Two Week Anniversary

As of yesterday I have been retired two weeks.  It doesn't feel like two weeks and to be perfectly honest, I don't feel like I am retired yet.  We have had a lot to do over the past few days since returning home from the trailer and I sat Monday wondering how we accomplished all of it while we were working.

Yesterday began with the customary morning walk with Honey but it was once around the block and that was it.  Mia took her on the long walk.  Mia had mentioned a loose toilet seat so I fixed it while they were gone and went down to restart the detailing process on the truck.  I worked most of the morning on cleaning and washing the exterior of the truck which began looking like this.

I washed it and cleaned everything, or at least that is what I thought.  The final result after waxing was very nice.

Except for the minor flaw I found on the right rear quarter panel.  It appears someone swiped it as they left a parking area and scratched it down to the primer.

I try very hard to keep my stuff nice and I understand it is a utility vehicle but this person knew they did this and never stopped to say anything.  Obviously just drove off.

Mia left to get a haircut and mention something about the toilet I fixed not flushing as she ran out the door.  I went up and looked at it and found the chain had come off the handle rod.  So tightening the seat early caused this?  Now I understand what technicians feel when they fix brakes and the customer comes back complaining of poor running and feels we should pay to repair the engine because we just did the brakes.

Got a haircut and spent some time in local parts houses looking for a Jerry Can and Mount for the back of my trailer but could find nothing.  I bought this cool little inverter generator for the trailer a couple of weeks ago at Costco and I want to carry extra fuel, just not in the truck.  So the search will be up to Google.

There are countless projects to do around the condo and since the weather is supposed to be really nice I'll be choosing a couple and trying to accomplish them.  Then we pack it all up and head back up to the trailer for our trip to Leavenworth.  I suspect we will leave tomorrow morning for Gold Bar, spend the night and leave Friday morning.  I am looking forward to it.  We have a couple of hikes already planned.

Hope everyone is well and thanks for stopping by.

Fossil Update, Screens and Spring

Honey and I took our normal morning hike around the neighborhood yesterday.  I am not sure who is walking who.  She is on some kind of timer that gets her up at 7 a.m. and she is ready to go at 7 a.m.  

She does a little stretching exercise and off we go.

She keeps looking back to make sure I am with her even though we are tethered.  As we hiked I noticed that Spring is indeed arriving in Seattle.  As you can see we had a sunny day yesterday with temperatures in the high 50's, low 60's.  It was beautiful as we walked through the neighborhood.

We had a lot of shopping to do yesterday and we succeeded in completing all of it.  We got the new chairs for the trailer from IKEA, looked at Tuff sheds as a possible gazebo, hit Costco and the grocery store and went to the bank.  We also went to the Fossil store.

In an early post I told you about the Fossil watch I received from on of the manufacturers that the dealership I worked for had represented.  It is a very nice looking watch but unfortunately it didn't work.  According to the instructions in the can it was a self winding watch that only required winding if it had set for a long period of time so I followed the instructions and wound it.  Nothing…It didn't move.  We went to Fossil in Southcenter yesterday and a very nice and patient young lady took care of me.  It appears the watch had set for sometime before being given to me and the battery (yep, not a self winder) had died.  I happily spent $10.95 for her to install a new battery and make it work.  Not only does it look good on my arm, it tells time.  I remember these from before smart phones.

I contacted Northwood Manufacturing yesterday about an obscure little clip I need to hold the screen into the window near the dinette in the trailer.  I haven't heard back, but I searched Google and could come up with anything that looked quite like this.

I am hoping I will hear from them today.

After all the shopping yesterday and while Mia was fixing dinner I went down into the garage and decided it was spring cleaning time for the truck.  Because we have Honey the interior of the truck can take along time if you really try to dispose of the vast majority of the hair.  I vacuumed and vacuumed, brushed and picked, until I didn't see the point any longer.  I cleaned everything including the heater vent grilles, dash, door panels, glass, seats and carpets.  I didn't get to the rubber floor mats.  The inside of the truck looks pretty good and I'll attack the outside and those rubber mats today.  

I can't help but wonder, how the heck did we get all this stuff done when we were working?

Hope everyone is well and thanks for stopping by.

Tornados and Fossil

I awoke this morning to news that tornados had ravaged mid America.  The first image I saw was a picture of a recreational vehicle park or lot where overturned trailers lay in the path of destruction.  I certainly hope and pray for the victims of this awful tragedy.

When I retired one of the manufacturers that our store represents brought me a beautiful gold watch made by Fossil with a nice leather band.  I am not a watch guy but this watch is very attractive and while the manufacturer logo is on the dial it is very unobtrusive.  Unfortunately it doesn't work.  I followed the instructions to get the self winding unit started and nothing.  I checked with Fossil and they told me the exact same set of instructions that I had already tried.  I am going to take it in to the Fossil store today and I believe they told me three to four weeks and it would be mailed back to me.  I think it is just a case of the watch sitting around too long.

Today is a shopping day and we have a list a mile long starting with the Fossil store, IKEA, groceries, Costco, Sumner RV and the list goes on.  So we will be out and about most of the day.

Hope everyone is well and thanks for stopping by.

Final Decompression

It is Friday morning the next to the last day of this stay at the trailer.  We don't have much planned today but one thing on our list this trip was going up the to Stevens Pass summit to hike a trail built from the old Great Northern Railroad bed.  It is cold, but there is no rain and the weather appears to be breaking, at least for now.  We load up our gear and head up the mountain.  Apparently this trail is flat and easy enough for an old man with knock knees to walk.  There are three trail heads, two are accessible from Highway 2.  While we didn't plan it, we ended up at the Martin Creek Trail head and using the lower grade trail we walked roughly two miles down towards the Interpretive Center.  Our walk took us just past mile mark 1719.

This is an impressive trail.  The volunteers who worked on this road bed did a fantastic job of bringing together a walk in the forest with the history of the rails that crossed the Cascades in the early years.  There are real remnants of the old tunnels and some objects laying around.  We thoroughly enjoyed our trip on this trail.  Less than 100 years ago this was an active rail.  Tunnels overgrown with vegetation as nature takes back what is hers.  It is a walk into the past.  A time when men by the sweat of their brow and the strength of their backs dug tunnels, dropped trees, cleaned brush, prepared a road bed, laid ties, put down rail and added ballast. 

One of the quotes you read as you walk the trail is from James J Hill, founder and CEO of the Great Northern Railway, Empire Builder.  It states, "I will make my mark on the face of the earth and no man will ever wipe it out."  He forgot about mother nature who made this road bed an extremely dangerous way to cross the Cascades and it was eventually left as another, safer route was found.  The history of this route is available in a PDF file at http://www.irongoat.org/guidebk.html

We intend to walk the whole trail in the coming months.  

I'll let some of the pictures speak for themselves.