Dishwashing

Today our assignment was to wash dishes and help clean up after the 12:30 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. meals (the meal schedule is later on Sundays to allow for people to attend church in the morning or vespers at the center at 5:00 p.m.). The job was not too difficult, especially since Carl decided to use disposable plates for the evening meal.

Chef Carl dishes up lasagna and veggies, while Jacalyn and Brad add salad and dessert.

Happy people in the dining room

We were very pleased to have a new volunteer couple arrive this afternoon. Greg and Patti have been here before, so they know the ropes. The other old timers know them too. They have a new travel trailer now, but we're told they spent their first year full-timing in a pop-up camper, with their dog and cat. We haven't met the cat yet, but we did meet the dog, a large, wrinkled bulldog named Hippo. As a result of the new arrivals, we have a revised schedule for the week, and we actually get TWO DAYS OFF! We'll count our chickens when they hatch.
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Another Early Morning

We got up early again this morning so we could take our walk before heading over to the CARE Center to help Carl with the noon meal. It was chilly, so we walked fast, but we did stop to listen to and watch a plump, cheery songbird, a kind we didn't recognize. It seemed to be putting on a show for us.

When we arrived for our assignment, Carl was preparing meatloaf, mashed potatoes, brown gravy, lima beans, and corn. We got to fix the big salad. Carl added a sugar free cherry cobbler, sugar free peaches, and cake as dessert choices. He also put a chicken in the oven for those who didn't eat red meat.

We had a full house for dinner, so every bit of the meatloaf, potatoes, and veggies was eaten. One guy (not a resident) came in 45 minutes after the noon hour, famished and begging for food. He ended up with peaches and cottage cheese, salad, and bread and butter.

Ken took some photos today of our fellow volunteers.

Jacalyn and Brad Dacles

Mary and Vern  Miller

Shirley and Al Coleman

Bob Maybee exhorts volunteers

On our evening walk we remembered to take some photos, too.

Put it to bed for the night???

Escapees' big red truck!

Cute dog is the first we've seen at the dog park

Nice dog park!

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Root Beer Floats

We finished our on-call assignment by showing up this morning at 6:45 a.m. as directed. On Fridays  the cook prepares the "Big Breakfast," so the morning kitchen people are asked to come in at 6:30 a.m. They had made the coffee and put out the tea and water and ice and juice, etc. The housekeeper had already folded and put away the kitchen laundry. The receptionist told us that it's her job to check people in and collect the money (everyone pays for the Big Breakfast). So our assignment came down to unlocking the building at 7:20 a.m. and turning off the porch lights. We could have slept another half hour! We told the coordinator we would come back after folks had left to wipe up the tables and chairs, but he said the staff would do that.

So we checked the driving schedule--no assignments. Our next assignment was to help in the kitchen for the evening meal. That means arriving at 4:00 p.m. on some days--but not this day. Ken decided to read over the volunteer manual, and suddenly he said, "We have to go over at 2:10 p.m. to help with root beer floats"--that's a Friday afternoon tradition here. Fortunately we had an hour before we had to show up.
We walked in through the multipurpose room, where a group was playing Bingo, and went to the kitchen. Joe had already started handing out floats to the early birds. We took over the job. I scooped the ice cream and Ken poured the root beer. We had regular and sugar free ice cream and regular and diet root beer, so one of the challenges was to keep straight which was which and who wanted what. When the Bingo game broke up, the crowd arrived, and we were busy for a while. When everyone had been served, we had our own floats--a perk of the job 8-)

The weekend and evening cook, Carl, has been on vacation, so the volunteers have been doing lots of cooking. Today he was back at work, for which we were grateful, since otherwise we'd have had to cook. He made grilled ham and cheese sandwiches. He certainly knows his way around a kitchen. We heard that he had cooked for years on offshore oil rigs.

Tonight I finally got around to checking my old computer for any files I might still need from it. Then I ran the recovery program, which wipes the computer clean and restores it to its original state, so now it's ready to put on Craigslist when we get back to Dallas.

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Driving

We started the day at our 8:00 a.m. volunteer meeting. One of the other couples was unlucky enough to have today as their day off--some day off! After the meeting, Ken went to check out the red Dodge minivan he would use to drive some of the residents to the doctor.

The rest of us, plus some other helpers, stuffed weekend backpacks for schoolkids on food assistance programs. In each backpack we put two individual servings of cereal, two small cartons of milk, some cans of ravioli and beans and corn, some pudding, and some canned fruit. The idea is to provide these kids with something to eat over the weekend. We packed 50 backpacks for delivery to a local school. We had a real assembly line going, and everyone had fun.

One of the residents scheduled for Ken's van had fallen during the night, and the EMTs were called out to assist him, so Ken ended up with two passengers. He drove them to a doctor's office near the new hospital. When the woman was finished with her appointment, the man was still in the waiting room, so Ken drove the woman home and went back to pick up the man. Fortunately, this is a small town, so the drives weren't very long. By the time he and his second passenger returned, they nearly missed lunchtime.

Ken and I ate at home and then went for our "morning" walk (by now it was 1:00 p.m.). We decided to try again to get propane, but we unfortunately forgot that the propane department was closed from 1:00 to 2:00 for lunch. Sigh.

Then we spent some time culling our Grand Tetons photos before going back to the Red Barn a third time at 2:30 p.m. Third time was a charm, so now we have a full propane bottle backup.

We were due for our evening on-call assignment at 5:00 p.m., so we got everything ready to finish fixing dinner when we had a break. We went back to clean up the dining room and then again at 9:00 p.m. to close up for the day.
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A Day Off!

Today was our first day off. We gratefully slept in and had a leisurely brunch. Our walk took us outside Rainbow's End. Ken snapped a couple of photos.

Inviting homesite in the trees

Pony!

 

Then we set out on some of our errands. We loaded our empty propane tank in the truck bed and drove first to Kwik Lube to get a new Texas State Inspection sticker for the truck. There was a line and a predicted wait of half an hour, so we moved on.

It turned out the next place on our list was Moore Auto Sales, right across from Walmart, so I stopped in Walmart to return some things while Ken went to get the inspection done. The timing worked well. I was just picking up a new fire extinguisher to replace the outdated one we had bought last week when Ken called to say we had passed the "inspection" (they hadn't actually checked much).

Next we stopped at the Murphy Memorial Library, where we checked out some videos and books. Then we went on to Brookshires, where we got some really good mahi-mahi and salmon. On the way home we stopped at the Red Barn for propane, only to find that the propane department is now closed on Wednesdays. Good thing we have another tank which is nearly full!
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Did I Mention That We're Tired?

Today we had 8:30 kitchen duty. We made a giant bowl of cole slaw, fortunately with the help of a Kitchen Aid food processor. Ken cut up a big bowl of fruit for the sugar free dessert. With one thing and another, we were busy until our shift ended at 1:30 p.m. and we went home for lunch.

We were on the driver availability list this afternoon, but got no assignments, so we heaved a sigh of relief and enjoyed the prospect of a free evening and a day off tomorrow. Yay! Read more!

Another Full Day

We started the morning by arriving at the CARE Center at 6:45 a.m. to complete our on-call duties. When we were relieved by the 8:30 kitchen team's arrival, we took our walk and then decided to get some shopping done.

First we stopped at West RV and picked up some replacement halogen bulbs and an extra awning wand. Next we stopped at Valero for diesel and then the Ace Hardware store. We went on to Walmart where Ken got a replacement for his lost Swiss Army knife and we picked up an HDMI cable so we could look at our photos from the laptop on the TV. Then on to Lowe's for some white coax cable (we saw another camper using it and noticed how well it stands out on the ground, so there's less danger of tripping over it).

While we were out, we got a call from the CARE Center with an assignment to take one of the residents, to the hospital for a checkup after a fall. Oh, no! We were on the driver availability list and forgot to tell the coordinator that we were leaving the grounds. He said he'd find someone else (thanks, Brad!).

We got home in time for the noon meal, which was cranberry chicken. I'd had my doubts when I saw Bobbi starting to prepare the chicken in the morning. The first thing she added was French dressing. It tasted good and the chicken was moist. We sat with a couple from the park. It turned out that he had worked for aerospace companies in SoCal, so he and Ken had something to talk about.

We had a brief break before arriving at 2:30 p.m. to start our kitchen duty. On Monday and Tuesday evenings, the volunteers prepare the evening meal. The menu called for fruit plate, and Ken turned out a beautiful platter of fruit. We also made brown rice to serve with some leftover sweet and sour pork and banana pudding (regular and sugar free). I mixed up some vanilla yogurt (again, regular and sugar free) to go with the fruit. Shirley offered to help with the serving, and everything went well, except that towards the end, we started to run out of fruit, so we had to rush some more fruit prep. Everyone ended up happy, and all the food was gone, making it easier to clean up.

When we left the CARE Center after cleaning up, setting out breakfast, and starting the kitchen laundry, it was after 6:30 p.m. and we were tuckered out. We ate a light supper and walked and then decided to watch another Masterpiece Mystery episode (we're several episodes behind on the TIVO). Read more!

On Call

Today was our first "On Call" assignment. Basically the on-call team responds to problems and emergencies that may arise, answers the phone, secures the building at night and opens it in the morning. At each meal, the on-call team keeps track of who eats and collects payment from guests. In the morning, the team records as residents call in which meals they play to be at. If someone doesn't call in by 10 a.m. (and they haven't been in for breakfast), the team has to try to contact them to be sure they are okay. Most times they have just forgotten to call.

After meals, the team cleans up the dining room. On weekends the team has additional responsibilities, like taking out the trash and vacuuming and cleaning the hallway and traffic areas of the multipurpose room. For newbies like us, it can seem a bit overwhelming, but we're sure we'll have it down after a couple of times.

By the time we finally hung up our hats for the day, I was exhausted and could hardly keep my eyes open. Read more!

Cooking at Cafe CARE

Today we had kitchen duty for the noon meal, so we had to be at work by 8:30 a.m. The weekend and evening cook is still on vacation, so guess what? We got to cook dinner for 35. The menu was pork loin, but we had to figure out how to cook it and what side dishes to serve. Fortunately, we had the help of one of the more experienced volunteers.

I found an interesting recipe on the web for roast pork loin with a spiced cranberry sauce. Everyone was happy with the meal, and after four hours on our feet, we got to eat before cleaning up the kitchen.

Shirley and Al Coleman in the foreground: Shirley was our advisor/helper in the kitchen.

We had no driving assignments this afternoon, so we took advantage of the break to get our laundry done.
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October 1--Official Start of Our Volunteer Month

Today didn't start too auspiciously: Ken was up in the middle of the night with severe abdominal pain, and we almost decided to go to the emergency room. Fortunately a pain pill eased the pain while his body recovered a bit. Though he remained under the weather all day, he decided he was going to live.

I managed to get a bit of rest before heading over to the CARE Center at 6:30 a.m. to help with "the Big Breakfast." Every Friday Bobbie fixes eggs to order, bacon, sausage, grits, biscuits, gravy, and hashbrowns. My job was mainly to help serve, and a steady stream of people showed up.

When things had died down around 8:20, I left to see how Ken was doing. He was actually up and getting dressed, so we ate a quick breakfast and went over to our 9:00 a.m. volunteer orientation session, which was a run-through of the "On Call" job and emergency response. After the two hour session, we took a brief stroll, since Ken wasn't up to our regular walk. Then he was ready for a nap before lunch.

The noon menu included some yummy looking bread pudding (one of my favorites) with lemon sauce. I got a to-go box with a large salad and two pieces of the bread pudding for us to have after lunch. Ken was ready for another nap, and I decided to lie down too and try to catch up on my lost sleep.

Tomorrow it all starts over again with an 8:30 kitchen assignment. They promise us it does get better!
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Expect Change

We went in this morning for the 8:00 a.m. volunteer meeting and guess what? Thinkgs have changed again 8-) Suddenly we weren't driving today. Instead we were scheduled for the 4:00 p.m. kitchen duty. It turns out that one of the couples will not be able to make it, so the schedule was completely reworked.

So, figuring we were free until 4:00 p.m., we headed out on our morning walk. We went over to the Escapees campground office, where they sell Escapees merchandise, to pick up a lanyard. Some of the other folks here wear them: it simplifies putting on your name badge along with a CARE Volunteer badge and a CARE bear.

We were on our way back home when my phone rang. It was Dan (the volunteer coordinator) calling to say that the lady who was supposed to come in today to do the residents' laundry would not be available and asking us to do the job. I told him we had to make a quick trip to the grocery store and we'd be right over.

Fortunately the housekeeper, Lesley, had actually collected and started some of the laundry. She went and picked up some more, so we had plenty to do, especially keeping track of whose laundry was where and how they wanted it done. Some want their clothing on hangers; others want it all folded. There were several special requests. We were making pretty good progress when we found out that there was one more resident who needed her laundry done. Her file card had not been pinned in the Thursday section of the bulletin board.

Another complication is that the machines have to be sanitized between residents, which means running an entire cycle with a sanitizer, plus one of the three dryers isn't working. We were definitely finding it a challenge, but (mostly) keeping things running smoothly, when Myrna, Dan's wife, showed up to take over and sent us home to rest up before our 4:00 p.m. assignment. (Thanks, Myrna!)

We were back over at CARE to help with the evening meal and cleanup. The good part is that we got to eat crawfish etouffee over rice with salad and banana pudding before we had to go help with the cleanup.

Friday mornings are special at CARE. Bobbie fixes a big breakfast, and lots of outsiders come to eat. She gets in very early to start. We don't have to be over there until 6:30 a.m.!
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TIRED!!!

We started early this morning so we could shadow Brad and Jacalyn, who were assigned to 8:30 kitchen duty. Dan diverted Jacalyn to doing residents' laundry, so Brad got the job of teaching us the ropes. We were on our feet from the time we arrived until we sat down briefly to eat lunch before jumping back up again to clean up.

We met Bobbie, the cook, and Calvin, her husband and assistant, who were already hard at work preparing the noon meal. They were very kind and helpful to us newbies. Joe, who is in charge of dishwashing, also took the time to teach us and to give us encouragement.

I found out that Joe is also a barber from way back and cuts hair for the CARE residents, volunteers, and Rainbow's End residents, as well as some community people, so I made an appointment for right after our shift ended to get my shaggy mane trimmed. Joe did an excellent job--and threw in a scalp massage to boot!

During the break between lunch cleanup and showing up to help with supper, Ken went over to talk with Bud and Pearl. He's driving them to Kingwood for a doctor's appointment tomorrow. At 4:00 p.m. we went back to work. More like...we dragged ourselves back over to work. I ran into Dan, the volunteer coordinator. When he saw how tired I was, he suggested that we not stick around for the whole shift. Supper is a more lightly attended meal, and they had it covered, so we stayed to help with prep and serving and then headed home.
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Volunteers!

We went to our first volunteer orientation today. It started at 1:00 p.m., so we thought we'd have plenty of time to pick up our mail afterwards (the mail window is open 1-4). Wrong! We finished up around 4:20 p.m. and needed to be back at the CARE Center by 5:00 p.m. to shadow the on call volunteers. We only had time for a quick salad and deep breath before heading back to the Center.

5:00 p.m. is the evening meal time from Monday through Saturday. The on call volunteers keep a record of who is there for the meal and generally help out in the dining room. They also get to eat if they wish. Tonight the menu was pizza and dessert. After the meal we were watching the folks in the kitchen, and they asked us to come in and watch what they were doing. Before we knew it, we were washing dishes. The idea is to learn by doing! We earned our little Care Bears today.

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Tyler to Livingston

We got up this morning excited to be opening a new chapter in our RV adventures, but first we realized we had forgotten to take a photo of our site at 5 Star RV Resort in Tyler, so here it is:

Our site at 5 Star RV Resort in Tyler was pretty basic.

As you can see, we had already started getting Venture ready for today's trip. We decided to take our morning walk around another part of the "trail" shown on the park map. As we started out, the owner stopped by on his golf cart to give us some advice. He said that he had some arrows ready to put up to direct people along the trail, but they aren't up yet. We did manage to have a nice walk in the woods. It was cool, so for the first time in many weeks, we wore our jackets on the walk.

We left for Rainbow's End around 9:40 a.m. for the 150 mile trip. We made a couple of stops to change drivers and to check out a produce stand. We were disappointed that our Verizon cell and data service were very spotty along the way. At one point I realized I had a voicemail, but I had to wait for a while to retrieve it, since we had no cell service. When I got the message, it was from Dan Duryea, the volunteer coordinator at CARE. He was calling to let us know that a space was already available for us in the CARE volunteer area, since they only had two teams of volunteers in September.

That made it easier for us. We had expected to stay in one of the regular campsites until our volunteer month started on Friday. There are seven volunteer sites, all in a row behind the CARE Center, and we chose one in the middle, site #39.

View of Venture in site #39, looking toward the back of the CARE Center.

Looking towards the south.

After we had lunch and got set up, we read over the new volunteer manual (extensive and very detailed)--most of which we'll have to read over many times. Then we went over to talk to Dan and find out our assignments. He talked with us for a while and gave us our "Care Bears."

We have a volunteer meeting tomorrow at 1:00 p.m. at which we'll learn lots more, we're sure. Meanwhile we walked around and met lots of nice people. One was a resident in a wheelchair who told us (cheerfully) that he was in a bad mood!
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Last Day in Tyler

Today was our last day in Tyler. We took the opportunity this morning to walk the trail and see the little pond. The trail wasn't much, but there was a swing by the pond, which actually had a few lily pads with blossoms.

We went over to Dick and Carol's afterward and ate the rest of our pizza from yesterday (still good) and more pumpkin custard (definitely still yummy!). Then Carol and I went shopping for a new swing set while Dick and Ken stayed home and watched the Dallas-Houston game.

We went first to Atwood's Ranch and Home Store, where we found only one swing set that didn't look too appealing. However, while looking for the swing set, Carol came upon a porch glider for a good price. She'd been looking for one since the tree the swing was hanging from fell down, so she decided to buy it. A store employee helped us load it in the back seat of the truck.

Then we drove to Spring Creek RV Resort to check it out. The sites were larger than the ones where we are now, and the parked looked more appealing and shady than this one, so we'll give it a try the next time we are in Tyler.

After a quick stop to pick up some groceries, we headed next to ToysRUs, which had advertised a wooden playset marked down. They had two left, so Carol grabbed one. Again a store employee helped us load it up, but this time the packages were *much* larger and heavier. They fit well in the truck bed, and Carol got Robert and some neighbors to help unload everything at home.

We got there in time to finish fixing the lasagna (Ken had done some of the preliminaries while we shopped). Debbie and family came over for dinner and games. Ken fixed salads. Carol had made brown bread, and we had pumpkin custard with ice cream for dessert.

Little Sam has grown quite a bit since we saw him last. He's a very smiley baby. While we were playing Rummikub, he was jumping in his jumper and put himself to sleep:

We finished the evening off by playing a few rounds of Boggle. A good time was had by all.
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Garage Sales and Blues Brothers

This morning Carol and I got to have some fun going to garage sales together. It's always interesting to see what finds are out there. There weren't very many sales, but both of us got some good bargains and had a good time looking.

Ken came over a little after 10:00 bringing laundry to do. Mostly we just hung around and talked. In the afternoon Carol and I did some grocery shopping and looking at swing sets.

After dinner tonight we watched one of my "finds"--a DVD of the original Blues Brothers movie. I hadn't seen it in many years, and the others had never seen it. A lot of the special effects are a bit dated (the movie came out in 1980), but the movie was still very funny (although some scenes run a bit long). I really enjoyed the original blues music, including performances by Ray Charles, Cab Calloway, and Aretha Franklin.
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On to Tyler

Our time at Brushy Creek has come to an end. We took our final walk around the campground and saw all the new weekend campers, including a large church group and several boaters. Then we were off to Tyler and new adventures. We are staying at 5 Star RV Park, just south of I-20. It's pretty basic: full hookups and a place to park. Unfortunately it's also been a bit noisy and the pet owners don't necessarily clean up after their dogs.

Around 5:00 p.m. we drove over to Dick and Carol's. It was great to see them again, as always.

They took us out to dinner at Bernard's Mediterranean Restaurant for my birthday. Bernard's is an upscale place featuring Greek and French cuisine. Ken and I shared a pasta dish, Ravioli St. Tropez (cheese ravioli, served in a sun dried tomato with baby shrimp and crab meat). It was delicious, and so was the fresh hot bread and olive tapenade.

The ambience and service were quite good. Here you can see the black napkin the server swooped in to trade for Ken's white one, to avoid the possibility of lint!

After dinner we had a chance to play Rummikub, which Carol had received as a 70th birthday gift. Dick won the first round, and Ken won the second.
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Getting Ready to Move

We're getting ready to move tomorrow, so today we got some chores done. Ken checked all the tire pressures and added air to the trailer tires. We made a new cover for our small propane tank and gas can, which sit in the truck bed in a rectangular milk carton. The old cover had shredded in the wind. I did some cleaning and organizing.

This evening we took another short hike marked on the map given to us by the Corps of Engineers guy. Again it was on a hunting road, but this one has clearly fallen into disuse. We had to wade through weeds and climb over a fallen tree. We did see one deer along the way. It was very near dark, and the road was not easy to see in some places, so we had some sense of victory when we emerged unscathed from the woods.
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Short Hike and a Trip to Jefferson

This morning after breakfast we set out on a short hike in Brushy Creek, actually along a hunting road. We had walked in part way a couple of days ago and finally got a map yesterday.

The Corps of Engineers guy who gave us the map told us that the "trail" is really a hunting road maintained for a special annual hunt. It's for disabled hunters, and there are several "Wildlife Feeding Plots" along the way, including this one, which also has a blind.

It's a good thing we had the map, because we came to a T in the road at which we would not have known which way to go without the map.

We emerged successfully back onto the road we had started on, but up towards the entrance. The entire trip was only just over two miles. We heard but didn't see many birds (except for buzzards and crows). We did spot a couple of deer.

We did some trip planning for a while before lunch. Then after lunch we drove to Jefferson to see what we could see. It's a quaint small town with lots of antique stores, so we browsed lots of antiques and miscellany. One store was called "Granny Had It." I recognized many of the items in the stores from my childhood. Suddenly it came to me that I was now Granny! We stopped at the City Drug, known for its soda fountain, in operation since 1953. We had a hot fudge sundae and a chocolate milkshake, both made from Blue Bell ice cream and quite authentic tasting!

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Cabin Fever

We got a bit of cabin fever today, so we decided to make a trip out to see more of Lake ‘O the Pines. We stopped at the Corps of Engineers Project Office to see if they had any maps of hiking trails. The folks there were very friendly and helpful. Although they said they don’t really have any hiking trails, they did offer us some maps of the hunting access roads that the one guy had hand drawn. They also gave us a Texas road map—yay! We really needed a new one.

We checked out the Buckhorn Campground, the next one north on the lake from Brushy Creek. It's a nice campground--but not as nice as Brushy Creek. If we stay in this area again, we'll probably come back to Brushy Creek. On the way back in to our campsite, Ken finally got to see some deer, and they conveniently posed for us.

Tonight we finally decided it was cool enough to enjoy a campfire--and it was, if we put our chairs back far enough! We did enjoy the chance to sit out and watch the flickering flames.
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