Spring Break

Well today is the first day of Spring Break for my grandson Adam, Grandpa will have to figure something out for us to do today, it’s a cloudy day so the park will be out, maybe a trip to the train museum. The St Louis Museum of Transport in Kirkwood MO is only about a 20 minute drive and they have all kinds of neat stuff for a nine year old boy and his nine year old Grandpa to climb over. I could get a few pictures if the weather co-operates. Donna is off to the truck company and I am awaiting Adam waking up, Rigg’s is still zonked out from playing ball before Donna got ready for work, as soon as she left he went to his bed and crashed,
Thought I would show you a couple of pictures of a trip Adam, & I took to Fort Madison Iowa a few years ago to shoot pictures of trains,The campground was located right on the edge of town and was $12 a night. had a big clean shower house/bathroom and not much else it looks like before the big flood of 93 there was a swimming area as it is on a cove of the Mississippi River but the flood destroyed  it. We were there in the fall but there were still several motor homes and trailers there. The trailer is our old 5th wheel.




At the campground you could shoot pictures across a cornfield that had been harvested. The others were taken at the Depot where you could shoot from the passenger platform. Amtrak’s Southwest Chief stops here.
Well that’s about it for now. Be Safe out there, Sam & Donna.

Sunday thoughts.

Well we held out and no snow in Dardenne Prairie this morning, We heard from Kenny and Angela in KC and they said they had 3-4 inches, we are a little over 200 miles east on I-70 and it was cloudy and in the 40’s most of the day with a little rain in the evening. I think we all have had our fill of winter this year, all except for those lucky Canadians who went to California this year. Anyway I posted some pictures yesterday of my truck or tow vehicle if that’s what it’s called and went into a blurb about the hard cover I put on and then wouldn’t you know it I found the pictures I wanted originally about an hour after the blog was published, so here they are.

   

As you can see it is in four folding sections and does a good job of keeping everything dry when it is down. It has a lock on the front compartment and one on the rear. The other thing I just remembered I did and it was ridiculously cheap was I put a torsion bar on the rear tailgate, it was about $15US and only required two holes being drilled, but you do need two people to lift the tailgate back into position. You can open the gate with little or no effort like an SUV rear door. That is my old truck in the background, it was a short bed ext cab, with the smaller diesel. The newer one is a long bed with the duramax/allison combination and is like night and day over the old one. Even though it is longer to maneuver I like the longer bed, no worries about cab interference, and it seems to ride better while towing.

Rigg’s had another typical day I’ll let him tell you about it.

Boy Dad chased me and chased me to get the red thing from me....its a what ?...an inhaler? but Mom I see u put it in your

mouth and its okay.....Its what ..medicine...yuck I don't like medicine....what did Dad mean when he said Walgreens isn't going

to believe this again.

I guess Andy snitched on me...well, he was in that thing that gets you all wet and Dad was downstairs and your bed looked comfy.

And I have short hair so I do get cold, and I always see you and Dad pull the blanket up over you...Guess I really conked out, I

didn't even hear Andy until he came over tapped me !....boy I was having such a good dream and he almost scared me to death, that

wasn't very nice.

Yeah I took that thing from shower floor, but Andy's the one that didn't hang it up....it really didn't taste very good...too soapy tasting.

Oh, it's suppose to taste like soap because its a shower sponge?

I really didn't mean to keep waking you up but I wanted to play and you had the gate up and you were ignoring me, that's why

I kept getting toys and throwing them over the gate....I thought you might want to play too and throw them back to me.

Oh well, honestly I'll try to be better tomorrow

Love

Riggins

 

Well, that’s it for today, be safe out there, Sam & Donna

Saturday happenings

Got up bright and early had coffee with Donna and went down to my office to browse the last couple of days of blogs I had missed. Adam was up about 07:30am and his mom came and picked him up for an Easter Egg hunt, Is it getting to be Easter already?  Yesterday was another gorgeous day with plenty of sun and temps in the upper 60’s. That changed today as it is in the 40’s with a high predicted of 50 and cloudy and looking like rain by this evening. Much better than snow.
I have been noticing a lot of the bloggers with 5th wheels have Chev/GMC duramax tow vehicles, I see several like Rick & Paullettes that are even the same color and could be a twin of ours. We bought ours in 2004 and it has about 75.000 miles on it and has so far been a great truck, other that one minor recall for the tailgate straps, it has never had to go back for any problems, Of course I change the oil and oil filter every 3000 and the air and fuel filters every 5000. I have had people tell me I am wasting my money doing this so often, but I can’t help but think this is money well spent on preventative maintenance. Would like to hear from others with their ideas. The only thing I have added is I took the original shocks off at about 6000 miles and bought a set of Bilstein gas shocks, they seemed to get rid of any bounce I had with the soft original shocks. I have a combined weight of about 18000 lbs when set up for a trip and the power seems adequate so I haven’t bought a chip for it. The only thing I miss since I drive Motorcoachs is the lack of a Jake brake. You get used to them when you drive bigger vehicles and I may look into some sort of exhaust brake down the road. Again if someone out there has experience with this on a pickup let me know your findings.

Here is the truck with our old 5th wheel in the background, This is before I put the Foldacover bed cover on it, It is really a great cover it folds forward when you want to tow and exposes the 5th wheel hitch, then when you want to cover it again it easily fold back and can be locked shut when the gate is up and interlock will prevent the tailgate from being opened until the cover is unlocked. Now I can put stuff in the back like groceries and they stay dry and can be unloaded without going in the truck.


This is our present 5th wheel a 2005 Coachman Chaparral,
The campground it is in is a private one at Lake Sherwood Mo. We own a lot out there and as a lot owner you have access to their campground. They have about 8 pull throughs and about 15 back in spots all hard packed graded gravel with wood curbing. picnic tables, bbq pits, and 30 amp power. A dump station and bathrooms/shower facilities are also provided. It is $5.00 a night for members and a member can bring a guest with their RV for a $10 a night fee.
We will probably sell this lot when we sell the house. But it has been a worthwhile investment for the last ten years as it gives you a great escape place within a 30 minute drive with 5 lakes and a swimming pool and swimming beach and clubhouse.
Well that’s about it for today, be safe out there. Sam & Donna

Home, At last.

Well Sam got back from his Kentucky bus run last night (Friday) it was an eight hour drive each way which when you put a lunch stop and a couple of rest area stops so the bus passengers can get off and stretch their legs every three hours or so makes for a ten hour day.
The college students he took down there were from Olathe Kansas, and the town we went to was Beattyville Kentucky. For those of you who wonder where that is it is located about 50 miles southwest of Lexington KY and is a very small town, I stayed four nights at the Travel Wise Inn in Beattyville and it was a facility straight out of the 60’s, It even came equipped  with a genuine key on a plastic tab for the door, no sliding card here. I must say though it was a family owned establishment and the owners were just good old country people who welcome you like family. Good thing as you could get pretty lonesome after four days with just a 50 foot motor coach and no car to take you around. No computer though so the blog had to sit from Sun till Friday. Oh well, The students spent their four days putting 12 hour days in rehabbing a house for a local church. What a worthy project and what a way to spend your spring break. Again just another example of some of the fine young people that are out there not getting the headlines.
Well with no computer even Rigg’s was disappointed he tried to send his Dad an e-mail but had no way to do it. So here it is a couple days late.
Hi Dad, I know you'll be home today so I wanted to catch  you up on a few things.
I have been a good boy, really.
I learned a couple of new tricks....no nothing like rolling over....this is much more fun.  I call it Fake Out Mom.
See I run to the back door and act like I have to go out....when Mom opens the door and grabs the chain I back up and
sit down just out of her reach....a few minutes later I do it again...sometimes I'll even run to the door and get my big boy bark
on like I hear something in the yard....boy it is so funny,...Kinda back fired the other day..the 2nd time I really did have to go and
she ignored me....thought I was going to pee on myself...so I started to cry and cry and she figured I really did have to go.
another neat trick is I go to my food bowl when she isn't looking, I grab some food in my mouth and then get close, but not too close.
to her and start moving my mouth and clicking my teeth so she knows I have something in my mouth...when Mom says, ok Riggins
what have you got now, I know its time to take off !....  She'll chase me and as usual stick her hand in my mouth....and then oh its
so funny, her hand comes out with nothing but a bunch of soggy kibble.  Gosh I wish I could laugh....but I sure can get a big smile .
Don’t know why Mom doesn’t smile, all she ever says is YUCK, Riggins !
Well, guess I'll save the rest for later....
I promise I'll be better tomorrow
Love, Riggins
After this trip I can see I might have to start looking for a laptop, Donna & I were going to wait till we got near selling the house and then buy two and load them with the programs we use on our desktop and then sell the office type stuff. I might just have to get one early just to take on trips with me, although the vast majority of motels I stay in have a computer for customer use.
Well that’s it for today Be Safe out there. Sam & Donna.

A Blast from the past.

It’s Saturday morning, Donna gets to sleep in, Sam was up at 05:30am and had his first cup of coffee. Got the word last night that I would be taking the bus out Sunday for a Christian University that is going from Olathe KS to Beattyville KY from Sun-Thurs of this week, since it is an 11 hour drive from those two points and you can only drive 10 hours in a day I will relieve another driver who is deadheading to Olathe and then coming back and I will meet him at Kingdom City MO and then finish the trip to Kentucky in 8 hours.

I can only hope the Motel I am staying in has a computer so I can make a blog entry or this will be it till Friday. Donna doesn’t get much free time with her two jobs so she doesn’t make very many updates.

Now, the blast from the past, was looking in a box of old pictures and came up with these.

This is Sam’s Dad, Bing Weibel in 1948 with an old Autocar Tanker he is filling with gas to be delivered. It was gas powered and Dad said it was a real dog.

 

Here is Donna in the 60’s with a 1955 Nash her Dad got her to get to school in, unfortunately she didn’t have it long, her Dad forgot to put antifreeze in it and the block cracked. Ooops. I little six, another dog.

 

                 Here is Sam on parade duty on his Harley about 1980, this was a 100mph machine. More Like it.

Wow, time flies when your havin fun. How about another Rigg’s adventure, he loves getting on the blog.

“Hey Mom why did I get doggie time out last night ?

How was I to know that yellow thing Adam had in his hand and was wiggling back  and forth was a pencil and he was

doing homework? I really didn’t mean to almost knock him off the chair.  It's just that yellow thing kept moving around and

I wanted it.

And that stuff you put on your lips last night, well it just smelled so good. Sorry if I pinned you to the chair and licked it all off.

Actually it smelled much better than it tasted.

Tell Adam I'm sorry for jumping on his back and pushing him across the room, I just wanted to play ball and he ignored me !

Tell Dad not to leave his cookies on the table, I just CANT resist a good cookie. Sorry Dad if you don’t have a morning snack.

I'll try to be better tonight” , honest.

Love Riggen.

TGIF

Well, now that we are at the end of the week, Coffee was at 04:30am, Adams Mom picked him up from school yesterday so he is spending the night with her tonight so Sam doesn’t have to take him to school today. Donna is off to work at the truck company and then to the restaurant tonight. God Love her I don’t know how she does it. I worry about her heart continuously since she had her angio plasti last spring, 3 stents. wow!. I always thought that as big as i am and with the stress of police work I ran the danger of the BIG One but I never thought my skinny wife would have problems. Isn’t that how life is. Maybe I can take this time to really introduce you to the Love of my life, a true soul mate in all respect, how I have ever been worthy of this love and admiration I will never know, I never considered myself an attractive man, however my wife saw something in me and now after 32 years we still see each other as nest mates and I think the main answer is respect. You have to love and respect your partner.

                        Donna,the love of my life with her boy.

                   Yep even camping she’s up before the sun for coffee.

                         Sam & Donna on our Nashville vacation.

                            Sam & Donna on the riverboat.

                            We’re still dancing after 30+ years.
This lady, works her heart and soul out to get us to our goals, how many 61 year old women work two jobs 12-13 hours a day.
I was always the brawn and muscle of the outfit and in that pretty body was the brains, she could figure a solution, when I couldn't A good mother, and now a good grandmother, what more could a man ask for in life. I have been truly blessed by God Almighty.

                              Still a really good looking lady.
                    
            Honey when you read this, I just want to say I LOVE YOU…
Okay I have bared my soul to the world, but that is how I feel about my wife and soul mate, Donna. Sam….

Another Train Thursday

Well, the usual , up at 04:30am, coffee, Donna off to the truck company at 05:30am, then make sure Adam is up and ready for Sam to take to school. I thought  maybe I would include some more train pictures of the models at the club.
This is not a club picture it is the Lionel O Gauge train from when I was a kid, we put it up under the Christmas tree. How many of you had or still have one of these, when I was a boy my Dad and Grandfather would fill the front room with Lionel's. What memories. To think they are almost 60 years old and still run like a top due to cleaning and lubrication. Not many toys last that long.

A street scene from the club,the yellow 55 chev 210 post is a model of Sam’s first car.

How about a roundhouse picture, yes the turntable will slowly turn an engine like like the real thing.

another roundhouse view.

the ole swimming hole.

Look’s like Sam’s parked the 5th wheel and the gang is waiting to take some pictures.

Always time for a volleyball game.
A Missouri Pacific freight train.

Nickel Plate 759 has a Rail fan Special at the station. This locomotive is at Steam town in Scranton Pa. Hopefully it will be rebuilt and returned to excursion service.
Well I hope this is entertaining to some , it is really a trick to get clear and sharp pictures of models that have a believing depth of field. Also we have surrounded the club layout with a Plexiglas fence to keep little and sometimes big fingers from causing unwanted damage.
Be Safe out there. Sam & Donna.