back to work

Good morning.
Currently 44 out. We've had quite the cool September, especially considering how hot it was this summer.
Yesterday, I thought would be a total bust since we awoke to rain, but it stopped before noon and actually warmed a bit,(up near 60) so I got a bunch more stuff cut down. I'm about 1/4 done. It takes a lot of time when you have nearly an acre of yard.
I also managed to clean the bathroom and replace the leaking faucet with a new one.
Craig vacuumed, but spent a good part of the day playing Bejeweled Twist. I think he's addicted to it. :-)
And here's another grass I have in the back yard.
Japanese Flame Grass. It starts out green in the spring and turns to a fiery red by summer. Of course it's looking a little ragged now from our hot dry summer.

And now it's time to get ready for another work week.

yard work

Good morning.
I wasn't sure I'd be able to make this post. My Internet connection has been acting up. But right now, I'm on.
I didn't get much done on Sunday, It was cloudy, cold and just plain icky, but I went out and picked up branches from the last windy day we had and got the idea some would make good kindling for a future trip campfire. So I wasted a lot of time sorting through them, getting fairly straight ones and trimming them to size.
But now I have 2 bundles of nice various size branches that will be good for fire starting.
I also checked the tire pressure on the mo-ho and the tow car and car caddy, and filled the water on the 'house' batteries.
Dinner was a roasted turkey breast with scalloped potatoes and asparagus.
Now Monday was more productive. A little warmer, (66) and partly sunny, so Craig mowed, while I cut down. I got the entire bed next to the pond cleaned out. It actually feels good to get started on the yard.
For dinner we had pork cutlets on the grill, butternut squash and baked potato.
Today, it's flu shots, banking and groceries, and maybe some more cutting, we'll see.
And i have several grasses that are starting to 'bloom'.


Fountain grass around the tree, and Japanese Silver grass at the end of the driveway.

Another grass at the edge of the house. Don't know the name.

Well, that's it for now....

my redundant life

Good morning.
I've just returned from cleaning the Salon. I know, I sound like a broken record, but life tends to be a series of repeated events. We work, come home, eat, watch TV, sleep, and do it all over again. If we're lucky, we get to throw in a little something different now and then. That's why we enjoy our RV trips so much. They give us something different to look forward to besides our redundant life.
Anyway, work was extremely busy and I'm happy it's the weekend. It's to be quite cool today with a high of only 56. It's currently 43. It might be too cold to work in the yard. ;-) We'll see.
Now time to take a shower, get Craig up, make our coffee, read the paper and get on with the day. Just like we do every Sunday. And it's okay.

my friday post

Good morning.
It has been an extremely busy week at the Salon so far, and today and tomorrow are looking to be the same. But next week, I have just 4 appointments on the book for Wed. The rest of the week looks good, but not Wed. It's funny how one week the phone rings non-stop, the next you keep checking to see if the phone is working. :-)
Hopefully it'll start ringing for next week also.
It appears we'll have seasonal temps this weekend, (68-70) so I hope to get enough drive to get out and work on cleaning up the yard and cutting down perennials. I hate doing it because it just verifies the season is over and I don't want it to be. But the more I get done in the fall, the less I have to do in the spring, and that would be good. And I have to accept the fact it is nearing the end of September. Summer is over.......
And tonight we'll have Red Beans and Rice for dinner with that wonderful Levandoski Sausage, and tomorrow, home made pizza.

So long summer

Good morning.
We had a great day yesterday. It got into the mid 80's and sunny. We won't see those temps much more this year, if at all. Today, back to a seasonal high around 70.
Spent most of the day outside of course. We mowed the yard, I polished the mo-ho wheels, cleaned up the inside of the mo-ho and restocked for the next trip. Then sadly, I marked the beginning of fall, I finally started the long process of cutting down the spent perennials. I still have quite a few things blooming, but there's a lot that is way past done. And the sooner I get started, the easier it will be. I'm sad that the summer is slipping quickly away, but I still have 3 more trips to look forward to. :-)
For dinner, I grilled some chicken thighs and legs, and Craig made his wonderful pasta salad.
And of course, we watched the opening season of Glee.
It was a good day.
And now, time for a shower and off to work!

trip #10, the details

Good morning.

I've just returned from cleaning the Salon. My posting is a little later than usual as it took a bit longer that anticipated.
Now back to our trip.
We left Lansing around 1 pm, arriving at the campground around 2:15 or so. Got into our site and set up. Relaxed with cocktails, and then took a walk around the campgrounds. They have 5 loops here. Quite a large area. But only about 140 sites because it's very hilly and wooded, so a lot of the sites are very secluded.
I grilled steaks for dinner with baked potatoes and coleslaw. We started a campfire since the highs were only in the mid 60's. After the fire was nearly done, we went in and watched some TV. It started to rain soon after.
It continued to rain off and on all night, with a lot of thunder and lightning near morning.
After Craig woke up and showered, I fixed us coffee, and off in the car we went. Wanted to pick up a paper, and a few items we forgot to bring. The rain ended around 11 but we decided to put off the festival until Sunday to let the ground dry up some.
We decided to tour some surrounding towns and drove through Holly, and Fenton with a stop for lunch at Broadstreet Station were we both had the best Patty Melt.
Arriving back at the campground, we read the paper and took a walk around the campground to see how many people showed up. It was very full. Only about 10% empty.
Back to our campsite, another campfire while we waited to watch the 8pm football game of the Michigan State Spartans taking on Notre Dame. For the game we grilled the best sausages you've ever eaten.Levandowski sausages! We can only get them from a local store called L&L Food Centers. They are really that good!
Anyway, the Spartans won the game in overtime! Yaaa!
The next morning, with the weather more cooperative, I woke up Craig so we could take a walk with our coffee, then I fixed breakfast. We didn't want to be too hungry at the festival and eat a lot of expensive carni food.
Bacon, eggs on the grill with toast and juice. Yummy! We don't eat bacon very much, so we really enjoy it when we do.
Then it was off to the festival.
Well, even though the weather was sunny and reached a high near 70 a day to let it dry was no help.
There was one low area that was a complete mud pit!

But most of the grounds weren't too bad.
The place was packed! Half of the fun of going here is a lot of the people that come to see the festival, also dress up in costumes. We were impressed by the extent of some of the outfits.

Our favorite show has to be Ded Bob. It was hilarious! Check out the link to his website.

And yes Garret, They did have Turkey Legs. And as good as they smelled, I didn't get one. I did find a new favorite drink, Woodchuck Cider! Ummm that was some tasty stuff!

With the day slowly fading, we went back to the campground for one more campfire.

Then while the fire warmed us, or maybe it was the cocktails, ;-) We broke down the campsite for an early morning departure.

Monday morning, it was cold, 48 out. The campground was virtually empty as most left Sunday, I fixed Craig coffee, pulled in the slides, stored the jacks, and put down the antenna. Put away the step and rug, and unplugged the mo-ho from shore power and flipped the fridge to propane. Went to the dump site, dumped the tanks, and off to Lansing we went, arriving back home after a stop at Flying J to gas and an extra flush of the holding tanks.

It was a good trip.

trip #10

Good evening.
Yes, my absence has meant we've been on another trip.
And we arrived safe with no issues, so it was a good trip.
This one took us to Holly Michigan. About 1 1/4 hour drive from Lansing, to the Holly State Recreation Area, for the Michigan Renaissance Festival.
Now if you haven't been to a Renaissance Festival before, this is something else!
Michigan has a very large site for their festival and it attracts thousands!
We were going to go on Saturday, but rain made us delay it until Sunday.
Here's some pics....

They've actually built this permanent Medieval village to use about 10 weekends a year. They have about 10 stages, and an abundance of acts. They also have numerous vending booths, and lot's of food and drink. And even a jousting field

I'll fill you in on more of the trip tomorrow

kia recall

Good morning.

It's currently raining out this morning. We've settled into a typical fall weather pattern. Cool days,cooler nights. Some sun, lot's of clouds and occasional rain. Yuk. I want summer back!

But still, 4 more weekend trips before we winterize and store the mo-ho.

Work is steady this week, not real busy, but steady. The owners of the mall we're in continue to do maintenance and repairs. It's actually looking pretty good.

In other news...

My new Kia Soul has been recalled.

This car comes with what they call 'mood lighting'.

What that is, is the speakers in the 2 front doors have lighting around the edge. There's a dial on the dash that allows you to turn it on, turn it to slowly pulse, or turn it to flash with the beat of the music. I must say I found it 'cute' at first, but the red glow doesn't show up during daylight, and at night it's pretty low to the floor so you don't really notice it that much.

Anyway, there's apparently a problem with the wiring that goes to them. They could short and cause a fire, so Kia asks that you leave them off until you can get them in for repair.

I've been planning on taking it in to have splash guards put on so I'll make an appointment for both.

And now I have an early day at work,

So later!

a lesson learned

Good morning.
And today is starting out better than yesterday.
I was online yesterday morning, checking mail when I clicked on a link and BAM! All of a sudden an antivirus window opens up saying I might be infected and should run a scan.
Well, first off, it wasn't my antivirus software so I knew it was one of those fake ones trying to get me to buy one. So I just closed the window. BIG MISTAKE!
I later learned that to get rid of this I should have immediately closed my browser. By closing the window I allowed it to download to my puter. It then incessantly popped up windows telling me I was infected and needed to buy their software to fix it. It disabled my antivirus software. It wouldn't let me scan my puter with any of my various apps. It even disabled Internet access. It was one mean piece of malware.
So, I turned off the puter. Fired up the laptop, downloaded the latest version of Malwarebytes, copied it to a flash drive, restarted my puter in safe mode, installed the malwarebytes program and scanned the puter. It found 2 infections and removed them. I then restarted the puter in normal mode, and ran my Avast. It found 5 more infections. Then I ran SuperAntiSpyware, which found nothing. You can never have to many antivirus programs because one may not find everything. Just make sure you only have one running at a time. I use Avast for my primary antivirus program. And all three are free!

So your probably asking if they're so good, why did I get infected? They can only stop unwanted things from downloading without your permission. I allowed it by clicking it. My mistake. But now I'm clean again.
And in other news.....
I caught the little bastard that's been eating up my yard!
In the pic below, I have sweet potato vines cascading down the walls by the waterfall.
Except now there just stems. All the leaves have been eaten off. That's one hungry woodchuck!
And here's the accused....

Just another of the many to enter the 'Wayne relocation program'. No more eating in my yard!

Also, I replaced a light bulb in the handle of the mo-ho. Our outside lights consist of a porch light which can be turned on separately, a light in the handle by the door, and a light under the steps. Very handy if you come back late at night.
You can leave the porch light off so as not to bother the neighbors and just have a soft light to see the steps and door.

So with all the work to get my puter clean again, I didn't get much else done.

Dinner was turkey burgers with fresh tomatoes from the garden, and roasted peppers from the garden.

My Monday post

Good morning.
Our weekend is going well.
Our workweek ended Saturday afternoon, where we finished it off with cocktails on the deck.
Dinner was homemade nachos. Yummy!
Sunday, I awoke at my usual 5ish, that's right, 5 am, no alarm. That's just the time I seem to wake up every day.
I fired up the puter, took my blood pressure pill, checked my mail and the weather, then dressed and went to clean the Salon. Normally it takes about an hour. I usually go in early Saturday before customers and wipe some stuff down to save time on Sunday. Anyway, I decided to power scrub the floors, so I was there nearly 3 hours. I stopped for the Sunday paper and arrived back home about 8:45, took my shower and woke up Craig. Fixed us lattes, him regular, me decaf, and we read the paper.
Went out for some groceries, and came home and checked our lotto tickets. We have 2 drawings a week and we wait until Sunday to check our numbers. That's our early retirement plan. It hasn't been working too well. ;-)
Craig did his usual bookwork and laundry.
I charged up the dump battery we use for the mo-ho macerator pump. That's how we empty our tanks. No messy accordion hoses for me!
While that was charging I went in the mo-ho to swap the new antenna handle for the broken one we finally got. Did that, and the antenna still wouldn't turn. Went up on the roof and wd-40ed it some more. I could turn it a little one way, but not the other. It kept going a little more with each twist until I finally got it turning. It is now working fine. Yay!
I then went out and set the live trap for the woodchuck we have again in the yard. That bugger has tripped it twice without getting caught.
We saw him later in the afternoon in the trap, munching on the carrots. He then grabbed one and went off into the bushes. I went out to see how he could have gotten the carrots without tripping the trap. The little bastard had turned the trap on it's side! So he wouldn't have to step on the trip plate! Now I don't think they are that smart. He must have been on the side of the trap trying to get to the carrots and pushed it over. So I got out tent stacks and secured the trap. I'll check this morning once it's light enough to go out.
I then cleaned the portable gas grill we use for the mo-ho. I've read mice can smell the grease and food bits, so they say to keep it cleaned. And I must say, the more often I clean it, the easier it is to clean. And when we're done with our trips, I also store it in the garage in the winter.
Our weather has been a little cooler than normal. We've only been in the mid to upper 60's. But it was sunny yesterday, and felt warmer.
We ended the day with drinks on the deck, followed with dinner. Ham steaks, mashed potatoes, and corn on the cob.
We have such an exciting life!

another post

Good morning.
It's been another busy week in the Salon.
I did manage to mow the yard after work Friday, and blow all the debris off the driveway and deck. Tuesday was extremely windy, and we have 2 old Chinese Elms that are very twiggy. We also have a Sycamore that's been dropping leaves for a month now due to the drought. So the driveway and deck were a mess. But they look good now.
The gardens look nasty. I'll try to remember to get some pics this weekend and show you. Between the heat and drought, most everything looks worn and ragged. I'm not ready to start cutting everything back yet, so it's good we still have a few more trips to concentrate on.
And to finish this post, some more pics from Indiana Dunes State Park.
These are mostly for Tom and Dean who were there with us in July.
This is a pic of the new viaduct that they were working on and was to be completed by July. Well, it wasn't and still isn't.
This is the other end by the beach trail from the campground and marsh. It appears they've torn out most of what they did and are redoing it. Must have discovered something they didn't plan on and had to redo it.

Here's the nice new fancy metal fencing that runs along it. No wood here except the top rail. This will last decades thanks to the stimulus money.

This is where the bridge for the beach trail will someday go. I'll report back about it's progress when we go back in October.
Now it's time to get ready for my last day at the Salon this week.

More about Indiana Dunes

Good morning.
Footprints in the sand. This is beach sand that was blown up on the parking lot during the night.
Most of you know I'm an early riser. Earlier than most people. So I like to walk or bike in the early morning. It's so quiet and peaceful.
I did just that on Sunday morning at the campground. I rode my bike to the beach.

Here's the walk way from the parking lot to the beach. See how sand has blown across the sidewalk during the night?

As you read in the last post, the blowing sand is what built the dunes. To try and prevent the sand from making the parking lot another dune, they've built these sand berms between the parking lot and beach and planted dune grass on them. As the grass spreads and grows it'll trap the sand.Indiana Dunes has a very expansive beach and with concessions and bathrooms easily available, it's a very popular beach.

So on Tuesday, after I cleaned the Salon, I woke up Craig, made our coffee, and did our usual running around. Bank, Salon to drop off checks, and grocery shopping. Exciting stuff. I spent the day, mowing, cleaning the mo-ho, and spot weeding the lawn. Craig did his usual bookwork and laundry. Dinner was chicken on the grill, grilled zucchini and leftover pasta salad.

Yesterday, a 10 hour workday, and today about 9. The Salon has been fairly busy. That's good since we seem to have bill after bill coming in. Had to have the new washer/dryer at work serviced already. It was making a weird clicking noise. Fortunately is was just a bolt that needed to be tightened. Just a one hour service call fee. No, there is no warranty when you use appliances for the home in a business.

And now it's shower time and off to work.

trip #8

Good morning.
My absence means we've been on another trip.
This one took us back to Indiana Dunes State Park. You'll recognise the name because we've been here 3 times this year.

Here's a pic of me on top of a dune overlooking Lake Michigan.
We've finally had a trip that was safe and incident free!
We arrived Friday afternoon, filled our fresh water tank, unloaded the car and car caddy, and settled into our site. Set up 'camp,' and relaxed and watched the continuous procession of campers that slowly filled the campground for the holiday weekend.
Saturday, after our morning coffee walk, it was off to Chicago, which is less than an hour's drive from the campground. We did our usual shopping, eating and sightseeing, but this trip, no Navy Pier. The temps were barely 68 with a very cold wind. Not a good time to be our on a pier in lake Michigan. We arrived back at the campground, took a bike ride, fired up a nice warm campfire, and relaxed for the evening.
Sunday, after our morning coffee walk it was breakfast.
Now we seldom eat breakfast because we usually have an early lunch. but today was hiking day, and we figured we'd need nourishment to get us through.

Ummm. Bacon and eggs and toast! Yummy!

See, even Craig liked it!
Then it was off to hike the dunes!

In all the years we've come here, we've never taken any of the hiking trails, and today was to finally be the first.

They have trails from 1.75 miles to 5.5 miles. We settled on the 3.75 mile trail that took us through the behind the dunes forest, then over the dunes and along the ridge.
People coming along the ridge, and me on top.

The pic below is called a 'blowout'. The dunes stretch all along lake Michigan, but occasionally a dune will become unstable and collapse. Remember, these are basically mountains of sand, kept in place by grass and trees. If you get a Storm that dumps a huge amount of water, that sand can get washed away and the whole dune can collaspe. What's left is a valley that fills with grasses which will start the slow process of becoming a new dune.

As sand is washed up on the beach, the wind carries it inland, where the grass catches it. That starts the rebuilding. As more sand collects, shrubs and trees start to grow behind it and allows it to grow taller and after hundreds of years we'll have another dune here.

Okay, that's your geography lesson for today.

People way down on the beach. The dunes are pretty tall!

And another pic of me on the dune trail.
It was an exhausting hike! It may have been only 3.75 miles, but you add climbing in the sand and it felt more like 10!

But we made it back to the campground, relaxed with the Sunday paper, and then we went down to the beach to soak up some of the last summer sun and people watch.

Later, it was another campfire, and chicken on the grill with a home made pasta salad.

Monday, it was pacing up and heading home where we arrived safe and sound.

It was a good trip.

And now I'm off to clean the Salon.

Friday post

Good morning.

Another week goes by and little posting by me. What can I say except our life during the week is pretty mundane and not worth talking about. Tuesday we didn't do much of anything. I cleaned the portable grill for the mo-ho and checked tire pressures, but most of the day was lounging. Wed. and Thur. are long (10-12hrs) days at work and when we come home we pretty much veg in front of the TV with cocktails to unwind and then to bed..

Today's shorter and I'll do some grocery shopping after work. But then we get a nice l-o-n-g holiday weekend.
So now I'm off to work!
Have a great weekend!