Countdown to Departure

December 6, 2009
Peoria, AZ

Wow, the past week has flown by! We've begun our preparations for our trip east over the Christmas and New Year's timeframe. We've started packing up a few things that "belong" in the coach, but somehow ended up in the house. We're working on having some "travel meals" in the freezer, so Geri made up a batch of her famous pulled pork, which I'll vacuum-pack today.

Yesterday, I tackled one of the key maintenance items needed before we go: oil and filter changes. It's not complicated just time-consuming, as a change takes 9 gallons of oil meaning that there are multiple catch basins to fill. Then there are two oil filters and two fuel filters, plus one filter each for the hydraulic and coolant systems. And then there's the process of doing most of this lying on your back. The things I do to save $100 by doing it myself.

We've had mixed results from the "overdue" wines we've started working through this week. We had a 1995 Zaca Mesa Pinot Noir (last year it was made, I think) with our beef short rib leftovers on Tuesday and, while it was good we both agreed that we were glad we drank it when we did. We made wings on Wednesday and found a 2003 Red Sancerre to be corked, so that went down the drain and we opened a young Zin. Thursday, we did a pork roast on the rotisserie and it paired extremely well with a 1994 Zaca Mesa Syrah that was good but also showing its age. For openers mid-week, we sipped from a 1990 Ampeau red Burgundy (Pinot Noir) and a 2002 Santa Barbara Winery Chardonnay that were in similar shape. Friday was pizza night, ordered take-out from Grimaldi's (there's nothing like coal-fired, thin-crust, New York-style pizza) and it went nicely with another older wine, a 1996 Ravenwood Wood Road Zin. Last night, we whipped up some sautéed shrimp with linguini simply done with olive oil and garlic, and opted for a younger wine for a change, a 2005 Curran Tempranillo from Santa Barbara County. Most of the wines we had this week were from California; they're not designed to age like many European wines so we'll probably have more of a focus there over the next few weeks.

Just to show that it's not all eating and drinking at our place, I spent some time mapping out our route east. We'll plan to head out of Phoenix on I-10 and pick up I-20 in west Texas. I-20 will take us right into Birmingham, where we hope to catch up with our friends Linda & Wendell; from their place, it's a short hop to Albertville. After Christmas, we'll head south to Florida in a 2-day trip (Rick and Annette will make it in one day in the car, I'm sure). We'll overnight at a combination of Flying Js, WalMarts, rest areas and Escapees parks on this trip (Rod and Bob would be proud).

That's it for now - Geri's making French Toast!