A New Month, A New Location -- Sat., June 30

Cotulla and San Antonio, Texas:

Here we are. Lovely San Antonio, Texas: Riverwalk, The Alamo, green, hilly, varied flora, freeways, big grocery stores, shopping malls, restaurants, Six Flags, botanic gardens, a zoo, the Hemisphere Tower, caverns, history galore, paved bike paths, cheap gas. Today we made our move from Cotulla to San Antonio, about 1-1/2 hours. We just finished dinner at the Mexican (Jalisco state) restaurant across the street.

But let me back up. After four hours of sleep, I woke up and finished reading "One Ranger" (the second book) so I could take it back to Jerry and Kit today on our way out of Dodge, er, I mean Cotulla. The "One Ranger" books are a fascinating read about the history of the Texas Rangers and their crime-fighting skills.

Bob woke up about 2:30 a.m. and had some traffic coming and going through the gate so he didn't get his usual nap from 3:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m. Both of us were very tired today. We knew our gate guard replacement was coming around noon. 

I played Suzie housekeeper to get ready for the move and Bob did his manly preparations outside. I vacuumed, washed counters in the kitchen and made sure interior items were battened down for the move. (Except I can't move the heavy recliners very well, so Bob took care of moving those out of the way of our slide.)  

Bob swept under the slide awnings to get out any spiders lurking there (at my insistence, being faint of heart at the sight of a spider). He put away the fresh water hose, took down our air card booster, emptied the grey and black water tanks, filled LOMA's generator with diesel and put in oil, took off the wheel covers, removed the chocks, hooked up the truck to the trailer, stowed the propane tanks and garbage can.

We were all done with our preparations at 11:00 a.m. While we waited, Bob took a nap and I started reading Kyle Mills "Storming Heaven" and checking vehicles in and out. 

Remember the Bewicks' wren we tried to discourage from building a nest under our dining room slide by removing all her nesting materials and putting up duct tape around the area to keep her out? Well, when Bob was cleaning under the slides, he found her nest. She had gotten around the duct tape and built a perfect nest. It had three little eggs in it. Oh no! Now what do we do with that? This is what we tried to avoid. When our replacement arrived we showed him the nest. He said he'll try to put it under his trailer. Who knows if the wren will be able to find her nest. We feel so bad. Pout.

Our supervisor and our replacement, a single guy, arrived at our site about 12:20 p.m. We gave our replacement the log books, instructions, and gave him a tour of where the motion detectors are located. Then we took off. I headed to Kit and Jerry's to return books and say good-bye. Bob headed to San Antonio. I followed close behind him.

The  RV park we're in is plush compared to the South Texas Brush Country. All it takes is two months in the middle of caliche dust and bugs to make you appreciate something different. 

Tonight's weather forecasters in San Antonio predict a 50% chance of thunderstorms. We'll see what develops.


Time for life's next adventure. I am looking forward to what's around the next corner.


Here are today's pictures:

Where the ground was wet, about 20 of these beautiful blue butterflies had landed.

The scissor-tailed flycatcher posed for a photo op.

Our site. Look....SHADE!!!

And a picnic table!

A view down the road in the RV park.

Our patio. Oh, look, a rainbow! Where did that come from?

The Escape pod at Travelers World.

Time for lights out. (I fell asleep sitting at the computer.)

Enjoy Sunday.

Not the Best Day Gate Guarding -- Mon., June 25

Cotulla, Texas:

The tables have turned. Bob used to have all the traffic on day shift. For the past three days/nights the night shift traffic has exceeded the day traffic. I've had many tankers coming and going to Pad B. 

Pad B ground to a halt late tonight. There is no wind so they can't fill the tankers. Three tankers that arrived earlier are camping out on the road until the wind picks up. (Update Tuesday, 1:15 a.m.: The wind must have picked up as the tankers are now loading up.)

Just found out today that Pad A goes into production tomorrow. Tonight they've been bringing in huge tanks and a big command center, tarps, and lights. Tomorrow morning Bob is going to be a busy man.

For the past four days our site has had H2S gas releases and the red flag has been up continuously. We are downwind and downhill from the releases so it comes right at us. Our throats and eyes hurt. The inside of our 5er smells horrible when we come in from outside. With no breeze, I can't open the windows to air the 5er out. What to do? What to do? This is not good.

Weather: The temperature today was 102. Our air conditioners are working hard to keep indoors 78 degrees. The next few days are supposed to be hotter.

Black water tank: We don't know what happened, but the company that is supposed to empty our black water tank every other week quit coming. The company used to come automatically. For the past two cycles we've had to call our supervisor to make sure they send someone out to empty it.

The refrigerator: Absolutely no clue what's wrong with the fridge. Bob noticed today that the food didn't seem cold. The display panel on the front had a symbol that looked like a lower case n. We looked it up in our owner's manual. The manual instructions said to turn the refrigerator off and turn it back on, which we did. It seemed to be getting colder, but when I checked it a few minutes ago only the top shelf is cold. The rest of the refrigerator is warm. The freezer, on the other hand, seems normal.  Hmmm. I'm going to try repacking and rearranging the fridge. Maybe the cold isn't circulating properly.

What was good about today, you may ask. 

1. I had enough sleep.
2. Our mail came on time from our mail forwarding service.
3. We had tostadas for dinner. Mmmmm.
4. Not very many bugs rode in on me tonight.
5. The gate kept me busy.
6. We saw sable antelope grazing at the ranch across the road.
7. The scissor-tail flycatcher is now one of the regulars at our generator bird buffet. Hopefully it will be back tomorrow and will let me take a picture. It's skittish.
8. I finished reading "One Ranger: A Memoir," by H. Joaquin Jackson. Imagine a Texas Ranger tracking killers and thieves through the Texas brush, hear the stories and history of the Texas Rangers, their code of honor, and learn about their lives and their weapons...that is what this book is all about. Bob said it's almost like reading Ann Rule true crime books. Both of us enjoyed the walk back in time to a different era.
9. Hershey's Kisses milk chocolate is melting on my tongue.
10. It's cool inside, but I already mentioned that didn't I?
11. Had fun playing with the cats.

Oh, I forgot to mention. Last night Bob got up at midnight to run/walk for two hours. He's training for the Honolulu Marathon in December. At midnight it was 92 degrees. By the time he returned at 2:00 a.m. it was 86. Ugh!