{"id":54,"date":"2013-01-04T04:33:41","date_gmt":"2013-01-04T04:33:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/?p=54"},"modified":"2014-01-30T17:09:43","modified_gmt":"2014-01-30T17:09:43","slug":"september-18-2011","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/?p=54","title":{"rendered":"September 18, 2011 – Our Retirement Home"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Allegro<\/a>\"Allegro<\/a>\"Allegro<\/a>\"J<\/a><\/p>\n

We searched and finally found what was to be our retirement home on wheels, a 2009\u00a0 Tiffin Allegro Bus with four slides at a very reasonable price. \u00a0We wanted to make sure we could both live in it comfortably.\u00a0 We were to find out later exactly why it was priced so reasonably. \u00a0It was located in New Jersey and, if we decided to take the plunge, the plan was to fly up and drive it back.\u00a0 Neither of us stopped to consider that we had, between the two of us, only about 40 minutes total of driving time in such a large vehicle.\u00a0 We made the offer, the seller accepted and we flew down to pick it up and drive it home.\u00a0 We arrived at night but John had secured a RV sales and service company to completely check it out so we felt confident that it was the beautiful clean and completely checked out unit that was promised.\u00a0 We spent several hours with the owners learning how to operate things and went to bed that night with our heads spinning wondering if we had made a mistake or if this was the beginning of a wonderful adventure.<\/p>\n

The next day we began our drive home, carefully maneuvering our home on wheels down the winding roads.\u00a0 When we turned onto the Pennsylvania Turnpike, the constant pounding of the wheels and shaking of our new home was a bit disturbing until we realized that it wasn\u2019t our RV\u2026it was the horrible condition of the Turnpike.\u00a0 After exiting, the road turned smooth and the ride became the comfortable ride we had expected.\u00a0 Our plan was to drive it to the manufacturer in Red Bay Alabama and have them check it out… just in case.\u00a0 As it turned out, a very good idea.\u00a0 On arrival we parked between the rows and rows of other Tiffin RV\u2019s and waited our turn at our full hook up space.\u00a0 The next morning we got the news that the roof rails (the curved area of the roof that connects the sides to the top of the RV) needed replacing, one of the explicit items I had John tell the service guy to check.<\/p>\n

Not being one to accept stress gracefully, I burst into tears and walked into the service room to await the news of what else was wrong and when it could be fixed.\u00a0 As luck would have it, there were several large dogs available in the room and since we had left our Millie and KatieBug at home, I was in desperate need of dogs to hug.\u00a0 Thankfully, up came a really large BMD (family joke\u2026we thought BMD stood for Big Mean Dog because they are rather ominous looking.\u00a0 It actually stands for Burmese Mountain Dog.)\u00a0 He immediately laid his huge furry head on my lap and I began petting him and feeling better. \u00a0His owner apologized for the intrusion but I thanked him and said a big furry head to pet was exactly what I needed. Our dog Millie is a Certified Therapy Dog and a Reading Education Assistance Dog, now retired, and a warm feeling came over me realizing the 9 years of voluntary service Millie gave to the elderly and special needs children probably made them feel the way I felt at this moment as I sat relaxing and petting this huge gentle fuzzy dog.<\/p>\n

Learning that the problem was to be solved but that we had to come back in 6 months, we left Red Bay for our \u201csticks and bricks\u201d (a term full-timers use to describe the homes that are not mobile).\u00a0 Most of the ride home was uneventful and we gratefully thank Wal-Mart for their kindness in letting big rigs stop and spend the night (aka boon docking) in their well-lit patrolled parking lots. \u00a0As a rule, we always ask the manager before staying and, as it is sort of an unwritten rule of etiquette, we never stay more than overnight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We searched and finally found what was to be our retirement home on wheels, a 2009\u00a0 Tiffin Allegro Bus with four slides at a very reasonable price. \u00a0We wanted to make sure we could both live in it comfortably.\u00a0 We … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-54","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=54"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58,"href":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54\/revisions\/58"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=54"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=54"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/perrellas.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=54"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}