07/28/08

Last night Manna seemed to be “leaking” – leaving a little wet spot behind her wherever she sat. It didn’t smell like pee but whatever it was, we didn’t want a mess in the house. So we put her in the bathroom shower for the night. The shower is big enough to hold a litter box, a folded towel for a bed, and the food-and-water dish but Manna meow-ed all night long. She was unhappy with the situation and wanted to make sure we knew it!  I am soooo tired today.  But at least I don’t have to listen to “meow…meow…meow…meow…meow…” all day. Randy gets to deal with that. He’ll have to figure out if she’s better or if she needs to go to the vet.

My work schedule is officially four 10-hour days now. Turns out it’s not that hard to work a little more during the day, and getting Friday off is certainly worth it.  


We still don’t have definite plans of when we will hit the road. Randy has contacted a realtor to sell the restaurant building. Plus he would like to wait until the economy is a bit stronger before we start using our savings to live on. So we have started talking about what to do if we stay in this area during the winter. Sunday we drove over to look at another RV park where we might move to, on the Illinois side of the river. The park is a bit nicer than the one we’re at now – the concrete pads are much more level than the blacktop we are parked on now. And some sites have a small section of grass beside them, which would be nice during the winter. If we stay were we are now, we would still have to walk the dogs outside the park gate to do their business, even in the snow. If we have a site with some grass next to it, they could just use that spot. There is also a MetroLink train station at the other RV park, which I would like. Now that I’m working 10-hour days, I am not using MetroLink anymore. At our current RV park I have to catch a bus to get to the train station, then take the train to work; with all the bus stops and extra time to make connections, I spent about 50 minutes to get to work and the same amount of time to get back home. That amount of time on top of working 10 hours is more than I want to do. If I can catch the MetroLink train at the new RV park and ride it straight through to work, it won’t take as long. And I won’t have to scrape snow off the car or drive in snow!

07/13 - 07/25

7/13/08 Wasn’t sore from the ride, but tired. Randy had to get up early to cook a pancake and sausage breakfast at the church. Later we went to Aaron and Dezina’s for dinner. She cooked ribs and potato salad – really good. Dezina and Randy are always comparing cooking techniques. Aaron and I just enjoy the good food.

7/17/08 Randy needed to put new tires on the RV, so we packed up the house. After I left for work, Randy and John took the RV out to get the new tires mounted and fill it up with gas. Unfortunately that day I missed the bus and drove to work, and got a ticket for running a red light. I say it was yellow, but I can’t prove it, so I will have to pay.

7/18/08  Randy was talking to one of the RVers in the park who likes to bike and wants to see some of St. Louis, so Randy agreed to bike over to Soulard’s market again on Saturday, to guide him around. Peggy, the other guy's wife, and I decided to bike along. We got there almost too early – some of the stands were still opening up for the day. But it was interesting, and they couldn’t believe the great quality and price in the market. When we got ready to leave, Peggy’s bike had a completely flat front tire. Peggy and I stayed at the market while the guys biked back to the RV park and brought the car to pick up us and our bikes. Later that afternoon Randy and I biked to Forest Park again. That’s about 13 miles, and although it was still very hard, it wasn’t quite as hard for me as it was the first time.  

7/20/08 Randy read about a local church named St Stanislaus that was going to have a Polish sausage lunch on Sunday. It’s a few blocks away so we walked, but boy, was it a hot day! Lunch was really good - Polish sausage, beets (neither of us liked those), sauerkraut and really great chocolate cake. Afterwards it was just too hot for a bike ride, so we got in the car and drove around, and I bought a pack to put on the back of my bike. It’s a metal frame sits over the back tire, and a pack that looks like those insulated lunch bags that snaps onto the frame. So I can carry protein snacks, sunscreen, water, etc when I bike.  


7/25/08 Spent the weekend with Mom, Kathy and Ruth. 

7/12 Tour De Donut!

Randy and I did the “Tour de Donut” bicycle ride today. Wow, was that hard - it was 32 miles long! They have free doughnuts at two stops along the route and for each doughnut you eat (and keep down), you can subtract 5 minutes from your ride time. I ate one doughnut at each of the two rest stops just because of it’s expected, plus who am I to turn down free doughnuts? Aaron, Dezina and Jacob did the ride with us. At one point Jacob's bike had a problem which Randy was able to fix. Then Aaron and Jacob pushed ahead while Randy stayed with Dezina and me to make sure we were OK. Randy talked Dezina and I through the rough spots, and about halfway through when Dezina decided to stop, Randy stayed with her until Jordan could pick her up. Then Randy caught up with me (easily) and finished the course; unfortunately it took me about 4 hours. But at least I finished!

July 5 - 8

7/5/08 Saturday we got our bikes out and rode to Soulard’s market, which is a mile or so from the RV park. On the way back we biked through the pretty Lafayette park and stopped at a coffee shop. St. Louis sets off fireworks on Saturday also, so in the evening we biked down to the riverfront for a better view than we got from the RV park. It was lovely, resting in the Arch park and watching the fireworks overhead.

7/6/08 Sunday we went to church, then had a great lunch of fried chicken at Moonlight. We organized our remaining stuff in the trailer, then went on a 12 mile bike ride.  

7/7 Getting a few tomatoes from our two potted tomato plants now. We also have chives, rosemary and mint in pots.

7/8 We've never been to America’s Incredible Pizza yet so we went there for dinner – a pizza buffet with the old “Flipper” movie.

07/04/08 Ballon walkers

Today Randy and I were part of the group from Enterprise who volunteered to be balloon walkers in the St. Louis 4th of July Parade. Our group was assigned to walk the Blue Angel helium balloon in the parade. The underside of a parade balloon looks quite different than the top!
The weather was perfect – sunny but not too hot and, very importantly, no windAfterwards Randy and I had lunch at Guido’s on the Hill, where we enjoyed an excellent deluxe salad and sangria. The owners are an Italian man and his Spanish wife, so the menu includes both Italian and Spanish food. Later that evening we joined friends in the St. Louis RV Park to watch fireworks from the 2nd-story office patio. There was one building that blocked some of the lower fireworks, but we had a pretty good view of the rest.