Friday, Paducah KY
Ducks Creek RV Park

Sorry about the Saturday morning at the KOA in Forysth, GA. I must have had a brain fart. I somehow lost Friday in my writing. I'll go ahead and change the blog so no one continues to think I'm nutso. Well, perhaps it is a bit late for that LOL!

Well, I asked Paul this morning if he was going try to make it home from outside Atlanta. Oh no, he tells me. Big fibber. Once again he has repeatedly said during throughout the day, "we can make it home, we are really close." Baloney! We were at this point at least 5 hours from home and it is 4 pm. Boy, how many times have we repeated this same scenario? This time we not only have Grandpa with us, but the furkids. When he pulls this crap and if we would push on, by the time we would get home, I would be so cranky and p*ssed, I wouldn't even be able to look at him. (Now, ask me how I know this!). Not to mention the fact that about 11 after 12 hours or so behind the wheel, he starts to fall asleep. He will deny this to the death. I know differently, I have witnessed the eye lids slowly drooping at half mast. That's when I slap him and yell "wake up you putz!" He will argue and argue that he was not falling asleep. If I didn't fear for my life I would videotape him. I am serious. I had to throw some really nasty comments his way before he finally he agreed to stop. This was of course after we had gone past several very nice campgrounds. So the only place to stay is Duck Creek Campground. It only has two W's in the Woodall's book so my expectations were rather low. It was a place to stop; they had electric and a pull through spot. Just how low this place is, well, trust me, this is trailer trash. A Mecca of old dilapidated trailers and fifth wheelers that are no longer road worthy. Good grief, some of these rigs have built over roofs on them and they look like something out of a National Geographic documentary of a third world country. I will take some pictures in the morning so you know that I am not making this up. Pictures don't lie!

We had BBQ steak, corn, baked potato and Texas five cheese toast for dinner. During the making dinner process I blew out the circuits. I had lamps on, the toaster oven and the microwave. Gee, just like home! I am really tired and I think Grandpa is too. We will hit the sack early and get home sometime before noon if we are lucky. I will call Mom in the morning and have her pick up our mail along with hers from the post office. We might not make it before their closing time at noon. I am not too anxious to get home. We do have a lot of stuff to do in the next week or so. Paul's shoulder replacement surgery on Friday, and has tests scheduled for Tuesday. Grandpa cancelled his colonoscopy before we are left so we need to call and get him another appointment. It will take us a few days to unload the rig. We have to do all the laundry, and strip the bed. We'll also have to wash all the blankets, blah, blah, blah. Ick. Oh well, I'll post more tomorrow.

Later

dennise

Saturday
Duck Creek Campground, Paducah, KY

Well, last night about 3 am I had to go to the bathroom (and what else is new you ask?). I am freezing. We have electric so we don'tt have to freeze because we have power to run the furnace fans. So why am I so cold? I crawl back into bed with you-know-who, and am startled at what I see. He had donned his FedEx heavy duty sweatshirt during the night and HAD THE HOOD UP OVER HIS HEAD! He looked like a dead monk. I lay there a moment and tried to figure out why it was so cold if the furnace was running. A light bulb went on over my head! Paul had plugged in a small electric heater in the bathroom area to make sure Grandpa got some warmth during the night. It was keeping the area around the thermostat just warm enough to fool the furnace into thinking it was warm! Duh! So very angrily I turned that sucker off, turned up the furnace and jumped back into bed next to the dead monk. Then I was cold so I couldn't go back to sleep. GRRRRR. But, I think I did finally doze off only to wake up at 6 am having to go to the bathroom again. Afterwards, I must have slept again as we woke up to a frigid but scenic Ducks Creek RV Resort. This place looks even worse in the morning light. We'll have a quick breakfast of toast and we will be off. We talked to Zack last night and he was crying the poverty blues so instead of going directly home we will take I64 to St. Louis and stop by to visit him. We will take him to lunch and Paul will slip him a twenty so he has money as payday isn't until Thursday. I remember talking to him when he returned to school; he had extra money in this account and he had thought the school made a mistake and paid him extra. Actually it was because they paid him early for January hours. Imagine that. I told him not to spend it like a drunken sailor,which judging by his down in the mouth phone voice crying poverty, he obviously didn't take my advice NOT spend the extra money in case the school found they had erred and withdraw it from the account. Well, here again, Zack has learned a very important life lesson. Some people have to have a brick hit 'em in the head. Zack is one of those poor souls.

Well, I have to go get the rig ready to roll. Will update when we get to the Flying J rendezvous point.

Later,

dennise


We have the genset running because we have entered the Artic zone aka Southern Illinois, I thought I'd write a bit more since I have power to run the PC (my battery is dying a very slow death). We have encountered February weather I guess, and it had to happen sooner or later. I am glad the folks up here had a nice month thus far; temps higher than normal; sunshine and 60 degrees. We took the cold with us when we left for Miami; recall me blogging that Miami had record cold temperatures when we arrived? Well not to be denied our obvious good luck, we are helping the folks in Illinois enjoy a normal February winter day. The trees are bare and look so dreary. I miss the beautiful palm trees, all 6 bazillion species of them. I miss seeing those graceful herons and sandpipers busily looking for a tasty tidbit of fish. I miss the warm breezes and the brilliant sunshine. Well, I am just feeling sorry for myself. I guess it will be good to get home and sleep in a real bed. Paul and I slept on the pull out sofa to let Grandpa have his privacy. It really worked out well. After the huge mattress on the sofa pull-out fiasco, we did adjust rather well to the 4 inch air mattress. I guess this is what the air number beds are like. I think we will think about replacing the atrocious mattress in the bedroom with one. Or a memory foam topper. Anything is better than the one that came with the rig. Grandpa slept well on it so it must not be that bad. After thinking back on this trip, I do think I would like to full time for a while. I don't think I could bear to sell the house and all our possessions just yet though. We can'tt afford to keep the house and be on the road fulltime. Mom and Cecil are ok, but the togetherness 24/7 in the rig is hard for two, with three it is a bit hard on veryone. Grandpa also misses having his own car. He mentioned that he didn't feel comfortable driving the Vue because his mastery of the 5 speed has deteriorated, his words, not mine. I think if we do go away again, we will find a place where he can fish. Although he and Paul did fish in Naples, they were not successful. It was amusing seeing a lot fish jumping out of the water at Sliver Lakes and nary a bite on their poles. They haven't caught a keeper sized fish I think since Grandpa lived in Spanish Lake, MO! I am sure we can find a place with good fishing. Of course the OCEAN has a lot of fish, hahaha! They didn't have the right gear to do that kind of fishing. There also was a nice pond at McDill where the cub scouts camp. I guess different local scouting groups use the tent camping area and then maybe get a tour of the base. There was a really beautiful pond in that area but I am not sure if one could fish there, or if there were any fish even in the pond. Besides its kinda close to the golf courses so you'd take your life is in danger from wayward golf balls. Most of the players are old farts and they can be a just a little bit um, shall we say wild? I don't enjoy fishing. I'd rather read or knit. Fishing puts me to sleep. Plus, I would never go deep sea fishing after my terrible experience in Cancun many many years ago (BM-before marriage). Well the furnace is on because of the generator and its giving me hot flashes. I will write more later.

dennise

here are the pictures I promised....


a nice view of mattesses, eh? The earth mover as an art piece is rather unique, dontcha think?



Here are the roofs...really classy I'd say!

I didn't post the very very obese cigarette man in his long johns smoking a cigarete