Nelson

So, bingo nights at the Crazy Horse just weren't enough "gambling" for us, I guess.

We're in Las Vegas right now, as I'm flying out of Vegas tomorrow morning to go do some of my consulting business at Peninsula Light Company in Gig Harbor, Wash. It was loads cheaper to fly from Vegas than from Lake Havasu City, so the original plan was that I'd take the car and drive up here EARLY on Monday morning, fly out and fly back on Tuesday evening then drive "home" to LHC.

But it sounded like too much fun for the two of us to take a "vacation from our vacation", as we refer to it . . . even though we do feel like we've shifted in to every day life. So Dawn will stay here in Vegas while I'm on my business trip, then we'll go home together when I get back Tuesday evening. Anyway, we boarded the dogs yesterday through Wednesday morning back in LHC, at a place we checked out on Friday, and drove up here. Once we got checked into our hotel, we went and had dinner at the buffet and found a good blackjack table. It was 3:30 p.m. when we found the table. By 1:30 a.m., after 10 hours at the same table . . . playing the same budgeted $100 each (more or less) that we'd started with, we decided we'd had enough fun for one night. At that point we went and had breakfast and back to the room for some sleep.

It was fun. Neither of us won money. In fact, I lost about $115 (including $23 that I played in a Wheel of Fortune quarter slot), and Dawn lost $70 (including $20 in a quarter slot machine). What's sad is there was a point that I was up about $75 on the house . . . and kept playing. But, we had a great time for a little over 10 hours!

While we were at the pet boarding place, we saw couple of ads for yorkie puppies, and my mom has been wanting a dog just like Molly. So we took down the phone numbers and shared the information with Mom. One of the ads had pictures of the puppies, and they do look exactly like Molly did when she was a puppy. I think we're both kind of secretly hoping she gets a yorkie puppy because she wants one, because they're so cute, and because we'll get to take care of it for her until she can come and get it (hint, hint Mom and Jim). :) All we can do is wait and see what happens.

Some more good news is that this morning when I checked my email, I got a contract from the World Baseball Classic. They're going to PAY ME! When I orginally entered into the agreement with them, it was going to be on a volunteer basis, but they said if there was money available when everything was said and done, they'd be able to pay me. Looks like there was money available! We're thrilled about that news! Now it's not only the great experience, and contacts of working media operations for the inaugural World Baseball Classic, but now it's a few extra bucks, too! Thanks again to my buddy Emmy Zack, who put me in contact with the right people to make this happen!

Well, today it's off to explore Vegas a little. We probably won't play blackjack tonight . . . but there's bingo at the place we're staying tonight!

Ok, ok here I am. Everybody really needs to get off my ass about blogging. How many times can I tell you guys about the beautiful weather or the ultrlights flying above me or the fires that we have on the beach or the margaritas that we're drinking on the outside deck of the restaurant? That is basically my entire existance right now. That is why I haven't blogged. I AM SORRY!!! Every day is just like the above scenerio. It just really sucks to be me. It's a hard knock life...(quote from "Annie".)

We actually are doing something different for awhile now. We are leaving for Vegas tomorrow. And then Nelson flies home(Gig Harbor) for business on Monday and Tuesday, while I stay in Vegas. Then we only have Wed. and Thurs back here in Havasu (sob, sob). On Friday Nelson takes the motorhome back to Mesa while I drive the car back to Vegas to meet Brooke for her Birthday on Friday the 3rd. I will drive back to Mesa on March 5th and meet back up with Nelson.

My girlfriend Lisa is in Phoenix this week at her mom's. I'm trying to talk her into coming and hanging out with me for the next week. Her mom paid for her to go to Phoenix to be with her, so I'm not sure that is going to work out, but I hope so, that would be really fun.

Next week when we're back in Mesa Nelson got a job working with the media in the press box at "The World Baseball Classic", and he got me a volunteer position working with him for the week, so that will be fun. I'll let you know.

So, sorry that I haven't blogged, but I figure, if you guys can't even comment, then why should I do a whole a blog???

I will write again when we do something different. So until then, QUIT BUGGING ME ABOUT IT!

I miss everybody and I'm looking forward to coming home in May...for awhile, lol.

...and Bingo was his name-o

Hey! As some of you already know, we've become avid Bingo players here in Lake Havasu.

Last Thursday, for the first time, we went up to the recreation hall here at the campground and played Bingo. Neither of us won anything, but we had a lot of fun. So this past Tuesday we went back (they have Bingo on Tuesdays and Thursdays every week), and Dawn won two games for a total of $33. I didn't win anything that night.

Tonight, we were again back at the Bingo hall, and I won! $12 for one game, which was really cool. A little bit later, Dawn won another game, too! She got 12 bucks, too! We're just rolling in the dough thanks to Bingo at Crazy Horse!

Seriously, though, it's been a lot of fun. When we were living in Hazel Dell, at the house with the pool, we kept saying, "We should go play Bingo" because of the big Bingo hall not more than 3 miles from home. But of course, we never did. Too much going on. Now we have no excuses, and I think we're really going to miss it when we leave Havasu next week.

Personally, and this won't surprise anyone, I'm going to miss "our" lake, too. It's been great having a place to run my boat whenever I want to (if the water is calm enough). I feel like I'm getting in a lot of good practice and testing with the boat as I get ready to switch full-time into ERCU this year. It's great to know that I'll still have my friendships with the guys in RCU, too.

It's interesting, the pied piper effect this thing has, too. The last three times I've taken it out to the water, different guys from the park have come down to watch and ask questions about the boat and what the whole thing is all about. Today, it was a gentleman who is a full-time RVer, just him and his dog (the second "neighbor" here who we've met that's just 'him and his dog'). Nice man. He said he's from Nebraska and travels all over the place, but spends at least 4 months each winter here.

Molly got a haircut today. I think I'll go for one tomorrow. It's been since Christmas since my last haircut. And I'm doing one of my media training seminars in Gig Harbor on Monday and Tuesday, so I've got to look nice and professional again. As for Molly, we found a mobile groomer here in Havasu, and the gal came to us for Molly's appointment. She has a small RV'ish-type of rig that's got all the grooming gear in it that she needs, apparantly. For a fair price, she groomed Molly and did a good job. I think Molly misses all the hair tonight, though. She's hiding in the pillows on our bed.

Anyway. It's a fun place to be, because there's surprisingly a lot to do here. And of course, you can't beat the weather. The next four days are supposed to be 80, 85, 85, and 78. Sorry . . . didn't mean to rub it in.

Nelson

Ahhhh President's Day. It's a venerable holiday, isn't it?

LOL. Just had to get that in. I'm not sure why . . . today was a normal day for us, but I guess we had some sort of holiday spirit . . . I worked this morning, then I guess we kind of observed the holiday by not working this afternoon. We went for another really nice walk. There are so many neat places here in Havasu, that we really enjoy going for walks as much for seeing the neat things as for the exercise.

Today, we walked through London Bridge Beach Park, which goes essentially from the campground (probably 1/2 mile or so away from us), on our way to our new favorite little "treat" place, Kelly's Coffee & Fudge Shop. It's located directly under the London Bridge on the east end. We also visited a shop called Wild Things on the other side of the bridge that's going out of business and having a heck of a sale. There were a few things that we found to be pretty nice, but decided we either didn't NEED them, or we didn't want to spend the money on them, despite the great prices. Our walk was probably three miles or so.

I took some time this afternoon to practice my R/C driving skills, too, getting the boat out on the water a little more today. It's funny how that thing draws attention of some of the other men in the park. I guess all men have a part of them that's still a little boy. And let me tell you, this town is all about the so-called "Big Boys Toys", you know it with just one glance out at the lake on a nice day (SeaDoos, speedboats, party barges, ultralights, etc., and then there's all the off-road vehicles people include in their "camping gear" when they come here). It's pretty unreal, actually. Makes my expensive little hobby look inexpensive, by comparison. Over the last two days, several different men have come to visit me about my R/C boat when they see me out there running the little thing around.

Tonight was wonderful, really. There was a gorgeous sunset, and my sweetie and I sat out on the beach, with a small campfire and a margarita, for a couple of hours. We probably ought to do that more before we leave here in a couple of weeks.

Other than some more work, I'm not really sure what tomorrow holds, exactly. But on Wednesday, we're going to drive to Phoenix for a sports and entertainment career fair. Never know what kind of leads we might come up with there! Not that we're exactly looking for a career that would cause us to relocate here, but it's all about the contacts!

Nelson makes lots of friends with all of the "little" big boys when he brings out his boat. He is so excited that it is running so well. ALSO... Good Luck to Brooke who is in Bellevue this week taking the Washington Bar. Her tests are from 6:30am to 4:30pm (that's 10 hour days) onTuesday and Wednesday, and from 8:30 to noon on Thursday. She won't find out until May if she passes. GOOD LUCK SWEETHEART, we're thinking about you and we love you.

We had a fire on the beach again this evening.

Tonight on the beach.

Nelson

Tonight I find myself really hoping that somehow my business will take off to the point where it'll provide a nice living for Dawn and I. I know that it doesn't happen overnight, and it takes a lot of hard work to make it happen.

I'm willing to do the work, and I feel like I'm doing it, but it's so spotty right now. For the last month and a half I've been REALLY busy . . . but the work is starting to thin out a little. It's time to find a bunch more.

I'm kind of getting to really like the life we're living right now. Every day is "casual Friday", as I wear sweats and a t-shirt from 8 until noon . . . the first half of my workday, then take a break to shower and clean up . . . and then move on with the rest of my day: usually in shorts and another t-shirt. I work from home, set my own hours depending on how much work needs to get done and what the deadlines are for each client, and when time allows, I get to play a little. And, for the rest of this month anyway, I've got the best view I could ever imagine from my "office". Most days, I'm putting in 8 hours, if not a couple more.

For example, today I took the afternoon off and got to run my new electric model hydroplane for the first time since I got it in November. There was a lot of work that I needed to do to it before I could run . . . assembling battery packs, touching up paint, "reversing" the motor, repairing dings, installing the radio, and all that kind of stuff. I'd been doing most of that between November and now. Today was the reward. I put the boat in the water, started it up, and it ran. It ran great, as a matter of fact. I'm thrilled . . . and really excited to get another chance to run the boat. Hopefully next time with some buoys to go around to help improve my driving skills.

But there's a lot more to this past week than just the boat stuff. I'm working on a few new clients, which is good because I'm starting to run out of work with the clients I've been serving the last two months. Problem is, I don't get paid for work promoting my own company. Not right now, at least. But still, I'm optimistic that things are going OK for the business. I know there's A LOT more that we could be doing but those opportunities are still to be found. Just takes patience and hard work.

I had some fun tonight, looking back on some of the blog entries from when we first started this trip. Wow. We've sure done a lot of things over the last three months. We're pretty lucky. Over the three months, we've seen Seattle, Seaside, Lincoln City, Bandon, Arcata, Ferndale, Fort Bragg, Mendocino, Marin City, San Francisco, Petaluma, Alcatraz, Paso Robles, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Ventura, Oxnard, L.A. (Encino, specifically), Beverly Hills, Palm Springs, Cathedral City, Rancho Mirage, Palm Desert, Desert Hot Springs, Quartzsite, Phoenix, Tempe, Mesa, Cave Creek, Carefree, Apache Junction, Prescott, Glendale, Scottsdale, Tucson, the Biosphere 2, Parker, and Lake Havasu City, not to mention all of the many great places along the way.

Wow. That makes me feel like I need to take a deep breath. But then I think about the places still ahead of us: Las Vegas, back to Mesa, the Grand Canyon, Flagstaff, Page, Yuma, San Diego, Malibu (when Luka graduates in May), and all of the places in between those spots (and on the way home), too.

The moral of this story is: We're pretty lucky. Lucky to be doing this, and lucky to have so many friends and family following along, living vicariously through us. Thanks you guys!

This picture is taken from inside our RV. I was too busy watching "The Last Samurai"(which by the way was a really good movie on HBO) to go outside. But, I was very excited when I saw Nelson running his new ERCU Boat. It ran great! He was like a little boy. He's been working on reversing the motor and putting the battery packs together with shrink wrap and a bunch of stuff he'd never done before. So when he started it and it ran perfectly, we were both really happy. GO NELSON!!!

Yes, we played Bingo last night in the community center of our RV park. I know, we're old people. We've heard that from everyone we've talked to. But ...it was fun. Sorry???

Nelson with his new electric, not nitro boat.

This is something I'd never seen at a model boat race before. In each turn, the race organizers had patrols on SeaDoos and a buoy line to keep boats out of the race area during the event. I thought it was a pretty cool idea. This guy (you can barely see him just to the right of center) was pretty good about keeping boats out. Just a few minutes after I took this picture, there were three pleasure boats parked on the beach on the other side of the channel . . . with the people just watching the racing.

London Bridge was the background for turns 3-4 at the NAMBA race last weekend. Pretty cool, even though the wind was blowing right in my face as I took this picture. For my RCU buddies . . . it was kind of like Ellensburg on Saturdays.


A crackerbox, running at the NAMBA race I went to watch last weekend. The racing was a little less than expected, as usually just one or two boats finished a heat . . . but in the guys' defense, the water was pretty rough. It was really windy that day.

Nelson took me to one of our new favorite Mexican restaurants for Valentines Day. This is the outside patio that over looks the lake. In addition to a very good margarita, I ordered a spinach potato enchilada. Has anyone ever heard of that? It was really good. I think I'm hooked.

We had our first fire on the beach out in front of our "home". It was a beautiful sunset and very peaceful with the fire and the sun going down. We are definitely going to have to do this more often.

This beach is one of the beautiful places we walk by on our walk into town. I guess in the summer this place is just filled with boats and families and teens. It is a perfect beach area to spend your day on the lake.

We walked to our favorite little coffee place by the London Bridge. It's about a 2 mile walk there and back, with beautiful scenery. It has become one of our favorite things to do during the day.

These flying machines were different than than the last ones I showed. On these they were sitting like in a chair with their feet hanging down, and the motor was like it was on their backs. There were 5 or 6 of these flying around at one time. The other ones I showed, their feet were out in front of them like they were sitting in a go kart. Rick, remember the soap box derby car that you and dad built when we were kids? Do you know they still make those? There was just an article in the paper about those. Those are great memories at "Mt. Tabor park" wasn't it? Is that park still there? Years after going there for the "Soap box derby" race, with you and dad, we used to cruise there as teenagers. Wow, that was like 40 years ago. Oh my gosh, that was a really long time ago!

Nelson

This weekend was really cool!

First of all, I pretty much took Friday afternoon off (remember, I’m self-employed now, so I can get away with that, as long as the work is still getting done…which it is), and we did a bunch of running around. Just stupid stuff that needed to get done mostly. But we had fun doing it.

On Saturday morning, I got up early. REALLY early because at 4:30 a.m., I heard the wind really whipping our awning…and being kind of anal about things, I got up and rolled up the awning and put away anything that the wind could blow away. I tried to get back to sleep after that, but probably only slept about 45 minutes or so before I got out of bed at 7:30 a.m. A couple of hours later, I was – guess where – at a model boat race! It was pretty fun, but the wind was still blowing (as it did all day Saturday), and the water was rough for the guys…so they couldn’t go as fast as they really wanted to or else the boats would flip. One of the things I noticed about these particular racers though, was that they are RECKLESS! I don’t know how many times I cringed watching the racing.

In the afternoon on Saturday, we went to the WinterFest street fair, which was one of the reasons we really wanted to change our plans and come to Lake Havasu City in February in the first place. It was actually really surprising how big the fair was. It was probably close to a mile of vendors (everything from Indian music on CDs to Kettle Korn (doesn’t EVERY street fair have Kettle Korn?)). But it was fun. When we got home, I worked on my boat a little (I got the motor “reversed” and finished up everything except getting a cooling fan (though I ordered one) to have it ready to run), and Dawn cooked a turkey (albeit a small one to fit in the RV oven). We had a great dinner, and tonight we had turkey sandwiches. YUM.

Today was fun, too. We had been told that there was a flea market here in town. Don’t ask me what it is – our fascination with flea markets – but we went. I bought a new pair of basketball shoes, which I needed badly, for $15. They’re not Nikes, but they LOOK like Nikes.

That’s the update for today. I’ll upload a few model boat racing pictures to the blog soon.

Another gorgeous sunset from "our house". I am posting these pictures at the same time that I'm watching "Grey"s Anatomy". If anybody out there does not watch that you are crazy! It is by far my favorite show. IT IS SOOOOOO GOOD!!!

Nelson and "the girls" on our beach patio.

Nelson, on our patio. This was just this evening. Very, very nice.

The good life.

We went to "Winterfest" this weekend. An outdoor craft market. Nelson enjoyed his Philly cheese steak sandwich...yum, yum.

Sunset from the boat.

This is a picture of "our home" from the boat on the lake. We are 3 RV's to the right of the one in the middle. It has an awning out and an empty spot to the left.

This is another picture of the London Bridge area in Lake Havasu City from the boat that we were on.

Nelson, on the boat that we took across the lake to the casino. This is also a picture of the London Bridge.

We took a boat across the lake to the California side, to go to Havasu Landing Casino. This is a picture of the London Bridge from the water. I think Nelson previously explained how this bridge got here, which is really amazing when your are standing here looking at it. We had lots of fun at the casino. It was really small and they had $3.00 Blackjack tables. We had a really nice night out.

Dawn

We have been having a wonderful time in Havasu. Our view is so beautiful. We both feel so lucky to be able to be having this sort of life right now. Nelson has been working a lot. Yesterday he took a break and we walked down the beach to the little shops under the London Bridge. It’s only about a mile from our “home”. There were some very cute little shops. We stopped for a cappuccino at an outdoor café where Nelson proceeded to spill his entire Mocha ( whipped cream , cookie and all) all over the table. The girl was really nice about it though and we left her a little bigger tip. We inquired into the cost of renting a waverunner (something both of us have been wanting to try), $60.00 per hour. That sucks, maybe next year.

We have been researching our internet options on the road. We did find some that were half way affordable. But after looking online at the forums that were discussing these options, we’ve decided that none of them sound very reliable. Therefore, we bought a T-Mobile phone for me ($30.00) with a USB port, so at least we can go online at the same time. Even if it is dial up, it seems to be our most reliable option for now.

Nelson inflated our rubber raft today to take to the lake. We didn’t get a chance to go out today, but hopefully tomorrow.

If anyone wants to take their vacation in the middle of the cold winter up there and come to Lake Havasu, we’d love to see you and show you around. I miss my friends and family (But not enough to come home, lol). Mick and Laguya are coming to Phoenix next month so that will be fun. And we’ll hang out with Lauri , Ron , Dri and Bella next month , and I’ll see Brooke and Luka next month. So at least we’ll get to see some friends and family.

The dogs have been loving our beach walks everyday. So have we.

Molly loves running on the sand. Neither dog likes the water though.

Today we saw our first sailboat in front of us.

This picture doesn't do justice to this scene. The sun was just going down and reflecting off of the mountains. The RV's are on the beach, by us and behind that is the city of Lake Havasu. Which, by the way we have a beautiful view of the lights at night. This was taken from our patio.

It was really windy a couple of days ago. It was kind of like a storm at the beach(without the rain). You can see in this picture that there were whitecaps on the lake. And we could hear the waves crashing and the seagulls. Really cool, but not awesome.

Our new patio on the beach.

These things are pretty popular around here. Ultralights, I guess. Pretty cool to be sitting on your patio and see one of these right above you.

Maps

Here are the maps I said I'd try to find for you. The one on top hopefully will help you figure out where we are. It's pretty much right on the California-Arizona border about 70 miles south of Nevada. You'll see, if you look closely at the bottom of the map above where Quartzsite is. :)

Nelson

The last few days it's been really difficult for me to concentrate on work, but today I got in a full day's worth of work. Yesterday wasn't too bad, either, when you combine the hours I worked in the morning with the three or so hours I worked last night.

But this place, Lake Havasu, is so beautiful there are lots of natures (and man's) temptations.

Those of you who know me well, know that I love being around the water. Well, the place we're parked in is literally less than 100 feet from the edge of the lake and there's nothing to obstruct our view. I'll try to find a map of the lake and the area that we can highlight where we are, so I can post it for you guys.

But here's the rub. This place is crazy about boats. Model boats, race boats, passenger ferry boats, sail boats, waverunners . . . whatever. They love water sports here. That makes it distracting, when it's so easy to just go out for recreation

Today was 80 degrees in Lake Havasu City, and we almost got out in the raft to float on the lake a little. But, I had to get some work done.

I think from now on, we'll take the plan we had yesterday. Work during the morning, and then go play in the afternoon, and work more in the evenings. Heck, I'm my own boss these days, so that ought to work!

Speaking of yesterday, it was an awesome afternoon. We went for a long walk, probably close to three miles. We walked down the beach to the little channel that goes between the island we're on and the mainland. Needless to say, most of that walk was on sand, and you know how demanding walking in sand can be. Ugh. We decided quickly that we wouldn’t walk back that way, and use the sidewalks instead.

Oh, I should have mentioned that the little channel we walked along goes under the London Bridge. Yep, the actual, real London Bridge. The one that was dismantled and auctioned off in the 60s in London, England. It’s the one that the children’s song is all about. It didn’t really fall down though. It’s now the main tourist attraction in a small town in the middle of a desert. Pretty cool, really, though.

Anyway, there are lots of shops and stuff around the bridge, most of which aren’t even open during this, the “offseason” around here. But it was fun. Everything has been fun so far. Even my work, which as I said, is tough to stay focused on here in Havasu.

But we’ll make it work. No doubt.

P.S. The dogs are loving having a beach right out in front of us. They both love the little walks they get to go on out there!

Nelson

By the way, lost in all the Super Bowl hype was the fact that the COUGS beat the little puppies of U-Duh (that's the University of Washington for all of you who aren't familiar with the Pac-10 rivalries) in men's basketball AGAIN on Saturday! That'd be a sweep of the pups this season.

Just like football!

GO COUGS and SEAHAWKS!!

Seahawks lost, but we fans won...really

I bet everyone who knows me thinks I'm devastated tonight. But truthfully, I'm not.

I said a couple of days ago that if the Seahawks lost, at least they still got there, which was major. After all the years that the Seahawks were not very good, it was a real treat to sit and watch them play in the freakin' SUPER BOWL today! I thought, for the most part, they played pretty darn well. They did make a lot of stupid mistakes, and were the victims of a lot of really bad calls, but they were in the Super Bowl. There are 30 other teams that were at home this weekend, wishing they were in the Seahawks' shoes...and think of all the fans of those teams who wished they were us this weekend.

On the other hand, it was frustrating to see the momentum taken away from my favorite team more than once, by poor calls made by the officials. First of all, Ben Rothlesberger's score was NOT a touchdown, and Darrell Jackson did NOT commit offensive pass interference in the first quarter, contrary to the east coast bias that obviously affected the officials in tonight's game. But oh well, as my lovely wife always reminds me, it's just a game. And it's over now. Time to start rooting on the Seahawks to a return to the Super Bowl next year!

It really was fun watching the game tonight. I had a perfect partner to watch it, and a great place to watch from. While the skies were blue, it was VERY windy today and Lake Havasu looked like the ocean. We even opened the door and a few windows in order to hear the waves crash on the shore. It was pretty cool. Seems as if the wind has passed for the day now, though.

Super Sunday!!

It's finally here...Super Sunday. GO SEAHAWKS!!!!!

Nelson

We bought a toaster!! We’re both excited, but I think it’s fair to say that the little boy in me is really excited about our new toaster. It’s nothing super fancy, just one of the least expensive ones we could find, but for the last week or so, we’ve both been commenting about how much we miss toast.

So today, when we were out shopping for a few things we needed, we strolled down the toaster aisle, and we found one! We also found a vacuum cleaner that we needed. With the new motor home (“Myrtle”), we have a light-colored carpet and all the dirt really shows up. If you never saw the first motor home (“Howie”), you don’t know that one had dark green carpet, so it wasn’t as much of a worry. Anyway, I’ll admit that I’m not much of a vacuum operator, so Dawn needed a vacuum that could suck up all the dog hair and tracked-in desert dirt that was in the carpet. She worked hard today getting the place cleaned up and it looks fantastic right now! Together, we also got our little “patio” area all set up this afternoon, complete with a picnic table that we heisted from the beach (like everyone else in the park has done), our big RV mat that sits outside so we’re not always walking on just dirt, and we got the awning out. We’re pretty much settled for the next month. It’s nice and cozy.

Over the last two days, we’ve decided that we’re going to live in Lake Havasu City from November through February, then Mesa in March, and travel the country for a couple of months (April & May) next year, and hopefully for a couple of years after that. We’ll spend June through October at home. We love Lake Havasu City. It is the home of the London Bridge, afterall (but that’s a story for later).

Our DirecTV is all set up and we FINALLY have DVR (TiVo) again! We even have the fancy hook-up that allows us to record two channels at once and watch something else that’s saved on the DVR. It’s pretty darn cool! Now all we need is our big screen XD TV that’s back home, and well be set. Man it would be great to have this set up with the new TV for the Super Bowl tomorrow! I understand my stepdad Jim has a new TV set up, too…just in time for the big game. I’m sure he, Mom and Trenton will enjoy watching the game on that!

By the way, we’ve got a used Dish Network receiver, a new DirecTV receiver (that came with the RV and we’re not using), and a used TiVO machine for sale. If anyone reading the blog wants that kind of fun electronic equipment, or knows someone who does, please let me know.

Speaking of all the fun TV-related gear (since people seem to be getting new TV stuff this week before some important football game), I feel so out-of-touch about the Super Bowl. I haven’t read anything about it online since late Wednesday night. There is another couple just down the road that are Seahawks fans (they have a huge banner and a flag hanging outside their fifth wheel celebrating the team) and today, we drove by their place and yelled out the car window, GO SEAHAWKS!! They waved at us, smiling. The guy at the DirecTV store yesterday said he’s not really a fan of either team, but he’s pulling for the Seahawks because it seems like no one else is. Regardless, I’m really excited about the game. So, if you’re watching the game, we’re hoping that you’ll find it in your heart to root for the Seahawks. We will be!

Lake Havasu City is really fun. Seems like everyone here is really nice. Last night for dinner, we went to a place called Chuy’s, which served all kinds of different stuff, but mostly Mexican. We ordered lobster tacos and a pork burrito, both of which we shared. It was pretty good, but the lobster tacos could’ve been better. They were pretty bland. The margaritas were good, though. It’s undoubtedly a town that survives on tourism. Today, at least four or five ultra-light aircraft flew over the lake right in front of us. There were lots of boats on the lake, and the RV campground we’re in is full to the gills.

While we were out today, we stopped by one of the hobby stores in town, the one that’s sponsoring the model boat race Dawn told you about yesterday. The boats that will be racing are similar to the ones I used to race (well, tried to race anyway), nitro and gas deep-v hulls, crackerboxes, catamarans and hydros. No electrics, which is what I’m doing now, but I thought maybe I’d take the new Red Man down with me and show it off a little bit. J My goal is still to have the boat ready to run a little testing here. It’s not like it’s a long way to go to run. Probably no more than 100 feet to the water from our RV, which brings me back to the point I started to make about our stop at the hobby store. The guy there was really helpful, and acted like thought it was neat that someone came in because his store had sponsored the race, and was interested in boat racing. He said he could order me the part I’m missing for my boat (which is pretty much the only thing stopping me from running right now), so I’ll call tomorrow and ask him how quickly he can get my part in. It’s silly really, just a $3 cooling fan that helps keep the electric motor in my boat from overheating.

Anyway, we’re having a great time, and tomorrow’s the Super Bowl! Go Seahawks!!

Monday, I’ll be back to working for all my great clients.

Dawn

Ok. We’re hooked. We are at Lake Havasu now. The lake with the sandy beach is right out our front door. We absolutely love it. And the rent is only $375.00 per month that includes electricity. This is the cheapest rent we’ve paid yet and the coolest place. I think this place is what made up our minds for us that we definitely want to turn into full time RVers. Our most recent discussion has been to come here November’s thru February’s ( 4 mos.) Go to Mesa in March (for spring training), travel to new places every April and May (the weather in other states should be ok by then) and then June through October at home. That’s Portland/Vancouver for 5 mos. of every year. If I can get my job back for the months we’re at home, we’ll stay around there. If not, we thought maybe living and working in Seaside would be fun.

We can’t wait to get our raft out on the lake. And Nelson is anxious to try out his little hydro. He read in an article today that they have some kind of model boat races here. With some kind of big race here on Feb. 11th and 12th. He’s trying to find out now just what kind of model boats they are and if they include hydro’s. So he’s pumped.

It’s probably about 75 or 80 degrees here today. It’s very pleasant at our site on the lake. I hear it gets to be as high as 120 degrees in the summer. This is actually Havasu’s off season with snowbirds this time of year. I guess it’s crazy with students next month on Spring Break (glad we won’t be here, a little too much excitement for us. We’d rather hang with the snowbirds. Anyone that knew me in my younger days would be shocked to hear me say that). And the summers are crazy with kids and families for the water activities.

Yesterday, we took the motorhome to a shop to have them check the “service engine soon” light. The dealer that we bought it from said he’d pay to have that fixed. It was actually free (still under warrenty) to have that fixed, but the service man found that the cylinder to the airconditiong was out of stuff? Freeon? Or whatever. And if we didn’t have it replaced it would freeze up something and be bad and cost us a lot of money. So that sucked. Although the salesman said he checked that, which he obviously didn’t, so hopefully he will reimburse us for that. Which was very expensive.

While we were waiting yesterday we went to the movies and saw “Fun with Dick and Jane”. Neither one of us really wanted to see that but it was the only thing playing at that time. We actually ended up enjoying it. It was very cute.

Nelson is trying to hook up our Directv satellite. Which we finally decided on. We’ve tried using the antennae(sp?). Some RV parks but not all, have cable hook up. Some are free and some cost. We hadn’t found anyway yet to use DVR, which we’ll now be able to again. That, we miss a bunch. Now we just need to figure out a way for high speed internet in any situation and we’ll be ok. We are back to dial up on Nelson’s phone this month. We did find a couple of things online that we could hook up to the dierctv satellite, but they’re pretty spendy. I think the cheapest one was about $2700 or so. So if anyone has any recommendations please, please, please let us know. I guess if we pay for cable, like through Qwest it’s about $35.00 per month, IF it’s available(which it isn’t here). So, I guess we could just figure @ $2700 the payment for that thing would probably be about $35.00 per month, so it might work itself out. But that’s still a lot of money.

Well, Steph got a new job at Billygan’s Restaurant in Hazel Dell. She likes it a lot. She’s going to try to stay on at Who Song’s too. So everybody go by there and tell her hi, and give her a big hug from me.

I hope everyone has a great weekend. I’ll think about all of you guys in Washington when we’re out on the lake tomorrow. See ya!

This is out of our front window.