Bend It Like the Beard Boys

For this new post, we're leaving Las Vegas and going home (to Austin) for a whirlwind visit with friends and family. And it was a whirlwind trip, that's fer shure, fer shure! Originally it was to be a 54-hour visit, but then I missed my flight out of Vegas. That could have been disastrous, but it actually wasn't that much of a problem, though it did cut down my time in Austin by three hours.

So let's start there. Flight out of Vegas at 8:30--well, really, 8:25, and in this case, those five minutes were crucial. I had NO IDEA what a madhouse McCarren Airport was, even on a fairly normal Friday morning. We'd been hearing about the chaos at the airport early in the week, because of the NBA Allstars game, which was held here for the first time in either a long time or forever. But I had no idea that chaos reigns supreme in Vegas at ALL times! Anyway, I got there--to the airport--with enough time to make the flight--if it was Austin. But it was Vegas, and there were hundreds and hundreds of people there, going through security four abreast in lines that stretched for miles, it seemed.


By the time I got to the gate, the door was closed and a few seconds later, the plane pulled away from the gate, leaving about ten of us standing there, sadly watching as it left (thoughts that I wouldn't have as much time as I'd planned in Austin to see "my boys"--there are two of them right here: Jason with his dad--made me really sad!). That was a bad moment, but it didn't last long. The people at the gate were very helpful and got us all on planes that, at least in my case, delayed everything by three hours, but was otherwise a fine solution. The bad news was that I had to amuse myself for 3 hours in the Las Vegas airport (which, for those who don't know, is FULL of slot machines! PLEASE don't throw me into that br'ar patch, Br'er Bear!). And I missed my haircut appointment in Austin on Friday afternoon. The good news was that my suitcase was already in Austin when I got there, so I didn't have to wait for it. And Karen flew into Austin from Dallas just when I did, so we hitched up there, I got my rental car, and we went on to pick up the boys.


Had a nice evening with Karen and Jon-Michael and Jason: we started out playing "throw the ball over the garage" (here's Jon-Michael showing off his arm), dinner at Schlotzky's, and then a trip to Barnes & Noble. Then back to their house, to play some games and then, at 11:30, to watch a movie. The movie was "Eight Below," about the eight sled dogs that were left "below" in the Antartic. Jon-Michael bowed out early and went to bed with a good book. But Jason, Karen, and I toughed it out to the end of the movie. The plan was that I would sleep with Jon-Michael, while Jason slept with his folks. But Jason had a better idea: "Mom," he said, as he and Karen started up the stairs, "I know: Grandma could sleep in the middle of the bed with me [i.e., between Mom and Dad!]." Lovely idea, young man, but I don't think so!


The next day was soccer practice: I got some great pictures of the boys, especially Jason, and I'm going to share a few more here, no matter what you say. Here's Jason, the Ham, before his practice. What a guy! Jason, with his nine cohorts (half in black shirts, half in blue) followed that ball up and down the field like a flock of birds, all turning in unison when one of them connected with the ball. Jason's eyes never left the ball--it was amazing to watch!


Jon-Michael's game was later in the afternoon, after I had a lovely lunch with Nancy VandeMark. It was fun to catch up with her, after her recent trip to Florida. Then it was back down south for Jon-Michael's game. Here he is between periods as he's heading over to us. How's that for stylish sports attire. And I'm especially envious of his head of curls. What a guy!


I had my re-scheduled haircut after the game--my friend Pam, who's also my hairdresser, accommodated me and we had a great time catching up. Then it was off to the Wegers, Kurtis and Lisa, whom I've missed SO much since I left. Here they are, caught just a bit off-guard, after a great meatloaf supper. Our friend Jiexia (who is Bob the Good Boarder's special friend) was also there, though Bob was in Los Angeles and couldn't be there.


One of the big items for me was meeting Lisa and Kurtis's new dog, Gizmo, a little (seven tiny pounds worth) toy poodle. Here's Gizmo in Jiexia's arms--what a special little gizmo he is! They found him on Craig's List--amazing! The listing had only been there for an hour when they found it and followed up. So now our dear Bart, Lisa and Kurtis's dog who left us late last year, is looking down and, we're sure, approving highly of this new little member of the Weger household.

I spent a lovely night (my first!) at the Wegers, and in the morning I had--finally--one of Lisa's special 2-hour (almost) massages. Boy! Have I missed those! It was on to my condo, to see Chris, my renter, who served me spectacular Danishes that she made herself (she's SO talented!), and then to the Novels in Progress group that I've been a member of for 2-3 years now. It was great to see them and catch up with all their activities.

One more hour with Karen and the boys, back to the airport, return the rental car (great news there: instead of $83, only $63 for a weekend rental! Can't beat that!), and no hurry this time: caught the plane in plenty of time--AND had a great trip home watching Studio 60 and Lost episodes on my iPod. It was a pretty full flight, but I must live right, because there was no one in the middle seat, so I had lots of room. We landed about 10 minutes early--and within 35 minutes of touchdown, I was climbing into my motor home. That's the upside of living about 6-7 miles from the airport!


Okay, I know this hasn't been one of the more exciting of my postings, but I do have pictures, so I hope that helps you get over it. Here's one last one that I couldn't resist. Jason just has to show off the happy face that his dad drew on his hand. So we all wish you a great day, and we'll see you next time.

Deliverance--Part Deux

Back again. Here's the promised view of the kitchen. It's light cabinetry, so that, even though there's not much natural light in there, it's not as dark as it might be. There's a dishwasher, a stove, a refrigerator (with ice-maker) and lots of cabinets. I'm not going to have much to fill them up with right now, because I was selective in loading up the motor home, but I don't care. It'll be nice to have empty space--for a while, at least.


Now if you walk a step or two further into the apartment and look the length of the living and dining areas, you look out onto this little patio. My camera was shocked by being aimed out the window, so the picture was very dark, and I tried to lighten it up. I think that my apartment faces east, so I'll have morning sun but shade in the afternoon and evening. From what I hear about Vegas temperatures, it gets VERY hot in the daytime, but it cools down very nicely in the evening, and there are no bugs--YAY!!! So I expect I will be sitting out there with my laptop doing writing of one sort or another. I LIKE that image!


The bedroom is just a square room, BUT it has both a large closet with sliding glass doors AND a walk-in closet (I remember saying, when I bought my condo, that I would NEVER again live in a domicile without a walk-in closet! Well, except for the motor home!). And it opens into one part of a two-part bathroom, with a counter with a sink and a bathtub/shower area. It's pretty big, really amazingly big, considering, and it has a door that opens into the other part of the two-part bathroom, which is really HUGE (please note that I'm standing IN the bathroom when I'm taking this picture), and has a toilet and a sink. So that second part is available to guests who don't need access to the shower part of the bathroom. It's a really clever floor plan, one I've never seen before.


Back in the living room, take a look at what's called the "entertain- ment center," those two "caves" at the far end of the picture. They're molded into/out of the wall (I think they call them "radius walls"--at least that's what the rental agent called them. They're stucco or plaster, but the corners are all rounded). Anyway, the upper cavity holds up to a 30" TV and the bottom can handle cable, DVD, stereo or whatever. I was thinking I'd have my stereo shipped from Austin, but I don't know where I'd put it, so I think I'll just get a small one (a Bose, maybe?) and ship out my CDs. In between the two tables that you see there, by the way, is the doorway into the bedroom. I'll probably put a small desk where the table is (maybe I'll have my grandmother's writing desk shipped out), and maybe even a wine table like the decorator has done.


The final photo is taken from the parking lot in front of the rental office, and I'm looking across Town Center Drive at one of the buildings in the 10-building Yucca Mountain Project complex. It's your first real look (but it won't be your last!) at the mountain range that looms over my office. And that big impressive green glass facade is where I went on my first morning here (just one month ago yesterday!), to get my temporary badge and an escort to the building where I would actually work. From the best of my figuring, my office is pretty much directly under the light pole that you can see--on the far side of the four buildings that form a sort of circle on the far side of the block. The building you can see is part of a similar circle of buildings, so I'll be walking to the other side of that block--should be about a 10 minute walk to and fro every day. I'm not sure that I'll walk home at lunchtime, since they only take 1/2 hour lunches (I got spoiled in the rest of my corporate career--I've always had an hour for lunch). But I can microwave something and eat at my desk with no problem.

Anyway, I hope you can see why I'm so excited about this final move. I say once more that I love the motor home--in its place. It's great when all I have is time--and when there are lots of resources around if I need help. That has NOT been the case here, and it only took me a month to find it out. And not too much money, either.

Okay, that's it for now. More on this as I figure out what's next. But I think my next blog is either going to be about casinos (the pink elephant in the middle of the room that I haven't mentioned) or about some of the sites I've been hearing about nearby.

Deliverance--in One Month

I've done it! Yep! I've done it. I've rented an apartment, my brother is going to drive the motor home back to Maine so it'll be there when I'm there--and where there is plenty of help and time to deal with motor home problems (see "The Motor Home Chronicles," recent blog). I'll store it there very near Scott's home (for only $62 a month, quite do-able), and whenever I'm in Maine (3-week vacation this summer, I believe, and when I leave this job, whenever that turns out to be), I'll have "my own front door," as I did this summer.

Charlie (my brother) will be here on March 9, I believe, and my move-in date is March 10, and I'm going to rent some furniture while I look around for pieces I like (or have them shipped from Texas, if that works out), and I just couldn't be happier. The motor home, as I've said, is an adventure, but with my work schedule and my moonlighting activities, adventure is going to have to wait.

But let me tell you--and SHOW you--my new apartment. First of all, it's in the Falling Water Luxury Apartment Home complex. And the apartments are, indeed, VERY nice. I looked at a 2-bedroom, but I really don't think I need that much space. In the 1-bedroom, I have about 185 square feet less than in my condo in Texas (1005 vs. 1190), but I have 2 fewer rooms and one fewer bathroom, so the square footage in this apartment appears to be--and is--much more spacious, as you'll see. In fact, I like my kitchen more than the condo kitchen (not that I'm all that familiar with the condo kitchen)!


Okay, here's the view from the back of the golf cart that whisked me away to the model apartment so that I could take pictures (for this posting and for figuring out what I need to rent to fill it up). You're looking at the office, the ubiquitous palm trees, and the mail hut (complete with mail truck). We'll revisit the view in this direction at the end of this little tour, and you'll be even more impressed.

Inside, I want to show you first the kitchen, to prove my point that it's nicer than my condo kitchen. In the model apartment, it's to the left of the entrance, and to the right is a laundry room that's considerably larger than the one in my condo, that INCLUDES a washer/dryer (YAY!!) and that has a painting on the wall. Va-va-va-voom!!! Pretty classy, right? Well, I WANT to show this to you, but I don't seem to be able to pull pictures in one at a time, so I'm going to quit this posting, and start Part Deux. THAT one will include the rest of the photos.

Back in a mo', as they say elsewhere.

The Motor Home Chronicles

It's been a while, hasn't it? Sorry, folks, but it has been a time full of little fires to put out. And a time of a BIG decision. Oh, and a little bit of fun, and a continued appreciation of this dramatically beautiful place. Let's see, where to start?

A couple of observations: First, this area is gorgeous! These days, I get out of work sometimes right after sunset, when there's a pale green glow behind the mountains. And the silhouette of those mountains is just dramatic, all toothed and craggy. And then, by the time I get up to the 215 for the drive down the west side of the city, it's dark and I can see the whole valley (the "meadows," I assume, for which the city was long ago named), and it stretches from the range of mountains to the west to the range of mountains to the east, and all down the valley as far as the eye can see, and it's lit with millions (literally) of twinkling lights, and it looks exactly like a magic carpet of lights. It takes my breath away. I want to pull off and stop and just soak it all in. Instead, I get to see it every night on my way home. At least now I do: when the days get longer, the nightly carpet will elude me.

Oh, and have I told you that, shooting out of the middle of all those twinkling lights is this intense beam of light aiming up into the heavens? It comes out of the top of the Luxor pyramid and I guess it's on all the time--or at least all the dark part of the day. You can always tell where you are relative to the Strip--at least, at night--if you can see that beam.

On the other hand, I spent more than 45 minutes tonight, driving around the streets near where I live, trying to find--a grocery store! And I couldn't find one. Anywhere! There was a Target--but not one with a grocery store. And there was something called Food4Less, but it was sort of like a run-down Sam's, with everything in bulk, or at least in quantities of more than one. I wanted a bag of salad greens--Nope! I wanted nonfat milk (1/2 gallon)--One left, and I almost missed that. I'm really amazed. There's just nothing within miles of where I live! I guess, if I want groceries, I'm going to have to shop up near where I work, where there are several really nice shopping centers with Albertson's, Vonn's, and Smith's grocery stores.

Speaking of where I work, it's time to talk about little fires, which have been the story of my life for the past 3-4 days. If it's not one thing, it has been three others. Let's see, I don't think I mentioned that I've had sewer problems. Last Tuesday morning (still wet from the shower), I responded to a knock on the door (it was 7:20 a.m.!), and let John from Master Mobile in. He was carrying a 3-foot length of plastic pipe, and he went straight to work. Within 5 minutes, he had poked a hole through the pile that had built up in my toilet, and once again things were flowing. Hurray, I thought, as I handed him a check for $120 (by my calculations, he's making somewhere around $700/hour at that rate! Mother should have told me to forget about college and marry a plumber who makes house calls!)

But that was not the end of it. Things "flowed" for a while--John had instructed me to always fill the toilet bowl twice--FULL--whenever I used it, so as to flush stuff down thoroughly. Well, that worked for the first day or two (though there were always air bubbles making geysers every time I flushed. But by Friday, I COULDN'T fill the bowl twice: If I did, it wouldn't go down, because the pipe was full. After a few hours, I could put more water down, but again, that would need several hours to drain. By Saturday evening, I couldn't put even one full bowl of water down there! I was NOT a happy camper. It was just one (but the biggest one) of the fires, but this was one that I had already paid someone to fix--and it hadn't happened!

So today, I called John and did my version of reaming him out! I think it worked: he's coming tomorrow or Wednesday (I'm going to leave my door unlocked, since I can't be here), I hope he'll do a REAL job of clearing things out of the pipe and the tank, and so far, he has not mentioned that I need to leave him a check for any amount.

Next little fire: ON Thursday, I felt a crack in my denture. Panic in the streets: I had had my denture break during my 2-1/2-month stay in South Carolina, and I tried to patch it myself with no luck. But finally I took it to a dentist that a local recommended to me, and she patched it with acrylic, and it's been perfect ever since. In fact, I think the patch is the strongest part of the denture. So, figuring that someone here could do the same thing, I got a recommendation from a local for a good dentist here. However, this dentist was out of the office until Monday, so I crossed my fingers and tried not to bite down, hoping the denture would last till then.

Nope! Friday night, in the middle of a great Quizno's sandwich, I heard the crunch, and I knew it was all over. I could still wear the denture, but the broken edge was sharp and it was very uncomfortable. So, as much as I could, I traveled without it. To give you "the rest of this story," I went to the dentist this morning. I liked her (she's British, tall, thin, blonde, and probably 35. I will probably stay with her (I also like her staff; it's a small office, so I already know everyone there, and I like that).

However, there's more to tell: the denture came back an hour early--yes, you heard me, "came back." This was not just applying some acrylic to put the two pieces together. This was getting the pieces picked up by a lab, worked on, and sent back, for a total of $632, of which I paid $366. THAT was a surprise, let me tell you! I asked about it (DUH!), and was told that they put NEW teeth on the denture. But we looked, and the teeth were NOT new--in fact, all they'd done was exactly what I had asked in the first place. Anyway, the dentist agreed that the lab had overcharged, and I got $91 back. I'm happy with the dentist, but I hope I don't have anything more to do with that lab. Anyway, bottom line, I can smile again!

That was fire #2. Next fire: I've had a light on my dashboard (spelling "BRAKE" that's been intermittently on and off, and has lately been on all the time. I needed an oil change (Kurtis, if you're reading this, it was 90,978, just 22 miles short of the 91,000 miles at which I was due. I'm a good girl!). Try and find a Jiffy Lube! Just try!!! Finally I found a Terrible's Lube. Yep, that's right: Terrible's. They're all over the place here, gas stations, car washes, convenience stores (with full banks of video poker and slot machines in every store), and, yes, lube joints. They changed my oil ($35--Kurtis, you sure have spoiled me!) and, when I asked them to check out the fluids, they said everything was full (including the brake fluid). Their guess was it was malfunctioning gauge in the fluid container. I'll have to go get my 90,000-mile check up soon, and I'll have Toyota look at it. But that took most of Saturday afternoon.

Sunday, I was nervous (toilet and denture problems hovering over my head), but I figured I could make it until Monday. And then, it started. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Omigod! What now? It seemed to be coming from the LP gas alarm, which is near the floor of the hallway, next to the bathroom door. But the only light (of three) that was lit was the "Operating" light (green, a good sign). The "Alarm" light wasn't lit, and the "Fault" light (amber) wasn't lit. But a couple of hours earlier, when I'd been sitting with the doors open, eating my lunch, I thought I'd smelled gas. So I did what I was told in the Operator's Manual, and turned off the LP gas, and got down at the level of the alarm to see if I could smell it--and no, I couldn't smell anything. But the alarm was still beeping.

So what did I do? What would YOU have done? Right. I left! I went to the movies. Yep, I spent 2-1/2 hours enjoying Helen Mirren's outstanding performance in "The Queen." I figured, if the motor home was going to blow up, it'd be better if I wasn't here. Don't you agree? I went to a theater about 5 miles away, so that, if it blew up, it wouldn't spoil the movie for me. And when I got back home, everything was still as I left it, with the alarm beeping away. So this time I walked further into the bedroom--and that's when I realized that it wasn't the LP gas alarm at all. It was the carbon monoxide alarm--beeping because the battery was running down, I assume. So I tried, and I tried, and I tried, and I COULD NOT unscrew the gadget so that I could check out the battery. I could push the button to turn it off, but after a few minutes it would come back on. This time, though, the beep came about every 20 seconds. I can live with that--once I could stop worrying about an explosion, I could get some sleep. But it does get annoying. And I don't have any idea whom I can get to come in and manhandle that cover off. I just flat can't do it.

Well, my brother's coming in 5 weeks. Maybe by then there won't be enough juice in the battery to even operate the beeps. I can hope, can't I?

One more small fire: I got up this morning to take my shower (after a bad night of beeping), and there was no hot water. It was the last straw! Of course, it was my fault: I'd forgotten to turn the water heater pilot light back on after turning off the LP gas. Pushed that button this morning, and had plenty of hot water in about 10 minutes--but no longer enough time for my shower, unfortunately.

Okay, now to the Big Decision. Can you guess what it was, after all this? I've decided I've had enough Adventure for one year. I've decided that a motor home is a great place for a man or maybe for a younger single woman. But for me, at 65, with a full-time job, a book to try to edit in the moonlight, and nobody to call on for help when things go wrong (unless I can hire them--but things always seem to go wrong on the weekends, when no one's around), it's just too much stress and not enough fun.

So here's my decision. I'm going to spend the next month (until Charlie comes around March 9th) finding and renting an apartment, hopefully near my work. In fact, there's a nice complex right across the street from my office that has fairly reasonable rent. And I'll rent enough furniture to take care of basic needs until I can replace it with non-rented stuff--and Charlie has agreed to drive the motor home back to Maine, where we'll store it until I can use it again the way I did this summer. That was really, really fun, living there and enjoying all the Bonney-Hogg family, but having my own front door. And meanwhile, Scott and family can use it on occasion, and I may even be able to rent it out now and then.

So. How's that for a turn-around? Oh, yes, I have decided that, even though that big newer motor home would have been great, and beautiful, and much easier to deal with on many of the issues that have been a problem with this one, it's still a motor home, and the problems I've had with this one could occur with that one. Unless it comes with a "handy man" as a built-in, I'd still be stressed out trying to take care of stuff. So I'm giving up on that idea, though I'm sad. It'd be great to have such a nice place to live in and travel around in later on. But I don't think I want to spend that much money for a part-time home.

Enough for tonight. I'm DEFINITELY going to have pictures for y'all soon. It is SUCH a gorgeous area. I can't wait to show it off to you!

Not sure where this blog will go next--but hopefully it'll be soon. Tune in for the next chapter. . . .

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love. . .

. . . sewer hoses! And their contents.

I've discovered something of an emergency in my sewer line. Here's the long version of the story (because I'm constitutionally incapable of telling the short version of anything):

My brother parked my motor home way forward on my slip, so that the awning (once I decided that the winds had died down enough on a sort of permanent basis to put the awning out, since it's broken and not easy to put out and take down by myself) would shade the picnic table for my site. I think that was a good thing to do because I've heard that, once it gets warmer, it still stays cool at nights so that it's pleasant to be outside (and there are no bugs). So I have visions of taking my (large) laptop out to the picnic table of an evening and writing on a fairly regular basis. But that's another story. . .

Anyway, because I'm so far forward on my site, it's a looooong way from the black water and gray water tanks to the sewer dump. So my brother bought an additional 15-foot length of sewer hose, along with one of those expandable track thingees that you can prop the hose up on, so as to develop a sort of downward angle for the "material to be transported" to travel so that it doesn't pile up in the hose right at the motor home. Well, there are several things wrong with this scenario, it's turning out.

First, 30 feet of hose is about 10 feet too many. And second, those little track thingees, when they're made out of plastic, as mine is, don't hold up under the strain that the "material to be transported" puts on them. Last night, when I got home around 10 p.m., I noticed that my track thingee had contracted in some places, broken in one place, and the hose had fallen off it in other places. I decided not to tackle the problem at that hour, but today, when I went out there to reconnoiter, I discovered that the "material to be transported" had a VERY circuitous route to travel--and, bottom line, it was not moving. The hose at the dump end was very light, while the hose at the motor home end was very heavy--that was my first clue.

Well, I massaged (literally) and cajoled and manipulated and re-positioned that hose for a good half hour today, got it back up on the tracks, tried to convince it not to fall in and make little "U" traps every few feet along the track, and, holding my breath for fear it'd all collapse again, finally decided I'd made as obstacle-free a path as I could with as much of a downhill trend to it as possible.

So, thinking lovely thoughts about the whole process, I then went inside to check things out there. And discovered that there's still a major portion of the "material to be transported" that hasn't gone anywhere and is still sitting in the tank. I've tried flushing it out--my hose has quite a bit of water pressure, since I'm on the campground water system--but that's not very successful. And of course, it's now after 6 p.m. on Saturday night, so I'm going to have to wait until Monday to get plumbing help. I think I can hold out (I use the term advisedly) until then; I've decided I'll use other facilities (why not the casinos? I'm certainly paying enough for the privilege) as much as possible, and then we'll see what's what.

One simple answer (that is, it's simple if there's two of me, but not so simple with just one of me) is to move the motor home back on the site so that I only need one length of hose to reach the tank. But my brother has me up on a pile of orange Lego tiles in the front so that I'm level, and he has me jacked up front and back so that I don't rock, and I'm VERY reluctant to mess around with all of that. As I say, if my brother were still here, I'd do it in a New York second. But he's not, and I don't know anyone here well enough to ask for help. He's coming for the weekend of March 10--but I'm not sure I want to wait that long, if the problem continues. So we'll see how things have progressed on Monday, and maybe we'll call in the troops.

Another (little) problem: I finally connected with the young IT guy for the campground. He's an arrogant young man who knows his stuff but makes it clear that he only works 8-5 and won't answer the phone any other time and, if he works on anything else, it's for $50/hour, dammit, and not a penny less. Well, I finally got him to come and do the IT work (which is the campground's responsibility: getting me connected to the internet, which I was for the first day, and then wasn't for about 10 days). He made the HUGE concession of coming one evening and taking care of that.

While he was here, I told him that I wasn't getting the 28 cable channels I was paying for as part of my site fee. I also wanted to have a DVD player for the living room TV. "Well," he said, "I'd do it for you, but I charge $50/hour and it'd probably take 2 hours" (I could tell he was trying to scare me off)--and I said, "Done. And you get to buy me the DVD player, so that you'll know that it works, fits, and will do the job." "Ah, er, well, okay," he said, and you could see the dollar signs in his eyes. If he wasn't so cute, and so wet behind the ears as far as behaving professionally, and so good as far as knowing his stuff, I never would have pushed him on it.

Anyway, last Sunday, he was supposed to come but blew me off. Then Monday he was going to come, but I told him I couldn't get home until 7 p.m., and he said he had something going on. So Tuesday he finally showed up--10 minutes late, thank goodness, and not unexpectedly, since I didn't get home until exactly 6:30, as I'd promised. He had the DVD player (a $40 number that he'd bought at Walgreens, so I was happy with that--and he didn't charge me for the time he spent finding and buying it--ONLY because he didn't think of it, you can be sure!). And sure enough, he took about 1 hour and 45 minutes to do the job because it was such a mess up in that compartment. Audio had been wired into video, things had been wired to themselves, and NOTHING had been done in a straightforward and intelligent manner. And I believe that was really the way it was, because he showed me a lot of the problems that he found, and I kept hearing him say, "I can't BELIEVE it," as he found the next problem.

He worked very fast and very efficiently, and when the dust settled, I had 28 clear channels in the front (only 12 in the back, because the remote is gone for that TV and the universal remote that I bought won't allow him to set up the TV to accept the channels--which is not a problem). And I could have watched a DVD if I'd wanted to. I was so pleased, I paid him for 2 hours, and gave him an extra $10 to cover the cost of the tax on the DVD player and a bit of his time in buying it. We were both happy--and it was a pleasure to see that HE was pleased because he'd been so reluctant to do the job at the start.

Well, all of that was great, and through the week I've watched some TV. Last night, though, I wanted to watch a DVD, and I pushed all the buttons he told me to--and I can't get the DVD to show up on the TV. DOGGONE IT! I'm scared to call him and leave a message on Monday and say, "Please tell me again what the configuration is so that I can watch DVDs," because he treated me (probably with some justice) as a very slow-learning kindergartner when he was showing me how to get it to work. And of course it'll cost me. But I'm going to be brave and call him--I certainly don't want to wait until my brother gets here in 6 weeks!

Speaking of my brother, he called me yesterday to tell me that one of his friends up there in New Joisey wants to sell his motor home. He used it to go to car races all over the country, but he's not racing any more, and he'd rather have the money than the motor home. His wife doesn't feel the same way about it--she LOVES the motor home--but I guess he's calling the shots on this one, so. . . .

Anyway, for the guys among you who care about these things, I don't know what the make or model is (my brother's going to get me that info next week), but it's a 39-foot (mine's a 32-foot) 2004 (mine's a 1998) motor home with two slide-outs (mine has none), hydraulic levels, a rear-facing TV, and all the bells and whistles that he could get when he bought it. Also it has only 29,000 miles on it (mine had 39,000). Charlie says he's taken great care of it (the plastic is still on the carpets, as was the case with mine last spring), and paid more than $200,000 for it. He owns it out-right and wants, as I say, to sell it.

I'm just drooling over it, especially after I've spent a month in this one. I do have enough space in here, if I get rid of some things (for one thing, the 12 boxes of my mother's photographs and slides, which I have to start working on one of these days). But I have to say I'm getting really tired of having to walk sideways around my bed, remembering to duck so that I don't hit my head on the TV shelf, and only having 2/3 of the bed to sleep in, because the other third is serving as part of my clothes storage.

Anyway, since I always say, "Dream big," and since it doesn't hurt to ask, I'm going to the bank on Monday or Tuesday, to talk to "my" banker. I met him the other day, a really nice guy, who made me feel as though I was a valuable customer. I came in because a transfer I'd made in my accounts hadn't shown up as quickly as I thought it should. Turned out I was just impatient--it would show up in a day or so--so I said, "Well, I guess I didn't really need to come in," and he said, "Oh, but you did--so that we could meet." Well, that was enough for me: he is now "my" banker, in the way that Alice Jones was "my" banker when I lived back in Pittsburg. I felt I could go in there, put my problem or my plan to her, and she'd work with me to solve it or implement it. That was nice--but I haven't felt that very often. When I bought the motor home last May, the woman I worked with at the branch in Austin became a friend, a sort of "my" banker kind of person, but she got transfered, so that sort of fizzled.

Anyway, I'm going to go in and ask Dan Clark what he sees (now that I've got a big healthy bank account and a nice income) as the possibilities for upgrading. Charlie says I should fly up there and see the motor home--I'll be sold right away, he says: he's seen it. And AirTran, a new airline, I believe, flies right into Newburgh, which is 1/2 an hour from his house. So I'm thinking about it--very seriously. Of course, Charlie would drive it down here and get me set up again.

What do y'all think of that? I know there'll be a variety of opinions on this, and I want to hear them all--and then I'll do what I want, so be prepared for that!

Enough for today. For my next posting, I've decided to put up my 2006 Christmas letter. I only mailed out about 5 of them, and I wanted to mail all of them, but it's getting ridiculously late, so I think I'll just post it and y'all can read it or not, as you choose. And it has pictures! Later, guys. . . .

Pretty in Pastels

It's been a week since I last posted. Time really, really does fly when you're having as much fun as I am. I have absolutely NO trouble getting to sleep these days; I can even fall asleep when my feet are cold, which was never true before. I'm not yet in the rythm of going to bed early and getting up early--I'm not usually in bed much before midnight, and once this week it was 2 a.m., so it's VERY hard to hop out of bed all bright and cheerful at 7 a.m. But I'm still working on it. Thank heavens the office is happy to have me there later in the afternoon in case stuff comes up and an editor is needed. Most everyone else is in there by 7:30 or 8, and they're on their way home around 5 p.m. But I stay (happily) until 6 or 6:30, and everyone's happy.

I got my first REAL report to edit on Wednesday. It's only 350 pages (the big ones can run over 1,000) but it's certainly big compared to the 15-20 pagers I've been working on. It's quite a challenge: the author is Chinese, although he's quite an exuberant and energetic fellow and I hear him talking all day long. His name is Fred and I like him. I think he likes me, too. He stops dead in his tracks when he sees me coming at him down the corridor and say, "Hi Pat-sy!" He emphasizes both syllables of my (new) name as if he were trying it out. I love to hear him say it.

I'm compiling a list of questions to go over with him. He's quite attached to what he's written, so every change of any import at all is a big thing with him, so I'm going to have, as Ricky R. used to say, "a lotta 'splainin' to do, Patsy!" I've spent 2-1/2 days on it so far, with another 3-4 to go. But today, just before I left, one of the checkers came to tell me there's a higher-priority document that needs to be ready for review by the end of next week, so I'm leaving Fred for a bit (and believe me, I'll have a hard time 'splainin' that to him, too), and tackling Mike (hmmm, interesting image!). I'm really in the thick of things now--feels as though I've worked there for months instead of just three weeks.

Okay, you're probably wondering why the title. It's because of my drive to work. There are several extraordinary things about my drive to work. The first has nothing to do with colors, pastel or otherwise. It has to do with speed. So far, I've driven to work 15 mornings (and home most of those evenings), and with two exceptions, I've driven the 23 or so miles to work in about 30 minutes. Amazing! Why, you ask? Well, I'm glad you asked, 'cause I'm gonna tell you.

I drive to work on the 215. That's how they talk about the main highways in this town. It's the 15, the 95, the 515, and the 215. The 15 pretty much divides the city, running diagonally from the southwest (my side of town) to the northeast. It parallels the Strip--and it is like I-35 and MoPac in the mornings: a parking lot. Thank heavens I don't have to deal with it. Coming home at night I get on it at exit 34, stay in the righthand lane, and get off at exit 33, and that's never a problem. When I get off it, I'm pretty much home, which is really nice.

The other major highways, I think, are similarly mobbed--at least, from what I can tell from the local traffic reports. But I avoid those, too, except for the 215, which I get on from the south end of the strip/Las Vegas Boulevard, which is the next street over from this RV park. My entrance to the 215 is at the same place as the entrance to the 15, which is directly under the traffic pattern for McCarren Airport. So here I am in the morning, driving east DIRECTLY into the sun for about a block, then turning north onto the Strip and driving for about four or five LONG blocks. Along this stretch of the strip is--NOTHING. Amazingly, much of this part of my trip is nothing but vacant lots, acres and acres of them, just sitting there, waiting (I assume) for someone to build a casino on them.

It's not ALL vacant, of course: there are lots of little stores lining the airport side of the road, and at one point there's the Las Vegas Outlet Mall, which is huge and may attract some of you to come visit me who aren't at all attracted by the casinos. Yes, people, there's an outlet mall within a mile or two of where I live. So come on down!

Anyway, I am now driving north on the Strip with McCarren on my right. And it--the airport--is RIGHT THERE. In fact, if I were to continue down the Strip, as I have done on weekends, past the famous "Welcome to Las Vegas" sign (which, my brother tells me, has been moved several times, because they keep building Las Vegas out in my direction), I'd pass a long stretch of tall black iron fence through which you can see the helicopters and private jets that are part of the Executive Park section of the airport parked right next to the fence. And the private jets come in right over the Strip, sometimes low enough that you think they're going to roll across the top of the car! Beyond them are the landing strips for McCarren, and sometimes, when the wind is right, the big jets come in over the Strip, too, looking for all the world as if they were going to crash into the big casinos that start RIGHT THERE, with Mandalay Bay the first one in line. That right there is an amazing early morning sight: a jet passing by the 15th or 16th floor (it seems) of Mandalay Bay Casino. If I haven't fully woken up yet, I do when I see one of those jets coming in.

Anyway, when I turn onto the on-ramp for the 215, I'm traveling right alongside all the people who have to take the 15 to get to work. And do I feel sorry for them! I sail down my long on-ramp alongside streams of cars that are slowing down and coming to a stop in order to try and insert themselves into the three packed lanes of traffic also trying to go north at a snail's pace. But (except for the two mornings when there were accidents on the 215) I can just sail onto MY highway.

As I said, that is one of the two things that is absolutely mind-boggling about my morning commute. I'm on that road between 8 and 8:30, which in any city is rush hour--and I have caught myself doing 80. On my way to work during "rush hour"!!! Amazing! Unbelievable! Astonishing! The 215, about 2 miles after I get on it, becomes the Bruce Woodberry Belt, and bless ole' Bruce's heart, I don't think anyone in Vegas has heard of it, because it's so UNcrowded. I love it.

The other thing I love is that, for the 20-30 minutes I'm on it, I am treated every morning to the most fabulous pastel views! Lovely vistas. I think this is true from most of the highways, but I think it's especially true of the BW Belt, the 215. The first thing that makes me catch my breath is the huge expanse of flat ground that stretches to the mountains, about 25 miles away. Las Vegas (as I think I said) means "the meadows," and it is literally a huge meadow of one-story dwellings and businesses. For pretty much 360 degrees, I could turn (if I weren't driving a car) and see "meadows" populated with low structures right up to the mountains, which suddenly jut out of the ground on all sides of this giant meadow. At night, if you can get above it just a little ways, which is easy to do on one of the highways, it's flat land for miles with a carpet of twinkling lights uniformly laid down on it.

But not all of the buildings are one story. I take the 215 north, then west, then north again, until I'm up in the Summerlin area, which is where my office is. I turn east at the Summerlin parkway, to the second exit, which is mine, and now I'm facing back into the heart of the city, and this morning, as is true most mornings, it was memorable. There was still a light bit of mist across the valley, sort of as in the days when people cooked over open fires and the smoke would kind of hang over the villages. And jutting above the film of mist are all the casinos, like 20 Gullivers in a land of Lilliputians. And beyond the misty meadows are the ever-present mountains.

So every morning, to get from my motor home to Summerlin in northwest Las Vegas, I have to drive around 23 miles heading straight into and along the most beautiful of the mountains (in my humble opinion). It wasn't until this, my third weekx, that I realized that, when I first get onto the 215 and look north towards my ultimate destination, there is only one building more than two stories tall, and it's the new Red Rock Casino, with a hotel about 15 stories tall. So it rises head and shoulders above everything else you can see. It is so amazing to me to look over there and see the place, 20 miles away, that I'm aiming for and to almost be able to trace where I'll be going--and then just sail along that road with nothing to impede me. It is some experience.

Oh yes, and the "Pretty in Pastels" title? Well, that is it in a nutshell. There is that whole beautiful view, that whole drive, and it's all done in the most gorgeous pastels. Pink, pale blue (a brighter blue in the sky, which is usually cloudless), light brown, sandstone, salmon, peach, and some actual red rock (dusty brick red) that I assume gave the Casino (and that whole area) its name. And along the highway, beyond its extra-wide shoulders, are stone fences (noise-proofing fences, I'd guess) with just a row of roofs peeking over them, with the roofs picking up both the jagged outlines of the mountains AND their colors.

My words don't begin to do it justice. I WILL TAKE SOME PICTURES, I promise. It'll be hard to get it in that early morning light (just as it's hard to get ME into early morning light). But I'll try.

Sorry, this posting is no shorter--it may even be longer--than the others. But I just wish I could convey the beauty that helps me to start off my day every day. Come and see me if you can't yet picture it.

Off to bed with me. I'm asleep at the wheel here. More next time on Las Vegas in the daytime.

Heat

Isn't it funny how your perspective changes once you're not uncomfortable anymore? I was going to say "not cold" but I know there are many people who LIKE cold. I'm not one of them, as my journey from north to south over the years of my life will show. Anyway, today is my first (and possibly my last) three-day weekend, and I'm sitting here with the shades up and the curtains open in my motor home, and it's pretty nice. I'm even wearing a short-sleeved shirt (layers are very important in the cold!), and I don't think the furnace has run since around 10 this morning.

The sun is weaker today than it has been, as if there were a film of gauze over everything, but it's still strong enough to make me feel comfortable, and there's another 4-1/2 hours of it. Of course, the minute it disappears behind the large fifth-wheeler next door, it'll get cold in here pretty fast, but for now I'm enjoying it a bunch.

That's the thing about the desert, I guess, that it gets cold pretty fast. It's so funny to think I live in the desert. If I could have imagined my life even ten years ago, never mind when I was 15 or so, I couldn't have done nearly as good a job as the Great Daytimer in the Sky has done with it. I just wish That Guy hadn't always put so much of the wrong kind of food on my plate! And I hadn't always helped myself so generously!

Another thing that blew my mind occurred last night. I was looking at Google maps while I watched CSI (the new episode at 9 PST), and I was trying to find Wells Fargo bank locations (of which there are MANY here in Vegas--I forgot that Wells Fargo started in California and moved east to Texas). I was looking at a branch on Flamingo Road when someone on the TV said that a woman was plying her trade at the corner of Paradise and Flamingo. It amazed me that I was looking almost at that very intersection (in what I guess is a seedy part of town--I'm going to drive by there today to see for myself!) when the entire country focused its attention on it--well, that large portion of the country that watches CSI every week. How 'bout that! And I LIVE here!

I've got to go out and check the level of the propane tank. Yesterday when I went to work, it was just a little over 1/4 full. On Wednesday, I called the propane company that delivered gas on Monday 1/8, when we ran out. They're going to deliver here again on Saturday, and we talked for a minute about whether I could make it until then or should instead call whoever would be coming out on Thursday or Friday. We decided to live on the edge. And I think I'll be fine. At the rate the tank has been emptying, I won't use 1/4 of a tank in a day and a half, even if I ran it constantly.

Between my wonderful little ceramic heater and the sun, today should be nice and toasty--and then at 11 or so tomorrow, the tank gets refilled. At this rate, I guess my gas bill should be around $125 for the month (especially if it starts to warm up a bit), which, coupled with the electricity, will make it an expensive month in terms of utilities. But then I was told that everything is higher here, which is why I'm getting paid more, I expect. Whatever, things are going well and will work out, as they always do.

This is not going to be as lengthy as some of the other ones have been, since I've got to go to the bank today. Of course, if the posting is too long, you can stop reading at any point. That's what I tell my daughter when she tells me my blog postings are too long: "You can read as much or as little at a time as you want!" "Yeah, right," she says, since we both know that once you start something like reading a posting--any posting--it's hard to stop.

My brilliant idea last night, when I was talking to Jon-Michael on the phone on my way home from work, was to tell HIM to read the blog! He has to read something--anything--for 20 minutes every night as part of his homework (PART of his homework--and he's only in 2nd grade!!! TOO MUCH!). So I suggested that he read my blog and tell his mom and dad what I wrote. He thought that was a great idea. So do I. I'm just full of it--er, them.

Well, I'm going to quit for today, to honor my daughter's plea for Shorter Blogs. In brief, and bottom line, life is GREAT here in Sin City, I couldn't be happier, and I hope the same is true for all of you.

Oh, there is one bit of news that I'm hoping sort of goes away. There was a brief mention in a meeting on Wednesday of the possibility that our schedule will be changing: we won't be doing these 9/80 days (giving us every other Friday off); instead we'll be working 5/10s--which means we'll be scheduled for 50 hours every week--and no Fridays off. Of course, that's a guaranteed 10 hours of overtime every week, but it's going to be exhausting, I can tell, because, after 44 hours last week and 36 this week, I'm VERY happy for three days off. And I LOVED my days off last weekend. So I hope that schedule change doesn't happen.

No one wants it, but they're just real worried that we won't have this license application ready when it's due. When I bring my computer up in the morning, there's a countdown to the application date, and there's something like 530 days to go (529 today, I believe). That's a long time--but it's not so long when you realize how much there is to do and how many rounds of checking and re-checking and then checking again before each document that will be part of the final application is submitted as a FIRST DRAFT! Then there are comments and reviews, and another round of triple-checking, and another submission--and this can go on for several drafts of the same document.

That's another thing that makes me love what I'm doing. It really feels valuable, and I really feel appreciated. Those two things are important in one's work--good compensation and competency, both of which I have, are two more factors. I just feel so lucky that, at the end of my (checkered) career, I'm as happy as I am with what I've chosen to do with my life.

Not sure what I'll tackle next. Maybe Las Vegas by day--now there's a topic that doesn't get talked about much!