Wandering down I-45 to get a new toy

The day before yesterday, my wife and I stopped at Wal-Mart to pick up a couple of things and then were planning to head down south on I-45 from Conroe to south of Spring where the Houston Amateur Radio Store is located. When we came out of Wal-Mart we could see smoke down south of us and had heard on the news just before we left the house that the Garden Ridge Pottery store was on fire. Being able to see that much smoke that far away and when we left our house we thought we could smell it, means it is a BIG fire. We were not sure if we wanted to go down past it but decided would give it a try, since the next day I would have a bad tooth pulled.




Here is sequence of pictures as we drove past it:

Of course the traffic backed up because everyone wanted a closer look, but surprisingly, it moved past without much delay.



OH yeah, I did get my new toy. It is hand held transceiver made by ICOM. My old one had the spring connector for the battery brake off. They didn’t have a part to replace it so I got a new radio. That works for me. Here are a couple of pictures of my new toy:

Before I forget, I need to give you an update on my trip to the dentist. He had a rough time pulling that tooth and getting the broken off root out. He was pressing down so hard on my lower jaw that I thought it would brake off. When I reached up and pressed where the jaw attaches, he asked if it hurt. Dumb question, it sure did. So, he gave me something to bite down on to relieve some of the pressure. Finally he got it out, took awhile and he even said that I worked him way too hard. I think we were both relieved when it was over.



You all have a great day now, you hear?

Wandering to the dentist, again.

I got an appointment for this morning with the dentist to get my bad tooth pulled. The X-ray revealed that at least one of the roots has already broken off. Guess it will come out in pieces. Also, got to get the garbage gathered up and down to the road for pick-up, so don’t have time to write what I had planned and post pictures.



I drove down I-45 yesterday to a special store to get a new toy for myself. On the way, went past that big fire they had at the Garden Ridge Pottery store. There was lots of smoke. I will post pictures of it and my new toy tomorrow. For now, got to run.


You all have a great day, not sure how great mine will be (grin).

Got a reprieve today and a product I like.

I thought that today was the day I was supposed to get my tooth pulled, but I was wrong.  The appointment is tomorrow, so I got a temporary reprieve.  I told you last week about what the dentist found.  I updated my blog that day when I found out the results of my exam.  To refresh your memory, here is link to that blog: (click here)

A lot of you our there are RVers and you all know that I am, too. I purchased a product a few years ago that has been worth every penny that I spent on it. I have a class-C motor-home and the house batteries are fixed in a compartment and since they do not slide out, it is hard to get to them for maintenance. It is impossible to check the water fluid level in them, so that is when I purchased the product, “QWIK-FILL”. It is an “on-board battery watering system”

This system replaces the caps on your batteries with attachments that have hoses connected to each other and then a long hose with a quick disconnect that can reach to the outside of the motor-home. The other part of this apparatus is a squeeze bulb attachment that has the other half of the quick disconnect connection. I keep this end section stored in a zip-lock plastic bag. Every now and then, I get the squeeze bulb section and hook it up to the rest of the system. Then I put the end of the hose in a jug of distilled water. You pump the bulb, which forces water from the jug into the batteries, until the bulb gets hard and will not squeeze anymore. This is the sign that the batteries are full. Just unhook the bulb section, put it and the distilled water away and you are done. Takes only a minute or two and I think it is a great product and time saver. Just thought you would like to know.

Wondering why this sounds familiar?

According to all the history books, history teachers, and history TV channels, back before Christopher Columbus everyone thought the world to be flat. That was proved to be wrong. The Earth is almost a sphere; almost, because it bulges at the equator. That must be caused from the centrifugal affect from its spin.



OK, now that also got me wondering. If the Earth has a larger diameter at the equator, would we weigh more standing there because of the extra gravity or would we weigh less since the centrifugal force is trying to throw us off. On the contrast, what if we sere standing at the north or sough pole? There would be negligible centrifugal force there, just gravity, so would we weigh more at the poles or less? Ok, now I am getting dizzy so better get back to my main subject.


Now, we have established that the Earth is round or near so, so what about the Universe? What shape would you think it is? If you believe in the “Big Bang” theory, then I would suppose you would have to believe that the universe is a sphere. I always did, but now the scientists are telling us it is flat. Where is Columbus when you need him? . . . Oh yeah, Columbus is in Ohio. This is the opposite of the Columbus story.


Yep, they say the universe is flat, a brane, and not only that, they believe that there are many of them stacked side by side, like pages in a book. From here the story gets complicated and way beyond my comprehension, so this is a good place for me to quit.


You all have a good day now, you hear.

Swap Meet at the Flea Market

Yesterday, when we showed up at the flea market as usual, there was something different there. No, I don’t mean at the tables. They were also holding a “swap meet” where people sell automobiles, parts, and related stuff. At a flea market you have to have lots of stuff.

Anyway, since all of you who are my age like to see old cars and dream about the “good old days”, I am just going to post a few pictures that I took of some of the cars and I will try not to comment too much; don’t want to spoil the pictures with a lot of words.

Now ain’t that nice, even has suicide doors.

Now here is ’57 Ford:

And an old Mercury.  Does anyone know what year this is?

And I love what is painted on the rear window:

Now here are two for the price of one:

I had a ’57 Chevy convertible that I really loved. It even had a “souped” up engine.

As we were leaving, we drove past the ’57 Ford so I snapped another picture:

Hope you enjoyed the old cars and brought back some good old memories.   Have a great day and week, you hear?

Wondering how I could have been that wrong.

I woke up this morning knowing that I made a big mistake. I must have been thinking about it subconsciously or how else would I know I made a mistake a couple of days ago the second I woke up this morning? This blog is to correct that mistake.



I want to apologize to David of the Terlingua or Bust blog posted on October 7th, for my completely incorrect comment about the planet he saw in the sunrise. This was my comment: “That is a planet and it is Jupiter. It is up all night, starting out in the east and setting in the west.” I could not have been more wrong. Yes, it is up all night and it does start out in the eastern sky and sets in the west. But it starts out in the east in the evening, not in the morning. It is that extremely bright star you can first see after the sun sets.



I must have been thinking backwards or maybe I was really dizzy, because I knew Jupiter was coming up in the east after sunset and would be setting in the west just after sunrise. I just got it turned around. Maybe I was looking in the wrong direction that morning or sometimes east is west and right is left and the reverse is forward, etc. Anyway, I can’t believe I was that stupid since I knew better. Guess I just wasn’t thinking.


OK, the only correct answer that I can think of, since Mercury and Venus are not visible at this time, is Saturn. It must have been Saturn. Now, this time, I looked it up just to be sure that I am right. Yep, it is Saturn. Sorry if I got anybody confused, as if you listen to me anyway (grin).


OK, off to the flea market again today. Now you all have a nice day, you hear?

Wandering to the flea market again this morning.

I was getting bored with the flea market until last week when I found those binders full of old Life magazines. Now, this morning, I am chomping at the bit to get back to it. The prospect of unexpectedly finding a treasure or something that I really like has reappeared in optimistic mind.



This IS going to be a good morning, just have that feeling. Maybe it is because the weatherman last night said we have a 30 percent chance of rain. Trouble is, the higher probability of rain is south of interstate 10. I guess there are some advantages to living closer to the gulf, but I like it up here where I live.


My cousin sent me an email about a lake about an hour from where he lives. He said it is almost at 4000 feet elevation and that makes it the highest lake east of the Mississippi river. There is a really nice hotel with a fabulous restraint beside the lake. That hotel is where most of the movie “Dirty Dancing” was filmed. The lake is almost dry now. Here are a couple of pictures that he sent to me:

He explained the pictures in an email to me. Since he did a great job in explaining his outing I am just going to copy and paste his email here, I don’t think he will mind:

“These pictures were taken a year ago, but it looked the same last weekend. There is some kind of shifting geological flapper valve at the bottom of the lake that causes the lake to drain away every 100 years or so. Or someone forgot to jiggle the handle after flushing. Since the hotel by the lake doesn't currently have a lake, they compensated by having the best Sunday buffet in the state. And yes, after my third trip (who's counting?) to the buffet table I was a bit dizzy. I told brother-in-law L--- that we could pack away more food because of the lesser atmospheric pressure, but ran the risk of exploding on the way back down the mountain. So we figured if we chew a pack of gum on the trip down, we'd be OK.”


I like the way he writes, don’t you? I think that he should start his own blog. Here is a link to Wikipedia that tells also tells about the lake and hotel: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Lake_(Virginia)

You all have a good weekend now, you hear?