CHECKING OUT THE LOCAL BARS

The sunny high for the day was 27C and the low Saturday night only reached 11.

The day started by watching the remote control cars going up and down the street owned by Gene, Tom and now Dale with his new truck. Don didn’t get his out as he was getting ready to go build the track again. They were zipping up and down sometimes with more control than others. When control was lost they would hit a tree, parked car, each other or would just roll/tumble just by the wrong touch of the controls. They are still getting use to the controls since the car/truck when it comes back towards you are opposite to what it was when going away from you. Inadvertently they get mixed up once and a while and they are off into the grass area somewhere.  It’s funny to watch and it is a good thing the vehicles are quite tuff and can take these tumbles. In one case Dale was parked off to the side of the road watching the others when Gene, who is a little wild lets say, drove his truck right over Dale's truck. Gene says “woops sorry Dale, did I put a mark on it?” Then off he goes.

The r/c group terrorizing the street.

Tom's 2-wheel truck with Dale's new 4x4 truck.

  On Saturday Linda asked if we wanted to check out a place called Riverside Club and of course we said sure. This is like a place we have never seen before. It is located in Mission, about a 45 minute drive to the west, right on the bank of the Rio Grande with Mexico being the river width away. It offered cruises on their own boat to go up and down the river. It consisted of a large new building with a stage for the live band and a good sized dance floor. The older section with the original building and a much smaller outside dance floor had tables placed around it. The food was served out there as well.  When we arrived for lunch around 1 o’clock it was quiet with a few people throughout. Rick/Connie and Gene/Jane jointed us a short time later which made for great conversation and friendship. By the time the band started at 2 o’clock the place was packed and the dance floor right off the bat was full. People here really like to dance and it was interesting to watch the different techniques. After checking the license plates out in the parking lot when we left, the majority it seemed were Winter Texans. It was a good time with great food and friends.

Cathy, Linda and Dale heading for Lakeside

Check out the fan! This is how quiet it was when we arrived.

This was on the center of the fan.

Outside area with the Rio Grande.

View from the back yard.

Gene taking on the tenderloin sandwich.

The band

The hall is filled up now.

After a few dances and drinks Linda who became our designated driver suggested we check out another place nearby called Crazy Joes which was another outside Bar/dance hall which is now all outside. It had a number of motorcycles parked in the front and was also very busy. We even noticed some people from the other bar were here. It was standing room only and it took Dale and I about 15 minutes for us to get a drink at the bar. Here too, there was a live band playing and the dance floor was full.   

Checking out Crazy Joe's

When we got home we had a short visit at John and Catherine’s for happy hour then went home to relax. It was a great day!

Til tomorrow....

CATCHING UP

Wow, we have been pretty busy the last couple of days and I couldn’t find the time to update the blog. So we are ok and everything is great.  Anyway, Friday had a high of 21C and it was a beautiful day. I started the day asking Dale if he was available to do some welding for me. He happens to be a retired Welder who worked on the pipelines in the north and has a welder on his truck which doubles for a generator when camping. I made a bicycle rack and attachment which fits on the trailer to haul our bicycles. There was too much movement when we hit some large bumps on the road causing it to spring forward and hit the back of the trailer. It was a small job but it was good having it done. I thought we might have to store the bicycles in the trailer with the Wing but this puts the rack back in use with no further dents being created on the trailer.

In the afternoon we went over to the metal ornament making place I blogged about earlier and picked up our welcome sign we ordered. It looks great and we will have to find a place to put it when we get home.The star under the welcome represents Texas, the lone star state.

We then headed over to Trophy Gardens Resort which was about ½ hour away and each had a Wellness Check done. It is a medical diagnostic team who goes around the Valley to various resorts doing some medical tests which we would only get at home if we were having symptoms and referred by our Doctor. The tests included 1) Carotid Artery test, 2) Abdominal Aortic Test which checks for the enlargement of the abdominal aorta, 3) Peripheral Arterial Disease Test, 4) EKG and 5) a Bone Density Test. The good part is they don’t even have to give you a needle, it is all painless and takes about 20 minutes. Cathy thought it would be a good idea to get and then send the results to our Doctor to use as a baseline for the future. In 2 ½ weeks we will be sent all the results and information as to where we stand and if there is something that needs to be followed up on. Cathy thought it was a pretty good deal for $125.00 each. We are going to try and claim the amount on our taxes (we’ll see?).

Osteoporosis Test

Checking the Carotid Artery

Abdominal Aortic test

The good news was we were back in time for Happy Hour and be able to relax the rest of the evening.

Saturday

Another beautiful day weather wise, the high reached 27C with just a few high clouds in the sky.   

Saturday was cleaning day. Cathy started by vacuuming inside and we washed the coach and trailer. We took our time and did a great job. I washed and Cathy had to work quickly drying as the sun was drying the surface fast. Afterwards we just relaxed and enjoyed the sunshine. Linda came over and invited us to go to the dance here at the resort and we accepted right away. We have done more dancing in the last month and a half than we have in the last few years. But before going dancing we had to attend happy hour and there was a very large group attending (about 30). During happy hour, Gene, the first person to greet us and his wife Jane just arrived from being home in Ontario for Christmas. It was a good time to arrive and say hi to all the friends and neighbours.

The other big news which moved through the group was Dale purchasing a remote control truck, this makes 4 units in the neighbourhood. This came to me as a big surprise, I didn’t think Dale would be into this at all.

The dance didn’t have a very large attendance which made it nice as the dance floor was not crowed. Cathy has been getting directions on how to do line dancing with the other girls and is getting a pretty good handle on it.

If we stick to our plans we will be leaving in 1 week. We are monitoring the weather to make sure the cold has moved out of our future destinations.

  

All for now...

 

BETTER WEATHER!

Even though the Wed. night temperature was the lowest we have had here reaching 4C, the day turned out to be very nice with very little cloud and a high of 23.


The day was quiet pretty much. We took the Wing out to get groceries and sat out for awhile enjoying the sun. I am not sure what happened to Cathy! While I was sitting outside she opened the door and asked me if I wanted to CUT HER HAIR. If you know Cathy she is very fussy about it and it completely caught me off guard. I said I would do it later. About an hour later I asked when she wanted me to do it and she must have gained her senses and said never.   

 The Woodworking Shop had a BBQ to raise money so we joined Ron and Janet to participate. For $7.00 each we received a burger, bag of chips, a spoon full of pork and beans and 2 cans of pop or 1 beer.
The event was well attended and I am sure they made a good sum of money.

 Sorry I have no pictures today.  

All for now.

OFF TO BROWNSVILLE

Tuesday evening was cool with a low of 6C but the day time temperatures are slowly rising with Wednesdays high getting to 17. We also saw the sun for the first time in awhile. (Nice!)

We were up early to catch a ride with Tanya and Don to go to Brownsville (just under an hour drive) to take a tour of the Border Patrol Facility. This was a very interesting tour. We joined about 50 other people in a class room and met several Patrol Officers. They also had the Supervisor from the Brownsville Border Bridge come in and speak on their responsibilities. They were a great bunch, very personal, down to earth and even threw in some humour.    

These organisations do not have to follow the 4^th Amendment, which is part of the Bill of Rights which guards against unreasonable search and seizures without any warrant. They also have to carry two other weapons other than their guns which include a taser and a baton (the kind that lengthens with a flick of the wrist). Their finger print data base is connected to all other Policing data bases including INTERPOL.

Their training is for 6 months and if not fluent in speaking Spanish they take another 2 months to learn it.

Detention Area

Lock boxes for their guns to go into before entering the detention area.

Camera Room - they also do thermal and night vision.

When we arrived back at the Resort, Don who has a remote control truck and is part of a RC group  noticed they were starting to install the track. The Resort put in $1000.00, provided the area and will be running some water over to the site to help maintain it.

It seemed like there were more Chiefs than Indians.

All for now...

GETTING BORED

We are hoping the weather will break soon as we are getting bored. It was cold, with a little drizzle in the am. The high reached 10C and the low Monday night was 7.

We just took the bicycles out to buy our water and stayed inside for the rest of the day. We did get together with the happy hour gang at a restaurant called Ram’s BBQ. They actually stayed open for us.

It is a cafeteria style dinner were you can have up to 3 meats and 2 side dishes with corn bread for $8.99. The meats were biscuit, ribs, sausage, meat loaf, chicken and catfish. Most of the meat was cooked outside behind the restaurant. Side dishes were beans, mashed potatoes, rice and bread.

We were home in time to play “Not your grammas’ bingo”. Four people share a full deck of cards (each person gets 13 cards). The caller calls out the cards one by one until there is a bingo. They play 3 games for a nickel, 3 games for a dime, 3 games for a quarter. The last game is for a dollar. It was a good time even though Cathy and I didn’t have any luck.

That’s it for the day .....