Mesa, AZ - Frost, Cookies and new RV's

Woke up this morning, looked out and our car was covered with glistening crystals. Hmm. Could only be one thing. And, that is not good. Frost. Here in Mesa, AZ. Shucks, not what we came down here for. Just kidding. Our weather here is so much better than other places in the US. We’ve got sun which makes any day seem at least 15 degrees warmer and we don’t have snow, sleet or ice. What can be wrong with this weather?

One of our favorite restaurants is Panera - light salads, sandwiches and soups along with yummy treats. And the coffee is very good. There is no Panera around us here in Mesa although Panera bought a local chain called Paradise and is slowly converting them to Panera. The closest one to us announced its conversion 2 years ago. Finally today, we went over there for our usual bagels and coffee before we began our errands. Hey, PANERA was the sign above the entry. WOW, it finally happened. But, it doesn’t open until 9:00 - an hour away. But, as 2 of the first 100 customers in the door, we got 2 (count them - 2) coupons worth a dozen cookies each month. That’s 24 cookies for us every month for a year.

Yeah, but what are we going to do for the next hour? Let’s go across the street to a restaurant called Wildflower: treats and coffee. OK. There goes loyalty.

Yeah, but after one coffee and treat, the Panera is open and we headed over there. Gotta be loyal, you know. We can’t wait to start our cookies in January.

When we bought our first RV (yep, we’ve had more than 1 in our 8 years of RV’ing) (maybe even more than 2), we had never stepped foot inside a motorhome (we had stepped inside several trailers and 5th wheels at the Iowa State Fair), had never stayed overnight in one, had never stayed in a state park, never traveled in an RV - well, you get the idea. We were absolute babes in the woods. But, there we were with a brand new RV and ready to travel. Who in the world would buy an RV with absolutely no experience with one? I thought we might be the only ones (I don’t want to call us nuts because I wouldn’t want to insult anyone else in our shoes but I certainly questioned our sanity some times) but I have since learned that there are many others who have done the same thing. They might not be nuts but we certainly might have been.

Today I met a couple who bought a used 41’ motorhone. He had been looking for 5 years and had found 2 he liked during that time but both had been bought before he had gotten around to calling the salesperson (he was buying from an online site). Then he spotted one he liked, talked with his wife, called the salesperson the at 8:00 am the next day, put $1000 down and hired someone to look it over to check it out. It checked out well and he and his wife went down to Dallas to buy it. The sales person gave them the walk-through and it was theirs.

Oops, he didn’t have a clue what the sales person was saying since he knew nothing about RV’s. Knew nothing about driving a 41’ motorhome, nothing about tanks, nothing about brakes, nothing about - well you get the idea. There they were in Dallas and had to drive it for the first time through Dallas, through Fort Worth to rte 35 and head north. Then the 6 lanes narrowed to 3 for construction. Oh, my.

Now, he’s driven it from Omaha to Mesa and is still not comfortable. I asked them how they liked the RV and they were not yet enthusiastic. Oh, oh. They have some friends who bought one in Canada, drove it down here and sold it for $.60 on the $1.00. Didn’t like it. I’ve heard this record before. I hope it’s not their record.

We were lucky, we both liked living and traveling in the RV. We liked it so much that as soon as we could, we became full-timers. No thought of settling down, of buying a house nor even of an area that we might like well enough to eventually settle down in. We say we are still looking for the ‘perfect place.’