live. work. dream.

Whenever I go MIA around here, it usually means I’ve been wrapped up is some major project – one that probably has something to do with three legged dogs. This time is no different.

I haven’t written since that silly Valentine’s Day post because I have been busy launching the all new and much improved Tripawds Gift Shop. This required dusting off the old right brain bits and lubricating my creative gears to come up with loads of new graphic designs for inspawrational three legged dog t-shirts, cards, stickers, mugs and other gift items.

It was fun designing all these new graphics, and it felt good doing it for something I am passionate about, without some client breathing down my neck telling me to make the text bold and red.

Oh, wait … the type on our new Tripawd Power design is bold and red! Well, not really… it’s Cooper Black actually, and more of a crimson. But there I go digressing, here’s the link if you want to talk about typefaces.

I would like to think this represents some of my best work. But that’s not saying much considering I haven’t done any real graphic design work since we sold our business nearly three years ago. But it is a nice feeling knowing that I still got it – if I ever really had it, that is. And it goes to prove that graphic design is like riding a bike, in more ways than one.

If you think you may have lost the touch, just jump back into your favorite Adobe product and start pedaling. And if your chain falls off and you just can’t get it to work right, call a professional. Anyone need a logo?

My wife told me not to get her anything for Valentine’s Day. I suppose I should be thankful for that.

“Let’s just send each other love letters,” she said. But it’s not like I can keep any secret shopping from her anyway, living 24/7 together in a 200 sq. ft. box. Nor can I get all crafty and surprise her with the type of personalized greetings I used to make with all our printers and graphic production equipment. So hear goes…

Dearest René,

I’ll keep this brief, because even the most eloquent words cannot convey the depth of my love for you. I cannot count the ways I love thee, for there are just not enough numbers. I know I don’t express it enough, but without you, I am but an insignificant spec lost, alone, in this big scary universe. You don’t just complete me. You make me all that I am.

With you by my side, I am a happy man. Your smile brightens my every day. And a night never goes by without your comfort giving me peace.

Above all, I am eternally grateful for everything you do. All that we have enjoyed, all that we have become, I owe to you.

Thank you for being mine.

xoxoxoxoxox

~ Your Sappy Valentine

PS: Remember this?

Our rig has been parked on the streets of L.A. for the last few weeks, while we catch up on the chisme with family and friends. Life here is as hectic and noisy as it gets, and every day Jim and I are reminded of why we chose to leave urban living behind.

We started 2009 with one goal; find Jerry’s Acres. Seven months into it, we did. Our Colorado retreat now sits underneath several feet of snow, waiting for our return.

With that behind us, we’re getting the other big part of our life in order, namely, making a real income again.

Our defnition of “real income” is different from most people’s. While we would love to be able to spend money on the finer things in life (like picking up a $20 bottle of wine instead of our old standard, Two Buck Chuck), we also aren’t willing to surrender our freedom in order to do so. My very short gig at Satan’s Castle was a good reminder about that.

People wonder, what do we do. How do we make any money? Well, we don’t do any one particular thing anymore. We don’t want to have one business again. And we don’t want to rely on one job to bring in money. We believe that putting all of your eggs in one basket is risky business, much moreso than varying your skills and finding multiple ways to generate income.

For us now, tiny bits of money trickle in from various web-based outlets that utilize our technical, design and writing skills. In 2010, we’ll work on building up our income revenue streams in these areas.

The money is iffy, the hours are long and uncertainty always looms over our heads, but we are much happier than we ever were in our previous lives. While we are still officially in the red and dipping into savings, I know that 2010 will be the year we are back in black, finally. It would be great if we could actually contribute to our retirement accounts once more. When that happens, I’ll know that we’ve truly been successful these last two and a half years.

On that note, I’ll say “Adios!” to 2009, and give 2010 a great big welcome. May this year bring the prosperity, joy and peace that we all need more of in our lives.

And many thanks to all of you for being a part of our world. Life would be pretty boring without you!

By the time we left our mountain home in between snowstorms, it felt like an episode of M*A*S*H with us bugging out and heading South before getting hit hard. On a side note, a weather report from Red Feather lakes last week said it was -2 degrees back home.

But we did have time to winterize the place, which based on that report, we are very glad we did.

In addition to a few minor exterior repairs, below are the steps we took to ensure our house survives the severe Colorado winter.

Steps for Winterizing Mountain Home:

• Close and/or cover all heating vents.
• Remove all food from premises.
• Clean out refrigerator.
• Remove all ice from freezer and shut off water supply to ice maker.
• Turn heater thermostat off.
• Turn off fuel supply and/or electricity to furnace.
• Turn off fuel supply and/or electricity to water heater.
• Turn off well pump.
• Drain well water pressure tank.
• Drain hot water heater.
• Drain water from and insulate any outdoor hose bibs.
• Drain water from all interior faucets.
• Flush toilets to drain tanks and remove excess water in bowls.
• Plunge out excess water from all waste water traps.
• Plug dry toilet bowls with rags.
• Plug all sink and tub drains.
• Expel water from lines using air pressure, if equipped.
• Lock all windows and close blinds/curtains.
• Deploy preferred rodent deterrence.
• Plug any exterior holes with steel wool to prevent rodent entrance.
• Set nail mats in front of all windows and doors to deter bears.
• Unplug any phantom load items, TVs, stereos etc.
• Provide contact information to neighbors.
• Pray that all is well when you return.

What is a nail mat you ask? We wondered the same thing when we discovered the picket fence looking things with nails sticking out of them in the garage when we bought the place. (See photo above.) Turns out the previous owner made these bear unwelcome mats to place in front of all the windows and doors, with the screws pointing up. Let’s hope they work!

The previous owner also told us he never winterized the place, but he was often up there on winter weekends. We told this to a couple neighbors, and they both said, “He was lucky!” We’ll be gone a few months. And considering this was the first time we ever had to do anything like this, we’ll see if these steps did the trick. Talk to us next Spring.

I’m proud of my little warehouse worker. Just yesterday she vowed not to let it get to her, that she would just do her job the best she could and punch her clock like a good worker bee would.

This morning she apparently stood her ground and told them something completely different, and was then sent home early yet again. We got to walk Wyatt together, and now she’s taking a much deserved nap. It’s good to have Margie home again, but I’ll let her tell the rest of the story.

It sure would be nice to know what happened to all those lucrative overtime hours we heard about though. But then again, I also heard that consumer sales for this Black Friday weekend were up a whopping 0.5% from last year too.

Well, it’s time for that whole Black Friday and Cyber Monday weekend business that’s been keeping the local newspapers fat for the past few weeks. And while on a run with Wyatt around 8:00 a.m. this morning, I noticed one good consumer couple already unloading various stuffed shopping bags from their car. They must have heard, the economy has recovered! But don’t they know there are deals to be had online…

I’m not exactly sure what such a negative connotation as Black Friday has to do with a great day for shopping. But it was certainly dark when Rene climbed on her bike and headed off in the freezing cold this morning to begin her overtime hours at Amazon. And while Wyatt is a handful, the rig is certainly lonely without her.

As long as she gets all those hours the Great Satan has promised her, our stay in Fernley might be worthwhile, and just maybe we’ll be able to afford running the furnace every morning for the next month. So don’t forget … if you plan on shopping online this year, please start here.

And if you’d rather not contribute to the evil Empire, consider this…

Or this…

And don’t forget Fido and Fluffy…

Or those outdoorsy folks on your list…

Or if you’re looking for something bit different for that someone special…

Thank you for your continued support.

Going seasonal certainly has put the trip into roadtrip. After a couple quick months in our new mountain home, it was exciting to get back on the road, but it’s kinda weird to have settled right back down here at The Desert Rose while René is doing her time at Amazon. We are nowhere warm yet, so I wouldn’t say we quite qualify for true snowbird status yet. Leaving the house behind, however, officially signifies Phase II of our journey.

So, we have a new Maps page to commemorate the occasion. All our original travel maps from Phase I are still available to show where we’ve been. And now you can see with a quick glance at our new full-time RVer visited states map.

I’m just happy I didn’t have to manually design this map. While my search for a WordPress visited states map widget for RVers ended with me wondering if I’m the only out there who thinks such a plugin would be really cool, I did come across a couple websites for automatically generating colorful RVer maps of visited states ready for use on any website!

I used this visited states map generator to make the map above. Here is another RVer map maker that includes Canada and Mexico. Those Geeks On Tour folks even have an RV map making tutorial video showing how to use the latter on rv.net. Making the map was simple, the hardest part was figuring out where we’ve been. But that’s where those early maps proved helpful.

So, 36 states down, only 14 to go – though I’m not sure how we’re getting the rig to Hawaii. Aside from leaving the mainland, and navigating a few congested New England states, we can now say we have been just about everywhere, except the middle. Well, that’s what this whole phase II thing is all about, or perhaps Phases III and IV. Now that we have a home base, what’s the hurry?

It can always be worse. Brain asked René…

What is Jim doing while you work for Satan?

As René answered, I am fortunate enough to be self employed with a full time job of maintaining the online endeavors of Agreda Communications. You see, the Tripawds Blogs Community has grown to consume most of our time. But while we do this out of passion and support for the more than 1,000 members, it really doesn’t make us any money to speak of. Hence the focus on running the endeavors.

Between attempts to tame the beast and battle spam blog registrations, I spend my day moderating forums, processing harness orders, developing content for promotional blogs, troubleshooting technical difficulties, managing member blogs, and playing host in our live Tripawds chat room. Oh, and I do this while playing Mr. Mom by keeping house and preparing meals, and feeding the beast.

But don’t get me wrong, Wyatt has come a long way and is actually showing signs he might actually show us some respect someday. And it could be a lot worse.

Instead of taking three long walks a day and sitting on my butt for hours on end staring at my Mac, I could be busting my ass like René, or worse yet dancing on some street corner hawking the liquidated assets of yet another discount furniture warehouse. Which I would gladly do if it came to that.

Though if it ever did come to that, I think I’d rather head back to our house and focus a little harder on these endeavors of ours. Talk to me come tax time.

Overheard in the LiveWorkDream rig recently:

“I’ve always told myself I would do whatever it takes to stay out of debt. Now I know I can.”

Or something like that. Nevertheless, I concur.

I’ve come to realize my birthdays will never be the same. After forty years of big hallowed birthday blow out bashes, the last three on the road have been, for lack of a better word, calm. But that is not to say I didn’t enjoy my, ahem, 43rd birthday. René has a knack for brightening every day of my life. And Halloween this year was no exception. At least we weren’t hiding out from trick or treaters.

Any time I get to go out for a good piece of meat is a good time if you ask me. And I got just that at the Silverado casino. Note the key word here being good. My prime rib was not excellent, nothing to write home about really – then what am I doing here, you ask – but it was prime rib! It came complete with all the fixins (albeit no Yorkshire pudding), a decent soup and salad bar, and best of all, it was cheap! Though one would think the cocktails you pay for in a casino might actually include some liquor.

Considering there is really not much to choose from here in Fernley, NV when it comes to a night on the town, the Silverado was obviously the place to be. And we finished our meal in time to meet fellow full-timers Jenn and Johnny in Jake’s Lounge. So we didn’t spend my birthday alone either.

Watching the locals served as ample entertainment too. I just don’t believe we’ll be living here for the next few weeks, in a place where a man in black face – from head to toe – and fake dreads can win a costume contest, when a large Mexican chicken clearly deserved first prize. I swore years ago I would never step foot in Reno again, but I digress, yet again.

Celebrating on Halloween, the big question is always, “What did I do on my birthday?” Jenn told us about all the apple trees at the RV park where they are staying. So on my actual birthday we went apple-picking and I made my fresh apple sauce, to go with my most excellent pork chop birthday dinner.

If you missed my applesauce recipe video from last year, here is a rerun for you …

So, another birthday down. No big deal really, considering I celebrate every day as just another great day (Jerry taught me that). You see, if you ask me, we are all aging at the same speed. So one’s age in respect to others is irrelevant. Therefore, birthdays are no big deal. You are only as old as you think you are. Believe this, and you will never feel “old” – either that, or you will be miserable.

One year ago today, we made the hardest call of our lives.

In the most spectacular place on earth, Yellowstone National Park, we woke up that morning and understood that it was Jerry’s time to leave us.

The heartache of saying goodbye to our spiritual leader is still fresh in our hearts. Just thinking about it makes me cry.

Until that day, I never realized how the death of an animal companion could bring a person to their knees with pure grief.

Today, as I look over at ten month old Wyatt, a bundle of fur curled up in front of the fireplace, I know that we are setting ourselves up for another eventual heartbreak.

Their terribly short lives are the price we pay for having Dog as our Co-Pilot.

We posted this rememberance of Jerry on our Tripawds site today.