It must be summah. Peggy and I just got back from a Saturday afternoon drive through the backroads of western Maine, and it was a beautiful drive, but the tourists have definitely arrived. We drove the Maine Turnpike back north to Topsham and it was really busy with most license plates being from out of state. I suppose that's a good thing ... Maine could sure use the revenue left behind by its "summer people."
One of those "tourist" vehicles today will be our son Brian, DIL Nicky and grand daughters Alyssa, and Emily as they drive to Maine from New Jersey to spend the week visiting all us Maine relatives. Actually -- I would think they would be happy just to get out of Jerzee ... but that's just me! Regardless ... we are anxious to see them, get hugs, and visit a few times before they have to head south again.
We had a fun but short visit with our RV buddies Darrell and Judy Patterson as they traveled through Topsham a few days ago. We had a chance to share a Maine scallop dinner on Wednesday night in Brunswick, a shrimp scampi pizza at "The Cabin" in Bath, ME on Thursday, a bit of visiting on both days, and all that mixed in around some repair efforts on their RV before they moved on to Belfast yesterday. We look forward to a longer visit when they travel back through on their way back south in a few weeks. Who knows -- we may even make a day trip up to Belfast before they leave there?
First Impressions
Our First Smartphones
We have had our new Samsung Galaxy S4 "smartphones" for about two weeks now -- so what do we think?
1) We had to have Verizon replace Peggy's phone after one week because the camera feature wouldn't work. Everything else seemed to function OK but the camera App just wouldn't work. Once the phone was replaced everything, including the camera, worked fine. Even though this is a bit disconcerting - I was pretty happy with the way Verizon stepped up and made the swap with no hassles.
2) The battery life is no where near as good as our old "stupid" phones. I could go a week - easy - without charging my old phone. The new phone can make it about two days ... and that's while spending most of its time here at home using the home cable based Wifi to access the internet. I suspect battery life will decrease when we are on the road and using the cellular system more to access the internet.
3) It's bigger and takes up more room in my pocket!
4) I think the sound quality through the phone when making calls is better.
5) Typing a message on the screen keyboard takes some concentration and practice. But it's still easier (for me) than trying to send a text on the old phone's 12 button keypad!
6) The phone's capabilities through all the various Apps are simultaneously amazingly cool and scary at the same time. It knows where you are, it knows what you like, it knows who your friends are, and much more.
For you folks who are really scared about what the NSA might know about you .... I have no doubt that Google and Apple know a whole lot more. Guess where the NSA gets a good deal of its info?
So overall I rate the new experience as a positive. But I still have my concerns about Big Brother!
Tankless - On Demand Hot Water
The heating guys and the propane supply guys showed up yesterday and did what they needed to do to get our new propane fired, tankless, on demand - Hot Water Heater in operation. We have only used it about a day but here are my initial impressions:
1) The installation was a bit complicated since we had to dig that trench and install the underground supply line -- but is was worth it. You would never know we had a 120 gallon propane tank on the property unless you walked behind our shed.
2) The new heater installation was relatively straight forward and only took a few hours. Since the new heater is mounted on a wall we gained some basement floor space which is always nice.
3) We won't know for sure how much $$ we will save on energy costs for some time yet. But it's pretty obvious that we will use less since this unit uses very little electricity and will only be heating water when we want to use it rather than all-the-time just in case we want to use it!
4) The only down side I see at the moment is that there is a noticeable delay when opening the hot water spigot before you get really hot water. The delay is noticeable but not really long. We experience a similar delay in the motorhome shower since the hot water heater is located relatively far from the bathroom. I'm sure we will get used to the delay and in a few months we won't even notice it.
So that's how things are here in late June in the State of Maine -- 73 degrees and sunny at the moment -- but more thunderstorms in the forecast.
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