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Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Just Hanging Out

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We have not done a whole lot since we returned from Canton. Working on a plan that will take us to Houston, one of my least favorite place to go, to visit my family before Christmas. There are several RV parks near my mom and sister. Surprisingly they are not booked liked they were last year. Our choice will be easy as one is wanting $284 for a week and the other being a POA park want $135. It does not have all the amenities the other park has to offer, but we wouldn't use them anyway as we will be visiting family most of the time. I guess you can say a place to come home to at the end of the day.

image It's that time of the year again where we are being bombarded by the sweet gum balls being blown from the tree we are parked near. The winds have been really  strong the past few days. They sound like bombs going off as they hit our fiberglass roof by the hundreds. Sure thankful they don't weigh a lot as if they did we would have to pull up our jacks and get out of here. When you walk out the door you have to dodge them as they fling through the air.

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Today warmed up pretty nicely and I suggested to Sandy that we pick up her mom and go sight seeing and look at some Christmas lights. I chose Jefferson TX as I recalled that city did put an all out effort to decorate the town and its historical homes. We picked her up around 2pm and headed east on some of the back Farm to Market roads.

imageFor the most part of the trip we were the only ones on the road. It sure was a nice drive as we saw country that one does not normally see when traveling the main byways. The small towns, farms, churches and homes were so tranquil looking as we drove past them.

imageWe were able to drive as slow as we wanted to without the fear of making someone mad or slowing them down to where they were headed. We arrived in Jefferson around 4pm and drove through town and by the historical homes. Here are just a few photos taken during the day light. I will save the night photos for a later blog. (click on pictures to enlarge)

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Until next time . . . .MtnAire Travlers.

Friday, December 10, 2010

What Goes On While You Sleep

Some friends of ours who live out in the country set up a game camera in one of their back pastures. They wanted to find out what critters were out there prowling around at night.
To make sure they would get some good photos they did spread corn and berry flavored deer food near the game camera. The following are some of the results of their efforts.

Large Buckimage

Coyote
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Doe Family
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Raccoons
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Small Buck
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One Surprised Doe
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If you look real close at the photo of the raccoon family the light colored one is an albino raccoon. Soooo  my friends you never know what's out there during the night. We really appreciate Don and Carla sharing these photos with us. Thanks guys!

Until next time. . . .MtnAire Travlers.

Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Remembering Pearl Harbor. . .December 7, 1941

USS Arizona

It was 69 years ago to the day that the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. They came in two waves the first at 7:53 am and the second at 8:55am. By 9:55am it was over. Behind them they left chaos, 2,408 dead, 188 destroyed planes and a crippled Pacific Fleet that included 8 damaged or destroyed battleships.

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Until next time. . ..MtnAire Travlers.

Monday, December 6, 2010

Four Days Of Canton First Monday

We are very close to that dreaded 5G limit on the Verizon air card. In fact we only have 480MB that must last until 12/7. This is our first time in the year and half we've come this close. Wish they would do roll over like AT&T does with the mobile minutes.

Thursday December 2
Our weather today was about near perfect for us. Our crowds were pretty good for a Thursday along with sales. Maybe this weekend will be one of those where we are pleasantly surprised.

We have a new vendor down from us that sells fudge. Strolled down to welcome them and tried a sample. Boy was it good. Would loved to have purchased at least one-quarter pound but I was able to stay strong and walked away without a purchase.

One of the reasons we probably had a fair Thursday is we discounted some of the older insert designs 15%.  Also we had some non structured small inserts  we were selling at 50% off. We are helping our supplier sale down her old inventory.

Thursday night I switched back and forth between the Eagles vs. Texans and Arizona vs Arizona State football games. The double overtime win by ASU turned out to be the best.


Friday December 3
We woke up at our usual 6:15am time. I turned the TV on to catch the morning news and for some reason we had no signal for most of our Direct TV channels. Checked our signal strength and it had dropped from a 89 to a 37. Normally being up next to the building we don't find a signal at all.

That's why we find the signal out in the parking lot and drive into our spot behind our booth. Sooo I asked Sandy if she wanted to back the motorhome away from the building and search for the Satellite.  She wasn't in favor of this so we turned the search button on again and to our surprise was able to get a signal strength of 69 which was good enough to bring in all of our channels.
Our crowd today was heavier than Thursday and the sales were not bad.

Saturday December 4
The weather today was great. Our crowds were good and they were buying. I watched college football all day and into the night. Since I had no favorites the teams that won and those who lost had no meaning to me. I guess pulling for the underdog though does have some meaning.

We had a little excitement where two guys came into the back of our booth asking if we knew who owned the large white cargo trailer parked behind our booth. Turns out they were State Investigators looking for  stolen cargo trailers similar to this one. We're told this is not that unusual for Canton. They ride around on a ATV four wheeler looking for the Vin # on the trailer tongue. We told them we did not know the person but thought he was in another Pavilion behind us.

As they were walking back toward the trailer the owner walked up and they confronted him. Curiosity was eating us up as we could not hear their conversation. They then turned and walked away together.

Sunday December 5
Got up to a crisp cold 36F this morning. Our coldest temperature is to come tonight 29F. This colder weather sure makes it tuff on one particularly dealing with the sewer and water hoses to drain our holding tanks before we leave for base Monday morning.

Our crowd Sunday was that typical group that comes to Canton just for the outing and to buy turkey legs, corn dogs and curly fries.

During our pack out this afternoon the owner of the cargo trailer that was in question as been stolen walked up and gave us some insight what was going on. It seems they could not find the vin # and required him to show proof of ownership. He said he didn't have the information on his person as all the papers were at his home.
He gave them all his personal information and they said they were out of the Tyler office and would be paying him a visit next week. The owner was pretty confident that he could prove ownership.

Oh, overall I guess we can say our month was a pleasant surprise.

Until next time. . . .MtnAire Travlers.

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

December First Monday Trade Days

 
We put the final touches on the booth today. Sandy and I strung the Christmas garland and lights around the edges of her grids where she hangs her purse inserts. I hung the Chameleon sign behind our booth. Doesn't look to bad considering us guys don't do things like this well. We had a real cold night last night but our temperatures will be in the high 50's to low 60's for the weekend

This is our last show for 2010 and compared to previous years our sales are down some. Now we venture into the first quarter of 2011 where usually they are mediocre due to the colder winter months. The customers just don't venture out in the cold and I certainly don't blame them.

They say you need a good last quarter of the year in order to survive the winter months. Our last quarter was good enough for our commitment to do the winter shows. Besides it give us an outing and we both enjoy the friendship we've built with our fellow vendors around us.

I see John and Brenda are now in Louisiana. Hey guys when you passed through Tyler we were only 36 miles west from their. Wish we could have got together for a brief visit. I did this collage of our Cowtown Gathering last week.

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We went to Robels tonight for some good Mexican food. Sandy had their chicken casadia  and I had cheese enchiladas. After dinner we returned to the motorhome where Sandy did some book reading while I watched that classic western movie of "Stagecoach" with John Wayne.

Until next time. . . .MtnAire Travlers.