The Class-less Class

[IYQ]

Went to the Yuma Testing Grounds yesterday and had to wait about an hour for them to do a background check on us and others. Do I look like a terrorist? Don't answer that! Apparently, those priors were not discovered or were expunged...LOL! Still, a very interesting place to visit. Overheard a guard say that they've heightened security about a week ago...should I be worried?!!

 

TID BITS:

Got an email space station alert yesterday but, slight cloud cover and all these dang city lights prevented that.

 

Roger

Roger Now you know what I've been putting up with all year here at the Low Hi RV ranch. I have a big Mercury Vapor light right over the front of my trailer and Town is only 4 miles away.

 

I've been busy all day and can't really remember all I did. I got all the money from the accounts I closed back east in the bank here. Then went to get LP gas and came home an took one of the cowgirls over to the storage lockers to add some stuff. The raced back hear to take a chisel over to another cowgirl to trim a screw hole filling job I showed her how to do yesterday. Tonight I to two cowgirls out for pizza and now I'm bushed. The weather wasn't very nice today it never got out of the 40's but we didn't get the ice storm they were warning us about last night and this morning. As we were leaving the pizza place tonight it did start to drizzle a bit but that's the only falling presip I've seen.

 

TID BITS:

Astronomy is full of very large numbers, Long distances and Long Time frames. It is very hard for a lot of people to imagine just how large things are or how big a number really is. So lets explore that a little and see if we can imagine what things really are. Let’s start with a Million. A Million sheets of paper stacked up would form a tower as high as a 30 story building and a Billion sheet of paper would stack up 10 times higher than Mt Everest. A Trillion sheet of paper would stack up a Quarter the way to the Moon. Another way to imagine these numbers is a Million seconds is about 12 days. A Billion seconds in more than 31 years and a Trillion seconds is 300 centuries or 30,000 years. If we made a scale model of the Solar system using a ping pong ball for the Sun we’d have to use a speck of dust for the earth and place it 2.5 meters (8.2 feet) from our ping pong ball sun. Jupiter would be the size of a pea and placed 12 meters (39.4 feet) from the sun. Neptune our last planet out would be smaller than a pin head and placed 100 meters (328 Feet) from the sun. Now when we hear that the Andromeda Galaxy is 2.5 Million Light years away it might just mean something to us. That’s 2.500,000 x 5.878,000,000,000 or 2.5 million times 5.878 Trillion or 14.695 x 10 to the 18^th power. Or 14.696 Quadrillion miles and when we look at it from earth, we are seeing it as it looked 2.5 million years ago.

[Roger & Lynn]

Jeri, can I assume that we should bring an hors d'oeuvre or a dish for the Margherita Night, etc.? Lynn has a killer taco dip that she'd like to make!

After Q we've got two weeks reserved at White Tank Mountain Regional Park starting the 28th. It's just west of greater Phoenix and recommended by an ol' HS friend there. It's only 20 miles from where the Super Bowl is being held. Not even thinking of trying for game tickets. Hope to catch our Pack players there! Made them yesterday and appeared to have a good number of sites available for now. Some of you NFL fans might be interested!

 

TID BITS:

When you put it that way Lee it makes sense why they use the term "astronomical"! Also, a well placed BB gun shot should take care of that light for awhile anyway...you could always blame "those darn kids"... !
Roger

[Wanderin]

Jeri, can I assume that we should bring an hors d'oeuvre or a dish for the Margherita Night, etc.? Lynn has a killer taco dip that she'd like to make!

After Q we've got two weeks reserved at White Tank Mountain Regional Park starting the 28th. It's just west of greater Phoenix and recommended by an ol' HS friend there. It's only 20 miles from where the Super Bowl is being held. Not even thinking of trying for game tickets. Hope to catch our Pack players there! Made them yesterday and appeared to have a good number of sites available for now. Some of you NFL fans might be interested!

 

 

Roger

I would contact Sue regarding Margarita night. She's taking care of it. What we will need are side dishes and stuff for Italian Night on the 25th. I think we need rolls, salads, etc

 

We talked to someone at the Elks about White Tank Mountain. He said it was like the Usury Park in Mesa. We love that place. Let me look at White Tank Mountain. We definitely do not want to be in the Phoenix area the weekend of Super Bowl. It will be a mess here. Not sure where we're going after Q but maybe Yuma or maybe to Parker. ????? Terry has a doctor's appointment in Portland on February 4th that I just found out about yesterday. That put a dent in my plans.

.

Go Seahawks!

Edited January 9, 2015 by Wanderin'

[palamine]

Maybe.

 

Went shopping today. I have the champagne, little umbrellas and triple sec for the morning pajama parties for the ladies. Now all I need is some orange juice and coffee cake. I think we'll wait until we're ready to hit the road before I pick those items up. Hopefully, I'll have some champagne left by the time we head towards to Quartzsite. I think those bottles have a tendency to leak.

 

I have Starbucks Lemon Loaf (that I baked) in my freezer.

[Wanderin]

twice?

Edited January 9, 2015 by Wanderin'

[Wanderin]

^{There's a reason we write everything in chalk. Terry's mom has had several recent surgeries to remove cancers on her face and shoulder. Today was the hardest one on her though. It was supposed to be outpatient to remove the cancer on her nose. However, she's had a rough time today and has more scheduled on Monday. Needless to say, Terry just erased the chalk for his trip to Hawaii. He's going to be staying with her next week. Not so sure yet what I'm going to do. If she needs me, I'll stay.}

[palamine]

^{There's a reason we write everything in chalk. Terry's mom has had several recent surgeries to remove cancers on her face and shoulder. Today was the hardest one on her though. It was supposed to be outpatient to remove the cancer on her nose. However, she's had a rough time today and has more scheduled on Monday. Needless to say, Terry just erased the chalk for his trip to Hawaii. He's going to be staying with her next week. Not so sure yet what I'm going to do. If she needs me, I'll stay.}

 

Ah, sorry you guys.

[floncto]

Hey guys- I've been lurking on this site for awhile and everyone seems pretty friendly. My DW and I are not fulltime as we both work, in fact I have two jobs. I work full-time as the financial director of a not for profit and both my wife and I are real estate agents. She's really busy because she both sells homes and manages rentals. We live in Lake Havasu CIty. I had my fill of snow being born and living in the Niagara Falls NY area for 50+years. Ten years ago I got tired of never seeing the sun and moved to Havasu. Anyway, since we're pretty close I was wondering if we might be able to join you people at Q? I know there's Mexican night (couldn't get the drink name spelled right and gave up after three red underlined versions) and an Italian night, but don't know what days they are. W will be at Escapade in Tuscon and if we can't get away for Q maybe we'll meet some of you there.

[IYQ]

I don't know what this RV park is coming to. They are training a new manager and she already has about 90% of the park PO'd. So now all of management is yelling at the membership and making them even madder. I'm sure glad I'm about to head for Q. I planned a little house warming party for the maintenance man that got the new trailer tonight just to get away from the park. This is a very nice park and I hate to see it coming apart at the seams like this. I wish I could find another park I like as much as this one but in a warmer area.

 

TID BITS:

Venus, earth’s twin is the nearest planet to the earth and has 95% the diameter and 81.5% the mass of Earth. But, that is where the similarity ends. Being 28% closer to the sun it’s hotter which has driven away all the water and the Carbon Dioxide that was released by cracking the rocks, didn’t turn to chalk and remain in the atmosphere which causes a thick cloud cover that covers the whole planet. The clouds start at about 28 miles above the surface and are about 16 miles thick. This shields the sun light and only a small percent passes through to the planet but it also keeps the heat from the surface from escaping into space which makes the planet even hotter. The light makes everything look a dull orange color on the surface. The atmosphere is 96.5% carbon Dioxide and 3.5% Nitrogen along with small about of other gases. The atmospheric pressure is 92 time that on earth. It would crush a man. The average temperature is 867*F and doesn’t vary much between the equator and the poles. The planet spins on its axis once every 243 earth days but the clouds whiz around the planet every 4 earth days. It spins in the opposite direction of earth’s spin. Because of the slow spin there is no Magnetic field. One article I read said that the clouds were made of tiny droplets of Sulfuric acid about the consistency of battery acid. Don’t stand out in the rain.

[IYQ]

Hey guys- I've been lurking on this site for awhile and everyone seems pretty friendly. My DW and I are not fulltime as we both work, in fact I have two jobs. I work full-time as the financial director of a not for profit and both my wife and I are real estate agents. She's really busy because she both sells homes and manages rentals. We live in Lake Havasu CIty. I had my fill of snow being born and living in the Niagara Falls NY area for 50+years. Ten years ago I got tired of never seeing the sun and moved to Havasu. Anyway, since we're pretty close I was wondering if we might be able to join you people at Q? I know there's Mexican night (couldn't get the drink name spelled right and gave up after three red underlined versions) and an Italian night, but don't know what days they are. W will be at Escapade in Tuscon and if we can't get away for Q maybe we'll meet some of you there.

Hi azbillsfan;

This is a very informal group and we'll all be dry camping out on the Plamosa Rd BLM north of town at Quartzsite. We have no officers or dues. We decide everything by consciences here on the forum. Someone throws out an idea and we bat it around for a while then see how many folks are ready to do it. Our annual meeting this year is January 21, through January 26. But some folks will be coming sooner and some folks will stay later. And as you probably saw while lurking we write everything in chalk to make it easier to change later (Jello works good too) I'm sure you would be received with open arms if you came by at Quartzsite. Just keep posting and reading all our post to keep up with what and when we will be doing something. Most of it will be planned after we get there. We'll probably go as a group to Silly Al's Pizza and maybe the Quartzsite Yacht Club and out to the Desert Bar. The Margarita Night and the Italian night have already been decided and will be put on by individuals who volunteered to supply the goodies. We do this every year so it's like a home coming to most of us. We do meet up with each other on individual basis during the year as our paths cross in our travels. We are all Escapee's but this is not a BOF group. Just an informal group of Full timers. We call our selves the Classless Class because we are made up of many of the smaller graduating to full time classes that were not big enough to sustain themselves. I hope you made sense out of my nonsense. I'm also sure others will chirp in and confuse you further and at least say Hi. IYQ

[soos]

Jeri, can I assume that we should bring an hors d'oeuvre or a dish for the Margherita Night, etc.? Lynn has a killer taco dip that she'd like to make!

After Q we've got two weeks reserved at White Tank Mountain Regional Park starting the 28th. It's just west of greater Phoenix and recommended by an ol' HS friend there. It's only 20 miles from where the Super Bowl is being held. Not even thinking of trying for game tickets. Hope to catch our Pack players there! !

 

 

 

Roger

Hey guys- I've been lurking on this site for awhile and everyone seems pretty friendly. My DW and I are not fulltime as we both work, in fact I have two jobs. I work full-time as the financial director of a not for profit and both my wife and I are real estate agents. She's really busy because she both sells homes and manages rentals. We live in Lake Havasu CIty. I had my fill of snow being born and living in the Niagara Falls NY area for 50+years. Ten years ago I got tired of never seeing the sun and moved to Havasu. Anyway, since we're pretty close I was wondering if we might be able to join you people at Q? I know there's Mexican night (couldn't get the drink name spelled right and gave up after three red underlined versions) and an Italian night, but don't know what days they are. W will be at Escapade in Tuscon and if we can't get away for Q maybe we'll meet some of you there.

Absolutely feel free to join us in Q. most of us will be Arriving around the 18-20. Margarita night ahould be on the 22nd if the weather is good.

What real estate agency does your wife work for? Some of us may be interested in looking at houses in Havasu ;-)

 

 

Roger, no need to bring anything to Margarita night but if Lynn WANTS to make a taco dip, no one will turn it down! We are providing chips, salsa, etc, Quesadillas and Margaritas. Had a great time last year!

PS depending on how my PATS do, I May WANT to be in Phoenix for the Superbowl!

Sue

Edited January 10, 2015 by soos

[Roger & Lynn]

 

Absolutely feel free to join us in Q. most of us will be Arriving around the 18-20. Margarita night ahould be on the 22nd if the weather is good.

What real estate agency does your wife work for? Some of us may be interested in looking at houses in Havasu ;-)

 

 

Roger, no need to bring anything to Margarita night but if Lynn WANTS to make a taco dip, no one will turn it down! We are providing chips, salsa, etc, Quesadillas and Margaritas. Had a great time last year!

PS depending on how my PATS do, I May WANT to be in Phoenix for the Superbowl!

Sue

.We really like Havasu too Sue! Long ways down the road to committing to a stick and brick but, it's in our top three locales so far. Not sure what the other two are yet...gotta a lot of looking around to do!

I'd take a Pack/Pats match up...however, it would be tough to beat ol' Tom twice in one season!

 

TID BITS:

"The planet spins on its axis once every 243 earth days". That's one loooong day Lee...I wonder how many Steveszzzzzzzzz it would take to get through one?!!

Roger

[Onthego]

^{There's a reason we write everything in chalk. Terry's mom has had several recent surgeries to remove cancers on her face and shoulder. Today was the hardest one on her though. It was supposed to be outpatient to remove the cancer on her nose. However, she's had a rough time today and has more scheduled on Monday. Needless to say, Terry just erased the chalk for his trip to Hawaii. He's going to be staying with her next week. Not so sure yet what I'm going to do. If she needs me, I'll stay.}

What a bummer for you guys and Mom. Sometime we just don't want to have to make choices.

[Roger & Lynn]

Hey guys- I've been lurking on this site for awhile and everyone seems pretty friendly. My DW and I are not fulltime as we both work, in fact I have two jobs. I work full-time as the financial director of a not for profit and both my wife and I are real estate agents. She's really busy because she both sells homes and manages rentals. We live in Lake Havasu CIty. I had my fill of snow being born and living in the Niagara Falls NY area for 50+years. Ten years ago I got tired of never seeing the sun and moved to Havasu. Anyway, since we're pretty close I was wondering if we might be able to join you people at Q? I know there's Mexican night (couldn't get the drink name spelled right and gave up after three red underlined versions) and an Italian night, but don't know what days they are. W will be at Escapade in Tuscon and if we can't get away for Q maybe we'll meet some of you there.

Sorry to hear of this Jeri...hoping that things turn for the better. Our best thoughts to Terry and his mom.

Roger & Lynn

[Ron and Linda]

Well, we,re leaving tomorrow. Hope to be in Q within a week. I will watch for the coordinates as we get closer. Got a pretty good look on Google Earth as to the location. We generally drive about 250 miles a day. Anxious to meet

everyone. Will try to load up with firewood an the way. Ron and Linda

[floncto]

We are really going to try to make it Q sometime when you are here. It's hard with having to work. My name is Frank Loncto and my DW is Cathy Helland. We work for

Brooks-Clark, which is the largest non-national RE firm in Havasu. Hope to see you in a week or so.

[IYQ]

We are really going to try to make it Q sometime when you are here. It's hard with having to work. My name is Frank Loncto and my DW is Cathy Helland. We work for

Brooks-Clark, which is the largest non-national RE firm in Havasu. Hope to see you in a week or so.

Frank and Cathy, I hope to see you there. I'll be leaving Deming, NM sometime next week between the 15 and 17th.

[soos]

.We really like Havasu too Sue! Long ways down the road to committing to a stick and brick but, it's in our top three locales so far. Not sure what the other two are yet...gotta a lot of looking around to do!

I'd take a Pack/Pats match up...however, it would be tough to beat ol' Tom twice in one season!

 

Roger

We are boaters from way back, which is why Havasu is on our short list. We have a jet boat in storage so it would be a great place to bring it. Not looking for the "final" home, but a winter place where we can hang out with friends and store all the toys. But then, its just as likely that we will get the heeby jeebies the minute we start looking at houses and wonder what we were thinking!

 

Either way, we'll have fun looking!

 

Sue

[IYQ]

Well I got the tires all checked and up to pressure this morning so it looks like I'll manage to get headed for Q next week as planned. Maybe one good thing about this cold weather we are having over here is the Jello is frozen hard and I can still read the plans I wrote in it. Today is overcast and the sun just doesn't want to show it's face. Maybe it's makeup is smeared. A couple of days ago the weather prevaricator was saying the sun would shine bright for the next 10 or 12 days. Now he says it will be cloudy the rest of January. I have 4 weather apps on my smart phone and everyone of them say something different. Oh well, I don't believe any of them anyway.

 

TID BITS:

In order for a moon to be recognized by the astronomy community it has to go through a procedure that may take several years. A scientist may discover a moon. He then submits his discovery to the scientific community and other scientist try to either verify or debunk the discovery. Then all data is submitted to the International Astronomical Union with the name given by the discoverer. They check the data to make sure it is appropriate and the name to make sure it follows tradition. Then at the next meeting of the Union it is voted on by all the scientist members and either approved or turned down. When it comes to the number of moons in the solar system we have to make some distinctions. If we are just talking about the moons around the 8 major planets, there are 166 that have been approved. If we are talking about all the moon around asteroids, mini planets like Pluto, rogue moons and other moons that have moons around them we are talking about 336 moons that have been recognized. The next TID BIT will discuss the 67 verified moons of Jupiter.

[IYQ]

Well, we,re leaving tomorrow. Hope to be in Q within a week. I will watch for the coordinates as we get closer. Got a pretty good look on Google Earth as to the location. We generally drive about 250 miles a day. Anxious to meet

everyone. Will try to load up with firewood an the way. Ron and Linda

 

I'll be glad to finally get a good look at you guys (sorry Linda you too) It's always a pleasure to welcome new members to our group. Sneak up on my face when you first see me and it won't be too bad of a shock.

[skp51443]

8 planets?

 

 

 

 

[IYQ]

8 planets?

 

 

 

 

Yep Stanley 8 Planets. Pluto has been demoted to a mini planet by the International Astronomical Union. Love the picture of the little girl and her Pluto shirt. Poor Pluto I wonder if his pay check got smaller too.

[Alie&Jim's Carrilite]

Finding out Pluto isn't a planet anymore is kind like seeing a dog kicked to the curb....

[IYQ]

Finding out Pluto isn't a planet anymore is kind like seeing a dog kicked to the curb....

Yep Mickey Mouse didn't keep Pluto on a leash and never picked up after him so poor Pluto has to suffer the consequences for Mickey's actions. That's a dog's life.

[IYQ]

It's a much nicer day today. 64 degrees, Sunny and very little wind. I'll take a bunch of these. I got some stuff out of my truck and into my shop and some stuff out of the shop and into the trailer today. I also got my USB WiFi antenna taken down and put away. Tomorrow I'll take the Cowgirl that cooks hamburger for me to the doctors office and twist her arm to cook up about 4 or 5 pounds of loose fry hamburger that I can freeze and take with me to Q. Just in case I can't con you gals into feeding me while I'm out there. LOL. I keep it frozen and it last for a long time so I can just break off a hunk and put it in my Tai Veggies, zap it and have dinner ready in 4 minutes. Not that I'm lazy or anything like that. It's just that Steve has been a bad influence on me and I have to conserve my energy for those long Steves. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

 

TID BITS:

The gas giant planet Jupiter is the largest in the solar system. It weighs 2.5 times the weight of all the other major planets combined. It only takes 9.93 hours to rotate on its axis and zooms around the sun in 12 years. The surface temperature below the cloud cover is estimated to be 43,000 *F and the cloud tops are at -256*F. The atmosphere is 84.6% hydrogen and 13.6% helium. Which are clear like oxygen and make a clear layer below the clouds and the clouds are made of simple Hydrogen compounds like Methane, ammonia, water and phosphine. The great Red spot is a huge storm that is twice the diameter of Earth and has been raging for the past 300 years. Its axis only tilts 3.1 degrees from the plane of its orbit so there are no seasons and because it radiates more heat than it absorbs from the sun the temperature under the clouds is constant over the whole planet day and night. 67 moons have been verified orbiting the planet and many of them have retrograde orbits (The other way around) 4 of them are very large, the rest are very small and may be asteroids that were captured by Jupiter strong Gravity. We’ll discuss the 4 large moons in coming TID BITS.