hot springs, hot days, hot hot hot and then cool

We did go to the church Sunday morning. We had a lazy morning then drove down to the church. It is a stone church. It is small but friendly. The pastor came out before the service and “got to know us”. The service is very similar to ours but they had a pot luck luncheon afterwards. One of their parishioners had been on a mission trip to build houses in Mexico and showed some pictures and told some stories about his trip. He used one or two disposable cameras and took them to WalMart to be developed. They made a slide show out of them but didn’t pay too much attention to how they oriented the pictures. Several of them were either upside down or sideways. It was really distracting from the show although he had plenty of stories. They did tell us that they only have the luncheons once in a while, not every week.

We explored the town some more but didn’t find anything very exciting. It was really hot (101) in the afternoon but started to cool down as the sun dropped towards the horizon. It was more than a single air conditioner in our camper could handle. We do not have enough electricity to run both of them so we had to pick the front or back. We run the back one at night and then open the window. Usually the coolness from outside keeps the a/c off but when the sun comes up, it will start to warm up quite quickly and the a/c will help keep it cool. Today, I discovered that both air conditioners use the same ducting. If you close the big vent at the a/c, the air comes out the scattered ducts. It never seemed to be as much air as you get from the main unit so I always wondered where it went. I went into the bedroom this afternoon and it was cooler in there than it was in the living area (with the a/c off in the bedroom?). Eureka!

The a/c in the living area blows straight into the floor and does not distribute well so I built a (cardboard) deflector for the main vent. This distributes the cool air pretty well throughout the living area. We were watching a movie this afternoon and it just seemed to get hotter and hotter as the movie played on. After the movie, I found that the deflector had come loose and was hanging out of the path of the air.

Today was a work day. We had to get ready for Stan and shift the camper around from a two person rig to a 3 person rig. That is not as easy as it seems but we moved clothes around, cleaned the rug in the living area (life in the camper had not been kind to the carpeting) and put everything in its place which is not something we do well. We found a laundramat (actually 2 of them side by side if you can imagine that). After driving all over town, we stopped at the information booth and the woman there told us where to find it (them).

Just as we started to sit down with our neighbors, the sky turned black. The wind came up and we got one of those afternoon thunderstorms everyone around here talks about. We are on a hill and get a good view towards the west. The blackness moved closer and he lightning just flew all over the sky. It sounded like a bowling alley on a Saturday night and soon we were folding up our chairs and heading inside. I tried to get some pictures but the lightning moved too fast or my camera was not fast enough. All of my pictures just showed bright patches in the sky vice the beautiful lightning bolts.

Well, that just about catches us up for the day. Like I said, not too much to talk about today. Tomorrow may be another matter.

The storm was big and shiny. It rained moderately hard but the real show was the thunder and lightening. The wind blew really hard and the trailer shook so hard it sounded like the awning was banging but the awning wasn’t even deployed. It eventually broke but it was too late to return to the outside and watch the lightening retreat towards the east.

We slept on the couch (pull out) last night. We give company the bedroom in the back so they have some place they can go for peace and quiet. We have a curtain assembly that we put up to separate the bedroom from the hall. The door provided by the manufacturer puts the bathroom in the bedroom area and that is not convenient so we hang the curtain and close the door. If we have to use the bathroom in the middle of the night, we can open the door and go into the hall and into the bathroom leaving the bedroom with its modicum of privacy. It works well.

The day dawned clear with some high thin clouds and much cooler and drier than it has been over the last few days. It is close to noontime and still comfortable outside in the sun. We did some grocery shopping and some more reorganizing for company. The table where I reside with all my computer gear will have to be next. I am not sure what I am going to do with it but I have an Uninterruptible power supply, computer, wireless modem and speakers so we can play music off the computer (It is fun to listen to WHEB while we are on the road and a necessity if we cannot get the races on TV or on local radio). A touch of home and more entertainment in the morning than any of the stations around here (better music also).

Well, time to head for the airport. It is much further than it had been at keystone but it is pretty country to drive through. I’ll get back to you soon.

C