Generational issues.....

 8:17 am - Thursday - Christmas Day  - TWW - 45° F, humidity 78%, wind 13 mph out of the south by southwest....partly cloudy today with a forecast high of 53° F.  The view this morning......

.....and on this date 10 years ago TLE and I were at my son's home.....

.....in SoCal taking family pictures in front of their Christmas tree.

Christmas Eve began with blustery winds, and threatening rain clouds, and ended with wind driven rain into the evening, ending in the early morning hours sometime after 4 am.  Charles and I spent time troubleshooting an issue with their Champion 7500 watt, split phase generator, which is supposed to help charge their house batteries when there is no sun, and there was NO sun Christmas Eve.  The inverter is receiving 122 volts per leg, but is detecting no hertz.  The inverter must detect a frequency of 60 hertz (hz) before it all allows the current (244 volts) to charge the batteries.  We worked on it for a couple of hours with no success, so I guess it is back to the drawing board.

As you know, we have a Predator 500 dual fuel generator to assist in charging our house batteries on days like Christmas Eve, and it ran a lot over the course of the day.  Lack of sun is rarely a problem here at TWW, but when it is you need a generator to make up the deficit.

Meanwhile, this current weather system is reeking havoc all over the west, but primarily in California from north to south, and west to east.....there are flash floods, general flooding, torrential rain, and large accumulations of snow.  The weather guessers estimate this series of storms could dump between 150 and 200" of snow on the Sierra Nevada....that's between 12 and 17 feet of snow.

TLE prepared a chuck roast with a side salad, and baked potato for our communal dinner, and it was great.  We all gathered in the house for dinner around 4 pm, and by the time we headed back to the Newell it had begun to rain.  Sometime during the early morning hours I was awakened by wind driven rain against the driver side of the Newell.  It continued for an hour, or two which made it hard to sleep.  Looking forward to checking to see how successful our water catchment was last night....stay tuned!

Thanks for stopping by!

Water catchment....at last!

7:50 am - Wednesday - The Eve of Christmas - TWW - 48° F, humidity 74%, wind 17 mph out of the south by southeast.....heavy cloud cover with rain, and wind today with a forecast high of 54° F.  The view this morning......

....on this date in 2024 TLE and I were driving to SoCal from TWW to celebrate Christmas with our kids.....

 ......we had a little rain, and a lot of clouds, but the drive was uneventful.

TLE and I were out early working on the installation of the rain gutters on the greenhouse to catch, and funnel it into our two IBC water totes.  We didn't have all the parts needed to finish the installation until Charles and Phyllis arrived around 11:30 a with the balance of the needed parts, but we went as far as we could.  Once they arrived, and had sufficient time to unpack the truck Charles and I got busy finishing the job of installing the rain gutters on the east and west sides of the greenhouse.  We didn't finish until just before 3 pm, but we got them done....

The east side....↕

The west side.....↕

.....there are a few adjustments still to be made, but we got them installed, and hope to catch some rain over the next few days.  Over the next few weeks we will also install gutters on the house, and add a few more IBC water totes in which to store any rain/snow melt.

Included in the things Charles and Phyllis delivered to TWW was a new adjustable drop hitch for our 1969 Chevrolet C50 tilt bed truck.....

.....now, once I get the tail lights working again, we will be able to pull the water trailer over to the water station in the future to get water, and that was the goal.  

By the time we finished at just before 3 pm I was out of gas, and ready for a nap, but I knew if I attempted to take a nap I would not wake up in time for dinner at 4 pm, so I deferred the nap until after dinner, and I was right....I napped after dinner for 2 hours according to TLE.  On top of that I went to bed around 10 pm, and slept until 7 am this (Wednesday) morning.

We had hamburgers for dinner, courtesy Phyllis, with all the trimmings, plus coleslaw and potato salad.  I think I had 3 helpings of that delicious potato salad....thank you Phyllis!  The next few days will be iffy for a lot of work being done as we will either have winds in the high 20's, or rain, or both during that time.

Thanks for stopping by!

Falling dominos.....

 8:23 am - Tuesday - December 23rd - TWW - 42° F, humidity 31%, wind 9 mph out of the south by southeast.....cloudy today with a forecast high of 62° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I were attending 'The Festival of Lights'......

at The Mission Inn in Riverside, CA.

When we were in SoCal a few days ago I walked over to the Home Depot (about 1/2 block from the hotel) to pick up a few plumbing fittings to fix a persistent leak on the water pump in the pump house.  There is an inlet, and an outlet on the pump, and the threaded PVC fitting on the inlet had been leaking since we got here in late October, and has been getting worse.  When the new (current) pump was installed last winter Teflon tape was used on the 1.25" diameter, threaded PVC fitting that screwed into the pump inlet, and I believe the vibration weakened the tape.  I bought a four inch in length, 1.25" diameter steel nipple, pipe dope, and a 1.25" compression sleeve to make the repair.  It was too late to mess with in when we got home Sunday afternoon, so first thing Monday morning I was on it.  I had to cut the 1.25" diameter PVC pipe feeding into the inlet to unscrew the threaded PVC fitting, and found that due to the deterioration of the Teflon tape it was only hand tight....no wonder it was leaking.....

1.25" diameter Compression sleeve

......I was able to unscrew it by hand, then screw in the new steel nipple with ample pipe dope, then reconnect everything with the compression sleeve, and with that the main leak was fixed.  Of course, you fix one leak, and another appears.....

.....on the outlet fitting.  I did a temporary fix on that one with some 'Flex Seal' tape, and a hose clamp.  Charles bought the parts for this new leak Monday afternoon at Home Depot in Phoenix, and will arrive Tuesday with those parts so we can fix that one last leak.....we hope....lol.  Right now it's dripping at a rate of 1 drip every 10 seconds, and overnight there was only an inch of water in the bucket we use to catch the leaks.  Soon there will be NO leaks.

Additionally, TLE helped me finish the water catchment system for our shed....

.....I need to cut a piece of plywood to be the lid for the barrel, I'll then cut a round hole in it for the PVC pipe to enter the barrel, then extend the PVC pipe downward into the barrel.  Done, just in time for the rain we expect over the next 4 days.

TLE and I are both still getting over the travel lag from our 700 mile round trip drive to SoCal, so by the time we finished with the shed water catchment setup we were both ready for a nap, or at least I was....lol.

On Tuesday, when Charles and Phyllis arrive, we'll begin attaching rain gutters to the greenhouse eves to also catch water from the advancing storm.  Things are coming together, and the dominos are slowly falling into place here at The Wilson Wilderness.

Thanks for stopping by!

Without incident.....

 7:59 am - Monday - December 22nd - TWW - 36° F, humidity 32%, wind 5 mph out of the south by southeast.....partly cloudy skies today with a forecast high of 69° F.  The view this morning......

....on this date in 2018 TLE and I were visiting the National Corvette Museum....

C1

One can always dream, can't one?

.....in Bowling Green, KY....one of my bucket list items.

TLE went to bed Saturday night at 8 pm, and I followed (after a long, hot shower) around 9:30 pm as I was watching the amazing come from behind win by the Chicago Bears over the Green Bay Packers.  We were both awake around 5:30 am, and were tempted to just get ready, and head for home, but neither of us had the will power to get up so early, so we lazed around in bed for another 30 minutes, then began to get ready to go.  We were aiming for a 7 am departure, but were in the VW heading back north on I-15 by 6:30 am.  The sun rises a lot earlier in SoCal (around 6:55 am) than Seligman, AZ, so by the time we crested Cajon Pass just before 7 am the sun was just rising over the eastern horizon, and just about that same time the ODO on our VW Beetle passed 200,000 miles......

....we bought the Beetle back in January, or February of 2014 when it had just 124,000 miles on the ODO.  Other than the Newell, we've never owned another motor vehicle for this many years.  

I drove until we hit Ludlow, CA where TLE and I took a break, then she drove for another two hours to Kingman, AZ....we re-entered Arizona around 11 am Arizona time....

Just crossed the Colorado River....less than two hours to go!

.....we arrived in Kingman on I-40 where we exited to pickup Route 66 around 12 pm.  Took a few minutes to refill our depleted fuel tank, then I drove the rest of the way home where we arrived around 12:45 pm without incident.

We were only gone about 2.5 days, but it felt like a week....lol!  All of that socializing wears us out, but we wouldn't miss it for the world.  It, however, is wonderful to be back home where the quietness is palpable, and we only have each other for company most of the time.

Thank you for stopping by!

The reason for our trip.....

 9:21 pm - Saturday - December 20th - Rancho Cucamonga, CA - 55° F, humidity 83%, wind 2 mph out of the northeast....dark now and the low of the night will be 50° F 6 am on December 21st.  On this date in 2018 TLE and I were in downtown Nashville visiting the American Picker's store.....

....housed in the old Marathon Automobile factory.....one of my bucket list items.

By the way, I'm writing tomorrow morning's (Sunday) post Saturday night as we will be on the road early Sunday morning to return to TWW.  I'm still waiting for some pictures from my daughter-in-law, Rochelle, so it may not get posted until mid morning tomorrow while we are on the road.  Ultimately I didn't get all the pictures until late Sunday afternoon, so I'm now posting around 7:36 pm on Sunday.

The gathering for our annual Christmas get together at Chris' home was slated for 2 pm so we had the entire morning, and part of the afternoon to ourselves.  While I composed my daily blog post TLE walked over to 'The Nook' to buy us a couple of Americanos to start the day properly.  We spent the morning reading, and watching one of the NCAA College Football playoff games between Texas A&M and the University of Miami.  The game was ultimately won by Miami, thereby eliminating Texas A&M from the playoffs.

We got ready to drive up to Chris' home (about 3 miles from the hotel) around 1:50 pm, and arrived there a little after 2 pm.  Over the course of the afternoon we learned that my first grandson, Christopher, and his significant other, Zoey, are expecting their first child in early July, which would be our 3rd great grandchild....wait, what?  We were not expecting that news at all.  Over the course of the afternoon family members continued arriving until we had over 40 of our family, and extended family in attendance.  It is crazy to think that except for TLE and I finding each other over 50 years ago, and giving birth to Chris, and Ed and Linda (Rochelle's parents) finding each other and giving birth to Rochelle none of those 40+ people would be in that picture....NONE.  They might be in some other alternate universe picture, but not that one.   As is almost always the case when we get together verbal chaos ensues, and with over 40 people there are probably 6-10 conversations in progress at all times, maybe more.  With all that said, I'll let these pictures tell the rest of the story.....

Chris, Cynthia, Rochelle and Christopher (the soon to be new father)

Levi (Kate's son) and Caleb (Sharon's son, and our 10th grandchild)

Nick and Kate

TLE and Charlise (Kate's oldest daughter)

TLE, Charlise, and Kate

Family, and extended family----40+

20.5 immediately family members now

.....TLE and I lasted until almost 6 pm before saying our until next times, and heading back to the hotel for the night.

Thanks for stopping by!

A change of venue....

 6:56 am - Saturday - December 20th - Rancho Cucamonga, CA - 49° F, h%, humidity 52%, wind 2 mph out of the north by northeast......partly cloudy skies today with a forecast high of 72° F.  On this date in 2014 TLE and I were spending a few days at Rincon Parkway, just north of Ventura, CA.....

.....about a week earlier we had just finished our second stint working for Amazon during 'Peak Season' in Fernley, NV.  Over the course of the week we made it south and west to the Pacific Ocean....a fitting place to unwind after 7 weeks of working in a concrete bunker....lol!

Our family tradition for the past decade, or more has been to gather at the home of our oldest son, Chris, and his wife Rochelle (TAR - The Amazing Rochelle) on Christmas morning to have breakfast, and exchange Christmas presents.  I think the only time we missed was our first year on the road when we were spending 5 weeks in Cedar Key, FL, otherwise we've flown home, once from Nashville after our third and final stint working for Amazon during their 'Peak Season' in Campbellsville, KY.  This year Chris is taking his extended family to Mammoth Mountain for Christmas to go skiing and snowboarding, so we are gathering at his home on the 20th  to keep the tradition going.

We were up early Friday so we could be on the road by 8 am (7 am SoCal time) to make the 6 hour trip.  We've made this 345 mile trip from Seligman to SoCal several times now, and it doesn't really feel like a 6 hour driving trip  (really 5 hours, but we stop two, or three times).  TLE usually drives about half the miles, which is nice.  Most of the drive is on I-40 through the high desert.....

.....I haven't had a haircut since November 11th, making me at least a week past due, so as we were descending Cajon Pass into the Pomona Valley TLE got me into the 'Lineup' at Sport Clips in Rancho Cucamonga.  We arrived there around 12:25 pm (1:25 pm Seligman time), and I was in the seat in 5 minutes....perfect.  It actually only took us 5.5 hours door to door!  While I got my ears lowered, TLE went over to Albertson's do pick up a few things.  She returned just as I was paying for my haircut.....talk about a well oiled machine!

Next up was a quick stop at the local Trader Joe's to pick up a few things, then we were on our way to our hotel (4 Points Sheraton in Rancho Cucamonga) where we checked in just shy of 1:30 pm.  We stayed here a few months ago when we flew down from LPG&RVR to meet our new grandson, Caleb Jett Garcia, and loved it.  We've stayed in several hotels around the area over the years we've been on the road, and this is our favorite.

Around 4 pm we drove over to 'The Hat', a SoCal institution since 1955 with 11 stores, which serves the best Pastrami Dip sandwich in the west coast as far as we are concerned.  The only place we've had a better one is at Katz's Deli in Manhattan, NY since 1888....kind of a head start....lol....

.....it's only about 3 blocks, and we probably could have walked there faster than driving in the insane rush hour traffic on a Friday evening.  Their Pastrami Dip sandwich is so loaded with Pastrami that you could make a second Pastrami Dip with what falls out while you're eating it....serious!  Of course, on a Friday evening the place was packed, but we managed to snag the 2nd to last table available.  In spite of how busy they were, we had our order (2 Pastrami Dips and a large order of onion rings) within 5 minutes.  They really put the food out quickly! TLE counted no less than 11 people working behind the counter to crank out those orders. Neither of us could finish both halves of our enormous Pastrami Dips, or all the onion rings, so we took them back to the hotel to be finished off later....

Day

Night

....our room is on the 4th floor and we have a nice view of the shopping plaza next door.  At the other end of the property is our favorite local coffee shop called 'The Nook', where TLE is right now as I am finishing my latest missive, buying us two Americanos.  Just as I wrote that she returned with the magic elixir that makes life worthwhile....lol!

Thanks for stopping by!

Deadfalls......

 6:18 am - Friday - December 19th - TWW - 40° F, humidity 32%, wind 6 mph out of the south by southeast......clear, blue skies today with a forecast high of 65° F.  On this date in 2014 TLE and I were southbound on US-395 at the Mono Lake Vista Point on Conway Summit.....

....it was cold, so we took our customary picture through the windshield of the Newell.  Lee Vining is in the distance.

There are a lot of deadfalls (dead trees on the ground) around the property, plus a few old railroad ties, and it seemed like a good day to move them to a different location to make use of them.  What kind of use you ask?  Well, on one side of the entrance gate (north side) the property is fenced all the way to the property line, but on the other side of the gate, if one was inclined, you could just drive onto the property (if the gate were closed) and be on the driveway in seconds.  In fact, when we first visited the property with Charles and Phyllis the realtor could not open the gate so we drove around.  Over the last 18 months a large part of the juniper tree which resides on the south side of the gate fell to the ground creating a natural barrier, so we decided to add to that making it a little more difficult for unwanted ingress.  TLE and I had already hauled all those large rocks we extracted from the driveway, and the front of the Newell out there for just that purpose.  It took a couple of hours using the Ford 420 diesel loader/gannon, and here is what it looks like now....

.....I would like to see us put up permanent fencing on the southside of the gate, but for now this will act as somewhat of a deterrent to most people.

As you know, we usually don't start our work day until around 10 am as it is often too cold (by that I mean too cold for people living through their 8th decade of life), so by the time we finished it was around 12 pm.  Now a lot of the old deadfalls are gone, along with the old, rotting railroad ties making the area around the house look a little better.  We've probably got another 100' of deadfalls we can haul out there when the mood strikes us.

After a suitably long break I decided to screw down the solar panels I put on the trailer roof a while back.  As you will recall just a couple of days ago I inserted 2 x 4's under the panels to get them a couple of inches off the roof so when it rains they will not be damaged underneath.  With the 2 x 4's there I had something onto which to screw them.  It took me about 30 minutes to finish securing them.  The reason for screwing them down?  Well, it can get quite windy here at times, and that will prevent them from becoming air born in the future.  So far, every day since I installed those solar panels on the trailer roof to aid in charging the lithium house batteries they have reached 100%....something that did not happen last year.

Right now, just two days prior to the winter equinox, the sun is setting at 5:22 pm, and rising at 7:37 am.  In two days that process will begin to slowly reverse itself with the sun setting later, and later, and rising earlier and earlier

For the evening entertainment we watch the finale for Survivor, season 50.  For the first time I an remember, and I am often wrong, the three finalists were all women.....Savannah, Sage and Sophie.  In the end Savannah won the 1 million dollars.  She won four immunity titles tying a record for women, and had to make fire to get to the final three, and just based on that should have been the winner, so it was no surprise to us.  Another great season!

Thanks for stopping by!

Mail run.....

 7:52 am - Thursday - December 18th - TWW  - 33° F, humidity 31%, wind 2 mph out of the east by southeast......partially cloudy today with a forecast high of 65° F.  On this date in 2023 TLE and I were enjoying another Glams North Hot Springs sunset.....

....we enjoyed our two winters there running the side by side rental operation, but are very happy to now be living totally off the grid in Northern Arizona each winter.

We're kind of in a holding pattern on installing the rain gutters, and finishing the firring strip installation until we are resupplied next Tuesday, plus we needed to make a run into Seligman to pickup mail from the PO Box, so we didn't get a lot done Wednesday.  We left home around 10 am to make the 30 minute drive to town.  We made a quick stop at the Route 66 Hardware store, then across the street to withdraw some money from the ATM at the Chevron, then down to the Post Office,  Family Dollar, and Seligman Market.  By the time we finished with those tasks it was almost noon time, so we headed over to 'Highway Hot Dog' to get two Americano Coffees, and a chocolate chip cookie for moi.  I love the ceiling they installed when they remodeled the building....

.....we sat outside sipping our Americanos for about 30 minutes before beginning the 30 minute drive home in the 1998 Ford Explorer, which is running quite well now that the two rear tires have been replaced....thank you Charles!

I spent the afternoon moving stuff around in the trailer, including moving those six 4' x 8' foam insulation boards to the garage until we install them in the shed, which will probably be after the New Year as we have rain in the forecast from the 24th through the 28th (next week).  We're hoping to have the rain gutters installed on the greenhouse by Tuesday so we can catch some of that rain off the greenhouse roof.

I decided to move one of the IBC water totes to the southeast corner of the greenhouse where it will receive runoff from the east side of the roof.....

.....we'll move the other one (left side of the picture) to the northwest corner in the next few days.

We had dinner around 4:15 pm so we would be done in time to enjoy another sunset fire before the sun set.  We had the fire going, and were in our camp chairs by 4:45 pm.  Since there were some clouds on the western horizon we thought we might get an interesting sunset, but it was not to be.  That's not to say it wasn't nice, but we were hoping for spectacular....lol....

....to think that just a year ago that greenhouse in the background had no roof, and no visqueen wrapping, had a broken door that wouldn't close, and needed to be scraped and painted in the worst kind of way, and now it is almost ready to be used for its intended purpose.

.....life is good....thanks for stopping by!