Monday, going into Tuesday, August 27-8, 007

Bob's Blah Blog:



Twice in one day..new record. I started this on Monday night and finished it on Tuesday morning. Please enjoy.



We got into Concord, NC this evening after an exhausting day on the road...I mean at the nail salon and Sam's Club. Someone, (and I mean Corinne) needed some major pampering done, (Like she doesn't get that enough from me). Anyway, we were looking for a Chicken-Filet for lunch along the road and found one, also a Sam's and a salon called Lovely Nails. We went to the salon first to see if they could take her. Ten minutes was their answer. Not even enough time to go to Sam's. Two person salon with lots of empty stations. Smelled like nail polish (Patti-Wack, take note...no smells!!! Increased ventilation is the answer) While someone was excessivly pampered, I read a magazine and conversed with the proprietor's neice, a 30 something Cambodian lady with three pre-teen chillins. Two girls and a boy. We told her we felt sorry for her and gave her some ideas on how to handle the dating years. She said her husband should greet the boyfriends at the door with a shotgun and warn them. That should scare them off or scare them straight. The other option was to lock the daughters in the closet until they are 21. I liked the second option myself, but the shotgun bit has something which draws my interest, too.



Sam's Club was not typically busy. However, they sold no hard liquor or beer, just wine. No mixers or other good stuff for a happy hour. Hmmm....strange laws here, I guess. We finally grabbed a couple of slices of pizza and some soda and had lunch at about 330.



Back on the road, we got to Concord around 630 or 7. Got a space in a near empty 493 space RV campground. I asked the lady if she had room for just one more. Corinne explained I asked that of everyone. Sheeesh, takes the fun out of asking the obvious, and ruins a perfectly good ice-breaker with a total stranger....and there are few stranger than I.



Got parked and took our dirty clothes to the camp laundry since it was empty when we checked in. By the time we got back, some lady who has been there for 2 months now grabbed the 3 washers for herself and left us holding the bag, laundry bag, that is. She did tell Corinne where there was another mat a couple miles away, so we went there. Her sense of distance and time are way out of whack. It was more like 4 or 5 miles but was a nice laundromat.



Our campground is right next to Lowe's Motor Speedway, affectionately called the Monster by race drivers. From the size of it, it must be a MONSTER, like PIR on illegal steroids. This place is huge and has lots and lots of parking stretching for miles in all directions. We hope to go tour it on Tuesday, and will most likely stay here another night "soos to takes in alls the sights."

We saw the coolest motorhome in the park. It was towing a car behind it. But in between the car and the motorhome was a motorcycle....zoom...zoom. There was some kind of hydraulic lift attached to the mh that lowered and raised the mc. The mc rode facing east to west for those keeping score at home. The car was connected to the mh with a standard receiver hitch type of assembly. Pretty cool way to bring all your toys along for the ride. In an rv'ing book I once saw something similar where the mh pulled a trailer behind which had a speed boat elevated at a 45-degree angle over the car riding on the trailer on the trailer below the boat. From a side view, the trailer, car and boat form an arrow so anyone looking at it would know which way the motorhome was going. Now that's RV'ing.

My eldest nephew, Trent scored the winning goal in overtime for his bantam league hockey team to win the championship. Way to go Trent. He's 16 now, so any of you who have a cute 16 year old daughter or niece who likes hockey players (still has his teeth...er tooth), give Trent a call. I always told him we would go out and get babes when he turned 16. Now that he's a hockey stud he probably doesn't need me.

It wasn't about us getting babes, it was about him being a babe magnet, for me. In a note Corinne gave me yesterday, she wrote, and I quote: The Women...Any Woman...Who "Gets All Over Bob" Can have Him! S.C.M., 8-26-07. In the interest of full disclosure, this note was given to me at the Wright Brothers memorial after she pointed out a man, about my age with long hair and a beard like mine, and ask why I would want to look like that? I told her she was just scared I was going to be soooo hooooot looooking the women would be all over me. I wonder who is going to be right in this contest? We have a friendly wager, so please respond and indicate who you think is gonna win... Bob the macho hunk or her.



On the road here, I read two license plates of interest. One read BEEPBEEP and the other read BOOP. What are the odds of my seeing these two plates on the same day?



Yesterday, we got our satellite dish working. After having spoken with KingDome on Saturday evening and being told there was probably something wrong with the wiring between the dish and the receiver, I decided to run a coax cable directly from the dish output to the receiver. Lo and behold, the stupid thing began to work. This moring, as we were getting ready to leave Willianston, the coax connector pulled off the coax where it attached to the receiver. Then, the connector where it attaches to the dish pulled off. So now, I am the proud owner of 25 feet of coax with no connectors on the end, and two connectors with no cable in between. Fortunately, I have a back up length of coax with connectors attached to use this evening.



Speaking of things falling apart, our "Little House on Wheels" is now a year old and things are beginning to break, come apart, whatever.... How does it know? Just little things that we can fix, but it sure is annoying.



Ok, all for now. Its 11 pm and I am tired and someone (and I mean Corinne) is already sawing logs.



Bobo the Hottie

ps...hey Dee S.

Monday, August 27, 007

Bob's Blah Blog:

"Bonus dee us" (praticing my spanish).

Okay, a little ketchup, please. Back in Edisto Beach I forgot to mention I went skinny dipping in the Atlantic ocean. Now...try to get that picture out of your head for the rest of the day.

Back in Iowa, I read a story about some guy named Pankow who worked in a bank back in the 1800 or maybe during the Great Depression (I don't recall which is correct, but I think it is the Depression). Anyway, folks were defaulting on their mortgages and this guy began to help them by taking his own money and paying the debt, of course, not letting the folks know he was helping them. His goal was to save their credit and not allow them to lose their land. But, as time passed, he ran out of money and began taking money from those folks who had lots of money and could best afford to help out those less fortunate. Of course, he didn't let those folks know he was borrowing their money. He always figured times would turn around and folks would get work and everything would be okay. Well, things didn't get better, and he eventually was found out. He committed suicide. All the town folks went to his funeral the next day or so, but word spread about what he had done. Those folks who had money, about 100 of them, went to his grave and urinated on it that night. In the end, those who didn't have money either paid those whose money had been "borrowed," or the debt was forgiven in the spirit of neighborly goodwill. Some folks just walked away from the debt. It was all because of the goodwill of one person. As time passed, folks realized this and now the name Pankow is well known and respected in the community.

Another story...a bad guy (murderer) was caught and taken to the hangin' tree. The sheriff told the man he was to be hanged by the neck for 30 minutes, and if, after that time, the man was still alive, he would be set free. The sheriff felt the letter of the law would be met and the bad guy had served his punishment....which was to be hanged. Well, the bad guy thought this was a pretty square deal, so he eased himself off the bucket and hung himself without breaking his neck. A doctor was on hand and when the 30 minutes had passed, the sheriff, not wanting to see the bad guy walk away, did not allow anyone to assist him and the bad guy eventually died from hanging. I often wondered why, in the olden days, the sentence given to the bad guy read: "Hanged by the neck until dead." Now, I know why. I wasn't going to finish this story in this blog, but I didn't want to leave you hanging for the rest of the story....hehe!

Also, if you read August 25 blog but not the August 18 blog, you might want to go back and read it. It got posted just before the 8/25 blog.

Our neighbors on the Outer Banks campground had a really nice Ford F550 diesel truck they had customized for pulling their house on wheels. It was pretty nice. Wish I had taken a pix of it. But the most interesting part of it was they are full-time RV'ers and they travel with about a dozen or so cacti (hey to Don R.). Some of these cacti were pretty large and their RV was a lot smaller than ours. Why would you want to travel with prickly cacti? Seems like someone would get stuck, as we did when someone (and I mean me) tracked some jumping cactus into the coach, totally inadvertently, and someone (and I mean Corinne) got stabbed in her hand by one clump of it. I kissed the ouchy and made it all better. I got magic healing lips from my mom who always did the same for me when I got hurt or skinned a knee.

We visited the Wright Brothers Historical site where the birth of modern aviation was founded. Pretty interesting site. The park ranger guy gave about a 40-minute program and history of the bro's, but he was hard to understand due to poor microphone and speaker system...just like being on an airplane today. I really didn't understand why we had to fasten our seatbelts and put our trays up just to hear his talk.

Some guy made an exact replica of the bro's 1903 gas powered aircraft and donated it to the museum on the 100 year anniversary of the first powered flight, which only lasted some 3 seconds or so. The furthest distance they flew on that day, including lay overs was 859 feet, I think. Of course, you may ask, there was no carry-on luggage.

We ate at a restaurant named Dirty Dick's Crab House. Food was good and the service was exceptional. For obvious reasons, I am not going to say any more about this, other than I got crabs. I did make the cashier in the gift shop part of the restaurant blush when I told her I wasn't buying thong underwear but I didn't want her to think I wouldn't wear them if I did. (Just in case you got the skinny dip picture out of your mind, this is something else to work on. If you haven't got it out of your brain, someone, and I mean Corinne, welcomes you to her world.)

It rained pretty hard after we left the islands. We crossed some pretty awesome bridges going to and from the islands. Corinne doesn't like crossing tall bridges with lots and lots of freefall space between the span and the water. She even drove over the tallest, longest bridges when we went onto the islands and I drove back from the islands.

We are on our way westbound to western NC to go by Dale Jr.'s motorsports facility and to DEI. Then, we will most likely push on to Pittsburgh to see Brandon.

We got a text message from my brother Danny yesterday about it being the 27th anniversary of brother Tommy's death. D was hosting a drink at his house to honor Tommy, a United States Marine 1st. Lt. killed at Camp Pendleton, CA in 1980. Sempre Fi, brother!

Corinne has biscuits, gravy and scambled chicken embryos ready for breakfast, soo0....

Bobo

Saturday, August 25, 007

Bob's Blah Blog:

Hello! We have little success in finding wifi or phone access for internet connection. Fortunately, I have been keeping detailed notes of our activities and will share them with you. Don't read this blog until you've read the Saturday, August 18 blog.

But first, for all you retirees, when do the dreams about work end???

Ok, we left bright and early on Friday morning (a week ago) for Greenville, SC to meet up with a friend of ours from Munich, Germany. She has been here in the states for the past year teaching german to american kids and english to german kids. Their parents work at the BMW plant in SC. We had a pretty uneventful trip to Greenville although someone (and I mean Corinne) slept thru the Great Smokey Mountains as we merrily drove along. Thankfully, she was not driving at the time. I, however, have perfected the ability to sleep and drive at the same time. Used to do it on our way to Lakeside, AZ when we went thru the Salt River Canyon. Had to be good cause there's a big drop off on one side of the road.

When we finally got to Greenville, we set up camp in a park called Paris Mountain State Park. It is about 4 miles outside of G-ville. Nice campground, clean, lots of pine trees, a lake, and friendly neighbors. Some guy even asked me to back his 5th wheel into the space because he was new at this stuff and all, and needed an old salt like me to do it....boy, was he ever mistaken asking me. Anyway, I got it parked without any problem.

We went into G-ville to meet with Babs, our German daughter. We technically are her american parents and are proud to say so. On Friday nights, they close off part of downtown and have bands and beer and wine and social stuff and restaurants to draw residents and vistors (us) downtown. We had a good time and ate at a restaurant there. I had Grits simmered for like three hours then they piled shrimp and andouille sausage in it. Talk about good...well, I couldn't talk about it because my mouth was full of it. Corinne had fish and shrimps and Babs had something called She Crab soup.

The next morning we met up with Babs and her boy friend Corie for lunch. They came out to our camp to see the coach then we followed them back into town. After a tearful goodbye (actually, I think it was sweat from the heat and humidity), we let her go so she could finish last minute details to leave for the homeland the next morning. We last saw Babs in Munich just a day after the 9-11 attacts when we were in Europe. We will just have to go see her next year. I was surprised how gut mein German was after all these years. Babs understood everyword I spoke. I cannot say as much for the poor soul who listened to her voice mail at her old phone extention at the school. Hehe.

The Queen let us down a few times while in Greenville. She always got us to where we wanted to go, but we sure saw a lot of scenery getting there. Over hill and dale and back again. Seems there is no straight line from point A to point B in G-ville. And, just try to find a Post Office!!

We went to see the Boring Ultimatum starring Brad Pitt or Matt Damon. Not sure which one. The constant moving of the cameral made me not feel so well. Why do directors think they have to do that? I didn't understand the first two movies, so this one was like Lord of the Rings in my book....SUCKS.

We left G-ville to head to Charleston, SC and Edisto Beach State Park. We didn't expect to be able to camp on the beach because our research indicated they were all booked up. But, when we got there, I asked the park guy (I call him park guy) if he had room for one more. He said "no, but would check anyways." He found space #8 was available for two nights if we wanted. Well, of course we wanted. The trick was getting the truck and trailer thru the trees and undergrowth. It was a challenge, yessiree, Bob. (that's me...Bob). Our spot was like 50 feet to beach and it was pretty nice. People were friendly here, too, not like in Iowa. The liked our Little House on Wheels, as Corinne likes to call it.

We made a side trip up to Charleston just to explore. Of course, we made the obligatory stop to the house of Costco to get supplies. We went downtown and saw Fort Sumter way off in the distance. What a neat place this was, except getting tossed out of the visitors center because it was closing time. I told some lady "I've been kicked out of better places. Fact is, I wouldn't go into a place that wouldn't kick me out."

On our way back to Edisto Beach, we stopped to take a photo of an ice dispensing machine like we used to see when we were kids. Never did figure out how that guy got inside the machine and knew how much ice to send down the chute when the time came. They called the machines Twice the Ice, and they had penguins (Hey, Susan and Gary) painted on the side. We took a couple of photos and someone (and I mean Corinne) was hungry.

Across the street,was a little restaurant named Dean's and Family Seafood. Corinne had been jones-ing for some seafood, so we went in. It was a niced mom and pop establishment, moderate prices and good food. At the end of our meals, Dean, came over to ask us if our meal was good and we ended up talking for about 20 minutes about the restaurant, his dad-in-law Marvin the meatman, Dean's spouse Debbie, kids, hunting and making diesel out of used cooking oil, which Dean has plenty of from his deep friers. Fact is, Deb didn't want him ruining their new 5000 mile truck by putting some homemade bio-diesel fuel in it. Fact is, he was pretty unsure he wanted to risk the rath of Deb if something went wrong.

But, one morning when he was sleeping on the couch (as most men LIKE TO DO once in awhile...don't we guys? even if the women folk think they are punishing us, its adventure sleeping for us!) he got up at 4 am and snuck out to put a gallon or two into an almost empty fuel tank. Planning ahead, he put air in the bicycle tires and put it into the back of the truck, just in case. He got down on one knee, asked for the Lord's help and drove for 45 minutes with his fingers crossed. It worked, but Deb later caught him red-handed putting bio-diesel into the truck and gave him hell. But, all was well and he now drives up and down the road in front of his restaurant to get customers to stop in. Seems the diesel exhaust smells like french fries and makes people hungry. I wonder if the E85 fuel made from corn smells like popcorn or cornbread?

At Edisto Beach, they have some mighty fine beach houses for sale and rent. Multi-story, mostly white in color, some with elevators. Ocean view or not. $500K or more. One for timeshare had a built in pool even tho the ocean was just a few hundred feet away. Too Much Money!!!

Did you know they have Piggly Wiggly stores back here? I have a membership card now and can proudly call myself a Piggy Wiggy....wait, that doesn't sound very good, did it? Well, heck, its the truth...deal with it.

The ocean water at Edisto was warm, like bath water. Felt good, but at the same time, with the high humidity and warm temp, it would have felt better 10 degrees cooler. We found some sea shells and I found a nice shell but I forgot what its called. I have always wanted to find such a shell and now my life is complete...but don't take me yet, Lord, I gots other stuff to do still that will make my life even more completer.

Along our travels, we have passed several Jellystone Campgrounds. Someone (and I mean Corinne) won't stay there. Yogi, Boo Boo and Cindy are all there. "Hey, Boo Boo...let's get some picinic baskets." Sure would have been fun to have stayed with my cousins.

Made a stop at the Darlington Speedway in Darlington, SC. Even got to go into the grandstands to see what it looked like. They are digging a big hole between turns 1 and 2 so they can drive the big trucks onto the infield. The banking at the first and second turns is like 23 feet so they really got to dig a big tunnel to get the trucks through. The security officer said the only tunnel they have now is barely big enough to get a pickem-up truck through. If it had KC lights on top they wouldn't be there at the other end.

Needed to buy a new shroud for the a/c unit on the roof. I think it got cracked or something when installed and the wind and grind from going down the road made it finally break apart. The bad news is, nobody stocks the shroud...but they can order it for me. Yeah, like I'm gonna hang around in their town while they wait for fedx to deliver something.

We were in Fayetteville, NC where Ft. Bragg is housed. They say they are the best military base in the country. Guess that's where the bragg name comes from.

We are currently on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. We spent last night at a Nat'l Parks Service campground. We had a great camp spot, high on a hill where everyone could see who the alpha dogs were. The only problem was no electricity. My generator quit for some no good reason and it was pretty hot and miserable all night. Fortunately, Corinne remembered we had a power invertor and we were able to tap into the 12 volt system to run our 120v fans. Without those fans, we probably wouldn't have been able to sleep at all. That Corinne, she's the BEST!! (and she said I could say that). We moved to a KOA this morning. Before we got anything else done, we powered up, turned on the AC and went to brunch. We got back to cool digs.

Cannot get the satellite system to work, again. Do not buy a satellite system! Nothing but a pain in the kabasa. I think Corinne is now napping before the NASCAR race starts tonight. We plan to leave the island tomorrow and head for Brandon and Kalina's in Pittsburgh. Don't know what day we will get there, just depends on how hard the wind is blowing and which direction it is going

As Lee Marvin so eloquently sanged...I was born under a wandering star...

Bobo

Saturday, August 18, 007

Bob's Blah Blog:


Ok, back to the blogging...Sorry, due to technical difficulties not entirely out of my control, I am now blogging and its Saturday, August 25. Today's blog was actually started on the 18th.


FOP conference went pretty well. Did I mention we went to see the Oak Ridge Old Men (Boys, but they are old now) on Monday night. I knew about 6 of their songs. Never was much of an ORB fan, just liked some of their music. They put on a good show, tho. Someone (and I DON'T mean Corinne) got really drunk at the concert and was really loud. She had a good time, tho, we thinks.


We didn't go to the hospitality rooms much this year. Too hot, too muggy, too old to go out drinking anymore. One beer and we are done for the evening. Sometimes a cold beer is really good, like with mexican food, and sometimes it just puts us to sleep.


We went to see the movie Hairspray on Tuesday or Wednesday afternoon since we had nothing else to do, like go to Wal-Mart, do laundry, sleep or eat or ?? It was an ok movie, but had lots of singing in it. Who makes musicals anymore? John Travolta did a good job as a lady, so he was funny.


We got a really big T-Strom on Thursday afternoon. Lightning, thunder, rain and hail....the big four. Golf ball sized hail in some parts of Jeffersonville, which was like a 1/2 mile away. No power outages. Wonder why we have power outages in Phx when there are thunderstroms...oh yeah, APS. How could I forget? Did I ever tell you what the initials APS stand for? Well, I can't write it here, but if you have an imagination of any kind, you can probably figure it out if you feel the same way I do about them. (long story, but would make a great novella).


We ate a couple of times at a restaurant named Rocky's. I-talian food. Really good food, reasonably priced and beer was served. One time we had pizza (imagine that..) thin crust, with almost everything on it. yum. Our waitress, Lauren, was particularly pleasant to talk with and she actually sat down after our meal and we talked about life, school, AZ and family. She wants to be a girls basketball coach (played college ball). She should do well at it. You go, Girl! Chi mangia bene, mangia Italiano! (Those who eat well, eat Italian)


The rain storm caused no significant damage to anything, as far as I know, but a tornado siren blared in some small burg nearby, according to the news people. Live. Local. Late Breaking. Anyone getting tired of hearing about "Late Breaking" news at the top of the news hour. Seems to be getting popular throughout the country. Oooo.....late breaking news that ocurred just three hours ago... I gots some late breaking news for them peeps.....

Went to do our laundry on Thursday night after the rain. There was a great radio station playing in the automat. I cannot recall the call letters, but the freq was 103.1 on the FM dial, Lowville, KY. While we were there, and there weren't many others there, cept a couple of ladies and a guy, we heard an old Eddie Rabbit tune I am sure y'all will remember.."I love a laundry night, I love a laundry night. I love to hear the washer and dryer as they spin to make my clothes clean, cuz it makes them smell good."

Anyway, a good slow dancing song came on the radio so I asked Corinne to dance. Damn the torpedos, full speed ahead, we go or die trying have always been my motto. Corinne accepted my invitation to dance since her card wasn't full up yet. We smooth moved around and between the washers and dryers, surely making the lonely men and women in the laundromat jealous of our style and pose. I think only one person left.

The Road Queen (and I mean Corinne) is still smiling ear to ear whenever anyone asks if she is enjoying retirement. Sheeya!


I want to give a shout out to a couple of new possible readers. Hey to Art and Terri, Barb and Joe. Hope Moe isn't keeping you all awake every night with all the party'n going on there. Also, a big thank you to John H. for fixing a wall for me at the house. Got knocked over, somehow, mysteriously. I know how it got knocked over, nothin' mysterious about it. It was space aliens with a tractor beam sent to take all the good stuff I have. Thanks, John, we will square up when I get back.


I don't know about you all, but if there is anything that does scares the b-gebbers out of me, its space aliens. I used to park my patrol cruiser out on Interstate 10, like at milepost 78 or something in the median and just shut off my lights and watch. Then, out of nowhere, there would be lights over by the mountains where there were no lights before. Scared the heck out of me, so I got back on the road and beat feet back to civilization. I feared the tractor beam would suck me up as I drove down the road and my cruiser would just continued down the road unoccupied. I know we all have this exact same fear, so I am sure you are right behind me on this, although it does make me susceptible to being abducted for spreading the word. Someday, I'll write about my theory of how space aliens make contact with their counterparts already living on earth amongst us.


We now have over 5000 miles on this trip. Getting 10 mpg still. Fuel has ranged from 2.99/gal in the west and midwest to 2.65/gal in Kentucky and surrounding area. What's wrong with that? Last time we were in KY, which was probably in 1993 or so, I found gasoline in a little town called London for .79/gal when it was selling for a good .50/gal more in other locales. Something needs to be done to get things right for the Americans.


We are having a great time and enjoying retirement. Wait, what's that bright light and humming noise? Awwwwwww!!!


O0m poppa. oom poppa, oom poppa mau mau....high 'ol Silver away......


Bobo

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Bob's Blah Blog:

Hey, Y'all, its been awhile, buts we's been busy at the FOP National Conference in Looeyville Kentucky. Imagine, being retired and having to set an alarm clock just to get up in the morning. I didn't sign up for nothing like that!!!

Lets see, where were we...oh yes, somewhere in either Nebraska or Iowa..I think it was Iowa. We stayed the first night in Ames, IA where my dad was born, raised and went for awhile to Iowa State University back in like 1940 or just before WWII, the Big One, the war to end all wars, etc. Too bad nobody took up that saying to really mean no more wars.

Anyway, we got to the Univesity and dropped the mobile passion palace in a parking lot near the stadium. Not even two minutes later some guy, who reminded us of Fred Holt (from our neighborhood) stopped to say we couldn't park there. They were going to have their big Straw Vote rally the coming weekend and they didn't want us to park our RV there, but somewhere else. Corinne told him we were only dropping for a couple of hours to visit the campus and would be leaving. He said he would let us do that. I told him I would let him let us do that. Suprised that didn't change his mind.

I gotta tell you, we (and I mean Corinne and I) didn't find most Iowainians to be very friendly. I guess they regarded us as foreigners or something. Some had a sense of humor, or sense of comedy would be the proper phrase, but othes were like we were a bother to them. We made it a point to tell the folks who were nice to us what a pleasure it was to run across them because those other folks across the hall were grouches.

So, at the campus, we went to the bell tower where we had distributed some of my dad's ashes when we were last in Iowa. I believe that is the root of most of the bad karma I have experience since that fateful day. See, daddy-o never did like a lot of noise, and with with 9, count em, nine chillin's to his name, he had a lot of noise around the house, specially them noisy girl sisters we boys had to put up with. Did I mention their names?? Mary, Ellen and Carolyn. Now, say those names really fast three times and see if I am right about being noisy. Of course, most of the noise was from them yellin' at (for no good reason) their six little brothers (Bobby, Tommy, Charlie, Jamie,Danny and Paul) who, boys being boys, were just being boys. But, I digress...

The way I see it, we put some of daddy-o's ashes by the bell tower that chimes every hour on the hour, 24 times a day. Pop only really had one good ear and by some quirk of fate, that one good ear must have been in the ashes we put at the base of the bell tower. Anyway, we scooped up some mulch and dirt and hopefully an "earful" of ashes and moved them away from the bell tower. Fact is, we still have the ashes in the travel coach as I forgot to deposit them somewhere in Ames, like the house he grew up in or somewhere. So, we put him on the dashboard of the truck and he got to see his beloved Iowa as we went down the road. Oh, and yes, we apologized to him for being so thoughtless as to put him at the bell tower and not over by the women's dorm or coffee shop where he probably would have been more comfortable...hehe. But, guess what, life does seem to be a little better for me, now...but could be the medication, too.

We went to the church were my grandparents, Edward and Marcella (Byrnes) Mitchell were married in 1917 in Ames and found a series of records for marriage and baptismals. I do have family!!! How they got to America, I don't know, yet, but we have a start. We then went to the local library and found old telephone books, copied the address and then drove around, using the Queen of England, of course, to guide us to the right locations. We found all the homes we were searching for,save two, which have been torn down. You know, I think I wrote about this stuff already. Did I?

So, moving on, we spent the night a couple of times in Iowa state parks along the way. They were not only dark and humid, but after the sun went down, the bugs all came out and made a heck of a racket. So much racket, I think my dad would have preferred the bell tower.

We spent a couple more days in eastern Iowa looking for Corinne's ancestors. We stopped at one town and searched the library, finding several gravesites and notations in books. The librarian even called some lady who was once married to a Paup. The lady came down to the library (she was one of the nice people we met) and sat with us for about an hour to discuss Paup-ism. We got phone numbers to reconnect with them should we come back and we shared our phone number with them should they think of anything of value to us. We also had a nice lunch consisting of a Taco Salad at the local cafe next door to the library, but the lady there wasn't friendly...even when I left her a tip. No wonder daddy-o left Iowa, he liked to talk to people and nobody there wants to talk to anyone.

While leaving one of the state parks to move onto Kentucky, we stopped at the RV dump station to flush our tanks, if you know what I mean. Anyway, when we were done and just putting stuff back into the truck and coach, I got stung by a big old something or other on my right earlobe. I was wearing a bright yellow shirt and carrying bright orange blocks and that big old something or other must of thought I was some kind of purty flower, which I am of course, and decided it needed some of my sweetness to take home to momma. My earlobe swole up like a watermelon and someone (and I mean Corinne) couldn't tell which was my head and which was my earlobe. I find that hard to believe, myself, because its plain to see my earlobe has more hair on it than my head. We never could find the injection point of the stinger, but it still hurts a little to this day, especially when its time to do some work. Ouch!

Did I mention the gravestones we saw at the Lost Nation (real name of a town) IA? The head stone said Knock on it, as in Tony Orlando and Dawn's famous song "Knock three times on the headstone if you want in...Twice on the urn if the answer is no." Well, anyway, why would someone in a grave want someone to Knock first? Lost Nation has a population of 497, according to Mr. Mayor, who we met at the cemetery. He was friendly. I asked if the town ever got any busier than it was right then and he said "no." Hmmmm, I could live here, I thought to myself. There was nothing and nobody around. The streets were virtually empty. The Postmistress wasn't friendly, tho. Gotta have a friendly Postmaster/mistress if your gonna live in a small town. How else you gonna get all the gossip about who's writin' to whom?

Having a good time at the FOP conference. Did the secret Lodge handshake and everything. Got some new guys from our Lodge and some older guys who are attending their first Nat'lconf. Too bad we don't have anything real controversial on the agenda...thats when it gets good! Looneyville, KY was the first conference Corinne and I attended with the FOP in 1993. As we recall, it was hot and humid and smokey. Smokey because it seemed everyone here smoked, indoors and outdoors. That has changed. Now they smoke outdoors, and really not as much as they once did, it seems. Still hot and humid, but its worse outdoors.

The Queen doesn't seem to know her way around Luueyville, KY. She makes us turn right, turn left, recalculating, turn in 400 feet, take the ramp right, exit left, and thats just to get out of the RV camp parking lot. The sad truth is, we can see the exit from our camp spot but have become so dependent on technology we cannot function without it...and this computer said I could write that. Buzz-click.

Corinne drove the big rig, again, and is gaining her confidence in being an over the road trucker. When we got to Looieville, KY, we had to find a place for to get her nails down. Can't be a big rig driver if your nails "ain't purty" I have said a 1000 times if I have said it once. Ended up at a Wal-Mart (sorry Stacy)but it was the best we could do. Anyway, having to find a nail salon got us to thinking about reemployment. We are kicking around the idea of us both going to cosmetology school and getting a national certificate for doing manicures and pedicures. We could then travel the country and whenever we pull into a RV camp or state park, put up our shingle and the "kitchen's open....come on in." We have even come up with a business name which suits us just fine...

Bob's and Coe's
On the Go
Fingers and Toes

Now, doesn't that have a nice ring to it? (ring---fingers, toes----ring....get it??)

If and when Moe decides to retire, we can expand the business and she can complete barber school and trim hair from old men's ears and nose. Of course, she will become a full partner in the business, but won't get top billing on the name, but...

Bob's, Coe's and Moe's
Fingers and Toes
Ears and Nose

does have a certain flavor to it and just trickles off the tongue.

Git er done!

Bobo

PS...I hear if you go to Google Reader, you can set it up so you will be notified when we publish a new blog. Give it a try and let me know if it works.

Photos We Meant To Post

Nephews Kevin & Kyle enjoying the ride on BART. They rode the bus to SF Airport with their friends from camp, so we took BART to pick them up. As we entered the tunnel, told them the tube leaks under the Bay after the earthquake a few days earlier.

Crossed this bridge over the SF Bay after dropping Kevin & Kyle off at torture camp. To keep Corinne's mind off her fear of heights, Bob talked about the recent earthquake in Oakland...DUH! Bob got paid back the morning the siren went off in Seward NE and he bolted out of bed thinking is was a tornado warning!!!

Aunt Marion's place on the Sacramento River Delta. Enjoyed having cocktails on the deck overlooking the river every evening. There's one slip open. Bob thinks tying telephone poles to the Alpha Coach would make it "Pontoon RV"and we'd then be "Water Dogs."

Wednesday, August 8, 2007

Bob's Blah Blog:

Whew-eee, its warm and humid and wet and cloudy and rainy tonight. We are in a little county park outside Marion, IA, around Cedar Rapids for you all playing at home. Just got here a bit ago and had time to blog, so put your seatbelts on and cover your eyes for this ride.

We stayed in Cheyenne, WY until Saturday morning then headed east for Seward NE. It was a long drive but the company (and I mean me) was good. Driving through someplace we needed to get fuel and just before we got there, a WY State Trooper came flying by us. We figured he had a wreck to get to and the roadsigns said we could tune to a radio station for road info. But, we were listening to the Blue Collar Comedy radio station and it was too funny to turn off, so we didn't. Anyway, as we near the exit we need to get off the road to a Flying J (thank you Lynda Schallmann) we saw the trooper's car parked sideways across the off-ramp. As we then passed the blocked ramp we saw the problem, the first and only accident we have seen on our trip. An 18 wheeler tried to take the curve too fast and rolled over. The whole thing was off the road and there was no reason to block the ramp. State cops...sheesh! Anyway, to compound the situation, we were in a construction zone with jersey barriers on both sides of our lane. Someone (and I mean Corinne) told me to get out of the construction area to pull over to see how to get back to the Flying J, so I took the first exit I saw, which turned out to be a ramp with no asphalt. Well someone (and I mean Corinne) wasn't happy with my little teeny, itsy-bitsy error so I stopped dead in the ramp. When I started up again, we got to the bottom of the ramp and some female flagperson was directing traffic so ineptly that she was holding her slow/stop sign backwards and waving traffic thru while showing the stop sign. She then came over to the first vehicle in line and talked to them about who knows what. They however made a left turn thru the construction zone and disappeared. I don't recall what the guy in front of me did, but I decided to go straight thru the intersection and take the on-ramp back to the highway and get the heck out of there. But first, I had to stop and ask some construction worker if anyone there on the site knew what they were doing. "No speak English" are the words I got back. Well, since he didn't speak english, he probably didn't understand what I called him as I drove off.

Anyway, we never did get back to the Flying J at that place and we had like over 100 miles to go and about 160 miles til empty showing on my gas gauge. Needless to say, we came about and 1/8 of an inch until someone (and I mean Corinne) would have had to start pushing the rig to the next station. But she lucked out and got to ride the whole way.

We rolled into Seward late Saturday afternoon, about 5 pm or so. We couldn't find a RV campground or nothing, so I stopped at the local constabulary and inquired if they had a recreational vehicle depot in their fine burg. Well, of course they did and gave us good directions to the campground, just outside of town along the Blue River on one side and the Northern-Burlington railway (or some other train company) on the otherside of us. We was squished in. But the price was right, $10 a night and all the electricity and water we could use. Well, we sure used our share and several other shares of electricity as it was hot and muggy and muggy and hot, and....well you know, warm and humid. We dropped the trailer and took a drive around this fine burg, found the cemetery we wanted, the Wal-Mart (I said it was a fine burg), and the Jones and Cattle Banks we came to see. It got dark, so we went back to the campground, which had one other traveling couple in it and some tent campers -yuk, across the way from us. It was way too hot and muggy to be camping outdoors. Of course, our satellite receiver didn't work, all tho it would get #110 satellite but not 119 which, as everyone knows and goes without saying, has all the best channels on it, like NASCAR and SPEED Network. I had another extended conversation with Dish Network that evening, in fact, I had a couple extended convos with the the morons without resolving anything except "the problem is obviously on my end of the system, it certainly cannot be on their end." We ran the TV antenna up and got a couple of local channels.

On Sunday, we drove around some more, got things ready for going to the library and court house on Monday and tried to find another cemetery called Greenwood. The only Greenwood we could find was in York, about 25 miles west of us. We took a nice drive there, saw lots of interesting stuff, but not the interesting stuff we were looking for, like graves of ancestors who have died and been buried. On our way back to Seward, we took a different route and came across the Seward County Historical Society building, so we stopped. Just as our luck was looking pretty darn good, the place was open on Sunday, but not after 5 pm. It was almost 630 pm. Oh well. The next day it would re-open was Thursday, like that's really gonna help us, we'll be long gone by then (but not long gone as in dead).

I colored someone's (and I mean Corinne) hair for her. It turned out pretty good, but turned green by Monday morning. But that's ok, because it all fell out by noon, so now I just call her "Cue Ball." I can't repeat what she calls me...lets just say it rhymes with "Sumb Dhit" It's so nice to have pet names for loved ones.

Monday, we roused ourselves late and got to the library probably around 10 or 11. Being retired lets us sleep in and be lazy lumps if we want. But, we did lose some valuable time at the library and Corinne was finding some pretty good stuff there, particularly in the Heritage Room (historical section) in which she had to be admitted by someone with a key, not just any key, but the Heritage Room key, and had to sign in and everything. Why sign in if you don't require to see some ID? We could of signed in under anyone's name, but we didn't. And besides, its just on a yellow pad that lays on the counter and anyone could take it. We were going to order a head stone for Corinne and Maurine's grandma, Courtney's mom, but decided to go to the monument place a cousin recommended. So we ended up driving 25 miles to Lincoln, NE to watch a movie. If you haven't seen the Simpson's movie, I highly recommend it. I found it to be very funny. Corinne on the otherhand said "she lives that life being married to me." I'll take that as a compliment!!!

Tuesday, we found out where the real Greenwood cemetery in Seward was located. It was right downtown in a small neighborhood, tucked away behind the weeping willows and oak trees. We found the markers we were looking for and a few we weren't. I think I found my new hobby...going to graveyards and looking for the odd and unusual grave markers. One I found said their family name was "Toogood." Toogood for what? Another read "Death robbed the marriage altar." Hmmmm, that one could be sad. Still, a couple of large monuments had the word "BYE" on them. I guess they were leaving and just wanted to let everyone know they died.

Tuesday morning Corinne hit the jackpot at the court house finding all kinds of probate records dating back to the 1850s. The court charged her 25 cents per page tocopy, that's the law. Too bad they wouldn't let her take the records to the library across the street 'cause they only charge 10 cents per page there. We're retired on a fixed income now. I never did understand that, everybody's on a fixed income. Although, a savings of 15 cents times 130 copies would have paid for the senior's breakfast for someone (and I mean Corinne) at Dennys.

We continued on toward the east and arrived in Des Moines late Tuesday evening. We tried to find a campground called Tom Mitchell Campground, but couldn't find it...at least not by the directions they gave in our RV Camping Directory. We ended up at Adventureland, parked between a casino and a roller coaster. And the rain came and came and came, not to mention the lightning and thunder that accompanied it. I don't know how long it rained for, but it wasn't raining in the morning. In fact, it was coool and just a bit humid when we packed up and pulled out of Adventureland, on the road again.

Wednesday, we went to Ames, IA and Iowa State University, formerly known as Iowa State College back in the olden days. My dad went there before going off t0 WWII and my grandpa, Edward Earl Mitchell, worked there as a custodian when Pop was a student. We went back to the campus bell tower where we deposited some of my dad's ashes a few years ago. It was a huge mistake to place his ashes there because that dang bell tower clock chimes every hour on the hour, 24 times a day. My dad didn't like noise and with my luck, I bet the ashes I put there contained his good hearing ear and that bell chime 24 times a day just....well, you can imagine what it probably did. Anyway, I attribute the bad karma I have to this one simple, single, innocent act a few years ago. Anyway, I scooped up a handfull of dirt and mulch and hopefully, no, I know I got some ashes, his good ear ashes, and put them in a plastic bag to take with me. We also checked out the bench across Lake Laverne where I also placed some of his ashes just to see if the bench was still there. Its a peaceful place and we are sure he is happy there looking at the lake and trees, even tho he'd rather be in a coffee shop talking to perfect strangers.

We went to the chuch where my grandpa, Edward Earl Mitchell married my grandma, Marcella Marie Byrnes in 1917 to see if we could find the marriage record and also Daddy-o's baptismal record. We hit pay dirt and found both those records and the baptismal records of Uncles Melvin and LeRoy and Aunt Marion. Really Cool! The church, St. Cecilia, has been long gone, with a new church built on the spot. We did get some pictures of the original church. After leaving the church, we went to the Ames library to look for old phonebooks to find addresses for Mitchell and Byrnes families. We got lucky and found addresses dating back to 1917 up to 1940 something. We drove around to find the houses and took photos of them. Only two houses were not there anymore. One was replaced by a bigger house and the other, where Pop lived while in college was "paved paradise and put up a parking lot" to quote the words of a famous song. I tell you, if we didn't have our Garmin GPS, the voice we call the "Queen" because of her English accent, we would still be looking for some of those addresses, even tho most were within just a couple of blocks from each other. The only bad thing about the "Queen" is, she doesn't always give the most direct route to the address. But, can we really criticize her, she is English you know. Now, if she was Scottish, that might be a different story (Hi! Mary Reilly).

We are now camped at the location noted in the first paragraph, I think. It is beautiful here. It is wide and open and green and tree-ey, and clean and just a very nice place. I think we will look for more like this place to stay. Just heard some thunder, so must be getting ready to rain again.

All for now. I know I have much more to tell, but that's what I get for not keeping up with my blog. Hope you enjoy.

Tell the yung-ins to mind their mammy and pappy.

Bobo

Thursday, August 2, 2007

Bob's Blah Blog:

Well, howdy! Today we hung around the coach til about noon, then went to the post office, Flying J for fuel, a credit union and A&W for lunch. They make a pretty good Papa burger there. Corinne had one with chili fries and a rootbeer float. I had a cheeeeze burger and fries and a big ol rootbeer. Yum Yum Yum.

Did you know the credit unions belong to a network and I can deposit money into my account via a credit union belonging to the same network. Pretty cool.

We went to the library today since Corinne had such good luck finding info yesterday. But, before we got to the library, I had to call MVD to find out why my dually is registered as a commercial vehicle, motor carrier and weight class. Finally, after about 20 minutes of waiting, I finally got some lowly state employee who could only tell me because my vehicle weight is listed at 15000 pounds gross, it has to be rated commercial, even if I don't use it for commercial businesses. After hanging up disgusted, I checked my original paperwork when the truck was first titled and it has 13000 pounds listed as the gross weight. Well, I guess someone (and I mean some lady at MVD) doesn't know what she is talking about with my vehicle. Does anyone have the phone number for Tom Clinkenbeard at MVD? I need to speak with him. Anyway, I guess I can't do anything about it until I get home. I might call them again to have them check their paperwork, tho.

Then, the other good news I learned today is our Nationwide Retirement Solutions aka Deferred Comp, closed our accounts after they transferred our money out of it. Now, we have our first installment sick leave buyback check being sent to them and we don't even have an account their. Guess who was on the phone with lots of people regarding this issue. I spoke with someone from the corporate office and they confirmed the account was closed. I told her how much I had supported and encourage state employees to join up with them for Def. Comp. and this is the thanks I got. I advised I had access to about 1000 state employee and was going to publish my dificulties with them and let the customer decide what they want to do. Unfortunately state employees don't have a choice of who they invest their def. comp monies with. I guess I'll also include ADOA, the Governor and the Dept. of Insurance in my addresses. We got a return call from someone named Wade from the Phx. office and he was completely sympathetic to our plight, but I doubt he really gave a darm since we didn't have any money in our accounts anymore. He said he would try to fix the problem. I told him I an concerned our check from ADOA will be held in limbo while they screw with me, like they did when we tried to move our money a couple of weeks ago.

Does anything ever get any better? If its not one thing, its another. I tried to trace my ancestory at the library, but I guess we came directly from venus and mars to earth, because there just aren't any tracks to be found for Mulvehill or Mitchell or ....? Corinne has lots of family, 1000's of names in her database, all I got is Bonzo the chimp. (Sorry to the rest of my known family but someone had to break the news to y'all).

Tomorrow we move eastbound. Next stop will probably be Cheyenne, then Omaha sometime over the weekend. So, you may not hear from us for a couple of days.

When you read this, please send me an email at offtherockerm@gmail.com so I can get a guage on who is reading this. Thanks.

Bobo

Wednesday, August 1, 2007 --- Continued

Bob's Blah Blog:


So, we left Walnut Grove on Sunday morning, bright and early, ok, 9:15 am. Our plan was to drive to Winemucca NV by way of Reno. Everything was going good until we got to the rough road up near Donner Pass. I think the road was rough because someone (and I mean Corinne) thought she saw bones in the road, left over from the Donner Party canibalization party in the 1800's or so. I got to admit, she had me believing her, but me thinks I was the heel of her joke, the butt of the funniness. When I almost had my finger on it, we had an elbow turn in the road and, headed back down the pass. Actually, I am not sure if the road was designed to be rough due to snow or if the vehicles with chains on their tires chewed up the concrete. All I know is it was one rough son of a gun.

We spent the night in Whineymucha, I mean Winnemucca. It actually wasn't too bad, they had a nice pool at the Good Sam, formerly a KOA campground. A bunch of teenagers came to use the pool and started splashing, so I had to introduce the youngest one to Mr. Drain. It was the only way I could think of to get their attention without having to tell them "don't get the redhead upset...I gots to go back to the coach with her."

Monday was a long drive to Salt Lake City. The weather was hot, nearly 98 degrees the whole way. The interesting part of the trip, other than Corinne driving, was the salt flats as you enter into Utah. The area goes some 36 miles of nothing but white salt and stagnate water. Getting back to Corinne driving, she had mentioned wanting to learn how to drive the "big rig" but only on the open road. So, about 50 miles outside of SLC, she got her chance. She did a great job, even driving in the city to the rv camp. The truck pulls the coach very well, and all one has to do is keep the wheels on the ground.

We got a nice parking spot at the campground, #922 for those of you keeping score at home. However, we have a tree just to the south of us, so we cannot use our Dish satellite, the very same one we had such fun with in Walnut Grove. Anyway, we sent the old one back to Dish today. I got a receipt from the UPS store so Dish can't screw me over by saying I never returned it. I got their number...tracking number, that is.

We have been spending most of the day at the Family History Library doing genealogy research. I don't gots no family...because I can'ts find nobody in the books. Corinne has found lots of stuff on her families, and really struck it rich today finding stuff on the McComases from NM and AZ.

When we got back to the coach last night after the library, there were some new neighbors parked across the road from us. Most of the boys didn't have shirts on, and one kid in particular looked like a refugee from the Nazi camps in Germany. He was so skinny he could have slipped into a pair of my undershorts (without me in them, of course) and put his whole body in one leg hole. Then the next day, he could switch leg holes and wear the shorts for another entire day...or more if he was so inclined.

The state capitol building here is under some major remodeling. As it stands now, it puts the AZ capitol building to shame. Talk about a nice exterior facade.

I had an absolutely terrible headache all day yesterday. It really only hurt when I was sitting down. Now normally, I would call that a pain in the arse, but it was in my head. When I would stand up and walk around, it still hurt, but not nearly as bad. Sitting down also made me feel like I wanted to vomit..that would have been pretty in the library now wouldn't it? Research that lunch and get back to me.

We will probably stay one more day in SLC to finish up some research, then move on. Either go east or north. Want to be in Seward, NE (near Omaha) during the week when the cemetary is open. We will go to a stone monument maker to make a headstone for Courtney's mother, Corinne and Maurine's grandma Harriett Tipton.

Showing photos on tv of the bridge collapse in Minnesota. What a mess. Glad we weren't there at that time.

Well, I guess that's all the news for now. I hope everyone is finding something of interest in these blogs. We try to keep them totally factual and interesting.

Hey, we got our ( and I mean mine and Corinne's) very first retirement checks today. They both went into my bank account. Yippee!!!, I knew if I hung around her long enough it would start to pay dividends. Now, the bad news is, ADOA lost Corinne's paperwork for the deposit of her first sick leave buyback check. How hard can it be??? Anyway, a telephone call and a verbal request got it handled. Sheeesh!!!

Bobo

Wednesday, August 1, 2007

Bob's Blah Blog:

Ok, some catching up to do. What we forgot to blog about were two things. After dropping Kevin and Kyle of at the camp, we drove down to Richmond, CA to go to lunch in Frisco. On the drive down, we stopped at the Infineion, Infinion, Infineon, or however it is spelled, racetrack. This is where Juan Carlos, or Juan Pablo or Juan somebody Montoya won the NASCAR road race a few weeks back. There were a mixture of cars racing around on the track when we were there. Corvettes, porches, mustangs, VW bugs (not really). We watched for awhile then left. Going into Richmond we crossed this big ol' bridge over the bay. Someone (and I mean Corinne) didn't like that idea very much. I talked about the recent earthquake in Oakland a few days earlier and someone (and I mean Corinne) didn't like that conversation any better. First, the girls (and I mean Corinne and Maurine) complain I don't talk enough when I drive, and now, someone (and I mean Corinne) says "I talks too much." A guy just hasn't a chance with a redhead.

The other thing to write about was when we were doing our first load of laundry in Walnut Grove, this guy came in wearing a Victory Junction Gang t-shirt. VJG is the place Kyle Petty (and I mean the son of the King, Richard Petty) built after the death of his son, Adam. It is for disabled kids to come and have fun at. Adam wanted to build something like this after visiting another place for disabled kids, but, Adam died in a car crash. Well, anyways, we got to talking with this guy and come to find out he is good friends with the Petty's and other racing drivers because he used to be on several of the racing crews and basically grew up in racing. He got to talking and telling stories about racing and the old days. He was pretty entertaining, and got emotional when he spoke about Adam Petty. He told one story about Richard Petty and friends out riding their motorcycles or quads or whatever on their farm land and some kid on a dirtbike came riding out of nowhere, passed them, then stopped and came back. He asked if that was Richard Petty sitting there on his machine and Richard said, "it is." The kid told Richard he was his favorite driver, then rode off on his motorcycle. Richard noted afterwards the kid was wearing a Dale Earnhardt t-shirt and said "those Earnhardt fans are everywhere."

All for now. Someone (and I mean Corinne) wants to use this computer to do some genealogy work. We are at the family history center in Salt Lake City.

Y'all tell ur momma I said "Hi."

Bobo