Happy New Year!

Since my last post Judy has won $32 playing bingo Monday night. We did one of my favorites....

shoe shopping. While at the mall I made an observation. Seems every teenage girl must have gotten a cell phone for Christmas as 80% of them were walking around talking on one. Another observation, they like to wear boots and shorts. Why boots? There's no snow down here and it's not raining? I played poker a couple time and lost a pound or pound & a half, of nickles & dimes. Spent time cleaning the truck and polishing the wheels. We also cleaned out and organized the basement. Jody and Bruce arrived (with their dog) about 8:30am today to drop off the dog while they spent the day at Baldwin Hospital. Jody is considering starting a clinic associated with the hospital after her residency is completed in the summer of 2010. She got her Step 3 US Medical License Exam exam results back just before Christmas and she easily passed the final exam. Good job Jody!!! I easily understand why doctors made the money they do and do not begrudge them that. If you consider 4 years of college for a Bachelors, 4 years of medical school, at least 3 years of residency as slave labor, racking of $250K of expenses (this is not counting the 4 years for a Bachelors degree!!), and the stress......who the heck would want to go through that?????

Don & Zola arrived early this afternoon, it's Zola's 39th birthday. All six of us went to the Shrimp Basket at 5pm for supper. We all had shrimp except Zola had oysters. It was a pleasant evening and we ate outside. There was a looong line waiting to get in when we left. We returned to our place and played cards. It was nice watching the Times Square New Years celebration at 11pm and going to bed before midnight our time. We heard lots of fireworks at midnight as we tried to sleep. In the morning none of us will have a hangover!

Christmas at the park

We received a nice picture of Kristi, D & Randy so our friends can see the northern Bahnmiller clan. Judy baked the lebkuechens Christmas Eve day, we have 100 of them! It takes loooonger to bake them in a tiny oven. We went to church at 7pm with neighbors Lucy & Jack from Tipton, MI. On Christmas Judy went to water aerobics then we went with Barb & Ray, fellow HitchHiker friends, to the movies to see Marley & Me. Oh the sobbing and falling tears! We also finished shelling 10 pounds of pecans we purchased when we arrived in Gulf Shores. At 4pm we joined the rest of the park for a Christmas pot luck, the park supplied the ham & turkey. I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas as we did!!!!!!

The weather has been GREAT. I had to turn the A/C on last night at 6pm when I returned from the pot luck. It's been in the 70s daytime & 60s at night. Lots of clouds but that's OK.

THANKS for the Charlie Brown Christmas tree D!!!!! Gramps

Windy but warm

As you can see in the pics it's overcast and very windy BUT.....warm. It's back into the 60s from yesterdays 40 degrees. Today we did lunch at Arby's (exciting huh?), visited the beach, then some grocery shopping, & dropped off the old newspapers at the zoo. I'd like to see them put the papers down in the lions or tiger cages! Tonight we played euchre and I did miserable (but had fun!!!!) and Judy tied for second for $6. If you click on the RV park picture to enlarge it (it was taken from the entrance) you can look between the trees and see our flag flying on the back of our home.

Christmas & Mobile

This morning Judy made a pecan pie and I mixed up the lebkukens. Later in the morning we went to Jody & Bruce's for Christmas before they left for Bruce's parents in SC. We went to Butch Cassidy's for lunch, a well known bar that has good burgers. We visited the old Church Street Graveyard were many were buried due to yellow fever. We then went to a downtown

park on the waterfront. After that we returned to their home for Christmas before returning home.

Judy's home & Clayton & Pat too

Clayton flew into Ft Lauderdale and met up with Pat then they drove to St Augustine to see Margaret. After spending a little time there they brought Judy back Friday. We chowed down on shrimp at DeSotos Friday night and Lambert's Saturday night. The weather was good and we ended up staying put Saturday after all the driving they had done. We did get caught up playing Tonk & 7-up! After Clayton & Pat left to return to Margaret's Sunday morning Judy & I went to church at the park and played euchre tonight, I tied for second....again. While Judy was gone I didn't do too much but did spend time cleaning the joint up before she returned. It's been warm (70s) the last few days but it's getting cold now!

Gary & Deb; Christmas cookies

Friday Deb & Gary Pearce stopped by and after visiting for an hour we went had lunch at DeSotos (Sea & Surf was closed) and checked out the beach. It was a nice sunny day so we drove along the beach and also the state park. They are spending 2 nights at the Escapee CG on their way to Rockport, TX. I really enjoyed their visit. Deb had a new camera and I was playing with it so much I forgot to take any pictures with ours! Saturday Jody & Bruce were here and we mixed up 2 batches of Christmas cookies then went to the Christmas boat parade at LuLu's.

The parade was smaller this year but still nice. Afterwards we went to the Shrimp Basket for supper, I'm developing a hankering for shrimp. Sunday I went to Jody & Bruce's and assisted in the cookie baking by tasting them. We also moved some furniture so they could set up their Christmas tree. Today was nice, low 70s but solid overcast and a little light rain, but still very nice outdoors. I did get a little work done in our home on wheels. HO HO HO y'all.

the zoo

Sunday we went to the Gulf Shores zoo with our friends Ray & Barb after lunch at DeSotos. It was a very pleasant and warm afternoon. We played euchre Sunday and Tuesday evenings but didn't do too well other than having fun. Wednesday morning I took Judy to the Pensacola airport and she rented a car and drove to here sister Margaret's new place in St Augustine to see her and help her unpack and set up her new condo. It rained real hard all the way to the airport, we are almost swimming down here. Clayton will be in St Augustine about December 18 or 19 from CA to join the party. Now it's turned cold, 44 degrees at 2pm and still spitting rain. BUT......it will be back in the 60s and perhaps low 70s next week!

Tuesday night was euchre, Judy tied for second and I came in third. We have decorated the inside and outside with our Christmas decorations. Thursday we went out to lunch with Tom & Ann after Tom & I went to the Escapees CG for their weekly computer meeting. Judy played cribbage in the evening. Friday we went again with Tom & Ann to Pensacola, FL to McGuire's for lunch. The pub had over $550,000 in $1 bills with peoples names written on them stapled to every possible surface, we added one more. Today, after we had breakfast in the clubhouse and Judy did water aerobics, we went to Jody & Bruce's. We repaired a screen the dog went through and Bruce made a good roast beef supper. Nice hat huh Randy? Eat your heart out. POPS.

Where did 11 days go?????

I'm back, but not sure where 11 days have gone since my last post. I can recollect we went with Ray & Barb, HitchHiker friends, to the beach and some great shrimp at the Sea & Surf. We also went with Ann & Tom to the Escapee park in Summerdale to check it out as we both like it and the Escapees there. We also stopped for a great breakfast, in the afternoon, at a nice hole in the wall place in Foley and we stopped at a pecan farm and got 10 pounds to shell and eat. I had a birthday in there somewhere; a biggie as I got to sing "Happy Social Security to me". Judy won $10 for first place playing euchre here at the park, she keeps reminding me I won only $5 for third place a couple days earlier. We spent 3 days working at Jody & Bruce's, his parents came over from SC for Thanksgiving. Jody was working or on call at the hospital but managed to be home much of the time. She's in her second year of residency at the University of South Alabama Hospital in Mobile. We are quite proud of her. We all spent 3 days working around their house, besides a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner. Norm had the flu, then Bruce, then Diane, then me. I spent the last day and a half in the bathroom or bed, ya, I know you really wanted to hear that! Judy managed some shopping and all is well here! It has rained quite a bit the last 2 days but is sunny with blue skies, 62 degrees. FLASH.....we are heading for Las Vegas tomorrow so Judy can hit the professional euchre circuit, she won $8 for first place again tonight. Happy Birthday BJ!!!!

Happy Anniversary to us......

Yesterday we relaxed, met up with some of our friends and did a little shopping after lunch at Krystals. Krystals is a slight upgrade from White Castle in the south. I haven't had one since we left in January. We played euchre last night but neither of us placed in the $$$ winners; next time!

Today is our 42nd anniversary so we celebrated by doing the laundry, getting the bugs cleaned off the front cap, and cleaning the truck real good inside and out. This afternoon we we to Jody & Bruce's then we all went to Felix's Fish Camp for supper. Boy was it good!!!! Remember it Randy & Kristi? Something special happen there?

Gulf Shores, AL

Sunday morning we went back to the old turn of the century wood frame church, a little grocery shopping, Subway for lunch then home. In the afternoon we started to break camp and pack up.
Today we pulled out at 9:30 and 3 1/2 hours and 180 miles later we covered 3 (small) states. LA, MS and AL arriving at Gulf Breeze RV Resort in Gulf Shores. This is one of our favorite places, it's got everything you could want in an RV park except a high price ($405/mo with everything included) , lots of park activities, all kinds of things to do in the area, some good restaurants, the Gulf of Mexico, a nice cat names Patches and yes, daughter, Dr. Bahnmiller is less than an hour away in Mobile.
After setting up we talked with neighbors from Tipton, MI; went looking for Tom & Ann but they weren't home; then stopped to see some HitchHiker friends. Kinda feels like home.

Abita Springs Opry

We stuck around home base today and I did some routine maintenance on Home Sweet Home. This evening we went to the Abita Springs Opry. The first two groups were OK, the second two were great. One was a zydeco band and the last was a gospel harmonizers. We really enjoyed them. One of the zydeco players had a rippled metal shield on his chest (like a washboard) and he ran two sticks up and down it, never seen one before. Can't say I understood many words in their songs because of the Cajun accent but we really enjoyed them. The gospel group also had the place rocking. It was a real gospel group because the lead singer had to open a Baptist hymnal for the words to one song as he said the had so many he couldn't remember the words to all the songs. Speaking of Cajun accent, it's interesting listening to some of the locals down here.
It's getting COLD. 33 or 34 tonight, only very low 60s today. Hi of 58 Sunday. Damn.

Insta-Gator

OH OH..........a tasty morsel walking by......

Today we went to Insta-Gator. It's a 20 year old enterprise (1 of 40 in LA) that harvests about 1500 wild alligator eggs annually, hatches them in August, raises them for 2 years until they are 4' long, then releases 14% back into the wild (only 6% of the eggs hatch & survive in the wild on their own). The other 86% are used for food and leather to support the business. This was a very interesting hour & a half we spent there learning why and how this is done. An ultralight plane is used to locate nests then marked with a flag so the swamp air boats can find them. Imagine digging through rotting swamp grass (with fire ants, snakes, various bugs, & vermin inside) looking for 30 to 50 eggs in a nest. Now, mom is lurking around somewhere and she's about 8' long and VERY protective of her nest. He said if you can see her that's great, when you can't see her you have a serious problem. One even snuck up under him between his legs as he was gathering eggs. The eggs have to be marked on the top, if you turn them upside down they will die. It was interesting when he put 2 mice in a tank full of alligators, we got to feed them marshmallows. He said they aren't too smart, all their small brains think of is swimming and food. It was very interesting.......

NASA Stennis Space Center, Mississippi

This is a Saturn V engine, 5 were used on the first stage of the booster in the Apollo program. The Center is also a refurbishment center for NAOO weather buoy's (left) anchored in the Gulf. It also has the largest concentration in the US of oceanographers.

How about a thermal image of us and me about to leave the planet?

Werner Von Braun's office and a moon rock.

This is a "test station" used for the Saturn booster engines in the 60s and for the space shuttle engines today.

Today we made the 35 mile trip into Mississippi to NASA's Stennis Space Center. Five small towns and all the residents were relocated in 1963 for the center to be built. When the Saturn engines were tested a small earthquake registers in Batan Rouge, LA. Today it tests all the space shuttles main engines as well as engines for all future spacecraft. There was an interesting video and display of the 2000 residents that were relocated, one old lady refused to go unless her house was moved. She sat on her porch in a rocking chair as her small old house was trucked down the road! The center is also hosts Navy Seals and many oceanographers and weather forecasters. There was also an interesting video and display on hurricane Katrina, the center housed many local residents during the storm.

Judy and I tried to land the space shuttle, we were 0 for 4 attempts in their simulator. The last noise you hear after you crash is a tinny hub cap rolling.

Tonight we went out with 4 other couples from the park for a good Mexican supper.