Stage 6 of drive to North Dakota

Kennebec KOA, Kennebec SD

Wednesday, 30 June 2021

I'd found online that Grand Island (NE) has a recycling drop-off place, so I stopped there on our way out of town - only to learn that they take hazardous waste only.  They told me the only way to recycle in Grand Island is to put it in my residential bin (and too bad that I don't reside there).  It's only been a week and a half since I last dumped my recycling, and I don't even save everything that could be recycled because of not wanting to use the amount of water I'd need to clean some containers - butter, for instance.  But I still had more stuff than I had room in my bathroom for, so I was really disappointed in Grand Island.

On my way out of town on US-34, I saw a sign saying it was the Henry Fonda Memorial Highway.  Turns out Grand Island was his childhood home, and he was so proud of that fact that he took steps to save the actual house at a local museum.

On US-281, I crossed the Platte River, which is as close to the town as I'd thought a few days ago when I was wondering about flooding.  And it's a big river, too.  Wikipedia says it's 310 miles long, so I expect I'll be seeing plenty of it when I spend my month in Nebraska.

All day I saw lots of Red-winged Blackbirds.  Lots of corn and harvested grain.  Lots of cows and calves; grazing land, vineyards, green rolling hills.  Agriculture quite clearly plays a strong role in the life and economy of this state.

I saw only one Trump flag today, this one just north of Greeley.

Those ghastly insect bites have finally stopped hurting on their own, though they come alive with a vengeance at the slightest touch.  It's incredible how many days they've been such an enormous nuisance.  And lest you think I'm exaggerating, here are 2 of the reasons I can't wear flip flops these days.

I didn't scratch these -
they swelled up like this on their own, 
as did many others.

We stopped for a break at the city park of the tiny town of Bartlett.  The area is cared for by the local garden club, and they've created a certified butterfly garden there.  Some seriously old trees at least 4' in diameter, lots of shade and nice cool grass.  The dogs and I loved it.

Back on the road I saw 2 deer up ahead crossing the road.  They both leapt a fence into a field, then turned around and jumped back over the fence and barely waited for me to pass before running back across the road again.

I've passed a surprising amount of bulrushes along the road, which may help explain all the Red-winged Blackbirds.

I was saddened to see the body of a very young fawn lying beside the road.  I imagine somewhere there's a distraught mother who's missing her baby.

I entered South Dakota at Gregory County, which includes the town of Gregory as well.  I'll expect to come back through here in August during my SD month.

I've heard several times in the last day or so that the governor of South Dakota has accepted funding from a private source (apparently a wealthy Tennessean) to pay the costs of sending the SD National Guard down to the Mexico border at the request of the Texas governor.  I am concerned, as apparently are many others, that this unprecedented decision looks like rich people can buy their own "well regulated militias," to quote the 2nd Amendment.  

But a bigger question I have, now that I've driven in South Dakota, is why didn't the governor ask that donor to provide all that money to upgrade SD's roads instead?  We had a very bumpy and uncomfortable ride beginning at the border and going for the rest of the day.  Reminds me of the contrast between the roads in West Virginia (not bad) and those in Ohio (terrible).

In South Dakota, I was still seeing rolling hills, but they were definitely different from those in Nebraska.  I'm not sure I can explain what the difference was, but it was clear.  Nebraska's were green, grassy and rounded; South Dakota's were more brown and not rounded but with odd peaks - though definitely hills and not mountains.  Odd.

I saw lots of calves today all during the drive.

As I was driving along, minding my own business, the "check engine" light started flashing.  Actually, it didn't say "check engine," it was just a little picture.  As soon as I could, I pulled over (narrow road, no shoulders, I had to wait for a wide spot where a road turned off) and sat and thought about it a bit.  I was pretty nervous about having anything flashing on my gauges, and when I figured out that little picture was probably supposed to be an engine, I continued to be really nervous.  And then it stopped.  Not just stopped flashing, it disappeared.  I was only very slightly reassured - just enough that I decided to try driving down the road and see what happened next.

It never came on again.  When I got to tonight's campground, of course I looked it up online and learned that it could indicate a wide range of problems, from the gas cap not being on right to major engine problems.  But Kennebec, population about 300, isn't exactly a metropolis, and I had a lot of rural South Dakota to drive through the next day.  Because the light never came back on again, I decided to compromise on checking my gas cap and planning to get the engine codes checked as soon as I get to Bismarck (area population about 130,000).  But it's very worrying.

The campground made a point of telling us campers that the "regional water authority has placed us under severe water restrictions."  I contributed my bit by not using their water at all, but instead sticking to what I have in my water tank.  The campground looked like it was in drought, too - mostly brown except for sturdy native plants.  But I was curious and looked up the latest drought map.   https://droughtmonitor.edu-Current-Map  What that showed me is that yes, South Dakota's got drought problems, but they're absolutely nothing in comparison with those in North Dakota.  I can foresee a very dry month there.

Stage 5 of drive to North Dakota

Grand Island KOA, Doniphan NE

Monday, 28 through Tuesday, 29 June 2021

I know I would usually have shown my driving routes on a map, but I don't have a map of Kansas with me, and my maps of Oklahoma and Texas have already been pretty thoroughly marked up from previous trips, so I decided not to bother.  Basically, I've been driving north northeast from Dallas/Mt. Pleasant.

I'm really noticing the difference in the lengths of the daylight hours as I travel north.  When I left Mt. Pleasant just after Summer Solstice, sunrise was at 6:11 AM and sunset was at 8:32 PM.  When I get to Bismarck a week and a half later, sunrise will be 5:53 AM and sunset at 9:40 PM.  Big difference.  And I gotta tell you I'm having a really hard time getting to sleep at night, given that I go to bed long before the sun even goes down, let alone when it actually gets dark.  Who knew being a morning person was so hazardous.

Before I could leave Wellington it started to rain, catching me and the dogs out for a walk.  As the day went on, the rain got much much heavier, causing me to slow way down for some of the drive.  There was also some thunder and lightning, which I hate to see when I'm driving a metal box.

When the rain let up enough for me to see the countryside, I realized that the view I was getting from the interstate was just what I'd originally expected Kansas to look like - flat with occasional areas of rolling hills, large fields of grain (already harvested) and corn, grazing lands, cows and horses and goats.  Very attractive, though boring after a while, but not the view I remember getting during my month of driving around on everything except interstates here in Kansas.

My route took me through the town of Concordia, which advertises The Orphan Train Museum.  I didn't visit it last October but did look it up to see what this train was.  There's a link to the Wikipedia page in my 8 October 2020 post, if you're interested.  What I hadn't seen when I was through there was an impressive brick mural.

The Whole Wall Mural in Concordia, KS

This mural is 15' high and 140' long and is the longest sculpted brick mural in the country.  The bricks are made from local clay, and the mural depicts the history of Cloud County, which Concordia is in.  It was made in 2008 and erected in 2009 to cover the exposed wall of a building bought by the Cloud County Historical Society.  The train shown in the mural, by the way, is the Orphan Train.  I don't know who the woman and child are in that statue in front because I didn't get out of the RV - I just happened on this as I was leaving town and stopped to take a quick photo.

I passed a sign outside of town saying I could turn right to go to Camp Concordia, a WWII POW camp.

A few feet on the Kansas side of the border with Nebraska I saw a Trump sign, which makes #2 for this trip.

The State of Nebraska bills itself as "Home of Arbor Day."

The town of Hebron, not far from the border, claims to be Nebraska's Porch Swing Capital.  Lots to look forward to when I get my month here.

York County, the 3rd county from the border, says it's "Livestock Friendly."  Because of the mental image I got of an area that lets cows and so forth roam free in the streets, I decided to look it up now and not wait for my month here.  Turns out Nebraska has a legislatively-authorized program to assist counties that promote the livestock industry.

I crossed I-80 and saw there were those red-and-white striped bars like at railroad crossings to block the highway entrance both east- and west-bound.  They weren't being used when I was there, but there was a sign saying, "Ramp closed when lights flashing."  I saw something like that in Virginia, maybe, and wherever that was I was told the road was sometimes closed due to flooding.  So my first thought was flooding, though I was a long way from the Missouri River, which is the major one in the area.  But the Platte River runs nearby and I know in the past there's been flooding in the state.  In fact, I looked it up and found that 2019 was a bad weather year with historic snowfall followed immediately by historic flooding.  At the peak, 3,300 miles of Nebraska's roads were closed due either to snowfall or to flooding.  Weird combination, isn't it?

Well, when I looked up I-80 specifically I found that just this past March the entire highway was closed from Grand Island (tonight's campground) to the Wyoming border, not because of Nebraska's weather as much as because of a blizzard in Wyoming.  That had caused all facilities in Wyoming to be filled, resulting in all facilities in western Nebraska being filled too.  So they closed the highway.  This shows me one of the disadvantages from myo growing up in central Texas - it was such a long distance to any of the borders, we never once thought about what happened in neighboring states as having much effect on our lives.  But in the rest of the US, states actually have to pay attention to their neighbors.  I think that would take some getting used to for me.

Speaking of emergencies, I can't quite remember where I saw this thing - I think it was in Oklahoma.  I must have seen one before but my memory couldn't recall it, so I looked it up.  My guess was that it was a tornado alarm, which is pretty much right.  It's actually a general emergency siren and speaker, according to the internet, but I'm guessing it's mainly used for tornadoes in this part of the country.  Once I'd seen this one, I saw more of them in other communities.  The internet says it's primarily useful in a small community - I guess because the signal can be heard within 3,000' (more or less, depending on size).  This thing can also broadcast voice communications, as well as warning noises.  So now I know.

I also now know that there are Mennonite museums in both northern Kansas and southern Nebraska.  I don't think I knew there were Mennonites here when I was in Kansas before, because my blog is only showing me posts from Illinois and Missouri and places that aren't Kansas.  Given that there are 2 museums, I'm guessing that the Mennonites settled broadly throughout this general area.

It was a long drive to this campground - Google said it'd be 4½ hours, and it actually took me about 6½ - so I was tired when we got here.  This seems to be a nice KOA - it has 2 dog parks because it's pretty big, but it also has a lot of dogs here so we had some trouble dodging them.  However, Dexter made a friend with one dog whose owner decided to take a chance on us.  His dog was 6 months old - a rescued Golden Retriever mix - and he and Dext had a great time chasing each other around the park.  

In the 2nd park, Dext found a hole with a critter in it.  It was fortunately 2 holes - 1 on the outside that was big enough for Dext to stick his snout into, and a 2nd one inside that that critter lived in.  And the critter must have been there because Dext looked like he was ready to dive in nose-first.  I worried the critter might have claws or teeth and would use them on Dext, which might then result in a vet bill at the least and serious health trouble at the most, so I dragged him away and made the dogs leave the park.  Life just isn't dull with these travel companions of mine.

I'm glad I built in 2 nights here, because I'm still not used to hard driving, and because I'm still dealing with those stupid bug bites.  I've been using Lanacane on them to help quell the pain and itching, but the can I have has an expiration date of 3/06 so it may not be totally effective.  When I tried to buy more, the store didn't have that but did have Dermoplast, which I thought was the same thing, though an ingredient comparison later showed me there are differences.  Still, it seems to help, though it never seems to dry which makes for a nuisance when I'm trying to go to bed.  What I'm looking for is relief that will get me past the pain/itching stage, because it's so incredibly seriously frustrating not to be able to scratch them.  And it doesn't help that 6 of the bites are either directly under or quite close to where my sandals hit my feet.  I have to wear shoes and socks to go for walks these days, when I usually live in flipflops.  I'll be so glad when this too has passed.

The campground backs up to a cornfield, and for most of a day it was being watered by one of those irrigation systems with the arms, like this.

And once again I had to convert this stupid thing from a .jfif file to a .jpg, even though the photo swore it was a .jpg photo when I clicked to download it.  My computer is converting it without giving me any choice and I have no idea why.  Of course, when I asked David for help, my computer didn't do it with him so he didn't have anything to figure out.  I was pretty sure it would start up again when I left, and sure enough, it has.

Anyway, the irrigation system we saw being used had the water coming out the top from that upper arm, plus there was a long-range sprayer on the end.  There was a breeze blowing when we were watching it, so we got misted and I hoped very much that it was just water they were spraying and not some kind of chemical.

I was here for 2 nights and the group of people staying here changed almost completely from one night to the next.  What I found interesting, though, is the number of Boston terriers.  Both nights that was the primary breed, I think.  When did they get so popular?

Boston terrier
(another .jfif conversion nuisance)

Stage 4 of drive to North Dakota

Wellington KOA, Wellington KS

Friday, 25 through Sunday, 27 June 2021

I heard on the radio that the new COVID delta variant has taken hold in this area: Missouri has the highest rate of new cases in the US, and Oklahoma's one-day 90% increase in the number of new cases puts it at #2.  North Dakota continues to have a low rate of new cases, but the delta variant has been found there, and less than half of adults are fully vaccinated.  Which means that I'll continue to be careful to wear my mask and gloves during this next month.

I'd intended to take the route from Lake Eufaula to Kansas that Google told me to, which was almost entirely on interstates.  But after that pleasant drive through rural country from Mt. Pleasant, I took a second look.  Since I didn't have internet access, that meant my trusty AAA map of Oklahoma.  And I found that US-177 runs parallel to I-35, and branches off of I-40 which was the first leg of today's route.  So I took US-177.  And I doubt if it added much more time to the drive, because Google assumes I'm driving at the posted speed limits - 75 mph for much of the distance.  I'm much happier going 65 mph on roads that are smaller but still usually good.  So that's what I did.

The farther north I traveled, the more I noticed cars and trucks covered in red dirt.  Oh, yeah, right - I'm in Oklahoma and this is where they've got red dirt.  Or, at least, they've got it in the western part.  I don't remember seeing it much in the eastern part.  And I'd forgotten that in Oklahoma, "the wind comes sweepin' down the plain."  It blew me around a lot on the road, and blew us around a lot when we stopped for breaks.  Still, it kept the bugs away and kept the sun from feeling too hot.  I wished I'd had a lot more of it while I was back in the state park.

At the town of Perkins (population about 2,800), I saw the first Trump flag I've seen on this trip.  Since that includes a lot of rural areas in east Texas and Oklahoma, I think that's interesting.  The water tower at Perkins informed me it was the home of Frank Eaton, aka Pistol Pete.  I realized I couldn't quite recall who this person was so I looked him up.  htt ps://en.wikipedia.org/Frank-Eaton  He sounds like he was genuinely good with a gun, and also genuinely good at spinning yarns about himself.  He may be best known these days as the basis for the mascot of Oklahoma State University. 

In the small town of Braman (pop. about 200), I saw a Biden flag - also the first on this trip.  I'm now officially interested in seeing whether there are any more 2020 election flags or signs along the road up ahead.

I've been seeing lots of corn growing today, and lots of grain being harvested.

I got to Wellington, KS, which claims to be the Wheat Capital of the World.  I stayed at the KOA here last October when I was spending my month in Kansas, and I remembered it as being a comfortable place, so I'll be here for 3 nights this trip while I do laundry and deal with the bug bites.

I've been enduring increasing misery as time has gone on - not only the itching and pain from the bites but also the frustration of not being able to touch them for fear of making things worse.  Finally, I looked up bug bites online and realize I could have been bitten by not just ticks, but also mosquitoes, chiggers, fleas, horseflies, and sand flies.  In fact, I'm certain I was bitten at least once by a horsefly, and of course I'm certain I was bitten a couple of times by ticks.  All the others are possible because of the varied environments I walked through, but I'm thinking most of them might have been chiggers.  

That's based on photos and descriptions I found in Prevention magazine online.  Some of the bites have subsided to red spots that aren't itching any more, but some of them have progressed to become pustules (a word I got from that online description).  I've been having a hard time getting any sleep these last few nights, because there's nothing to take my mind off the terrible itching and even a little pain.  Being in bed actually makes them worse in a way, partly because I don't have a movie or a book to distract me and partly because the covers rest on the bites, which irritates them and makes them itch again.  I haven't found any position that makes them tolerable.  All I can hope now is that they'll run their course very soon.

We've had a lot of rain while we've been here, and apparently we've had thunder, based on the dogs' reactions, though I haven't heard it.  I'm not complaining, though, because I much prefer this to that searing heat they're having in the western US.

The KOA has been completely full every night, including Sunday.  The staff told me they'd been incredibly busy all summer because so many people bought RVs during COVID and now that the weather's better and the virus is easing, they want to get out and camp.  Of course, that means a lot of these new owners have no idea what they're doing with the equipment and so forth.  (I remember it well, those first few months of utter ignorance.)  The staff said more campers has meant more people using their laundry facility, so they've had to empty the coin boxes much more often than before.  I found all this out when one of their washers wouldn't work because the coin box was completely filled.

There must be a lot of cottonwood trees here because I've seen a lot of the cotton in the air.  I'm not allergic to it, but I know some folks are.  In some places here at the campground the cotton is thick on the ground, looking a little like actual cotton.

Stage 3 of travel to North Dakota

Lake Eufaula State Park, Checotah OK

Tuesday, 22 through Thursday, 24 June 2021

I think I've forgotten to mention that mimosas and magnolias have been blooming all during my time in Texas, and are still blooming up here in Oklahoma.  It's really been nice to see them and smell them.

The non-toll route from Mt. Pleasant to this state park passes through a lot of rural area, which I was glad of.  The Dallas area is so extremely urban it's almost hard to remember that there's countryside out there.  So being out there was a nice change.  I saw cows, green fields, ponds, trees, lots of small towns.

The Johntown Baptist Church had a sign reading, "The world needs godly fathers."  At Bogata (pop. 1,153) I saw a sign advertising the Bogata rodeo this coming weekend.

All along the road I saw corn growing and fields of grain that had already been harvested.  That seemed odd to me, because it's only June, but then remembered that the growing season in Texas starts early.

The Unity Baptist Church at Hugo (OK) had a sign saying, "Don't gamble with your soul."  The sign was posted near a casino.  Hugo, you may remember, bills itself as Circus City USA.

I saw miles and miles of Black-eyed Susans.  I guess purple-flower season is done for the year.

Lake Eufaula State Park is where I spent a very pleasant night on my way south to Dallas in May, and I decided to stay there again on my way up to North Dakota.  That was pleasant again in many ways, but it also turned out to be a HUGE mistake.

Bugs.  Dozens of different species of flying insects.  Spiders.  And ticks.  Enormous numbers of ticks.  I finally called the park office and suggested they might at least warn people when they check in of the danger of ticks, because nobody said boo to me about them when I checked in.  She said they'd put out a lot of tick-repelling granules (or something), but she figured the massive amount of recent rain had washed them all away.  I told her I'd already gotten 10 ticks off me and another couple off my dog so, yeah, bad timing on that repellant.

But I'd underestimated.  I lost count but got at least a dozen off me and 3 off Dext.  And when you're traveling alone as I am, you find it hard to check some parts of your body to see if there are ticks there.  I had to check my clothes, too, because I found one in the waistband of my shorts.  And I kept on finding them as the day went on.  It made me afraid to leave the RV, not that being inside the RV was any longer a refuge.

I'm willing to admit that much of this misery was my own fault: I took the dogs for a walk down one of the trails in the park.  Since going there was a sudden idea, I wasn't dressed for it: I wore a tank top and shorts and flip flops.  At least I didn't have many items of clothing to examine afterwards, but I also didn't have any protection.  

The bit about the flying insects was also weird.  At first I figured they were just attracted to the light, like moths, because of the way they'd swarm around us and my flashlight and the RV's outside light when we'd go out for our early walks.  But then I realized they swarmed around us any time we were outside, unless there was a strong enough breeze to blow them away.  

It was especially frustrating (besides the ordinary irritation of having them swarm around us) because Gracie is sometimes reluctant to climb the steps into the RV, and she'll stand at the bottom waiting.  Apparently waiting for them to disappear so she doesn't have to climb them.  There are only 3 steps, and when she tries she can climb them no problem.  But here she was, standing at the bottom, standing, standing, while masses of bugs swarmed around us and flew inside while I waited, and Gracie would get more and more reluctant the longer she thought about it and finally try to back out of trying at all.  She never thinks these things through.  I mean, where is her alternative to go?  So then I'd change from vocally encouraging to vocally frustrated, which would scare her into thinking I was about to beat her (never mind that she's lived longer with me, the non-beater, than she ever lived with anyone else) and then she'd really shy away.  And it was all a mess.

I seemed to have my best luck with her when I'd insist on her getting into the RV first, and make Dexter wait.  I don't know what it is with the other way around that causes her problems, but there seems to be a difference.

The one nice thing I can say about all those bugs is that I saw a number of species of dragonfly types, which was nice.

And speaking of wildlife, I think the squirrels were having a competition to see which one could throw acorns on the top of our RV the hardest.  I guess it was acorns.  They sounded more like coconuts.  Really really hard and loud and scaring all of us.  And I, at least, never got used to it.

I couldn't get an internet signal, which I'd expected, and spent 2 full days sorting through a year's worth of receipts and checking them against my VISA bills.  I'm glad I did it and, as I always do, vowed to stay more on top of it in the future.  Maybe this time I actually will.

We never actually saw any deer, though I'm sure they were around and a couple of times Dexter acted like he smelled them (it was pitch dark so he couldn't see anything).  We didn't actually see any other critters besides the squirrels and bugs.  I heard a Pileated Woodpecker and saw a nuthatch and several Cardinals and Blue Jays and Mockingbirds and crows.  Mostly just dense mixed pine/deciduous-tree forest.  But overall it was quiet and pleasant.

Stage 2 of travel to North Dakota

Mount Pleasant KOA, Mt. Pleasant, TX

Friday, 18 through Monday, 21 June 2021

Before I forget, my blog company has been posting a notice to me that says, "Email subscription service discontinued in July 2021."  It says I should notify my readers.  I have absolutely no idea what that means, but in case any of you do know, consider this my notification.

Before I left Cedar Hill State Park, I was lucky enough to get a really close view of a Scissortail Flycatcher.  I'd never realized how rosy red they are under their wings.  This photo is off the internet (and you have no idea how much trouble I've been to to convert the .jfif version that insisted on downloading despite telling me it was a .jpg into the .jpg that is required by this blog program) and the bird I saw was actually much rosier than you see here.  I knew Scissortails have a pretty buffy color underneath but had never really seen this rosy shade.  It was a delight.

Scissortail flycatcher

And speaking of birds, I've been noticing the male Cardinals are much more red than they've been.  Their color is almost startling among all the green leaves, and I finally realized they've probably gotten new plumage for breeding season.  They're absolutely gorgeous now.

On the drive over I saw a semi with 2 signs on the back:

     Passing Side       Suicide

             ←                   → 

I don't remember seeing that before.

We've stayed at this KOA so often that, when I called to make the reservation and asked for the campsite I've used a couple times before, the woman said, "Are you the woman who has the 2 dogs who comes here now and then?"  So I guess we've made an impression.  At least it wasn't such a negative impression that they don't want us to stay here again.

I don't remember ever seeing it so green here before, and there's thick healthy grass in several places where I know it didn't used to be, like in the doggie playground.  This is the KOA with the enormous fenced play area that includes a sheltered leafy corner that Gracie especially loves.  I don't think she remembered it at first, but when I pointed it out to her, she settled right in just like she used to.

Speaking of Gracie, I'm seeing signs that her stroke left some damage.  I'd thought she was pretty much well, but she's having a bit of trouble negotiating stairs, which she has to do to get in and out of the RV.  She can do it, but she's not comfortable with it.  I really think what I'm seeing is that she has lost some or all of the vision in her right eye, which means she's got defective depth perception.  Now when she hesitates at the top of the 3 steps out of the RV, I've started patting the top step to show her where it is, and that seems to help.  Going up the stairs is a little easier but she's still awkward at it.

Not long after Gracie's stroke, David and I did a fair amount of online research into ramps, in case she continued to be as unsteady as she was in the beginning.  Unfortunately, all the many variations we found had a fatal flaw of one kind or another that would keep them from fitting into our lives.  Some were designed for smaller dogs than mine or were just plain flimsy.  Some had a lip on the side (good) but others didn't and I was afraid Gracie'd be likely to fall off without a definite edge.  Most didn't telescope down enough to fit behind the driver's seat, which is where it'd have to go, and one that did had several user comments saying it telescoped so fast they'd been injured beyond just a broken fingernail.  Almost all of them weighed more than 15 pounds (I regard a 20-pound box of kitty litter to be heavier than I prefer), and since I walk the dogs a minimum of 4 times a day - even up to 6 or 7 - portability is important.  Most had a walking surface described by users as sandpaper, which bothered some dogs and not others, and I was afraid Gracie would be one of those bothered.

She's just so fearful of such an incredible number of things in life, and it's reasonable to assume a ramp might be one of those.  I'd have to spend a lot of time and effort and massive amounts of patience teaching her to be comfortable on it, and unfortunately food is useless as a training tool for her.  Still, if I could have found a ramp I thought I could live with and she might be taught to use, I'd have bought it.  But as it was, I was seriously relieved when I saw how well she seemed to be recovering from the stroke.  

Now I see that her recovery was real but not complete, and I wish I'd been able to find a solution for her.  In the meantime, though, she and I are both adjusting to our new reality and I think we'll be okay.  It's just different.

We drove into town one day so I could go to the grocery store, and I stopped at 2 different parks I'd found on previous trips here.  One park has a pleasant paved walking trail and, luckily for us, we were the only dogs there that day, though there were several parties of humans using it.  That park has a fishing pond in the center, and I saw 4 medium-sized turtles on a rock in the sun and several tiny turtles on a branch in the sun.  That was nice.

And we went to a very small park right in town that we've often visited before - mostly when I wanted to walk the dogs but couldn't do it easily in the campground because of too many other dogs.  I hadn't realized it before, but this park has a splash pad, and a family with very young children was enjoying it.  That's how I learned that the water flow for the splash pad is activated by a switch - I saw one of the little girls push the button and, like magic, water started shooting up.  So that was nice too.

One evening here I had a little celebration to mark being back on the road again.  I started with some champagne - Pol Roger - I'd bought in Cedar Hill.  I've never tried that kind before but heard about it in a Dick Francis book and was curious.  It tastes really good.  I didn't have much of a feast - just some Parmesan I'd bought for something else and never used, an avocado Anna gave me when I left, some crackers and some strawberries (Richard Gere's character in Pretty Woman tells Julia Roberts's character that the strawberries bring out the flavor in the champagne, but I couldn't tell any difference in either the champagne or the strawberries).  But it wasn't the kind of supper I usually have and made it seem more of a celebration.

I think I've gotten the RV organized again.  I unpacked my summer clothes and packed up my winter clothes, figuring that even though I'm going to the northern US, it's still the middle of summer.  I expect July in North Dakota and August in South Dakota are likely to be quite warm.  It's taken me some time but I've finally gotten a handle on how to set the AC temp to make it comfortable overnight in here - one of the skills I'd forgotten while I wasn't living here.  As far as I can tell, I've gotten things back in their regular places once more, which means less work for me in figuring out where things are.

Speaking of muscle memory, I've discovered that I get more exercise in the RV than I thought I did, mostly because of needing to go up and down stairs all day long.  Stairs into the RV, 2 levels inside the RV, I have to use a stool to get into bed.  I've got some muscles that are a little sore at being used again after weeks of living in a level-with-the-ground house.  I can't expect to lose any weight over it, but I guess I do feel a little more physically fit.

Stage 1 of travel to North Dakota

Cedar Hill State Park, Cedar Hill, TX

Sunday, 13 through Thursday, 17 June 2021

Sunday morning

David and Anna go to brunch most Sunday mornings at the AllGood Cafe in the Deep Ellum section of Dallas.  They told me they started going there as a way to support struggling businesses during the pandemic and continued because enjoy it.  I've been hearing about these brunches for some time now and didn't want to leave town without going myself, which is why I chose Sunday afternoon as my departure time.

The night before, they took me to their one of their favorite pizza places - Industrial Pizza in Richardson.  It was busy and crowded and was a big adjustment for me to go to an enclosed public place like that and take my mask off.  The pizza was worth it, but I still had to keep reminding myself that Dr. Fauci said what we were doing (fully vaccinated, staying seated while unmasked) was safe.

So the next morning here we were in a similar situation, except the cafe was much larger and had a much larger crowd of people than the pizza place, making it yet another mental adjustment for me.  Again, the food was worth it, but I was surprised at how thoroughly I'd incorporated the safety lessons from the pandemic: avoid enclosed spaces, avoid crowds, maintain social distance, wear a mask.  It's clear I'm going to need a decompression period from the pandemic.

Except that I'm now worried about those variants that are circulating, particularly that delta version that is said to be extra virulent and extra communicable.  And I'm about to head to a part of the country that has largely ignored the health warnings during this past year.  So while I enjoyed these restaurant visits very much, I don't think I'll be repeating them much up north any time soon.

Moving back into the RV

When I moved out of the RV 5 weeks ago, I dumped most of the belongings for my critters and me into shopping bags.  And I pretty much kept them there ever since, never believing I'd be staying as long as I did and thinking I'd want to be ready to move back in as soon as the RV was ready.  So in many ways, the move wasn't hard.  Except that it turned out I'd taken an awful lot of stuff into D&A's house to avoid making the RV at risk for burglary - I wanted it to look as empty - or at least uninviting - as possible.  And that meant many multiple trips today by all 3 of us out to the RV with yet more bags and boxes.

It also meant that all those bags and boxes got stacked just about any place where they wouldn't slide around while we were traveling - all over the bathroom floor and my bed and lots more of the floor space.  The RV looked like I was planning to hold a yard sale and just hadn't put stuff out yet.

To the state park

You'd think as many times as I've stayed at this campground in the last couple of years that I'd know how to get there from D&A's house.  Apparently not.  Google told me the trip would take me just under an hour; it ended up taking me 2½ hours because I got lost several times.

My first stop was at a gas station, where I was completely unable to locate my stash of cash.  I drove back to D&A's, thinking that bag had somehow not gotten on board, but with Anna's help I eventually found it already in the RV.

The second stop was at the grocery store, because I felt moderately safe in buying perishables now that the frig was working.  But not too many because if Dodie could find a new one I'd have to keep everything in the old one cold while the new one was being installed.  That meant no ice cream, for instance, to avoid it melting all over everything else.  I decided on a few pieces of fried chicken and some cole slaw that could be eaten or jettisoned fairly easily.

Then I got on the road, which is when everything went wrong.  I kept taking wrong turns and having to make u-turns or just plain getting lost.  Once I stopped in a parking lot to try to get directions online, only to find that I didn't know where I'd put my hot spot.  I'd been using David's wifi signal at their house, so the hot spot had been stored for most of the 5 weeks.  I looked unsuccessfully in several bags and boxes, finally settling on the AAA map.  My mistake there was to ignore the map of Dallas I had and instead try to use the little inset map of Dallas on the state map.  Definitely not detailed enough, I found, when I made my 3rd u-turn and my 2nd wrong turn.  Instead of heading southwest, I ended up in Rockwall east of Dallas.

That resulted in yet another u-turn, but this time I got on a road that I knew would actually take me where I wanted to go.  And I went.  But all 4 of us had gotten out of practice for driving in the RV for several hours at a time.  We were all tired and hot and ready to stop somewhere.  By then, though, I was afraid to stop anywhere short of the campground in case I made the wrong turn again, so we all toughed it out.

And in the state park

I'd expected to find that getting to our campsite would be a relief, but it turned out to be the beginning of yet another problem.  I'd forgotten to bum ice off D&A and forgotten to make any of my own.  No ice.  And after that long hot frustrating drive, I wanted a drink.  A nice cold iced drink.

I took the dogs over to the boat ramp area so they could walk around and relieve themselves before we actually settled into our campsite.  That meant that, once I'd plugged in the power cord, I could go immediately in search of ice from a neighbor.  Unusually, they were all single women.  The first I tried was already eating supper (which I would have been doing on a normal day) but she said she didn't have any at all.  At the second trailer, I woke that poor person up from her nap; she offered ice water but I guess that meant refrigerated water because she too said she didn't have any ice.  The third not only had ice but had an extra bag that she offered me, saying she'd just figured she'd take it home and dump it on the lawn.  So I now had ice for multiple drinks and was hard put to express the depth of my gratitude.

Back at the RV, after fixing my drink I fed us all because we were definitely past our suppertime.  But then, instead of resting, I had to make a start on dealing with all those bags and boxes, just to find my toothbrush and clear off my bed so I could sleep.  I'd already had to locate and unpack the bags with the critters' supplies, and I just picked up from there and put away a bunch more stuff.  

What I found odd was that I couldn't remember where things went.  After living in this space for so long, I've figured out spaces for most of my stuff, and have routines worked out so I can find what I need without much thought or work.  Well, it turns out that 5 weeks was long enough for me to lose all that muscle memory, so to speak.  I'd aim to put something away and realize I couldn't remember where "away" was.  Weird.

Monday

Today I spent many more hours unpacking and stowing stuff.  I have no idea why it took so long.  Gradually I started remembering more about where things went, which was helpful.  I didn't find that hot spot until the bags I unpacked in the afternoon, but was very thankful when I did find it because the state park doesn't have a wifi system.

Cedar Hill State Park has enough of a problem with ants to warn campers about them.  They say some campsites have Argentine Ants, which is an invasive species.  Apparently, my site is one of them, because on Monday I saw a bunch of them.  I've been infested with ants a couple of times before and know it's excruciating trying to get rid of them and wanted to stop them before they invaded again, so I drove into Cedar Hill and bought the large-sized box of baking soda.  That's a trick I'd learned from a state park somewhere back a year or two during one of the invasions.  I sprinkled the baking soda liberally all along and covering the power cord lying on the ground, and then used toxic bug spray on the tires and wheel wells, then called it good.  I also have an okay-around-pets bug spray, and I used that inside the kitchen trash can.  I decided against hooking up my hose to the water outlet to limit my exposure to ant invasions, and the baking soda + bug spray apparently did the trick.  But I worried and kept a sharp eye out for them inside.

The really important thing I did was call Dodie about a new frig.  He had indeed located one, which he said was local so easy for them to get, and that it was still-in-the-box brand new.  He said it'd take 2 or 3 hours to install and he'd be glad to do it this Wednesday morning.  My regular frig was still working just fine, but I knew I'd waste too much energy worrying about it if I didn't replace it, so Wednesday it is.

Speaking of the frig, though I'd tried to limit the items in it to make the transfer to the new one easier, I'd acquired slices of several different kinds of pie.  Anna took us to a bakery called Piefalootin in Garland that occasionally makes a double cherry pie that she especially loves.  I too am an admirer of cherry pies, so David and I went with her.  We each ate a slice of pie while we were there - Anna had the cherry, and David had some other kind.  My choice was a chocolate cream pie that looked and tasted like the chocolate ice box pies I remember from my childhood.  Of course, I couldn't finish it, so half of it came with me in the RV, along with a slice of the double cherry and also a slice of Southern pecan which I couldn't resist.  But with the frig replacement actually scheduled for Wednesday, I decided not to wait too long to enjoy them.  I had the leftover chocolate pie for dessert tonight, and planned for the cherry pie to be breakfast tomorrow and then the pecan could be dessert tomorrow night.  So much to look forward to.

Tuesday

I'd intended to stay in the campground all day today but changed my mind when I tried to plan the logistics of running some errands.  I wanted to get more of those CBD wafers, so I'd have a supply that would last me for a while, figuring I might have trouble finding them in the Dakotas, for instance, but would undoubtedly have no trouble finding thunderstorms along the way when I'd want them for the dogs.  The only store I knew for sure had them was the one in Plano where I'd first gotten them.  And getting there would be at least an hour's drive.  Also, I've been wanting a copy of The Milagro Beanfield War (the DVD, not the book).  Half Price Books in Cedar Hill told me over the phone that the only store locally that had a copy was in Lewisville, even farther north than Plano.  I'd intended to go by both places tomorrow after the frig installation but realized that would likely shove me into DFW rush hour traffic, which I wanted to avoid.  So I decided to go today.

Got me and the critters and the RV ready to get on the road, and then discovered my battery was on its last legs.  I'd left my headlights on all night.  First time I've done that.  It took several serious cranks of the engine, during which I had time to envision calling AAA and wondering how I'd get them into the campground to help me out.  But finally the engine turned over, I breathed a major sigh of relief, and figured the battery would charge up during the 1-hour drive north.

Bought the last 3 bags on the shelf of the CBD wafers, cranked the engine again, and found basically no juice at all.  But here I had an advantage, because I was in the smack middle of an urban area with services all around, so I figured I wouldn't have trouble getting help.  And I didn't.  The AAA guy was at the RV in less than half an hour from my call, and in the meantime I'd turned on the generator so we could run the AC.  We've been having a serious heat wave, including serious air quality warnings and highest level ozone readings.  I didn't want the critters to have trouble breathing, even though my asthma was making itself known to me.

The AAA guy did some tests and said the battery was the original one and was completely dead; but the also-original alternator and starter were still a-okay.  So I now have a new battery to match the other new stuff on the interior.  Thank goodness I didn't have to deal with that while I was still in the state park.

From there I drove another half hour to Lewisville, got lost, got found again, and went to the Half Price Books, which was holding my DVD copy for me.  You know how sometimes a song or movie or quote will keep cropping up in your life - and that's what happened to me with The Milagro Beanfield War.  I hadn't thought of it in years, and maybe it first came to mind when I went over to Albuquerque for a few days last year to visit my friends Paula and Bruce (the movie was filmed in New Mexico).  But it's kept coming up, popping into my mind here and there, and I finally decided to buy it.  I know I'll want it anyway before I spend my month there.  But it's an old movie and was never a big hit so hasn't been easy for me to find.  It's the 2nd movie Robert Redford directed, following his masterpiece of Ordinary People.  I find Milagro truly a miracle in some ways, mostly for the way it makes me feel.  I'm glad to have found a copy.

And because of the delay in dealing with the battery, I was indeed mired in Dallas's rush hour traffic, on a blazing hot day, with no choice but to live through it.  Still, I got those 2 errands done that might have been hard to do otherwise, so that's good.

Wednesday

Install-the-new-refrigerator day.  

Another day of beautiful weather that was already showing signs of being a hot one.  For more than a week, this area has been posting temps well over normal, though none of them record-setting, which I guess is good.  And when the temp each day would come near 100° I'd tell myself that this is, after all, June in Texas, which made it easier to accept somehow.

Dodie had expected that most of the work could be done by one guy, but this one guy discovered early on that the RV cabin door was too small either to get the old frig out or to get the new one in.  The door opening is 22½" and the frig is 24¾" - and neither the opening nor the frig has - say - an expandable waistline.  The only option was to take out the window over the kitchen table.  Which is what they did.

where the window used to be

hoisting the new frig through the opening

the new frig from the side

the window reinstalled

The labor cost ended up being more that any of us had expected, but that wasn't anybody's fault and I didn't mind paying it.  The final bill was $3,500 for everything, which was a whole lot of money I hadn't expected to spend, but I now have a new refrigerator that I hope will last for the rest of my trip.

And in case you were wondering about the critters, I put Lily into her crate and put her on the bed, where she was pretty comfortable after her first round of vocal indignation.  She had 2 windows to look out of, which she did, and she could easily see what was going on in the cabin.  

The dogs weren't so well off - I put them both on leashes, put myself into the passenger's seat, and pulled the dogs up into the cab with me.  Okay at first, but as time went on, it was less so.  Gracie was lying in the driver's seat, which after a while was in direct sun.  Dexter was on the beds between the seats, but he got really hot there over time and finally insisted on lying on the floor near the cabin door.  Both workers said he didn't bother them, so I let him stay there and hoped it wouldn't be long before we could start an engine to get some AC again.

In all, it didn't take much longer than 2 hours - the extra labor cost came from them needing 2 guys for most of the time instead of only 1, but having both of them shortened the total time so it was worth it.

after a run to the grocery store - 
I just stuffed things inside without trying to organize them

This new frig claims to have more capacity than previous versions, but their bright ideas actually provided far less capacity than my old one.  Each shelf had a divider in it that limited the number of items I could put on it because of the size of the spaces it created.  And there are 2 lower drawers instead of 1 large one for vegies, so I could barely fit a head of romaine lettuce into the space in 1 of them.

In desperation, I figured out that the shelf dividers moved (the owner's manual said I could slide them to keep shelf items from moving around during transit, but I've never found that to be a problem), so I then figured out how to slide them out of the shelves altogether.  Which nearly doubled my shelf space.  Sadly, there's nothing I can do about the lower drawers except live with them.

When I took some time back in the campground to organize all of that, the frig looked much less crowded than in that photo.  I didn't bother taking a photo of the outside of it because it looks exactly like my old one.  Mainly because it actually is the outside of my old one: the doors are actually covered with the panels of my old one.  Turns out the fronts of those doors are wafer-thin sheets of plywood that slide into the door frame to make an attractive front for the industrial frame.  I watched them do it.

So that's the last of the fixing-the-RV chores.  I hope.

Thursday

I spent most of the day figuring out and writing down directions to all my stops between here and North Dakota on July 1st.  I'd made reservations at the various campgrounds already, so it was just a matter of figuring out how to get there.  I was a little surprised to find that each of these states - Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota to North Dakota - is about the same width.  I'm leaving tomorrow for a few days at one of my favorite KOAs in Mt. Pleasant.  From there, Google says it's 3½ hours to Lake Eufala State Park in OK; 3½ hours from there to the KOA in Wellington, KS; 4½ hours from there to the Grand Island KOA in NB; 4½ hours from there to the KOA in Kennebec, SD; and 4¼ hours from there to the Bismarck (ND) KOA.  Interesting, isn't it?  And of course, I have to add at least half again as much time to those estimates, which is why I'm making what looks like short hops.  Any drive that Google says will take 4 hours is one I have to assume will take me at least 6, especially if I'm on an interstate because I rarely go the speed limit.  And of course there are the rest stops that we all need every couple of hours.

I'm still trying to relearn my routines, which help me remember where things are supposed to go.  I don't know how the critters feel about being back in the RV, but they seem to be adjusting with no problem.  Oddly, for me it's been a bit of a rediscovery, remembering the life I'd gradually constructed and trying to adapt.  I'll never stop being grateful to my family for their generosity, but I'm glad to get back to my own life again.

getting stuff done - the next 3 weeks

David and Anna's house, Richardson

Sunday, 23 May through Saturday, 12 June 2021

RV repair

I took the RV in to Dodie on Monday the 24th, and 2 weeks later he called to tell me it was ready.  In that time they'd done an incredible amount of work, despite his concern that parts might not be available (because there's currently a shortage of parts in many fields - like air conditioning).

They found that the screws holding that door hinge had vibrated loose, which doubtless explains why it finally split.  And they replaced the hinge and tightened the screws, so now the door actually works like a door should.  

And speaking of doors, they installed a screen in the upper screen door that didn't have a Dexter-sized hole in it.  It's a little weird having an ordinary screen door that keeps out bugs.

They replaced the motor and the bent shaft on my awning and replaced the covers that are supposed to protect the hinges, so now I have an awning that actually rolls out and back in the way it's supposed to.

They found that the reason my heater didn't work, even with the new thermostat, is that air had gotten in the lines.  They bled the lines and say that it now works just fine.  I'm taking their word for it because it's way too hot to turn on the heater, even for a test.

The RV's state registration expired at the end of May, so while they had it, they took it to get the state inspection done.  The day I got it back, David took me over to a DMV office (he said I shouldn't bother taking the RV over there because I'd never find a parking place, and he was right).  In Austin, they have you take a number and sit down to wait, but here you just stand in line with people being only vaguely conscientious about social distancing.  But I had to get a current registration sticker before I dared drive the RV much.  So that's done.

I've been driving around with 2 big dings in the windshield ever since Amarillo (or someplace up there) and I decided to take this opportunity to get it replaced.  Maybe I didn't need to, but those cracks have been bothering me ever since they happened and I wanted to stop having that niggling worry all the time.

They checked the house batteries and found that they were nearly dead and replaced them.

I'd lost a hubcap while I was in Iowa or thereabouts and asked them to find a new one.  Dodie told me they had to order an entire set, but I decided to do it.  The first set came in the wrong size.  The second set came in damaged.  And by then it was time for me to pick the RV up, so I still have a hubcap missing.

More than a year ago, I stopped getting power to my TV or DVD player.  They both plug into the same outlet, so once when I was in town, David decided to plug them into an extension cord that I could then plug into a different outlet - the one by the kitchen sink.  And that's what I've been doing ever since.  Sometimes it's been a bit of a nuisance to run the cord from the upper cabinet where the DVD player lives down to the outlet between the sink and the door, and still keep it out of the way when I'm coming in and out.  And it takes up an outlet that sometimes I wish I had the use of.  Sometimes it's just seemed to be too much trouble and I don't use the machines even when I vaguely want to.  I asked Dodie to figure out what was wrong and fix it, and he reported that his guys hadn't found anything wrong.  They didn't know what my problem had been.  They thought maybe I'd been trying to use them while the engine was running, so they carefully explained to me why that wouldn't work.  But I know for certain that's not what I'd been doing, because I already knew it wouldn't work.  And it's certainly not what I'd done over and over and over when I'd tried to use the TV, with or without the DVD player.  So I still don't know why it didn't work, but now it does.

They did an engine tune-up and changed the spark plugs and wires and so forth.  That's the first one in all these years.  Neither Anna nor David has a very high opinion of Fords but, as I pointed out to them, my Ford engine is about the only thing that hasn't needed repair.  I get the oil changed about every 5,000 miles and I think a new air filter once.  And that's it.  So it deserves new parts and I hope that doesn't throw it for a loop.

An incredible amount of work, isn't it?  That tune-up was by far the most expensive part of it, because of the labor time involved.  My total bill was $3,500 and I feel like it was absolutely worth it.  To me, my door hinge is almost worth that much all by itself.

RV repair, part 2

David drove me over to pick the RV up, and on the way back to his house I noticed the radio wasn't working and that I didn't seem to have an odometer, both of which I regard as essential to life on the road.  One of the earliest lessons I learned in my RV ownership time is that there's a switch that has to be turned on to activate the radio and the back-up camera and some other stuff - though I have no idea why or what the point of having such a switch is.  I could see from the driver's seat that the switch wasn't turned on, so with difficulty I found a place where both David and I could pull off the road for me to turn on the switch.  Back off down the road with a now-functioning radio but still no odometer.  Found another place to pull in, went back to consult with David, and we decided to go right back to Dodie's place.

Back there, one of the clever guys who worked there very nicely pointed out to me that there was a wheel that provided more or less amounts of illumination to the dashboard gauges, and when he turned it to more illumination I could suddenly see my perfectly functioning odometer.  So I told Dodie the diagnosis was that I was a complete dope and I appreciated his patience with me.  Yes, I already knew about the wheel but had never changed its setting in all these years so had forgotten its existence.

In the meantime, while I was checking these various non-malfunctions, I noticed the refrigerator also wasn't working, and that it continued to not work even after I'd flipped on that special switch.  I knew I had propane but, when I double checked it, I found that in fact I didn't have any propane at all.  Two different gauges told me the tank was empty.  I realized later that, while the guy was bleeding the air out of my propane heater, and then restarting it, he likely used whatever propane I'd had left in the tank.  Anyway, I needed it so the refrigerator could work, and David and I went over to fill the tank, which didn't take as much as I'd expected.  Just under 8 gallons filled the tank that had been completely empty.  Good to know.

Once I had the RV back, I decided to spend a couple of hours cleaning it more thoroughly than I'm able to do when it's full of critters, their paraphernalia, and all my stuff.  That turned out to take several hours longer than I expected, especially when I found that the freezer had, of course, defrosted itself while it was turned off.  There was an inch of water in the bottom that I had to mop out.  Then I found that because the refrigerator had been turned off and closed up all this time, a fine crop of mold was growing in many places inside.  So I had to clean all that out too.  

Meanwhile the day was seriously heating up so I turned on the generator so I could run the AC, and once it was clean I tried cooling off the frig.  The freezer cooled off right away, but the frig stayed warm.  Even after it ran for hours, it didn't want to cool off.  So once again, I drove it back to Dodie's for help, and sat there for ages while one of his guys used a thermometer that has a separate sensor attached to measure the inside temp while keeping the door closed.  It didn't get below 65° inside in all that time.  So he suggested I keep it set on its coldest setting for 24 hours and then measure the temp again.  

The shop explained that the usual solution to my sort of problem is a new coil (or something, I can't remember), and with parts and labor it could cost a big chunk of the cost of a new frig and not have as long a warranty.  So I told them to start looking for a new refrigerator for me.  Before I bought my RV, I'd heard from many people that these RV refrigerators don't last very long, and mine had already lasted more than 3 years with constant use, instead of the intermittent use that's more expected.  I figured even if mine came back up to the proper temp after 24 hours and seemed to be functioning fine, it would be just a matter of time before it'd go out on me, and I didn't want that to happen in July in North Dakota, for instance.

We agreed they'd start looking, understanding that I was planning to leave town in a week, and that I'd check back in with them on Monday the 14th.

The next day, David used a similar thermometer he uses to check meat he's smoking or cooking, and it said the frig had cooled so well it was now close to being a freezer.  So we moved the setting from 5 down to 2 (I usually keep it at 1, but David and I decided 2 would be safer).  We figured we'd check it again the next day before loading it with food.

Critters

Dexter had his surgery and came home with 8 or 9 stitches across his back.  The vet had used wire for the stitches for some reason, but they didn't seem to bother Dext.  The vet advised me to put a shirt on Dext until the stitches were taken out, to keep him from worrying at them, so Anna sifted through her less-desired clothing and came up with a couple of tank tops.  They sagged so Dext nearly stepped on them and couldn't pee without messing the shirt, so Anna used a rubber band and some twist-ties to custom fit the shirt to the dog.  And that's what we did for 10 days while we waited for him to heal.  The stitches came out just fine, and both the vet and Anna suggested using Neosporin on that little place under his ear that was having a harder time healing.  I'd never used that before, but Anna told me it was good for a wide range of sore places, so I put it on that spot of Dext's before bed.

The vet said the lump I felt in his side wasn't actually a lump but instead the end of a floating rib that was sticking out now and then.  But the vet also found a lump I hadn't known about under Dext's left ear and took it out.  Just a little one that needed only 1 stitch.  Unfortunately, the Gentle Leader (collar) I won't take Dexter for a walk without hits him exactly where that place is, so it took a lot longer to heal than the place on his back.  I gave Dext pain pills for 5 days and antibiotics for 10 days, neither of which was a problem because I just put them in his food, and he'll eat anything.

When Gracie was recovering from her stroke, that vet gave me medicine for her, and getting those pills into her was a real problem.  Food is meaningless to her unless she's hungry - and not even then if it's something she doesn't like.  So even coating the pills in peanut butter - which she loves - wasn't good enough.  I had to stick the pills/peanut butter onto some inner mouth part, and thank goodness peanut butter sticks to things or I'd've never gotten them into her.

Gracie's vet had suggested getting her some CBD.  One day I was with Anna when she went to a health/vitamin store, and I asked about CBD products for pets.  And walked out with a bag of peanut butter/cranberry CBD wafers that cost $28 for a bag of 36.  A LOT of money, it seemed to me.  But Gracie loved them and would eat them even when she wasn't eating anything else.  And they seemed to help her relax at bedtime.

So after Dexter's surgery, I started giving them to him, too, at bedtime.  He loved them, and he slept well too.

We kept having intermittent rain/thunder/lightning most days, and I finally got the bright idea of giving both dogs a CBD wafer when we first heard it thunder.  And it seems to help.  With Gracie, I combine it with her Thundershirt.  These wafers tend to put them to sleep, which is much better than having Gracie try to dig a hole under my bed (Anna and David have hardwood floors so digging really isn't a good idea).

Gracie seems almost completely recovered from that stroke.  But I'm wondering if she lost some of her eyesight in one of her eyes.  When she's looking at something on the ground, she doesn't look at it straight on.  Instead, she tilts her head to the left and puts her face closer to the ground.  I don't know if that means her right eye isn't working right or if it means her left eye is weak and she's compensating.  Either way, it's not like it was before.  Otherwise, she's much better and is starting to want to play with Dext again.  Earlier, she was too unsteady on her legs to want to play.

Dermatologist

I've been vaguely worried about some rough spots on my face.  A dermatologist I went to before I left Austin 3 years ago told me that places like that that I'd had before were pre-cancerous and I should be sure to see a dermatologist once a year.  Well, I've been having a big enough problem seeing a regular doctor once a year to get my blood pressure meds re-upped and had no idea how to find a dermatologist.  But since I was going to be in one place for a while, I decided to give it a try.

I ended up going online and checking, as best I could, the dermatologists that were nearby.  And I found one that had plenty of positive comments online - comments that seemed to have been written by real people - and she seemed to be well-established here, so I called.  I couldn't get an appointment before Monday, June 7th, but I made the appointment, figuring I'd just cancel if it turned out I'd be leaving town sooner.  But I was still here by then so David took me to her office.

Dr. Koriakos seemed to be the only doctor in the office, and judging by the number of patients who were scheduled ahead of me, and the number who were waiting when I came out, she's got a thriving practice.  She reminded me of Dr. Shung, my primary care doctor in Austin, who seems to have boundless energy, be very knowledgeable, and is willing to take the time to listen to me and ask questions.  

She found a bunch of places on my arms and hands that I'd been ignoring that were the same types of places on my face, and she checked the rest of my upper body just in case.  Then she used liquid nitrogen (I think it was) on all these many places and gave me some written instructions for what to expect and how to care for them and also gave me some sample products to care for them, and then said to come back by in 6 months or so if I were back in the area.  She urged me to wear sunscreen, pointing out that the sun shines brightly in North Dakota too.  I was impressed with her.

Dog grooming

One of the things I'd wanted very much to do was get the dogs bathed, wash their beds and air them out.  I honestly can't remember when they last had a bath.  I had to wait 3 days after Dext's stitches came out, per the vet, and David drove me and both dogs over to the place they used when their dogs were still alive.  Strong scent of perfume in the air, so I emphasized that I wanted them to use unscented shampoo.  The guy looked at me and said, "So does that mean you don't want us to spray them with perfume before you pick them up?"  Yeah, that's what it means.  I really don't want to live in a very small enclosed space with 2 refugees from a French bordello.

Back at the house, I had to wait until the yardwork guys had finished their work (Thursday's their day) but we got all the beds outside to air and I washed the covers and the towels I dry them with and so forth.  Then back to pick up the dogs.

They remembered to keep Gracie scent-free, but Dext had a definite aura, which he clearly hated because he kept rubbing around on the grass afterwards.  I think, though, that they'd just started spraying his head with that perfume when they suddenly remembered and stopped, because it wasn't all over him and it wasn't seriously strong, just sort of.  But they'd gotten massive amounts of hair off Gracie, and it was nice to have the dogs feel clean to pat and smell clean again.  And those were the things I wanted to accomplish.

Travel plans

I spent days trying to figure out my upcoming travel itinerary and making campground reservations to fit.  I had 2 main hurdles to deal with: the holidays (4th of July & Labor Day) that always attract even more campground crowds than are usual, and the seriously rural nature of the states I'll be going to.  A not insignificant additional problem is that summer is when everybody wants to go camping, so campsites at state campgrounds are harder to come by and on weekends are almost nonexistent.

After taking a good look at my trusty AAA maps, I realized that North Dakota has only 2 real cities - Bismarck and Fargo.  Bismarck is in southcentral ND while Fargo is on the border with Minnesota.  Other than those 2 cities, there are only small towns scattered around the state so I can't expect to find easy access to private campgrounds.  Or to a wifi signal, for that matter.  And while there are a reasonable number of state campgrounds, ND is a large state so there's a lot of miles between them.  I finally made a reservation at the only KOA in the state - at Bismarck - for the entire long 4th of July weekend, and may end up staying a full week.  Then I've got 2 nights in state campgrounds, and it took me days to get those reservations because their computer program was having glitches and I couldn't get anybody to answer the telephone.  And my 2nd weekend is booked at a city campground in Fargo on the Missouri River.  From there on, I'll be heading into rural North Dakota.

August will be in South Dakota, which is far more popular than North Dakota because of attractions such as Mt. Rushmore.  August 1st, when I'll move into SD, is a Saturday so I was back to the problem of where to stay on a weekend.  I ended up cobbling together a full week spread among 3 different KOAs in that Mt. Rushmore area.  And given the popularity of SD and the time of year, I went ahead and made reservations at 3 different state parks and yet another KOA to get me through half the month.  From there I'll be traveling around rural South Dakota, ending up at a state park on the last night of the month.

September is Wyoming, another state with major tourist draws, such as Yellowstone National Park.  And also with a national holiday - Labor Day.  I'd intended to wait until the end of the month to try for campsites near Yellowstone, but checking around I found I could get a week's worth of reservations at 3 different KOAs, and then a night actually in Yellowstone National Park.  I found I had to stay in the park because all other campgrounds are too many miles away.  They aren't really, but to travel from any of them into the park to see the geysers, for example, and then to travel back to the campground - I'd spend an entire day driving instead of sightseeing.  Wyoming's not quite as rural as the Dakotas, but it's far far more mountainous.  There I'll be back into pieces of the Rocky Mountains, which will be a big adjustment after not seeing any mountains since last September in Colorado.

My current plan is to go from there to Utah in October, New Mexico in November, and Arizona in December.  That schedule likely means I'll have to miss some things I'd like to see because of probable snow or ice or even wildfires.  But as I've found, I can have plans derailed by bad weather in just about any state at just about any season (though not always be snow).  I still remember trying to dodge that tornado in Alabama last December.  So I'll just play it by ear and see how it goes.  Fortunately, I've seen the Grand Canyon twice, and while I'd love to see it again, I still carry a very clear memory of it, so not seeing it won't blight my life.

Relaxation

David and Anna left town for an overnight to spend time with some friends south of Waco, and I spent most of the time they were gone watching movies.  It's not like my usual schedule includes watching a movie every night, because I don't.  But when I do, I usually start it at around 4:00 so it'll be over around 6:00, and I can walk the dogs and be in bed by 7:00.

D&A have a somewhat different schedule, including usually eating much later than I do.  They modified that significantly while I was there, especially when they started noticing me getting crabby because I was hungry, but movies didn't figure into their usual plans.  And since Anna doesn't seem to enjoy them as much as I do, I didn't feel right about suggesting we do something she wouldn't much want to do.  Plus, if we started a movie after dinner, it'd be running so late I'd be falling asleep before it was done so I wouldn't enjoy it either.  

But with them gone, I took a day out of my travel itinerary planning and watched one after another after another.  In all, I went through 10 movies while they were gone.  I've never done that before and don't expect to do it again any time soon, but it was fun.  And I ordered a pizza for dinner, which was enough for lunch the next day too.  Except for walking the dogs now and then, I sure didn't burn up many calories.

And a few days after my 2-week post-vaccination period, when I was deemed to be fully protected, they had a friend over for dinner.  Completely weird being in an indoor space with a stranger and none of us wearing masks.  But they'd assured me their friend was as cautious about this virus as I was and had been fully vaccinated for quite a while so was as safe as anybody is these days.  Still, a strange experience after this past year of isolation.

Finally . . .

. . . this was a long period to spend ashore, so to speak, after being on the move for so long.  I spent the first couple of weeks being nearly exhausted just by walking from D&A's kitchen to the back bedroom that was David's office before I and my critters moved in.  Of course, much of that was likely due to that stomach virus I was dealing with, and the way it sapped energy out of my body.  But still, the RV is smaller than their family room, so it was a big adjustment in many ways.  The dogs never did quite figure out how to keep from sliding on the wood floors, though that didn't slow Dexter down much.  And while both dogs seemed to appreciate having more space to stretch out in, I think Lily was the happiest with the new situation.  She appropriated several areas in different rooms of the house as her own and insisted that any passing human needed to stop and turn on the bathroom water faucet for her to drink out of (which we mostly declined).

And for me, it was a big relief as one after another of the problems that had been niggling at me got resolved - the door that wouldn't stay closed, the growth on Dexter's back, the rips in the screen door with bug season beginning, the broken awning that would begin to mold if I couldn't get it fixed, the heater that didn't quite work, my COVID vaccination.  And I also had several problems solved that I didn't know I was going to have: Gracie's stroke and the malfunctioning refrigerator.

None of the 3 of us humans expected I'd end up staying so long - I think we all envisioned 2 weeks, maybe 3 at the most - so 5 weeks was verging on me feeling like I should start paying rent.  It was Robert Frost (I had to look it up) who said, "Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in."  And I can truthfully say that at no point did either Anna or David make me feel like they grudged the enormous amounts of time and energy they spent for me, and in fact made me feel like it was all just fine and dandy.  They showed an incredible level of generosity and I'm really grateful they're my family.