Today is a very special day. 28 years ago today, my daughter Tiffany was born, and my world has been a much brighter place since then.

Of course, being my daughter, Tiffany had to make her entrance into the world in a memorable way. I owned a weekly newspaper in Grays Harbor, Washington at the time, and Tiffany’s mom had been admitted to the hospital the night before, scheduled for a C-section.

Soon after Tiffany’s mom was wheeled into the operating room,  unbeknownst to me, my secretary was in a car accident and got banged up a little bit. She was in the emergency room, and asked one of the nurses to call me upstairs to let me know about the accident. When they paged me, I was told to go downstairs to the ER.  I did, and the charge nurse said “Okay, there’s nothing to worry about. She’s got some cuts and bruises, and we’re gong to take some x-rays, just to be sure.”

Now remember, the only person I knew was in the hospital was my wife and my soon to be born daughter, so I asked “What the hell did you people do, drop her off a gurney or something?” The nurse said no, it happened in the car accident. “Car accident? Did she go for a joy ride?” We eventually got things sorted out, and I got back upstairs just in time to hold my beautiful new little girl.

Today Tiffany is a mommy to two little girls herself, and has grown into a beautiful woman. I’m proud to say that she is not only my daughter, but also my friend.

Being a great wife and mother apparently wasn’t enough of an accomplishment for Tiffany, so a year ago she took on a new challenge, losing over 85 pounds! Here is a picture of Tiffany with husband Jim, oldest daughter Hailey, and little Destiny last year at Sea World, a few weeks before she started her diet and exercise program.

This picture was taken last November, and Tiffany is well on her way to her goal.

And here she is now. What an accomplishment! I sure wish I had her willpower.

Tiffany has been empowered by her weight loss, and is now back in school, working on a degree. Can you tell that I’m a very proud dad?

Happy birthday, Tiffany. I love you very much, and I am so very, very honored to have you as my daughter.

Thought For The Day – A daughter may outgrow your lap, but she will never outgrow your heart.

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When last we left our erstwhile young RVers, they were in Kingman, Arizona, trying to decide whether to hang around while a windstorm came through the area, or to head over to Show Low ahead of the bad weather, so they could spoil grandkids beyond redemption.

We decided yesterday morning that we’d go ahead and hit the road. We really wanted to get settled in at our campsite in Show Low, and besides, I had drunk up all of the Pepsi in my buddy Mike’s house.

It was too brief of a visit, and if Kingman ever gets high speed EVDO wireless service, and if Mike ever restocks his refrigerator with Pepsi, I’m looking forward to going back.

Mike is a confirmed bachelor, so Miss Terry had fun making him a home cooked meal and a big batch of chocolate chip cookies while we were in town. I keep telling Mike that if he’d find a nice girl and settle down, he could have home cooking and cookies all of the time. But he’s pretty picky when it comes to women; he insists that the number of teeth they have exceed the number of tattoos. In Kingman, finding a woman who meets that strict criteria is quite a challenge.

We stopped at the Flying J for fuel, and because the RV island was backed up, and is so hard to get in and out of, I opted for the truck pumps, which ticked off one trucker. When we can use the RV islands, we do, but the layout in Kingman is terrible. On one occasion a few years ago we were struck for over an hour because someone had parked his pickup in a marked slot in front of the RV island and left in another vehicle, which made it impossible to pull a big rig out. We had to unhook our toad, and I had to maneuver our motorhome in a series of short back and forth turns to get past the truck. What a mess!

We got onto Interstate 40 just before 11 a.m. and began the long, slow crawl uphill all the way to Flagstaff, 150 miles to the east. Even with all of the work we’ve had down to our bus, it just is not suited to RVing in the West. At one point, between Seligman and Williams, our speed was down to 10 miles per hour, I was driving on the shoulder with my emergency flashers on, and even with the misters pumping water onto the radiators, our temperature gauge was flirting with trouble. We have come to realize that while our bus does okay back East and in the Midwest, it is just not suited for traveling out here in the West, where the mountains are high and the air is thin.

From Flagstaff to Holbrook is mostly downhill, and we rolled right along, even passing a slow moving eighteen wheeler now and then. When we left the interstate in Holbrook and got onto State Route 77 for the 46 mile run to Show Low, we began a series of long, shallow upgrades that again had us slowing down some, and the headwind didn’t help much. But within an hour or so we reached Show Low Lake Campground, a nice little city-owned campground where we usually stay when we’re in our old hometown. We had covered almost 300 miles since we left Kingman, most of it uphill.

We got the bus backed into our site, hooked up the 30 amp electric, (no water or sewer hookups here, just a dump station and several hose bibs scattered around), and then met my daughter Tiffany, her hubby Jim, and our granddaughters, Hailey and Destiny, for dinner at Pizza Hut. I swear those girls have grown a couple of inches since we saw them a few weeks ago at Sea World!

We’re going to be here a while enjoying family time, visiting with some old friends, and just relaxing in Arizona’s beautiful high country.

Thought For The Day – Seat belts are not as confining as wheelchairs.

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We spent yesterday with my daughter and her family at Sea World in San Diego, and as expected, those two grandkids of mine ran all four of us adults ragged, and still had energy to spare! Don’t let those oil company clowns fool you, there is no energy crisis. All we need to do is harness up whatever it is that gives children under age 10 their pep and we’d have enough power to run the world!

Miss Terry had never been to Sea World before, and I had only made one previous visit. We both came away with mixed impressions. The tricks they teach their orcas and dolphins to do are truly amazing.

Unless you have seen a four hundred pound dolphin leap high in the air to jump across a rope, or a massive killer whale launch itself out of the water and spin on its tail, you just can’t know how impressive it is.

The interaction between the animals and their handlers is really something to see. We watched a petite teenaged girl perform a beautiful water ballet with an orca, and then ride on its nose around the pool. Later, several of the beautiful black and white creatures slid completely out of the water to pose for photographs.

Sea World is a great place for kids to learn about wildlife, from petting and feeding giant batwing rays, to handling starfish and hand feeding dolphins. My son-in-law, Jim Robinson, enjoyed introducing daughter Hailey to the starfish and sea urchins in the man made tide pool.

But there is a flip side to the Sea World experience that left a bad taste in our mouths. Everything is so darned expensive, and in some cases it’s a downright rip-off! Yes, I understand that it costs a lot of money to operate a place like this. But do they have to rob you at every turn?

A one day admission pass for anyone age 10 and above is $65, and kids ages 3 to 9 are $55. You can get some better deals online or at local hotels, but you can still expect to pay $50 or so for an adult ticket, and a child’s admission will set you back $40 with a discount. So for a family of four, it’s going to cost close to $200 with discounted tickets.

However, as they say in all of those late night television infomercials, “But wait, there’s more!” Parking is $12 a day for a passenger car, and $17 for an RV. And once you get inside the park, keep your wallet handy. Every time you turn around, someone has taken your picture, a copy of which you can get for $10 to $15.

I expect to pay more for snacks and food at a theme park. After all, they have a captive audience. But for what a burger and fries set me back, I could have had a nice sit down dinner at a Chilies or Applebee’s kind of restaurant.

Tiffany was understandably upset when we went to the Dolphin Encounter, where for $6 you get three dead minnows to feed to the dolphins. As soon as they gulp down your three fish, you are quickly herded out unless you want to spend another $6 on three more minnows. Not because there is anyone else in line behind you waiting their turn (there wasn’t), but because if you’re not spending money, you’re history.  

We hung around for the evening Shamu Rocks show, and by then it was dark and downright chilly. They had vendors working the crowd, selling cups of hot chocolate, and Jim was going to buy some for the kids until we learned they were $10 a cup! Hey, for that kind of money, I want Shamu himself out of the pool and carrying it up to me!

Don’t get me wrong, we had a wonderful time, and we’re going back this morning, because Tiffany has Hailey signed up for an in the water dolphin encounter program. (I have no idea what that costs, and probably don’t want to know.)

I just wonder how many hard working parents will never be able to bring their kids to Sea World because the high prices for everything are simply out of their reach.

Thought For The Day - Middle age is when work is a lot less fun and fun a lot more work.

We sure had fun yesterday! My daughter Tiffany and her family are visiting San Diego, and yesterday morning we went to meet them at La Jolla Cove, which has to be one of the prettiest pieces of coastline in the world. I wouldn’t give you a plugged nickel for most of southern California, but scenes like this almost make it worth dealing with all of the traffic, crowds, and big city hassles.

Our granddaughters, Hailey, age six, and Destiny, almost two, love the beach and the water. Hailey is a tomboy and is fascinated with any kind of wildlife, be it the ducks and geese in the park back home in Show Low, Arizona (which she routinely stalks and catches, only to pat them gently and turn them loose), to the marine life that lives in the tide pools at surf’s edge.

Destiny is still too young to adventure far from Mommy and Daddy’s reach, but give her some sand to roll around in, and she’s happy as can be. Oh, to be that young and carefree again!

The place was crowded, even on a Friday morning in February, and I commented to Miss Terry that it must be a real circus on summer weekends. We had to park a mile or so away and walk down to where the kids were, but with the beautiful scenery, it was a pleasant stroll. I tried to call Tiffany to tell her that we had arrived but at the south end of the cove, near the lifeguard station, we had no Verizon cell service. By the time we reached the kids at the north end of the cove, we had three bars of 1X service.

As soon as we arrived, Hailey was eager to show Grandma Terry some of the things she had discovered in the tide pools. Just a quarter mile or so up the cove, harbor seals were whelping their calves, and a crowd of people had gathered on the walkway overhead to see them.   

We had no big plans for the day, so to fill up the time, Tiffany proved that she is her father’s daughter by locking her car keys in the trunk of their new Chrysler Sebring. While we waited almost two hours for road service to come and open the car, son-in-law Jim and I visited, while Miss Terry and the girls played in the park. I really admire my hard working son-in-law, and always enjoy spending time with him. Meanwhile, Hailey had to show off her acrobatic skills for Terry. Can you tell we’re proud grandparents?

Now, I have to report a Bad Nick sighting, right here in San Diego.

When the road service guy finally arrived, he managed to open the car doors, but the keys were locked in the trunk. The car has an inside trunk release, but as part of its built in security system, the trunk would not release from the inside, even after the alarm stopped blaring, because the doors had not been opened with the key, which has some sort of built in computer chip.

So Jim managed to fold down one side of the rear seat, wrestled out some luggage, and managed to force his head and broad shoulders inside the trunk. Somehow he fumbled around and got the trunk to open, and Tiffany finally retrieved her keys. But, we had one more problem. Well, actually Jim had the problem.

He was now stuck, laying on his back, his head and shoulders in the trunk, and the rest of him dangling off the back seat of the car. I wish I would have had my camera handy, because it really was a Kodak moment.

Of course, I wanted to help the young fellow out of his predicament. After all, he is just like a son to me! But about that time Bad Nick arrived upon the scene, and you just know that wasn’t going to be a good thing. I tried to stop him, I really did. But the little imp just had to take advantage of Jim’s misfortune.

Did you know that when you tickle a very strong, very stuck 26 year old construction worker on their exposed belly, they really squirm and wiggle a lot? Or that when you then run around to the trunk to see their head, the ears get really, really red? Did you know how many naughty words 26 year old construction workers can say? Or at least giggle when in such a situation?

Finally Bad Nick retreated, because Jim threatened to do things to him that I’m sure are illegal in several states and all Canadian provinces, and are pretty darned immoral too! I managed to help pull Jim free, and all of those people watching from the sidewalk really seemed to enjoy the show.

Today we’re going to Sea World, and I bet those kids are going to run Grandpa’s stubby little legs off!

Thought For The Day - Talk is cheap because supply exceeds demand.

We’re on a road trip.

Yesterday we left the bus in Tucson and drove the van to Gila Bend, where we stopped to visit with Ron Brundage at RV Sat-Link. I have grown tired of fooling around with our tripod TV dish and wanted to see one of the new VuQube portable satellite TV dishes in operation. I’ve been debating the advantages of one of these over a rooftop mounted dome.

As it turns out, Ron did not have a working model in stock, only a dummy display unit. But from what I saw, I’m impressed. The base model VuQube is not automatic, but you aim it from inside your RV with a remote control. From everything I have read, acquiring the satellite is fast and easy.

From Gila Bend, we continued on to Yuma and visited with Kelly Watkins, manager of the Yuma fairgrounds. As most of you know, we are looking for a new location for our Western Gypsy Gathering rally.

Kelly was very accommodating, and let us know that he wants our business, and will do anything within his power to get it. How refreshing after the clowns running the Pinal County Fairgrounds in Casa Grande! I really believe that the new fairgrounds manager in Casa Grande wants to make things work, but I think she’s in way over her head and the situation is too far gone for anybody to salvage.

Okay, the good news with Yuma is that the fairgrounds is much nicer, the buildings are in much better shape, the bathrooms are clean, It’s all grass so nobody would be parked in the mud if it rains, and they do not double book the fairgrounds.

The bad news is that it is in the flight path for the Marine Air Station, which is located right across the road, so we would be dealing with the noise of airplanes coming by overhead. But to me, that’s the sound of freedom. And what the heck, did you ever park in a campground that wasn’t next to a railroad tracks?

Another consideration is that for next year, the only week available to us is March 8-12. I need some input from our snowbird readers who winter in the Southwest. Is that too late in the season for you? When do you start heading for other parts of the world? Please post a comment, or e-mail me at editor@gypsyjournal.net and tell me what you think.

From Yuma, we drove to Imperial, California to check out the fairgrounds there as a rally location. We were not impressed with the fairgrounds, the city of Imperial, or neighboring El Centro. I’m not saying that it’s a complete armpit, but instead of mowing grass, the public works department shaves the place twice a week. We liked it even less than Casa Grande. That’s akin to me saying I like my first ex-wife even less than I like my second ex-wife!

It was starting to get dark by the time we were leaving Imperial, so Miss Terry took the wheel and drove the 120 miles to San Diego. We will be here through the weekend. My daughter and her family will meet us tomorrow and we’ll spend the next couple of days going to the beach and taking our two granddaughters to Sea World. We need to help those two little girls build some memories of time with their gypsy grandparents.

Thought For The Day - Always drink upstream from the herd.