Free Water with Free Delivery! What a Ganga!

Today has kind of been one of those A.D.D. days. We started the day out with coffee as we do every morning along with a walk for Savannah, a little morning TV, chatting in the van, followed up by working for J' and catching up on posts for me. A little into the afternoon I got out to stretch my legs and mess with Savannah! hee hee What does she have to do anyway? The other day, J' was trying to see if she would do a new trick: putting a snack on her nose and seeing if she would stay and then catch it off of her nose. haha Yeah. It didn't really go down like that...that day. Today, I would spend a little bit of time with her and see if she could pick it up. She is a really quick learner and she's super smart so I thought I'd give it a go. Surprisingly, it didn't take her all that long to get the hang of it. I would hold her snout lightly put the "beefy" on her snout, then tell her to Staaaayyyyy... slowly take away my hand and she freaking stayed until I gave her the go-ahead. She's so cute and smart. The only thing I haven't been able to teach her yet is to Hi-five...she hates her feet being touched so I think that might stay a no-go!

[caption id="attachment_1323" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Cross-eyed girl[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_1324" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Is she falling asleep?[/caption]

 After doing such a good job being our lil' Circus dog, I let her chew on a bone that daddy found in the desert (that I washed off)...probably a hip bone to an animal a loooooonnnnngggg time ago.

[caption id="attachment_1325" align="aligncenter" width="300"] What an animal![/caption]

 As we were watching Savannah gnaw on her new-found love and talking about her new trick, we heard our first 4-wheeler (at this spot). We peeked our heads out of the van and saw a guy on his 4-wheeler about to whiz by the van. He drove past us at full speed, waving as he passed, then we heard it coming closer again. I poked my head out again and there he was coming straight for us...oh goodness...what does he want? (You just never know what you're going to get when you live this lifestyle: people wanting something from you, telling you to move on, etc.) He came close to the van, but not disrespectfully close and yelled out, "Do you guys want some water?" I told him that we had fresh water and he said that he just had this bottle that was fresh and freezing cold and it kept falling out of his bag he had around him and didn't want to just chuck it, so I said, "Sure, why not. Thank you so much."

[caption id="attachment_1326" align="aligncenter" width="225"] Quite refreshing[/caption]

He was pretty cool and yes, before I took a sip I made sure that the seal was unbroken (my Russian friend would be so proud, haha). It was quite the refresher to have freezing cold water...it's been a while and today was a scorcher! I also told J' if something happened to me to take the bottle to the E.R. to run tests! haha Gotta cover your bases. When the afternoon started turning into evening and the sun was not so hot I took Savannah for a "potty walk".... and pictures of course. I just love how the sun hits the mountains in a different way every hour here.

[caption id="attachment_1327" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Day in the Desert[/caption]

Really just another day, but another great day and I learned two things: 1- Not everyone approaching the vehicle is coming to report bad news and 2- You can teach an "old" dog new tricks! We're just going to hang out the rest of the night, probably watch some TV since we now have four channels instead of one ...exciting! It actually is very exciting to us...haha

[caption id="attachment_1329" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Good-night[/caption]

Hope you have a great night!

PEACE

This day will definitely pay off

Phew, let me sit down a second to catch my breath from all of the running around we did today! We woke up at a half-way decent time to get out of here, probably 8:15 or so. I was actually still in bed but was woken up by J' starting the van. I said, "We're not like leaving, leaving right now, are we?" He says," Yeah, we're gone." I love how he is so cute to let me sleep in but not when my clothes and my shoes are sitting outside...and he's like come on, let's go! I have to laugh about it now, but at that time I wasn't finding it very humorous. I understand he just wanted to get on the road and down there, we had a lot to do. I got dressed, got my shoes, "did my hair", and hopped in Joon Van. We headed straight to the Postal place, well with a slight detour to Burger King for breakfast...they made us Whoppers at 9:50 in the morning! We figured it wasn't what we planned on but it's better to fill the belly with something rather than nothing, especially when we have to go deal with a lot of stuff (that could potentially be damaged or broken). We get to the Postal place, open the van and J' starts bringing one (big) box at a time. It was a good thing that we left all of our stuff at Tai Shan, these boxes were super big and heavy, there would have been no room for them. After we loaded them in the van, we opened them to make sure there was no damage...better to open them here than get all the way home and then have to make the trek all the way back. Everything looked in good condition, so off to the grocery store we go. Since I sincerely loathe the Wal-mart in Clovis, I wanted to go to a different Wal-mart. J' suggested we just go to a regular grocery store instead of Wal-mart. We found a Save Mart (reminded me of a Winn Dixie). They had some pretty good veggies, so we got just a few potatoes, onions and apples (we were planning on stopping by the fruit stand on the way back). We got some things that they are always out of at that Clovis Wal-mart and a few other things and then had to wrap it up... the prices are definitely not Wal-mart prices.

[caption id="attachment_214" align="aligncenter" width="300"] I think we lost Nana![/caption]

We tried to find another Wal-mart that's a little better than Clovis and it kept putting us at Sam's Club. Our food was starting to get a little warm so cringingly we had to go to the Clovis Wal-mart because there was still a lot of stuff we needed that the other store didn't have and I needed to pick-up a Rx up there. I cannot emphasize enough how much this Wal-mart makes me never want to be around people ever again! They are so unorganized, the people (customers & staff) are so very rude, there's no room to walk, yet alone push your cart anywhere in the entire store, they are always out of everything and are of no help when you ask them for anything, half the time they make up crap just to get you to walk away. It's horrible. We are going to have to find a solution to this because I don't think I can walk in there one more time. I thought it was just me because I am very sensitive to things like that, especially big crowds, but even J' said something to me the last time we were down there about it. Anyway, sorry I think I rant every single time we go there...it's sad to think that's what the human race looks and acts like...sad, very sad. Moving on~ We were almost done and J' just had to run into Home Depot real quick to get the rest of the parts and tools for the Solar install....I stayed in the car with the bug. Forty-five minutes (and counting) later, out emerges J' with his handy little bag of implements! Hooray!! We had one more stop...the fruit stand of course. This was one of my favorite parts of the day. There is a little fruit stand that sits on the corner of these two streets that we come down to drive into town (sorry don't know the names of the streets). I LOVE fresh fruit so we stopped on our way back 'home'. It's just the cutest little stand, probably a small bathroom in a regular sized house. At the very front there is nothing but tomatoes, this probably changes with season.

[caption id="attachment_215" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Maters Maters Maters[/caption]

As you walk into the little "hut" area, there are tons of fresh fruits and veggies. Let's see if I can remember a bit of what they had; Tomatoes, Summer Squash, Zucchini, Italian Peppers, Bell Peppers, Onions, Potatoes, Blackberries, Raspberries, Strawberries, Figs, Plums, Peaches, White Peaches, Apricots, Grapes, Cherries and they had more than that but that's all I can remember.

[caption id="attachment_217" align="aligncenter" width="225"] So delectably delicious[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_216" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Ummm... I'll just take everything. Thanks.[/caption]

And guess who got 'yelled' at??? haha Yep, I'm not even kidding. I told you I get 'yelled' at everywhere I go! Unknowingly, I put my fruit in plastic bags ... crime of the Century I know, well I was told I am supposed to have Fruit in papa' bag and Vege-tables in pwastic bag. Apparently they have signs up that say all of this. I guess I was overwhelmed from all the excitement! I wish J' was there to see me gettin' told by this cute little Asian woman, but I asked him to go get my camera out of the van...rats! In the end, I walked with 4 amazing Tomatoes and 4 Peaches & 1 White Peach equaling out to a whole $3.74!!! Ganga for fresh Fruit...you know this girl (ME) is jumping for Jehoshaphat's!!!

[caption id="attachment_218" align="aligncenter" width="225"] I got some goodies![/caption]

When we got back up to Shaver Lake, we stopped and filled up on water. Don't know if some of ya'll even know this (because we didn't), but in the state of California gas stations HAVE to supply free air and water (they say for automotive purposes, but how do they know what you're using it for!?) We filled up both of our gallon jugs, water bottles, and then our 5 gallon jug, we call it the water cooler.

All stocked up, off we go again, to home, to get this stuff on some ice before all that money goes down the drain. I'm sure J' wants to sit and look at all the new "toys" for the install tomorrow.

[caption id="attachment_223" align="aligncenter" width="300"] We got new solar and lots of other things...[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_224" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Our Brand New batteries[/caption]

All of this craziness and racing around (and we were rushing) still took us about 7 hours. No trip to town is ever a 'hurry and come back' ordeal, just glad all of our food is safe, bagged and cooling again. We're going to (try) to eat like Kings tonight baby!!

[caption id="attachment_222" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Only a lot burnt, but still edible[/caption]

PEACE