11-5-08 Wednesday (Winter Wonderland)

Snow! There's probably an inch of snow covering the Cherokee this morning. Snow covered tree branches are my favorite winter sight. It's so beautiful. Today we loaded up the Cherokee with the new cushions and drove to the RV place. We had a list of somethings we wanted to bring back to the hotel. We grabbed that stuff and put our cushions in place. We disassembled the booths further to get the fabric trim panels removed. We'll recover the 2 remaining cushions along with the trim panels. We're not sure if we'll use the same fabric or a coordinating fabric. The first set we did looks great so far. I took a before photo but forgot to take the after shot. Oooops. Jim talked to the technician working on the vehicle. They discussed the "done's" and the "to do's". The fiberglass repair is done. The new awning is up but the arms are white instead of the aluminum finish, so I'm not sure if we're gonna let that fly. They completed some other inside repairs as well.

Some photos from the hotel.

  

Jim is ready to remove snow with a kitchen utensil

Jim works on the snow.

He's almost there.

 

I made a wittle snowman.

I bent over to pickup something and Clea thought it a great time to cuddle.

Jag looks out the hotel window.

11-4-08 Tuesday (The Foam, Fabric and the Wardrobe)

Ahhhhh, it's started to snow. Right now it's at a chilly 38 and falling. I guess it's better to snow while we're not in the RV. The forecast says its not going to stick until tonight. Then again, they said its not going to snow until this afternoon, and since its morning, they're already wrong.

When we first used the new GPS we discovered the volume for the different voices available was lower than our first GPS. With the volume at 100% it was difficult to hear. We were ready to return the unit. When we got home, I Googled the volume issue and found some hacks to edit the voice volume. I backed up the original files and began hacking. The volume was much better. Yesterday, we found the GPS to have a speech impediment. As it gave directions, it would stutter. I thought perhaps I screwed it up. "Great", I thought, "we purchased a GPS that requires speech therapy". More fitting for us would have been a GPS with a lisp. (They have voice files on the Internet for a fee and one was a gay guy with a lisp.) Later in the evening, I found a manufacturer update to correct voice stuttering. I found the therapy! We'll see how it works today.

Today we purchased our foam and fabric for 4 cushions. We went to Joann's and it wasn't a superstore so their fabric selection was limited. Using a 40% off Internet printable coupon, we bought 5" foam. That coupon saved us $100! Next we went to Home Depot and bought some wood to use as the base, for something to staple it all to since we don't sew. At the next Joann's we bought fabric and batting, spent $3 (at the recommendation of the nice fabric cutting clerk) to buy a magazine that had 50% coupons in it. Our total supply cost was $250. We made 1 bottom and 1 back cushion so far. We'll check to make sure we like the fit before we make the others. I'll take photos when it's done.

We finished dinner and just had some sleet. For you native southerners, sleet, to meteorologists in the United States, consists of frozen raindrops that hit the surface as little ice pellets.

Ladies, ladies, I spotted this woman at Wal-Mart today. Yeah, we were shopping at Wal-Mart, but that's not the highlight here. It would be this lady, wearing a blanket. It was awful. Don't do it! Save the blankets for the beds!

11-3-08 Monday (Violated)

There's times when animals are so smart, it's not cute. Clea acts like she's starving. She meows and purposely misbehaves until she's been fed. She'll jump on the counter, meowing, and taunting us. "You need to reevaluate your morning priorities", she meows. We yell, "Get down!" repeatedly to which she seems to laugh at. An inconvenience factor is created. Clea makes us get up off our asses to try and remove her by force, only to jump down when we get within the 1 foot radius. "Since you're already up, why not feed me?", she glares. Do I feed her at that point? No, now it's time for me to be stubborn. A kind of "you're not the boss of me" attitude that restrains me from giving in. I want to wake up. Is it so terrible of me to want that wake-up time? Piss off!

Jim barely talks to me in the mornings until I've had a cup of coffee. He's learned over the years that we wake up differently. When he awakes, he's the spring to life, ready to take on the world type. Me? I'm the lethargic Ogre type. It's been a long time since he's tried talking to me about finances just as I sat down to my first cup of coffee. In more recent years, we exchange good mornings and that's it until it appears that I may give a crap about world peace and where we can get milk cheaper.

We stopped at a WaMu today. Their bank is impressive. There's no teller windows, just podium type desks for each teller. Of course I was inquisitive about its setup and asked a few questions. If a customer gets cash back, the receipt prints a code. The customer walks over to a cash disbursement machine and keys in the code. Out pops the cash and any change. If a customer deposits cash, the teller drops it into a slot at their desk. It was more service customer oriented and ahead of its time. Our teller, Katie, was very informative as you can see.

We got the new GPS today and then had the glass replaced in the Cherokee while we had breakfast at Denny's.  While I prefer Perkins over Denny's, we weren't too picky being we had to hoof it.

I've suspended the ads on my blog.  I've been reading that Google violated it's own terms of service.  Adsense by Google states this as one of their violations.
Violent content, racial intolerance, or advocacy against any individual, group, or organization
If you're asking, "huh?", read this link about Proposition 8 ads.

We stopped by the RV repair place today to get a few things out of the rig. It didn't seem like they've done too much but really they've only had it for 2 full days.  I guess being in the hotel over a weekend makes us feel as repairs are taking longer.  Since the Cherokee break in, I'm sort of uneasy.  Next door seems to have a lot of traffic in and out of their room.  Yeah, maybe drugs, who knows.  It seemed like a nice place when we booked here.  As Jim and I walked out the door for a smoke, an older man was next to our Cherokee and seemed startled and walked away to his Cherokee which was parked next to ours.  I marched over with anger and inspected our vehicle, and also moved it to a closer recently empty spot.  I theorized that since he was on his cell phone, maybe he didn't realize he had walked up to the wrong Cherokee.

It's time for bed.  The water here will be off 11-2 tomorrow, I guess for some repairs or something.  Hopefully we'll get moving in time to gets showers and be able to get out of here for a while.

11-2-08 Sunday (Stranded In The Rain)

This morning started off pretty rough. Jim found the passenger front window of the Cherokee in fragments leading to a stolen GPS. We should have known better to take the GPS out especially with the kind of characters we've seen walking around here. Jim called the insurance company, we have a $250 deductible and it won't cover missing items. Sigh. We have a black cloud hanging over our head - literally. It hasn't rained here for the weeks we've been in Utah, until today - of course. We got a big trash bag from the office and covered it as best we could. Being a Sunday is the other unfortunate thing. Naturally, everything we'd need for today is closed. Glass replacement - closed. Rental car company - closed.

It's all my fault. I think it was yesterday that I said we should have gotten the more expensive GPS with more features. The good thing, is that now I'll get my wish. The bad thing is it will cost $250 (deductible) + new GPS ($300) so we'll now have a $550 GPS. I found the model I like (Garmin Nuvi 750) for the lowest price at Sam's and Costco for $300. Sam's seems to stock it, Costco doesn't. Wal-Mart was even a little cheaper but we'd have to wait until Tuesday to get it. With us being out-of-towners, a GPS seems like a necessity anymore.

We've worked out so many ways to get a rental, my head is spinning. Local rental offices are closed. Enterprise at the airport won't pick us up. Bus rides would be under 2 hours. Cab rides are $45.00. I guess it will have to be a Sunday in the hotel, with rain.

The mountain view from the hotel was interesting. The clouds seemed heavy and unable to make it over the mountains. I took a few pictures.

11-1-08 Saturday (Enlargements)

Happy November! At the time I started typing this, we've gotten 2 comments on yesterday's blog. It's VERY easy to post a comment WITHOUT having any account.

1. Click on "X comments made, click here to see or post"
2. Instructions are above the comment form to remind you.
3. Type your comments in. (duh)
4. Select Name/URL as your identity.
5. Type name into name field, leave URL blank.
6. Click "Publish Your Comment".
7. Take a nap (optional), maybe substituted with "sigh".

We love comments! Here's a screen shot of the comment form:
  Last night we watched 2 movies on TNT back to back until 3am. That's unusual for us since while we've been RVing we don't normally watch TV nor do I stay awake that long anymore. The movies were good, but the commercials got lamer and lamer as the evening went on. Sometimes the same penis enlargement pill commercial was shown twice in 1 commercial break and then every break thereafter. Let's not forget how texting your birthdate will give you a reply of your soul mate's name for $20.00 a month (according to the small print). Then there's the bimbo 900 numbers for us to call. So many options, who should I call first?

It was another laid back day for Jim and I.  We managed to get to Wal-Mart.  The highlight for us was at Albertsons where we only paid $2.35 a gallon. Yay!  It was almost a pleasure to fill the tank.

Tonight's menu consisted of burgers. No, no, I didn't cook, we went to Applebee's.  For desert, we browsed TJ Maxx (dumpy store) and Old Navy.  We left without spending money.  A nice change.

Another cute pose by Dasher and Clea today:

Sorry, this is all I have for you today......