Watching Gustav in horror

We are still in Kissimmee, Florida, at the relief operation for Tropical Storm Fay.

I have a great deal to update since my last post here ten days ago. It's finally slowed down enough here at relief headquarters that I can spend some time writing -- we've been swamped the last ten days, and even our day off was busy with the backlog of household chores and errands, including replacing two leaky recirculating valves and a waterlogged feedhorn drumhead on the satellite dish, not to mention continuing to wring everything out from the part of Fay that actually made it inside the bus. We did take a couple hours to drive over to a local joint and get massages, which were much needed and appreciated.

Some of our readers may be wondering what, if any, impact Hurricane Gustav will have on our lives. To be honest, we are wondering the same thing ourselves. Our current status as assigned to TS Fay precludes us, at least for the current pre-landfall push, from being included in the massive recruitment for Gustav, which now stands at a call for over 4,000 (yes, that's not a typo) volunteers across five separate relief operations (Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, and the Florida Panhandle). There is no doubt that Gustav will hit hard somewhere along the gulf, just three years after the one-two punch of Katrina and Rita.

That being said, there is some possibility that we will be kept in place here for additional flooding in Florida from the outer bands, which are already hitting here, as shown in this satellite photo (I have indicated our approximate location):




So I guess the immediate impact from Gustav on us will be additional rain (and Odyssey leakage). More importantly, the rivers in Florida are just now cresting over the last day or two from Fay -- we still had over 400 in one shelter in Fort Myers as of yesterday, due to flooding there over the last few days. So any rain dumped here from Gustav will just add to that problem, and perhaps cause this relief operation to extend further. And that does not even count what might come this way from Hanna, already making its way toward us.

All of which add up to us not being available to help with any of the operations west of here, at least in the near term. By the time we are done here, I expect those operations to be well under way and fully staffed (well, at least our department, anyway -- Mass Care will still be looking for help, as well as Client Services). So we may yet end up getting our visit to Disney World in before we leave Florida.

To be honest, our experience en route to this operation is causing me to rethink my commitment to the Red Cross. So whether we will be going to any disasters from here at all is an unanswered question. The details are too lengthy to expound upon here, and I think I'm still a bit too raw to write it up dispassionately. The upshot, though, is that we are collateral damage in somebody's political power game, with the net result that our expenses are being partially reimbursed only from Gainesville, rather than from Port Lavaca, where we were located when we learned we were needed here.

That's a difference of over 1,000 miles, and while we would never have been fully reimbursed for the roughly $900 that distance actually costs us, the few hundred bucks we'd normally see at least makes us feel welcome and needed, in addition to partially offsetting our costs. The money is decidedly not the issue, however -- I have already decided that we'll be reducing our significant annual donation this year by at least that much.

This slap in the face came the morning after the most grueling driving day in Odyssey's history to be available here in a timely way. And it came in the form of being told, in fact, that we would not be assigned to the operation at all, after coming almost the entire distance. Our chapter intervened at the last moment, and managed to get us assigned, but I have been in something of a funk ever since. All this came on the heels of having to fight to get our (partial) reimbursement for our Austin expenses while we were in Mercedes, a battle that took an emotional toll on all involved. So we are feeling, at the moment, a bit unappreciated as volunteers.

Perhaps after this operation is over and we have had a chance to recuperate a bit, I will have some calm time to write more. In the meantime, whether we go out again will have a great deal to do with how (or if) we are asked.

A "rain event"

We are, at this writing, still being pelted by rain from Tropical Storm Fay.

As Louise has written, we are parked a couple blocks from relief HQ, in an honest-to-goodness camping space graciously provided by the (undisclosed) landlord of our temporary HQ facility, with a 50-amp pedestal and a water spigot.

Fay seems to have spared us, and most of Florida, any significant (read: damaging) winds. Instead, it has maintained a tenacious amount of organization over land, and has dumped huge amounts of rain on vast tracts of the state. We are in the crook of the pivot as the storm makes its "boomerang" turn back inland, and so the rain has been incessant here for well over 24 hours, with probably another 8-12 hours to go. Points east and south of here have gotten even more. That makes this storm a "rain event" rather than a "wind event," from a response perspective.

CNN was reporting earlier today that 8,000 homes were flooded in the Port St. Lucie area. While this number is, doubtless, media hyperbole, if even a fraction of that proves to be accurate, what has been a very small operation to this point could mushroom rapidly into a major response.

Ironically, we are being booted out of the ~22,000 square foot facility we are in now (where the whole operation occupies a tiny corner of the cavernous room), and are moving tomorrow afternoon into a ~3,000 square foot union hall that will barely fit the number of relief workers we have today. We are bracing ourselves to move HQ not once, but twice in the next several days if the operation expands.

Odyssey's various leaks have been troublesome in the middle of all this, but we have little time to deal with them during the day. We've been taking turns running home and wringing out microfiber towels. We are hopeful that we'll get a respite from all this rain in the next day or two so things can dry out.

In the meantime, we'll be moving to our new HQ tomorrow night, and we're hoping for at least a 15-amp outlet there to keep some A/C running throughout the day.

Ready for the rain

We're on-site for the relief operation for Tropical Storm Fay. As of this morning, the National Weather Center is no longer predicting a hurricane, but a big, wet storm. Tornadoes and floods are expected, so we're sitting tight and waiting for it all to pass.

We have a 50 amp hookup, which will help keep the air conditioners running and drying out the bus after the inevitable window leaks. We're parked about 2 blocks from headquarters and are using Sean's scooter to get back and forth. He's going to try to get the scooter inside the HQ building for the worst of the storm. While we don't worry much about the wind for Odyssey, the People 150 is a different matter. The very lightness that makes the scooters easy to get in and out of the storage bay make them a bit tippy in 50mph cross-winds.

More details and perhaps photos later. We have the key to the building and so need to be the first ones in this morning.

Photos of our last job

I finally uploaded the pictures from our camera and thought a few photos would be a nice change here.

This is all the equipment we used at the headquarters for the Dolly relief effort. Usually we ship it all via FedEx, but because we were fairly close to Austin, TX, we loaded it ourselves onto a box truck and one of our guys, David, drove it back. Austin is where the DSMC, a giant warehouse full of Red Cross electronics, is located.



It was difficult to get a good angle inside the truck to capture how much stuff this represents. The orange box in the middle is about the size of a large suitcase, and the black cases are about the size of a steamer trunk. They are piled four high, and each weighs between 20 and 50 pounds. Our heaviest items weigh close to 150 lbs. Six of us loaded this truck in the "cool" morning temperatures of over 90 degrees.



You can see that all that hot lifting took a toll on our seventh guy, Hueso. He wasn't much help at all. David reported that when the truck was inspected by the Border Patrol between Mercedes and Austin, Hueso's paperwork was not in order. Seems he left Austin without his Death Certificate. Fortunately, he has an official DSMC photo ID and they let him through without a body cavity search.



Here's most of the Dolly Disaster Services Technology gang at work in our corner of HQ. Usually there aren't so many of us standing around, but this was during the one or two slow days in the middle of an operation. For a brief few days, we are neither building an HQ nor tearing it down and we can relax just a little. Our boss, Gene, in the red shirt, usually looks more intelligent than this photo portrays him. This is, however, a very typical photo of me: mouth open, hands waving, talking up a storm.





These last two photos represent why we do it: thank you posters from our clients. These were created at a Red Cross shelter and then brought to HQ to share with the staff. Since the Technology department rarely interacts with clients, they are especially meaningful to me. They are reminders that at the end of the day, real people suffer losses from storms, floods and fires, and that our food, water and shelter can give them a little support and hope. Sometimes I get caught up in the hurly-burly of HQ and start thinking too much in terms of wires, computers and cell phones. The real work happens out in the field, face to face with tired, hungry folks. I am proud to be "in the rear with the gear," to support our staff members who do that hard work. You guys are the best!

Another long day

We are at a Petro truck stop on I-75, just south of Gainesville, Florida (map).

We drove 640 miles today, our longest day ever. We might well have continued on all the way to Kissimmee, except for the fact that, as of dinner tonight (at a chain restaurant back in Lake City), our official deployment orders still had not come through. This spot, believe it or not, was the first allowable parking spot we could find south of Lake City, unless you want to count the strip joint one exit north of here. We did try the Wal-Mart in Gainesville first, but it was posted No Overnight Parking, as many in Florida are, even though our no-parking directory made no mention of it.

We had another set of delays today, including a short stop in Gulfport for fuel, a bargain at $3.999 per gallon at the Kangaroo station on US49. We also passed another wreck in the westbound lanes, on the Mobile Bay causeway, which was a short rubbernecking delay for us, but a nightmare in the other direction -- we counted our lucky stars again. Lastly, a huge wreck happened right in front of us in torrential rain on I-10 in the panhandle.

We were virtually first on scene, and Louise phoned it in while I ran over to put out the engine fire in a totaled car with one victim -- I caught the well-meaning neophytes this time before they yanked her from the car; with no further danger of fire, I wanted to wait for EMS, as she clearly had multiple fractures and I was worried about a C-spine injury. (Nothing life-threatening, fortunately.)




Between firefighting and directing traffic, we were on scene for perhaps 20 minutes, but that was still less of a delay than those arriving after us -- the freeway was closed, but we were at the front of the scene and could just drive away once law enforcement showed up to take over. Another lucky break. Incidentally, it looked like the solo car driver had lost control (probably hydroplaning) and crossed the median, where she struck a big rig, ripping one of its side-saddle fuel tanks clean off, and causing it to jackknife. She was lucky to live through it -- the big rig literally crushed the front of her car, and debris was strewn across both eastbound lanes for perhaps a hundred yards. I think Louise got a photo, which she'll probably add to this post when she gets a chance.

Kissimmee, you fool

Just a quick update tonight -- it's been a long day.

We are in the truck parking area across from the Atchafalaya visitors' center, under the Atchafalaya causeway on I-10 (map), about half an hour west of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. We are en route to Kissimmee, Florida, the tentative staging area for Red Cross assets in support of the relief operation for (what we assume will be) hurricane Fay.

Our day actually started quite casually, wating for a thunderstorm to pass before putting the scooters away. We did not roll out of the park until after 10, with the intent of continuing northeast until we heard something definitive, stopping either in Channelview or Beaumont for some visits if nothing came to pass.

Good thing we were not yet under any time pressure, because we had not made it even a quarter mile from the park before a passing car kicked up a rock which put a dime-size volcano in the windshield. We had to pull over just east of the Lavaca Bay causeway, and spend 45 minutes on the side of the road with the chip repair kit. I'm getting better at these as time progresses -- you can hardly tell that this one was even there.

We continued northeast on TX 35 at a relatively normal pace, on a now-familiar road. At 1:30, my phone rang with the (not unexpected) call from the Disaster Operations Center in Washington. With the usual disclaimers that we are not actually deployed and "authorized" to travel until we hear it from our chapter, they wanted to know where we were and that we were continuing to move towards Florida. A short time later, they confirmed that they were requesting us "by name," but the chapter still hasn't seen anything yet, because the staff deployment center is holding all staff requests until tomorrow afternoon. So we are on our own, with no choice but to press on if we are to have any chance of being there on time. We hope that our official deployment orders come down the pike fairly early in the afternoon.

After passing the Johnson Spaceflight Center (Mission Control) and crossing the whizzy suspension bridge over San Jacinto bay, we made a quick grocery stop in Baytown before hopping on to I-10 east, and settling in for a long drive on the superslab. A few miles further east, we spotted a sea of brake lights just in time to bail off the highway, bypassing about three or four miles of backup due to a big-rig accident. We also had a slow-down near the state line, due to an overturned big rig in the westbound lanes, but counted ourselves lucky -- the freeway was closed in that direction, with perhaps ten miles of traffic backed up.

The delays added up, though, which is why we ended up a bit short of our target of Baton Rouge for tonight. We did stop for a nice dinner, though, at local Acadian favorite Fezzo's, in Crowley, before landing here at this well-designed rest area.

Tomorrow morning we will get an early start. If the track really does bring the storm to the keys early Monday, we'll need to be in Kissimmee no later than Monday morning, and we have over twelve hours of driving to get there.

Repositioning

We are at the Lighthouse Beach & Bird Sanctuary, in Port Lavaca, Texas (map), operated by the city. We stayed here once before, over three years ago, and passed right by it just this April as well.

This is a far cry from South Padre Island, which is where I expected to go after Mercedes, even Twittering to that effect. However, this morning's Atlantic tropical forecast made us change our plans.

We've been watching a tropical low known as "Investigation Area 92" (AL922008) for the last couple of days, and, this morning, it looked very much like it would become a bona fide tropical depression by mid-day, with strong potential to develop into a tropical storm. This morning's track forecast models had the storm making US landfall anywhere from the Florida panhandle all the way to the Carolinas, in possibly as little as four days.

Now, Mercedes, Texas is more than 1,500 miles from south Florida, nearly three days' drive for us. South Padre Island is even further -- the only route north out of southeast Texas is state highway 77 from Harlingen, and we'd go right past it on our way to South Padre. So while a couple days R&R there was somewhat appealing (alhough this is really the wrong time of year for it, and there is still a good deal of damage from Dolly), especially spending a day at the Schlitterbahn water park there in the high-90s temperatures, we decided instead to start moving toward Houston, to be in a somewhat better position should AL922008 develop into a tropical cyclone.

Of course, that's exacly what has happened -- AL922008 is now officially Tropical Storm Fay. The forecast models have been updated since this morning, and all models except the BAMD now have the cyclone swinging into the eastern gulf after crossing western Cuba, which would give it a panhandle landfall around Wednesday morning, probably as a hurricane. The NHC has set its official forecast track closer to the BAMD, projecting the storm across the Florida Keys as early as Monday morning. I believe the NHC is simply erring on the side of caution here, and we are watching the storm closely as it proceeds across Hispaniola.

A landfall in the keys would mean we would not only have much less time to get there, but also a lot further to travel. However, the storm would also have less time over open water to intensify into a large threat. In either case, we know we need to be east of here in a big hurry if we are going to be truly useful assets for any response to this event.

We had hoped to make some stops to visit friends in Channelview (east of Houston) and Beaumont as we made our way slowly along the gulf, but it now looks like we will blast out of here towards Louisiana in the morning, unless the storm dissipates or changes track substantially.

In hindsight, we should have continued on 77 direct toward Houston rather than diverting here to Port Lavaca. But we did not get the latest forecast updates until we were here and had the dish deployed, and we were hoping, when we made this decision, that little would come of this storm, and we'd simply continue on along the gulf, perhaps spending a night or so at Galveston Island State Park before heading to Beaumont. Besides, we knew it would be quite a bit cooler here on the water, rather than further inland.

In fact, we took the scooters out for the first time since Wyoming, fired them up, and rode over to the Tropical Bar and Grill for dinner. The seabreeze was pleasant enough for us to eat outdoors on the deck, overlooking the bay.

In the morning, we'll be checking in with the various tropical weather forecast sites before making a final decision on routes. We'll either be in Galveston tomorrow night, or somewhere east of the Texas line, depending on what we find out.

Finished, fueled, and feline-friendly

We are still at the Paradise South Resort in Mercedes, Texas (map). The relief operation is over (mostly - more on that in a moment) and we are on our own.

Sunday turned out to be the last full day of the operation for us. We had a late (9am) start, but the intention was still to get the truck mostly loaded in the cool of the morning. Alas, it was not to be. David brought the truck around to the loading door, only to discover that the padlock that was originally on the truck had been switched out during the course of the operation by some other department that borrowed the truck. (The truck is a national fleet asset, and has to be available when on an operation for any operational needs.)

Of course, by this time we were about the only ones left in HQ, and the keys to said padlock were nowhere to be found. No doubt they were in some volunteer's luggage, 30,000' over Iowa by this time.

I owned up to having both a set of 30" bolt cutters and an angle grinder with a cutoff wheel in the bus, and so it was decided that I would run home and get the bolt cutters to get the lock off. After about a 15-minute round trip to retrieve them, I started in on the lock, an unassuming looking Master model with a hexagonal shackle.

I'd like to say that the bolt cutters made short work of the lock, as they have done countless times before, but the truth is the other way around: I literally broke the jaws of the cutters. I'm sorry now that I did not take a photo before I threw them away -- it was truly impressive.

Back to the bus I went, sorry, now, that I did not take the extra ten minutes to excavate to the angle grinder on my first trip, buried, as it was, in the depths of the spare parts bay, behind the entire collection of lawn chairs, patio mats, and tables. 20 minutes later I was back at the lock, and, after fiddling around for another five minutes, I was finally able to attack it by having someone hold it in place by jamming the handle of a hammer behind it.

The angle grinder made it through both sides of the shackle in under two minutes, but the damage to the schedule was already done -- it was nearly 11 by the time we started loading the truck.

And so it was that we did not actually finish de-commissioning and packing everything until after 8pm, at which time we slammed the door on the truck and trundled over, truck and all, to Milano's Italian restaurant in Weslaco for a final team dinner. The rest of the gang left for San Antonio first thing Monday morning directly from their hotel in McAllen, so we bid everyone a fond farewell.

Monday for us was really our first chance to catch up on sleep, as well as all those other pesky things that fall by the wayside while we are engrossed in a relief operation, such as paying bills. We both caught up on a month's backlog of email, and finally got a chance to put away myriad things that have piled up around the house, including various tools and other items that we took out to use at the office.

Monday afternoon we drove into Harlingen to check out what remains of the operation, the "transition team" working out of the chapter office. While we elected to officially process off the job effective Tuesday morning, we had a report that the transition team would be wrapping up Wednesday evening, and we agreed to stick around until they were done, to pack up and ship the transition equipment, and provide any support that might be needed along the way. As such, we had made arrangements to keep the rental car until Wednesday evening.

What we learned Monday, though, was that the Wednesday date was a complete red herring -- they will be working all the way through to next Monday. We don't want to stick around with our hands in our pockets till then, nor does it make sense to keep the rental car another week, so we spent a few minutes showing the lead over there how to pack everything and keep the finicky printer running, and told them we'd be around till mid-week if they had any problems. (The car is on a monthly rental, by the way.) We also stopped by the warehouse, also in Harlingen, to check on the lone computer and printer located there, but the place was deserted.

Yesterday we locked our personal computers and all our Red Cross paraphenalia in the rental car, packed up the bus, unplugged, and headed across the bridge to Nuevo Progreso for fuel. (Leaving the computers back at the RV park locked in the car meant not having to explain two computers to Mexican customs, who are rumored to be suspicious of personal computers in general, and more than one in particular, and also not risking having them inspected or possibly detained by US customs, who are invigorated by a recent court ruling affirmng that they can do so -- there's nothing to be found on them, but losing them would be a huge pain.)

As we rolled up to the International Bridge, and got ready to fork over our toll, a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agent came running across the street to quizz us about why we were driving the bus across, and perhaps persuade us to park on the US side and just walk across. We did not want to debate with him any issues related to importation of diesel fuel (although the amount in question is well within our personal exemption), and so we simply explained that we had our pets with us and they could not be left unattended in a 105° parking lot while we wandered around town. He nevertheless insisted on doing a cursory inspection of the bus, including the bays, making us wonder just exactly what authority CBP has to perform such inspections on vehicles exiting the country.

After crossing the bridge (for US$9.75 -- we had $2 ready as per the sign, which neglected to include the amount for three-axle vehicles), we enjoyed yet another inspection on the Mexican side, by no fewer than four agents, all of whom appeared to just want to look inside, and chat among themselves about what it must cost. We were simply waved through the military checkpoint a few yards further along, and then the real trouble started.

After crossing the first side street and making it half a block down the main boulevard, we were stopped dead in our tracks by a low wire. We saw it snag just as two locals did, and they were kind enough to stop traffic behind us and help back us out to the intersection. We could see similarly low wires all along the street, and we knew from the satellite photos that the Pemex station was all the way at the other end of town. I was able to muster up enough Spanish to ask where the truck route was ("¿dónde está la ruta de camiones?") and they gestured down the side street -- between the two of us we made out enough of what they said to know approximately where we were going.

The side street brought us to a dirt ramp up to a levee, which is where the truck lanes are (the trucks have their own bridge, adjacent to but separate from the auto bridge). The truck route turned out to be paved for only half a mile -- we rumbled along a rutted dirt road the last mile or two. The road came out right at the Pemex station, just north of the highway, and we rolled up to the truck pumps. I was surprised to see the price posted at MX$6.10 per liter, as I had just read that it was $5.93, but that's a difference of only US$0.08 per gallon, and this is the only Pemex in Nuevo Progreso.

We put in a full 302 gallons (1,143 liters) for an even MX$7,000 (US$707) with the tip for the attendant, working out to US$2.34 per gallon, or a savings of around $600 over what we would pay here in Texas.

Sadly, we were unable to see any more of the town or take in a meal, and we simply worked our way back out the way we came in. Uncharacteristically, the Mexicans were more lenient with the bridge toll, assesing us only MX$41 (US$4.10) to cross. We had hoped to stop and turn in our FMT's (tourist permits) from our last jaunt, as they will expire in two months, but there was no place to park Odyssey while doing so. Of course we had the usual circus-clown parade of CBP agents crawling through the bus on the US side, including the guy who had run across the street an hour ago, wondering why we were back so soon. We just recounted the low-wire story, which prompted a smug look and an "I told you so."

Today, after dropping Angel off at the vet (on advice of several people who suggested that the recent pee-on-the-rug episodes might be evidence of a urinary problem), we returned to the international bridge. The rental car is not permitted to leave the US, so we parked in the $2 lot on this side of the bridge, paid the $0.25 pedestrian toll, and walked across to deal with the FMT's. While we were there, we walked a couple blocks along the main street dodging the vendors hawking every imaginable craft, as well as pharmacopeia and dentistry, and had lunch at upscale Arturo's, which reminded us very much of one of our favorite restaurants in San Jose, California, "Original Joes." A very nice meal, complete with a Negro Modelo, came to $20 for the two of us.

Angel, it turns out, does have some type of urinary infection, and so we now have yet another pet on daily meds. At least we have some hope that the incessant peeing will stop when she gets past it. The vet had her all day, and she was very happy to see us when we picked her up this evening.

We're giving the folks in the warehouse until tomorrow morning to get back to us; if not, we'll turn in the car at Avis right across the highway, and get ready to leave town.

Sleeping in

We are still on the relief operation in Mercedes, Texas.

Today is the first day we are not starting at 7:30am since the operation started, back in San Antonio on the 21st. It will likely be the last day for HQ, and we're starting at 9. By the book, today should actually be our day off, but we're probably all done by tomorrow anyway.

There will be a handful of people continuing to work out of the chapter office in Harlingen, and we are leaving some equipment there. We've agreed to go over there and pack it up if they wrap up mid-week, so we're hanging on to a Red Cross rental car. Most of the cars had to go back to San Antonio (where most of the volunteers had to go anyway for their return flights), but we managed to trade the Chevy Trailblazer we were driving for a Toyota Camry that was rented in Harlingen. Once we ship the equipment, we'll have to figure a way to get it back to the Harlingen airport -- I'll probably just have to follow Louise over there in Odyssey.

I expect that tomorrow, after the truck leaves, we will collapse into a heap here at home to recover for a day, and maybe clean up the various piles of junk that have collected around the coach while we've had no time at all to deal with them. Perhaps Tuesday we will drive over to Nuevo Progreso for fuel, which, at $2.25 a gallon, is still about half what we'd pay here, even though diesel has dropped a good 25 cents just in the three weeks we've been parked here.

The eye of the storm

We are at the traditional lull in the middle of the operation. The chaos of setting up headquarters (twice now) and field sites is over, and all the niggling little fires are out. As usual, we are now overstaffed for our current workload.

We've sent the two ECRV's home, along with a relief crew from Spokane that arrived to take over the Spokane truck, which never actually made it here due to problems with its brand new MotoSat dish. I have to say, MotoSat has been absolutely atrocious to deal with (are you listening, Royal?), making me somthing of an idiot, as I've been suggesting the trucks be equipped with MotoSats since I first came aboard (the older gear is electrically operated but manually aimed and positioned). I suspect this will be the Red Cross's first and last MotoSat installation.

The Spokane relief crew drove the Ryder rental truck back to San Antonio and, along with another couple of folks, packed up all the gear we left there. They should be in Austin by now, unloading it all. I'm not sorry to see that truck go, as it completely ruined a brand new pair of my khakis when I slid out of the driver's seat the first day we had it. Harumph.

Everyone's been here at least a week now, so we are rotating through days off, which is good timing for the current workload. Louise and I did not want to take different days, but neither could we both be out all day at once, so we took two half-days (well, more like one-third days) off Thursday and Friday. We got the laundry over to the fluff-and-fold, and Opal to her overdue blood testing (her levels have stabilized, and we are reducing the Prednisone dosage). We also had early dinners both days and hit the sack early to catch up on sorely needed sleep -- I couldn't even keep my eyes open long enough to blog.

We have another person going home today, and one more on Tuesday, which will still leave us with more than enough folks to tear everything down and pack it up. We have one box truck left, so we will just stage everything for departure rather than shipping it to Austin as we usually do. Someone (maybe us) will drive it back there when we are all finished.

I neglected to mention earlier that we coasted in here on fumes. The fuel gauge has been acting up lately -- it read "full" halfway through Wyoming after filling up at the Flying-J, and then, one day, it suddenly read 2/3. On the way here, it rapidly dropped from 1/4 to 1/8, and then held there until just before we ran out of fuel on US83. When we passed the Flying-J north of Pharr, I reasoned from the gauge reading and the mileage that we had plenty to get to Mercedes and then to Mexico to fill up.

Fortunately, I recognized immediately the symptoms of fuel starvation, and was able to nurse the bus to the next exit and into a Valero station, where I put 20 gallons in. That's not enough to run the genny (or the heater, not that we would here in the 105° heat), but it's enough to get us over the bridge to Nuevo Progreso and a Pemex station when we are done here in Mercedes. So we'll be putting over 300 gallons in when we finally get there, and, in the meantime, we have full hookups paid through the 21st. (There's also a pool, but who's got time for that?)