The 11th found me short on sleep and anxious to get started. These three were arriving at 8ish and they were going to load some of the things in my garage and home that were going home to live with them.

Darian, my youngest son:

Riot, my youngest grandson:

Chad, my nephew (Vickie’s son):

Two of them have been extremely helpful in this move, lending their brawn, ideas, and a lot of hard work to my overall project. One of them lends his laughter, smiles, and ‘get in the way of everything’ to all projects and that’s what makes him so special…you figure out who does what.

They showed up with bags of ‘Mickey D’s’ and we stuffed our faces as we talked about the day and how it would end up. Riot terrorized everyone’s food…even though he had his own. They would have helped me hitch up the coach and move across town except Wayne was coming, with his friend Benton, to pick up some furniture and we were delivering it to Wayne’s place – then Wayne was helping me load, hitch up, and move across town.

Everything went off as planned, sort of. Wayne’s furniture made it to his place. We made it back to my place and loaded most of what was left of my belongings and goods into the coach (I had already loaded the majority of it during the previous two days). I headed for Boulder Highway, coach behind, and Wayne was going to pick up food for us. I arrived at the RV park before he did.

I hit one turn going to my site that I was sure I wasn’t going to make it around. I backed up three different times and pulled forward – with a concrete block wall on one side and a damn street sign keeping me from completing the turn on the other side. Each time I backed up and pulled forward, I made headway. I considered the possibility of just blocking the whole damn road, putting the truck in park, and calling my son to tell him he had to back me out of it (about a 100 yards). While I was trying to maneuver the turn, two women came out of two different sites to survey the situation and help. One of them, Paula, was a gem. She wedged herself between my truck and the concrete wall and gave me all the help I needed to make it almost past the street sign. When I got to the spot that left me with a few feet to clear, she grabbed the sign and pulled on it hard enough so I could just clear it. Then she helped me around another corner and when I got to my site, she guided me through coach placement so all the slides would clear the hookups and power enclosures. I would have never made it through the first turn by myself. I would have spent an hour backing out of it…hey I’m new at this stuff, ok? Let’s hear it for the women of the world…hip-hip-hooray! Both women told me that a man had tried that corner a few days ago and he finally gave up and backed out of it…guess they didn’t run out to help him.

Wayne arrived with food. Set up and unhitch. Wayne took the task of assembling of a hitch jack. I scurried to hook up the electrical, sewer, and water, knowing that I would run out of steam shortly and have to sleep. Wayne had already informed me that he wasn’t ‘mechanical’. Once when I stopped to say something to him, he exclaimed, “Don’t rush me…”

I wasn’t. About 10 minutes later, not even thinking about his progress, I walked by and said, “When you finish with that…”

He interrupted me, “Don’t rush me, Linda!”

I wasn’t. But he seemed to feel I was. I wanted to laugh out loud but it just wasn’t the time. He did finish it though. And I’m happy that he opted to help me with any of it. I’m going to marry him at some point…I believe it will be in our next life. Love ya Wayne.

We were hanging out at the Valley of Fire in this picture:

But back to camp – the jacks that extend and retract under the hitch refused to extend after I unhitched. It was impossible to finish leveling out the coach without the jacks. I ended up calling Wheeler RV (the place I bought the coach from). They gave me the number of a mobile repair guy and Newmar customer service. Ouch! I was tired and grouchy over this set back. My intention was to have all the heavy-duty stuff finished by the time I passed out from exhaustion. It just wasn’t to be. There was nothing more to do except wait for tomorrow and see if I could find the mobile repair guy.

Wayne helped me pull the rest of the loose ends together and put stuff away. He brought a bottle of champagne to celebrate my ‘coach warming’. *glasses clink* He headed out, I headed for bed. So ended my first day of being a ‘full timer’.

More later…