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Nick's Blog Thursday, May 15, 2008 Yesterday was a horrible day, and my wife is an evil woman. Among the fun
things I get to do while here in The procedure itself is really not that bad, thanks to the wonders of drugs that quickly take you to la-la land while the doctors do their thing. But the prep… oh, the prep! Ladies and gentleman, there truly is hell on earth!
First of all, you
have to fast the day before the procedure. I’m not a fasting kind of
guy. I’m half-fast at best. The fun starts with drinking a bottle of
chilled magnesium citrate, which tastes like salty 7-Up. It’s not the
most pleasant beverage I’ve ever had, but it’s not too bad. Than, a
little later, comes the main course. I had to drink a gallon of a
concoction called GoLytely, and if there was ever an example of no
truth in advertising, this is it! The stuff tastes like what I imagine a
combination of salt water, yak urine, and diesel fuel would, and my gag
reflex was working overtime. And I can assure you that you will not
go lightly! You will go heavily, frequently, and without stop. You will
have eruptions that will put I had three hours to get this stuff down, and while she was pouring the first glass and handing it to me, that loving, gentle and supportive woman I married began to suddenly morph into a sadistic Nazi nurse whose only purpose in life was to gloat over my misery. I complained about the taste of the stuff, and she reminded me that I had many more glasses to finish, so I’d better get used to it. I reminded her that we share everything, and that it would not be fair of me to keep this nectar of the gods to myself and consume it all in front of her. Her reply was “Nice try, buster. Now drink up!” The same woman who has talked me over high bridges, assured me she still finds me attractive when I accidentally stumble in front of a full length mirror, and rubbed my shoulders and feet after a long day of teaching, suddenly was without sympathy as she forced glass after glass of this noxious liquid plumber onto me.
At one point, after my 102nd trip to the bathroom, all I wanted to do was cuddle to her bosom and have her tell me what a brave little soldier I was being. Instead, she suggested that I turn on the bathroom fan on and leave it on. “Don’t you care what I’m going through?” I asked tearfully. “Of course, I care, darling,” she replied. “After all, I’m the one who insisted we put oversize holding tanks on the bus so you wouldn’t have to go to the dump station between glasses.” Folks, I know it’s necessary. I even think Miss Terry really means it when she says it’s all for my own good. But I swear that at least once as I went rushing past her toward the bathroom I saw a smile on her face that told me she was enjoying payback for every time I neglected to wipe my feet before tracking mud inside on her clean floor, or every time I mistakenly glanced in the direction of some sweet little waitress at dinner. The good news is that I’m going to be very proud of myself when I climb on my bathroom scales this morning, because I know where 30% of my body weight went in the last 24 hours. Talk about fat flushing foods! Thought For The Day – When
you create your own destiny, you prevent others from doing it for you. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Wednesday, May 14, 2008 Blogging has become an important tool for RVers to keep in touch with family and friends, as a record of their travels and for some, a way to make a few extra bucks. Blog is geek-speak for a web log, an online diary, if you will. Most RVers host their blogs with commercial blog services, such as www.mytripjournal.com, www.blogger.com, or www.wordpress.org. Some of these services are free, while others may charge a fee. Many RVing bloggers feel that if there is a fee, it is money well spent for the convenience and extras the companies offer. Some RVers want to share more than a simple blog with the world, and actually have full fledged websites, with the blog being a part of the overall website. While most RV blogs are intended simply as a communication tool, for some, blogging has also provided the added benefit of a secondary income stream. This income usually comes from commissions from advertising links placed on the blog, as part of an affiliated marketing program. Perhaps the best known of these is the Google AdSense program www.adsense.com, which places small ad links into member blogs and websites that are targeted toward the content of those web pages. Google’s computers “crawl” the blog or website pages and select appropriate ad links based upon keywords on the pages. You will never get rich with ad links on your blog, in spite of what many internet hucksters would have you believe (and they just happen to have information to sell you that explains how to do it!). But if you can draw enough readers to your blog on a regular basis, you might be surprised at how those little ad clicks add up. I have been participating in the AdSense program with my three websites www.gypsyjournal.net, www.motorcycletravelonline.com, and www.publishing4profit.com for over eighteen months, and am averaging over $500 a month from the ads on all three sites combined. But, I put a lot of work into it, updating my blog on a daily basis, usually writing a daily entry from 500 to 750 words. We average several hundred hits a day on our three websites. Some of the ads pay as much as $2 each time someone clicks on them, especially on the self-publishing website. But the biggest majority of ad links on the RV website pay in the 25 to 35 cent range, and quite a few pay only a penny or two. AdSense only works if you have a lot of daily hits, and until you accumulate $100 in ad commissions, you do not receive a check. Still, if you enjoy writing and blogging, the extra money is an added benefi. You do not have to update your blog on a daily basis, but if you don’t do so fairly regularly, you will lose readers who soon grow tired of visiting and seeing the same old posts. I would think at least twice a week would be the very minimum if you want to attract new readers and keep them coming back. So what do RV bloggers write about? Everything and anything. Their travels, of course, and all of the adventures they have along the way. In their blogs they also talk about the people they meet, campground activities, good roads and bad, and whatever else happens to come to mind. Some bloggers prefer to keep their readers at a distance and don’t delve too deeply into personal feelings, while others find it cathartic to share their good times and bad. RVing has both good times and bad, and to me it is just as interesting to read about the days when one is sick and stays inside, or when bad weather keeps them confined, as it is to read about them being awestruck standing on the rim of the Grand Canyon, or watching a sunrise over the mountains of New Mexico. Every blogger has their own style, a direct reflection of their personality. I read several blogs every day, and others on a more infrequent basis, including Donna Yeaw’s http://lilypad.froggilady.com/, Dan and Terri Gregg’s http://www.danandteri.blogspot.com/, the adventures of Tioga and George at http://blog.vagabonders-supreme.net/, Mike and Pat McFall’s blog at http://mikepatstravels.blogspot.com/, and Jerry and Suzy LeRoy’s http://www.jerrysuzylifeonwheels.blogspot.com/. Each is different, and each teaches me something new every time I read it. For those wanting more information, Jim and Chris Guld have a lot of information available on their website at www.geeksontour.com and will be presenting an excellent seminar on blogging at our Ohio Gypsy Gathering rally in September. Chris has proposed holding a Computer Boot Camp prior to the rally, and we are trying to work out the details on that now. Blogging is easy, it’s fun, and it’s a great way to share your RV adventures with your friends, with the added bonus of a way to make new friends. So what are you waiting for? Jump on the blogging bandwagon! Thought For The Day – Life is a test, and I didn't take very good notes. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Tuesday, May 13, 2008 While Terry and I love it, fulltime RVing is not the right lifestyle for everyone. As the Bowling Green Life on Wheels was wrapping up Saturday, a couple came up to me to thank me for convincing them that it would not work out for them. One of the things I stress in my classes on fulltiming is that a couple may love each other, but they must also be best friends to make this work. A couple that constantly quarrel and bicker in a 3,000 square foot house may well find living in 300 square feet of rolling homestead intolerable. I have no doubt that this husband and wife, who have been married for over three decades, will continue to get along well enough in their present home but they were wise enough to realize that they get on each others’ nerves too much in close quarters, and that the things each wanted out of the new lifestyle they were considering were radically different. She wanted to be able to visit family and friends scattered all over the country and see attractions she had only read about. Her idea of the perfect RV was a large motorhome with multiple slideouts. He was determined to get as far away from people as he could and enjoy the solitude of the great outdoors, and wanted nothing larger than a small fifth wheel or a Class C. Neither seemed willing to compromise. It’s better to learn that before they sell their home and spend their equity on an expensive RV. Most of yesterday
was spent on a series of medical appointments at the VA hospital. The
folks take very good care of me here in For several days now I have not been feeling well, and the last two days I have had a vicious headache, sore throat, and overall aches and pains. I thought a lot of it was because of talking so much at Life on Wheels, but it was determined that I have a sinus infection, so a course of antibiotics was prescribed. Several folks were concerned, as I was, when I wrote about being awakened with chest pains a few days ago. Yesterday I had an EKG, which shows some heart damage from a past cardiac incident, but right now things look fine. Seventeen years ago I had a heart attack, but that did not show up when I had my last two EKGs within the last couple of years. I’m not sure if the damage that shows up now is from something more recent but I’ll know more about that after all of the results from this week’s tests are in. I have some more medical stuff to do here, including an appointment tomorrow, and on Thursday, the dreaded colonoscopy. What fun! But I lost some family members to cancer, including colon cancer, so that puts me in a high risk group and is something that needs to be monitored. It was also decided today that I’m going to have some surgery in the next few weeks. It’s a relatively minor thing, but of course, when it’s your own body they are messing with, nothing is minor, right? L Back at the bus, longtime Gypsy Journal readers Bill and Helen Moll stopped in to say hello. It’s been a while since we crossed paths, and it was nice to see them. Unfortunately I was not feeling very well, and I’m afraid I wasn’t much company. Hopefully they will give me a chance to make it up to them the next time we meet up. Thought For The Day – I
feel like I'm diagonally parked in a parallel universe. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Monday, May 12, 2008 We left 70 miles north of Bowling Green, at Elizabethtown, we turned east on the Bluegrass Parkway, a nice divided four lane highway that took us 80 miles east to Lexington, passing through beautiful rolling hill country that was shrouded in rain and mist. The rain let up a bit, and the wind was now coming from the rear quarter instead of a full broadside, which made driving a bit easier. We covered the
150 miles to the campground at the With all due
respect to our friends Orv and Nancy Hazelton, who have called the city
home for years, has anyone ever been to This year I scheduled my annual visit to the VA hospital for mid-May, and when we arrived here it was cold, raining hard, and the wind was enough to blow you over. By the time I stopped at the dump station, got the bus parked in our site, and the utilities hooked up, I was freezing.
We’ll be here all week while I get some medical stuff done, and I also hope to spend some time getting some writing done. I’ve even promised myself a couple of afternoon naps. Thought For The Day – Go
as far as you can see, and when you get there, you will see farther. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Sunday, May 11, 2008 Usually when a
Life on Wheels session ends, Terry and I find someplace to relax and
decompress for a few days before we do much else. We need the time just
to catch up on our rest, have some quiet moments together, and to go
over the feedback forms the students fill out about our different
classes. The I did some horse trading yesterday. We always donate some one year subscriptions as door prizes to Life on Wheels, as do other companies who want to help support the program. One door prize that they give away at every session is a nice barbecue grill. Another is a Dometic RC 4000 portable refrigerator that operates either on 120 volt, 12 volt, or propane. Measuring just over 16 inches high and about 24 inches wide, the refrigerator would be perfect in our van. The students who won the barbecue came up to me and said that they would love to have a subscription to the Gypsy Journal, and offered to trade the grill for a subscription. We don’t need a grill, and this one was too big for us to use, but I said sure, thinking we’d give it away as a door prize at our Ohio Gypsy Gathering rally in September. (You’ve heard of re-gifting – this is sort of like re-prizing). I went up to pick up the grill, and the lucky winners of the refrigerator were there getting their prize, and told me that they wished they had won the grill instead, because they already had a portable refrigerator. They also mentioned that they wanted a Gypsy Journal subscription. It didn’t take us long to strike up a deal, and suddenly I was the owner of a brand new portable refrigerator! Even before we bought the motorcycle, which we haul in the van, we had decided we wanted to replace our pickup with a van that we could throw a cooler, porta potti, and air mattress in and use for short two and three night trips away from the bus. So the Dometic fits perfectly into our plans! Once the closing ceremonies were over, we went to dinner with a couple of the Life on Wheels instructors, our pal Orv Hazelton and Mac McCoy. Mac is the recognized expert in RV fire safety www.macthefireguy.com and we have enjoyed our time with him at RV rallies and Life on Wheels session across the country for more years than I can remember. Back at the campus, most of the students and instructors had already left, but a few RVs remained. We sat around swapping lies with Rick Schaefer and Marcia Gantz, new Life on Wheels instructors whom we have known for quite some time, Rick and Joyce Lange from Recreational Vehicle Safety Education Foundation www.rvsafety.org, Mac McCoy, and a few of the students. File this one
under Typical Bureaucratic BS – a gentleman in Thought For The
Day – When
a man steals your wife, there is no better revenge than to let him keep
her. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Saturday, May 10, 2008 Apparently I’m
not the only one disappointed in Verizon cell phone and air card service
in the We wrap up our Life on Wheels conference today, with me teaching two 90 minute sessions. Then we’ll have the closing ceremony, and like baby birds flying away from the nest, our students will head off in every direction to try out their newfound RVing skills. Teaching ten 90 minute sessions in 2½ days is hard work, and I pay a price for it. But when a student comes up to me, as a lady did yesterday evening, and tells me that she has been terrified of leaving home and her familiar surroundings to go fulltiming with her husband, but that my classes helped put her mind at ease and now she’s looking forward to it, suddenly the aching back, the sore feet, and the ragged throat are worth it. I really do love teaching and sharing, and feel honored to be able to help newbies learn about this wonderful lifestyle of ours. Yesterday was a very rough day for me. One of the worst I have can remember experiencing in a long time. As I wrote in yesterday’s blog, I have not been sleeping well, and sometime early in the morning I woke up sick to my stomach, aching all over, and my chest was hurting. Over the next hour or so it got so bad that I was seriously contemplating waking Terry and asking her to get me to an emergency room. I finally dropped off to sleep and woke up again about 6 a.m., still feeling puny. It was the first time in all of my years of teaching at Life on Wheels and other RV events that I really did not think I could make it through my classes. My first class was at 8 a.m., and I decided to give it a shot, hoping I could give the students what they came for. It was a long, long day, but sometime around the third class of the day I started to get my second wind, and muddled on through. As soon as the last class was over I went back to the bus and took an hour long nap, and woke up feeling somewhat better. We’ll stay on
campus again tonight, and Sunday we’ll drive to Thought For The Day – For those that have answered the call, freedom has a flavor that the protected will never know. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Friday, May 9, 2008 Over all, I have been very satisfied with our Verizon air card. In our experience it has been a much better option than the manual tripod internet dish we used for many years. The convenience of being able to get online wherever we have been traveling has made our lives on the road much easier. However, the
service here in We knew going in
that we would run into marginal service areas, and I expected them in
places like Quartzsite or rural Yesterday was our first full day of teaching here at Life on Wheels, and already I’m worn out. I taught four 90 minute classes yesterday, and by the end of the day I felt like I usually do after the conference ends. I haven’t slept well for some reason, something that happens to me often during our teaching gigs. My mind just won’t shut off at bed time, and instead of resting I find myself thinking about the next day’s classes. I teach four more 90 minute sessions today, and two on Saturday. I don’t drink coffee, and I’ve cut way back on my Pepsi consumption for my diet, but right now I sure could use a caffeine jolt. Maybe I’m just getting old. It rained most of yesterday, and the dreary sky didn’t help matters any. It would have been a great day to snooze on the couch. As I write this, it’s just after midnight and I need to be up and in the classroom in just a few hours, so I’m going to make this blog entry short and go snuggle up with Miss Terry. Maybe she’ll tell me a bedtime story. Thought For The
Day – The
journey, not the arrival, is what matters. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Thursday, May 8, 2008 Terry and I both slept restlessly Tuesday night, and awoke yesterday morning feeling tired before we even got out of bed. We spent the day meeting and greeting students coming in for Life on Wheels, renewing acquaintances with the other instructors, and generally socializing, which is a part of what we do here on registration day. I was delighted to have several students say they are regular blog readers, and it was nice to get to know them. Now, don’t go getting
all excited here, but I actually helped two different students with
mechanical/technical problems yesterday! One lady with an Alfa See Ya had
posted on the Escapees forum that her house batteries were not charging,
and I told her to look me up when she arrived here in The next student was a fellow who bought a used coach with an aftermarket security system that had suddenly decided to go off every fifteen minutes. He was of the opinion that the neighbors would not appreciate being awakened several times an hour by his blaring horn and flashing headlights. Myself and instructor Rick Schafer went to check it out. The system was tied into his starting batteries, and we searched or a battery disconnect switch, but could not find it. So we opened the compartment where the alarm system was mounted and I spotted a circuit breaker. I pulled the fuse out, and the problem was solved! Just to be sure everything else still worked, we had him start his engine to be sure I hadn’t disabled anything critical. These must seem like very small issues to many folks, but when you consider that I could get my fingers caught in a crescent wrench and need a team of paramedics to get free, you can see why they are major victories to me. After the instructors meeting and the Welcoming Session for the students, we joined our friend Orv Hazelton for dinner at a nice barbecue place, then went back to the campus to get ready for today’s teaching sessions. As with much of the RV
industry, the high fuel prices are taking a toll on Life on Wheels
attendance. We are down over 60 students from last year. We still have
two more conferences this year, in Lewiston, Thought For The Day – The
journey, not the arrival, is what matters. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Wednesday, May 7, 2008 We pulled out of our site at Cherokee Landing
Thousand Trails preserve near We didn’t need it, but we stopped at the Flying J
in As I wrote in yesterday’s blog, I wasn’t
looking forward to all of the traffic congestion and road construction
in Chalk this one up as a near miss. As we crossed the
state line into Kentucky, I almost stopped at the When we arrived at the campus, some members of the Life on Wheels staff were already on hand. Once we unhooked the van and were parked, we dragged out lawn chairs and joined everybody for happy hour. It was nice to see everybody, but I have to tell you, it’s just not the same without our dear friends Dave and Sandy Baleria here with us. Today the students will be coming in and getting parked, and we’ll be busy meeting and greeting everybody. Classes start Thursday morning at 8 a.m., and I’ll be teaching ten 90 minute classes in 2½ days. It’s going to be a busy week! Thought For The Day – There
are 3 kinds of people: those who can count and those who can't. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Tuesday, May 6, 2008 We’ll be on the
road today, headed for Bowling Green, Kentucky, where we’ll be teaching at Life on Wheels at What I’m not
looking forward to is driving through In big cities
with multilane highways, I prefer to drive in the second lane from the
outside, which allows faster traffic to pass us on the left, and keeps
us out of the merging incoming lane on the right. But in Faithful blog reader Mark Thiel has been parked near us at the Thousand Trails and it was nice to get to know him. Mark and I see eye to eye on a lot of things, so you just know he must be a sick and twisted individual too. Mark took bundles of the Gypsy Journal with him to drop off at two other Thousand Trails campgrounds where he and his wife Sharleen will be staying. We always appreciate when our friends do this for us, because it helps spread the word to new areas. Thanks, Mark! As some of you
know, I’ve toyed with the idea of building a truck conversion on a
stretched semi tractor frame for quite We’re a long way from taking on such a project, but I’ve seen some good deals on trucks lately, because just like the RV market, truck sales are in a real slump right now. Miss Terry has been thinking about floor plans and doing some preliminary planning, so who knows? All it takes is time and money. Thought For The Day – Education
is what you get from reading the small print. Experience is what you get
from not reading it. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Monday, May 5, 2008 I have a friend
in Now, don’t get
me wrong, we owned a Getting on the internet has changed dramatically since Terry and I became fulltimers nine years ago. Back then, we lugged our laptop to the campground office and borrowed a telephone line to plug into to retrieve our e-m ail, and if we wanted to surf the internet we either used the computers at the local library, or found an RV park with phone hookups at the sites. These days, with WiFi, air cards, and internet dishes, we can reach the world wide web from the comfort of our homes on wheels, wherever they may be parked. The internet is a great resource, and as a writer I sometimes wonder how I ever worked without it. But one has to be aware that there is a tremendous amount of misinformation out there. Unfortunately, there are a multitude of people who seem to believe anything that pops up on their computer screen as gospel. It must be true, it’s on the internet. The other day I was chatting with a couple of guys here at the RV park, and someone mentioned flashing your headlights at an eighteen wheeler when it passes you to let the driver know it is safe to pull back into the right lane. Immediately one of the fellows warned us never to do that, because he had read on the internet that an initiation ritual with gangbangers involves driving down the road with their headlights off, and shooting the first driver who blinks their lights to let them know. I believe this claim about as much as I do the ones from all of those hot college coeds who send me e-mails because they want me. How many gangbangers have you seen cruising down Interstate 40 in a Kenworth? Another RVer warned me a while back about using a GPS in our bus, because the government can use the signal from the satellites to track our movements. He knew it was true, because it was on the internet. So let’s see, we have fuel prices climbing higher every day, illegal aliens swarming across our border, wars and terrorists abroad, and recession at home, but the Feds want to know which WalMart or truck stop I’m parked at tonight? Give me a break! Use the internet for the valuable tool it is, but always remember that a lot of what you see online has just about as much truth to it as your average RV salesman’s spiel. Thought For The Day – If
you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there. Sunday, May 4, 2008
We had a good time admiring all of the dog related artwork, from sculptures of hunting dogs that greet visitors to the museum, to the beautiful paintings of dogs and hunting scenes inside. The museum also has a nice library of outdoor books and periodicals, and I recognized several titles that once graced my own bookshelves.
I spent at least a half hour crawling around on the floor with this gentle and loving dog, and loved every minute of it. Though Miss Terry and I made the decision not to own another pet at this point in our lives, I suspect that if Lottie Dot had followed me out to the van, she’d be sleeping at my feet right now. But I know she has important work to do here at home. We have enjoyed
playing tourist here in southwestern Thought For The Day – A
good traveler has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Saturday, May 3, 2008 After two days of sightseeing, we spent yesterday at home. While I did some writing, Miss Terry did some housekeeping chores and a couple of loads of laundry. Terrible storms battered much of the region throughout the day, and I kept the television tuned to the Weather Channel, monitoring reports of strong thunderstorms all around us. We were under a tornado watch most of the day, and were glad when all we got at the campground was some wind, lightning, and a lot of rain. Bad weather is
always a concern for RVers, and we have had a couple of close calls over
the years. In There is not much you can do in the path of a tornado except seek shelter. Here at the Thousand Trails campground, we are parked near a sturdy block building that houses the laundry room and bathrooms, and knew that if the weather worsened it would provide refuge. We try never to travel in inclement weather, but when we have gotten caught out on the highway, we have found a place to park in a rest area or truck stop and waited for the storms to pass. Driving a big RV is challenging enough, why add to the danger by trying to drive in a nasty storm? We have our house with us, so if we pull off the highway until the weather clears, we can read, catch up on our e-mail, have a snack, or just relax until it is safe to get back on the road again. There is no place we have to get to that is so important that it can’t wait until it is safe to travel. Like many RVers, we have a CB radio in our bus conversion, and like many RVers, we leave it off much of the time because the language of the truckers can get pretty rank. But when the weather looks ominous, we keep it on, and it has alerted us to problems up the road. Our CB also has a weather channel, which we monitor when we are traveling and run into marginal weather conditions. While we are cautious about bad weather, we don’t let the fear of what could happen dominate our lives. Just like high fuel prices, tire blowouts, and mechanical problems, bad weather is just a fact of life we have to be aware of. We keep informed of what is happening around us, we have a plan of action in case things go bad, and then we continue to enjoy our life on the road. Thought For The Day – Whoever
said nothing is impossible has never tried slamming a revolving door. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Friday, May 2, 2008 We spent some more time playing tourist yesterday, visiting a couple more points of interest here in western Tennessee. We drove to
The story was familiar history to me. I remember my dad playing his guitar and singing the Ballad of Casey Jones when I was a kid, and I used to imagine myself in the cab of a steam locomotive. After checking out the locomotive on display at the museum, I think I’m just as glad I do my traveling in the cab of a bus. The creature comforts are far superior. Casey Jones Village Marketing Director Deborah Laman treated us to lunch in the restaurant and spent some time visiting with us and telling us about the history of the place. The food was excellent, and after our meal we spent some time wandering around the store and checking out all of the neat antiques on display.
Of course, no trip is without some adventure. Along the way I spotted a sign pointing toward a small Civil War battlefield and detoured to check it out. Unfortunately, the signage was not very comprehensive, and we could not find the place. So we ended up making a long detour through some pretty countryside. But what better way to spend an nice afternoon than out for a ride with my best girl? In the town of Just in case, I kept a low profile until we were way out of town. One can never be too careful, you know. J Thought For The Day – After all is said and done, more is said than done. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally Thursday, May 1, 2008 Bad news for owners of Alfa RVs. RV Industry News blog reported yesterday that the California manufacturer has laid off its entire work force and closed their doors. Another one bites the dust. It’s sad to say, but I think we’ll see more of this as fuel prices continue to climb. It sucks to be us. We had to work yesterday! Of course, the good news is, our work consists of going where other people go on vacation. That’s a pretty good gig when you think about it. J We left the bus
at the Thousand Trails campground and made a big loop through Selmer,
Adamsville, Our first stop
was
We stopped at the
Back at the bus,
subscribers Mike and Sharon Young stopped by to visit. We last saw them
at our Gypsy Gathering rally in Today we’re off
in search of new adventures, and I’ll be sharing some more interesting
places in western Thought For The Day – The
real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in
having new eyes. Register Now For Our New Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally
Click Here For Our April 2008 Blog Click Here For Our March 2008 Blog |
To give you an
idea of just how bad the storm was, here is a picture of a trailer that
lost its awning at the 
some time now, similar to the
Kingsley Coach or Haulmark conversions. We love our bus, and it has
served us faithfully for years now and could continue to do so for many
more years. But there are some advantages to a truck conversion,
including more power, better fuel mileage, and we could incorporate some
of the things we learned in building the bus that we wish we could do
over.
There
are cat people and there are dog people. I’m a dog person. I can’t
tell you how many dogs I have lived with over the years, mostly German
shepherds. But I also have a soft spot for the hunting breeds, having
owned a couple of wonderful Springer and Brittany spaniels in the past.
So yesterday I had a good time touring the 
As
it turned out, the only real live dog at the museum was not a hunting
breed at all, but rather a delightful and lovable Dalmatian that I
instantly fell in love with. Lottie Dot belongs to the lady on duty at
the museum, and although she is totally deaf, she is a certified therapy
dog, working with sick children, the elderly, and veterans at the
Memphis V.A. hospital.
Located
in a downtown building, the museum includes musical instruments, photos
of well known musicians, and music memorabilia. Every year the Hall of
Fame hosts a Rockabilly Festival where some of the biggest acts in the
music genre come to perform. Terry and I were impressed with the mural
on the side of the building, which had us tapping our toes just looking
at it.
Our
next stop was Casey
From
the village, we drove to 
Sheriff
Pusser was a larger than life lawman who took on the gangsters and
corrupt politicians who had turned the area along the
A
few miles east of Adamsville, we stopped at the 
Our
next stop was the battlefield at Shiloh, where 44,000 Confederate troops clashed with a force of 40,000 Union
soldiers in a bloody two day battle in April, 1862. Terry and I are
history buffs, and we always enjoy visiting the places that we have only
read about in books before.
Anyone
who has been reading the Gypsy
Journal for very long probably knows that about the only thing I am
more afraid of than driving over bridges or letters from my ex-wives'
lawyers, is snakes. People have told me that snakes are more afraid of
me than I am of them, but I’ve e never believed that, because if that
were true, they’d carry guns too! But Miss Terry has worked very hard
to get me house trained and civilized over the last ten years, and I
think it’s working. Yesterday we came across this serpent, which
measured about four feet long while we were at Shiloh, and I shot it with a camera instead of a pistol. Of course, I had a
camera with me and not a
pistol, so who knows what could
have happened?