Life in the time of Wuflu, Part 33: Impatiently waiting

Not where we camped, but a reasonable facsimile.

It was an interesting weekend, to say the least.

While I had pulled the RV out from under its cover on Tuesday, poor weather, the Thanksgiving holiday and migraines kept me from doing much to prepare for our trip until Friday morning. No biggie; over the years we have gotten the process of getting ready to go down to maybe a couple of hours of slow but steady effort. (In case of an emergency, it can be done a lot faster.) We keep most things in the unit, and only need to check the tires, load clothes and food and do a quick cleanup before we’re ready to hit the road.

My theory has long been that this is supposed to be fun, and spending 8 hours working on the thing before leaving to have that fun is a violation of the basic concept.

So we made an uneventful trip to the campground. Traffic was lighter than I expected. I guess the panic made Black Friday a mostly online event this year. For a change, the drive to this particular campground was not filled my my commentary on the ancestry of other drivers and miscellaneous comments full of four letter words about their driving abilities and lack thereof.

I hate driving in cites these days, especially when towing the RV. Contrary to the belief of big city drivers, I can’t stop on a dime and give you 9 cents change, nor can I accelerate to lightspeed instantaneously. It’s bad enough in a single vehicle, but when you’re 53′ long and weight about 16,000 pounds, you need to be a bit slower and more deliberate. Physics, morons. I have a lot of sympathy for the folks who drive big trucks.

(I probably also ought to throw this out here. I know RVing isn’t camping. Having actually camped, it bears about as much resemblance to camping as staying in a nice-ish hotel does. Still, it’s commonly called camping, so I’m rolling with it. Besides, I’m old, and I like my creature comforts.)

Anyway, we made it to the campground safely. Because it was a holiday weekend, the snowbirds were moving south after a prolonged northern autumn and I had gotten my site reservation late, we had a small site to work with. I was able to stick the parking job first time, and just took my time doing the setup. Setting up was one of the more interesting parts of the trip.

There was a group, looked like 3 families, across from us who had been having a few beers. They probably didn’t realize it, but they were talking a bit loud, and I could clearly hear them. The topic of conversation was, shall we say, the stolen election and what needs to be done about it. I’ll just comment that it’s probably a good thing they were just talking and leave it at that.

We went out to dinner with Mountain Man and his wife. The restaurant staff more or less wearing masks (they did seem to have problems keeping them up, but they were on their bodies) and no one else was. We all kept our social distance, enforced by taped off tables, and no one lost their mind about “Ermagerd, you’re gonna give me the ‘rona!” There was overheard conversation about normal family stuff,  elections, shutdowns and “We’re so glad you’ve been able to stay open!”

Saturday was a trip to a local range. I’ve got to get to the eye doc. I can’t see iron sights worth a diddly. I’m still “minute of bad guy”, but it’s embarrassing to shoot patterns when your friends are shooting groups. I don’t know if something correctable is going on or what (and I suspect “what”), but this needs looking at. I was able to find some hunting ammo a friend is looking for. There was also this really nice Smith 34-1, but I persuaded myself to leave it there.

Saturday night, we hit the local big-box home improvement place. There was someone at the door enforcing mask rules. I wore mine because I needed some things. As soon as I was out the door, it was back off. We hit a drive-thru to grab some food. All of the visible staff had masks on, although the effectiveness of them could be questioned. Do they work well down around your chin?

It’s my unscientific opinion that if the virus cases are going up, it’s because people aren’t taking the simplest precautions seriously. I’m not talking about the masks, but about things like keeping a bit of distance, washing your hands frequently, coughing into your sleeves and all that. A little sanitizing of door handles and such on the part of stores might help. We don’t need to go full germacide, just take a few easy precautions. Instead, we’re back to normal human behavior.

Sunday, it was time to break down and head home. During the process a nice fellow from upper NY state, outside of Albany, stopped to ask about our rig and how we liked it. I asked him if they were heading south for the winter and he told me, “Hell no, we’re heading south permanently. We can’t get rid of our idiot governor and our kids have already moved to North Carolina. We sold our house and 35 acres last week. We’re done with New York.”

I didn’t tell him that things might not be much better here if we can’t get rid of our idiot governor, but he seemed like a smart guy-he’ll figure it out.

After that, we pointed the nose toward home, cleaned out and winterized the RV and slipped it back under its cover, where it will rest until spring.

It seems that people around here are impatiently waiting, both for the election to be resolved and for some sanity to re-assert itself during the time of Wuflu. I get the feeling that both need to happen sooner rather than later, or impatience may give way to something else.