Things I can learn from my dog

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Things I can learn from my dog.

That’s the theme of my entry tonight. It’s Friday evening and a squall line of severe thunderstorms is approaching the Tampa area. Fortunately I am somewhat sheltered in my RV in the service bay. So DB is covered with only the very front getting a little wet from some blowing rain. Ike is parked in front. I’m hoping and praying we won’t have any damaging winds, hail, or tornadoes. But I feel like I’m a little better protected than if I was set up in a campground.

Let me back up and see if I can recap the last few days. Wednesday they made pretty good progress with some of the smaller items that needed attention. We did end up staying in the rig in the service bay on Wednesday evening. I took photos but will upload them later (more on that in a minute).

I was editing some photos in Photoshop when my laptop began to get flaky. My computer system essentially became unstable. I figured it was due to the software I installed last weekend to merge my hard drive partitions. CS3 quit working, as did most of my other programs, so I didn’t get an update on the blog Wednesday evening.

Thursday I contacted the software company and was assured their product was not the cause of my computer troubles. So I located the nearest Best Buy and Chessy and I headed over. One of the Geek Squad guys was very helpful and ran some diagnostics thinking my hard drive had problems. But everything checked out. He then theorized I might have to restore my operating system - not a pleasant thought.

Follow up calls to the software company continued to bring up the possibility I had memory problems. He suggested I try running my system with one memory bank at a time and see what happened.

So Thursday evening, after trying a couple of system point restores to earlier settings and unsuccessfully finding a way (I know there is a way) to create a system restore disk (I have a set back home but doesn’t do me any good 600 miles away), I decided to “test” the memory.

Guess what I discovered??? One memory module is kaput! After I went through the steps to figure out which module was bad, I was able to run most programs and surf the net last night - with half my memory - in the motel room.

Yep, Chessy and I spent Thursday evening at the Hampton Inn near the dealership as DB was in the paint shop.

We checked out around 11 this morning and headed back to Best Buy. They advised me I did have a lifetime warranty with my Kingston memory but I needed to contact the manufacturer to get a replacement.

I got a very helpful customer service representative who agreed they would ship my memory module OVERNIGHT with a Saturday delivery to the campground. Before I set that up, I coordinated with my service advisor and was told they would need all day Saturday to try and finish the work on DB.


The memory will be sent overnight from California and be here tomorrow. I’ll FedEx the bad module back to them. So what has been a couple of VERY frustrating days with severe computer problems will soon be a distant memory. I was very impressed that Kingston agreed to ship it with a Saturday delivery. Normally their overnight on Friday would arrive Monday. In the interim, I’m able to limp along with half the memory. So no Photoshop editing until I’m back at “full power”.

The muffler was repaired this afternoon and the paint touch up was completed. Saturday they need to install a new gasket on one slide out, replace/repair the entry door locks, and hopefully get the new tiles put in. If so, all my work will be completed by the COB Saturday and I’ll be good to go.

I’ll overnight in the adjoining campground (which I’m confident they will provide me a voucher) and head out early Sunday morning for Unadilla, GA. Hopefully I’ll still be able to get a campsite at the campground with no advance reservations so I can take in The Rally beginning Thursday in Perry, GA. If not, I guess I’ll end up at home a week early .

I’ll wrap up this journal entry with some random thoughts and musings with lessons Chessy can teach me about the week. Perhaps I can get Jeff to write a guest column to more eloquently express the lessons we can learn from our dogs!

Chessy has really amazed me at how well she has coped and adapted in what I’m sure has been a stressful and different environment. She has basically been by my side the majority of each day. She stays in the Jeep at my meal time (last night I got takeout and ate in the motel room) but otherwise has been hanging out with me wherever I go.

One of the things I can learn is always smile (I figure she is smiling when she wags her tail), enthusiastically accept any petting, hugging and loving, don’t be a grouch and don’t growl or raise my voice. Not once did she growl or bark at any of the other dogs - even though some are quite the “yappers”. She is also very adept at taking any opportunity to find a comfortable spot and sneak in a nap. Another lesson (which I probably have down already) is never pass up an opportunity to take a potty break ! I carry poop bags in my pocket at all times and we take frequent walks outside. She rarely misses an opportunity to tinkle. She’s also good about drinking water (and that helps remind me I should drink plenty of water as well).

So in spite of what has been a somewhat stressful week for me (and for Chessy I’m sure) she has done a great job of helping me realize to just relax, chill, and enjoy the moment.

And in spite of sitting around for 4 days while minor things are attended to on my RV, I realize I have a quality unit. I haven’t experienced any of the major things I’m hearing from so many people as we talk around the service bay “campground” .

Another revelation hit me today about the frustration with my computer. At least it happened while I had time to troubleshoot and be in one location for several days. It dawned on me that it would have been difficult to realize I had a problem at home as I normally use my desktop there.

All in all it’s been an interesting, enlightening, but different week. Things could have been a lot worse and I’m grateful I have the time to get things squared away before heading out on long trips.

If you made it this far, thanks for taking the time to read my ramblings. I’ll try to have photos ready to share when I make my next entry.

Hope everyone has a great weekend and no trouble with the last gasp of winter weather.

Don’t forget to spring forward Saturday evening .

Bruce and Chessy - who is sleeping by my feet!

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