Getting Away for the Summer

For those of you that know, I apologize to the redundancy.  This year has been full of work, stress, shock, dismay…as well as fun and frivolity.  And so, our summer sojourn, has been much anticipated.

Leaving as we did yesterday (last Friday now) , required a huge push to get all things done.  Uncle Ralph’s house has been all consuming and Thursday, we met with the appraiser, the home inspector, the realtor, and the contractor.  The house is ready to list for sale.  Yippee.  Next week after the appraisal comes in.  In order to get to this…oh, the heck with it.  It was very stressful and very labor intensive.   Bottomline.    It’s  almost over.

Then there was the renting of our house.  We decided to try to rent our house through a property management outfit.  And it is rented each month, June, July, August.  To three different couples.  Yippee.  However, in order to be the good “landlord”, every cupboard needed review and a scrubbing.  Every drawer.  The garage.

 

Our golf cart.

Our golf cart.

 

Perfect segue.  The garage.  We decided to sell our golf cart which lives in our garage.  We don’t use it enough.  So I listed it on Craigslist at three different price points, starting at $1500.  Ending at $800.  A fellow named Ryan, came by, looked at it, liked it and peeled off $800 in cash on the spot.  He called once and said he would pick it up after Mother’s Day.  And we haven’t heard from him since.  Who does that?  So, it’s still in the garage.  Will he ever return?  I don’t know.  But I have emailed Craigslist 3 times to ask them to help me locate him because we have no number for him and don’t know his last name.  Really.  Craigslist has not responded.  So, we had no other choice but to leave town with the cart still hogging room in our garage.

We also decided to order two new interior doors for our house.  Both doors lead to bedrooms.  When we left, they were hanging where they should be hanging but they were not yet painted (only primed).  Our contractor that worked on UR’s house is doing this work.  Hopefully they will be finished by the time the first couple arrives.  We’re at Lake Topaz in NV.  I don’t know.  I can only hope.  The reason we did this when we did was that both doors open to our long, dark, hall.  And these doors have three panes of glass (you can’t see thru the glass).  Our thinking is that they would allow light in the hall when closed.  Especially the one in the middle room which is a den, which we are locking for the duration of our trip because we stored stuff in that room that we thought should not be left out.  So, that door will be closed but it will let light into the hall.

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Then we had Bob, our neighbor up to teach us how to cook a pizza without burning it to as crisp in our wood chip heated portable pizza oven.  He had worked for Uno Pizza and knew what to do.  So, he came up.  Rayman lit the oven, Bob made the pizza and it came out okay.  Just a bit burnt on one side.  Then he made the second pizza.  That one acted up.  It seemed glued to the surface of the pan it made it on.  And when he tried to “jerk” it free so that it would transfer to the pizza stone, well, it did not cooperate.  The pizza came out of the oven looking like a tomato football, and undercooked throughout.  That one went into the garbage.  So, we ate the one pizza and Bob walked home after our respite.  When he left, I looked at the Rayman and said, “Let’s leave this pizza oven at home with Bob over the summer…and maybe he can figure out how it is suppose to work perfectly.”  Rayman expalined, “Great idea.”  So, Bob now has our pizza oven as I sit here blogging at Lake Topaz, Nevada.

Of course, I couldn’t give up the notion of not having a portable pizza oven.  So, I went on Amazon and bought a new portable pizza oven that is heated with propane canisters.  Our friend, Al DeVico…Italian as they come…has one and loves it.  It is now being sent to Little Bear RV Park in Blairsden, CA.  That where we will be tomorrow.  And for a month.  I’m bound and determined.  Don’t ask me why.  I do not have a sufficient answer to the question.   Just because.

Assemblying the PizzaPronto portable pizza oven with doggie advice.

Assemblying the PizzaPronto portable pizza oven with doggie advice.

We arrived here about 4:30 after a fabulous drive up to this location on highway 395.  My, oh, my.  The Eastern Sierras are awesome.  The weather was wonderful.  The views were never ending.  We ate on paper plates (a first as I always insist on china).  We bought these paper plates for “one night stands” so to speak.  We are camping here tonight and leave in the morning.

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Eastern Sierras in all their glory.

 

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Mono Lake looking south.

Mono Lake looking south.

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So fun to see raging water of Walker River.

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Lake Topaz from our RV park.

Yesterday when we extricated ourselves from our abode in Morro Bay, we drove to Ridgecrest to stay and visit with our dear friend,, Nancy.   She had us for dinner along with her good friends the Shibleys, who are going to rent our house for one of those months while we’re gone.  But let me back up.  In order to leave at a reasonable time, we pre-loaded the Dog House, except for the refrigerated and frozen items.  So, we got up in the morning and there was nothing to eat.  On the way to Ridgecrest, we had some pita crackers, a

few raisins, a banana and some peanut M&Ms.  IMG_0560No coffee.  Just water.  OMG.  We were famished when we arrived in Ridgecrest.  We had a great dinner.  And she had leftover potato salad, cole slaw, and barbecued pork ribs.  And let’s not forget the pineapple bundt upside down cake…a rendition on that theme.  Yummy.

This a.m. she offered us leftovers.  Of course, we accepted.  And that’s what we just finished eating for dinner tonight.  Thank you, dear Nancy!!!!!




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