Broken Computer

Actually the computer is fine, it’s the operating system that’s broke. I should have known better but I clicked on a link in my email and from then on things were wacko. Some Internet pages took forever to load and some didn’t load at all. Google was especially difficult. When I did a search, Images wouldn’t work and if I clicked on a link it would redirect me to someplace completely different. I searched for viruses but found none. A while back I lost my ability to create restore points because of another virus. So I figured it was time to dump everything and restore my system. This went well but took a couple of days to get everything reinstalled and configured. Funny how some things don’t work the way they did before. I know it’s got to be some configuration setting I can’t find right now. Anyway I am back up and running again. Al least I know my recovery disks work. I was always wondering about that.

Craigslist is a winner

So I decided to yank the 12V battery from my golf cart. I could never figure out why the golf cart had a separate 12V battery just for the radio. The 12V lights and horn are connected to 2 of the 6V batteries so why not the radio. Every time the 12V battery needed charging I had to brake out my 12V charger and charge it separate from the golf cart batteries.

The battery box I pulled out looked like it might be something someone might want. I looked it up on the internet and they sell for $60 new. So I posted it on Craigslist for $20. Within about 30 minutes I got a call. The guy came out and not only took the battery box but the 10 year old battery along with it.

Less that an hour from placing the ad and it was gone.

How does that happen? Do these guys sit around all day monitoring Craigslist for stuff to buy? I couldn’t believe how fast I got the call.

Now I’m looking around for more stuff to sell.

No rain today

At least yet. It is 8:00p and the day has been rain free. There is plenty of moisture in the air though. It was, for the most part, an indoor day since the humidity was very high and uncomfortable. I can see out the windows that the thunderclouds are welling up again though. The weather says lightning, thunder and heavy rain until midnight but I kind of doubt it. Last nights rain was another bad one. There were more rescues in town and the streets got another dose of mud, rocks and debris. We got a dose of that one here at the resort. This morning I took a drive around to access the damage. We survived real well. The only real damage is the path through our common area. It is washed out in places and rutted pretty badly.

We took another drive into town to check on the houses we are watching today and they survived another one although the streets around them were near impassable. We did have to turn around on one street and find a different route. The bad weather should be all gone by tomorrow.

More floods tonight

The rains are back and there is more flooding in town. Tonight the storm is over us also. We are getting very heavy rain here at the park. I haven’t gone outside but by looking out the windows it appears everything is intact although there is a lot of water flowing down the roads. There is lots of lightning and thunder and of course our satellite TV is going in and out as the signal tries to get through the moisture in the air. I am listing to the Havasu Police, Fire, And EMS on the internet and they are very busy.

Susan and I took a drive in town today and it looks like a hurricane went through. A lot of roads were blocked off due to washouts and LOTS of debris and rocks in the roads. Unfortunately there was one death last night when one car was swept into a wash. Two in the car got out OK but the third was swept away and found dead 2 miles down the wash.

We checked on our friend’s houses, which aren’t in town right now, and all was well. Looks like we will have to take another drive tomorrow to make sure they survived tonight’s storms as well.

There are a lot of videos on You Tube of the floods.

Boss called today

My boss called from home this evening and asked if we got nailed by heavy rain here at the resort. He said they got hit so hard on the south end of town that his pool overflowed. We got nothing but a little rain and a very close bolt of lightning and thunder that knocked out our power for a split second. We figured we were going to be hit next. Luckily it bypassed us. I called my boss back and he said the south end of town was chaos. The washes turned into rivers and flash floods washed cars off the roads. Cars were washed out of one of the restaurants parking lots in town. Earlier Landen asked if we could go out to dinner. I told him not tonight. After telling him about the restaurant parking lot he said that is were he wanted to go tonight. We dodged that one but there are more to come.

116 degrees today

I started the day working this morning at 8:00a. The temps quickly rose to 100+. My shirt was so soaked the pool guy asked me if I went into the pool with my shirt on. That probably would have been a good idea. I worked until noon at which time it was around 114 degrees. For some strange reason Susan decided to put 2 pots of soup stock on the stove. This raised the inside temp to 90 degrees. The motorhome never recovered from that. We are supposed to get some thunderstorms starting tomorrow evening. This doesn’t mean it will be cool, it’s still going to be over 100 degrees and raining.

Yesterday I took the Saturn Vue into the shop to get the timing belt replaced. I knew it would take about 5 hours to complete so I wasn’t surprised when they didn’t call until 4:00p to say it was done. The ladies I bought the car from were pretty meticulous about the maintenance but for some reason the car was about 20,000 miles over due for the belt change. A broken belt means a destroyed engine so I feel a lot better now that it’s done.

Tomorrow the temp is supposed to be a bit lower. I am going to work again in the morning then I got a 2:00p dentist appointment to get my new crown placed. I have been running around with a plastic temp for 2 weeks now and will be glad to get the real thing. I have been so afraid of knocking it off that I haven eaten on that side. Takes me twice as long to eat that way.

Big change for 4th

The weather around here in Havasu has been consistently over 100 degrees for quite some time. The 4th of July, however was much different.

We had rain in the morning and the temps never reached 100 all day. This didn’t stop most people from partying in the channel.

In fact it was much more comfortable than the 100+ temps. The cloud cover was high so the fireworks were great.

Oatman

One of the things Landen likes to do while here in Havasu is take a ride up to Oatman to feed the burros. Oatman is an old gold mining town up in the Arizona mountains on the old route 66. The burros are descendants from the burros that were used by the miners. After the price of gold went down and the mines didn’t produce enough to make it worth looking for the operations closed and the burros were let loose. Everyday they roam into town to look for a handout from the tourists. You can always count on a few babies tagging along also. Here a couple of photos of Landen having fun in Oatman.

Landen and his buddy

Landen clowning around

Landen feeding the burros

Burro lunch box

Missing TV

No it didn’t get stolen.

It gets too hot on the patio for the TV. The specs say not to operate the TV over 104 degrees. Well, it is 104 about noon. So I decided since the grandson's game console uses an HDMI port only and none of the inside TV have HDMI it makes sense to move the patio TV inside and get some use out of it. So now Landen is happy he has his own TV for his games.

Normally I would not let him sit inside all day and play gamer but when it reached 114 outside it’s just too hot for him to play outside. He did go to the movies with Susan today while I wiped down the motorhome and flushed the holding tanks…someone has to do it.

Crash And Burn

Landen and I went over to the racetrack again today to run his car. We did a reprogram on the electronics because he lost braking and reverse. The test drive went well until he crashed and broke the right rear suspension piece. We packed up and headed on over to the RC shop to pickup a new part thinking, “How much can this cost”. I was thinking somewhere around $3.00. Was I surprised… $10.00. $10 was the price for a set of left and right but still. So I thought I would see if I could glue it back together.

I drilled the pieces and inserted a pin for strength and used a 2 part epoxy. I got to thinking that even if this held, it is a weak point and will most likely break sometime down the road so I got on the internet to search for a better price. I ended up placing an order from an Ebay seller for the left and right set for $3.74 with free shipping. We should be getting it in the mail by Thursday. Hopefully my fix will hold until then.

RC Truck Racing

Landen and I had a guy day today. We headed over to the local RC car track to run his Radio Controlled Car. He has one of those really fast RC Off Road Trucks.

He has never been on a dirt track and found that to be a different experience than running it on the streets.

There were lots of turns and jumps and his tires didn’t have much grip so the car was all over the place. After a while though he got the hang of it. I asked him if I could give a try and I was wrecking all over the place. After the track we checked out a couple of RC shops in town to see the new stuff. We also headed on over to the RC Airport to see if anyone was flying their RC planes. We found that the airport is only open on Saturdays so we might go back tomorrow. By this time it was lunchtime so we stopped at In and Out for a couple of Double Doubles.

HOT Summer

It’s been HOT. Everyday the temps are over 100 before noon. It drops into the 80s during the early morning for a while then starts heading back up to the 100s. Landen and I went to the Aquatic Center today for a couple of hours. Unfortunately (for me) it was Summer Camp Day. Bus loads of kids, good for Landen though. He had plenty of kids to play with. At the center there is a LARGE pool and a water slide. At one point the pool was so jammed with kids that I couldn’t move without running into one. I had to just get out and wait it out. The line at the water slide was too long to deal with. Fortunately the kids only stayed a short time then they packed back into the busses and left the pool to the rest of us. Landen is worn out…well so an I.

Back in Havasu again

We left California this morning. Since we picked up the “new” car (Saturn Vue)

we had two cars to bring back to Havasu. Susan wanted to drive our original car and I drove the Vue. Landen, our Grandson, rode with me. We made several stops

to check on each other and see how the trip was going. Everything went well and now we are back at the Resort in Havasu.

We had a great time at our daughters house in California. The weather in California was sunny and overcast at times. The temp in the high 60s was comfortable. We arrived in Havasu to sunny skies and 107 degrees. But then again, we are used to it so it didn’t feel bad.

Visiting Friends

Today I went down to the State Park we used to host at to see some old friends. After visiting friend I took a drive down the coast. It’s good to see the beach again.

It was a good day since I can now stand straight up. Let me explain, Before we left Havasu I messed up my back doing some work around the resort. I was laid up for 2 days before we left and was hurting pretty bad the day of travel. The drive wasn’t too bad since the seats in our Saturn are comfortable enough but I was really stiff at the end of the trip. Today I can finally stand straight up with no pain. I still have pain bending and twisting just right but it just gets better everyday.

Uneventful Trip

Just the way I like it. We made it to our Daughters house in about 6 hours arriving at 2:00p. The trip went well and the car ran good. I haven’t had time to calculate the mileage yet but last trip out here we got 38 mpg in our Saturn SC2. I do know it cost more this time because of the price of gas. Last time it cost me $28 to do the 300 miles and this time the bill was $36. We paid $3.89 when we left Havasu Arizona and paid $4.25 here in San Diego California.

The weather will take some getting used to. It was around 85 degrees at 8:00a in Havasu and was in the high 60s at 2:00p when we arrived here. Good thing I packed some long pants and tennis. No more shorts and flip flops for a while.

I will have to cruise the beach while I am here. I do miss the beach.

California here we come

Tomorrow bright and early we are heading to California to pickup our Grandson. Those that follow our Blog know we do this every summer when Landen gets out of school. He loves to hangout with Nana and Papa for the summer and travel with us. We plan to hang out here until after the fireworks on the 4th of July then take the motorhome on a short trip somewhere. Not sure where just yet but I’m thinking the Grand Canyon area. Landen wants to get back home by the first of August so he can spend some of the summer with his friends. I knew it wouldn’t be long before he wanted to spend summer with his friends and soon he might not even want to hang out with a couple of old folks like us. We need to take advantage of having him travel with us while we can. We are just going to take the car over to California because we are only staying for 4 days at our daughter’s house then head on back here to Havasu. It’s a whole lot cheaper fuel wise to take the car than the motorhome. Also while in California we will be picking up another car. We bought a 2005 Saturn Vue so we will have 2 cars coming back. If the Vue checks out OK we will sell the other car. I know the people that own the Vue and know how it’s been taken care of so I am sure it will be a great car.

Welcome to my back yard party

Just can’t go through a holiday weekend without going down to the Channel and watching the crazies. Then coming back to our quiet calm paradise here at the resort.

Here are a few photos. Some I don’t dare post…

It’s getting hot

I have altered my work schedule. Now, instead of working 2 full days, I am now working 3 to 4 half days. I start early and knock off around noon. The place is starting to look real good. Everything is growing well and the manager and I have been trimming and cleaning up all the fall leaves. Unfortunately most of the “Snowbirds” have headed back up north for the summer so there are few left to enjoy.

Boats boats and Bigger boats

This weekend is the Desert Storm Poker Run and Shootout on the lake. All the BIG boats are in town from all around the country. Today was the Desert Storm Street Party. This is where a lot of the boats are lined up along Main Street for viewing. There is some amazing engineering and artistry involved in these boats. Tomorrow we will go down to watch the boat parade through the channel before they head out on a poker run.Here are a few photos I snapped today at the Street Party.

Big trucks for Big boats.


These things are so big they have to be trailered on their side to fit the road.



Some crazy graphics

Big motors for big boats.


Seating for 5, how about a ride?

This is all you get when you spend too much on your truck.

Honest, I was taking a picture of the big screen TV mounted on the side of this truck.

Cool job

Where can you find a job where you go to work in the morning, knock off for lunch at noon, jump in the company pool for a couple of hours then go back to work. That is exactly what I did today. The temperature was just under 100 today but after trimming about 100 palm trees I was ready for a dip in the pool.