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 Being Retired now, I thought that it was time for a new name to this Blog |
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Talk about perks, my career had one of the best I can think of! I traveled in the course of business, delivering classes for my employer. I was a Senior Training Specialist for Motorola Solutions, and taught classes on a wide variety of subjects centered around 2-way radio communications. I knew that when the time arrived that I would retire, and I have. I've always said that if you can't stand the heat in the kitchen, get out! I can't handle the heat anymore. I was qualified to deliver approximately 32 different classes, but about half of those were 'Legacy' classes, and were not in demand anymore. My students were technicians, those who maintained, programmed, calibrated, and repaired large 2-way radio systems. Some of these systems are statewide, and use TCP-IP networking to allow sites to communicate with others. Some are small, traditional type radio sites. The size doesn't matter, in each case the systems must be kept operational at all times, since many of them are Public Safety Systems. So I traveled, sometimes frequently, 3-4 weeks in a row.... where have I been? Some of the places I've been (I can't list them all here, the list would be too long) are pretty interesting. 1. Hawaii - Four times, Oahu, Maui (twice), and the Big Island 2. BangkokThailand, twice 3. Frankfurt Germany, twice 4. Algiers, Algeria 5. Melbourne Australia 6. Bismarck North Dakota, Summer & Winter 7. Los Angeles, Too many times to count 8. Washington DC, Too many times to count 9. Seattle three or four times 10. Texas, all over the state 11. Florida, all over the state 12. New Mexico, HOME! Several times  Best Cultural And Regional Honorable Mention |
Signs, Signs, Everywhere's A Sign Yeah, I know it was a song long ago, this post is not about that song, nor anything close to it. You might remember that I enjoy driving, a lot more than some people. I've seen some signs that make you ask, "What?" Here's some examples 1. Slow Children Playing - I've mentioned this one before, so I'll keep this one short. Why do the towns/cities insist on picking on slow children? I've never seen a warning sign about Fast Children playing. Maybe they are so fast that your can't see them. 2. There are a lot of signs around right now about 'Uneven Lanes'. Hmmmm, Uneven huh. That means that they are 'Odd' lanes. The workers or whoever are just being nice to not call them Odd Lanes. That might hurt their feelings after all. Despite all this, I never see a reference to a lane number, like 1, 3, 5 or what. If Uneven Lanes are around, what about Even Lanes? Yeah, I never see signs for them, nor their numbers. What's going on? Why the preferential treatment for the Uneven Lanes? 3. I was dining in a restaurant one time when in the back I saw a sign for 'Sanitary Restrooms'. That really made me wonder if the place had Unsanitary Restrooms. I began to have second thoughts about dining there. 4. I once saw a semi-truck on a highway with a sign on the back that read, 'Inedible Animal Food'. That one really made my head spin for a few minutes. What could they be transporting then? Human food? 5. There there was a sign next to an air pump that read, 'Free Air, while supplies last'! I'm telling you, I'm not making this up! 6. Or a sign in NYC that read, 'Senior Citizen Crossing Ahead'! I wondered then, was that the only place that Senior Citizens could cross the street? I'm sure there are more out there. Maybe you've seen odd signs around... |
The Devil Went Down To Georgia I guess we're going to play the Devil today and head down to Georgia. We're taking our time though, and will stop somewhere along the way. We're heading to Woodstock! Oh wait, not 'the' Woodstock of Music Fame. That's in New York. We are to look at the van I wrote about yesterday. I guess I'll share more info about it. First, my current van. It's a 2014 Ford Transit Connect as I've mentioned. It has everything you could want for a day of travel. It's just that we both need to stop for 'Potty' breaks at times. Sometimes it's an Emergency stop. It would be nice to have the ability to stop almost immediately and use the 'facilities'. This van has that, my current van does not. Plus, being a 2014, the mileage if over 100K now, this van has only 28K on it. We've run a Carfax report on it, everything checks out. The 'new' van is a 2018 RAM Promaster with a V6 Gas Engine. I think I had resigned myself to a new van using Diesel, and of course this one doesn't. A lot of the vans we've looked at online were long, 22-23 feet in length. I had resigned myself to having one that long. This one is about 19 feet long, 4-5 feet longer than my Transit Connect. That's a lot of difference when you consider that the other vans we'd looked at were almost 10 feet longer than our current van! So here's your chance to have a peek at what we are contemplating buying. Only time will tell now. IF we buy it, I will have to fly back down Saturday or Sunday and drive it home. Kathy can't drive long distances, she'll fall asleep. We can't have that, can we? |
Oh Geez, The Van Again The Ongoing Search Continues. Wouldn't that be a nice name for a Soap Opera? The search for what? In this case, it's our continuing search for a Camper Van. But why a van and not a Motorhome? Let me explain. First though, if you're sick and tired of reading about our search, just move along.  As I've mentioned before, we live in a small house. The drive way is long enough, I think it could hold five cars easily, plus one in the garage. So plenty long. I don't think it's as wide as most driveways, but my van sits in it just fine. But my van is a 2014 Ford Transit Connect. That's a mid-size van, not a mini-van. It doesn't sit as high as a 'normal' van. It's about seven feet wide, and a little under sixteen feet in length. Like I said it fits in our driveway nicely. This week's flavor, errr, van is the same width, a little longer. I'm not going to post what it is here, I'll wait until/if we buy it. This van is longer though, by about five feet. You know I will post a photo of it once we buy it. But I haven't yet told you why a campervan, and not a Motorhome. So here goes. Remember our driveway and its width? There's a city Ordinance in Bloomington about parking a Motorhome in the driveway. We can park it here from April 1st until October 31st. After that, it has to be in storage. The Motorhome we're in love with is the Navion/View. It's essentially the same width as a van, but has a lot higher height, and is about 10 feet longer than my current van. We've checked the storage fee, we don't want to pay about $300/month for secure storage. So the van it is. And this van has everything a Motorhome has, just on a smaller scale. Well, that's it for this episode of As The Van Goes. Be sure to tune in next week and learn if Jim & Kathy have a new van, and what type it is!  Jim Dorrell |
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