Charlie’s 2nd Birthday Party!

Posted on July 19, 2015 by Rachel Gillen

It was very successful! She turned 2 on Friday and we threw a little BBQ shindig on Saturday at our house, parked at Candlestick RV Park here in San Francisco. All the guys from work came over, along with our neighbors and their dog. I think everyone had a blast! We had really good weather so we got super lucky on that front!

The guys from work, and me

Charlie digging a hole

I got a Selfie Stick when I was at the airport, so we had some fun with that! We cooked burgers and Mets and brats and shrimp kabobs and a bacon wrapped pork loin, with baked beans and potato salad and ice cream cake. Those boys can eat!

the tower crew

I definitely needed to have some fun. I’ve had kind of a rough week, mostly bad dreams and nightmares. I did some Googling on bad dreams and grief and apparently this is normal. Not fun. But normal. So I guess I’ll just take it as it is and hope for the best.
Charlie had fun also. I bought a squirt gun (for her birthday-what a crappy present!) and used that for the first time yesterday whenever she got nuts and started barking like a little maniac. I think it’s working!

Charlie this morning… Exhausted pup.

Oh Charlie…

Posted on July 13, 2015 by Rachel Gillen

I think my puppy is depressed. Allen says she is just used to being by herself all day since I’ve been gone and it’ll probably take her a couple of days to get back to normal. But she doesn’t really pay attention to me. She will go on walks, but then when we come back home, she just sleeps in bed. Lazy little thing.

Yesterday we spread my brothers ashes in San Francisco Bay. Charlie came with us. I read online that it helps to let flowers go too so that you can kind of follow them out. So we did that. Allen suggested next time that we spread them in water (is it called spreading? Scattering?) maybe we should put a little inside the rose, in between the petals and float it out. I think that’s a good idea.

After that we went to the grocery store and even though we left here less than a year ago, I forgot just how much more expensive everything is! Goodness… So I need to rethink how I’m going to cook dinner to try and make it cheaper while still being healthy and delicious. That’s going to take some brainstorming, and googling….

At least we have a lime tree, lemon tree, and a loquat tree here in the campground, not even 50ft from our front door! I’m making chili today, so those won’t come in handy. Unless we have some rum and cokes, then the lines would be perfect!

Here are some pictures I snapped this morning to show more of just how tight everything is in the campground… You can see some more here.

Back to Reality

Posted on July 12, 2015 by Rachel Gillen

So I arrived in San Francisco Saturday evening. Allen picked me up from the airport and we went to get some food and a couple beers at Red Robin. Then we went home to CHARLIE! She was SO excited to see me! (She even peed a little…) Gosh, I missed her like crazy! I woke up pretty early this morning, I’m still on Eastern Time really… So I showered and got dressed and made some coffee then I took Charlie for a walk. I made a grocery list and printed some coupons… Charlie and Allen are both sleeping. In bed. Still. Lazy bums…

The campground (Candlestick RV Park) is SO crowded compared to last time we were here… All the little patches of grass are now just dried, dead, brown patches of dirt. All the flowers that were so pretty are now just thorny sticks with a couple blooms here and there. Candlestick Stadium is gone so the view is completely different. We have an end spot this time, so we look out at trees instead of the side of another camper, which is nice. It almost tricks you into forgetting you are in a black top parking lot. Almost. Not really.

Marcus, Allen’s coworker, moves in today right behind us. I think we should go buy some of those swimming noodles and put them on the bumper, because we will probably be touching. It’s that tight out here. I’m not exaggerating.

Getting to Say a Long Good-Bye

Posted on June 29, 2015 by Rachel Gillen

In my last post I talked about losing my brother Adam. Thanks to a lot of very generous, kind people, we’ve raised a lot of money on GoFundMe to help pay for the funeral expenses.
His funeral was Thursday evening. I thought it was beautiful. We didn’t have a reverend or pastor or preacher. (We didn’t want anyone to look at Adam negatively and judge him, especially the fact that he was gay) Instead my Aunt read a poem from my mom and then we invited anyone up who wanted to share a story or memory about Adam. I think a lot of his friends got up and said something. It’s all still mostly a blur.

We had pictures of Adam playing the whole time on a slide show and then when everyone was finished speaking, we played some of his favorite songs. He would’ve loved it. Missy Elliott “Work It” was the first one to come on!

Adam playing dress up through the years

We had been planning to bury his ashes next to his dad in a cemetery close to my mom’s house. But the other night my mom and I walked over to see where we would put the marker. We were both thinking, but not saying, that we weren’t sure if this idea fit Adam.

We eventually said, almost simultaneously (we do that a lot even when we don’t see each other for months) that his ashes should be spread, not buried. Adam has always wanted to travel and never really got the chance. The last conversation we had, he told me that Charlie was the luckiest dog ever because she got to go everywhere and see everything.

So I’m going to bring him with me. It’ll be his first time on a plane and the first place I’m taking him is San Francisco. I think he would love this. I’ve started compiling a wish list of places I’d like to scatter some of his ashes. But, as with the rest of my life, I know all of this has to stay a tentative plan. We will just have to see where the wind blows us.

I just read an article that gave me some really useful tips. I’m glad I found it. Thanks to the author.

On another note, Allen and Charlie made it to Candlestick RV Park in San Francisco safely on Friday afternoon. Our super nice neighbor Carmen watched Charlie while her husband Doug helped Allen squeeze into our spot.

Photos from Carmen to me during the action

Allen said we arent moving the camper until we leave for good. No NHRA at Sonoma this year. 😦

He took notes and pictures for me, well, for the blog. So when I get out there, I’ll post about their super slow trip from Dallas to San Francisco. (He couldn’t check into the campground until Friday so he was doing less than 500miles/day) Allen also wrote some Google reviews of the campgrounds they stayed in on the way out. I’m so proud of him! My mom joked that he’s going to become known as the angry blogger. I love it.

Taste of Dallas

Posted on June 14, 2015 by Rachel Gillen

We went to the Taste on Saturday. I was surprised that it wasn’t bigger actually. (The Taste of Cincinnati was bigger) But we had some good food. Allen and I met up with Cletis, a guy he works with. I love Cletis. We parked by he tower so therefore got in free. Sshhh…

We had alligator on a stick, a brisket sandwich, shrimp and crab on a stick, ribs, and chicken. Yum!

On our way home we stopped by Randy’s Farmers Market. We picked up some tomatoes, potatoes, green beans, onions and plums. We found some local honey too. I’ve heard that if you eat local honey it’s supposed to help with allergies. I hope it works! We also got some bbq sauce and some chips and salsa. The salsa is no joke-SO spicy! And we like hot and spicy, but this is off the charts!

When we got back we went to the pool to hang out. Allen has been teaching me how to swim and I think I’m getting the hang of it. I mean, I can doggy paddle and survive but I’ve never been able to swim on top of the water. He was a lifeguard and taught swim lessons when he was younger and he’s been pretty patient with me.

Towards the end of the day I went and got Charlie and brought her up to the pool. She’s done a lot of swimming in the last week! The other night she was running around with a pup named Tater and she ran INTO the pond and swam back out! She’s a brave little thing!

View from Above

Posted on June 10, 2015 by Rachel Gillen

Allen has an awesome job. Few people get this view from their “office” every day…

The Cotton Bowl

Downtown Dallas

Fair Park

A drop zone type of ride at Fair Park

I think these tents are for “Taste of Dallas” this weekend

a platform on the tower

Meanwhile, I’ve been reading and relaxing by the pool…

“The Street Lawyer” by John Grisham

the pool

Charlie thinks it’s too hot for anything.

RV Ranch of Keene, TX

Posted on June 8, 2015 by Rachel Gillen

I think we got lucky with this spot. We would normally stay at Trader’s Village in Grand Prairie. This time we wanted to try somewhere new because we have a different, bigger camper and Trader’s Village can be really tight depending on where they put you. I started calling around to different parks when we were in Oklahoma City on Friday. We started with parks between Cedar Hill (the shop) and downtown Dallas (the new job site). I called about 6 different campgrounds (with pools because it’s ridiculously hot and I just need a pool), and everywhere was full! That’s never happened to us here. So we had to keep going further out and finally found this place, the RV Ranch. It’s an hour from the job site and 40min from the shop. So that sucks. Luckily Allen will probably be able to ride the bike most days.

Anyhow, we headed down I-35 and got here Sunday afternoon to 90+degree sunny weather! We got an easy pull through spot with a nice little half moon shaped patio and a little arbor type things so Charlie has some shade. Our spot is long enough to open the hatch and leave it as a back porch but I can’t really see that happening with how hot it is. I don’t think our AC’s will shut off during the day!

We are right across from the showers and laundry in the adult (21+) section. And the pool is one row over behind the office. The office is also a tanning salon and a movie rental store and a pizza place… Charlie and I went exploring this morning and I think we are in the fancy section. The other half of the park is mostly filled with mobile homes and long term residents. Overall, I think we are going to like it here. I can’t wait til my sunburn from OKC fades so I can use the pool!

Tower Drop

Posted on June 2, 2015 by Rachel Gillen

Now it’s here.

Now it’s gone.

Yesterday, Allen dropped the last 550 feet of the tower! They destacked the top 450 feet to get it short enough for the fall zone. My mom came up and we drove over to the site to watch. It’s a pretty neat thing to see. I’ve seen them drop two now. The first was in Robertsdale, AL and the site was directly across from the RV Park we stayed in. It takes a lot of planning and setting up and then it takes less than a minute and it’s over. Here are some pictures we took from across the street in the safe zone. If you hadn’t known there was a tower standing there, you’d never know now.

My mom got a short video and this is a screen shot from it

Another screen shot right before it fell into the woods

Here are some more pictures we got yesterday…

So now that’s finished, and for this job we (and by we, I really mean Allen and the guys) don’t have to stay and clean up the mess. This job is kind of an exception because the guy who owns the tower also owns a demolition company so he’s doing all that. Allen is at work today waiting on trucks to show up so they can load out. We are leaving here tomorrow and our tentative plans (what other kind of plans are there?) are to stop in Sparta, Kentucky at our friend’s house (she has about 5 acres we can park on), and stay a rent free day there. Then take our time getting to Abe’s RV Park in Oklahoma City so I can see my buddy Karen, then we need to be in Dallas by Sunday evening. So we have some time, which is a rarity and a luxury. We are thinking of staying at the North Texas Jellystone Park, but it’s about 35 minutes from the shop. It looks nice and it would be a change from where we usually stay, at Trader’s Village RV Park, and I’m thinking I will like it better, but we still haven’t nailed that down yet. Who knows, our tentative plans could change later today…. But for now, I’m going to start getting the little things put away and ready to hook up and go.

Oh! I almost forgot, we had a little tiny sparrow trying to make a nest in our fifth wheel… We’ve seen them in our neighbor’s since we got here and then the other day Allen saw the little fella with some moss in his beak, climbing in there. So we took the nest out and put it across the street in the grass. At least all his findings are in one spot still…