I suppose all first trip days are bound to be hectic. I'm sure not as stressful as waiting your turn in the guillotine line during the French Revolution and not as bad as last time with smashing my thumb in the door and dropping the boom box on my face but enough stress to make me wonder why I thought a long trip was ever a good idea. The smoke over our house from the Santa Barbara fire was one of the good reasons to get out of town. Breathing is already difficult enough!
Big mix-up with my hair appointment--I wasn’t down until Thursday--no good. One simply does not embark on such a journey as this with a faded weave and roots showing. A scramble to get squeezed in at noon. Ok--just a one hour delay so far. But wait! The doctor changed one of my nasty microbe meds so I needed to pick up a prescription today as well. Paint me gray and call me a jackass--I thought that just because I needed a 2 month supply instead of the usual 30 day supply doled out by the insurance company when I use a REAL DRUGSTORE it would not be a problem!!! So wrong! First, it’s a chance for the prescription part of the plan to soak you for 2 co-pays; Second, it’s a double-chance for the REAL DRUGSTORE to mess up the prescription. Both happened--but the action--or lack of action--in the prescription line is worth a few words. In the half hour I waited in line I saw one woman faint and have to be helped to a chair. Another couple held up the entire process because of some error. The young boy in front of me waited through all of this to get his prescription and was truly mystified that he was expected to pay some money to get his medicine--he had to leave without it. The elderly man behind me just leaned on his cane and said he was quite used to this. There was one person working the desk!!! All of this mini-drama took place in a small aisle between condoms, pregnancy test kits and creams of some kind on one side and douches, yeast infection treatments and tests to let a woman know if she’s hit menopause!!! Egads--I’d love to meet the woman who needs a test to know if she just might have hit those years!!! Here's a real cheap test: ask her husband!!!! I think there was so much conversation amongst strangers just to avoid having to look at these products. My take on it was that no one in line would be buying any of the merchandise on either side.
The trip to the monastery was hot and uneventful. Upon arrival I hooked up to the electrical power, turned on the AC(the temperature inside the coach was 95o) then proceeded to heat up a Hot Pocket in the microwave. Wham!!! Blew something because the power went out to the coach and half the monastery. There was also no water coming through the faucets. Fr Basil to the rescue! He thought it was a “city” black out since the same thing had happened last night. The water problem was because a new water regulator installed by Hubby was not allowing any water from monastery well to reach the RV. Soon all was well--gin and tonic in hand, Hot Pocket consumed and some time to chat with monk friends. They’d had a busy day with 3 visitors that evening--not counting me--and a group of 5 nuns earlier in the day.
The puppy is growing very fast. Ozzie wanted so much to play with Byrdie but she simply won’t acknowledge other dogs in her world. At least she had sense to leave the cats alone and just stand on an old pew outside the common room window and stare at me.
Thus ends another first night. A good clean shower, a rig that is at least less than 80o inside and hopefully a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow the goal is to make St. George, Utah. No stopping in Las Vegas--sorry chat buddies--and finally hook-up to the internet again. Put here are pics of what I could snap from I-15 and my RV park for the night 
here in Utah.
Big mix-up with my hair appointment--I wasn’t down until Thursday--no good. One simply does not embark on such a journey as this with a faded weave and roots showing. A scramble to get squeezed in at noon. Ok--just a one hour delay so far. But wait! The doctor changed one of my nasty microbe meds so I needed to pick up a prescription today as well. Paint me gray and call me a jackass--I thought that just because I needed a 2 month supply instead of the usual 30 day supply doled out by the insurance company when I use a REAL DRUGSTORE it would not be a problem!!! So wrong! First, it’s a chance for the prescription part of the plan to soak you for 2 co-pays; Second, it’s a double-chance for the REAL DRUGSTORE to mess up the prescription. Both happened--but the action--or lack of action--in the prescription line is worth a few words. In the half hour I waited in line I saw one woman faint and have to be helped to a chair. Another couple held up the entire process because of some error. The young boy in front of me waited through all of this to get his prescription and was truly mystified that he was expected to pay some money to get his medicine--he had to leave without it. The elderly man behind me just leaned on his cane and said he was quite used to this. There was one person working the desk!!! All of this mini-drama took place in a small aisle between condoms, pregnancy test kits and creams of some kind on one side and douches, yeast infection treatments and tests to let a woman know if she’s hit menopause!!! Egads--I’d love to meet the woman who needs a test to know if she just might have hit those years!!! Here's a real cheap test: ask her husband!!!! I think there was so much conversation amongst strangers just to avoid having to look at these products. My take on it was that no one in line would be buying any of the merchandise on either side.
The trip to the monastery was hot and uneventful. Upon arrival I hooked up to the electrical power, turned on the AC(the temperature inside the coach was 95o) then proceeded to heat up a Hot Pocket in the microwave. Wham!!! Blew something because the power went out to the coach and half the monastery. There was also no water coming through the faucets. Fr Basil to the rescue! He thought it was a “city” black out since the same thing had happened last night. The water problem was because a new water regulator installed by Hubby was not allowing any water from monastery well to reach the RV. Soon all was well--gin and tonic in hand, Hot Pocket consumed and some time to chat with monk friends. They’d had a busy day with 3 visitors that evening--not counting me--and a group of 5 nuns earlier in the day.
The puppy is growing very fast. Ozzie wanted so much to play with Byrdie but she simply won’t acknowledge other dogs in her world. At least she had sense to leave the cats alone and just stand on an old pew outside the common room window and stare at me.
Thus ends another first night. A good clean shower, a rig that is at least less than 80o inside and hopefully a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow the goal is to make St. George, Utah. No stopping in Las Vegas--sorry chat buddies
here in Utah.
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