Category Archives: Life in General

Three updates

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It has been a while to post but three events had taken place so I will lump them together.

One.

Our daughter Hannah has been going to school (Academy of Art) to get her Bachelor’s degree (she is the first one to do so in the immediate family).  She has finally achieved it!  Her graduation was on May 22 which happens to be one month to the day after Roxie had her back fusion surgery.  You think Roxie, or I, would miss that?  No way!

We decided to take the trailer as Aaron, his girlfriend and Paige (granddaughter) were going to be there for the weekend also so an RV park made more sense than a hotel.

We left a day early and stayed at WalMart in Los Banos:

Los Banos

This time I chose to stay at the Trailer Villa in Redwood City.  A bit far from the city but cheaper and not too bad in the back.  It backs up to the Redwood Slough (so get one if the back in spots, we will next time):

Slough

 

We attended Hannah’s graduation as very proud parents.  The ceremony was in the Cow Palace and we saw her on the Jumbotron!

Hannah

It was a good weekend of family times:

Family

 

One added note.  Roxie did an amazing job only one month post surgery and having a temporary Handicapped parking placard is amazing!

Two.

I had a Snugtop shell on my truck for a year and a half.  For almost all that time I have had problems with the shell fitting close enough to the cab.  It was very frustrating.  I worked with my local dealer and they were wonderful.  The issue was with Snugtop itself.  I created a website about it:  http://snugtop.casarodante.org  They did not decide to work with me to get it fitting.  I even offered to drive to Long Beach so they could do it.  Eventually, after more emails, a negative Yelp review, a negative Facebook post, Snugtop gave up and gave me a full refund.  Thanks for that but no thanks for not even trying!

I took that refund and immediately purchased a Leer top.  Although I had to wait 6 weeks again for a shell, here it is:

Shell

I really like the Windoors that have a screen also.  I am overall happy with it but I will let you in on a secret, the Snugtop is higher quality than the Lear.

Three.

One other trip to mention.  Father’s Day.  Aaron wanted to do a Father’s day thing so it was decided to head to the Dodger’s game on Saturday.  With Roxie still on the mend we opted to spend a couple of nights in Valencia which is not too far from Dodger stadium.  Five of us went to the Dodger game, me, Aaron, Paige (granddaughter), Rachel (Aaron’s girlfriend) and David (Rachel’s Dad).  Roxie and Julie (David’s wife) hung out together are Julie’s house.

It was a fun time except the fact the Dodgers’ lost.  Here are some shots from the stadium:

Chavez Ravine Dodgers

There you go!  Three in one!

Urban Camping

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If you remember from the previous post we had to cut our Casini trip a bit short.  This was due to an upcoming surgery for Roxie.  She has had leg pain for many years but it had just recently got much worse.  So much so that it was impacting her mobility and quality of life.  MRI’s and X-Rays found a grade 2 slippage between her L5 and S1 vertebrae.  This was impinging on the nerves going to her legs.  Hence the leg pain.  Surgery was scheduled to fuse L4, L5 and S1 with bone and screws.  However, before any surgery, there are many tests and clearances.  This is what shortened our trip, but that is OK (I like you a lot).

Her surgery was finally scheduled for 4/22 and she had to be in Fresno at 6am for surgery.  That would normally mean we would have to leave Visalia a bit after 5am (ugh).  But she also needed a shower cleansing before surgery so that means getting up even earlier (double ugh).  The solution?  Go camping!

I was already thinking of this solution a few weeks ahead.  I checked out the street behind the surgery center, I checked the Fresno codes for parking.  It was all set.  I knew where I wanted to park and was hoping it was open when we got there.

Roxie also knew from a previous surgery that it is not good for me to sleep in the same room as her as she is convalescing.  I snore just a little.

We left the Tuesday night before and parked on the street behind the building.  I made sure that I parked the trailer’s tongue right up to a red curb that was near a parking entrance.  That way I could ensure that no one could block me in when we had to take her home.

Here is where we parked:

2015-04-22 07.45.45

 

Roxie’s surgery went well but she had to stay two nights.  But this was OK.  I could stay there all day in her room but recuse to the trailer so we could both sleep.  On the morning of her discharge we hooked up and went home.  It worked out very well and no one bothered us at all.

Oh, here is what they did to Roxie’s back:

2015-05-28_1952 2015-05-28_1958