Trip to Brownsville uneventful, thankfully.  I hit Houston about the time the snippets of heavier traffic was going to begin. Eastman - which is the loading plant - took forever to get the truck weighed in.  Waiting for 28 minutes type of forever.  Ridiculous.  They don't have any good excuses and they don't care.  It just adds to the day and the rack operators give me looks when I pull up there with 30 minutes eating up the time frame.  I told the dude right off  - it took half an hour to get weighed in.  Just to unruffle their feathers.  I was still 15 minutes early, but the dude that runs that operation wants you there much earlier than that. 

I can't change things I have no control over, at all and they know that. They can complain to the powers that be about the hang up in getting scaled in, I'm not doing it.  I don't need to be a target at that place, it's my current livelihood.  

Anyway, I'm in Brownsville and there are no empty trailers. It's a good thing I have Wednesday to back up into before vacation, because who knows when an empty will come in? Tomorrow morning? Afternoon? Mid afternoon? Evening?  Completely unpredictable. But, it's worth the wait to get my detention pay and up the ante on my next paycheck.  

Foregone conclusion I will be taking at least some vacation hours to buffer the loss of 5 days of work. But not too much.  I'll be into Saturday and Sunday off, well possibly Friday as well (they sometimes count that for the next paycheck and they sometimes count that for 2 paychecks after that depending on - who knows what), so I really don't need to claim too many vacation hours. Maybe 15.  We get paid a tad bit of money for vacation time.  

I applied for and was accepted for a credit card for the business.  Now that I have both LLC status and an EIN number from the state of Texas, I can apply for lines of credit.  Why do I want the business to have lines of credit running? Because I will probably have to get a loan to expand the park in the future. I need to get some lines of credit going, use those lines of credit and pay them off before the 30 day period is up to begin to establish creditworthiness for the business. 

It only made sense to get it started right away and Capital One - of whom I've already been a customer of for at least a decade now - was not shy to give me a line of credit starting at $2,000.  Not much, albeit, but it's a starting point. I had to list my annual income as 0 - it didn't give an option for projected income so I was at honest about it.  0, lol.  They did a credit check on me and that is, what I suspect, what gave me at least a foot in the door.  I'll buy whatever I need that the card can cover and pay it off before 30 days and do that every month.  

Coughing hasn't ceased but it isn't constant and it isn't that bad. The fatigue, however, is a different story.  I went to bed early last night and slept 9 plus hours.  I was glad to have a later load this morning.  Should I go to the doctor on Wednesday, when I expect to be back at the latest?  Uhhh, maybe.  Spreading Covid around isn't my idea of fun. I don't know that it's Covid, I don't know what it is.  But I could certainly go on vacation in this condition and enjoy myself. Maybe not as much as being 100%, but it's doable.

My concern is whether anyone else is going to get sick because of me.  If that happens and they aren't feeling good, then that might change the whole thing. I would still take the time off, but it would be a staycation.  I could burn off the piles at  the property if I had that much time for sure, lol  Or if the kids get sick, will Maria still watch them? Possibly not.  Can't blame her, just saying if that happens, we ain't going nowhere.  Kids are not in the plans of this vacation, this is an adult trip.  Adult venues and adult atmosphere.  

It's almost midnight, I didn't get done til' 10:45 or so, so I best be getting offa here and sleep time.

G'nite.  

 I only made it 240 miles today before I just had to pull over and sleep for a while.  Not feeling good - at all.  It's not that bad, but it's bad enough to just want to sit home and do nothing.  40 minutes worth of sleep in a rest area and I felt a little better - not that much but enough to get home.  

I read the trip sheet wrong - I do not have tomorrow off, I have to go back to Brownsville.  I decided to say nothing to my dispatcher about it, hopefully I have enough in my to get down there tomorrow, sleep, and get back up. Then I'll be off work for 5 days.  So yea, I'm just going to try and tough it out.  I've got 5 hours before I have to go to bed, then sleep, then get up later than normal - 10:30 appointment to load.  So at least the wake up schedule won't be gruesome.  

I did more study on these Sweet Gum trees.  They actually sell a machine that picks up the Sweet Gum balls - which are the nuisance part of the tree that everyone hates.  It's what I wanted to find out - is there something invented to pick them up? Yes, it's over $500 but it means I can keep at least some of them up and not have to worry to much about getting the balls up off the ground.  

Some strange stuff going on on the roadways today.  I caught glimpse out of my peripheral of a vehicle swerving in and out of traffic.  When I actually looked in the mirror, he was swerving over to an exit lane - passed a car, came zooming up to me and then passed me on the shoulder. He was going at least 100 mph.  Yes I honked at his stupid @$$, wth was he driving like that?  He stuck his arm out the window and flipped me off - weaved in and out of traffic ahead of me, flipping all of those people off as well.  I doubt they caught him, but I called 911 on his @$$. This was highway 59, not the Daytona Speedway, he was driving extremely erratically and dangerously.  

On another note, I was coming up on a vehicle so I got out in the passing lane to pass him, which I did. There was a truck in the passing lane - well behind me.  This is what some truckers do nowadays, they'll just sit out there in that passing lane and apparently trying to intimidate anyone from pulling out and slowing them down. But he was hundreds of feet back when I pulled out there.  So, I pull back over after passing the vehicle and what does this truck do?  He passes me and then cuts back in front of me - with maybe 2 feet between our bumper. I promise you I did not cut this dude off, at all.  It's funny, now that I think of it, these people doing this stuff? It's going to get flagged on this new artificial intelligence camera to the company.  They could, if they felt so inclined, turn that guy in.  

I doubt they will, but if that driver had tapped on his brakes, I would have rear ended him - but - the camera would have shown what actually happened.  So maybe I can give the camera a little bit of kudos. Not just that it's constantly videoing, but when something like that happens, it flags it and sends an 8 second video alert to the employer.  I'm not out there to start trouble with anyone, believe me. I"m just doing my job, working and trying to get the day over with - safe and sound like everyone else.  

And then another incident on the 610 West loop freeway in Houston.  I was coming up on this car - which was in the next lane over - apparently it didn't like being stuck behind traffic and just - cut right out in front of me. I'm used to this, it  happens 100 times a day.  I just let it go.  I was stuck behind this driver for a while as they were going slower than I was, but eventually, traffic cleared so I got over into another lane - where he cut me off again. I am still inclined to let it go, stuff like this can never end well, so I went over another lane where he tried to cut me off a third time.

Now, I'm wondering if this dude is trying to collect insurance money, for there was no legitimate reason for him to cut me off the second or third time.  Whatever the case, I came up beside the dude before he could cut me off and if he was going to ram the side of my truck, good luck with that.  After that, I got ahead of him and thought nothing more about it - until 10 minutes later he comes racing up beside me - but kept on going.  I'm just waiting for my company to tell me about someone that called in about a rude truck driver and then I will direct them to take a look at the video.  

Anyway, the day is over, thankfully.  And no big deal about tomorrow not being off from a home standpoint, I was going to go set the rest of those piles on fire. Turns out it's going to rain for the next several days, including tomorrow morning, not exactly favorable burning conditions.  I'll make enough money in these 2 brownsville trips to cover the week and then take vacation hours for the next pay period.  I'm hoping to feel better by Thursday as I really don't want to cancel this trip.  Not at all. 

 Hmm, been a few days since I last posted.  

Well, yesterday - Friday, I was off, we have too many drivers once again - I went out to the property after seeing Taylor, James and the 7 year old off. They were going to Longview and I had the 4 year old.  Daddy and mommy day with the 7 year old is what they were calling it - well his name is Phoenix but that's neither here nor there to strangers reading this post lol.

I decided to go over to the property and test the trackhoe operator's theory that he has the piles packed so tight, that if you get a hot enough fire going, the fresh trees will burn up anyway.  Well I knew that would be true, I just wondered how hard it would be to get a fire going.  I brought one of those ez light fire logs that burn regardless. Just put a lighter to it and in a minute it's started burning without anything else. 

So I got that log going after stuffing it in the pile as far as I could get it without starving it of air and lit it.  It took quite a while to get anything else going, but eventually I had a small fire going.  I kind of wrote it off, this probably isn't going to work. The 4 year old was practically begging me to take him to Waffle House, so we went there for breakfast and came back about and hour later.  

The fire was going much better.  I started adding dried wood to it and building it up.  Yes, there is dried out wood out there as well.  I just kept adding wood and twigs to it for a while until the fire really started going good.  I was more amazed at how well and long the 4 year old was engaged with this fire activity and staying interested in it than I was at whether this fire was going to get up and go. But eventually he got bored so I put him in the vehicle, found some Minecraft kid's videos for him and that kept him heartily entertained after that.

Well the fire started to take off and so did the smoke - it was billowing out and wafting all over the place, I called the county volunteer fire department and let them know there is a controlled burn going on and if anyone calls, well, this is what it is.  They said thanks for letting them know and if it gets out of control or something happens, to please call them.  Yes of course, thank you.

After that, the heat started building up and I knew I was getting some good hot coals - this is a very large pile of wood even tho it was the smallest one of them all. There are 7 other piles to go.  Anyway, Brandon - a friend of James and really my friend now as well - heard the call since he's a volunteer fire fighter/first responder and ended up coming out.  

By the time he got out there there was no stopping this fire without dousing it with a lot of water.  Not that I wanted it out, at least not at that point, but you could feel the heat 30 feet away from it.  He asked at some point if I wanted to put it out.  Well, I thought and then responded, probably, this is going to take all night long.  Yes, the fire and heat had burned out the core/center of the pile but there was still plenty to go.

So, he got his truck into position. About that time, James and Taylor and Phoenix showed up - I had been out there for many hours.  They started dousing the flames and pretty much emptied out the tank. Brandon thought it was done and over with, I knew better but kept my mouth shut, lol.  I could tell from the smoke that there were still hot embers under there even tho they had sprayed a lot of water onto that thing.  

We all eventually left, but Brandon went back later and sent a pic to James - it was all on fire again.  But, these piles are along way off from anything, it's just dirt around them.  And it had just rained the previous night.  I wasn't concerned about it, but they - fire people - were.  In the end they decided to just let it burn out. I haven't seen what's left of the pile but since they let it burn, I'd have to guess a lot of it is gone.  

I was given "advice" later on from James who had talked to the fire chief who told James to tell me that I should let the contractor do the burning since you have no water out there.  Because if something happens and you are the one that started the fires, you will get the ticket.  I looked at James, uhh, well, that depends on this contractor. If he doesn't get out there soon and get this going I am going to do it myself.  I don't But hey, I could have the city turn on the water, I guess, tho I'd have to run 800 feet of line to get to the further back pile and a garden hose isn't exactly a real threat to a very hot fire.  

Still, the fact that the nearest trees are at least 50 feet away make this idea that something is going to happen a moot point to me.  I wondered how much this fine would be, if it's only a few hundred dollars I don't really care. In the name of progress I'll get it done. Note that I won't get a fine if nothing happens, it's only if the fire somehow spreads.  

Anyway, I am in Brownsville atm, but I am already under a trailer.  So I'm leaving relatively early in the morning, around 5:15  when I can get on the clock, it's almost 8:00 pm right now.  I have Monday off, the drive back tomorrow - should be a piece of cake.  Sunday drives are the best as far as traffic goes.  I always say that, but it's true.   

And yes I had thoughts of going out early Monday morning and setting all 7 of those piles on fire and get this part of it behind me so they can get out there and blade the soil, but there is a 46% percent chance of rain and that is in the morning. Unless that changes, I doubt I will even try.  

Now, as for the next run they wanted to send me on.......She - my dispatcher - sends me today's run, which was fine.  And then after that, sends me a run leaving Monday to West Virginia. Remember, we are leaving for vacation on Thursday.  I immediately wrote her back and said, well, you've got me leaving at noon for West Virginia, that's late for getting me back in 3 days.  And there are times when it takes 4 days.  

Of course, she wanted to be argumentative about it - I've never seen it take anyone 4 days. I doubt that's true, at all. I've had it take 4 days on many occasions when something went wrong either in traffic, or stuck at the loading plant half a day or had a break down.  I don't know who she thinks she's trying to kid, but she figured out quick I wasn't backing down. I wasn't going to argue with her. If she wasn't going to change it, I was just going to go over her head to my manager.  She then offered to see if she could switch the load with someone else.  

That's really what she should have said in the first place.  Of all the dispatchers we've gone through at this company, this one is the most rigid.  She doesn't want anyone attempting to change "her" plans.  But when it comes to my personal life and I have already received the permission to have the days off, I'm not going to have her messing around with it.  There is no guarantee I would get back the third day and it would be night time getting back even if I did.  She still doesn't understand what she's doing, they never send out a West Virginia run that late in the day.  It's always an earlier load time so the load can get delivered the next day and the customer is happy.  I told her that once, but she apparently didn't learn anything from it, perhaps the customer no longer cares, I don't know. 

I do know they've told me in the past they want it there in the afternoon the next day after it leaves the loading plant.  

Anyway, I got a run going back down here on Tuesday instead. That may, actually, jeopardize my vacation, but not that much.  Yes, we are leaving on Thursday, but not until after James gets off work.  We are driving there and have a late check-in and then have 2 full days and a third partial to enjoy whatever activities there are to do a the San Antonio Riverwalk.  Apparently there is quite a bit to see and do?  I dunno, it's just a getaway from home.  The kids aren't coming - thankfully, this is more an adult themed trip and the dogs/cats/fish have someone to come over and tend to them.  

The only thing that is distressing me right now? I now have chest congestion and a cough.  I will probably go to the doctor on Monday if it persists and get checked out. They will undoubtedly want to do a covid test - and tho I don't have to allow it, I would probably go ahead and get it done.  I don't need to be walking around San Antonio spreading the Omnicron or whatever I might have.  But, this is also the time of year for colds and flu. 

I have no fever. My sense of smell and taste are intact.  I can deal with a coughing cold on a vacation as long as I have some drugs to deal with the coughing.  Which I already have but will need more of.  But if I have Covid, I won't knowingly go around spreading it everywhere. The trip would have to be canceled and my work would make me stay home for 10 days, at least.  Oh, I also have steriods left over from last coughing cold. Those usually work pretty well, tho on the last thing I had, which I believe was Covid, it didn't work that well. And that was a shot in the butt type of steriods, not the pills I have.  If a shot doesn't work, foregone conclusion pills won't either.  

This Covid stuff is pretty strange.  Regardless, if it is just a chest cold, I will need some strong enough medicine to stop the coughing, because nowadays? If you're out in public coughing? People give you some pretty strange looks.  Like - HE MUST HAVE COVID!!! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!! Lmao

Just go into your local Walmart or supermarket with a cough and look around while you're coughing. You ARE going to get some people giving you some pretty interesting looks, lol.  

Well, the property is in a holding pattern right now until the cleared trees are gone.  I'm not moving forward with anything until that is done and over with and the get the dozer out there and blade the soil and then, see if we need to do some leveling, which I believe we will and wasn't included in the price.  I never-the-less want it at least somewhat level, not too much incline.  A little is okay.  It's probably going to cost far more than I anticipated and I'm just going to have to deal with it.  But I still think the best thing is to simply dig out a pond and there is all the soil they will need.  Kill 2 birds with one stone and keep costs down as much as possible.  

However, my LLC is up and going.  I can now open a checking account in the business name and do other legal stuff that I couldn't do before getting this business status.  It's a good thing I'm still working a full time job, this "small" stuff adds up.  $500 here, $1,000 there. None of it coming out of the funds I have set aside for the park, I'm paying out of my paychecks for these things that aren't too terribly expensive.  Still plenty of decisions that will have to be made, it's on step at a time. I have a solid idea of what my end decisions will be on important things, but, my mind is open and I still look for input, especially from park owners and managers that have been there, done that and understand what works and what doesn't.  

I think I'm going to start a fund and save for the coin op or credit carp op laundry machines.  Those will probably be a bit pricey and I'd like to not have to pay for that out of the park funds. Just do it out of paychecks.  This is the one of the main reasons I knew I'd have to keep working, even after the park is up and running. 

It's near my bedtime and I'm getting sleepy, getting up 4:45 am and driving all day today. Time to go to sleep.

G'nite. 

 8 nights from now, we'll be headed to San Antonio for a nice little mini-vacation.  No kids, no trucks and I'm not driving.  Should be fun.  

Tomorrow, I'll be home from this Oklahoma trip and wil be going over to the property again to check to see if they are doing anything.  I suspect they won't be, they were waiting for it to rain to lift the burn ban.  Well, it's raining where I'm at and it's definitely going to be raining in my town, if not already.  

Yes, it would be rather difficult to do the dirt work with those giant piles of trees sitting all over the place.  That stuff has to go.  It would be at least 15 truck loads if not many more to haul it off, I ain't paying for that. Mother Nature and fire can get rid of it and that's that.  I suppose the wood will be too wet to burn tomorrow.  They aren't asking me to do it, they will do it, I just want to lol. I like fire and big bon fires are fine. GIANT bon fires even more fun. SEVERAL giant bon fires and the entire community is going to be calling the fire department. Hence the reason you call them first and tell them what you're doing, so that when the calls come pouring in, they can simply tell them it's a controlled burn.

I don't always carry my firearm out of the vehicle with me when I'm over there, but from now on? Oh yes.  That next door neighbor dog came running over to my property yesterday morning, growling, hissing, barking, snarling it's teeth at me, very aggressive stance.  I was lucky my dogs were in the vehicle, foregone conclusion that the dog would have attacked my dogs. I'm not actually that much concerned about Addler - he can take care of himself - easily. He's much larger than that dog, he is very agile and he has muscles protruding on his legs, but, chest, everything.  He has had his share of run ins with other dogs.  

But I don't want to go there.  I would rather the owners deal with their dog and if they don't and if it does attack me or my dogs, I'm going to shoot the thing and be done with it.  That may sound cold, but you weren't standing out there yesterday, unexpectedly having an encounter with this beast.  He's not a small dog, he also has rippling muscles all over his body, tho I'm still confident Addler could defend himself and Aspyn is a scrapper, she would be all over that thing as well. She might have some serious flaws, but not protecting the pack isn't one of them.  

So, I guess I'm going to have to contact the county about taking the giant, dead, rotting tree down.  Supposedly it's on the county easement and if that's true, then yes, they need to come deal with it before it falls over the street and potentially hurts or kills someone.  

I've heard nothing about the LLC, I have no idea how long Texas takes to issue that stuff. I'd like to get it done with so I can go open a bank account in it's name and transfer most of the money over to that account.  

I must be having delusions of grandeur.  I keep thinking about the expansions I would like to do with the place over time - and I am nowhere near even opening the place yet.  Some rental cabins, glamping tents, all kinds of things. Turn the entire property into a money making venue, not just the front 7-1/2 acres.  

But right now? I want the surveyor out there to definitively paint a line up the side of that house next door as to where the property line is and then I want to get a person in there to put up a barbed wire fence.  That guy tears up the front of the driveway every time he backs that truck into it.  Their property is a mess.  The house is old and needs a lot of work, the garage looks like it's about to cave in.  But the dog yesterday crossed my line.  

I'd do a better fence but barbed wire is cheap and it sets the boundary, which is all I want to do for now.  From the street all the way back to where the trees start - and the barbed wire fence starts for the property behind that house. There are several properties on that side that border mine, but they appear to all be owned by the same person. Said person lives in a ritzy neighborhood south of For Worth.  He has done nothing with the 2 properties that abut mine and it would be interesting to see if, some day, he'd be interested in selling them. He has no interest in using them and that house - he doesn't maintain at all.  

Anyway, that truck being parked there is starting to bother me.  It's an eyesore. He parks it right at the driveway entrance or close to it, right where campers would be pulling in.  This is junk that people don't necessarily want to see coming off the road to park for the night or several days.  Or however long, really.  

I was reading a post by a man on one of the RV park owner sites who said that "rv campgrounds are not retirement plans! You'll have to work hard and harder than any job you've ever had to do!".  Ohh? I don't know what kind of jobs he has had, but trucking can eat up to 16 hours in any given day.  I was at 12-1/2 today.  Yeah, no fam, that campground would be a piece of cake compared to the ridiculous nonsense I have to put up with now. 

He then went off on to how you aren't going to get rich!  Yea, I don't plan on getting rich off of one park, I plan on paying my bills and being able to save money and have a decent lifestyle, pretty much like I have now but without the trucking junk involved with it.  I can see how you could get rich if you started buying up parks or building more.  I really do want to build a parking lot place for overnighters.  Very few amenities, just a place along the Interstate.  But I'd also like to do something like that for truck parking.  No amenities besides maybe some port-a-jons, just pay your fee and stay up to 24 hours.  

I can see it's going to take months to get this contractor's part of it done over with.  I expected that. Just a slower pace than I'd like to get this stuff done with and I'd like to get the money spent and out of my account.  

Whatever the case, I'm getting sleepy. Time for bed.  2 hours to the yard tomorrow morning and then back home.  And from what I saw on the group text today, we've slowed down again.  Okay, it's more like they have again acquired more drivers than they need.  So it may be that there is a day off between runs again.  I dunno, but I have chest congestion sinking into my lungs and not feeling all that great. I'll be happy to get this run over with and get home tomorrow.

 So I was going to buy a new phone today.  My phone's camera is total garbage.  But, I wasn't going to get sucked into another "deal" like what happened last time and I got reamed in the end.  So we sat at Verizon wireless and he did his math, went to the back room and then came back saying I'd get the $300 discount "after you give your phone today".  Yeah, no, that's not going to happen. 

The really strange part is that they wouldn't - or said they couldn't - take full payment for the phone instead of this monthly payment garbage.  I just said thanks for your time, no thanks for the offer.

I'll buy one off of Amazon or Ebay before I fall for this sucker deal.  Really tired of the scams these phone companies play with people. It's just suck you out of as much money as they possibly can. They didn't offer another deal as I got up and walked out of there.  And I didn't care. Yes, I want a newer phone with better video capabilities, but no thanks, I'm not going to get into elongated payments.  

I also asked after he told me no, they can't accept full payment for the phone that if I decided to pay it off after 30 days, they would still revoke the $300 credit.  The whole thing just reeked of scam, I couldn't get out of there fast enough as this information came rolling out of this guy's mouth, who couldn't convince me as hard as he tried to take the deal.  They could give a counter-offer- but none was given.  So, I am guessing I will have to switch back to ATT for a new customer deal that usually far exceeds any existing customer offers. 

Over to the property early this morning.  Kids talking in the living room woke me up.  What can I say, I"m a light sleeper.  It was pretty much all done as far as the big trees go.  There's a couple more I want out of there - the tops had been broken off and useless to me.  No big deal, it was trees I wanted saved, but not damaged.  The dude got a couple of pine trees nicked on the trunks, one especially bad, that was disappointing.  He could have nicked any of those other trees I wanted to save and I wouldn't have cared, but the pine trees kind of got to me a little.  

I'll be calling out a tree expert to see if they can be saved. 20 years worth of growth isn't replaced overnight with a sap.  In fact, I want someone to inspect all of the trees and determine if anymore of it should come down.  But it was amazing to be able to see the entire quarter mile plus of the property from front to end. Giant piles of plucked forestry, that stuff needs .

I did hear back from the contractor - it usually takes hours at least before you get any kind of reply from him. It's just the way it is with him, it's no better with any of the other contractors in these parts.  But they are planning on burning the tree piles and doing dirt work.  Dirt work would be a dozer blading off the entire thing, getting the rest of the small stuff up that the trackhoe didn't get and smoothing it out.  After that I can put stakes in the ground and run strings from one side to the other and see if it's even close to level.  

I can also run 10 foot strings between stakes and see what the drop is. If it's an inch or less, it's fine. Over an inch and you need to get some dirt.  Optimally I would have a surveyor come out, but I don't want to spend the money on it, at least not yet.  It's a simple enough thing to find out if it's level or how far out it is. What a surveyor can do, tho, is put stakes in all over the place that show how much it needs to go up - or down - to level;. It's just that you pay them hundreds of dollars per hour for that. I'll try my method first and see how it looks.  

The point is that I don't have unlimited, deep pockets for this project.  I need to keep costs down where it's okay to keep them down and spend the money where I need to spend the money.  

Anyway, it's starting to get late - my version of it lol. I've got a run to Oklahoma tomorrow which is perfect, I can be back on Thursday morning and maybe get a 2 day run that would have me back Saturday night.  I just want to be around because something finally got done and perhaps, if I'm lucky, they'll drop a dozer over there and start doing that work as well.  It's a bit perplexing why I can't get him to give me a quote on a pond.  I've tried 3 times now.  I dunno, but I'm not getting pushy with him, he's got all the cards, I just have the money.  

 I had to reconvince myself of the Sweetgum trees after hearing more ridicule of them. Look up pics of them, they aren't bad looking trees!  Yes they drop these things, the same as the oak trees in our back yard do. I'm not leaving up thousands of them, just some here and there.  Something to give the look of trees over nothing.

Yes, there are tall trees on either perimeter of the intended RV park but that wasn't good enough for me and frankly, The few trees I'm leaving up IN the park aren't either. It was just too hard to try to calculate where the trees would need to be left up.  I will plant pines in the future.  

Well actually there is a long list of evergreens that grow well out in these parts, there will be a mix of them.  

_________________

Started this one before I left for Brownsville.  I actually should still be down there, but the driver that left before me yesterday didn't make it down there until today, for unknown reasons.  I would have liked the detention pay, frankly, but it's whatever.  I will guess the other driver had some sort of mechanical or breakdown issue.  They don't want or like us taking more than the same day you get the trailer loaded to get down there.  There has to be a legitimate reason so I'll give the dude a pass on that one.  

I have tomorrow off - I didn't ask for it but I don't have enough hours to go on any trip anywhere.  

I'm guessing the property is done as far as trees go.  Tho I might have something to say about it, it was dark when I got back today. No way to see if everything is done that I want done involving the trees.  There are lots of sticks sticking up out of the ground, things that trackhoe couldn't get out.  I'm assuming they are going to bring a dozer to finish the job.  I haven't heard from the owner of the company about anything yet, so I will wait.  I'm paying a premium to have that land cleared, I want it cleared before the check is written.  I also want a dozer to smooth out the surface and give me some idea whether I need to have any leveling going on.  

But I want it level, or pretty close to it.  I don't need people complaining on the internet that the lots aren't level.  They think it's too much to push a button, apparently, for automatic levelers to do the job for them.  Okay, there are older rigs where you have to get out and use a lug wrench to extend the jacks.  Whatever, I've had RV's, I know the struggle, I never complained about it all over social media.  I just leveled the thing, got it over with and enjoyed my stay.  

I'm not going to worry about it if it's close, but if it's too far off then dirt is going to need to be hauled in and I know just where to get that dirt: the rear of the property and digging a pond.  How much is this going to cost? I have no idea.  Hauling dirt in isn't part of the land clearing.  It might be another 20 grand for all I know.  I'm prepared to take out another loan near the end of this, if need be, to finish everything.  Well when I say 20 grand, I mean digging out a pond and moving the dirt, not just bringing dirt in.  

That much money isn't part of my plan.  But doing the vital parts of the project half-@$$ed would be foolishness in my view.  Sure, I can put up a temporary laundry room and office type thing, but the lots? Those are permanent.  And if they are at some extreme angle, people simply won't want to come. They will write their rancid reviews and if you build it, they won't come.  

Tomorrow morning, I'll load the dogs in the SUV and head over there.  Dogs can run all over the place and I can inspect what's been done.  After that, I have a new desk that needs to be put together.  That was an 8 day fiasco trying to get the thing delivered here....I want to get the thing out of the boxes and make sure nothing is damaged.  

And tonight I booked the hotel for our San Antonio trip.  I spent a good deal of time looking for a hotel that has an indoor pool - we like pools but it's a bit cool to be swimming outdoors even if it's a heated pool.  We also like to hang out next to the pool and have a good time.  Indoor pools aren't that many in San Antonio on the riverwalk, at least not that I found. There are some, but the other criteria was to have a room with a bedroom and a sofa couch.  That way we don't have to get 2 rooms, save money.  

There might be more, but I found 3 places of interest. The Marriott Rivercenter, the Drury Inn and a Home2 Suites by Hilton.  The Home2 suites look - tacky to my anyway, don't like the whole ambience of the rooms or the rest of the hotel. It was a draw between Drury and Marriott. But, I'm a big fan of Marriott's, never been to a Drury and the Marriott has a half inside and half outside pool. Yes, believe it.  It's one big pool that goes underneath the window wall that separates it.  This was of great appeal to Taylor and I thought it nice as well.

So, this morning, I tried to reserve one of the rooms that has the separate bedroom and living room with sofa couch.  Yea, no.  Several sites including the Marriott site itself didn't have any available, whereas they did a few days ago.  I wasn't trying to procrastinate, it was just a tough decision to try and figure out where to stay and hopefully end up with something beyond decent, something nice. I don't get vacations often and spending a bit of money on it isn't of great concern to me, at least not in my current situation. 

So I got home tonight and sat down at the computer and started looking. It's a fact that different booking hotels buy up X amount of rooms. If one booking site doesn't have any, it doesn't mean another won't.  And so it was, Booking.com had one and I jumped on that immediately.  Paid for it with my Bank Of America credit card - I am going to use my accumulated points to pay for part of it.  Around $600 worth of it. We're 3 nights there, it's not exactly cheap and the taxes are unbelievable.  Over $200 just in room taxes?!!All of these major cities add on exorbitant hotel taxes. You're paying for their pet projects.

But whatever, that is nothing new, just that amount was a bit breathtaking.  The 24th-27th, something I'm looking forward to.  

Anyway....I put the desk purchase on a credit card I haven't really been using.  That charged the account a few days ago and then yesterday? My credit score on TransUnion took a 72 point hit. I was like, what?  Why?  I have no clue. I could have put it on another card and nothing like that would have happened.  I don't understand that, at all, I'll just pay the thing back down and see what happens. But what was perplexing is that it was only a few days between putting the charge on the card and the extreme hit.  We're not even close to the end of the month?  

And my new mortgage account hit s well, 10 points tho, not 72.  My old mortgage holder has yet to post that it's paid off.  Maybe that's it, I have far too much credit showing on my accounts because - Midland Mortgage - won't post it paid off for 2 months.  Yes, that has to be it.  I think? lol

What else is going on.  School reunion in May.  Flight, hotel, whatever.  Obviously if I'm going back for whatever reason, I'm going to see friends and family.  Just thoughts floating through my mind.  Wondering where I'll be at with this park project.  Many of us from that school graduation year are already deceased.  I've watched them through the years dying of cancer, murder, car accidents.  I feel rather blessed that I've actually made it this far considering they life I've lead. 

I'm motivated. That's what it is.  To get out of this trucking grind. I find it more and more distasteful as time goes on.  Long, long days and now these cameras that scrutinize your every driving move. Yes, the inward facing camera isn't a factor, but the one facing outward - is.  When someone cuts you off - which is 25/50/100/more times per day, it sends  notification to the company.  Or if you're approaching a green light and it turns yellow - at a point where you won't be stopped in time so you blow the red light or you slam on your brakes and still end up in the middle of the intersection. You get dinged either way.  

I figure the company is going to dump a lot of drivers - even tho they can't afford to get rid of any of them - that's the way this company works.  I'll probably be one of them because I don't give a damn about that thing telling me how to drive.  It doesn't take a LOT of things into consideration which I don't feel like going into here.  Maybe a future post, not this one, it's getting late and I feel blessed that I got the room we wanted done today and we are good to go. A family friend is going to come over and take of the dogs, the boys are also going to be taken care of, we are good to go.   

 I'm totally psyched tho. Not about the vacation, that is going to be good, I'm sure, but no, it's about the property.  It's in the beginning stages, yes, but it has begun.  It might take time, sure, but it's actually started.  And I have the LLC application into the state, the fees all paid.  I just wish I could translate all of this excitement to get this project over and done with into driving the truck and making the money I need to make to cover these smaller expenses without digging into savings.  

It's a thing that truckers understand because we live it.  It's not that we're special, it's just that we are sick of the endless bs thrown at us.  And now, they have made it even more difficult for people to get into the profession. The government must be begging for the new era of self-driving trucks.  Besides highway safety, there will be whole new chains of bureaucracy and politicians and states wanting their piece of the pie.  But they want to get rid of human drivers, that's a fact.  There are always unintended consequences to such broad sweeping reforms, I can predict a few of them but there will be stuff no one saw that will occur and leave these idiots running the show scratching their heads.  

Whatever the case, it's bedtime.  

Up early - 4:00 AM - got out of Brownsville and headed up.  Day kind of dragged on, I wanted to see if they had actually gotten out there and what they had gotten done.  When I arrived at the yard, I figured my manager would have some "words" for me about my driving.  It's impossible ot drive a tractor trailer rig, going 68 mph on highways that are posted at 70 and 75 to not have cars and trucks cutting you off all day long and having this artificial intelligence garbage "tattle-taling" on me.  I can't control other drivers. 

I'm "supposed" to slow down when they cut me off like that, but for what purpose? They are going way faster than me, they may leave little space between vehicles but it doesn't last and they are down the highway.  I did have one guy in Houston who apparently didn't like the lane I was in come zipping around me and brake checking me.  I am pretty sure most people know nothing about these "dash cams" that are more like robotic drivers. I may not like them, but they aren't real good for people playing games in traffic, either.  

After brake-checking me, he put his arm out the window, pointed to me to pull over and then flipped me off.  He then brake-checked me again and then I simply started pointing at the camera.  Note there was very little traffic on the Beltway, like hardly any at all. I wasn't holding up any traffic, at all.  I don't bow to the will of other drivers.  They can call my company and complain if they like, I don't care.  I do care about safety and do not  like going back and forth in lanes on busy freeways with the type of material I'm hauling. Well I don't like doing it whatever I'm hauling.  

Anyway, my manager said nothing about my driving, instead he started talking about his upcoming vacation - starting tomorrow- and how drunk he was going to get. He is going with friends to some destination and he is buying himself a bottle of some high end whiskey that I had never heard of before and the name now escapes me.  Have fun! 

Off and out of the yard - after dropping the trailer and hooking up to another one that I will be taking up to Oklahoma tomorrow - I boogied over to the property.  It was a pleasant view to see a swath of trees that had been uprooted and laying over.  I looked far down there - the giant trackhoe was piling trees up onto a giant pile.  I mean, this pile is 20 feet tall and at least 15 feet wide if not 20.  I marveled at the site of it.  I was glad I had left up some trees along the driveway, now seeing how it actually looks.  They may be Sweetgum trees - people laugh around these parts I can tell ya, the guy operating the trackhoe thought it was funny as well - but this is old growth. I can plant pines and wait until - after I'm passed on - for them to be big enough to actually provide shade and beauty.  

I guess one could pay to have larger trees planted - at quite the premium.  I got back in the SUV and drove down the driveway looking at the progress.  I kind of kicked myself for not leaving some trees at the back in the middle.  There are trees around the perimeter but I didn't know how I was going to set everything up so I just had them take out everything.  It's okay tho, there are plenty of trees around. 

The back portion was almost done.  He didn't do the very rear where I had changed my mind, I think I had originally told the company owner I didn't want that stuff taken down, so this guy - didn't. Kudos for following instructions, but my desires have changed and I want that stuff down. It's not that much and the underbrush stuff I wanted to use as a natural barrier to blocking the view of the gas well stuff - is quite ugly.  There are some trees that can stay up but most of it needs to come on down, please.  

I have pics posted on Facebook.  He said he thinks he can finish on Monday.  Well good, I thought, I am doing Oklahoma tomorrow, back early Saturday I can go out there and check what's been done and see if there's anything I missed that I would rather have down before he is done and the opportunity -and the money along with it - vanishes.  Oh, he isn't working the weekend.  

The only thing I really wasn't happy about is he had nicked some of the trees I want up, including a couple of mature pines.  I'm going to have to look up online and see if I can fix them somehow or if they are eventually doomed.  I'm not going to get mad at them, all of the trees I want up are surrounded by trees I want - down.  It appears there are methods to save the tree, I will check into that soon enough. Tho I did see one method where you simply put the bark back on and duct tape it.  I don't think it was a troll post, lol.  

Anyway, this old guy was going on about these trees.  I asked him about removing the roots, if they don't come out, can these trees grow back? Yes, he replied and then compared them to giant weeds.  Anything left in the ground can regrow. I thought that after seeing new growth on a tree that I had stripped down to the ground. There were several new branches growing out of it.  Yup, just like a weed.  He gave me instructions on how to get the Sweetgums I am leaving up to branch out and have a fuller look to them. Yes, well these trees were all densely packed together and had nothing but the tops - canopies - able to get any of the precious sunlight or even room to grow branches.  This was a thick, dense forest of mostly small trees.  

But the roots are what led me to the conclusion that I had to pay someone to go out there and do the job, versus trying to use that little Bobcat. It had a heck of a time trying to get the roots out.  That giant trackhoe has no problem pulling the entire mess out of the ground.  

This project on this contractor's end is probably going to drag out for a while. They are busier than I even knew and they have crews - but there are spread out and working all over the place.  The best I can do is just keep texting the dude. This guy said he can't even call the owner, he doesn't answer even for his own employees.  I get it, the dude is busy. He is out looking for new work as well as overseeing current projects. I don't know if he's spreading himself too thin. I just know I will have to keep after him to keep things moving along.  

I don't expect this project to be finished by summer. When I say that, I mean everything in place, not just utilities and the things this company is going to do.  But I can see that getting the septic installed and the electric is going to take a while. I may have gotten a bit ahead of myself on water tap installation and electric - but  hey - it's done and it's there.  They aren't charging me anything extra for that power pole installation, it's just there.  I told them what I intend on doing, I guess they expect to make a good profit off of it, win-win.  

I can remain hopeful of a summer opening, of course.  But I'm not going to have a meltdown if it doesn't happen.  I've watched parks being built taking a few years to go up.  And I want things done right, I don't want half-@$$ed anything that is permanent in nature.  But, I can have shed style laundry room, I  no longer see a problem with that since it is temporary, serves the purpose and if someone doesn't like it, oh well. Bathhouse the same. Cabin shed setup at best.  A permanent shower setup will be a cabin appearance, as well as a laundry room. I have lots of plans for the property. Plans are more than goals in my view. They are things that will be done at some point or another.  Not, might be done if I can.  

The money is out there. I just don't want any substantial loans right now.  Let's just get done what I can with what I have - or if I have to get a small personal loan to finish things off, that's fine as well.  But I won't be in a debt-hole to start off with.  Land payment, sure, already paying that. A little more for my house payment in Phoenix, okay.  Anything more than that? Sparingly, like, exactly what I need and no more and make sacrifices if necessary.  

Oh, I spent the entire day at the yard in Brownsville yesterday.  They only brought in one empty at around 11:00 am and the other driver got that one.  I thought another was coming right after - but it didn't show up until around 8:00 pm last night. I did get my LLC application started and paid for.  These are all the steps along the way.  It might take a minute for all of that to get done.  I'm not having power or water turned on until I'm informed they need it to do the install. Cause', after that, there are monthly fees regardless of whether you are using the utility or not.  

I also got approval for a vacation from dispatch for the end of this month. We want to go to the Riverwalk in San Antonio.  I have tens of thousands of points on my credit cards and after consideration, found one property that we want because it has an indoor pool, is close to the river walk and has a separate bedroom and living room.  I just can't sleep in the same room with other people if those other people snore.  It's not a judgment, lol, it just keeps me awake.  I snore, everyone in this house snores. Even the 7 year old snores - not very loud but it's there.    It is what it is, but my sleeping environment has to be "perfect" or sleep just doesn't happen.  Having a separate room should eliminate that problem.  

If I have to be honest about this, my own snoring has awakened me.  Lol.  

Well, it's a quarter of 9, not terribly late and I have a 9:00 am load appointment, but I think this old man is going to crawl into bed, watch a bit of tv and go to sleep.

 By far the worst I've ever seen this yard.  Brownsville, Texas drop yard that is. It has been raining so much down here that the yard is nothing but a giant mud pit.  There are barricades up in the back portion where you have to go to turn around, it's that bad.  Many of the parking spots back there are just feet deep worth of mud, nothing you would want to back a semi trailer into and get that mud all caked up in and around everything under the tandems.  

It was definitely the first time I had ever seen barricades in the middle of the yard, unbelievable. These people need to fix this permanently by paving the entire yard.  They already tried putting gravel down, it worked for a while - but now this. It was dark or I would have taken some pics of that nonsense, maybe tomorrow morning when I have to go back over there to wait.  

Very unwanted situation also hit me when I entered the yard and there were no empties there> I say there because that yard is so horrible I came up to the truck stop to spend the night.  I wanted an empty there this time so I could hook to it and be out of there first thing in the morning after required 10 hour break. Yes I like detention pay money but sometimes going home is better.  

I want to see if they actually started today and see how much they got done.  I would have gotten back to the yard by around 3:30 pm and hoofed it over to the property by 4:10 and see what they have gotten done.  I don't suspect it's going to take them too long to clear that stuff out of there with that giant machine and if they have an experienced operator at the helm.  

And I'd like to get those lots officially marked out for them to start the project of installing the utilities including the septic system.  Well, the septic system is subject to the State of Texas whims and run through the county fire department.  That probably doesn't happen overnight, they have to get permit to do anything and undoubtedly the fire marshall or someone from that department has to come out and inspect the proposed location of the vaults.  

Well, it's getting late. I was looking at resort style hotels in San Antonio. We still want to vacation at the River Walk.  Just that James work was screwing with him and playing games with his hours and they thought he'd have to find another job.  The hours are apparently back on track tho I have no idea how long that is going to last, I had put off vacation until they figured out his job situation. If he was going to change jobs, he wouldn't be able to get off.  As it stands, he has 4 day work week so we are planning a 3 night stay.

Just trying to find a very nice hotel that has a nice indoor pool that is also close to the River Walk that also has one room with a separate bedroom and a sofa bed. No sense in paying for 2 rooms if we don't have to.  I don't know, but I think I found a hotel that has all of that, I need to call the hotel and make sure what I'm seeing is actually what is reality. 

Yawn, tired, g'nite.  

This guy really doesn't communicate too much lol.  I went over to the property today - and it was a really beautiful day, took the dogs with me - to see if they had shown up yet to start this project.  

No one there.  Drove to the back and walked to the west side, to the rear of the place.  There is a nice stand of pine trees over there. There are stands of them in various places but this one I really like.  But that area isn't for me.  It's where I want to put some tent camping sites.  But this time, I was really honing in on how I could get people back there without even using the easement up the hill.

I'd rather not use it because it's a very good drop off there.  Would be a very steep drive for anyone to drive their vehicle back in there.  I don't really envision cars driving back there even on a better road setup, it's got to be pickups only. 

Anyway, I want to start with two of them back there and another one further up, sort of off to the side of the gas well operation, but in another stand of pine trees.  I plan on making a trip to the local state park at Caddo Lake to see what they offer for tent sites.  What I mean is, what do they do for the tents? Just an open area? Some kind of platform?  Like if it rains and water is running through, something that elevates them off the ground? 

I never tent camped like that but I'm taking it campsites put some sort of platform in and some of them put in sand pits.  These will be primitive sites. There will be nothing offered beyond a campfire pit, a picnic table and a place to park the vehicle beyond the tent site.  It's a very beautiful, serene, peaceful area.  

Addler was so happy to be back there that he was tromping around all over the place, making all kinds of noise. I had to call both dogs over and make them sit and be still.  I wanted to hear whatever sounds there were to hear.  Nothing but nature, I was hoping.  The breeze flowing through the trees. This is exactly what my version of tent camping is.  

The property is a real gem and the price tag on it was even better.  My overlooking it at the get go was only because I found places I thought were better.  Well, one of them I still really wish I could have gotten, but I see now that what I have is much better. Much more land, city water, internet is right there, close to the city yet definitely not the city feel at all.

I  tracked what I thought would be a good road to build into that area back to where the well site is and then, found a much better approach to driving back there than anything I had seen before.  I mean, it has to be cleared but it's not that much that has to be moved out of the way.  I plan on spending some time with this contractor back there and showing him what I want done in terms of trails, a road, leveling some camp sites.  I expect at least 5 grand more added to the price tag.  So beit.  These are must haves in my view.

Back to the vehicle, but I was looking at the other above ground pipe setup.  They just repainted all of it.  They don't ask permission, lol, that's all their stuff, I just see it after the fact.  They also completely cleared out the corner that was overgrown the last time I saw it - which was not too long ago.  See, I like them taking care of that stuff. Less for me to do or pay someone else to do.  

Stopped again and listened to the sounds.  The cattle rancher was out there so the cows were howling, that's what I call it anyway. It's beyond mooing, they start making a lot of loud noises when someone they know comes along and they figure they're bringing them food.  That didn't last long.

The only real, annoying noise is the train.  Most trains fly through the tracks, you hear them a couple of minutes at most and that's that.  This trains?  It honks every couple of seconds.  2 short blasts.  Wouldn't be a big deal but it must be traveling really slow because you can hear it for 15 minutes.  I've heard it a couple of times out there and today was one of those times.  It just went on for so long.  

Still, the noise people must be hearing at all of these sites right next to Interstates and major highways is constant and loud.  So a bit of annoyance here and there? I'm not going to worry about it.  The only way to get out of all of the noises altogether is to go well out of town and well off the beaten trail and then? Good luck getting people out there unless it's its own destination spot that has plenty of stuff to do.  

Well, off to make a donation.  A person's mobile home burned down yesterday and they needed help and were asking for donations. I remembered when my house burned down and all the help I got.  I had to do something.  The post was just asking for stuff, I just wanted to give money. Yes, they will need other stuff - there were pictures of the house while it was burning down form the local fire department, total loss.  So I went to the bank and yes, they had an official account set up for it.  

Dollar General, Kroger's, an oil change place and then Chili's later, I texted the contractor.  When is the start up date?  I need to know.  I need a date.  I mean, yes, if weather is bad such as it has been I can see it. But give me a date so I have something to latch onto, not these endless generalities.  It took a while to get an answer.  Tomorrow.  Followed by "wanted to make sure it was dry". 

So, tomorrow, they are going to be out there dealing with all of that stuff.  I will be heading down to Brownsville, unfortunately, I'd rather be home for the beginning of this.  But he understands my ribbons, that's pretty easy, the rest of the stuff comes out and they will put it in huge piles. It will dry out and eventually can burn it. That stuff can go down at the other end where I'm not going to be doing anything for a while with the land.  

The day of reckoning is coming.  I will have to make decisions.  My mind is all over the place.  If I have to sacrifice one thing for another - keeping costs down and trying to make money versus getting into a lot of debt - there are things I think I can compromise on, in my own mind if with no one else.  A simple barn shed that costs a few thousand dollars (or less) can work for laundry.  People want laundry.  I can see it.  They don't want to have to wait at a laundromat, they want to be able to just do it wherever they are staying.  

Perhaps the same setup for a single bathhouse if I can do nothing more.  Just a small shed thing with a full bathroom including shower in it.  

Or no bathhouse to start with and let's get this going.  In my mind, walking trails and a pond are more important. 

I'm going to wait on some of these decisions to see what I have left after the basic stuff is installed, paid for and over with.  Well, I guess just the price tag, whether it's done or not, so I can figure out what I have left over and what I can do without spending anything more than what I have left and leaving some working capital.  What I'm kind of not knowing right now is the cost of the driveways and the pads.  I'm guessing another 20 - 25 grand.  That's going to eat up a lot and I will still have wifi after all of that to install.  

Yes, I will take out another small, personal loan - if I absolutely have to - but right now, my thinking is to get whatever I can get going - going. Save up as much of the income as possible and expand.  After everything is all said and done - whether I get a pool loan or not is unknown at this point, no decision on that yet - the next priority will be to double the number of sites.

I'm not feeble minded, I'm just trying to figure out what I really should have based on the information I have before starting this endeavor up..  14 sites won't be much, but if I can fill them up it will be more than enough.  People will come - I think - if the right amenities are in place.  WiFi is one of the highest if not the highest priorities and I want that to be right regardless of start up expense.  If you have good WiFi, you will get the reviews to back it up.  If you have bad WiFi, you will get those kinds of reviews to cast a pall over your operation.  It's really that important to many of the people that come into those places.

It's rather perplexing to me, because if I were full time RV'ing, I would just have what I have now as a truck driver: unlimited Verizon with unlimited Hotspot.  I wouldn't rely on the campsite for it.  But if there is one complaint that stands out above all the rest of it, its the idea of a campground having bad wifi.  And even worse, if  a campground claims on their website they have good wifi - but you get there and it sucks. 

Okay, I have an early rise tomorrow.  My mind is refilled with thoughts again now that the construction is finally going to begin.  This has been a long road and it's not even half over yet.

 Trip to Oklahoma yesterday? Mixed bad

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

 It dawned on me that they will probably start this project on Monday.  So, if on Sunday I get an early enough start - which I will - I should be able to make it a day trip.  That's because the trailer is already loaded and I won't have to drive to the plant  and in the plant, wasting around 32 minutes of drive time while doing so.  

The roads should be fine by then, they have already cleared up quite a lot since I checked earlier today, looking at GPS and most of the red line stuff is gone.  Getting it done will have me home on Monday unless of course this rather - edgy - dispatcher is looking to get me on the road again.  She claims she is short-handed, we'll see if that rubber actually meets the road.  i don't need to be there for them to start the operation, not at all.  The trees are plainly marked that I want to keep up with bright pink ribbon.  

I went over to the property today to drop off the contract and tried to open the gate lock but the wheels you turn to align the numbers were frozen. I stopped smoking cigars a while back so I didn't have a cigar torch with me, just ended up leaving. It was cold out, I just wanted to see if they had taken any equipment to the back, the owner of the company had asked for the code a few days ago.  

The 7 year old was with me, he wanted to go as long as he could bring his new Nintendo Switch, lol.  We ended up at Applebee's eating lunch and then home for the rest of the day, watching some Disney flick this evening, - the entire family - a movie called Encanto.  James and Taylor went to the local movie house for movie style popcorn, they already had the movie. Anyway, I don't often watch Disney cartoon style movies anymore but this one was entertaining.  

I did by some more crypto currency today.  $100 worth this time.  I'm sort of dipping my toes into these waters and trying to figure out how it works.  I have 6 of them now and they move up and down.  If you could figure out when it's going to move up and buy before it does that, well, like day trading on the stock market seems to me.  I'm going to dabble in it for quite a while before I decide to dump, say, a grand into one of them and watch it on whatever day I would do it on and see if I can dump it at a higher price.  Still trying to figure out how this stuff works.  

I sort of feel like it's a younger generation's platform.  But I see nothing wrong with taking a gamble.  Right now I'm maybe $20 ahead of what I've spent. It was up higher but several of them dropped their value.  

Anyway, in an RV park buy/sell group I'm in, a person posted the results of a question he posed to get the pulse of RV'ers. ""If you could tell RV park and campground owners one thing... what would that be?" He posted pages and pages of answers on a PDF file. So, I decided to ask the same question in an RV Tips group I'm in. That's RV'ers, not RV managers and buyer's sellers The answers were predictable but I wanted to refresh my memory.

:Larger sites - when they say that they mean wider. So many pars are sardine can style. Good wifi. Rules that are enforced. Pool, laundry room, pull-through sites. Large dog park with grass. Lots of other stuff that I have seen over and over. Since this thing appears to be at a starting point, I want to get refocused. I've kind of gotten away from it because this has been dragging out for so long. I do drive by or to the property frequently. It's like, here it is, let's get this going.

I really just want to get this money spent on what it needs to go to. I figure I'll be down 50 grand pretty quick after they get this land clearing up, going and done.

Anyway, that's it, lol, g'nite.

 Finally.

Well, first the work situation today.

I knew it was going to be bad up in Oklahoma, but I didn't know how bad.  The forecast continued to change over night until the point it seemed and untenable undertaking.  But, I showed up at the yard, hooked up the truck, went to the plant and that's - where all the trouble started. 

Not with the plant, but with my dispatcher.  She called me and said that another driver who left for the plant up in Oklahoma yesterday was stuck at a truck stop. I was all gung ho, let's go, come what may.  Then the driver sent her a pic of a snow covered road and commented that no one is moving. There were no tracks in the snow and I couldn't tell if it was iced over, but if this driver said he was stuck, he's stuck.  

This led to me reminding her I have Saturday off and her saying I said "if possible", my replying you said I could after I had asked and then her telling me that she didn't have anyone to replace me.  Well who is going to drive up there? They're going to get 170 miles out and then what?  Sit like the other driver is? What sense does that make?

Back and forth until I just contacted my manager - if anyone will save my day off, it will be him.  

Then the dispatcher called me and told me I am calling to tell you I don't appreciate you being rude, blah blah blah. I wasn't being rude, I was telling what she had told me and that there is no way anyone is going up to the plant today anyway, it's too dangerous.  My manager had told me that national guard had been called out and they were directing people off the highway.  

I then looked on GPS and that told the entire story. The entire span of the Indian Nation Turnpike had various hues of red - meaning stopped or very slow moving traffic.  No thanks. My manager then said something about the roads being bad through Saturday and he didn't have a problem with me taking the load on Sunday. I didn't ask for Sunday, I was just insisting on having my Saturday off.  I'm sorry they can't cover it, I rarely ask for time off and when I do, I want it off. 

What happens if I decide to go to the high school 40 year reunion in may, buy airplane tickets - or drive not sure which - and they tell me no?  Nah, fam, we aren't doing that.  

I dunno, but at the end of it, the dispatcher wasn't talking to me, my manager promised heartily that there wouldn't be any retribution, ie: my on the dispatcher's s*** list because I wanted the day off and that I could just take the load out on Sunday. He probably called up to the plant, told them situation and they just - what are they going to do?  If we can't get up there, there is nothing anyone can do, period.

So, I took the loaded trailer back to the yard, parked it, went into the manager's office. He wanted to show me what he can see on these new cameras - they believe the inward facing cameras aren't even turned on. I don't know, I don't trust them.  But, he showed me on 3 different incidents where - someone cut me off and were directly in front of me - "all they want to see is that when that happens, you hit the brakes or let off the fuel".  I tend to stay up on them so I can pass them since they cut me off and are going slower than me and if I back off, more care will cut me off leaving a net zero differnce.  

He then showed another driver who was riding a car's @$$ in front of him, I mean right up that car's @$$.  That was rather dangerous.  And then another where the light was turning red but he didn't hit the brakes, until the last second and then had a "sudden deceleration event" otherwise known as hard braking.  "He wasn't paying attention, I can tell ya that".  

It's exactly what I thought it would be.  

____________________

Friday morning.  Looking at GPS of the road up to Tulsa - unbelievable!  It's almost ALL red lines, including probably 85% of the Indian Nation Turnpike.  I-40 going through Tulsa area is nothing but solid red.  I would be stuck up there right now, sitting there scratching my head wondering why I agreed to take this load with these conditions?  Because we do not get paid for foul weather conditions where you are forced to sit somewhere and wait for the weather to pass. Now if that were true, I'd be happy to sit in it with full fuel tanks, a refrigerator full of food and enough water and coffee pods to make cups of hot coffee.  Yesterday, I had a refrigerator full of food, I thought about the idea that if I was going to get stuck somewhere, I wasn't going to starve.

Fortunately I went through the ordeal with the dispatcher to get out of it.  That other driver must still be stuck at that truck stop, or, he is going 3 mph or whatever for hundreds of miles.  I don't have to take the load up until Sunday and I'm going to leave early.  I don't have to load, the truck is loaded, if the roads are cleared by then I should be able to make it a day trip.  Well, unless there are no empties up there, I'm not sure what I'm going to run into in that department.  

My crypto experiment is interesting. I'm not doing it like I think these guys making the dough off of it are. I have 5 different versions of it and now I'm almost $50 ahead.  I'm rich!  But I can see how if you dump enough money in to any given currency and IF it goes up, you could make a ton of money in just a single day.  I'm not that brave, but I'll probably put a few hundred more into it and maybe start moving some of it around if it goes up substantially.  

As for today? Well I have to go to the property and drop off the letter I sent to apparently the wrong address that has the signed contract for the land clearing.  With the machinery I saw on my land yesterday, I can see them getting it done in days, definitely not weeks. That track hoe is huge, I'm happy they have equipment like that, this portion of it won't drag on forever.

However, I can easily predict they won't be out there today.  It snowed over night, the ground is probably hard and pulling out the trees will be - harder and maybe not get the roots out.  I want all of those tree roots out of the ground, I want nothing left to start growing again. I have already seen some of the trees I cut down to maybe a few inches out of the ground have shoots coming out of them. They are nothing but giant weeds.  I still insist on leaving some of them up, but not too many.  

Oh, it wasn't that much snow but it stuck and is still there.  

Ugh. I wanted to take the dogs for a walk but there is snow and it's below freezing.  I guess they might still want to go? Addler will freeze, lol.  

Done with this one, g'day. 

 A rare Illinois trip, over and done with, just short of 1,700 miles round trip.  I also dodged a bullet, severe winter weather is heading into Missouri and Illinois.   Another driver allegedly up there today, I don't envy him.  I was very glad when I got up to the plant that they got the thing unloaded and had me out of there in around 4 hours.  I've spent as much as 18 hours waiting at that particular plant.

No rhyme or reason why we got these runs, they only order them through trucks when the rail cars are showing up late and the chemical company that loads our trucks gave those contracts - the 2 Illinois plants - to the competitors out of spite for our company and the actions they took against the previous manager.  

I suppose it's a good thing for them that we don't just say no thanks, you didn't want us to do those loads at all, find someone else. Of course, there is noone else, save a company that has 2 trucks dedicated to that particular product but only haul back and forth to Houston area and another company that hauls it's own product for their company.  

Thinks are slowing down with drivers coming back into the rotation after being out for various reasons.  A good and bad thing for me I guess.  Means I'll likely be going back to having a day off in between runs.  I mean, I made excellent money last year in spite of that so I'm not going to complain.  I did ask for my birthday off which is on Saturday and the only thing I got back was "I'll try my best".  

That isn't good enough. If any of us asks for time off, it's either yes or no, not - gee, it might happen or it might not.  I won't have a cow if I don't get it off but anything important that I must have off? I'll just have to pass that through my manager who will get it done. 

So yes, I have tomorrow off and then they will only be able to give me a 2 day run before Saturday - if she gives me anything at all.  I'd prefer an Oklahoma run since 2 day trips to Brownsville are never guaranteed.  

Considering running for City Council election coming up in May. I have until the 17th of February to file the affidavit.  Why? because the town is run by a bunch of liberals, people who do not understand contracts and construction companies and have no sense of real priorities, such as the city's crumbling infrastructure.  Underground water mains and sewer lines are 50 plus years old. They continue to patch  the problems, the council doesn't even discuss a plan to replace the system.  They're building sidewalks while the roads are falling apart. Literally everyone complains about the streets but the city doesn't even discuss it.  

People bring rogue ideas for consideration - such as putting people into jail for having old, rotting houses on their properties.  They agreed with the state to reduce the speed limit on the Interstate going through town without even asking citizen' input.  The things that matter to citizens doesn't matter to them - at all.  They only meet twice a month and it doesn't cost me anything to file.  I won't be putting up posters or doing much of anything.  The other person in my district running is also a no-name person that no-one knows either.  

What is the city doing to encourage development of housing projects? Apparently nothing since you see none going up. You might see a single house going up here and there, the city's planning and development manager is a person that apparently isn't interested in seeing the city grow.  I've listened to the meetings on zoom while on the road, appalling.  If it's nothing more than filling in some forms and walaah, I"m going to do it.  I can participate Zoom - as they have been doing anyway since covid started. Some have finally come back to City Hall for the meetings, some are still doing Zoom calls.  It's basically a volunteer position, I don't think there's any money involved with it or if there is, it's certainly not enough to live off of.  

They have no vision and the city is paying for it.  There is a huge lack of rental housing and I don't know why developers don't want to come to the city to build housing.  There have been various business projects going up over the few years, the most notable is a new Chick-fil-a that's going up on the main highway - they are dumping some serious money into that thing.  But they keep building and there simply isn't enough population here to sustain it. They rely on highway 59 traffic passing through, but when Interstate 69 is all done, it will go around the city, not through it as it currently does and they will lose a lot of that business.  It needs a modern sports complex for famliies/kids.  I could go on and on......

I asked a while back if they even considered writing grant requests for the infrastructure and received no reply.  The state and the feds will give huge grants to replace water and sewer systems, not sure about roads and streets. Anyway, I intend on going to city hall and getting the application packet.  The worst that can happen is I don't get voted in.  Oh well, not the end of my life, but I have complained about a lot of this stuff, the only answer for me now is to simply do something about it.  I've done plenty of volunteer work in my life time - 5 years on the mission field and 10 years on a Little League board doing just about everything.  Not to mention church service, it's not like I am new to the world of volunteering or understanding how an organization works and what it takes to keep things running.  

But just keeping things running isn't good enough, you have to have a vision and have to want to see it through.  Anyway, the person that is leaving the council is being forced to because they have term limits here.  At this point, I am going to say that term limits would be a very good thing for Congress.....

Well that's enough of this.  I'm going to bed early.  

 There isn't much nice to be said about getting to the plant early - after being asked by plant personnel - and then having to wait an extended period of time for the other personnel in the scale house to actually do their jobs and get drivers out of there in a short amount of time.  Versus sitting on the scale both coming in and out for long periods of time just waiting for them to take the weight and save it and then going in and waiting with other drivers eternally, wasting the clock, wasting the day and generally wondering why am I still doing this job? Well I don't have any choice atm, is the easy answer.  There are plenty of jobs where I live, but they are either all low paying or it's skilled labor - for skills I don't have. 

The days drag on with this profession, some days I'm good, other days I'm not so good with it. Today was a "not so good with it" day.  It just dragged on until after 10:00 pm when I finally got to the Choctaw Travel Plaza - I believe this is Grant, Oklahoma - where I stop frequently for the night.  Just seemed like it took forever to get to the end of the day. It didn't help that a J B Hunt truck was going so slow on a 48 mile stretch of highway that is 2 lanes and only 1, real, passing lane.  There was a very long line of traffic stuck behind him - but when we got to this 4 lane stretch for passing, about a mile long, he suddenly was going something like 75 mph.  And then, back to 2 lanes? Yup.

Doing it on purpose.  

Whatever. 

I was looking at this sheds on both the Home Depot and the Lowe's sites today. It suddenly dawned on me that they sell them as well.  Their prices are much better but they simply don't have the right style.  I guess I don't necessarily care too much about style if affordability rules the roost, but so far I have only found them with barn doors.  I need a regular door on it, like the cabin sheds have.  

This is one I found on another site. It's 14X20, the pic is deceiving, makes it look much smaller. It's 12 grand plus $539 I think to build it if I don't want to build it myself (which I don't, simply don't have the time for it).  That is Wayfair site, which has a large selection of them. The drawback? Those doors.  I do like it tho, other than that and I'm sure the doors will work. It would be a combo small office/laundry/at least one shower/bathroom combo for men's and women's rooms.  

Certainly not sold on that one, still looking atm.  I'll be stopping by both Lowe's and Home Depot in Longview on the way home from work tomorrow - they are conveniently located next to each other lol.  Home Depot has a huge selection of them, but it's something I have only glanced at previously, nothing I took a good hard look at.  There is a place in Shreveport that has a huge selection, I think that was a Home Depot as well (I don't get to Shreveport much anymore since I quit the Ferguson job 4 plus years ago).  

Oh, an RV park I have been watching them build for almost 2 years now has finally opened up.  It's nothing but an RV parking lot.  There are no trees, no picnic tables, no fire rings, pool, laundry room, nothing. It's just lots all crammed together with a very small office - a portable building such as I am musing but very small - and very gaudy looking. Exactly what I'm trying to avoid. Some of these sheds look great, many of them I think are a turn off for anyone approaching a place and saying, what the heck is this?  So far, I've only seen one rv parked there.  Looks like about 50 lots and very small  

People are trying to cash in on the RV boom.  People are buying RV's at staggering rates and parks are filling up.  But I never got into this with the thought of "cashing in" in mind. Yes I want to make a profit, but it wasn't because there is an RV boom. I didn't even know there was any such thing occurring until I started doing research after I had started looking for the land to build one.  

This RV park is directly next to a very busy and noisy 4 lane highway, I mean, right next to it.  It's pathetic looking, just bare bones minimum garbage.  It's on the way down to Brownsville, I'll be watching it to see if it ever gets any units in there.  In no way am I wishing them bad luck, I just wonder how much thought they put into it.  

Whatever the case, it's almost midnight and time to go to sleep. 

 It was a bit disheartening to find out today the contractor isn't coming on Monday. I keep having to contact him for any updates.  This dude comes highly recommended by numerous people and excellent reviews.  No one in this area has anything bad to say about him/company at all. At least not publicly and I've looked.  So, he told me late next week instead of Monday.  I dunno what to think.  Just wait and see I guess.  I also contacted the other electrician of whom I talked to almost 2 months ago.

I frankly told him that it wasn't really all the great that he obviously just blew me off. It's your company, you can do whatever you please but it also might affect your reputation.  Well it didn't take him long to respond to that.  I kept it pretty short and sweet.  He actually profusely apologized and - made a bunch of excuses of which were of no importance to me, I dismissed him in my mind a while back when it became obvious he wasn't going to do anything that he said he was going to do.  I instead went into a few groups full of people that build RV parks and presented the numbers I had been given by this company I am attempting to use and they said it either looked good or was cheap.  

They seriously couldn't see how I was getting off so low on the septic system. Turns out, other states have much higher minimum gallons per day requirements for a system.  Why? I have no clue.  This state is allegedly 40 gallons per day. Other states are 120 and higher per day.  I've spent plenty of time in RV's, I can't imagine going through that much water.  You get pretty sparing with using it - tho that is usually because you are working with a fresh water tank that might hold 50 gallons of fresh water which doesn't last long if you are just using faucets as normal.  

I've spent a lot of time listening to rich people telling either how they got rich or what you should be doing to protect your money and where you should be stashing it.  One of them is off the cuff but quite humorous.  He had a 5 point plan he was giving today - Don't have anything in your name, either put it in an LLC or corporation, have life insurance with long term coverage, 40ks, annuities and I can't remember the last one. All of this is difficult or impossible to subject to lawsuits was his point.  I'm going to follow some advice to put the land in one LLC and the business in another.  I'm still trying to under C corporations.  

These people know things that most of us don't know.  They have knowledge and some of them will impart it freely.  It's certainly worth the time to at least hear them out.  Not that I intend on becoming filthy rich, but I do need some business knowledge and short of going to school, this is at least something that might help me out.  And most of them will tell you that you won't learn the things they learned from any schools.  

Anyway, Brownsville run over, another run in the morning, but I decided to go home anyway. They have me penciled in for 10:30 load, meaning a bit more morning time to get up and get out of here.  Everyone is in bed at this time of night but the dogs are always happy to see me whatever time it is lol.

I'm going to remain optimistic that this guy is going to finally get freed up and get started on my project. Not like there are a lot of options around here. Well, land clearing is endless contactors, but the rest of it, not so much.  

Time for bed.