On the Road Again! 10-31

The first picture is out of our trailer window of the backyard before we left, and the others are between Fallon and Sparks of the cottonwoods along the way.

It has been a busy few days. On Thursday we pulled out of the Fallon driveway for the last time at noon. The new owners were already there…they were like, don’t let the gate hit you in the ass on the way out…jeez. It was sunny and no wind. We stopped in Fernley at the Black Bear Restaurant for lunch/dinner. It was such a relief to be done with the house after the headaches we had while it was a rental. We love the house, just not where it is located. I think it’ll take some time before we really feel free of it!

We left Fernley at 2 p.m. and headed for Oregon. It kept getting warmer the further north we went…unusual…Fallon had been so very, very cold. We stopped for the night along highway 89 west of Bartle. We backed into a little “road” in the forest and had a very peaceful night “boon-docking”. Larry had replaced our trailer batteries before we hit the road so we had plenty of “juice” for the furnace over night…it was warmer than the nights most recently in Fallon so it didn’t go on that much.

Yesterday after getting ourselves ready for the day we hit the road around 8:40. The truck was making a funny noise every once in awhile and we couldn’t really pin point where it was coming from. We fueled up in Weed and soon after as we were heading north on I-5 we heard a dispatch go out on the scanner about a head on collision north of us on the Klamath River bridge right at the rest area. A wrong way driver hit someone and both north bound lanes were blocked…we anticipated being stuck for hours, but because the emergency personnel hadn’t arrived on scene yet and there was an exit right before hitting the bridge that trucks were starting to dive off on we followed along. Sadly both vehicles…what we could see from the distance looked pretty badly totaled…two pick-ups. We were able to go down under the bridge past the rest area and back up onto the highway. As we hit our brakes heading down the off ramp there was this huge noise from the rear of our truck…sounded like the rear end or transmission was falling off as the weight of the trailer shifted on the bed of the truck. We stopped alongside the river and Larry looked all under the truck, but couldn’t see anything glaringly wrong or loose, so, on we went.

We heard on the scanner that one victim was 11-44, which is deceased and another was real bad and they were wanting a helicopter, but because the surrounding areas (not there at the accident site) were fogged in they couldn’t fly….I told Larry I bet that poor person wasn’t going to make it because they wouldn’t survive the long drive to the nearest trauma center…it was a long way back to Redding. Sadly I was right…we read an article online this morning and the elderly male who was the wrong way driver was dead on scene and so was the 34 year old woman driving the other truck…her passenger was expected to survive, a man…they had camping and fishing gear and were from Washington state.

We’ve seen a lot of accidents over the years, but this one was disturbing…timing and all…that grace of God thing. Our first week out Full-timing in ’04 I encountered a wrong way driver on I-5, after dark, but I had plenty of room to get over…scary. Your brain just can’t believe what it is seeing because it is so wrong.

So anyway on up the road we went yesterday and we saw two other accident sites…one was a freight trailer that had been on fire and was a melted mass…the truck was already gone from the scene (this accident was before the head on and was what had prompted the scanner getting turned on) and further on up there was a minivan that had burned really bad. We also hit really thick fog going over the Siskiyou pass and people were going way too fast for the conditions. People take their lives sooo for granted and while rushing through theirs they jeopardize the lives of others.

Our truck made that noise again and lost power and the brake warning lights came on and then the engine light came on and the speedometer needle was bouncing all over the place…it was a “what the hell” moment. Larry never panics and tries to understand what is going on…was it an electrical or sensor problem. I think we were around Medford somewhere…we pulled off again, Larry checked everything over. We didn’t really want to get towed and stuck there, so we decided to see if we could keep going. We had lost our higher gears so we couldn’t go much above 50mph, and if we didn’t strain things too much the noise wouldn’t start up. I’ll spare you the rest of the slow details, but we pushed onto Albany…it just took us a lot longer at the speed we were going, but we got there. Being Friday afternoon we can’t get the truck looked at until Monday. Larry is concerned that it won’t make the same noises without the trailer weight on the back…we’ll see. It is definitely more than just sensors, but we’ll find out on Monday.

We arrived here in Albany at our usual place around 4:30. We got all set up and then Larry decided he wanted to see how the truck would run without the load, so we took it over to Michelle’s…she is about 3 miles from us and now the truck wouldn’t get out of the really low gears…we couldn’t even get up to 45 mph now.

Michelle and Darel moved into this new place in July so we hadn’t seen it yet…very nice and spacious. Seth was happy to see us as always and was bouncing off of the walls…we got blamed for the hyper behavior….whatever….laugh.

It rained early this morning around 2 a.m. and was in the 50’s over night…there was some sunshine peeking through this morning so we took our walk. The sky was getting really black by the time we got back. I baked some cookies and did a load of laundry and of course when it was time to bring the laundry back from drying the sky opened up and it poured for about 10 minutes…I waited. It looks like Oregon might be back in its usual wet weather pattern…very damp and humid compared to the high desert of the Great Basin, but we usually don’t stay long enough to get moldy!

Michelle and Seth came over to see us…Seth spent the afternoon with us, playing with Grandpa on the floor with those magnet things, building stuff and he played with me on the computer with the Fish game cleaning tanks and rearranging my fish tank “décor”. He is a very busy boy…always moving.

We plan on staying here through next weekend…unless they still have our truck……

Bye Bye Fallon!!!!

House has closed, last errands being done and we will be on the road again!!!! Don't know how far we'll get today.

Empty House 10-27

Every day since I last blogged we had packed and cleaned and moved something. We finished yesterday and the house is empty and clean. We are now living in the trailer again in the backyard and waiting for the closing. It has of course turned COLD and windy which isn’t our favorite weather when living in the trailer, but tis the season. Tomorrow we do the walk thru with the buyers.

Our storage was big enough for all of our stuff and hopefully will fit in one big truck when we move into our future home…wherever that may be.

We won’t know where we are going from here until the day we pull out, but it will definitely be one of the girls’ places.

Almost Done 10-20

Boy this month is going by way faster than I had anticipated and I knew it would go fast! We are in a holding pattern now. We have packed and moved most everything into storage and what we need into the trailer. We are just figuring out the last minute logistics. We haven’t packed the cookware and silverware yet because we are still using it. We have the truck reserved for Monday to move the big furniture and appliances to storage, so before that we have to get the refrigerator’s contents moved to the trailer and get it cleaned and I need to get the last of the laundry done before those machines go to storage…so Sunday evening and Monday morning will be busy.

Tuesday it will be get the last of our stuff into the trailer day, if we hadn’t done it already and then I’ll do the last cleaning of the house…then we’ll live in the trailer until the closing. We would rather have our part done early rather than scramble and just toss stuff willy nilly on the last day.

When we hit the road, we will probably be heading over to Ukiah to await Connor’s debut into the world.

The weather here has been pretty nice…the couple of rainy days have actually been welcome…they cleaned off everything, wet down the dirt and made it smell so fresh. The cottonwoods around town are putting on their bright yellow show…against the bright blue sky…stunning!

SOLD! 10-13

Hello all! Today is wet, windy and cold; it has so far rained enough to actually wet the dirt.

Well most of you know that we have sold this house here in Fallon…finally. It took getting the yards done and all my stuff unpacked for it to happen. Well, partly…the other part was deciding that we don’t really want to be here, that I don’t want to settle somewhere I didn’t really choose and the concern that if we waited much longer the values would keep sliding down here and take 5 to 10 years to recover…so we decided we didn’t want to wait. No one likes losing money and I was afraid Larry would want to hang on for awhile longer, but he said one day that at some point you’ve got to quit throwing good money after bad.

So on the 19th of September we listed the house and in less than a week our buyer came through our house very impressed, made us a practically perfect offer and we are out of here by Halloween! Our termite inspection passed…of course and the appraisal came in correctly and now we are packing. We rented the storage this Sunday and have most of the house packed in boxes and over there already…these past few days feel like weeks we have gotten so much done.

During the packing we have also been loading the trailer with what we’ll need for living on wheels again, though we hope to find our new home soon so we are trying to not take as much stuff in the trailer being short-timers…we hope. If we can’t find what we want in New Mexico then we’ll just have to keep looking.

We are waiting on Connor’s appearance before heading south…he better not dawdle!!!

Today we wrapped up and packed all my pictures that were hanging in the house and stored in the garage. Felt like a bazillion, but probably about 25…I made a point of going through every room and pulling the stuff off the walls and stacking it in the bedroom where we were working so I wouldn’t forget any. We get them all packed and taped into their boxes and I go out to the front room to talk to my sister on the phone and while talking to her I am gazing at the wall and after a bit it penetrates my brain that I am staring at my lovely print of petunias …a FREAKING picture ON THE WALL in the main room and that I had to walk past every time to go down the hall to the bedroom we were working in!!!! Oh MY Goodness!!!! It isn’t little either…oh well…could be worse…we could have overlooked it and left it behind…..

About all we have left to pack are dishes and cookware. During the last week we’ll have to rent a truck or trailer to move all the big furniture and appliances….the drawback to having a short bed pickup with a tool box and a trailer hitch in the bed. Though Larry has gotten most everything already over to storage with the truck with the space it does have, just more trips.

I wish you could spoon up a cup of this killer butternut squash soup I made from scratch in the crock pot yesterday. It was the BEST ever! The hardest part about making this soup is cutting up the squash…you need like a chain saw or a hack saw to cut the thing…I just had my big strong Husband cut it up for me with my really big knife. Yum-Yum…oh yeah, the soup too…..Laugh!

Apparently I am a true desert rat now….with this wet rainy weather I could NOT get warm tonight…I have on sweats, thick socks, bootie slippers, a robe and a blanket on before I finally felt warm and the thermostat is set at 70….pathetic! We have also had some really good downpours...unusual for here.

Stunning Photo 10-9

I want to share one of the most stunning fire pictures I've seen in awhile. This was taken this past week at the Old Fort Ord near Monterey by someone in another airship. Larry was down there this week for the yearly prescribed burn they do down there. They start the fire and work at getting it hot fast so the smoke creates a strong column that goes up instead of smoldering and spreading out. This is just a beautiful picture.

That is a Hughes 500 for anyone that cares and hanging beneath the chopper from a ladder is the heli-torch that drops a special firey mixture to start the fire.

Projects 10-8

Larry is heading back from Marina today...he'll be back late tonight.

I have been busy cleaning out the pantry and my closet. I packed a pile of summer clothes in one of those nifty space bag cubes, threw some stuff away, put some stuff in a pile for the thrift shop and then loaded some into the trailer.

A couple weeks ago I finished the very large white baby blanket for Andrea's baby shower...Connor will be able to use it for a very long time...laugh. Then I made a smaller baby blanket and had enough yarn leftover to do another for Andrea's friend...these I edged in satin blanket binding rather than crochet an edge...they are knit and in spite of blocking, the ends want to roll and the binding helps stop that too.

I also completed two more candle holders and I am happy with the way they turned out.

The nights have gotten really cool here and it is time to turn off and drain the sprinkler system. The weather watchers are predicting another cold nasty storm to go through this region on Tuesday and Wednesday...we'll see.

So that is about it for me today....have a lovely weekend!

Hello 10-5

Just thought I would pop on here and say Hello and Good Morning.

Not much to tell, Larry left early this morning for the Monterey area for a prescribed burn...he'll be just a short time over there. I have been finishing up a bunch of various craft projects...photos to follow when I finish of course.

Lots of changes on the horizon....Andrea is doing well with her pregnancy and is still on target for around the 10th of November...Michelle and her family are kicking along and all is well in our world.

I may have to retire this blog...not much traveling going on...I'll be thinking on it.

Happy Autumn! 9-24

Ten days since I last checked in…I don’t know where the time is flying to!

Happy Autumn! It is my favorite time of the year, I love the feel in the air the most and the slant of the sun and of course the colors, but it is too early for those yet. Our sun sinks behind our horizon at 6:30 now.

We had a great visit with Lori. We went to Minden one day to Mike and Pats place; Don and Linda drug themselves out of the casinos to have dinner with us too and visit! It was good to see everyone, just sorry that Pat was feeling so poorly…her treatments for her back the day before were causing her a lot of pain.

The day after that Lori and I did some shopping and I gave her a massage and then she baked us some of her wonderful chocolate chip cookies. She left the next day for Cousin Mike’s…he took her to her very first ever hockey game and she had a blast and is now a fan! The next day was her high school reunion, which she said she enjoyed a lot and then on Sunday she was able to see Aunt Gretchen, Uncle Dan, Darcy and Debbie and Deb’s husband Eric….it was the first time in over 20 years that she has seen any of them…so that was nice. She has the itch and I suspect that in the next few years she might be back “home”.

Larry and I have been busy with projects. Today I finished painting these cylinders that were left here by our tenant. They are concrete, about a foot tall and really heavy….I was going to mosaic them but decided to just spray paint them and put inspiring words on them. I used oiled bronze for the base which looks black and then hand lettered the words on with acrylic paint and then Larry clear coated them for me. There are five of them and we have 5 juniper trees so we placed one in front of each tree…it looks cool.

The weather has been great still, the nights got a bit cool for a few days, but it is still getting in to the low 90’s most days and bright blue cloudless sunny skies…tee hee….that was for Lori…she is back in gray, gloomy Ohio!

My sister is visiting 9-14

Sorry again, been busy with my sister Lori who is visiting from Ohio. We've taken walks in the morning, eating, drinking, visiting, eating, visiting and she baked us a great apple pie this evening. The weather has been cooler which has made it really pleasant. Wow, two weeks gone from September already!

My man is back home 9-8

Sorry about that, I just realized that I forgot to check in on Monday the 6th and tell everyone that Larry got home safe and sound around 3 in the afternoon. He stopped in Pine Grove and suprised my cousins with a visit...we have never been to their new place there yet. After he got back on the road he was glad he had stopped because the road further up had been closed for quite awhile and he would have had to cool his heels on the highway.

Since he's been back he had just been getting stuff unloaded and working on stuff in the trailer. I've been doing a lot of nothing. It has heated up here again today and for the next few days and then back into the 80's...so they say and I hope "they" are right because that is where I like the temps to be.

So that's it, can't think of anything else new...Have a Great Weekend!

Stirring the Stuffing 9-6

I don’t know what comes over me sometimes, there will be something that needs doing and I wait until I don’t feel like doing anything to take care of it. I was feeling kinda weird today, probably because of my workout yesterday…tired, no gumption for any of my projects…so what do I keep looking at…the saggy back cushions on our sofa and love seat.

I remember the furniture tech telling us to unzip the backs, take a wooden spoon and stick it in there and stir it around in the fiber stuff to bring them back to life. I have been thinking I needed to do it for the past couple of weeks and so today that is what I ended up doing. I wrestled the bottom seat cushions off one at a time, unzipped, stirred and jabbed around in the seat backs, re-zipped and then muscled the seat bottom back in place. I did that five times and had it all back together when I decided I needed to rotate the bottom cushions…could I have thought of that in the beginning…NO, so I pulled off the seat bottoms, moved them all over one place and got them shoved back into place. I was hot and sweaty when I was done so I ended up on the back patio enjoying the cooling breeze and watching our flowers dance around.

Earlier in the day I had gone to Walmart to pick up some stuff, I dusted and then lazed around reading a good book. I talked to Larry awhile in the afternoon, (he is being released today and will be home tomorrow…woo hoo), answered a few emails, and there you have it ….another exciting day in the life of Val.

Gratitude 9-4-09

Let us rise up and be thankful,
For if we didn’t learn a lot today, at least we learned a little;
And if we didn’t learn a little, at least we didn’t get sick;
And if we got sick, at least we didn’t die;
So, let us ALL be thankful.
---The Buddha

This is the first time I have ever seen this quote and I LOVE it. It got me thinking…we have heard a lot lately about the power of Attitude and Gratitude, but we have all had days, weeks or years when we haven’t been able to get our heads around how to do it and those five lines teach us how to be thankful and grateful.

I learned from my Grandmother at an early age that everything happens for a reason, that good comes out of even the so called BAD stuff and it is up to us to get on with it. A lot of people like the saying “shit happens”, but it really should read “LIFE happens” ; because that is what it is; life. The one thing constant in this world and our lives is CHANGE….there is no stopping change.

Even in the most stagnate looking of homes…the same decorations, Mom/Dad still in the same chair etc., something has changed. There is change happening every day, we just may not see it. The sun fades the fabrics, dust collects, dust is removed and in that removal the things get moved and replaced, there is NO stopping Change. Even mountains and rocks change, just at a pace we may not see.

So as much as we may not want something to change…it is going to!!!

I am thankful today for the little book that I read this quote in today, “Learning to Dance in the Rain”.
I am thankful that I could see the words,
I am thankful for the glasses on my face,
I am thankful for my hands that could turn the pages,
I am thankful for the table I was sitting at under the roof that I was under,
I am thankful for the peaceful community that my roof is a part of,
I am thankful for the food I was eating while reading the little book,
I am thankful for the sunshine on my back and for the gentle breeze blowing through the door,
I am thankful for this computer and technology that lets me share my thoughts with others,
I am thankful for all my friends…known and unknown…,
I am thankful for my family,
I am thankful for my good health,
I am thankful that I awoke today…here, now,
Today is BEAUTIFUL!

Now it is your turn…

Valerie Moniz 9-4-09

Thirty-two Years! 9-3

Our thirty second anniversary of marriage is today! Larry sent me these gorgeous flowers...my man is special!
Larry is thinking he might be home in the next few days...
Enjoy the pics...we look like such babies....I had just turned 18 and Larry was 2 months shy of 20 and we had been going steady for three years....ahhh.....seems like only yesterday!

Larry's Dad, Edgar passed away in 1987 he was 49. My Mom, Adah passed away in 1990 the day after her 53rd birthday and my Dad, Tom (step-dad) passed away in 1996, he was 66.

Busy week 9-02

I guess I’ve been busy this past week….laugh…no blog post.

Larry is still outside of Yosemite and he doesn’t know how long he’ll be there of course, as they haven’t gotten a handle on the situation yet it will probably be another week or so. Though today nary a rotor turned from the base Larry is at…there is another one in the park, (base that is) so maybe he will be released sooner than expected….you just never know with this stuff and whatever happens…happens.

On Saturday I drove down to Minden to see my Corral Cousins, Mike & Pat…Stephanie was there with her two kids, Anthony and Mara. They were napping most of the afternoon after I got there, we all had a nice visit and then we had a wonderful dinner and then they kicked me out the door!!! Laugh…they’ll get what I mean.

I’ve just been puttering around here doing my usual stuff…chores, cooking, eating, reading, crocheting, computering and doing an art project here and there. I’ve gotten on Facebook so sometimes I get stuck on the computer longer than I had planned…it is kind of addicting. I’m on the phone to Larry for quite awhile every day getting caught up and that is about it.

It has been in the low 90’s every day, some days with clouds, some not and the nights get down into the 50’s…very nice. People expect because it is high desert over here to be scorching hot, but it is way hotter in California’s valleys and foothills than here…thank goodness. I have adapted to the 90’s, but I’m not out in it much…at least I don’t feel like melting into a puddle as soon as I walk out the door and it is really dry here which makes the heat easier to take. Larry loves the heat…I like it in the medium range.

Andrea tripped in a hole in someone’s lawn yesterday and fell…baby is fine, but she tore a ligament in her ankle and gets to wear one of those large, black Darth Vader looking booties for 4 weeks. I can’t imagine it…their bathrooms are upstairs…bad enough for Will after he hurt his knee and had surgery, but he isn’t preggers…I’d be investing in a porta potty for the garage…laugh!!!
These pictures were taken at Pat and Mike's...the first picture is "Oma" reading to her grandchildren, Anthony and Mara....the second is Stephanie setting up the food and the last two are cute...Mara was having a high old time eating the whipped topping off of her jello, until Papa cut up her jello thinking he was helping her...she was not happy about the change in her jello....funny for us, devastating for her...she got over it pretty quickly though!

Happy 29th Birthday Andrea!

What a cutie!

Stuff 8-28

Time is flying by….almost September already…obvious to some….a surprise to others of us.

This week we just got caught up after a week with our grandson Seth. I cleaned the house, Larry emptied the pool then it found a new home across the street with the neighbor kids, he cleaned and detailed the truck to rid it of all the dirt we picked up on the road to the mountain top, I ran errands and then yesterday afternoon Larry got the call to hit the road.

While he was waiting for confirmation he loaded up the camper and trailer, I beautified him with a haircut and he was on down the road to the Yosemite area. A controlled burn got away…again. I don’t get these controlled burns during peak fire season and conditions…I’m starting to think they do it on purpose…just a thought.

I’ve started a crochet project now that the days are shorter, the evenings are longer and it cools off a little earlier. I also tiled two steel crosses today using thinset mortar for the first time…easier than I thought…I just have to work on my timing with how it sets up but they are going to be pretty. After a couple days of curing I’ll grout them.

Today was hot, hazy with clouds and windy in the evening. I wanted to do some spray painting but it was too windy and hot to be out there…darn.

This picture was from a few nights ago…the moon looked so pretty there in the pastel colors left behind by the sun.

Long Day 8-23

Yesterday was a looonng day. We were up just after 6, got Seth up at 6:30 and hit the road at 7.

It was hard waking up…some fools had their music cranked up at 3 in the morning and it was 45 minutes or so before it got turned down to a easier to ignore irritation.

We got to Weed about 12:30. We made a couple of stops along the way and in spite of continually getting behind the same slow motor home it was a pretty easy trip. Seth was happy to see his Mom, we transferred all his stuff to her car and then had lunch at McDonalds….their new Angus burgers are pretty good. We said our good-byes; Seth kept hanging onto my arm…sweet boy and hit the road.

It was pretty warm; we saw 107 around Redding somewhere. We went home a different way today, down I-5 to Red Bluff and then up highway 36, a road we have been on many, many times. Lake Shasta’s water level is very low and I got a couple pictures at Bridge Bay while we zoomed by.

We were going home this way so Larry could go up to Turner Mountain to retrieve some of his equipment. From Mineral it is a 15 mile drive along a dirt road and the last half mile is uphill, rocky and needs 4-wheel drive; the site hasn’t had any road maintenance at all in the 5 or 6 years since we were up the last time and nature has taken over…the Manzanita and other shrubbery had grown immense and encroached heavily on the road….it was a tight squeeze for our truck, which we really didn’t want all scratched up.

It is almost always windy on the mountain tops and yesterday was no exception. The views are awesome but the view of the valley was hazy from smoke, Shasta was a ghostly shape off in the distance, but I was able to get a few decent shots of Mount Lassen and the southern part of the National Park.

After Larry got his stuff all loaded up in the truck it was time to bounce back down the mountain. We stopped at the snowmobile park at the top of Morgan Summit to use the restroom and noticed how all the Sugar Pine trees were loaded with their very large green, sappy almost foot long cones. We had never seen so many of the trees so full of pinecones…you never want to be under one when it drops one of those cones!

It was after 7 p.m. when we hit Chester, Ca, where we used to live…we decided to stop at the Knotbumper for some dinner. It annoys some people, but the one thing you can rely on NOT to change is the menu of the Knotbumper, which for us was nice because we knew what we would be getting and it was good as always. Steve the owner was there and sat with us while we ate and caught us up on all the business happenings of the area.

It was almost 8 when we hit the road again; we got fuel in Susanville and hit 395 south for the last leg of a long day. It was pretty windy the rest of the way home. We got home at eleven and we had traveled about 650 miles…whew, but a nice day.

It was hot and stuffy in the house and still about 80 when we got home; it never got below 67 all night.

This morning though a low came through, it was cloudy, breezy and cold. It got down to 62 and stayed that way until around 2 when the sun finally was able to break through a bit and it heat up pretty quickly to around 80.

Larry worked on cleaning the inside of the truck and checking out his recovered equipment. I spent the day cleaning, sanitizing and de-fingerprinting everything. I ran to the store for chili fixings…it was that kind of day, made chili and cleaned, did laundry etc.

Hard to believe that it is the end of August and summer is drawing to an end already!