^[1]WOW – Christmas came and went so fast it is hard to realize it was ever here!  It’s not like it was when I was a kid and the days, hours and minutes crept by slower than molasses dripping out of a jar on a cold day.  Now, time just flies by – you know, ZAP!  One day you are 20 and before you know it 40 is here.  Then, blink your eyes and 65 appears.  Don’t believe me?  Just wait and see (which I hope you will ).

A lot of gifts were given and received.  I gave Nancy a new Kindle Fire to replace the old (but still neat) B&W plain Kindle along with a big Amazon gift card so she can download plenty of new books.  She is having a ball learning about the new features and of course, playing Angry Birds.

Me?  Well, I got everybody to stop giving me ties, shirts and socks years ago.  Now, they know to give me tools, electronic gadgets, or gift cards to Camping World ^[2] or Tractor Supply.  I love them all!  Oh, BTW – if you are a member of the Good Sam Club ^[3] you are now automatically a member of the Camping World President’s Club ^[4] and get discount pricing.  This is a doggone good deal!

^[5]I have a new iPhone and have downloaded a slew of apps.  One – of course –  being the FREE Woodall’s Camping app ^[6].  It is great, as is all of Woodall’s stuff.  Hopefully they will have one for the Android market soon as well.  I am falling in love with the iPhone and it is so simple to use.

One Christmas gift I did not ask for started as a rather ugly sore on my forehead.  At first, everyone thought Nancy might have hit me with a frying pan or I got silly after drinking spiked eggnog and fell down the basement steps.  But, nope, none of that happened.  The sore just magically appeared.

Within a few days, the sore had grown and was having an impact on my left eye.  It hurt like crazy and looked nasty.  Stephanie (our daughter) literally made me promise to go see my doctor.

Doc looked at the sore and said, “Shingles”. ^[7] Well, shingles to me are something you put on your roof to keep the inside of the house dry.  They are not something I expect on my forehead.

“But, Doc, I had the shingles shot last year – how could I have shingles?”

“You better be glad you had the shot.  Without it you would really be in a lot of pain and have even more nasty sores.”

So – he gave me a script for a bunch of big horse pills that are suppose to be an anti-viral and make the shingles go away in about a week.  In the mean time, there is considerable nerve pain and my left eye feels like I got hit by a baseball.  Add this new complication to the Plantar Fascitis ^[8] that I developed just before Christmas and you end up with a cripple that looks like he got hit by a bus.

^[9]

New Truck Seats

This spate of warm weather (it was 70 yesterday) has given me the camping fever despite my ailments.  I’ve been rearranging the basement gear in the RV – throwing out never used clutter and adding in an assortment of new stuff that should come in handy.  Stuff like fresh flashlight batteries, rope lights, extra fire extinguishers, power cords that connect to the tow vehicle and NEW extremely comfortable seats in the cab of the Volvo.  All of this was sort of hard to do with my current ailments, but you just can’t keep a good man down!

Speaking of camping – we have some great, new destinations booked for 2012 beginning next month (February).  We’ll start down on the panhandle of Florida parked smack dab in front of the Gulf at Ho-Hum RV Park. ^[10] I currently have our 12’ inflatable boat and the little eight hp companion gas motor in the garage for servicing – they will go with us and hopefully serve as a platform for some mighty good Gulf fishing.

All this scare talk about rising fuel prices due to the Iranian threat to blockade the Straight of Hormuz ^[11] has fellow campers worried that the coming season might be too expensive to travel very far.  It is never good when fuel prices go sky high and you are pulling or driving an RV that gobbles up a gallon of fuel every 8 to 12 miles.  Still, it is cheaper than stopping at hotels and you always get to sleep in your own bed.  That I like!  In anticipation of higher fuel prices I have filled both tanks on the Volvo to the brim at Sam;s Club with $3.51 per gallon diesel.  With at least 250 useable gallons on board, I expect to get 2,500 miles of fun before the next bank breaking fill-up.

It is like this – we enjoy the RV experience so much that we will travel regardless of fuel prices, shingles, or plantar fascitis.

HAPPY NEW YEAR…….

AND HAPPY CAMPING TRAILS TO ALL!

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Last 5 posts by Professor95

• Got an iPad? Drive a RV? Check out this new GPS app from Rand McNally! ^[19] - January 10th, 2013
• OLD GAS PRESSURE LANTERNS - Restoring My Past ^[20] - January 3rd, 2013
• IT WAS THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS (Revised by...... well, ME!) ^[15] - December 16th, 2012
• IT'S FINALLY HERE! (The 2013 Good Sam RV Travel Guide & Camp Ground Directory) ^[14] - December 12th, 2012
• CAMPFIRE STORIES - "Broken Down on the Key Bridge" ^[21] - November 16th, 2012

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