Category: Family

I just uploaded a bunch of pictures. You should see them in the right sidebar. Click here to go see them. Enjoy.

Yes, it was 112 today. Yes, the van is fixed. Yes, it was really $1400+. No, it was not worth it. Yes, I should have gotten a new one. Wo is me.

We spent 4 days in Oceanside, CA, here. We’ve stayed there twice now and we’d recommend it to anyone, especially those of you with families. We had a great 1 bedroom condo right on the beach. It’s called North Coast Village. Just south of Camp Pendleton, between the harbor and the pier in Oceanside. I can recommend at least one owner. They usually don’t rent nightly, but some had availability, so we were lucky I guess. The normal arrangement is weekly — Saturday to Saturday. We had to take the biscuit, and she really was pretty good. She slept a lot (as did I). We spent some time just sitting on the beach, went down to the Scripps aquarium in La Jolla, drove around Solano Beach, went to Horton Plaza, etc. It was a good time. I should have pictures up shortly. The temperature never got above 70 on the coast. It’s supposed to be 112 here tomorrow.

We always wonder why we live in this place whenever we drive back from California, especially in the summer time. You get over that divide thing just past Alpine (CA), where the elevation promptly drops to below sea level in that wonderful town, El Centro. It was about 5 miles outside of El Centro where the trip went really bad. We were cruising along when there was this poof noise that came from the engine somewhere. Julie thought that all 4 tires had exploded and was coaching me not to touch the brakes. I thought that the radiator exploded, but the temperature was fine and there was nothing coming out of the engine compartment. The bottom line was that our air conditioning had gone out.

So here we are about 5 miles past El Centro and probably about 45-50 miles to Yuma. My options were:

1. Go back to El Centro, probably get mugged, and don’t get the car fixed.

2. Go on to Yuma, probably get mugged, and don’t get the car fixed until at least Monday. Meanwhile my mom and dad were liable to kill my other 3 girls they were so graciously watching.

3. Buy a new car in the cities mentioned above, which meant that I’d probably get mugged and it wouldn’t really work out.

We (I) decided to push on to Yuma and hope that somewhere is open that can at least give me a clue about what’s going on. I figured that the compressor had blown up, but I’m pretty clueless about all that kind of stuff. We get to Yuma and jump out at the Chevron/Blimpie station and Gwenyth is purple from the heat. Not fun.

I got back in the car and went down to a Valvoline station at around 3:50 that was scheduled to close at 4. They can’t help me, but they tell me that it’s “probably” the compressor — or something related to it — and they give me the address of someone who could “maybe” help me on Monday. The guy was great, but since his response didn’t include snapping his fingers and the problem goes away, I was naturally disappointed. So we stayed long enough in Yuma to cool off somewhat, I went out and bought a spray bottle to try and keep everyone cool, and off we went.

It think it’s about 90 or so miles from Yuma to Gila Bend. And there’s literally nothing in between — except the date shake place I guess. So we tried to keep cool and calm until Gila Bend. There we spent an hour or so with the rest of the ornery, hot, tired travellers at McDonalds. At least it was cool. Eventually we made it home . . .

Hopefully the $1400 I was quoted to fix things really fixes things. And hopefully I can pay for it before the year is out . . .

We’re off for another road trip in 3 weeks. This one to Utah. Hopefully we’ll have better luck.

Believe it or not, I’ve had more than 1 person ask me about the lack of posting on here. So that means that the number of readers is at least 100% larger than I thought it was. Incredibly exciting.

Life is going on. The girls finished school a few weeks ago. It’s hotter than Hades outside. 112 tomorrow, supposedly. Ouch. Julie and I are heading off to Oceanside this week for some downtime. We’ll be taking the biscuit with us (that’s Gwenyth — daughter #4 for you new folk). Speaking of the biscuit, we took her out for her 5th movie tonight. She’s been absolutely horrendous in all but one of them. Apparently she doesn’t enjoy them all that much.

Work is still keeping me busy. I had the pleasure of returning to Trenton, NJ, this past week. I know it sounds crazy, but I’ll take 110 in Phoenix any day over 85 in Philadelphia (that’s where we flew in and out of). All I can say is that at least we know what air conditioning is out here! Then I caught some sort of bug, so I had an interesting 5 hour plane ride back to Phoenix. At least I got to sleep in my own bed.

Abigail and Grace will be turning 7 and 5 in a few weeks. Julie’s planning some big party, as always. I’ve heard rumors of dual parties, one for the friends and one for the family. That doesn’t mean that family aren’t friends, it just means . . . nevermind.

The end of June/beginning of July brings that oft-longed-for time of the Jenkins’ family reunion. It’s up in Utah this year. We’ll be there over the 4th of July, just long enough for Julie to want to move back, as I’m sure it’ll be lovely weather. We’ll see.

That’s all for now.

We’re well into May here and have yet to have a 100 degree day. This is a good thing, and it’s a late time to not have had the triple digits yet. I hear that we’re supposed to get there this Thursday. Should be fun.

The family is good. Gwenyth doesn’t seem too happy sometimes. She cries quite a bit and has got some pipes on her, so you certainly know it when she cries. Abby and Grace both finish school soon. Abby keeps telling us that her last day of school is May 25th. She keeps telling me that she wants to go to a museum this summer to see the dinosaurs. I’m thinking that maybe we can go to Thanksgiving Point up in Utah when we go for the family reunion.

Other things are going well, generally. There are some potentially big changes coming up in our lives, but I’m often too hesitant to pull the trigger on some of them. Part of me worries about the practicality of it all and part of me worries about the apearance of it all. Yet another part of me just wants to go for it. One things for sure, though, is that I don’t get as much sleep as I should. Sob story, I know.