may be too late.

Thursday, February 28, 2008

Judging from the comments I got on yesterday’s blog, a lot of RVers who have the same Thetford toilet as we do are unhappy with the product and the company’s customer service. Two or three writers said they finally gave up on Thetford and purchased a Sealand unit. We looked for a Sealand here in Tucson with no success, but I think we’ll try to order one, if we can get it delivered before we leave town.

Yesterday Terry and I unloaded my motorcycle from the van, in the hope that I can get in some riding while we’re here. It was the first time we have unloaded the bike all by ourselves. Until now, we’ve always had someone else standing by to give us a hand, just in case. At over 650 pounds and nearly eight feet long, it’s a big, heavy bike, and we’ve appreciated the help. But by using the winch to keep tension on the bike, and taking our time as we eased it down the ramp, we actually found it to be a pretty easy job. The weather forecast is for the upper 70s to low 80s with lots of sunshine for the next ten days, and you just can’t ask for better riding weather than that.

Once the bike was unloaded, we mailed out some book orders that had come in, then spent the afternoon visiting with my cousin Beverly. I only have a few relatives left in the world, and even fewer I spend much time with, but Beverly is one of the exceptions. We’ve been very close ever since we were kids, and have shared a lot of good times and bad over the years. Back when we were both single parents raising our kids alone, Beverly was an important part of my support network. Now we’re both grandparents. Where did the years go

Back at the bus, I was going through my e-mail, and one popped out that caught my eye. It was from a couple I wrote about a few days ago, who are hoping that they can finance the fulltime lifestyle by selling the jewelry that their thirteen year old daughter makes. The mother wrote that after reading my bog entry, she thinks I just don’t get it. She wrote: “I cannot believe that you, who have been so successful as a creative entrepreneur, can be so negative about another’s plans. Before you dismiss Christina’s creations out of hand, I would really like to send you one of her pieces for your review. These are not the typical work of a kid, they are true works of art.”

I wrote back that she doesn’t need to convince me of the jewelry’s value, she must convince hundreds of people a week if the family expects to sell enough to support five people traveling on the road fulltime. I think their chances are slim to none, and Slim isn’t buying anything because he’s saving his money for fuel.

I don’t want to step on anybody’s dream. I’m a dreamer myself, and I have been fortunate enough to have seen many of my dreams come true. However, I’m also a realist. And the reality is that there are not enough people at RV parks, RV rallies, and crafts fairs who are going to buy this kid’s jewelry to buy the family a meal, let alone finance living on the road.

Thought For The Day – The sole purpose of a child's middle name is so he can tell when he's really in trouble.

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

I have added Thetford to my list of companies whose products and customer service leave a lot to be desired. In October we replaced our existing Thetford toilet with a newer model, after the slide blade valve mechanism broke for the third time.

The new toilet, an Aqua Magic Style Plus model, began giving us problems within weeks. It uses a ball mechanism to seal instead of the blade, and we began having problems with it not closing completely, which allows odors to come into the coach. Yesterday the connection between the ball valve and the arm sheared off, and I called every RV parts store I know of in Tucson looking for parts to make the repair. Nobody had them in stock, but two different places told me that this particular model toilet has a lot of problems.

Camping World referred us to Beaudry’s RV, since the toilet is under warranty. The parts department at Beaudry also did not have the parts needed, and the counterman there added to the comments we had heard from other shops about it being a flawed design. He suggested we call Thetford’s customer service number and explain that we are fulltimers and use our toilet daily, which I did.

The girl I spoke to at Thetford was probably not quite as useless as breasts on a bull, but she was certainly a contender for the title. She could not seem to understand why we didn’t just make an appointment with a service facility. After I explained to her for the second or third time that we are fulltimers and live in the bus, and that no service place in town had the parts in stock, or could get us in for several weeks even if they did have them, she finally said she’d send out the parts, but it would take a week to ten days to get them. I asked what we should do for our potty needs in the meantime, and she asked why we didn’t use the bathroom in our house until we could get it fixed. Uhh, this is my house, you dodo!

When Terry called back and said to just send the parts and we’d fix the toilet ourselves, Thetford’s rep offered to send the parts with two or three day delivery for an additional $38. So, I can either wait weeks to get into a service facility and send Thetford a bill for a couple of hundred bucks under warranty, or they could send us the parts faster and we’d fix it and save them the labor cost, but they can’t seem to understand that. No wonder the RV industry has such a bad reputation, with airheads like this taking care of customers’ problems.

On another note, I saw a news story about a prison inmate convicted of murder who is suing the State of Massachusetts because he wants sexual reassignment surgery. In 2002, a federal judge ruled that Michelle Kosilek, formerly known as Robert, was entitled to treatment for gender identity disorder, including hormone treatments, laser hair removal and psychotherapy, but not the surgery itself. So far the state has spent over $52,000 in defending against Kosilek’s lawsuit. Hey, I have an idea. For less than 50 cents you can buy a bullet!

Thought For The Day – Failure usually follows the path of least persistence.

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Yesterday was a long day for us. We left Tucson and drove the van up to Mesa to drop off many thousands of stuffed envelopes at our mail service. On the return trip we stopped in Casa Grande just long enough to take a couple of photographs for an upcoming story in the Gypsy Journal and to drop off a bundle of sample papers at one of the RV parks near the interstate.

All the way to Mesa and back, traffic was heavy, and there were a couple of construction zones where the speed limit dropped to 55 miles per hour. The only problem with that was that most of the other drivers on Interstate 10 must have missed the warning signs, because they were zipping past us at 75 or more. There is nothing like trying to obey the law while a snarling and snorting fully loaded Kenworth is crawling up your tailpipe.

Back in Tucson, we still had several hundred papers that had to be mailed out to our Canadian subscribers and those with the First Class postage upgrade, so we hit the post office, forgetting that it was a Monday. Folks, never go to a big city post office on a Monday! We were inside close to two hours before we were finally finished. I’m a people watcher, so I spent a lot of the time in line checking out the people around me. I need to remember to do that again the next time I get down on myself for being short, bald, and overweight and start to feel totally repugnant. Compared to some of the guys I saw in that line with me, I’m an absolute stud muffin!

Back at the bus, we checked e-mail and made a pit stop, then our pal Orv Hazelton joined us and we went out to dinner at a very nice Mexican restaurant called La Fuente, which has been a Tucson institution for over 40 years. According to the restaurant’s website at www.lafuenterestaurant.com, their many satisfied customers have included such luminaries as Barbara Streisand, Frank Sinatra, Johnny Cash, J.F.K., and President George W. Bush. I didn’t see any big name celebrities while we were there, but I sure enjoyed the company I was in.

Miss Terry was a hit with the guitar player, who was the only member present that evening of what is usually a four man mariachi band. He came by our table and singled my pretty bride out, and Terry delighted him by joining in, singing several tunes in Spanish. Wow, what happened to my normally shy wife? You go, girl!

Back at the bus, Orv visited for a while longer, then had to head back to his motorhome to get rested and ready to continue his trip to California tomorrow. I answered several e-mails, including one from a reader who asked for my advice on the purchase of a Fleetwood Pace Arrow Vision, since he had heard we owned one at one time. I started to tell him to run, not walk away, from the deal. Then I remembered what a lemon our Pace Arrow was and decided that he could indeed walk away. Why run? If the unit he is looking at is anything like the one we had, it’ll break down or fall apart before he’s more than a few feet away from it anyway.

I had another e-mail from a nice lady who is a brand new fulltimer and was overwhelmed trying to figure out how to handle the thousand and one details of this new lifestyle, from how to back into an RV site and how to get her mail, to how to handle things like making campground reservations when she doesn’t want to be tied down to too tight of a schedule. My advice was to attend a Boot Camp at an Escapees rally www.escapees.com and a Life on Wheels conference www.rvlifeonwheels.com. The Tucson Life on Wheels is March 18-21, and they still have openings.     

Today we have a few minor chores to take care of, but we’re in a slow down mode after being so busy the last few weeks, and I plan to concentrate really hard on doing as little as possible for a while.

Thought For The Day – The older we get, the fewer things seem worth waiting in line for.

Monday, February 25, 2008

Miss Terry spent the weekend stuffing envelopes, and today we will deliver them to our mail service in Mesa to get them in the mail. Then we’ll come back to Tucson and finally have a couple of weeks to relax before Life on Wheels. We are really looking forward to the downtime and to not having to be somewhere at a particular time.

Yesterday just about the time I carried the last bin of envelopes out to the van, our dear friend Orv Hazelton arrived at Tra-Tel RV Park for a night or two. Once Orv was hooked up and settled in, he came by the bus for a visit, and then the three of us went out to dinner. Orv is a special friend, and we always enjoy spending time with him.

After reading that the lawsuit brought against the State of Tennessee by fulltime RVers who were denied their voting rights had been dismissed, blog reader Roger Smith sent me an e-mail that raised an interesting point. Roger thinks that a case could be made that both Tennessee and Bradley County are defrauding the federal government, since they are certainly taking advantage of at least some of the multitude of federal grants which are issued based on local population. Are those same fulltime RVers who were purged from the voter roles being counted as residents when the state and county want those big federal bucks? Roger wondered if some sharp attorney couldn’t inflict a little pain on the state and county by raising this issue.

I like the way you think, Roger. Just like every small town newspaper publisher in America, I was threatened with libel lawsuits more than once when somebody’s name appeared in the police blotter for DUI, domestic violence, or some other misdeed. The defense against libel is truth, so I knew that as long as I had a copy of the police report, I was covered. But just out of sheer orneriness, the three times that some fool actually did make good on his threat and filed a lawsuit, I counter-sued for $10 million, citing pain and suffering, emotional distress, interference with my freedom of the press, and anything else I could dream up. When my adversaries were served with my response and counter suit, they immediately dropped their cases each and every time. It’s called fighting fire with fire. Lots and lots of fire. Maybe the bureaucrats in Tennessee need a firestorm to descend on them too, to convince them to leave law-abiding citizens, who happen to be fulltime RVers, alone.

I need your help. I get a lot of e-mail from readers, and I enjoy hearing from all of you. But please do me a favor. When you write, include something in your subject line with my name, the words blog, Gypsy Journal, or RVing. Anything that tells me it is a legitimate e-mail.

I get anywhere from 100 to 150 e-mails a day, and even with a spam filter, a lot of junk still gets through. If I get an e-mail from someone I don’t know that has a blank subject line, or just says hello, I assume it is spam and don’t open it. Then I’ll get another e-mail later on from the same person asking why I ignored their first message. So please help us both out, and let me know your e-mail is a legitimate message, not just someone trying to sell me a product to enhance my manhood, offering me low cost medications from Canadian pharmacies, or offering to share millions of dollars found in a deposed  Nigerian dictator’s safety deposit box.

Thought For The Day – Success begins with a simple decision to pay the price, and ends the moment you cease to pay it.

Sunday, February 24, 2008

Terry and I have been very fortunate in that we have been able to build a business that allows us to enjoy the RV lifestyle and travel fulltime. We know it is a dream that many others also have, and one that does not come true easily. It takes hard work, persistence, and more than a little bit of luck. It also takes common sense, a commodity that doesn’t seem to be all that common anymore.

Because of the Gypsy Journal, and because I have written a book on working on the road, and teach seminars on the topic at Life on Wheels and RV rallies, I frequently get letters and e-mails from people who have an idea for a business they want to take on the road and support themselves with.

Unfortunately, all too many of these folks seem to be more than a little unrealistic. They have a dream, and sometimes I’m put in the position of having to advise them that their dream could quickly turn into a nightmare. It’s okay to dream, dreamers have accomplished a lot in the course of our history. But we do need to temper our dreams with a dose of reality from time to time.

The other day I got an e-mail from a couple, who included a digital photograph of several pieces of jewelry their thirteen year old daughter had crafted from yarn, polished stones, and pieces of driftwood. They said the girl is a natural artist and that her jewelry was a big hit with all of their family and friends, and that their daughter had sold several pieces to her friends at school. Now they hoped to hit the road marketing her creations at RV parks and rallies as they home school their three children.

Folks, it’s just not going to happen. How many people do you really expect to be able to sell your daughter’s jewelry to? Even if there was a market for it at the RV parks and rallies you will visit (and there isn’t), your child would have to turn out hundreds of pieces a week.

I had another e-mail from a fellow who is a country music singer and performer. He hopes to be able to make his living on the road by performing at RV parks and passing the hat. I wrote back to tell him that there are many, many talented folks out here who do perform at RV parks and functions, but very few make a living at it. At best, they sell a few homemade CDs and take up a collection that covers the cost of a modest meal out now and then.

Most fulltime RVers we know who operate a business on the road do it as a supplement to their retirement or some other outside income. Yes, a few, including Terry and I, do make our entire living on the road. But I suspect that we are the exception to the rule.

My advice to anyone who wants to operate a business from their RV and support themselves as fulltimers is to first reduce your outlay. It’s a simple fact of economics that the less you have to pay out, the less you have to earn. If you are making big payments on an RV and tow vehicle, you are going to find it very hard to make ends meet.

Secondly, find a unique product or service that appeals to a large number of people. There are plenty of vendors out there selling waterless car wash, bungee cords, tire pressure monitors, and satellite dishes. Some do very well and some barely squeak by. But the more competition you have, the larger customer base you must find to draw from.

Yes, it can be done. We are proof of that. But starting and succeeding in a business does not happen overnight. It has taken us nine long years to get to where we are today. Before you jump headfirst into water that is over your head, have a realistic and workable business plan, and a way to support yourself until your business takes off.

Thought For The Day – I went from normal to flat out crazy without even pausing at peculiar.

Saturday, February 23, 2008

Fulltime RVer Ron Teel, who was one of the parties who brought a lawsuit against the state of Tennessee after 286 fulltime RVers were dropped from the voter rolls, sent me an e-mail to say that a federal judge dismissed their lawsuit this week. U.S. District Judge Curtis L. Collier ruled Wednesday that Bradley County, Tennessee officials who dropped the fulltimers from the rolls in 2006 did not violate their right to vote or their right to travel. The RVers all used a mail forwarding service, as most fulltimers do.

A similar challenge to voting rights came up in Polk, County, Texas, home of the Escapees RV Club www.escapees.com in 2000. In that case a federal judge sided with the Escapees and prevented fulltimers from being blocked from voting.

Interestingly enough, homeless people who claim Tennessee residence are eligible to vote. The judge’s ruling said "homeless people are residents of the place they live, even if that place is a park bench, while plaintiffs have not clearly pointed to any place they live." Nonsense! Why should an American citizen be denied such a basic right just because they don’t fit into the accepted lifestyle model for residents of Tennessee?

Ron says no decision has been made yet as to the next step, but an appeal is a possibility. If you are a fulltimer or are planning to become one, and you are considering Tennessee as your legal domicile, this is an issue you need to be aware of.

After sleeping for thirteen straight hours, I awoke yesterday feeling almost human again. The garage called just after 11 a.m. to report that the new radiator and thermostat had been installed and our van was ready to pick up. We got a ride to the shop, paid the bill, and headed right for Mesa to pick up the pre-addressed envelopes from our mail forwarding service. It began to rain somewhere around Casa Grande, and it never stopped all the way into Mesa. After loading the envelopes we drove over to Apache Junction to pay a brief call on Terry’s mother, the rain beating down on us all the way.

We took the back way on our return trip to Tucson, following U.S. Highway 60 east to Florence Junction, then turning south on State Route 79. Within just a few miles we were out of the rain, and marveling at how pretty the desert was around us. Water does wonders in the desert, and where normally there is just hard dirt and patches of brown scrub grass, now a carpet of green stretched as far as we could see. Within a couple of weeks we should have a wonderful color show as the spring desert flowers begin to bloom. 

Soon we were coming into the little community of Florence, where the forbidding barbed wire and gun towers of the Arizona State Prison dominate the scenery. As we drove past, I remembered when the notorious Tison gang broke their murderous father out of prison here in 1978 and started a multi-state crime spree that resulted in the deaths of six innocent people. Compared to family scion Gary Tison, movie monster Freddy Krueger looks like a Sunday school teacher, and it is sobering to drive past the prison and realize that there are animals just as savage behind those barriers just waiting for the opportunity to hit the streets you and I drive on. 

South of Florence the road became the Pinal Pioneer Parkway, a relaxing drive through magnificent desert scenery, with snow capped mountains off in the distance. We passed the small roadside park with the monument that recalls the single car accident near here that took the life of cowboy movie actor Tom Mix in 1940, and soon we came to the junction with State Route 77 and followed it into Tucson .

This will be a busy weekend as Miss Terry stuffs envelopes to get everything mailed Monday morning. Each envelope is individually bar coded and must be kept in the proper sequence. Terry has her own system and says it causes more delays if anyone tries to help her, so my job will be to just stay out of the way and carry filled bins out to the van and fresh bundles of papers back inside to her. 

Thought For The Day – I know God won't give me more than I can handle. I just wish He didn't trust me so much.

Friday, February 22, 2008

When we get a new issue of the Gypsy Journal printed, we send the papers out in a series of mailings to subscribers who use different mail services like the Escapees, FMCA, and Alternative Resources in South Dakota , along with the mass mailing to subscribers who don’t use a mail service.

Miss Terry spent most of yesterday stuffing envelopes to get the new issue mailed off to some of the mail services. They were ready to go by mid-afternoon, so we made a quick run to the post office and to the office supply store, and ran into trouble.

What had been a minor leak in our radiator that we were going to get fixed next week suddenly became a major problem when the radiator began pouring fluid out. We limped into Ed Taylor’s Auto Clinic, a shop I have done business with before while here in Tucson . We left the van with Ed and called the office at Tra-Tel RV Park, and they sent someone over to pick us up and bring us back to the bus. The van has a plastic radiator, of all things, and it’s basically a throwaway unit. Ed ordered a new radiator and thermostat and said he expects to have the repairs finished by noon today.

As soon as the work on the van is finished, we’ll pick it up and then run up to Mesa to pick up the printed envelopes from our mail service to start getting our main mailing sent out. We’re running about a week behind schedule due to the rally, and Terry is working hard to get the job done.

I’m afraid I’m not being much help to her at all. I thought I was over the worst of this flu thing, but apparently it was just taking a little rest before attacking again. Yesterday afternoon it came back with a vengeance, and by early evening I was right back where I started. This is getting very old.

Like most men, I make a terrible patient. I get grumpy, I’m even lazier than normal, and I just want to sleep.

I hate being sick, because I can’t write. Normally I can sit down at the keyboard and the words flow out pretty smoothly. But when I’m like this, my head is so fogged that I can’t concentrate. I find myself typing a line, then reading it and realizing that it doesn’t even make sense to me, so I delete it and start all over again. Right now writing is not fun, it’s just work, and I try to avoid work at all costs.

So I’m going to close for now and just lay around and snivel.

Thought For The Day – Brain cells come and brain cells go, but fat cells live forever.

Thursday, February 21, 2008

Thanks to all of you who wrote with get well wishes. I think being worn out from all of the rally planning and activities, and then getting the flu, were just too much and my body decided to go on strike. Through a combination of Mexican antibiotics, ibuprofen, Alka Seltzer Cold Formula, and rest, I seem to have it under control, and I am actually starting to feel a little bit better.

We stayed in most of yesterday. I did some work on this website, adding more listings to our Small Town Festivals page, finished up the books for the rally, and filled a few orders that came in from the website.

I even did a minute or two of manual labor. Miss Terry looked outside and saw water spouting a couple of feet into the air. Someone at a site behind us had ran over a water bib and sewer hookup. The manager of the park arrived just as I came out to investigate, and once he had the water turned off, I helped him replace the water bib. Actually, my contribution consisted of holding it while he used the monkey wrenches, since I’m not licensed to operate such high tech equipment.

The young man who ran over the bib was suitably embarrassed, but I told him this was nothing compared to some of the havoc I have wreaked behind the wheel. Like the time I drove away from a gas pump with the hose still in my car’s tank, or the incident where I started a car while it was in reverse and backed across my garage and into the water heater. I won’t even mention the first day on the job years ago at the Tucson bus garage, when I wiped out the side of a brand new RTS bus on a concrete pillar holding up the parking canopy. That was a not a very good career move, and my time there was short lived.

Perhaps my highest (or lowest, depending on your point of view) point behind the wheel was back when I was a kid and lied about my age to get a job driving a forklift at the Libby Owens glass factory in Toledo, Ohio. I lied about knowing how to drive a forklift too, but I figured, how hard could it be? As it turns it, it was much harder than I expected! The foreman told me to take a forklift down to the loading dock on the other side of the factory and report to the shipping clerk. I bluffed my way through getting the forklift started, managed to get it into gear, and started off down the narrow aisle of the factory. Everything was going great, until I got to my first turn, where I swung the steering wheel around. That’s when everything went to hell. Instead of the front end turning like it did on my car, the rear end of the forklift turned instead, slamming into a row of stacked glass. The resulting sound of large sheets of plate glass shattering as they toppled in a domino effect was not pretty. When the foreman arrived, his face a deep shade of purple, I tried to explain to him that the steering needed repaired on the forklift, but I was escorted off the property before I ever learned if they got the danged thing fixed!

All of these misadventures happened in wheeled vehicles. Someday I’ll tell you about the helicopter. I think the Army has lost my address by now.

Back inside the bus after the water was working again, I snuggled down into my recliner for a nap, and woke up an hour later. I could get used to this life of leisure.

Thought For The Day – If you must choose between two evils, pick the one you've never tried before.

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

We drove back up to Phoenix yesterday morning to pick up the new issue of the Gypsy Journal from the trucking company that brought it down from our printer in Flagstaff. Just as we were entering the Phoenix metropolitan area, we saw several police cars stopped on the shoulder of the highway, and news crews filming them. We learned later that 30 illegal aliens were discovered in a pickup truck during a routine traffic stop.

I don’t know about you, but I’m really sick and tired of our tax dollars and law enforcement resources being spent to deal with these criminal trespassers. It seems like every news broadcast and newspaper edition I’ve seen or read anywhere in Arizona lists at least one crime committed by someone who is in this country illegally. We’ve been in the state since early December, and have seen reports of kidnappings, drive by shootings, murders, rapes, and armed robberies committed by illegals. When I was a youngster in Arizona, we had plenty of illegals too. But most of them came across the border seeking honest work. Now it seems that the new industry for illegals is crime. We need to take harsh action to stop the flood of criminals coming into our nation from south of the border. Instead we book them, feed them, put them on a bus, and take them back across the line, so they can turn around and return the next day or the next week, and the revolving door just spins faster and faster.

Once we loaded the newspapers into the van, we returned to Casa Grande, hooked the van up to our tow bar, and made ready to leave. After over two weeks at the Pinal County Fairgrounds, I was ready to be someplace else.

We had an easy run south sixty miles to Tucson, where we took a site at Tra-Tel RV Park, our usual base when we are in the Old Pueblo. The manager greeted us and got us parked in our site, and informed me that he and several other people in the park all had motorcycles and had been getting in some riding time together.

Hopefully I can join them while we’re here, but it won’t be anytime soon, I’m afraid. This flu bug is still hanging on, and really kicking my butt. By the time I had hooked up our utilities and tuned in our TV satellite dish, I was completely wiped out. I laid down on the couch for a nap and woke up over an hour later, feeling just as drained as I had before. Ever since we arrived, Miss Terry has been taking advantage of our full hookup site to catch up on laundry, and cleaning up weeks of accumulated dust from Quartzsite and Casa Grande.

We’ll be here until March, when we teach at Life on Wheels at Pima Community College. We have some writing projects to finish up, and I have some family here I want to spend time with, but not until I’m feeling better. I don’t want to make them sick too.

Thought For The Day – Junk is something you've kept for years and throw away three weeks before you need it.

Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Yesterday morning Terry and I drove to Avondale, Arizona to pick up a new starter and solenoid for our Onan generator at Cummins Rocky Mountain. Back in Casa Grande, Phil Botnick, from Phil and Ann’s RV, made short work of getting them installed, and before long we heard the sweet sound of our generator coming to life. Phil hung around for the weekend after our rally ended just to get us back up and running again, and we really appreciate him doing so. In addition to being a top rated mobile tech, Phil and his wife Ann operate a small full hookup RV park in Flat Rock, North Carolina, where they spend their summers.

Terry and Connie Simpson also stayed on for the weekend, and helped us get my motorcycle loaded back into the van. As weak as this bout with the flu has left me, I sure needed their assistance. Thanks, guys.

Once the bike was loaded, we spent some time going over the feedback forms from the rally. Overall, we had very high marks. There are some areas where we need to improve, such as having more evening entertainment and a wider variety of crafts seminars. Some things we can’t do much about, such as the fact that the fairgrounds parking is on dirt with limited electric power.

One complaint we heard echoed several times was that we charged the same amount for a couple in an RV as we did for a solo, yet the couples got two door prize tickets and the solos only got one. The fairgrounds and insurance company charge us by the number of RVs, whether there is one person or three in it, so we can’t do much there. But I agree that we need to level the playing field, so at future rallies the rule will be one door prize ticket per RV.

Our parking crew got rave reviews, though there were many comments about being parked too close to the rig next door. We’ll work to improve on that for future rallies.

Some feedback forms prove that we can’t please everybody. Last year we started our morning coffee and donuts at 7 a.m., and our first seminars began at 8 a.m. That was too early for most folks, so at this rally we moved everything up an hour. Some feedback forms suggested we go back to the early starting time, while just as many suggested that we not start anything until 10 a.m. Go figure. Likewise, we had comments on seminars saying such and such seminar was a waste of time, while just as many praised the same seminars as being the best thing about the rally. Again, go figure.

Some feedback forms just leave us scratching our heads. One feedback form said we should ban people on wheelchairs from the rally area. Huh? Could they be serious? How about we ban insensitive jerks? Another complained that I was rude to Miss Terry on stage. This may be because I am a shameless flirt, but my wife knows where I sleep at night. Besides, she says I’m like an old dog she once had – he chased cars, but if he ever caught one, he couldn’t drive. I apologized to Terry for anything I might have done to offend her, but she’s just as mystified by that comment. Trust me, my wife is no shrinking violet. If she felt that I had done something wrong, the aches and pains of this flu thing would be the least of my problems!

A common comment was that people liked the laid back feel of the rally, and urged us not to allow it to grow so big that we lost that. We don’t want that to happen either, and have to walk a fine line between making the rallies large enough to pay for themselves, and yet keeping that atmosphere that we all enjoy.  

All in all, we are very pleased with the comments. Everyone who attended last year’s rally said this one was a big improvement. Many veteran RVers who have attended lots of rallies said ours was among the best they have ever been to. And of the people who had never been to a rally before, several commented that we set a standard that will be hard to beat by anyone else. You can’t know how proud that makes us feel. We appreciate everybody’s feedback, and we’ll be analyzing them in depth before our next rally to make it even better.

Thought For The Day – If money doesn't grow in trees, then why do banks have branches?

Monday, February 18, 2008

Even though I got a flu shot during my annual medical appointment at the V.A. hospital in Lexington, Kentucky last fall, I have managed to get it. I had been feeling funky for a couple of days, then started coughing, and Saturday night I awoke to chills and aching all over. Since then it has been like riding a roller coaster. About the time I begin to feel a little better, it comes right back and hits me again. I’m not the only one. From the news reports, there are so many cases here in Arizona that hospital emergency rooms are faced with long delays to treat patients, and are steering them to urgent care centers and private physicians.

I spent most of yesterday inside the bus, catching up on paperwork that I had gotten behind on during the rally. There was a Native American festival in town that Miss Terry wanted to check out, but I felt too puny to do anything. I told her to go and have fun, but she opted to pass and instead stay home and try to get a leg up on her paperwork too.

For a while now, we have been wanting to have a new logo designed for the Gypsy Journal, and recently I asked graphics artist Chris Hallock to see what she could come up with. It didn’t take Chris long, and here is what she sent me. What do you think? I like it!

In yesterday’s blog, I had a picture of an RV that got stuck while trying to leave the fairgrounds after our Gypsy Gathering rally. I got an e-mail from the rig’s owner, Greg White, and as it turns out, it’s all my fault. Greg has been a big fan of mine, for whatever twisted reason he may have, and he was just trying to emulate some of my own goofs. Such as the time I drove our bus the wrong way up a one way street in Bremerton, Washington.

I proved that you can drive a 40 foot MCI bus conversion up a hill so steep that your front wheels are on the ground and your back bumper is in the pavement, but your drive wheels are four inches in the air. I also proved, as it turns out, that while you can drive into this situation, you can not drive back out of it! That requires rather large tow trucks, police blocking the street, and coverage on the local news. So don’t feel bad, Greg, you’re not alone.

Today we’ll see if we can locate a new starter and solenoid for our Onan generator, and if so, Phil Botnick will install them for us. Then, depending on the time and how I’m feeling, we hope to go on down to Tucson and get settled in for some relaxing before we teach at Life on Wheels in March. They still have openings for this Life on Wheels session, and I guarantee that it will be a learning experience you’ll never forget. For more information, visit their website at www.rvlifeonwheels.com.

Thought For The Day – Don't assume malice for what stupidity can explain.

Sunday, February 17, 2008

We awoke yesterday morning to the bleating of sheep. The fairgrounds had told us that a rabbit show was being held this weekend, but they never mentioned that it actually included all sorts of livestock. There were kids with sheep, goats, pigs, and all sorts of barnyard critters wandering all over the place.

I’d like to say that they were a good crowd, and most of the youngsters probably were, but the parents of many left  a lot to be desired. The RVers who were here for our rally went out of their way to clean things up, but this crowd is just the opposite. As soon as they arrived we started seeing litter everywhere. Paper drink cops, soda cans, fast food wrappers. Miss Terry, Terry Simpson, and I were standing outside our bus when one father walked past with his two pre-teen kids, and casually threw his candy bar wrapper on the ground. What a great example to set for your kids, you jerk!

Okay, file this one under “You can’t fix stupid.” Yesterday morning the fairgrounds was a muddy mess, and streams of pickups and SUVs pulling stock trailers were coming through the gate. Meanwhile, an impatient fellow in a 40 foot diesel pusher was trying to muscle his way out against the flow of traffic. Once he was finally through the gate, he apparently decided that he would take a shortcut across a grassy area that was covered with standing water, with predictable results. It took two tow trucks to get him back on the pavement, and by then the livestock people had all been parked. So what did he accomplish? He had South Dakota plates on his RV, so I assume he was a fulltimer. Where did he have to be on a Saturday morning to warrant such nonsense?

After watching the tow trucks pull the RV out of the muck, Terry Simpson and I walked over to where Donna Yeaw, aka Froggi Donna, had been parked for the rally, and helped her load her motorcycle into the trailer she pulls behind her Class C.

Back at our bus, things got busy. My buddy Smokey Ridgely had been using our Ford van as a demo unit during the rally to show how effective his Dri Wash N’ Guard product is. The only problem was that he was so darned busy selling that he never got the van finished. So he completed the job, and I was amazed at how well his waterless car wash cut through the accumulated diesel grease, oil, and dirt on our van. Check Smokey’s website out at www.EZcleanandshine.com. It’s good stuff! While Smokey was hard at work, his wife Pam pulled up a chair to supervise.

Meanwhile, Miss Terry put her old glass shop skills to work, putting a window back in the door of Smokey and Pam’s beautiful Peterbilt truck that had been knocked out when a thief broke into it just before they came to the rally. Smokey had tried to get it back into place without success, but my pretty lady had it back in in less time than it takes to tell you about it. Smokey was impressed, and I was too, because it’s been nine years since Terry walked out of the glass shop for the last time to hit the road with me. Then again, she impresses me on a daily basis.

The starter on our Onan generator has bitten the dust, so while all of this activity was happening on one side of the bus, Phil Botnick of Phil and Ann’s RV was on the other side diagnosing the problem and taking the old starter off so we can (hopefully) get a replacement for it Monday morning.

I can’t decide if I’m coming down with the same crud everyone else around here has had, or if I’m still just worn out from the rally, but most of the day I felt pretty funky. In the evening I felt well enough that we drove into Casa Grande for dinner at a nice Mexican restaurant called Manuel’s. Just as we finished our meal, a four piece mariachi band began playing, so we hung around a while to enjoy the music.

Back at the bus there was just enough time to download some photos, including this one that Mike Fousie sent me of one of the vendor rows at the rally, and then we headed for bed.

Thought For The Day – Life may not be the party we hoped for, but while we are here, we might as well dance.

Saturday, February 16, 2008

And then the rains came. We had great weather all week for our Gypsy Gathering rally, but late Thursday night it began to rain, and continued all through Friday. I’m glad the bad weather held off until the last day of the rally, but it sure made a mess for folks to get ready to leave in! Everything was muddy, and several rigs were surrounded by standing water.

Even though there was another event coming into the fairgrounds, several rally attendees were able to make arrangements to stay over until things dried out a bit. Then the fairgrounds realized that they had not one, but two different events booked at the same time after our rally ended, and cut off any more space rentals until they could figure out where to put everybody.

After we said our goodbyes to everybody, Terry Simpson and I took a load of donated food to the food bank in nearby Coolidge, and they were thrilled to get it. Life has been good to us, and we believe in giving something back to help those less fortunate.

With the rally officially over, Terry and I are worn out. It doesn’t help that we both seem to be coming down with a bug that nailed Terry and Connie Simpson a couple of days ago, as well as Smokey Ridgely and a few other folks at the rally. We both feel like we could sleep for about 24 hours straight. But still, it was a great week, and we appreciate everybody for coming to the rally, and all of you who pitched in to help out.

Unfortunately, even though most people at the rally seemed to have a fine time, there are always a few who cause you grief. One fellow arrived in a large Class A motorhome towing a long cargo trailer. I told him he would have to unhook and park the trailer off to the side so we could fit him into a parking space, just like the other attendees with trailers. He refused, and then expected to be able to take up two parking spaces so he could stay hooked up.

When I informed him that the fairgrounds would charge us for two spaces, and I would have to pass that price on to him, he didn’t like that either. Would he expect to go into an RV park and take up two spaces and only pay for one? We gave him a full refund, even though he had stayed one night, and he left in a huff. Some of his friends who stayed on left us nasty feedback about the matter, but we did not throw their friend out. We gave him the option to unhook and stay several times, and he refused. Then he refused to pay the extra fee the fairgrounds wanted. Should I absorb the cost because he chooses to drive a large coach and tow a large trailer, and not unhook it?

I did ask one fellow to leave the premises, a man named Stacey Frank, who owns a company called Weigh-It Portable RV Scales. Mr. Frank contacted me in late December asking about being a vendor at the rally. When I told him that the vendor fee was $135, he declined to pay it, saying he only went to rallies where he could come in for free. I guess he is another person who expects me to pick up the tab for him, even though our other 30 or so vendors paid their way, just like we do at every RV rally we attend as vendors.

During the rally, Mr. Frank came in on a day pass, walked around wearing a jacket with his company name on it, and after talking to some attendees who had spoken to him, I felt  that he was soliciting business. I tracked him down and he said he had not solicited anybody. I asked him to leave, which he did.

After the rally ended, I discovered that he had arranged to weigh RVs for our attendees in the fairgrounds parking lot. How did he do that if he was not here doing business without paying a rally fee, unlike the honest vendors who paid their way? I checked with the fairgrounds office, and they said he did not have their permission to weigh RVs on their property. When they contacted him, Mr. Frank reportedly told them that he was doing it as part of our rally, per arrangement with us. This was untrue. No such arrangement was ever made.  

Mr. Frank may make a few bucks off of our rally, but it will cost him more in the long run. Before this happened, I referred two or three rally attendees to Mr. Frank to get weighed, because even though he was not a vendor, I believe being within safe weight limits is very important. But I can tell you that I will never send any business his way again. I don’t know about you, but I don’t feel comfortable doing business with somebody who plays games, tries to slide by at the expense of others, and is not forthright in their business dealings.

The working RV vendor circuit and the fulltime RV community is a small world, and we all know each other. The word gets out pretty quickly about people who don’t play by the rules and who pull stunts like this. They never last long. If I were to advise anyone needing RV weighing, as I do at every Life on Wheels and RV rally where I teach, I would tell them to go to the professionals at RVSEF www.rvsafety.org or to a commercial truck scales. Mr. Frank and Weigh-It may be very good at what they do, but it’s been my experience that people who cut corners in one area will do it in other areas as well. I believe that my coach and my safety are too important to trust to just anyone.

Thought For The Day – If we are what we eat, then I'm easy, fast, and cheap.

Friday, February 15, 2008

The 2008 Western Gypsy Gathering is officially history. Today the attendees will be pulling out of the Pinal County Fairgrounds, headed for all points of the compass. It’s been a busy, fun, exhausting, exhilarating week. I’m glad it’s over, but we’re already looking forward to our upcoming Eastern Gypsy Gathering in Celina, Ohio September 15-19.

Yesterday filmmaker John Holod came up from Tucson and presented a program on RVing to Alaska, which drew a large audience. We have sold John’s DVDs on our website for years now, but it was the first time we ever had the opportunity to meet in person. Check out John’s website at www.rvadventurevideos.com

I mentioned in yesterday’ blog that vendors Smokey and Pam Ridgely www.EZcleanandshine.com sold out of their Dri Wash N’ Guard and had to scramble around to get more product to finish out the rally. Mike and Pat McFall, our PressurePro dealers http://pressureprosystem.com/ reported that they also ran out of their excellent tire monitoring systems. The demand was so great that their distributor had to fly in more inventory in his airplane. Here is a photo of the pilot and Pat unloading boxes of tire monitoring systems. It may have been a relatively small rally, but these folks sure spent some money with our vendors!

Well, it was bound to happen. I got busted! No, Miss Terry didn’t catch me flirting with some pretty lady. I got in trouble with the Food Bank Police.

We believe in giving something back to the community, and during the rally we had a table set up where people could donate nonperishable food items for the local food bank. Over the week, we collected an impressive assortment of canned goods, staples, and food supplies. I called the local food bank to try to arrange a time to deliver the items, and the person I spoke to rudely informed me that I did not have any authorization to collect food for them, and that I should have received a permit in advance of doing so. Apparently, one needs a permit to contribute to charity these days. Grab the soap and head for the showers, Bubba, I’m your new cellmate!

I decided that rather than incur the wrath of the Food Bank Police, I would just end the call before they traced my telephone number and the condiment cops burst in with guns drawn and subjected me to a full body cavity search. I then called the Community Resource Center in the nearby town of Coolidge, where the nice lady who answered the telephone was very happy to accept our donations. We’ll be dropping them off this afternoon. What’s next? Will a federal identification card be required to drop a couple of dollars into the Salvation Army buckets at Christmas?

Thought For The Day – For every action, there is an equal and opposite government program.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

Happy Valentines Day, everybody! Before you do one more thing, get up from your computer and go tell that special someone in your life that you love them. I’ll wait here for you to get back.

Even though putting on a rally is very hard work, and there seems to be a thousand and one details to handle every minute, it is a wonderful experience. We have had a ton of fun, I can’t count the number of volunteers who have pitched in to help, and everybody seems to be having a good time. Our vendors all seem to be doing a booming business. In fact, Smokey and Pam Ridgely, who sell Dri Wash N’ Guard, ran out of product and had to purchase more just to finish out the rally! Here is a photo of one small part of our vendor row, courtesy of Mike Fousie.

Yesterday afternoon I did my Frugal RVer seminar, which seemed to go over very well, and from the feedback I heard from folks who attended other classes, they all seemed to be very good.

Yesterday evening we had our pizza party, which was a real success. We ordered 200 pizzas, and Dominos needed two full size pickup trucks with their beds filled, to get them all here. But they all arrived hot and delicious, and I was amazed at what a fast job the volunteers serving did in getting everybody fed.

After we passed out some door prizes, it was time for the big event of the rally, our Second Annual Cactus Queen Beauty Contest. This is a hoot! We got a bunch of guys, all but one from the Escapees Class of 2007, to dress up in women’s clothes, and the audience selected the winner.

Last year’s Cactus Queen, Thelma Thermopolis, was on hand to present her crown to the new queen, and I don’t think there was anyone in the audience who didn’t laugh until their sides hurt.

Here are a few pictures of our Cactus Cuties. After the beauty pageant, the “girls” lined up at the front of the building and collected cash donations for the Escapees CARE Center in Livingston, Texas. Our generous crowd donated over $500! Who can say no to faces like this?

Today is the last full day of the rally, and it looks like the weather is going to get a bit nasty, with wind gusts and cooler temperatures. But that won’t stop us from enjoying every minute of it! We’re here to have fun! 

Thought For The Day – Men are from earth. Women are from earth. Deal with it!

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

The rally is in full swing and we’re having a wonderful time. We have over 250 RVs here, everybody seems to be enjoying themselves, and we’re getting lots of positive feedback from the attendees. That makes it worth all of the stress and hard work. One of the fellows here, Michael Fousie, sent me a neat link to his blog, where you can see a 360 degree view of the rally. Check it out at http://www.lightcurve.com/

Yesterday afternoon I did my Highway History and Back Road Mystery seminar, which is my favorite out of the nine different seminars I present at Life on Wheels and other RV events. I had a large crowd, and they all seemed to enjoy it.

As for me, give me a microphone and a bunch of people to stand in front of, and I’ll have fun every time. When I look back and remember how terrified I’ve always been of public speaking, I have to say I’ve come a long way. I had been a firearms instructor in the Army for a while, but that was a different type of thing. I had a captive audience back then. If you outrank them and have a machine gun, people seldom boo or heckle you.

But in my career in the newspaper business, every time we won an award for something, I would send my secretary or one of my key employees to accept it, just so I would not have to get up in front of the crowd and say thank you. The very thought sent chills up my spine.

I still remember the first class I taught, at the first RV rally we ever attended, a Spring Escapade in Lancaster , California in 1999. I was so nervous that I stopped to throw up three times between our RV and the classroom! Now I just get up there, act the fool, and everybody seems to have fun with it.

I think the lesson here is to try the things that you never think you could do, and see what happens. You may just be surprised. I know I have been. I have discovered that I love teaching and giving my seminars. I don’t have much patience, so I could never see myself teaching kids in school, but I think I could enjoy doing something some day in a college or junior college setting. You never know, if we ever do hang up the keys (and we have no intention of doing that for a long, long time, I may find myself a place with a bunch of pretty coeds and get a job. I bet I’d look good in a tweed jacket with patches on the elbows. What do you think?

Thought For The Day – If it weren't for stress I'd have no energy at all.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Yesterday I did something for the first and last time in my life. I took pictures of the sunrise. Here they are to prove it. I was up and outside by 6 a.m., and pretty much had the place to myself. That’s because anybody with any common sense was still sound asleep!

I have heard sunrise here in the desert described as glorious, spectacular, and even magnificent. Here is my take on it. Sunrise sucks. Sunrise is just like sunset, except that it’s colder and it comes at an ungodly early hour of the day. Nothing good ever happens before 10 a.m. If you think I’m wrong, consider that worm the early bird had for breakfast. If he’d have stayed safe in his underground bed, that worm would still be alive and well. And it’s nothing to brag about if you’re the bird, either. Worms for breakfast? I don’t think so! I think I’ll just hit the snooze alarm a few times and have French toast about mid-morning, if it’s all the same to you.

The reason for all of this early morning stuff the last few days is because we’re busy with the Gypsy Gathering rally, and I’ve been up to help with parking all of the RVs that have been arriving for days now. As of last night at 9 p.m., we had 249 RVs here! What a crowd! The ladies registering the new arrivals were kept busy all day.

The opening ceremonies kicked off yesterday afternoon, and we had a wonderful crowd. I asked who had come the furthest just to attend the rally, as opposed to someone who came to Arizona and included the event in their winter’s travel plans. Would you believe it was a couple from New York, who drove 3,600 miles just to be here? Wow!

After the opening and vendor introductions, I led a panel discussion on RVing in general, with several longtime RVers and industry experts pitching in to answer questions from the crowd. At the same time, in another building, Jodie Spiller had a packed house with her Craft and Hobby Show and Tell. I wasn’t able to check it out, but Miss Terry said the place was really hopping.

After a short break to catch our breath, we were back at it in the early evening with door prizes, and then we had line dancing in one building, and a group of musicians had a jam session in another. If you’re not here, you’re missing one heck of a good time!

Thought For The Day – If the professor on Gilligan's Island could make a radio out of a coconut, why couldn’t he fix a hole in a boat?

Monday, February 11, 2008

There is a spot on my right side, down just below my rib cage and a little left of center that I am acutely aware of. The reason I am aware of this particular piece of real estate on my body is because that is the only place that does not hurt! The rest of me either throbs, aches, cramps, is sunburned, wind burned, or bruised. I feel like I’ve been rode hard and put away wet. I’m not sick, I’m just beat up from parking RVs the last two days.

I was up and out of the bus by, and no, this is not a typo, 6:50 a.m. yesterday! That is at least two hours before I greet the day on my rare early mornings! We had a meeting with our volunteer parking crew at 7:30 and by 8 a.m. everybody was in place, ready to park the arriving RVs. Last year on our Early Bird morning, the parking lot was full by 6:30 a.m. This time around we had only parked three or four RVs by 10 a.m., and I just know the folks on the parking crew must have been grumbling about getting up so early for nothing.

Then the dam burst and we had one RV after another pulling in, all day long. Finally things died down about 4 p.m., and I told the exhausted parking crew to call it a day. About the time they were all back in their RVs putting their feet up, we got hit again. By the time Terry Simpson and I parked the last two coaches, a little after 6 p.m., we had brought in 135 RVs in one day! We had expected about 100. At close of business, we counted 188 RVs here, and the general parking does not happen until tomorrow! To put that in perspective, at last year’s Gypsy Gathering rally, we had 185 RVs total!

My body is not used to all of this physical labor, and I know that Terry Simpson was going behind my back and putting more air in the tires of the quad I was driving, because every time I got off for something and tried to climb back on, it was higher than the time before! By the end of the day, I felt like both of my ex-wives, their mothers, and their assorted attorneys had wrapped me up in a burlap bag and beat me with broomsticks.

I can’t say enough good about all of our volunteers, from the parking crew to the people helping Miss Terry get everybody registered, and the folks who just pitch in whenever they see something that needs doing and get the job done. You are all wonderful.

What is not wonderful are people who just will not take no for an answer. If you have been reading this blog for very long, you probably know that we have a policy of only allowing one vendor per type of product at our rally. This way each vendor has a good chance to make a profit, which will (hopefully) give them the incentive to come back next year. If we have several vendors all selling the same thing, nobody makes any money. Terry and I could be selfish, like some rally promoters, and just let anybody and everybody in, not caring if they make a sale or not. If we did that, it would put more money in our pocket, at the expense of our vendors. But we will never sell our integrity for a fast buck.

A while back we had a vendor call us, asking to come in. I was concerned because I felt that their product was too close to another vendor who had registered months ago. The prospective vendor assured me that they were not the same animal, and that the other vendor even carried their product.

Before I would give him an answer, I checked with our registered folks and we determined that there would be a conflict, so we declined to accept them. They then called again, trying to argue their point, and I explained our position for the second time. Within minutes, they had a third vendor call me to plead their case. If you know me, you know that by now they were close to exceeding my Bull$&*@ Tolerance Level, and for a third time I explained our policy and the reason for it.  End of story, right?

Wrong! Yesterday the guy arrived at the fairgrounds expecting be parked as a vendor! When I told him that was not going to happen, he assured me that he had already talked to his competitor, who was here and set up, and it was okay. I went over to the vendor area, and was told that no such conversation had ever occurred. So not only was this guy obnoxious, he lied to me! Then he proceeded to try to talk over me to give me his sales spiel and inform me of how successful a businessman he was. Any consideration I might have given to this fellow at a future rally was long gone by now. When he left, he asked one of our parking crew what made me so high and mighty.

I hope he’s reading this, because I’ll explain it one more time. I doubt he’ll understand it, but here goes. It’s about being honest. It’s about being loyal to the people who have supported me for years. It’s about understanding that quick money will not buy honor.

On second thought, never mind. Like the bikers say when people ask why they ride those dangerous things – if I have to explain it to you, you wouldn't understand anyway.

Thought For The Day – Many folks want to serve God, but only as advisors.

Sunday, February 10, 2008

If you want to hear God laugh, make plans.

In this life, we make plans, and then we make contingency plans to cover what will happen if our plans go awry. Then everything goes to hell and you just throw the plan out the window and roll with the flow, or at least paddle really hard and try to keep ahead of the flood. Such was yesterday.

We had planned on about 15 RVs from the Escapees Class of 2007 arriving at the Casa Grande fairgrounds so they could park together for the rally, as well as a couple of vendors. But RVs started rolling in and they never stopped coming all day long. By the time the day ended, we had 53 RVs here! And this was the day before the Early Bird arrivals!

Fortunately, several fellows from the Class of 2007 pitched in to help us, along with Terry Simpson, Jim Brattmiller, Sal Bellomo, and several other volunteers, and we managed to get everybody in and parked without much hassle. Meanwhile Miss Terry had a crew of ladies helping her get folks signed in that included Connie Simpson, Suzy LeRoy, Dot Bolton, Alice Allard, and I’m sure there are names I have forgotten because my brain has turned to jello. But we sure appreciate each and every one of you.

Today is the official Early Bird arrival day, and we have over 100 RVs scheduled, so it’s going to be a long, hard day. But if everybody cooperates like they did yesterday, we’ll get the job done…. just in time to catch our breath and start parking the regular attendees on Monday! When this is all done, I’m going to get me one of those RVs and just travel and relax for the rest of my days! Those RVers, they have it easy! J

Some of you know about Bad Nick, that imp that lives inside of me and just has to create mischief from time to time. He is the alter ego to my true shy wallflower self. Well, I’m happy to report that Bad Nick is alive and well.

After riding in the back of our van for five long months before we pulled it out the other day, the battery on my motorcycle was really low. I gave it a quick charge and managed to start it for a quick ride to the store and back. Yesterday morning when we got ready to move down to our parking space for the rally, the bike would hardly turn over. So I pulled out the Battery Tender again and plugged it in and let it charge all day long.

At one point yesterday, a fellow walked by and saw the bike plugged in to an electrical outlet. Is that an electric bike?” he asked me. “I didn’t know they made them that big.” 

Before I could answer, Bad Nick jumped into the conversation and said “Yes, it’s one of those new hybrids, just like the cars they’re making these days. Runs on gas or electricity.”

I’d love to be eavesdropping when that fellow hits the local motorcycle shop looking for one of those newfangled hybrid motorcycles!                              

Thought For The Day – Opportunities always look bigger going than coming.

Saturday, February 9, 2008

Yesterday was a very hectic day. It started out with several rigs coming in early for the RV Driving School. Then several folks from the Escapees Class of 2007 arrived and needed to be parked.

Miss Terry had run into Mesa to pick up a supply of paper cups, coffee, and such for the rally, Terry and Connie Simpson were out collecting door prizes, and Gene and Cheri Holcomb had to run down to Sierra Vista to take care of some business, so I was left to my own devices. You just know that’s a recipe for disaster.

I was scooting around on Simpson’s quad getting people parked, then running back and forth to the fairgrounds office trying to get them to work with us on some last minute snags, the telephone kept ringing with people wanting to register or asking if they could come in to the rally on days passes (yes, it’s $5/person per day), and every chance I got I popped into the bus to answer the flood of e-mails coming in about the rally.

Fortunately, everyone was patient with me when I asked them to wait to be parked, and I pressed Joe Jones from the Class of 2007 into service to help with the parking. But I sure was glad to see Miss Terry when she got back!

Our good friends Sal and Bonnie Bellomo arrived from Texas to help with the rally. We met these two wonderful people years ago in our early days as fulltimers, and they have been strong and faithful supporters of the Gypsy Journal ever since. In fact, a few years ago we auctioned off a couple of lifetime subscriptions to the paper as a fundraiser for some event, and Sal was our first lifetime subscriber. So far it has worked out fine, but if the price of postage goes up again anytime soon, I may have to shoot him just to save money! Sal and Bonnie have volunteered again to handle the morning coffee duties at the rally. Thanks, guys, we really appreciate you.

Sometime during the afternoon I had a slight lull in the chaos and jumped on my motorcycle to run down the road a half mile or so to a small store that has a postal substation to mail out a book order. After not riding in five months, it sure felt good being back in the saddle. I’d have loved to get a few miles under my belt, but by the time I was walking out of the store, the phone was ringing with another rally attendee telling me that they had just arrived and asking where to park.

We’re going to be going at full speed ahead for the next week with all of the rally activities, so my blog posts may be a bit brief for a while, but I’ll get online enough to at least give you a daily update.

Thought For The Day – Why do doctors leave the room while you change? They're going to see you naked anyway.

Friday, February 8, 2008

By the time Terry and I rolled out of bed yesterday morning, Terry and Connie Simpson were already in town, making an early start at collecting more door prizes for the rally. Those two are like a couple of Energizer bunnies. They just keep going and going and going.

We were on the go all day long yesterday, handling last minute details, putting out fires, and trying to make sure things go smoothly when folks start arriving for the rally. We learned a lot from last year’s rally, and are trying to put that experience to work for us this time around.

Longtime Gypsy Journal subscribers Tom and Barb Westerfield arrived early to help us out, and came over to say hello. While they were visiting, Barb told me that her mother, Pat Westphal, is a faithful blog reader. Hey, Pat, next year why don’t you stow away in the back of the motorhome and come along? This crowd needs all the adult supervision we can get!

Jim and Hope Brattmiller are also on hand, and Jim is going to be helping us with the parking again this year. We could not pull this thing off without so many wonderful people pitching in to help.

We loaded my motorcycle into the back of the van in mid-September after Fall Escapade in Goshen, Indiana, and it has been there ever since. Everywhere we have been, the weather was just too darned nasty to do any riding. We’re enjoying beautiful weather here in Casa Grande, and even though I really don’t have time to play, I just couldn’t resist any more, so yesterday we set up the ramps and rolled it out. Jim Nicastle happened to be walking by, and he jumped right in to give us a hand, which made the job a lot easier. The V-Star 1100 is a big bike, well over 600 pounds, so we appreciate Jim’s help.

After riding around in the back of the van for so long without being started, the battery was low.  I plugged the Battery Tender into it’s connection on the motorcycle, let it charge for an hour or so, and it started right up. By then daylight was fading fast, but I took it for a quick ride around the fairgrounds just to see if I still remembered how to ride the darned thing. I won’t have any time to ride it very far with all of the rally activity going on, but maybe I can squeeze in a quick scoot down the road and back a time or two. If you’re a motorcycle riding RVer, you might enjoy checking out my motorcycle website at www.motorcycletravelonline.com.  

We’re back at it again today. We still have to make up the name badges, print extra copies of the schedule so everyone will have one, nag the folks in the fairgrounds office, (who still don’t have all of the portable water and electric hookups rolled out) and about 500 other little details. But at least we’re seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. Assuming it’s not an oncoming train, that’s a good thing.

Thought For The Day – Thou shall not weigh more than thy refrigerator.

Thursday, February 7, 2008

We’re getting down to the wire folks. It won’t be long now!

We spent most of yesterday morning planning out the vendor parking. We have so many more vendors this year than last that we don’t have the room to park them end to end as we did last time. But Terry Simpson came up with a staggered parking pattern that works great. We pulled our two 40 foot MCI bus conversions over to the vendor area to try it out, and once they were in position, I was amazed at the amount of room each had, and the visibility the vendors will have. They will also all be parked in such a way that in an emergency, anyone can start up their rig and drive away. I just couldn’t visualize it as Terry was explaining it to me, but once we had our buses in place it was like a light bulb went on in my head.

I learned a long time ago that some customers are not worth having. If something feels bad going in, and that little voice in the back of your head is whispering (or screaming) to you, listen to it. A while back I got an e-mail from a fellow asking about attending the rally, and some comments he made about solo women RVers didn’t set right with me.

Yesterday he showed up at the fairgrounds, and within a minute or two of meeting him, alarm bells were going off in my head.

I’m far from a saint, and when you reach my age and have lived the life I have lived, in the lines of work I have had, you’ve heard just about every filthy and disgusting thing a person can say. But I can’t recall hearing so much offensive talk in such a short period of time from one person. I decided very quickly that this was not someone I wanted at our rally, and I cut him off in mid-tirade to tell him so, and told him to hit the road. Folks are coming to the rally to have fun. He wanted to be here for an entirely different reason. He won’t be. 

Our pals Gene and Cherie Holcomb arrived yesterday afternoon to help with pre-rally chores. It’s only been a few days since we saw them in Quartzsite, but their smiling faces were a joy to see. Once they were settled in, we rounded up Terry and Connie Simpson, who had been out all afternoon collecting door prizes, and we all headed out to dinner. In the restaurant we ran into our longtime friends John and Ellie Holmes and another couple, who are all in town for the rally. I’m sorry that I can’t remember the other couples’ names, so please forgive me for not including it here, but you know how it is when you put a fat man in a place full of food. My attention was elsewhere. Life has its priorities.    

Thought For The Day – Middle age is when broadness of the mind and narrowness of the waist change places.

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

The rain finally left the area and we had blue sky yesterday. Hopefully we’ve seen the last of the ugly weather for a while.

Yesterday morning Terry and Connie Simpson spent some time helping us check out the RV parking here at the Pinal County Fairgrounds and in deciding how to lay out our vendor area for the rally.

We’ll have close to thirty vendors, up from only ten vendors last year, so we had to change the vendor area to get everybody in with room to maneuver, and still keep them conveniently located for the rally attendees’ shopping convenience. Terry and I have been RV rally vendors for years, and we know the challenges they face. We want to make this rally a good experience and a successful venue for them.

Our friends Terry and Connie Simpson are two of the nicest people you’ll ever meet. They came into the fairgrounds early to help us get things set up, and then started calling on the businesses in town yesterday afternoon to solicit door prizes. I’m sure glad they work for free, because we could never afford to pay them for everything they do for us!

I have had some inquiries about what facilities are available at the fairgrounds. There are restrooms and shower facilities, but they are nothing fancy. I much prefer the comforts of my own bus. But if you have a small rig with limited holding tank capacity, the fairgrounds’ bathrooms will serve the purpose.

We’ll have 15 amp electricity and water for everybody at the rally, and the fairgrounds has a couple of dump stations. If you’re coming to the rally, be sure to bring an adapter to plug into the 15 amp outlets. We have had some people concerned about being able to live on just 15 amps, but don’t worry, you’ll be fine. You won’t be able to run your microwave, but we have spent many, many days on 15 amps and survived. Many of us have just spent several weeks boondocking in the desert with no power, so 15 amps is a luxury by comparison. It is amazing how little one really needs to be comfortable, once they get over the idea that they must have unlimited shore power. Hang around us for a while and we’ll teach you how to get the most from your self-contained RV’s onboard systems.

Tuesday, February 5, 2008

What an ugly two days we have had here in Casa Grande! The wind blew, the rain flew, and it was cold enough to set me to shivering. Water puddles formed in every low spot, and every time we stepped outside, we tracked mud back in.

Fortunately, the ground here at the fairgrounds is so hard that it will not get soft enough to get stuck in, and by yesterday evening the storm seemed to blow itself out and we saw stars dotting the sky.

My daughter Tiffany called from her home in Show Low, in northern Arizona’s high country, where deep snow was covering everything and still falling. I keep telling Tiffany that she and Jim should move their family to the Texas Gulf coast, down around Rockport/Fulton. I even suggested that they get a place big enough to park my bus next to the house, and put in a 50 amp full hookup so dear old Dad could come by and visit for a month or two every year, and have a place to spend my golden years. Being the ungrateful brat that she is, she hasn’t acted on it yet, but I haven’t given up. J This is my retirement we’re talking about. A guy has to plan ahead.

During the worst of the wind, my tripod mounted portable television dish blew over and trashed the arm for the LNB, breaking the spot welds that hold it together. I was able to bend it into enough shape to pick up a minimal signal, but I think it’s time for a new dish. My buddy Terry Simpson got himself one of those fancy rooftop domes while we were in Quartzsite, and that sure is slick. He just pushes a button and in a minute or so he’s tuned in and watching his favorite show. I think Miss Terry should decide that I need one of those.

While we were in Quartzsite we saw a nifty little portable automatic satellite TV dish called the Vu Qube that you just sit on the ground, or even on the front seat of your RV if you are facing the right way, and use the remote control to home in on the satellite signal. It was originally designed for truck drivers, but for folks like us, who have filled our RVs’ roofs with things like solar panels, I think it would be very handy. I’m just not sure how one would keep it from walking away if it wasn’t chained down.

We wrapped up the new issue of the paper last night and today we’ll ship it off to the printer. Then we’ll be involved with last minute details for the rally for the rest of the week. It’s almost time folks, the fun is about to start!

Thought For The Day – Is Disney World the only people trap operated by a mouse?

Monday, February 4, 2008

Judging by the response I got to yesterday’s blog, I guess I’m not the only man in America that doesn’t care about professional sports after all! I had several letters from readers sharing my dislike for all the hype and nonsense about the Super Bowl. As I write this (just after midnight), I still don’t know who won the game. In fact, I don’t even know who was playing!

Yesterday we had a surprise visitor. Subscriber Ed Hackenbruch stopped by. We met Ed in Yuma a couple of years ago. Ed and his wife have a beautiful MCI bus conversion, we both spent a lot of time living in Washington state, and Ed’s father was a small town newspaper publisher, so we have a lot of common ground. Ed and his wife were at the fairgrounds to take in the Gourd Festival when he spotted our bus and came over to say hello. I tried to talk Ed into hanging around for our rally, but they were headed back to their lot in the Foothills area of Yuma. It was nice to have the opportunity to visit.

After Ed left, Miss Terry ran into town to stock up on supplies at WalMart, hoping that most people were home watching the game and the store would not be as crowded. While she was gone I chained myself to my keyboard and hammered out a couple of stories for the upcoming issue of the Gypsy Journal, and listened to the wind growing stronger by the minute. By nightfall it was rocking this old bus so much that you would have thought a couple of young honeymooners were inside, instead of us old married folks. The good news is that the long range weather forecast says that we’ll have decent weather for our Gypsy Gathering rally, at least for the early part of the week, with lots of sunshine and daytime temperatures in the mid-70s.

A couple of questions have come up about the rally that I should have addressed earlier. For people registering late, there was no way to get info packets mailed out in time to reach them, and some folks have wondered what they need have with them to check in at the rally. No problem, our parking crew will have the list of paid registrations and will check you off when you arrive.

Some folks who have pre-registered have decided that they want to come in with the early birds, on the 10^th, and wanted to know if that was okay. Sure, come on in. We need to collect an extra $12 to pay the fairgrounds for your early arrival, but we can do that when you check in. And for all those procrastinators who have not registered yet, just come on in. We have room for you.

Another reader asked if I could post the GPS coordinates to the fairgrounds. My GPS shows the staging area parking lot, on the north side of the fairgrounds at Latitude: N32° 52.395' and Longitude: W111° 34.054'. The Pinal County Fairgrounds is easy to find. Just take Exit 194 from Interstate 10 and drive east seven miles on State Route 287, until you come to the traffic light at Eleven Mile Corner Road. Turn right at the light and take the very first right into the staging area parking lot.

Folks, I do have to ask you to please, please not come in the night before and dry camp in the staging area. Several people did this last year, and the fairgrounds was really upset with us. We had to pay for their extra night, at $12 each. The management here is firm that anyone parking on the grounds has to be paid and registered. If you want to dry camp in the area the night before, there is free dry camping at Kortsen County Park (also shown on some maps as Pinal County West Park), just north of Interstate 8, Exit 151, with lots of room for RVs. GPS coordinates are N32° 50.4287'  W112° 6.7860'.

Thought For The Day – Eat well, exercise, stay fit, die anyway.

Sunday, February 3, 2008

It’s Super Bowl Sunday. I wonder if I am I the only man in America who could care less?

I just have never been interested in organized sports. Too many athletes are overpaid jerks for me to get excited about watching them play.

Even when I was a kid, while my friends loved playing baseball or football, I much preferred finding a good book to curl up with, or calling my dog and going for a long walk in the desert or forest, depending on where we were living at the time.

A few years ago we were at the Escapees Dream Catcher RV Park in Deming, New Mexico, and did not even know it was Super Bowl Sunday until someone asked when we were coming over to the clubhouse for the pre-game shows. When I told them that we were pulling out shortly to go on to Arizona, you would have thought I had spat on the American flag or declared my allegiance to the Communist party! “How can you not watch the Super Bowl?” one fellow asked. “What’s wrong with you anyway?”

As it turns out, a lot of things are wrong with me. Just ask one of my ex-wives or their mothers. But being hooked on professional sports is not among my many shortcomings. Besides, while everyone else was parked in front of the boob tube, we had the entire highway to ourselves!

I plan to spend this Super Bowl Sunday the same way I spent yesterday, listening to some good music and catching up on my writing chores. After boondocking for two weeks in Quartzsite, it sure is nice to leave my television on all day, and not to have to even glance at my battery meter. We enjoy dry camping sometimes, but we enjoy the luxury of unlimited water and electricity too.

We have had a few changes to the schedule for our Gypsy Gathering rally, due to last minute cancellations by a couple of seminar presenters who had health emergencies. We have been able to fill those time slots with some other great seminars, including Dave Baleria’s excellent RVing the Heartland of America seminar, an interesting seminar on understanding extended warranties and service contracts by Chris and Charles Yust, and filmmaker John Holod will be presenting his outstanding Perfect Alaska RV Adventure seminar. For those who are thinking about venturing even further away from home, Carolyn Harris will be doing a class on RVing in New Zealand. Check our Seminar Schedule on the rally page to see what we have planned. No matter what your RVing interests may be, I think we’ll have plenty to keep you busy at the rally.

This year’s rally hasn’t even started yet, and Miss Terry and I are already negotiating with the fairgrounds for next year! One thing we know is that we are going to need a fourth building the next time around. Last year we had two buildings, this year we reserved three, but that’s still not enough as fast as this thing is growing. There are just too many good speakers who want to present seminars, and we can’t fit everybody in with the three buildings we have now. 

Thought For The Day – What disease did cured ham originally have?

Saturday, February 2, 2008

We said our goodbyes to Terry and Connie Simpson yesterday morning and pulled out of our campsite in the La Posa South LTVA about 9:30 a.m. We had the option of using the LTVA’s dump station, or if the line was too long, of just waiting until we got to Casa Grande to dump. Just one of the advantages of a bus conversion is the huge weight carrying capacity we have, so we don’t have to dump to reduce weight if it is inconvenient.

As it turned out, there were only a couple of RVs waiting to dump, so I slid in beside a neat looking Kenworth truck conversion, and while we were waiting our turn to dump, I asked the owner about it. He built the conversion himself, and invited Terry and I inside for a look. It was not as big as some of the factory units we have seen, but was decorated very well and we really liked the way they had done things. You never know with me, one of these days we may just get silly and build ourselves one of those things!

One we had dumped and hooked the van up to our Blue Ox tow bar, we got onto Interstate 10 and had headed east about 90 miles, then turned south on State Route 85 and followed it 44 miles to Gila Bend. There is some construction work going on State Route 85, part of the project to make most of this a four lane divided roadway, but we didn’t have any delays.

This route added about 20 miles to our trip, but bypasses the Phoenix metropolitan area and all of the traffic around the big city. I’ll trade a few miles for easier, more relaxed driving any day of the week. Actually, I think that even though we added some miles, it doesn’t take any longer to go this way than it does fighting the heavy traffic around Phoenix .

Our fuel gauge was dipping down lower than I’m comfortable with, so even though diesel costs more in Gila Bend than it does at the Flying J and other truck stops around Eloy and Casa Grande, we stopped at Love’s and I pumped 75 gallons in. That will hold us until after we go to Tucson in March. For a few cents a gallon, I won’t run the risk of running out of fuel, or sucking crud up from the bottom of the tank.

We picked up Interstate 8 in Gila Bend and followed it east about 60 miles to Interstate 10, and before long we were pulling into the Pinal County Fairgrounds, seven miles east of Casa Grande, with almost exactly 200 miles behind us. The bus ran fine and surprised me by climbing the grades with only a couple of downshifts. At one point, as I pulled out to pass a slower vehicle, I commented to Miss Terry again about how much more comfortable it is to drive since we upgraded the steering system.

The Annual Gourd Festival is going on at the fairgrounds and the place is packed. We were here last year for this event, and were surprised at how many people are into using gourds for craft and art projects.

The folks in the fairgrounds office are a bit surprised at how many RVs we have coming to the Gypsy Gathering rally. They told us several other RV rallies usually held here are way down in their numbers, while ours is growing. That’s because of folks like you, who have given us so much support.

We have plenty of room for anyone who has not registered yet, so come on down, we’ll make room for you. You can click the link below, or register when you arrive. If you plan to register upon arrival,  it will help us plan our parking if you can at least send me an e-mail and let me know you’re coming.

Once we were parked and hooked up to water and electric, we ran into town and picked up a large box of mail at the post office, and then stopped at our favorite local Chinese buffet for dinner. There were several Escapes there, so we said hello to everybody, then hit the buffet lines.

We’ll be here getting ready for the rally, and several folks have said they are coming in early to help with the parking. It’s going to be a busy couple of weeks!

Thought For The Day – Sometimes I have delusions of adequacy.

Friday, February 1, 2008

We had a great two weeks in Quartzsite, but today we leave for the Pinal County Fairgrounds in Casa Grande to get settled in for our Gypsy Gathering rally, which begins in just over a week.

Being here with our friends Terry and Connie Simpson, and Gene and Cheri Holcomb has been a real treat. Gene and Cheri left the other day for a quick visit to California, then will be arriving at the fairgrounds next week as part of our early staff. Terry and Connie will hang around Quartzsite a few more days, riding their quads and just relaxing together before they also come over to Casa Grande to help us get things in order. Last year Terry and Connie did an amazing job of getting door prizes from the local businesses, and they have volunteered to take on that job again this year. We have so many friends who have volunteered to pitch in to help make the rally a success that Terry and I are just overwhelmed with gratitude.

I guess it’s a good thing we’re leaving today, since the starter on our old Onan gas generator seems to have gone out. When we try to start it, either from the remote control inside the bus or outside manually, all we get is a click. Since we know the batteries are good, I think it has to be in the starter. There’s no way to tear into that out here in the middle of the desert, but I hope we can get it taken care of once we get to town.

Last night we joined Terry and Connie at the Grubstake Bar and Grill in Quartzsite for dinner. We’ve driven by the place many times, but this was our first sojourn inside. Miss Terry opted for the chili, while the rest of us chose the fish dinner. It was delicious! Two huge pieces of Alaskan whitefish, coleslaw, and a heaping order of French fries. Folks, I’m a big eater, but it was all I could do to clean my plate!

While we enjoy dry camping and are pretty adept at it after all these years, it will be nice to get into town, where we can plug into shore power, take long showers, and watch TV all day and all night long if we want to. While we live quite comfortable dry camping, one still has to be aware of their water and power consumption. As one veteran boondocker told me last year, “Who needs a vacation? After a few weeks in the desert, anyplace with full hookups is like staying at the Ritz!” 

Click Here For Our January 2008 Blog