Saturday, October 5, 2013

A rainy day

We are still at Maumee Bay State Park
along Lake Erie in Ohio.

Last night Jim & Kristi, having finished up their business
in Elkhart finally caught up with us and our little circle is complete.

Below is their rig with ours next to them in the background.


The rains have moved in for the next few days but that is ok.
When traveling, where we are is home and you have to expect some rain
from time to time at home.

The ladies take advantage of the weather to work on some projects.


Gracie takes advantage of the day to catch some of that
all important 23hrs a day of shut-eye.


I've been taking advantage of the weather to get a jump on some projects that I'm
working on for my job.
We removed/replaced some chairs and I installed a desk and new work area
in the RV to better allow me to maximize my time and the space.

My new office in the rig is a much more functional set up.
I have the printer and scanner right at hand on my desk.
My office view is constantly changing.


The gentle rain is nourishing the wild flowers that surround us.


Kate has a pot roast going in the crock pot for dinner tonight.
Our neighbors will be over for dinner and a bottle of wine...
or two.

We'll probably figure out where our next stop will be and its looking more like
Gettysburg is going to have to be bypassed due to the government shutdown.

This was one of Kates bucket list items so I feel bad for her but
we'll just have to keep in on the list of places we want to visit down the road.

Thursday, October 3, 2013

Escape from Goshen

Free at last...  Free at last...

The blog has been silent for a while and I guess that I should explain
as several folks have emailed me and said  WTF?

Wow.   What a week.

Kate & I did not enjoy that rally at all.

My last post about the factory tour got me in all sorts of trouble with
the powers that be in the Montana Owners Club (MOC)

I had asked the factory rep who led our tour if it was ok to take some photos
for the blog and he said "sure - take as many as you like".

So I did.
Then I put a link to the blog on the MOC forum...
That started the whole mess.
It was deleted by the censors that night.

It turned out that someone tattled on me.

Then when someone asked where the post went, I replied that it was deleted,
and questioned why it was and that
ignited a mini drama firestorm of folks who portrayed me as a
corporate spy, rule breaker...
others who said I was owed an apology etc.

When the rule was supposedly announced at one of the functions I was being a 
good little soldier selling raffle tickets...
Everyone was taking over the endless announcements and it was impossible
to hear anything in the big tent anyway.

They had asked first-time attendees to step up and volunteer to help operate the
rally so that's what we did.   Big mistake.
Like I say - no good deed in life goes unpunished.

We spent all of our time at all of the functions working - selling tickets,
holding raffles, when instead we could have been hanging out with some
folks that we knew from Quartzite and just having a good time.

Then our reward was....

I had people coming up to me during the functions explaining the rules to me,
others apologizing...   

I've seen others on the MOC get it even worse.
Especially if they complain about something.

The internet "pack mentality"
"Mouse Balls"

Goshen was for us a whole different "vibe" than Quartzsite
which is an "unofficial" rally.
Quartzsite was a blast.

Goshen is probably fine for most of the folks who attended but for us
it was our first - and will be our last - "Official Rally"

Well more than enough said about that...   Sorry didn't mean to be so dark.

Much good did come out of our time there.

We met a few new friends that we'll see in Quartzsite.
Dave & Linda just back from Alaska are two.

Kates BFF Mary was able to come for a few days and visit with us.
That was a special treat.


Kristy and Kate got in a tiny bit of Crafts Time...


I went Amish


We finally got out of Goshen today and have landed in a nice
State Park in Ohio on the shore of Lake Erie.
Maumee Bay State Park.

We'll hang here for a while waiting for Jim & Kristi to catch up
and in the meanwhile recuperate and lick our wounds.


It is quiet, we have a pond out back and the fall colors are starting to
paint the landscape with the special tones of the season.

I installed a new satellite dish on the roof of the RV while in Goshen
You can see it in the photo above.
It helps me to keep in touch with the mother ship.
Nanu Nanu.

Our side yard.
We call it "The Recovery Room"


The view out back.


We've seen a bunch of "birders" here so I imagine that
this area must be a big migratory bird area.

With the current Government Shutdown most of the parks that
we intended to visit are now closed 
so we are going to need to figure out where to go from here.

I'm back to blogging so more to come.