On the Banks of the Saguenay River OR "We aren't in Kansas anymore, Toto"

We left Lapeer, Michigan last Sunday morning at about 8:30 AM and crossed into Canada at the Port Huron (US)/Sarnia (Canada) border crossing.  For the first time ever the border guard came inside our RV.  He wanted to know if we had any guns.  We assured him we didn't but he wanted to look around anyway.  We got into Brampton, Ontario (ON) at about 2:30 in the afternoon.  Irene and I had church service in our RV.  We sang about 5 songs, had a couple of prayers, read John 19 and 20 and then had the Lord's Supper (communion) together.

After we were done with out assembly we called our daughter Mary and got together with her and her husband Brad and Amélie and went to the park.  Amélie is quite the wader.  She reminded me of a crane.  Here are a couple of videos showing her in the wading pool at Stanley Park behind their home:

She's also quite the hoofer.  Watch her "cut the rug in the two videos below:

After going to dinner we took it back to the Trekker for the evening.  Monday we played some Scrabble.  Irene won 2 out of 3 games.  DRAT!  Then we watched TV that had recorded from the previous week when we were in Mission with Brenda and Phoebe.  Thank the Lord for DVRs!  Then that afternoon it was back to the kids house to meet with Brad and Amélie for the evening (Mary had a prior commitment that she couldn't get out of).  For dinner Irene and I had the BEST fish and chips. Well, the best fish anyway.  It was a firm, dense Haddock filet.

We left Tuesday morning for our trek to Saguenay.  We decided to hold driving to about 4-5 hours per day, so we left at 10 and got to our next RV camp about 3 PM.  It was the West Montreal KOA.  It was a really nice park.  It has a great play area for kids.

Wednesday we got out about 10 AM again and and got to our RV Park about about 2.  It was about 10 minutes from downtown Quebec City.  It is called "Camping Transit." Now THERE'S a "catchy title" for you!  This one was a let down.  The spot was great but when I called to ask for the WiFi password the guy told me.  "I will bring it to your rig in just a few minutes" but then the NEVER showed up.  That kinda yanked my chain.

RANT ALERT! RANT ALERT!

One of the biggest problems with being in Canada is the fact that they charge INTERNATIONAL ROAMING rates.  How can this be?  I mean I KNOW its another country but we have the same phone system!  You don't have to dial 011 to place a call to Canada.  They use 1-AREA CODE-NUMBER just like we do in the US.  800/888/877/866/855 calls to/from Canada are all still TOLL-FREE.  Why is it that they have to charge international roaming rates for cell phone use?  Since that's the case AND since so often RV park WiFi systems are pretty shoddy (even in the USA) I couldn't do any blog posting the last 4 nights.  Even now my cell phone is sitting here with Cellular Data turned OFF.  Canada mooches off of the US for national defense, why can't they let us mooch off of them for WiFi.  (FYI: Do you know that 90% of Canadian citizens live within 100 mile of the US border?)

Back to our day in Quebec City.  I decided to drive through the city to check out our route to Saguenay.  It proved to be VERY easy.  It was all on "Interprovince(?)" roads.  Then I took Irene to dinner at a sidewalk cafe/restaurant in the downtown area: "Versa" was its name.  It was VERY GOOD. Pure, dumb luck I guess.  We had no ideas about where to go.  We just found a parking spot downtown and walked to something close.  When we got there it was 4 PM and NO ONE else was there.  But we sat down and gave it a shot anyway.  It was NOT a mistake.  Here's a pic of the love-birds at "Versa":

That is Irene with her French Onion soup (the best she has EVER had she said) and me with some "Seafood Chowder."  It, too, was very flavorful.

After beating her 2 out of 3 in Scrabble and watching "Brooklyn Taxi" last night we retired for the evening to get on the road at 10 AM this morning to drive up to Saguenay Sainte Ambroise.  We were here by 2:30 PM after a very lovely and pleasant drive through the Canadian Laurentides (The extension of the Appalachian Mountains into Canada).

The first thing we did was "pop the top" on the Trekker (get the electric, water and sewer hooked up and open up the slides).  The we drove to Alma (about 16 miles away) to get our car washed and find the closest Walmart.  After that we invited the Greniers (Jean and Ana) to dinner with us.  Having gotten back I'm just finishing putting the blog posting to bed at 11 PM.

I know, I know, It's been a while OR We be busy people, folk, it aint like we are slumming here, ya know!

Wow, it's been a while since the last post and (as is our wont) we've been here, there and everywhere since it was written.

First off - SPENCER, WV Sojourn

The sojourn went as well as God wanted it to.  We had 9 kids and 15 adults over the 5 days.  The Gralls and the Wootens did yeoman's work and we can't thank them enough for all they did and how easy they made being the "Team Leader" on the sojourn.  Thanks.  Here's a picture of the crew.

OUR MISSION (TX) TRIP

Following the sojourn we drove in a single day back to Frankfort, IN to park the rig to head for Mission, TX.  We met with the church there on Sunday AM and I preached the sermon.  Then we drove to Indy to get our 4:40 PM flight out.  Unfortunately it was delayed for 2 HOURS which caused us to miss our Flight from Dallas to McAllen so they had to schedule us on the last flight of the night. SO, instead of getting in at a reasonable 8:15 PM, we got in at 11 PM.  Brenda and Phoebe were driving down from Midland, TX to spend the time with us so that became a little tough for the 4 1/2 year old to deal with.  

This was our second inspection of the house that we are having built for us at Retama Village.  Monday morning we selected the plants for our gardens and our 2 trees.  One is a "Live Oak" tree.  

I've got 2 sets of pictures below.  The FIRST set we took on the Monday and shows the house all drywalled and trimmed out - ready to paint.  They are videos:

The second group is a series of pictures taken by Brenda just before they left to visit her family over in Brownsville, TX.  It's just 4 days later and the painters and stuccoers are attacking the house having almost all the stucco done (the 3rd and 4th coats) and inside the ceiling and trim were all painted:

LUCY, you got some Splainin' to do:

Thursday night Steve, Kazumi and I went to see LUCY with Scarlett Johannsen and Morgan Freeman in it.  It was 2001:A Space Odyssey and a Jackie Chan movie put into a Waring blender and put on purée.  Some of the allusions to 2001 were so blatant that if Adam Clarke weren't dead I'd counsel him to sue for Copyright Infringement.  Grandma Irene and Neo stayed at the Chino's house and watched "FROZEN."  Neo can do a command performance of "Let It Go" from start to finish.  It was pretty amazing.  Irene said it was a a really good movie. NO IT WASN'T! It's a cartoon.  I don't do animated films.  I'm not "moved" by them (other than the urge to puke).  Even when I was a kid I thought that Bambi, Cinderella and Snow White were idiotic.  I just don't think in "Cartoon", I guess.

EYE, EYE Sir

Friday I had an eye appointment.  For the second appointment in a row my eye did NOT need a shot (queue Handel's "Messiah" here). Then Friday afternoon we drove up to Shults-Lewis Children's home to give ourselves a "head-start" on our trip to Saguenay, Quebec.

SATURDAY NIGHT'S ALL RIGHT FOR FIGHTIN'

Just a quote from a Elton John song.  We left Shults-Lewis at about 1:30 today and drove to Lapeer, Michigan which is about 50 miles from the Canadian border.  Tomorrow we will drive to Toronto to spend 2 days with our daughter, Mary; her husband, Brad and our granddaughter Amélie.  Then it's on to Saguenay for our first of 2 back to back physical sojourns.

"It just rattles around a bit"

In the movie Patton, General Omar Bradley (played my Karl Malden) is explaining to General Patton (played by George C. Scott in academy awarding winning fashion) how the American tanks (which ran on gasoline) would explode when hit by a shell, bullet, shrapnel, etc. but the German tanks (which were powered by diesel fuel) would just keep going though "you can hear the shell (that hit them - JRG) rattling around inside them."  I'm convinced that is what happens to the WiFi signal at so many of the locations we have Sojourns - "It just rattles around" - around the hills here in Spencer.  We get anywhere from NO SERVICE to 2 bars and 4G (even USING our Signal Booster) at the church building.  So, you have to wait for web pages to load in small bursts with varying amounts of time just sitting there mocking you.

We are here on our 2nd "Becoming Servants" VBS.  For the last 4 days we have been door-knocking in town and inviting people to attend.  There are 2 other Sojourner couples here with us - Dave and Charlotte Grall from California and Elger (Al) and Glenda Wooten from Alabama originally but trying to buy a home in Parkersburg, WV.  Al has plantar fasciitis so he isn't able to do any door-knocking so they just arrived on Tuesday and we are VERY happy to have them.

The Gralls are wonderful - real troupers.  We couldn't ask for better partners in this Sojourn.

We've had 3 teams of 2 people put out 634 invitations in town and speak to LOTS of residents at the house about coming in pretty physically demanding geography.  In case you haven't heard - West Virginia is H-I-L-L-Y!!  So getting to many of the doors on the houses demands walking up a flight of (usually) steep stairs OR a long inclined driveway.

Tomorrow is our "day off."  We are supposed to get Friday and Saturdays off - yea! right! fat chance!  The VBS begins Saturday - so that day isn't going to happen AND tomorrow (Friday) many of the teachers will be working on getting their class materials and classrooms ready.  Here's the teaching line-up:

Pre-School - Irene

1 & 2 Grade - Allison Miller (a local member that a is a teacher)

3 & 4 Grade - Charlotte Grall

5 & 6 Grade - Glenda Wooten

Teens - Dave Grall

Adults - Jim Gordon

The VBS goes on from 6:30-8:30 each evening from Saturday 12th - Wednesday 16th.

The church here is very small.  It only has about 20 members.  They've helped as much as they could and we really appreciate it.  Marvin Miller and Harold Richards have been out door-knocking every day with us and Allison have been printing our materials and helping us bag the stuff.

Because the WiFi here is so poor, this is going to be a text-only blog posting.

God bless you all and have a great day.

The Things You Can Learn in Medical School OR More construction pictures of the completed Closed Cell Wall Insulation

We are in Durham, NC visiting our son, Junzo; his wife, Emma and their children Maeda and Rowan.  One of the things that we did today was watch Junzo put on a "bubble blowing" exhibition.  It was pretty amazing.  Here's a video:

If you read to the bottom of the post the "Recipe" for the bubble soap is there. 

 It contains a special ingredient.

These first four pictures below show the progress made on the "brown coat" - the second of the four coats applied when stuccoing a house

Here are the posts on the west side of the "RV Port"

This is the wall at the back of the port area.  The door is into the storage shed.

This is the entry arch with its brown coat applied

This is the eastern wall with the glass cube windows for the living room and kitchen.  

The one window has all but one block installed.

The pictures below show the foam adhering to the rafters.  It's thick enough that you can not see them:

This picture is of the Living Room Rafters (the JOISTS are the wood 2x6s that you can still see)

This shows the walls meeting the ceiling in the Master Bedroom

This is a picture of the Master Bathroom over the Toilet

This is a picture of the ceiling in the master bathroom shower

The pictures below show the walls after they are foamed.  They use a special knife that reaches across 2 studs and cuts off the foam that is sticking out past the studs:

This is the corner of the front (guest) bedroom with the foam in the walls.

This shows the wall that runs from the computer desk (which will be below the window on the right and the Laundry Room.  The Pocket door framing has also been installed.  At the lower left of the picture you can see the dryer vent hole.

This is the Kitchen wall foamed and ready to drywall.  Notice the 

Glass Blocks have also been installed.

Here is a shot of the Living Room wall from the inside with the foam applied.  Again, notice that the one "Glass Block Window" has all but 1 glass block installed.  The other "Glass Block Window" is still awaiting its blocks.

This is the wall in the Guest Bedroom.  Since it is a "Bay Window" the top of it is

 framed in like a wall because it will have drywall attached to it also.

This picture is of the master bedroom wall all "foamed and ready" for drywall.

The Bubble Soap Recipe:

12 parts of water

2 parts of Dawn Detergent

1/2 part of Surgical Lubricant

The two sticks are just from off of the ground.

The string between them has a weight at the bottom heavy enough  to pull the string together when it is put into the water.

The Surgical Lubricant is the key.  It increases the Surface Tension of the soap so the bubbles don't pop easily and get VERY large.

Our Best Johnny Cash & June Carter Cash Impersonation OR "o/`o/` We've been everywhere man, We've been everywhere man, We've been everywhere man, We've been everywhere man, We've been everywhere man, ....o/`o/`"

Just a quickie post to keep all you "trekking junkies" satisfied.

Don't like Johnny Cash?  How about Ricky Nelson "o/`o/` I'm a travelin' man... o/1"

Thursday we were in Indianapolis, IN on our Sojourn at the Franklin Road Church of Christ.  We drove the Trekker to Frankfort, IN to park it at the Memorial Parkway Church of Christ and immediately drove back to Indianapolis Airport to get on a plane (2 actually) to fly to Mission, TX to look at the house we are having built at Bentsen Palm Retama Village.

Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights we were in Mission, TX.

Monday we flew back to Indiana and stayed in the Trekker Monday night at the Memorial Parkway Church of Christ in Frankfort, IN.

Tuesday I had an eye appointment in Lafayette, IN in the morning YIPPEE! NO SHOT REQUIRED.

Wednesday we drove the Trekker to Centerville, OH to spend the afternoon and evening with Larry and Jan Long (the couple that taught me the gospel while we were stationed at Minot, ND in 1974-75).  We stayed in the parking lot of the Centerville Church of Christ for the night

Thursday we got up and drove the Trekker to Spencer, WV where we begin our next sojourn this coming monday (July 7th).  It's going to be another VBS.

When dropped our rig off there and got it leveled up and then drove  the car to Durham, NC to spend the 4th of July with our grandchildren Maeda and Rowan and their mom and dad (Emma and Junzo) and our daughter Fumiko.  Junzo is on the staff of Duke Medical Center.  He is the head of their Gynocological Radiation Oncology section.  Fumiko is just beginning her "Internship" at the Medical center having graduated from Duke Medical School in May.

We will drive back to Spencer, WV Saturday Afternoon.