The last day of February! Ski season started late, but is lasting late, too!

These are pictures from the latest snowstorm that hit Spicewood, Tx. (down by Austin) where Ty (my brother) and Sandie live....unbelieveable, isn't it?

Friday afternoon, the parts arrived....and the axle was the wrong one!!! Sooooooo, since our friend John that lives here, also has a bus, same year as ours, Jimmy went and took the axle off of his to put on ours. This, at least, got us to our place in Alto, on the other side of town. Now, he will take it off and replace it on John's bus.
The correct axle arrived today, Wednesday, from New Jersey. They shipped it with the axle sticking out of the box! Crazy, huh? We're suposed to get more snow this weekend, so will be changing the axle tomorrow or the next day, but, at least we're in our comfortable spot with the bus plugged in and running water and the deck to relax on. (We've got it all closed in and my pellet stove heating it, so it may be 27 degrees outside, but it's a toasty 65 to 70, inside!)

Such pretty scenery!

Since the parts were not going to get here until Friday afternoon...Jimmy and our friend David decided to go skiing! Jimmy said it was just like riding a bike.....had a really nice time.

Well, after getting the house re-financed to get a lower interest rate.....and all the stress and paperwork that brings......we decided to go get the Hummer which had been in Tulsa getting some warranty work done. We went and picked it up, headed home and planned to head west. However, on the way up there, I was laying on the couch watching TV, in the bus, and suddenly got a terrible hard hit on my head! It felt like a 5 pound hammer! It seems that a 1/2 inch thick lucite wall of the display case above me, just suddenly, let go! It hit right on the edge on my head. Needless to say, I was screaming and crying, couldn't tell what it was because it was dark (nighttime). Jimmy was trying to find somewhere safe to pull off the road and I looked at my hand that was on my head....it was bloody! Holy cow, did it hurt!!! He pulled over, halfway out in traffic to grab an icepack, wet washrag and look at my head. The gash was about an inch long, but I bled like a stuck pig! We were somewhere in-between Tulsa and Texas, at night, so....no doctor. I told Jimmy to watch me when we went to bed that night...so I didn't wake up dead or somethin'.....ha!

We got home and stayed for a couple of days...long enough to get the brakes on the bus worked on, then we took off for Ruidoso again.

We were 12 miles out of town when suddenly the bus just went out of gear..so Jimmy coasted to the side of the road. When he got out to look, the back left tire was soooo hot, and smoking that he couldn't touch it. We saw a road at the bottom of the hill, that turned off to the right, so we disconnected the Hummer and I followed him, coasting, down the hill to the turn off. Luckily, it was an old dirt parking lot in front of a defunct Episcopal Church. After getting stopped...he investigated further. When they did the brakes, they tightened a bearing too tight and it caused the drive shaft to build up heat. It melted and broke!!

So, here we are....12 miles from town, broken down on the side of the road, with a broken axle.....(sigh)! Some well meaning guys in a pick-up truck, stopped and gave Jimmy a phone number to a mobile service guy, they knew of...and he turned out to be a gem! Anyway, Jimmy had already gotten the tires off, when he got here, but the bearing had melted to the metal, and the axle would not come out. Jimmy had ordered a new axle from Prevost (the bus company), so they were going to overnight it from Dallas.

In the meantime, a friend from Ft. Worth , was here to meet us, so he and Jimmy could go skiing. Sooooo, since the parts wouldn't be here until the next afternoon, they went skiing, Friday morning.

We've been home awhile so Shadow decided to help me do some office work! Ya' think he's a Mama's boy? haha!

It's been a heck of a week, getting all the taxes, re-fi on the house and next getting the bus re-financed.
Jimmy and I took a few minutes to go and have lunch with Dara. She went to High School with me....but we weren't friends, then..... then, strangely enough, when we had the other trucking company, she came to work as the dispatcher! We don't have the company anymore, but have stayed friends all these years!
Great to see her again, She's going to come help Jimmy and I with the paperwork, for a few days at the office and, hopefully, get all the files in order (especially the driver's files) and help me set up a safety program for them to comply to each quarter. (A new Fedex mandate, for each contractor).