Tennessee - Days 2 & 3

Newport KOA
Saturday, 2 and Sunday, 3 November 2019

Campground time
I spent both these days here in the campground.  The whole first day was spent pulling my drafts out of the word processing program and trying to make them fit as blog posts.  I still haven't figured out how to make the font behave, other than to retype all of them.  And as wordy as I am, that's not a time-saving option.  Anyway, I got caught up.

The second day I spent reading tourist handouts I'd picked up at the Visitor Center a couple of days ago and figuring out what I wanted to see.  Of course, that list isn't at all the same as where I'm able and willing to go - but it's a good place to start.

I saw weather reports about that storm and cold front we dealt with in the Kentucky campground and felt very lucky.  I saw that many parts of this general area had tornadoes and downed trees to deal with, and all we got were some high winds and rain for a while.  I'd take that option any day.

What we've had here is nights just below freezing and sunny days up to about 60°.  I filled up with propane as soon as we checked in here and have had to run the heater most of each morning because it's been so chilly.

Campsites
When I got to this campground the other day, I found a pickup truck parked in my designated campsite.  When I told the manager, instead of making the guy move his truck, he told me to take another site.  That site had me sitting at another angle - and it didn't take me long to decide I wasn't going to fight gravity for several days at the rates they're charging.  So he gave me yet another site, which was somewhat more level, though I had to work at it.

I see that many campers have little blocks they put under their wheels to help level them, but that's not something I want to try by myself.  I never see anyone else setting that up by themselves so don't know how I'd do it without help.  And for me, that wouldn't be very useful anyway because I so rarely stay in one place for more than a night.  Most campers are being parked for days while the owners go off in separate cars.

Food litter
For some reason I can't imagine, there's food lying on the ground all over this KOA.  The very first time I took the dogs out once we'd gotten settled in a site, Dexter found some chicken still on the bones right here in this site.  I didn't see it until I was prying it out of his mouth, and I threw it in the firepit, which already had some garbage the previous people had left.

But we've hardly had even one walk in all these days where Dext and/or Gracie didn't find any food.  And this isn't Dext's usual eat-anything sort of food, but instead I'm getting real food out of his jaws.  (Thank goodness he lets me do it without a fight.)

But there was one ghastly incident Sunday afternoon when, once again, Dext found something he was crunching on and, because I was afraid it was a chicken bone or something that'd hurt him, I pried it out of his mouth only to find it was covered in feces.  Which then my fingers were, too.  Fingers on both hands, and I was smearing it on the leashes too.  The smell was awful and I was almost in shock from the ghastliness of the situation.  I pulled the dogs back to the RV and barely got the door open with my little finger (undefiled) and started disinfecting everything.

I had to clean my hands 3 times with disinfecting wipes, wash them 4 times with soap (rubbing and singing the alphabet song twice each time), use a nail brush 3 times, and then do it all over again before I could get rid of the smell.  Given that my nose isn't a surefire indicator of cleanliness, I have no idea whether I got rid of the contamination.  And somewhere in there I also used disinfecting wipes on the leashes.  It was an awful episode.

Otherwise
I got an appointment for Lily to have her claws clipped Monday morning in Knoxville, and brought out of storage her new carrying case.  I set it up in the cabin so she could get used to it and twice I saw her climb into it and lie down for a while.  I think she really likes the mesh sides that let her see around her.

I gave the dogs their monthly heartworm medicine.

I looked at my winter clothes, stored in duffel bags, but it's just not cold enough for them yet.  I only brought out my winter shoes (no breathing holes like my summer shoes) and the winter vest I bought in Connecticut last November.  I imagine I'll be needing the rest in a couple of weeks, but not just yet.

I came up with a plan for Monday, which turned out to be entirely errands and no sightseeing.  I just have a lot of chores that piled up while I was in rural eastern Kentucky.  Since I'm hoping to go from Knoxville into rural far eastern Tennessee, I figured I'd better get things done now. 

I found a campground to stay in Monday night that's much closer to Knoxville than I am now (more than an hour away now).

And I made what seems to be a realistic plan to see the Appalachian area of Tennessee later this week.  We'll see what happens when reality shows up.