Harlingen, TX 08

What a busy and fun time we have had. We arrived in Harlingen on Wednesday and Wednesday evening, Mem and Larry and their friends Shirley and Dallas had cooked a great BBQ rib dinner. It was wonderful. We thoroughly enjoyed meeting Shirley and Dallas. They are the kind of people you meet once and think you've been friends forever. On Thursday, Mem, Larry, Shirley and Dallas showed us the town of Harlingen and where the Wal Mart is. It's very important to know where the Wal Mart is when you are camping! That evening we ate at one of their favorite Mexican food restaurants. On Friday, we all went over to Mexico for the day. (See pic 1 of Jim and I standing in front of the Welcome to Mexico sign). The Mexican border is about a 45 min drive from our campground. We parked the car on the US side and walked over a bridge to get to Mexico. It was amazing to see all the dental offices in town - there must have been 20 of them on one street. And every other store was a pharmacy where you could buy drugs without a prescription. It was wild. I priced a few of our medicines but we get them cheaper than they were selling because of our health insurance (it must be wonderful for people who don't have insurance). Meanwhile, we basically shopped til we dropped. We had a great lunch at a place called Garcia's and then us girls went back to shopping. Then we took a break and met the guys at a place called the Neon Moon. (See pic 2 above of us in the Neon Moon). They had a great band and Jim and I enjoyed a few dances and a Margarita. Actually Jim enjoyed several margaritas! We also met friends of our dear friends from Tulsa (Mason and Flo); their friends are Gerry and Kenny from Sands Spring, OK. As you can imagine, being friends of Mason's and Flo they were quality people. We really enjoyed meeting them. We made plans with them to get together for dinner later in the week. Pic 3 is of Bono chilling out and watching the outside TV. Saturday night we (Jim and I and Larry and Mem) met Gerry and Kenny for dinner. It turns out that our buddy Mason called Gerry and "instructed" her to take us out to dinner on his behalf. What a wonderful meal. We went to a place called the Roadhouse which is famous for their BBQ. There was so much food, Jim and I took the leftovers home and will probably get 3 more meals from it. They're not kidding when you hear everything's big in Texas. On Sunday we went to a huge Flea Market. Again, we seemed to shop til we dropped. After the Flea Market we decided to satisfy Jim's need for a WhataBurger. On Monday we took a ride over to S. Padre Island. The last pic 4 is of Dallas and Shirley, Jim and I and Mem at the beach in Padre Island. (Larry was taking the picture). We all took a tour the town and ate at a place called Dirty Al's. We also celebrated my birthday at the restaurant. The food was excellent. Everyone but Jim got the fried shrimp which were gigantic. Jim got a chicken sandwich and he claims he enjoyed his meal as much as the rest of us. I don't see how he could have. We all agreed we had never had such big shrimp before. On Tuesday we had a down day. I came down with a tremendous sinus cold. Jim went out and got me some Mucinex-D and I slept most of the day. We did manage to watch two movies though. I must have had quite a few drugs in me because that night I woke up to see this naked, hairy body with a led blue light shining the blue lights up on the cabinets in the front of the motorhome. At first I thought I just had a nightmare then the creature starting walking toward the bedroom. I was scared to death and could hardly breath and I shook Jim to tell him to do something when I discovered Jim wasn't in the bed and the naked hairy creature was Jim. I asked him what in the world was he doing. He said he had 14 control systems to checkout and he was just checking to see that everything was working. I could have killed him! Wednesday Jim and I had a cookout for 10 (Larry&Mem, Shirley&Dallas, Gerry&Kenny, Judy&Frank and Jim and I). We really had a good time. We played one of my favorite games, Left, Right, Center. (Pic 5) Because we had 10 people playing at $3/person each pot was worth $30. We played twice; Shirley won the first game and Jim won the second. We would have probably kept playing but American Idol came on so we tuned in to watch the show. Pic 6 is of Gerry and Kenny and Jim and I. Thursday, Mem, Shirley and I went shopping in the town of Harlingen and that evening we all went out for Mexican food again. Friday, Jim and I went to Mission,TX with Mem and Larry. We met up with Shirley and Dallas who were visiting friends in Mission and we went to another favorite BBQ called the LoneStar in Mission. Everyone got catfish except Jim and Larry who got the BBQ. Again it was a great meal. Afterwords, we all met back at Shirley and Dallas' RV and had pie for dessert. We leave tomorrow, (Sat) to go to Thibadeau, LA to do Habitat for Humanities work for two weeks. We've met so many nice people here we're kind of sad about leaving. The weather here has been great. Lots of sunshine and nice cool breezes. We really enjoyed our visit here. Until next time...........

San Antonio, TX 2008

We arrived in San Antonio on Sunday. We settled in to our Thousand Trails campground at Medina Lake and drove out to our friends, Lynn and Joe Nelson's. They used to live in Stafford and have relocated to San Antonio. They have a gorgeous home (over 4,000 sq ft) and just love it in San Antonio. We went out to a Tex Mex resturant and had a wonderful time. On Monday, we met with Jim's sister, Diana and her long time friend Weesa for lunch on the riverwalk. Diana is visiting from Denison, TX so it was great that we were able to catch up with her in San Antonio. We had a wonderful lunch at Sawgrass Steak House located right on the riverwalk. From there Diana and Weesa came back to the campground with us to see our new motorhome. While they were visiting, a bunch of deer came around the motorhome so Diana and I went out to feed the deer. It was great fun. They actually came up to us and ate out of our hands. The next day, Joe and Lynn came out to the motorhome for breakfast and to see our new motorhome. We had a great visit with them. Later, Jim and I were just going to take it easy before we headed out to Harlingen, TX but we decided to join Diana and Weesa for a movie and dinner in town. We went to see Fools Gold. It was a great movie - we all enjoyed it very much. Weesa is such a hot ticket. Diana and her husband Sherman have known Weesa and her late husband for 30 some years. Weesa's husband, Chief was actually Sherman's boss in the military. Weesa had us laughing so hard as she was telling us about Diana's grazing habits during the middle of the night. Diana loves candy and every night she would get up and found all of Weesa candy stash. I think by the time we met up with them on Tuesday, Weesa was just about out of candy and sweets. Jim had met Weesa and Chief years ago, but it was the first time I got to meet her. I had heard so much about her from Diana over the years and it was great to meet her. Whenever I see candy though I will think of poor Weesa and her disappearing candy stash!

San Antonio, TX Bound

We left Las Vegas on Friday, Feb 15th with a goal to make it to Tucson, AZ. However, we got stuck in traffic in Pheonix for 3 hours so we changed our plan and made it as far as Casa Grande, AZ. We had a wonderful trip in our new motorhome. It runs much quieter and smoother than our older one. We did however, find another issue. We hit driving rain in Pheonix and we discovered we had a small leak at the top of the windshield. I don't know what it is about us and windshields but we have had our share of problems with them. This isn't a big leak because when we are sitting still it doesn't leak; it was only during a driving rain storm and while we were driving. We passed through a really neat little western town called Wickenberg, AZ. It was very rustic western and we even saw a guy pull out onto the highway in his horse and buggy and while we sat in traffice he trotted about a mile down the road to the grocery store and was on his way back before we ever got near the grocery store. This guy sure looks like our friend Larry Halstead. Must be his twin. Anyway, I really envied him being able to run out to the grocery store with his horse. I later read a plaque about the town and found out it is the dude ranch capital in the U.S. I definitely want to come back to this little town in the future. We spent the night in a WalMart parking lot in Case Grande, AZ and both Jim and I slept great. I think we were so relieved as to how well our motorhome did. Saturday, we drove through AZ and New Mexico deserts. I did most of the driving today because Jim has a head cold. I even pulled into a Flying J and actually manuvered around in the parking lot around other cars and trucks. I have never done that before. This motorhome drives much better than our old one. I used to get so nervous whenever a tractor trailer passed us while I was driving because it felt like we were going to get swept off the road. This new motorhome doesn't rock and roll at all and you cannot even feel the air pressure from the passing trucks. I usually only drive about an hour at a time but today I drove four hours. Piece of cake! Anyway we drove as far as a town called Van Horn, TX. We drove through the desert for hours and all of a sudden here is this little town of 2 streets and it has an RV park but no Wal Mart. In fact, Jim looked on his Garmin and there isn't a Wal Mart for 200 miles. We are staying at the Eagles Nest RV Park and it is a really nice park with nice big pull-thrus so we didn't have to unhook the truck and we can just head right out in the morning. Speaking of Garmin, Jim now has two GPS systems to get us down the road. The one that came with the motorhome is an Alpine and if he messes with it while he is driving, the lady's voice tells him if you are driving the vehible and trying to access the Alpine system you need to pull over. I'm glad he's got another woman bitching at him for fooling with the system while he is trying to drive! Bono and Charlie have gotten quite comfortable in the new motorhome. But Bono keeps getting up about every 30 minutes to get patted by Jim as if to say "You still love me man?" Charlie's position is in my lap watching the road. We should get to San Antonio tomorrow (Sunday). Looking forward to seeing Jim's sister, Diana, who is visiting a friend and our friends from Fredericksburg (the Nelsons) who have relocated to San Antonio. Until next time.......

Las Vegas 08 Week 4 Pictures

This is Jim's new "friend" Chris or Senuous Chrissy. Can you believe Jim didn't notice anything different about him?













This is our new motorhome! Or should I say Bono's and Charlie's new doghouse?

Las Vegas 08 Week 4

Well we've had another great week. A lot has happened. We traded our Motorhome in on a new one for one thing. We got an 07 Winnebago Vectra. It is wonderful. I'm having trouble loading pictures on the blog so as soon as I can get the pictures loaded I will. Also, we went to a production at the Aruba that David put together. It was so much fun. It was like a talent show and had all kinds of acts. David was introducing us to some of the performers as they came in the club that night. One of the performers was a drag Queen named Chris. I'm going to try to tell this story but I know I won't give it justice. David introduced us to Chris who was about 7 ft tall with red sequined eye shadow, huge fake lashes, a long blond wig, red lipstick and 5 inch leoprod heels, and a long trench coat. Jim shakes hands with him and just starts talking away to him and even said my you're a tall boy! Well after Chris walked away I couldn't stop laughing and Jim said he sure was tall. And I said I was surprised you were so friendly to him with him being a drag queen and all. Jim goes no way. I said you mean you didn't know? and he honestly didn't know. I said what did you think about the eye shadow and red lipstick and high heels? He said he never noticed any of that he only noticed he was tall. I couldn't believe it. I couldn'st stop laughing about it all night. Then when the guy came out on stage he was announced as sensous sissy and did a strip tease act down to a red bra and red sequined jock strap. I thought Jim was going to die. David and I were laughing so hard at Jim's reaction. You had to be there to understand. We spent the rest of the time going to my grand nephew's basketball game again and movies and dinner with David. After we bought the motorhome, we spent two days rounding up boxes and packing up. Our new one was ready for pickup on Tuesday. We had to go through the whole motorhome so they could show us how everything works. I should have brought a book with me, Jim asked about every knob and gadget and then explained it back to make sure he understood everything. I was dying while we were waiting because I wanted to start unloading. Jim finally finished asking questions about 3pm and we had two hours to unload our motorhome into the new one. We parked it door to door but it was still a lot of work. We managed to get it done in 1 hour and 50 minutes. Then we took it back to our campsight and started unloading boxes. We worked til 8 that night and stopped to watch American Idol and hit it again the next day. By the end of the 2nd day we pretty much had everything put away. I'll still change some things around in the closets but for the most part we are pretty much settled in. We stayed an extra two days just to make sure everything worked. We found some small stuff that needed fixing and the dealership sent over a guy who fixed our satellite on the spot, Jim fixed a couple of things himself and on Thursday we took it over to the shop and had some adjustment made. If Jim was awake while I'm writing this I'm sure he would fill you in on all the technical stuff, but its after 8pm and he is sound asleep. Valentine Day was our last day to see Dave so we went over the the Aruba for dinner with him. They added a resturant to the club and Valentine Day was its grand opening. We had a very nice dinner and the owner of the resturant came out to meet us since we were Dave's parents and all. We left Friday for San Antonio, Texas. Hope to be there by Sunday. I'll send pictures as soon as the blog program will let me. Until then..........

Las Vegas 08 Week 3

We ended another fun week in Vegas. Thursday was a work day around the RV. Jim did the outside maintenance and I cleaned the inside top to bottom and did the laundry. That evening, David joined us for dinner at the RV and we watched a movie. Friday night Jim and I went down to the Aruba where David works. Habitat for Humanities and an art group joined forces and put on a Marti Gras Party at the Aruba. What an event it was. I have never seen so many people at the Aruba. They had 3 bands set up in 3 different rooms and people were dressed in all kinds of colorful garb. Artists were set up in various areas throughout the club and were painting and displaying their art. It was really a fun night. Saturday we had a quiet night at the RV (resting up from our big night out on Friday haha). Sunday my cousin, Ricky, from San Diego, CA came in for Super Bowl. We joined him at his hotel, the South Point, which was putting on a big game party. I made my first bet on a super bowl game with my cousin's help. I bet a whopping big $10 on the New England Patriots and that they would win by 12 points. Rick bet $50 on the Giants and took a 12 point lead. I wanted to bet on the Giants but I felt since I came from New England, I should be loyal. Well as you could image, I should have followed my gut and bet on the Giants. That was really a great game though. We had so much fun watching it with the big crowd. After the game we went down to the casino and I played $10 in a nickel machine and won $10 so I got my losing New England Patriot bet back. Monday we introduced Ricky to our favorite little casino we found that has $2 blackjack. We all put out $20. Poor Jim he lost $10 and decided to leave the game. Rick and I continued playing and we both made money. I think Rick made $48 and I made $59. They also had 10 Cent Roulette so I put down a $10 and doubled my money. Then I went over to a Penny machine and put in a $5 and walked away with $30. So overall I had a good gambling day. That evening, we tried another Steak Resturant called Morton's. Man was it good. Jim immediately cut his dinner in half and put it in a doggie bag (he's trying to be the good dieter and all). Rick and I on the other hand tried our best to eat our entire dinner but we both gave in and called for doggie bags. The first pic above is Rick and I. We then went over to David's bar and spent the evening with him. The second pic is me, David and Rick. The 3rd pic is David behind his bar, and the 4rth pic is Jim having a ball at the bar or should I say nap at the bar! Last week he kept teasing with my Uncle Joe that they were wild and crazy guys. He doesn't look to wild and crazy here. Anyway, the Rick, David and Jim were so nice they watched Dance War with me so I wouldn't miss it. (I think they actually enjoyed it, even though they didn't say so. They were certainly voiceing their opinions on who did the best job!) I should mention, Jim didn't take his nap until after Dance War. Rick left to go home on Tuesday, David had to work, so Jim and I went back to our favorite little casino. Jim played blackjack for a couple of hours and managed to leave with his original $20 and two free drinks so he was pretty happy. I turned my $20 into $45 and I was pretty happy. Wednesday we went looking at RV's and found a couple that we could live with if the price was right (yeah right!) but we had fun looking. Tomorrow starts our last week in Vegas. Until next time.........