Ontario, Oregon to Spanish Fork, Utah

We're back in Spanish Fork, Utah.  We have been here before.  We're at the same Hampton Inn as last time.  We like this hotel.

Today was the day of the truck.  I have never seen so many 18 wheelers on the highway before.  We saw something that really creeped me out.  I thought traffic on the highway had stopped for construction.  After consideration, we decided that the stoppage was due to a gaper's block.  There was an trailer from a big rig on the other side of the jersey barrier.  Its tires had been peeled off the rims, and there was damage to the undercarriage.  It was very surreal.  Then we saw a Tahoe or a large sport utility vehicle on a landoll trailer, that looked like both doors on the driver's side had been bitten off, and the car body was crushed.  So that was unnerving.

The weather started out good, then got bad.  Just south of Salt Lake City, it was snowing heavily, but it was too warm to stick.  I hate driving in snow, just hate it.

Here are photos. We had some impressive clouds as well as some impressive wind.

I'm trying not to look at election results.  It's too soon to know anything, and it will just make me crazy.  

Tomorrow we are up and out for Bull Head City, Arizona.  Yep, that really is the name of the place.

Spokane to Ontario, Oregon

Today's weather just sucked.  Clouds in the trees, the road in the clouds in places, windy, wet, and cold.  Tomorrow night Spanish Fork is forecast to go into the 20's so all the drugs (prescription), Covid tests, and contact lenses have to come in so they don't freeze.  It makes me irritable to haul all of these things into the hotel, and then have to haul them back out.

I have had a major packing fail, my Clinique moisturizer and both our deoderants are in the cabinet where they always live, and not in the blue bag.  It's aggravating, I did so well on not forgetting stuff until I did.  Good thing it's cold, no one is sweating.

We are at the Holiday Inn Express.  It's not the worst place we've been.  The pros are, big room, lots of horizontal space for spreading out our multitudinous items.  Bathroom is large.  I do hate the shower head.  There is no good setting for the water flow, the shower curtain is not wide enough, so the floor is wet.  They're using a water softener; it's tough to feel really clean, softened water has a slimy feel.  The bathroom floor is not clean, our flip flops stick a little bit when we walk in there.  This hotel also charges the refundable $250 "deposit" in case you smoke in the room.  We don't smoke, but house keeping makes the call.  Once you're gone, good luck disputing that charge.  It's just aggravating.  We're on the freeway side of the hotel, I think if there is a next time I would request the other side of the building.  

We did better getting through Kenniwick, but we still messed up on an exit.  GPS sorted us out as soon as we realized we were not where we wanted to be.  Today's key learning was look at the GPS map prior to getting there, and know all of the places where one can go off track and don't do that.  We did have improvement today, I think we've run out of exits to miss.

Here are a couple of photos from today.  Photography was difficult due to the water on the windshield, and the phone camera's insistence on focusing on that, instead of outside.

Oil change and caffeine, everything you need, nothing you don't.

Snow in the area of Deadman's Pass.  It went away as we lost elevation.

Day one out of four is done, three more to go. 

Update to post:  We would not go back.  Even though I thought we were on the freeway side of the hotel, we weren't.  The truckers' Jake brakes woke us up a lot all through the night.  There was a lot of road noise.  Ontario is a grim little enclave, deep in the red part of Oregon.  We just did not like being there. 

Protector of Women

Good morning People of Earth.  We are up and out early for warmer climes tomorrow.  At present it's in the low 30's with fog.  My favorite weather.

I know we're all sick of the election, but this is too amazing to pass up.  A few days ago, in one of his rallies, the orange sicko was heard to say that he would be the protector of women, whether they wanted him to or not.  Think about that, we have no say as to whether we want his protection or not.  So, that was bad enough.  Now we have this from The New Republic.

Trump’s Promise to Young Men: I Am Your Retribution Against Women

He and his MAGA allies are ramping up the sexism and misogyny as part of a closing message that they will restore men to their rightful place—of total control over women

Cognitive dissonance much?

 

Madam Vice President was on Saturday Night Live last night.  Here is a short clip from the show.  I thought she gave a pretty good performance of being a nice person.

 

So, we're now up and out to complete the process.

 

This is the current state of the back of the car.  There's more to be wedged in there.  The shiny things on the right are deflated Space Saver bags.

 If you haven't voted, please do.

 

Halloween

Happy Halloween.  

I just spent an hour of my life that I will never get back.  Before lunch I was out on Google Photos examining the number of drawers that the new kitchen does not have.  The software was working fine and life was good.  Two hours later, I discovered I was kicked out of google.  No Gmail, no access to Blogger, no google photos, google did not know me.  I'm on a different PC, I'm sure that had something to do with it, but why was it fine, and then it wasn't.  It was fine on my phone.  After an hour or so of trying to convince google it was me, I clicked on the "recover account" button on a help article, and low and behold it worked, I was back.  So much of my personal history is on blogger in unpublished posts, I put stuff there to have it where I can find it.  The inner workings of Google are a mystery to me.  Of course, I could say the same thing about Microsoft products.

My laptop is at the PC doctor.  I charge it at night, shut it down, unplug it.  Then, in the morning, sometimes the battery is at 0%.  This is the laptop I bought in February 2024 to replace the one upon which the hinge failed.  This is a failed hinge below, you can't close the laptop anymore.  So, he's trying to determine what the issue is.  If it wants a new battery, I'll pay for it.  If it's the mother board, it's going back to somewhere because it's under warranty.

I think this is fairly emblematic of the world at the moment.  First we had a happy skeleton with his jaunty pose next door.

Then there was a windy afternoon.  No one has been out to pick him up. 

The inflatables have been out since September.

We were just visited by quail.  Many quail.  Look left in the photo, just off the grass, tree in the background.  That gray blur is a quail flying straight up.  I thought it was a smudge on the window, but it's a quail.

It rained a lot today, but then the sun came out, so I guess the trick or treaters will be here after all.

More Fall

This is a quick post to mash down the post I just mistakenly published.  Some of your blogs are fast on the draw to update your blog rolls.  Anyway, here goes mashing down the stack.

In news of the good Shaye Moss and Ruby Freeman take possession of all of Rudy Giuliani's worldly goods today.  I love that.  He ruined their lives with his lies about them passing a thumb drive to each other.  So, this is a good thing, reciprocal ruination.

It's fall, this was yesterday.

That's it! 

Madison Square Garden

Did you watch the klan (also Nazi) meeting held in Madison Square Garden?  I don't think the orange guy helped himself much.  This video of Tony Hinchcliffe particularly seems damaging.  GO HERE, play the video clip.  If you can't play it, this is what he said.

“There’s a lot going on. I don’t know if you know this but there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. I think it’s called Puerto Rico”

Tony Hinchcliffe may have just scuttled the orange intestine's campaign. The clip is everywhere, it's on Facebook, Instagram, twitter, everywhere.  Meanwhile, Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, known as Bad Bunny, shared to his 45.6 million Instagram followers a video from Harris’s official account in which the vice president outlines her vision for Puerto Rico. A source close to Bad Bunny confirmed the post was the artist announcing his support for Harris.  I've never heard of Bad Bunny before, apparently he is a much beloved rapper from Puerto Rico.  You can read more here.

Then there was this.

 

Soon, this will be over.