Saturday, morning.

Received a text at 8:33 am: is James awake? Taylor asking about James. 

I dunno. Got up, went out the bedroom door, no-one is awake. I instantly knew what this was about: the 7 year old was supposed to be at a location to sign up for soccer clinics, sign-ups starting at 8:30 am.  

To save the household from a weekend of a 7 year old pouting and crying because he missed the sign-ups (yesterday he proclaimed playing soccer "is my dream")l, I woke James up.  A flurry of activity and they were out the door in a about 10 minutes time. Not bad, really.  

I decided to get with it and get the last stick of drainage pipe over there and also loaded up 4, 14-foot sticks of sewer pipe I have laying in the back yard.  

Whereas the RV section of the park could have 40-50k pound vehicles driving over the drainage pipes, the drop-off in the back will have at most a pickup truck worth of weight driving over drain pipes and the pipes will be deep under the ground.  No worries about them caving in, the pipe being free, I am using that old stuff to use for when it rains and you can clearly see water runs along the bottom of the drop off.  

I have my rates pretty much set.  $525 monthly rate which includes utilities;  $40 nightly rate for large lots and $35 for smaller lots and 10% off nightly rates for weekly rates.   These rates designed with everything else in the area.  

I'm not really sure what anyone charges for monthly rates, tbh, but I have to make a profit and electric usage is estimated around $100 per month annually.  There are large variables, of course. Giant rigs with 2 or even 3 air conditioning units will use much more electricity than much smaller rigs, but if you're going to live there, you're going to pay.  It really makes me second guess myself of why I didn't have power pedestals equipped with meters.  A lot of people say no, you don't need them, but if you're doing long term stays, then you really do.  

What I really have no idea about is what I'm going to get coming in there?  It's going to be advertised, yes, the advertisement is going to be nightly, weekly and long term stays.  

Anyway, it's the weekend and I am worn out from working in the hot sun, high temperatures and high humidity. I'm not doing any work out there today or tomorrow. The temps are supposed to drop considerably on Monday.  I have to see if I can find info on taxes and who to pay them to at what rate.  I'm not a tax dodger and I don't need the IRS coming after me.  I don't know if I have to pay federal tax on business revenues.  I do believe I have to "pay myself" out of the business account and deduct federal income tax accordingly (Texas has no state income tax).  Well, saying that I"m going to spend today and tomorrow doing research.  I'd like to cut my expenses if possible.  

Bookkeeping isn't my forte, but there's a YouTube video for everything, right? lol.  My list of known expenses beyond taxes will be electricity, water, wifi, lawn maintenance.  I can't find any info on how much a small park pays out in expenses every month, so I'm going to guesstimate and - probably be off but maybe close?  I'm guessing around 3 grand.  I'm guessing insurance around $500 per month, that's from reading other park owners, but they have much larger parks and I'm hoping the price will be lower than that. Whatever it is, it isn't something I will be going without.  

The last thing I need is someone suing me and then losing the park and property altogether because I didn't have insurance to cover everything.  Maybe a subscription to one of those legal operations would be in my best interest as well.  

I have so much work to do....I was walking around the trails today. There is so much wood to be cleaned up.  And some of the trails are powdery dirt, I'd really like some grass  in those areas.  Amazingly, there is natural grass growing near the back of the property where there was just trees before.  I didn't spread grass seed back there, lol, I have no clue how it got there. 

I have also determined how to get a road back to the "group campground", I'll need a dozer for that.  There is a lot of dozer work that needs to be done in the front and rear of the property.  I don't think one day rental of one will be enough.  There are mounds of dirt that have been there a long time when they made the easement passage on the west side.  They pushed the dirt well down the hill. I only need flatten those out and use the extra dirt for the drop off there to create a nice road back to the group campground. 

This group campground - if I can ever get it ready - will be heavily promoted locally.  There is enough space for probably  7 tents plus a large fire ring and a couple of picnic tables.  Promotion will simply be on local Facebook pages, nothing I will be spending money on. But there is one local group where, if I place an ad on there, it will spread around the region like wild fire. It's the local gathering spot for everyone looking for whatever they are looking for. Everyone is on there including the local Chamber of Commerce.  I'll gladly have port-a-potties brought in if I can get groups to come in. Boy Scouts, businesses wanting outings, just large groups of friends? Who knows.  

And there is another large area - which is flat, level ground - on the other side that I really would like to have for large groups.  It's all dozer work getting roads in there, I don't think I need the mulcher man back out for that.  

So, this coming week? I'm going to try to get another person out there with me that said he'd work every day for X amount per hour (not high rates, let me tell ya, but if he really works I'll give him a bonus to keep coming back).  I just have been putting off a lot of trail work with removing wood because of the high heat factor, I get worn out after only 3 or 4 hours and I'm toast.  Monday's high is 85 and low is 57!  This is the kind of outdoor temperatures where I can work and not get work out so quickly!  

Tedious work, the small trees have to be dragged out of the side pockets along the trails where the machine pushed them into, cut up into smaller pieces and hauled to a burn pile.  It's pretty unsightly and I can't imagine just leaving that stuff there.  Woods don't have to be "clean" per se, but all of that debris has to go.  And it's going to take a while.  

Gag, which reminds me, one of the chainsaws needs the idle screw set to idle higher. The thing won't idle. Runs perfect if you hold the trigger in a bit, nothing wrong but the idle setting.  Just have to take a bunch of stuff off to get at it, I could have brought that home with me to tinker with today.  The other chainsaw needs a new chain- I have the chain just need to install it. Maybe I'll go back over there today and get them and bring them home.  

Oh, and I am wondering if James will finish welding together my ramps.  I got the materials for it a long time ago, but he only has one ramp completed. The rental company only charges $30 for the trailer rental, yes, but I'm counting my pennies atm and every little bit helps.  

Enough for this entry. Time to get busy with research.

G'day