We are still in Chowchilla and preparing ourselves and our rig to move out.  Not much of excitement these past few weeks but it is time to post.

I gave my notice at work that my last day will be Friday April 10th.  Kind of funny how life is.  I let my boss know about my last day on March 6th, 2015.  Exactly 37 years earlier I stated by profession life on March 6, 1978.  No wonder I have some grey hair.  Anyway my company does not have a replacement for me.  In May of 2014 I told them of my plans but so far no replacement has been found.  I guess I am just irreplaceable.  Yea right.  A good buddy of mine points out every 4 years we replace the most powerful person in the world with not so much as a small hick up.  We will see what happens.  I might get tapped to do some work in May.  It would be nice to get some extra dollars but then again I am ready to get out of pushing numbers around a spread sheet.  Also kind of weird feeling.  Really looking forward to the next chapter in my life but also a little unsettling.

Vicki decided her dentist and her orthodontist need some extra money.  She is in the process of getting 3 crowns and a new retainer. Lost the first retainer with help from a busboy.   I also guess the endodontist also needs some extra to make a boat payment.   What happened?  Well lets see.

Four weeks ago Vicki had her braces removed, YAHOOO!, then started to wear a retainer, BOOOO!  Two weeks she was in her dentist chair for 4 hours getting 2 teeth squared away for crowns and had temporary crowns installed.  Five days later she thought something happen to one of the temporary crowns.  Off to the dentist.  Nope, broke a different tooth.  Plan was if she could stand the pain would wait until her full-time crowns were installed and then have the tooth repaired.  Well plan did not work out.  Too much pain.  So off to the dentist again.  Sent her to an endodontist for a consultation on a root canal.  Now this is on St. Patrick’s Day and we had plans to celebrate with freinds at a local watering hole that was to have live music.  Consultation turned into a root canal.  We were a little late making to the St. Paddy Day celebration but we made it and it appears that all is going well in the tooth department.  Celebration was good.  Needed to tell them hold the green dye in the beer.  Green beer is for amateurs.  Good band doing rock n roll.

Why do we celebrate St. Patrick Day?  One thing I need to point out is St Patrick was not from Ireland originally.  He was from either Scotland or was Welsh.  I got this from the internet so you KNOW it is true.  This is an important point to keep in mind.   Now Vicki’s side of the family has definite claims to being Irish with her grandmother’s name of Dougherty.  Also Thomas in her background as British next door neighbor of Ireland.  Then there is a Buffet in her background which is French.  Rumor has it she is a distant relative of a musical guy and some super rich old man.  What about me?  On my mother’s side it is all German.  On my father side I am Scottish so with St. Patrick originally from Scotland, forget about the Welsh thing, this is how I am entitled to celebrate St. Paddy’s Day.  Might be a stretch but what the heck.

Now we have some projects to take care of to get ready to take off.  First we need to give the rig a good washing and put on a protective coating on the rubber roof and wax the sides.  With the drought restrictions in this neck of the woods we need to have some one wash the RV with recycled water.  This will cost $80.  Not a bad price but I like doing this stuff.  For and extra $300 he would wax the sides and put a protective coat on the roof.  Nope, I plan to do that myself the week after I leave work.  Should not take more that a long day.

The other major project is to replace and upgrade the tires which means  we need to upgrade and replace the wheels.   I will not bore you with the technical details but the tires that come with a new trailers are very poor.   Many people who I have become friends who full time have replaced their tires.  I was hoping we could put this off but 3 weeks ago I was inspecting the tires and saw that one had a bad side wall.  It was to be expected but really!?!  With about 2,000 miles on them and they are having problems?!  Not a small dollar amount but I would rather be safe.  I had one blow out on our travel trailer about 4 years ago and it was not fun.  Nothing serious happened but do not want this to happen again.

So now the time line is I quit work on April 10th and complete all the chores on the trailer, pack up and start moving towards Likely, CA on Friday the 17th or Saturday the 18th.  Plan to pull out of Chowchilla and head toward the tire shop, get the new tires and wheels installed and go north.  Most “likely” will make the 400+ mile trip in two days of travel and most “likely” stop around Reno for a night or two.  We will see.  (Note to self – stop the “likely” stuff, gets old)

Well that is about it.  Seventeen more work days…..