I no more posted the last post and the Driver License office called me where I had scheduled an appointment on May 3rd to renew my license.  We're sorry, but the courthouse will be closed on that day so we need to reschedule your appointment.  That did, of course, throw me for a loop, for the next available dates are well out into the future, 3 months at least.  It's ridiculous. The state of Texas needs to fix this.

She got pretty short with me too after she went on and on about it and I said, uhh yea I didn't cause' this problem.  She went off on me. I didn't say it nasty, I was just responding to her going on and on about the fact that I would need to reschedule and my statements about the fact that my license expires in 4 days and the extension only goes out until April - and the next nearest appointment is well into May at the earliest.  You know, most people need their licenses, mine is of utmost importance since I also rely on it for my job. 

She then stated that I would have to just show up one day as a standby.  "We'll work you in".  Okkkk.  Obviously I have no choice in this matter.  But since my appointment is cancelled, I'm going to look for a new appointment in their system anyway.

Oh, and she threw in a monkey wrench, one I didn't know: When you renew your license? You also have to renew your hazmat certification.  Yes I know that.  Well, sir, you will also have to retest.  Oh dang.  I didn't know that, it doesn't tell you that on the renewal instructions.  Yes, I've been doing hazmat for 3 plus years, yes I know what I'm doing, but yes, they ask a lot of irrelevant questions that most hazmat drivers wouldn't know the answer to without - studying.  

I have tomorrow off - and no I'm not going.  My brain is tied up in sicknessland, I am not going to sit here for hours doing what I did when I got hazmat certification the first time: spend hours and hours online, taking sample hazmat tests until I could answer the questions correctly.  I can thank them for canceling, for I didn't know that little tidbit of information and I would have shown up without having had done any studying.  Would have I passed? I have no idea, probably not.  

Well I just had to type that one out.  Took me by surprise.  Like, how do you just shut down the courthouse for a day? Did they know this when they put up the available dates for appointments?  

 The only reason I use La Quinta in town is so I can bring doggies with me.  Other hotel chains aren't so fond of dogs, or if they are, they certainly aren't allowing Great Danes in.  Having said that, the TV wasn't hooked up, they gave me a single queen instead of 2 and the wifi password didn't work. Calling up front, the lady insisted it was the right password.

So I hung up and tried on my phone - after trying unsuccessfully 10 times on my laptop - only to have it do the same exact thing.  I gave up on that, I have unlimited wifi on my iphone and it has unlimited tethering, but kind of annoying that I can't just use the hotel's wifi.  

Anyway, on my way down to Brownsville 2 days ago, about 70 miles into the trip, I developed a flaming sore throat. I mean, it came out of nowhere and it was intense.  I'm not the type to just give up, call work and say I'm coming back, so I continued on, figured it would mellow out.  Uhh, not only did it not mellow out, I also developed other "symptoms" quite rapidly.  In no time, I was feeling like I was full blown flu.  

Miserable, I decided to press on, get down there and go to bed - and hope there aren't any trailers waiting so I could rest longer.  It became apparent to me, after arriving in Brownsville and going straight to bed that if this didn't let up by the next morning, it would be time to go to urgent care.  

The next morning - I felt worse.  Looking around, I only found 2 urgent care centers open. The first one was filled with people.  I had no desire to wait. The second one, they took me in right after filling out my paperwork, there were hardly any patients there.  The copay was much higher tho, it was considering a regular hospital with everything a hospital can do - whether that includes operations who knows.  But, it was filled with real doctors, so that looked at least promising.  

They took my blood pressure, rather high for me but they proclaimed it is quite normal.  Then they said they were going to do a flu/covid test and a strep throat test.  Plus take xrays of my chest.  This assistant took a swab with a wood stick and shoved up into my nose, into the membrane/flesh inside my nose at the top and kept pushing. Quite painful, in fact I pulled back after she just kept pushing firmly up in there as if it were some sort of machinery that you can just keep bashing against.  

Anyway, some time later the doc came back in and said negative on all tests, said I had bronchitis.  Interesting, I thought.  I've been getting bronchitis one and off all my life, I never felt like I had the flu. I'm not saying they were ever cakewalks, miserable indeed, but nothing like this?  Maybe my age is playing a factor in sickness feeling worse and worse as life goes on?  I don't know.  Anyway, I left there, was going to go to the pharmacy but I was going to be passing the yard so I stopped in to see if any trailers had come in.  Sure enough, 2 empties sitting there.  

I decided to hook up and get the medications the next day.  Whether I was going to be capable of driving straight through?  I didn't know, but I was determined to try.  Halfway back up, I had to take a nap.  45 minutes worth and before getting to Houston. It was Sunday tho, Houston should have been a non-issue, as it was.  I kept on driving.  I knew there was another driver "racing" to beat me. He had shown up last night and was coming back to the yard just as I was pulling out with an empty.  When I got to Lufkin, I saw him sitting in a fuel aisle.  He was taking his 30 minute break there, a big time no-no in the trucking world.  Selfish, no concern for others, they take up fuel lanes while others are waiting to fuel. Not to mention there was plenty of room for him to pull ahead and out of the way.  

Well, I entered the store, got a water and a hot tea, got back into the truck and started taking off, he fired up and started a second after I did.  He did, however, stop after seeing me rolling out of there.  Was feeling miserable the entire way, btw.  I got on the road, 82 miles left to go.  I pushed it, got back to the yard, unhooked the truck, turned in my paperwork, moved the truck to a parking spot - and went to bed in the truck. Driving home at midnight wasn't exactly in my line of thinking.  I was glad I did. Those people came early this morning to continue on with the banging and noise making on the floors.  

After getting up, dragging myself out of bed after 11 hours of sleep, getting some coffee - in the truck - I left and went to Waffle House.  Hadn't hardly eaten anything in well over 24 hours.  Filled up, went to the pharmacy got that filled and then went home.  They were all there. Banging away.  They had put fresh cement down - the use it to even out the new flooring between pieces.  They had done around a 4 foot section right in front of my bedroom door.  I mean, there was no way to get into my bedroom without stepping into their fresh concrete or whatever the substance is, so I took that as a sign to go get a hotel.  

I grabbed Addler, he wanted to go so bad, I was going to leave him but he's outside all day so I figured he'd like the distraction.  It's kind of like when I'm on the road and occasionally get a hotel room. I always think, Addler is the only thing missing here.  Of course people were - shocked - seeing him walking into the hotel, but La Quinta doesn't discriminate against the size of the dog.  I would like to think they'd deal with aggressive dogs, but I've never seen any like that here.  

So here I am, in peace and quiet.  I took all 3 of the concoctions they gave me, haven't done anything yet and I"m not sure what one of them even does.  I thought they were going to give me prescription strength cough medicine - the stuff I like, it doesn't have opiates or whatever in it, it just stops the coughing without making you feel drowsy.  But they didn't.  They also tried to give me ampicillin, which is a derivative of penicillin, of which I am highly allergic to and noted that on the paperwork I filled out.  

Well, if the coughing doesn't slow down after all of this stuff, I will go to the local urgent care here and ask them for a prescription for it.  

Dispatcher just texted: want me to take you out of scheduling for awhile? YES.  Not that I don't want to work, but right now? I just can't do again what I did yesterday.  At least through tomorrow, maybe longer.  Hopefully these drugs will do something quickly to deal with this mess.  

Nothing else coming from the realtor.  Probably nothing in my price range left to bring to the table. There's just that one, 19 miles away, sitting right next to a golf course.  It's the 1st of February, I think another lien sale is only a month away.  So, I'm just going to wait until then unless some spectacular, magical fairy dust piece of land appears before my eyes that I must have.  If there is nothing available at the tax lien sale, then I don't know what to do.  Nothing.  Give up.  I dunno.  My interest in it will start to wane, it's been a long term goal that sort of came to fruition last week - until it was confirmed that none of those properties will work. And I"m not sure I want to drive 20 miles each way to get to the property if something comes up.  I'm expecting them to update the sale list with a new one - but it might be a few weeks before they do that.  Amazing a county out in the middle of nowhere has so many listings for properties with unpaid taxes.  

Taylor said she'd contact me when they leave.  The contractors that is.  I'm not sure I want to go home.  My version of bronchitis is contagious.  I don't want to give it to the boys - they are always up in my business when I get home.  If they get sick, they have to stay home, period.  The school system won't let them go to school and neither will the daycare allow them.  Of course, I saw them the night before I left, I didn't get it from them, I'm assuming so wherever I got it, I can only guess that everyone in the house may come down with it.  Taylor also has it, but she always has it.  The "acute" kind.  Oh wait, that's with a fever. I guess they will accept them sick, but if they have a fever they have to stay out until they are temp free for 24 hours before they come back.  Still, this stuff is nasty.  

Yup, I'm just sitting here, lazing away the day.  Doing nothing is the order of business. Either laying down or sitting back in a chair, doesn't matter, as long as I"m not exerting any energy. Been through bronchitis - many many times before.  You try to do stuff? You just prolong it. It can literally go on for months if you don't simply rest.  Oh, well I found reruns of Star Trek the Next Generation, that will suffice for now.

 The phone call.

They called me an hour and a half later than the scheduled time.

I didn't really are one way or the other, but after half an hour I figured they weren't going to call and...oh well.\

It was both an interesting and hilarious phone call. I can make people laugh when I want to, lol.  They are all heirs to a property that a great grandfather had etched them into.

They did not, however, know who the person was who didn't pay their portion of the taxes on the property.  They guessed at probably a friend of the grandfather, but they had no clue.

They also tried to tell me that they "go there all the time". I wasn't out to start trouble, but it was obvious that no-one had been on the property for some time.   

The house I found on there? Made out of railroad ties? An aunt had lived there.  However, they had no knowledge of it falling apart and roof caving in - which was the part where I knew they hadn't been there in forever, regardless of the claim that one of them lives across the highway and can "practically see the property" from their perch at their home.

The only people seeing that property are the ranchers that own the land around them.  But, as I said, I wasn't out to start trouble so I just played along with it.  They were shocked, actually, to hear the house had fallen apart.  The didn't care that I had taken my dog onto the property and wandered around everywhere.     

In fact, it became evident they have zero interest in the property took great entertainment at some of my statements - howling laughter - the laughter made me laugh lol - and specifically stated that they were okay with me going through "their" portion of the property to get to "mine".  

Huh?  I have researched all of this, but I can't say I have any expertise on it.  We went back and forth for a while, until one of them sent me via email a designation of their portion of the property.  "I don't know what's yours, but this is ours". Not said in a derogatory way or anything, we really had a light hearted discussion, for I bit my tongue numerous times just to keep it civil. They could, indeed, cause' me problems and I don't need that.  

I was sent a pic of the land, with their portion circled in yellow.  Great, I thought, I won't bother to tell them that if they wanted to try, they could keep me off my land.  They claim the city here made such designation of who owns what - but how? This property is definitely not in my town's city limits.    And regardless, it's labeled undivided interest for a reason. No one owns any particular portion of the land.  Now, they may have voted to do that but it's not on the official documents for the land, so I dunno what's going on with that.  But, they don't care what I do over there, they don't want to buy that property so I'm likely stuck with it. If I can ascertain there is deer on the property I could sell it as a hunting piece of land or I could sell a deer lease.  Just enough to pay the property taxes so I'm not paying anything on it at all.  

___________________

Fast forward to the next night, now, Friday night.  Getting yet another Brownsville run lol.  That will eat up 2 days at least and maybe they will be done with this house.  I couldn't stand it in here today, I left early, stayed out most of the day.  The noise and the dust were unbearable.  They made great progress, I'll give them that but they have a lot left to do.  Taylor goes to work in the morning, James said he and the boys will be going out doing stuff, cause yeah, no one wants to sit around a house listening to that racket literally allllll dayyyyyyy long.

The house is in complete chaos/disarray as everything has been moved, stacked, stored, whatever.  Lots of stuff came into my room as well. Don't mind, but want this stuff over with.  

The realtor sent me a link to a listing that was just put up today.  It's 19 miles away from here, it's almost at the Louisiana state line.  It is 5 acres and it's located literally right next to a golf course.  I dunno if that's an allure for RV'ers or not.  That's a "I'm thinking about it" deal and I didn't have a chance to go take a look. The price per acre is too high and I dunno if they'd take a lower offer having just listed it.  

Well enough of this. 

Tired, the dryer is singing it's tune saying laundry is done, time to go to bed. 

 Busy day but i feel like I got nothing accomplished.  I ended up having to go to the city and ask them to show me what is allowed where. I went to the property this morning, I thought even tho a few houses that are in bad shape in the area, I could build a long enough driveway to get that stuff out of view.  There are some  nice houses there as well.  The property is densely wooded, keeping those bad views out of sight would be easy.  probably 70% of the woods are small trees that would easily come down with heavy machinery.  A bit of a grade on the property, but not enough that an RV jack wouldn't be able to level the RV.

I found what was supposed to be a road according to GPS was actually a power line easement.  That would be to get to the landlocked property.  Besides not knowing if the public can use an easement, it would be 4 wheel drive material to get back there or an ATV.  

Anyway, I went to the city and it is zoned Residential and Agricultural. The man said commercial enterprise not allowed, nix that one off the list.  I had hopes for that land, especially if I could have gotten the price down a bit.  I then asked about another property the realtor had sent me, it is not in city limits, therefore there are no restrictions. I met the realtor there at that property.  It's the one that says it's half unusable because of a flood zone but that the front part would be great for building!  

Not so.  First off, you would have to bring in probably 50 truckloads of dirt to build a driveway in there, the embankment is long and steep. Second off, and the thing that told me no right off the bat - the entire front portion of the property was flooded.  No thanks.  I need more flat level ground with an entrance that isn't too steep up or down.  I don't want to spend a bunch of money on that kind of improvements.  

She then told me about another property.  It's right next to the local airport.  I went over there and there was an airplane revving up it's engines - extremely loud and noisy even tho it was probably 500 feet away. Plus it was also on a grade, tho nothing like the one I had just viewed with the realtor.  I thought the noise would not be so nice for people wanting to enjoy a wooded area out in nature, literally at the end of a street.  

So, I'm left with nothing to look at now.  At least, nothing in my price range.  I admit I want cheaper - this project doesn't have to cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.  The cheaper part is the land, I just don't want to be saddled down with high monthly payments. This is potentially risky venture, what if I couldn't get enough people to park there to even pay monthly expenses? But, there is risk in any business venture.  I'm really sold on the idea of out in the county tho.  I passed by RV parks that had both mobile homes and RV's on the same lot.  The city won't allow that even if they did allow any potential parcel of land to build a park.  The beautify of the county - far less restrictions.  

I don't believe the dude standing on his porch just off the right to the entrance to the property by the airport was all that excited to see me lol.  And I think the road going through that property is actually an easement owned by the airport, there is an old gate at the end saying no trespassing airport property.  However, that easement would work as a driveway, so that wouldn't be a problem.  I'm going to think about that one for a while, but I guess I"d have to spend a day out there seeing how much air traffic noise there is. It's a small town, it would be hard to believe there would be too much of it, but you never know. 

It isn't really a let down that none of them work.  Well sort of is, but I'm in no hurry for the wrong property that won't appeal to RV'ers.  An ideal property would have a large pond on it - stock it with fish, plenty of trees and level, no extreme grades to deal with.  Not right off the highway, but close enough to not turn people off and a good rood to get in there. So I'm going to take another look at properties just for the fun of it, but the ones that might work are just too pricey, the down payment money is not available.  For example, an 88k property which would have worked well - also means a $17,600 down payment. Don't have that much.  And I don't want to take out a personal loan to get - a loan.  The thought of taking out a HELOC on my house in Phoenix crossed my mind.  

It would probably be the cheapest interest rate I could get.  Chase bank isn't offering them right now - that's the bank I use for checking and savings.  It might be a better idea than cashing out the 401k.  Probably could find one somewhere.  

Anyway, I'm coming to the conclusion the only good property I'm going to find is through the tax lien auction.  It's only like 5 weeks away, so unless something really good shows up I'm going to wait and see what that sale has to offer this time around.  

And so these people called back again.  I have NO idea why they want all of these people on the line, but she said she couldn't talk right now and that she could get everyone on the line at 6:00 pm today.  ???  I just wanted to ask what they are going to do with the property - if anything and what objections - if any - of me using it for hunting purposes.  I can't imagine what all of these people want to talk about, so I'll just wait and not speculate too much about it.  They can't tell me to stay off of it, they can offer to buy it out and I'd sell it to them - I'll end up with something sooner or later that isn't owned by a bunch of other people and wont' have to worry about dealing with them.  

Well whatever.  I come home from all of this, these contractors are in the house - no one else home.  Not a problem. I go into the kitchen, put some groceries away, they come into the kitchen, we chat a bit.  They go out onto the front porch so I stepped out there as well.  They leave. I didn't notice that this dude locked the freaking front door on me.  Unbelievable.  

With that, they're back and I'm going to go say something to them about that......

 So, I have to go back and look again. 

The accessible property - really need to put another set of eyeballs on, because the road leading into that neighborhood is replete with junk, rotting houses and slum like houses with garbage laying all over the place.  There is another way in there that I need to go look at this morning and see if it's any better.  I don't really want to sink money into a property that is surrounded by garbage, filth and puke.  Okay I didn't see any puke, but you get what I mean.  RV parks get rated - for better or worse - and they get published. A bad RV park is going to circulate around everywhere rather quickly.  The good ones do too, but the bad ones stick out from what I am seeing. 

Yes, I've been doing some research.   Definitely not sold on this property yet.  The landlocked one -apparently is landlocked. The GPS I was looking at showed a road going next to it, that road, however, does not exist.  

I also got a call back from the undivided property owner(s) yesterday, but - I didn't recognize the phone number so I didn't answer it.  This lady with quite the Texas drawl was on there - left a voice message - telling me she is on the phone with the other "heirs" of the property. She went on and on, then said she'd be waiting for my call back.  She apparently thought that she had hung up on me, for she started talking to the rest of the people on the line.  For  unknown reasons, they all want to talk to me.  These people are all related, apparently brothers and sisters.  But they couldn't agree on a time when they could all be on the line to discuss - whatever they want to discuss.  Perhaps they want to buy my portion of it back - which I would do at cost plus a fee since I went to the trouble of buying the land and dealing with my end of it.  

I tried calling back but they didn't answer.  I dunno, but I will continue on with my visits there with Addler to have a place to run free and sniff and do his thing.  They certainly can't stop me and this lady that called lives over 200 miles away.  I doubt she's ever been there, or if she has, at a much younger age.  From the looks of the property, none of them lives nearby or if they do, they have no interest in it.  I wouldn't mind buying them all out and potentially even building a house there and living on it.  That's 12 acres, plenty of space for kids to roam and not get into trouble - excepting maybe railroad tracks being right there.

Today is the big day.  Finally.  The floors in most of the house are going to be replaced, they are allegedly coming - at what time no one knows.  Seems like they would have been here by now to start on it, it's almost 8:30 am.  James/Taylor have spent days cleaning every thing up, boxing stuff and moving it out of the way.  The house should look pretty awesome after they are done. I am going to suggest a no shoe rule in the house.  It's the only real way to keep it clean, especially with all the rain we get and everyone tracking in leaves, dirt and water on their shoes. That suggestion may not go over so well, but if they don't do it, it won't take long for that suggestion to take hold.  

Oh, the group where the lady kicked me out. Yup, they are missing me.  She doesn't care but everyone else does.  To the point they are doing almost nothing in the way of moderating the group.  Now, she is mad at them, they just shrugged their shoulders and said all of that stuff Ben used to do, I (we) don't have time to do any of that stuff.  They're forcing her hand - not to try and get me back in, I don't really want anything to do with it now after all of what she said and did - but to get her to actually do something in the group besides putting up posts that say how wonderful she is and how great the group is.  The group is only as good as the people moderating it.  If no one does anything, trolls take over and the hate people start dumping all over the place.  If she wants to be the "top admin" in her words, she's gonna have to work for it - or - let the group go and it will return to the troll land it once was. 

My detention pay.  I was unnerved yesterday receiving the settlement sheet in email and it literally had nothing on it besides the letterhead.  A blank piece of paper.  I thought maybe my phone wasn't loading it correctly, so I got on the computer a few minutes ago and same thing. But after more research, they are dumping 2 paychecks into my account tonight.  First is my regular wages the second is that check with the detention and Christmas pay on it. So, tomorrow's pay definitely makes up for the lack of pay last week.  It kind of sucks that all of us drivers have to fight for our pay, keep track of literally everything and have to go after that pay. Otherwise? You are doing work that you aren't getting paid for.

Okay, well the county sent the final bill for the properties I bought. I knew there would be more, the judgements on all of them were either through 2019 or 2020.  So there would be more taxes to pay to get it up to current.  Only one of them is a bit high - the undivided interest property - and it appears they are making me pay the tax bill for the entire 12 acres.  I will be going into the tax office - maybe today - to ask about how this all works.  The other 3 properties are low - $32, $75 and I don't remember the third one but it's basically nothing.  Again, this wasn't unexpected.  I'll be good until next year.  I am hopeful by then I can get something going on at least one of those properties and that is another trip I need to make to the city of Marshall and inquire about zoning, permits and such.  If I could get a decent, older mobile for 5 grand, fix it up and stick it on one of them, that would pay all the money I spent on the properties back in about 8 months time.  After that, it's all profit.  There is a great lack of housing in this town and what is available is way over priced.  I could see charging around $600 per month for an older unit - in decent shape of course, they cover their own utilities etc, but that would be cheap housing at that price.  

I will also be going to look at another property today, it's just outside of town and right off Highway 59. A large portion of it is wetland designated, but there is still, allegedly, enough property to do "something" with it at the front.  It's 14 acres.  The location is ideal. Lots of traffic goes up and down 59 through this town.  I could attract travelers overnight and long term as well.  The price is a bit high for something that has a lot of unusable land at 40k, but it's been on the market awhile. If it were something that could work, I would offer 25k for it and see if they budge.  I mean, people that own properties around here apparently don't care if they sell or not, judging by the amount of time most of them have been listed.  

Well, that's enough.  I need to finish in the kitchen before these people get here and go get stuff done. 

G'day.  

 A little bit has transpired since last post and discussing finding a property.  

I asked for $25k versus the 35K they're asking for. Reason being 5 acres of it - full half of it - is non-accessible. The properties are separate, but near one another, yet private land is between them.  The weird thing tho, is that both of them are right up against public roadways. One of them is a  highway.  It doesn't make any sense that either of them aren't accessible from the road?  There must be more to this story than I am seeing, because I sent the link to Taylor and she thought the same thing.  Maybe they just don't have a driveway built into it?  

I also asked about zoning, seems that it's inside the city limits, something I am really trying to avoid.  This may be a small city out in the middle of nowhere but it has it's on planning/development department and the entire city has zoning in it.  However, this property is well outside the major portion of the city and in the woods, basically. Both properties are entirely wooded and it would take some work to clear out an entrance, driveway and spots for RV's.  Either road would be good for RV's, the 2 lane highway being the best.  

Am I sold on it? NO.  I haven't even gone to look at it yet, the realtor was like, well I'm going to write up the papers and offer it to the owner.  Not so fast, please, I need the zoning info and I really need to go take a look at it first.   She didn't try to use any pressure tactics such as "someone else is looking at it", the 5 acres unusable is highly likely a turnoff to most people.  Again, I need eyeballs on both properties.  Which one is accessible and would it make a good candidate? Which one isn't and why if it's literally up against a public roadway?  But yes, I offered 10k less.  

It's only been on the market a month.  I look at how long properties have been on the market. The outrageously priced ones are on there 100, 200, 300 plus days.  

This property has owner financing available.  20% down, payments I'm not sure  of yet.  Well I take that back, doing the math.  With 5k down, the payments would be $208.33 per month plus interest.  8% interest for the loan life, not sure how that would calculate to payments, but I'd guess no more than $250 per month. That's easily doable.  This gives me more confidence that this property isn't going to sell anytime soon, giving 8 years at such low monthly rate.  Well I'm wrong, it's $282.73 per month.  Should have known there is a calculator online. That's still quite doable.  That makes the property payment a non-issue at that kind of money.  

Property just isn't selling in my area.  That's why I'm also going to be looking at putting mobile homes on the other properties I purchased at the tax sale. If I were to go through with this, my tax sale purchasing would be done for now.  It will be enough to get all of this going without having to buy more and be saddled with more property taxes on land I am not using.  I could put one of them up for sale, I guess, and see if it sells, take that money and buy more tax sale land.  The one by the railroad I definitely want to do something with if possible.  It's right near everything.  Kroger's, CVS, Walgreens, an entire strip mall with all kinds of shops including a Super 8 are within walking distance.  Walmart is a quarter mile up the road.  The only drawback is it IS - right - next to the railroad tracks.  I don't know where the nearest crossing is so I don't know if horns will be an issue. There is a trellis going over Highway 59 so they aren't using horns there.  I personally wouldn't mind the sound of a train rolling by - but horns blaring are a different story.  

A little excited? Yes, a little.  I can't get overly hyped about it until I have more details and if/when the signing actually occurs and suddenly I am a land owner and have some property. 5 acres is big enough for an RV lot.  I could put a lot of lots on a 5 acre property and have room left over for an office, a picnic area, a playground for kids and whatever else my mind can think up of to attract people to come live there. Note that I am looking for people to move their RV's in there and live there, overnighters welcome by that isn't the main goal for the property is a bit off the Interstate and but not too bad from the main highway 59.  There are other RV parks in contention for the business, tho.  The thought also crossed my mind to buy old RV's cheap, fix them up and rent the RV with the lot.  Probably more of a rent to own thing - I don't want to be maintaining rv's forever.  Let the renter pay for the RV with minimal interest, get it paid for and then they are responsible for repairs.  

Throwing this in at random: I am still at the Brownsville yard, it's 7:00 pm. They are just now hooking up to one of the loaded trailers, meaning they won't be back until 9:00 pm. I am not leaving out of here tonight and I will be claiming another night's worth of detention pay. That's how they have structured it and that's fine by me.  There is absolutely no good reason to leave out of here at 9 at night. I would just stop at midnight and only make it a few hundred miles up the road. I'm good with driving straight through tomorrow - as is my custom to drive straight through anyway.  That will make this trip worth almost $1,500, so yea, thanks for the extra night.  Oh, now I'm seeing they've hooked up to both trailers.  The first person down here from Longview will not get any detention time.  Well take that back. If they get in here before they return with empty trailers, then he can legitimately say nope, no empty trailers "upon arrival". That's the deal, that's what I'm going by as well. We all know that if we come in here and no empties, we either leave - which many do and go up to the truck stop - or close the curtains and stay out of sight.  +

In fact, I expect to see another loaded trailer pulling in here at any time now.  They have trucks coming down here every single day, usually two of them, sometimes only one and sometimes 3.  I'm not going to answer the door if that dude comes pounding on it again.  I don't care if a trailer showed up at 9 pm and I already told the dispatcher that I won't be back until tomorrow afternoon. Note: My manager is not doing dispatch now, a dispatcher in Amarillo Texas is doing it. I only write all the details because I don't want it sounding like I am stealing from any of the companies involved here - which there are 3 of them.  They made the agreement, it's their deal, I get to stay another night, I'll leave early morning and I will bank the money and say thank you!  

Back to property.  My head starts going off in all kinds of directions once a possibility for something shows up.  I wish I were home, tho, I would have gone out and looked at both properties today.  And stopped at the city of Marshall asking about zoning - that is really the ultimate decider if I take it or not.  No RV parks! No thanks. Nothing else I need it for.  

I dunno, but everything today has sparked in me tells me that -whether on the right track or not, whether it succeeds or fails - I am doing something that actually intrigues me.  Trucking is not intriguing.  It has no great magic. The roads are filled with selfish, stupid people.  I'm tired of having to be on edge for 10 plus hours every day I drive because of idiots either intentionally doing stupid stuff or morons that have no more business driving than they do operating a space shuttle.  I was literally brake check a few days ago by a little, bitty car. I had pulled out into the passing lane to pass a very slow moving vehicle. That car was at least 400 feet behind me when I pulled out, I didn't cut them off. 

I immediately got the phone out and turned video recording on.  They brake checked me several times but it's whatever to me, I'm used to these people playing these games out here.  I just wanted proof in case they actually caused an accident.  

I'll be.  They actually brought in a trailer without having had taken the full ones over first.  I don't care, it's 7:30 pm, I'm not going anywhere. I'll set the alarm for 4:00 am, get out of here by 4:30 am, get back to the yard by 3:00 pm and be quite happy with that.  And yes, still get my detention pay for today.  It's based on when they get here with it.  After any time when a truck could have legitimately made it from Longview to here, yup, it's a done deal.  Well, I've made it here as early as 5:30 pm.  7:00 ish frequently.  Just depends on the load time. 

That's it, I think.  I'm loosely following the news - have cut back on it 90%ish - TV version hardly watching at all.  Just don't need that kind of stress. I know what Biden is doing, it doesn't take much to see he's creating chaos at the border, wanting to implement a mileage tax, totally backtracked on his declarations that he'd have the virus handled quickly and has said a lot of other - garbage - that frankly I don't need to dwell on. Particularly now that I'm out of that debate group - what a refreshing thing that has turned out to be. The admin - ugly person, toxic, needs Jesus, but the outcome?  Not consumed by irrelevance.  There are far more important things to focus on in this life than a president who doesn't seem to care about tens of thousands of people losing their jobs over a pipeline, strained relations with Canada because of it, China doing shows of force - they apparently think Biden is weak and I'm inclined to agree with that.   And lots more, actually, but who cares? Well actually, I do! I just know I can't do anything about it. 

Okay, I made a lot of internet style relationships in that group.  Good people, fun to chat with.  And my inbox is proof that I am both missed and people aren't exactly happy with her - the other admin's - decisions.  Shrugs shoulders.  She'd have to profusely apologize to me for the way she talked to me and then return me to admin status and even then? I would back way off.  My absence has already created a huge hold that she is trying to fill.  Good luck! to a person that has almost no involvement, whatsoever, in the group for a couple of years now.  

Well enough for now, the trailer is here so I am getting up early morning to get this trip over with. 

Nite. 

 Didn't finish last post, but decided to post it anyway and just start a fresh one. It's now Tuesday.  I left the plant yesterday morning, drove down here without incident - Brownsville Texas that is - and now am waiting for an empty to show up.  There is a driver ahead of me also waiting, but they usually show up with 2 empties on any given day they're bringing them here, I"ll just end up having to leave later than whoever it is that is in the other truck waiting.

Some of the other drivers are not friendly and do not talk to anyone.  It's the nature of trucking, it fits perfectly with people who are loners, don't like to be around other people and are = not necessarily pleasant folks to be around. Some truckers virtually live in their trucks, meaning they don't have a place called home beyond it. No house, no apartment, nothing.  That is an unfathomable idea to me, I couldn't deal with that.  I only say that because the other driver isn't getting out of his truck, didn't wave at me when doing the same and was highly annoyed when a driver from the company whose yard we are in gave a light honk on the horn asking him to move so the driver could access a trailer he was parked in front of. 

That shouldn't happen, but I'm not a tattle tale so I'll just let that person live in their misery alone.  I need no part of it.  

Meanwhile, I have 2 brownsville trips with about $1,400 in detention pay the company owes me, plus they didn't give any of us that worked on Christmas our Holiday pay. You work on a national holiday, you get an extra $140.  It used to be $170, but I guess the company that took over decided that was too much.  So they owe me over $1,500 in back pay and I had to ask my manager again to look into it.  He had, indeed, sent an email to whoever in payroll, the person in payroll - did nothing about it.  If I don't get the pay this week, I will simply bring it up to my manager again.  Note that my trip shits have huge lettered words I inscribe on them: "DETENTION PAY" with arrows points at the dates and times.

I also write it at the bottom of the sheet - with the words they want us to use: "No empty trailers available when I arrived".  Our manager basically told the company in Alta MIra that if there isn't an empty when we arrive, it's automatic 14 hours of detention pay, since we arrive at night and we shouldn't be expected to have to look out the door/windshield all night long seeing if any empty has arrived.  

I did a quick sweep of available properties, nothing has changed, no new properties added to any lists and now it's easy to find where the new ones are added instead of having to go through the entire lists.  It may very well be that I can only find a decent property on one that has been left to rot with unpaid property taxes.  I mean, there are some good properties that I have watched fall out of my hands as people with a lot more money than me bid it up and up. The most desireable ones  are also the ones that they are also interested in.  Actually, one dude bids on all the properties worth bidding on.  I watched him last time, I figured he wouldn't bid on those Deerwood Estate properties - too much risk - and I was right. And other properties I had researched - he also didn't bid on. Such as ones condemned by the city or have existing - falling apart structures.  

The one by the railroad tracks he didn't bid on, which was a curiosity to me.  Perfect place for a small house or a mobile home - I'm hoping to put a mobile on it but the 6 months hasn't elapsed and I'm not going to waste my time for now until the 6 months passes.  The hunting property is a different deal.  It's something I can use now, even if to just take the dogs for unfettered running around without having to have leashes on them. They get to enjoy nature and I get to dream of having my own property someday that has no - other owners - involved with it.  I was informed that you can only hunt deer during Texas prescribed hunting season and you have to have a permit, even on your own property.  

I thought that strange - in Arizona they sort of have the same laws but forest officials won't do anything about you hunting them on  your own property as long as you live/spend a lot of time up there.  It may be true here as well, but it isn't worth taking chances on.  I found an animal trail going into the property, it's heavily wooded and there is a stream going through it.  Perfect for deer. I need to find what I did with my motion activated camera and set it up out there and see what's roaming it during the day and night.  

Deer season ended earlier this month and no more until November.  Pigs I think you can kill whenever, they are considered a nuisance. They destroy farmland and are generally giant rat type creatures that serve very little useful purpose to wildlife.  I saw no indication of pigs on the property, but again, a camera would reveal what's going through there.  

Oh, and for the fun of it I did look up dozer rental. It's the piece of equipment they use to clear land.  I've watched contractors doing it for years - I used to deliver to construction sites all the time - they take down trees and clear brush with them.  Stack it up in a big pile and burn it.  Not big trees tho, lol, small ones. The big ones you don't fool with or if you want to take it down you need to get a chainsaw and cut it.  Anyway it's $700 per day for one of them things, that's a bit pricey.  Not alot of options tho and hiring someone to do it is much more expensive.  

The property by the railroad would need cleared as well. I'd say half a day or less to clear that one out and built a driveway into it. Well not build one, just make one with the dozer.  No, I don't know how to operate a dozer but it can't be any harder than a scraper, I've operated all kinds of heavy

I've operated all kinds of heavy equipment, just not a dozer, but it looks to be one of the easier pieces of equipment to run.  

Okay, well, allegedly people coming to rip up the floors and replace them today.  But allegedly only, looking at the security camera, there is no crew there. In fact, there is no one home at all.  The delivery of the flooring materials must have been delayed.  The entire house is getting new flooring including my room. They decided to go ahead and do that as well, tho it wasn't part of the damage done by the central AC unit.  That thing needs replaced badly - but that isn't my house. The thing is, it could easily get backed up again and start leaking again and destroy the new flooring - again.  It's old, it's full of crud and that crud comes out with the condensation and clogs up the pipe that drains it out.  

And the kitchen sink drain is clogging up again.  Old house = problems.  I paid for the plumber to come out last time, last year.  It'll be their turn this time.  But, it was a pleasant surprise when they announced they would be having my room done as well.  I will have to clear everything out of there which means a forced project: going through old papers and throwing out as much as I can.  I tend to keep receipts, contracts and the like around for a while.  

So Ill start plugging away at that until it's ready.  Otherwise I'd have to dump it all into boxes, I'd rather deal with it and trim down the amount of papers that I have instead of attempting to move it around.  

Okay, my best guess:not going to be out of here until late afternoon or even night time.  It's almost noon and they haven't hooked up to the full trailers, so I am going to be prepared to - not get home today.  And that's fine. Get paid for 3 days work but drive only 2 days.  

Oh and the group where the bossy admin threw me out of admin position? Lol, members not happy.  They are already missing me.  Which is interesting, but now that I've been out for a bit I don't know that I want to go back in there.  I didn't realize how much time it was consuming. It's a facebook group and there is no good reason to be spending that kind of time dealing with people on the internet.  Not to mention the cusswords she was leveling at me - of which I did not respond in kind.  But, she'll spite the group to "get at me" and that's her choice.  It was all about control - of everyone.  She's power hungry and I really want no part of it.  Now that I know what kind of person she is - I knew that before but she hadn't done any of it to me - I would throw her right back out of the group just as she has done to me if I were in an admin position there now. It is not her group, the founder left and she was the only admin at the time.  She literally had nothing to do with the group for over 2 years and baam, comes back out of nowhere, take-over mode.  

Okay enough of that.  I am actively keeping my mind off of that group - albeit old habits have been hard to break, such as clicking on the link to go in there. I let myself out of the group so all I go to is a join group tab.  I was looking at my old 401k - it's going up and up.  I am at the - reluctant point - of wanting to cash it out.  But  will the stock market crash?  And if it does, will it come back up? And if so, how long will it take?  Lots of questions.  Even more so, if I did cash it out, get a business going - would I be able to replace that money in a relatively short period of time?  

No answers.  So I'll probably just wait until the next tax lien auction and see what's available.  The list will come out sometime next month and I can start doing the research and see if there's anything that will work.  

Ohhh myy. I just found 2 properties being sold for one price, owner financing.  Right outside of town, definitely would have water and electric, maybe even sewer.  That would work depending on down payment money.  I put in a request to the realtor for more information - specifically: zoning. I can't tell whether that's in town or outside.  This would really work out well considering the location.  

 Addler was a happy doggy today.  He got to sniff around all 12 acres of that land.  I posted 2 videos on my Facebook, he's on a lot of it.  So while he was doing his thing, I was walking around with my gun in my pocket, wondering if I was going to run into anyone, whether I would have problems and whether things would go - south.  

About halfway through I became convinced that this property hadn't been used in years - despite a large amount of trash laying all over the place.  The trash was old, rusted out and had been there for a long, long time.  There was a road through it - overgrown with trees and shrubs. I walked clear to the other side of the property - I knew there was ranchland there but wanted to see for myself.  On my way back - almost back to the railroad tracks, I found the remnants of a house. It has been built out of railroad ties.  

The roof was completely caved in, there hadn't been anyone living thee in probably decades.  It was amazing to see a phone company pedestal replete with the wires hanging out.  I have no idea what the other people that own this property's interest in it is.  Some relic they inherited?  I can see where a road/driveway could be plowed into the land without going on anyone else's property. Just across the railroad tracks.  A bulldozer could clear the land nicely. get rid of the shrub, made a road into the property and have it looking nice.

But, I only own a portion of it and without consent from the others, I don't see any reason to make improvements. I'll be researching this for a while - but the only thing I really see is a hunting property. No improvements needed and I found an animal trail that is obviously well used going into the property.  I motion activated camera will tell what is going in there - I have one somewhere, just need to dig it out and get it up and going.  

Oh, there is apparently electricity running onto the property, judging from the remnants of the house.  There are electrical outlets in the walls Again, it's nothing I would really get delved into.  Maybe, tho, an RV trailer pulled onto the land with electric hookup.  Water - comes from a creek that feeds into a large pond in the next property over.  If there is septic, it would be useless now.  I would imagine anyway.  

That was mine and Addler's excitement for the day.  After that it was over to Chili's.  It is 50 degrees out and Addler was happily laying down in the back of the SUV so I didn't take him home first.  I mean, if it was hot summer I would have dumped off at home and then came back up.  

I am enjoying a day off, tho I am helping with getting stuff moved. The floors are being replaced. When I say the floors, I mean the wood beneath them as well as the flooring.  That may happen on Tuesday - the flooring is on backorder but supposed to be in tomorrow- Monday.  

I'm off to Brownsville - late load tomorrow. Noon.  Crazy.  I'll be out til' midnight getting down there.  If that means 3 loads going out Monday, then I'll be guaranteed detention time.  

___________

Well the day wasn't over.  We were all invited over to Maria's for dinner. So we went lol. The boys were over there anyway, they took them there last night so we could work on painting the living room.  And getting the house ready for the flooring people to come in and do the floors. Kids would have gotten in the way.  So 2 hours of that and finally home.

And during the interval, the dispatcher sent me a text changing my load time from noon to 9:00 am.  Well I dunno if that means no detention pay, but regardless, I'm happier with a bit earlier loading time than noon. 

I dunno, but Maria has no plans on moving to Oregon after asking her today.  Well, she was but that fell through and she is happy to help with an RV park.  So that gets me a bit back on track, sans the fact I can't find a suitable property anywhere nearby that fits the bill.  

No, I haven't looked in days. I have scoured the land for anything that would work.  I've searched both on the internet and looking around while driving everywhere.  It needs to be in a relatively easily accessible area preferably next to a major highway. Plenty of those around, just not anyone selling any land along those roads.  

 On hold for 26 minutes now. Attempting to find out if the driver's license office in Kilgore is actually open without an appointment, as another driver stated to me a few weeks ago. Just getting into the queue to be on hold took 10 minutes and several calls.  The first I did all of their prompts - at the end of several minutes of getting switched from one to another queue, the artificial voice on the other end of the line said sorry, there are too many people only, please try your call again later.

After that? I called back pushing zero every time.  After several more calls, I finally got through.  Why call instead of just going over there? It's 40 miles away.  I have no interest in driving that far only to find out it's appointment only now and can't get in, wasting 80 miles of driving, that much time and that much fuel in the process.

____________

Went to see the wooded property. It wasn't a private road to get back there is it appeared to be on the map so that was good.  You go back a very narrow road to railroad tracks, cross over and there is a locked gat on the other side replete with no trespassing signs.  

________________

Yup, typical of me to start a post, not have time to finish it, pick it up and then - find that I have to stop yet again.  That last portion was 2 days ago.  I went to Brownsville and turned around and came back up the next day.  Which is today lol.  

Whatever the case, I came home to kids gone and house in great disarray.  The floors - most all of it - are going to be replaced after a large amount of damage from the central AC unit pour water into the flooring and - messing it up.  The insurance company is paying out a large amount of money to fix it.  So, they are painting the living room.  Actually, they started painting it over a year ago but never finished it. 

Well anyway, I think I"m going to go back to the new property tomorrow.  Do some trekking around and see if I can find anything on the property or if its really just a bunch of woods?  I also think I"ll take Addler with me.  He'll enjoy the adventure.  I will, of course, carry the deed with me and hide a pistol in my jeans.  Not that I hope to find anyone out there, I would like to explore the entire perimeter and see what this property is all about.  

Which reminds me, I want to look up these properties and see whose name is listed...Ahh yes, my name shows up on the appraisal district now with $155 owing for 2020.  You buy these properties, sometimes they don't sell after the judgement and you end up own another year's worth after the judgement was made.  No biggies, it's not much money lol.  

I'm wondering if I could sell a deer lease on my interest in the property.  I'll have a lot to discuss with the lady that the county official sent me an address to if she call me. I sent a letter and hope to hear back from her.  But if I don't? I'll go back to the county and ask about anyone else - but since my name is listed on the title, I"m going to go there and explore it. 

However, I do think James wants to start trying out hunting - with bow/arrow.  I don't mind that, I also dont' mind blowing them away with a hunting rifle, skinning and gutting them, cutting them up and eating them. Not that I've ever actually done that, just haven't had the opportunity.  Now I can create my own opportunity.  I suppose it will have to be predicated with watching endless videos of people showing videos of how to field dress a deer. 

But it's more exciting to just have a place to go wander around and see what's there.  Amended to say that there doesn't have to be anything there to make me happy beyond thick woods and a stream, I would be quite happy with that.  

And yes, they rent bulldozers and yes I know how to use one.  Clearing trees - that's the main way they do that on thick wooded properties.  The place looks like it needs  a narrow road cleared through it?  I dunno yet,  the bulldozer idea came to me from one of the other properties I bought.  I never got a reply phone call from the city about zoning and what I can do with property in the city, so I guess I'll have to go over there and address them in person - and ask why they didn't return my phone call.  

All of this including attempting to find property for an RV park is a journey.  Keeps me motivated. Goals are good, especially if you are actively trying to accomplish them. 

I really need a lifestyle more active. This endless trucking business isn't good for your health.  Well, I will take a nice hike tomorrow and get some exercise and the giant doggy will also have a nice trot.  

With that, watch a rerun of a show and go to bed.  

Nite. 

 The inauguration of Joe Biden?  I turned on Faux news and saw them oohing and awing over Biden. The "news" side of Fox News has switched over to liberalism and I turned it back off after watching less than a minute of it.  I saw Biden making some lame speech about unity.  If he wants to proclaim that through Christ, I'll listen, but I've seen how he talks about Trump, he's a silver-tongued devil.  I've heard all of them. I need not go into it because you have either heard it or you haven't, it doesn't matter, if you are a democrat you take a non-existent moral high ground and declare it doesn't matter how we get rid of Trump - and boy did they not care about morals during this last election cycle.  

I don't have a short memory, I doubt most people that support Trump do either.  I have kept myself up to date on politics, but now?  I'm sick of it.  I read a few lines and switch to something else.  I watch 30 seconds of it on the news and  - turn it off. 

Basically, we have Obama running the nation again.

So enough of that.  Politics is becoming less and less of my attention.  I can't stop what these people are going to do.  The only thing that will stop it is either an Article 5 Convention of States or a civil uprising. Prefer the Article 5 over people killing each other . I'd rather focus on the Lord.

I have tomorrow off.  The manager announced via text to everyone that we are going to be dispatched by Sheila again. She usually does an excellent job of keeping me busy and making good money. We'll see. They have overwhelmed dispatchers with too many drivers and too much work.  They even admitted it in a recent news release company wide. Won't go into the details for reasons I can't go into here.  Just saying, they have - changed - the structure of the organization.  

But tomorrow?  I have a list of things I want to get done. It's too much to do in one day.  That's the results of being out on the road all the time. It may slow down now that everyone is back from vacation.  My Driver's license is on the top priority list.  So Ill call them first and see if they actually can get you in without an appointment.

Meanwhile, working on mother's birth certificate. She has never had one for reasons that I will not go into on the internet.  But since she's never had one, she can't apply for it - she's tried, she asked me to try since a family member can.  I dunno what kind of ethereal hell to be had trying to get a birth certificate - created - for a person that is 8 plus decades old, but I"m going to try my best to get it done.  I expect this to be a long process - COVID combined with the lack of existence of such certificate ? I mean I may have to call senators or something to try and get this done.  But I'll start with the normal process and work it from there. 

I still haven't made it to the wooded property - I just get caught up in doing things that are neglected and those things take priority over a property I can legally access.  But don't really own until the redemption period expires.  If I ever do get property for an RV park, getting it going is going to be a challenge with work duties.  I have given more than considerable thought about this idea.  My 401k 's are doing excellent.  Even today, the Biden inauguration, the stock market soared.  

So I got into the indecision mode again.  Will my old 401k continue to soar with it or will  - as recent reports are coming out have stated - the stock market tank?  Because if I don't cash it out before a potential tank, I won't touch it.  I'm kinda focused on another tax lien sale.  

Oh well, I'm not going to dwell on it too much, not at the moment anyway. The next auction being March, I'll make a decision about it when the sale list comes out and see what's on it.  I will say, however, if some piece of land comes along before then that I can scrounge up enough down payment for that works for what I want it to do, it's a done deal.  

Uhh, that's it, I think.  Getting late, would like to get some good sleep and get up and get at it in the morning.  They are having the flooring redone in almost the entire house in a week or so, they need space in my room for some stuff to move out of the way  

Oh, my manager, lol.  Got into a long discussion with him before I left yesterday morning for Oklahoma  - which was an uneventful trip.  We got to talking land, housing and then living conditions. I said I live with people - I have told him that in the past - said I could afford to live by myself but I prefer living with people  He just looked at me and said, I dunno how you can do that.  How can you stand living with people?  He went off into family, lol.  I'm like, well these people aren't blood/family and we get along really well, in fact we are all friends.  He still shook his head, how can you stand it lol. That was funny.  To each his own?  

G'nite.  

 Well that was interesting.

A political debate group that I have helped run for years now.  The "senior" admin - she didn't found the group, the founder left long ago and basically left it to her - took a 2 year hiatus from the group. She didn't say that, she basically just disappeared.  She would drop in once in a while, say hello and we would carry on with running the group.  

Well - she decided to come back last month.  Whatever happened to her during the interim, she apparently got over. However, when she came back, it was something akin to a dictator style entrance in making decrees, demands and telling us what we need to do.

Huh? This is a Facebook group, you aren't my employer and even my employer doesn't talk to me like that.  I thought but didn't say, ,I wanted to see how far she was going to go with this.  Well it came to a head 2 nights ago.  She was discussing a new thing she wanted to do and another admin said he wasn't interested, he had enough to do.  That started her off.  

See, this person is totally insecure and quite obnoxious.  I had had thoughts of leaving the group before she started the hiatus.  Running the group was fun - dealing with her was not.  But then she just got burned out on it so I basically took over and started taking actions to improve the group.  

I read through an extensively long thread of comments back and forth between these admins in the admin group.  He was lamenting about not feeling free to speak - freely - because of her. She was ignoring that and going off about her idea that - he was rejecting.  Reading down the thread, another admin had come in and said he also wanted nothing to do with it.  

The thing she wanted to change was the welcome post.  I came up with the idea of doing that after Facebook introduced an option to generate a post that tags all new people that have joined the group.  This was during her absence, tho she knew about it.  She wanted everyone to have a chance to post it on a weekly basis.  Both of the other admins said they had enough things to do, they were fine with me doing it. 

The insecure, authoritarian, obnoxious and overlord admin got quite offended.  After all of that had occurred, I got into the discussion.  Because it yesterday morning that I saw all of this, that conversation occurred while I was sleeping.  It's a long story, but she went livid with anger at all of us.  It was insane.  No one was dissing her, just voicing opinions on the subject.  People that don't want to involve themselves shouldn't be forced to do so.  One of the admins had stated "if the wheel ain't broke, don't try to fix it" and that also sent her off.  

By the time she got to me, she was already fuming.  She started calling me names - d***, As****, etc.  But I wasn't going to back down, no one was speaking to her with contempt, we were just sharing our opinions.  One of the other admins admitted that he never disagrees with her because he knows what will happen - which set her off again.  

She disappeared after telling me off, of which I finally laughed at her and sent laughing emojis - she was WAY overreacting and in my mind, it was becoming humerous to watch this person become totally unhinged over a very minor thing that doesn't even make that much difference in the group.  Having a literal melt down because people disagreed with her. I hadn't even started this altercation, I had just chimed in my opinion. Why not? Because, I knew what would potentially happen and it did.

The next day, we found that all of us had been removed as admins, she had made statements to everyone but especially scolding me and telling us it was up to us if we wanted to stay.  She had sent moderator invites instead, saying she thinks we would try and remove her from the group! lmao. 

Paranoia much? It happens when you are hitting the bong all the time. I used to smoke pot, paranoia is definitely a potential side effect of it and she smokes a lot of pot.  But whatever, I just accepted it, only to find that she had removed me from the mod position as well and muted me for 14 days!  I immediately left the group.  

Today - this is day 3 of this unbelievable nonsense - the new moderator that I had pushed to have brought in the group contacted me:"OMG, :She removed you ?!!".  Naw, I removed myself after she dumped me first as an admin and then as a mod.  Long discussion. She said she was going to try and talk to her and believes she could get through to her - she really doesn't know this admin, I do.  But I said good luck! lol  She said if the admin doesn't change her mind, she's going to levae the group as well. One other admin said he was going to just hang back and let everything go and see if she was going to pick up the slack. 

Basically, all the work we have done to get rid of trolls and people wanting to start trouble plus get some modicum of decent debating going - is being undone.  I only write about this because I was in that group 6 years and helped run it for almost 4-1/2.  

I almost want to find a way to infiltrate the group and hack into the admin position and throw her out just for the fun of it.  But I guess that would be repaying evil for evil so that thought passed quickly. No need to stoop to her low.  

Oh, I wasn't actually thrown completely out of the group, she simply removed me from both the admin and then the mod position and left me as a regular member.  After all the work I did in there? Naww, no thanks.  I left the group this morning and now the aftermath has begun.  People actually liked me in the group, lol, people asking questions after this "senior" admin posted in the pinned post: "UnfortunatelyBen B has been removed as admin".  

She needs Christ, that's all I can say.  Beyond that, help.  I've been watching her lash out at people that were her friends for years now, I figured it would happen to me someday and the day arrived. It wasn't shocking since I've seen her doing it before, but it was interesting that she not only removed me out of admin position but the other two, overnight. No one even knew until the next morning.  

I was just informed the newbie lady that only wanted to become a mod because of me - seriously she's said that several times now - is talking with this "senior" admin. 

Anyway, just back fresh from yet another Brownsville run - that's 3 in a row and over 3 grand worth : )

Getting sent out tomorrow to Oklahoma - which is fine by me, after getting back on Wednesday morning I'm hoping to head over to a driver's license department in another town I was told about that isn't requiring appointments to renew your license.  I'm like, yes please! 

What else? I haven't been eating much and on the Keto diet at the same time.  The pounds are coming back off.  Not as fast as I'd like, but you know, you go off a diet for a few months you probably should expect it to take - a few months - to lose all of it.  Gut is shrinking.  

Yes, I did look for properties today lol. But nothing elongated. I did find one, but the down payment is too much, just don't have that kind of money atm.  

And the inauguration. Are you watching it? I will take a glance - only to see this debacle of 25,000 national guard troops basically taking over DC. I don't care to see Biden sworn in but I will be interested to see if a crowd shows up - he never had crowds at any of his rallies.  And then there's the allegations that Trump supporters are going to try to - disturb the inauguration or do something.  So yes, I'll take a peek at it, but I won't be watching long unless something incredulous is happening. The other news was that the FBI projected that all 50 states may have protesters/violence at the state capitols.  

And on, and on - the censorship stuff is annoying.  I've hardly watched any news, tho, it doesn't take long to get caught up on the gist of all of it and then tune it out again.  

Well enough.  Watch a rerun on tv and then go to bed.

 2:30 pm. Got here late last night - Brownsville that is. There was an early load, the got the only empty trailer here.  One of their drivers just hooked up to one of the full trailers, that should mean that in 2 or so hours, an empty will come back.  Unlike the last trip, I'll take off out of here if it gets back around 5 or earlier.  Last trip they didn't get here until 8 and it seemed a waste of time to start driving that late at night, only to shut down 3 or so hours later. It all just depends on their timing.

And while I don't much care for these trips turning into 3 days, I also don't much care for small paychecks.  It's basically 3 days of driving for 2 days of actual work.  Just get bored sitting in this truck.  I usually go find something to do, just not feeling it today.  

I was on one of the local FB marketplace groups for our town and caught a lady giving away a fish tank just as she had posted it. I was the first one on it.  It's easily $250 worth of stuff for free.  So we're going to get that and then Taylor can get these Oscars that she wants - apparently they eat other fish for food.  Lol.  

Besides the unending political drama - of which I am more ignoring than watching - there isn't really much going on.  I gave a half-hearted, short search for a property today, but it's all the same stuff, no one has added anything yet.  Figure to do that every few days and see what might have been added on to the local postings.  Well, james started school so that's new - go to work all day and then off to school right after work.  Tough schedule. 

Taylor is getting more hours at her new work, the kids are the kids, the dogs are the dogs, the fish are the fish and that's about it lmao.  

Oh, Maria. Apparently she wants out of Texas. To the point that she was going to move to Oregon with her son.  I thought that weird since her son has a successful swimming pool business in Houston, why is he moving? Turns out swimming pools businesses aren't doing so well right now.  Corona? People being forced to clean their own pools?  She doesn't like it in Texas, that is what I'm getting from her and so I am not going to rely on her for any help with the RV park if I ever get it going. It would have been nice to have someone living on the property - I may just put out an ad when the time comes and exchange free rent and electricity for help managing the property.  Oh, well the deal with the son fell through and he didn't end up moving.  She's caught in a rock and a hard place with extremely limited income. 

I'm still at a loss why she can't do one of these home jobs taking calls for companies.  She'd make a lot more money and get off of welfare.  But, that's me, I'd at least try to figure something out. 

  I am not quitting my job for this business. It just doesn't make good sense when you don't know what kind of profit margins you are going to get or if it's even going to take off at all. Tho I suspect it will, every one of the RV parks I see is at least 3/4's filled up - the good parks and the ratty ones.  I lived in an RV trailer - it's not the worst thing and the cost of living is quite low if you own the trailer out right. 

Enough of all of that, now that I think of it I should take a short nap so I"m fresh to go for driving today - if that does, indeed, occur.  

 

 I actually was hoping to get an Oklahoma run for today to round out this week's pay period. But, arriving at the yard yesterday I knew that wasn't going to happen, a line of trucks sitting there waiting for runs as well.  Plus they brought in another driver from some other division - a person we definitely don't need and everyone came back from vacation.  I assume we'll be slowing down again even if all of the accounts are full steam ahead.  They aren't doing something right in losing accounts. The only thing I think that saves us is the fact that these are specialized trailers and very costly - 350k each minimum.  But I wouldn't put it past one of our competitors to ramp up their inventory of these trailers and start taking more business away.  That would lead to layoffs/goodbye notes.  I dunno what this year has in store as far as income goes from current employer. Just have to wait and see what happens.  

One guy is retiring this month, that will help a little, but if they continue to bring people in that's not going to be helpful at all. I'm sure the manager isn't all that interested in more drivers for our division either.

Yesterday - got up early, 3:45 am after an empty showed up in Brownsville at 8:00 pm.  I wasn't about to start driving that late. They got a new hire at the yard down there who had the gall to come knocking on my door telling me a trailer is there. I just said "okay, thank you" and went back to bed.  It made more sense to me to get up early and get the day over with in one fell swoop than to drive 4 hours or so and then have to take a 10 hour break - I wasn't about to drive til 7:00 am to get the run over with.

Unfortunately, one of those small, roadside inspection stations was open. They took one look at the Mexican trailer and declared that they would be inspecting the truck and trailer on a level 1.  I don't really mind inspections, but that was rather annoying.  First because I got up early to get the day done early, not to sit around an inspection station. 2, because they didn't even get to inspecting my truck for almost 15 minutes.  That's ridiculous.  If they want to pull people in for inspections, they need to start immediately.  I have thoughts about calling the station and making a complaint about that.  It was an hour and ten minutes before they finished, including using a creeper to get underneath the truck and trailer and measure brake travel.  

The waste of time is that fact that junk trucks were driving through there that they weren't bothering with.  The Mexican trailers are dirty, but that's it, they are usually well maintained.  And if there is a problem with them, we don't take them out of the yard down there, they have to fix it first.  Of course both truck and trailer passed to the point that gave me stickers to put on both for a 3 month pass on any further inspections.  I guess that's good but the waste of time.  I was going to pull into a truck stop only a few miles up the road and take my break, get a nap and finish the day. Instead, my break was spent with these folks and I ended up not taking a nap and driving straight through after that.  

Whatever.

Taylor wants to go to the larger town 35 miles away today and get some more sucker fish for the aquarium. I had originally bought 2 - small ones they didn't have any big ones.  One of them died straight off the other one just doesn't do that much, lol, he's a tiny little fish.  Need about 3 or 4 more of them to do the job in there.  I dunno what else she has in mind, but I'm guessing a stop at the bookstore will also occur.  

After refiring the Keto diet, I am back down 5 pounds in 2 weeks time. I'm going to get down to around 190 and then switch to a different thing that a friend has suggested.  Keto is a bit difficult to stick with, admittedly.  It's just the idea that you can't have potatoes, break, milk, pasta and a host of other foods that you - or I anyway - grew up eating and have a taste for.  But, it IS effective if you do it right.  I see people complaining all the time about how it's not working for them in the online Keto groups. A little sleuthing and you find out they are drinking alcohol types that are loaded with carbs or dumping sauces or gravies that are also loaded with carbs.  Or cheating.  You can't cheat on Keto if you want it to work. As soon as you're thrown out of ketosis that ends the whole point of it. If you are cheating regularly, you aren't going to see results.  Or if  you do, much less results than you would if you were counting carbs on every single thing you consume.  

That diet definitely isn't for everyone.  But I do find it humorous people moaning and complaining about it. Like okay, try something else if you can't do it, there's plenty of diet plans out there, probably most of them work, but like any diet, they have parameters and rules you must follow in order for them to work. 

Enough of that. Besides the trip to the town I intend on driving over to the wooded property today and seeing about gaining access to it.  Well I guess that depends on how long the fish trip takes.  I keep saying I'm going to go and then I  - don't get a chance to go lol.  I got back to find one little pile of snow from the snow storm we got. It was all hard from melting and useless.  I missed that entire deal, people were building snow men all over the place.  Those are all melted down and just small patches of icy snow on the ground.  

Just another day in paradise.  I stopped the endless searching for a property.  Just nothing there that fits the bill. I'm sure more properties will get listed over time - or another tax lien sale will occur before that and maybe something will be in there.  I put in some online requests from local realtors that I haven't received any reply to.  There were two properties that looked good - until I got to the part about them being landlocked. Another amusing thing.  Who is going to drop 60k for a property they can't even access?  The ads literally say there is no access to the property, they're surrounded by private property. One of them says they're trying to get an easement.  Well, easements usually come at a price, the owners of the properties don't just give away portions of their land so others can travel on it.  

Well, off to breakfast and get about the day.  

 Monday - late morning.

Got here - Brownsville - after driving through rain and snowstorms for more than half the trip down here. It was a let down to find out it snowed heavily enough at home to accumulate on the ground and build snowmen.  Like, dang, it only happens once every several years - snow that is - why couldn't I be home?  C'est La Vie

No snow down here, but it's definitely been raining with craters of pools of water in the yard, mud, not so nice conditions. To the point I spent the night at the truckstop.  Just dropping the loaded trailer meant wading through near ankle-deep water. Yup, put my boots on for that one.  

Really incredible.  People who bought property dirt cheap at the lien sale auction have those properties listed for sale for far more than they paid for them. 2 grand they pay, asking anywhere from 16 to 75k.  I'm not saying I'm going to get rich doing this, those properties may sit there a long, long time before anyone is even remotely interested in paying that much money for such small amount of land.  My interest was more in putting rental units on them and earning long-term revenues.  

Really, it appears at least in my area, that the only way to get a piece of land that is actually not over-priced and is in a desireable location is to buy it through the county auction sale.  I've been over 50 different websites and they all are incredibly over priced and alot of them are showing the same properties as the rest of the sites.  

This is kind of setting my vision along what avenue to take in getting to the goal.  Do enough research and homework you at some point get a view of what you really need to do.  I'm not going to pay 10k per acre for property that isn't worthy anything near that.  There is one property that looks interesting and has a good price but - there are no roads leading to it!  Lol.  It's surrounded by other property and satellite and street views show nothing in the way of access.  You aren't going to pull an RV trailer through an easement, lol.  But I don't even see any easements going through it.  

So I'm going to continue to sit on this for awhile. Still looking, still thinking about it, still doing research, but taking no action - yet.  If I acquire land but use all my money up and don't have anything left over to build the park, then it's basically useless property. Go hunting, ATV riding, great, but no revenue stream from that.  I could go outside of my city area - but I"d have to go east to get anything decent and too far away to make it convenient for anyone to help out with it. Going west - the properties are also high priced.  

Getting into high payments? No thanks.  Getting into low payments? Maybe.  Basically, I'm going to wait until the next auction, see what's available on it, if anything looks good and considering how much it might end up being to get the winning bid on, I will think about options to have the money available immediately in bank account after the auction closes.  They want you to pay within an hour of the end of the auction.  Why? I dunno.  If you don't, you get fined and end up paying 25% of the winning bid amount. So, yea, you want to have the money available lol. 

Why do I keep writing about this? Because it's a portion of what's on my mind.  It's something I've been wanting to do for many years - even decades.  It's something I wish I could have gotten started 20 - 30 years ago.  I wouldn't even have to be working by now. A steady stream of income on a monthly basis, I would have developed, over the years, an oasis style park that has all kinds of amenities and would be a go to spot for travelers.  It would have a reputation and I would keep improving it.  Instead, I'm 56 years old and still have nothing going.  It's rather frustrating, to be honest - I have good credit now, I have a 401k I could cash out, I can get loans - but I can't find anything that fits the bill.  

I have someone that can actually live in it and run the place. I have people to help with the accounting and fixing things as necessary. Ugh, lol. 

Well whatever, need to clear my mind of that for a while, easy to get engrossed in endless searches and finding the same things over and over.  Give it a rest  Just for a while lol.  The only property I found that would work won't allow that kind of development so shrug my shoulders and move on.  

As for today, it's noon and they haven't even taken any of the full trailers out of here yet.  99% of the time they take out two loaded trailers and come back a few hours later with empties.  I would have liked to have been out of here by now so I could make it back tonight.  About 2:00 pm, maybe 3:00? That's as late as I can assess getting out of here and making it back to the yard.  After that, I spend the night on the road somewhere for I don't see any point in driving all night long so I can feel like crap all day long the next day, unless the manager specifically asks/needs a trailer for the next morning.  

It's likely he's going to text me soon and ask me what trailer I'm bringing back and that's when I'll tell him I have no trailer lol.  

I'm getting appalled by the news/politics and everything that's going on there - which is out of my control - but there is no end in sight.  So, I'm not taking a total break from it, but I've kind of tuned that out as well. God is greater than all of that garbage and is over all of it, I'm going to put my trust in Him.  Whatever happens, we all end up before the same Creator in the end.  

Anyway, I still haven't had the opportunity to get to that wooded property - or try to get to it. It's only 7 miles away from my house but definitely outside of town and in the country.  It'd be nice if I could leave here today, stop for the night somewhere and then have a part of the day tomorrow to see if I can access it without going through someone's private property.  Not sure about the road, seems to cut through private land and isn't on the street map version of GPS.  I'm not bashful, I'd go ask for permission if it comes down to that.  Otherwise, park on the highway and walk down the railroad tracks lol.  
Really want to see what the rest of the owners are doing with that property, if they have put up any structures and if they are open to others coming in. Not that they have a choice, but I'd rather at least try the peaceful/nice way and see what happens.  It's a weird proposition to co-own land with complete strangers, glad I didn't pay much for it.  We'll see what happens.  And showing up - a stranger - without any intro to the rest?  I'll be approaching it cautiously, people in Texas don't like strangers showing up on private land without permission.  

And for that, I think I'll get out of this truck and go for a walk. Need some exercise.  

 Saturday night.

The last run was an Oklahoma run that takes a full day and a portion of the morning after that.  So, finished that this morning.  Ran around getting stuff done and came home, only going out to get some wings at Wingstop.  Busy place - fortunately.  I like having that new store in town but it obviously has to have a steady stream of customers to stay viable. So it is good every time I drive by there to see it full of customers waiting on their orders.  

___________

Sunday morning - got distracted last night.  I'll be driving all day long today getting down to Brownsville.  Sunday is both a great and terrible day for driving. Great because the roads are far less busy and there is no rush hour traffic (think Houston, TX).  Terrible because - it's Sunday and traditionally for me, before this particular job, Sundays were a day off to rest, relax, hang out, do anything but working.  Or if work, things getting done around the house. Nothing I can do to change that at the moment - besides taking a far lessor paying job, which I just won't do ATM. Besides paying down old debt, I think I have another year to go on that, saving up even more money to buy more property. 

But, the next auction I go to, if I don't get something before then, is going to be solely focused on getting some acreage.  I have 3 small lots in town now, that's enough.  Once the 6 month period is over I'll be finding out what I can do with those properties.  But what I need/want now is acreage out in the country, outside of city limits.  That's for the RV park. That's for a business, money making opportunity. Not a get rich scheme, just an income that will last into my retirement years.  Something that can start small but has enough land to build it up over time.  Preferably a property with at least a small pond.  Fishing is very popular out here, that is something that could generate even more revenues with people coming to fish a stocked large pond - pay a fee of course. 

Other places around here do that.  But getting the property has been out of reach so far.  There are properties that are too large and just too much money, I'll be in debt - for a long time on any of them.  Short term debt fine, but 10, 15 plus years is too much.  Trust me, I've been looking. There is only one that really fits the bill for location but the price tag is 88 grand.  I'd have to come up with 20% down for a land loan, I don't have that much money atm without taking out a separate loan, a home equity loan or cashing out the 401k. I have close to that, I'm not broke lol, but spending all of that would leave me nothing in my savings account and deplete my checking account as well. 

There are also smaller properties with outrageous prices per acre.  10 grand per acre for property out in the middle of nowhere.  Oh, and the property on the flood plain? Scammers!  Thick, far east accents greeted me on the phone and I was immediately suspicious.  I then found out "we are not local but we'll contact a local agent for you". Uhh, no thanks, scammer, I can do that myself.  They quit contacting me after that. I am purely and completely suspicious of anything found on the internet until it is proven to be ok.  The listing showed it a local realtor but my suspicions started up when I saw an out of state area code texting me. 

The search goes on, that's all I can say. Not a rush for the wrong thing.  Yup, another search, same results. 2 acres, 50 grand?!! Stuff like that. Small lots going for 20 k per acre, the 88k lot is still available. That's 34 acres right outside of town.  It's less than 3 grand per acre so that makes it a good deal, but it's really too much money and tho I'd love to own 34 acres of land - RV lot would take up a small portion of it - I can't see myself dug into 4 or 500 per months payments on it.  That eats into any profit, plus property taxes every year.  I doubt they're going to bring the price down, at the same time the property has been listed for something like 200 days.  

So, I may just have to wait until March for the next lien auction and see if they have anything worth buying that will fit the bill.  

As for everything else?  Uhh, house in phoenix doing well for now.  They let the power go down to unacceptable amount of money on the card reader for electricity, so I dumped $100 on it.  Just comes out of the money I get every month for rent payments.  Mark is having a hard time finding the odd jobs that locals were giving him before the pandemic started. Now, people are unemployed, broke, holding onto whatever money they have type of thing.  I'm going to help that situation out when necessary.  They have enough now to last around 25 days - it's winter time the electric use is way down.  

The household here? Same old thing. The 5 year old turned 6 2 days ago.  The 3 year old is - a handful times 100. Hissy fits, conniptions, meltdowns, etc when he doesn't get his way.  Just shake my had at that boy and all the trouble he gets into because he refuses to listen.  

Cleaning project out back got a start but then I ran out of time and I wasn't going to do anything yesterday with my limited free time.  Next full day off I get I'll pick it back up.  

And then - there's politics.  Banning Trump, censoring him permanently from Twitter.  Censoring Parler by removing it from the app stores.  The media and politicians complicit in a campaign to silence Trump and apparently attempt to get us all to somehow forget his tenure in office. Telling us he incited a riot and guilty of sedition, telling us if Pence won't enact the 25th amendment against him, they are going to impeach him again. Telling us that Trump shouldn't have the nuclear codes for he has become a world threat.

These people have lost their ever-loving minds.  I summarily reject all of these narratives, their agenda is to silence Trump and his supporters. Ain't gonna happen. Lots of people deleting their Twitter accounts and getting off of Facebook. I'm going to delete my Twitter account to join the crowd - I rarely ever use it.  Facebook not so fast.  There's got to be a viable alternative.  But this open and out and out censorship? Unbelievable.  And the left is going to try to tell me that Communism isn't their end game?

Good thing God is over all of this and is still in control. Peace is found through him and the knowledge of that fact.

G'day.