Friday October 24 2008 by Leland.

Thursdays at 7 pm and Sundays at 2 pm the Racoon Valley Escapees has a Blue Grass Jam Session.  A group of local folks along with anyone from the park who think they have music in them gather in the office and make music. 

This was our last evening here in the Knoxville area and I decided to check it out.  What a great time I had.  There was a guy with a mandolin, a guy who played banjo and guitar, a gal who played guitar, a bass and a mouth harp (he couldn’t play for squat.) and so on.  They played a combination of blue grass classics, gospel blue grass, pop and other music.  It was cool.

This woman played “The Unicorn song.” along with a couple of Tammy Winette type songs.  Good voice.

The young gal with the white shirt and red pants in this photo was one of God’s Angels on earth.  She was having a birthday and turned 21.  Laurie is what we call retarded.  One guy next to me said “it’s a shame.”  I told him I disagreed.  She loved the music and when a good rousing song like “Rocky Top.” started up she was up dancing.  Now her physical impairments made her dance just a shuffle/stomp but she hooted and danced as the music moved her.  She was happy, she didn’t care what she looked like or what people might think of her.  She is, to me an example of what I should be more like.  God Bless you Laurie.

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Friday October 24 2008 by Leland.

Wednesday was Zoo Day for us.   I knew this was a city zoo when I saw this critter staked outside for display!  :)  Just kidding. 

We saw the big animals and the small as we went through.  I loved the Butterflies, as you might guess.

We used the timer button to get one of the rare “both of us” photos so thought we’d use it as we turned our backs on the Zebras.

Folks walking by were nice enough to stop and let us get the shot.  Nice people everywhere.

The Montana Bear Connection?  We found this exhibit (PC word for cage) empty with this sign.  What a coincidence!  This bear has moved to Billings Montana.  Someone should go out and see how he is and tell him hello for us.

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Wednesday October 22 2008 by Leland.

This day was a drive in the country.  Some things that I have noted are the lack of wild life and the lack of dirt roads.  We took off on a drive just north of our Racoon Valley camp, headed towards Big Ridge State Park.  While the road was very winding and very narrow, it was all paved.  We haven’t been on a dirt road yet.

At the entrance to Big Ridge State Park we spotted this mama Black Tail Deer and her twin fawns. 

We drove around for miles, following traces of roads on the GPS and finally wound up back at camp. 

Cinnamon and I decided to take the Tick and Chigger risk and go for a hike on this trail.  It was so beautiful that we didn’t mind the two or three ticks we picked off at the end. 

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Tuesday October 21 2008 by Leland.

The weather was GLORIOUS.  The trees were changing and we headed out for a drive to see the Great Smokey Mountains National Park

.  While we did see the park and it was super, the most memoriable part of the trip was the traffic. 

Seems some radio and TV stations in Knoxville had declared that the colors were at peak this weekend and everybody in Tennesse and loads of surrounding states decided to take a drive to the park.  We finally got to the Park after spending almost two hours doing the last 25 miles.  CRAZY.At the visitor center we got a map and decided to take one of the roads less traveled so instead of going up to the high country and over the “Gap” we headed down the river road and enjoyed one of the most beautiful drives I have ever taken.  We went down a very winding and twisting river road, looking out at and up at the scenery.

We need to go back when the trees have had a little more time to costume themselves.

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Sunday October 19 2008 by Leland.

One of the few bleak features of our lifestyle is missing the kids and grandkids.  We meet people who say it doesn’t matter that they don’t see their kids and grandkids but that ain’t us.  We miss ‘em.  So how do we cope?  One of the ways is the miracle of the internet with a web cam. 

In this photo you can see Kitten in our office area doing the deal with Megan.  Megan is in college and misses the family so we often talk with her.  We also talk with Meranda, McKinzie, Ronda, Stacey, Brittany and Aaron.  It is a very satisfying way to stay in touch.

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Saturday October 18 2008 by Leland.

Just another day in Paradise!  Pondering what needs to be done and how the world is doing.

Well I guess the Montana snow is mostly gone, at least in the city.  I repaired my ladder - Did I tell you that I broke the bottom 18″ off when it drug at St. Francis Kansas. I bought a 6″ piece of conduit, cut it in half and made a splice. It worked and it’s back on but I think I want to shorten it about 6 inches which will be easy now that I have the splice. I’ll just open the splice and cut off one end and re splice. I managed to fix the porch light, the bulb was just loose. Not bad. Two down. It’s chilly (54) this morning but I think I’ll go out and wash the beast anyway. I want to especially wash the roof so that I see all of it closely.  I’m going to do an oil change and lube as soon as Kitten goes up to do the laundry.  I’ll pull in the slide and lift the nose to make some space.  Later we are going to take a drive. I think we’ll explore the first parts of the Great Smokey Mountains National Park. Just an exploratory trip to see how the traffic is and what the campgrounds look like. It’s about 50 miles away from here. I think I want to camp in the park and do some bicycle riding. I may have to camp outside the park due to our size but we’ll see.

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Saturday October 18 2008 by Leland.

This has been an interesting week.  While Kitten stayed in the Escapees park here in Heiskel Tennessee, I flew from Knoxville to Chicago to Portland to Klamath Falls.  While there we did final tests and cutover on the project I have been working on for almost four years.  It’s kinda wierd to not have that project on the plate anymore.  Then on Thursday I flew from Klamath Falls to Portland to Washington DC to Knoxville.  Other than being a real long flight, the only remarkable item was the Garlic Knots I found in the Washington DC Dullas Airport.  They were at a pizza stand.  They are little bread balls deep fat fried like donut holes that are in Garlic sauce and have little cut up pieces of garlic in them.  If you like garlic, and I love it, then this is a treat.  Of course nobody loves me anymore…..

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Sunday October 12 2008 by Leland.

Today we went to the Tennessee Home coming Blue Grass Festival.  It was held at the Aplachia Museum which is an outdoor museum with old buildings, craftspeople and all.  They had 5 stage areas with a schedule of bands and entertainers all day from 9 a.m. to dusk for 4 days.  We just went this one day and we really had a ball.  The bands on the stages were great, there were banjos, fiddles, basses and the guitars, dulcimers in several varieties and singers, cloggers WOW.  I really enjoyed the impromptu concerts that were happening around every curve in the paths and anyplace two or three of these talented people ran into each other. 

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Friday October 10 2008 by Leland.

We arrived at the Racoon Valley Escapees RV Park at 6:30 p.m.  It was a beautiful drive from Red Bay Alabama.  Some of the trees are just starting to turn color so there were splashes here and there.  It is going to be beautiful in the next month.  This is certainly hill country around here.  We haven’t explored any so don’t know much except that it is certainly also rural around here.  We picked up our General Delivery mail this morning and are reading all this stuff.  Packages from home - what more could you ask for.

There is a big Blue Grass Festival just 5 miles up the road this weekend so we should have fun with that.  $25 tickets per day so we will enjoy one long day. 

More later after I get some work done.

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Thursday October 9 2008 by Leland.

We closed the books on the Tiffin Adventure this morning. We traveled about 1800 miles, got a complete new roof and some new cabinets in the Butterfly along with a small pile of other maintenance items such as taking the mud dobber nests out of the holding tank vents and fixing a screw that came up in the floor under the carpets.
Our appointment started on September 15th when we checked the rig into Bay 19 and let Anthony have the list. We picked it up this last Monday October 6. In between times we lived out of the car at a motel or two and at Kitten’s sister Pat and her husband Jim’s. We lived out of what we had stuck in the car and two small duffle bags of cloths. It was nice to get your undies out of a drawer again, instead of the bag.
During this adventure I flew to Oregon twice on business and each time Kitten and her sister went shopping! Scarey.
Now the new adventure begins. We are headed to Racoon Valley Escapees park just north of Knoxville Tn. We will be there about two weeks, during which time I will fly to Oregon for probably the last time this year. At Knoxville we are going to get our tow bar fixed and attend a few Blue Grass festivals that predominate the area. Wow, what a trick! Now for 7 hours driving….. Not the fun kind, this is the “gotta get there” kind. oh well

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