Housekeeping in Texas

In the 2.5 years we’ve been traveling, we’ve stayed in the same place only 3 times (the Airstream lot in Ohio and near Tracy’s people in Iowa).

This is the 4th, at what’s technically our home base north of Houston: an easy drive to our established doctors, our mailing service, and the county where the truck and trailer are registered.

Life Garbage

That’s what our almost-full-time friend, Melanie, calls these errands; I’d call this round, “Life Hell” because I’ve dreaded it.

First off, we had a combined total of six doctor appointments in two long days. When you barely know your doctor—how to get there, what the office is like, what the doctor is like—it all makes me anxious. Plus, who knows when some doctor is going to discover there’s something wrong with you?!?

Then, the very next day we hitched the trailer (again, from the spot we’d just pulled into) and towed it to our county so we could get it inspected, and because there was nowhere to drop the trailer, we had to grab our mail at Escapees and get a new license plate (the old one fell off somewhere in California) all while towing, then grab lunch and drive back to the campground and back into out spot again and level again and get all set up, again.

The good news is that all of that is done! Barring iffy results from various sets of labs that are still out, we won’t have to come back for this rigamarole for another year, at least. Whew!

New Plates, New Window Treatments

Now we’re no longer driving around illegally with only one plate on the truck. We’d gone through two border crossings and one brief period of no proof of registration without that plate, but I’m guessing we were never pulled over because only Texans know Texas requires both plates. We sure were on the road a lot like that.

Plus, we picked up two very cool window treatments for the windows over the sink, where the current roller shade drives us nuts because it hits the magnetic knife strip on one side and the electricity display box on the other. (We installed the strip and the box, so our bad, not Airstream’s.) If you have any dishes out drying when you want to lift it up or down, forget about it.

What we bought is a cool-looking set of plastic vertical strips that slide over each other, effectively to open and close the viewing area. We can’t install them until it’s above 50 degrees out for a day, but I’ll show you then. I’m pretty pumped! (Yet another good idea from the Facebook group about Airstream interior decorating. Who’d have thought that would be one of my favorite places online?)

Cagle Recreation Area

Now that we’re done with all those errands, we have a few days in this lovely park on a lake. Too bad it’s so cold that all we can do is walk briskly. Walking is good though. There’s a trail around the campground that Banjo quite likes, with armadillos and deer galore.

And the sunsets, either from the beach or even from inside the trailer, are fantastic.

Frankly, we’re regrouping our brains and souls after all that stress, and it feels good to just look out at the water and sunlight. Next up: New Orleans.