Day 3076

 I woke up about 4:30 and turned over to go back to sleep.  I woke up about every hour until 7:30 and did the same thing.  Then it was up for breakfast.  After that it was time to hook up the trailer.  All of that went fine.

As expected a regen started about 30 miles into the trip.  What wasn't expected was the attack of diarrhea that I suffered about 12 miles into the regen.  There weren't any exits, so I had to pull off on the shoulder and take a shit in the trailer.   The regen restarted but it didn't finish well.  The end ash level was 36%.

We drove another half hour and the diarrhea started acting up again.  This time there was a truck stop to stop at.  I pulled into their dirt parking lot.  It had huge pot holes that I hadn't seen.  The trailer legs scraped twice before I could escape it.  I parked on the pavement and took another shit.  After that y asshole quit giving me trouble.

The rest of the trip went fine.  Melissa called and we had a long conversation with her.  We got to the park a little after noon.  That's because we gained another hour because Arizona doesn't believe in DST.

We unhooked without drama and fed the pets.  Then we went to In-n-Out for lunch.  After that we went to Wally World and bought another weather radio.  The one we had in the trailer is too hard to use. 

Fuel here is $4/gal.  We used 25 gallons (11 mpg) on the way here.  It was $100 to fill up.  Fuck Biden.

We went home.  Ellen did the wash and I hid out in the trailer.  It was 92 degrees.  I surfed for a while and then switched to videos.

The Bronco guy sent me an email.  Dan picked up the Bronco today.

Abby is really dragging her ass.  She doesn't understand why she is feeling so crappy.  It hasn't hurt her appetite though.

The park is re-modelling the showers.  That means that we have to shower in the trailer.  That's a pain because we hang the wet clothes there.  Also it means I'll have to drain the tanks before we leave.   I was going to wait until Mesa to do that.  I think that they should give us a discount.

Dinner was frozen followed by more videos.  Tomorrow we'll go shooting.

Day 3075

 I woke up at 7:45 and got up for breakfast.  Then it was hook up and leave.  We departed at 8:45.

The road was good and the traffic was light, but the trip started up worrisome.  The low mileage and high EGT's from yesterday continued.  I was wondering if there was something going wrong with the truck.  Also the one tire pressure monitor doesn't work even though it has a new battery.  Because of the 9 mpg we were getting we had to stop for fuel in a town just short of Van Horn.  

We filled up the tank giving us 1/3 new diesel and 2/3 biodiesel.  There was almost an immediate improvement.  Within 25 miles EGT's went back into their usual ranges and mileage went up to 11.3.  I guess the moral to the story is don't buy biodiesel from Wally World.

The rest of the trip to El Paso went great.  We just cruised along with the truck acting normally.  As we got 5 miles or so from downtown traffic came to a stop.  Some shithead had crashed.  I headed off on the frontage road and fought the traffic there for 2 or more miles.  Then I got back on.  The guy who was in front of me when I took the exit and stayed on the freeway came up on me 1/4 mile after I got back on.  The stress of the frontage road hadn't gotten me anything.

The freeway was clear for miles past the backup.  Then we got to milepost 9.  Traffic was reduced for two lanes.  They are doing a massive rebuild of the westbound lanes.  It's going to be 18 months or more before the freeway has more than 1 lane again.  The one lane was stop and go, mainly stop, for 3 ore more miles.  I was beginning to stress because I thought we'd be doing another regen just as we got to the park.

Once past the construction the rest of the 25 miles to the park were fine.  The regen held off, it will happen soon after we leave tomorrow.  All in all we spent about an hour sitting in traffic today.

While we were going through El Paso Dan called.  He wants to pick up the Bronco tomorrow.  Ellen sent him the contact info.

We set up and then went over to Wally World for a few things.  Abby had broken her chain, so we bought a new one.  This one's a cable.  Then we got fuel - no biodiesel.  We skipped the Wally World and went to a Circle-K.

It was almost 90, so we just stayed in the trailer and watched videos.  Abby officially went into heat and is now wearing a diaper.  Ellen fixed Rudy's sausage and french fries for dinner.  After dinner was a little more videos, and then surfing.

Day 3074

 I woke up about 7 and dozed until 7:45.  Then it was up for breakfast.  There were two big thunderstorms last night, so I didn't get quality sleep last night.

With breakfast over it was time to hook up.  There was one small problem.  I didn't have Ellen dock the Starlink before I took it down.  Oh well.  We left the park about 9:15.

Most of the trip was on state highways with short jaunts on county roads.  Most of them were pretty rough.  There weren't many curves though.  Instead there were a lot of hills.  It was a relief to get to I 10.

Mileage sucked and the EGT's were really high.  I was worried until Ellen looked it up.  We had a 20 mph head wind all day.

We got to the park a little before 2.  The truck went into regen as we were driving the 5 miles into town.  I decided to drive up and down the highway until it was finished.  We were driving into town with the regen almost finished when the low fuel alert went on.  I'd thought we had plenty.  I immediately stopped and put in 10 gallons at the net station ($4/gal).  Then we went on to Wally World and filled up the rest of the way with $3.49 fuel.

We ended up putting 35 gallons in.  That meant that there was only 4 gallons in the tank when the alarm went off.  At 9 mpg that's only 36 miles.  No wonder it went off.  After fueling up we went home.

I sat down and watched videos.  Amazingly I didn't fall asleep.

Ellen refused to make dinner, so I ended up with a frozen one.  I wasn't particularly happy about that.  After dinner was surfing.

Day 3073

 I woke up a little before and got up for breakfast.  Then I loaded up the truck and we went to the club.  We left the dog in the trailer because we didn't know if they had carts or not.

One the way to the club we passed two huge factory complexes.  One was 3M and the other was Kohler.  That explains why Brownfield is thriving.

The club was about 5 miles out of town.  It was beautiful.  It has a very nice clubhouse with a veranda that overlooks a stunning view.  They had carts.  That was great because the course was as hilly as one at Mt. Vernon.

The scenery on the course was great, too.  The targets were first class.  The setter did a great time using the terrain.  Overall the targets were challenging, but didn't eat you up.  I did my normal mediocre performance, but I had a lot of fun.

In fact we had so much fun that when we were finished we bought some more ammo and shot the super sporting course on the second course.  The targets were a little harder, but really fun.  There was even one station where the targets landed in a pond.  Screw the EPA.

We had lunch there, chili dogs.  Then we went back to town.

I needed bananas and milk, so we stopped at Aldi's.  It's the first one I'd ever seen and I wanted to take a look at it.  It sucked.  It was small, had a limited inventory, and its produce department was a couple of small bins.  The bananas were on the edge of being rotten.  We left and went to Wally World next door.

After filling up with fuel at $3.35 we went home.  I'm sure that's the cheapest fuel that we will see all trip.  We spent the rest of the afternoon on surfing, videos, and naps.

Dinner was frozen stuff.  We waited until an hour after Abby ate and took her across the road for another run.  She ran herself tired.  Her obedience was spotless.

The rest of the evening was videos and surfing.

Day 3072

 I woke up at 7:45 and got up for breakfast.  Then I started collecting things to go to the trailer.  There was CPAP stuff, electronics, final toiletries, dirty clothes, and the breakfast stuff.  It was quite a collection.

I moved all of the stuff to the trailer and put it away.  Then it was time to hook up.

Of course I made a rookie error.  I forgot to remove the safety pin on the hitch, so it wouldn't latch.  That was an easy fix and it hooked up with no problems after that.  The rest of the operation went smoothly.

Getting out of the place was fairly easy, too.  We did have to move about 6 rocks.  I'll have to cut the oak tree at the gate though.  It scraped the side of the trailer.

We had to go up 71 on the way to Brownwood.  The traffic wasn't bad, but the lights sure were.  We cruised up 71 for 30 miles past the Marble Falls turnoff.  Then we took other highways and some county roads to get to Brownwood.  It was a nice drive through a part of the hill country that we'd never been to.  There was almost no traffic.

We got to Brownwood a little before 1.  We pulled into an oil change place.  Getting into and out of it was a breeze.  There was a Mickey D's next door, so I walked there and we ate in the parking lot behind the oil change place.

Getting to the park and parking was super easy, too.  All in all the whole trip was about as good as it could get.  We got just under 10 mpg, probably because there was a regen.  It went down to 11%.  The only fly in the ointment was that the tire pressure sensors weren't working well.  I think that they need batteries.

It was 90 when we parked.  We set up with no problems.  Then we drove around Brownwood.  It's a nice old Texas town with a lot of stores and places to eat.  We also got some batteries for the pressure monitors.

It was still hot when we got back.  We put up the Starlink and then hung out in the trailer.  We plugged in electronics and I put batteries into two clocks and two temperature sensors that had died.  Everything works fine now.

I emailed the Bronco guy and gave him Dan's number.  Then I texted Dan to warn him.

After that it was videos that turned into a nap.  Then we took the dog to run in the park that's right across the road.  She needed it.

I had a sandwich for a really late dinner.  After that it was more videos and bed.

Day 3071

 I woke up at 8 and got up for pet stuff and breakfast.  After that most of the day was spent getting ready to leave.

I thought that I'd taken most of the stuff to the trailer.  I was wrong.  I spent a lot of time moving clothes, plants, groceries, refrigerator contents, guns, archery stuff and other things.  I also packed the basement for travel.  Before I'd just placed things in there.

I had trouble finding the key to the gun cabinet.  I must have spent almost an hour trying every key in both key boxes.  None of them fit.  I had almost given up when I decided to look in the valuables box in the safe.  That's where they were.

The weather didn't help.  It was 82 degrees with 87% humidity.  I was hot, sweaty, and tired for most of the day.

Ellen moved some stuff and also finished cleaning the house.  A significant amount of her time was spent doing things that should already have been done.  I was not happy about that.

One thing that I was happy about is that I have lost at least a little weight.  The shorts that I could barely get into 3 weeks ago now fit comfortably.  That's a real incentive.  I thought that I'd noticed a small reduction in the size of my gut.

I finally got finished with all that I could think to do in the late afternoon.  I did some surfing and had a sandwich for dinner.  After dinner was a video.  I went to bed early because I was tired.

Day 3070

 I woke up about 8 and played games for along time.  Then it was up for pet stuff and breakfast followed by a little surfing.

When that was done I started moving more stuff to the trailer.  I moved extra clothes, pet food, RC stuff, and some incidentals to the trailer.  Then I packed everything in the basement for the trip.  I actually have some space left over.

I asked Ellen about the mail and she said that the street post box wasn't being forwarded.  We had to go to the post office for that.  On the way we stopped at Costco for DEF.  On the way home I fueled up the truck and put in some DEF.

When we got home I backed up the truck to line it up for connecting to the trailer.  I was going to put the repair plastic on the tail light, but the weather was miserable.  It was high 80's with 77% humidity.  We retreated to the house.

I called the place in Brownwood about doing a safety inspection.  That's when I found out that they were only open Mondays (wait a minute, it's Wed.).  I found another place that can do it.

I also charged up the iPad and Surface Pro.  Updating the Surface Pro took hours.  The last of the many updates failed several times.  I decided to forget about it.

It was hot and miserable until after dark, so I surfed and then watched videos.  I took out three big bags of garbage just before dark.

Ellen fixed sausage and hash browns for dinner.  After dinner I watched the start of a Netflix series.  I'll probably never finish it, but I will watch at least one more installment

Yo called just before dinner.  I didn't answer the phone.

Day 3069

 I woke up about 8 and got up for breakfast.  After breakfast I did a little surfing and then went outside to put the Ranger away.

That's when I fucked up.  While I was backing the truck up I hit a bush and broke the left rear tail light.  FUCK.  I went inside and had Ellen order some repair materials.

I'd noticed that the Ranger tires were low.  They were really low, under 4 lbs when they are supposed to have 20.  I filled them all up.  Then Ellen helped me cover the Ranger.  It was a cool cloudy day, so I decided to fill up the truck and trailer tires.  I finished checking the lug nuts just before it was time to go to the bank.

The bank branch was in Belterra.  We got there just in time for the appointment.  The bank guy was being observed by some kind of supervisor.  It took quite a while to get things done, first convince them that we existed so they didn't give the money to the state.  Second we set up automatic transfers so It doesn't happen again.  Third, we moved a lot of the money into CD's.

When we were done we went next door to Chik-fl-la.  They still have their robot.  After that it was a stop at HEB to get cotton balls.  I also managed to get the mouthwash I'd been looking for.

When we got home we washed and waxed the car and put it away.  We put peppermint cotton balls everywhere.

By then we were both tired.  We sat down to watch videos and both of us napped.

After dinner I took the bourbon over to Lee.  Then it was videos until time for bed.

Day 3068

 I woke up about 8 and played games for a while.  Then it was up for breakfast.  When that was done I collected a couple of bags of stuff for the trailer.  I left them by the door for later.

It was time to vote, so we drove to Dripping Springs.  Voting didn't take long.  After that we took Abby to the soccer fields for a run.  She covered a lot of ground.  She was tired when we were done.  As we were near the parking lot she laid down under a tree and waited for us to get there.

I stopped at HEB and bought some cider for Martha.  It wasn't the kind she really liked, so we decided to got to Spec's.  I drove in on 290 because I wanted to see how the Y looked.  We haven't gone through there all winter.  There's a lot of progress, but there's more to go.  Traffic was pretty normal though.  One good thing is that the exit to the post office is now open.  We stopped and got the mail.

We ended up stopping at two Spec's and two more HEB's.  None of them had the cider we wanted.  I found out at one of the Spec's that they don't make it anymore.  We went home in disgust.

After lunch I went outside and cleaned the interior of the car.  I also put the stuff for the trailer away.  Ellen cleaned the bathroom and part of the kitchen.  We'll wash the car and put it away tomorrow.

After that it was more surfing that morphed into videos.

Dinner was frozen pizza.

After dinner was more videos and a movie - Godzilla.

Day 3067

 I woke up at 8 and played games for a while.  Then I got up for breakfast.  It was cold this morning, 61.  I decided to just surf for a while until it warmed up.

Eventually I went outside to work on the Ranger.  I started it up and let it idle while I put away the charger and power cord.  Then I drove it to the back storage area.  I was planning on moving the motorcycle lift to the small storage.  Unfortunately it's too big to fit.  I went back to the garage and pumped 2 gallons of gas out of the tank.  It's pretty old gas.  Then I added 1/2 gallon of new gas and some Stabil.

Abby had been having a fun time running all around the property.  She also liked running beside the Ranger.  I put her in the Ranger and we drove to the other end of Bear Creek and back.  The rig runs well and I'd forgotten how much fun it is to drive in it.  When we got back I parked it by the flat bed trailer.

I went inside and took a shower.  I'd spilled some gas on my foot while I was transferring it.  When I was done we left for CVS so I could pick up some drugs.  Then we stopped at Beckett so Abby could run some more.  She'd already got in a substantial run while I was working on the Ranger.  When that was done we ate lunch at Mighty Fine and then went home.

I got out the Wrangler to work on it.  That was a cluster fuck.  I tried to put on the chassis guards I'd purchased.  The center guard wouldn't work because I have the wrong screws.  I think the right ones are buried in the trailer basement.  I couldn't put on the diff covers because I'd put too much lock tight on the screws and I couldn't get them off.  I decided to switch to the body mounts.  I couldn't do that because they one's I bought were the wrong diameter.  Finally, When I was putting things away I tore off the connector for the front bumper lights.  Crap.

I gave up doing anything more on anything.  It wasn't my day.  I started watching videos instead.

Dinner was leftovers and after dinner was more videos.  I'm not sure right now what to do tomorrow.  It will probably have something to do with cleaning though.

Day 3066

 I woke up at 8:30 and played games for a while.  Then it was up for breakfast.  It was raining a little and the Spring garbage collection was going on in the cul-de-sac.  I decided to move things to the trailer.

I made several trips to the trailer.  I moved clothes, drugs, RC stuff, and groceries.  I stopped when I literally couldn't think of anything else to move.  Then I organized the shells we're going to take.  After that I put them in plastic bags and put them in the truck.

While I was doing that Ellen was cutting the bushes in the front entry and the back porch.  I'm not sure why she picked today to do it, since it was still raining.  By rain I mean Seattle type rain.

We both finished up about 12:30.  We put Abby in the car.  We thought we might take her for a walk, but she'd already done a lot of running with both of us working outside.  As we were driving to Belterra we made an appointment to give her a bath.  She was pretty dirty from her last walk.  It was damp and she rolled in some stuff and ran in mud puddles.

We bought Buffalo Trace bourbon for Lee.  Then we went to HEB.  I'd intended to just buy Milk and orange juice.  Instead we bought a lot of stuff for the trip.  That took so much time that we had to eat sub sandwiches in the car before Abby's bath time.

The bath at Tomlinson's is great.  Abby emerged clean, soft, and smelling like a French whore.  She also got a nice treat.  We ended up going back to Spec's for two more bottles of Buffalo Trace, one for Hooch and one for John and Patty.  Hooch said it's his favorite.  When I left Spec's only had 3 bottles left.

When we got hoe we both sat down to videos.  Then we both took naps.

Ellen fixed chili dogs for dinner.  After dinner we watched videos while a thunder storm rolled in.  It was loud and dripped over half an inch of rain.  The temperature tonight is cold - 55.

Hopefully it will be dry tomorrow so I can finish up with the Ranger.

Day 3065

 I woke up about 8, played games for a while, and then got up for pet stuff and breakfast.  After some surfing I went out to the garage and got the battery charger and a power cord.

I took the cover off the Ranger and hooked up the charger.  When I went back into the house Ellen said she wanted to take an hour to cook sweet potatoes for the dog.  While she was doing that I got out the RC stuff and finished putting the Wrangler together.  I attached the roof light and the interior.  By then the hour was up and we left for errands.

We went to Spec's in Belterra to get Bourbon for Lee.  They only had one of the two types.  We decided to go to Twin Liquors for the second.  We only got a little past the end of Belterra on 290 before we were in a traffic jam.  The phone said it lasted for a mile.  That's why I don't travel after noon on Fridays.  We made a U turn and went to Circle C.

We stopped at Tomlinson's for a dog treat and ate at the Italian place.  I walked down to the Twin Liquors there and got the other Bourbon.  Then we went home.

I took the Wrangler body out to the garage and reattached the snorkel to the body.  I'd used tape to mount it and Ellen had knocked it off when she touched up the paint yesterday.  I used two screws.  It isn't going to come off now.

After that I did a little surfing and then started to watch videos.  That turned into a nap that lasted until feeding time.  After that I watched videos for the part of the evening.  That got boring, so I switched to watching a movie.  It was on Prime.  They have commercials now, a LOT of them.

Day 3064

 I woke up at 8 and played games for a little while.  Then it was up for breakfast.  The weather sucked.  It was hot (eventually 91) and very humid.  Outside felt like a steam bath.  It hadn't rained though, so it was outside after breakfast to mow the lawn.

The process took a little over 90 minutes.  I was soaked with sweat and covered with dust when I was done.  I decided that there was no way that I was going to do the edging.  The mower blade needs sharpening badly.  I may wait until the fall to do it.

With the mower put away I went inside for a drink.  Then Ellen cut my hair.  I really needed a haircut.  After that it was time for a badly needed shower.  By then it was a little after 1 and time to go somewhere for lunch.  We went to Rudy's.  Abby really approved of the place.  Then we stopped at Penney's for underwear.  Most of mine have holes.  It was $62 for two packages.  Fuck Biden.

From there we went to the pet store.  Unfortunately they didn't have the cat food.  Abby got a treat though.  We didn't try to run her.  It was 91 degrees and really high humidity.  I don't think that she would have done much.  Instead we went home.

It was about three when we got home.  I could have worked on the Wrangler, but I was tired.  I sat down for videos. That quickly turned into a nap.  I'm beginning to expect that whenever I sit down in the afternoon.

I woke up a little before pet dinner time.  Ellen fixed chili.  After dinner it was videos until I got bored.  Then it was surfing.

Day 3063

 I woke up about 8 and played games for a while.  Then it was up for pet stuff and breakfast.  After breakfast I took out the garbage and recycle.  Then I went back to cleaning off the stuff on the spare bedroom's bed.

I collected almost all of the remaining stuff on the bed.  Some of it needed to go to the garage and some needed to go to the trailer.  I "filed" the stuff for the garage in the various parts containers.  The trailer stuff got put either in the bedroom cabinets or in the basement.

It was hot and humid, but I decided to continue work in the trailer.  We had a new mount for the inside StarLink antenna.  Unfortunately the antenna cable wasn't long enough to mount it.  I had to reposition the cable by drilling a new hole in the cabinet.  That meant getting down on the floor and blindly drilling the hole.  I was a little off and had to do some sawing to make it big enough.  By then I was covered in sweat.

I went to the garage to get the vacuum to clean up the cabinet.  The battery died almost immediately even though I'd just changed it.  I ended up sweeping it out.  I decided to attach the mount with both mounting tape and screws.  I had to use an Exacto knife to get the backing off.  I finally got it mounted.  Then I spent a short time mounting a picture with tape.  I was tired, thirsty, and soaked in sweat by the time I was done at 2.

When I got back to the house there was a message from Lee.  He wanted to have a play date for Abby in the afternoon.  He also wanted to talk about reloading.  I spent most of the time until 4:30 writing up a short tutorial for him.

Abby didn't seem to want to run around with Kai.  Instead she acted timid and submissive.  I actually thought that she might be going into heat.  Later on she and Kai started to play a little bit when Lee threw them a tennis ball.  We talked for over 2 hours on a variety of subjects.  Lee wants to get together again next week before we leave.  I told him any time, just call. I also found out what bourbon he likes so that we can buy him some.

Abby had to wait a while before dinner when we got home.  The cats acted like they deserved another one.

I had leftovers for dinner and then watched videos.

Day 3062

 I woke up about 8 and got up.  Ellen fed the pets while I got the laundry ready.  Then it was breakfast.  I'd planned on mowing today, but it rained last night.  I decided to do a couple of other things that need to be done before we leave.

The kitchen table was piled with old mail and other stuff.  I cleaned it all off.  Some stuff was put away, some was placed to go to the trailer, and some was trash.  Then I took out the trash.

One of the things on the table was a birthday card from Diane.  I wrote her a belated response.  I did a little surfing and then got out the RC stuff.  My goal was to finish the Wrangler body and put away the stuff covering the bed in the spare bedroom.

The Wrangler body took much longer than I thought it would.  There were a lot of stickers that needed to be attached to both the body and the interior.  I also had to assemble the interior.  I also attached the snorkel, rear view mirror, and fuzzy dice to the body.  I worked on attaching the roof lights.  That takes time to position the holes correctly.  Unfortunately when I went to test the light it wouldn't work.  It would occasionally flash, that's all.

I spent quite a bit of time trying to debug the problem.  I even checked the power supply.  Eventually I gave up and ordered another one on Amazon.  I had to find a duplicate because I'd already made the mounting holes.  While I was doing that I discovered the problem with the light I had.  It requires a controller to work correctly.  I don't have one.  The new light is the controller-less version.

All of the ate up the morning and half the afternoon.  I wanted to quit, but I needed to work on the bedroom stuff.  I collected all of the leftover hardware and put it in my parts container.  There was a lot of it and it took awhile to sort out more than 50 screws and other small parts.  I ended up with a whole bunch of plastic bags which I also sorted and put away.

I quit about 5:30.  The bed isn't cleared, but it's a lot cleaner.  There's a whole bunch of stuff that I need to take to the garage.  After that the bed will be fairly clear.  I also have to organize the RC stuff lI'm taking with us and put it in the trailer.

Ellen fixed chicken and rice for dinner.  I had a salad for lunch.  I was really hungry in the afternoon, but I managed not to eat anything.

After dinner was videos.

Day 3061

 I woke up at 8 and payed games for a while.  Then it was up for breakfast.  I surfed until the oil change place was open.  They don't take appointments and the lady said that they were very busy right then.  I decided to surf until 10:30 and then go.

They were still busy when we got there.  That was OK.  There was a small area in the back where the dog could run.  Unfortunately the fence was barbed wire and Abby quickly figured out how to get through.  We tied her to the table that we were sitting at and surfed until the truck was done.

Abby took a crap while we were there.  The vet was just a little down 290 from the oil change place, so Ellen collected it and we took it there when the truck was done.

After that we took Abby to the soccer fields.  We walked the usual paths.  Before this she always stayed on our side of the barbed wire fence.  Not this time.  We had to call her back several times.  There are a  lot of porta potties by the fields.  Apparently the tank truck guy spilled some shit outside one of them  Abby found it and rolled in it.  She came back with patches of shit on her.

When we got to the rest rooms I got a lot of wet and dry paper towels.  We used them to get as much shit off the dog as we could.  We also noticed that Abby had a scratch on her leg, probably from a barbed wire fence.  Then we went to the place by HEB for lunch.   When we were done I went to HEB and bought fruit and vet wrap.

We stopped by Tomlinson's, but someone was using the dog wash.  We bought Abby a treat and went home.  Abby got an immediate bath.  Then we put antiseptic on the leg and wrapped it with vet wrap.

By then it was time for Ellen to go to the club.  I got out the RC stuff and replaced the orange LEDs i the back of the MT10 with red ones.  I like the result a lot better.

After that it was surfing and videos for the rest of the evening.

Day 3060

I woke up at 8 and played games for an hour.  Then it was up for breakfast and a little surfing.  After that I took the MT10 and the new hex hubs out to the garage.

I spent some time experimenting on how I was going to get the hubs to fit.  I finally figured out that I needed to drill out a constriction in the center hole.  luckily I had a metric bit that was the right size.  SAE bits wouldn't do it.  I too off all of the wheels, drilled out the hubs, and installed them.  It took a while.

When I was done I went back inside the house.  Both of use got ready and then we took Abby to Circle-C.  There were some soccer games going on, but there was also a lot of open fields.  We took Abby on the outside path and she had a great time going through the woods.  We also walked a lot of the lower fields because there weren't any games there.  On the way back we stopped for a little while and watched some grade school kids play.  They obviously had been taught the game and how to play.  Abby behaved perfectly the whole time.

After that we went to Torchy's for lunch.  I tied Abby up in the outside dining area and went back to the car to get my phone.  She was great.  She just laid down and waited for me to come back.

When we got home I wanted to do more RC worked.  However I was tired of doing non-assembly things.  I decided to fit all of the detail parts on the body.  I stripped off the masking and the outside cover.  Then I started bolting things on.  There were a whole lot of parts.  I noticed that the front was sagging and tightening the shock springs wasn't helping.  I got out the calipers and found that the rear shock springs were much heavier than the front, so I switched them.  By then it was after 5 and time to put things away and quit.

I switched to videos.  Dinner was a frozen thing.  After dinner was more videos.

I still have to do a lot of wiring for the Wrangler.  I also have to install the light bar, chassis protection, and a couple of aftermarket dress up parts.  I'm not sure if I'll have time to do it before I leave.   That's OK though.  I probably won't take it with me anyway.

Day 3059

 I woke up at 8 and got up to do the pets stuff and have breakfast.  After breakfast and some surfing I went to the garage to finish building the brackets for the Wrangler rock lights.

The brackets were just L shaped pieces of metal.  Each leg had a hole, a small one for the screw into the lights and a bigger one for the screw into the bumper.  In addition I had to locate small screws for the light attachments and slightly larger ones for the bumper attachment.  I also had to trim the ends of the brackets.  There were 8 brackets.  That's 16 holes to measure and drill, 16 bracket ends to trim, and 16 screws of the right sizes to find.

It took me until a little after 1 to get the brackets made and attached to the lights (2 per light).  Then I attached two of the lights to their fenders.  After that I called a halt for lunch.  

After lunch Ellen wanted to go to Hobby Lobby.  We took Abby to the Beckett park first.  She had a great time going through the woods.  After that it was Hobby Lobby and then CVS for drugs before back home.

I went back to working on the Challenger.  I attached the fenders and the other two lights.  Unfortunately the wires on the lights are too short.  I'm going to have to rewire them.  I also attached the tires.  That ends building the chassis.  There's still a lot of work to build the body and do the wiring.

While I was doing that Ellen gave the dog a bath.  I had to take some time out to help.

I also tried to put the brass hexes on the MT10.  It turns out that I'm going to have to drill them out a little before they will fit correctly.  That's going to take some time and careful work.

Ellen fixed chicken and rice for dinner.  After dinner I put everything away and watched videos for the evening.

Day 3058

 I woke up about 8, dozed for a little while, and then got up for pet stuff and breakfast.  After that there was a little surfing before we left with Abby.

We took Abby to Circle C.  Unfortunately there was no water.  Instead we walked all around the park.  Abby was a little bit wild.  She would disappear into the woods whenever she got the chance.  There were 2 or three times when we had to stop and call her in order for her to come.  There was a zap or two used also.  She got in a lot of distance and so did we.

After the park we stopped at Tominson's to donate the wrong size dog bed I ordered.  We also bought all of the canned cat food we'll need until we're in Oregon.  It was on sale.  By then it was time for lunch so we went to Waterloo.  I had a semi healthy lunch, a grilled chicken sandwich.  After that we stopped at HEB.  This time Ellen went in.

It was only a little after 1 when we got home.  I decided to work on wiring.  I wired the headlights for the Wrangler.  It will be a while before I install them.  Then I wired the headlights for the MT10.  That was a big operation.  I had to insulate the LED leads and bend them  Then I wired the LED leads together.  Finally I connected them to the rear light wiring and the receiver wiring.

That whole operation took until 8 o'clock.  Then main reasons were I had to scrap one of the LED setups and I took some time to watch videos.  I'm happy to put the wiring away, but i still have to do the Wrangler when its assembled.

While I was wiring Ellen went out and finished painting the Wrangler.  It looks nice.  It also means that I'm clear to complete the build.  She was watching movies when I got done with the MT10 so I surfed for the rest of the evening.

Day 3057

 I woke up a little after 8.  I dozed for a while and then got up for pet stuff and breakfast.  I did a short surfing session and then started taking the shooting stuff out to the car.

The trip to the club was a little annoying.  Every stop light seemed to be red and every person in front of me was slow.  Oh well.  On the other hand it was a beautiful day, sunny but not too hot.  The doctor called while we were driving.  She said my blood work showed that I'm diabetic and they are going to start me on drugs.  Crap.  I'm immediately starting a lose weight/eat healthy diet regimen.

I did shoot like shit though even though I tried.  I guess I have to accept that I'm not ever going to be good again.  Abby liked riding in the cart even though she's not fond of her ear muffs.  Afterwards I ran her in the fields before we left.  She didn't run for a long time, probably because by then it was getting warmer.

The trip home was frustrating for the same reasons as the first trip.  It just wasn't my day for traffic.  We did stop at the post office.  All of my packages from China were there.

I needed to clean my gun when we got home.  I want it to be clean when we start to travel.  It was 85 degrees in the garage, but at least the humidity was low.  I've never seen the barrel that dirty.  I ran a lot of patches through.  Used two different brushes with the drill.  I also used two different types of solvents.  I still couldn't get all of the dirt out.  I spent at leas two hours on it and finally gave up.

I went back inside, put everything away, and fed the animals.  Then I sat down for videos.  As usual that also involved a short nap.

Ellen fixed beef and rice for dinner.  She fixed me an apple for dessert.  There won't be any more sugar for quite a while.  I'm thinking about setting a goal of losing 40 lbs before I start to ease up on the diet.  We'll see.

Day 3056

 I woke up about 8 and got up to do the pet stuff and have breakfast.  After a little surfing I went out to the garage to see if my idea to use the cabinet latches as light mounts for the Wrangler would work.  I built 2 sets of mount and it looks like they will work.  Unfortunately it was time to go to the doctor, so I didn't get a chance to check them out.

The doctor was an unpleasant experience.  He agreed that I needed the wax removed.  He had me lay on my side and he pored some stuff into my ear.  Then I laid there for 15 minutes while it worked.  When that was over a nurse came in.  She had what amounted to an electric powered bottle pump filled with a warm solution.

She proceeded to squirt it in my ear.  When the bottle ran dry she filled it with warm water and did it some more.  Finally she used some sort of instrument to remove the wax.  It was sort of a flat plate about half the size of a postage stamp.  I'm not sure how thick it was.  That's when the dizziness hit.  The room was spinning wildly.  I was sitting down and had to hold on to the edge of the table to keep from falling out of it.  My head started aching badly. I was sweating, and I felt like I was going to throw up.  The sensation lasted for about a minute.  When I was done the headache and stomach queasiness remained.

They doctor came in and pronounced me cured.  I was still feeling sick when I left.

We took Abby to Circle C.  We walked around the park.  I wasn't feeling well at first, but I got better.  There was no water in the creek, but she met a cool dog.  They chased each other around and wrestled for quite a while.  Then we did more walking.  Abby was really having fun going through the woods.  We had to call her back three or four times.She always came immediately.

We had to cut things short because Ellen had a 1:00 appointment.  I drove home and she turned around to leave.  I did a little surfing and then had lunch.  By then it was time to go to my 2:10 appointment.

My PSA is a little over 10.  That's the second time and it's somewhat alarming.  The doctor said we could let it ride or do a MRI.  I said we'll wait 6 more months and then see.  He was OK with that.  The appointments have been made for November.

Traffic was backed up a little when i drove home.  I stopped at HEB on the way and bought a bunch of groceries that we needed.  When i got home I put them away and did a little surfing.  That turned into videos and a nap.

Dinner was a frozen thing.  After dinner was more videos.

Day 3055

 I woke up about 8 and got up to collect the wash and have breakfast.  It was windy and raining a little.  That put a stop on taking the dog for exercise.

I did some surfing and then looked for something that I could use to mount the rock lights to the Wrangler.  I found some cabinet latches that I think will work.  I'll have to do some modification though.  Ellen said she'd get them when she was done with archery.

After that I got out the Wrangler instructions and figured out what I could do without putting on the fenders.  It wasn't a whole lot.  I located the parts I needed and assembled some of them.  Then I took the rest along with some stuff for the Defender out to the garage.

I started out mounting the tow hooks on the back bumper of the Wrangler.  That was drilling 8 holes and screwing them on.  Then I mounted the trailer hitch that I'd purchased.  That involved cutting a notch in bumper and drilling a hole in the hitch.  All of that gives me a nice hitch that cost a fraction of what an after market one would be.  I also got red and white LEDs for the lights.  The red ones had wires, so I installed them in the light holders.  The white ones will require soldering.

I did a little prep work for installing the guard wires on the Defender.  Then I decided to call a stop for lunch and a little surfing.  After that it was back to install the wires.  They worked out really well.  That was all I had to do, so I packed up and went back to the house.

I put everything away and then started surfing.  That turned into videos.  The weather service started broadcasting thunderstorm warnings.  We just kept watch on the phone radar.

Ellen fixed polish dogs for dinner.  After dinner we could see that a big storm was coming.  It was continuous thunder and lighting.  I went out and put the car in the garage and took in the trailer slides.  It was good I did.  When the storm hit it dropped hail the size of marbles.  Fortunately I don't think there was enough to do much damage.  It was loud though.

After the storm passed it was back to videos.

Day 3054

 I woke up at 7:30, got up to feed the pets, and then went back to bed to play games.  I got up for breakfast a little after 9.

It was cloudy in the morning, which didn't bode well for eclipse viewing.  I got out the RC stuff.  I immediately ran into problems.  My custom mount wouldn't work.  I had to go out to the garage and take a Dremel to them.  After that I discovered that I needed to drill a hole in the frame - another trip to the garage.  Eventually I got the battery tray attached.

The next step was to install the servos.  That had to wait until after the eclipse.  The cloud cover hadn't gone away, but it had thin patches that allowed viewing the sun.  We sat on the deck and watched whenever the clouds thinned.  Unfortunately they were very thick during totality and we didn't get to see any of it.  Shit.  We went back inside disgusted and had lunch.

After lunch it was back to RC.  The after market servo mounts I'd purchased didn't fit.  Another trip to the garage and the Dremel fixed that.  The next step was installing the receiver box.  At least that went without drama.

I got out the fender to install them.  Before I did I decided to install the rock lights I'd purchased.  They came in pieces with no instructions.  It took me some time to figure out how the first one went together.  After that the other three were quick.  I have to build mounts for them.  It was after four and I'd had enough for the day, so I put everything away.

I watched videos for a while and then had a frozen thing for dinner.  After that it was more videos.  I also did a little investigation into another RC car. We'll see.  I still have work to do on the Defender, the MT10, and finishing the Wrangler.

Day 3053

 I woke up at 8 and got up to have breakfast.  There wasn't any wind this morning, so I told Ellen that I wouldn't be going shooting with her.  Instead I went out to poison the environment.

I backed the mower out of the garage and put the battery in the sprayer.  At first it wouldn't work when I opened the sprayer valve.  I actually hit the pump with a hammer before I realized I hadn't turned on the power.  I'm definitely getting old.

After that things went smoothly.  I sprayed the remaining 6 gallons in the tank and then filled it with another 6 gallons.  That was enough to do all of the gravel including the driveway.  When I finished I cleaned out the sprayer and put it away.  Then I parked the mower in the garage.  I still have to do the mowing, but I'll probably wait until next week.

I really wanted to get all of the poisoning done today, so I got out the Casoron and put it all over the lower part of the gravel.  I didn't do the driveway because there isn't any weeds growing there.  The whole operation took about 2 and a half hours.  When I was done I put my clothes in the washer and took a shower.

After that I had leftover pizza for lunch and then sat down for videos.  I watched them for most of the rest of the day.  I did stop for about an hour and go out to the garage.  I fabricated a couple of parts to substitute for the missing part on the Wrangler.  I'll install the tomorrow.

Ellen fixed steak for dinner.  It was good.  Abby liked her share, too.

The weather was cloudy in the morning today, but cleared up a lot in the afternoon.  I'm hoping that it will be clear for the eclipse.  It's the last one that I will see in my lifetime.

Day 3052

 I got up about 8, got up and did the pet stuff and had breakfast.  The wind was blowing pretty hard, so spraying was out.  I went outside and moved the mower and sprayer into the garage because it was lightly raining.  I was outside for a while and Abby had a great time running around.  Eventually she tired herself out and laid down to watch me.  The wind and light rain continued almost all day.

I decided to keep working on the Cherokee.  To make progress I had to make the shocks.  It took me 3.5 hours to do it.  I started to count how many parts were involved and lost count when it was over 50.  The C clips were the only hard part, but of course greasing the seals and bleeding the shock oil was really messy.

When the shocks were done Ellen told me we needed to pick up the cat food.  We drove to the pet store and had lunch at the pizza place next door.  Traffic was really bad.  It took forever to turn out of the development onto 1826.  On the  way home loop 1 was jammed up at the Costco entrance.  There were a lot of cars without of state license plates.  One was a Tesla from Hawaii.

When we got home I went back to work on the car.  I put the steering links on the front axle.  Then I attached the front and back axles.  Of course I had problems with the axles coming apart and lining up the links for attachment.  I used to never get frustrated with my hand.  Now days I find that I sometimes do. Today was one of those days.  The thing is beginning to look like a RC car though.

I started to do the next step.  I got a little done before I found out that one of the parts is missing.  Luckily it's not an important one, but it pissed me off.  I was tired anyway, so I quit and went to watching videos.

The videos turned into a nap.  After I woke up it was more videos, leftovers for dinner, and more videos until bed time.

Day 3051

 I woke up about 8, played games for a short while, and then got up for pet stuff and breakfast.  After that I surfed.  The Ukrainians mad some impressive attacks on Russia yesterday and I had fun watching them make good Russians.

Ellen had a doctor's appointment at 9:45.  After that we went to the park on Beckett. I attached the RC speed reader on her.  Then we went on our normal walk across the field and then through the wood.  We took a couple of new paths, so it might have been a little longer than normal.  When we got back the reader said that Abby had gone 3.3 miles and hi a max speed of 20 mph.  I was impressed.

When that was done we went to the post office and then had lunch at Torchy's.  The wind had gotten too high to spray, so we sat there for a while surfing and enjoying being outside.  Eventually we went home.

I'd planned on spraying, so I didn't have anything else to do.  I got out the Wrangler stuff and went to work.  First I constructed the drive lines.  It was messy, a lot of the parts had to be coated in black grease.  Then I started building the frame.  That was a large muti-stage process.  It started with attaching the suspension links.  Then building up the servo mount and on side of the front shock towers.

From there it was attaching the skid plate and servo mount to one set of frame rails.  Then it was adding the rear servo mounts.  Then it was "do the other side".  Eventually I had the frame completely assembled. The last thing I did was attach the motor and transmission to the frame.

The instructions didn't help in some cases.  They left out some of the part identifiers and in one place didn't show how the part was attached.  I even had to go the garage to get 4 screws that weren't included in the kit.  The last straw was a part was left out of the parts bag.  It's probably in another one, but it was 7 and I was too tired and hungry to go searching for it.

The next step it to build the shocks.  I can't put that off any more.

While I was building Ellen went to the grocery store to buy everything we'll need until after the eclipse.  We saw people driving rental RV's on 1826 today.  It's going to be a madhouse.  In fact the doctor's office called and rescheduled my appointment to after the eclipse.  I'd been worried about going there on eclipse day.

After dinner (leftovers) I watched videos.

Day 3050

 I woke up about 8 and played games for a while.  Eventually it was up for breakfast.  It was a windless day, so when I was finished I went out to poison the environment.

The whole effort was a shit show.  The first step was the setup - put the batteries in the mower and tractor and get them out of the storage building.  That's when I noticed that the tires on both the mower and the sprayer needed to be pumped up.  All of this took a lot of time that I could have avoided by doing it earlier.

I filled the sprayer with a little wire and tried the pump.  It didn't work.  I tried hitting it with a rock, but that didn't help.  That necessitated a quick trip to Harbor Freight.  I bought a new sprayer for $100.  It took a while.  Their computer was down, so they only took cash.  The bigger problem was they had to get the sprayer from the back.  I couldn't get anyone to go get one even though some of them were standing around with their thumbs up their ass.

Abby was really disappointed.  Ellen had put on her collar, but we didn't let her out of the car.

When I got home I needed to move the pump from the new sprayer to the old.  Before I did that I decided to hit the old pump with a hammer.  It started working.  However, when I tried to spray with it the flow was tiny.  That was a waste of time.

I transferred the pump and wand from the new sprayer to the old.  That's because the new one didn't have wheels.  Fortunately the new pump was an exact replacement.  That was the only good thing all day.

By then it was 91 degrees and I was hot, tired, hungry, and thirsty.  I went inside and had a sandwich.  Then it was back outside.

I started to spray the lower parking area.  The spray started getting weaker and the pump finally stopped.  Fuck.  That was it for the day.  I put the battery on a charger and it started charging.  I'd charged the battery a week ago.  By then it was 3.

I went inside and took a shower.  After that it was surfing for a short time.  Then I used on of the Velcro straps to attach the RC speed reader to the dog.  We took her outside to play fetch.  It was over 90 though and she really didn't want to.  She did get up to 18 mph though.  The speed reader has a bug though.  Once you turn it on you can't turn it off.

I also programmed the new gate openers.  They both worked.  I guess there were two things that went right.

Ellen fixed turkey and noodles for dinner.  After dinner was videos.

Day 3049

 I woke up about 8 and played games for a while.  Eventually it was up for breakfast and surfing.  That lasted until it was time to go to the urologist to get blood drawn.

I got to the doctor just on time.  It was busy.  We got the only parking spot in the place.  Ellen sat with the dog while they took my blood.  It didn't take long.

After the doctor we stopped at the pet store. They told me yesterday the the cat food was coming in that day.  Apparently it didn't.  They are supposed to cal when it does.  I think we should order some.  After that it was Beckett park so that the dog could run.

Abby did her normal thing.  She ran around like a crazy dog on the field and cruised around in the woods.  She always came back to check in 45 seconds to a minute after she would disappear in the woods.  She also immediately obeyed the couple of times we called her back.

The last stop was Waterloo for lunch.  We've been there enough that the waitress asked me if I wanted a mango margarita as soon as we sat down. When that was done we went home.  Ellen was leaving early for the club.

After she left I surfed for a while.  Then I got the urge to work on the Wrangler.  I got out the instructions and built up the suspension and steering links.  There were 11 links.  Each had ends to attach, and each end had a ball that needed to be inserted.  It took almost 2 hours, mainly because the instructions had an error.  They labelled all of the ends as having the same part number.  There were actually three different types.  I had to look carefully at the illustrations to determine which ends went on which links.  

Before I could build the links I had to go out to the garage to get the micrometer.  Cooper zoomed out when I opened the door.  He headed for the woods.  Abby went after him.  She sort of herded him towards me as he went through the bushes.  He figured out that he wasn't going to escape and went back and sat on the lawn so that I could pick him up.

When I was done I had leftovers for dinner.  Then it was videos for the evening.

Day 3048

 I woke up at 8 and got up for breakfast.  After that was some surfing.  I had gotten Ellen's mini-b from the garage yesterday and needed to reprogram it.

Unfortunately I'd forgotten to charge its battery.  While that was happening I put holes in her new painted body and installed it on the car.  I cleaned up the papers on the kitchen counter until the battery was charged.  Then I used a YouTube videos to reset the controller and trim the steering.  Now it's ready for her to use.

By then it was time to go to Costco.  I got there just at12:30.  I dropped off the hearing aids and did some shopping while they were being programmed.  When I got back they were ready.  The tech looked in my ears.  He said that the ear wax in my right ear is too hardened to be removed by the stuff I bought.  He said a doctor will have to do it.  I'll ask Dr. Cox next week.

After that I went to Fireman's for lunch.  Ellen called and asked me to buy her a sandwich.  I also stopped at the pet food store and bought some canned cat food.  I also ordered some of the dehydrated stuff.  It should be here tomorrow.  Then I went home.

As part of getting ready to leave I took out some stuff to put in the trailer.  I also spent sometime going through the junk drawers and removing stuff that didn't need to be there.

I took Abby to get the mail.  Some more stuff from China showed up.  There's still a couple of items that are due to be sent to the mailbox.  The new stuff goes to the post office box.

After that I sat down for videos.  They again turned into a nap.  I think that that's getting really common.  I guess it's part of getting old.

Dinner was a sandwich.  After dinner was more videos.

Day 3047

 I woke up about 8 and played games for a long time.  I was really on a winning streak and didn't want to quit.  Eventually it was up for breakfast and a little surfing.

I really wanted to get the MT10 finished, so I got it out along with the ESC programmer and the controller.  I bound the receiver and controller and then set the throttle positions.  Then I set the steering trim.  Finally I used the programmer to program the ESC.  The car is really quick to accelerate, even though I was using a 2S battery.  It should scream on 3S.

It was a little after noon when I finished (did I mention I got a late start?).  We packed up the dog and went to run her at Circle C.  It was a steam bath outside - 84 degrees and 98% humidity.  Abby didn't seem to mind.  She took off running around the field to start with.  When we moved to the path she started making long loops into the woods on either side.  She always came back in a timely manner though.

Ellen had lunch before we left, but I didn't.  I stopped at Culver's for a hamburger.  Then we stopped at a pet store for a bag of dog food and a few cans of cat food.  After that it was home.

A really weird thing happened when we got back.  The garage door opener was missing from the visor and it wasn't in the car.  Abby must have knocked it down and it fell out when I got out of the car.

Ellen left for the club and I surfed for a while.  That got boring, so I did a little work on the Defender.  I went up to the mailbox at 4:30, but there was nothing there.  The mystery was solved when I got back.  I had 4 emails from AliExpress asking me to confirm some deliveries.  I looked at the tracking info.  4 packages had been delivered to the mailbox on Friday.  That's the day we noticed the mailbox door was open.  Yes, they'd been stolen.  I lost $23 worth of stuff.  What hurts the most is it's stuff that I need right now to finish up the MT10.

When Ellen got back we did a little shopping.  I ordered a new opener and a dog shit bag holder (the old one broke today).  I also ordered some Velcro ties for the dog/rc GPS.  We both decided on a new dog box pad.  Abby has chewed the old one up.  After that it was more videos.