No More Days Like This, Please - Mon., Jan. 6

It had to happen on a Monday. Just one of those days. I had a long list of chores I wanted to accomplish today; even made a list. I felt like I got up on the wrong side of the bed or something.

First order of business was washing dishes left over from last night. Only a few drops of water came out of the tap. Temp last night was about 29 degrees.

I went outside to find out why our water was only a trickle. I wanted to take the hose off the spigot to see if the hose was frozen, but I couldn't get it off. Bob was at work.

One of the guys who works in the park was walking by. I asked if he could help me. He got the hose detached from the spigot, checked the incoming water filter that goes on before the hose, and the spigot. Everything seemed to be working, nothing was frozen that we could see.

Next we checked the hose where it goes into the RV. There was green algae stuck on the intake filter which was blocking the flow. Ewwww. He said it probably came from inside our hose. Yuck. I'm going to have to bring in the hose and bleach it.

While we were out there, I was telling him no hot air was coming into our rig. I had checked the propane and switched tanks to the full one. Still no hot air inside, only blowing cool air. The temperature in the 5th wheel wasn't getting above 60 degrees. However, where the air flows back out of the rig, it was hot. Don't know what's wrong with it. He checked and both tanks had propane in them and were hooked up right.

Then we noticed icicles hanging off the lower storage area. They were right below the hot water heater. Steve opened the hot water heater compartment and the hot water heater pop-off valve (is that what it's called?) was leaking...a lot. He said something must have happened with our hot water heater and the valve blew as a safety measure to keep our water heater from blowing up. Yikes!

Oh, and one of the cats got hold of my strongest hearing aid and I can't find it anywhere. All I found were the little plastic ends. I have turned this place upside down looking for it. Bob wonders if a cat might have eaten it, but it's awfully big. (The cat running off with it is just a theory. It could have fallen on the floor, or got stuck in clothes which may have been put in the laundry. Before we do laundry next we'll be searching for my hearing aid in every piece of clothing.)

AND, we ran out of cat food.

Things brightened considerably when Patrick of Stagecoach RV stopped by and came in to check the airflow intake for the heater which is located under the kitchen drawers by our kitchen sink. He opened up the vent cover and took out two drawers above it. Then he pulled out unused, freezer-sized plastic bags with Halloween decorations on them. He must have taken out 100 plastic bags. They were super dusty and covered in cat hair.

In the two years, three months we have had this 5er, we have never owned Halloween-decorated, freezer-sized bags. We bought the 5er used from Camping World in Troutdale, Oregon. I guess they didn't take the drawers out as part of their turn-over cleaning. It's obvious someone besides us stored plastic baggies in the drawers above the air intake. We never have, our plastic baggies are stored in a cupboard below the pantry. And in two years, three months we never took the vent cover off our furnace air intake. Live and learn. Patrick didn't charge us anything. That was mighty nice of him.

After Patrick left, I checked our mail at the RV park office and the cat food order had come in. No more starving cats!

After he cleaned out the freezer bags from the intake area, the furnace warmed the rig up to 70 degrees. With the addition of our electric space heater, our living room warmed up to 75 degrees. Nice.

So tonight the temperature is supposed to go down to 20 degrees. The RV park maintenance crew were out this afternoon turning on all the spigots in the park (without hoses attached) to a low, steady stream. Should be interesting to see what they look like by morning! Bob took our hose and water filter off to be stowed inside.


All for today.

Travel Bug out.