Wednesday July 31st 2024

My plan for the day was to get up early and visit Disney’s Animal Kingdom today. The goal was to get there before the heat peaked and the animals retreated to the shade. Well I woke up just before 7AM which is better than I’ve been doing for the last few days. I turned on the TV to watch the last few minutes of the morning news before I got out of bed. The next thing I knew it was 9:30AM. Is this living my retirement or just being lazy? Animal Kingdom will happen another day.

Today was another day of dealing with the expectation of rain. The weather forecast I heard before returning to sleep this morning called for an ever increasing chance of rain from 2PM until about 9PM. As the day went by that forecast changed. In the end we only got a few sprinkles. There weren’t even any black clouds on the horizon or the sound of thunder in the distance.

I had much better luck with traffic today. All of the roads I was on kept to what I have come to expect to be normal level. Basically, that means getting stuck at every traffic light, but only for one cycle. You can’t go anywhere down here and not see new development of some sort. Traffic will only increase.

My walk around the park was along a shorter route today. The occasional sprinkle of rain kept me in my half of the RV resort. My longer route takes me through my half of the park all the way to the other side of the lower half of the park to get to Lake Davenport. That is close to a mile distant along the circuitous route through the park. If it started to really rain, I’d be very wet by the time I got back to my RV home.

Tuesday July 30th 2024

The weather surprised me again today. Leading up to mid morning every forecast I saw or heard called for no rain to only a very small chance. Then everything started to change. The online forecasts and the noon TV forecasts suddenly had a 40% chance of rain from 5PM to 10PM. That wasn’t the end of the surprises. Thunder storms in this area of Florida can come from any direction. In most areas of the country, severe weather usually comes from one or two directions, mostly west and south. In the last few weeks, I’ve seen storms here come from the all points of the compass except the northwest. Tonight around 6PM a very heavy storm arrived from the northwest. The sound of rain on my roof along with the lightening and thunder were very dramatic.

Today’s issue was a multitude of traffic jams. While out touring this afternoon I ran into heavy traffic that was probably the result of an accident ahead. I decided to take a much longer detour, but that didn’t work. A few miles along my new route I found more stop and go traffic. This time it looked more like “get out of work” traffic. Soon the “time to leave the theme park” traffic got added into the mix. Just getting home was a challenge. This area has so much new development going on that the roads just aren’t keeping up. The philosophy seems to be build housing in phase 1, build retail om phase 2 , build office buildings next and then add lanes to the access roads one at a time until traffic is tolerable. With the added lanes comes more traffic lights and awkward turning situations. Shouldn’t the roads and other infrastructure come first?

The rain kept me from getting in my usual walk around the RV park. Since the heavy storm arrived around six, it has been raining lightly most of the time. The only thing that is gone is the thunder and lightening. I managed to catch a little bit of the setting sun from the door of my RV home. It looks like it was raining off in the direction of the sunset.

Monday July 29th 2024

The temperature was a little lower today, but otherwise it followed the same pattern as the last few. There was rain in the focus for sometime in the afternoon. The start time just kept moving out. Only a few rain drops have fallen so far.

This weather pattern really results in slow days for me. To take advantage of the day you need to get going in the morning. I have found myself sleeping in more than I should. My sleep pattern has once again skewed later in the morning. The things I’d like to do need slightly cooler temperatures and at least a chance of a dry sky that the morning holds.

Today I was a particularly slow start since I went back to bed after my morning shower. The southern sky was dark with thunder and lightening when I finished breakfast at the start of the lunch hour. Morning activities were off the table. Instead I got a few chores around my RV home accomplished.

The campground turned over a lot this morning. Many of the RVs that arrived in a cluster last Monday and Tuesday departed this morning. So they only stayed about a week. My door side neighbor also departed today. The guy on that site has been there since before I arrived. Over the weekend he emptied the trailer into a U-haul van. He made several trips, so his stuff is moving somewhere nearby. This morning an RV transport service arrived to pull the trailer off the site. Who knows what the real story is, but he always struck me as using the RV for a temporary living situation. The method of departure would seem to confirm that thought.

Sunday July 28th 2024

Looking back at the day as I write this blog entry, today seemed to be a repeat of Saturday. Not only was the weather very similar, but my response to the forecast followed the same pattern. I took my time with breakfast then watched the more esoteric Olympic events on TV.

The days rain arrived around six in the evening, but it was providing a good noise and light show prior to that. I managed to get in a short walk after the rain. The drainage ponds still contained a lot of water. Since the middle of last week they haven’t dried out like they were earlier in the summer. The birds were taking advantage of the wet ground. I assume they were finding worms, grubs and other bugs to their fill.

Saturday July 27th 2024

There was a layer of high clouds when I got up this morning. The sun was very filtered and it felt like rain could happen anytime. The forecast basically agreed. The temperature climbed to the low nineties. More lower level clouds were on the eastern horizon during the early afternoon. It looked like the rain would arrive at any minute. Storms did form, but passed by to the south. Only a little bit of very light random rain fell in this area late in the day. Once again my plans for the day were postponed because of forecast rain that never arrived.

Not much happened today that is blog worthy. I lingered over breakfast while reading various internet sites. Eventually I cleared the table and cleaned up the dishes. Then I switched my attention to the TV. The obscure Olympic sports were on the various cable channels. They tend to be more interesting that swimming, gymnastics and the track and field events. Today I watched table tennis, polo and fencing. Once you figure out a little bit about the activity it is fun to watch. I haven’t seen the brake dancing yet. How that is a sport is beyond me.

Friday July 26th 2024

Today’s weather pattern had the daily thunderstorms forming on the western side of the Florida peninsular. The last few days the storms have formed more in the center of the peninsular. It all depends on the strength of the wind from the east or west. Where they meet you get storms forming. So far today they have formed but haven’t moved back to the west but haven’t moved back to the east in this part pf the state. Clouds have blocked the sun during the last few hours of daylight so the mid nineties temperature has dropped to high eighties. The feels like temperature was around 105.

I thought the resort wasn’t going to get the lawns mowed this week, but shortly after eight this morning I heard the sound of a lawn mower gradually getting closer to my RV home. They were a day or two late this week. The lawns need mowing. All the rain with the heat really gets the grass to grow. I need to do some trimming of my own. The landscape people don’t seem to want to get close to my steps. The grass is now above the height of my first step. I’ll have to find a knife or some old scissors to cut the grass assuming I can’t just pull it out or break it off.

My main task for the day was getting some groceries. The nearby Walmart is always busy and congested, but that was my choice for the day. I really think the management philosophy that keeps pallets of goods in the aisles of the grocery section waiting to be stocked on the shelves is questionable. The pallets make great obstacles. The good thing about this particular Walmart is they open most of the “Assisted” checkouts at busy times. Today I only had to wait for one customer before I was able to be “Assisted” with my checkout. The wait for the self service checkouts was longer.

Today’s walk around the RV resort was a short one. I walked down to the still wet retention ponds and watched the birds for a few minutes. From there I looped back to the air conditioned comfort of my RV home.

Thursday July 25th 2024

There were several passing storms overnight that allowed the day to start fresh and clean. The general forecast for my area south of Orlando was for a lower chance of rain. North of the city there was a much higher chance of heavy thunderstorms. Most of the day was filled with hazy sunshine. The temperature climbed into the mid 90s.

Around 5PM after the peak heat of the day, I headed for Disney’s EPCOT. My plan was to get some food and wander around the grounds. On a positive note it wasn’t very crowded. The down side for me was the temperature wasn’t falling very fast and there wasn’t much of a breeze. Going in and out of air conditioned buildings didn’t help the much either. I’d just get cooled down before stepping back outside into a wall of heat. Complaining about the heat isn’t my usual behavior. I like to comment about it, but why is it causing me to complain now?

After riding the Living with the Land attraction in the front part of the park I headed toward the back of the World Showcase for food. I stopped way short of my destination and bought my desert first. There is a kiosk that sells soft serve ice cream made with real vanilla beans. Eating it before it melted did a good job of freezing the inside of my mouth. I never made it to the back of the park. I decided I didn’t have the energy for wandering around the park and headed home for the evening. Dinner came from my freezer.

It was a less than three hour visit to the park, but I got some nice pictures. Thank goodness I have an Annual Pass. The cost for the limited visit Florida resident pass I have is already paid for by all of my previous visits along with the free parking it provides. It is nice to be able to visit the park short visits or longer.

Wednesday July 24th 2024

I think I got psyched out by the morning weather forecast. They were using terms like “the heatwave has returned” and “warmest day of the week”. It turned out the actual temperature and humidity weren’t much different from yesterday, but when I stepped out of my RV home this morning the heat hit me like a solid wall. I was outside for only a little while before I retreated to the air conditioning.

It was an inside day until a little after 5PM. I did a few chores and chased a lot of random information on the internet as a form of entertainment. Around 4:30 it got very dark outside. I assumed a storm was approaching, but all of the horizons were still bright with sunshine. The thunderstorm was forming right overhead. I stepped out briefly to get picture of the cloud shelf to the east. A few drops of rain fell along with a lot of wind. The real storm complete with thunder and lightening did materialize before the black clouds were well to the west.

I was able to get my walk around the RV park in shortly after the storm moved through. It was much more comfortable walking outside. The storm took a few degrees of heat away with it. On my walk I observed the park was still well occupied at about the same level as Monday. The surge of occupancy didn’t seem to continue to increase yesterday or today. On the wildlife front, the birds were still taking advantage of the water in the retention ponds.

Tuesday July 23rd 2024

It was another day with above average humidity leading up to the afternoon storms. Today’s thunderstorms were of the heavy rain and wind type. The lightening show we got yesterday was not part of today’s storm. The threat began around 4PM and actually arrived after 5PM. The worst of the storm lasted until around 6:30.

This was a day of cascading chores complications. It started with washing the morning dishes. The sink wasn’t draining well. My first thought was that I needed to dump my holding tanks. When the gray tank gets near full things slow down. So my first task interrupt was to dump the tanks.

I always check the connections before I dump the tanks. Today I opened the gray tank valve a little and observed the flow. I had a small fountain coming out of the middle of the hose. Clearly a pin hole leak had developed. These could happen just from the sun breaking down the plastic or from projectiles from a lawn mower. It happens more often than I would like. I’ll have to replace the hose, but for now good old duck tape solved the problem. I proceeded to dump the black and the gray tanks without any further incidents.

Back inside I cooled off and dried off from the humidity before returning to the dishes. It turned out I had a simpler problem. The drain was clogged probably from cleaning the toaster the other day. So the second task interrupt was getting the plunger out to clear the drain. A little while later I was back to the dishes about two hours after I got started.

I got a short walk around the RV resort in today. The humidity made the walking a challenge. There was still water in many of the holding ponds early this afternoon. The birds that appeared from nowhere yesterday were still hanging around plucking nourishment from the soggy grass. The heavy rain later in the afternoon likely increased the water level and the time before the ponds dry out again.

Monday July 22nd 2024

After yesterday’s fierce thunderstorm, today’s was entertaining. The lead up to the afternoon storms was filled with heavy humidity and ever increasing cloud cover. Around 5PM the southeastern horizon was filled with flashes of air to ground lightening followed shortly by the rumbling of thunder. As time progressed, the storm moved overhead with the lightening and thunder much closer. The rain and wind weren’t as heavy as yesterday allowing me to watch the storm with less concern.

For some reason the RV resort’s occupancy is increasing. With the exception of the site immediately beside me that seems to be out of circulation, all of the sites I can see from my RV home are now occupied. Why there are so many RVs arriving on a Sunday and Monday is unknown, but I’ll keep speculating.

I took a short walk before sunset after the thunderstorm moved through. All of the runoff rain had collected in the retention ponds. There was six inches to a foot of water in most of them. Along with the water that had arrived less than half an hour earlier, there were lots of birds. How do they know the ponds have filled? Were they hiding in the trees during the storm waiting for the water to fill the ponds? The water doesn’t stay in the ponds long. Most of them will be empty again tomorrow and the birds will be gone.