On the Road

We finally departed Knoxville. The prescription still had not arrived. I left a forwarding address at the PO, so hopefully they will send it on if/when it arrives. Meanwhile, I think we'll have to request another shipment from Rochester next week.

A new repair item arose. One of our storage doors is rotted enough that when I closed it, the door broke and the hinge popped off, forced out by the gas cylinder that usually holds it open. With Consuelo's help, I got the cylinder off, and closed the door, and then duct taped it shut. I'm thinking I'll have to tru to cut off the rotten wood inside the door, without damaging the paint on the outside, if possible. Then attach a new top section and epoxy everything together. It will have to wait until we land in Bushnell, where we'll stay for 3 weeks.

Last night we stayed at a Walmart in McDonough, GA, about 20 miles south of Atlanta. We usually follow the Escapees guidelines for Walmart stops: to stay only one night, not to spread out, and to ask the manager if it's OK. We were the first RV into the lot last night, around 5:30 PM, and once found, the manager said it was OK. Since we don't set up our satellite dish, we only got TV off-air, one channel, and poorly, at that. So to amuse myself, I penned the following poem.

Stopping by a Walmart on a Cloudy Night

The maps are vague, the stops unsure,
The stores are hard to find.
The day's been long, we pulled up stakes,
The manager was kind.

We're on our way to Jacksonville,
to see a vampire bat.
We got a special entrance card
from Jack the technocrat.

And so we slip into a space
or two or three or four.
We come alone, but soon it's filled
with campers by the score.

The privates hate the way we play,
stopping for a night.
They want to suck the pockets dry,
And leave us nice and light.

We walk the dog, and watch TV,
We act like we're in homes
Play solitaire and pinball, too,
And write these silly poems.

And then we sleep, all through the night,
with traffic whizzing by.
Shoppers keep on pulling up
to make a late night buy.

And when the sun climbs slowly up
we'll wake and clean our plate.
And drive to maybe one more store
Along the Interstate.