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Working Man’s Weather

The weeks keep flying by and I find myself having a hard time keeping this blog up. I used to post daily – or nearly so. Nowadays, once a week is about it. That’s mostly due to our winter digs – we spend an extended period of time in San Diego followed by a long stint in Arizona.

Mesa, in central Arizona, is a great place to winter. When we lived here in a sticks-and-bricks house, we found many of the snowbirds to be a nuisance. Out-of-state drivers often had annoying habits on the road and the stores were often crowded compared to the number of people here from spring through fall. The snowbird season peaks in January-February-March, then begins to taper off in April. I guess we’re part of the snowbird crowd now.

One of the things we like about staying in east Mesa is the easy access to open country. We’re only a few miles from Usery Regional Park and the Tonto National Forest. It seems a little strange to be calling the desert landscape National Forest, but that’s the designation. The Bush Highway runs through the Tonto National Forest following the Salt River. It provides access to Saguaro Lake and miles of hiking, biking and horseback riding trails.

On Friday morning, I was up before the sun. Mike Hall came by at 8am and picked me up. We headed out Bush Highway to AZ87 and into the desert in his Toyota pickup. We spent the morning target shooting in the desert. It’s fun and a popular activity here. Getting out early to claim a good shooting area is always a good idea. We burned up ammo and plinked at his steel-plate targets for a few hours. I was back home by noon – I had a train-the-trainer pickleball session at 1pm.

On Saturday morning, Donna and I were up early again – I had an alarm set for 6:15am. We wanted to have ample time to hydrate and caffeinate before we competed in the Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort Valentine’s Pickleball Tournament. There were over 30 teams entered, split into two groups. Most of the teams were couples which made it interesting. We were in the early group which had 15 teams – 30 players total. We rolled through the round-robin matches and were undefeated after six games. We went into the playoff rounds along with two other teams, but our luck ran out on us and we finished in third place.

After the tournament we came home, cleaned up and had lunch. Then we headed out in Midget-San to Fountain Hills. There was a large car show there that ran until 3pm. It was a beautiful day out with blue skies and the temperature was in the low 70s. The drive out Bush Highway with the top down was very enjoyable. The car show was at the Fountain Park in Fountain Hills. I wrote a post about the fountain – you can read it here.

The area around the park was crowded and finding a parking place wasn’t easy. We managed to squeeze into a spot on the street about half a block east of the park. My interest in the hot rods and muscle cars has diminished lately. At the cars shows, I find myself more interested in the unusual and older cars. I learned about this show from a Facebook post by the Phoenix Lotus Club. I wanted to check out some of the old Lotus sports cars.

When we entered the park, we saw the scope of this show. Cars were displayed all the way around Fountain Lake. There were crowds of people, food vendors and cars everywhere. It was so packed in many places that it was hard to take photos – but I didn’t let that stop me.

They kept the fountain running at low-power throughout the show.

Cars, crowds and vendors on the grass at Fountain Park

It turned out the Lotus Club was set up on the far west side of the park. We hiked past display after display and made a complete circle of the lake. There were also a few oddities on display. This is the first car show I can remember that had helicopters on display.

WWII era half-track with 50 caliber anti-aircraft guns

As we made our way to the west side of the lake, we began to see British Car Club displays.

The cars on display were mostly privately owned and driven to the park. The sheer number of valuable cars is a testament to the wealth in the area.

A highly modified Ford V8 in a 1971 De Tomaso Pantera

We found the Lotus Club and saw a few old Elans that were cool and also spoke to a couple of club members before we continued our hike around the lake. Past the Lotus area, we found scores of exotic cars. I mentioned the wealth – the countless Ferraris and Lamborghinis that showed up was mind boggling.

We left Fountain Hills around 3pm and drove down AZ87 to Gilbert Road – making a loop out of our route to and from Fountain Hills.

Sunday was another gorgeous day with the temperature in the mid-70s. It was a mostly lazy day for me. Donna never seems to slow down. She rode her bicycle over to Orangewood Shadows RV Resort to visit with our friends, Lowell and Debi Hartvikson. We met them several years ago when we stayed at Orangewood and Donna often hiked with them. Donna’s also keeping up with clarinet practice, tennis lessons, pickleball and hitting the gym here at Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort.

Last week, Donna prepared a dish that we really liked in the past but haven’t had in a while. It was coconut curry chicken. For some reason, it seemed to be lacking the curry kick we remembered. I don’t mean to be critical of the meal she prepared, but we both were puzzled by the relatively bland flavor. The ingredients were fresh and the recipe unchanged.

Coconut curry chicken with grilled bok choy

The great weather held up until yesterday afternoon. Rain moved into the area around 4pm. I came in from reading outside with a cigar about five minutes before it started raining. I made a marinade for another batch of jerky. I bought two pounds of pre-sliced top round beef at Winco. The meat was sliced about 1/8″ to 1/4″ thick across the grain and all I had to do was cut it into strips – and it was only $3.48/lb!

The rain continued off and on overnight but it’s dry this morning. We still have clouds and the expected high temperature today is only around 60 degrees. Things should warm up to the 70s again by Thursday. It seems like we’ve had working man’s weather – rain and cold Monday through Wednesday or Thursday, then warm, sunny weekends over the past few weeks.

*Just so you know, if you use this link to shop on Amazon and decide to purchase anything, you pay the same price as usual and I’ll earn a few pennies for the referral. It’ll go into the beer fund. Thanks!

Minor Maintenance Tasks

We enjoyed another week as temporary residents of Mesa, Arizona. We’ve been coming here every year for the winter months since we hit the road – this is our fourth year here at Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort. From 2006 to 2009, we lived here in Mesa full-time in a sticks-and-bricks home about 3 miles away from Viewpoint.

I had a couple of minor projects to attend to last week. When I dumped our gray water tank, I noticed a slow drip coming out of the bottom of the plastic pan in the wet bay. Later, I went to see about taking the cover plate off the wet bay to inspect the water lines, but the drip had stopped and all was dry. The next day, I saw the drip again. Taking the cover plate off the wet bay involved removing 14 screws. Once I did that, I saw that I really only needed to remove 11 of the 14 screws. Three screws were attached to a stiffener board that came off with the plate. Next time I’ll know.

I found the source of the water drip. There’s a plastic fitting in the PEX fresh water line with a small valve and connector to supply the ice maker in our freezer. This fitting had a hairline crack and was leaking. I made a trip to Ace hardware and bought a new fitting. I had to replace a short section of PEX tubing and it was job done. I neglected to take any photos while I worked.

The other minor project was routine maintenance on Midget-San. Modern cars make it easy to forget how much maintenance we once had to perform on automobiles. Unlike modern cars with sealed bearings and lifetime lubricated ball joints, our 1972 MG Midget requires chassis lube on the front suspension components. There are zerk fittings on the ball joints and king pin links and trunnions. These need to be greased with NLGI #2 bearing grease.

To do this, I needed to raise the Midget – it sits only a few inches above ground level making it impossible for me to get underneath the car. I jacked the car up and supported the four corners with jack stands. I used a grease gun and a cartridge of grease to inject grease into the zerk fittings.

I also had ordered a new distributor cap and rotor along with an ignition wire set from RockAuto. Nowadays, cars have separate coils mounted directly on the spark plug, eliminating the distributor and ignition wires. Modern platinum or iridium spark plugs can last 50,000 miles or more. Not so on the 1982 Nissan A15 engine in Midget-San. It is equipped with an electronic ignition module, so there isn’t a set of breaker points to replace. This is the only electronically controlled item on the car. The distributor is otherwise an old-fashioned device with a vacuum advance mechanism to control ignition timing. The single ignition coil is a Bosch blue coil feeding high voltage to the center terminal of the distributor cap where the current then travels through the rotor to each ignition wire and on to the appropriate spark plug.

These parts can wear and need periodic replacement. The high voltage arcs from the rotor to the distributor cap terminals resulting in wear on both components. The ignition wires delivering high voltage to the spark plugs can break down, allowing the current to arc to ground rather than firing the spark plugs. As part of my preventive maintenance schedule, I replaced the cap, rotor and ignition wires. It’s a fairly easy and straightforward job.

New distributor cap, rotor and NGK ignition wire set

Overall, the maintenance work was easy and didn’t take a lot of time or effort. These are the things you need to do to keep a 48-year-old car with a 38-year-old engine running smooth.

In my last post, I mentioned a new recipe I wanted to try. It was Smoked Paprika Chicken Legs with Chimichurri. I made a rub with paprika, coriander seeds, lime zest, salt and pepper and two tablespoons of olive oil. This created a paste-like rub that I massaged into the chicken leg quarters.

I set the Traeger wood-pellet fired smoker-grill to high (450 degrees). The chicken leg quarters cooked on the smoker for 45 minutes.

While the chicken leg quarters were cooking i made the chimichurri by putting a cup of parsley and a cup of cilantro along with jalapeno, onion, garlic cloves, fresh squeezed lime juice, olive oil, salt and pepper in a food processor and pulsed it until it was creamy. This was served directly on the chicken.

Thigh portion of chicken leg quarter with chimichurri, mashed potato, corn and asparagus

The result was tasty and it’s a recipe worth repeating. Next time, I think I’ll use bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs. The high setting on the Traeger made a pleasantly crispy and tasty skin on the chicken.

Our Superbowl Sunday plan had a bit of a hectic schedule. Donna had tennis in the morning and a clarinet lesson in the afternoon before we drove to Mike and Jodi Hall’s for food, drink and the game – and cigars for Mike and me. The day before, we went shopping at Winco foods. I looked at the babyback ribs there, but wasn’t impressed. The only babybacks they had were Hormel brand, frozen rock hard and they didn’t look very meaty. We tried Fry’s grocery and they didn’t have any at all! We then went to Basha’s where I found nice looking fresh (not frozen) babybacks.

I did my usual thing with two racks of ribs on the Traeger Sunday afternoon. We took them to Mike and Jodi’s place around 3:30pm. Jeff and Chrissy Van Deren were there along with Mike’s sister, Connie, and Jodi’s sister Jackie. Donna made stuffed mushrooms and a vegetable tray. Mike had a whole chicken on his smoker grill. We had plenty of food for all. It was a good time and we enjoyed the game.

The weather had been great all week with daily highs in the low 70s. The weekend was warmer and we hit 78 degrees on Sunday! But on Monday, a cold front moved over the area and we had a partly cloudy day with the high only reaching the low 60s. I think the warmest part of the day was late morning, then it got colder as the day wore on. Last night, the temperature dropped to 34 degrees and we have a freeze warning tonight. Cold temperatures with the highs only in the 50s are forecast for the next few days. As I type this, it’s clear and sunny outside but the temperature is only 50 degrees. This cold spell should break by Friday and we’ll be back in the 70s.

Reeling in the Years

Another week has flown by since I last posted. I wrote that post on a wet and dreary day. It’s been the opposite of that since then. Glorious, sunny days with blue skies and cool evenings. It’s hard to believe the first month of 2020 is coming to a close already. I have a theory about the perception of time accelerating as we grow older.

When we were 12 years old, our lifetime experience could be broken down into 12 increments, each spanning one year (this isn’t exactly true – most of us have little or no recollection of the first few years of our life). So, our internal perception of time revolves around a year being 1/12th of everything we know.

When we reach the age of 60, our lifetime experience can be broken into 60 equal intervals, each spanning one year. These intervals are now 1/5th of the perceived interval when we were 12 years old. A year represents a much smaller portion of our life experience, thus we perceive a year as a much shorter span of time. Therefore, for us old people, time really flies.

After the rain cleared up, Scott started working on our coach on Wednesday. A painter’s work revolves around prep. The quality of the work is a reflection of the preparation. I’ve had car painters tell me that actually shooting the paint is the easy part. Getting the surface prepared and the final cut and buff are what make the job come out great. Scott spent three days preparing the surface for paint. He had to remove the clear coat from the areas where it was failing. To get the new finish to adhere, the old clear coat had to be cut back to provide a good, solid margin. He did this with a razor blade and sand paper. It looked like tedious work.

To match the paint color, he had to remove one of the basement compartment doors that had all four colors on it. He took it to a paint shop where they could color match with a special camera and computer program. He was ready to start applying paint on Friday.

Saturday afternoon he was ready to start the finish work. He had to block-sand the clear coat, then buff it with a polishing wheel. He ran out of daylight and had to finish up Sunday morning. The finished job looks great.

Meanwhile, we went about our business. Donna started practicing new music on her clarinet. The next Viewpoint Concert Band performance is February 16th and they have a whole new repertoire to learn for that performance.

I learned something new about UPS deliveries. Apparently, they have a new protocol where they only make one attempt to deliver a package in some areas. If you aren’t home, they take the package to a UPS Access Point. I had a package come on Thursday while we were out. There was a note left on our door. After I deciphered the driver’s chicken scratch note, I figured out that I had to wait until the next day to pick up my package at a nearby CVS pharmacy. Seems a little crazy to me, but I suppose the agreement to accept packages at CVS will bring customers into the store to potentially shop while they’re there.

On Saturday morning, Donna and I drove Midget-San to Gilbert where we were meeting our friends, Sara and Howard Graff, for the farmers’ market. They actually pulled up next to us at a stoplight on Gilbert Road at Baseline on the way there. What timing!

Gilbert used to be little more than a crossroads in the desert. Urban sprawl has made it part of metro Phoenix today. Everything from Glendale to Phoenix, Scottsdale, Tempe, Mesa, Gilbert and Chandler is one big area of development. It’s hard to tell when you cross into another city limit. Gilbert has gone from being a one-horse cowboy town to a trendy place to shop and eat. There are numerous restaurants along the old Main Street.

We strolled and shopped at the farmers’ market. They had a fairly large number of vendors there with plenty of fresh produce.

There was a separate market place on the north side of the old town for arts and crafts. After walking through all of the markets, we checked out a few places to eat and settled on OHSO Brewery and Distillery. We had a short wait, then were seated out on the covered patio. Their food was excellent – we were all very happy with the meals we ordered. On the weekends, brunch from 10am to 2pm includes a 10-ounce beer or a mimosa when specific menu entrees are ordered. My entree included a drink, but Donna commandeered my mimosa when I ordered a Bloody Mary. The Bloody Mary was made with half jalapeno vodka and half horseradish vodka. It was spicy and it included a stick of house-made beef jerky.

Speaking of beef jerky, on Friday, I trimmed and cut beef top-round steaks across the grain into strips. I had them marinating in the refrigerator overnight. Saturday afternoon I set up the Traeger wood-pellet fired smoker-grill and set it to 180 degrees. I started with two pounds of beef. Four and a half hours later, I had one pound of beef jerky after the meat had smoked and dehydrated. It’s pretty good. I’ll make an adjustment or two to the recipe and reduce the smoke time to four hours when I make it again.

On Sunday evening, my middle daughter, Jamie, and her man, Francisco came over from the west side to go to dinner. Francisco’s birthday is today, but we celebrated early with dinner at the Black Angus. I worked at Stuart Anderson’s Black Angus back in the ’70s in San Diego. That’s where I met my first wife – Jamie’s mother. The Black Angus isn’t what it used to be, but we enjoyed the meal and had a good time together.

Here are a few other good meals we enjoyed over the last week courtesy of Donna’s culinary skills. First up is coconut curry wild Alaskan sockeye salmon with bok choy served with forbidden rice. A favorite for sure.

Coconut curry salmon with bok choy and forbidden rice on the side

Another seafood dish was served up Thursday night. Donna grilled shrimp with pesto served with grilled mushrooms, onions, peppers and zucchini with cauliflower risotto on the side.

Last night, she kept it simple with a chicken stir-fry.

Yesterday, I prepped chicken leg quarters. Later today, I’ll put them on the Traeger. I’m trying something new to me – smoked paprika chicken legs with spicy herb chimichurri. I’ll let you how that works out.

Although a cooler day with clouds are in the forecast for tomorrow, we can expect the favorable weather to continue with highs in the 70s through the weekend. We’re getting plenty of exercise – one day last week I had almost 18,00 steps on the pickleball court!

Cars and Music

I closed my last post on Friday saying that Mike Hall invited me to join him at the Gooding and Company Auto Auction. Mike had VIP passes that gained us free entry and the run of the place at Scottsdale Fashion Square. The first part of this post is car picture heavy. If you have no interest in rare, expensive automobiles, you may want to skip down past the photos.

Mike picked me up here at Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort and we arrived in Scottsdale around 4pm. We were waved right into the show area after showing our VIP wristbands. Right at the entrance, a beautiful yellow 1967 Ferrari 300 GTS was on display. I’ll let the photos and captions walk us through some of the cars up for sale.

A modern Ferrari – a model year 2020 488 Pista

My favorite of the show and the first time I’ve ever seen one other than photos – 1956 Jaguar XK140 Aerodyne

1964 Jaguar E-Type 3.8 Series I Roadster – please excuse the weird lens flare in the photo

1941 Packard Custom Super Eight 180 Victoria

1932 Hispano – Suiza J12 Dual Cowl Phaeton

Not your average Porsche – a model year 2004 Carrera GT – Fewer than 1,400 of these V10 powered Porsches were made and only 644 were imported to the US

After we checked out the cars, we decided not to fight the rush hour traffic on the Loop 101 and 202. We stopped at Fox’s Cigar Lounge in Old Town Scottsdale instead. This is a nice cigar bar with a good assortment of reasonably priced cigars and a well-stocked bar with local beer on tap and a huge selection of liquor. We each picked out a cigar and sat at the bar puffing and sipping a beer for the next hour or so. Altogether a very enjoyable evening.

Saturday morning I played in the 3.0+ pickleball tournament. I didn’t have my best day on the courts. We’re having a bit of a problem here with people self-rating and playing in skill level groups they have no business playing in. Most of us tend to rate ourselves high, but we need to be realistic and the organizers need to enforce the ratings through round-robin results. Playing in a tournament where you draw a different partner in each round is frustrating when you end up partnered with someone that isn’t at the skill level being played. I’m not trying to make excuses for not making the finals, but I was a bit frustrated in a few of the rounds.

On Sunday night, Donna performed with the Viewpoint Concert Band in their monthly performance – Donna’s first concert performance in 45 years! I was amazed at how good the band sounded – they only rehearsed together four or five times. Everyone worked on their parts obviously and Donna had a great time and performed well. There were at least two hundred people in the audience. They played 14 pieces in the hour and a half performance. Now they’ve turned all of that music in and will start learning a new repertoire tomorrow for February’s performance. Wow! Donna is really enjoying her clarinet and started lessons with a new teacher just a couple of miles away from here on Monday.

Poor lighting for photographs – Donna is left of center between the conductor and American flag

I played in the 3.5+ round robin pickleball group Monday morning. We split into two random groups. I had a good draw and scored a perfect total of 66 points by winning all six of my games. It was an encouraging day on the court.

Shortly after we arrived here, I saw a guy doing some paintwork on an upscale American Coach in the row behind us. Before I could talk to the guy, he was gone. Later, I found another guy I mentioned in my last post to do some paintwork for us. On Friday, I saw the first guy again. This time he was re-caulking the seams and accessories on the roof of the American Coach.

I introduced myself and found out he was Scott Hancock. Scott used to be the Service Manager at an RV shop here in Mesa. He relocated here from Elkhart, Indiana where he built and finished RVs at the Forest River factory. Resealing our roof was on my to-do list. I figured it would be a day’s work to remove the old sealant and lay down new urethane sealant. You don’t want to use silicone sealant on an RV roof. Flexible, self-leveling urethane is the way to go.

I asked Scott what he would charge to reseal our roof. He told me if I would buy the sealant he wanted to use, he would do the work for $75. Deal! I had to order the sealant – he likes Sika brand SIkaflex Pro Select polyurethane self-leveling sealant. I found it on Amazon and had six tubes delivered by Sunday.

Scott resealed the roof on Monday. It was good thing. The sealant had ample to time to cure before rain moved in early this morning. I looked at the paintwork Scott did on the American Coach. I asked him what he would charge to do the paintwork I originally planned to have done by Perfect Touchup & Recondition. Scott quoted me a price that was $500 lower. I cancelled the job with Perfect Touchup & Recondition and scheduled the work with Scott.

After a weekend of temperatures reaching the low to mid 70s, we have a wet and dreary day today. The thermometer isn’t likely to exceed 60 degrees. We should dry out tomorrow and the daily highs will be back in the 70s in a few days. Nice!

My Frugal Side

We’re more than halfway through January already and I’m behind on posting. It’s not that I don’t have anything to write about – we’ve been busy. Between scheduled pickleball time and coaching the refined skills class, I’m staying busy. Donna has a lot on her plate – she’s rehearsing with the Viewpoint Concert band weekly and practicing clarinet daily. She’s also hitting the pickleball and tennis courts and doing strength training. The concert band has a performance on Sunday – Donna’s first public performance in about 45 years! I have a pickleball tournament tomorrow.

This is one of the things we love about Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort – the activities and amenities. One of the amenities is free landline phone service. We have an old-fashioned telephone with a curly cord on the handset in the coach. Donna bought it at a garage sale for $5 a few years ago. This year, she set up an answering machine to receive calls when we’re not home! I’m sure some of you must remember answering machines! To dial within the park, you only need to know the site number you want to reach. Punch in four digits and you are connected. You can also dial outside of the park and receive outside calls. Pretty handy.

There’s another reason I haven’t posted lately and it’s a real peeve. Microsoft has a Windows 10 update that’s flawed. I’ve researched it a bit, but haven’t come up with a suitable workaround. The update was automatically uploaded to my computer by Microsoft, but when the update tries to run – which it does at random intervals – my computer locks up. Apparently, I have a program or app I installed that’s not compatible with the update. But, the update doesn’t identify the issue, it just shuts down the hard drive. It’s frustrating. Am I supposed to uninstall every program or app until I discover the compatibility issue? I think Microsoft just wants me to buy a new laptop with their latest whizbang operating system. End of rant.

Awhile back, a blog reader, Tanya Faidley, made a recommendation. Donna’s clarinet is a reed instrument. Having good, balanced reeds is essential for good tone and playability. Unfortunately, many reeds out of the box are not very good. I experimented with adjusting the reeds and managed to slice my finger. Tanya is a clarinet player and she recommended Tom Ridenour’s ATG reed balancing system. I’d read about this system before but was reluctant to order it.

The reason I was reluctant, although it had many positive reviews, was my sometimes frugal nature. The kit costs close to $90 and the hardware is just a small sheet of tempered glass, a special sanding block and some wet or dry sandpaper. Maybe $10 worth of hardware. But it also includes an instruction book and DVD. That’s where the real value is. Tom Ridenour is a clarinet expert – he designed clarinets in the past for Leblanc and has his own line of clarinets now. His technique for balancing reeds is simple and effective. It’s also counter to most instructions I’ve read. Now I’m Donna’s reed technician and I rework all of her reeds. They play much better, she’s able to play without making changes to her technique to compensate for bad reeds.

Speaking of my sometimes frugal nature, I had another small project. The air filter assembly on Midget-San’s Weber carburetor is supposed to be stainless steel. Well, the clips holding the top of the assembly to the base were pitted with rust spots. Every time I opened the hood, my eye was immediately drawn to the unsightly pits. A replacement assembly – base, cover, clips and filter element costs about $35-$40. Instead of replacing the whole thing, I sanded the rust pits out and painted the clips. I’ll probably end up replacing it sooner or later anyway.

This leads me to the next topic – paint. I saw a guy repairing some damaged bodywork on a coach in the park and he painted the repaired area right at the site. I talked to him. His name is Andy Crespin and his business is called Perfect Touchup & Recondition. He has a small cargo trailer that’s his mobile workshop and it has a large air compressor. We have a few paint issues on our coach. On the passenger side, one of the basement compartment doors was heavily scratched by a short bush at a narrow site we moved into in Hemet, California. The bush was only a few feet tall and I couldn’t see it and ran the side of the coach into it. There’s also a compartment door that has sun damage – the base coat is faded. The bigger issue is clear coat failing on a couple of panels on the right rear and back of the coach. I had Andy take a look at our coach and give me an estimate. We agreed to schedule to work in a couple of weeks – he’ll do the paint work right here at our site.

I mentioned in my last post that Donna’s diligently following the Bright Line Eating (BLE) program this month. The plan excludes sugar and flour and includes weighed portions of protein, fat, veggies and fruits. So, I’m not exactly on the same plan, but I do end up having some different meals than usual. That’s okay – I could stand to lose a few pounds.

That doesn’t mean she isn’t feeding me well though. Here are a few examples of the dinners she made. First up is a Greek pork stew.

And a New York strip steak smothered in sauteed mushrooms and onions with broccoli and cheese sauce (and a side of mashed sweet potato for me).

And fajita spiced, grilled chicken breast over grilled veggies.

Fajita spiced, grilled chicken with grilled veggies

And a dish called Pork Diane that’s served with a mustard-lemon sauce with sides of fresh green beans and garlic mashed cauliflower.

Pork Diane with garlic cauliflower mash and green beans

The weather has been fantastic. The days are warm with temperatures near 70 degrees. The nights are cool – down to the 40s. Yesterday was cloudy and cooler with gusty winds, but we’re back to nice sunny weather today with clear skies and it looks like much of the same for the coming week. This afternoon, I’ll be heading out to Scottsdale with my friend, Mike Hall. Mike has VIP passes for the Gooding and Company Auto Auction. This is an exclusive, high-end auto auction. This week is known as auction week in Scottsdale. The well-known Barrett-Jackson auction is taking place as well as the Russo and Steele auction. These are big events with hundreds of cars. The RM Sotheby, Bonhams and Gooding auctions are much more exclusive and smaller with many rare vehicles. Many of the cars at Gooding are expected to fetch one to three million dollars!

Starting the 20s in Mesa, Arizona

We pulled into Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort as planned on New Year’s Eve. Our timing wasn’t so good though. We arrived at the office at 12:05 pm only to find they close for lunch from 12:00 to 1:00 pm. A few raindrops were falling – even though the weather guessers said there was zero percent chance of rain – so we settled down in the coach, had some lunch and waited. At 1:00 pm, I checked us in and we headed over to our familiar site 5245.

Most of the sites around us were empty, so I had ample room to maneuver. I should add that the orange trees at the corner of each site always make it a little harder than it has to be to drop our trailer. We were set up fairly quickly and the rain didn’t continue. The sites at Viewpoint are roomy – it’s one of the things we like about this park.

We were surprised to find neighbors moving in as well. Our friends Chuck and Sue came in across from us and a neighbor came in next door. We didn’t expect much activity on New Year’s Eve.

I had called the Two Wheel Jones Bicycle Shop the day before to confirm Donna’s bike was ready to go. They were supposed to phone when they had it ready, but didn’t. They told me “No worries, it’s all set and on the showroom floor.” Once we were set up, we drove over to the shopping center at the corner of Power Road and McDowell Road to the bike shop. I wasn’t too happy to find the bike was on the showroom floor as they said, but they hadn’t installed the rack and bag I’d ordered or the upgraded pedals! In fact, they said the pedals hadn’t arrived!

They quickly resolved the issue and even robbed a set of the pedals from someone else’s order – they hadn’t come in to pick them up, so Donna left with the bike fully assembled as ordered after 30 minutes or so. The new bike is similar to the one we bought last summer in Arlington, Washington. The main differences are this is a women’s specific design – the frame and seat are different – and the color is Miami Green instead of black.

Once the bike was ready, Donna rode it a mile down Power Road to meet me at Lucky Lou’s. We met some of the usual suspects there for a cold one before Donna rode the four miles back to Viewpoint. We locked the bike in our trailer. Donna wanted to get a new bike lock before she took the bike anywhere. She ended up ordering a German-made folding lock that should be a formidable theft deterrent. The lock wasn’t cheap – it cost about $100, but that’s not unreasonable when you think about the cost of replacing her bike. We traded in our two road bikes for her Trek Dual Sport 2 last July and having it stolen less than six months later resulted in a cost of over $1,000 to replace the bike and accessories.

While we were at Lou’s, a number of people checked out Midget-San which was parked right at the entrance. There are almost always interesting cars in the lot at Lou’s and this day was no exception. I saw a beautifully restored Mercury Monterrey in the parking lot. I didn’t meet the owner, so I don’t know the model year for sure, but this body style was built from 1952 to 1954.

The cool weather persisted until the weekend with highs around 60 degrees and overnight lows in the upper 30s. At this time of year, the Phoenix area is a little colder than what we’d find in San Diego, but it’s much drier. San Diego’s rainy season runs from Christmas to March.

I finally shook the cold I’ve been fighting and now Donna’s over hers too. We’ve been taking it fairly easy. Donna started the Bright Line Eating plan on New Year’s Day. This plan cuts out flour and sugar. It still allows plentiful portions of food though. This plan is healthy and Donna has had great results with it. One of the menu items is pizza chicken – I wrote about it before. It’s an interesting dish that substitutes slices of chicken breast for pizza crust. Donna serves it with spaghetti squash and it’s very tasty.

On Saturday, my middle daughter, Jamie, and her significant other, Francisco, came by to visit. They moved from Texas to the west side of Phoenix recently and are only about an hour away from here. We sat outside in the sun and had lunch and talked while I was distracted by the wild card weekend NFL games on the outdoor TV.

Before they left, a neighbor unloaded a car from his trailer. It was a hot-rodded 1961 Chevy Impala. I wish I’d taken a photo. It’s a beautiful car with an incredible black finish. The panels are so smooth and the paint is flawless.

Monday, Donna and I hit the pickleball courts. It was windy and the gusts made outdoor pickleball very challenging. This morning, I played in the 3.0 round robin. I usually play in the 3.5 group, but I needed to work out some of the rust from only playing indoors for the past several months. Tomorrow, I’ll resume the refined skills coaching sessions I did last year. These are sessions for players moving up to intermediate level play. I enjoy coaching them and it helps my game as well.

The temperature reached highs of about 70 degrees over the weekend and today we should see the mid-70s. We’re sure to have another cold spell before things start warming up here in Mesa, Arizona.

*Just so you know, if you use this link to shop on Amazon and decide to purchase anything, you pay the same price as usual and I’ll earn a few pennies for the referral. It’ll go into the beer fund. Thanks!

Two Nights Out

We pulled out of Mission Bay RV Resort on Sunday as planned and left San Diego. I took my time packing up – I was still feeling a bit under the weather as I’m having a hard time shaking the head cold that hit on Christmas day.

We have an inline dual canister water filtration set-up that I always use to filter fresh water coming into the coach. I’ve had a few people question whether it’s necessary when they are connected to city water. When we arrived in San Diego, I put a fresh, new sediment filter in the first stage canister. This filter element is made from spun polyester and was pure white. When I disconnected the water supply, I removed the filter element. This is what three months of city water left in the sediment filter.

Sediment filter after three months of city water

You can see the amount of rust and dirt particles it captured. The city water supply may be sanitized through the use of chlorine, but whenever a line is opened up anywhere along the supply route, dirt can enter and old valves may be rusty. This is why I always filter our water. I change out the sediment filter every three months. The second stage is an activated carbon block filter that removes chemicals and odors and I change that after six months.

We made the usual eastbound run on I-8 over the three summits in the Laguna Mountains – Laguna Summit, Tecate Divide and Crestwood Summit. Each summit is over 4,000 feet above sea level and there was snow on the side of the road. We exited I-8 at the Imperial Dunes Recreation Area – about 10 miles west of the Arizona border.

Our friends, Jeff and Deb Spencer (Rolling Recess), were boondocking there off American Mine Girl Road. Donna had texted Deb and she met us on the side of the road and led us to their piece of desert. Donna mentioned to me that when she tells people we’re going to spend the night “out in the desert,” some people ask how do we get “out in the desert?” First of all, you need to know the rules for the area you’re in. At Imperial Dunes, some of the public land requires a camping permit. Other areas of public land managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) are open for free dispersed camping.

Again, it’s public BLM land and it’s free, but there are rules. You can’t just bushwhack your way into an unmolested area – you have to stick to established paths. Of course most of those paths became established after someone starting driving in and others followed. Many of the points of entry are created by BLM personnel and some have markers and numbers. So, these paths are dirt two-track trails that lead away from roads and civilization. You are allowed to camp for up to 14 days, but you are supposed to leave the site as you found it – no improvements or structures are allowed.

Two-track on BLM public land and dispersed campers

Many people camp in groups in this area and use their ATVs or sand buggies to explore. I think they like the comradery and sense of safety in numbers. Others prefer solitude and keep plenty of space around them. We usually keep our distance – about a quarter of a mile is good separation – unless we’re with friends. In this instance, we camped near Jeff and Deb’s rig.

When we did the RAGBRAI event with them in 2017, I made Memphis-style babyback ribs one night on the Traeger for us to share. Jeff decided he needed a Traeger wood-pellet-fired smoker/grill. The thing is, they have a fifth-wheel RV, so storing a Traeger is problematic. He could store it in a basement compartment, but it would be a pain to remove and set up and put it away again. So he mounted it on the rear rack on their trailer.

He used an aluminum drip pan as a heat shield to keep excessive heat from reaching his bicycle or the rear of the trailer. He has a thermocouple he puts on the pan and an alarm set to notify him if the temperature exceeds 135 degrees. Smart set-up!

I kept my visit with Jeff and Deb brief as I wasn’t feeling good and didn’t want to infect anyone. Donna visited for a while. Later Jeff brought us a plate with St. Louis spare ribs he cooked on his Traeger. Yummy! Thanks, Jeff!

Sunset in the desert can be spectacular, especially when high clouds are present. I shot these photos within a few minutes of each other – the first just as the sun was setting and the second a few minutes later when the sun was below the horizon.

Monday morning we rolled out of there and continued east on I-8. We found a new Pilot/Flying J Travel Center had opened at Tacna – about 40 miles into Arizona. I topped up our tank there. We continued east past Casa Grande where I-8 merges with I-10 and took the first exit at Sunland Gin Road in Eloy. I needed to have the oil changed and chassis lubed on the coach. The Cummins ISL diesel engine holds 28 quarts of oil. I don’t change the oil because I can’t deal with seven gallons of waste oil!

Last year, Speedco was bought out by Love’s Travel Stops. I wasn’t too happy with their service in Denver. I’ve used the Eloy Speedco several times before. Love’s ownership hasn’t been an improvement. They’ve raised their prices and the employees seem indifferent and lacking motivation. The good news was, I didn’t have to drop the trailer and there was no wait. They had me pull in over the lube pit with the trailer still with us. We were in and out in about half an hour!

From there, we backtacked a bit through Stanfield and headed north on AZ347 toward Maricopa to Harrah’s Ak-Chin Casino to spend the night. The paved RV lot was a little crowded but we found a new graded dirt lot. This large lot was level and only had one motorhome and one tractor-trailer rig in it. We set up for the night.

Shortly after we set up, another RV arrived – a truck pulling a small fifth-wheel trailer. You would think that a lot with a few acres of open space would allow him to give everyone some space. For some reason, he set up right next to us.

I don’t mean to be unsociable, but I don’t understand what he was thinking.

It was cold overnight – the temperature might have been down to the 30s. We had the heat pump on before we went to bed and it’s back on again this morning. The high today will barely break 60 degrees. That’s how we’ll end the second decade of the millennium. Tomorrow we’ll welcome the 20s – hopefully with a roar!

We’ll head to Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort this morning. We plan to pick up Donna’s new Trek Dual Sport 2 bicycle this afternoon and settle in for another three-month stay.

Wet Christmas

I hope all who read this had a great Christmas and are continuing to enjoy the holiday season. I wrote in my last post about Donna’s start to the festivities with the Santa 5k Run. On Wednesday, December 18th we were invited to a Christmas party at my friend, Tye’s, house in Bay Park. He lives up the bluff on Galveston Street and has an outstanding view of Mission Bay all the way to Belmont Park.

We enjoyed good food and drink among friends there. Donna made deviled eggs with bacon bits that were outstanding. I wrote in my last post about my friend, Bob Babich, a former NFL player. He was in attendance at the party as was Ralph Perretta. Ralph was an offensive lineman – guard and center – drafted by the San Diego Chargers in 1975. He played here until 1980 then played two seasons with the New York Giants. Tye had old NFL FiIms productions playing on his DVR and it was fun to hear stories of the good old days of professional football from guys that were there on the field.

One of the things I’ve figured out recently is this. I’m getting older and don’t recover or heal like I once did. On the 11th, I cut my finger and had to have it stitched. I’ve had stitches several times in my life and it isn’t a big deal. Usually after a week or so I’d just clean the area and remove the sutures myself. The doctor told me this time to give it seven to 10 days. So I split the difference and on the 18th I removed the sutures. Well, I don’t heal so fast anymore or maybe the cut was deeper than I imagined – anyway I may have been a couple of days early.

This is what it looked like after I pulled the sutures

A couple of days later, it looked better, but it still wasn’t fully closed. The thing is, I’ve left stitches in too long before and it makes removing them difficult. I guess I should have waited the full 10 days in this case.

It’s in pretty good shape now and I’m able to play the guitar without any issues other than the lack of callous on my finger tip. Santa put a guitar-clarinet duet music book in my stocking, so Donna and I will see if we can play a few of the arrangements together.

Rain moved into the area on Christmas Eve. We kept it low-key and did the typical taco Tuesday night at Offshore Tavern and Grill and saw a few friends there. It rained off and on Christmas day. I had a restless night and woke up Christmas morning with a sore throat, congestion and lacked energy. I spent most of the day in bed reading and napping. Last night it stormed with heavy rain and gusty wind. Right now, the sun is shining, but I can see on the Radar Express app on my phone that another bout of rain is likely to hit us today.

I’m not complaining – things could always be worse. I was reminded of that when we came into the park the other day and saw the entrance gate and fence was damaged.

Apparently, someone hit it while entering the park. Later, I found out it was a new neighbor. He cut the corner at the entrance in his tag-axle Newmar Dutch Star. This coach is north of 40-feet long and he turned in too early. You have to really drive deep into a turn before you start to turn in or this is what happens. As you can imagine, the coach suffered damage as well.

It’s hard to see in the photo, but the damage starts behind the right front wheel with dents and scrapes across the first two basement compartment doors. The third door was completely torn away. Ouch!

The forecast calls for the rain to clear up and we should have sunny days starting tomorrow and through the weekend. This is fortunate timing as we have to prepare to move. We’ll pull out Sunday and head to the desert. I need to organize and pack the trailer. I’ll check and adjust all tire pressures – coach and trailer.

We still have Ken’s car. I notified the lender in writing about his passing and told them where they could pick it up. I haven’t heard anything from them. My friend and attorney, Dan Cullen, will take care of it if they don’t pick it up by Sunday. I also ordered a new bike for Donna from Two Wheel Jones bike shop in Mesa, Arizona. They said they could have the bike in the shop and set up for her by New Year’s Eve. I was supposed to be kept in the loop on the progress via e-mail, but I haven’t heard from them. I’ll follow up today with a phone call.

So, the plan is to head out on Sunday and spend a quiet night in the desert. Then we’ll move on to Casa Grande and get the Cummins ISL diesel engine in the coach serviced and move on to Maricopa for the night. Then we’ll be back at Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort in Mesa, Arizona on New Year’s Eve.

Holiday Thieves

Another week has flown by here at Mission Bay RV Resort in San Diego. I’ve been in a regular routine, visiting with friends for a happy hour cold one at Dan Diego’s or Offshore Tavern and Grill on Monday and Thursday or Tuesday and Friday respectively. We’ve been playing pickleball at the Ocean Beach Recreation Center on Monday, Wednesday and sometimes on Friday.

One habit I’ve fallen into is the Tuesday Taco Special at Offshore Tavern and Grill. They have large, tasty tacos during happy for $3.00 on Tuesday and they are the best. One thing I discovered there is Curt’s hot sauce – made right here in San Diego.

The label says Extra Extra Hot, but it’s not really all that hot – it is very flavorful and I love it.

One of my pals I often have a cold one with is Bob Babich. Bob was an NFL Football player – he was the 18th player drafted in the first round in 1969. He played with the San Diego Chargers for three years then, in 1973, he was traded to the Cleveland Browns for a first and second round draft choice. He played in Cleveland until 1978.

One of the bartenders at Dan Diego’s is Mike Fulton – brother of chef and part owner, Ryan Fulton. Mike found and ordered a Babich number 60 Cleveland Browns jersey. I’m not sure if the color and layout is period correct, but it was nice touch and Bob was really surprised to see Mike behind the bar with it.

Donna’s been faithfully practicing with her clarinet and going through the break-in process with her new wood Leblanc clarinet. I ordered a variety of reeds for her and I’m learning how to adjust and balance the reeds. Clarinet and saxophone players all have a love/hate relationship with their reeds.

I adjust the reeds by carefully scraping the reed to balance both sides. I use a new, razor sharp utility knife blade to do this. On Wednesday, I was pulling a new blade from the dispenser and it was stuck. I gave it a good yank and it suddenly popped free. I swiped it right across my left index finger. Dumb! It made a clean, deep cut. We were off to the Pacific Wellness & Urgent Care Center.

Doctor Moore at the center fixed me up with three stitches. The worst of it was when he numbed my finger tip with injections into the cut. Finger tips are very sensitive!

We had really nice weather on Thursday and Friday. Donna had friends over for dinner Friday evening and rented a fire pit for the occasion. Sini, Mona and Sharon Hinton joined her. John Hinton also came down for awhile. On Friday afternoon, Donna picked up her race packet for the San Diego Santa Run on Saturday. The race packet included a “sunny Santa” costume.

I’m making a Christmas wish on Santa’s lap

The San Diego Santa Run is a 5K fun run in Pacific Beach held the morning before the Christmas parade. Donna rode her bike to the starting area near Garnet and Cass Street. She found our friend, Brooke, there along with about 4,000 other Santa’s.

Donna heading out to the San Diego Santa Run

She had fun and found out that Cass Street is actually uphill as you head north. Not so much that you think about it in a car, but you can feel the incline when running it!

A few nights ago, Donna made a dish that we haven’t had in a long time. It was spiced pork tenderloin with maple-chipotle sauce. I don’t know why we haven’t had it in while, it’s a real goody.

Last evening, I finally caught a nice sunset over the bay. With all the rain we had lately, I haven’t seen many sunsets.

This morning, it was cold in the coach. We don’t like to sleep with heaters – we’d rather put a down comforter or extra blanket on the bed. This morning was coldest of the year – 52 degrees in the coach. We decided to go out for breakfast. One of our favorites we’d discovered in Maui is a Hawaiian breakfast dish called loco moco. Loco moco is rice topped with a hamburger patty, fried eggs and brown gravy. We found it here in San Diego at Leilani’s in Pacific Beach a few years ago. We went for it this morning. I had the Hilo style with spicy fried rice.

When we came back home after breakfast, Donna made a grim discovery. A thief had cut the lock off our bikes and stole them! They were locked to the picnic table and covered with a plastic tarp. Either during the night or while we were at breakfast, the thief struck. They must have cased it out – they had to know what was under the tarp and how to steal it. It looks like they used bolt cutters to defeat the Kryptonite brand cable lock. I can see now how poorly made this cable lock is. Neither of us can say for sure if the bikes were gone when we left for breakfast or not. The thieves took Donna’s new Trek Dual Sport and my Specialized Crave 29er mountain bike.

I’ve been asked if we’ve noticed much difference here since Campland took over managing the property. The biggest thing that stands out is the lax security. Before, anyone entering the park without a vehicle tag was stopped and had to surrender their driver’s license at the security shack for the duration of their visit. Now, anyone can just drive right in, no questions asked. Also, parking enforcement is almost non-existent. Rules are meaningless.

Campland was granted an $8.1 million lease credit to complete the clean up of the old manufactured homes surrounding the RV park. Final demolition and clean up was slated to begin in October. To date we’ve seen little or no activity. It must be nice to manage the park with no lease payments – cash flow is positive for sure!

After a few days with temperatures reaching about 70 degrees, it looks like we’re in for a couple of cooler days in the low 60s before it warms up again over the weekend.

Early Christmas Surprise

The last week was a bit of a whirlwind. We were able to close escrow on the sale of Ken’s house without having to drive up I-15 to Riverside County – thanks to the concept of electronic signatures and a service called DocuSign.

Once the funds were transferred into the trust account, I made a distribution to beneficiaries. This involved running around to three different banks to distribute the funds with the least cost. I only had to wire money to one account. Wire transfers cost $35 per transaction. By using free cashier check service, I was able to directly deposit into two other bank accounts that have branches here in San Diego.

I’ve held back funds in the trust account to cover any bills that may still be outstanding – things like ambulance transfer costs, medical, and personal income taxes for 2019 on behalf of Ken. Overall, my duties as Successor Trustee progressed quickly and relatively smoothly. I’ll be glad when we can wrap things up and close the trust in four or five months.

Wednesday morning, Donna had her alarm set for 5am. I could hear rain drops on the roof of our coach once I was awake. She was planning to call Lyft for a ride to the airport, but I drove her there and dropped her off around 5:45 am for a flight to Albany, New York. She was heading to Bennington, Vermont for a surprise visit with her parents. The occasion was her mom’s 80th birthday. I would be on my own for the next five days.

On the way back from the airport, I hit the drive-through at Jack-in-the-Box. I don’t think I’ve been to a Jack-in-the-Box in thirty years or more. I went for a breakfast burrito and was surprised by the size of the thing. It had egg, sausage, potato and cheese and was over 1,000 calories! Yikes, I can’t make a habit of eating like that!

I played pickleball at Ocean Beach Recreation Center (OBRC) and hopefully worked some of those calories off. It continued to rain throughout the day and all day Thursday as well. That left me shut in for a couple of days. I had an idea for a Christmas present for Donna, but I had to do some research. The rainy days gave me plenty of time to search the Internet.

Donna has been really diligent at practicing the clarinet. She played the instrument in her junior high school days and picked it back up in July. I’m amazed at how well she can play it. Clarinet is not an easy instrument to play. There are tone holes, keys and levers that require an number of different finger positions to create notes in different registers. I think I read there are 24 tone holes altogether on the instrument.

Donna’s clarinet is a used student model she picked up when we were visiting my daughter, Alana, in Arlington, Washington. Donna has an ambitious goal of playing in the Viewpoint Golf & RV Resort band when we get to Mesa, Arizona next month. I have no doubt about her reaching this goal.

I didn’t know anything about clarinets. I know from my experience with guitars that the step from a beginner instrument to a more advanced, higher quality piece can be a vast improvement. For example, going from a $400 electric guitar made in Asia to a $2,000 Gibson is a huge leap in playability, tone and overall quality. I decided to research clarinets and see if there is a similar step in quality of the instrument.

Over a few days I learned more about clarinets than I ever thought I would. Indeed, the step from a student model to an intermediate level clarinet is a big difference. Once you reach this level though, the next level of instruments follow the law of diminishing returns. For example, going from a $400-$500 student model to an intermediate model of around $2,000 makes a very noticeable difference in the quality and playability of the instrument. But, unless you’re a professional musician, going from a $2,000 clarinet to a $4,000 clarinet doesn’t make that same jump in quality. It’s more subtle and probably only a pro would be able to pick out the nuances that make a clarinet cost $4,000 or more.

The thing is, buying a musical instrument can be a very personal decision. What speaks to one person may not be the same for someone else. So picking out a clarinet to buy for Donna was a bit of a conundrum. I finally decided on a few models and concentrated my research on those. I read opinions on musician forums and reviews. I watched countless YouTube videos. Then I bit the bullet and placed an order. The deal is this though, that meant I had to reveal her Christmas present early as returning a musical instrument is a time-sensitive issue. You can only test drive it for a week or so or most shops won’t accept a return unless there is some kind of defect.

The rain moved east by Friday and we had a sunny day. I took advantage of the weather and got Midget-San out of the trailer for some exercise. I drove to OBRC for more pickleball. I loaded it back in the trailer when I came home. It was a good thing I did as rain started again in the evening and rained off and on all weekend.

I picked Donna up at the airport Sunday around 5:30pm. After we settled in back at Mission Bay RV Resort, I told her about the clarinet. I told her it would most likely arrive on Monday and she should try it out. If she didn’t like for any reason, we could exchange it and my feelings wouldn’t be hurt. It seems like I always have reason for an early Christmas present reveal over the past few years.

The clarinet, which is a Leblanc Serenade model made of African blackwood (Granadilla) with silver plated keys came on Monday afternoon. It’s a real beauty.

One of the cool things about a clarinet is the compact storage – just right for someone living in 300 square feet. The instrument breaks down into five component parts and is easily stored or transported. There’s a break-in process recommended for wood clarinets and Donna’s already on it. It should be fully broken in and ready for long session use by the time we get to Viewpoint in Mesa, Arizona.

Another item I received was an air filter element for our coach. I prefer the Fleetguard brand of filters for the Cummin ISL diesel engine and that’s what I got. Air filters are a tricky item to set a preventive maintenance schedule for. Much depends on the conditions it is operated in. High exposure to dusty conditions mean more frequent replacement while more “normal” driving conditions can extend the life of an air filter. Changing it too often is not recommended as the air filter element gains efficiency once it traps a certain level of particulates. Most diesel-powered coaches have an air restriction gauge for the intake that would reveal an air filter that’s becoming clogged.

Some people think these gauges are worthless while most air filter manufacturers will tell you they’re the best way to know the air filter condition – they say it’s impossible to tell the actual condition of an air filter just by visual inspection. Judging by the restriction indicated on our gauge we didn’t need an air filter element yet. But, there’s also a time factor to consider. Over time, the element (paper in our case) can weaken and eventually break down. It only takes about a tablespoon of dust to completely ruin an expensive diesel engine. I’ve also heard of a case where a paper element disintegrated and pieces entered the combustion chamber with catastrophic results.

So, I’ve arbitrarily set a two-year air filter change interval as long as the restriction gauge shows the air filter is still good. In other words, if the restriction gauge showed excessive restriction before two years, I would change it sooner. But if the restriction gauge remains in the acceptable range, two years is the maximum time. Our filter was last changed in October 2017. We haven’t run the engine since we arrived here in late September, so I’m at the two-year interval although this is December.

Air filter restriction gauge – still in the green

It’s importatnt to keep things clean when you change the air filter element – it’s doesn’t take much dirt to ruin an engine.

Old filter on the left, new on the right – it’s hard to judge condition by visual examination

The Fleetguard filter comes with a new rubber sealing washer for the wing nut securing the filter. I always renew this washer to avoid having a leaky seal that could allow dirt to enter. It’s also important to tighten the wing nut sufficiently to compress the seal on the backside of the air filter element sealing it to the housing.

The last step was to note the date of the filter replacement – I use a strip of duct tape and a marker.

Today it’s partly cloudy but there’s no rain in the forecast. The rest of the week should be dry, but it’s cooler with the temperature only reaching the low to mid 60s. It’s December, so I can’t complain about cooler temperatures!

Flying The Koop

…from real estate to wheel estate and back again

Category Archives: Uncategorized

Working Man’s Weather

Minor Maintenance Tasks

Reeling in the Years

Cars and Music

My Frugal Side

Starting the 20s in Mesa, Arizona

Two Nights Out

Wet Christmas

Holiday Thieves

Early Christmas Surprise

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