ENJOYING OUR 2ND THANKSGIVING

Us Canadian Winter Texans that leave home after our Canadian Thanksgiving get to have a second Thanksgiving with our friends here in Texas

It was a lovely day with great food and lots of good wishes all around. 

I'm so glad my medical situation allowed me to get down here in time for this.  Then it is time to put up my Christmas decorations.

THE TEXAS SEASON IS UNDERWAY

THE SUN IS SHINING AND WE ARE BAR-B-QUING

Today's only chore is to try to figure out how to set up our new phone system.  Most of my regular readers know how I HATE the learning curve. I can't say I was ever really fond of learning things that I, "had to" learn, even in my school years, but if it was interesting I would perk up.  I always liked to research things on my own and I took it at my own pace.  But now with new technology constantly changing, I feel like we have to be constantly running trying to keep up. 

Patio life in Texas has begun.  Sea-Enna is enjoying the outdoors and the long arduous journey is fading from her memory.  

Dan is BBQing some chicken and we are relaxing.  This is what we drove all this way for.   



TIME TO ENJOY



 

HOME SWEET TEXAS HOME

We have arrived.  We had a good morning drive down to the bottom of the state.  

We know we are almost there when we start to see the Palm Trees of southern Texas.  

Then just as we arrived it started to pour and it never really let up all day.  But we managed to get our TV, phone and Internet hooked up.  Then we went and picked up some basic groceries, that will take a week or so to find out all that I need.  But we are settling in.  

JUST GLAD THE JOURNEYS OVER.

WE HAVE MADE IT TO SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS

We have called it a day in San Antonio, for the reasons I explained in yesterday's blog.  Plus I will use any excuse at all, for an overnight in San Antonio.  I love this city and the River Walk.  

 We have made this same drive south every fall and back north every spring since the fall of 2008 and I have never been through Fort Worth to Austin that we have not been held up and slowed down with major construction going on.  Today was no exception.  What a nightmare!

 

I have now come to the conclusion, that they will never ever be finished.  

With the amount of construction projects they have going, by the time they get them finished, they will have to start all over again.   

We really MUST find another route.  Even if it's a little out of the way, anything has got to be better than this nightmare every spring and fall.  

 

I WILL DEFINITELY LOOK INTO THAT

 

WE HAVE DAY 2 UNDER OUR BELTS

This morning started out just as bad as yesterday.  Rain, Rain, Rain.  We were on the road by 7:00, and we finished off Iowa and Missouri in the rain.  

Then when we finally got onto the Kansas Turnpike, the sun broke through and we drove the rest of the day in the warm beautiful bright sunshine.  High today in Kansas was 60 degrees. 

I love the Kansas Turnpike.  It is a beautiful road, with beautiful scenery, and well worth the $10.00 it costs to drive it from the North-East corner to the South West Exit.  

We are settled in here in Oklahoma City and are only going as far as San Antonio tomorrow.  We could push on through to McAllen, but if we did we would arrive very late in the day and have all the unpacking and trailer set up to face.  So we are going to face all that after a short drive from San Antonio on Friday morning.  After we are all set up, un-packed and settled in, we will still have grocery shopping to do.  

LOOKING FORWARD TO OUR HOME SWEET TEXAS HOME.  

 

TEXAS HERE WE COME

We were up and at'em bright and early this morning.  We were on the road by 6:30. Foggy and rainy.   

We drove through rain the entire day.  We finally called it quits tonight at 6:00pm.  We will spend the night here in Council Bluffs Iowa and travel across Kansas and Oklahoma tomorrow.  

We are just searching for a weather forecast I want to see some sunshine, I am sick and tired of rain.  



DAY 1 DONE, ON TO DAY 2 

WELL I THINK WE ARE ALL READY TO ROLL

I just got the OK from my doctors so that we are clear to leave for Texas.  This weekend we took the car out to Jack and Susan's (where we leave it for the winter) 

The truck is all prepped and ready to go.  We are now in the process of packing it with all the stuff, that has been cluttering up the condo for a couple of weeks or so.  

 Hopefully we will get away nice and early tomorrow morning and try to make Sioux Falls SD or Sioux City IA or maybe even Council Bluffs IA.  That would be a good first day.  

 

Then day two we have the long drive diagonally across Kansas then through the state of Oklahoma, and hopefully make it into Texas.  How far into Texas depends on how far we made it on our first day. 

Then on the third day we will drive the rest of Texas and our arrival time will depend on traffic and our starting point that morning.  

WE'RE OFF!  

I WILL POST ALONG THE WAY.

WE ARE FINALLY GOING TO BE TRAVELLING AGAIN!

Seeing as how this blog is called "Travels with Linda and Dan"  it has been rather frustrating to be stuck waiting to get on the road.  

Finally, my medical testing is done.  I even have a letter to get across the border.  Apparently I am going to be radio active for a few days and they will stop me at the border if it's still in my system.  We are hoping to get the results ASAP as we would like to set our departure date for Monday or Tuesday November 16th or 17th. 

Almost everything has been packed up and ready to go for some time.  Now we just have a few last minute details to see to.  

The contents of my freezer will go in my cooler and we have to buy some dry ice to go over it.  Then I have to empty all perishable and salvageable  stuff from the fridge and put it all into the Kool-atron. 



READY TO ROLL!


 

MY TESTING IS UNDERWAY

Well the first days testing is over and that wasn't so bad after all! I was rather nervous and tense the first day, not knowing what to expect.  From where to park, to what are they doing to me now?  

 

The second day will be much easier and will be much more routine.  The only thing to worry about now is "What will the results be?"  and "What do the results tell them and how soon can I get those results?"  



ALL QUESTIONS THAT ARE UP IN THE AIR

 

LEST WE FORGET

 

Rememberance Day has always been rather sacred to me, but after doing a lot of Ancestry research I have even more reason to keep this day.  

  WWI     James Goodwin

              Gladstone Ewart Baker

WWII    Herbert Baker

              William Baker

              James Baker

              Harold Whittaker

              John (Jackie) Whittaker ...killed in action

              Elmer McLay

            

  

STILL MORE BOAT PROJECTS

Well, seeing as how we are stuck here waiting for medical procedures. we might as well keep busy.  During our spring work on the boat, we realized our mast on Thunderbird had some serious rot problems.  So, we dismantled it to assess the situation.  

It's obvious that the mast is purely decorative.  As we have been without it this whole summer and never really missed it.  The only function it serves is to carry our top white all around light, and our forward facing white light, that is only used for night running and anchoring out, which we never do.  It also has a spar and was originally intended with a manual pulley system to lift a dinghy onto the roof of the boat.  But we have never used it for that either.  We just never trusted it's strength.  Once completed and re-assembled perhaps we will be able to use it for that purpose. 

There was no rot on the spar, so that will simply be re-attached.  We have a new 4X4 post that is now being shaped to replace the original.  Thanks to our son Ken's wood working skills.  We are also adding some length back onto the mast as we are aware that it has been cut down a couple of times. (due to said rot)  It has been suggested by some that we save ourselves some work and do away with the mast and spar.  But real Trawlers were working boats, and conversions,  and I like the utilitarian look of this equipment. 

SO THAT IS THE PROJECT WE ARE WORKING ON NOW, TO KILL TIME.  

MORE ON COMPUTERS

I am sure glad I am fortunate enough to own two computers.  I have updated my desktop computer to Windows 10, but left my laptop running with Windows 8.1. 

There is a REAL problem, with how this new Windows 10 handles or should I say "Does not handle" photos.  All of the photos I have taken since the change in programs are useless to me.  They are almost impossible to find, and when you do find them you can not do anything with them.  It won't let me edit them, move them, use them in my blog,   Nothing. 

On the Windows help site there are pages after pages of everyone complaining about this since the launch on July 29th, but so far no fix has been forthcoming.  So, I will not be updating my laptop to Windows 10 until this problem is resolved. I will clean up my good old laptop as best I can and get it ready to use in Texas.  I will leave my Desktop computer on Windows 10 and wait and see if they have found a fix by the time we get home in the spring.  If not I will remove the update if I can. 


COMPUTERS : IT'S ALWAYS SOMETHING.