So we woke up to a dead truck
battery this morning. Aghh! Left something plugged in and turned on in
the truck last night...certainly won’t do that again! But thanks to Stanley, the portable
charge-all thingy, Kim got it started.
Yay!!
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If anyone is travelling through Carrizozo,
NM, and needs a comfortable, clean and relatively inexpensive motel to crash at
because they’re tired and should get off the road, I heartily recommend the
Four Winds Motel. Pillows were a bit too
fluffy for me but I made it work.
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Set the alarm for 6:30 a.m., showered and
ready to go by about 7:40 but the truck not starting...well, that was a little
delay to the whole getting on the road early plan. And then there was the burro finding
expedition...then there was breakfast at a local diner. As I was getting out of the truck for another
burro picture, I told Kim that I would not be asking to stop by the Cadillac
Ranch as we get near Amarillo, that he was being more than gracious about my
burro curiosity and that that would be enough...for today, at least. 😏
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 |
| Z.....the Super Burro! |
I didn’t have to go far to get my first
picture of a painted burro. There was a
BBQ shack in the parking lot of the Four Winds Motel right next to our truck
and a super hero burro was standing guard over it. From there we drove through town on my burro
quest. Carrizozo isn’t very large so the
driving part didn’t take long but there were a number of very cleverly painted
burros so the picture taking part took a bit longer. Also saw a tree full of vultures and some
tulips in bloom.
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It was 34o in Carrizozo at 7:30
a.m.! Thirty-four cold degrees!! Back to
wearing jeans, two shirts and socks.👎 Temperature did rise quickly though...by 9:30
it was 56o. And it got a
little warm when the sun came in the windshield but that was remedied by
turning the air on low.
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Driving north on US 54 up to Santa Rosa is a
wide open country experience.
Occasionally we’d pass the remnants of a town or maybe a town that was
giving mixed messages...more closed up storefronts than open, plenty of motels,
a few cafes, a spread out residential area and no visible means of industry
(Vaughn). Not even a Dollar
General. Most small towns out here have
a Dollar General or a Family Dollar, sometimes both. Anyway, US 54 is not a
populated route...just miles of road through hundreds or thousands of acres of
fenced in pasture. Cows and old time
windmills round out the picture.
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The 4th KY WonderKid made her appearance
today at about 10:30 a.m., coming out at 22” in length and weighing 9 lbs., 10
oz. Marshal and Callie didn’t know what
they were having but they were thinking it was a boy, so they had a boy name
picked out. They were a little surprised
by the girl-ness of the baby and as of yet, she doesn’t have a name. By all accounts, mom and Baby are doing well. As of 2 o’clock I hadn’t heard what her siblings
think of the new arrival.
That makes a total of 15
grandkids for Kim and me...5 from his kids and 10 from mine.
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After a stop at The Curio Teepee in
Tucumcari, NM, I couldn’t take the heat of my jeans any more. I went into the trailer to change into shorts
and take my socks off. That made the
rest of the day a very comfortable ride with the sun coming in the cab. Temperature through the Texas Panhandle was
in the 70’s.
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It is with great dismay that I report that
the Kmart in Tucumcari has closed. We
stayed at the Tucumcari KOA on our Final Four ride back in the fall of 2015 and
when we asked about shopping we were directed to the Kmart in town. It’s
the smallest Kmart in the country we were told and we believed it. It wasn’t a big K store...it was one of the
original Kmart stores and we didn’t know whether it was truly the smallest in
the country or not. Didn’t matter to
us...it had what we needed and it was fun to think that it was one of a kind, a
holdover from days gone by. But now it’s
boarded up and for sale. 😧
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A few days ago when I talked to Marshal, the
baby wasn’t showing any sign of wanting to leave its happy place. So we left it that we would stop in Kentucky
to see the baby and his/her older siblings if the big event happened while we were
enroute; otherwise we would boogie on home.
Yesterday afternoon I got a text saying that we should just plan on
stopping at their house. Several more
texts were exchanged and we went to bed expecting our sleep to be interrupted
by a phone call from Marshal. So when
the phone rang this morning while I was still in bed and Kim was in the shower,
I threw back the covers and sprinted for the phone, only to find that it was
the cleaners telling me that I had a “crap load” of work waiting for me. No baby but lots of work. Great!
Can I go back to bed now?
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Talked to Marshal this evening...told him we
probably wouldn’t be there until Thursday.
He joked that maybe the baby would have a name by that time. I have been telling them right along that if the baby was born
on my birthday I was going to come up with my own name for it...it would be my
special nickname for him/her. I might
still do that if they don’t hurry up with a name...and I'm kind of partial to the name I choose. 😏
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So much of this ride across Texas is
familiar to me...wind turbines, little town names, stockyards, landmarks. This is our 4th or 5th time
through here; I’m able to look out at the countryside more than Kim who usually
drives. It’s all part of being a
passenger on a 2,000+ mile trip. We’ve
taken different routes into and out of Oklahoma City but driving across the top
of Texas is the quickest way through that state.
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Cruised in the Central Time Zone in Texas so
we’re one hour closer to normal time now.
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In Yukon, OK, for the night...just outside
Oklahoma City.
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Random conversation of the
day:
We finally bought a cord that would allow us
to listen to my iPod...radio stations haven’t been the most reliable. It’s a common occurrence for me to sing along
with the songs, lip sync or hum my way through a song. Music is not a passive experience for me.
Today
we were in need of fuel and take an exit that has a somewhat confusing turn
onto the overpass. Kim was struggling
with the sun’s reflection in all available mirrors while waiting for the light
to change and I was humming with a Billy Joel song waiting for the chorus so I
could then full out sing along. Just as
the light changes and Kim starts to turn, the music for the chorus starts. I’m in my own little world and start singing
the music with a ‘wah...wah...wah’ which causes Kim to think that he’s going
into the wrong lane so he quickly turns the wheel to go toward the lane on the
other side of the cement island which never would have worked for our rig. As this is happening this conversation is
taking place:
Kim: “What?! I’m not doing this right? Where am I supposed to go?"
Me: “No, you were doing that
right....wait, you can’t turn there, that won’t work....just go straight now. You were doing fine until you second guessed
yourself.”
Kim: “I didn’t
second guess myself until you started saying wha...wha...wha! Then I thought Shit, I’m doing this wrong.”
Me: “I didn’t say anything.”
Kim: “You did,
too...you made that wha...wha...wha sound like I was doing something wrong. Like I shouldn’t turn there.”
Me: “I wasn’t telling you not to turn there....I
was singing, Kim!”😐
The timing was perfect for a
misunderstanding that produced a bit of frustration and then a whole lot of
laughter after we explained ourselves. Like
I had to explain that I was singing “wah...wah...wah” and not saying “wha...wha...wha”. There is a difference.😏
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Drove about 540 miles today...on the road for
maybe 10 ½ hours.
