We had a lot to get done yesterday, and accomplished very little of it. Some days are just like that, I guess.

We had quite a bit of stuff that we had been carrying around in the van that we decided had to go away, so I loaded it into the Explorer to drop off at a Goodwill or Salvation Army. It’s amazing what you discover that you had forgotten you own!

A little after noon we drove back to the car dealer in Winter Haven, where we bought the Explorer, to pick up the the SMI auxiliary brake that they had agreed to disconnect from the van, and to drop off the van’s title, which we had forgotten the day before. Along the way, we stopped at a Salvation Army store and unloaded the items we had to donate.

We had noticed a squealing noise coming from the Explorer, that I suspected was a fan belt or something like that. It wasn’t a big deal, just irritating. So I asked their service department to take a look, and they decided that a serpentine belt and a pulley were glazed, which was causing the noise.

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They pulled the vehicle into the shop to change them, and said it would take  a couple of hours to get the parts and do the job. Okay, we were there, they were paying for it under warranty, so we’d get it out of the way.

Well, we all know that no job ever gets done in the time allocated, right? The two hours stretched out to almost three before they were done, but they did a good job. This was supposed to be a quick trip, so I had not taken my iPad with me, so I spent the time reading old magazines about topics I had no interest in, while Miss Terry, always better prepared, had a book to read.

We needed to find a Fed Ex drop box to send the loan paperwork back to Alliant Credit Union, and we thought we had seen one in a shopping center we would pass on the way out of town. As it turned out, we were wrong, so we stopped at a hotel to ask if they knew of one nearby. They didn’t.

Again, if I had my iPad, I could have gone online and found one quickly, but we figured we’d pass a Staples or Office Depot, which usually does Fed Ex shipping. No such luck.

Miss Terry was driving, so I got online with my Droid Incredible and looked up Fed Ex, called them, and they gave me the location of the nearest Fed Ex drop box. Isn’t technology a wonderful thing? I entered the address into our Garmin GPS, which directed us a mile north, only to then tell us to make a U-turn and drive two miles back south to the drop box! Isn’t technology a wonderful thing?

Eventually we found the drop box, deposited the envelope, and headed back to the Thousand Trails campground. We stopped along the way for a bite to eat, made a stop at Lowes, and got back to our motorhome just after dark.

We’re due to leave here tomorrow, and we still have to pack the Explorer, get our hard kayaks onto the roof, and get some other chores done. All the stuff we had planned to accomplish yesterday!

Thought For The Day – Friendship isn’t a big thing, it’s a million little things.

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Well, it took a while, some trial and error, and my blood pressure was in the stratosphere for a couple of days, but it was worth it. Well, it was worth it to me. Miss Terry had to live with the grouchy bear I become when I get too stressed out from dealing with thieves and idiots, and I’m not sure she’d agree that anything is worth that! But, it all came together, and yesterday we resolved the issue with towing the Ford Explorer, and took delivery of it.

Actually, we already had it, because the folks at Dodge Chrysler Jeep of Winter Haven allowed me to keep it overnight Wednesday while we tried to figure out a way to get it set up to tow behind our motorhome.

As I wrote in yesterday’s blog, the Explorer requires a Neutral Tow Kit, which is basically an LED light that plugs in under the dashboard, and a simple computer procedure from a Ford dealer to set up the transfer case for towing. However, the company that made the kit for Ford has gone out of business, and a dealer in Oregon bought up every kit available and was charging $375 plus $30 shipping, for an item that originally retailed for about $30. What a rip off!

A lot of internet research, and repeated phone calls to my two most reliable technical guys, Greg White and Ron Speidel, confirmed my belief that any LED light would complete the circuit and work. Thanks for all of your help and patience with my repeated phone calls, guys.

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The next step was finding a Ford dealer that would “flash” the computer for me. Jarrett Gordon Ford, in Davenport, Florida was willing to try it, and it worked like a charm! A $2 LED light beats the heck out of over $400 to accomplish the same thing!

Once we knew that we could tow the Explorer, the next job was to unload our Ford van so we could drop it off at the dealer as our trade in, and do the paperwork. Do you have any idea how much stuff you can cram into an extended length Ford cargo van? A lot! We are going to have to get ruthless about what to keep and what to dispose of, because while the Explorer will carry the newspapers we take to RV parks and rallies, and our kayaks on a roof rack, it’s no cargo van.

What it is is a very nice ride, maybe the nicest we’ve ever owned. The previous owner was a Ford executive who special ordered the Explorer as his retirement present, and it has every option that was available that year. Leather interior, power seats, power windows and door locks, power sunroof, zoned climate control, molded in running boards, and more than I can remember. These pictures are from the dealer’s web site, and are not great, but hopefully they will give you an idea of what it looks like. It’s tan with a tan interior.

In fact, I was driving it home and playing around with all of the buttons and knobs, and suddenly I started feeling uncomfortably hot, even though the air conditioner was on. I told Miss Terry later that if I had been a woman, I would have sworn I was having a massive hot flash. As it turns out, I had turned on the seat heater, an option I never hope to be in cold enough weather to need!

The base plate for towing the Explorer is on order, and it will be a couple of weeks before we get it installed. In the meantime, I’ll drive the motorhome and Terry will drive the Explorer for the little bit of running around we’ll be doing between now and then.

By the way, if you are a fulltime RVer who is having trouble obtaining financing on an RV or tow vehicle because the bean counters at your bank don’t understand our lifestyle, call my friend Eileen Gilmore at Alliant Credit Union at (773) 462-2200, extension 3621, and tell her I sent you. Eileen will go the extra mile for you. She handled the purchase of our motorhome last year, and the Explorer now, and she has always been great to work with.

While I was busy with all of the details of the Explorer purchase, Bad Nick stayed out of the line of fire, and wrote a new Bad Nick Blog titled Coloring Outside The Lines. Check it out and leave a comment.

Thought For The Day – Adversity introduces a man to himself.

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