Thank you.....

6:44 am - Tuesday - January 3rd - GNHS -  46° F, 84% humidity, wind 6 mph out of the east by southeast.......partly cloudy today with a forecast high of 63° F.  On this date in 2015 I was mountain biking with good friends......↴

I didn't throw the covers back, and get our of bed until almost 7:40 am....that's late for me.  The only reason I did get up was to watch the beginning of the Rose Parade at 8 am.  While we used to watch the parade in its entirety many years ago, TLE and I now usually watch the first hour, or so, and then move on to something else. Nevertheless, we were in the middle of watching one of the bowl games around 10 am when the COA* phone rang.  It turned out to be a potential customer who was standing at the door of the COA office, so TLE went out to see what he needed.  It turned out he wanted to do a 6 hour rental of one of our RZRs.  Not being ones to turn down business TLE proceeded to get the paperwork completed while I got dressed (TLE was already dressed), and went outside to pull RZR #5 up to the staging area.  I had already checked the oil, and cleaned the air filter the day before, so all I needed to do was check the tire air pressure.  The paperwork was completed quickly, and within 30 minutes he was on his way .

That he was on his way did not end our responsibility.....now we were on the hook to be available for the next 6 hours at a moment's notice in case of breakdown.  We've been leading charmed lives lately, and haven't had rescues since before Christmas weekend when we had two in one day.  Since then they go out, and come back without event, but we know the next rescue is only a phone call away.  As it turned out the customer returned right on time at 4:30 pm.....thankfully he avoided the muddy clay, and there was no need to rush out and wash the unit.....I'll do that Tuesday, or Wednesday.

Typically the week, and weekend after New Years is dead, and that is how it looks.....there are ZERO bookings for Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, or Sunday at this time, and it is likely we will have none.  TLE will probably have the week off, but I'll be busy with some deferred maintenance on the UTV's, specifically the Kawasaki KRXs.  The door latches on all three are sticking, except for the one I fixed many weeks ago when we first began working for COA*.  So I've got 5 doors left to shim, so the latches will stop sticking, and it takes 1-2 hours per door as they must be completely disassembled, as one might guess, to do the fix.

Around noon time the grand exodus began in earnest as one RV after another left GNHS to return to their workaday lives......

....as I always tell TLE.....they have to leave, but we get to stay!  By Tuesday morning this place will be a ghost town once again, and we will have the hot pools/tubs all to ourselves.

On February 1 of this year TLE and I will begin our 13th year of living full time in our 1982 Newell Classic, and 12th year of traveling full time.   I began blogging on a daily basis in early October of 2012 when we arrived at Amazon in Campbellsville, KY for our first Peak Season, and with the exception of last summer when I was going to work at 6:30 am each day, and only put up a post every4-5 days for a month, or two, I have posted every day.  Getting up each day, going to the bathroom, getting a cup of coffee, and sitting down at my laptop to write about what happened in our lives the day before has become a deeply engrained part of my daily routine.  

I originally began blogging as a way to keep our children up to date on where we were, and what we were doing, but gradually, over time, other people, unconnected to my family, began to read the words I post each day about our nomadic lives.  That other people besides my kids read my daily missives blows my mind.  I don't write the blog as a money making instrument....I write because I enjoy it.  However, I do earn around $20-25/month, and am always happy to see Google deposit money into my checking account every 3, or 4 months when the balance tops $100.  Very few bloggers earn significant money, and by significant I mean enough to make it their full time job.  I'm retired, and not looking for another full time job, but I am content to spend 30-45 minutes each day sharing our nomadic lives with whomever is interested.  For those who make good money blogging it is truly a full time job to keep creating interesting, and compelling content, including weekly videos, which consume enormous amounts of time in the filming, editing, narration, and mixing in non-copyrighted music.  

I know that as our nomadic lives have evolved we have tended to stay put in one place for months at at time, and as we settle into somewhat mundane routines my writing can become a little stilted, and matter of fact sounding, but in reality, staying in one place for long periods of time, making friends, integrating ourselves into a new community gives us lots of joy.  There is something so liberating about being nomads.  For one thing you make friends more quickly, which is something we did not do in our workaday lives when we lived for almost 30 years in one place.  We knew the neighbors on each side of us, and directly across the street, but that was it....we knew them, but there was no deep connection.  Living as nomads we have found that most new friendships evolve quickly into deeper relationships, to the point where we stay connected, even when we decide it is time to move on to the next adventure.  

How many adventures do we have left in us at 73 years of age?  We have no idea, but that is the charm of being nomadic.....you do not tend to think too far into the future.  You find yourself living more in the here and now......the past is gone, and the future is yet to be written.  That is how you wake up one day and find that it has been almost 11 year since you took those first tentative steps toward being nomadic.  It was scary at the beginning....where will we park tonight?  Will anything bad happen to us?  Will it cost too much?  Will we tuck our tails behind us and rush back to the 'safety' of our sticks and bricks lives?  Will we be lonely?  Well, all those questions, and more have been answered over the past 11 years, and, frankly, we cannot imagine living any other way.

Thank you for being loyal readers. Thank you for your occasional comments!  We do enjoy reading, and responding to them.  And, as always, thank you for stopping by!

*COA = Colorado Outback Adventures