It's about time.

Many of you can relate to Working long hours at your career. Raising your families. Buying a home and paying all the bills related to being homeowners and parents. We're now retired and don't need all that work and expense. Now "It's about time" and what we do to follow our dreams.

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Tuesday, January 2, 2018

In Line At The Post Office, D.J.’s Back and More Server Maintenance.

Our Location today is La Posa South L.T.V.A., Quartzsite, Arizona, U.S.A.

Even though Kathy tried using my new backup CPAP Mask to sleep with last night after nearly Four Hours she needed to get up. The problem was that she is not normally a Mouth Breather so with all that air going through her mouth because her nostrils were completely plugged she had a dry sore throat. (Get rid of one problem and inherit another.) She ended up propped in her Recliner for the rest of the morning drifting in and out of sleep. I was awake when she got up but fell back to sleep until the Sun started seeping past our Window Shades

We nearly finished our first cup of Coffee/Tea at the table this morning while we discussed what needed to be done today before we actually moved over to the Computers and our Second Cup. We were fortunate not having to run the Furnace as the Wind seemed to be carrying a warmer breeze out of the south. 
A lot of Cloud covering this morning.
With Kathy still not feeling the greatest once I had my inside chores completed around 10:30 I headed off to Quartzsite. I needed a Stamp to be able to mail that letter to the Bureau of Land Management applying for the Official Reservation of the Ramada (Pavilion) for Blogger-Fest on January 27th 2018. We had been too busy on Friday to write the letter and when it was ready on Saturday the U.S. Post Office was closed and no other business in town is allowed to sell Stamps. When I got there a Postal Employee told me they only opened at 12:00 noon and to come back then.

I called to inform Kathy of the delay so she suggested I could go to Carl’s Jr and get a $5.00 Meal that we would share. Back in Ontario if you go through the Drive-Thru you get first service because they don’t want your vehicles polluting the air. Besides being understaffed, apparently Carl’s Jr in Quartzsite doesn’t do that. After being in line for Five Minutes I started shutting the Truck off only starting it to move up in line. Thirty Minutes from the time I arrived I was finally leaving with our lunch.

Now that we are in to the month of January I forgot not to go down Tyson Wells Road. It was bumper to bumper of people driving at a crawl by the Vendors Area
The Colourful Spirit Gypsy.
I made it Home with our Lunch Box that we shared and had eaten before Noon. The food made Kathy feel a bit better so I invited her to come back to the Post Office with me. She would not be going in but it would get her out of the trailer and give her some fresh air.

It was 12:15 when I got in line with about Thirty People ahead of me. There was only One Postal Worker at the front desk not moving too fast and another down the hall taking care of Parcel Pickups. Everyone was getting anxious because the Post Office is only open from Noon until 1 pm Monday to Friday. After being in line for Ten Minutes the same person was still being served at the desk and people started talking as to why they were there. When I said I only needed a stamp to mail the Letter a woman behind me dug a book of stamps out of her purse and gave me one. When I asked how much I owed her she said “Have a nice Day”. Who says nobody has kind heart anymore.

Last year we had purchased Firewood from a young man called D.J. and he treated us well. This year someone else had set up on his spot and we didn’t see him so we got Firewood from the other guy. We didn’t get as good a deal and the wood quality was poor. Leaving the Post Office, we saw D.J. back in his site. He had gotten his license before he left last spring and even paid for his spot but the other guy had just presumed he could set up where he wanted. Since we’ve used quite a bit of wood in a month we added to it from D.J. today. We got nearly as much Hardwood as we got from the other guy for less then half the price. 
Supper tonight was Macaroni with Cheese and a Clementine Orange.
Kathy was still experiencing a sore throat so we stopped at Dorothy and Toto’s for a treat. The cold Ice Cream helped soothe her throat and she was feeling better by the time we got Home.

While I was outside unloading the Truck Kathy started trying to do her On-Line Banking again. As soon as I walked in I needed to call them up again. This was the same Credit Card Company that was doing “Server Maintenance” the other day. I was only on hold for Twenty Minutes today and Mike had us reconnected in another Five Minutes.

I then called the Wilson Electronics Company and after explaining that our Weboost had suddenly stopped working the tech had me plug it into a 12 Volt Power source and check the Power Output with my Multi-Meter. Our new Power Cord will arrive at Quiet Times in Quartzsite soon. 

My next call was to Verizon about our Data Usage. When we’d had a problem with our MiFi Hotspot and needed to have our SIM Card replaced. When I mentioned our high Data Usage to the Verizon associate, she recommended changing our plan to Unlimited and at a cheaper rate then we were already paying. Our usage last month was just over 33 Gigs of Data. That may sound like a lot but we shut our MiFi when we are not On-Line as well as disconnecting our laptops. We could just check our E-mail in he morning, shut the MiFi, returned in the evening only to find Two to Three Gigs of Data charged to our Usage

Since our new Usage Cycle we have watched the same thing occur until we reached 15 Gig Usage. That’s when you receive an E-mail saying your speeds are being reduced from 4G to 3G. After explaining everything to the Tech he suggested a One Time Charge to bring us back up to 4G speed for another 5 Gig of Data but the same thing can continue to happen over and over. Even Verizon has their own Scams. I declined saying that it was too expensive and we’d make do with what we had. 

We had just finished cleaning our dishes when Kathy went back On-Line to check our other Credit Card. Would you believe that they are doing Server Maintenance today. I don’t think we’ll be buying a Lottery Ticket anytime soon. Thanks for following along, feel free to leave a comment and click on the pictures to enlarge them. Be Safe and Enjoy!

It’s about time.

Krackers

You Might Be a Redneck If

Your best furniture is molded and stackable.

5 comments:

  1. Hope Kathy gets to feeling better.
    The data amount seems to go up weather you use it or not. Happens to everyone.

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  2. Something is definitely wrong there. I do all my banking, surfing and online computer work using less than 6 gig per month with Verizon. Something or someone MUST be connecting to your MiFi and using data.

    The other thing I do is never set my phone to use the MiFi (like they tell you to do constantly) because that uses up all your data all day long. Make sure that setting is OFF on your phone.

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  3. Wow, the post office getting away with only one hour of operation in a busy place like that. I take notice of all the trouble you encounter and hopefully learn from them. Hope all your issues will be resolved quickly. Wishing good health to you both and hope Kathy feels better soon.

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  4. Perhaps Kathy would benefit from the steam bath approach. Have her drape a towel over her head over a steaming bowl of very hot water. That will help to loosen everything and make it drain, which should help her get a good night's sleep or at least a partial nights sleep. It may not help but at least it won't hurt either.

    We had a similar experience in the McD's drive thru yesterday and left the line after about 20 minutes, we hadn't reached the pay window by that time and it was 2 cars ahead of us.

    A Verizon tech told me to shut off all programs such as Facebook, GasBuddy, etc, anything that automatically loads, opens and runs in the background on ALL electronics that have been connected to the Mifi such as phones, tablets, and laptops. Those things running in the background take up a great deal of data when we are using our electronic devices for other things not realizing they are on and running.

    I'm amazed at the Post Office having such hours. Even in Tonopah which is a wide spot in the road with 5 buildings in the area, the post office was open for a number of hours multiple days a week.

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  5. Thanks for the efforts to make sure we have the spot for Blogger fest. At least we can make any other groups who just show up give us the best spot. :)

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