Kind of a rough day.

Fasting is never easy, at least not for me and for the fact I haven't done that much of it in recent times besides the 3 day fast I did two or so weeks ago.  But I don't see any reason not to fast - and pray for that matter - starting a diet that is pretty difficult to follow. After the last fast, it would have been easy to continue on with Keto. I didn't do that, sort of wish I did.  If you haven't been eating in many days, whatever you are going to eat? It's all like a prime rib dinner with all the fixings.  It's food and it doesn't really matter what that food is.

I could have sat around the house another couple of hours if I had known that the plant was going to keep me sitting around for 2 plus hours.  I got in there and the first driver was still there, not a good sign for he should have been loaded and gone by the time I got there.  He told me after the finally finished him he had gotten there on time for his appointment but they made him wait.

Turns out it's the new guy that was loading all by himself and he was complaining about allllll  the trucks he had to load that day.  Well of course, that's what they hired you to do. What, did you think you were going to be sitting around most of the time?

The thing that got me was after I finally got backed into the loading bay and sat there 45 more minutes waiting, he came up to me and told me I had to move, the pump is broken.  I suppose it's possible the pump is broken, but I have also seen them just move us out of the way to preload their trucks.  Well, that bay where they load those trucks half blocks the bay we back into.  I wondered what he was going to do about the "broken pump"?  Nothing.  Absolutely nothing. Another loader showed up for work not long after I pulled back out into the parking lot and approached my truck.  Well, do you think you can back around that truck? I dunno, has anyone else ever done it? Yes, a few have been able to.

Well, I would love to but the new dude said the pump is broken.  "Let me go find out".  Yes, please do, because it takes them hours to load those trucks in that bay to and in front of where we load our trucks. He came back, yea, it was just making a noise but I know what is wrong with it, it's just the filter sock needs to be changed.  Again wondering why this kid wouldn't do it, the answer was obvious.  He was going home and had made me wait 2 hours 30 minutes for - nothing.  

So, I said heck ya, I'll back this truck in there!  Sure enough, I nailed it the first time, didn't have to do a single pull up.  You have to back to the side of the parked truck getting loaded and then jackknife the truck so the trailer gets into position correctly.  He had that thing loaded in about 35 minutes.   That other truck had already been sitting there a long time and they were nowhere near done loading it when I was pulling out of there.  I was there a total of 3 hours and 15 minutes but it would have been more like 5 or more hours.  I commended the other loader, you are the best loader here! He really is, he can load 3 trucks at the same time and think nothing of it.  He kicks @$$, basically.

Coming back was also an interesting situation. On the final highway I have to drive one, it's 2 lanes with passing lanes here and there.  A pilot pickup for an oversized load came racing up to me, pulled over into the double yellow lines signaling me to move over.  Huh? I'm going 70 mph in a 70 mph zone and he wants me to pull over for him? Screw that, they can wait until we get to a passing lane. 

So we get to one, this pickup comes flying by me but the truck is back a ways.  It has a large steel structure on it sticking out at least 2 feet on either side, doesn't even fit into the lane.  Well, by the time he got maybe 150 feet behind me, the passing zone was ending, merge left. So, I put my signal on and was coming back over.  What did he do? He floored it, crossed over the double yellow lines, must have been going 80 mph in that thing.  It was pure insanity, going over the crest of a hill, no way he could see if any traffic was coming. 

I'm not going to cause a head on collision from some other truck driver's appalling stupidity so I let him back over, even tho the lane was ended right then.  I had half a mind to call state Troopers to come out and have a discussion with him, but I decided against it.  I don't know what his big hurry is, I never see oversized loads that big going that fast and taking that kind of risk with the motoring public.  I wondered if he would end up killing someone driving in that manner. 

Anyway, it's 5:30 pm and I just got home.  I should have been home 2-1/2 hours ago.  Whatever, it happens but obviously, anytime it gets busy at the loading plant and that new guy is the only loader there? It's going to be a long wait.  They have been having 2 loaders there and everything runs like smooth silk.  We get in and out of there.  I just had an issue with him saying a pump is broken and doing literally nothing about that, he didn't even have to load the other truck, some other driver backed it in there and a different loader who doesn't do our trucks was up there loading it.  It was just an excuse to do nothing else until he was going home. 

Way too late to stop at the tractor dealership. 

I remembered today that there is no toilet paper in the shed, but I also thought: why am I going to go out and spend $30 on paper that is going to be stolen by someone or more than someone?  I have decided I am just going to buy a 30 pack or whatever and just keep a couple of rolls in there at a time, the rest can stay in my vehicle. They do make locking toilet paper dispensers, but that's not what's happening. Someone is grabbing  15-20 rolls of it and walking out with it. So many people go into the bathroom with large bags it is impossible to tell who is doing it.  

I built that bathroom for myself initially, it morphed into a bathroom/shower room after I did some research on RV'ers habits.  

Anyway, another 4 hours and I can go to bed and not think about food. I am awfully hungry right now, but I'm going to forge ahead with this fasting for it is extremely beneficial for not only kick starting keto, but also for health benefits.  I'm going to at least make it through tomorrow afternoon.  I'll have to decide then if I can make it another day plus.  I"m going to try, that's all I can promise.

Kids are coming home and grandma is leaving right away on Friday, I asked them to change my schedule.  I kind of didn't give an option, it needs to be changed.  So, she changed it, but the aftermath is 4 days in a row now of late load/unloading.  It's just that no one is going to be here, apparently.   So grandma would show up and can't leave until someone comes home.  Well, I should be there long before they get there now and frankly, I certainly don't mind being home early on a Friday going into Saturday.

I'm hoping loading will be better on Wednesday - it will be late load as well but if they can get their act together down there I can be out of there early enough to stop at the tractor dealership.  

Well, I'm getting off of here. I can't get my mind off of food and I need to do something to distract my attention.

 Monday - not particularly early, not late either.  

There is no reason to leave early for today's work, it will just have me sitting in a truck for hours waiting to get loaded.  I'd rather wait at home.  

I have no idea what would possess birds to start chirping at 2:30 am, but they did and it was a lot of them, waking me up out of a deep sleep.  The sleep tracker verified that, showed in deep sleep and then a straight line goes all the way up to the top - awake.  I put in my ear plugs to block out the noise, but damage done.  Didn't matter too much, I was in bed 10 hours and slept 8 of them...

And TBH, I don't really mind a bit later run on a Monday morning after a weekend off.  The day will drag out longer but I won't be so tired as I normally am on a Monday, early, getting up and dragging my @$$ to work.  I'm leaving a bit earlier today than I normally would because the trailer has been sitting 2-3/4's days out in the heat.  The glue starts to dry up and it takes them longer to get it off the walls of the trailer. 

Anyway, it was a nice weekend, didn't do much and don't regret that decision. My only desire was to go talk about a tractor but that fell through, I want to see what TYM has in person first before going to the Kubota dealer. The other person in Fort Worth went to the disrespectful mode Saturday when he was offering a "free implement" and I said thanks, but I can't sign anything until I get a feel for the tractor.  

He then brought up that I was willing to buy it sight unseen. No sir, I still have all the texts....so, he brings up a text (which was amazing that a salesperson would call out a potential customer to begin with regardless of whether he was "right or wrong"), shows that I "want to get a feel for it first".  Yes, that's exactly what I mean, but we had discussed on the phone about seeing one of the units in person before I would sign on the dotted line.

Who in their right mind is going to sign for 35k worth of machinery without even seeing it first? Pictures are great, they don't tell the whole story, they never do.  But, the guy dug in further wondering what he had just wasted 2 months of discussing this tractor situation with him if I had wanted to see it in the first place?  I had had enough, instead of dishing it back out to him, I simply said "Have a nice day" and that was the end of texting.  If he texts me again?  It probably won't be so pleasant.  I don't care what he has to offer, he isn't local, Fort Worth is 3 hours from here.  At least the place in Carthage is relatively close at 25-30 miles, the same with the dealer in Longview. 

Apparently grandma has to drop the kids off and go straight back to Arkansas for whatever reason on Friday.  So, I am going to ask them to change my schedule so that I have first load, I am already doing a second load this week anyway, not particularly happy that they dumped with 2 of them in the same week.  I wasn't going to say anything about it, not this week anyway, if she (dispatcher) tries that again next week? I'll tell them to dump the second one on someone else or I'll refuse the load.  It's that simple: this company allegedly does not have forced dispatch. Meaning, if they give you a load, you can tell them no.  I don't want to do that, of course, it doesn't go over too well for any favors in the future.  

Our internet still isn't working properly. They got it up and running, but it zones out a lot. Meaning: it just stops working.  So you try to post something and nothing happens. Exactly what's going on now, tried to post a comment to a friend's Facebook and it said "unable to post".  Looking at the bottom row on the screen, I'm not even on the internet right now.  Sometimes, restarting the computer works but if I do that?  I'll lose everything I have written on here since it hasn't been able to save it. 

So, I'll hope it either comes back on before I leave or I'll put the computer to sleep and try again when I get home later.  

Basically, I'm on the verge of having to go out and buy the next size fatter waist size pants.  Just no.  This is one of the reasons we're doing a 30 day challenge.  Can I make 30 days? Certainly.  I've done far more than that on the Keto diet, going 4 or 5 months without backing down.  Now, can I just start out from scratch and do it? Remains to be seen.  But I'm going to try, this is getting ridiculous.

The driver trainer is having prostate problems. To the point he is going to have to go through low level radiation. He said he has to do it every day for 2 months and will be scaling back his driving to weekends only. Why he chose weekends I have no idea, I guess to accommodate work and put it in a more favorable light for him.  He spoke with the manager about it, I guess that means that's a go for him.  

I dunno if I'd want to work at all going through something like that tbh.  Especially considering I have the insurance to cover such things.  You don't get a full paycheck, but that's ok. You scale back on any recreational spending and saving and just pay your bills.  I'm not judging him at all, it just may be that he rethinks that stand once he's into it and realizing the effects that kind of treatment may have on the body.  I mean, it might be a bit difficult if it were me to walk away from this job than it was before the pay raise, but who can work going through such things?

Did I say my paycheck was $400 more than the last one?  I mean, it's going up not down.  I hate working every day for 2 weeks in a row, for now it's just a necessary thing I have to do to pay the bills and hopefully get ahead, at least on the business account.  

Well, there we go. Electric bill paid.  I dunno, I was just holding on to all of that money to see a flourishing business bank account, lol. Next bill will be much higher I am sure with the day time temps up in the mid to high 90's.....June is always hot along with July and August, still quite warm in September, October it will start coming down.  I dunno about grass, I am having different thoughts about it.

The problems is rocks. There are endless rocks and if you go down even a few inches into the soil, there are even more rocks.  I'm wondering if I should change the whole thing to a landscaping rock setup and have maybe a small patch of grass in there somewhere and call it good.  I am not interested in fighting with the natural rocks that are everywhere forever.  If you get one thrown out by a mower, you are screwed.  The only other alternative I've seen is artificial grass, which in my view looks tacky and gaudy.  And I can't imagine it lasting very long before getting dirty.

Another option would be to mix landscaping rock with a cement area for chairs and such.  I'm just not going to sit around wondering if another vehicle is going to be hit with an errant rock and end up doing more damage that is costly.  People won't like a non-grass set up and it doesn't really identify with the name of the business, I have some thinking to do about it.  I don't even know what kind of landscaping rock is available in this area.  

Whatever the case, it's almost time to leave.  Not a big hurry, but in case something is going on over at th park and people see me and start asking questions or bringing up complaints, I like to take extra minutes with me as well.  This because it's later in the day, not 6:20 am when I am usually arriving there to get the truck fired up, get a pre-trip inspection done and get on the road. 

Oh, I reset the router, internet is back up....

G'day. 

 Sunday - late morning

Last night was a bit crazy.  We went to eat at a local mexican food restaurant.  All well and find, however, something in that food started making my stomach go all different ways out of whack.  We went home and after James got off of work, we then went to Applebee's.  It was very noisy in there, much like a dive bar.  They were doing karaoke and the volume was turned up very high.

There was one dude that was singing, he was octaves off pitch and just, well anyway, it wasn't pleasant on the ear drums.  Some other people came up to the mic and belted out songs I have never heard before.  I am not much into current day music, I consider much of it to be - off - to put it mildly.  I've never been into rap music, in my view it is just a person talking trash at a high rate of speed with very little music added to it and giving a message of how great the thug life is.

Anyway, by the time I got home from that, my stomach was talking to me.  Drank down some Pepto Bismal which eventually settled it down.

Anyway, it's Sunday morning, leaving for church in a few minutes. I haven't been in 3 weeks, this would be week 4.  2 weekends were working and another was going to 6 Flags.  I probably could have made it back in time from 6 Flags, I had decided against it for I was very tired after walking all day long.  

Anyway, the dude at the tractor dealer didn't bother to let me know they were reopened, I had to contact him. He got back to me a few hours later, but by then I was fully involved in other things.  I had second thoughts about doing business there. What kind of salesman just leaves a solid lead left on the table?  What happens when you need service or repairs?  I dunno. Maybe it was just an oversight, maybe it wasn't.  I haven't even looked at that business' reviews yet, now that I think of it, I will do that after I get back from church today. 

I don't think anyone else is going to church today and the kids are still in Arkansas and will be until Friday.  I'm not letting that deter me, I have sat in church alone for many, many Sundays. I usually get something out of the messages even tho it is really devoid of the "meat of the word".  The pastor doesn't believe, for the most part, in discussing the "deeper things" of God.  I'm simply referring to repentance and all the things Jesus told us to do with our lives. It would help to hear messages like that, that bring conviction from the blessed Holy Spirit.  

I have thought about going to a different church, the kids will have nothing to do with it and now that mom is going off and on, they can go with her if I did, indeed, decide to go somewhere else. There are plenty of churches in town. It's just that probably most of them have nothing like the setup they have for kids at this church.  

Well, time to go.

G'day

 Saturday - morning

I rather enjoyed not having to wake up to an alarm going off and having to immediately get up out of bed and get the day rolling.  Instead, I woke up an hour and a half later than normal, which isn't as much as I would have liked but hey, there is no rush to do much of anything.

I am really not feeling like doing anything today - unless I had a tractor then I'd get over there and fix that driveway.  It is in horrible shape and I am simply going to have to ask for 2 days off during the week.  It is not a weekend thing unless I had Saturday through Monday off.  Then, I could have the tractor all the way up until Monday morning and get the driveway as good as it can get with that particular tractor.  

Wait, but what would work is if a Monday was a late delivery.  I don't leave the yard for a late run until 9:15 am and that would be ample time to return the machine.  They open at 7 weekdays. I am pretty much on the idea that I am not getting a tractor soon enough to fix that mess, it needs to be done now, not a week from now or however long this process is going to take to get one.  

Wait.  I have late loads next week...I'll look later, the tablet is elsewhere.  

So, these people pay for a spot, show up and just keep driving through the park, not even slowing down.  Or was it them?  Sometimes people mistake my place for the private park down the street.  I dunno, but whoever it was? They never called, they didn't ask for their money back and I have no idea why someone would show up to just leave like that.

I get that my place - as is any business - isn't for everyone.  Most people like it, some people don't.  Speaking of that, it's time to run another ad on Facebook.  I mean, the boost thing not just the ads I place on my Facebook account.  Actually, I could probably just run it on all the local facebook groups for free and see if that does anything.  Facebook boost has been getting some rather interesting things happening.

It places the ad on people's profiles that are not looking for an RV park or in some cases, don't even own an RV.  Shrugs shoulders - excepting the part where some of them come to my business profile and start trash talking and posting stupid memes and things like that.  

I have 3 lots open right now and only a smattering of reservations that don't even pay for one of them for a month.  Just placed a boost ad but also looked at the audience.  Coverage was "united states".  No, no, no.  I was reading some information on targeting your audience and I didn't know Facebook just presumes you want the entire nation covered.  Well, the entire nation isn't coming here.  Some of them might be, but I want ads more targeted to the local region where people are working/living and looking for something different. 

So, I kept United States in there but then also added several cities in the surrounding region which caused a nice, large bubble to show up over the entire thing.  Some people don't mind driving 25 miles to work or even further. I did it for a couple of years when I moved here. I didn't like it but it was the only option at the time. Actually, it wasn't the only option, I was being narrow-minded in wanting to stay with my company and transferring out here.  I wanted to keep the job because I had so many vacation hours for I had been with them quite a while and I was just on the verge of getting up to - was it 150? - vacation hours per year.  Yes, it was like a month off.  I don't miss that place - at all.  Low pay, horrid working conditions (which wasn't the case in AZ), it just plain sucked.  

I get so easily distracted lol.  First the coffee got cold, then I decided to start dusting the room, then I wanted to get some electrolyte pills I had completely forgotten about (summer, heat, helps) then I got to looking at the tablet and sure enough, I have late load Monday.  Also on Friday.  2 late loads in a week.  I'm not going to say anything, I'll see what happens the week after upcoming week. If they do that again I will have to say something.  I don't necessarily hate not having to get up early, it's just that the day doesn't end until at least 5 pm.  

And takes me back to whether I want to rent that machine today, or not, or if it is even available. It wasn't there yesterday, if my memory serves me correct. They are right next to highway 59 and all of their equipment is lined up out front, facing the road.  I guess I'll call them and see if it's available.  I am not really in the mindset today for working, I'm more in the "gee, let's stay home, maybe do a little cleaning, put away the clothes that are in the dryer, maybe vacuum the floor, and definitely watch some movies" mind frame.

However....that driveway....videos and pictures don't do it justice.  You have to experience driving over it in it's current state.  I have  a stream running down my driveway whenever it rains and then it crosses over. Where it crosses over - which is at several points - is where the damage occurs.  Last time I rented that tractor, I spent many hours just going over the same areas repeatedly.  It's because their tractor doesn't have rippers on it and they don't have them on there on purpose, without giving explanation as to why.  Hence, I really don't want to pay that much money to rent their tractor again .. however...they are the only ones in town to rent from.

Everyone else is at least 30 miles away.  It does work, just not as good as it would be with rippers/teeth on the box blade.  And it eventually works after going over the bad spots probably 50-75 times.  This is why it takes all day to do that project, it doesn't have what it needs installed on it to get the job done much faster.  And we aren't talking cheap, it was near $400 last time I rented it.  I feel that if I have to keep renting machines and will have to continue renting them in the future for sure, why not just get one?  

____________

I have 50 minutes to make up my mind.  I don't mind the part about spending  all the time today and tomorrow on the machine, it's the taking-it-back-to-the-store-on-Monday part that I'm not really fond of.  That's, take it back to the store at 7:00 am - you can't take it back later than that or they'll charge you for an extra day. The appealing part is it's only $311. I dunno if my memory is failing me or if I definitely recall them charging me near $400 last time.  I know the mini-ex is over $400, but that's pretty normal for a machine that is more expensive to buy, maintain and operate.  

I'm going to sit here and think about this for a few minutes and make a decision one way or the other.  

Regardless, we are going to El Taco today for a "last meal" sort of, 2 of us are on a challenge that will last 30 days. Dieting/what you're eating/drinking etc.  We are getting too fat and that's - well that may adjust my desire to rent this machine today.  I will also be fasting again.  Ugh, this is a tough decision.  I think it would be far better and easier to just have 2 days off during the week and do it that way.  

 Friday - morning

Well, the weekend is almost here. Funny I can say that, doesn't happen that often albeit the fact I did have the weekend off 2 weekends ago to go to 6 Flags. Before that? I had worked many, many days in a row.  

I have plans, at least not yet, but I'd like to do much of nothing. It usually does not work out that way, one can dream.

Today's paycheck is....almost $400 more than the last one.  Now we're getting somewhere. I could definitely live with these kinds of checks. Don't much care for the "let's work 14, 15, 18 days in a row" methodology to get it there, but I digress. If I can just keep a grand of it per month towards savings, I'll get the money to expand the park by 5 or so spaces soon enough.  Well, a couple of years I guess.  It's asking a lot to save more than that, I have too much debt I'm paying off and that's going to go on for quite a while.  

I'd like to not have to retire with a bunch of debt beyond house payments and possibly the land payment, which is pretty small comparatively speaking.  Speaking of that, I only owe 2 more payments on  the shed and that is done and over with and never again deal with such a slimy, low- character, lying organization such as Tower Loans. I have never heard of it before, I didn't really think much of it until I got into it.

It will probably never go out of my mind that this company switched my account from a Louisiana based account to a Texas based account, which changed the bank info on their end, didn't bother to tell me about it and my bank declined the transaction.  I didn't even notice it until a couple of months of them giving me endless phone calls. They had been doing that, much like the insurance people calling you every day telling you that your car's warranty is about to expire....

I had stopped answering the phone for them is the point and then they finally sent me a notice in the mail.  By then, I think I had 3 late payments that they had declared to the credit reporting bureau and trashed my credit score.  It takes 3 years for that junk to fall off of there.  There were some pretty ugly phone calls after I realized what was going on and calling my bank to find out why they had rejected the auto pays, it wasn't because I didn't have money in there, obviously, it was this loan company's bs. 

"Oh, well those late payments on your score will just fall off of there" was this loan company's statement to me.  Anyway, I am thinking of just paying the rest of the loan off and get that behind me.  

Ugh. It's time to leave.  I don't wannna go to work! Waaaahhh! lol, just kidding, trying to act like the newer generations who for the most part have no work ethic.  I have bills to pay, I'm not sure how they live...oh yes, they live off of their still-working parents.

G'day

 Thursday

I guess what I posted yesterday - didn't post after hitting the post button.

Whatever.  These people that "showed up" but didn't show up, called after they allegedly showed up and said my pedestals were underwater? Disputed it and they apparently automatically get their money back.  Until I dispute the chargeback. So, I spent 32 minutes on the phone today with these people. 

It's one of those deals where English is far from their first language and understanding anything they are saying is difficult at best. The first person? Can you put someone on the phone that speaks English, please? They don't like hearing that but if they are being hired to deal with English speaking people, perhaps the employer should ensure that the prospective employee's speech is at least intelligible and a normal person can actually understand what they are saying.

I went through 3 more people after that, tho not because I was asking for someone who speaks English. I was, well, give me all of this information. Great, I'm getting somewhere. Yes, well now we will transfer you to the chargeback division.  Next person: takes all the information, yes, we will now transfer you to the chargeback division.  Next person: takes my information and after all of that, tells me that a chargeback can only be done on the internet.

I became completely irritated at that point.  What? Why didn't you, the last person or the person before that just tell me that in the first place?  Why did you ask for all of this information? Well we have to verify it's you.  Who the hell cares who is calling if all you are going to do is tell the person that they have to use some other venue to make your dispute?   

That's as far as I got. I had no interest in further communication in any format with this company so I just blew it off for today. I will get back to it this weekend, the online version anyway.  

I think D-Day is lost on generations that could care less about our nation's history or why we even exist as a nation as it stands.  Without the people that fought that battle at Normandy and defied and defeated Germany, who knows what this world would look like right now?  All of those people did not die in vain, but I fear their demise is lost on generations who don't give a damn about anyone but themselves.  I feel we are living in the most selfish, self-centered times in any decade that I have lived through. 

Work today was uneventful. Waking up this morning in a fog that didn't go away for many hours, I could have easily slept another 2 or 3 hours.  This always happens on work days whereas on days I am not working? I can't even sleep  7 hours.  Ridiculous.   The washout didn't take long and the loading was fairly quick, out of there and back home before 1:00 pm. That's a decent day right there.

Get the thing unloaded tomorrow and I have the weekend off.  

I would have gone by the tractor dealership today, their power is still out.  They can't do anything until that is back up and so, I have to sit and wait until their power is on or, go to Longview and see about a Kubota tractor. 

Democrats: "Convicted felon" and all the rhetoric and endless bs that is going along with it.  I'm tired of politics but it greatly affects our lives and how we live it.  People may think it doesn't affect them, living in a bubble and denying the reality of what these people are doing to the quality of life in our nation isn't going to somehow make it better.  How many coal fired plants need to be shut down before we all start paying a price for that? Or getting rid of natural gas appliances? Forcing EV vehicles down our throats because of some concocted calamity that is going to end the world as we know it?

You know how many times they have been saying the world is going to end or some version of it with this climate change crap?  I don't deny we could do better in emissions, but let's get that capability to cover the power grid in there first before we just say no more natural gas anything, thanks.  Natural gas is pretty clean burning as it stands.  

Well, I'm done here. I might get back on later but I feel the need to take a nap. 

 Tuesday - late morning

There was no sleeping in for me, at least not anything you'd call excessive. 7:00 am and I was up, just couldn't sleep anymore.  

Went to the bank to deposit cash, another store, then Great Clips.  I waited there awhile, they apparently weren't bothering to show up for work today - it was 20 minutes past their opening time before I left and went to the place I used to go to. There is a lady there that has no more business doing hair than a convicted bank robber has being the CEO of a bank. 

She gave me stares and glares when I came in, lmao, but fortunately she was already busy with someone else.  That someone else was repeatedly asking her to do something on his hair and she of course couldn't get it right.  She flat doesn't care and doesn't take pride in her work.  She wants it over with so she can sit down and play on her phone.  

The lady that I ended up with spend nearly 40 minutes fixing my hair up.  She kept saying how "awesome" my hair is.  Most of them say that, it's inherited from my father, thick and nice.  But if I don't keep it trimmed, it just goes to Jungle Jim and a mop head look.  

After that?  Well, I went to one place for tires, $800 plus tax.  No thank you. I knew the price of tires was ridiculous but this was too much.  Another place I normally go to? "We have Chinese tires for $700, everything else is over a grand".  I said I might come back.  He then said he'd go $25 lower, then $50 and that's when I said ok.  I would have put on American made stuff but the price tag was ridiculous.  

95% of my driving is around town and this is a small town.  I don't envision buying tires for it again in at least 5 years.  I just dont put that many miles on my vehicles ever since getting out of trucking and working on my RV park and then back into trucking, but only having to drive to my RV park to get to the truck on any given day.  The point is that one of the tires was causing a severe vibration.  I have experience with such things: leave them go too long and the next then you know, the tread comes off and does 2 grand worth of damage to your vehicle.  

The deductible is $750, I think, so what's better? Spend the money on the tires now or spend the money on the tires later and have severe damage to your vehicle? I got to look at the brakes while they had them off.  Still some life left in them but the front rotors need replaced.  I don't really want to pay someone $500 for something I could do for around $125, I will probably end up doing that myself. 

During all of this, I was calling and emailing the tractor dealer.  After several hours and coming home - let's just say I had need of the bathroom badly - he finally emailed me then called me back.

You know all these severe thunderstorms and deluges of rain coming down? Yup, a giant pine tree had crashed down on the power lines near their business and had knocked out the power to it.  No tractor today, at least not at that business.  The temptation came to just go to John Deere, but I knocked that out quickly.  It's just not worth that much more money and huge monthly payments.  

I've been listening to rolling thunder - it does, it just rolls across the sky - well for weeks now.  I don't mean continual, but every time it's been raining lately its' been thunderstorms and you get that rolling thunder. It's pretty awesome actually, even if it also means a lot of water coming down from the sky.  

What now? Well, it's almost noon and I was disappointed I couldn't do the tractor thing today. Really disappointed, the driveway is hellish at the Park. Too wet to do anything about it right now anyway.  Just wanted to make a deal and get it over with.  I contacted the Kubota dealer 2 towns over, Kubota comes highly rated but I think they are also expensive.   I mean, do you pay more for better quality? I would love to, but can I afford the payments?  Are they going to be so high that profit just goes right out the window? And then, what's the point of having an RV park?

The farmers are leaving. I'm giving them the 2 days they stayed beyond their monthly payment for free just to get them the h*** out of there. Good riddance, take your laser gun/direct energy weapon conspiracy theories elsewhere, I'm done with it.  They will start the same s*** wherever they go and that's fine, I am washing my hands of it and lesson hopefully learned:  next time some fruitcake comes in talking strange talk like they were? Bid them a goodbye, go take that garbage somewhere else.  

I have 3 open spots atm including theirs.  One of them is for overnighters, but I really want to rent out the other 2 to long term.  I dunno, people just call out of the blue. Most all of them want something right now.  It's strange how they do that.  I rack my brains, think about what's coming in and any more almost always say yes, I have something available.  

So I don't know about the rest of today.  I am not working outside in this weather, the park can wait.  Beyond the driveway, there is nothing pressing over there anyway.  If I don't get a tractor soon, I'm just going to have to rent one again.  I'd just like this torrential rain to stop so my fixing the driveway actually stays good for a while.  

Trump. Lots of speculation  Some think Merchan will throw him into prison, others think there is a grave risk in doing that to a former president who is also the presumed nominee for the GOP.  I'm assuming Bragg will be asking for prison time, remember, he's the one that ran on the platform of "Orange man bad", I will get Trump.  I find the current times we are in to be utter insanity, not just with Trump but with DEI and what they're teaching in schools and all of this political nonsense you see going on every single day on the news.  It is insane.  How is the rest of the world looking at this ridiculousness?  Now they're saying the American flag is racist! Good God in Heaven.  Have mercy on us and help us to come back to our senses.  Please.  Amen.  It isn't just political opponents now, it's "the other side is our mortal enemy".  And the sheer hypocrisy.  I want to puke hearing some of these politicians doing a 180 on their previous positions in order to take up the current political mantra.  

They think us citizens are stupid.  Or that we forget.  No, we don't forget, not with this nonsense.  Communism is somehow good now?  What planet did they just fall off of? I see people arguing FOR Marxism all the time now.  They say: well his plan was never followed all the way through. Well who the hell cares? We saw what his partial plan did: killed tens of millions if not hundreds of millions of people through starvation and mass killings.  Then they try to say Jesus was a Communist!  

Where do you see Jesus killing people? Or starving them to death?  I think it was Stalin who exiled a large number of people to a deserted island that had no food or food source.  The people were left to rot and they turned to cannibalism.  Do you know of a SINGLE example in WORLD HISTORY where Communism actually worked? Where people weren't killed by the millions?  These people just deflect and go off on how bad capitalism is instead of answering the question. They can't legitimately answer the question..

Kubota called and we got into a long conversation about what I need.  They're going to write up a couple of quotes and send it to me.  Doesn't sound like a today thing, I sort of have given up on getting a tractor today, but I thought I'd best give Kubota a chance at least for they are right up there with John Deere. 

Instead of looking for things to do, I think I will just relax the rest of the day.  I don't get many days off, but looking through the tablet they have given me this coming weekend off, Saturday and Sunday and then have me scheduled through 2 Mondays from now, lol.

 Monday

Almost 13 hours on duty/driving.  I mean, I knew today was going to be very long and drawn out and I wasn't disappointed in that respect.  Up to Gurdon, thankfully the glue came out quickly today, the temperature was much warmer than the last load.

Then, off to Nacogdoches.  3-1/2 hours to there, no trucks ahead of me at the washout, they got that done in about 50 minutes, over to the plant, 40 minute wait before they could get to me. There was hardly any workers there, I didn't bother to ask why the plant was shut down, but whatever the reason was, the workers were not there.  I saw all of 2 people.  Normally see dozens at least. 

Out of there, over to the Love's for fuel and then back to the yard.  The foul weather hit about 10 miles outside of my town, on highway 43 south of Interstate 20.  The wind was blowing so hard, the trees were going over, well not quite sideways but tilting well over.  Loaded truck, it didn't push me around quite as bad as it would if it were empty.  Lots of water. I mean, these recent rains have been downpours.  Lots of flooding all over the place already from the previous rains, this is just going to make it worse.

Anyway, I hadn't done a full route in one day until today. I knew it was possible even tho the other driver said you can barely do it.  Nah, I had over an hour of drive/on-duty time left.  I mean, yes if you run into a problem at any of the 3 places you have to go, then you might end up staying in the truck overnight, otherwise it is definitely doable.  In other words, if I really wanted to, I could do a trip a day and literally double my paychecks.

No thank you.  Of course, they now know I can do it but I made the comment that "I can do it once in a while to help out when it's needed", not "I'll do this every week and so just dump me with this stuff".  But really, all it means is I don't have to do tomorrow what I got done today, meaning tomorrow is a day off.  It's not really a day off, it's just that I did the work already, they don't want me to deliver that load of blue until Wednesday.  I'm good with that. 

It's already 8:00 pm.  This is one of the biggest reasons I wouldn't want to do this every day.  Get up for work at 5:30 am and get home at just before 8.  

Well, let's back up here. I completely forgot about all the junk this morning.  I got to the park, pulled up to the mailbox as is my want before going into the park on any given morning, reached out to open the lid to the mailbox and lo and behold? Someone had run into it, bending it over and at about a 35 degree angle.  Of course, whoever did it didn't call me - the phone number is right there on a billboard at the entrance to the park, left no note, just: screw you.  At least an apology?  It was $125 for that setup, I'm guessing it's much more now with inflation crap.

Into the park, I pulled my SUV up to my parking space and got out. I heard a noisy generator, looked over and saw it was the new people. Why on earth are they running a generator? There is power right there! My mind wasn't working quite right this morning if you can't tell.  The power had gone out last night at 8:30 pm, no one called or texted me about it as they usually do so I knew nothing about it. 

Into the shed, there was a card from the septic system company. They come every month to inspect the system.  Fire ants - completely forgot about that and then a note that the entire system wasn't even working and another note: "I fixed a short in the system and got it working again".  I wondered how long it had been down and also why the alarms didn't go off? Well, probably because the short must have cut out power to everything, including the alarms. The final message?  "the tanks are full of grease and need to be pumped out".  

WTH.  Lovely. I think they charge $450 to pump the tanks out, it isn't cheap and that is more than just a bit annoying to find out people are just dumping grease down their drains.  What a bunch of idiots, whoever is doing it. They are not only screwing up my system, but they are going to have some problems in their pipes and their holding tanks if they keep up that nonsense.  There is no way to know who is doing it.  The only good thing, I guess, is it was 9 months ago it needed pumped out last.  

3 things hitting me within 10 minutes time.  I just wanted to get out of there, which I was doing anyway, getting the truck started, getting the pre trip inspection done and leaving.  Turning out onto the street, it's a steep hill.  A loaded truck, it's going to take some time to get the thing moving.  No biggies, but a man came out quickly at the top of the hill, waved some sort of stick or something at me, hit the ground with it and apparently wanted me to stop and talk to him.  He had a nasty look on his face.  

I'm like, why do I want to get into some kind of altercation with some dude I have never seen before and want nothing to do with?  Not after all of that junk hitting me.  Oh, and coming back into the yard today, I closed the lids to the dumpster this morning. So what did some wonderful person do? Filled the entire damned thing up with trash and left the lids open.  Who is doing this? I am ordering a hunting camera tonight.  I am tired of this s***.  I've tried the hunting camera thing before but the cameras, 2 of them, were old and didn't work.  I'll get a brand new one and I'm going to find out who is doing this stuff and if it's someone from the park, I am going to get right into their face.  If it's someone that doesn't live there, I dunno.  No way to identify someone I don't know.  Unless there's some way to get license plate numbers and report it to the Sheriff.  I have a sign out there that says the dumpster is for RV park guests only, all others will be prosecuted.  

So, I passed by the dude and just looked back at him.  Whatever he wants, I'll deal with it at some later date.  If his issue is the truck, I don't care.  There are a large number of trucks going up and down that street what with the logging operation going on and a small trucking company further down the street.  It's the county, the county doesn't care what anyone does either.  So, who knows.

Back to the tractor subject.  I am going to go to the town tomorrow if I get my @$$ out of bed early enough to see what they are offering and the package price and what I qualify for.  If it doesn't include a tractor with a bucket, a back hoe and a box blade, I don't want it.  I need all of those things and frankly a bush hog attachment would be good as well.  I am very good at getting up and walking out of dealerships, I've done it dozens and dozens of times when searching for my next vehicle.  I don't do it rudely - unless they start talking trash to me which some of them have done - I just say I'll go home and think about it, but unless you can come up with what I want at the price I want, I'm 90% no on this deal.  

I was going to take a pass on a backhoe and just do without it, but what is the point? It is a necessary tool that I greatly need and I don't want to have to go rent a mini-ex every time I need the use of a excavation unit.  I'm ready to get this machinery and get moving on at least getting the dirt work done on creating new pads.  It would take quite some time on a smaller tractor to get that done, but no rush.  Work on it here and there, I don't have the money to do any of it yet anyway.  

So that's where I am at with that.  I need it, I want it, I want to do a deal, but the deal has to be right.  I've noticed that all of the tractor dealers are taking desperation moves to get units sold and off their properties.  Zero percent financing on numerous units, longer term financing, zero down.  

What else? No clue, I'm listening to the endless sound of rain hitting my window AC unit.  The town is beginning to flood, pics being sent out of parking lots you could float a canoe on.  

And I think that's it.  It's after 9 and I want to get into bed and vegetate. 

 Sunday - evening

People come into the amenities shed sometimes at night, look at the camera and then turn off the light. As if the camera isn't going to show everything they are doing,   It can see in the dark and will show everything that is going on in the dark, lights, no lights, no matter.  So it was a while ago a tenant doing that.  He turned off the light, went into the bathroom, then grabbed something off of the table which as of yet I have to ascertain what (it isn't my stuff so I am not in a hurry to figure it out), went back into the bathroom and has been in there even since.  

Someone has been stealing toilet paper and I am not particularly interested in replacing all of that - yet again - excepting I have decided to put a 24 pack in the back of my SUV and I will refill it when I see the 2 rolls I am leaving in there from now on is gone.  I will probably end up buying a locked toilet paper dispenser as well.  I just never envisioned such a thing happening at a small park.  

I am eternally glad the tent people are gone. They paid some, the last payment was $50.  But, the constant irritants weren't worth it, especially hanging out in the laundry room for hours and hours.  

Anyway, I got onto the workamper's case, he hasn't done anything in a week?  You agreed to trim this and that and mow that and that over there.  He has a lot of excuses. He isn't all there.  His wife is intelligent and understands, he, however, is - well I'm not trying to diss or malign him at all, really, but - he's low IQ and his elevator doesn't quite reach the top floor. I got that the first time I discussed everything with him, but as this thing progresses, it doesn't get better.  

Now I've got people claiming he destroyed their sewer hoses.  Those things aren't cheap. I told him today to just stay away from the trailers, there is plenty of other things I can have him do - but - if he isn't going to do anything, they can put the monthly rate ... or they can leave.  

If you haven't been able to figure this out yet? I have no problem getting rid of people.  I give them several chances before I get to that point. I don't just go up to people and tell them they screwed up, goodbye, take your self and your @$$ out of here, bye bye. I'm not like that. 

But when I say the same thing over and over and over to the same person over an extended period of time, my patience runs out. I'm not there with these people yet.  I did tell him to get out there and cut the damned brush down hanging over the driveway.  It's maybe a 15 minutes job.  It was the 4th and was going to be the last time I asked him. I wasn't going to ask him again.  The next words were going to be: This isn't working out. You can either pay the regular rate or you can leave, I'm not going to deal with this anymore.

He started out good, I can say that.  He continues to blame rain for doing nothing.  Yeah, no. Been plenty of days that there hasn't been any rain. Foregone conclusion that if I get that tractor? He isn't going to be on it at all.  I can't trust him with 35k worth of machinery and I have had enough experience to understand that there are enough people out there that don't care that you should just say no.  I will do that myself, thanks, I was doing this long before you arrived, I will keep doing it long after you leave, Lord willing. 

I'm a little bit tired, that may be coming through my words here tonight. I didn't sleep worth a dead dog's awakening last night.  I woke up around 12:30 and it was after 3:30 before I finally got back to sleep.  

____________

Power went out while writing this. Not for long, but you know how it is. The internet has to restart, restart the computer, go through all of that nonsense. Thunder, lightning rain, then power outage.  

There is so much noise right now in my bedroom. It is POURING rain out there and there is a lot of water coming off the roof, falling onto my bedroom window AC unit plus the rain falling on it, crazy.  Note that there was not rain forecasted for tonight. Lol. 

Anyway, tomorrow is, as I see it, the dreaded day. Well maybe not that bad, I'm just not looking forward to getting up at 5:30 am and then getting home ... well there is no way I am getting home before 6 pm, probably more like after 7.  I agreed to it to help them out, that's all there is to it. I didn't say I liked it.

I will be going to the town 25 miles south of here to look at the tractor and what kind of financing package they can give me if nothing else happens. I see a tractor with a backhoe the key to expanding my park.  I may be wrong, that's fine. Won't be the first time, but at this point, it is imperative I get a machine in there to deal with the constant, deteriorating condition of the driveway. It needs regular maintenance. 

G'nite. 

 Saturday = afternoon

Took one hour and forty five minutes to unload, which is quite a long time.  First time unloading this trailer.  The thermometer on it is obviously broken, the glas shield is missing and it said the product was almost 90 degrees, lol.  In reality, it was so cold, there was condensation to the point it was dripping onto the ground on the outlet tube underneat the trailer.  It's where you hook up a line to unload it.

Like, about as cold as an ice cold cup of water.  So, I figured that was why it took so long, the other loads I've gotten recently have not been that cold.  They put the glue through a cooling process and sometimes they leave it in the cooling phase too long.  The glue thickens and it just doesn't flow as well.  

Getting back to the park, the family had moved the trailer to behind the laundry room/shed (I had given them permission to) and were getting the rest of their stuff off of the pad.  The original people who wanted to move in changed their minds when I told them they couldn't have 3 vehicles and a big trailer parked in front of it, you'd have to have 2 of those sitting over behind the shed.  No worries, another couple called and said they wanted it a day later.  They are coming in today.  So I just have one lot I want to rent right now after they are in, the other one I am keeping for ovenighters.  

++++++++++++++++++

We had fun at the grand opening, however, we did not get to go around to the different events.  We were all hungry - I hadn't eaten all day on purpose  - so we went inside the brewery and ordered food.  Yes, and a beer.  We sat there chatting for quite a while.  I started looking at weather for tomorrow - working again of course - when i saw that there was a storm moving in.  Not tomorrow, like right now.  We sat there and said, yup, it's going to rain. We left, by the time we got into the pickup, it started raining.

It rained for a couple of hours after we left there, those poor people having to tear down their canopies and putting all their stuff away in that kind of weather....

It dawned on me today when I got back to the park that the tent people left.  This because I take the truck clear to the back of the driveway to make a turnaround and I can see the tent spot from there.  Tent gone, they're gone.  I can't say that I will miss them and I can't say I will do this again.  Abused twice in a row, I only intended tent camping to be for people coming to camp overnight, not spend weeks/months there.  

Those people were a PITA and I think they were the ones stealing toilet paper. I'll soon know, it's all gone again besides a couple of rolls. We're talking a 24 pack that normally lasts at least 6 weeks? A couple of rolls left in there after a few weeks.  Yes, I have cameras in the laundry room, obviously not in the bathroom itself and people are always taking large bags in there to take showers with. No way to identify who is doing it. It will likely come down to me carrying toilet paper in the rear of my SUV and restocking it at my leisure.  In case you didn't know, the price of toilet paper, like everything else, has gone well up.  I'm not in business to give away everything for free.  

So, Democrats want to pass a bill that strips Donald Trump of Secret Service protection if he ends up in prison.  It doesn't take a brain surgeon or a giant leap to come to the immediate conclusion that democrats want Donald Trump assassinated in a federal prison.  There are a lot of people that hate him and I'm sure that includes some prisoners.  We all know what happens to certain people that go to jail and end up - dead - murdered by another inmate or inmates.  That's what I have concluded and I don't give 2 shits what anyone else thinks about it. If you want a man that was a President of the US to end up in prison without extensive security protection of the SS, you want him dead.  

If you really want to see this nation go berserk, send him to prison.  Add to that, send him to prison without the SS watching his back.  Top that with him being killed. You are concocting a recipe for an uprising, a civil war, whatever might happen, it will certainly send this nation into upheaval the likes we haven't seen since the Civil War.  I think the left should rethink this situation, because there is quite a bit of speculation that Merchan is going to sentence him to prison. It is only speculation, of course, but the man has shown his bias against Trump in a variety of ways that I could outline, but am not going to bother with here. 

I firmly believe that at some point in some higher court, could have to go to SCOTUS, that this entire kangaroo court fiasco is going to be overturned. But there can be a lot happen between now and then.  

Anyway, it's almost bedtime and yes, Sunday is coming and unfortunately, I have to work again.  3 Sundays in a row I will have missed church.  

And not looking forward to Monday where I will have to offload in Gurdon, then drive to Nacogdoches, washout trailer and then over to Lufkin to load. I normally only either load or unload on any given day, not have to do both. 

 The bs with a particular other driver continues. Not only did he dump me with a trailer with a huge air leak, I found out this morning that he hadn't even completely emptied the trailer.  There was an inch of resin on the bottom.  You don't leave the offload until it is all emptied and then you pump water into the tanker to clean out as much as possible and clear the drain line and manifold so that the glue doesn't set up in there and seal it shut.  

I told the manager about it.  It cost me an extra half hour to sit there and wait on them trying to clean all that crap out of there.  I more harped on the idea of pulling a trailer with a serious issue and not doing anything about it.  I won't likely hear anything back about what, if anything, the manager will do about it.  They have trouble keeping drivers and this dude has allegedly been working for the company near 2 decades.

Senioritis.  That's what I call people that have been in a company so long, they start to get the idea that they can do whatever the hell they please and no one will do anything about it.  And don't you dare tell him to his face about his bs, at least in his mind.  That doesn't stop me, of course, I don't care what he thinks about me and I am certainly not afraid of his skinny old @$$.  I'll give him credit for having a really cool doggy tho.  There, that's one nice thing I can say about him.  

I get a call while waiting endlessly to get loaded today.  The plant had only one loader and I sat there fully 2 hours, in fact, 2 hours right on the nose, before he could get to me to load me.  Umm, they are closing the plant for a few days next week, could you possibly offload on Monday and then drive down, wash out the trailer and load again in the same day?  

They are closing the plant that makes the glue, I should clarify, not the plant that uses it in Gurdon.  I quickly decided it would be in my best interests to make a sacrifice, for they have been giving me mostly early runs and I"d like it to stay that way.  I'll have Tuesday off.  It's a Tuesday load going Wednesday is the point.  So, I get a day off in the near future.  I'd love to get some stuff done over there, but what I'd really love to do is go get a tractor.  

Anyway, I'm 2-1/2 hours short of 3 full days of fasting and that is the goal I made for myself.  I am going off the fast pretty soon here.  I was going to start Keto again, but we are going to a grand opening celebration tomorrow in downtown, so I think I'll just eat something to get my energy back today, probably a couple of things, eat whatever tomorrow and then start keto.

I have been planning on going to this grand opening for a while, btw, hence the idea that I am just going to let it go until probably Sunday.  

Or not.  I could just say well, that's all nice and fine, I'll figure out stuff to eat there that isn't full of carbs and garbage. It is not likely they will have much that would fit that description. It is a brewery taking over the entire downtown with a bunch of activities and food trucks coming in.  Food trucks are not typically keto friendly, lmao.  

The farmers had someone over there presumably fixing the leak.  I had no idea they had a leak going and as soon as I saw it, yuck.  Grey water maybe, but the ground is black and nasty looking.  The idea that he wanted to "dig a trench to the storm drain" to let it run where, exactly?  Over to the lot on the other side of the driveway so that  lot could get nasty too? Not to mention mosquitoes and bugs of all types and likely a health hazard.  

I don't really care about the diet, going back to that, for today and tomorrow. I was more interested in a toxin cleanse and I am pretty sure that occurred to some degree, for I have had a metallic taste in my mouth that isn't pleasant.  I can fast again next week for one day to kick start keto.  I guess I should go test for ketosis, if I"m in it, I may change my mind about eating whatever today and tomorrow.  

That's it for now.  

 Friday - early

That alarm went off early and I woke up feeling like hell on feet.  Headache and a feeling of general nastiness.  Fasting - you don't do it for a long time and the side effects can be pretty gruesome one the first several days. Body ridding itself of toxins - which is one of the reasons I wanted to do this fast - but also start my diet up again.  And praying . 

But of the greatest interest to me regarding fasting is the idea that it can help prevent the onset of dementia/Alzheimer's.  I've read quite a bit of material about it, the only problem is there have been no clinical studies on humans, only on rodents.  Why, I have no idea, it would seem prudent that they would do testing on humans to see if there is any benefit.  

For a little info, AI comes up with this: "Intermittent fasting has been shown to improve dementia pathologies in rodents, such as neuroinflammation, synaptic dysfunction, and brain insulin resistance. It may also promote longevity, improve cognition, and increase the generation of new brain cells. In addition, animal studies have shown that intermittent fasting can remove beta-amyloid protein from the brain, which is a hallmark of Alzheimer's disease."

 I have been toying with AI because it is here and it is here to stay. Like it or not, you might as well get used to the idea of having it around and if it's going to be around, you might as well learn how to use it. Sort of like smart phones, they came out and I wanted nothing to do with them for many years after they were on the market and had already gained worldwide popularity.  My resistance was futile, as the Borg like to say it, smart phones are an invaluable tool.  I do believe that there are down sides to smart phones, one of which is not having to stuff things into memory so much and therefore, not using your brain as much to navigate through any given day.  

Anyway, I have discussed the fact that there is Alzheimer's in my dad's family lines including my dad himself, who succumbed to symptoms that arose out of having Alzheimer's.  His dad as well.  There's 3 of us brothers, I hate to even think it, but it seems likely that one of us will end up with it.  I hope not, that's for sure, but I have given thought to what, if anything, I could do to prevent or slow it's arrival at my doorstep if I do, indeed, acquire this dreadful disease.  

If you have ever watched anyone going through it, it is one of the most vile and evil (imo) diseases a person can get.  It takes the you away from you.  When you can look at your own offspring and not even remember who they are, that is evil. Not that the person is evil, but the disease itself it from the pit of hell as far as I'm concerned.  They FDA approved a new drug last year that slows the onset of Alzheimer's.  I guess what I really want to do is have on of those tests to determine your mental acuity, cognitive ability, etc.  Whatever they do, they can determine if you have dementia or are going to get it.  

Yes, I think about such things considering my age, tho I started thinking about it long ago, watching my father go through it.  If fasting can help - there isn't any real proof yet that it can - but if it can help, I'm going to do it.  A side effect is weight loss and toxin removal. In fact, there are many benefits to fasting that I am not going to go into because it's very early and I am about to leave for work.  

Nacogoches and then Lufkin this morning.  

Speaking of that, yesterday.....

That dude was there before I arrived at Gurdon.  I got rather irritated rather quickly.  This guy doing this 2 days in a row?  I decided I would contact management to find out what's going on because I had already confronted him yesterday about showing up before me.  He is basically doing one full run a day, or something akin to that depending on how everything goes everywhere he needs to go.  That's all well and fine, if he wants to spend his life in a truck, have at it.  However, I am a "senior" driver as the manager likes to put it, I've only been there since September but since I was hired before this dude, I have seniority over him. 

I do like the seniority system. It only works, however, if it is enforced.  Turns out he had been there for quite a while, after the manager called me back, the driver got in his truck and left. I'm glad I didn't confront him again, there is no sense in lighting up a firecracker to stick into someone's mouth if you don't really need to.  The manager said this is actually the dispatcher's fault, he went off on her.  This is really poor dispatching, he continued after an introduction to what this driver is doing.  I'm sure they must love him doing all of that work, perhaps they should give him a better truck.

They don't have better trucks and apparently aren't getting better trucks. This is how you lose contracts.  

I did ask the manager if he never does late loading as the driver claimed.  When the driver said that to me yesterday, that just irritated me even more. "I don't care, this is my loading time, which means this is also my washout time".  I let him know in no uncertain terms that I am not intimated by his speech and I am not going to tolerate him jumping ahead of me.  If you don't put your foot down with people like that, they will not stop. They will think they got away with it and they will get away with it for eternity.  

Well whatever.  I'm not trying to be totally negative here, it's just that situation came back into my mind.  I'm actually trying to be positive that this is going to be a great day, everything is going to go smoothly and if it doesn't, that's just part of the deal with the trucking industry.  I have a different trailer and I don't think I've had this one before.  It looks like everything is good on it at least.

With that, I must depart hence for hither yonder lands.

G'day.  

 Thursday - evening

No lack of excitement around here. Tornadoes, ultra-heavy rain, flooded streets, constant lightning, park is half flooded.  When I got back from this ridiculous run, I ended up putting on my boots, getting out in the driving rain - and that is no exaggeration - and unplugging several pipes that were underwater and hardly any water going through them.  I was quite wet even with an umbrella by the time I got through.  I gave up quickly even trying to stay dry, useless waste of time.

So, let's back up.  First, Trump has been convicted on all 34 counts and I'm sure leftists/communists everywhere are all gleeful.  I'm also at least fairly sure that there are a large number of things that will be put on appeal.  Mostly, the way that judge behaved himself and the "instructions" he gave to jurors.  But make not mistake, that jury was probably filled up with Trump haters.

Anyway...After getting unloaded in Gurdon, I headed to Crossett.  The problem? You have to go through El Dorado to get there, the other route was an hour plus longer.  Crazy.  I get to the washout over there, drop my trailer so they can wash it out and then someone will haul it back to the yard to do the repairs and the inspection.

I was instructed to look up into the manifold (the valve assembly where the glue comes out the bottom of the trailer) to make sure they had cleaned it properly.  Now I know why that trailer unloads so slowly:  The valve does not go all the way down.  In fact, it only goes down about half way, greatly restricting the flow.  So I called the manager and he decided he wanted that trailer back at the yard to fix it.  Great.  Take that other trailer,  it hasn't been washed out, you'll have to have that done tomorrow at the normal place. 

Ok.  So, I hook up the air lines, electrical, etc., open the service valve to let air into the tanks in the trailer.  I hear the air passing through the valve, all normal well and fine. However.  It never stopped going through it.  I just sighed.  I knew what that meant: there is a massive air leak somewhere on the trailer.  Mind you, that trailer had just been brought in there by the "king of truck drivers", an old, whiny, cranky bastard, sorry but that's what he is.  This dude said nothing to no one about this huge air leak. 

I had to crawl underneath the trailer to find out what it was.  A brake chamber, they call it.  It's the can where pressurized air goes in, pushes against a rubber diaphragm which pushes a lever, turns other levers, pushed and S-cam, which pushed the brakes against the brake drum.  HUGE air leak.  I mean, even if you couldn't hear the air going through the valve in your truck - which anyone surely could - you would definitely hear that racket outside of it. 

This is one of the biggest gripes I have against this company: jerkoff drivers that don't give a damn.  Tires, brakes, lights, this thing, out of inspection, all kinds of stuff I have endlessly encountered.  I made sure everyone knew that that dude that claims he's the king of all truck drivers or some self-made trucking god did nothing about this situation and just dumped the trailer in the yard over there.  

So, I had to drive the damned thing back to the yard in El Dorado where, at least, the mechanics got right on it. That because the manager was all over it.  You can't have that many trailers down, you have to keep some of them going at least.  It took him maybe an hour, not terrible, but I had already been out on the road many more hours than normal.  Like, around 6:45.

Then, faced with trying to get the drain pipes to - drain.  Oh, btw, the power is out at the park. The entire street is dark.  There are fully 5 power company crews out there working on restoring power, at least they're trying.  I don't envy their jobs in inclement/foul weather.  They are required to work out in it unless there is something dangerous going on, such as tornadoes.  But, I can tell the power is still out cause' I turned the light switch to the on position in the laundry room. Apparently, my battery-powered cameras are using the sim cards to send out the signal.  Cause I can see both the outside and inside cameras, they are both working. 

The park is literally flooded. I mean, once it gets to the west side of the setup, it all drains away, but those east side lots are full of water and there's nothing I can do about it.   It's just ultra-heavy rain and it doesn't happen that often, it is what it is.  I will add here, my property is on a hill.  I'm nearer the bottom of the hill and a vast amount of water comes down the hillside, even if thick woods, which is why the park gets flooded out in these heavy rains.   

I'm not watching the news.  I don't want to hear the gloating.  Leftists got what they wanted: Trump is a convicted felon, they are already saying.  How can you vote for him? Easy, look at the alternative. Trump is not going to destroy our constitutional rights, if he were capable of doing that, why didn't it happen his first four years? I will guess that this situation will only solidify Trump's base and probably sway undecideds his way.  I can tell ya, I'd vote for Trump even if he were sitting in a jail cell. Another 4 years of Biden WILL destroy this country, it will be unrecognizable.  

I made it all the way up until now not eating. That's 48 hours.  I'm not sure I can make it until tomorrow, I'm awfully hungry, it was a long day and I really want to eat something.  It doesn't help the folks are making these awesome looking sandwiches...amazing what kinds of food look the same as a steak dinner when you are extremely hungry.  

That's it for now.  I have another couple wanting to move in, they came and looked, said great and that was that.  I told them I don't have a lot available until next week, they were fine with that. 

Anyway, time to wind things down. Almost 8 pm and bedtime isn't far behind it. 

 Thursday - early

Going to bed last night, the hunger pains completely disappeared and I have no hunger this morning.  I feel like I should continue on with this fast, so I am going to try.  3 days would be the ultimate goal, having made it this far wouldn't upset me as to the idea of being a quitter or something like that.  

It doesn't take near as much time to get ready to leave for work in the morning without having to deal with making a thermos of coffee and lunch, so I have extra minutes sitting here lol.  

Well, that's it.  I just sitting here looking at all the news about Trump and one juror who analysts sitting in the court room are saying may be a Trump supporter.  They also concede that most of them are Trump haters. Well of course, look at where this trial is taking place and why the attorneys wanted it to be moved elsewhere where there might be a better possibility of finding a jury of his peers that won't think: "Orange man bad".  

Anyway, gotta go! 

G'day

 Wednesday - evening

I started a blog entry yesterday but didn't get far with it. Too much going on here.  Today I am relishing in the peace and quiet of no kids.  I got home at 1:00 pm, which is super early and I very much like it.  I was going to stop at the tractor dealer in Carthage, I just wasn't feeling it. Wet feet (it's been raining here again) and just wanted to go home, lay down on my bed and enjoy the time without kids around.  I love those kids, don't get me wrong, but it is nice to have a break from them.  They aren't allegedly coming back until the 14th of next month, we'll see how that works out.

The youngest will likely start clamoring to see his mom after a week or so.  It will grow in intensity until they either relent and bring him home or, somehow, they talk/bribe him into sticking it out.  No idea.  Probably try the bribery thing.  I "bribed" them at 6 Flags by telling them I'd buy them each a souviner at the end of the day if they behaved all day long.  It was quite amazing that both of them actually kept their cool, so to speak, for it definitely wasn't cool outside.  

Anyway, at the Lufkin plant this morning, well they always look at expiration dates on various inspections required for tankers. One of them is expiring after the 31st.  Well, that forces it, I'll have to drop that trailer off at the washout in Crossett tomorrow and pick up another one.  Going to Crossett is far worse than going to El Dorado.  It will add a minimum of 3 hours to the day tomorrow.  So, not looking forward to tomorrow and not looking forward to that trailer they have for me: it's a slow draining thing for whatever reason and takes much longer than the other trailers to empty out.

I don't have a whole lot right now. Lots on my mind.  That workamper was supposed to trim back some brush along the driveway, I've asked him twice and he says yes he'll do it, but hasn't.  I'll ask him one more time and if he still doesn't do it, I'll consider his services to be minimal and will reduce their rent but not eliminate it altogether. He was also going to install the new parts on the riding mower, going on 2 weeks now. He keeps saying he'll do it, he doesn't do it.  Apparently all he wants to do is mow and trim grass. All well and fine, but not worth a month's worth of rent including free electricity. Not to me anyway.

Oh, the Trump trial, one of them anyway. It's been handed to the jurors with "very complex instructions" given by what many accounts is a completely biased judge, Juan Merchan.  It will be interesting to see if there is anything that comes of this concerning the judge's behavior in this trial.  It will also be quite interesting to see if the jury can come to a unanimous agreement.  I would suspect there are Trump haters lurking in that pool of jurors. No way to prove that either way, of course, but I can tell you from ample experience that people that hate Trump are more than willing to lie or do most anything to make life miserable for him.  The experience is just watching this nonsense going on the last what, 8 years now?  The ends justifies the means in their thinking.  4-1/2 hours so far of deliberating, I have to wonder what are they talking about?  I can't imagine this jury going on for more than another day or 2 to come to either a decision or a hung jury. I'm guessing the latter.  

The jury wanted the instructions read to them again, I'm guessing they're trying to make sense of the instructions and how to apply it. If this ends up in a decision against Trump, it appears that an appeals court would highly likely overturn it for a myriad of legal reasons that I am not an expert at, but have been listening to these people for a while now.

Was looking at the specs of a tractor at TYM they want me to buy. 25 hp, 3,500 pounds give or take.  I was looking at the specs of another brand it was much lighter.  I don't want a light tractor, you have to have some substance to bear down on the box blade that will fix the driveway or dig into a hill full of dirt or handle digging out trenches.  

I have started my diet again.  After getting rather fat and uncomfortable, I decided to kick start it today with a complete fast, no nothing excepting a few sips of black coffee this morning (no sugar or creamer) and water the rest of the day.  I only drank a little coffee to avoid headaches from caffeine withdrawal.  I really do not like the Keto diet, it is very restrictive and you have to watch every single thing you eat including gravies, sauces and condiments - but it does give results.  I dunno, I just can't keep getting fatter, I'm about to have to switch from 35 waist pants to 36, that was sort of the line drawn in the sand: I can't be going there.  

I haven't been on the diet in quite some time.  Just tried to limit my eating.  It isn't working, obviously, as the fat just seems to pour on week by week.  So, I'll have to get into the discipline again of watching carbs on everything. No more pasta and potatoes, those are my weaknesses and the reason I stopped doing Keto altogether for quite a while now.  I can live without pasta, but I like my potatoes. All kinds of potatoes.  I thought a good water fast would also help clear out my head and body of toxins.  It won't help my need for potatoes, oh well.  It's only a 24 hour fast and almost over, I might go 2 if I can handle, 3 if I'm really brave lol.  You go 3 days fasting you really experience a place where you start to feel better physically and even psychologically.  For me, anyway.

I suspect having to drive all day long tomorrow will cause me to want to find something to eat, however.  No biggies, it's the diet I am trying to get started again and I have always found this is the best way to do it.  24 hours is almost up but I won't be eating until tomorrow.  

Fasting and praying is also a thing the Bible directs us to do. 

__________

Several hours later.  Fasting is always the hardest the first day and boy is it hitting me.  It's 8:30 pm so I am just going to go to bed at 9 and forget about eating.  

And anyway, I have a very long day tomorrow, if I wake up early I might just get an early start on the day. I don't think they care what time you show up there at the lumber plant as long as there is room for the glue in one of their tanks.  

And that's that.  I'm outta here.

G'day

 Monday - night

Late for me.  People called and said the dryer isn't working.  Ok, well try checking the circuit breaker.  I get a call back: I tried to open the box but a wasp came out and stung me on the chest.  

I got a flashlight, a can of wasp spray and headed over there only to find....they had opened up and sprayed the wasp nest anyway, after I told them I didn't want them spraying anything inside the breaker box.  It's great having people that give no cares about your stuff.  You can imagine what could possibly happen sprayer something on breakers that can conduct electricity...

I'm going to put a lock on that box now that that happened. I would have to guess a wasp short circuited the breaker for the dryer and that's what kicked it off.  

But, it reminded of that project I keep putting off and now that it's heating up? I can't put it off anymore.  I need to get 2 days off and get that situation squared away.  Probably next week.  I want to get over to the tractor place and see if we can work a deal first. If we can, I might as well use that to dig the trench versus renting a machine for over $400.  Put it to good use right off the bat. 

Anyway, it was around 5 pm and I was informed the grandma is "on her way".  I don't get a lot of info on what's happening around here, I found out most things when it happens.  I bid my goodbyes to the kids, I will be up and gone before they even get out of bed tomorrow.  Grandma tested negative for Covid so she came right down to get them.  

Anyway, the drive today was mostly uneventful.  No tires popped, the vibration is still there, I'm told I can "just stop by, we can get that done quickly".  Yeah, sure you can, while I waste 3 hours just doing it after I offload at Gurdon tomorrow.  I have little choice in the matter.  Anyway, in between Nacogdoches and Lufkin this morning both going to the plant and coming back, there were at least half a dozen state troopers out there.  

No, they don't normally do that. They were up and down that highway all over the place, pulling people over and I would assume handing out tickets.  They're good at that, the handing out tickets part.  I had one come racing up on me, but he kept going and got behind a tin can car.  Sat there beside the car for a while before he just turned off and let them keep going. Not sure what grabbed his attention.  I assume they were on Memorial Day detail looking for drunk/impaired drivers. 

Well it's getting late and I have a long day tomorrow what with having to go to the yard.  I am hoping they have a pressure washer there, I'd like to at least clean the wheels, tanks, grill and bumper.  Looking pretty dirty.  Just spray the stuff off of there, nothing fancy or taking too long to do.  That or get permission to take the thing to a truck wash.  That has neve even been discussed much less offered. I don't find things out in the company until I need something or don't do something I'm "supposed" to be doing.  And then I get this situation where I end up telling people, I had no idea, no one has ever said this, please discontinue with the lecturing.  

If they had told me all of these things when I spent 2-1/2 weeks in "orientation" in Oregon.....You know, the whole reason going up there to find out how they do things and want things done? 

Yup, the end. I'm tired, time to phase out.  

 Sunday - afternoon

Yesterday morning, we headed over to 6 Flags. The parking fee was excessive and shocking. I mean, I was shocked: $45 to park a vehicle in a parking lot for one day.  I was on the far left pay booth lane and was looking at all the traffic heading into another parking area much further away...then the entrance to one right there It was the only entrance, immediately to the left, to that parking area that was opened, but people were going in there. Yup, I got in there and saved a lot of walking.

It was hot yesterday, there was no denying that.  We were all sweating all day long.  That didn't stop us from having fun, we had lots of fun on lots and lots of rides.  We didn't just do kiddie rides either, the boys did many "adult" rides that I thought they would be terrified of. Well, they admitted some fear but they worked through it and were glad they did.  The only ride of any visible fear was the Pirate boat one.  It's a boat that glides through an underground cavern with a pirate theme and also a them of "Spleelunkers" that don't like pirates.  Besides being a fun ride, it was very cool in there and I wanted to go again, lol.  

Actually, we tried to go on that ride in the morning, it closed down after waiting for around 40 minutes. We were close to getting on the boat, but, one of the boats was sinking, yes we could see it was submerged in water.  In fact, fully 7 rides we were going to go on had closed down either when we got to them or while we were waiting in line.  Others were closed for "refurbishing".  

The plus side was the fun, the downside is the excessive prices you will pay regardless of what amusement park you go to.  Disney, MG, Six Flags, mom and pops, they ream you. It's why we don't' go very often. Actually, we don't go on vacation often at all.  It's just too pricey, spending $18 on a glorified hot dogs with fries? $18 for a double cheeseburger?  

We were there from the time it opened until the time it closed. If we gonna pay that much, we gonna take advantage of it. The problem for me was when it was time to drive home. I thought I was good to go, the kids were still with me. But 30 miles down the road I said no.  The kids wanted to go to a hotel again anyway, so in Terrell, TX, I got off the Interstate and started going to various hotels. They were all completely filled up. There were only 2 places left after I went to the better hotels:  Motel 6 or Super 8.  I used to like Motel 6, they were obviously lower end but they took care of the places. 

At some point in time, they let the chain degrade into dive hotels and I refuse to go there unless there is no other option. Super 8 had many rooms available, I got one with 2 queen beds. I don't want to sleep with kids, thanks.  They move around all night long, they take up space, I want my own bed.  But, they were as exhausted as I was and they fell asleep at 11 pm and did not wake up until 9am. I didn't even try to get them up, I just decided it would be better to let them get a full 10 hours of sleep, there was no agenda for today, I blew getting home in time for church off.  

Oh, and Marriott, well I wrote about that in the previous entry but my, I just love those places. This one didn't disappoint. An indoor pool.  See, I was looking at satellite pics of that place and didn't see a pool, I thought a "mandatory" inclusion on those properties was a pool. I had never been to one with an indoor pool and thought didn't cross my mind.  We had as much fun playing in the pool as we did at 6 flags.  

The drive home today was uneventful. There was an IHOP in the area we stayed, so we went there for breakfast and drove straight through.  I was figuring on stopping on the way back for the kids to go pee, but I made them go to the bathroom before we left IHOP and they didn't say anything about a bathroom break all the way back, which was nice, we got it over with. It's really not that far to Dallas, it's the constant traffic on I-20 that I despise.  It's one of those highway corridors where they need to have 3 lanes on each side. There are many Interstates in the US where an upgrade to 3 lanes is really quite needed.  They spent all those trillions of dollars in the last 5  years on what, exactly?  

I did realize, however, that I need new tires.  One of them is vibrating but they are all in need of replacement.  I won't do that until next paycheck. I only need drive around town right now, 10-15 miles max on any given trip.  It also needs an oil change and the rear brake rotors are pulsing the brake pedal when I hit the brakes, so those and new brake pads.  Talking $800 worth of maintenance.  Oh well.

Maybe I will take a paycheck from the business after all to pay for that stuff.  I especially dislike driving around with a tire you know is going to fail sooner or later. If it fails in the way of the tread coming off, that can do extensive damage to your vehicle. It's cheaper to just replace the tires than to have to have body work done AND replace your tires.  

Home.  I can tell you I have nothing else planned for today.  I don't want to go anywhere, I don't want to do anything but kick back, relax, recover, rest and get myself read for another work week. Cause' honey, 5:30 am comes awfully early and I have issues with the truck that need fixed. However, I don't plan on dealing with that until Tuesday unless a tire blows out.  Love's broke a lugnut and I still have the tire vibration going on that Love's was supposed to fix - until they broke the lugnut in half.  I'm going to have to take it to the yard and Tuesday will undoubtedly be another very long day.  I won't be surprised if they don't want me to wait for them to do the repair and replace the tires that need replacing.  

But, as I said, that tire could give way before then. I'm just going to take the chance and hope that it won't.  It will pass any DOT inspection, it just did in fact even after telling them a tire is bad.  It's just I know a tread is going to come flying off sooner or later unless, of course, I get it fixed first.  I tried!  

Farmer bill called yesterday and said he has some "good news" for me.  No idea.  I haven't had any problems with them after I gave them a direct warning to cease and desist or vacate the park. I haven't heard a peep out of them or from anyone complaining about them, so if they want to stay, that's up to them.  As long as they follow my directive to keep the laser gun junk to themselves.  They are going to - and already have - find that no park anywhere wants to deal with that kind of nonsense. If you want to entertain conspiracy theories, that's your business....until you make it everyone else's. 

I dunno what else. Trying to think.  It would be nice tomorrow to go up through Carthage and stop by the tractor place.  But I dunno if I will, depends on the truck and whether it's giving me hell or not and also how long it takes to get done.  If it goes like it has been going, getting done is going to be early and very well received.  

Well enough.  Already 4:00 pm, the day is flying by.  

 It's been quite the day, lol. 

Drive up to Gurdon, offload, back home, get the kids out of daycare, back home again, get stuff, get in the car and leave.  

I-20 traffic was horrendous as usual, but even more-so today with holiday traffic.  We got here alright, even with idiots doing stupid things on the highway....

Got our room , got a free appetizer card for a steak house, went over there, which was all of maybe a 1,000 feet away and at steak dinner.  I thought it amazing they had a steak meal on the kids menu  I don't see that anywhere else we go and yes, I check. These kids love steak.  

I ordered medium rare for all of us, most of it was in the "raw" territory.  I can eat it like that and totally enjoy it, I wondered about the kids? Turns out, one of them had very rare steak and the other was cooked to near medium rare.  I cut and served the near-raw stuff to the 7 year old, he merrily downed it without a hitch.  I didn't say it was undercooked, I wanted to see if he would eat it like that.  

If you tell a 7 year old the meat is not cooked well enough, they will just reject it. If you tell them nothing and see what happens? Who knows.  

It turns out this hotel does have a swimming pool. And indoor swimming pool and yes, we went swimming.  These boys love pools and we are on vacation.

There was another young boy in there, they all hit it off.  However...

I got into a conversation with what turned out to be the stepfather.  Their house just burned down. Been there, done that, I could totally empathize with them in a way that they might not find with other people, my house burned down in 2004 and it's and experience I'll never forget.  I'm not going to go into all of that now, excepting to say it's a miracle my son wasn't killed in that experience.  Their story went further with the lady having just gotten done with chemotherapy.  Him quitting his job to take care of her.  

I could go on, you get the picture, they are in a living hell right now.  They are actually living here in this hotel.  It is a residence inn and they do have rooms with 2  separate bedrooms that have their own doors and bathrooms.  There is a kitchen with a full sized refrigerator, a stove top, microwave, Keurig,, dishwasher and all the tableware, cookware and plates/glasses you need. There is a kitchen table, a desk area and a living room.  This is one of those types of places corporates like to put up their people that are out on travel and have to stay somewhere for a while.  

The boy attached himself to me quickly, which I thought odd. His father is in prison, but his stepfather was sitting in a chair right there  The boys wanted me to get into the pool, I didn't feel like it but they pleaded lol.  Ok, Ok! We had fun, but after an hour and a half? I'm ready to go to the room, settle down and relax for the rest of the evening. The boys didn't disagree, so we dried off and left.  I felt sorry for that entire family situation, but, their needs are being met.  Just the emotional stuff got to me, brought back memories of that fateful Sunday 

__________

That was yesterday.  It's about time to check out of this hotel and head over to 6 flags.  Going to be hot today, not sure how that's going to work out lol.