Third Time.... Was Not the Charm

After ordering furniture and having it delivered, we then began to think about lamps. The lamps at the furniture stores were too pricey. I have ordered a few things from Wayfair, and I found a few lamps that I liked, so I placed my order.

Image from Wayfair 

Image from Wayfair

The lamps arrived within a few days. The good news is that the Mister liked the bird lamp, even though he wasn't a fan of it in the online picture. The bad news is that the glass lamp was broken. I went to the Wayfair site to report the damage. I submitted pictures of the broken lamp and within seconds of pushing "enter" I had a message that a replacement lamp was on its way. 

A few days later I received a message from Fed Ex, reporting that a package they were delivering had met with an unfortunate incident and they were notifying the shipper. Shortly after I received a message from Wayfair that a replacement lamp was on its way.

I received a call from Fed Ex a few days later. Uh oh! I immediately asked, "Did you break my lamp again?!" The employee was a bit nonplussed, and explained that he was calling for the driver who was trying to deliver the lamp on a Saturday to our RV resort. The resort's office was already closed, and he wanted to know what the driver should do. Since I was not at the RV resort I asked if it could be redelivered to our new home. No problem!

And of course, when the lamp arrived, it too was broken. Perhaps the driver tossed it down in frustration at not being able to deliver it as it was addressed!

By this time I decided that the lamp was never going to arrive in one piece. I called Wayfair. They offered to have it double packed. I suggested they send a different lamp instead. The employee was most apologetic, and even gave me a discount. A few days later, the replacement of the three broken lamps arrived in one piece! Finally!

The Devil Finds Work for Idle Hands

or

"The Devil made me do it!"

You may recall that we Dreamers were stranded in Florida waiting for a windshield, and then for medical tests and their results. OK, so I did take a brief sojourn to California by myself. But, before that we had a lot of time when almost everyone had left our resort and no activities were scheduled, and it was too darn hot to do much outside. We aren't shoppers (in the usual sense). I'm not much for sun bathing or hanging out at the pool.  I entertain myself with painting, writing and sewing, but after a while, participating in those pastimes is awkward and/or confining on the motorhome. We had cabin fever and needed to get out. So, get out we did. We went to look at model homes here and there. We both knew that at some point in the future we would want to take the wheels away and have a real home some place in Florida. We took this opportunity to see what was out there ,and where. We visited a number of developments, and walked through many homes. A lot of them were lovely. Many of them were well beyond our budget. Some were too far out in the countryside. Many were in congested traffic areas. Some homes were too close to others.

Then, we found it. The house was Perfect... with a capital "P"! We knew it the minute we walked into it. First, the house had an extended 3-car garage, so there would be plenty of room for the Mister's workshop. Second, one of the bedrooms was 15' X 12'. Wow! My longarm sewing machine will fit, and then some! The house is in Babcock Ranch, the first solar-powered "city". The first homes became available just over a year ago, so the community is still new, and everyone is open to meeting new people and forming new friendships. The developer has grandiose plans for this "city", with shops, meeting places, sports opportunities and even a school. It is beginning to grow quickly.

After much discussion we decided that we liked the idea of this community. All the people we met were very friendly. We like that this isn't limited to 55 years of age and over. Most of the homes on this street are owned by snowbirds. Thus we have similar interests. However, it's fun to see the kids. We like the idea of being in on the ground floor instead of coming into an established community. We might have an opportunity to shape what the community will have to offer. The community is going to be huge, with a 5-year or longer buildout. (Constant construction is a downfall, however) We like that the house is just under a mile from the main entrance. We won't have to drive miles through a community to get to our home. The house is close to a community clubhouse, pool, and a walking trail that leads to a dog play area. After many visits to the sales models and discussions with the builder's representative, and consideration of building the same home on a different lot, we decided to buy the house.

We closed in September, and began moving things into the home when we returned to Florida. Before leaving the area for California we did order some furniture. This season we will participate in events at the RV resort and in our new community, as we can easily go back and forth and spend a night here or there. We will probably sell the motorhome in the spring. We also talked about selling the house in California, as we no longer need something that large. However, we discovered how much we love that location, too. Perhaps we'll revisit that again next year. Who knows. Obviously, we don't! We didn't even know we were going to consider buying a house in Florida this year!

Recently the furniture arrived. We thought we bought a lot. We still need so much more! However, we do have spots for folks to sit, and the empty house echo has gone, so we can take our time and have fun finding the perfect pieces(s)!

Another day dawns... who knows what this day will bring!

WEP Entry: Alcoholic Annihilation

Writing Challenge for October - WEP + IWSG

Here is my Horrible Harvest:

Golden orbs, a blush of pink on their cheeks, sway and bob from branches of the ancient, gnarled apple trees. The sweet smell of freshly mown grass rises from the earth and the cicada chorus tunes its tymbals to accompany the sun’s descent. Dusk’s deepening colors splash playfully on the fruit, filtered by the leaves of the trees in the orchard. 

The scene is idyllic . The sort that plein air painters capture on their canvases. The day’s end in fall;  the clear blue sky blending to purple, with washes of red and gold; cooling night air a portent of winter to come. The scene is deceptively sweet. Deceitful.

As nightfall advances a curious phenomenon occurs; sugars produced by the sun and stored in the apples combine with naturally produced yeast on the skin of the fruit. Fermentation begins. The fruit exposed to more sunlight during the day, on the upper branches and those on the southern side of the trees, are the first to ripen, and the first to become noticeably tipsy and silly. 

The orchard fills with sounds of mirth, the volume increasing to eclipse the music of the cicadas as evening stars march into their places in the sky. The moon arcs across the sky; the party escalates in cacophonic splendor. Less inebriated fruit duck under leaves within the trees’ branches, fearing the loss of control of their comrades and the resulting consequences. They’ve seen it all before. 

More alcohol is distilled within the most exposed fruit and tempers flare. Nasty comments rent the air. Ugly, harsh voices snarl and screech. Emily Post filters of etiquette and reasonableness fall to the ground, along with the first colored, withered leaves of autumn. 

The fruits bob on their stem tethers trying to turn hateful words into hurtful actions. Biting words turn into blows when one fruit manages to reach another. Heavy, wet plops echo throughout the orchard as drunken fruits smash to the ground, pulpy and brown, releasing an odor of apple cider that has turned. The fruit within the inner sanctum cringe at the bawdy behavior, wanting to disassociate themselves from the horrid show of inebriated excess. They sense the coming terror, with anxious tightness in their cores, wondering when they themselves will lose control and plunge to a pulpy end. The raucous noise slowly abates, turning to muttered epithets as sounds soften with the first blush of daylight. Actions slow, and with the exception of an occasional guttural grunt, a somnolent snore and soft mutterings, all is quiet. The sun’s first rays focus on sweating fruit, seemingly from a heavy dew, hanging languidly on the branches. The cloying sweet smell of alcohol rises with the morning mist. Throughout the orchard smashed bodies, oozing sticky wetness and attracting numerous buzzing insects, are mounded in the grass casting long shadows across the ground.  

The sun rises. The light intensifies, beginning the cycle of destruction anew.

Word Count: 486

Feedback is always welcome.

Five Hundred Miles (Times Six) and Then Some

It's our annual migration. You might say we are on a "repositioning cruise"!
We left the San Francisco Bay area and began our trek to SW Florida. The distance is over 3,000 miles. How many miles over is dependent on the exact route we take and how many side trips we manage along the way.

Here are a few highlights of our trip:

Tehachapi, CA (Day 1)

• Of course, meeting my blog friend, Inger was a huge highlight.
• Seeing the trains on the Tehachapi Loop was very special.

Seligman, AZ (Day 2)

• We stopped here, but didn’t have the energy to go into this historic Route 66 town. The campground host implied that there wasn’t much to see. The weather was cold and very windy. 
• Oh. My. Stars! When I took the dogs out for their evening walk I was treated to the most beautiful evening show of stars. Having lived in an RV resort with street lights, and a neighborhood in California with lights, such that I don’t even need a flashlight at night, I was stunned by the spectacle. It’s been a long time since I lived without light pollution and could see the amazing heavens!

Albuquerque, NM (Day 3)

• We passed this interesting building near Williams, AZ. This is the Kadampa Buddhist Temple. This is one of five International retreat centers for the study of modern Kadampa Buddhism. In Flagstaff, no less! 

• We try to get off the road by 3:30, or after 330 miles, especially on this long trip. We hit two construction zones outside of Gallup, NM that slowed us down. We were surprised at how much time they took off our trip as we got into the park in Albuquerque around 4:30. It wasn’t until the next morning that we dumb Dreamers realized we had changed time zones, and all of our time instruments had automatically adjusted when we weren’t paying attention! For all intents and purposes, we did get in at 3:30!!
• I discovered this black and red blister beetle at our campsite in Albuquerque. The bugs give off a toxin that can create blisters on your skin. In researching the beetle I found an interesting Navajo story. The bug is also called a Navajo Pot Carrier or a Water Carrier. Some of the bugs have rounded abdomens that look like Indian pots and oral traditions have a complex story to tell about the beetle. 

 Shamrock, TX (Day 4)

• On our drive we saw many, many RV’s. The most unusual, however, was an Airstream painted to look like a duffle bag. It was the Lands’ End trailer on its Heritage Tour. They were heading to the balloon festival in Albuquerque. 

This is the only picture of the trailer I could find on the Internet.
Luckily, we weren't driving in snow!

• We stopped at the Texas Route 66 RV Park, a small campground along the highway. The owners are delightful. They bought the campground a year ago and are working hard to make improvements. I like finding places like this, and returning to see how things change over time. I wish the new owners well in their venture.
• Texas has stickers and tarantulas! The grass at the Shamrock campground was recently mowed, but it still had all kinds of stickers that found their way into Tucker’s and Gypsy’s coats. I began taking the brush on walks with me to save my fingers from getting poked! While I was out walking the dogs, the Mister spied two tarantulas; a he and a she! They had a quick affair, she returned to her home in a small tunnel in the grass, and he ventured on.

• The rain in Texas was all our fault. We washed the accumulated dirt and grime from the storage yard off of the trailer in Albuquerque. So, of course that would bring rain.  We enjoyed the drumming of rain on our roof, and in the morning there was only a narrow band of rain right over us. As we began our morning trek to the east, we quickly left the rain behind. Thank goodness!

Historic landmark: Tower Service Station and U-Drop Inn

Alma, AR (Day 5 & 6)

• We always struggle to find a nice campground in this area. I found an interesting campground in Arkansas “Wine Country”, amidst several wineries. It was basically a dirt parking lot with hookups. The Mister didn’t want to drive that far to sit in a dirt parking lot (It was another 40 miles beyond Alma). So, I fell back on one we’ve used in the past. Last year we had a terrible experience. The campground encourages the guests to write reviews on various Internet sites, and even provides directions about how to do so. Instead of leaving a bad review, I sent an email, suggesting they wouldn’t want to see what I’d write. I informed them of some of the problems we had. So, fast forward to this year. I called to make a reservation. When I gave my name the woman evidently looked me up and their was some sort of “flag” on my name. She said she needed to so some research and would get back to me. I was fearful that they would refuse to allow us to come this year. A bit later she called and apologized for the problems we had last year and said they’d like to give us a discount for our visit this year. What a surprise. We still aren’t enamored with the campground, but it was kind of them.
• More sparkles in the night! The only flashlight in the trailer that works is a headlamp. So, after dinner I donned my “miner’s lamp” and took the dogs out for their evening walk. Oh, my! I had forgotten about the reflections one sees from spiders in the grass. Ugh! Then, I almost walked into a spider dangling from a tree. No stars here, but plenty of sparkles.
• We decided to spend an extra day and get some much needed R & R. We ventured into Fort Smith and visited the Fort Smith Museum of History, located in the 1906 Atkinson-Williams Warehouse, which once operated as a hardware store, soda fountain and pharmacy. We also visited the Fort Smith National Historic Site, which had another excellent museum. From there we stopped by the Ft. Smith Trolley Museum. The “Mister” enjoyed chatting with the docents as he used to volunteer at the Denver trolley. So even though we didn’t do a whole lot of resting, we did enjoy a nice change of pace, and an excellent lunch at the Bricktown Brewery. I had to try the sweet potato fries with caramel, sea salt and bacon. Oh. My! 

This was one of my favorite exhibits. These are life-size leaves that were carved out of the wood of that sort of tree. 

These are 5 tree samples from the Jesup Wood Collection that included 455 specimens
and was unveiled at the Museum of Natural History in New York in 1880.

My lunch!

Ft Smith

A replica of the gallows, where 86 people were hanged from 1873 to 1896  in this town on the border of the frontier.

Tupelo, MS (Day 7)

• We are in the south, after all. I guess temperatures above 90 are to be expected. We were all feeling sluggish from the heat.

Chattahoochee, FL (Day 8)

• We made it to our home state. Hooray! We stayed at a clean, no frills, family run campground. Over 300 trees were lost because of Hurricane Michael. The owner of the campground also owns a heavy-equipment company, so cleanup was quick and thorough. 

North Fort Myers, FL (Day 9)

• We broke our 330 rule (driving 330 miles or stopping by 3:30 PM, whichever comes first), by continuing on to North Ft Myers. We drove 426 miles, but due to an early start, actually made it in well before 3:30... so I guess we didn't break our rule after all! 
• We spent one last night in the Airstream, then the next day, got everything settled with the motorhome, unloaded the Airstream and put it up for a rest in our storage unit.

Now our winter adventures begin!

Blog Friends

If you haven't blogged, you might not get it. Some of my face-to-face friends don't get it. Many times, while engaged in a conversation, I'll respond with something I learned or heard about from one of my friends... a "blog friend". My face-to-face friends sometimes give me quizzical looks. As they are not bloggers, they don't realize that many of us "follow" other bloggers, and get to know them as true friends, through our online connections. We share our life events and they share their's and we know many facets of their lives. Just like happens with a face-to-face friend.

It's similar to other social media, but we began our connection as total strangers. While reading a friend's blog post, I might see a comment from another blogger, or I might see a link to another blog on a side bar of a blog friend's page. I find my self "hop-scotching" from blog post to blog post. When I stumble upon a blog that interests me, I'll follow the blog, and when time permits, return and read more posts. Readers have an option of commenting on blog posts, and the blogger can return comments. In this way, we sometimes get a small conversation going. When I follow a new blogger, that blogger may check out my blog, and begin to follow my posts. I have been blog friends with quite a few bloggers for nine years! Those friendships run deep!

On rare occasions my interactions have jumped off the Internet page. I shared letters and packages with a few bloggers. I've stopped in my travels to meet a few others. It is all very rewarding. 

Recently I knew my travels would take me near a very special blogger named Inger. She first blogged about the Tehachapi Railroad Loop in 2011. On our route from California to Florida last year, we drove right by the loop. I was beyond excited... and filled the Mister in on the loop, and he, having cut his eye teeth on the railroad, became enthused. This year, I (being in charge of the route we drive) planned for us to stop in Tehachapi on our first night of travel. I wanted him to see trains climbing the loop, and maybe see the front of the train cross over the back. I wanted to meet Inger!

I've always felt a kinship with Inger. She is Swedish. My mother was Swedish. Inger loves the open spaces where she lives, and finds beauty everywhere. I feel the same way. Inger loves dogs, and I do, too!

Everything worked out perfectly. We had a nice drive from our California house to a campground next to a glider airport in the delightful town of Tehachapi, CA. (I was hoping we’d see gliders, but it was too windy.)  After walking the dogs and setting up camp, we took off for the loop.  We were just in time to catch a train coming down the pass.  It was remarkable to see the train loop around the hillside, turn and enter a sloping decline to a tunnel that goes under the back of the train. This is a one-of-a-kind engineering marvel that was constructed in 1876, and that is still used today by an average of 40 trains each day.

This train is going uphill. The locomotives are almost dead center in the picture. They are moving to the right. You can see a change of color in the grass just above the engines. That is where the trains emerge, also moving to the right, having come through the tunnel that is not visible in the picture.
It was to watch.

Although I took a number of pictures and videos from the hillside, it's hard to truly see the ingenuity of the loop. This overhead shot looking up the canyon gives a better perspective. We were standing on the hillside on the upper right of this picture.

Courtesy of the Thayer School of Engineering

Here is a link to a youtube video of a long training going around the loop, if this sort of thing is exciting to you! It's OK to be excited! When we were at the loop a 10 year-old boy was jumping up and down and squealing in excitement! A fellow who has lived in Tehachapi all of his life brought a visitor up to see the loop and said he's come hundreds of times, and he always gets a kick out of seeing the trains!

 https://youtu.be/yZCYhP1D4O4

The next morning we went into the town to meet Inger for breakfast. Inger writes "Desert Canyon Living". It was so nice to spend some time visiting face to face. We plan to come back next year, and spend a few days to see Inger, meet her dogs, Faith and Samson, and see more of the things Inger has written about on her blog. Tehachapi is quite the place!

Dreaming, the Mister, Inger