A Shrimpin’ and a Dippin’: At Billy Bob's Boat and Bait

Seems like this here story just keeps gettin’ interrupted, but I figured you’d like to hear about Nilda for a change, instead of just my ramblin’s, and then all them other things a come up. But now we is a gettin' back to that city feller and Billy Bob’s boys, I could tell that city feller was not a getting’ the information he wanted, but if I understood it rightly when it come to them two boys, getting anything right was something that weren’t never a goin’ to happen.
They was a goin’ at it right hard, and when them boys just turned their backs to him and headed off into the boat and bait, I figured it is my chance to show off my new found nautical knowledge, and get me some free boat time in the bargain. He weren’t a lookin’  two happy when he comes back out, so I puts my biggest grin I can on my face and says,”Only thing dumber than Dumb or Dumber is Dumb and Dumber,” figuring that would show him that I was filled with local knowledge, and a man who could help him out.
Except he gets this screwed up look on his face, turns a little redder than he was, and says something about me gittin’ out of his way cause he’s had it with stupid bafoons who couldn’t tell one end of a boat from the other. I still had that grin a plastered on my face, and just as I was about to launch into telling him about the starboard and port ends of the boats, he looks at me a little slantwise, and says’ “Say, aren’t you staying in the RV Park around the bend?”
Now that weren’t what I was expecting him to say, but since he did, I told him I were, and afore I knowed what was what, he was a treatin’ me like a long lost cousin or something, I had to admit, he did look a little familiar, havin’ some of the same features as the Pauling side of the family, but while he might favor them some, he sure weren’t one of them. Even so I couldn’t let it just lay there, so I asked him, “You aren’t a Pauling are you?”
From the look I got, you’d a thought I’d slapped him up aside the face, then he says, “Oh, you mean is my last name Pauling.” Of course I did, and just what in blue blazes did he think I’d asked him? He must have took my look as a yes, cause he says, “No, I’m not.” Figurin’ to let bygones be bygones, I says, “Well I thought there for a minute you favored one side of my family.” To which he replied, “No, I‘m sure I’m not any part of your family.” I have to say he had an interesting way of saying “your", but then Nilda says that accents vary from one part of the country to the other, so I chalked it up to that.

Seein’s that we’d broke the ice so to speak, even though it was nigh on 80 degrees already, I figured to see if he could use some boatin’ help. He seemed a little standoffish, but as we talked, I think my knowledge of all them nautical terms was a swaying him over. Seems his wife wasn’t to big on him a renting the boat, particularly from those two idiots, as she called them, at Billy Bob’s Boat and Bait. He’d been told that they was just a couple of local boys and everything would be alrighty then he found out it weren’t so.

Problem was everything wasn’t alrighty, in fact everything was the opposite, what with nothing going right. Guess he really didn’t know much about driving a boat even though he let on to her that he did. Then when he went back to Billy Bob’s to pick up some gear that those two bozos as he described them, had forgotten to put in the boat, he runned into more problems.

Seems he misjudged the dock on his approach, and almost throwed his wife out. Mindin' my manners like Ma taught me, I didn’t tell him I’d seen him do just about the same thing a little bit ago. Then he tells me that when he and the wife was about to leave Billy Bob’s, he got all tangled up trying to adjust the boat and his wife gets stung by a bee, Lawdy, lawdy, this is that city feller they was telling the stories about back at the campground, and I’ve done throwed my lot in with him.

Campground Etiquette

Nilda just got back from the beauty parlor and she was tellin' me about the weekly gabfest they have, and how one of them ladies grandson is some bigshot website developer critic for some on-line blog. Guess this lady was just a goin' on and on about how how well knowed he was and all. That got me to thinkin' that maybe I should toot my own horn, like as I've read in them, promote yourself and find unbelievable wealth in only 20 minutes a day, books. So just to get you all lathered up and a wanting more of my writin', this here post is about puttin' into practice what them ladies was a confabulating about at the beauty parlor, How to be a websight critic.

I know that most anyone a readin’ this here blog figures I have got to spend many hours everyday just a staring at the computer, as well as engaging in more research than a crow lookin’ over a newly planted corn patch. Because how else would I be able to produce the high quality writin’ you find here. But that’s where you’d be wrong. Turns out that just like I got a natural nack fer cipherin’, I also got one fer this literary thing.

Now I got to be realistical here and admit I’ve got a long way to go afore I begin havin’ the 100 or so visitors a day that come to them real popular websites on this internet thing. So, while maybe them amazons and the like don’t got nuthin’ to fear, I figure I’m fast catchin’ up to some of them more popular regular mobile, mobile home sites like Bus Builders Bible, 5th Wheel Parts Finders, RV Dumps Guide and Beaders N Birdhouse Builders Anonymous. That last one because it’s designed to help them RVing types who are a thinkin’ they can make a livin’ off sellin’ beady bracelets and birdhouses. Sheesh. Just plain old beggin’ fer money like them regular down on their luck fellers would probably do better than that.


So I know yer a asking, I.M., just what does all this yakking about Builders, Parts, Dumps and Beaders got to do with websight critics and campground etiquette. Which made me realize that I had wandered off of my majorly intended subject of the day just a mite. Then I remembered why I’d been a wanderin’. There was this other website, the name of which is on the tip of my tongue, but it just ain’t a coming out. Seems this here website, which I can’t recall, posted a article on camping at my most favorite campground, wallmart, and in introspect I figured that a few comments a straightenin’ out what them folks was sayin’ was in order. Which as I understand it best I can, is what bein' one of them websight critics is all about.

Now I remember what I was a trying to so hard to remember, it was to tell y'all that because writin’ comes so easy to me, I got lots of time to read all the RVing blogs that them people put out. I just wished I could stop wanderin’ around this her page and recollect that website with the wallmart article so I could give them proper credit.
Anyways, I thought to give you a little insite into wallmart camping from someone whose done more than his share of it. Usually because that’s the first place the tow truck operator is familiar with when he tows us into a town when Ol’ 5th Wheel breaks down.

So are here a couple of hints that you may not be aware of, not that I do them mind you, or encourage you to do them. Nilda say’s I should put that in there afore I get into trouble by someone mis-interrrupting what I’m sayin’ though what with most of my readers bein’ just family relations and all, no matter how distant; camping at wallmart ain’t something that just exactly fits into their life style even if they could make their mobile homes, mobile.

Now the first subject I want to cover is entailed: When you got to go, you got to go. Just check out them fellers parked over them drain grate things in the wallmart parking lots and look for them hoses a hangin’ down under the middle of their mobile, mobile home. A feller once told me they is known as the dump and dash set, which went right over my head but seemed reasonable. Then some other feller said that the dump and dash set was a funnin’ thing, like a play on the country club set. Now I don’t know about them dump and dash fellers bein’ in the country club set, but I do know that them dump and dash fellers must be a settin' on a bunch of baling wire cause it usually looks like the only thing holding their RV together is exactly that, baling wire.

Now that feller went on with a bunch more about wallmart camping, includin’ a passle of pictures of things that people do. It were a right good article, except fer a few minor errors only critic as good as me could catch. Still, if you happen to see it, that fellers aticle makes for right good readin’. Darn, I’ve wandered just about everywhere in this article except onto the name of that websight. Guess it just goes to prove that even the brightest person, such as yours truly, dims for a minute or too on occasion.

I.M. Writing Literature

You recollect back a few days ago when I was a writin' about the big ruckus over my literature I wrote for the teacher's wife? I guess it must of upset her a might bit more than it appeared, cause it looks she must have misplaced them sheets of paper with my literature writing on them, leastaways that's what I figure must of happened. Maybe it were when she was a visitin' the RV park lawnderomat, cause somehow several ladies stayin' here stumbled on them pages, the result being that they was pesterin' Nilda right and left as to when I was a gonna write some more literature, and some of them was even a askin' me to write specifically about them.

Then the RV park office lady comes up to me one afternoon in the back isle of the drugstore and starts asking all kinds of things about my literature, such as where do I get my ideas for my literature, if'n it's from actual experience and the like, the kinda questions that a woman ain't got no business asking a man that she ain't married to.  When she started gettin' more friendly than I remembered Nilda being when we was a sparkin', I lit right out of there.

I didn't know whether to bring what happened, (actually, what almost happened but didn't) up to Nilda, nor not. Then I remembered how Nilda was always a supportin' me in my writin' efforts, so as she was a slatherin' on another layer of beauty cream just afore lights out, I brought what was a troublin' me up. Which is the why and how of the writin' of the followin'. Nilda said I should write something for them lady's. Of course, she wanted to read it with me first, just to make sure I didn't make any mistakes, as she put it. Once she was satisfied with it, she would give it to them and and hopefully it would do some satisfyin' of their needs by them readin' it. She then started talking about other things, including me requiring more research for my writtin', all of which it's probably best I not get into.

So that's where what follers come from, but before you read on, Nilda suggested I put something like this at the beginning of my literature: Those of you that's got some of those Puritan ways may want to not read this, and those of you that's got some prurient ways should probably read what you usually do. But for the rest of you, if you want to find out what kind of writin' them lady's thought was so interesting, read on.

Bertha Ethel Snowbird's bosom was heaving as she paused on her way to the top of the ornately carved, curving wooden staircase that led to the upper level of the RV Resort's clubhouse. Her eyes glanced upward, and there he stood, an apparition, bearing a striking likeness to one of the Geek God’s Bertie had studied about in her recent ancient civilization, history class. From the moment she saw him she was struck speechless, parts of her quivering in her intense need to draw a breath.

Grayson Devlin Poindexter IV had just finished his conversation with Hannibal Larcey, his financial adviser and confidant. Absentmindedly placing the phone in his pants pocket, Dev, as he was known, whirled to descend the wooden steps, a path that would take him to what he knew would be the worst moment of his life, and it was at that instant their eyes met.

One set sparkled with astonishment, innocence and wonder, the other was pale, hooded and dispirited, displaying only the last flickering embers of hope. It was the look that man and woman have shared down through eternity, the one that fans the embers of hope back into flames. The one that unlooses the bondage of innocence, freeing its occupant to devour the offerings of life.

The silence that permeated the moment was roaring in Bertie's ears, sounding much like when she had watched the trains climb the ribbon of rails on the nearby mountainside where she grew up. A throbbing, similar to what she had felt when those giant engines pounded by her secret hillside hiding place began in her head, descending downward, and generating feelings in places Bertha had never before had feelings. What was happening to her, she wondered. Then her breath became even more ragged, the end of every nerve of her body seeming to be spouting Fourth of July sparklers. Lord help me she thought, I’m about to faint.

For his part, Dev, was also feeling something, the sense of dread at knowing he faced another expensive RV repair, but all that changed at the sight of Bertha Ethel. It was as if the one person he had constantly dreamed about but knew would always be unattainable had suddenly appeared before him. For there, standing just a few steps below him, was Meg Ryan, Sharon Stone and Tea Leoni, all rolled into one. He saw the look of innocence, the cute, pert, little nose, the rounded curves and the beautiful hair he had always dreamed of, but knew he would never gaze upon. All thoughts of his troubles, his life as it was, a life that an instant before was collapsing around him, vanished at that moment. For here, just before him, was his life, his future, and all he had to do was to reach out and catch her before she fell down the stairs.

That last thought crashed through his momentary euphoria and brought him back to the present. Forging past  the unintelligible  jumble his mind had become at the sight of this unbelievably scintillating woman, he saw her eyes, those beautiful bright blue eyes,slowly begin to roll upwards as her delicate, fluttering eyelids began to descend. Dear God his tortured mind screamed, now that at last I’ve found her, don’t take her away. Like a man possessed of the fury of a weekend warrior trying to get the last site in the RV park, Dev leaped across  the abyss of the few intervening steps, throwing his arms around his blond goddess just as she began to topple over backwards. A fall that would surely have extinguished her life had it been allowed to happen.

For a moment Bertha Ethel’s momentum threatened to carry them both outward, a trajectory that would have seen them plummeting to the bottom of the stairwell and a sure death. Death! The Darkness of Death! Never could he allow it to come between them. Summoning near superhuman reserves of strength, his bugling biceps nearly tearing the fabric of his hand tailored shirt, he held to her with a desperation born of the ages, teetering on the abyss between a future he thought he would never have, and the fate that befell Romeo and Juliet.

Exhausted almost to the point of collapse himself, by summoning his last ounce of energy he swung them away from the stairwell, their intertwined bodies collapsing as one toward the steps. There they lay, unmoving, Dev’s bulging arms securing Bertha, holding her tight to his unmoving body that had provided a cushion for her short fall.

Now I know you all was probably expecting something more akin to what them RV park lady's was a wantin', but this literature, leastways the books I read and how Nilda explained it to me, didn't do it that way. There's characterization, plot development, reader involvement, and rising action leading to the climax. Now this part had them first three, and the second part would have them last two, if'n anybody wants a second part that is.

PS. If you don't want it writ, its okay, cause Nilda has asked me to finish it fer her in that case. Sides, I'd much rather write about what me an Nilda does in our daily livin' and all, plus some help pieces fer folks that's just taken up this mobile, mobile home life. Seems like all this literature writin' does is cause me trouble, when I could be usin' the time to work on fixin' Ol' 5th Wheel so we could be a gittin' down the rode and away from this place. Either that or I got to get Nilda to find her another beauty palor, cause was where all this literature stuff started.

Nilda gets excited

Alrighty then, it's been a right long time since I was a writing  bout how me and Nilda got started down the rode to this here mobile, mobile home life. And what with all these daily goin's on's to report on, it  took me a might off my writtin track, with a literary detour or too in there, but I.M. a tryin' my darndest to get stopped a wanderin'. Best I can recollect, I left off telling about the pretty Palace that me and Nilda had up there on the Gulch, and I'm sure most of you spent much of the time between then and now just a wondering how we could have given up all that luxury for a life careening down America's highways from one breakdown to another. :)

In a way we was lucky, but in another we wus unlucky. Lucky because we didn't need much room, and unlucky because we didn't need much room. Seems both us men and the womenfolk are born with all kinds of internal plumbing that's got but one purpose, and that's to ensure that the house is continuously filled with little ones. :)

Unfortunately, whoever made all the connections when they put both Nilda and me together must not have been able to tell which parts went where, cause neither one of us worked right in that area. So while everyone around us was inundated with squalling, bawling little ones, Nilda and I was a working our butts off just trying to make even one of those little buggers. :)

But no matter how hard we tried, it never come to nothin', though it sure were somethin' while we was a tryin' to get beyond that nothin'.  So since there was only me and Nilda, that was how we ended up living for nothin' in the back of Pa's filling station. From those three old "restrooms", as they've taken to calling them lately, we made us a bedroom, a living room and a kitchen. And that's why when that city fellar cousin of mine started talking about living in a mobile home we wasn't interested at first, as we was already living the good life. :)

Then the more he talked, the more Nilda's ears seemed to perk up, and first thing I know she's asking him all kinds of questions. And that's when we first heard about the Great Kiva, the place to go and learn all there is about this mobile, mobile home life they also call RV'in' from this here RV know it all King thing. :)

Hello From Nilda

Since I.M. started his blog about our decision to leave the place we had called home for all our married life, and become full time RVers, I’ve often wondered what it would be like to be able to add my own thoughts of our life to his blog. Late last night as he was working on his post for the day, I brought him a cup of coffee and started to give his back a rub. He works so very hard on his blog, and even though he seems to have very few regular readers, still, it never seems to discourage him.

He asked me a few times as he paused in his writing, if thought his blog, and in particular his spelling and grammar, were improving. It's one of the things I’ve always appreciated in I.M.,  his acknowledgment that he isn’t always perfect, and his desire to improve both his, and our life. I helped him with several grammatical constructions, as he occasionally lets his old ways slip in. The same with his spelling, and try as he might, I believe he is always going to have a problem with dropping that final g of “ing”, because that’s just who he is, or as he enjoys saying, I.M. is who I am.
 
As he was stretching his back after posting his blog and getting up from his chair, he turned around, gave me that special little boy look of his, and said, to use his exact words, “Nilda, you spend almost as much time on this here blog as I do, but I get all the credit for doin’ the writin’, maybe you should write a blog post or two sometime."


Talk about dreams coming true, it was exactly how I’d been hoping the opportunity to write a few blog posts of my own would come about, as I would never have directly asked I.M. if I could write a post for his blog. Bless his heart, he tries so hard with his writing, but other than our many relatives and friends from back home, very few people read what he writes. I’ve always thought that if I could provide some observations from a woman’s point of view, perhaps it would broaden the appeal of RV-Dreamers.

I know I.M. is anxious to start working on his blog post for today, and since he has spent most of the morning under "Ol"’ 5th Wheel, as he so fondly refers to our RV, (I wouldn’t dare tell the world what I call it),  I will allow what I've written to this point to be my first ever post on the RV-Dreamers blog. May your problems be small and your pleasures large – Nilda.

My Writing Education

It's been a couple of days since that beauty parlor lady filled Nilda in on my need for some writing education, which resulted in Nilda bringing me a bag of books from the library. Jumpin’ golly gee whiz, but now I know why that bag of books was behind the library instead of in it. If that was the kind of literature that beauty parlor lady reads, there’s a lot about her that nobody knows.

Now before I commenced to reading those books Nilda said I should pay careful attention to certain things in them, which she then proceeded to list out for me. Things like symbolism, characterization, plot lines, similes, imagery, syntax, metaphors, grammatical construction and the like. You’d a thought I was one of them little water bobbers you put on the edge of a glass of water, like we used to buy at the carnival when it would come to the Gulch, the way my head was a noddin’ up and down in a agreement with what she was sayin’.

But as you most likely know by now, I didn’t have a idear as to what Nilda was a sayin’. However, I got to say that since I read every page of every one of them books, not just once, but several times so as I could absorb all them literature education materials, relations between me an Nilda has improved most spectacularly, so leastways some of it might useful.

I’ve got to admit that much of it was more than I could figure out, especially when it came to all them peaks, pink pebbles, proud nubbins, sweet lava flowing, simultaneous explosions, ragged gasps (though with that one I thought I remembered Tomato Blossom :):):) mentioning something about them, though she was breathin’ so heavy at the moment I’m not sure if that was what she was talkin’ about).

Some of them words and figures of speech things in the literature I could figure out for myself. Like “reclaimed her mouth”, for takin’ her to the dentist, or, "feeding from the sweetness of her mouth", like when me and Nilda would share a fresh picked strawberry. And doin' that was definitely one of them similes Nilda told me watch out for, cause we both always got a big one on our faces after we ate that strawberry.

I will say them author ladies of them stories must have a mite of a problem holding on to where they are going with them literature stories, what with more stuff gettin’ spilt from more places by them characters they was a writin’ about, than by a bunch of blind bricklayers buildin’ a church steeple. And all that goes with leavin’ out the eruptions, spasms, waves, crests, undulations, and convulsions that they seemed to be a sufferin’ though on a regular basis, commencing about half way through each of them books.

I figured that the best way to understand all that was to try my hand at writin’ some of it my self. It took a few try’s, but once I got the hang of it, it weren’t no problem being a near on literary genius. Figurin’ the best thing I could do was to show that gossip lady at the beauty parlor that I was just as good a writer as all them literature gals she was a wanting me to write like, I took her a copy of my latest, which were a little piece I wrote about what the gossip lady’s life is like from the literature standpoint.

When I told her that I had takin’ the words to heart she had said to Nilda about my writing and I wanted her to read my new and improved literature writing technique, she got a little uppity, then finally took the papers from my hand. I sure wanted to see the look on her face when saw just how improved my writing was, but after just a bit, her face was getting’ hard to see atall, what with it turnin’ such a dark shade of red.

Next thing I know, she is right up in my face a yellin’ something, about “I never’, and “How could you ever think’”, and a whole bunch of other stuff I couldn’t understand. Though the, “Get out of my house, you pervert” that she yelled just before she pushed me out the door and slammed it was uncalled for since I was already a high tailin’ it out of there.

One thing I didn’t understand was why if she was so riled up, was she a clutching herself in them places like so many of the ladies in those literature pieces did, while still a holdin’on to my pages. Leastaways that’s what I thought I saw as I was roundin’ the back corner of her house, a headin’ back to Ol’ 5th Wheel, when I accidentally looked into her window. Guess even with the readin’ of all that literature, I’ll still never get the hang of the hows of womenfolk thinking.

Lots of Comments and Comments of Lots

This here RV blogger thing is really gettin’ me excited. It’s givin’ me new insites into what ways me and Nilda can live this mobile, mobile home lifestyle we been a workin’ at all this time. The other day we got a comment from a longtime follower of this blog, which considerin’ the fact I only been a writin’ it since early in February ain’t sayin’ much, but then, Old Jack Daniels once had only cooked off a batch or two of whiskey, and it must have been some time till he got to No. 7.

So just exactly what was this fellars comment? He come up with the idea of savin’ money by buyin’ some small piece of land and by putting an outhouse on it, we would have a place where could stay cheap, but have all the comforts of home. Obviously he didn’t know what life up on the gulch was like or he wouldn’t a been sayin’ that, but it still got me to thinkin’.

Here we been traveling around the country fer a number of years, a doing our thing, makin’ mistakes an breakin’ down about as often as them 60 minutes fellers is on TV, but what about them folks that is a sittin’ in their living rooms, a reading all these here blogs and a dreaming of a joining us some day. It’s like when you are not livin’ the mobile, mobile home life, you want to give up your patch of land and house, and live in something about the size of a pea pod that eats gas like a hog that just got a big bucket of slop.

Then once you get out here on this so called heavenly rode of bliss, you learn right quick that if you ain’t broke down, you are about to get broke down, or that fancy RV park ain’t nowhere near as nice as the pictures showed it to be, if they even got a spot when you show up hours after you thought you was gonna get there. And that’s leavin’ out all the things that happen when you pull into a town where you don’t have the foggiest idea where anything is at.

So, it ain’t long before that rosie picture of the idleic life on the road begins to start a lookin’ a might frazzled around the edges. All them folks a sittin’ out on their front porches as you wander, lost, down the highways of life are lookin mighty happy compared to you and the wife, who by this time, if she’s still a speakin’ to you, is a tellin’ you to go to places that womenfolk ain’t even supposed to know about, let alone talk about.

Still, what this feller mentioned was something that ain’t to far from any mobile, mobile home person’s heart, which is the idea that on whatever side of the manure pile you are standing , it probably don’t smell as bad on the other side. Course truth is that no sooner do you skedaddle over to the other side than you discover it smells just the same.

Bottom line, which is something that jailer fellow taught me all about when I was a gettin’ my degree, is that each of us has got to live this life the way we want, and if it don’t measure up to some other fellers idea, it's okay. Look at all them people up on the Gulch that weren’t near as successful as me and Nilda. That don’t mean their unhappy, it just means they look at things a mite different. So we’ll let that fellar dream of his piece of land and security, but for Nilda and me, the open road and most likely, the next parts and repair shop beckons.