Road trip

Cliff and I have been wanting to ride the motorcycle to Arkansas and stay in the Hub Motorcycle Resort for a long time, but seems like something always went wrong:  Last time we made a reservation, rain was forecast for the whole weekend and we cancelled;  the rain materialized, too.  
Cliff's youngest sister and her husband spent a few days at the Hub recently and loved it.  That did it for me; I suggested to Cliff that we make reservations, and if it looked like rain, we'd drive the car and haul the motorcycle on a trailer.  
Until mid-week, the forecast looked perfect throughout the weekend.  Then suddenly the weather-guessers started putting chances of rain in for Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday.  They're blaming it on the current tropical storm.  
We've changed our minds a half-dozen times about whether to take the car or not.  I know it sounds like the easy way out, but it really does spoil the adventure of the trip; half the fun is getting there, picnicking somewhere along the way.  Coming home, it would be nice to have the comfort of the car, but you can't have it both ways.  
So I think we're going to take our chances with the rain and be free spirits.  On the way down, we hope to stop at Gene's Gallery in Springfield and see if they have any accesseries we need for our Gold Wing.    
I'll be taking the laptop along.
Cliff's sister will be next door keeping a sharp eye on the place; Iris will once again be boarded.  She seemed quite happy with her stay last week, so I feel at ease about it this time.  She'll be in air-conditioned comfort, hopefully away from the noise of firecrackers, which are driving her nuts around here.    
There was a little glitch in our plans today, but it all worked out.  My bathroom developed a leak in the plumbing; actually there had been a drip for awhile, but nothing we couldn't live with.  Today it was serious enough that Cliff decided to try and fix it.  
He did his best, but he's not a plumber, trailer house plumbing is the cheapest-made in the world, and he ran out of time and had to get ready to go to work.  I suggested a plumber, and he agreed that since we're leaving, there was really no choice.  We picked one out of the phone book; Cliff left me a huge handful of cash and went to work.  
The plumber declared it an easy job and was done in fifteen minutes.  I asked him how much I owed, and he said....
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Twenty-five dollars.  


WHAT?????  That's all?????  Maybe this was a better day than I thought.

Road Trip!!!!

Cliff's brother Don and his wife are going to be camping down at Bull Shoals in south Missouri. We're going to ride the motorcycle down there and spend a night; Cliff's sister who lives in our old house is going to follow in her car.

Grandson Arick is going to dog-sit and watch the place, so no intruders had better encroach on the compound. Arick knows where the gun is. I'm just sayin'.

I have a new stereo sound system I won't say much about, but it rocks.

This S.E.T. thing (spousal equity tax) is working out quite well for me.

I wonder if I could persuade Cliff to buy another tractor.

It's a day for riding the Gold Wing

Less wind today and more clouds. 68° for a high. Not a perfect day for a ride, but it's doable, as long as we wear our leathers. I have our picnic lunch packed, and the crock pot is full of beans so there will be a meal when we get home. I need a bigger crock pot! I have two of them, but they're both really too small for a pound of dry beans. I always make plenty so I'll have some to put in the freezer.

My idea today is a trip to the James Farm at Kearney, Missouri. We were there perhaps twenty years ago, but I need my memory refreshed. However, I haven't run this idea past Cliff, and he may have something different in mind. We'll see, when he gets up.

I really want to go to St. Joseph one of these days on a road trip; I've never seen the Pony Express Museum. I believe the Jesse James home, where Jesse died, is at the same location; however, it isn't open until April. So we'll wait on that one. The Patee House is there, too.

Yesterday I figured out how to get our local weather on the Dish interactive channel; according to what I see there, it's going to be cool again for awhile. As much as I love temperatures in the 70's, I'm glad we'll be getting back to normal. Too much warm weather this time of year gets all the little buds swelling, and next thing you know, blooms are getting nipped by a hard freeze.

Have I mentioned that I haven't had a single cold this winter? Not even the least little bit of sniffles! Maybe going outside scantily clad in single-digit temperatures to get in the hot tub was good for me. Cliff has had only one very minor cold. So we're still walking in favor and living the dream.

I increased the amount that goes into Cliff's 401k, last week. Crazy, you say? Well, I hope not. You see, some two years ago I moved all his funds into stable-value. I know everybody says not to do that, but I'm sure glad I did! So it's really more like a savings account than an investment, but we haven't lost all the money other folks have. We don't have that much there anyhow, since Cliff started with his 401k so late in life. But at least we've not lost half of it. At our ages, I don't like risk.

Someone asked if I had a halter for Sadie. Well of course she has a collar, and I have a leash for her. I refuse to restrain her when we go for a walk, because she gets so much more exercise running free. and she never runs away from us back in the pasture. Here at the house she has a tie-out; yesterday that's where she was, on the tie-out, barking like crazy at the neighbor's dogs. I went to get Angel at my sister-in-law's house and on the way back, thinking Sadie would like to come inside and play with Angel, I un-clipped the chain from her collar and she was off at the speed of sound. There's no stopping her when she has an agenda, and she is fast as a greyhound. In the past, when she finally showed up at home after such an escapade, I'd scold her, and even give her a couple of smacks with the fly-swatter. All that did was make her refuse to return after one of her jaunts. One day she stayed back in the pasture for hours, and when she would see me approaching, she'd slink into the woods. So I don't scold or punish her any more, and she comes home when she's ready, happy to see me. I used to think that as she got older she'd lose some of that run-away energy, but she's five years old: If she were going to settle down, she'd have done it by now. I've threatened to get a shock-collar for her, but I can always think of so many better things to do with $100.

Sadie is a unique dog. All who have met her will agree on that. Well, unique isn't so much the word they use: "hyper", "crazy", "weird" and "&*%#$@ dog" are more typical descriptions.

What a rambling blog entry this is! It started out about motorcycle rides and rapidly went to the dogs. Have a great day, all my readers.

A motorcycle ride

Cliff took today off so he could have a longer weekend. We watched the weather this morning, and learned that although it was going to be cloudy all day, there was no rain in the forecast. We headed out on the open road, thinking perhaps to go to Hermann, Missouri and spend the night there, returning tomorrow before the forecast rain started. Today was supposedly rain-free; the next four days had rain indicated. Are you with me here?

Not a half-hour from home, sprinkles started, and continued sporadically for the next couple of hours. We didn't get wet; our leathers were sufficient to protect us, and the tall windshield on our fairing kept it off Cliff's face. Missouri's rolling countryside is beautiful even on cloudy days, and we enjoyed ourselves. However, somewhere along the line, Cliff suggested we simply ride to Versailles and then home.

Lunchtime approached, and we couldn't find a suitable place to eat. The rain finally let up, so we decided to have lunch at the first city or roadside park. I carry a large freezer-bag with emergency rations in the Honda, consisting of at least a couple cans of sardines, a roll of crackers, some 100-calorie packs of cookies, and single-serving cans of fruit.

Not far out of Boonville, we came to this park (click to view pictures larger).

It was cloudy, but we had ourselves a satisfying lunch. All we lacked was our after-lunch coffee; we prefer McDonalds for coffee, but couldn't find one. so we stopped at a Breaktime station, where I took the following shot of us:

When I take these self-portraits, I always seem to be giving the world a shot of the inside of my nose. But YOU try holding a camera at arms length, aiming it at yourself, and shooting with the camera backwards. Not an easy task, I assure you. I was quite proud, by the way, that I accidentally got the Gold Wing in the picture.

We stopped by Cliff's Aunt Gertrude's in Versailles. Her son, Darryl, is living with her right now; he and Cliff had a great visit. As we were getting ready to leave, these Clydesdales came past. I have no idea what they were doing on a city street, but it was a pretty neat thing to see.

So we've started our weekend with a bang. If the rest goes as well, I will have no complaints at all.

Oh, about the forecast of rain for the rest of the weekend? That's all changed. No rain is forecast now until Tuesday.

A road trip tomorrow?

Looks like Cliff and I might make a four-hour (one way) trip down near Independence, Kansas, to visit his brother, Donald. There are tractors there that Cliff wants to see. I'll take the camera. And a good book to read aloud while we travel.