Rant over...  now a wild windy holiday weekend in southeast AZ.

See the Saturday Rant UPDATE down below:
Should be no more untimely deliveries here from FedEx. The local FedEx authorized delivery service got fired. 
More below on all that in the update... Below the Thursday post heading.

What was all the fuss about anyway... It was so I could get a heavy duty 12 v  power supply to power the RV water pump to circulate water from the hot tub through a propane water heater and back to the hot tub.

Not earth shattering to be sure... But it should not take five days to go the last mile. In this case 30 miles.  We are spoiled with our expectations. I know that. Think what people would have thought 100 years or so ago to get a package or even mail this far across the county so fast. That was then... this is now. 

Now Onward...

This has to be the windiest day so far that we have been here. We were told spring is the windy season here in SE AZ and we can now attest to that. Local news sez this is way above what is normal.  Like weather all over... nothing is normal anymore. Red Flag (wind and fire warnings) are up untill 8 PM tonight. Knock on wood... no wind wipped fires reported in the area. People here are very careful as this is nothing new to them at this time of year. We are just getting educated to our new surroundings. Humidity is at about 10% and wind is steady at 34 mph with gusts to 50 mph with a temp of 90. (OK OK you know the drill by now ... It's a dry heat.)  I laughed at that just like you are doing but it is the truth.... Too understand... all you have to do is just visit the midwest in the summer. We are at about 4200 ft. here so can expect about 8-10 degree temps below what is reported in Tucson. Even Benson, AZ just to the east of us is at about 3500 ft. is warmer. There is a 5% several mile downgrade on I-10 to get to the valley. Nice views though... We like to compare this to the high up vista views found at Page, AZ. You can see forever from here and that is what makes this area so special. 
Now saying all this about the weather here... this is so preferred to the midwest storms... any day. And to think soon we will be heading in that direction. lookign around the rest of the country it has been a banner year for snow in the higher west.. good news to be sure.. but now it is melting resulting in flooding in Montana. Bet they would rather put up with more than less snow pack. Even if it causes problems.  And to our friends in the northwest (as in Portland. John and Derek) who are having an above normal wet spring.  Send your rain down here...  Thank You. The southwest is still in a drought... May the so called AZ Monsoon Season bring rain to this area. 

While the hot tub was heating Saturday Terry was keeping busy on his crafts. Doing necklace chain making. 

This pattern is called Byzantine.  To see how it is made, see this YouTube video. Terry looked at the video and said... 
They are making it way too complicated!   He uses a speed weave technique. Now if you want personal instruction you will just have to visit Terry's Arts and Craft Studio. :)  I swear before he is done there might just be a Mini Gem and Mineral Club in our steel shop building. Along with special guest appearances of our good friend Tad R. MFA with expertise in jewelry and lost wax casting. 

I have to be vigilant to make sure his craft area doesn't creep over into my spa, exercise area. 
To be expanded on the left later on with an above ground pool. I have plans...

Since it is a holiday weekend Terry has been busy today cooking. Making his special baked beans with bacon, and a batch of potato salad. Brats tonight and on Monday Baby Back Ribs. 
 He would normally like to do the beans in a dutch oven over coals. But too windy with the fire risk and dry conditions to make that an option. We may be crazy, but not nuts. 

Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service.
 

Thursday May 26

Ready for a Rant.  Sure you are... 
See Friday 8 PM UPDATE below...
See Saturday UPDATE below...

Ya that is alogo behind the NOT.
I didn't have to make the NOT sign. Found it easily on the net. Who would know I'm not the only disgruntled customer. 
I have always been happy with package deliveries from the big shippers UPS, FedEx and USPS Priority. 
Well that only meant I was lucky and lived right, or in the right location. Many deliveries when in Quartzsite as I followed them on tracking would come into Lake Havasu and then get driven the same day down to Q.  Or delivered out ot Yuma 80 miles away.
Now in southeast AZ at Benson I ordered the power supply (below). And FedEx was the delivery agent. 
Tracking info...

So I assumed it was out for delivery  (In transit) at 7 AM on Tuesday and I would get it that day. You know wht they say about assumed... makes an ass out out of u and me.
No show so I got to checking what... Tendered to authorized agent for final delivery  meant. FedEx turned it over to a third party to deliver. Called FedEx and they connected me to the end delivery service and I was told they only deliver ONCE A WEEK. It would be out on Friday for delivery. I went what?  This is Tuedsay. FedEx had just told me it would be delivered the same day the third party delivery agent received it and they also showed it was out for delivery. I called FedEx customer support back and told them UPS comes by here everyday and their service using a third party to deliver was not acceptable. Got I'm SO Sorry. Took my phone number and would try to speed up delivery as they said that this delivery schedule was unacceptable to them also. Ya Sure.... 

All you have to do is Google "I hate FedEx" and see what people have to say about this company. 

And dealing with Amazon there is no way you get to choose which service is used to deliver your package. 

You understand a rant is good for the soul from time to time. Especially when there is nothing you can do to change things. When businesses don't care about customer service... let's face it we are screwd. 

You say well I'm not cost effective to deliver to everyday due to being ruarl or something. Rural? I can see the traffic on I-10 from here. 2 miles off I-10. 5 miles from Benson, 30 miles from Sierra Vista, and 35miles from Tucson.  When in Quartzsite we were 80 miles from Yuma or Lake Hauasu and got same day service when the end terminal got the package. 
When back in Iowa about the same distances out in the country things got delivered on time.   Me thinks here the Sierra Vista the tenderded delivery agent got a sweet deal and just feels they don't have to preform. Larger bottom line... Screw the end user.  Why, because they can.  To be sure FedEx got an ear full. If that makes any difference. FedEx would only transfer me to them and also not give me their phone number. They did give me thier address. More like a coordinated scam to keep the customer in the dark.    The last (first) delivery for Terry a couple of weeks ago showed up way late (I didn't know he had ordered anything). Just honked and Terry had to go out to the driveway gate to retrive the package.

UPDATE:Friday at 8 PM   No delivery and after a call to FedEx at 6 PM... no help. They tried to call the local agent and said I'm sorry they are closed and we don't have an after hours contact. So the tendered agent blow us off and what now... I have to wait another week for delivery.  The escalation person at FedEx said he would note and escalate the problem to higher levels.  I was nice and told him I was not upset with him as he can only do or follow company policy. It doesn't do any good yelling at a customer service agent as the more you yell the less they tend to help. Talking in a pleasant voice just stating your case, will do wonders at times.  I will be calling and asking for help much higher up the lader at FedEx on Tuesday to be sure. The FedEx peson checked my Zip Code and said FedEx does use their own trucks for express or next day service for here (only for FedEx ground do they hand off to this agent) so I will request they go and get the package from the contract agent and deliver it to me next week.  Any Bets?

UPDATE:Saturday at 2 PM a van pulls up in the driveway and honks.  Sure enough a delivery on Saturday.  The driver sez looks like you have been waiting since Tuesday for this.  And goes on to say starting next Tuesday they will NOT be delivering to this area anymore. All deliveries will come out of Tucson. Must not have been the only one complaining to FedEx...  They still will have other areas but not just here anymore. Bet this was brewing for a long time.  Case Closed.

We powered up the propane heater and water pump and got the hot tub up to temp and had a great soak listening to Prairie Home Companion. 
 

Now time to get ready for the Memorial Weekend... And to remember why we celebrate it. 
We are planning a little road day trip without the RV. Time to expore this southeast part of Arazona. 

From Benson (lowere center) north to Cascabel, Mammoth, and Haydon, HW 77 to Globe and back down US 70 to Safford, Willcox. Branching off to take side raods to explore. Should be a fun drive... Checked it out with Googel Earth. 
You all have a relaxing weekend.
 

Saturday May 21

OMG   Did it happen?    And below the spa is coming together....

On this day of days... I noticed Terry was gone... and this is what I saw...   I thought OMG... 
 Was Terry called home... Upon reflection... How stupid of me.  Not possible. 
Then I heard the shower turn on.   He was being cleansed all right...  But only by the force of our shower.

Now later...  that we knew we were spared. 

We started the remodel of the garage/shop.   You do remember I said I would claim an area for a hot tub, workout area, and later an inside pool.  We made a good first start.  We had the blow up hot tub, just had to retrieve it from the storage area in the RV. 

I came up with the fence idea... to make it look more like an outside back yard... only inside. I'm so good... We found the fence sections at the local Benson Lumbar yard.  Competitive prices, right in town, and friendly. They gave us extra slats to replace any in the fence that were bent etc. Very nice. Above Terry replacing a couple of slats. 

Mind you inside we don't have to abide by any property code requirements for fences. See we have the fence face toward us. Most codes say the fence ribs need to be on the inside and the nice side face out.  Another advantage of outside is inside... 

Now time to sow the grass... Reused from boondocking in the BLM in Quartziste. 
Very green so to speak, when you can rip up your lawn and take it with you. 
A little double sided carpet tape to hold it in place. No watering needed... Gophers have a hard time digging under this turf. 
We have a couple those pesky critters outside here and they are not long for this world. Chemicals are good for some things. Have to check if they might have been beamed up today.  Being they live underground and never see the light of day. 

Now to make good use of the treadmill we got from craigslist.  A top of the line Reebok unit for only $200. 
The sellers were getting ready to bug out for Germany on a transfer from the military base here in Sierra Vista. 

Still room for expansion for a pool don't Ya Think. Just add more fencing and grow more lawn. 
Next task is on Sunday...  it's time to fill this sucker with water... and a have a hot soak. 
Our first fill will be with using our home water system... (Not like back in Quartzsite hauling water to fill it) Here just run water from the house through the propane on demand water heater to the tub. 

But to reheat the water later on we will need to recirculate the water from the tub back through the water heater...  To do that we use a 12 volt RV water pump to push water through the water heater. Now in this situation to power the pump I found a Pyramid 120 volt to 12 volt converter on Amazon so we don't have to power it from the RV 12 v feed.  Clean regulated 13.8 VDC output. Ham rig people rated this a good unit for low noise.

This will bring it all together to make our littlle inside hot tub very workable inside our garage/shop. 

Now so you can understand why all the fuss. The hot tub comes with an internal electric water heater... 
But me thinks that could get expansive to heat the hot tub and it would take a long time to do it unless you left the electric 
heater on all the time making the main electric meter spin out of control. 
So using a propane heater just makes sence don't you think.  So if we only want to heat the tub on demand it only takes a hour or less to get it up to temp using the propane heater. 

Now if a blow up hot tub like this looks like fun.  You can use this while traveling fulltime. Get your own blow up hot tub. 
It did travel in our 5er basement alter all. Folds up to a very small package with its own storage bag. 

We found ours at where else...  Walmart.com  MSPA USA Bubble Spa B-130  with free shipping. 
 
 
 
 

Sunday May 15

Goofing off in prime time weather...

I have to fess up we goofed off most of last week. We did go to Costco for Michelin LTX M/S2 truck tires on Wednesday but that was about it. Just enjoying our winter home. That's enough me thinks for right now. We will have to get busy and clean the 5er inside and out as it's dirty from the winter boondocking in Quartzsite. Two guys in a 5er not exactly ready to start a "Merry Maids" franchise. Men and cleaning are not words that go together. 

Guess the above picture sort of sums up the attitude of some people in the Tucson area in Pima county.  A liberal bastion in southern AZ that has a different mind set than the typical right wingers in the rest of AZ. Isn't that how the rest of the country thinks of Arizona anymore... and for us to see a little liberal thinking in this desert mecca is a welcome thought. Little did we know. We see a Facebook page is up and running called Start Our State.

Our property is on the very east edge of Pima county. You can throw a stone from our land and have it land in Cochise county to the east where Benson is located.  Not sure what it's political climate is yet. Assume more like Pima as so close and southern. This whole area was a part of Mexico many moons ago and just tends to have a little more respect for diversity and culture. We are meeting our neighbors and they are very friendly and have welcomed us. It's not like we are on a close in city neighborhood as we are on the dead end of a dirt/gravel lane.  Each property has an entrance gate.  No through traffic. 

Our property gate. 

Each 4 acre property is fully fenched as there are range cattle out here after all. And a good fence does restrain the dogs... not that any of them are a problem. Any visit is announced... so to speak or bark as the case may be.  We feel secure with neighbors looking out for each other. We are all located on dead end private roads and are here because we like it that way... off the beaten path. High up with vast vista views. But still not that far out of it all. Just a few miles to Benson and under 40 miles to Sierra Vista or Tucson. 

Now we may get more active this week as we found a top end treadmill on craigslist and will be going down to Sierra Vista to look and buy it. That means a stop at Lowes of course for more stuff (2x4)s etc. so Terry can finish the back shed that the orig owner never finished. 

There is extra siding for it... just needs some proper framing done as Terry sez. It has a cement floor (poured at the same time as the garage/shop) and it has quality windows and door... just needs to be closed in. Sort of an eye sore... that we want to take care of.

Terry did got on his "Merry Maid" outfit and cleaned the shop/gar some so he could put down our green grass (indoor/outdoor carpet) on the back side near the rear door.  Next the inflatable hot tub goes in. He needs me to help carry it. May not put water in it right now but it needs to get out of the basement of the 5er before we travel. Want to at least blow it up to see if it still is secure for air pressure.  Bet there will be water water in it by later this week... Don't Ya Think. Open the back (above picture) shop/gar roll up door and watch the moon while soaking in the spa. A little patio out the back garage door would be nice and is in the plans. After all...  Got to start to get the spa... health center (treadmill)...  and later pool area in the steel building ready.  Remember I always said I get half for spa, pool... and Terry gets the rest of the building for his shop.  Get out the tape measure to see who gets what. Are we having fun yet.. Yes Indeedy... 
 
 
 

Sunday May 8

I love my new internet service. 

Sure a Datastorm satellite service is needed when out in the boonies BUT in this winter sticks and bricks fast is better. No more waiting for web pages to download, they just blink and appear, and how should I say, with video, no more buffering pauses. Just click and watch. My... that is nice, I'm going to get used to it in short order, me thinks. Not to mention all the stuff I can do now that the HD TV has Wi Fi and even the DirecTV box is hooked to the internet. 6 thousand more movie options along with TV Apps.
Can watch DVD recorded stuff on the computer and send pictues from the computer to the big HD TV screen. HBO has a service, I can watch HBO shows on the computer. Like most of these extras, probably wont use most of it, but cool to know it's there. Technology designed to be used only by the nerds who come up with this stuff. Most people just want to turn these things on and use a simple interface. Who reads the manual. If they do, do they remember any of it. Like a fancy Digital SLR camera, most are set to auto picture mode. 

Our portal to the world... The small dish is the Wi-Power (WiMax) system. All the electronics is in the LNB right on the dish. The power is fed to it by two unused leads in the Cat5 Lan network cable. The white little box is just a grounding protection device. The big dish is of course our DirecTV.  Notice only one LNB head.  New design as it will pick up all satellites for HD. No more multi head LNBs needed. It still has four coax connectors multi feeds. 
It's strange being retired Bell telco not having DSL but that's not available this far out... not even cable, so Microwave is the answer.

We did make it to CostCo the other day and ordered 6 new truck tires. Michelin LTX M/S2.  10 ply, 70,000 miles, nitrogen inflated. $190 each. Same price as GoodYear Silent Armor tires.  We got in ahead of the tire price increases. They will call when they are in. Just in time as after we were home noticed the left front was going down. Had a cut on the inside wall. Now running without a spare but not to worry with a dully, just move tires around if one goes bad. Only need four tires in a pinch and have six. 
We missed the guy with the two kitchen island chairs. He works nights so only at home till 10 AM. Talked to him and we will stop when we go back for the tires. See last post for a look at them.

While we were in Tucson we took a little time to drive through the Saguaro National Park in (east) Tucson.  They have a 8 mile one way drive and now that it is spring some blooms were out. Free with Senior pass so why not.

A fun day was had by all...  Oh almost forgot Terry is loving his new kitchen. When in Tucson we stopped at the 17 St. Market for some Chinese and Thai cooking ingredients.  Here he is cooking Pad Thai on his new stove. 

Just think I had to eat it...  First night it was with chicken... second night with pork.  I'm Pad Thai'ed out. 

DAMN THIS INTERNET IS FAST. 
Now reflecting the years ago being an early adopter with 24 and 48 kbs dialup.  And I thought it was beyond belief what we could do connecting to the outside world so to speak or type as the case may be.  No graphical interface back then.  You do remember  CompuServe  and later Prodigy (online service)  don't you. Not you kids of course... but I dought if any of those are reading this blog.  Listening to the modem chirp on connect was high tech. All this was a natural as I worked back then in a telco in a big central office with circuits connecting cities and business to each other. That's we were the only game in town and we were busy trying to stay ahead of it all. A rewarding career learning the latest advances as they were introduced. It was changeling keeping up with technology advances.  We had to prove we were up to the task along the way. Like many professions continuing education was a must. My original advanced training was at DeVry Tech where we used slide rules and most electronic equiptment still had vacume tube. To say the least, later on we learned as we worked. 
Now back to here... with all the wind (La Nina brings flood risks and drought to West) we can keep the DataStorm dish on top of the RV down, so it doesn't blow away, since we have two new dishes to replace it on the side of the house.

Today is that special day we remember our mothers with even more intensity, than what we do everyday. If yours is still with you in this life... OMG feel blessed, and let her know how much she is loved.

Now I think my Mom should at least have her picture flow around the world on the internet, on and on as they say. Winding up on some server in a cloud forever. 

My favorite picture... Taken with a Polaroid Instant camera way back when. I had to run out to the RV to find the picture.  I got in a panic and worried I had lost it. This was taken by me, in my first home which she helped with a loan for a down payment. That's when home loan interest rates were over 14%. I assumed a loan to get this house. Years later when time to sell... finding out even that deal was not so hot as the house was over priced due to being able to get it with an assumed loan at a much lower rate.  First house, live and learn. Did better on later home deals.  But it was my first, and my mom was happy to see her son in a home. Proud is the word I guess. 

It is with a lump in my throat that I honor my mom today. I was born the youngest of three boys, a preemie at 7 1/2 months (I'll show you my long birth certificate if you want) and was never expected to live. That was back in 1947 mind you.  I don't remember, but it's reported they carried me around in a womans shoe box. Tiny and sickly to be sure.  Look at me know, or as I say... no pictures please. My mother gave me life and I did her proud by serviving. 
She later got Polio, in the early 1950's and was never expected to walk again. (I was too young to remember). She like me was a fighter and came back to have a full but hard life untill later it came back to haunt her when she got Post-polio syndrome. (Disabling effects that appear decades after the initial polio illness). What a kick in the pants, you are one of the few who servive polio and it cames back to hit you again much later in life. She died at 83 after also dealing with Alzheimer's. A strong woman who gave me life... and worked hard on her own life... Now there goes that lump in my throat again. I like to think we both were fighters and survivors. Thanks Mom.
 

Tuesday May 3

What more can I say...

Still hanging out in our new winter home getting it set up to our liking. 

The roses are doing fine as you can see.  Remember when they promised smell-a-vision. 

We are off to Tucson on Wednesday to buy 10 ga wire so Terry can wire up the RV outlet.  He has installed the box on the north side of the garage/shop. A 70 foot run so needs 10 ga. Another graigslist deal for the wire as the big box home stores want 51 cents a foot and the guy on graigslist wants 19 cents. Save enough to drive to Tucson for it. 
And since we want to go a brand new Costco store right on I-10 and price/order tires for our truck. Michelin LTX MS2 tires at $190 each... but we want/need six... $1335 Och. but since we have the Executive Card we get cash back at the end of the year. 
After that Terry wants to explore the 17th St. Market for Asian cooking stuff and a Silver Supply store for his chain making hobby. 
Not done yet we want to look at some kitchen island chairs that we also found on craigslist.

It's hard finding items that fit in but these may do as our appliances are all white. The cabinets are maple so just finding oak stuff won't work. Still looking for a kitchen dinning set. 
That's for Wednesday but what I'm looking forward to is our appointment with Wi-Power an internet access company associated with the local electric company to show up Thursday morning to install our internet microwave WiMax service. Anyway it think it is WiMax if I did my research correctly.  I'm tired of the slow buffering on new (Youtube) videos etc. with our DataStorm satellite system.  Sure it's great when on the road to get the internet anywhere and most of the time it works to our satisfaction... but now in this winter base I want a faster service.  I want to WiFi my Droid phone to stream the NPR station out of Tucson and our favorite NPR station back in IA on the new service since I have a wireless router to hook up to it.   Our new Sony 55" HD TV even has has WiFi built in. 
So me thinks 5 Meg unlimited download and 512K upload bandwidth service for $70 might do the trick. (same price as our DataStorm) When traveling we can put it on vacation mode for six months as we can also do with our DataStorm service when here. So we can use one or the other. If both of those fail still have my Droid phone using PdaNet 3.0 (check ou the new 3.0 improved  version) for unlimited internet assess. Don't want to abuse that as cell companies are trying more and more to limit high usage. Don't want to show up on their radar screen if I can help it. 

Happy in the high desert.... wish you were here Tad...  Ok if it hs to be next October so be it. 
 
 

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