Posted in: Exploring Texas, Hiking, Injuries, National Parks, Sightseeing

Pointy Things Hurt

After years of poking ourselves with sewing needles, bamboo skewers for kebobs, or even sharp corners of the cabinets, you would think that we would learn.

Nope.

In Arizona, Nick touched the red fruit of a cactus. The fruit were smaller than a dime and looked soft, but there were still sharp needles on there! You just couldn’t see them as easily. We had just been researching about the prickly pear cactus fruit and how you have to remove the fine needles from it before eating. However, because they were smaller, I guess he thought he could poke at them.

In Texas, near the Japanese Tea Garden, Ben had a run in with a yucca plant. There were not any sidewalks from the Garden to the neighboring parking lot, so we we trying to walk in the grass area to avoid the incoming car/truck traffic. Ben got too close to a yucca plant and got stabbed by its pointy tip. We did some quick research and found that yucca’s have a toxin in them that create swelling. We keep a stocked first aid kit in the truck, so we cleaned it, put antibiotic ointment and a bandage on and gave him a Benadryl. It bled quite a bit for such a small hole. We changed the bandage that night and used Benadryl cream. It still had quite a bump for a few days and was sore.

We have definitely learned new things on this trip. For example, I had no idea yucca had a toxin and that the ends got harder as the plant got older.

Posted in: Bike Rack, Broken/Damanged Things, Newbie Mistakes

Let’s Not Move On A Wednesday Again

Moving day! The boys and I got a lot of the RV ready to move while Ben worked. When he was done we finished packing up and got on the road. We were still going to be in Colorado and it was going to be a pretty short drive to our next campground (just 1 1/2 hours).

There was a lot of construction on our way down. The RV park only had a back-in spot when we booked and I had called down a few days before to see if they had any pull-throughs available. They said they would see what they could do.

Unfortunately, our site was a back in. The plus was it was a little shaded! It’s been pretty warm and dry so far in Colorado (getting to 90 most days), so the shade was really nice. We had just enough room to put up Ben’s tent.

That was where the decent day ended.

The new bike rack made the turning tighter. I didn’t notice right away because I was paying attention to the RV back up camera and truck side view mirrors. I knew when to stop when it was just the RV and the truck, but hadn’t accounted for the bikes. I thought (stupidly) that they wouldn’t be in the way. The bolts on Will’s bikes tires ended up scratching the paint on the truck and the truck cap. It also made the rear wheel of Will’s bike now rub against the frame. There is no visible big bend in the wheel. We’re going to see if anyone can fix it, but it is the back wheel with the gears.

We have some extra paint for the truck, if I can find where we packed it, so I can help fix the truck and the cap.

Now the next part is not so easy to fix, nor do I have any idea of how it happened.

The rear passenger stabilizer arm bent. We didn’t have it down yet. We had leveled before putting the stabilizers down. I really can’t think of what we could have done to have caused this.

On the plus side, it’s nothing that is integral to the moving of the RV. (I don’t think.)

It was just not a good day and very stressful. Tempers were high and there was some arguing. Having loud neighbors up until long after quiet hours probably didn’t help anyone’s mood.

Co & Propane Gas Detector

Did you know that you can set off your CO/Propane detector by using Lysol? Me either!

Well, now I know. We had bought the kids new blankets and I sprayed them so they could use them that night (it’s been chilly). Suddenly the alarm started blaring. I had no idea that spraying the Lysol would set it off.

I did some reading online and supposedly Febreze, passing gas right next to it, the RV batteries getting warm and emitting odor/gas, bug sprays, sunscreen/spray, hair spray, even some cooking sprays can all set it off.

We even spilled a little bit of an alcoholic drink near it, and it went off as well! It is starting to remind me of the smoke detector in the kitchen of the house. Anytime the oven got over 375 degrees F, it went off.

It certainly has been an experience learning the idiosyncrasies of our RV. Although, to be fair, it hasn’t been too bad so far. Just a little ear splitting at times. 🙂

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