Week 8 of hiatus

Monday, 25 to Sunday, 31 May 2020

Coronavirus tales
Week 8.  And it looks like it'll still be a while before I can even start thinking about being back on the road.  I have 2 reasons for that skepticism: (1) the apparent absence of common sense from people celebrating the Memorial Day weekend by gathering in large groups without masks and without any attempt at social distancing; (2) the report this week that nearly every state in the country has been reporting inaccurate information about the progress of the coronavirus.

Regarding the first reason, I sincerely hope I'm wrong, but I expect to find a sharp spike in cases of the virus within another week or so from now (2 weeks from Memorial Day).  This insidious virus that is easily transmissible and is often not detectable for 2 weeks or more after it's been contracted - and sometimes has no symptoms at all, so the infected people don't know they're carriers - this virus is still very much among us.  Just look at Iowa, for example.  Two months ago, they had zero cases there; now they're past 19,000 and still moving up.  And these are the ones that are confirmed.  It's even worse in Indiana, going from zero to more than 30,000 now.  Both states have much of their population in rural areas, areas lacking the medical resources of big cities.  A gap in medical care can make the situation even worse than it might have been, but news reports a while back suggested these rural residents had gotten complacent, as if this big bad virus would never dream of attacking these innocent farmers, far from Sin Cities.   More than half of the states have Republican governors (27), most of whom seem to be doing what the president tells them to do (despite his rapidly changing positions).  So when Trump says open up everything as fast as you can, governors around the country are doing just that.  And because this is a free country where we can all travel anywhere we want, if even one state is opening up regardless of the public health dangers, then all states are at increased risk.

So the virus continues to spread at just the time government officials around the country want to move back to the way things were.  Except we can't do that.  We'll never again be quite the way we used to be.  Even if a vaccine is found, which isn't a sure thing, that vaccine just protects us; it doesn't kill the virus; it's not like calling in an exterminator for a pest problem in your home.  What we have to protect us from the flu, COVID's close relative, is a vaccine that's good only for 1 year.  We also have 25% of respondents to a recent poll saying they won't get the vaccine if it's discovered.

Regarding the 2nd reason, news reporting says some states count those in nursing homes while others don't; some states have information computerized while others are still using pencil and paper; some states have a dearth of needed equipment, including the ability to administer tests, while others have plenty.   But beyond those technical problems is the misreporting of the data we have.  There are 2 types of tests - an antibody test that says whether someone once had the virus and now has antibodies, and a virus test that says whether someone has the virus right now.  Those tests are aimed at different populations and produce different results that can't be combined.  But many states are combining them.  Result: we don't actually know how many tests have been administered or how many people have tested positive or negative.  In other words, a positive test saying someone once had the virus is being reported as if that person has the virus today, or vice versa.  Further, authorities have recently learned those tests aren't even necessarily accurate.  And even if the data were accurate, the antibody test may not be of much help in the future because no one knows whether those antibodies will protect that person (after all, some people get the regular flu more than once).  I found this subject confusing, but this article in The Atlantic is fairly clear.   https://www.theatlantic.com/cdc-and-states-misreporting-test-data

And I'll add a twist to that situation.  Big announcement in the paper this week that new testing sites have been set up in this area.  So I went online to the CVS site, because they're the ones administering the test, found that I had to make an appointment, and tried to do that.  First they wanted me to answer some questions.  My answers told them I wasn't showing any of the most common symptoms for the virus, so they turned me down.  Apparently I had to be obviously sick before they'd tell me I was sick.  No matter that many people never show symptoms; no matter that places around the country (including here in Dallas) are complaining about people not wanting to get tested, no matter that my age and health problems put me in a high risk category.  There were no questions about those things at all.  If I wasn't clearly sick, they didn't want to see me.

So much for the claim that everybody who wants a test can get one.

But if that's what happened to me, it's no wonder this virus keeps spreading.  And if the states aren't even reporting data properly, none of us can make sensible decisions about when and how to begin resuming the normal life authorities claim we should.

So yes, I'm more than ready to get moving again, but I won't be doing it in June.  I'm going to wait and see if state and federal authorities can get their act together, and see if the virus is truly abating during the hot summer months as they'd hoped a while back.  Meanwhile, I'm trying to get some things done I haven't had the time for before.

RV repair
My repair appointment at Luxury Coach Service was last Wednesday.  I've ended up spending my entire stimulus check at that place, between this week and the repairs 2 weeks ago.  But after all, it's gone to support a locally-owned business employing local workers and it's left me much happier, so how can that be wrong?

Alex, who did such good work for me 2 weeks ago, worked on my RV this week and did an outstanding job.  See for yourself.

What you're looking at is the new molding around both sides of the overhang on my RV.  Looks ordinary, right?  That's the point.  After he stripped off the old, shrunken trim and installed the new trim, Alex took the time to get off the yucky residue from the duct tape that'd been trying to hold the old molding in place.  I'd figured I'd have to spend the week doing that (unwelcome in the summery Texas weather), but Alex took care of it for me.

He also installed my new TV antenna, so I can now get the morning weather reports and local news like I used to.  Amazing to turn on the TV and actually get a signal.  52 signals to be accurate.  (A lot more TV stations in the Dallas area than in some of the places I've been.)

And he installed my new kitchen faucet, resulting in an actual water flow.  No more trickle unless I want a trickle.  A complete gyp by the faucet company for making me buy a whole new assembly and get it installed instead of just the little cheap nozzle that was plugged up and couldn't be unplugged.  But I've got water now.  Indoor plumbing is a miracle we all take for granted, but I sure appreciate it now.

Weekly Cleanliness Trip
I heard on the radio that a waterspout had been spotted at Toledo Bend Reservoir on the TX/LA border.  A waterspout is basically a tornado that forms over the water instead of the land.  I noticed this report especially because I camped at South Toledo Bend Park for a couple of days when I was traveling in Louisiana.  Nice place.  I was comfortable there.

I also heard about a new concept in entertaining that's a result of the ingenuity needed for businesses to survive the challenges of this virus.  Richardson is now the home of a Drive-In CarBaret - probably the world's first.  It sounds completely dopey and completely fun.  Here's a link for it.   https://artandseek.org/pop-up-drive-in-and-live-cabaret-all-in-a-parking-lot

I went to dump my tanks at a TA Travel Stop that I hadn't been to before; it had a large parking area with some grass so I also walked the dogs.  I saw stickers on a couple of light poles from a group called Patriot Front.  One of them said One Nation/Against Invasion.  Wondering which nation they meant and what invasion I'd missed, I went to the website and was completely appalled.  Wikipedia describes it as a white supremacist, neo-Nazi, neo-fascist, American nationalist group, and from what I saw on Patriot Front's website I'd say that's pretty accurate.  You can see for yourself at this link.   https://patriotfront.us   To get the real flavor of this group, go to their "manifesto" section.  I honestly find it terrifying.  Or for an overview, here's the link to what the Southern Poverty Law Center has to say about them.   https://www.splcenter.org/patriot-front

I went from there down County Road 309 for a few miles.  I figured a county road in Texas was bound to be a decent drive, even if small.  What I didn't figure is that this road, which was once paved, has deteriorated so thoroughly I had to drive 15 mph (in a 35 mph zone) just to keep from being shaken to death.  There was no place on the road that was smooth until I got right to the end.  But that's where I was going: Ham's Orchards in Terrell TX, apparently well-known in these parts.

This is the sign on one of their buildings.  What they had available when I was there were bags of peaches, barbecue, and a shop with many many types of jellies and preserves and various fruits and pies and all kinds of stuff.

It also had about 80% of the customers that weren't wearing masks and hadn't ever heard of social distancing.  I wore my mask and a pair of gloves, and I did the best I could to stay away from other people.  It was very discouraging.

But the peaches were great.

As I was driving back into town I passed several signs about something called Smurfit Kappa.  For instance, they'd volunteered to clean up part of the highway.  I thought maybe it was some strange fraternity until I passed a building with that name on it, but still nothing at all to tell me what on earth it was about.  Smurfit Kappa turns out to be one of the world's leading paper-based packaging companies and Europe's leading corrugated packaging company.  They've got 5 locations in the DFW area, one of which is in Mesquite, which I was passing through at the time.  But "Smurfit"?  I'd have thought when they came to the US they might want a name that doesn't sound like a cartoon character.

And on a more positive note:
In today's Sunday Comics, the one for Luann was really nice.  I tried to find a copy I could post to show you, but you'll have to look it up yourself.  It showed her sitting in a chair in her yard with her dog on her lap watching the sun rise (or maybe set).  It was peaceful and a reminder that in the midst of all this anxiety and uncertainty, Nature is still doing her best to tell us to take it easy, stay calm, and enjoy what we've got.  Because we really have a lot more than we think.

Week 7 of hiatus

Monday, 18 to Sunday, 24 of May 2020

This week I had a brief bout of optimism and decided things would be much better as the summer went on, given doctors' thoughts that the coronavirus would mimic the habit of the flu virus to virtually disappear in warm weather.  And Lord knows Texas has warm weather in the summer.  I started thinking maybe I could visit New Mexico in July and Arizona in August, maybe even taking in Texas before fall came around.

All that changed when scientists began reporting increasing numbers of infection and death over an increasing number of states, numbers that looked like they coincided with the premature (in my mind) reopening of activity in those states.

I do not believe there will be many governors who try to reestablish lock-downs if the numbers seem to get out of hand, and even if they try they'll have to figure out how they plan to enforce them.  There are already a stunning number of idiots who believe the virus hasn't really happened at all, or that it has happened but it's a weapon of Democrats and will disappear after the election, or some other nonsense, and are unfortunately acting on their beliefs - i.e. refusing to follow simple health guidelines that protect them and the rest of us.

Those being my beliefs, I not only can't assume - I can barely even maintain a flicker of hope - that I'll be able to get back on the road at all this year.  This reassessment of my situation has made this a depressing week for me, and I've been having a great deal of trouble finding impetus to get much done.  But I also believe that it's all only temporary and that if I'm careful, I too will be able to live through this mess.  In this case my optimistic hopefulness didn't serve me any better than the subsequent depression, and I'll be much better once I can get my feet back under me for living on an even, and more realistic, keel.

Ants
I'm still having a battle with ants and still hating it, so this week the pest control guy came by to give me an estimate.  He pointed out that the tree I'm parked under - a crepe myrtle - is notorious for encouraging ants.  He pointed out at least 6 ant beds under this one as well as a healthy trail of ants climbing the tree.  He figures what's happening is the ants are climbing the tree, falling on the roof, and getting in through the skylights (which explains why they sometimes seem to drop from the sky - they are).  He said he didn't think I had a colony living in the RV, which was a relief, but that he'd be glad to come in and do the usual spray  under cabinets and around what would be baseboards if this were a house with baseboards.  The company's usual cost is $125 for ant service.

He also suggested I move over a space under the next tree, which is an oak.  It too had some ants on it, but he thought my problems would greatly diminish with a move away from the crepe myrtle.  He said his company is often having to suggest to clients with recurring ant problems that they cut back crepe myrtle branches at least 3' away from their houses.  In this case, I'm barely 3' away from the whole tree, let alone its branches, so that's not an option.  The oak has some branches that hang down too low for me to park the RV under, but Anna said she and David could help me with that problem.  After I give the oak a chance, I'll see how much of an ant problem I still have before calling in the bug service.

Dexter

this is 4 fans, plus the water dish,
taking up the limited floor space

He woke me up before 3:00 one morning this week, pacing back and forth (which was a trick in the dark with all the fans on the floor).  I thought he'd heard some thunder that I couldn't hear (it was forecast) and tried to calm him down.  A few minutes later, Gracie came back to try to get into the bathroom, which I again assumed was due to thunder I still couldn't hear.  But I finally got worried because Dexter kept pacing back and forth, which he doesn't usually, and got up - to find that Dext had vomited a large quantity both on the floor and on his bed.  The smell was probably what got Gracie up.  Dext went on to vomit on my driver's seat, which was fortunately covered with an Indian print bedspread that I got at Pier 1 my sophomore year of college (making it 52 years old).  Did you hear Pier 1 is closing permanently?

So I spent quite a while trying to clean up the mess and finally took the bed and bedspread outside and laid them on the carefully pruned boxwood hedge around this parking area.

After all that, Dexter was still pacing up and down and I finally decided he may be having other digestive problems as well, and took both the dogs for a walk.  Sure enough, he relieved himself several times in fairly liquid form, and I sure was hoping that forecast for rain materialized because I had trouble cleaning up people's lawns (it didn't).  Fortunately, after all that he was fine.  I'm assuming he ate something I didn't see him eat - he can be so fast about it, but I'm usually able to see him even when I'm not fast enough to stop him.  Whatever it was, it was gone from his system.  But I'm still trying to clean up the mess, because it did rain on Saturday and again today, so the bed and the cover and the spread keep getting wet and needing to dry out.  At some point the neighbors are going to complain that I'm bringing down the tone of the neighborhood.

The next day, we had an appointment for Dext's annual shots.  Vet visits are so different now than before because vets don't want to be in small enclosed rooms with the pet owners.  But the vet told me afterwards that he'd been well-behaved, which was a relief because he isn't always where shots are concerned.

And Lily
She woke us all up very early another morning by yowling at the door.  She's never done this before and it upset the dogs for being so unusual.  She made it very clear what she wanted: to go outside.  It's the first time since I got her that she's made any move towards the out-of-doors besides just greeting us at the door when we get back from a walk.  Yet there she was, standing down on the bottom step, yowling away in that special way only cats can pull off.  Well, it got me out of bed.  That's 2 mornings this week I was rousted by agitated animals.  Of course, I explained to Lily she had a snowball's chance of getting outside, but she kept registering agitation.  I have no idea what was outside.

Gracie
She wasn't a problem.  I just thought she should have her own category, since the others did.  Well, no more of a problem than usual.  When I got back from taking Dext into Banfield for his vet appointment, I found a note on the windshield saying I should crack a window for Gracie (by name) and that this nameless person had discovered my door was unlocked and come inside the RV and given Gracie some water.  God Bless! the note said.

Dext and I were gone for a half hour, almost to the minute, and the outdoor temp was in the 80s, not the upper 90s.  So my first reaction was slight exasperation with this well-meaning but officious person.  But later it hit me - she (it was certainly a she who put the little hearts on this note) entered my home without my permission or even knowledge and with no real excuse.  If she'd actually been observing my actions, she'd know I wasn't gone but for a few minutes before she did all this - not exactly an instance of animal abuse - so instead she was probably just passing by and saw Gracie sitting in the front seat waiting for us to come back.

I really wish I had a chance now to talk to this woman.  How many people walking down a sidewalk and seeing a dog in the window of a house would even go up to the door, let alone see if the door was unlocked - let alone actually walk into someone's home uninvited.  That's called trespass and can be prosecuted criminally.  Just because many people use an RV for weekend recreation didn't give this woman a license to go inside it.  So I've come to see that this was emphatically not the actions of a reasonable person, however well-meaning she may have been.  Honestly, I feel invaded.  No I don't lock the door when I leave - it's never been a problem before.  This woman's lucky it was Gracie inside and not Dexter, who takes a pretty serious view of his role as protector of the home.

Weekly Cleanliness Trip
I needed water as well as a tank dump, so I went back to the RV park in Caddo Mills that I went to a month or so ago.

I drove past a company called Signazon, and with a name like that I looked it up.  They do custom banners of all kinds for anyone who wants them.  For instance, they've got a whole category of banners for less than $25 that you can customize to welcome home a returning service member.  Nice idea, actually.

I had no idea JC Penney's is headquartered right here in Plano.  I heard it on the radio.

I also heard a reporter on the BBC Newshour talking about the president's claim he's taking that hydroxychloroquine.  With her British accent the reporter was saying how surprising she thought that was, given that he's "fond of his bonnet" and that hair loss is a common side effect.  Which makes me think he isn't really taking it, because his doctor would undoubtedly have told him of this side effect.

I saw several fields of corn at varying stages of growth - some about 4' high.  It's so easy for me to forget that nature's keeping on keeping on, and our nation's farmers are obviously trying to keep on with it.  Seems brave of them.

Scissor-tailed Flycatcher

I think I saw several Scissor-tailed Flycatchers today.  The bird book says they're rare outside their range, and sure enough, I haven't seen them in years.  But Texas is their breeding ground and I grew up with them.  They're still around.  Their tails are pretty unmistakable.

For part of today's drive I was on Farm-to-Market Road 36.  I'd forgotten about these roads, but this gave me a good refresher course: they're built to carry goods from farms to markets (duh) so they run past lots of fields.  This means they're full of 90° turns as they go around people's property lines.  One after the other after the other.  Did a good job of keeping my speed down, but I don't mind it.  They're clearly a continuing part of the history of our state.

As I drove through the small town (1,300 folks) of Caddo Mills, I wondered about the name and found the city's website.  They say the Caddo Indians used to camp near the banks of nearby Caddo Creek around the 1850s; some years later, European settlers established a gristmill in the area.  The town says it was named for the gristmill (though there was only one mill apparently, not mills plural).  I think the town should revise its website to say it was also named for the Indians, or at least for the creek, and not exclusively for the singular mill, but history's a tricky thing.

I came across the highway turnoff to the town of Fate, so of course I had to look it up to be sure it really was a town.  It is.  But even the town can't seem to agree where the name came from.  Everybody seems to agree it was named for either William Lafayette "Fate" Brown, originally from Mississippi, or for George Washington Lafayette "Fate" Peyton, originally from Tennessee.  Despite the obvious name similarities, they don't appear to be any relation to each other, but both were early settlers in the area.  I can see how 2 men can be named Lafayette back then, but how can it be possible for both of them to be nicknamed "Fate?"  Anyway, they were, and the town was named for one or the other of them, and I guess not many people today really care which one. (I'm guessing "Fate" is a play on Lafayette, but in both cases it was a middle (or 3rd) name so seems odd to be a source of a nickname.)

What's odd about Fate, though, besides its name, is that the 2010 National Census identified it as the fastest growing city in Texas over the previous decade (from 602 in 2000 to 6,357 in 2010) and there's thought it could exceed 20,000 by 2021.  That's definitely a population boom.  But other than it being 30 minutes from Dallas, I can't figure out what's propelling the growth.  Odd.

I passed a billboard that said: "Remember when everyone had a waterbed?  Times change.  Jesus doesn't."

Next up
I've got an appointment on Wednesday to get the parts I ordered installed in the RV - the new kitchen faucet and the TV antenna and the trim around the cab.  I hope those things'll make it seem more like the little guy I originally set out with - though dirtier.  I need to wash it sometime.

I really will dredge up more momentum this week and get to work on my 2 unfinished blog posts.  I know I keep saying that, and I'm not promising, but I really do want to get them off my to-do list.

I saw in the paper that a peach orchard is reopening its market as of yesterday.  It's about 30 miles from here, so I thought I'd head that way on Tuesday on my weekly cleanliness trip.  The article said they'd gone to a great deal of trouble to figure out how to keep both them and their customers safe while still selling their peaches - they're not opening their indoors market, for instance, just their outdoors one - and I do love peaches, so I'm hoping it'll work out.

And I hope everyone's keeping safe and healthy.  These are scary times in some ways, but I do believe everything'll come out okay in the end.  (And if you've seen The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, you know the next line is, "And if it's not okay, it's not yet the end.")  Hope on, hope ever.

Week 6 of hiatus

Monday, 11 through Sunday, 17 May 2020

Hard to believe it's been only 6 weeks since I came here.  Feels like it's been months.  I'm guessing half the residents of the world feel that way.  I still believe the scientists more than the politicians, though, and am only sorry that the politicians have sidelined the scientists.  Makes it hard to get trustworthy information, which makes it easier to be worried.  The unknown is almost always scarier than the known, which is how incumbent politicians get reelected so often.

Weekly Cleanliness Trip
The trip was reasonably successful but the day itself was a near disaster.

I was only planning 4 stops and intended to start with the KOA in Arlington, where I could dump my tanks.  From there I was going to a Target to order some DVDs, then to an Albertson's for groceries, then on to the recycle center and then home.  After I'd gotten the whole itinerary worked out and written down, I called the KOA just to be sure they'd let me dump my tanks and they said yes, no problem, but don't come before noon.  So I had to rearrange the whole thing, but at least I found out before I'd started driving.

So here's how the disaster day went:
   Tuesday started with thunder and lots of rain and upset the dogs, but then that cleared off and it got hot and humid.
   I hadn't slept well the night before so I was fighting to stay awake all day.
   I was wearing a shirt that kept reminding me I've gained too much weight in the last 2 years, so I spent all day feeling fat.
   When I was tying my shoes in the morning, I noticed water dripping from the frig and discovered it really had turned itself off.  I'd been suspecting it was doing that but hadn't ever been able to tell for sure, but this was for sure.  So I spent all day worrying about how and where I was going to get it fixed.  The KOA gave me business cards for 2 mobile RV repair companies, so that was a help.
   The manager at Target told me they couldn't order my DVDs online, and I said I don't want to order them online, I'm ordering them here in the store.  So he repeated that same thing, and I repeated my same thing.  And he got mad at me, and I told him I'd called the day before and the woman I talked to had told me she couldn't do it over the phone, that I had to come in, so I was in.  He wanted to know who I'd talked to, but I didn't get her name, all I knew was that it was a woman.  So he got upset with me about not knowing who I'd talked to.  This is the manager I'm talking to.  I finally pointed out to him that I wasn't understanding the words he was using and that all he kept talking about was ordering online which I didn't want to do, so he needed to use other words if he wanted me to understand him.  He got really huffy but said I couldn't order the DVDs in person in the store.  I thought he said I couldn't order them at all while the coronavirus was still a problem, but that made even less sense than the rest of what he said, so I ignored it because I don't believe it.  Of all items that might cause transmittal of the virus, DVDs should rank pretty low on the list for either side of the transaction.  But his whole approach was that I was causing problems by asking at all and by not getting the name of the person I talked to on the phone.  I almost told him that many stores, including many Targets, assume the customer is not an enemy and they try to solve problems, not stonewall them, but I got tired of dealing with him.  Jerk.  He almost made me reconsider my policy of never posting an online comment about a business.
   After I got groceries, I opened the frig to store the refrigerated stuff and discovered that my bottle of soy sauce had tipped over, the lid had come unscrewed, and there was soy sauce dripping all over everything because of course it was on the top shelf.  I mopped up as best I could, but even then opening the door smelled like a Chinese restaurant and the smell was all over my hands.
   Sometime about then, I discovered the cabin electricity was completely out - it supplies power for the cabin lights and water pump and anything electrical when I'm not plugged in and don't have the generator on.  Gone.  At least everything worked when I turned the engine over, but I need to have that independent power.  At the same time my radio stopped working, even when the engine was on.  It didn't come back for the rest of the day.
   On the other hand, I did get the tanks dumped and filled up with fresh water.  I did get the recycling where it belonged.  I did get the groceries I wanted.  I didn't fall asleep at the wheel or have an accident out in the Dallas traffic.  So I guess disasters are relative.

Mopping up problems
The next day I spent quite a while cleaning up the soy sauce smell in the frig.  Turns out it had dribbled on about half the stuff in there, so everything had to come out while I wiped down all the shelves, pulled them out to clean into the slots the shelves fit in.  And the glass shelf at the bottom didn't want to go back in because the door was in the way - the platform my bed sits on is exactly in the way of the frig door opening far enough.  I had to take the door off, except the door didn't come all the way off, there was no screw at the bottom that I could access, and I had to hold the half-off door with one hand while reinserting the glass shelf with the other (my left), and it didn't want to go and didn't want to go and it was all pretty hard.  I'd had to take it out because the shelf not being porous meant lots of soy sauce had collected in the slot the shelf sits in.  The frig was full of food, of course, and I had the contents sitting on every flat surface in the cabin, and the day was getting warmer so I was trying to hurry to get stuff back in before things started spoiling.  And I was doing all this cleaning with a water source that was just a trickle.  My water faucet has gradually over the 2 years been producing less and less and less water flow, and now it's just a trickle.  Really hard to rinse out a sponge full of soy sauce with just a trickle.  All very trying.  It's not like patience has ever been one of my outstanding virtues but I didn't have a choice.

At least the frig no longer smells like soy sauce.

Then I tried to come up with solutions to my other problems.  I called the 2 numbers KOA had given me, and got a recording for one saying the mailbox was full and got a recording for the other saying all circuits were busy, which was nutty - what circuits?  It was the same area code as the first number so what circuits?  Anyway, I kept trying several times and finally got an answer at one number.  The guy said he'd call me back within a half hour.  An hour and a half later he finally called me back, but he was talking while he was driving (not a good idea in Dallas traffic) and the signal kept breaking up so I couldn't understand him.  He said he'd call me in just a few minutes when he got to his next stop.  An hour later he still hadn't called back, so I called a company in Rockwall that had a big bunch of good Yelp reviews.  They said they'd squeeze me in the next morning for an assessment.  Nice folks.

Thursday, I went out there - Luxury Coach Services - sounds like a really fancy company for the likes of me and my little beat-up guy, and it was.  They cater mainly to the spiffy Class A bus-type RVs, but they said they're happy to help anybody who needs it, which certainly includes me.

A very nice guy named Alex came right out to work on my RV and I suggested he start with the cabin batteries, because it had occurred to me finally that they're supposed to be the power source for the cabin lights.  He looked and said yep, they're bone dry, no wonder they're not putting out any power.  He replaced them and cleaned up that whole area and all the connections which had been crudded with dirt and hair (the nest the batteries stay in is under the entrance steps).  He checked that everything was getting power and - like magic! - I had power in the cabin.  Everything worked again.  He said the frig draws some power from those batteries even when I'm plugged in to a power source; he said the frig is a delicate piece of equipment that has to have a reliable source of power at all times, and that's why it was cutting itself off sometimes.  The water pump worked, the radio worked, the frig worked, everything worked.  It was very exciting.

So I had him order parts for me for several other repairs I've been wanting but not taking the time for before now.  Of course, like everybody else, time is about all I've got these days so I might as well get it done.  Things like a new TV antenna that I guess got ripped off by a tree branch more than a year ago and a new faucet for the kitchen sink to get more than a trickle of water out of it, and repair to the trim around both sides of the front cab that I've been having to hold up with duct tape and making my little baby look like Frankenstein with braces.  So they'll order parts and then we can set up a date for repairs.  Nice people.  Not cheap - labor is $155/hour - but it seemed worth it and I think that's about in line with other mechanical labor costs.  I told Alex I thought the cab trim might be just cosmetic, but he explained its actual purpose was to cover up the screws holding the outside siding in place, and without the trim the screws would get corroded and leak and then the whole thing would start to fall apart.  So I'll get the trim and pay to have it installed.

They called me the next day to say they'd found out the faucet company doesn't sell just the spray head, which is what I wanted, that I'd have to order the entire assembly which would cost $120 plus an hour of labor.  A far cry from just screwing in a new faucet head that I could do myself.  I authorized the buy and now have my fingers crossed that this will actually fix the problem.

Meanwhile . . .
The weather on Tuesday stopped being thunder and rain and started being really hot and humid and stayed that way - on Thursday I saw it had gotten up to 91° in mid-Dallas, and I figure it was somewhere about that here.  All that meant it's been hot at night - not even getting down to 70° by morning - so it's hard to sleep very well.

All that changed on Saturday.  A little after 7:00 AM it started raining and from then on what we got was rain.  All day.  Well, it let up now and then, but it was mostly serious rain and often a lot of wind along with it.  In the paper today it said they got more than 3" of rain at the Dallas Love Field weather station.  I just could not work up any enthusiasm at all to get anything constructive done and instead spent almost all day watching NCIS episodes on DVD.  It was all so cozy in here, and the rain was so steady outside, that when I asked the dogs if they wanted a walk about 2:00, they just lay there and looked at me.  Actually, Gracie didn't even bother to open her eyes.  It finally let up towards evening (and got hot and humid again of course), but it was a pretty relaxing day.

I'm still seeing ants everywhere in the cabin.  On my bed (I've killed them walking across me during the night), on the kitchen counter, on the table, on the floor, coming out of the microwave, on the upper bunk.  And I still can't for the life of me figure out where they're coming in and why.  There simply isn't any food around.  I really do have it all sealed up.  I finally called a pest control company, and they said they've done RVs before, and we finally settled on a (free) estimate visit next Friday.  I want them to take a look at the space they'd be treating before we actually book a visit, and I want them to tell me if I need to move things out before they do it - move the dog beds, for instance, or clear out the storage space underneath the cabin or pack up the pans and stuff in the drawers - like that.  They said they'd charge me $125 for an ant-killing visit, which is a lot of money, but I really don't like having ants walking all over me.  I've been killing them on my arms.  It's just a grotesque way to live.

And I have an appointment for Dexter to get his annual shots.  When I called the nearest Banfield I explained that they'd have trouble getting his records because their computers ate them last year and a second file had been started up in Michigan or somewhere, and I told her the IT people had blown off both the Banfield person who'd tried to recover them before and also me when I'd called to ask.  The woman I talked to at this Banfield said she'd try to track down them down, and she called me Saturday to report progress.  She says she's one of those who believes persistence is a virtue (that's not the way she put it) and the squeaky wheel gets the grease (that is how she put it), and she wouldn't take no or later for answers.  She says they're trying to come up with a work-around.  The system insists Dext is actually in one of the Banfields right now - has been in there continually all this time - that the system had a glitch while he was there way back when and never logged him out and won't even allow that Banfield to log him out - they tried.  She thinks if they have to, they can get that Banfield to fax his records to her.  I'm still not sure where the second file is, though I have some records myself now.  But it's really nice to find someone who's willing to put in so much effort for me, and I said so.  She said she and the IT guy both enjoyed it - she said she felt like a detective doing all that tracking down.  Very nice of her.

Other comments
Despite the stupid virus, nature keeps on going (thank goodness).  I saw a pair of Cardinals and their 2 babies when the dogs and I were out walking the other day.  The babies were fledged of course but following the parents around to get fed.  Very sweet.

The magnolias have been blooming for a week or two.  So pretty, though they don't smell as strong as I remembered.  Probably it's my memory that's not as strong.

I heard on the radio (once it started working) that accordion sales are up during the sequestration.  There's a company that makes them in Dallas and the owner said they'd sold as many in the last few months as in all of last year.  Who woulda thunk it?

When I was out on my two drives this week, I passed a large group of buildings labeled Texas A&M Agrilife.  I learned that, among other things, they do research on turfgrass breeding, looking for something suitable for this climate.

In Richardson I passed a business called Qorva, no "u", so I looked it up and learned they're in the semiconductor business.  They're right down the street from a Texas Instruments facility, so I guess Richardson's turning itself into a high-tech center.

Arlington has car manufacturing plants - I passed a Ford plant and heard about a GM plant that's the only one still producing GM's large SUVs.

Apparently both Arlington and Grand Prairie have large Spanish-speaking populations, based on the signs and businesses I saw driving through there.

All day I noticed how high the gas prices are in this area.  I saw $1.39 - $1.49 at most places and at a Shell station saw $1.69.  That seems crazy to me given that Texas is full of oil wells and oil refineries and the price of oil is still rock-bottom and I was paying $1.19 in Arkansas a couple of months ago.  I asked David and his best guess is the amount of tax different states tack on.  I imagine he's right but I never saw Texas as being big on gas taxes.

I passed a billboard that said, in big letters, OOPS.  And underneath it said DallasDivorce.com.  And that was it.  So I looked it up and found a lawyer named Kimberly Pinkerton.  I don't know - "oops" just seems like an odd word to connect with divorce.  I mean oops isn't how my divorce felt.

And I'm back in Texas where drivers refuse to let me merge or change lanes and speed up to keep me from moving in front of them.  And all the time I've been driving in other states wondering if I've been fair to Texas drivers or maligning them in retrospect.  Now I find my memories were pretty accurate.

I passed a highway sign saying "Monday - Friday, Various Lane Closures."  "Various?"  Really?  Does this really alert drivers to a danger?

I passed another sign that said "Heavy Load Must Exist."  And my tired brain finally figured out the sign had said "Heavy Load Must Exit."  But in the meantime I thought it was funny.

In Garland I saw a huge facility labeled Epiroc.  They manufacture mining equipment.

The Nabors Family Roofing Co. in Rockwall has paid for at least a half dozen billboards on I-30 that all say "Proverbs 3: 5-6  Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight."  I'm sure it's a nice thought but can't figure out a context for it - not for roofing or for this stupid virus or for driving down the highway, for that matter.  Wonder how they came to pick that particular verse.  I mean, billboards aren't cheap.

Next week I'll make a higher priority of finishing that Civil Rights Museum post.  The last time I worked on it was last Monday.  With all the problems I had on Tuesday that I was still dealing with the rest of the week, I just couldn't dredge up the motivation to fit civil rights in.  But now I don't have to worry, I just have to keep my appointments, so I'll get my work done more expeditiously.

Hope everyone's staying healthy and safe.

Week 5 of hiatus

Monday, 4 through Sunday, 10 May 2020

My time
Other than it taking me all Monday morning to figure out the errands I wanted to run and the route I wanted to take on Tuesday's Weekly Cleanliness Trip, I've spent all week working on my post about the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis.  The museum presented an extraordinary amount of information and, as I've said before, they didn't present it in a way I could follow easily.  Trying to understand it myself and pulling all that together coherently is just time-consuming.  But I'm almost through 1963, so onward and upward.

Weekly Cleanliness Trip
I went back to the TA Travel Center in Rockwall I went to several weeks ago because it was the closest one.  At all my stops today I wore a mask and gloves.  I was glad to see that in many stores, everyone else was wearing masks, though in others quite a few weren't.  But still, I did my best and I was glad to see others doing the same.

Garland
The Dallas-Ft. Worth Metro area is packed with smaller towns, many of which I drove through during the day.  From Richardson, I went through Garland, passing a large Kraft (as in cheese) plant and a huge 1st Baptist Church.

Rowlett
Then there came Rowlett (1st syllable pronounced to rhyme with ow (as in I stubbed my toe), and the emphasis on the 2nd syllable.  It sits on the shore of Lake Ray Hubbard, a very popular site for any water-related activities, named for the man who was head of the Dallas Parks and Recreation Board for 30 years.  (The City of Dallas owns the lake.)

Rockwall
Just to the east of the lake is Rockwall, where the Travel Center is.  This time when I pulled up to the dump station, I noticed the padlock was unlocked.  When I went in to pay I told them so, and said they didn't have to come out because I'd leave it as I'd found it, but they asked me to wait a couple of minutes for a staff person.  I went out and waited a couple of minutes and went ahead and dumped my waste tanks anyway.  I was finished with that and had my hose put away in the RV's storage area and was throwing away my gloves when finally an employee came out, carrying a soda, saying sorry for the delay in a perfunctory sort of way.  When I told him what the other staff hadn't, about the lock being already undone and that I'd left it just as I'd found it, he was quite disconcerted.  And I sure was glad I hadn't bothered to obey instructions.  I understand their concern - lots of people don't know what they're doing (just as I didn't at first) or are sloppy about doing it (leaving a yucky mess).  But I've been emptying these tanks at least once a week for more than 2 years now and no longer need adult supervision.  Especially not the kind where my convenience isn't as important as his soda.

I drove from there back west on I-30, then on I-635, over to the northwest part of Dallas.  First time on interstates in a while.

Mesquite/Garland
I passed through Mesquite and must have gotten back into Garland without seeing a sign when I passed something called Amberton University.  The name of this Garland school sounded a little hokey to me, so I looked it up.  They started in 1971 as a part of Abilene Christian College (now University), and separated in 1981 as Amber University; in 2001 its name changed to Amberton Univ.  It's the only private university in Texas that allows concealed carry (of guns) on campus.  It caters to working adults and all students are age 21 or older.

And as a by the way, Abilene Christian University (in Abilene, duh) is one of the few US colleges that has chapel each class day, and it's mandatory for all full-time undergraduates.  Missing chapel without an exemption may result in the student being suspended.  I don't know what qualifies for an exemption.  In contrast, offshoot Amberton University, while still being affiliated with the Church of Christ as the mother school is, promises students complete freedom of conscience in pursuit of their education.  Maybe they mean it.

Farmers Branch
Then on to the town of Farmers Branch, for some years the home of Robert Tilton, a televangelist in the 1980s and '90s who taught that all the bad things in life, including poverty, were the result of sin.  He preached that when people made financial commitments to his ministry, God would reward them with vast wealth.  He preferred commitments of $1,000, occasionally asking for $5,000 or $10,000.  He said when people would send him these commitments along with a prayer request, he would personally pray over each request.

Diane Sawyer and her show PrimeTime Live on ABC, and later the Texas and US governments, did some investigating.  They found all the mail was sent directly to the bank, which opened the mail and deposited the money.  A lot of this mail was found in the bank's dumpsters; 10,000 pounds of these prayer requests were found in a recycling bin in Tulsa, where Tilton had a PO box. 

Tilton sued ABC for libel; a federal judge dismissed the case; the appeals court upheld the dismissal; the US Supreme Court refused to hear the case (effectively upholding the dismissal).

Then some of the private donors/victims sued Tilton for fraud; eventually the Texas Supreme Court ruled that the victims couldn't prove damages because they couldn't show that, even if Tilton had prayed over their prayer requests, God would have granted those prayers.  (With examples like these, I wonder how anyone could think of the study of law as boring.)

And as for Tilton, he left Texas, tried a few other places, and now is starting his whole set-up again in Florida.

And Farmers Branch, by the way, was the first town in Texas to pass anti-illegal immigration laws, such as fining landlords who rent to illegal immigrants.  The federal district court said they were unconstitutional; eventually the US Supreme Court refused to review the judge's ruling.  The court process took 7 years and who knows how much money in legal fees.  Farmers Branch has fewer than 25,000 residents.  I would have thought they could find more constructive uses for their money, since they were bound to lose that argument.

Addison
David had warned me that I might run into traffic problems in Addison; he said it's geared more for smaller cars so has small parking spaces and crowded streets.  My high school memories of Addison are of a country town, so I was curious and didn't take his advice.

Turned out that the virus has so many people not getting out that there wasn't a traffic problem.  And I stopped worrying a long time ago about not fitting into parking spaces - I just park far enough from the door that I'm not blocking off most shoppers by taking up extra room.

Richardson
The Addison stores were all along Belt Line Road, which is a loop road around the outer edge of Dallas County.  From Addison, Belt Line runs into Richardson and was always the main road (though there's a separate Main Street) through town.  The city's recycling center is just off Belt Line, and that was my next-to-last stop.  David offered to give me some of his official recycling bags for weekly pickup by the city, but I don't mind going to the center, which is free; the bags cost a little money so why bother?  I'm just delighted to have a recycling center that will take glass, after all those months of trouble.

I swung by a Kroger near home because I hadn't found everything I wanted in Addison, and Anna and David surprised me by showing up there.  They brought me an envelope that looked like it was from the IRS and thought I might want to get it in the bank while I was out.  It turned out to be my $1,200 stimulus check, which is certainly a nice addition to a bank balance, but by then I was just exhausted and wanted nothing more than to drive the one more mile back to my parking place in front of their house.

Weather
Monday the "feels like" temp was 95°, but I could feel a storm blowing in when I walked the dogs late in the day and, sure enough, from midnight on we got thunder and rain, and it was much cooler in the morning.

It warmed up but still, cooler weather - like daytime 70s and low 80s - was the norm for the rest of the week.  That was a help because last week it was so hot I had a hard time sleeping at night.  In fact, I haven't had more than about 4 hours of sleep any night in several weeks.  An extra hour or two of dozing each night helps but doesn't replace the lost hours of sleep.  I end up feeling groggy a lot more often than I want to.  But oh well.  It happens.

Another storm blew in Friday with strong strong winds all day.  Friday was trash day and this whole end of the neighborhood was coated with bits of trash from one of the neighbors down the street.  I finally went out myself to pick up some of the trashiest of it but was limited because I don't have a lot of storage space and the trash truck had already come and gone.

And so forth
We were really lucky to have the Blue Angels do a flyover all around the Dallas area, buzzing the area hospitals.  Because there's a hospital pretty close to here, we got a good view of them, though at the speed they were going it was a really quick view.  Super nice of them to do.

Because I like routines and think the dogs need something to count on, I take the same routes for several of our daily walks, and switch around another one of them for variety.  But I end up seeing many of the same people on these walks.  One older couple living the next street over walk to the end of the block and back to their house most days, and then the husband does some exercises in the garage.  When I passed them one day this week, I asked how they were doing and the wife said, in a strong Texas country accent, "We're one day closer to being out!"  Given the frustration of not having an ending date to this sequestration we're all going through, I thought that was a real positive way to look at it.

Despite all that spraying I did last weekend, I still have ants.  Not in the trash any more, because I spray the inside of each fresh bag I use, and spray inside it again a day or two later.  But I'm finding them all over the RV - on my bed, on the table, on the kitchen counter and in the sink and on the stove, on the upper bunk - I've seen them everywhere but on the floor.  And I can't for the life of me figure out where they're coming from.  They just suddenly appear in a spot where they weren't the split second before I saw them.  I don't see them coming from the walls or the windows or the door.  There's not a trail of them anywhere.  I just see 5 walking on my bed in the 3 minutes it takes me to get dressed.  Or 10 walk across the kitchen counter when there's nothing going on.

I'm now washing the pet dishes twice a day, wiping everything off all the time.  I only have about 3 or 4 more Clorox wipes so only use a clean sponge or paper towel to do this wiping, but I'm sure there's nothing available for them to eat.  Everything that's at all edible is either still in its original, unopened packaging or it's in a Zip-loc bag or it's in the frig or freezer.  Everything.  Including the pet food.

The only thing more I can think of to do is call a pest control company, but I'm not sure I'm ready for such an extreme measure.  At least, it seems like it'd be extreme, an RV not being much at all like a house.  Well, if this keeps up, maybe I'll at least call them.

Still want very much to get back on the road, but since today's only the 10th, I'm going to wait and see what happens later this month to the number of infections now that the governor's reopened the state (way too soon in my opinion).

I sent emails to my 3 cousins, who are all older than I am so I was worried about their health.  All 3 wrote back that they're sticking to their homes and staying away from just about everybody.  I sure wish the rest of the country were following their example.

For everybody reading this, I hope you're able to stay safe and healthy.

Week 4 of hiatus

Monday, 27 April through Sunday, 3 May 2020

"Time keeps on slippin' slippin' slippin' into the future."  (per Stevie Miller)

And that's just about the way it feels.  The days are each happening, and I can remember each one, but they seem to be doing not much besides bringing the future.  That future keeps looking different, too, thanks to our changing levels of knowledge about the coronavirus. 

I'm guessing that a lot of the frustration and eruption into mass groups on beaches and in parks that we're seeing is due to cabin fever.  I lived too many years in Alaska not to have a healthy respect for the power that feeling can generate - and that's what this looks like to me.

The trouble here is that the stakes are a whole lot higher.  I'm getting a little tired of the it's-my-life-and-I'll-risk-it-if-I-want-to line of arguments, which completely ignores the crazy ease with which this virus is transmissible.  But, as I said, cabin fever is a powerful force that can override reason.

Daily life
I'm still keeping to the RV as much as I can, aside from walking the dogs 4 or 5 times a day.  One of the best things about this "campground" David and Anna are running is the number of different routes the dogs and I can take.  This being an actual neighborhood and not a campground, we can take different roads and take them in different orders, which keeps our walks from being boring.

I started a 4-week subscription to the Dallas paper, which has been nice.  I like paper newspapers much better than digital ones, and I've really missed the Sudoku and crossword puzzles on my travels.  Plus, the paper articles seem more in-depth than most of those I find online.

But one thing online that I did enjoy was Brad Pitt's take on Anthony Fauci for SNL.  I've never been a Brad Pitt fan, but this was something special.  I actually had trouble finding the whole clip but, if you haven't seen it, here's a link.   https://www.huffpost.com/anthony-fauci-brad-pitt-snl

I spent most of this week editing the photos I took at the Birmingham Civil Rights Museum.  At least, that's where I thought I'd taken them.  Finally, Saturday afternoon I discovered they were actually the 2nd batch of photos I took at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis.  The ones I posted a few days ago were only half of what was there.  I remember now that by the time I got that far into the museum I was feeling a little overloaded with information and took a break, got some barbecue, walked the dogs, then went back for a few more hours in the afternoon.  And it's those afternoon photos I spent the week editing.  The ones I took in the Birmingham Civil Rights Museum I'd dumped into the trash.  Fortunately, I haven't emptied the trash for just such a situation so was able to retrieve all the photos from there.  Once I'm finally done with Memphis, I'll move on to Birmingham and then FINALLY I'll be caught up.

Errands
On Tuesday I took my usual Weekly Cleanliness Trip.  One of my first stops was at a Valvoline Instant Oil Change place, to get some way-overdue servicing done on the RV.  I'd called ahead to be sure they had a door that was tall enough to take me, and when I pulled in the guy came running out and said "there are 3 others ahead of you" which I didn't think anything about.  But then I waited and waited, watched 2 of the 3 clear out, watched 2 of the 3 employees doing nothing, and got more and more irritated as more time passed.  Finally the guy came out and said they'd have to take care of me out on the drive because they didn't have room inside, and I knew then that something was wrong.  No way were they going to do an oil change out on the driveway.  Turns out they thought I wanted a state inspection done.  He never bothered even to mention it, let alone ask me.  And though I didn't mention it either, when a business is named "Instant Oil Change" I'd think they'd assume it was an oil change I was there for.  He apologized and gave me $20 off, but that wasn't enough for me to think he was doing a reasonable job managing the place.  Still, the oil got changed, which is what I wanted.

I dumped some more stuff at the storage place, but some day I need to go back and spend some serious time rearranging boxes and figuring out what I have in there and how I can store it better.

I stopped at a PetsMart and bought a couple of new dog beds because I'd had to throw out one of those I had.  On Sunday morning, Gracie started gagging, and since she was standing over the floor at the time I thought it'd be easy to clean up.  Then she moved onto her bed and (before I could get to her) instantly vomited.  There was a lot of it for some reason and when I pulled the cover off I found it'd soaked past the cover (which anyway was coated in dog hair) and into the bed before I could even get to the paper towels.  At that point I gave up on trying to clean it up and took it outside for the trash pickup.  Dogs are still easier than kids, but sometimes it seems like a tossup.

Then I went on to this week's dump station - a business called National Indoor RV Centers, which sells and services fancy Class A RVs.  They also have 3 dump stations, which they let anyone use for free, and also access to potable water, which I needed to fill my almost empty tank.

This place was on the other side of Dallas in Louisville (the Fighting Farmers, per the slogan on the city water tank).  On the way I went through actual countryside (though I'm sure the developers will build more houses on it in the next 20 years), with cows and at one place a herd of llamas.  An actual herd (or whatever you call a bunch of them).  I'm used to seeing just a few at any one time and this was a lot more than that.

There seems to be a sizable Korean community out in the Carrollton/Lewisville area, based on the number of churches I saw with Korean letters on the signs.

I got behind a delivery truck that said "Texas Born, Texas Bread."  It was a truck for Mrs. Baird's Bakery, which I'm delighted to see is still in business.  I remember our Brownie Troop went on a tour of their bakery in Waco.  That must have been 60 years ago, and I still remember it.  Amazing thing, memories.

Weather
For most of this week, the temperature has been higher than normal, which isn't really what I wanted, given that this isn't December.  We've had several nights where the temp inside the RV was well into the 80s when we went to bed and didn't get even close to 70° until about 6:00 AM.  I have one little fan that works only if it's about a foot away from you - so not enough.  Anna and David have loaned us 2 more fans, which really help, and I run the fan in the ceiling unit from about 2 PM on.  It's humid, too, which makes it seem hotter than it is.  On my errand run this next week I'll stop off at a Target or somewhere and see about getting another fan or two, since it looks like we won't be able to leave for a cooler climate any time soon.

It did cool off real nicely one night, though - that was the night we had a serious thunderstorm that scared both my puppies quite a bit.  I hadn't been able to sleep anyway because of the heat so noticed when the thunder started up about 10:45.  I looked at the floor and saw both dogs huddling by the bathroom door.  I patted them and said encouraging things, which I'm sure they didn't believe, but the thunder still kept up for a couple of hours.  It brought with it quite a bit of rain and wind, and I was really glad I had believed the forecasts and closed all the windows and skylights, even though it meant we'd be hotter.  As it happened, the storm cooled things off just fine, so we were okay.

Ants
On Thursday morning, I opened the cabinet to put some things in the trash and saw, to my great dismay, that there were enough ants crawling around in and on the trash can for me to start an ant farm.  It was really strange because there hadn't been a one 20 minutes before that when I'd gotten the pet food out of the same cabinet.

Anyway, I bundled up that bag of trash and put it outside for the next day's trash pickup.  A day or 2 later, David and Anna picked up some ant spray for me, which turned out to be very timely.  Because of the gazillion warnings on the label about it being hazardous to pets, I planned to take the 3 critters over to their house for a few hours on Sunday while I sprayed around the cabin.

Well, Sunday morning, there were another ant-farm's worth of ants crawling all over the trash can.  This time I took the can outside and sprayed it all over inside and out with that spray and just left it outside for a while.

I also found a dead baby Robin lying on the drive near my RV, poor little thing.  I found a broken Robin egg near that same spot a week or 2 ago, so I worried about whether the parents had been able to produce any surviving birds.  But then I looked them up and learned Robins normally lay 4 eggs, so I'm hoping they'll have some survivors.  Anyway, I had to bag up the dead baby and the ants that were crawling on it and then spray that spot and the surrounding area.

Once Anna was supervising my babies, I spent an hour emptying cabinets and getting pet beds off the floor and sweeping up Gracie's hair and so forth.  I turned the fans off to do the spraying, to keep the spray from getting on things I didn't want it on, so it was a pretty hot and sweaty chore, but it had to be done.  The whole time I worried about the health risks and how to protect us in such a small space from the cure being worse than the disease (as our elected officials are wont to say these days).  I also sprayed some of the outside of my RV and the power cord that trails for its whole length across the ground to meet David's power cord.

I turned on all the fans and went back over to my family's air conditioned home.  I'd especially worried about Lily adapting, but I closed off all the bedrooms to limit the number of places she could hide and she spent more than an hour exploring the 4 main rooms she could get to.  Actually, so did Dexter.  Dext tried to chase Lily but lost traction on the wood floor and slip-slided away while Lily took up a strong defensive position under the coffee table.  When he got to her again, she hissed and clawed at him, which he deserved, and that seemed to settle him down a bit.  Otherwise, she was fine.  She voluntarily got up into Anna's lap a few times, which I wouldn't have thought she'd do.  By the time I took them home a few hours later, she made a beeline for her litter box, but I was relieved she didn't just pick a corner of a rug or something before that.  She has better manners than I expected.

I also spent several hours doing my laundry, which is never a cool chore, so by the time I got the cabin put back into order and my laundry put away and the dogs walked, I was really hot.  Weather.com said it was 90°, with a feels-like reading of 94°, so no wonder I was warm.  But I found after I sat for a while in the breeze from Nature + the fans that I'd cooled down to a temp that wasn't life-threatening.  Imagine running a fever in these conditions.  I'm so very thankful I'm still healthy.

I hope you all are staying safe.