A Lifestyle Change!!!

 As you can tell from the pics above, I had a slight mishap in Houston....fell off my trailer and I have done a number to my right ankle/foot!  It has probably been about 30+ years since I had a sprain like this!

I have been at Tif and Cary's for about 11 days now and it looks like I'll be here for a while longer.  I fell off my trailer about 2 weeks ago and I'm still on my crutches and can't really put any weight on my right foot.  This is going to be a long "repair" run!  I just don't seem to heal quite as fast as I used to!     Heheheh.....duh!!                                                     

 And I did not want to go in the hole any more with the truck..... sooooooo... with the help of Tif and Cary my truck got emptied and I returned it yesterday and am no longer in the trucking industry.  This in turn has brought on mixed feelings.  I love driving and see the road and meeting folks....and having a different sunrise and sunset every day....but that can only go on for so long.  I have gotten over the hump of the "giving up on driving"....so now for the next leg of this life experience....getting to learn how to be a gran'pa....and actually getting to slow down on my terms. 

And two of those "terms" are sitting on my chest above....it is Gramps time!  A little hard for a workaholic to slow down....but getting there.....and the other three are in Alabama...And I will be headed for there in a couple of months....have to get my retirement house settled first and a little cash and then to the "Heart of Dixie" we go!!!

And then there are those kids that are still in the process of getting to the "big boy stage"!!!!   But I think they will all make it yet!!!

And last week was a fabulous week of rain and wind and cool for this part of Texas. And sitting on the front porch and watching the winds blow in and the rain just come down and to just be able to watch it and not worry about the time or the timing of the "run" were quite pleasant....I am pretty sure that this transition to "Froggy Retirement" will be pretty painless!!!  I am already getting used to this!!  Now to get my right foot back and all will be well with the world!!!

Rain, Rain, Rain!

Still in Tye/Abilene area & boy have they gotten some rain in the past 3 days! I'm sitting in the "driver's lounge" at Bruckner in Tye....they're replacing the oil filter mount on Bertha. Looks like I'll be here until this afternoon sometime. But I think this will take care of most all that has been wrong with Bertha for a while....hopefully!  Now to get a run in the direction of Al so I can drop in on the kids for a day or two.  :-)

If all goes well I'll have a couple of pics this evening of the sleeper...I have about all the storage figured out, so it should look pretty good by then. At least the floor will be completely cleared and my "partial" wood floor will have a rug on it.  :-)  Should be pretty good!

I dropped in on Best Buy here and just looked around....but in the appliance section I found a quesadilla cooker....and it really works very well.  So my diet continues to get better! I've actually lost 5+ pounds.  :-p

800 Days....Thank God!!!

 I Love It.....when I stumble upon another "old time RV lover"!!!! This little jewel was in the parking lot at Home Depot in Abilene. It is a 1972 model that the guy is totally reworking on the interior...and I mean totally! He has basically almost stripped it down to the shell and is working his way out...wiring and plumbing and all!! All of which, of course, makes me want to take a little more time each month and work on my little jewel!!!  Have my list of what all I need to get done...now I just have to take the time each month to get it all done by 08/18/2016!!!  Heheheheheh   ;-)

 

I don't remember is I already put this pic in the blog yet, but this was my last load....light poles from MN to TX...all 9,709 pounds!!  I love those heavy loads!!  LOL 

There was nothing basically moving Friday, unless I wanted to drive all the way to the fields out west then double back to Abilene....and I was really not in a very good mood on Friday, so I said to hell with it....I got 8 new tires put on the trailer, then I dead headed to Abilene. I have an appointment monday morning to have the filter mounting block on my engine replaced and have the A/C looked at.  So I am just chilling this weekend. I've not done a lot today but watch the Belmont stakes, now watching the Stanley Cup game #2, added a smooth board to the floor to make it easier on my feet, and changed out the air filters for the cab and sleeper. When it cools down this evening I'll work on splinting my cell phone amp antenna better. Tomorrow morning early start working on the TV antenna I want to mount and the work lights on back of the sleeper. Abbie has a spa appointment at 8am at PetSmart in the morning.

Just a little over 2 months and FOOTBALL SEASON will here again!!!!!  YES!!!  Heheheheheh   ;-P

I'm parked in front of the Abilene Hastings store right now...going to go in and have a look around in a little while, then park myself in the cafe for a while and use their wifi to download a couple of map updates and just relax for a while...if I can in a cafe....depends on the amount of people and noise...we shall see!!!

CA was still the pits!

Have just spent 2 glorious days in CA....and will be headed out in about 4 hours!  Thank goodness!  The roads here are the pits...still!   One for one & all for themselves!  It is probably not quite that bad, but it seems that way when you are driving the roads out here.  And the majority of them are so rough that you can loose ideas!

I loaded up Thurs evening with "bee food"!  That's right...it is high protein & vitamin food for honey bees!  And the gentleman where I loaded up is a bee person....or maybe should be called a bee herder?!?!  :-)  I just thought it was neat.

Anyway, I will be headed for Huxley, SD. Should be there by Sunday afternoon. Haven't been in SD in a  couple of years. Should be interesting to see just how much it hasn't changed.  ;-)

But I will be rolling out of here by 0400 so I won't have to deal with Sacramento rush hour! So lack of sleep and excess caffeine.....and just plain old stubbornness.....and I'll be on the roll to the plains!

South Dakota...I like this land!

I'm sitting in Watertown, SD doing a 34 hour restart...and it has been cool, quiet and relaxing. Now, there have been a lot of storms, wind, drove thru hail and heavy wind and rain on the way up here from CA....but I really do like the land up here. It is rolling hills, the Badlands, grasslands, gorgeous farm land...

 The really nice thing about storms out in the plains is you really get to have a good look at the clouds!  And they can be magnificient! The thunderhead above took on the look of an atomic blast in the light of the setting sun....that you don't see very often...if at all!!  :-)

 The other nice thing about the plains is the cars that you get to see....and you can see just about anything out here!  Caught this rod while looking for a spot to park here in Watertown.

 The drive up here thru the Badlands is just fabulous! The rolling hills go on for ever, it seems, and just blend into the horizon. And there was so much snow this past winter and they are getting so much rain so far this year that everything is green....and I mean everything!!

And I was not sure when I would be back thru this area, so while I had the chance I stopped at the Wall Drug Store in Wall, SD to pick up a couple of books on the ghost and gold towns of this part of the world. That is one of the things I plan on doing is getting back up here and finding some of these old towns from the gold rush days...and the silver rush days.

And what I hauled up here from CA was about 24,000 pounds of "bee protein"....honey bee food!!  And it was rainy and wet and windy and stormy for over half of the run. In fact, we unloaded in a nice steady rain that was just enough to get you soaked in 30 minutes!  But the storm that came along after that was just really massive!  I sat and watched it pass by...missed where I was sitting by just a couple of miles...but once it went by....on the rain that we got here for the next several hours....such fabulous sleeping weather!!!











I was able to get a couple of more of the modular drawers to try to finish up my storage issues in the truck. Added a 5 drawer to the closet since I have very little that needs to be hung up (because in the cold weather I keep my coats hanging on hooks that I can get to easy), almost all my clothing is in drawers (or will be before the night is over).  I'll get a pic of them when I get them all set up.

I have no real idea yet of where I am headed tomorrow. I'll be heading down towards Sioux Falls, SD to get a load out. And am working on making another run to CA for the AutoDisplay folks. We'll have to see how that one comes together.

But I think that the rest of the evening will be a movie night, just kick back and relax, get a good night's sleep and be ready to run for 7 days. Of course, tomorrow is the first day of the annual 3 day escapade of the DOT to check trucks, as many as they can, in their annual crack down on bad trucks. Let's just hope I can roll thru it without getting stopped....kind of like last year...it is just an inconvenience for time!  I'm not worried about passing one of them, it is just the hassle of it all. But if there were not so many crappy trucks out here with equally crappy drivers they wouldn't have to be doing it.  That is just the point that the trucking industry has gotten to. Not like it was several decades ago....and it just keeps getting worse!  

805 more days to go!!!  :-)