Scooter Frustration

UPDATE AT BOTTOM OF POST

Dad has been talking about getting Mama a scooter for well over a year.  Mama has resisted.  She is nervous about riding it.  She changed her mind after seeing Tom Hanks ride one in a movie recently.  BOL!  Dad has done a ton of research on scooters, but recently discovered that in Texas there are restrictions as to what qualifies as a scooter and what qualifies as a motorcycle. Mama told Dad that she is not taking a motorcycle class and taking a test. Dad would have to do the same and he doesn't know when he would be able to do it since it is possible that he may just be dropping us in Texas for the winter and not staying.  The folks started looking at the approved scooter list that Texas has.  If you buy one that is not on the list, you have to get a notarized affidavit from the dealer which isn't a big deal but Texas can still turn it down if they find it not to be on the up and up.  The folks set out on Saturday to search for a scooter.  Mama fell in love with one.  It is a Yamaha Vino.  The Vino is on the list, but not that particular model.  The salesman said he would sign the affidavit, but after speaking with him later in the day, he wasn't quite as sure. The folks decided not to take the chance on it.

Mama has been wanting a Buddy 50, but Dad thought you had to mix the oil and the gas since it is a 2 stroke.  You do not.  It does it automatically.  Dad is now fine with getting a Buddy 50 and it is on the TX approved list.  Yay!  Problem solved, right?  Wrong!  Texas and Illinois have different rules on what is considered a "moped".  In Texas, a Buddy 50 is considered a "moped".  In Illinois, it is not and a license plate is required.  If it is a moped, no license plate or registration is required.  Okay, that shouldn't be a problem because in Texas you need a license plate, so we can just register by mail.  Wrong, or we think it is wrong.  In Texas, you have to have a "K" endorsement on your driver's license in order to drive a scooter.  Mama doesn't think Texas will allow her to register the scooter via mail because of that. She needs to take a written test to get that. Her insurance agent said to give them a call and they might.  She is going to call them later today and hopes she gets a nice person.  BOL!  If it turns out that Texas will not let her register by mail, then she can get a temporary license and registration in Illinois that is good for 30 days.  Yep, she will only be able to ride if for 30 days and then it will have to sit until we get to Texas.  Dad said he wants to get it now even if it has to just sit for a while.  They bought a motorcycle carrier for it yesterday so they are ready to buy one on Saturday unless something happens to change their minds.

The dealership they went to on Saturday that had the Buddy 50 had an extremely rude salesperson.  Mama said he must be related to the Pigman.  He was rude when Mama called him on the phone to see if he had any in stock and really rude in person.   Apparently, Mama is stupid for thinking that the price tag hanging from the scooter was the actual price.  It said $1,999.  It was white and had a storage container on it.  The folks wanted black, but Mama said she really liked the extra storage.  There was a black scooter inside without a storage container and it was priced at $1,999.  It turns out that the $1,999 does not include the price of the storage compartment.  Mama thinks there should have been something on the price tag indicating that, but the salesman implied she was stupid for thinking it was included because it cost him $300 to add it and did she think it was less money because it was white.  The paint color doesn't matter. Really?  There was a lime green one priced at $1,799 next to it, exact same model.  He also said she was trying to get him to rig the registration.  She just asked if it could be extended after the 30 days.  If you are wondering, they will not be buying from him.  Mama said there are other dealers in town and she refuses to deal with him again.

Is anyone still reading this?  BOL!  We debated rather or not to even discuss it but this has been the topic of discussion in our home for the past week.

If you are wondering, Scout and I are doing fine.  We have been busy chewing our bully sticks.  We really love the bladder sticks, but they don't last nearly as long.  Mama was too tired last week to help me with the blog.  She is having trouble getting used to get up at 4:30 a.m. when Dad's alarm goes off.  I think she is feeling better because we let her sleep to 5 a.m. on Saturday and Sunday.  BOL!

It is going to be really hot here the next two days, so we are going to just chill inside.

UPDATE

Mama called Texas and they said it was not a problem at all to register through the mail.  Mama told them she didn't have an Endorsement K and they said they didn't care about that.  It sounds like she is going to be a Scooter Mama soon!

Joey,
The Greyhound Who Hopes A Scooter Will Bring Him More Hamburgers For Lunch

Wordless Wednesday - Anticipation

 

 

Joey,
The Greyhound Whose Day Just Got A Whole Lot Better!

Loving This Small Town

We are really enjoying the area we are staying.  The town seems to have a lot of events for being as small as it is.  Saturday, they had some sort of a food event. Sundays, they have a farmers market.  We were told that the Pumpkin Fest in October is huge.  The town next to us is having a Corn Festival next weekend and the folks are thinking of going.  Dad said he wouldn't mind living here except there are snowplows all over.  Yep, the snowplows are a reminder of what is coming in a few months.

Yesterday, Mama decided to walk to town.  It is not a bad walk, but she is having trouble with her tennis shoes.  They have split open due to walking on wet grass. She sealed them up with glue and bought new liners for them. She thought the liners would be really good, but her feet were really aching when she got home.  She looked for shoes this past weekend, but couldn't find anything she liked so I am not sure what she is going to do.  She really likes New Balance shoes but these only lasted three months.  Do shoes normally come apart at the seams when you walk on wet grass or are these just not made well?  She doesn't know but it is the second pair that have fallen apart in the past year.  She is thinking of trying a different brand.

Here are some photos of our neighborhood.

This is a bed and breakfast.

This house is being renovated.

The post office.  Ivy covers the backside.

The court house.  It was built in 1905.

Another photo of the court house.

There are many small shops in town.  Mama stopped at a dollar store.  There used to be a Ben Franklin, but now it is a shop where you make jewelry.  She wishes it was still a Ben Franklin.  She also stopped at a store with homemade items.  There is a bakery and several restaurants.  She stopped at the butcher shop which is at our park entrance. They serve food there and she had a bacon cheeseburger and a slice of cheesecake.  She said the lady who works there was super nice and showed her all around the store.  The burger was delicious and she will eat there again.  There is a pizza place across from the butcher shop and she may order dinner there tonight as Dad is going to be really late tonight.

The is the burger.  It was larger than the photo indicates and Mama was stuffed after she ate it.

Mama is all excited about something she bought for us last weekend.  Scout and I don't find it exciting at all, but Mama is happy about it. She bought us the Martha Stewart Pet Waste Dispenser. The reason she likes it so much is because it holds the big sized waste bags. We buy the big bags at Dollar Tree.  The dispenser we had didn't hold them until we used several of them and then it was still a pain to put the bags in that dispenser.  She said this one is a breeze to put new bags in and the bags don't just roll out like with the other dispenser. they are made of silicon, so they are very flexible and they don't make noise when they hit our leash.  We don't get why she is so excited, but if she is happy, then we are happy.  She bought them at Petsmart.  They were on sale for $7.99.  She would have preferred to pay less, of course, but that was the sale price. They are normally $9.99.  No, we are not receiving any type of compensation for this endorsement but if  Ms. Stewart wants to contact us about any future endorsements for her products, our ears are open.  BOL!

Our new bag holders.

This was our old system.  It was hard to load and the top fell off more than once sending bags flying out.  It didn't hold our big bags which the folks prefer.

Joey,
The Greyhound Who Tried To Class Up The Blog By Calling Them Waste Products Rather Than Poop Bags

Rochelle Railroad Park and Ronald Reagan Boyhood Home

The folks enjoy visiting places that they find on Roadside America.  Some of the places are really different and some are odd,.  There are a lot of places in the Chicago area that are listed on the Roadside America website, so they decided they would visit as many of them as possible.  Saturday, the plan was to visit the McDonald's Museum.  Mama decided to call first to make sure of their hours since it is about an hour from us. She was quite disappointed to learn that they are closed due to a flood. They are renovating.  Their operating hours are Memorial Day to Labor Day, so it doesn't sound like they will be open this year.  They decided to switch gears and visit Rochelle Railroad Park and Ronald Reagan's Boyhood Home.

The Rochelle Railroad Park is located in Rochelle, IL.  From the Roadside America website: "Rochelle, IL is the home of the Rochelle Railroad Park. The Park sits in front of the country's only Quad Diamond rail intersection where the Union Pacific and Burlington Northern Sante Fe Rail Lines intersect. On any given day over 150 trains cross this intersection. The park is open 24 hours a day 7 days a week and features a pavilion with radio traffic of both lines pumped in on speakers so you can hear what train is next to come flying through this busy intersection. The pavilion is elevated so that when sitting on the picnic tables in the pavilion you are at eye level with the engineers running the trains as they go by. The park also features a Hobo Fire Pit that you can build fires in at night and watch trains go by."

The platform.

 

This is what makes the tracks unique. See how trains can come in any direction?

 The platform had many train enthusiasts. They had scanners and schedules of the trains.  Some of the people were there for the day with lawn chairs and coolers full of food and drinks.

The folks then headed to Dixon, IL to see Ronald Reagan's boyhood home.  He lived in Dixon from the age of 9 to 18.  He lived in this house from the age of 9 to age 12, but these were his formative years or that is what they claim.  Ronald Reagan did consider Dixon his hometown.

The house was completely restored for President Reagan's birthday in 1984.  He visited the house with Nancy and his brother Neil.  He commented that if the house had looked that good when he lived there, he would have never left.  The furniture in the house was not original as that furniture is said to have been burned in a fire at a storage facility.  The President and his brother had looked through a catalog before their visit and picked out items that they remembered from the house and those items are now in the house.

Ronald Reagan's boyhood home.

This is where Ronald Reagan hid his pennies. It is a loose tile by the fireplace.  When he saved 5, he would take them and go to the movies.

The top photo shows Mr. Reagan putting pennies in his hiding place when he visited in 1984.  Those pennies are in the frame with his photo.

Sitting area

The popcorn on the table is real.  Mama thought it was fake, but the guide said they change it out.  It was a favorite of the Reagan boys.  When Mr. Reagan visited, he grabbed a handful to the horror of the staff.  Luckily, it had been freshly popped.  He said it needed more salt. 

 

Curling irons were heated with lanterns.

Neil and Ronald's room.

Ronald, Nancy and Neil sitting on bed in the boys' room.

Kitchen

Kitchen

 Apparently, Mama did not take photos of the dining room.  The Reagan's actually sat at that table and had lunch there twice during their return visits to the home.  How could Mama forget to take photos?

Statue of Mr. Reagan

Does it look like him?

 When they arrived to the house, there were bikers there holding a benefit for breast cancer. They had put a pink bandana on Mr. Reagan's head.  Mama did not get a photo of it.  She should have, but at first she thought it was a little disrespectful.  Was it?  We still don't know.  It was funny to see and maybe since it was for a breast cancer fundraiser, Mr. Reagan might have thought it was okay. The tour guide commented on it and said she had mixed feelings about it.

After leaving the house, visitors are encouraged to drive by the church and high school that Mr. Reagan attended.  At the riverfront, there is a nice statue of Mr. Reagan.  He rode a horse in a parade when he visited Dixon once and that is where the idea for this sculpture came from.

The folks said they enjoyed visiting the President's home even though he only lived there for three years.  (He lived in 4 or 5 homes while in Dixon.)  A video with the President talking about visiting his boyhood home made it even more interesting.

Joey,
The Greyhound Who Thinks This Post Is Way Too Long

Near The Windy City

We were disappointed when we heard we were being sent back to the Chicago area.  We had been hoping to be sent to Kansas City.  We really did not enjoy our last stay here.  We stayed at a campground where the manager is extremely rude to the guests.  The latest reviews show he is still being his rude self. Mama called him the "Pigman" because soon after we arrived she saw him getting dressed in a pig suit for a pig roast they were having at the campground.  He drove a tractor around in his pig suit.  We really thought we might end up there again because the selection of campgrounds in the Chicago area is not very good.  There are just not a lot to choose from and some of them close on October 15th.  We needed a place to stay through most of November. We debated on staying at "Pigman's Park" and a place that would add more time to Dad's drive.  We decided to try the park that is further away since that is how much we dislike the Pigman.

We arrived here Wednesday afternoon. We are located in a small, historic town.  Mama says it reminds her of Union, MO, but it probably a little bigger and the houses are much older.  There is a town that is larger that is about three miles away and it has about anything you could want.

Our campground has two lakes. There are trails going around the lakes.  Scout and I have walked them both a few times already.  The owners are very nice. They said we can walk anywhere, but we are not allowed in the water or on the beach.  Mama went to the office/store last night hoping to buy some paper towels.  They didn't have any in the store, but went to their private stash and sold us a roll for $1.  Mama thought that was nice of them. We can receive mail here and that always makes Mama happy. She ordered us bully sticks today!

 The sites themselves are not pretty. We are basically in a gravel parking lot.  We knew that before we got here.  Dad decided to rent us a premium site because we would be closer to the grass and wouldn't have to walk on the gravel as much. We have a lake view which is nice, but we are not next the lake. There is a field of grass between us and the lake.  We are in full sun, but we figure that will be good when the weather turns colder.  We like our site.

Our site.  We do have a small tree on one side of us.  Our mat makes our place look nicer.

The walkway to the office.  It is very close to our site.

Our view.  Yes, the lakes is there.  We see it better in person than the picture shows.

A pond.

A swan in the lake.  We have several swans here.

 

 

 

We are definitely in farming country here.  Corn is huge here.

We are across the lake.

We really like it here so far.  Scout is even happy. She happily walked the trails yesterday. Today, she was not as excited, but Mama made her walk this morning since there weren't any bugs and it was cool out. I'm sure we will bored here after a month or so, but for now, it is a fun place to explore.

Joey,
The Greyhound Who Thinks His New Place Has Interesting Smells