I try to be upbeat in this blog, but anybody who knows me knows that I don’t pull any punches either, and I give you the good with the bad. Not to be a downer, but today I have a couple of the bad to share.

Even though I am married to the best cook in the world, I enjoy dining out, and we do it a lot. It just seems to be a basic part of the RV lifestyle. Put the fulltiming occupants of any two or more RVs together for the first time in a campground, and once they discuss where they just came from and where they are headed next, the very next question is “Where are we going for dinner?’

When we are in a new area, I frequently refer to the Yelp website for reviews of local restaurants. Overall, I have found that if you disregard the obvious cranks with an ax to grind, and the guys who sign in to pump up their own or a friend’s place, when you average the rest of the reviews out, you get a pretty accurate idea of what to expect.

We have been wanting to find a good Chinese buffet ever since we left Apache Junction, Arizona, and the Yelp review showed a place called Best Empire Buffet in Gilroy, about ten miles away. So once we got settled in at the Thousand Trails campground in Morgan Hill on Monday, we drove back to Gilroy to try it out. The reviews were very positive, but as it turned out, they were wrong in this case. We’re still looking for a good Chinese buffet.

At this restaurant, I accomplished two “firsts.” I had the very worst Chinese buffet meal of my life (and we eat at a LOT of Chinese buffets coast to coast), and I paid the most I ever have at a Chinese buffet. The selection was huge, but everything was cold, and a lot of it was stale. I complained to a young lady monitoring the service line, and she just nodded and stood there.

If it wasn’t late in the day, and if we had not been tired and very hungry, we would have left. Once we got our bill, we wished we had. For two people, with me having a Coke and Terry having tea, the tab was $32.91. When Terry told the girl at the cash register that we were unhappy with the meal, she just said “Okay, thank you for coming!”  Hey, life is a crapshoot, right? Sometimes you win, and sometimes you lose.

Then yesterday, I had another unpleasant experience. Terry needed to make a WalMart run to stock up on some things, so while she did her shopping, I sat out in the van cruising the internet on my iPad. It was in the upper 80s, and Terry’s shopping took longer then expected, so when it got too hot in the van, I started the engine to let the air conditioning cool things down.

So there I am, reading the Escapees RV forum, when somebody knocks on my window. I look out and there stands a pissed off policeman. Did you know it is illegal to let a car idle in California? I sure didn’t, until he explained it to me in great and forceful detail. Apparently it’s a crime that ranks right up there with armed robbery and peeing in public.

He sternly told me that I was wasting precious fuel and adding to the state’s pollution level, among other things. Did you know that if all of the millions of drivers in California did the same thing, nobody could breathe? I didn’t, but I do now. I’m not sure, but I may also be responsible for the current budget crisis, and for the fact that French poodles are such ugly dogs, too.

Okay, I get it. I was wrong. I was wasting fuel, and I was properly chastised. But that wasn’t enough, he ran my license plates and drivers license, apparently to see if I was recently featured on America’s Most Wanted, or in any way affiliated with terrorist cells Then he told me I was very, very lucky he didn’t give me a ticket, or arrest me.

Please don’t get me wrong, I am a strong supporter of law enforcement. The men and woman who take on that job deserve all of our respect for everything they do to keep us all safe. And again, yes, I was wrong. I should have gone inside the store to cool off. But gee, a simple “turn the engine off” would have worked just fine.

I don’t think I like California.

Thought For The Day – Life is not always fair – get used to it!

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When our friend Cindy DuBois told me about the Ethel M. Chocolate Company factory in nearby Henderson, Nevada, taking a tour went to the very top of my bucket list! After all, chocolate is the fourth major food group, right?

Mere minutes after I told my pal Greg White about the factory tour, there was a great screeching of tires in the road outside our motorhome as Greg slid sideways to a stop, yelled “Hurry up! Get in!”, and we tore out of the Thousand Trails campground like we were on our way to a fire.

Located just a short drive from the Las Vegas Strip, the Ethel M factory offers free self-guided tours, where you can look through a glass wall and watch workers making all sorts of delicious confections. I hope their janitorial crew had a good supply of Windex in stock, because Greg and I left a lot of drool on that glass wall!

And what’s a candy company factory tour without a free sample at the end? This is Joanne, and if polygamy had been legal in Nevada, I think Miss Terry might have had a sister wife! Anytime a pretty lady wants to give me free candy, I’m in love!

Of course, while there may be free samples, there are no free lunches, or free desserts either. But don’t despair, because once we finished the tour and got our free candy sample, the gift shop was just steps away, where they had all kinds of goodie on sale. Here’s Greg deciding how much candy his budget and blood sugar level will allow. Doesn’t he look happy? Wouldn’t you be happy too, with all of that candy around you?

The Ethel M factory also has an impressive cactus garden, where you can walk off some of the calories you just purchased inside. The garden has cacti from all over the United States, and even rare species from South America!

We spent some time strolling the paths through the garden, and of course, the battery in my digital camera died about then. But never fear, Miss Terry’s camera is never out of reach, and she is a much better photographer than I am.

They call this a Teddy Bear Cholla, but don’t be in a big hurry to hug it, or you’ll find out that this Teddy Bear has claws!

This barrel cactus is another plant that is just loaded with thorns. I lived in the desert for many yeas, and learned to give the native plants a wide berth.

Of course, not everything in the desert has thorns or looks forbidding.  There is a lot of beauty here too. This is a Fairy Brush, and Terry did a great job of zooming in for a close-up shot, didn’t she?

Here’s another close-up photo, and Terry’s favorite of all of the ones she took yesterday.

It’s pretty, but I think I prefer this one. To each his own.

Greg and Jan love Chinese buffets as much as we do, and we’ve been on a quest to find a good one here in Las Vegas. We’ve tried two so far, and we’re still looking for a good one.

After an early dinner, we returned to the Thousand Trails, and as we pulled up in front of our Winnebago, longtime reader Ron King was knocking on our door. Ron has an interesting blog called Chicken Fried RV, and we had a nice chat with Ron and a friend who was with him, and I got to get my puppy fix with Bubba, a friendly Schnauzer who was inside Ron’s pickup, just squirming with eagerness to get some loving.

Free candy, pretty plants, good friends, and I got to scratch a friendly dog’s ears. All in all, that’s a good day in my life!

Bad Nick doesn’t have time to play though, that boy is all work! Yesterday while I was out having fun, he was home writing a new Bad Nick Blog titled Do Something, Even If It’s Wrong! Check it out and leave a comment.

Thought For The Day – Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all. – Helen Keller 

Things are really happening fast around here! The Yuma Fairgrounds is filled with RVs here for the Arizona Good Sam rally, and we have run into several of our friends who are here for that rally, and will be staying over for our Western Gypsy Gathering rally afterward.

Yesterday morning our friends Ed and Stevie Hackenbruch stopped by to drop off three containers of some of the most delicious, fresh, locally grown strawberries we have ever tasted. Yummy!

Unfortunately, before I could even taste one, I had to run up to the front gate of the fairgrounds to meet with the Good Sam folks about a couple of issues to make all of our lives easier.

Then I spent some time talking with some of the vendors, and those folks are our best advertisement, because they have convinced several of the other vendors for the Good Sam rally to stay for ours, too. We always try to make sure our vendors have a good show, and we let them know that we appreciate them for coming.

Our T-shirts came in during the early afternoon, so I picked them up at the fairgrounds office, and by the time I had them loaded into our van, I got a phone call that Greg and Jan White were five minutes out. Because the fairgrounds is not open to the general public and does not have RV parking except for rallies, we had to make special arrangements for a couple of our rigs to come in as part of our advance party. There is no way we could do everything that needs completed for the rally without our faithful volunteers. Greg and Jan will be busy the next few days collecting door prizes from local merchants, which is always a hard task, especially in today’s troubled economy.

Once we had Greg and Jan in and parked, volunteers Mike and Elaine Loscher came over to talk about some rally parking and registration details. Mike is our welcoming committee at every rally, and he does a great job of greeting folks as they arrive, and determining if they need to dump their holding tanks, need handicapped parking, etc. Terry says she could not handle the crowds at registration without Elaine’s calm, steady presence, helping her and the registration crew get everybody taken care of.  

Just about the time Mike and Elaine left, Bill Becker came by to pick up the T-shirts, so he and Mabel can start sorting and folding them. Did I mention how much we appreciate our volunteers?

As Bill was pulling out, Kelly Watkins, the fairgrounds director, showed up to ask if a couple of local organizations who hold evening meetings at the fairgrounds could still hold their regular meetings in the evening during our rally. Sure, why not? Kelly and his crew have gone out of their way to accommodate us. What goes around comes around, right?

The next order of business was to dump our holding tanks. It’s been about eight days since we last dumped, and we could have stretched things out a little longer, but we will only get busier between now and our rally, so we decided to get it done while we could.

With that chore out of the way, I pulled the Winnebago back into our parking area at the back of the fairgrounds, and before I could even finish hooking up water and electric, I got a phone call to come back up front. There was another problem.

Three RVs with folks from Canada had arrived and tried to bluff their way onto the fairgrounds by telling the Good Sam people that they were with our rally. Because other fairgrounds where we have held rallies do allow folks to come in early and stay, we have had some people who were confused and just showed up, expecting to be able to stay.

But this wasn’t the case. In fact, these folks were not even registered for the rally. They had just heard about it from somebody.  I explained to them that this week is the Good Sam rally, and if they wanted to pay to attend that, it was up to Good Sam, and then they could register and pay for our rally. I told them that only our advanced staff was allowed to stay on the fairgrounds. That’s when they assured me that they didn’t have to pay for either rally because the fairgrounds is public property and anyone can stay here.

I can handle confused people, I can handle stubborn people, and I can even handle stupid people. But freeloaders who play games really tick me off! That’s when Bad Nick came out! I told them that I didn’t want them at the rally. Then we discussed their concept of “public property” and my feeling about rude French Canadians (just the rude ones) in general, and them in particular. About then they decided it was in their best interest to leave and not come back.

That hassle finished, I went back to the motorhome, rounded up Miss Terry and our real advance staff, and we hunted down a Chinese buffet for dinner. By the time we had finished eating, I was more than ready to come back home and take my shoes off for the evening.

Today will be just as busy as yesterday was, and I need a favor. For the next two weeks or so, please don’t send me forwarded jokes, whatever the latest internet hoax is, or feel good stories. I just don’t have time to sort through them. If you need to get hold of me, please don’t hesitate to e-mail, and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible. But please, no forwards.

Of course, Bad Nick has been busy too. Besides running off freeloaders, he posted a new Bad Nick Blog titled The World’s Biggest Ghost Town. Check it out and leave a comment.

Thought For The Day – “Suppose you were an idiot and suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.” – Mark Twain

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I wrapped up the new issue of the Gypsy Journal late in the afternoon yesterday, Miss Terry got it proofed, and today we’ll send it over to our printer for final tweaking and printing. If all goes according to plan and if the angels are smiling on us, we’ll get it back and mailed by the end of the year. Still late, but it’s the best we can do under the circumstances.

With the paper finished, we needed a break, so we went out to Foley to a Chinese buffet for dinner, and by the time we got back to the campground it was cold! I am so tired of being cold, I just want to be someplace where we can sleep with the windows open, and not have to shiver every time we step out the door.

Back at the motorhome, I wrote a blog entry about my thoughts on some of the electronic gadgets I’ve experimented with over the last few months and my impressions looking back, then decided I didn’t really want to post it, and saved it for a day when I’m running late and have nothing to write about. Writers call that “banking” stories – saving a few in reserve for when they have a deadline and their brain turns to pudding and they need to fill a column or blog quickly. I don’t believe in such a thing as writer’s block, because I can always find something to write about. As I wrote in an article on my Publishing4Profit website, writer’s block is a crock. Anyone who has made their living in the daily or weekly newspaper business will tell you that. But sometimes it’s nice to have that extra cushion, just in case I get lazy, if nothing else.

I’ve been looking at our trip west, and though the easiest route would be to get on Interstate 10 and take it all the way into Arizona, I really don’t like that route. I-10 across Texas is long, boring, and we’ve done it too many times. I mean, how many dead armadillo, coyote, and deer can you stand to look at?

If the weather cooperates we may go up to Livingston, Texas for a couple of days, and then take U.S. Highways through Waco, Gatesville, Goldwaithe, Brownwood, Ballinger, and San Angelo before we eventually hook up with I-10 somewhere in west Texas. There are a couple of stories up in that area I’d like to stop and research for future issues of the paper. But as always, we never know exactly where we’ll be and which route we’ll take until after we’ve been there.

We may find something that catches our interest, and hang out somewhere or take a side trip along the way, and we may just as easily fall into “go fast” mode and just decide to get there and get settled in. We don’t have to be anyplace until early February, when we’ll be in Apache Junction, Arizona to help Terry’s parents celebrate their birthdays. That’s the great thing about the fulltime RV lifestyle, we have plenty of options and the freedom to exercise them at our whim. 

Thought For The Day – The future will be either what you make it to be or what you allow it to be.

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally

I feel like I’m wading in waist deep muck. I have so much I need to get done, but it’s like every step I try to take forward takes forever to accomplish, and I keep falling further and further behind.

Part of it is that I feel like I have hit an emotional and physical wall. I can’t concentrate, my brain feels fuzzy, I’m grouchy and irritable, and I’m worn out. All I want to do is lie down and take about a 36 hour nap. I know that it’s all a delayed stress reaction to recent events, and I’ll work through it. I just needed to snivel. Okay, enough of that.

Yesterday we had a lot of running around to get done. Our first stop was at the post office in Summerdale to mail off a bunch of orders, and then we went to Camping World in Robertsdale, where I picked up a written estimate to have our rooftop automatic TV dish replaced. Among the other things that happened during the burglary was that he (or they) ripped out the control box for the rooftop dish and the Dish Network receiver, threw them on the floor and stomped on them. Since Winegard no longer makes our model of dish or supports it and no replacement parts are available, we have to get a new one.

While we were at Camping World, we picked up a folding aluminum outside step with a 1,000 pound capacity for times when the distance between the ground and the step of the Winnebago is too much for our stubby little legs.

Terry also found a small oak  footstool to put under her feet when  we’re traveling to make it more comfortable for her. The top raises to give access to a small storage area for items like remote controls and such, Just what I need, one more place to lose my remote control!

We then had to run over to Daphne, on Mobile Bay, to pick up some items at Sam’s Club, and while we were in the area, we stopped at the Bass Pro Shop at Spanish Fort. Terry wants a pair of fuzzy moccasin style slippers from Minnetonka or TeePee for Christmas, and I was hoping we could find some there, but they didn’t have what she wanted.   

We also went to an Office Depot to make copies of paperwork for the insurance company and faxed that to them. If you have ever wanted to be a crook for a living but are to afraid of going to jail, I think you should just open an insurance company. It’s like a license to steal. We have paid thousands of dollars in premiums over the years and never had a claim, but now that we need them, we are getting one runaround after another. One person tells you one thing and the next person contradicts the first one, things one tells us are covered the next one says are not, and “total replacement coverage” and “disappearing deductibles” are all bull$&@! when it comes time to pay off.

By the time we got all of that done, it was after 4 p.m. and we were getting hungry. I had spotted a Chinese buffet in a shopping center across the street from the Office Depot, and asked the clerk who sent our faxes if it was any good. She said she didn’t like Chinese, so couldn’t tell me, but one of her co-workers spoke up and said it was her family’s favorite Chinese restaurant, and that her sister drove all the way to Daphne from the far west side of Mobile to go there at least twice a month, so that was good enough for me. We adjourned to the Grand Buffet for dinner, and while I wouldn’t put it up in my Top 5 list of Chinese buffets, it was pretty darned good.

Back at the campground, I answered some e-mails that came in during the day, fiddled with the satellite and Dish receiver hoping against hope I could get them to work, and finally gave up in frustration. I know a lot of folks say that they don’t care much for TV, but I do. There are a few regular programs we watch regularly, and I am a news hound so I miss the daily news broadcasts and a lot of good documentaries on A&E, the History Channel, and such. Tomorrow I may drag out my old tripod dish and see if I can get any kind of a signal off that.

Of course, nothing stops Bad Nick. He has a new blog post titled Welcome Home, Sisters. Check it out and leave a comment.

Thought For The Day – There is great need for a sarcasm font.

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