Thursday November 23rd 2017

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. I continue to be thankful that I have the health and means to enjoy this full time RVing lifestyle.

It was another record warm day in Las Vegas. The high for the day was in the upper seventies with lots of sunshine and very little wind. Between breakfast and the first football game of the day I took a walk around the RV park. As I mentioned in yesterdays blog entry the park is almost full. The surprising thing was there weren’t a lot of people around this morning. I can only conclude that they are staying here but have holiday plans elsewhere in the area.

One of the Christmas displays at the Sams Town casino.

When I got back to my site, the impromptu entertainment began. The guy in the motorhome behind me has a cat that is always getting out of the RV. There was one instance shortly after I got here that the cat was missing for a couple of days, but he usually tracks the animal down quickly. Today wasn’t one of the quick days. He starts by yelling at the cat to get inside. The cat takes refuge under his motorhome. The guy gets his knee pads on and starts crawling around the RV continuing to yell at the cat to get back in the motorhome. The cat is following none of his directions and makes a run for the next RV. The guy follows and is now under his neighbors RV yelling at the cat. This continues for ten or fifteen minutes before the guy comes back from down the street trying to herd the cat in front of him. The cat again doesn’t follow directions and passes right by his RV and continues under the next RV.

Another of the Christmas decorations at Sams Town.

I guess my neighbor took a break from chasing the cat, because it became silent for an hour or so. The silence was refreshing. About and hour later my neighbor was back out wandering the RV park yelling for the cat. He never seems to try and get the cat to come to him. He just keeps yelling the cats name. I know very little about cats but this seems to be counter productive. When he knows where it is; wouldn’t it be better to sit down and calmly try and get the critter to come to him? Tonight, six or more hours after this all started, he was walking around all of his neighbors RVs with a flashlight calling the cat some more. Now he sounds distraught, but earlier he just sounded mad at the cat.

For Thanksgiving dinner I went to Sam’s Town casino. I joined a few hundred other people at the buffet for the holiday meal. It seems to be a popular destination for local families. Seeing all the little kids walking through the casino is a bit unusual. This is definitely a different type of crowd than you normally see at a casino. They seem to embrace and welcome the kids. The indoor courtyard was decorated for Christmas and starting tomorrow Santa Claus will be there every afternoon and evening.

Dinner was good and I ate too much. My first plate was traditional with turkey, green beans, dressing and mashed potatoes with gravy. My second plate focused on a slice of beef with similar sides to the first plate. For desert I squeezed in a small slice of apple pie. While I digested my dinner I feed a slot machine its Thanksgiving dinner.

Wednesday November 22nd 2017

The predicted great weather continued today. It topped out in the high 70s more than 10 degrees above the normal temperature. Tomorrow is expected to be similar. The beginning of next week is the expected return to normal.

Ducks hiding in the grass.

The last few days the RV park has been emptying out. Today many RVs have arrived. I don’t think of Las Vegas as a weekend RV destination, but that is exactly what it looks like. The RV park is filling up for the long weekend. The Las Vegas area is the only population center for more than one hundred miles. St George Utah is the nearest significant population area. It is one hundred and twenty five miles to the north east. The Los Angles area of California is more than two hundred miles west, Phoenix is a little further to the southwest and Reno-Carson City, the other population center in Nevada is over a 400 miles north. What that means is Las Vegas is a long way from everywhere a weekend RVer might come from.

I went to the Orleans Casino on the west side of the strip to spend a little money on “entertainment”. It’s not hard to navigate around the valley, it just isn’t easy to drive on the roads. The traffic continues to be a thing to complain about. The roads in the valley are basically a grid of roads that go from the east side of the valley to the west or from the north to the south. There are very few obstacles to road construction so they are mostly straight. Occasionally a road will end only to pick up in the same direction a mile or two later. When that happens you only need to turn right or left to the next through street. Another interesting things the government does is change the names of sections of roads to honor famous people. I’ve been on roads named for Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, and Jimmy Durante to name a few.

I also stopped at Home Depot to check on availability of a gas grill. It’s interesting to see all the preparation going on in the store for Black Friday. It seemed like they had all hands on deck to fill in all the available space with sale merchandise. Once they completed the setup they wrapped the displays in black plastic to keep shoppers away until Friday or tomorrow evening. I didn’t inquire when they are opening. A lot of places are opening tomorrow at 5pm or 6pm.

I wish everyone reading this on or before Thanksgiving a happy and thankful day. If you’re reading this blog entry after the holiday, I hope you had a great day. I’ll probably go to dinner at one of the area casinos. Most of them have dinner specials. I’m a little surprised that this RV park isn’t organizing anything for the monthly residents. They had a Halloween party, but I’ve seen nothing about a Thanksgiving celebration. I probably wouldn’t have participated anyway, but the choice would have been nice.

Tuesday November 21st 2017

Last night it got down to the low forties. It was a little warmer than the last couple of nights and probably the last night in the forties for awhile. The forecast continues to call for record or near record highs through the end of the week. Definitely nothing to complain about. I’m sure it will be cooler than normal soon.

Making tracks for some food.

After breakfast this morning I got back to my Blueray DVD problem. I checked all the connections one more time, but nothing changed. The Blueray still wasn’t putting anything out the HDMI port. I started to try things that shouldn’t make any difference. The first step was to unplug the DVD player for thirty seconds to a minute and try again. It shouldn’t have worked, but it did. My Blueray DVD now works on both the bedroom and living room TVs. With everything working I finished anchoring down the new hardware and closed up the cabinets.

Found some straw. Is this food?

This afternoon I drove over to the Wetlands Park to enjoy the mid seventies sunny afternoon. I saw many more people walking the trails today than the last time I visited. It’s still a big enough area that you are alone with nature most of the time. I spent a fair amount of time at one of the ponds watching the ducks. The only other wildlife I saw were the rabbits. They were very skittish. As soon as I was within fifty feet they’d head for cover.

The three mile drive back to the RV took over an hour. Traffic was backed up and stopped for yet another traffic accident. It seems like every time I’ve been out in the last few days I see the aftermath of another accident. My first few weeks in town I was seeing crazy driving, now I’m seeing the result of crazy driving. I hope the trend doesn’t continue. I don’t want to be part of an accident.

Monday November 20th 2017

The overnight temperature was in the high 30s again. Unfortunately, there was cloud cover this morning. The sun was not able to warm the interior of the RV quickly. I had to turn the heat on for a couple of hours. Around 10am the sun was out in full force warming the inside air. The temperature topped out at the seasonal normal high in the mid to high sixties. Tomorrow and the days to follow are forecast above the normal temperatures flirting with record highs through the weekend.

Desert P\plant picture of the day.

This morning I picked up an Amazon delivery at a local Amazon locker. I could of had the package shipped here to the RV Park, but tried the locker for the novelty of the experience. It might be an advantage if the normal carriers are backlogged. I think shipping to the lockers is handled by Amazon and not FedX, UPS or similar shipping services.

The delivery contained two HDMI splitter extenders to solve my satellite TV distribution problem. The splitters that came with the RV got bounced around to much. They have been out of service since June. Consequently, I have only had satellite TV on my bedroom TV and I haven’t had any access to my Blueray DVD player. With my purchases I now have satellite TV on both the bedroom and living room TVs. I will live with no satellite or Blueray on the outside TV for this simpler, hopefully more reliable, solution.

The original HDMI splitter. It takes 1 HDMI input and has 1 HDMI and 7 CAT6 outputs. Four of the CAT 6 outputs weren’t used. The need for one HDMI output is what made finding an alternate solution difficult.

This afternoon I got the big old hardware out of the cabinet and the new little hardware installed in it’s place. There is more room for air circulation and I should be able to anchor it down better than the old units. Testing everything out I have successfully got satellite TV in the bedroom and living room. The Blueray is another problem. It isn’t working on either TV.

The new HDMI Splitter Extender (I forgot to take a picture of the actual unit, so the box will have to do). This unit only has two outputs, one HDMI and one CAT6, but it is also only as big as a deck of cards. The other one was more like a heavy dress tie box.

I made a trip to Walmart, Home Depot and another Walmart looking for a connector to help diagnose the problem with the Blueray DVD player. Ten miles and an hour plus later I had the means to isolate the problem to the DVD player itself. It turns on and displays the start up messages on the LCD display, but nothing seems to be coming out the HDMI cable in the back to feed the TVs. Unlike the HDMI switches the Blueray is a quality LG unit that should stand up to the bouncing in the RV. I need to do some more testing before I look for another unit. I don’t use the Blueray much anyway.

The good news is I can now watch ESPN, HGTV and all the Hallmark Christmas movies in my living room. When I retreated to the bedroom to watch programs I usually fell asleep on the bed somewhere in the middle of the program.

Sunday November 19th 2017

The temperature got down into the high thirties overnight. It was around 50 inside the RV when I got up this morning around 8am. It warms up quickly inside once the sun hits the windows. The high was in the low 60s late in the day. It was a very nice fall day overall.

Sunset at the RV Park.

I didn’t leave the RV park today. I spent most of the day watching the football coverage. Here in the Pacific time zone coverage starts at 9am with the pregame shows and continues through the end of the Sunday night game around 8:30pm. I wasn’t glued to the screen all day. At half time of the first two games I took a walk around the RV resort for some exercise and I only watched a few minutes of the night game.

I was happy to see the Patriots win against the Raiders. People around here are not as happy. The Raiders broke ground on their new stadium in Las Vegas last weekend. They will be moving here in the summer of 2020, but the local media has jumped on the Raiders band wagon big time. At least two of the stations had a reporter down in Mexico City to cover the game and another reporter was at a local bar that had a watch party. I can only imagine what it will be like after the team gets here.

Blossom of he day.

Saturday November 18th 2017

Yesterday’s cold front had the expected impact. The temperature didn’t get out of the sixties today. Tonight, as I write this blog entry, it is fifty degrees. It may make it down to the thirties. A freeze warning is out for some areas in the region. I understand this is normal conditions for December and January. November is supposed to be a little warmer. By Thanksgiving we’re forecast to be in another hot spell.

Today’s flower blossom is an interesting yellow ground cover plant.

Most of my day was spent watching sports on TV. For a little exercise I took a walk around the RV park in the early afternoon. I was surprised at the number of empty sites. It is hard to understand what drives the ebb and flow of occupancy here. At the beginning of the month there were no sites available and they were using storage sites for travelers. I wonder what it will be like over the long Thanksgiving Day weekend.

I was reviewing some of my older blog entries today. Last year at this time I was staying in an Army Corp of Engineers campground east of Fort Meyers Florida. The approaching holiday season was not on my mind. I think because I am in the middle of an urban area this year I am very aware of the start of the Christmas shopping season. The celebration events also start earlier out here. I recall that the Christmas event at the Edison and Ford Winter Mansions in Fort Meyers kicked off the day after Thanksgiving. Here many of the Christmas light displays started last weekend around the 11th of November.

Toward evening today for a distraction I went to Boulder Station Casino to “donate” a few dollars. I spent a couple of hours listening to to music, people watching and hitting a button on a slot machine or two. I didn’t leave with more money than I arrived with, but my loss was in a reasonable entertainment budget.

Friday November 17th 2017

Today started off cloudy with a constant south wind. As the day went by the clouds broke up and the wind speed increased. It turned out to be a warm day with heavy wind gusts. This evening the cold from finally passed through the area. The wind has reversed and is now blowing from the northwest. Either the wind is much stronger or I’m less sheltered from the wind out of the northwest, It sounds and feels worse than it has in the last couple of days.

Waterfalls and fish ponds at the Bass Pro Shops.

My days of late have followed a pattern. I hang around the RV in the morning doing chores, watching TV and reading. In the afternoon I visit various stores in the area looking for a laundry list of things I either need or thought about needing over the summer. So far I haven’t really bought anything. I need to develop a critical mass of information answering basic questions like do I really need/want something, what brand or model do I want and where do I want to buy it. Once I think I know the answers to those questions I surprise myself and actually buy something. I’ve always been a very analytical shopper, but not having access to lots of different stores the last few months have made my shopping approach a real bottleneck.

The highlight of today’s running around the valley was a stop a Bass Pro Shops. In addition to merchandise that is always interesting to look at Bass Pro Shops have fish tanks and stuff wild animals throughout the store. Walking around the store and checking out the displays is fun.

Mermaid in the Sliverton Casino Aquarium.

Mermaid interacting with the kids.

The Bass Pro Shops shares a building with the Silverton Casino which also has a big aquarium. They’re aquarium also has divers feed the fish for entertainment. Today the diver was joined by a mermaid. Later in the year the diver will be joined by Santa Claus. It is a big draw for the kids. Today the mermaid was interacting with the little kids watching her on the other side of the glass. She’d blow air bubbles for the kids and high five with them through the glass. It was fun to watch.

Thursday November 16th 2017

The weather today could only be described as wierd. It started cloudy with a light wind. The wind increased as the day progressed, but it also got warmer. The wind was out of the south and brought in warmth. By noon the “wind event” that had been forecast since Sunday was fully engaged. The wind was steady between fifteen and twenty miles and hour. Gusts were recorded near forty mph. The high temperature for the day was around eighty, but the cloud cover remained all day. The wind is forecast to continue all day tomorrow.

View out the front window of my car looking south this afternoon. The city of Henderson NV is in the valley below.

I spent the first half of the day around my RV home. I dumped the holding tanks and made sure everything outside was safe from blowing in the wind. Inside I took stock of my food supplies and determined that a grocery run was needed. I’ve been holding off as long as possible to get the timing right. I don’t want to have to visit a food store between now and Thanksgiving. It was bad enough today with the extra shoppers and the extra food stacked in the aisles.

During my travels around the Las Vegas valley today I was also back to looking for a replacement for my gas grill. The basic issue remains to find a small gas grill with enough quality to last more than a few uses. I’ve tried the normal places like Camping World, Home Depot and Lowes. Today I tried a Dicks Sporting Goods store. They had another possibility that I’d found in my online searches. They had a small Blackstone Griddle. It is more like a frying surface than a traditional grill, but it is a possibility. Tomorrow I’m going to visit Bass Pro Shops to see what they have.

My guess is I’ll have to go with a bigger grill than I currently have. The size of quality grills has increased in the last ten years or so. If I go with a Weber Q grill I’ll have to clean out space. That means moving stuff around or better yet throwing away stuff that I’m not using on a regular basis. A new grill will be bigger in size, but not much greater in weight so that’s a positive. Weight is the biggest enemy to keeping my RV home moving down the road safely.

Wednesday November 15th 2017

It was cloudy and cool most of the day. The sun broke through for a little while late in the day to get the temperature up to seventy, but overall it was an uninspiring day. I was back in shopping without buying mode today.

In my travels around the Las Vegas area I’m seeing a lot of preparations for Christmas. The middle of November is about the right time to start seeing Christmas lights but I haven’t been out after dark much. I’m seeing lots of light strings waiting to be turned on either at dusk or at some later date. The fact that I’m a visitor to the area is probably making me more sensitive to spotting the lights. I’m continuously looking for something new to see.

Today’s flower blossom picture.

A couple of weeks ago when I stopped at the Ethel M Chocolates Factory and Cactus garden all of the cactus were strung with lights for Christmas. There was a grand opening of the Christmas lights at the Cactus garden last week. I’ll go back to see the colorful display sometime soon.

When I was parked at the Las Vegas Speedway for the Aviation Nation Air and Space Expo there were many wire frames holding Christmas lights. They are part of a drive through Christmas lights display called Glittering Lights. This event started last week. There is a per car charge to drive through the display. At twenty dollars per car during the week it won’t get my business unless I find a few others to join me in the car. It is even higher on weekends and I can’t find any indication that the proceeds go to charity.

I was in a mall today that was already decorated for the holidays. They probably had them on the day after Halloween if not before. A couple of the casinos I stopped at have wrapped trees and columns with clear lights but haven’t turned them on yet. From my experience the casinos don’t go overboard with Christmas decorations. With a few exceptions the most you see are a few lights and a Christmas tree or two in a discrete location. The exceptions are the Bellagio Conservatory and similar display areas in other casinos.

Here at the RV Park I’m starting to see signs of decorating. The RV Park staff has strung lights on the clubhouse building, but they haven’t turned them on yet. Several of the RVs are starting to show the holiday spirit. I’ve seen some lights and at least one Christmas tree. It looks like there will be a lot of decorations for the end of year Holidays.

I will buy some cheap lights or a small fake tree for my Motorhome. I don’t carry them around the country with me. I’ve thrown them away after the new year the last couple of years. I do carry some ornaments and Christmas stuff that has sentimental/historical value to me. I’ll use some of those to add a little cheer to whatever I buy. I don’t expect to do anything before this time next week at the earliest.

Tuesday November 14th 2017

My energy level was up this morning and the symptoms of a cold were gone. The sun was also shining brightly so maybe that had some impact as well. From the sounds of things to come today was the last really nice day of the week. A cold front from the northwest is moving into the area.

Red Bull parachute jumper from the airshow Saturday.

The weather forecast for Wednesday night through Friday is for a high wind event. They have been forecasting winds with gusts exceeding forty miles an hour since Sunday. In the northeast, I’m used to the weather forecasters getting excited about rain and snowstorm forecasts. A wind event seems to be the desert southwest equivalent. The TV weather forecasters are getting very excited about the upcoming wind. I’ve experienced enough wind this summer that I consider myself an old had at wind now. Those maybe famous last words, but I’m not getting excited about the forecast.

I finally got the laundry done today. I got lucky and found an empty washing machine when I drove over to the laundry. The laundry was still very busy. I had to wait five minutes or so for a dryer. Overall it took about two hours from the time I left the rig until I got the clean clothes back in my storage draws. It really takes a big chunk of time out of the day to have to babysit the washing. Unfortunately it’s necessary. People come in and randomly open machines to find available machines or the machine they put their stuff in. That’s annoying enough, but they also seem to forget to restart the machine.

While I’m on my soapbox of annoying things. I”m tired of car horns beeping at all hours of the day and night. Why do people have their cars configured to beep the horn when they lock the door with their key fob. The beep “feature” is configurable on every car I’ve driven. In a densely packed area like this RV park horn beeps are a regular occurrence. On quiet days and during the night they are a real pain. At the very least a considerate person shouldn’t make the car beep in the middle of the night. OK, I’m finished with my soapbox speech.