Thursday, October 31, 2013

10/31/2013 Halloween Comes to Quail Run

(Arizona City, AZ)

Halloween has come once again to Quail Run.  Witches, goblins and superheroes graced us with their presence on this night.  These weren’t little kids knocking on doors in hopes of being given chocolate or licorice or candy corn, oh no, these were adults all dressed for a Halloween party.
 
The music was provided by our very own DJ Lawrence Wilson and his lovely wife Elaine.

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A sampling of the costumes from the Halloween Dance.

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As you can imagine, everyone had a good time!

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

10/27–10/29 There’s a Vue in Our View

(Arizona City, AZ)

Bob has taken to walking around the park every morning for exercise.  he walks up and down every street and then on alternate days around the whole block outside of the park.  He comes home with news of our friends, who has arrived, who has done what to their park model or yard, who got a new RV, just a wealth of info.

This week he came home with new different news.  News that will make a big difference for us.  Really big.  Huge even.

He told me that he saw a car for sale and that it looks pretty good.  Hmmm,,,,a car for sale.  We have been talking about getting a car for awhile now.  Quite frankly, its killing us in fuel costs to run the truck back and forth to town, sixteen miles round trip.  It would also make things easier for us when he is working on a project and needs something from the hardware store.  You see, most of Bob’s tools are in the different compartments in the truck so if one of us has to make a hardware store run everything has to be closed up and sure as my name is Snookie Quinn he’ll need something while I’m gone and his work will come to a standstill.   Hmmm,,,,a car for sale.

We had to go out later in the day and I told him I wanted to see this car.  He took me to it and I had to agree it did look pretty good.  I especially liked the color.  Dragonfly green.  It even sounds pretty doesn’t it?  I told him while we’re here we might as well ask some questions.  I didn’t realize who lived in the motorhome when I knocked on the door and when he answered I knew who it was immediately.  The first question I asked was, “Why are you selling it?”  He pointed to his new truck and said, “I just don’t need it  anymore, I’ve been wanting a pickup truck and we just got this one.”

We looked the car all over and the interior is just like new.  This couple are the first owners of this vehicle and it is evident it has been taken care of.  He told us what he wanted for it and we told him we’d be back to take it for a test drive the next day.

We did go back for a test drive and I took it for a spin first because its kind a given that this is my car.  It’s a stick shift which I haven’t driven in quite awhile.  I think my first four cars were stick shift so I  didn’t have to learn how to drive all over again.  I am proud to say that I didn’t even stall it out on the first try as we pulled away from the site.  In case you haven’t figured it out from the title it’s a Saturn Vue, a small SUV.  Its an 05 and has some miles on it but that’s ok because Saturn’s are known to go 150,000 miles or more.  Since we’ll only be using it six months out of the year it will take us a long time to get to that.

We discussed it further that evening and decided we would make an offer the next day.

We went back to talk to the couple who owned the car and we made our offer.  They accepted without hesitation and we shook on it.  It was agreed we would swap cash for keys the next day.

Our new (to us) car….

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Saturday, October 26, 2013

10/20–10/26/2013 Another Week In the Life….

The link I posted below has been fixed.  Sorry for the inconvenience.

(Arizona City, AZ)

Our days are running into each other.  Each one pretty much like the day before.  Bob putters and I hang out at the pool with “the girls”.

I’m getting brown as a berry.  Wait, stop, back up.  What berry is brown?  I wouldn’t eat a brown berry!  I’d eat a blue one, a black one and a red one but never, ever a brown one.  Nevertheless, I’m brown as one. 

Our group is growing now as more winter residents arrive.  How can I tell?  We’re running out of lounge chairs.  We have four plus a lot of regular chairs that are placed around the tables.  I’ve done some shopping at Home Depot and Lowe’s pricing them out and have given the information of what I’ve found to Brenda, our park manager.  In turn she has to give the info to the park owners and we’ll hope they’ll say yes to buy them.

I’ve been asked to be an administrator for the Quail Run RV Park Facebook page.  So all of you Facebook’ers feel free to check out OUR PAGE so that you can see what’s going in this desert park.  Please, like the page and feel free to leave comments.

Remember the cotton fields I told you about?  They have been harvested and big blocks of baled cotton stand in the fields now.  This field below has had one pass through it with the mechanical cotton picker.  I’m sure it has a much more proper name but since I don’t know it mechanical cotton picker will have to suffice.

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A couple of days passed and when I was in town my cell phone rang.  It was Brenda asking me where I was.  I told her and she asked that I meet her at Lowe’s so that we could get the lounge chairs.  Yay, the owners said buy them!  Since I had the truck and “the discount” I was glad  to pick them up.  We now have plenty of lounges to go around,,,,for awhile anyway.

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Bob and I went for a ride one day just to get out of the park for awhile.  We took a ride over to one of the golf course areas just to see some green.

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I think we both needed to see this!

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A going down the road picture I snapped.

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Do you see the lizard?

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We had a pool party where many of those in the park gathered in the pool area for socializing, snacks, drinks and dancing.

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Just another week in the desert.

Saturday, October 19, 2013

10/19/2013 Full Moon Rising

Not much to say about this….

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Nuff said…..

Friday, October 18, 2013

10/13–10/18/2013 Loving Life in the Desert!

More friends have arrived in the park and hanging around the pool is a great way to spend the day!

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It’s even better to be in the pool.

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Bonnie having fun in the pool.

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I’ve had several requests to do a Scavenger Hunt again in the park this year so I started taking the pictures for it this week.

I’ve got a couple of projects going this season and I’ve started working on them also but more on the later.

I’m Christmas shopping this year which is something I haven’t done in YEARS!  I am so taken with Jasmine, our granddaughter, that I just started buying and then I couldn’t leave her older half brother out so I started shopping for him too and then saw something for Jonathan and Brandi.  Well you can’t buy for one son and his family and not the other and our granddaughter from Timothy of course is a joy to buy for too.  UPS is going to love me this year!

For those of you new here let me explain the above.  Jonathan lives in Kentucky and we met his little girl for the first time when she was a shy two year old.  She didn’t really interact with us and we also met his fiancĂ©e Brandi for the first time and who also quiet.  This all changed this year.  Jasmine is now an outgoing 4 year old and Brandi and I just seemed to “click” this visit.

Because of all this I am a shopping fool!   And I’m loving every minute of it.  I haven’t had the Christmas spirit for many years and I think I’ve got it back!

This was the week we enjoyed the “Hunters Moon”.

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Bob has been happy to have so many projects to keep him busy and I’m happy the girls are here to hang out with while I work on my tan.  Life is so darn good!

Saturday, October 12, 2013

10/5/–10/12/2013 Friends Are Coming In

On Saturday we had a potluck dinner with about 40 people attending.  Once again the great cooks of Quail Run were showing their culinary skills.

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As always there was way too much food and most of us ended up waddling home.

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A small portion of the food we had.

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Bob has been puttering around the house, going into town for this and that and visiting his friends in the VFW.

I have been spending my days at the pool working on my tan.  Bonnie Larson is my pool companion most days.  We walk back and forth across the pool for exercise.  We walk forward, backward and do a side step to use all of our muscles.  She always seems to get there before me and tells me she’s already started working out.  Hmmmm…..I went earlier than usual one day and here’s what I found.

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On Sunday I needed to go to the store and for some reason grabbed my camera.  I noticed lots of activity in the surrounding farms that are growing cotton and realized that very soon the green plants with the white cotton balls would soon be gone.

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Pretty soon these fields will be nothing but brown dirt.

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Tuesday Steve and Bonnie returned to Quail Run.  I have so been looking forward to this day.  Bonnie and I have become very, very good friends and have talked on the phone several times a day every day for the past few months and texted in between.  We are finally getting to get to talk in person for the next five months or so.  She called me when they pulled off the Interstate and I was ready for them.  I made a WELCOME HOME STEVE AND BONNIE sign and everything.  What Steve failed to tell Bonnie was that were stopping to fill their huge fuel tank!  So I was standing at the park entrance for what seemed like forever.  As I stood there a few other residents came over to see what I was waiting for and when they finally arrived we had quite a welcoming committee!  And I waved my sign….

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Do you see my sign I’m waving? Here’s a better look at it.

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Who cares if its on a 4” x 6” piece of notepad paper?  It’s the thought that counts.

The next few days consisted of pool time and shopping for me and small projects Bob wanted to get done around the house.

On Saturday Steve & Bonnie and Bob & I went over to the local Moose Club for an afternoon of Bar Bingo!  I am loving this game!  Of course the fact that I won $64.oo probably had something to do with that.

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More and more winter residents are starting to trickle in.

Friday, October 4, 2013

10/1–10/4/2013 Doctors and Rocks

Bob finished up all the sun shade screens and what a huge difference it makes.  We can open the blinds and look out and not have the sun glaring in.  We are happy campers!

Tuesday brought a trip to the doctor for both of us.  Last week Bob had been experiencing swelling in his feet since it wasn’t going away he thought he’d better get things checked out.  I hadn’t been to the doctor in awhile either so I made for me too.  As expected I was sent down the hall for blood work.  To be honest the phlebotomist was really good and since I was really good I got stickers!  They will be sent to Jasmine, our granddaughter.

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Well, we aren’t getting good news after these appointments.  It has been determined that I’m pre-diabetic (???) so that means NO MORE PEPSI’S!  Oh just shoot me now!  NO MORE CANDY!  Please, please, just shoot me now!  Well, we had just done shopping and I have candy and Pepsi’s in the house and I’m damn well going to finish them.  Let the feast begin!  I opted to take a pill everyday for 90 days.  The doctor says if I cut out the sodas and candy I should lower my numbers significantly and suggested this med for 90 days and then in all likelihood I wouldn’t have to take it anymore.  My cholesterol is also elevated and it was suggested that I take two Metamucil capsules every day.  Since they are over the counter I have chosen to take four for that extra boost.  I hope it works because I cannot take statins.

Bob has to have some more testing done.  A stress test and the like.    He’ll have those done in the next few weeks.  We aren’t anticipating any problems there.
 
We were basking in the glow of a job done well but little did we know a lot more work was just around the corner!. Actually, around the corner and across our lot!

On Wednesday I was sitting on the patio reading and Bob was inside watching TV when we heard this diesel motor.  Naturally I looked  up because our friends are starting to come in and I wanted to see who it was.  Bob also did the same thing from inside.  Well.  Here comes this motor home in a wide turn, across our front yard within six feet of our home and one foot of our brick border around our front garden.  I jumped up and as the driver went by he waved and smiled.  Oh, I don’t think so!  Bob came out and looked at the tire tracks across our gravel and said, “Get on the phone and see who sells rocks!”  After a few phone calls we found what we were looking for.  A trip to town was in order.

When we went in the first time our thought was to buy two or three good sized boulders, big enough to stop a bus if need be.   That big.  We’re talking 600 – 700 pounds each.  They would deliver the boulders the next day.  They told us how it would be done and that’s where we had pause.  They would bring them in a dump truck and do just that …. dump them.  All well and good but what if they rolled?  They were too much for the deliver man, Bob and me to move if they did or if they didn’t fall where they were supposed to.  We told the guy we would call later in the afternoon that we would look into making arrangements for a Bobcat to move them.  Adding the cost of a Bobcat rental to the mix just made this too expensive for what we wanted to spend.  We canceled the boulders.

By the next morning Bob’s wheels had been turning and the next thing I know there are a dozen empty beer cans spaced evenly around the perimeter of our property.  (We have a curb along the side)  I went out to find out what was going on and he replied in two words.  “Smaller rocks”.  Alrighty then!  He suggested I go into town to buy rocks at the place we were yesterday.  Now I’ve gone to town to buy wood, cement, tools and a multitude of other things for him, and let’s not forget the cases of beer but this is the first time I’ve been sent to buy rocks.  We walked around a little bit looking at what rocks other people had for decoration so that I could get an idea of what size he was talking about.  Ok, twelve rocks about this (---------) big.  Got it.

I left around eleven because it was going to be a hot one.  By eleven thirty I was rock shopping.  Buying rocks is not an easy thing to do.  They come in all different sizes and shapes and colors and there are just so many to choose from.  And for the most part they are in a big pile.  I felt sorry for the guy who was getting them for me.  So I picked the twelve out and made arrangements for delivery the next day. 

At ten a.m. on Thursday a dozen rocks weighing between fifty and a hundred pounds each were delivered.  The fellow helped us place them and after he left we moved them here and there and back again until we got them just right.  So now our place looks like this….

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It’s hard to believe those rocks weigh so much!  This should slow everyone down coming around our corner.