March 2017 – Page 5 – RVing With a Purpose

Don’t Ask!

Monday, March 6, 2017

One general dentist, 2 oral surgeons and one endodontist. That’s the day. ‘nuf said.

“When We Carve Away All The Bad Things…”

Sunday March 5, 2017

This cross greeted us when we arrived at our church this morning. In the early morning hours of Sunday, January 22nd, while we were between NOMADS projects, the City of Oneonta, Alabama was hit by strong winds that caused damaged to many homes and buildings. Lester Memorial UMC was one of those damaged.

Some of the damage to the church building

Many people from the church and community met that morning to cleanup as much as possible around the church and surrounding homes. Of the many trees blown down one large one was in the church parking lot. The Blount Countian, our local newspaper, published an article by Richard Thorne about how the cross on the stump came to be:

A cross carved from a tree trunk sits by the parking lot of Lester Memorial United Methodist Church. The old oak tree was felled by a storm in February [sic] and Blount County resident Fred McCarl offered to clean up the tree for the wood. When he finished, he says he was inspired to carve the cross from the remaining stump. McCarl wrote about the project, ‘When we carve away all the bad things from around us, we can see the beauty that is on the inside. I pray the cross continues to make an impact on many others.’

It was really neat to see the cross for the first time this morning. It reminded us of all the crosses at Storm Mountain Center in South Dakota where we did several weeks of NOMADS drop-in work in 2014 when we were in route to and from Alaska. You can read about it at Alaska 2014 – Day 12: Trail Clearing at Storm Mountain Center. Good memories of Storm Mountain and our friends there.

Hope you have a great Monday.

Back to Alabama

Saturday March 4, 2017

We spent last night in a Walmart parking lot in Forrest City, Arkansas. Some people think that it is awful to stay at Walmart. We prefer to stay in a parking lot at Walmart, Lowes, Home Depot, Cracker Barrel, etc when we are just doing a quick overnight. We want some place close to our route and don’t need a campground since we carry everything we need – kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, etc. We usually try to arrive shortly before or just after dark and are back on the road 6:30-7:00 am or before. We check with the manager and make sure it is OK and ask where they prefer we park. It’s not really all about the cost, although we don’t like to pay $25-30 for a quick overnight stay. It’s more a matter of convenience. It sometimes is more expensive than a campground because we usually shop wherever we stop. In fact, we made at least three shopping trips across the parking lot for groceries for the weekend. The Forrest City Walmart lot has a sign that says “No overnight truck or RV parking” but the manager allows both to stay overnight. Last night there were five RVs and seven 18-wheelers there. It was a quiet night and we rested well. We were back on the road at 6:30. We continued west on I-40, then I-55 in Memphis to US 78/I-22. It was a nice sunny day and an uneventful trip back to Alabama.

We received a call shortly be getting home from the assisted living because Aunt Jean fell out of her wheelchair with a little assistance from another resident. She was not hurt and all is well. After getting FRED home and emptying the tanks, we checked on our other LOL’s. We made veggie soup for lunch tomorrow (and had a sample for supper). Anne’s sister-in-law with ovarian cancer, Marguerite, is not doing well and we would appreciate your prayers. She is having what we think is an adverse reaction to a new cancer medication and she is being admitted to the hospital. This next week is going to be very busy, but we will try to keep you posted on what is going on. Maybe we will remember to take some pictures but…..it may be mundane and boring. Enjoy worship at your church tomorrow. We look forward to returning to our church. We miss Lester Memorial when we are gone.

Time To Travel Again

Friday, March 3, 2017

last-sunrise-in-elmore-city This morning was our last Oklahoma sunrise. In addition to meeting great people and making what we expect to be life long friends, and working on a great project, by working this Oklahoma disaster rebuild project we also got to add another state to our map. We now have 21 states and 3 Canadian provinces on our map of states where we have spent at least one night in the motorhome. We probably won’t get to add any additional states until we go to Iowa to our annual meeting in September, since we are trying to stay a little closer to home these days. We really enjoyed our stay in Oklahoma and wouldn’t hesitate to go back and work with the folks again.

Hated to leave, but today was a travel day and we enjoy travel. It was in the 40s when we got back from dinner last night but we knew it was going to be in the low 30s again this morning so we went ahead and did most of the outside departure tasks. We also started the inside packup. Everything has to be secured or put away so that we have nothing flying around if we have to stop suddenly or get bounced onto the floor on the rough highways. We both slept well which is always good for the night before travel. Sometimes our brains won’t shut down and we stay awake going over the departure checklists in our heads. We had breakfast, went over to the Badger Den and got some cinnamon rolls for later in the day and then said our goodbyes to all our team. Love them all!! Dennis and Carol will be joining the team in our place tomorrow and they will have another great week. Then next Friday Scot and Pat, Henry and Barb and Gary and Gwen will all be leaving and 3 more couples will join Dennis and Carol.

We departed at 8:10 and drove to I-35 to Oklahoma City, then took I-240 to I-40 East which will take us all the way back to Memphis. There was the usual areas of construction and congestion, but overall not a bad driving day. We noticed what appeared to be several large wildfires in the distance as we came across I-40. It is still very dry there and they continue to be under fire warnings. We made a fuel stop before leaving Oklahoma as fuel was less expensive there. Almost as soon as we crossed in to Arkansas we began noticing how much greener it was than 3 weeks ago. The redbuds and lots of trees along the interstate are blooming and putting on leaves. We stopped at a rest area about 36 miles after entering Arkansas and had lunch – leftovers from last night’s dinner. We then arrived at the Forrest City, Arkansas Walmart about 5:30. We will stay here tonight and it looks like several other RVers have chosen to overnight here too. Tomorrow morning we will continue east back to Alabama. Hope you all have a nice weekend.