Cancelled flight and 900 miles in a mustang convertible!

 Friday December 23, 2022

We cleaned up the camp site and put out our outdoor rug today. As we are here for another week or so we might as well make it comfortable. The Kolman’s spent the day in a huge indoor gaming arcade. Millie and I went to Walmart for a few groceries; we figure most of the stores will close early tomorrow and be closed Christmas day. We had beyond burgers cooked on the grill today.

The Kolman’s are still planning on flying home tomorrow afternoon. Time will tell if they have a plane available for the scheduled flight. The whole country is being blasted with a winter storm and flights are being cancelled left and right.

Saturday December 24 2022

Temperatures went down to 20 degrees in Myrtle Beach last night. It dipped into the forties here in Fort Lauderdale. Lots of the rest of the country are suffering with temps much worse than that. I had my friend Doug shut off my house water main valve yesterday just in case. As it turned out the power did go out at home last night but did not stay down long enough to freeze anything in the house. Our one mistake was Millie’s tropical house plants, we set them up with a watering system on the enclosed Carolina Room but we didn’t turn the heat on out there, we never dreamed it would get cold enough to freeze. The damage is done now, they will either survive or they won’t.

We went to the AirBnB  to spend the last morning with the Kolman’s. We all went to the Peter Pan Diner for lunch and then they started the long trip back to New Mexico.

It was standing room only when the service started.

Millie and I attended Christmas services at the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church here in Fort Lauderdale. It was a very nice service in a stunning church building. The Christmas event was a huge performance with a 100 person (my estimate) choir, an orchestra, solo vocalists, two pulpits and a professional video production crew. I’ve been in a bar in New Orleans with dueling pianos but never seen dueling pulpits before! Seriously though, there was two preachers but they had a compatible message, no dueling sermons!

Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale Florida

A while back I had purchased the DVD of “Downton Abby a new era” and Millie decided that we would save it and watch it on Christmas Eve. Well we did, but I can tell you this, it won’t be a Christmas tradition in our house. It was horrible, poorly produced and an unrealistic storyline, I can’t think of anything good to say about it. Even the scenery shots were short glimpses of some wooded hills, no panoramic spectacular landscape to be seen. I hope they paid the cast a lot of money, they need some consolation for being part of such a weak ending to an otherwise great series.

We are also nearing the end of the final season of “Better Call Saul” and it is going downhill too. We really enjoyed the first 5 seasons and the 6th up until this point. The continuity of time is lost and the script is jumping to different episodes of Jimmy’s life without any clear reason why. Four more episodes to go, we’ll see, I’m not expecting a happy ending but a conclusion that makes sense would be nice.

Sunday Christmas Day 2022

We spoke with the Kolmans this morning; they are driving across Texas on their way to Albuquerque New Mexico on this Christmas day. A major winter storm has been whipping across the country which is presently a challenge for the airlines. The family made their flight from Fort Lauderdale to Houston Texas yesterday afternoon, but the connecting flight to Albuquerque was cancelled and the next available seats for a family of four isn’t for days. They rented the last available rental car, a mustang convertible and are driving a distance of almost 900 miles. Once in New Mexico they will pick up their car from the airport and drive two more hours to their home in Los Alamos. A Christmas to remember!

Who wouldn't want to waltz across Texas in a mustang convertible!

Christmas day is quiet here in the Easterlin Park Campground, it is still only 50 degrees here at 11 am and no one is outside. I haven’t even seen any dog walkers yet. Millie is watching a live stream of Christmas service at her home church in Myrtle Beach, technology truly is amazing and we’re starting to take it for granted. We expect cell service and high speed internet every where we go now days. The RV is warm, we have two built in heaters, a gas furnace and an electric heater, either one will provide abundant hot air. 

We ate leftovers from the Peter Pan diner for lunch and dinner today. Chicken Phillly sandwich for lunch and Chicken from the diner and green beans and mashed potatoes Millie made. Both meals were delicious.

Between lunch and diner we took a drive around town. It never got out of the low 50’s today and there was not much traffic due to the holiday, so it was a good day for driving. Speaking of driving, Millie has been keeping in contact with RaeAnne all day and at 7 pm they are still on the road. They have been traveling now for over 24 hours via airline and rental car. They still have several hours to go before they get home. I’m afraid this will squelch any future plans to meet somewhere warm for Christmas. Can’t say I would blame them though.

Yes it may have gotten a bit cramped after a while!

This afternoon we watched a DVD movie, a Tyler Perry rendition of Alex Cross. Well, he should go back to comedy, he’s no Morgan Freeman. I’m sure it was as bad as I think, but my opinion is also biased. I have listened to many James Patterson audio books in the Alex Cross series and I’ve become jaded to the miraculous case solving and the always superior Cross family. In this story they didn’t boast about the better than everyone family but Cross pulled many rabbits out of the hat to track down the assassin and then the man who hired him; it was totally inconceivable that anyone could solve the mystery with so little evidence. I know it was just entertainment, but it should have been somewhat plausible. 

After doing a proof reading of this journal entry specifically my movie reviews it seems as if I have become a grumpy old man. I assure, that is not the case, I’m still the same easy going guy, older true but still happily living my best life. I’m blessed to be living in the warm south and unconditionally grateful for my life with Millie. Grumpy…..that’s impossible!