In the land of “Sweetheart and Honey”

For the majority of my life I have called folks “Sweetie Pie” or “Honey”. I have been “talked” to about my the inappropriate workplace names that I used.

Haaaaa, no more!!! We are in the land of clerks, waitresses, sales folks all using the words “Sweetheart”, “Hon”, and “Darling”. So my “Sweetie Pie” and “Honey” are completely acceptable terms here in Kentucky.  I’m so happy because at my age it gets harder and harder to remember names.
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Last week we had 73 new seasonal campers come to work so that is 73 names to memorize. We have a new group of “seasonal campers” every Monday for the next four weeks.  That’s a lot more names to memorize.

Our bodies have “hardened” pretty well. We ARE tired after ten hours of work, but at the end of the fourth day we are still not as tired as we were in Coffeyville last year.  The design of the production lines here are easier on the body…less back aches. Also there is less walking as Stowers than I did last year…different layout of the plant.

Our buddies arrived this week….Yippeeeeee!!!! So we have The Deacons, The Meyers, The Doyle's and The Mossman's.  We are all in the same campground and have enjoyed being together. Tonight Jim Mossman made a large pot of chili that we enjoyed with hot French bread.  Later on we enjoyed a campfire together.

Jim and I are changing shifts tomorrow so we only have one day off.  We went to the Huddle House for breakfast, which was very good. Then it was to Walmart, Krogers and then I had to do laundry….all that domestic stuff. I did get my hair cut with a new style which I really like….photos soon.

Well, it is almost 8 p.m. and my bedtime…..stop laughing there….we get up at 4 a.m. so have to get to bed early….but only about 38 working days to go!!!

Remember, you are loved!

A Birthday Party for John

 

We had a carpool with Alet, Tom and Jean. Jean’s husband, John, works at home as a programmer and yesterday was his birthday.  That is definitely a reason to have a party….although we really don’t need much of a reason to party.

So last night we gathered the carpool group and our two next door neighbors plus our visiting friend, Marty, and had a burger cookout.  The Greek salad, mac salad, cole slaw, and Alet’s wonderful baked beans completed the side dishes we enjoyed.

While Jim was grilling a little friend appeared on the scene.  This is a Walking Stick and is really interesting to study.

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

Jean discovered it on her shirt.

 

We decided we would gather every couple of weeks for a cookout of some sort as long as weather permits. We have a double picnic table in our campsite so we can accommodate a lot of people.

Our buddies, Rich and Terri, are arriving here today and we are excited to see them again. They are managers of a commercial campground in South Fork, CO, close to where we camphost during the summers.  It’s only been a month since we’ve seen them, but have missed them a lot.  It will be a good happy hour today!

Remember, you are loved.

Came Home to a Friend

When we drove into Indian Ridge Campground tonight after work, we were delighted to see our Escapee friend, Marty Cassidy, parked across from us!!! Oh, it was soooooo good to see our old friend again; it’s been since January when we were all in Quartzsite, AZ, together.

After a couple of drinks at happy hour Marty took us out to dinner at the Smoke Pit which I blogged about before.

 

 

Marty has been waiting to get to the south to get some authentic BBQ.  I think we took care of that craving at the Smoke Pit.  Marty seemed pretty happy with their smoked ribs.  At least he was moaning a lot with his eyes closed!!!

Tomorrow morning we are having an informal morning get together with muffins and coffee cakes to meet the latest amazon.com season camper arrivals. Then we plan on driving Marty around a bit and also check out Green River Lake COE for The Mossman’s as they are thinking of staying there for a week before joining us here at Indian Ridge CG.  Then tomorrow night we have a weekly tournament of Corn Hole with the “local libation”.

Jim and I are tired tonight.  I broke my personal walking record, as I walked 18,478 steps today; that’s about 8.4 miles…as I said, it’s a new record for me.  I better start losing some weight or I’ll be upset.  Need to see some benefit from all this walking…my right thigh is tingling and going numb by the end of the day.

Remember, you are loved.

Denver’s Spot Beam Part II

My error….it wasn’t Denver who decided to go to a spot beam, it was DISH’s decision to spot beam the four Denver local stations.

All of us who had Denver for their “local” stations will no longer be able to watch those stations.  I am really bummed out….we love Channel 9News and their wonderful PBS stations.

Guess we’ll just call DISH and change our local stations each time we land somewhere for a while and use the batwing to pick up what we can for short stays.

You are loved.

Answer to Denver’s Spot Beam

Thank you Tom Nankivell for sending me the information on Denver’s decision to spot beam their local stations.  If you are interested, here is the website address for the explanation:

http://www.satelliteguys.us/dish-network-forum/227736-denver-locals-moving-spot-beam.html

So, we aren’t crazy and Jim didn’t aim the satellite incorrectly.  Basically, “Denver” has decided to make all their four local stations to spot beam only. 

That means we will have to call DISH and have them “zap” us the local stations whenever we “land” for a while.

This is definitely a “bummer” and a pain in the *&$#@)+…..  it’s out of our hands and we just have to deal with it.

But I’d rather have to call DISH each time than have to have only Los Angeles and New York.

Remember, you are loved and really cared for also.

Betty’s Country Cooking Restaurant

Betty’s is 8 miles south of the campground in Columbia, KY, and they have a tasty breakfast.

 

 

 

 

We were surprised at the reasonable prices. Two eggs-sausage patties, bacon or fried bologna-biscuits or toast was only $3.75.  Hay, Rich Deacon, found a place to get that fried bologna you love so much :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Look at those wood panel walls! The shelves are decorated with seasonal decor. Outside the front doors are also decorated for the season.

The breakfast was very tasty. The two huge homemade biscuits were almost a meal on their own. I really liked the sausage links with natural casings.

 

Betty’s does have a buffet, but it’s a one-trip only.  Never heard of that before.  Also, there are three different prices depending on the number of vegetables you take….that’s another first for me.

I’ll stick with the breakfasts and will go back again.  Remember, you are loved.

Amazon.com’s Meet and Greet

This is a retro blog post because I forgot to post it before.  It happened on September 26.  These are photos of our Sunday Meet and Greet.  Amazon.com put on a good feed to enjoy.

Here are photos of the people we’ve heard about or talked to.

 

This is Stephanie Clenney.  She’s real nice and very friendly.

 

 

 

 

And this is Phil Schafer, the seasonal camper coordinator.

 

 

This is Nikki Warren, HR

 

 

 

 

There were several people who spoke.  The Plant Manager, Rob Robinson, welcomed us and genuinely seemed to be pleased to have us seasonal campers here.  He said “we dipped our toe in the pond last year” experimenting with 50 seasonal campers.The project was so successful they “decided to just jump right on in the pond this year” bringing in a whole lot more folks.

We even had Eddie Rogers the Taylor County Judge Executive come and speak to us.  He was funny…he said “My name is Eddie Rogers. Welcome to MY neighborhood”.  The judge executive is like the mayor of the county, he explained. He sure wished we were all residents of Taylor County because he is up for re-election and “I sure could use your votes”.

Everyone was very cordial, friendly and welcoming.  It was a good start of our stay.

Remember, you are loved.

Two Time Zones in Campground

This is really funny.  Part of Kentucky is in the Central Time Zone and part in the Eastern Time Zone.  And guess where the dividing line is????  Right between campsites #34 and #35 here in Indian Ridge Campground!!!!  Isn’t that hilarious?

We were informed that amazon.com was in the Eastern Time Zone and to make sure our watches were all set that way so we wouldn’t be late for work; seems Three Springs Campground a little further south is in the Central Time Zone.

I didn’t think too much about it until Phil Schafer, the seasonal camper coordinator, said last year he was here in site #35 and he was in the Central Time Zone.

That sure is going to make things interesting, isn’t it?  Wouldn’t make much a difference if you used your watch to tell time, but I stopped wearing a watch earlier this year and have used my cell phone to check the time if I need to…..can’t do THAT any more :))

Remember, you are loved.

Problem Getting Denver Stations

When we went to being fulltime RVers in 2007 we thought we could get by with using our batwing to pick up local stations and cut out on the expense of satellite TV.  Well, that lasted about a month…Jim without a lot of TV stations to surf through?  Are you crazy?

We opened up another account with DISH while camphosting in South Fork, Colorado.  Of course, we had to declare ourselves as ‘nomads’ without a permanent stick and brick.  At that time we had several choices of cities to be declared as our “local stations”….New York, Atlanta, Chicago, Denver and Los Angeles as I remember.  So naturally we chose Denver as it had always been our local station while living in Alamosa.

We have been able to “get” our Denver local stations and Denver news, etc., everywhere we have traveled from South Dakota, Pennsylvania, Florida and Arizona…no trouble.  That is until we got here to Campbellsville.  When Jim set up the satellite dish here all of a sudden the Denver stations wouldn’t come in as a transponder but as a spot beam.

When we called DISH tech services we were told we never could have gotten Denver stations outside of their area.  Well, up to two days before we arrived in Campbellsville we were watching Denver news just fine in the Chicago area, thank you very much, and have received Denver stations everywhere for the last three years.  Then the tech said something really stupid, “you must be mistaken”….oh, yea, we only imagined we watched Denver Fox, Denver news and all the Bronco games for the last three years while traveling all across the country.

So we are watching the local Kentucky news stations and a couple of the major network stations with our batwing and then switch over to our satellite DISH for Foodnetwork, History channel, CNN, etc.  It’s a major drag, but I don’t want to change over to NY and LA if we can somehow get our local Denver stations back when we leave here.

Anybody got any ideas of what may have happened to all of a sudden get our local stations spot beamed to us instead of getting them through a transponder?

Remember, you are loved.

Smoke Pit

Sunday seems to be the day to go out to eat as a group.  We had over 20 people last week but today we only had 8…but that’s how it goes.  Today we had pretty miserable weather…overcast, very windy and some light rain.

Now last Sunday was our first visit to the Smoke Pit which is owned by Pat Blevins who is in his 30s. He learned to cook and barbeque from his grandma and he uses all her recipes.  His banana pudding and peach cobbler is outstanding.

You go up to the counter and order. They have pulled pork, pulled chicken, pork shoulder slices, ribs, etc. The sides are different, like smoked cabbage wedges, broccoli casserole, hash brown casserole, sweet potato casserole, etc. Prices are reasonable. Sandwiches are $3.50, drinks $1.50

This photo shows two orders of a full rack of ribs. Yes, that is two half racks of 6 ribs each in that basket, plus two sides, a roll and a drink for $19.99 – half a rack order is $11.99  Jim and I shared a full rack order and we could only eat 3-4 ribs a piece; so now we have some great leftovers for lunch tomorrow.

 

Last weeks’ gather of folks

 

 

 

 

 

We went grocery shopping at one of two Kroger’s in town.  One is newer and in the Walmart shopping area and the other Kroger is in town proper.  Prices seem to be about the same as in Colorado, although the produce is lower…apples regular price $1 a pound, lettuce 98 cents each.

There is also a six-plex cinema and they do have matinees on Friday, Saturday and Sunday…I think it was $5.50 for seniors and they show first run movies.

Time for a nap, so I’ll sign off for now.  Remember, you are loved!

Week One Done

We’ve completed our first week and only have 12 weeks to go.

Yesiree, we survived Week One and are enjoying our first day off.  Our bodies are doing better and adjusting to walking and standing on cement floors.  We will take the extra week to continue  “conditioning” by working five hours a day for our four day week. At 68 years old I can only push my body so far; and it takes longer to get in shape. 

The Stow and Receiving Schools amazon.com have are very good and it prepares you well for the actual work you will be doing. The whole place is clean, well organized and well run.  The regular employees are pleasant and very welcoming.

The weather has changed to fall temperatures.  Days are now in the 70s and low 80s with the nights in the 50s.  We have had some strong winds the last two nights and mornings have been foggy.  The fog created amazing photos.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our evenings are quiet. Jim barbeques and we watch TV. We take walks in the evening and visit with campers sitting outside.

 

We drove to Green River Lake and Marina to check out the campground there.  It sure is a pretty place and they say the fishing is good.

Well, I’m off to do the laundry.  It sure is nice to have four washers and driers right here in the campground.  They are clean and convenient.  Oh, for those also coming to Indian Ridge Campground, laundry is $1.50 per wash and $1.50 for 45 minute dryer.  They have change machine or have rolls of quarters in the office.

Talk with you later.  Remember, you are loved.