Trip to Oklahoma yesterday? Mixed bad

I forgot that my fuel gauge isn't working and paid a good price for forgetting.  10 miles on the Interstate going to work and the thing started dying. It slowly droned down to zero miles per hour and I knew I was screwed. Sunday, early morning, no one awake, no one answering the phone.  An app to get help? No luck nor tow trucks. 5 miles to the nearest gas station.  Eventually James came and rescued me.  That SUV holds 33 gallons of fuel and yes, it took just short of 33 gallons to fill it up.

Off to work.  Fire up the tractor, get my stuff and - find out the cab heat isn't working. It is cold here, at least my version of it, anything below freezing is cold to me.  

Anyway, the rest of the trip was a nothing-burger.  Snow on the side of the road, no snow on the road and no ice.  Up to the plant, drop and hook, back to the yard. Very possible to do it in a day if the trailer is already loaded and you don't have to waste the time going to the plant and doing all of that.

Birthday - was wonderful.  Fattening, but cool.  My stomach is just popping out too much.  I am on my 38th hour of a water only fast - well there is a little black coffee in there too to keep from getting headaches - but yeah, it's time to get serious about the diet.  I've done enough cheating, the fat is piling on, time to reverse that.  Fasting will get ketosis fired up again quickly, it did the last time I tried it a month or two ago.  

Crypto - mixed results. One of them is up 40% - I dumped $100 into that when I bought it.  That's a good rate of return. Others are up a little and a few are down a little.  I could see how if a person could hit one right and dump a large sum of money into it, you could get some serious gains quickly. Of course, you could also lose it.

No, I'm not dumping my park money into it, this is all money that comes from paychecks.  I'm about $250 cash into it, probably going to do a couple thousand after I get acclimated to how this stuff works.  So far, I am seeing everything I have bought go way up - and then crash way down - and up and down like a roller coaster ride.  I guess you just have to hit it when it goes up and get out of it quickly.  But - none of them stay down lower than what I paid for it, eventually it goes back up again.  I mean, if you had 100k and got a 40% increase 3 days later - well do the math.  

But, like gambling or the stock market, it has risk attached to it and therefore, I'm not jumping in the deep end. It's just something I've been looking at for a while and wondering why I don't at least give it a try.

Property? No idea. The trackhoe is over there, I'm home, going to load up the dogs and go over there ina bit and see if they have actually shown up to commence operations.  That's all I know, everything is is ready for them, the only change I made was moving the park another 75 feet south to the edge of the gas line easement. This creates a huge swath of room for a large dog park that won't interfere with other plans.  People want a large dog park, I'm going to give it to them. The only cost is putting a fence around it, a gate, installing a dog doo post with a trash can and plastic bags and grow some grass.  Probably the cheapest amenity I will have that people really want.  

As for all the other amenities, I am just holding back until the utilities are installed.  My view of it changes with passing time.  Perhaps the park could have a "soft opening" with nothing more than the utilities at each site and the doggy park, advertising it as such in bold print so people are not going to be able to say they were mislead. Well - and the walking trails.  I want those done as well.  That might cost a couple thousand to finish them but the end result will be worth it.  If I limit amenities at the get-go, I also reduce the cost of liability insurance.  It would be nice to have a couple of washers and dryers there, tho.  And I am going to have to have someplace to put the wifi hardware.  

I can simply offer a reduced fee for a soft opening and if I can keep the place filled or mostly filled, I will still turn a nice profit to begin with.  

Am I sold on this line of thinking? No. Just thoughts - wondering how much all of this gravel and pads are going to cost that might eat up whatever I have left in available cash.  It's 56k for the full hook ups and then whatever after that for gravel/pad creation and whatever after that is for the dog park and whatever else I can afford.  I'd like to not have to take out any personal loans.  I have around 120k available to do whatever I can get done.  

I have conflicting thoughts on amenities right now, is my problem. Yes, I can buy a cabin shed - it's just a shed with a porch - and have an office with a couple of showers.  But - is that what I want permanently? No.  I want a log cabin - a real log cabin - setup.  I go back and forth in my mind with this. "If I buy the cabin shed, what will I do with it if I have a cabin built?".  "Use it to start a parking lot style RV park that is just overnighters stopping on their way to somewhere else".  "So, buy more land?". "Yes, you were going to do that anyway, a couple of acres right off the Interstate".  "But I wouldn't be able to do that for years". "So?  You weren't going to upgrade to a building like that for years, either".  

That is my thought process, lmao.  Don't tell me y'all don't get into arguments with yourself over tough decisions lol.  

Yes, I thought about the Google reviews and what might happen with a soft-opening, but if I advertise it truthfully - this is what I have, this is what you are going to get when you arrive here - type of thing, what can they say? Well, they can say anything, that's for sure and some of them will, that's also guaranteed.  Nit pickers and people generally unhappy in life will poop on everyone else's parade regardless of how good a setup it is.  I could have a perfect park and someone will find fault with it and they will publish their discontent. 

The biggest priority on people's list - I have been researching this for a while now - is good wifi, a doggy park, lots of room for the pads. People are sick of tiny parks with small lots that have no room between sites.  My latest post in a giant RV tips group - I didn't see a single person say anything about a bath house. That was kind of odd.  Many wanted a pool or a place to swim, many more said they didn't care about a pool. Some want concrete or paved roads and pads. That's a no-go.  Think gravel is expensive? Try having asphalt roads and pads installed. 

The fact of the matter is, is that I'm coming to the point of a reckoning.  I'll have to decide what I have to have and what I don't have to have and move forward accordingly.  What's going to bring them, what might be appealing to a certain crowd of them, what isn't really that big of a deal that I don't need.  

To that end, I am going to go to a nearby state park with a lake and see how they have their campgrounds set up. Tent camping that is.  I don't know if they put some kind of sand pit or what for the tents or if it's just like the good ole's days, find a level spot on the ground and pitch the tent. I always went tent camping with air mattresses, which I assume a lot of people still do. Still, I'd like to see how the state parks do it just to get an idea since I do want to have a few tent camping spots as well.  

With that, I am out of here, going over to the property and see if anything is going on. If it is, there will be pics or maybe a live video stream on my Fakebook page.