El Mirage, Arizona

Remember this scene towards the end of The Wizard of Oz?

The tethers that hold the balloon in place are broken, and the wizard sails away in his balloon without Dorothy.

Once more, Glinda, the Good Witch of the North, comes to the rescue in her shiny pink bubble.   Dorothy explains to her that the wizard was going to take her home, but that he is gone, and she will never be able to get back to Kansas.  That’s when Glinda points with her wand to the ruby slippers, which have been on Dorothy’s feet the whole time she’s been in Oz.

“You had the power all along, my dear,” she tells Dorothy.

The shoes that Dorothy had taken from the wicked witch’s sister had the power to take her home whenever she wanted…

Recently I found out that I was like Dorothy. I had the power to connect both of us all along to the Internet at the same time, but I had no idea until a tech wizard at Walmart told me.

Last week I went to Wal-Mart to look into a Wi-Fi hotspot and talked with a wonderful salesman. I didn’t have my phone with me, but he could tell what type of Verizon plan I had based on how much I paid per month for a specific amount of data.

Turns out that my cell phone and plan have the power to act as a Wi-Fi hotspot and will allow other devices to connect to the Internet through it via tethering.

So, like Dorothy I had the power all along.

Well, actually my phone and plan had the power all along.

I just needed to hit the right buttons and throw some money at the problem. 🙂

El Mirage, Arizona

Yesterday Carol and I played in a pickleball tournament together.

We had a blast! Won two matches; lost two. Met some wonderful people that I’d love to go to lunch with, and one or two I’d rather not.

Setting the scene for the rest of this post…

There’s a Netflix show called “Orange is the New Black.”

It’s about a group of women in prison.

Piper, the main character, was being bullied by Pennsatucky who is a religious zealot.

Pennsatucky forces Piper to pray an apology for her wrong doings. Pennsatucky watches Piper closely because she knows Piper has no relationship with God.

Piper: Dear Jesus… 

Pennsatucky: That’s awfully familiar for somebody that doesn’t give Him the time of day. 

Piper: Um… Dear Mr. Christ? 

Pennsatucky nods her approval for the change in greeting. 

Piper: Dear Mr. Christ…  

I laughed and laughed when I heard that. 🙂

Back to today’s post…

Carol posted this picture of us on Facebook.

I was shocked at how old we looked and commented, “Jesus Christ! I can’t believe how old we look, Carol.”

Carol, who knows my lack of religious connection with Jesus responded, “That’s Mr. Christ to you, Kathy.”

El Mirage, Arizona

It rained yesterday.

No, not that much. 🙂

But enough to make people crabby; especially snow birds who come to the area to escape any semblance of winter weather.

I, of course, loved it. I had just finished playing two hours of pickleball when it started.

Thirty sprinkles turned into a downpour within minutes.

I helped pick up equipment and was drenched immediately.

I slowly started riding my bike back home so that I could enjoy it.  One of the other players stopped to tell me how awful the rain was.

I told her that I actually liked it.

She said, “Then move to Oregon! That’s why we’re called The Ducks!

Not sure how much of her anger was at the rain and how much was disappointment over the college football national championship. 🙂

El Mirage, Arizona

The second weekend of January is the best weekend of the year…

At least it is for professional football fanatics like me.

There are only four games, but those four games are usually very high quality games because they are theoretically the best eight teams of the year.

This weekend’s games were all good, very good. No big blowouts. Very few controversial calls.

I don’t really care who wins or loses. I just like for everyone to play well. (Yep, I’m a sports Pollyanna.)

And they did, so that’s what made this weekend’s football so great!

El Mirage, Arizona

One of the things that has surprised both Rich and me is the fact that most RVers still honor the weekend.

Weekends are treated differently than the rest of the week.

It makes no sense because 99% of us aren’t working but those old habits of Monday through Friday being different than Saturday and Sunday must die hard.

Many wait until the weekend to do their grocery shopping.

Others was their vehicles (including their RVs) only on the weekends.

Bob, a pickleball friend told me that he only plays Monday through Friday. “Do you rest on Saturday and Sunday?” I asked him. “No, weekends are spent with my wife,” he said with a smile.

Apparently playing pickleball is his job… Or maybe he works weekends and has five days off. 🙂

El Mirage, Arizona

The RV resort we are staying at now provides no Internet connectivity other than a slow WiFi hot spot in the club house.

We decided to purchase connectivity from a company recommended by the resort for $30 for the month, but unfortunately it’s worse than dial-up when it actually works. 🙁

So this month I’m going through the delirium trenums of Internet withdrawal.

It’s not pretty.

So I’m counting the days until we’re move back to Gold Canyon because they have fabulous Internet included in our rental fee.

El Mirage, Arizona

I went to a pickleball club meeting yesterday. While we’re not going to be here very long, I wanted to pay my membership dues. And I wanted to volunteer some time to help with training entry level players.

Most meetings are at least a bit counterproductive and at least a bit of a time suck.

This meeting was no exception.

I’ve been to and run a lot of meetings over the years as I’m sure you have, too, Gentle Blog Reader.

The theme for volunteer organizational meetings generally follows the same agenda:

1. Some people are doing all the work.
2. They are getting tired of it.
3. The rest of the people need to step it up.
4. No one in the audience volunteers to help.
5. So the same people keep doing the work…

I was talking with Melissa about it, and she quoted a demotivational poster, “None of us is as dumb as all of us.”

I had never heard that expression before, but it makes perfect sense for office and volunteer organizational meetings…

But according to science, the most important thing to a successful meeting is to have donuts! So I’ll be bringing donuts to the next meeting… 🙂

El Mirage, Arizona

I was driving down the street the other day and noticed a car with a bumper sticker on it.

That was the only bumper sticker on the car, and it was just like that.

One word stating (what I’m guessing is) the most important characteristic of the car owner.

One and only one.

So that got me to wondering…

What word would I use to describe myself.

Limiting to just one is very difficult.

I think that the three things that define me the most are the year I was born, the fact that I’m a female, and the affects of having an identical twin.

If I was born in the 1600’s, I would be a totally different person because life itself would be so different (duh) and so short. 🙂

Had I been born a male, I would have a totally different take on life regardless of the era I was born. Just think how different the counter around my bathroom sink would be. 🙂

Being born and raised as an identical twin greatly altered my life because I didn’t individuate from my parents and siblings as early or as completely as a singleton. Well at least that’s what my therapist told me. 🙂

Knowing those three things and how much each of them affects who I am, I’d have to say that were I to put a bumper sticker with just one word to describe myself to others on my car, I’d choose twin.

So, what would your one word be?

El Mirage, Arizona

The other night we were visiting our good friends Dean and Lil who are renting a house in Phoenix for a while.

While we were there, I used the restroom.

I almost whooped with delight because that was the first time I’ve used real toilet paper in months! It truly was ultra soft. 🙂

RV septic systems are fragile, so we use a special one ply paper that does the job but leaves a lot to be desired.

It could also be called John Wayne Toilet Paper:

John Wayne toilet paper – Military term used to describe the low grade toilet paper found in the MRE (Meal Ready to Eat) accessory packet. Called so because it’s rough, tough and don’t take no shit off of anybody.

El Mirage, Arizona

Played pickleball at our new resort yesterday morning at a round robin competition where we each played with different partners against different opponents for six matches.

It’s always intimidating to play with and against new people. There’s so much to figure out…

Do they have a soft game? How accepting are they of new players? How good are they?

And while all that was going through my head, I’m also trying to play my best and play my game.

I gave myself an A- for facing the intimidating situation and a B for my execution.

Next pickleball session, my goal is an A- for execution. I’d rather be happier with my play than happier with my courage…