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Second Trip + Vacation

 So I’m gearing up to drive back to Oregon for two reasons, #1 to to go on a long planned vacation to So California, with my daughter Kate and granddaughter Charlotte. The second reason is to bring the second half of the load of personal possessions that I had planned for the move. Initial planning to start at the crack of dawn tomorrow and arrive on Thursday 4/29.

In planning the route, I decided to mix it up and see more of Wyoming. My initial plans are to continue North on I-25 to pick up I-90 and take that to Spokane and then cut down through Tri-Cities to Portland. That will give me a chance to see more of Wyoming.  See below:

Trip Route (click me)

My initial plans are to leave tomorrow early morning and to drive through to Spokane or so and see how I’m feeling. I’ll either spend the night there, or push on further.  

Once I get to Portland, I’ll rest up and we fly to So Cal on Sunday for a week. I plan on visiting family, doing some Downtown Disney (at least). The purpose is basically for Kate to burn through some Disney Vacation Club points before they expire. Unfortunately, Jen and Patrick have some medical issues to deal with and won’t be joining us this time. The good news is that they can watch the cat for the week.

After we fly back up to PDX on Saturday 5/8; I plan to leave a day or so later. On this pass through I plan to go the Northern route again, but cut south short of Billings on US-310 and US-20 down through central Wy. 

Click Here

I expect to finish up and wind up back in Casper about the May 11th or 12th.

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Some Explorations and Other Changes

 Well I have rejoined the less hirsute society by getting a haircut and beard trim. It turns out there was a barber just a couple of blocks away that had an appointment (another change due to COVID – all barbers have gone to appointment only) available the next day. Below is my current appearance.

Dean 4/2021

Unfortunately I got my driver’s license picture taken last week, so I will have by ‘lost in the wilderness’ image memorialized on my driver’s license. Going to the DMV was another instance of  ‘they do things differently here’ . I went in about noonish one day after researching what documentation I needed. They had a DMV lady guarding the door to make sure that people had all their documentation and only allowing the single person in who needed service. While chatting with her, she apologized that there was a 2-3 hour backup, and they were rotating people out for lunch. She pointed out that if I came back the next day that they had 8-10am reserved for older folks who needed service, and that if I came back then I could probably get served much faster. I did and was in and out in 45 minutes.

I also got a phone call this week telling me my initial non-embossed license plates were in and that I could come down and pick them up at my convenience. I went in and picked them up, and a very personable young clerk apologized that she hand not done a direct transfer from another state and that she needed an office mate to check her work to ensure there were no problems. She apologized to me that it was taking a few minutes longer to accomplish her task.  
Wyoming Plates

I also went exploring the local area, so I drove up Mt Casper to the south.

View of Mt Casper from town.

Amazingly enough it’s only about 30 minutes south. About half way up there is a rest area for pictures.

Looking down into Casper
For those interested, right click on the picture and ‘Open in new window’. Click on picture to enlarge. The preserve is about half-way between the lake and the tree in the foreground 

Shot further up the mountain

Visitor Info at the State Park

Major intersection further up. 

Out of the park, past the crest of the mountain.

It was an interesting trip, the mountain is still heavily snowed, although the road is mostly clear and dry. There are a couple of side trips to places up there that will have to wait to later in the spring, side roads, especially non-paved ones, were not plowed and I wasn’t feeling that adventurous. I figure after I get back from So Cal in mid-May, I will start getting serious about looking for a more permanent residence/abode/bunker in the woods.

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Outsmarting the Cat

 So on the last family Zoom call, yesterday, I mentioned that the cat had unveiled a new behavior, unrolling and munching on, the toilet paper. After he completely unspooled half a roll, I resolved to outwit him.

My initial thought was to get a metal shield like device to make it more difficult for him, but since this is a rental unit I was somewhat limited in what I could do. I was wandering through Amazon (searching under “cat proof toilet paper holder”) and was browsing a likely candidate under “Customer Reviews” and someone was having problems with the product and suggested an alternate.

Cat proof TP

Using a one gallon zip lock bag, with holes cut in the side to take the center spool. We will see how that works, but the current score is Cat 0 – Human 1.  I think I am safely ahead, provided he doesn’t evolve opposable thumbs.

In other news today at church, they have removed the ‘every other pew kept empty‘ protocol. We are still wearing masks, but it is a sign that we are putting some of the craziness behind us. 

Speaking of crazy, tomorrow I am officially two weeks out from my J&J shot and I believe I am officially immune from COVID-19.  I will assume I am also immune from variants until I see evidence that shows otherwise. 

The other day I had to go to a liquor store to get some more Kahlua for my morning coffee. In WY they have privately owned stores, unlike OR where you have to buy from the official state-owned stores. I was amazed by the difference that free enterprise offers. The breadth and depth of alcoholic beverages was amazing.  I picked up a bottle of Jägermeister, just because I can.

Jägermeister

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Predicting the Future

 So on the family zoom call last night (Jan, & Kevin you are still invited; David, Kathy or Greg can hook you up) both Dawn and my daughters were commiserating about a big storm that had blown through the Pacific Northwest. It’s a pretty common thing with low pressure systems that originate in the Gulf of Alaska and sweep down. They warned me that it was coming.

Snowfall 4/11/2021

In the picture you can see the snowfall coming down in Wyoming, 12 hours later, as predicted. 

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Curiouser and Curiouser

 So I got back from my trip to Cheyenne. It turns out it is an easy 2.5 hour trip down (with virtually no traffic congestion at all).  I learned a lot about the Anti-Collision camera systems. 

Lunch at Chili’s in Cheyenne

More importantly I drove down early enough to stop at the Chili’s in Cheyenne for lunch. If you were following along in the last episode (here), I had the windshield replaced in Casper, but encountered problems with calibrating the Anti-Collision cameras.

When I got into Spradley Barr Hyundai in Cheyenne, the mechanic (Matt Peters) told me it might be a quick check. Sure enough he was back in 10 minutes with the explanation. It turns out that merely replacing the glass doesn’t require a re-calibration if you don’t disturb the cameras. Merely replacing the glass doesn’t necessarily require a calibration. He also pointed out that if the cameras are disturbed, the embedded display system will alert you that the cameras need re-alignment. He apologized that my trip down wasn’t required (certainly not his fault) and I pointed out that I had scored lunch at Chili’s so the trip wasn’t wasted.

The other good news is that the trip down to Cheyenne saved me $250. in an unnecessary re-calibration which was also a net savings. Matt also insisted on giving me his card and invited me to call his direct line if I had any other issues. In the future, for any car issues, oil changes, etc. I will probably just plan on driving down to Cheyenne to get it done (and hit Chili’s of course).

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Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

 Continuing to settle in.

1. I’ve got the feeling I’m not in Kansas anymore. I had sent a check to WYDOT (Wyoming Department of Transportation) for new license plates (Amateur Radio Plates W7GGD). I included $50.00 for embossed plates, as opposed to simple painted flat plates. I got a call back from a nice lady who explained that they were having a problem with the embossing company they used and weren’t sure when they could ship them. She offered a number of options to resolve the issue. I chose the one I wanted (have them ship me flat plates, that I would exchange when the had the embossing issues resolved). This was a simple, direct communication that resolved the issue in one short conversation, rather than a convoluted, opaque process I would have expected. 

2. Continuing Story of Furniture.  It turns out that the furniture I had wanted wasn’t something that Furniture Row stocked and they would have to order it from the manufacturer. On reflection, I decided I could order it from Montana Woodworks myself and do the simple assembly. On looking up Montana Woodworks website I discovered that they had other options besides the Glacier Country. After reflection I decided that the Homestead Collection better reflected the ‘rustic’ flavor I was looking for. After noodling around for a couple of days, I wound up ordering $8K of furniture for delivery in 6-8 weeks.

3. Discovered one of the issues with remote-ish location. When I took Kate to the Casper-Natrona County International Airport and I picked up a rock chip/crack in the windshield. I checked USAA website for glass damage ($1,000. deductible despite what SafeLite ads say, there were no SafeLite locations in WY in any event). I found Decker Auto Glass that could replace the windshield and do the re-alignment of the Collision Avoidance system for ~$1,000.00. I took it in this morning and discovered a problem. They replaced the glass just fine, but couldn’t get the Collision Avoidance to calibrate after multiple tries. They suggested I try the nearest Hyundai dealer, which is in Cheyenne. I called them and managed to get an appointment for tomorrow afternoon so I have a two and a half hour road-trip tomorrow to get it looked at. 

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Settling In, Finally

 It’s now April 2nd and I’ve mostly settled in.  The drive turned out to be mostly anti-climatic. Without having the trailer, we loaded the car to the gills with moving boxes with the cat squeezed up behind the driver/passenger seats. Kate came with me to help with the moving. Steve arranged to get us accommodations from Fri-Mon so we had good sleeping arrangements pending getting moved in. It turns out that all of the shopping is within a half-mile of the intersection of Wyoming Blvd and 2nd Street.  But over the weekend we made multiple trips back and forth, to wit:

  • Walmart 5 trips
  •  Home Depot 4 trips
  • Sam’s Club 3 trips
  • Staples 2 trips
  • Best Buy 2 trips

1. Rented a bed for a month for $90. as a bridge to when my Sleep Number bed arrives. Currently scheduled to arrive April 20th (just in time for my birthday).

2. Got recliner loveseat to provide seating in the living room. And a 55″ Roku enabled TV.  I didn’t bother to get cable, but am relying on internet connection.

Loveseat powered Recliner

TCL Roku powered TV
3. Speaking of the internet – it has taken me nearly a week to get a stable internet. I’ve been doing WiFi internet for years and thought I understood most of what was going on. I went through the help line (after wading through several levels of phone ‘help’ to get to a representative) for both Spectrum and Netgear. The end result was trying two versions of the WiFi router and 2 editions of the modem and finally got it up Thursday. Thank God for the iPhone connection via the cellular network.
4. Got the cat a scratching post/climbing tree. Also hung up the Kling Family blanket that I got from Jan. At least I’ll have something up on the walls until the next trip back in early May. 
Kling Family 
Poppie’s Clock

5. Kate flew out on Monday after having worked mightily to get me unpacked. She was a tremendous help in making the move easier. More info later.