Day 104

We got back home to Austin today. I'm getting better at backing the trailer next to the garage. It took less than half and hour.

As soon as we got the trailer parked we went to the post office. We didn't have much mail. That surprised me. I miss the magazines the most.

We also went to the grocery store. It was 77 degrees today. They predict a temperature of 36 tomorrow afternoon. Apparently the cold snap will last for the rest of the week. It's supposed to get into the teens in a couple of days and might snow. There's no way I'm going to be on the roads here if it snows.

I spent the evening watching episodes of Spartacus. I love to watch the heads roll. I also like to watch the scheming.

Day 103

We drove to Fort Stockton today. Traffic through El Paso sucked. It seems that you are driving through that town forever. I think that at least 20 miles of I-10 is in the urban area.

We tried to fuel up at the east side of town. We stopped at Flying J, but they were remodeling and didn't have any RV pumps - only truck ones. I couldn't get into the Love's across the street. The trucks were stacked up onto the street and nothing was moving. I finally had to drive back across the freeway to a Petro. The problem was that Ellen left the truck at Flying J and I couldn't stay there to wait for her. She ended up walking over to the Petro.

The park at Ft Stockton is nice. It doesn't have cable and we're to lazy to set up the dish. However there are 11 on air channels available. About half of them are in Spanish. That should be illegal.

Day 102

On the road again. It was 389 miles from Ben Avery to Deming. There was a little traffic through Phoenix, but other than that it was a smooth trip. I even lucked out at the two fuel stops. At one access was super easy and there was a place waiting when we pulled in. At the other the place was crowded, but the space we needed opened up just as we got there.

There was a tail wind crossing New Mexico, so we got almost 14 mpg for the last 60 miles.

When we got to Deming we did the wash. Clean underwear for the first time in three days. I also unhooked in order to top off the fuel tank. We actually found a couple of relatively low priced stations. Most of the stations in Deming are outrageous. One wanted $3.79/gal for diesel. We bought it there for $3.27 and could have got it for $3.25.

Tomorrow is 342 miles to Fort Stockton. We'll loose an hour when we get to Texas.

Day 101

We went shooting again today. We shot the "hard" course. They had changed a couple of stations and it was a fun course. I didn't shoot very well. For some reason I couldn't seem to mount the gun consistently.

After that we sat around and talked with the people at the club. That grew old and we went to lunch.

After that we went back to the club. Jason was there and we had a good time catching up with him. He was there to sell them some wireless controllers. We watched him demo one. They look pretty slick.

After that it was getting dark so we went home and started getting ready to leave tomorrow morning.

Day 100

We went shooting again today. We shot the "normal" course. It was about the same difficulty as a course at Mitchell's. There were a couple of challenging stations that were really fun. We made some of the others more interesting by changing them to true pair and/or shooting them backwards.

We were talking with the people who run the place and found out that Jason is going to be here tomorrow afternoon. We decided to stay another day to see him. Also, that avoids us having to drive through Phoenix traffic. This morning all three southbound lanes of the freeway we have to take were blocked by an accident. Apparently they can't drive any better in Phoenix than they do in Austin.

Last night the wind blew very hard. It blew the antenna out of alignment 3 or 4 times during the evening. It also blew the antenna half over after we went to bed. The problem was that the bungee cords that I was using were worn out. After shooting we went to Home Depot and I got three heavy duty rubber cords. When I put them on the tripod I found out that one of the legs was damaged. I fixed it as well as I could.

Of course all of that effort insured that we had a calm evening.

Day 99

We went shooting today. We shot the "hard" course. It was challenging, but not what I would call overly difficult. Later on I found out that they had softened it up for the tournament that they held last week.

One thing I didn't like about the place is that they charge you for every target, even broken ones. And they don't give you any sighters. We had 8 - 10 broken birds, so I felt ripped off. Plus, I missed several because I didn't have a chance to look at a pair before I shot them.

We let Lucy off lead while we were shooting. The first time I let her go she found a covey of quail in about 30 seconds. We would tie her up while we were shooting and let her run between stations. This lasted until we were about half way through. Then she got into some cholla and we spent about half an hour picking it out of her feet. After that she stayed on lead.

We decided to stay another day and shoot the "medium" course tomorrow. It is the course that they used during the tournament. It is supposed to be about as hard as the one we shot today.

After shooting the course we had lunch and did a little bit of grocery shopping. Then we sat around and did nothing for the rest of the afternoon.

Day 98

We made the 250 miles or so to Ben Avery without any problem. We've been looking at a book on CD the Patti gave us for Christmas. It makes the miles go a little quicker.

The center only has back in spots. Fortunately they are pretty easy to get into. I managed to do it without a lot of effort. Then we unhooked and filled up the truck. We had to unhook because the clay target range is a couple of miles from the camping area.

We went over to look at the clay target area. Wile we were there I ran Lucy in the parking lot. She's a very tired dog this evening.

Day 97

We went to Sin City again. This time we went to some other places that we'd never been before. One was Planet Hollywood. It had some magnificent chandeliers. They were globes made up of hundreds of crystals. Each crystal was hung from the ceiling by a separate wire. The casino had a cool shopping center associated with it. The places was filled with stores that I'd never heard of.

Then we went to another new hotel/casino called Aria. It's a complex of at least half a dozen high rise glass buildings. Along with the casino was a shopping center with nothing but very expensive shops. They also had the coolest sculpture. It consisted of a bunch of water filled plexiglas cylinders. There were mechanisms in each cylinder that caused funnels. The funnels and the water levels were continuously varied. It was very, very, cool.

After lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe (Ellen bought a t-shirt) we stopped by the MGM Grand. They've redone it. It has this multi-million dollar lion habitat in it. The lions are tame and there are handlers in the cage.

Then it was time to go home and get ready to leave. We ran the dog and I drained the tanks. I didn't hook up because we don't have far to go tomorrow.

Day 96

We went to Las Vegas today. We had a good time looking at some casinos that we'd never seen before. The Venetian, the Palazzo, the Mirage, and the Wynn. The Wynn had the most elaborate public restrooms I've ever seen. All beautiful marble and brass fittings.

We also went to see Caesar's Palace. They have this very cool circular escalator. I'd never seen one of those before.

We gambled at all of the Casinos. Penny slots only. We ended up about $1.50 ahead. We had a lot of fun doing it.

We ate at a California Pizza at the Mirage. The restaurant bordered the sports betting area and the Bears/Packers day was on. It was neat to watch the game and listen to all the bettors cheer there favorite teams on. I wish I'd bet on the game - the Packers beat the spread.

Day 95

My phone battery died last night. When I recharged it this morning there was a voicemail saying that I had won a set of Ranger shooting glasses at the show. I called and left a message. They didn't call back, so I'll try tomorrow.

We decided that this would be a day of rest. We surfed a lot and then took a short trip to the new bridge that they built below Hoover Dam. You can walk over the bridge, so we did. It's a pretty spectacular sight. At the middle you're 800 feet above the river. That's a long way down.

After that we did a little grocery shopping and then came home. We left off the dog and went to a casino for their buffet. We went early since we didn't eat lunch. It was pitch black when we got out - a little after five. That's what happens when you're two miles from the timezone boundary.

When we got home I started feeling bad. So I went to bed about 8:00.

Day 94

The last day of the show. We got there late as we'd already seen most of what we wanted to see. We looked at a few suppliers of dog stuff. They didn't have anything that we wanted. I had Ellen sit down to rest her gimpy knee while I did a quick pass through both floors looking for things to buy. I didn't come up with much, mainly because we already have just about everything we could need.

We scored 6 boxes of write in the rain paper for about 1/3 of retail. We would have never gone into that section of the show (law enforcement) except that there was a dog place there.

We also got some dog supplies from Boyt. They were at a substantial discount. Finally, we got a gun cleaning box from Midland. I'd seen it in a catalog earlier and decided to pick one up.

We left the show in mid afternoon and walked around the Venetian awhile. It's an amazing place. It's really astounding what America comes up with for entertainment. We dropped $5 in a slot machine. They really didn't have any that we liked. Ellen says that's because the machine we like are to old.

Day 93

We went back to the Shot Show again. We mainly looked for dog related products. They were scattered all over the show, so we didn't get to all of them. That's OK, we'll be there tomorrow to look at the rest and buy some samples.

We left at noon to meet with Stephen. We had lunch with him and told him about a couple of things that we'd seen.

After that we were Shot Showed out. So we went to Fry's just to look around. Then we went home and ran the dog.

Day 92

We spent the second day of the show looking at the other large area that we didn't get to yesterday. The areas we looked at were mainly firearms related products rather than firearms themselves.

We met up with Bret from Kesselrings and I told them to order us a PocketLite. We also met Dave Fiedler and talked with him for awhile. He's almost convinced us to shoot the worlds. I also saw Sue and her husband from the old Tri-county board days. We talked for awhile about the changes that have been going one. Neither of us want to get involved again.

We ran across a couple of things that might work as prizes for shoots. We also looked at some nice binoculars. We kind of settled on something in the 8 x 35 range. The choices are Nikon, Leica, and Swarovski. It will come down to price.

When we got home we ran the dog again. It had the same effect as yesterday. She's very calm this evening.

Day 91

First day at the Shot Show. We got registered with no problems because they'd e-mailed confirmations to Ellen's phone. We walked inside the first exhibit hall and hadn't walked more than a few yards before we saw someone we knew. They were folks from Promatic.

Over the day we met lots of people we knew. Folks from Fiocchi, Crimson Trace, Filson, and even Kesselrings. We saw a couple of shooting celebrities, too. Tom Knapp and Evil Roy. There was a guy at one of the booths putting on a spectacular demonstration twirling Colt revolvers.

I saw two guns that I'll be buying. Colt is bringing back the Pocketlite. Also Beretta has a new automatic with a data acquisition capability. Bill (from Crimson Trace) is going to see about getting us a Texas edition LCP.

Because we didn't know where to go parking was a big hassle. It should be better tomorrow because we stopped and asked where to park.

When we got home we took Lucy for a run. It was a very good idea. We had a tired doggy inn the evening rather than one jumping all over and barking to go do something.

Day 90

Wow. Three months since we left Oregon. It only seems that long when I think of all the work that we've done on the place.

We made it to Boulder City. Traveling on 93 instead of through Laughlin is sure a lot nicer. The view coming in from Arizona down to the dam is quite spectacular. We even got reasonable mileage. For some reason it seemed a longer drive even though it was really shorter than the other two days.

When we got to Boulder City we set up the satellite antenna. This is the first time we've used the new setup. It works pretty well.

We're just barely (maybe 5 miles) inside the Pacific time zone. That means it's dark by 5:00. I hate that. What's worse is that it's going to be light early in the morning. That makes it hard to sleep in like I love to do. Oh well, we should be getting up to go to the show anyway.

Day 89

Leg 2 of the trip went well. It started out cold. It was 24 degrees in Van Horn when we left. The country got uglier and the temperature got warmer the farther west we went. The size of Texas is impressive. We went 450 miles yesterday and still had to go another 170 miles before we got out of Texas. And Austin is in the middle of the state.

We got raped on the fuel costs. They were as high as $3.41/gal. One place we saw wanted $3.69. Mileage was a little better, about 11 mpg.

It was nice to have the extra hour from changing time zones. We had to stay at the fairgrounds because the park we wanted to stay at was full. The extra hour allowed me to see the gun show they were having there. It was a run of the mill show. I wanted to go because of the big deal the liberal assholes had made about having a show so soon after the liberal nutcase shot the congresswoman.

Being at the fairgrounds means that we have to drive through Tucson as soon as we leave tomorrow. It's Monday and I want to avoid rush hour. I think that we'll leave about 9:00. That won't impact our arrival time much. That's because we gain another hour from a time zone change and we only have to go 393 miles tomorrow.

Day 88

On the road again, on the road again.

We made it to Van Horn with a minimum of difficulty. Fuel prices have been steadily climbing as we go west. In Dripping Springs it was $3.05. Here in Van Horn it's $3.39.

Gas mileage wasn't the greatest. I didn't figure it exactly, but it was probably a tick under 10 mpg. Of course that was with two regen cycles. Thank you goddamn tree huggers.

Lucy is now firmly in heat. That will make the next couple of weeks a little bit of a pain in the ass. It also means she won't be able to swim in Lake Mead.

We made 449 miles today according to Google. We've got 439 to do tomorrow to get to Tucson.

We're staying at a KOA. It's got a nice little restaurant attached to it. Id eat there except that I'm just not interested. Ellen is making sloppy Joe's instead.

Day 87

So we're ready for takeoff. We moved food and clothes into the trailer. Ellen did a final load of clothes. We went to the post office and picked up the mail. We went to the grocery store and got enough food to last us until we get to Boulder City. I'm hoping to not have to unhook until we get there.

When we got back I started to prep the trailer. Of course it had to start to rain. Things started off well, the tire pressure gauge didn't work. The batteries had died. I can't complain, they lasted at least 5 years.

Once the batteries were replaced everything went pretty easily. I hooked up the truck, but I didn't move the trailer off the blocks. I wanted to keep the trailer's weight off the truck. I also didn't disconnect the electricity. That allows the refrigerator to cool down as well as possible.

Finally, we put the car in the garage. It's a tight fit with the lawn tractor already in there.

Tomorrow we get up early, disconnect the trailer, lock up the buildings, and get the trailer out of its parking space. The last might be a little challenging. Then it's 450 miles to Van Horn, TX.

Day 86

I think that this is the first day since we got here that we did absolutely nothing. After another late rising we started surfing. When interest ran out on that we watched a movie. Then more surfing. Then another movie. Then it was time for bed.

It was kind of nice to take a day completely off. I don't think I could stand it long term though. I'd get bored awfully quickly.

Boredom won't be a problem tomorrow. We've got to load up the trailer and prep it. We also have to do a little grocery shopping. After that we'll put the car in the garage and lock up the apartment.

Day 85

We did a little prep for the trip. One of the propane bottles ran out last night, so we got it filled. I also filled up the truck. The price at the station I went to went up 8 cents in one day. Diesel was 10 cents more expensive than premium. That just ain't right.

When we got back we put the hitch back in the truck. It seems I have to relearn the process every time we do it.

It's too cold to do anything except stay inside and surf or watch movies. Oh well.

Day 84

It was cold today. I don't think it got above 45. We didn't get out of bed until noon. We were awake. We just decided to surf the web in bed with the dog and cats. When I finally got up I took out the garbage and walked to the mail box. It was cold, very cold.

When we did get up we didn't do much. I contacted a couple of people on Craig's list. We went to one looking at a rug. The sellers smoked so the rug reeked. We passed on it. On the way back I stopped at Harbor Freight to buy a chalk line. They were sold out, but we managed to fine half a dozen other things we didn't know we needed until we got there.

When we got back I was feeling guilty. So I decided to put up the banister on the apartment stairs. I used both the drill and the circular saw that I bought awhile back. They job actually went quite well. It would have been nice if the temperature was above 40 degrees while I was doing it though.

Day 83

It was cold and raining. We might as well be in Oregon. We spent the morning doing not much of anything. At least they bothered to deliver the paper today.

We did go out to the credit union to get a check to pay off the trailer. Then it was over to the post office to mail it. On the way home we did some grocery shopping. All an =d all an exciting day.

When we got back I felt guilty. So I went over to the apartment to set up the new antenna for the trailer. I'm glad I didn't leave it to the last minute. The old one fought me when I took it apart. The new one fought me when I put it together. Then I went to the trailer to change the wiring. There was a lot more to do then I thought.

All in all it took a couple of hours to get everything set up. Now we'll have to see how it works on the road.

Now it's just about time to watch the BCS championship.

Day 82

The newspaper wasn't delivered today. That was very disappointing as I woke up looking forward to a relaxing morning reading it. So I went out an bought one. That was probably the high point of the day as I didn't do anything else for the whole day.

I couldn't paint or work outside because it rained for a large portion of the day. 47 degrees and raining. We might as well be in Oregon.

I watched a couple of football games and my first 3D TV show. It was about ancient Egypt. The 3D effect is quite entertaining. However, I suspect that viewing it for a long time would leave me with a crashing headache.

Day 81

I didn't paint the antenna mount because they said it was going to rain. It didn't. After a day using it I'm not sure that it does any good at all. Oh well, it was worth a try.

We went over to Dripping Springs to look at a lift that I could use to work on the lawnmower. It turned out not to be appropriate.

We decided to turn it into a doggy day, so we went to New Braunfels. On the way we stopped at a antique place. They had a nice hall bench/chest combination. It wasn't too expensive so we bought it for the entry way.

Lucy was very happy to be swimming. She must have done between 30 and 40 retrieves. Then she did at least 20 land retrieves as we tried to dry her off. To round everything out we stopped at Sonic and got her a hamburger to put on her dinner. She's a very tired doggy tonight.

Day 80

Lucy was very cute this morning. When we woke up she jumped up on the bed and laid down on the pillow beside me with her head on my head. Then she proceeded to lick Ellen in the face. She laid there on top of us until we got up.

I did the cable routing for the cell antenna. It turned out better than I hoped. They had left a lot of wire connected to the wall outlet. It was enough to reach all the way outside to where the antenna needed to be installed. The task went surprisingly smoothly. Then we went to a couple of sales. One was a moving sale - nothing interesting. The other was an estate sale. We bought a few small items.

I picked up my prescription and we went to Lowe's to buy the stuff to install the antenna. I also bought a post so that I could build a banister for the apartment steps (the next task). I also picked up a brochure describing their do-it-yourself rain gutter system. I may try to do the rain gutter myself.

When I got home I installed the antenna. It didn't go smoothly. The wood I tried to use to mount it split when I drove screws into it. The clamps I bought were too big, even though they were marked the correct size. Two of the screws stripped while I was screwing them in. I had to use almost 30 washers as spacers to get the mast mounted correctly.

When it was all said and done the antenna is mounted in a decidedly suboptimal place. There's a large tree between it and the tower. However it has to be there due to the restrictions on the relative positions of the outside and inside antennas. It seems to make a small improvement, more than the temporary setup I had last night.

Day 79

I didn't feel like doing much today, so I didn't. I did look at the chest. Ellen had glued the piece of wood back on that had broken off. It turns out that it didn't bear the main load of the hinge. I took the hinge off, bent it back into shape, and put it back on. They don't make hinges like that anymore. It used 6 screws, in 3 different planes, to attach to the chest. When I was finished everything worked fine.

Then we went to eat at the Donut and Taco Palace. It's a hole in the wall near the Post Office. They have great donuts. The kolaches aren't bad either. Then it was off to the Post Office and Walgreen's. Walgreen's said that it would take an hour and a half to count out 30 pills. I'll have to pick them up tomorrow.

When I got home Ellen decided to clean her gun. I decided to do nothing. We got four packages today. This is the first time in a long time that we don't have anything in transit to us.

One package contained the cell phone amplifier. Installing it will require me to pull more wire. I also have to go to Lowe's for some mounting hardware. I did some preliminary work and set it up temporarily as a proof of concept. It appears to provide some improvement.

As part of setting it up we looked up the position of the Verizon towers. Basically we're about in the exact middle of a hole in their coverage. No wonder reception is so bad. I doubt it will get much better since the hole is sparsely populated.

Day 78

It was a day to do some small jobs. I went to the apartment to check for water leaks. There weren't any (joy, joy). So I cleaned up the mess left over from the install and put down the rug that we bought. It looks kind of funny since there are now three rugs of different colors, blue, brown, and beige, in the same room. Also they wrapped it so tightly that it wouldn't lie flat. It looks like corduroy.

Then I installed the new entry way light. The dumbshits struck immediately. They hadn't bothered to put a box in the soffit. I could have put one in, but I didn't want to drive 24 miles round trip to Lowe's to get one. So I succumbed to the spirit of dumbass and just attached the light with screws.

In the afternoon Ellen started to strip the rest of the paint off the chest. Unfortunately she knocked it off the stand and broke the hinge. I'll look at it tomorrow to see if it can be repaired. I took the bikes and bike rack off the trailer. I was going to put the bikes in the small bedroom. I couldn't because they wouldn't fit through the tiny door. Crap.

Day 77

I went out to cut some branches that were brushing against the roof of the storage building. That went OK. However, while I was there I suffered another attack from the dumbshits. They had attached the siding with nails. At some point the siding on the front side pulled away, so they fixed it with screws. The same thing happened in the back. Apparently they were too lazy to fix that. Or maybe just too lazy to walk around and look. Anyway, I fixed it but I'm afraid that the siding may have been damaged a little.

The vanity doesn't appear to leak. That's a relief. Ellen caulked it, so it can now be considered done. She also painted the walls where she missed the first time.

I finished sanding the chest that we bought for the apartment. Ellen needs to strip off the areas I couldn't sand. Then I'll finish sand it and she can paint it.

I was going to replace the light in the entryway. It started raining (it rained all afternoon), so I decided to postpone that.

The HDMI switch for the bedroom came today. It works like a champ. It's totally automatic. You don't even know it's there.

After dinner we had another attack from the dumbshits. I went to put the dirty dishes in the dishwasher and the dishwasher tipped forward out of the cabinet. It turns out that the dumbshits had attached it with screws that were so short that they barely bit into the cabinet. One fell out some time ago (or was never installed). The second fell out as I was loading the washer. I reattached it using screws of an appropriate length.

Those people were so stupid that it's a wonder that they manage to remember to breathe. The man was a diesel mechanic. I sure as hell wouldn't want him working on any vehicle that I owned or depended on.

Day 76

The vanity is done. At least I think it is. When I checked earlier in the evening there was a couple of drops of water under the sink. They could have been left over from the install and I wiped them up. I'll check to see if there are any more tomorrow morning.

I also replaced the missing shelf in the medicine cabinet. I used a panel from one of the drawers in the old vanity. It came out pretty good.

I got my hair cut today. It was aggravating as I ended up having to wait about 45 minutes even after coming back 40 minutes after I first showed up. It's an OK haircut, but it's shorter than Judy gives me. It was cheap, though. Basically the process blew most of the afternoon.

We messed around at a couple of other stores and then came home and veged.

Day 75

It was cold this morning - 32 degrees. We got up early (for us) and drove over to the gun club for their tournament. We shot with a nice couple from Comfort. We shot both the main and the 50 bird "hard" side match. Ellen won her class. I didn't shoot particularly well, so I didn't win anything.

After that we went over to a stereo/TV store that advertises a lot in the paper. It's a pretty nice place. It will cost me about $500 to replace the subwoofer. I'm going to see about getting it repaired first.

Lucy had a good day. She got to go around with us on the course. They had brisket for lunch and she got her share. She even got a large dog cookie from the people at the club. We're still not letting her run. She always limps when she gets down from the couch.

When we got home we just veged out for the rest of the day.

Day 74

Today was a day to finish up a few things. I started to finish the vanity. The first thing I did was discover that the down pipe for the new sink wasn't long enough. Off to Lowes. When I got back I installed the new pipe, connected up the hoses, and glued the top to the cabinet. That's all that can be done until the glue dries.

Then I went out to the yard and finished painting the TV dish mount. I managed to get a little in my hair and on my pants. Then I hooked up a ground wire to the antenna pole. That put finished to two jobs that have been bugging me.

I glued down some wood strips in the living room that had come up. Finally I broke up the old vanity and put it in the garbage can. Breaking it up was fun. Hauling it to the garbage wasn't.

All that's left on the vanity is to hook up the drain pipe and caulk it. That won't get done tomorrow - we're going shooting.