When it rains, it pours!

We are here at the Central Florida Fairgrounds in Orlando for an FCOC (Freightliner Chassis Owners' Club) rally. We arrived Monday afternoon and got parked quickly. We have 63 rigs in attendance. . . a nice size for a rally. Not too big, so you get to know a lot of people. We had happy hour at 4 p.m. and then a delicious catered dinner. Tuesday we had "technical" day and had seminars on the Freightliner chassis, air systems, tires, and Cat engines. We were able to ask a lot of questions and we learned several things from these discussions.

Last evening we went to IKEA. If you have never yet experienced that store, you should take an opportunity to do so. We just really did more browsing, but it was a lot of fun. Once we got home, we had to change the mattress on the bed. We sleep on air and while we like the dual zone Aero Beds, we have had some trouble with them leaking. The last one I got was still in the closet and we have been sleeping on a $20 Coleman air mattress for the last 9 months. It developed a leak and when we stripped it, we found a little tear on the top. No idea how it happened, but we got out the Aero Bed and set it up. Boy did it feel good! Shortly after we went to bed, we started hearing the raindrops. It rained steadily during the night and when Terry got up this morning to let the dogs out, there were several inches of water around the rig, so getting the dogs to the pen required carrying them. At least the pen was not sitting in water, so they were able to do their jobs and get back in without getting wet. It was still raining, however, and when Terry tried to put out the awning, it didn't work. We have had some awning issues before and have had it repaired once on the road, and once at the factory. I'm a little miffed that we are still having issues with it. But Terry kept toying with it and eventually got it to deploy.

We went to the catered breakfast which was very good. Scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, hashbrowns, grits, biscuits, juice, coffee and a big bowl of mixed fresh fruit. The catering service they are using is very good. The food has been hot and very tasty.

After breakfast, we left to go find LabCorp, as Terry had to have blood work done. Somehow his coumadin has gotten messed up and he is having to have blood work every two weeks. Hopefully we can get it corrected before too much longer.

At 11:30, we met our friends, Janice and Dean from the Fulltiming Class of 2005, for dinner. They are camped in Clermont and are waiting for the paperwork for their new coach, a 2005 Allegro Bus. They are going to be moving from their 5er into the motorhome this weekend. As we are going to be in the Tampa area visiting friends, we may get a chance to help them move. Just have to wait and see. I remember moving from our old rig into the new one and it is a real job. You just don't think that you could get that much stuff in 40' of space, but you really manage to collect it.

We got back to the camp in time for Happy Hour as it was our group that was to provide snacks. We are going back at 7:30 this evening to play card bingo . . . whatever that is.

Till next time. . .

Dale