Blub, Blub

Well, the rain continues (forty days and forty nights?). As our daughter Veronica said, "I'll probably regret saying this in August, but I'm sick of rain and want it to stop!"
Yesterday, across Lake LBJ from our house in Horseshoe Bay, 19 inches of rain fell between midnight and 10:00 in the morning. That's about six-months worth of normal rainfall.
On the positive side, the lakes are full for the first time in several years, the wild flowers were stupendous, and you can tube-float the Guadalupe River without bumping your butt. On the negative side, our realtor is finding it difficult to find folks willing to venture out in the rain to see our house. It'll happen, and in the meantime we decided to start prepping our property for construction. We are going to be clearing, connecting water, bringing in caleche for a driveway, and installing a septic system.

Silence can be golden. . .

Why do beauty operators (stylists, or whatever they call themselves now) think that their customers are interested in their (a) problems, (b) pains, or (c) personal business?

I've had this problem with my stylists throughout the years, but I think my current one gets the award for sharing personal things. I've heard how her doctor cannot find her gall bladder; how she got drunk at a hair show in Las Vegas and missed most of the sessions; the problems she has with her mother, her son, and her ex; etc. etc. etc. I am very happy with how she cuts my hair and I really don't want to look for someone else. . .

Why don't they realize that getting one's hair cut and styled is supposed to be a pampering experience? We don't want to hear about problems; very likely we are escaping some.

My goddaughter got her beautician license in January and I've given her strict instructions to talk to her clients only to the extent that they indicate they want to be talked to. . .

When it Rains. . .

We really thought we were going to have to get our ark-building equipment out today -- it rained almost continuously all day and, for about two hours, very heavily. We had about 2 inches of water surrounding our trailer and, in fact, we have a leak so we had water coming inside the trailer! Carl sacrificed himself in the downpour and discovered (and corrected) what, he thinks, is causing the leak. So hopefully we don't have to worry about that any more, as the forecast is calling for more rain the next couple of days.

The day ended beautifully as we went out to dinner with our best friends, Bill and Susan, to celebrate Bill's birthday. Also in attendance were Susan's dad, and her sister and brother-in-law. We went to Italian Garden, a small restaurant close to us, with delicious food and very reasonable prices. It was a great evening!

Take Us Off Your List. . .

We have just had it with credit card solicitations, political solicitations, and other junk mail. I saw a segment on the "Today" show several weeks ago on how to "opt out" of all this "stuff" so today I finally had the time to call the numbers and sign onto the websites.

For your information:
1. To "opt out" of credit card solicitations: www.optout.com
2. To stop receiving junk mail: www.dmaconsumers.org/cgi/offmailing list (if you sign up online it costs $5; you can instead, for the price of a stamp, complete the online form, click "register by mail"; print the completed form, and mail to the address listed on the form.
3. To stop telephone solicitations: www.dma.consumers.org/cgi/offtelephone (same rules apply as in #2)
4. To reduce e-mail solicitations: www.dmaconsumers.org/consumers/opoutform_emps.shtml.

As it turns out, it's very complicated to simplify one's life!

A Day in the Life of an RVer. . .

This was truly a typical day:

Carl spent the day glued to his laptop and to his telephone engaged in one conference call after another.

I went to the gym, got caught in a "frog strangler" and gingerly drove home; spent the afternoon doing laundry at my girlfriend's house.

We got a call from a repairman that one of his contractors said there was no electricity at our Horseshoe Bay house; he was going to check it out himself and call us back, one way or another. He called about 11:00 this morning; it's now 7:20 p.m. and we've yet to hear from him -- even though we've left him a couple of voice mails asking that he let us know what he found :-(

We're fixing beef stroganoff for dinner -- OH YEAH!

It's a real party here at Jellystone!

The Poop Dance

I learned about the poop dance when I first brought J. J. home from the breeder -- he was 7 weeks old and he fit into the palm of my hand. My best friend, Susan, and I were outside my house watching him explore and, all of a sudden, he started turning in circles. I said to Susan "Look how cute that is!" She said, "I think he's getting ready to poop." And, sure enough, she was right.

From that time forward, J. J. became more and more discriminating about the places in which he would poop: he would sniff, move forward and sniff, move backward and sniff, turn in circles for awhile, stand up, sniff, move forward and sniff, move backward and sniff, turn in circles for awhile, etc. etc. etc. Finally he would find the perfect spot and, eventually, poop!

We were in for quite a shock when we got Grover because he would literally stop in stride, while lifting his leg, squat, and poop!

Well, things have changed! J. J. now is now non-discriminatory about where he poops; he sniffs a couple of minutes, squats and poops. Grover, on the other hand, has become the gourmet of pooping places: he will go so far as spinning in circles, moving forward and sniffing, moving backward and sniffing, turning in circles, squatting, and THEN GET UP! He then continues his walk and, after all the steps I've described above, he will finally find THE PERFECT SPOT!

Ah, the entertainment opportunities for those who live in RVs. . .

Kids and Kayaks!

In his Father's Day card from his youngest daugher, Carl learned that she and her husband just bought kayaks! So now they have kayaks, as do my younger nephew and his wife. And we know that my sister and brother-in-law, and my older nephew and his wife are all eager to go kayaking. So we are looking forward to some great times on the river this summer with family!

What a Great Weekend!

This was a great weekend because:

1. Carl didn't do ONE BIT of IBM work!
2. We finished dozens of tasks around the RV; very important since, for the past several weeks, we've left town, come back, dumped everything, and left again. . .
3. We visited the new HEB Plus in Kyle -- what a party!
4. We did some additional beautification to our "yard."
5. We enjoyed watching the US Open -- unfortunately, Tiger lost by one stroke.
6. We started from scratch on the floorplan for our new house and came up with something that we both LOVE!

It was a good time!

Dinner Show at Jellystone Hall

Carl & I had a delightful evening: we attended the dinner show at Jellystone Hall. We had seen the signs that there would be a dinner show every Friday and Saturday night during the summer, so, with very low expectations, we decided to attend tonight.

First of all, the dinner was delicious: brisquet, pinto beans, baked potato, applesauce, and peach cobbler topped with vanilla ice cream. Then there was the entertainment: the English brothers. These are four extremely talented musicians, singers, and entertainers who perform the "songs of the cowboy." Many of the songs were familiar to us; others were not. All, however, were beautifully done in the tight, beautiful harmonious style of the Sons of the Pioneers.

We will definitely take advantage of the show again and hope to bring friends and family with us. It's very refreshing to have such wonderful wholesome entertainment!

From the Mountains to the Hill Country

We got back from the Davis Mountains last night about 8:00. We had SUCH a good time: we got a lot of work done (both in the main kitchen and in our cabin); we visited almost non-stop with family and lifelong friends; we had the opportunity to get better acquainted with two couples that we've known for years; and we observed two majestic thunderstorms as only West Texas can produce!

For those of you who have no clue what I'm talking about, let me explain: Nestled in the beautiful Davis Mountains of West Texas, on the scenic loop between Fort Davis and Valentine, is a section of land known as Bloys Camp Meeting. which is held one week a year in August. The camp was started in 1898 as a way to gather the ranchers together to give thanks for a good year -- now 5,000 - 6,000 people attend each year. It is a non-denominational camp with programs for every age group. It is up to the attendess as to which (if any) of the services they want to attend. There is no swimming pool, no horseback riding, no television, no wifi service, and limited cell phone service -- just the glorious mountain vistas, beautiful weather, good food, lots of opportunities for spiritual renewal, and and lots of visiting with friends (old and new).

My grandfather started one of the six eating sheds on the campground in 1926. He turned the management of the camp over to my dad in the early 70's and then Dad turned it over to his sons-in-laws. Dad had attended every camp meeting of his life except the 3 years he was in the South Pacific in WWII. Both my sister and I have attended every year of our lives -- it's very much a part of our year and who we are.

Camp Meeting is a unique place: it must be experienced to fully understand the magic. What a blessing to have such a place in one's life!

Davis Mountain High

We are off to spend 5 days in the gorgeous Davis Mountains of West Texas. It will be at least 10 degrees cooler than it is here in New Braunfels, we will get to visit with long-time friends and several family members, Carl gets to do physical work (which he is very much looking forward to), and we'll be computer-free. A recipe for a very relaxing, recharging week!

Until the 13th!

A River Runs Wild!

Hi, this is Carl.
Well, after nearly four years of drought our lake & the river have almost burst their seams. There has been continuous rainfall in the aquafer west of us for the last several months. We don't have photos (although we may get some later) but for the last two weeks the Canyon Lake Dam has been releasing water at the rate of 4,800 cubic feet per minute (CFM). The input to the dam is entering at 600 CFM so things will change soon. That may not mean much to those of you on large rivers, but here it is huge. For the last few years if you wanted to float the Guadalupe River on an inner tube, kayak or canoe, it meant a lot of portages or "butt-bumping."
Now, we are all fearful of venturing out onto the river. It is spread far beyond the normal banks and is pretty dangerous. So, as you might imagine, we haven't gone forth on our kayaks this spring/summer. Oh well, when it rains it pours. Soon, when the dam has released enough to get to normal levels, it will be perfect. We expect that within a couple of weeks we will have a river to die for.

I'm Counting My Blessings

I had scheduled lunch in Austin with Mandi and Weston (niece and great nephew) and, to my surprise and delight, my nephew Jeffrey also went with us. We went to Tin Grill where I had THE BEST vegetable quesadillas I've EVER had -- the company and conversation was pretty great as well!

Weston, just recently turned 18 months, has discovered the joy of dipping -- he's not interested in eating whatever he's dipped; he just likes to dip. So he had a great time dipping his chips in the ketchup!

Following lunch we went back to the house for more great conversation and observation of Weston. One of the cutest things he does is getting upon the couch by himself -- he tries to do it by using only his legs! Quite entertaining!

What a blessing to have such a wonderful relationship with a nephew and his family!

When Life Gives You Lemons. . .

Yesterday started out as a normal, glorious day. But then the lemons started kicking in:

I logged on to work on my e-mail and discovered that my computer no longer recognized my address book ??? OK, no problem. I'll just clean the RV.

I then showered and got dressed to volunteer my shift at the library. I got there and 2 other volunteers were already there. One said, "I wonder why we have three today?" She looked at the book and I wasn't scheduled to work! OK, no problem. I'll do my laundry (not a trivial task when one lives in an RV!)

Carl and I drove to my sister's lake house (about 150 miles round trip) to pick up a nailer that my brother-in-law wants us to take to camp meeting this weekend (it was on the list to pick up last weekend when we were there, but it got overlooked). Well, we couldn't find the nailer and we couldn't get in touch with Maxie. OK, no problem. We ate at one of our favorite places in Marble Falls!

I think that today we definitely qualify for poster children for the saying "When life gives you lemons, make lemonade"!

What a Pain in the Neck!

Actually, it's a pain in my shoulders which started on my drive to Houston on Thursday. I think I exacerbated the problem during the house cleaning on Saturday so yesterday I called to get a massage. I got the answering machine which said they were open on Tuesday through Saturday so I hung up.

Imagine my surprise yesterday evening when I received a call from the owner! She said she'd had a missed call from me and wanted to get back with me, so I made an appointment for this morning. She worked on me for almost two hours and charged me for a 50-minute massage! She said I was in bad shape and really needed the work!

I made an appointment for another massage on Thursday; I think it'll take3 - 4 times to get all my muscles loosened up and I know I'll feel better once it's done. . .

Playing Catchup

I didn't intend to be off the blog for so long, but it just worked out that way and now I have to play catch up.

I drove to Houston on Thursday for an AAUW "gig" Thursday night. A real treat on that trip was that I got to stay with my nephew, Alan, and his wife, Bekki. The visit was short on quantity but long on quality -- we had a great visit and the AAUW "gig" was great fun.

I got back home about noon on Friday and then Carl, J. J., Grover and I headed for my sister and brother-in-law's place on Lake Buchanan about 2:00 p.m. We stopped by our house in Horseshoe Bay to meet the exterminator and then we popped in on our neighbors for a nice visit. We got to the lake house about 7:00 p.m. and spent a lovely evening on their deck overlooking the now-full lake!

Saturday morning we started work about 9:00 a.m. and worked like little elves cleaning their house and front and back porches so that everything will be nice and welcoming for them when they come home next weekend after 6 months in Las Vegas!

Yesterday, my girlfriend (Susan) and I did some fun running around and then the two of us and our husbands cooked out together at their house last night. A fun, and delicious, thing we grilled was stone fruit (peaches, plums and apricots). YUMMO! as Rachael Ray would say