Healthy But Not So Happy

Surrounded by snow capped mountains and having woken up to multiple accumulations of white fluff in less than two weeks was enough for Chris and Jay to decide to make tracks south.  They had stopped in Salt Lake City, Utah for Jay to fly to Mobile, AL for the annual Pterodactyl gathering,  which took place from November 9th through the 13th, and had planned to stay a bit longer to further explore the area, but the Arctic blasts, left them a bit "cold" and they were pining for a toastier terrain.  Plus the holidays were approaching and Chris had flight reservations in Las Vegas for a return home at Thanksgiving.  Two good reasons for them to get to lower latitudes and altitudes – and quickly.   Fortunately it took only a day’s drive and on November 14, 2011 they arrived in Sin City and set up Sonny in the RV Park at Nellis Air Force Base.  Within the week the Snowbirds had decided it would be a good place to spend the winter without traveling further south, only to head back north for their spring adventures.

Leaving Hill AFB in Salt Lake City for toastier temps!

It had been about a year since they had left Maryland and it was time for Chris to return home and visit with family and friends.  Her daughter Jessica was able to get leave over the Thanksgiving weekend and Chris decided that would be the best time to go home for a ten day stay.  The time passed quickly as she scheduled visits with friends and family and attended not one, but two, huge Thanksgiving dinners – one at her brother’s house and one at her son’s. 

Even Las Vegas airport has slot machines in the terminals.

Jay spent his high school years in Greenville, Ohio, a small farming town about an hour north of Dayton.  There his father managed the State Theater, one of two movie theatres in the town and where Jay met and worked with Bob Oda who was a few years older than he.  Over the years they had lost touch with each other but connected again in the early 2000s.  Bob and his wife Ann had settled in Las Vegas to spend their retirement years, and visits with them included enjoyable dinners, and movies at the local theatre where Bob kept his hand in the business one day a week. 

After Bob left the State Theatre he worked in public relations for United Artists and toured the country planning and presenting events to promote movies and their famous stars.  Of all the movie stars he hobnobbed with, Robert Mitchum was his favorite. Where he currently worked, Bob ran the projectors for the 14 movies the theatre presented daily.  Huge, black boxes, the size of Mini-Cooper automobiles  housed the digitized projectors which were capable of showing both standard and 3-D movies.   Compared to the film projectors of the 1950s that he operated, Jay was amazed at the changes in technology of today’s theatres. 

Nellis AFB is the Top Gun of the Air Force and home of the Thunderbirds, the second best air demonstration team in the world

(next to the Blue Angels of the Navy, of course).

For many years both Chris and Jay have read a variety of health related newsletters and books, written by various doctors, to learn how to keep themselves in optimal health.  In casual conversations, they discovered that many people don’t know the information they have learned.  They discussed creating a series of health related seminars to share the information with other interested parties at the RV Parks where they stopped, but time constraints never allowed them to compile the information into a presentable format.  Spending the entire winter in one location would enable them to finally tackle the project and possibly begin with presenting them at the Nellis AFB RV Park.

A query of the Park management and they had the okay to proceed.  Little did they know that each seminar would consume a full week of their time to gather the information and compile it into lesson plans.  But once they began they felt committed to see it through as they had a core group of very dedicated participants who looked forward to receiving the information each week.

They met in the RV Park’s office area which was equipped with tables, chairs and a huge, flat screen TV on which they could show health related documentary movies they had found to be very informative.  Because of the office’s evening time restrictions the movies and seminars needed to be on different nights but this small detail did not hinder the level of participation or cause any inconvenience.

Unfortunately there is a rotten egg in every barrel and one Camp Host took a disliking to not only Jay and Chris but to the information they were presenting.  Completely baffled by the hostilities cast their way, they began to avoid Clyde like the plague.  But like all  pestilences he continued to spread his hatred and discontent, toward them presenting the seminars, to his co-hosts and management.

John McKay, who had served as a flight crew member with Jay in Cape May, NJ and his wife, Linda Morse, had stayed at and worked with Clyde at the RV Park some years before.  They had subsequently moved to a home in Pahrump, NV about an hour west of Las Vegas but stopped by to visit one day and  revealed the reason for Clyde’s discontent.  It seems that his wife sold New Skin.  Chris and Jay use Melaleuca  products but knew they could not use any RV Park facility to promote sales of any kind and they did not mention the company or any products they used in their seminars.  Despite this commitment on their part, Clyde thought that the seminars were a marketing venue to sell Melaleuca, eventually using his influence with the management and squeezing out Jay and Chris' ability to use the Park office, forcing them to move to a faithful participants’ spacious RV.  All-in-all, the change was a minor inconvenience and blessing in disguise since they could then introduce their loyal followers to the benefits of Melaleuca products:  Two of whom started their own Melaleuca businesses.

The whole experience with Clyde left a bad taste in the presenters' mouths.  Fortunately  they had heard about other, less expensive RV parks in Pahrump.  Half a day on the computer investigating prices and other features and Chris discovered an Escapees Co-op RV Park that was less than half of the monthly fee at Nellis.  It didn’t take long for them to decide to head west for the remaining two months of their winter before going back to Bryce Canyon National Park for a spring commitment of camp hosting. They pulled out of Nellis and headed further west on February 15th.