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Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Taking off the old solar panel and a Lopsided Chipmunk Face

Ok... last part of title first.

Yesterday I cracked a molar... OUCH!   Called our dentist and got in within an hour.  Nice to be in a small town sometimes.   Soooo  in I went.   He started to pull it, broke some more. Took four needles of *stuff* to finally numb it enough.   Ended up with three pieces  and now a very swollen jaw from his wrenching me back and forth.  ACK   Don't hurt, but just swollen now.   NO pictures.   LOL


Yesterday Steveio and his buddy got up on the roof and pulled off our existing 75 watt solar panel.   They had a bit of struggle loosening the nuts, but finally got it. The solar panel came off fine, it was just the nuts on the brackets that gave them grief.   Glad I wasn't helping.   I was in the house dosing from the pain meds for my dentist trip, so I was not the appointed GOPHER.






We put it up on Ebay for sale, for sale with the controller too.   It worked great to top off our four 6V golf cart batteries when boondocking.  

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300397964158&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT


Steveio is going to install four big 100W solar panels with a bigger controller and trimetric gauge (digital readout of exactly how many amp hours are left at any given time)   Bit by bit, we are getting set up for fulltiming.  We will also increase our battery bank from four to six of the 6volt golf cart batteries.   Then we don't have to be so careful and stingy with our power consumption.


Had a nice weekend with all three grandkids...  we saw Chelsea on Friday, babysat Jameson overnight on friday night, brought him home Saturday and went to see Allegra on Saturday afternoon.  Wheeee a 3 Grandkid Weekend!

Got some snow over the weekend too.... so everything is bright and white again and not so crusty and dirty black snow along the roads.  

But I think we are getting Spring Fever pretty bad.  On Sunday when we were out in the motorhome doing a few things, we turned on the new heater, turned on the tv, and curled up and watched a movie!    We were pretending we were somewhere... anywhere....  


Last year at this time we were basking in the heat of Florida, 
camping at Fore Lake in the Ocala National Forest! 


We camped in such a lovely campsite... all covered with live oaks, spanish moss and very quiet and removed from the hustle and bustle!  Makes us daydream of being there right now.

My folks camped in the next site over with their Holiday Endevour motorhome.   Then a few days later our friends Barrie and Claire joined us too for a day with their motorhome in the site on the other side.   We cooked together and laughed together and just plain old enjoyed ourselves.....   Barrie and Clair had to drive back to Massachusetts in between snow storms, and we had to bide our time to head north too between ice storms and snow storms in Tennessee and Indiana.   We sure didn't want to leave the sunshine and the warmth!


(left to right: Dad, Barrie, Steve, Claire, Me - with wine, and Mom)


Steveio made sure he was well-rested for the trip home to Wisconsin......

(Do you think he was dreaming of snow in Wisconsin?) 

9 comments:

  1. Ouch! ...and Ouch!

    Dee told us last night in the chat what had happened.

    Take care of yourself!

    You guys are really getting things done. You know there is a direct connection between getting things ready and that "hitchitch" thing. lol

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  2. Oh but we have to wait till 2013 for Steve's long awaited and well-earned pension. In the meantime, we get to take lots of weekends, and about 8 weeks of paid vacation time each year. Though he is not allowed to take it all in one lump, has to be spaced out in smaller increments.

    As soon as the snow melts, and the weight restrictions are off the backroads, we hit the woods almost every weekend. Can't wait!

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  3. 2013,Wow, and Donna and I are sitting here hoping three months will pass quickly, I can really get into resting up like Steveio is doing. Good things are worth waiting for and I'm sure you guys will have a good summer with many outings. See you maybe on one of your summer outings as we plan to be north in the summer and south in the winter, Be Safe, Sam&Donna

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  4. Sam and Donna.. let us know if you are up in this general area, perhaps we can meet up somewhere!

    Yup Al, we are waiting.. waiting... waiting for Spring. Sometimes we have snow as late as May. (sigh)

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  5. We're wanting to put on solar panels as well. We will have to have it done though. It's beyong our skill level!

    Your dogs are very pretty. Are there any more pictures of them in the blog?

    I checked out our toilet and I don't see how the base comes off like yours did. I think I will just cut the Allure around it and put down some of the life saving rubber molding to cover up the gap. It's going to be a chore to get the correct fit around the toilet though.

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  6. Karen and Al... I think I have pics of the dogs on almost every blog post! haha especially the ones starting with *Campground Reviews*... and there is a special post about spinning my old dogs fur into yarn and making a blanket out of it....

    Its from Feb 10 and title starts with Snow snow snow snow snow.....

    Karen and Steve

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  7. Yes, I am thinking Steve and Mike could be twins--Mike also uses Craigslist for hours and hours where ever we are! We too are thinking of getting solar and I probably won't bring the longarm next year, just my sewing machine and some other projects--we need to hook up somewhere, I want to learn to knit socks.

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  8. Hey Janna... my next blog post for today I made for YOU! It's all about knitting socks on needles, and my easy pattern to do it. Check back as soon as it's done uploading!

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