Wednesday, September 30, through Tuesday October 6, 2015: Yet Another Week In Williams:

Wednesday, we realized, was the first anniversary of our having closed the escrow on our Williams home.  Hurray!  It continues to have been a very good decision on our part.  We really enjoy this place.

Wednesday is also the occasion of the official weigh-in after two weeks of our diet.  I have now lost 12 pounds.  Double Hurray!  I celebrated all day.

Thursday, after I got a pedicure, I started reading Shadow of Power by Steve Martini.  (I'm taking a break from James Patterson for a while.)  It consumed most of my "free time" during the day.  I'm so busy, you know.

Friday, I dropped off Becky, Ramsey, and Kelsey at Buckskinner Park for their long hike of the day.

Buckskinner Park, in the Kaibab National Forest, is the location of one of the Williams reservoirs.  I puttered around while they hiked, doing some minor maintenance items.  Plus I read a little.

Friday afternoon, the mail included our Trusted Traveler cards from Homeland Security.  That was fast.  Now we're ready to travel like the big boys.

Saturday morning, after raking and bundling some of the gazillions of pine needles that have been falling this week,

we went to Flagstaff to run errands.  That evening was the occasion of the annual "Taste of Williams."  This year they moved it from the Elephant Rocks Golf Course to Bearizona, and changed the name to "Taste in Williams."  The event was supposed to be a costume party, and the theme was supposed to be Come As Your Favorite Star.  I dislike costume parties a lot, but we decided to go along with the crowd and at least wear our matching Hawaiian shirts (from Meghan's Bat Mitzvah).  That way, I could claim that I was Tom Selleck.  It turned out to be too cold, though, and we abandoned the idea of costumes altogether and bundled up. 

The event was fine, by the way.  We discovered one of the vendors was providing "Arizona Poppers" consisting of jalapeno peppers filled with cheese and wrapped in bacon, then deep-fried.  Absolutely delicious.  We ate too many of them.  And the live music was very good.

Sunday afternoon, we went to the Flagstaff Brewing Company on Route 66 in Flagstaff, to listen to some local bands.  We went specifically to hear The Prowlers, which featured Sue Kelly, the woman who does Becky's facials, as vocalist.  They were pretty good.  We were very good to ourselves, having only French Onion soup and Arnold Palmers.  It was interesting to see that the venue was packed with what seemed to be only friends and relatives of the various performers.  I guess local bands are like that.

Monday started out with rain, which returned a few times during the day.  It was actually quite a relaxing day.  And of course we can always use the rain to fill our reservoirs.  The Monday night redbox movie was I'll See You in my Dreams, with Blythe Danner.  Sam Elliott was also in it, almost as a cameo.  It was first shown at the Sundance Film Festival this past January and released in May, so it went to video rather quickly.  It was a nice, bittersweet film, though, well worth seeing.

I finished Shadow of Power early Tuesday afternoon.  Pretty good, though very complicated.  The Sutton Plumbing people showed up mid-afternoon and replaced the shower cartridge.  We'll see if it stops the drip.  They didn't need to snake the laundry tub drain, though.  Becky inadvertently cleared the blockage on Monday by simply filling---and emptying---the tub while getting mud off her shoes.  

The Tuesday night redbox movie was Cop Car, with Kevin Bacon.  It was an unusual film, odd, but very entertaining.  Like the earlier one, this was released just two months ago and is now available on video---not a good sign for a movie.

Wednesday, September 23, through Tuesday, September 29, 2015: Another Week In Williams:

Wednesday morning's end-of-the-first-week weigh-in was positive:  I've lost eight pounds so far.  We'll keep going on the diet.

We are now in escrow on Becky's dad's house for the fourth time.  Three prior escrows have collapsed because the buyers were apparently spooked by the huge number of items that needed to be fixed---none of them major.  (The house is 65 years old, after all.)  Over time, we have now fixed virtually all of them.  We hope this escrow holds. 

The Wednesday redbox movie was '71 which was a very graphic, tough film about what are apparently commonly referred to as the "Troubles" in Northern Ireland in the '60s and '70s.  Some of the dialog was hard to understand due to the accents, but it was an engrossing movie nonetheless. 

 

Thursday as a serene day.  I finished a James Patterson book I've been reading for a few days:  Miracle at Augusta, which is not one of his mysteries.  It's about golf .  I don't play golf, but I know enough about it to have thoroughly enjoyed this small book.

 

I also got a flu shot on Thursday.  It was a Chinese fire drill at Safeway.  I had to wait my turn at the pharmacy, then fill out paperwork, then wait again for the clerk to come free, then wait for her to input the information to Medicare (which didn't like some of the data, so I had to wait again for that to get cleared up), then got back in the original line to sign the terminal, then wait in line for the pharmacist to finish what he was doing.  Then I got the shot.  In all, I was there for an hour.   

 

Friday, was my day to attack our 2014 taxes. 

 

 

I finished up the calculations which I do and emailed our accountant (in Colorado) with the Readers Digest version.  (I send all the backup stuff independently.)  Immediately after sending the email, I realized I had made a big mistake in one of the calculations, and emailed him a replacement version.  By then it was too late to send him the backup stuff, so I did that on Saturday, which meant that the UPS package would not go out until Monday.  But we still have more than two weeks to get it all finished and filed, so I'm not worried.  Ken, the accountant, has been doing this for us for 16 years (always filing in October) and he is very accommodating.

 

My copy of Bill O'Reilly's Killing Reagan arrived on Thursday, but I couldn't get to it until Friday.  I got half way through it on Saturday.  

 

 

I noticed one mistake.  O'Reilly describes the weather at the 1981 inauguration as pleasant:  "The Reagans have brought California's weather with them.  Tens of thousands of people stand in shirtsleeves and light jackets on this fifty-six degree day."  I was there.  To my mind, 56 degrees is not California weather, and I'm not sure it was really 56 degrees.  It was verrrry cold.   

 

I also watched my share of football on Saturday.  UCLA beat Arizona fairly handily, though, in truth, Arizona helped with some dumb mistakes.  The big thrill was watching Utah pummel Oregon 62 to 20.  Both teams were ranked in the top 25, Oregon at 13 and Utah at 18, I believe.  For some reason, I dislike Oregon almost as much as Notre Dame.   

 

The Sunday redbox movie was Water Diviner, with Russell Crowe, who also directed it.  Interesting movie.

 

 

 Sunday night was the occasion of a lunar eclipse that was interesting, and Monday night we had a "blood moon" which occurs when a full moon is closest to the earth.  Both were interesting to see. 

 

Monday morning, we dropped the dogs off at the railway kennel and headed for Phoenix (362 miles, round trip) for our "interview" with the Global Access folks from Homeland Security.  We passed!  We now are Trusted Travelers, meaning we can avoid some of the hassles at "participating" airports. 

 

 

After a 3 1/2 hour drive, the interview took about three minutes.  It was 104 degrees when we got to Phoenix, and we couldn't wait to head back.  It's only in the 70s here in Williams these days.  Very nice. 

 

Monday evening, I finished Killing Reagan.  For some reason, I was a little disappointed in it.  I don't think it was because the man was portrayed as a real human with many faults instead of the hero many of us have created in our minds.  Anyway, it was well worth reading. 

 

Tuesday morning, the folks from Sutton Plumbing showed up to fix our leaking master-bath shower faucet and snake a slow drain in our laundry tub. 

 

 

On a guess, I had contacted Moen and wangled a free replacement part for the shower.  It turned out the faucet is a Price-Pfister.  Oops.  A frustrating trip by the plumbers to the hardware store ensued; the store no longer carries Price-Pfister parts.  The parts need to be ordered by the plumbers. 

 

During their midday walk, Becky and the dogs encountered two bears in the forest.  The mother took off but the younger bear approached Becky and her troupe.  It was scary, according to Becky's report.  She started to make noise and wave her arms, which is the suggested protocol under the circumstances.  Just then, a fellow approached in a car, got out to offer help, and Becky noticed he was armed.  That changed things.  Eventually, the bear wandered off.  Whew. 

 

 

 

Tuesday afternoon, we headed for Flagstaff to have an adult beverage with Bruce Bourne and Patrice Giordano at their very nice, remote home.  It's located on two acres, tucked inside the Coconino National Forest on a dirt road, with a remarkable view of Mount Humphreys across a wide meadow from their terrace.  

 

 

Patrice is the aunt of a fellow who used to work with Becky.  We met them last year.  They're very nice people, and we had a good time with them.  

 

Wednesday, September 16, through Tuesday, September 22, 2015: Our First Week Back:

Waking up in our regular bed Wednesday morning was a little unsettling after sleeping elsewhere for the previous 3 1/2 weeks.  And the dogs were a little unsettled, as well. 

But we all got back to our regular routine in a short time.  The big job, which we had started on Tuesday, was moving a ton of "stuff" from the rig back into the house.  Becky, the champ, did most of the work, of course.  The house was fine, but we discovered that our "water feature" was not working---apparently, a burned-out (or at least very cranky) motor.  Becky ordered a replacement.

Although we had not gained any weight on the trip, we both thought it would be best to lose a little before embarking on our Transatlantic cruise in October.  So we dug out The South Beach Diet book that we have been using rather successfully since 2004, and started in on its regimen Wednesday morning.


Wednesday night we watched part of the Republican Debates on CNN.  We gave up halfway through the second one.  The structure---pitting one candidate against another over often petty matters---was both uninformative and boring.

Thursday, I started to work on the faucet in our laundry room.  It was not only crusted with lime, but it leaked when you turned on the hot water.  After struggling with it for two hours, it was shiny and clean, but it still leaked.  I'll get a new one on Friday when I go to Flagstaff.

Friday, I went to Flagstaff to run some errands and Becky washed the rig.  It's beautiful again.

Becky also started to replace the pump for our water feature.  It needed some connecting parts, which I went to the hardware store (twice) to get.  I need to go again on Saturday, since my last trip produced a wrong-sized coupling.  Oops. 

Saturday was a great day.  First, we joined fellow Williamsians (?) in a two-hour local trash-cleanup effort,

then Becky completed the water feature pump replacement and it works beautifully, and I successfully replaced the laundry faucet.  I also fixed a leaky water hose that was connected to the rig, and otherwise prepared the rig to go into the barn until we leave for the winter.  And I got the truck washed by a bunch of middle-schoolers who were running a fundraiser in town.  Months of bugs were finally off the grille. 

And, finally, Stanford upset USC and UCLA beat BYU.  What a wonderful way to end a terrific day.

Sunday's big goal was to move the rig into the barn.  First, I had to lower the hitch in the truck 3 inches so the rig would fit in the barn.  I've done this before and it was difficult but not too hard.  This time I was so visibly struggling with it that Jay, my next-door neighbor to the South, came over and volunteered to help.  I accepted, and in short order we had the job done.  Becky then guided me through backing the rig into the barn---much more easily than last time, due entirely to the new driveway gravel that helps prevent wheel-spinning. 

Thank you, Troy (our landscaper).  I was tired after that pair of projects, so I napped while Becky took Ramsey and Kelsey for a long walk.

Monday was my day to go to Flagstaff for a CT Scan of various parts of my body.  It was a scheduled follow-up to my recent bout with melanoma.  I had to drink some prepared stuff the night before and the morning of the test, and I couldn't eat or drink anything else for many hours before the test, but I survived.  And the report from Dr. Mathern afterwards was that I passed with flying colors.  Hurrah!

Naturally, since we were in Flagstaff, we had to run some errands.  One of them was to got to the Amtrak station and pick up our Southwest Chief  tickets to and from Los Angeles for the beginning and end of our Transatlantic cruise.  We now have our train and airline tickets.  If we get our weight in line, we'll be all set.

Tuesday was a simple day; nothing special.  It rained a little, I took the tire monitors off the rig to save their battery life, I sprayed the rig's tires with some stuff to make them look nice, I arranged with a fence company to re-do the fence and gates on the South driveway (in November; they're very busy) because the current setup is sagging, and I read a lot.  Nice, quiet day.