Rain in the Old Pueblo

It's raining.  Actually as I type this, it's pouring.  It's not supposed to do this in November, especially on the weekend that is the Tour de Tucson.  It's just going to suck for the riders, all that oil on the roads will be lifting with the rain and it's going to be dangerous.

 

Currently there's about 6 inches of standing water at our end of the park. We're the low end.

 

The gray tank is full, so Jim has had to go out in the rain to dump it.
My job today will be to call Century Link to inform them that they have sent two wireless modems, when only one was requested.  I will bet you dollars to donuts that if I send the extra one back, they'll cut off my service.
Jim got his pc back from the virus slayer, it's running much better than it was.  His job will be to re-establish access to online banking. Our credit union can be difficult to deal with.  They say they're just being diligent, sometimes I think they're just being a pain in the butt.
In other news, I can wear shoes now, but I'm still walking like I have peg leg.  I land on my heel but do not roll forward to the ball of my foot.  It's aggravating my heel and my left hip.  There is a knot in my left arch which is painful as well.   The key learning here is that we don't heal as well in our 60's as we did in our 50's. 
This is all I have to report, maties.  Things are a little slow in the Old Pueblo.

First World Problems Being Resolved, Slowly

There was goodness today, after a poor start to the day.  I had lunch at La Botana Fresco Grill and Cantina with my friend Marcy. We sat outside and had fish tacos that were really good.  I'm looking forward to going back there.  Since Rubios took carnitas off the menu, there's really no reason to eat there anymore, so this is an excellent discovery.

 

This is Marcy's billboard.  She's my age, and this summer had both hips replaced.  She has recovered so well that TMC is featuring her in their new ad campaign.  That's her horse Mex, who she can now ride.  She can also swim, lift weights and bicycle.  Pretty cool, eh?

 

We've decided to turn off the refrigerator.  Having the RV burn to the ground would be beyond inconvenient.  So, we now have 4.4 cubic feet of tiny refrigerator with an even smaller freezer compartment.  Tomorrow we're filling the chest with ice in an attempt to save the french fries and the ice cream.

 

Just after I left for lunch, a Century Link tech came by and activated our DSL service.  Then the modem showed up via UPS around 4:00. I think someone else's modem was diverted to us because the phone number on the activation letter did not match the phone number they gave me this morning.  So now we have 40 meg/sec of blazing internet access.  Tomorrow I will cut back our Verzizon data plan and suspend the Jetpack.  The 78 minutes of my life that I squandered on the phone this morning yielded good results.  This year I was able to hook up the modem and initiate service without having to call help desk.
So there you have it -- part two of the day.

First World Problems

This has been a veerrryyyy long and aggravating week.  Oh wait! It's only Tuesday.  Imagine the possibilities for the next 5 days!
We left the house yesterday to take Jim's PC to the virus slayer.  Due to an error in judgement on my part, Jim's PC has been compromised.  A full wipe of hard drive may be necessary.  No, I'm not divulging my error in judgement, it's too embarrassing.
Then we went to physical therapy for the foot. We saw this on the way.  See the dinosaur trying to bite the land shark?  If you look carefully you can see the fin the dinosaur is going for.

After spending some time trying to loosen up my scars so that my toes can move, there was electricity.  All physical therapists seem to enjoy putting electrodes on their patients.  It's a creepy feeling.  I keep waiting to be electrocuted.

 

After PT, we went grocery shopping.  It was a big shopping with lots of meat and vegetables and frozen stuff.  Upon entering our RV we discovered that the refrigerator was dead.  No lights, no nothing.  Our rudimentary problem solving skills were of no use so we called Ken.  He came out and told us the cooling unit is dying.  It's not unheard of for these to fail, especially in a Norcold.  Here's the bad news.  He reset the cooling unit so it would come back on, but now it's a fire hazard.  Ken told us why, but I couldn't follow the discussion, it has something to do with bad metallurgy. He made a heat shield out of aluminum foil and told us to keep the water pressure up in the hose with the spray nozzle. The new cooling unit will be here in a week and a half, until that time we're at increased risk for burning the RV to the ground.  I think we may go buy a couple of dorm sized refrigerators and turn the current one off.
THEN, this morning, I got on the phone with Century Link to inquire as to why the internet modem that was supposed to arrive yesterday was not here.  They had no record of our order. None!  After hollering for a bit, I was put through to a supervisor, who discovered that the system had cancelled the order 4 days ago with no explanation.  Perfect. One hour and 18 minutes later, they set up a new account, waived all of the activation and shipping fees, and expedited the new order so that hopefully we'll have DSL by this Friday.
Oh, and this morning I locked myself out of my credit union account because I can't correctly type my new, more secure password.  Ack.
So that's what we've been doing here.  I'm really hoping the rest of the week will be tranquil.

Hiking and a New Bike

Yesterday we saw the movie Ender's Game.  It was really good. If you haven't seen it, you should go.  The characters are good and the special effects support the plot, instead of being the plot. When we came out the sun was setting, it was a beautiful evening.

 

This morning Jim went for a hike (without me).  It was a good workout for him, the trail goes UP, the trail goes DOWN, then back up and down.  I'm looking forward to the day when I can go suffer with him.

 

So while Jim was gone, I couldn't go anywhere. The park is large, and stuff is too far away to walk.  My two bikes aren't good for me at the moment, the road bike has clipless pedals and the mountain bike pedals have spikes in them.  We went to Target and looked at cheap bikes.  They're crappy bikes, with crappy components so I ended up getting a bike with no gears and coaster brakes.  It's hard using the coaster brakes. I have 40 years of muscle memory using hand brakes, I keep reaching for them and they aren't there.  My current technique is to slow down a bunch and then sort of jump off.  Here I am on my maiden voyage.

 

It's a cute bike.  I'm going to give it a couple of days and see if I can get used to the coaster brakes. This is a more or less disposable item so spending mass dollars on it makes no sense.

Unresolved Front End Badness AND a Tire Cover Installation Tip

You no doubt remember all of the bitching and moaning I did about the roads in California.  Well, after the transit our previously perfectly aligned RV returned to Tucson with vibration in the steering column and more noise on bumpy roads.  Yesterday we took it into Arizona Spring to check out the front end.  We like them.  When we had the 5th wheel that ate tires they fixed our bent and non parallel axles.  Anyhoo, AZ Spring could find no damage, said we appeared to be in alignment, and suggested we have the wheels balanced.
We went here, to GCR Tire Center.  They're doing excellent brand management.  We pulled up and someone was out the door greeting us.  So they balanced and added a 10 ounce weight to the right front tire.  That helped, but we still have vibration in the steering column on bumpy roads (which would be just about every road in the US).  I guess our next step will be to replace the shocks.  It can't hurt, it might help.

  

Now I have a life improvement tip for you.  When we were in Missoula, we were next to a delightful ex-Forest Service pilot, who showed us what he had built.  When one owns a Class A, getting the wheel covers on the back tires can be a pain in the patootie because you must wiggle a cord between the two back tires and then through another grommet and then pull it back all the way around.  If this makes no sense to you, never mind because we will never do this again.
Here is the improvement.  It's a dowel, with duct tape wrapped around one end, and a removable clip on the other end.

 

Remove the clip, run the dowel through the back grommet.  Thread the dowel between the two back tires, toward the front of the bus.  The duct tape on the end stops the dowel from going all the way through the grommet.

 

Then run the dowel through the other tire cover grommet and place the clip on the stick.  This is so simple I can't believe it.  So now our tire covers are secured to the bus, and life is better. 

 

The foot continues to improve at a glacial rate.  I drove a bunch yesterday, following the bus around Tucson and by the end of the day it was pretty swollen from being down so much.  I was forced to lie on the couch and have Jim bring me things for a few hours.
The weather heads are predicting gusts between 40 and 50 mph today. I think that may curtail outside activity.  It's half past 10 and the breeze is filling in.  So that's what's happening in the Old Pueblo.

Truck Detailing and Local News

Jim arose with the dawn this morning to take the truck in to Watson Chevrolet for detailing.  They washed, clayed and waxed it.  The clay is amazing stuff, it picks up all of the little specks that washing doesn't get, leaving the paint surface as smooth as a baby's butt.
This is the rental we had today.  It's a low end Beetle, but it's fun to drive.  It's a zippy little car.  Being that low to the ground after the pickup is somewhat unnerving.

When Jim left this morning, there was a huge police action at the Silverbell Inn.  After he returned from dropping off the truck, we left in the car and the road was totally closed.  We surmise that something really awful happened, as the road was closed for hours.  When we came home late this afternoon the police were gone, but Bud Foster was out filming a news segment.  We're now suffering through the KOLD talking news heads to see if they'll tell us what the heck happened there.
News flash:  Jim discovered via the internet that the whole thing was due to a suspicious package left in front of the hotel. 

 

Were you aware that the Rincon Market suffered a devastating fire in early July of this year?  We were not.  Today we learned that repairs and renovations have not yet started.  Apparently there have been issues with obtaining approvals from the owner of the building.  On a happy note, the business insurance policy is paying the salaries of the 60 people who lost their jobs due to the fire.  The business owner does not expect to re-open until mid-2014.  This is such a bummer, I love their salad bar.  Many a Sunday breakfast ride has had the Rincon Market as its destination.

 

I put a shoe on my left foot this morning.  It's a little tight, and my sock is leaving imprints in my fat little piggy toes, but I was able to lace it and briefly walk in it.  I'm going to call this progress.