March 12th - Nice Day, but not awesome

Tuesday
No walking but did go over and help at the church for about 4 hours in the morning. Kathy dropped me off and did some shopping. She picked me up and we had lunch at an oriental buffet where we had eaten before. We also checked out a Coleman outlet store, interesting but nothing spectacular.

Wednesday
Did my 3 laps around the campground, 4.1 miles, in 58 minutes this morning. I won't be trying to improve on that for awhile. A couple of times I wondered if they would have to pick my fat old body up from alongside the road <grin>. We have a small leak under the sink. I thought it might be in the new drain lines that Camping World installed. After a lot of searching Kathy & I determined that the combo faucet on the sink has a small internal leak and water runs down, and drips off one of the lines going to, and coming from, the faucet. It only drips when water is being drawn from the faucet. A new gasket set will probably fix it, I just have to figure how to get a set.

Kathy went out and "shopped" some more this morning. I lounged around the motorhome. In the afternoon we went over to the local Sam's.

Andy sent me this photo. I think he was using the tractor to bring some wood up for the shed out back.

If she were any cuter I couldn't stand it.

It is supposed to get down to 37 tonight and tomorrow night but tomorrow and Friday the highs are supposed to be sunny 60 and 66. With the sun that feels quite warm. (70 again on Saturday)

Guess that is all the news from here. May God bless you and yours.

March 10th - Gorgeous Day

Saturday
I went over and had French Toast and sausage at the club house. Kathy stayed home. I can't remember anything special we did during the day, just enjoyed a great day.

Sunday
Went to the 9 AM service at Liberty. Probably close to 175 people at the early service. More of us "old folks", but a nice mix of ages. I managed a 21 minute, 1.2 mile walk/run around the campground before church. It was my best time for "one lap".
We just enjoyed the remainder of the day. Walked around some a couple of times and visited with a few other "campers".

Monday
Did a 75 minute, 4.2 mile walk, 3 laps, around the campground. Just didn't have the heart to do any jogging. I went to a couple of more places looking for a 12 volt ballast for one of our fluorescent lights but no one had one.
Sunday one of the announcements was that during the week they needed help to tear down a wall between the current area being used as the sanctuary and another one of the theater sections. When complete the sanctuary will consist of what was 3 theaters in the old theater complex. I stopped by and helped for about 90 minutes in the morning and then went back after lunch and worked another 4.5 hours. I was white with dry wall dust when I got home. I enjoyed the time I spent working with them but I am pooped tonight. I plan on going back in the morning and helping until lunch.
Kathy twisted my arm <grin> until I took her to Big Daddy's for lunch, AGAIN. She had another shrimp basket and I had a Philly Cheese Steak sandwich. She REALLY likes the shrimp baskets and my cheese steak and onion rings was good. That makes at least 4 trips to Big Daddys.
It was sunny and in the mid 70's today, just a beautiful day. Tomorrow, Tuesday, is supposed to even warmer.

Time for bed. I hope you all had a great day. May God bless you and yours.

March 7th - Nice Today

Thursday
It was cool and rainy yesterday. We went to Walmart, about 8 miles from here, and bought a few things. Some time ago we were unable to make the DVD player in our motorhome work. While at Walmart I picked up a new one. I also picked up a printer cartridge for the printer we keep in the motorhome. Kathy bought a few groceries. On the way home we had to stop at Big Daddy's for lunch again. My blackened fish was a little over done but she said her oysters were great.

We just lounged around in the afternoon. We did go to the 4 PM get together that occurs daily in the clubhouse. It is just a time to update everyone on area events. We found out that the local Tractor Supply had dropped their propane prices to $2.99/gallon, which is anywhere from $0.70-1.25 cheaper than the other places that fill tanks.

I did get the printer cartridge installed and got the printer working again. Also, when putzing with the DVD player I managed to get the old one working again. There are LOTS of buttons and settings since it displays on the TV but the should plays through the stereo system. I think the problem may have been the operator wasn't smart enough to run it.

Friday
This morning I managed 3 loops around the campground, 4.1 miles, in 60 minutes. My best time so far. Later we went to Camping World to get a fluorescent bulb, then to Walmart to take back the DVD player. On the way we drove through the Tractor Supply lot to check out access to their propane station. There is no way we can get our motorhome in there with the car attached but I think we can do it without the car. We still have over a half tank so we won't need propane before we leave here. We plan on stopping when we leave for TN. We can hook up the car in the Tractor Supply lot, after getting the tank filled.

I put two new bulbs in the fluorescent light and it still doesn't work. Apparently the ballast is bad. Lots of folks are changing over to LED's but they are EXPENSIVE. I'm not sure the power savings is worth the extra expense, if I can find a new ballast or a new fixture that matches the old one.

Kathy made me feel guilty so we stopped at Big Daddy's AGAIN, for lunch. (That makes 3 days in a row.) I had another of their half pound hamburgers and she had another shrimp basket.

This afternoon all we have done was walk over to the 4 PM get together at the clubhouse. (I guess I should say its all I have done. She washes a load of clothes almost every day.) Actually we did stop by the office and extended our reservation. We are now paid up through the night of Sunday, March 16th. Monday, the 17th, we will head for Tennessee.

Tomorrow morning, Saturday, they are having French Toast, Bacon, Sausage, Coffee & Juice at the clubhouse, $3.50/person, so I will get over their to eat. We heard about a Farmer's Market that we are going to try and find after breakfast.  I'm not sure what we will do the rest of Saturday. It is Spring Break and we have been warned that the beach area is an absolute zoo during this time. Highs are supposed to be in the 70's for the next 4 days so we need to get out and enjoy it.

May God bless you and yours.

March 5th - Big Daddy's

Wednesday
This morning was rainy and cool, low 40's. Rainy is to strong a word, it misted all morning. I know because I spent over an hour out walking in it (dumb?). Managed 4.42 miles this morning.

Later we walked over to the clubhouse and listened to the "jamb session". When we arrived there were already 6 people playing and/or singing. Two more showed up a little later. A guy told us they normally have as many as 19. The did mostly gospel and country songs. Just before we left one lady sang, she also played a guitar, "Get Your Kicks on Route 66". She was GOOD. A couple of the guys were also pretty good. One of the guys who we heard sing 3 times was BAD, but I guess he was trying. He butchered 3 Hank Williams songs. He got worse with each new song.

For lunch we went to Big Daddy's, on the Fish River. Kathy had read about it and one of the guys at the campground recommended it. The bill was $16.05, including tax. For that I got a half pound hamburger and an order of onion rings. Kathy got a shrimp basket and onion rings. I ordered my hamburger medium rare, it was closer to rare, but it was good, as were the onion rings. Kathy said her shrimp were excellent. The place is only a little over 4 miles from us. We will definitely go back there before we leave.

Big Daddy's

We did not eat outside, but several groups did. (By the time we arrived it was in the high 50's) In the background is a boathouse and the Fish River. Note the toys in the sand behind Kathy. There are two areas with large sand piles and toys. When we first arrived there were two kids out playing with these toys.

When we got back to the campground we sat out in the sun for a bit, walked around the campground a little more and basically just lounged around the rest of the afternoon.

This afternoon we got a call from our neighbor back in Centertown. He works at Lowe's. They had a bunch of 5 gallon pails of driveway sealer, normal price over $40/pail, that they marked down to $4/pail. Part of our driveway is asphalt so I had him buy us 15 pails of it. Andy picked it up for us this evening.

It is supposed to be 60 with thunderstorms the next two days, before warming up to the high 60's and low 70's. We can take a little rain with these great temperatures.

May God bless you and yours.

March 4th - Cool & Rainy

Monday
I walked 3.8 miles around the campground, for exercise, in the morning. We stayed home all day. I cleaned out the car and Kathy did cleaning in the motorhome. Nothing to exciting. It was cool and rainy.

Tuesday
The overnight low had been forecast to be 38 but was actually 33. I think today's high was only in the high 40's, much colder than had been forecast. The good news is that it is supposed to get continually warmer and in a few days we are supposed to have 4 consecutive days in the 70's.
I walked 2.7 miles this morning, knowing that my activity level was going to be low again today. We did get out today. I was the designated driver and Kathy hit numerous "thrift stores". She didn't buy much but appeared to have a good time looking around. We went to an oriental buffet for lunch, only $5.50/person. It was the best meal, and certainly the best deal, I have had since we have been down here. After lunch Kathy hit the grocery store and then we came home. We are looking forward to the warmer temperatures that are coming.

No firm plans for the rest of the week. We want to go to Pascagoula, Mississippi (she isn't sure why, just thinks it sounds like a place we ought to see) and we want to go to Pensacola, Florida another day. Pascagoula is about 90 minutes west while Pensacola is less than an hour to the east of here.

Good night. May God bless you and yours.

Mar 2nd - Sunday

Saturday (continued)
We did go to a local flea market. It wasn’t much and didn’t take long to walk through it. We had lunch at a small, non-chain, Mexican restaurant. Mine was edible, Kathy’s was good. Other than walking around the campground a little we didn’t do a lot.

Sunday

Kelsey let us know that there church had been cancelled, due to weather, and they were available for a Skype video chat. After a couple of tries we managed to make a connection using my phone. It worked okay for a while but then it seemed like we lost bandwidth/signal and both video and voice was choppy. It was good to see Lydia and K&A.

We were almost out the door to go to a 9AM church service when Kelsey texted us. The church as two services so changed plans and went to the 10:45 service instead. The church is called Liberty Church. They meet in what used to be a multi-screen theater.  There was free coffee and other things at the “snack bar” when you entered the lobby. They appeared to have torn down the wall between from between two of the theater areas to make a larger area for the main meeting area.

 

This photo shows half of the sanctuary. There is a much larger screen at the front of the other half. The theater seating is still in place.

 

 

I think there were around 200 adults, mostly young adults (20-45), attending the service. Music was contemporary/praise music. A couple (retirees?) who are relocating to the area, from northern Alabama, got up and gave a testimony. From what I gather they were relatively new to Liberty (maybe attended 4 or 5 times). Several weeks ago the Pastor preached on healing, He emphasized believing/claiming that we were healed even if we didn’t see the immediate impact of the healing. A few days later the guys right leg swelled up. Doctors told him that he had blood clots and that the blood clots had moved to his lungs. Apparently when checking his lungs they found that he had cancer which had spread to his lymph nodes. Last week he went in for further scans and they could not find any cancer.

This mornings message was about fighting. The text was II Ti 4:6&7, where Paul says that he has fought a good fight. We Christians are in a battle. It is important that we recognize who we are fighting. We are not allowed to have enemies (dislike/hate people) but we are commanded to love people. Until we learn to love others, all others, we should not even begin to think we are mature enough to get into the real battle as described in Eph 6:10-18.

 

In addition to having small groups the church appears to have many other ongoing activities. One of the things that started today was "5,000 random acts of kindness". Members were asked to do "random acts of kindness" for other people. There will be a huge bowl at the church where members can write a little note about what they did and then put the note in the bowl. Liberty seems like a good place to worship, if only they would throw in some southern gospel music <grin>.

It was another nice day today. I sat outside for about a half hour getting some sun. (I was only out for a  half hour because I don't want to get my pasty, white skin sun burned) I wore shorts and no shirt. Temp was in the mid 70’s. Rain is moving in for the next several days but the lowest of the temperatures in the 10 day forecast is a low of 38 one night and a high of 51 the following day.

May God bless you and yours.   

Mar 1st - Beautiful Saturday Morning

Friday

We went to Mobile, about an hours drive from the campground. We spent 3 hours touring the USS Alabama. It was a self-guided walking tour and we did a LOT of walking and climbing up and down on ships ladders. Kathy gave out about half way and she went out on deck, sat in the sun, and read, while I finished looking around. I don't think we "baby boomer", or younger generations, can even begin to understand the sacrifices preceding generations made so that we could have our freedom, freedom that we are allowing to be taken away from us without even a good fight.

One of the “100 places not to miss while in Alabama” is the Dew Drop Inn. They are noted for their hot dogs, and Kathy and I love good hot dogs.  We arrived around 1:30PM and had to wait about 5 minutes for a place to sit. There are maybe 20 booths and 10 tables in the place. When we left, a little after 2, there was one empty table. Their standard hot dog comes with sauerkraut, chili, pickle, mustard and ketchup. (The have a “female” hot dog on the menu, it comes with everything but the wiener) The hot dogs were good, not as good as I remember the ones being at Fort Wayne’s Coney Island, but if I went there today I probably wouldn’t think theirs were as good as they used to be.

After lunch we drove around Mobile a little but didn’t see anything else worth getting out of the car to look at.

It was around 3:30 when we got back to the campground to enjoy a nice afternoon. Thursday night it did get down to near freezing but yesterday was sunny with a high in the mid 50’s.

Saturday

We walked over to the clubhouse for breakfast. $3/person for 2 pancakes, 2 pieces of either sausage or bacon, orange juice and coffee. The food was good. While we were eating, the campground’s Mardi Gras “King & Queen made their entrance, to a lot of fanfare. Even this far away from New Orleans people make a big deal out of Mardi Gras. There will be a parade in the campground today, and there seems to be parades in every city/town in the area.

I think we are headed to the flea market later this morning. Last night the low was in the high 50’s. At 9AM I am sitting outside in a tee shirt, in the shade, and am comfortable. It is in the mid 60’s.

May God bless you and yours.