RV Looking Tomorrow

Unless the weather is really awful tomorrow I think I'll go look at RVs.  I think I'll look at Class C's this time and test drive one or two.  I realize this picture is of a Class B, but I was really tempted to buy it a couple years ago. I'm glad I didn't because I don't think there's enough room.  As you can see, there's no basement storage. I think this type of RV would work better for quick weekend jaunts than full-timing.  

It drives me crazy when I go to an RV dealership and the sales people won't leave me alone. This guy wouldn't get out of the way, obviously, when I was taking pictures.  If this were mine, my dog would be laying (lying?) down in the narrow aisle and I'd be stepping over him to get from the front to the back.  Not fun.

This is a slow news day for me.  We had a lovely sunny day and I decided to prepare bowling balls outside so that I can continue decorating them as yard art.  A good friend of mine is turning 65 on Sunday and I think I'll decorate one for her yard.  She loves aqua so I spray painted the ball today and I'll get started with the beads shortly.  Yes, it's going to be late because I just decided to do it today and it takes me longer than two days to complete one. She just returned from a 48 day cruise to Australia and I'm excited to hear how it was.  She said she'd call me when she recovered and that was Monday, so her recovery time must be taking awhile.  

More sunshine please,

Jeana

Family Veterans

I'd like to dedicate this post to the Veterans in my family...my father, my son Jason, my daughter-in-law Melanie.  My father began his career as a Private in the Army Air Corps, where he learned to fly, and retired from the Air Force as a Lt. Col.  He was a Pearl Harbor survivor.  My son, also Air Force, has been to conflicts in Bosnia, Kuwait, Iraq and Afghanistan.  My daughter-in-law has been to Iraq.  I think that now is a tough time to be a parent of a child in the military, let along being that child.  However, what I've learned from my son is that his deployments were always harder on me than they were on him!!  Thank you dad, Jason and Melanie.  I also want to thank all the Veterans in our country and their parents.

Dad in WWII

Melanie and Jason prior to dad's funeral

Out of Scanning Space

I reached 999 pictures/slides scanned and couldn't scan any more.  I was not too happy.   This happened last night and, fortunately, I had an appointment today at the Apple Store for a One to One Session with my favorite helper.  I planned my whole day around the 11:00 appointment.  I show up at 11:00 and they have no record of an appointment for me.  I found my helper and went and talked to him and he helped solve the problem...our appointment is next week.  Someone else had cancelled so then I was able to get in at Noon today.  I was so relieved because I don't want to stop scanning.  So I had an hour to kill now but "luckily" I'm at a mall and there's lots of things to check out. 

I didn't realize there was a Verizon store there and decided to go in and pay my bill.  I also didn't realize that my bill was due to today, I thought it was tomorrow because I appear to be a day behind.  Or am I a week early?  

Depends on the store.  I got my scanner problem solved when I went back to the Apple Store and have already scanned in about 100 more slides.  I'm enjoying myself looking at the pictures and I'm bored doing the scanning cause it takes forever.  Yesterday while I was scanning I decided to continue decorating another  bowling ball at the same time.  I have a stop watch so I timed how long it took to scan four slides and then worked for that amount of time on the bowling ball.  They're in separate rooms so I was back and forth every three minutes and I think my dog thought I was nuts.  He eventually quit  following me from room to room and just settled in my office.

That's all for today.  Even though it was a gorgeous sunny day today I want it to continue so,

More sunshine please,

Jeana

The Day After Meltdown

First...welcome to my blog Sharon, Kimberly and Jeanne...just in time for my first meltdown.  More than likely the first of many.


One of the things I didn't mention yesterday that I think was a huge piece of the meltdown was the Magellan motorhome in San Diego that fits the bill of what I want, except for price.  I've talked to one of the sales people a couple times about different scenarios of me buying the Magellan while living in Seattle.  Turns out I was really stressing myself out about that particular motorhome, i.e., its location, as in, do I fly down there and check it out?; I don't want to learn to drive a Class A in a city I'm not familiar with; I don't want to drive over any mountain passes this time of year; and on and on and on ad nauseum.  I've decided to pass on the San Diego motorhome and I feel so relieved.  


Thanks for all the comments yesterday...they were all helpful and I really appreciate the feedback.  What a group of people you/we are!!


In taking care of myself today I went and worked out, went to Panera Bread afterwards with five ladies from the work out group (I drank water, no bagel), and the best of all...I got a massage!!!   The repetitive motion of shredding pictures after I scanned them has created a problem in my left shoulder and neck so I'm supposed to switch arms.  Fortunately, now that I'm scanning slides there is no shredding.  


Question:  How do you tell a dog used to eating at 5:00 (he comes searching for me at 5:00) that 5:00 is now 4:00 so it isn't time to eat?  


I'm going to continue scanning pictures into my computer and downsizing.  I think I'll take a trip somewhere sunny and warm within the next three months or when I hear snow in the forecast in the Seattle area...by airplane!!  Maybe I'll follow Cruzin2some's example and have a garage sale or three.  I've offered to let them spread their expertise around and help me out, but I think they're ignoring me (which I totally understand).  


I'm happy to be part of the RV community and I'm loving reading about your adventures.  


More sunshine please,


Jeana






  

What Am I Thinking?

Today I'm wondering what this is all about...RVing full time, that is.  I have my heart set on a motorhome (the one pictured above) because of the great floor plan.  However, the thought of driving a Class A puts terror in my heart.  Why would I have my heart set on something that scares me so much?  Am I trying to sabotage myself before I even get started?


I must have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed this morning because I'm not able to think about a single positive thing about full timing.  Why would I want to leave this house I've spent so much time fixing up?  I think part of the answer is fear.  I know what to expect from my life right now. It's predictable...and boring.  


If I live as long as my dad did I have 29 more years to live. I'm a lot healthier than he was so maybe I have more years...or less, who knows? So I ask myself, do you want to spend the next 29 years in the same house doing essentially the same thing every day to get through the day?  My answer is a resounding NO. 


OK, let's look at the big picture...reasons for and against a motorhome: 


Reasons to buy a motorhome:
1.  I don't know when/if the blankets were washed at the hotel(s).
2.  I can drink as much water as I want because the bathroom is nearby.
3.  Life won't be predictable and boring.
4.  I'll meet lots of new people, online and on the road.
5.  If I don't like where I'm at I can go find another place.
6.  It will add excitement to my life.
7.  I can get away from the traffic noise where I'm living now.


Reasons not to buy a motorhome:
1.  Fear of driving.
2.  Possible loneliness while on the road.
3.  Fear.
4.  Feeling stuck is actually OK no matter what anyone says.
5.  Fear.
6.  I was braver when my son was along the first time and now I'm alone.


Questions and/or Concerns:
1.  Should I tow my SX90 SUV or store it somewhere?
2.  Do I want to store my SUV?
3.  Should I look at Class C's instead of Class A's?
4.  Should I get another fifth wheel?
5.  Do I want to full time?
6.  Do I want to stay stuck?




I'm feeling nervous about posting this.  But I believe that I'll get responses back from people who dealt with the same fears and overcame them.  If I don't talk, or in this case, write about the fears, I think they'll just get bigger and bigger and paralyze me into doing nothing.  That's not OK. 

Daylight Savings Time...Grrr

Welcome StrawBoss, my latest follower.  It appears we have a Tucson connection and I love those connections.   The title of this post doesn't apply to you because you're in Arizona.  I'm no longer there so I have to put up with it.  

Question...did anyone else notice that the time on your cell phone and computer was adjusted automatically?  Does anyone else besides me find that somewhat disconcerting?  Right now it's 11:21AM.  Yesterday at this time it was 12:21PM.  Which is the "right" time?  Does it even matter? Probably not, I just find it irritating.  

OK, something really positive I forgot to mention about the external hard drive.  I don't know if this applies to all of them but I found out that if I delete something by mistake and notice it a day later (or longer), I can go back into the external hard drive and reset my computer to a time before I deleted whatever and get it back.  I think that's great.  

I'm already redoing the motorhome I haven't located or bought yet.  I learned from a couple other bloggers that the interior can be repainted.  I don't know why I didn't think of that myself, but why not?  Want different furniture? Why not?  See the two chairs on the right in the motorhome picture?  I don't want them.  Gone.

I want to replace them with this chair and fountain.  The chair will be reupholstered first, though.  I'm hoping the fountain won't be too large.  It isn't too heavy so I don't think that will be a problem.  And maybe when I find the motorhome I'll find out this isn't a good idea.  But right now I like it.

The sun is out and yet I want...

More sunshine please,

Jeana

Book Packing

Welcome Patti C. as my latest follower.  I can't tell if you have a blog or not for me to plug, so I'll just say welcome.

I haven't scanned any pictures yet today because I had appointment at the Apple Store to help me with my new external hard drive.  My one hour appointment turned into a two hour appointment and Brian, the young man who helped me, was the best helper I've ever worked with.  We've scheduled another get together for next week.  I've had my Mac for two years and I know I haven't been using it to its full potential, but I haven't enjoyed the previous helpers and kind of drifted away from the One to One sessions.  Unfortunately, the store is located in a mall and I usually avoid malls like the plague, especially on weekends.  It was hard to find a place to park, it was crowded and noisy, so I made sure to schedule our next appointment during the week.  

FYI to other external drive owners.  A couple of you made comments on previous blogs that you are also using external drives and I want to let you know what Brian, Apple Store, said about external drives.  He said that it's also a good idea to download pictures to a DVD-R.  Reason?  Because they can be stolen along with your computer (happened to a customer of his) and they can also go bad like hard drives on our computer.  So, DVD-Rs are on my shopping list.  Maybe that's the way I should have started, it would have been cheaper.   

So what did I do instead of scan pictures?  I sorted through books.  I went into this project telling myself that I can't hang onto all the books I have, they won't fit in the RV, and many of them haven't been opened in forever. That alone is a good reason to get rid of them.  Aaaaand, I'm retired now and the books that are job related are no longer necessary, which most of them are.  It's still a hard thing to do...get rid of books.  I also found quite a few more pictures to scan.  When I was in the garage looking for boxes to put the books in to take to the second hand store, I managed to locate the box with all the slides in.  

Speaking of books, I have a concern about books and RVing full time.  I'm always reading a book and I'm wondering what to do when I'm on the road. Now I get all my books from the library because it's so much cheaper. At home I read books and in the car I listen to books on tape.  I'd like to continue with the books on tape when I'm driving to my next destination and I go through withdrawal if I don't have a book.   Any ideas or suggestions?

I think I'm feeling brain dead from all the computer knowledge I packed into my brain today. So, I'm going to close for now.

More sun please,

Jeana