The homeless life!

Well, while not official, it’s darned close. We have an offer on 178 Wentworth Drive, our Vegas home for more than 20 years, and we have accepted it. Escrow has been opened. Now we await inspections and appraisals. Soon the worries will be over – at least those worries.

We met Robin’s sister Barb in San Diego to visit our son Nick, and to spend some time on the beach. Barb brought Robin’s niece Mallory so we had a pretty full coach for a week. Kona cooperated a bit – he didn’t tend to wake up before about 5:30 AM, and even slept in till 6 a couple days. Despite the early Kona alarm clock, Barb and Mallory had a great time. And we spent as much time with Nick and Val as they could stand.

San Diego was unseasonably chilly in February, at least the weeks we were there, so not a lot of beach time was had. We did, however, manage to get Kona to the dog beach several times, so he got to savor the stinking sand that Niko used to live for. He didn’t have the cojones to dip a paw in the water, but he had a great time.

We managed to get together with the Woman’s brother Kevin and his entire family. Kevin and Teri have relocated back to the Santa Barbara area with their daughter Hannah, and both their sons Will and Jake are living in LA. We split the difference and met them for lunch in San Clemente (Nixon hangout) and had a great time catching up.

We are now in Arizona visiting friends and checking out some of the quiet National Monuments – the ones managed by the BLM. Today we drove through Ironwood Forest National Monument, established by Bush Jr. in 2000. I swear there are more saguaro cactus here than in the Monument’s neighbor to the South, Saguaro National Park!

There are no services at all in the 130,000 acres of wilderness. The road is borderline 4WD accessible only – no visitor center – no marked hiking trails. Just acres upon acres of spectacular desert scenery. We are quite glad we spent the day roaming around this gem.

We were pretty sure we maybe weren’t going to even find any proof that we were actually in the Monument – just dirt road and Saguaro. However, we finally found this “No Hunting” sign that confirmed we were where we wanted to be.

Then we found it! The sign! Every Monument we have been to has a sign like this at its various entrances. We suspect, however, that there may only be one of these here. A 25 mile loop that you can only navigate at speeds of maybe 10 MPH means slow going.

Talk to you soon!

Almost officially homeless!

Well, we still own our home we bought when we moved to Vegas in 1995. However, we are moved out, and for the last two evenings we have been sleeping in Colectiva. It feels comfortable sleeping in our bed on wheels where we have spent at least half the year for the last few. But it is weird to see our home with no furniture, no decorations, no nothing.

The echo in the cavernous structure is strange – it never echoed before. We expect to have it on the market in the next week or so. Very strange, but exciting at the same time.

We’re living at Oasis Las Vegas RV Resort, at least for now. Soon we expect to be back on the road again, heading to San Diego to warm up a bit.

Talk to you soon!

Next phase of life!

Well, we've pulled the trigger. We have been thinking about this possibility for many years, but we are finally moving to disconnect ourselves from a physical address, and only have one on wheels!

So, last night was literally the last night - the last one we slept in our home we have been sleeping for over 20 years in Las Vegas. Tonight we begin sleeping on a full time basis in Colectiva. As a result, our home of over 20 years looks a bit cavernous.

With luck, we will enjoy this next phase of life. Wish us luck!

Talk to you soon!

Yeah! No check to COX!

Well, no matter what I did I could not connect to the internet with my HP laptop. I don’t know why I even did this, but I turned off the wireless adapter on my HP laptop. I waited a couple minutes and turned it back on.

Bingo! It automatically connected to the bougiegrnk wireless router and we are in business! No check to Cox today!

Talk to you soon!

Next phase

We are in the process of initiating the next phase of our lives. We are planning to list our home for sale after the 1^st of the year and will be moving into Colectiva as our permanent home – at least for a while – to see how much we like it (or how little).

So, step one is to store everything we can’t fit into Colectiva, but that we don’t want to part with. No furniture being stored, just memories. Here is our first 4 boxes of memories in the corner of our 10X10 foot unit. Hope it is big enough – we have an awful lot of memories!

I also learned what happens if you don’t pay your monthly rent. The round silver lock is the one that the unit renter puts on the unit to secure it. The red lock is the one that the owner of the rental facility puts on to prevent a delinquent renter from removing their stuff!

Talk to you soon!

I knew better!

I am back on Blogger now. Blogger didn’t work well on the Ipad, so when we were in Europe I used Wordpress. Wordpress at least worked acceptably on the Pad. But I won’t use it if I can get decent access to a laptop. Guess I am just a technological dinosaur!

Miraculously when we returned, I fired up the HP laptop and shazam! We were immediately connected to the good old Bougiegrnk wireless network – unbelievable we could be gone 6 months and our wireless network didn’t skip a beat!

So, in preparing the house for the market, I have been room by room getting it ready. The office was the room I attacked next, removing the desk and shelves and all other loose items. The room next door has a built in desk, so the office moved over there.

Seeming so simple, I ignored the nagging voice that told me not to do it as it would certainly result in disaster. I disconnected the wireless router and moved it next door. What was I thinking! Of course, when I hooked it back up, it’s deader than a doornail. I keep getting error messages that the IP address is incorrect, and of course, I have no idea how to fix that!

So, if you are reading this, it means that COX has been out and I soon will have paid for my bad judgment. I mean literally paid – I will have to write a big check. COX no longer does network maintenance unless you pay their people by the hour!

Oh, by the way. The Woman decided she needed a new dog – she misses Niko something awful. I suggested we maybe consider getting a different breed so we don’t constantly compare our new dog to Niko. Good news and bad news. Good – the Woman agreed. Bad – she has decided she needs a Cavachon – a mix of a Bichon (ala Niko) and a King Cavalier Spaniel. Holy crap are they expensive! He is named Kona in respect of Nick’s old buddy.

Here’s hoping to be back on the road again after the first of the year. Hope your holidays are great!

Talk to you soon!

Lombard

With the Woman on the Crown Princess I headed out to click on more off my bucket list.

On January 16,1942, TWA flight 3 crashed in

to 8,300 foot Double Up Peak trying to climb over Mount Potosi. All onboard were killed, includingCarole Lombard Gable and her mom. Unbelievably 75 years later debris from the wreckage still lies at the crash site.

The weather was glorious, breezy and cool. The elevation meant the wild flowers were still thick.

The changing colors and varieties kept me searching for more and more.

Because I no longer have the Jeep I couldn't get to the trailhead using the 4WD

roads. That ended up adding another 5 miles to the journey. But this hike had been on my bucket list for over 5 years, and the total experience was worth it.

After a nice picnic lunch overlooking the Strip, I called it a day.

Talk to you soon!