Roll Over Beethoven.......

6:43 am - Sunday - February 5th - GNHS - 45° F, humidity 57%, wind 3 mph out of the southeast.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 73° F.  On this date in 2013 TLE and I were having lunch in Mt. Dora, FL at the Frog & Monkey Restaurant & Pub......↴

We weren't planning to open the COA office until 9 am Saturday as we had no advance bookings, however,  a couple of people showed up at the office at precisely 8 am wanting to rent a RZR for an all day excursion, so TLE rallied herself, got dressed, and went to open the office.  While she readied the necessary paperwork I got dressed, and staged our #5 RZR.  These folks had rented from us back around Christmas time, so they are officially our first repeat customers.    They were on their way by 8:30 am, and we retired back to the Newell to finish drinking our coffee.  Since they were an all day customer we thought we would be on duty all day, but you just never know what is going to happen......

Roll Over Beethoven.....Chuck Berry

....you might have a good guess what happened, based on the YouTube video I have chosen to give you a preview....lol.  A little after 10:30 am they returned.....the wife was driving when she went into a corner too fast, popped the right rear tire off the bead, and rolled good old #5.  She, the RZR, had been our good luck charm this season, and had only had a broken drive belt back on Christmas weekend, but had otherwise always come home unbroken.  The wife claimed she was driving in a straight line at just 10 mph when the right rear tire came off the rim, and caused them to roll onto the right side of the RZR.  Of course, this is not even remotely possible, but you know how people are....sometimes they just cannot accept the consequences of their own actions, and want to blame their misfortune on outside forces.  Ultimately, she admitted she was in the middle of  'driving AROUND a berm' when it happened, and I'm pretty sure she was not going 10 mph. The husband claimed the tire must have been defective, and came off the rim, but we were immediately able to re-inflate it, and pop it back onto the bead with no leaking.  As I always do before a rental leaves, I checked all 5 tires to be sure they were at 15 psi, and they were.  Kyle then took it out for a 20 minute test drive at pretty high speeds, doing donuts, and fishtailing (he is a good side by side driver!), and the tire performed as it should....

Scuffed up rim

Both mud flaps are scuffed, and the roll bars are scrapped down to the bare metal

....the damage is strictly cosmetic, and not that bad at that.  There is nothing mechanically wrong with it, so I don't think it will cost that much to repair.  So, as you can see, our day was shortened dramatically.  We are now up to three rollovers, one broken left front axle, 5 broken drive belts, and three rescues since the beginning of November.

Because I thought we would be on duty all day I decided to finish painting the roofline trim on the office, and was in the middle of that when our customers returned without smiles upon their faces....

.....I've written often about our telescoping ladder, but I do not think I've shown a picture of it for some time, so I took a picture off the office with and without the ladder in the picture.  The telescoping ladder can be lengthened up to 12', and stows down to about 2" high....in this picture it is extended to about 8'.......

Before

Finished

......now that the front trim is completely finished the office really looks nice now...at least I think it does....what say you?

You've seen pictures of our 2022 Polaris RZRs in my blog over the past few months.  Our RZRs are 'base models', with a couple of upgrades....door skins, and a roof.  Their cost new is around $25,000.  Here is a picture of a 2022 Polaris RZR with all the bells and whistles, including a 4 cylinder engine, which can be yours for the tidy sum of just $50,000.....

......this RZR looks virtually brand new.

As you know, TLE's older Ekhornes recliner has been retired, but not forgotten.  She chose to place it out front on the porch of the Roadrunner building to the right of our office, so she can relax there when we are on duty, and her services are not required within the office.  It is completely in the shade, and sheltered from the rain and/or dew.  We'll probably leave it here, inside the office, whilst we are up north this summer, so she can use it again next year....

.....TLE made BLT's for dinner with a side of fried potatoes which we ate on the 'lido deck', then we played 6 games of Yahtzee of which 4 found me victorious in this fun game of chance.  We retired inside the Newell for the evening watching two Hallmark movies before calling it a day.  Another day well lived!

Thank for stopping by!