Thursday, January 19, 2012

Q. Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday

Tuesday:
A beautiful, sunny, non-windy day. Finally no wind.
Frank gave me a ride to the downtown grocery stores this morning. The town and desert is really starting to fill up. Everywhere you look, there are RV’s pulling into town.
Steve, aka Lazy Bones, and his Boston Terrier Jiggs pulled in today. Apparently Steve and Jiggs were at this years Balloon Fest. Steve doesn’t control Jiggs very much and Jiggs went around lifting his leg on all sorts of stuff like coolers, lawn chairs, Linda's statue, etc. Some people got annoyed at Steve and Jiggs. Years ago we were in a dog park and a dog came up to Carols scooter and peed on one of the wheels. The owner was really embarrassed but, hey, if you’re in a dog park you just have to expect such things. The wheel dried off just fine. Jiggs is a nice dog.

Roger’s guess is that by Saturday, we’ll have about 18+ rigs in our little patch of desert.

By the time we’re ready to head east towards Tucson, we’ll have dry camped for about six straight weeks; a personal record. In this desert environment, the two hundred watts of solar power and two batteries has proven adequate for our needs. A third panel would be better, but two work. Last night Carol watched TV for two hours and by morning, the batteries were at 60% charge.

Wednesday:
Took a walk into town this morning with the guys. Someone always seems to need something.
Rick, Annie and their dog Dweezil Zappa , pulled in about 1pm. We first met them at the Balloon Fest in 2008 then again, here at Q last year. Two really nice people. Annie is an RN as is Ann. We now have two nurses on call.
Jerry, aka Budster, arrived about 4pm.
Tonight was campfire night. Roger enforced the only campground rule; there will be no campfire or social hour discussions that involve politics. If you want to talk politics, wander off someplace in the desert.
There was a discussion on The Escapee board concerning internet service in Q during late January. Those who understand such things, said that in the evening when people were “home” and using the internet, service would slow to a crawl because so many people would be using the same tower. That’s exactly what’s happening. I use Speedtest.net to check internet speed. Download speed right now, 7:21pm, is 0.03 Mbps. I just shut the computer down for the night. I’ll use it in the morning.

Thursday:
Today was run errands day for most everyone. We did a load of laundry, went grocery shopping, got a longer hose for the Wave 3 heater then met up at the Grubstake Restaurant for lunch with some of our friends. The Grubstake is a Q tradition. For lunch they have a $5 fish and chips special. One large piece of very good fried fish, some excellent coleslaw and a pile of not very greasy fries. They also have “challenge” meals. Like eat a two pound hamburger in 30 minutes, or a jumbo order of super hot wings, that sort of thing. No one ordered a challenge meal.




After running errands we took long, hot showers then went to the dump station/water fill. We were number 14 in line. It took 45 minutes to finish that chore. The crowds are really building. Everywhere you look, RV’s are pulling into town. Most of the commercial RV parks have their “full” signs posted.
Three more Lazy Daze pulled in today. Lisa and her Mom, Mike and Gracey, Kevin and Malia.



We are thoroughly enjoying ourselves. After Q, some of the group is heading down to the Imperial Dam/Senator Wash area. We'll meet up with them there.

Monday, January 16, 2012

"Q" Friday-Monday

Friday & Saturday:

Saturday morning we all took a walk into town. Even those that didn’t need anything came back with something. I’ve been having problems with my house batteries recently. They don’t seem to be able to hold a charge very well or something was causing a drain on them. Interstate Battery makes a 6v deep cycle battery (GC-2-XHD-S) with a 232 amp hour rating. A place in town had them for $105/each. The same store wanted $148 for a Trojan T-105 at 225 amp hours. Roger and John are very knowledgeable about such things and thought the Interstate battery would be a good choice. Roger drove me to the store to get the batteries and, in about 30 minutes, John installed them. According to the date code on the Trojans, Roger said they were five years old.
Tonight was Mexican dinner night. We made a pot of beans. Others bought tamales, rice, salad, etc. After dinner was the piƱata assault.




Frank and Cookie, and Buddy the dog, pulled in today.

Sunday & Monday:

On Sunday we awoke to a grey, cold and windy day. Never got much better as the day went on. I walked into town this morning with some of the other guys. I have everything I can think of but Jerry and Jim came back with a few more things.

Monday: A bright, sunny, windy day. 54* when we got up. About 9am we drove into town for propane and water and to dump the tanks, pick up some grocery items and, of course, stop by the really good bakery in town. Every night there is a social hour, or so, starting about 4. I needed some snack type things for that.
Kuehn Street, where the vendors are, has lots of parking suitable for an RV up to about 30’ as long as you get there early. We found a really good spot and spend the rest of the day there. Carol was able to get around very well on her scooter. She found some nice, warm, fuzzy socks and I came across a replacement handle for the bathroom door that is much easier for Carol to operate. Pushing the button on the original latch was always troublesome for her.
For lunch, we split an Indian Taco and a strawberry fry-bread desert. Excellent!!
Next week, during the RV show, the plan is to get up about 7am, drive here, park, have breakfast then walk to the Big Tent which is only a few blocks away.

Roger bar-b-qued a tri-tip roast today. Everyone else brought a side dish. I made brownies. Ann made the most wonderful clam chowder; one of my personal favorites.

The new batteries are working very well so the electrical problem I was wondering about wasn’t something more serious.

Another rig pulled in today. Andrea, who is a full timer.