Sunny Acres RV Park

It's Sunday and a pretty low key day....not doing anything and I am BORED!! This is a pretty nice park....a good place to hang out waiting for parts. Much better than stuck in the desert, for sure.
I am feeling introspective today...just kinda quiet and thinking. We have lots of different things going on and I am trying to consider each one in turn. First and foremost for me, is Lisa. She is such a sweetheart, rarely bucks whatever is going on at the time. Her seizures, tho, add an element that can be crazy making. We never know when they are gonna hit......waiting for that last boot to fall.....and when they do, all hell breaks loose. So, we listen closely and ask often "Are you ok?" I am thankful that she hasn't hit her little bald noggin going down....bumps and bruises everywhere else, tho. Is it fair to her to move her all the time given that people with disabilities generally want routine and "sameness"? On the other hand, she enjoys getting out and seeing things. I wish I could just ask her so many things and this is one! But her language skills are just not there....she says "yeah" to everything! And, if I try, she gives me a confused look...so I try again with different words....only further confusing her and frustrating myself!
Then there is Irie.....I can tell she doesn't like her new life. She doesn't have her forest to run in, no smelly dead things to roll in, no freedom at all. Consequently, she spends her days guarding us. Her occasional growls and mini barks have grown to every other second. Thankfully, she isn't a yappy little dog...that would drive me insane! And I feel guilty that I can't walk her as much as she would like.....some days my Fibromyalgia just won't allow it.
I am worried about Alan, too. He says he's happy and loves this life, but lately, when something breaks down (and there are always at least 3 things waiting to be repaired), he says "that's it!!" and growls and grumps for days...so how happy exactly is he? Our so called insurance has been anything BUT assuring! This is the first big repair they have ok'd.....I'll bet we've put close to $10,000 dollars we don't have into this adventure! Money is a fear button for a lot of people and it is for Alan...so he stresses every month that we will run out....  And I know he feels guilty that he had this idea and pushed for it. But, in truth, my wandering soul liked the idea a lot....
Now, I'm not so sure. Yes, it is wonderful to get out and see the sights. Yes, we have met some great people.  Yes, it is the only way ,financially,  we can afford to get across the nation and see my brother and his family. But all these good things happen 1/3 of the time...the other 2/3 are taken up with repairs or simply doing a leg of our trip east. In the meantime, domestic chores are all made more difficult. Lugging the dirty clothes to and from the laundry, making meals in a tiny kitchen without all my handy dandy gadgety things, being on top of each other 24/7, dealing with RV plumbing and the toilet that hurts my back and arm every time I flush, walking to and from the showers with Lisa and towels, shampoo, soap, etc. or taking a shower in our shower where I bang my arms on the side walls trying to wash my hair, things falling out of cabinets on my feet or trying to find something, I miss my roots and friends and especially, Kris and April.....I could go on, but what's the point??
Somehow, I've got to figure out how I really feel about this life and if I want to continue. When Alan is ready to dump it.....I'm looking on line for a house to rent and finding really great ones with character and an ocean view! When things are good....I am enjoying it and Alan is fun to be around. I just wish it would stay good at least 50% of the time! On the other hand, how many people get to do this? We have seen some amazing sights, truly, truly beautiful. Met people that would help you out in a second, enjoyed meals and sunsets and sunrises to take your breath away.... so much to think about! We have talked and decided to give it a year, which would be March 1st, 2012.
I will close by telling you about the lady next to us here. What a hoot! At night, she is right outside our bedroom, saying in a Mini Mouse, high pitched voice, "Go poo poos for Mommy, go poo poos, come on baby go poo poos, go poo poos....." and it goes on and on for maybe 5 minutes of this sing-songy voice til the poor dog manages to please her and shit!! I feel sorry for that poor dog! We just walk Irie and she does what she does! So, you see, I have met some unusual people, for sure! LOL!!

Still here......

And it looks like we will be here for a while! The good news is that the insurance is actually gonna cover most of the repair......the torn up carpeting is still on us and that's a bummer. I would love to put in hardwood, but that's heavy and may not work with the slide (according to the rv repair guy). Carpet just doesn't work.....it gets dirty really fast.....maybe some sort or Pergo? Has anybody worked with Pergo? It "sounds" easy, but.....
The other option might be some linoleum????

Halloween is almost upon us, so I got this pumpkin that lights up and Lisa had a ball putting up these sticky gel decorations on the windows.

Lisa had one small seizure yesterday morning, but rested and was fine the rest of the day and today. I think the increased meds are helping! She also doesn't seem so "out of it"!!

Our next door neighbor was BBQing last night and then a crazy storm came in and it poured off and on for a  few hours! Not exactly a StudMuffin......lol!

Las Cruces, New Mexico

After saying goodbye to some new friends, we left at the butt crack of dawn, but we made it no trouble at all. Alan drove the Magic bus and I followed with the flashers going.....it was a long 60 miles, but it was all good. Dropped the rig off at Sunland and then put in our first of many phone calls to Lisa's neurologist. Between having to drive back to Deming to sign a permission slip to fax her lab results to Dr. Blaha and then waltzing thru the rigamoroll (sp?) with WalMart pharmacy, we ended up with 3 days worth of pills!!! SO frustrating!! The  rest were ordered and will be in tomorrow afternoon, so that will be another 120 miles round trip. Good thing we adore this girl!
While back in Deming, we visited their museum.....it was HUGE! And had everything from military to dolls. They had a tree that you could put your family's service people on...just kinda of honoring them. So we put Sean's name and my Dad's.
We visited a park just across the Rio Grande, but opted not to hike because of the snake factor. We did see this roadrunner (Remember Wile E. Coyote and the Roadrunner? I LOVED that cartoon! One of the few I'd sit and watch with the boys). The Roadrunner (Beep, Beep!!) is New Mexico's state bird....cute little fella and he even stopped and posed for us! Then, we took Irie to a city park and let her do her running thing...she loved it, of course.

Now staying at Sunny Acres RV Park and it is pretty nice. The internet connection sucks, so I am currently in the clubhouse and enjoying the quiet. I need to get back...it's Lisa's bedtime, so I'll close. Tomorrow will be a down day as we are sticking closeby to the Rv repair place (they are ordering parts and it looks iffy as to whether the insurance will cover this repair, too), so I'll probably do some laundry and such. Oh, these last 2 pics are of the cotton!

Adobe Deli went straight to hell

We started our day hunting down a deli that everyone was raving about....figured we just had to try it. Out of town 8 miles, then right on a dirt road "can't miss it!" Obviously, these people don't know us well!! Finally called 411, got the number and then called them at the Deli. STILL weren't sure when we pulled into the parking lot! Finally spotted a sign over the door and went into the most unusual place ever. Had a great lunch, watching the locals all vying for attention of one lady. Pretty interesting.
While we were walking around, Lisa excused herself and went into the bathroom. She was taking a while, so I went to check on her and she said was "ok". We waited another 5 minutes and I went to check on her with "Are you sure you're ok?" I could see her thru the opening between the stall and door and she didn't look right to me. Before I could say "unlock the door" she went down on the floor!! I forced the door open and realized she was in a full blown seizure. As per usual when she gets these, she had lost control of her bowels, and so, we were slipping and sliding in shit! YUCK! I got her back on the toilet, and then, while holding onto her (she goes completely limp), and Alan handing me paper towels, I got most of it cleaned up throwing them into the trash and taking fresh from him. After a bit, she was better, but still having "aftershocks". The staff at The Adobe Deli couldn't have been nicer and let us use a couch to lay her down on. Lisa was complaining of her back, so we opted to have the staff call for an ambulance. Maybe 15 minutes later, she was loaded up and I jumped in too. Alan followed in the truck. The EMS guys were very sweet with her, very efficient.....even getting an IV started on that bumpy dirt road! Hospital staff were wonderful and the doc even played with Lisa saying she was "breaking his finger" when he had her squeeze it. XRays and blood taken, and then the long wait.  Alan went to get clean clothes for her and more waiting. Finally, the doc came in, all was well, nothing broken, just low on her seizure meds. He ordered a shot for her that was supposed to stop the aftershocks, but it increased them! I wasn't comfortable going out of there like that, so again we waited to speak to the doc again. You know how ERs are...everything takes an hour, I swear! This time he ordered her regular med for her, but twice the dosage she now takes and that did the trick.

Got her into the truck, up the stairs and onto our bed where she watched a Betty Boop (her all time fav!) movie til bedtime. Today, you'd never know we had all gone thru so much last night!! But we are still taking it easy, getting laundry done, stuff like that. Tomorrow, first thing, I'm calling her neurologist to discuss her breakthroughs. Also, tomorrow, we take the Magic Bus in for her appointment.....really hoping we can stay in it and not have to "hotel" it! Wish us luck!

Silver City, New Mexico

Took off for the day to check out a town about 50 miles away. Interesting place. Small artsy shops, a cabin that Billy the Kid lived in and then the most amazing restaurant. Very upscale, but without the upscale prices. I had a Chicken Penne and a glass of red that were both just topnotch! I really enjoyed the place! There was a really quaint and obviously old hotel called the Palace Hotel.....the shot is their lobby.
Lisa was pretty pooped coming home, so she took a nap (see pic). LOL! I guess the sun was in her eyes! Once we got back to the RV park and mentioned going swimming she perked right up. That girl was a mermaid in a previous life, I swear! She likes to let the pool water go in her mouth which definitely grosses me out, but I keep telling her to close her mouth. Hopefully, before she gets sick from it, she will get the hang of it. The park backs up to I-10, so we have that noise at night, plus 3-4 times a night a train goes by, sounding it's whistle!! Egads! You can even feel the vibration in your butt as they go by!! Hopefully, on Monday, they will have a quieter place for us to stay. I would like to stay in the RV, but I'm not sure that will be possible, especially if they have to remove the entire slide! I just am REALLY not looking forward to sleeping with Lisa in the same room (at a hotel). It would actually be quieter in the Magic Bus because we have 2 doors we can close to drown out her snoring.
With the pool and the people we have met, the park is just fine. It's a gravel lot and not all that pretty, but the social end of it is great! We went to an ice cream social last night. $1.50 bought a bowl of ice cream with caramel or chocolate or strawberry toppings and they had homemade peanut butter cookies that were outstanding. So, we'll spend the weekend here and then we'll take the Magic Bus to Las Cruces on Monday. Hoping we don't get a ticket because of that damn slide.....with it extended out maybe 6" it puts us over the legal limit (on width) by that very 6"! The limit is 102" wide. Keep your fingers crossed!!!!

The new guy

The second guy showed around 5:00 PM and we immediately knew that this guy knew his stuff. He literally tried everything, including trying to wench out the slide with his service truck.( see pics).....all it did was move his truck! By that time, we had made 5 or 6 new friends!! Everyone was really interested to see how the hell this guy was gonna get the slide to move at all. And we have collected cards from people that want to hear how this ends up.
Coach Net is our towing service and because the slide is jammed and won't go all the way in or out, they will not tow us on a flatbed. Liability issues....So, we have an appt. on Monday with an RV repair place in Las Cruces...60 miles away. Alan is gonna drive the RV there and I'm gonna drive the truck.  The large metal Roadrunner was a statue at at rest stop...very cool. But, not so cool, are the signs warning of snakes everywhere!!
Meanwhile, we are talking a LOT about what we want for our future. Tons of people have told us that Rv's have 3 or 4 things going wrong at all times....they all stand around talking horror stories of things gone terribly wrong. One guy overfilled his fresh water tank to the point of buckling his floor and blowing out his joists so badly that the slides would never, ever come in again. Other stories of overflowing black tanks and shit flowing freely into the coach, rats eating wiring and birds building nests in exhaust pipes.! Can we take the stress? I dunno.....one day at a time, I guess. I just know that stress is SO not good for either of us.....it sends Alan's blood pressure skyward and throws me into a fibro flare, big time.And, of course, Lisa and Irie both feel it in the air and react it accordingly.
Speaking of birds, two of our new friends have FOUR parrots in their coach! We had a hard time with the noise and mess from one parrot....we'd never make it with four! But it sure is fun to visit with them. They have a 4 year old Goffin Cockatoo....such a sweetheart bird! It's wings aren't clipped, so they take him outside on leash. He flew off their shoulders and came to visit both Alan and me.....fun stuff!

and the saga continues.....

Ok, today, a mobile RV repair guy shows up right on time and he came from over 90 miles away. I thought to myself, "Cool! Maybe this is a good omen" NOT! The guy was here at 9:30 AM and left around 2:00 AFTER he broke a rod that is made to manually get the slide in. Now, the slide won't move at all! Resigned, we call Coach Net and they tell us they can't tow us with the slide out because it could damage the slide even more. They referred us to the same guy that was already here! Alan told them what happened and that the guy basically just left.. So, they called around to find someone else and that guy is even further away, but says he'll be here today. The closest dealer (again, MANY miles from here) can't take us til next Monday, so we are stuck here til then. The hope is that this new guy can get the slide in and then we will drive to the dealer if it is safe to do. We are fairly sure the ins. will cover the repair, tho we also know how well that has worked out in the past!
We are both debating about continuing this lifestyle. We want to stick it out, but, financially, these repairs are killing us. It would be hard, if not impossible, to get all of our money out of it if we sell. There apparently is no such thing as a lemon law for us. And the stress!! Alan tends to go to anger and I tend to go to tears and neither one helps a bit. We imagined a life of easy travel days, arriving 2-4 PM and then spending a day or two sightseeing, not this "OMG! It died again, the slide won't move and has torn up the carpeting, the GPS has us on a street you wouldn't take a VW bug down, this doesn't work or that is making a weird noise" It's crap.
The up side is that we have met some really nice people here....ones we'd like to keep in touch with, there is a nice pool, a great shower and laundry. We played pool the other night and that was fun.

STUCK AGAIN!

Our biggest slide won't come in all the way. At first, we saw it was hanging up on the carpet, so we pulled that away....nothing. Alan has tried everything...nothing. Since it's Sunday, we are stuck here in Deming. As more and more of these things happen and we sink more and more money into this thing, I am dreaming of renting a house somewhere. The stress of this is just awful and I'm frankly not sure how much more we can take.....sigh....pray for us, please!

Chiricahua National Monument to Tombstone, Az.

We try to get out and see what's around us...this day, we did more travel than usual, but there just isn't much in the desert! At once, we saw these huge grasshopper things... I'm talking like 3 inches long and they were everywhere!! Must be mating season...lol! We did find out at the Chiricahua Visitor's Center that they are called Grouse Locusts....crazy.
From the early 1400's southeastern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico have been home to the Chiricahua Apaches. They were traditionally nomadic, hunting large animals and gathering plants. When settlers arrived, they fought relentlessly led by Cochise and Geronimo. But in 1885, they ultimately surrendered and were taken to reservations in Oklahoma and New Mexico. I still have a hard time with that. They were here first afterall.
Really didn't think I would ever want to look at another rock formation, but they still intrigue me. I think Alan (and definitely Lisa) couldn't care less, though! These pics are from the road as we couldn't hike the trails. There was a large forest fire up there last May and burned thru July...all roads and trails were closed. The "This button doesn't do anything" pic was positioned below a film screen in the Visitors Center....kinda cracked me up!

Off to Tombstone, Arizona thru more sand, sagebrush and flash  flood zones. There were some crops, though. What looked to me like pecans, corn and even cotton. I was surprised to see the cotton! Tombstone is pretty much what you would expect...touristy gift shops, tee shirts and even a Harley store! Check out the old Harley! Of course, we went to the reinactment of the gunfight at OK Corral. That was pretty fun and they did a good job of setting up scene with all the tension in town between the cowboys and townies. We both warned Lisa several times that it was gonna be loud, but when the gunfire started, she nearly climbed into my lap!! LOL!! On our way out of town, we stopped at the Boothill Cemetary....pretty cool. There was a guy trying to get people to go to his shop/museum. It was a reptile place with over 30 snakes. I stopped to see the snake and Lisa loved it....even pet the snake with me holding her hand. Alan hates snakes, so he went into a gun shop. LOL!!

We are now in Deming, New Mexico.. ...NOTHING here to see, so we have done laundry and they have an indoor pool...that was nice! Off tomorrow for Van Horn, Texas.....