We have not been able to post lately as we stayed in the Phoenix area and have been very busy with work. We arrived on Saturday the 30th so that Bill could go golfing with Nick on Sunday for his birthday. Nick took him to the golf course where he used to work while he was in school down here and Bill had a great time. We stayed at the Wild Horse Pass casino which is in Chandler and makes it easy to break up the city by location. We normally hit the suburbs such as Surprise, Avondale, Buckeye and Glendale as well as western Phoenix on one run and then hit Scottsdale, Mesa, Chandler, Gilbert and eastern Phoenix on another run. It is getting so busy though that we may have to break up the runs into quadrants instead. Unfortunately most of the jobs are rather low paying so we spend a lot of time finding them, organizing them and then entering them...but at least it's work! We were able to pick up some veterinarian audits so we have started getting the Monsters their checkups and shots for their health certificates to pass through Canada if we do end up taking the Alaska job. The casino itself is very nice and when we were dumping over at Beaudry RV across the highway (free dumping is always good!) some people told us about the old casino which has much more space for RVs to boondock. When we go back on Wednesday we are going to try that out.
On Thursday we went in to fill out our paperwork for working at Phoenix Municipal Stadium and the Oakland A's during spring training. We will start on March 5 and the Cactus League games end towards the end of March. We will be running either a fajita/drink concession stand or a baked potato/drink concession stand. It will be a nice change of pace from merchandising and we will be able to see some of the game too. The company running the concessions is Aramark and they have different venues across the country. It will be good to get in with them and hopefully this will lead to more work in the future.
When I was in the Aramark office filling out the paperwork for the job, I noticed that my passport had expired on January 31. So I had to go and get pictures and send in my old passport to get the new one. along with $75 thank you...it's taking between 4 to 6 weeks to get them so we are basically barred from going back to Mexico until I get it in the mail. It would have been nice if the Border Patrol agent would have said "Oh by the way, your passport expires a couple of days" when we crossed back in on January 29. But no, why be helpful? Thank God that we just didn't cross over and then try to get back in this week without me noticing the expiration date...I am sure I am on some list to be harrassed by the Border Patrol just as I am for the TSA. Our understanding is that they cannot deny you re-entry into the country but they can make you wait hours to get back in. It's long enough as it is!
On Saturday Bill went to do the three repair jobs that we had found so far. The first two went wonderfully but the job for the guy who originally contacted us was the job from hell. Bill was there working on the crack for at least 4 hours and it just turned out to make it worse. The countertop is out of warranty so we are going to have to file a claim with our business insurance as the guy is very picky and we don't need a bad reputation down here. Hopefully it will not raise the rates, but we have had insurance for probably 6 years at between $1000 and $2000 a year cost with no previous claims...not that it will matter to the insurance companies no doubt!
Were are you staying for Spring Training? Had to give up my spot cause one car and Home Depot. Shootin for next year. Hopefully we can get together while you guys are there.
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