The mirror jinx - struck again.

Woke up to heavy rain and thunder and lightening. And it looks like it will last most of the day. It is coming from the south west and moving right over us. So will just hunker in and enjoy being close.

I was thinking about the mirror breaking just before we left home. Isn’t that supposed to bring bad luck? But we didn’t break it – Mother Nature did. So it will be her bad 7 years right?

Well maybe not. We had somewhat of a problem last night. I plugged the little heater in and Poof – the power went out. Hum this park has good 50amp service. Also it sounded like a telephone was ringing somewhere under the motorhome. Bill stood up and listened – then headed for the door. Ever helpful me said, “That’s not our phones ringing, where are you going?” He gave me an exasperated look and said, “It is a switch warning”. So he grabbed a flashlight and went out and reset the breaker. And looked in one of the under compartments where the inverter and the battery disconnect switch is located. Everything seemed fine so he came in. About a half hour later I went up towards the front to put the windshield shades down…and SMELLED something – not good – something was burning. Out he went again and sure enough the battery disconnect switch was smoldering and melting the plastic around it. OH NO!!!  He quickly disconnected everything – cooled down the metal ends and wrapped them in electricians tape. All of this was accompanied by much colorful language about the @#$! switches. Everything still works fine – so will have it looked at when we reach Vegas. He says he has left them open for 10 years and never had any problems but was told by a mechanic at the rv repair place to close them. Voila – I don’t understand their purpose – something about draining the batteries … so that was our excitement last night. Glad it wasn’t raining then.

We are getting way too many gadgets – and this isn’t all of them. My laptop and Nook. The MiFi, a WiFi extender (which I’m using now and it has boosted the signal from the parks WiFi by two bars). Two phones – who needs two phones – half the time I can’t answer either one. And the newest – the Tablet. And of course Bill has his PC and his own Nook. When something dings, rings or buzzes we have a devil of a time trying to figure out what needs attention.

Just had to share this picture – taken a couple of days before we left home. I passed by the door to the back and was startled to see that we had a lake view. Took a minute to realize what I was seeing. The entire valley below us was covered in fog – with a couple of darker clouds in the middle – looking like islands – then darker clouds in the far distance looking like hills on the other side of a lake. The picture doesn’t do it justice. 

Oh - and I forgot - the kitchen sink is not wanting to drain properly - just gurgle, gurgle - so going to try the boiling water method and if it still isn't working the vinegar and baking soda method.
P.S.

And the day continued to get better. Actually it did for a while. The rain stopped and the sky got quite a bit lighter. So we took off heading for Cuba, Mo. A little town south west of Saint Louis on the I-44.

As we were driving along I could see Bill checking and rechecking the instrument panel. So finally I got curious and asked if anything was wrong. I should have just ignored him. He told me that the batteries weren’t charging. That didn’t sound good. As we got closer to Saint Louis he said we’d better find an RV service facility. !!!  So using all that high tech stuff we have I asked for RV service facilities. None. Except one in Iowa. So I continued to fuss asking the question in different ways. Still nothing. But finally – Camping World.  And it didn't say they had service. So called them. Yes they had service. Then the tech asked me where we were headed - I said the south west. So he suggested we stay on our planned route and head to Strafford on the I-44. It was further but we'd be headed where we were going. They were in Columbia, Mo 130 miles away on the I-70. We decided to head there as it was closer. Luckily we were on the 270 which runs into the 70 so we headed there. And of course the weather got worse, rain harder and visibility 20 feet – while we were driving in the metropolitan area with lots of traffic. We were lucky though as the worse part of the storm was south of us and if we’d continued on to the I-44 we would have been right in the middle of it.

The rain let up [did pass two accidents – overturned semi and a small car that spun through the grass – people need to slow down in the rain.] Eventually we found the Camping World with no problem – except the GPS told us to turn left and we could see it on our right so we ignored her and she got upset. Bill stopped in the parking lot and I went inside to get a service person. They came out and told us to drive around to the back where there were overnight parking pads. Just as we drove through the gate into the back – everything quit working. Poof!. All instruments shut down, no gears, no reverse, no anything.  The engine kept running in 3rd and the steering worked - as we had to drive around the building again to get into a parking spot where we could plug in. Once Bill shut it off it wouldn’t restart. So here we are for the night. 
Need an alternator for sure - plus the problem from last night needs to be fixed. 
At least we don't have to pay for parking - just $110 per hour!
Went out to dinner at Bandana's BBQ - very very good. Now to watch NASCAR qualifying.