May 4-6: Visiting Geri’s sister and nephew

May 6, 2012
Lancaster and California City, California

The next stop on our trip was to see Geri’s sister, Kathy, and nephew, Rick.  Last fall, Rick arranged to move Kathy from Lompoc to California City so she could be closer and he could oversee her care more effectively.  Kathy’s been in a care facility for several years due to Alzheimer’s, and she requires round-the-clock monitoring.  Suffice it to say that she continues to slowly deteriorate from this awful disease.

Having done some research, we knew that our options for a good RV Park in/near California City were limited.  OK; that’s being charitable.  There isn’t a good option.  Accordingly, we decided to stay a little farther away in Lancaster.  We’ve been to the Antelope Valley Fairgrounds before for rallies (actually, that’s where we met Wayne & Eva back in 2006), and we knew there was an on-site RV Park.

We left Indio mid-morning on Friday and were parked in Lancaster around 2:00 PM.  Since it was generally all uphill into a strong wind, we got awful fuel economy, but it was only a short leg of the journey.  We even had a chance to see the “super moon” rise over the campground.  I did have a small scare as we got ready to self-register: I couldn’t remember if I’d packed the checkbooks (no credit cards allowed here).  Fortunately, they were right where they were supposed to be.

Having passed both a Costco and a Super Wally on the way up CA-14, right before we got off for the Fairgrounds, we decided that it was a good time to clean up the grocery list.  We didn’t need a lot, but the Costco Rotisserie Chicken and Mashed Potatoes came in handy for dinner on Friday and Sunday.

We’ve been using an iOS/Android app called “GroceryIQ”, and it’s actually working out well.  Each of us can update the list from our PCs, iPads, or phones and the app uses cloud storage to make updates appear everywhere.  I use it on the phone to check things off as we shop.  It doesn’t keep us from buying things not on the list (neither did a paper list), but at least we’ve stopped forgetting to bring the list when we go to the store.

Saturday, we headed up to California City.  We found Kathy’s care facility and were a little surprised that it was a single-family house.  Yep; she’s the only “patient” cared for by a long-time nurse in her own home.  Kathy got really excited when we came in, and again when Rick arrived.  Unfortunately “excited” does not necessarily mean coherent, but it was great that she knows people.  We brought more old pictures on the iPad, and she was intrigued by those.

After a visit, I headed back to Lancaster to pick up the pups and Geri and Rick took Kathy to Rick’s house.  He put on a nice barbecue (chicken and tri-tip) and we had a good visit with his family (Loretta, Ricky and Crystal).  Kathy got agitated after a while, but they had calming medication on hand and it soon passed.  Rick took her back to the care facility at the same time we were heading out for the 45 minute drive back to Lancaster.

Near the Fairgrounds where we were parked in Lancaster, I found a “Musical Road”.  OK, I missed the turn toward the Park and saw the Musical Road before I could make a U-turn.  It’s an interesting little stretch of highway where one lane has hundreds of grooves cut across it.  Apparently, by adjusting the width, depth, or inter-groove spacing, different sounds can be created given a constant speed (55 MPH was the speed limit).  The length of each note is fashioned by the number of grooves in a “tone”.  It’s similar in concept to the “rumble strips” found along many highways these days to alert drivers that they’re out of their lane, except with a touch more creativity attached.  I remember seeing something like this in a car commercial once, but didn’t realize we’d find one so close to a stop-over.

We managed to drive over it a couple of times while we were in Lancaster, just for grins.  On Sunday, I took a walk over to it on one of my “exercise jaunts” (about 3.5 miles, round trip), and took a few pictures.  I tried getting a video of a car passing, but the sound was too muffled.  We did another pass in the Rover, but the sound is kind of faint there as well.

Since we’ve become the masters of travel flexibility, we decided to stay in Lancaster another night.  This gave us all day Sunday to catch up on bills and emails, and I started composing for the Blog.  I have an app on the iPad that should help with that, and it’ll be easier once I have an easy way to get pictures from the phone to the iPad (can you say iPhone 5 anyone?).  In the meantime, I’m regretting the purchase of the iMac back in November.  Not regretting having a Mac, mind you; just thinking I should have gotten the Macbook Pro that I’ll probably end up with once the next versions of those are released.  I love the iMac, but a 27” monitor/all-in-one is a bit of a stretch for the close quarters in the coach.  I rigged up a prototype of a desk-like setup that’s working OK so far, so all’s right with the world...