Sometimes I have all kinds of things to write about in this blog, and there are other times when I sit down at the computer with no idea what I will come up with to fill the minimum 500 word quota I set for myself every day. Fortunately, one way or another, I always seem to manage to come up with something. My old man used to say, if you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with BS.

But in writing today’s blog, I had a completely different problem. I couldn’t keep my eyes open long enough to type, and my fingers all felt like limp noodles when I tried to hit the keys.

No, I’m not sick, just super relaxed. Our friend Jean Damon gave Miss Terry and I full body massages yesterday evening that just turned us both into Jello. Jean was born and raised in the Philippines, where she studied Asian massage techniques before marrying Dave and moving to the United States to become a fulltime RV gypsy. Now they work the rally circuit, selling 303 products, and Jean gives massages.

Jean said she did about 10 massages at our Eastern rally at Elkhart Campground, and another 25 at the Escapade in Goshen. She offered us massages at our Elkhart rally, but we were just too busy to take her up on them. So when we ran into them here at the Orlando Thousand Trails, Jean said we weren’t getting away until she got us on her table. All I can say is wow, it do feel good! If you have never had a professional massage, trust me, you have no idea what you’re missing. Pamper yourself and get one sometime.

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Speaking of RV rallies, I’m thrilled to say that our friends Joe and Vicki Kieva will be presenting two of their excellent seminars at our Arizona Gypsy Gathering rally in Yuma. Joe and Vicki are two of the most well know RV writers and speakers of all time, and having them at our rallies is a real honor for us.

They will be presenting their ever popular  Alaska, the Ultimate RV Adventure seminar, and if you have ever wanted to make the trip north, you don’t want to miss this one. There are plenty of travelogues showing pretty pictures of Alaska, but Joe and Vicki’s presentation is a how-to type seminar telling people how to prepare for a trip to Alaska, and what to expect along the way.

Joe will also be drawing on his experiences as a police officer, and their years of RV travel, to present his Personal Security Tips for RVers seminar. Overall, RVing is one of the safest lifestyles that one could ever choose, but even so, we know firsthand that anyone can run into trouble anywhere. Joe’s seminar shows you the criminal’s point of view, and gives you tips and ideas on how not to become a victim.

Check out Joe and Vicki’s RV Notebook blog, and  be sure to take note of the books and e-books they have advertised in the right hand column. I’ve learned a lot from them over the years, and they’re happy to share their vast knowledge with you too.

For anybody planning an Alaska trip, you can’t have too much knowledge. This rally is going to be a real learning experience on making the big trip north. Besides Joe and Vicki’s seminar, my buddy Dennis Hill from the RV Driving School will be presenting his Preparing To Drive To Alaska seminar, and we will also have an RVing Alaska panel discussion with several folks who have traveled and lived in Alaska participating. So as you can see, we have the topic covered well!

Okay, I’m so relaxed I can’t write another word. I’m headed for bed.

Thought For The Day -  I am not stupid. Everyone else is just smarter than me.

Register Now For Our Arizona Gypsy Gathering Rally

I’m a short round guy, but sometimes I feel stretched so thin that I just can’t cover all the bases, no matter how hard I try.

We have a lot of folks from our rally who are still here at Elkhart Campground, or else are at the fairgrounds in Goshen, waiting for the Escapees Club Escapade rally to start.

Before and during our rally, and since it has ended, we have had many offers to take us out for lunch or dinner from more people than I can count. We appreciate that, and it’s very flattering that so many people want to treat us to a meal and have some time to visit, one on one (or two on two, as it is).

But, there are only so many days in a week, and so many meals we can eat. Plus, we are worn out from the rally, and just need some down time. And we still have a ton of post-rally work to get done before we leave for the Pennsylvania RV Show in Hershey on Wednesday.

We don’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings or act like we are too good for our many friends and readers, but sometimes we just have to say no. In at least a couple of cases, that has resulted in hurt feelings, which I really regret, and which really stresses me out. But what can we do?

My dad used to say never complain and never explain, because you’re friends don’t need it, and your enemies won’t believe it. I don’t have any enemies that I know of, if you don’t count ex-wives, but I sure hope our friends understand that there are times when we have other obligations, and times when we just cannot accommodate everybody.

Yesterday Miss Terry and Gita Patel from Elkhart Campground reconciled the numbers for the rally, and arrived at the amount we owe the campground. This rally has been a real shot in the arm for Bob and Gita, and we’re glad we could bring them so much business, and were able to introduce so many new people to their RV park.

I spent some time going over the schedule for the Hershey show, and it looks like I will be presenting my Highway History And Back Road Mystery seminar every day of the five day show. We’re looking forward to introducing a whole new audience to the Gypsy Journal and our books.

After we get done in Hershey, we’re not exactly sure what we’re going to do. We want to go back to Washington, D.C. again, and there are several things in Baltimore and Annapolis, Maryland I’d like to see and do stories on.

We may return to Elkhart to get the next issue of the paper printed, and some dental appointments out of the way. I also have to spend some time in Lexington, Kentucky, getting my annual medical checkup at the Veterans Administration hospital. We know that we’re going to be in Florida for part of the winter, but we’re not sure exactly when we’ll get there. That’s the great thing about the fulltime RV lifestyle – our plans are always written in Jello.

Bad Nick has been quiet for too long, but he just posted a new Bad Nick Blog titled Combat Knows No Calendar. Check it out and leave a comment.

Thought For The Day – There are no such things as limits to growth, because there are no limits to the human capacity for intelligence, imagination, and wonder. – Ronald Reagan

Yesterday we wrapped up the new issue of the Gypsy Journal, our 68th issue. That’s a lot of travel stories!

Today we will take it to our printer in Michigan, and they will give everything a once over, print it on Wednesday afternoon, and we’ll pick it up Thursday morning. But we’re not done yet, we still have to stuff all of the envelopes and get everything in the mail. And when we get that all done, we still have an RV rally to put on!

My buddy Greg White hasn’t been sitting on his duff either! Yesterday he started calling on local businesses, collecting door prizes for our Eastern Gypsy Gathering rally. There is no way we could hold a rally without all of our hardworking volunteers, and we really appreciate them!

While Miss Terry was doing the final proofing for the new issue yesterday, our pals Bob and Molly Pinner, and Mark and Dortha Hall stopped in to say hello. Bob and Molly are busy working on the upcoming Escapees RV Club Escapade rally, which will be held in Goshen, Indiana, a couple of weeks after our event. This is a learning experience for Bob and Molly, who will be the directors of next year’s Escapade, and we know that they will do a great job.

The weather has cooled off very nicely here in Elkhart. It was pretty hot the last week, but a cooler trend is starting, and yesterday it was very nice. I went for a little walk around the campground just before dark, or at least I tried to. But I ran into Dennis Hill from the RV Driving School and a whole crowd of other ne’er-do-wells that included Denny Orr, Mark Hall, Frank Hinman, Bob Pinner, and some other folks who I tried not be be recognized associating with in public.

They obviously needed adult supervision, so I hung around for a while, and I’m not sure if that didn’t just add to the problem! Finally the neighbors got tired of listening to us, so they sent out a horde of mosquitoes with orders to either chase us off or eat us alive. When I left at a trot, I think I saw them circling Frank for the kill, but by then it was every man for himself! 

There are already a lot of folks here for the rally, and more seem to be arriving every day.  We hope to have some time to visit with everybody before the rally starts.

Somebody who was looking at the rally seminar schedule on our website said that we have too many seminars, and it makes it hard to decide which ones to attend, or to have any downtime to relax and socialize.  When it comes to seminars at an RV rally, we believe that more is better, and we work hard to have plenty of choices for everybody. But we don’t take attendance at the seminars, so if you want to just hang out at one of the tables we’ll have set up just for visiting with your friends, that’s fine too.  Some people come to an RV rally to learn, and others come to see their old friends and make new ones. Whatever makes you happy.

We have had feedback comments that we should repeat the seminars at least twice at every rally, so if somebody misses one, they can catch it the second time around. But that would drastically cut down on the number and variety of seminars we could offer. There’s an old saying that says “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Our rallies keep on growing, and people keep coming back year after year, so I guess we must be doing something right.

Thought For The Day – The past is the past. Leave it there.

Click Here To Register For Our Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally!

After telling you in yesterday’s blog that I had uploaded the registration page for our Eastern Gypsy Gathering rally, we had a great response. By yesterday evening we had 25 reservations come in, the greatest majority of them for 50 amp full hookup sites.

I guess a lot of folks are quite happy to pay more for a rally at a campground.  Keeping in mind that we only had 80 of the 50 amp full hookup sites to begin with, available on a first come basis, I wouldn’t want to wait too long to register if I absolutely had to have one. Once they are gone, they’re gone.

To hopefully meet the needs of rally attendees who prefer limited services at a lower price, yesterday I called Bob Patel at Elkhart Campground, and was able to negotiate some basic RV sites with 20 amp electric and water at a discounted rate. For more information, check out on the Rally Registration Page.

At past rallies, we have had Early Bird arrivals, and also a lot of people that just show up at the last minute without pre-registering. That has not been a real problem at fairgrounds, where we have lots of space.  Due to the Escapees RV Club Escapade rally two weeks after our event, a lot of people will be arriving in Elkhart early. I cannot guarantee that we can accommodate last minute arrivals who have not preregistered, because once the campground is full, we won’t have a place to put you.

If you want to arrive early or stay at the campground after the rally, you can call Elkhart Campground at (574) 264-2914  and register for those days. Reservations for the rally dates have to be made through us to get the rally rate.

I spent much of yesterday trying to wade through a big backlog of paperwork that I had allowed to stack up. It’s the least favorite part of my job, so I tend to put it off until I can’t see the top of my desk any longer, and then I force myself to deal with it.

Sometime in mid-afternoon, just about the time when I really needed a break, my daughter Tiffany, her husband Jim, and our two granddaughters came by for a visit. They had not seen our Winnebago motorhome yet, and they all loved it. In fact, Tiffany suggested that with all this extra room, it would be perfect for taking the little ones on a trip. Grandpa quickly nixed that idea. Our motorhome seats six, but only sleeps two!

I know a lot of RVers who love taking their grandkids on trips with them, but I’m just not sure I could handle that at this stage in my life. Those two little ones have more energy than a boxful of kittens! I prefer to visit them at their house, feed them junk food, wrestle with them and get them bouncing off the walls, and then retreat back to my home on wheels and leave their parents to deal with them. Hey Tiffany, it’s payback for those sleepless nights you gave me, sweetie!

Actually, my daughter was never a problem child, and she has grown up to be a fine young woman whom I am very proud of. (I have to say that, or she’ll drop off her kids and keep right on going!)

While I was working, and then snuggling up with those little girls, Bad Nick was busy writing a new Bad Nick Blog titled One Extreme To The Other. Check it out and leave a comment.

Thought For The Day – When we lose the right to be different, we lose the privilege to be free.

Click Here To Register For Our Eastern Gypsy Gathering Rally! 

Is there any greater treasure than the people you love in this life, and those who love you?

Yesterday Terry and I spent the day visiting with two very special people, who have helped enrich our lives in so many ways that I could not begin to count them all.

We met Tim and Ann Moran at our very first Escapees RV Club Escapade rally, in Lancaster, California in 2000, and there was an immediate bond that has stayed strong through all the years that followed. Maybe it was slogging through the mud to get to our motorhome, the four of us laughing and giggling like school kids as we slipped and slid across the muddy racetrack where the RVs were parked that let us know that we had met kindred souls.

In the years that followed, we all have had our ups and downs, and Tim and Ann have been there for us when we needed friends the most. During the darkest days of Terry’s battle with cancer, Tim was a strong shoulder I could lean on. In the hard times that followed as she recovered from her illness, and we recovered from the terrible financial hit it had given us, Tim and Ann were always there. At one point when we were not sure if we could carry on, they stepped forward and made it happen.

When we bought our MCI bus, Tim and Ann drove to Kingman, Arizona and spent two or three weeks helping us as we started the conversion project. We could not have done some of the big jobs early in the conversion, such as enclosing the sides and cutting in the new RV window openings, without Tim’s help.  

Tim has been facing some serious health issues that have caused them to make the decision to stop fulltiming and settle down close to his doctors. It had been way too long since we saw our friends, and visiting them was the reason we came to the Titusville area.

We spent the day together yesterday, enjoying a tour of their new home, and the opportunity to just be together.

Tim is a feisty retired Navy Chief Petty Officer with a positive attitude you just can’t help but admire. His illness has knocked him down several times, but like the stubborn little Irishman he is, he just gets back on his feet, shakes it off, and charges right back into the fight. I know he’s going to win this battle, because he’s just too damn stubborn to throw in the towel.

Tomorrow Tim and Ann are taking us on a tour of the local area, and we’re looking forward to spending more time with our friends, and learning more about Florida’s Space Coast.

While we were off visting, Bad Nick wrote a new Bad Nick Blog post titled Sometimes It’s Because You’re A Jerk.

Thought For The Day – You cannot plow a field by turning it over in your mind.

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