Oct 10th to 12th - Mesa

Oct 10th – Sun – Mesa
We made dinner for the group today so after the gym and posting the blog, we put a pork roast in the crock pot and then went to the produce market and a grocery store. I did some prep work, made lunch and then we hit the pool with everyone else.
We had time to set up tables and lights before our guests arrived for drinks & appetizers. We made bruschetta on the BBQ and Julie brought shrimp and homemade dipping sauce. Terry hung his fluorescent BBQ light under the sun shade so we were able to enjoy dinner outside in the cooler weather once the sun went down. The menu – pork roast with applesauce, Acorn squash, asparagus, cabbage/apple slaw, onion/poppy seed pull-apart bread and ginger cookie/whipped cream dessert. Is anyone hungry?!

Oct 11th – Mon – Mesa
After the gym, coffee & breakfast, Terry & I went to find a different K-Mart to see if they had another pair of clearance priced shorts for me as I love the ones I bought. We went all the way (9 miles?) to Tempe and then there was no store when Wanda said “arriving at Kmart on right”. Right across the street was a huge shopping center and we saw a JC Penney Outlet Store so we checked it out. Nothing there that we couldn’t pass up so we wandered down the mall a bit and realized we were at Arizona Mills Outlet Mall which I have heard of in previous visits.
Unfortunately, we were now close to a casino so we had to check it out. Probably won’t go back there as it didn’t take too long to lose our decreased allowance.
We had a snack, watched TV & were too lazy to go to the pool when we got back. Lauri & Julie went to the casino this morning to play bingo but didn’t win anything.
Larry & Billy came over for a drink and then it was just us for dinner & watching TV (DWTS for me of course). It cooled down enough to turn off the AC and open windows – very nice.

Oct 12th – Tues – Mesa
I went to the gym, did some work on the computer and then went back to the gym for a class by a trainer on using the equipment properly. Just after 10, “the group” piled into our truck for an outing – first to Goldfield which is a reconstructed western/mining town touristy place and then to Tortilla Flat for lunch. After lunch we continued 7 miles on the road past Tortilla Flat to a lookout point and took a little walk to admire the views. The road turned to bumpy gravel for the last 1 ½ miles and we were all glad that we were going back the same way rather than continuing on for the rest of the 20 miles of gravel. We stopped at a bar & restaurant called Filly’s for a cold beer and arrived back just after 4.
When I opened our 5th wheel, the heat hit me like a hammer. Terry had closed up the windows and turned on the AC when I was gone this morning but he didn’t put on glasses and read the setting so we had only the fan running while we were away. It was 105 inside! Terry went outside to watch TV but it was still too hot for me so I went to the puzzle room for a while and picked up another book from the library. With everything in the rig being so hot, it took the AC a long time to cool the place down so it was good thing that I could make leftovers for Terry for dinner and a big fruit salad for me.