Wintering in an RV

Posted on September 22, 2016 by Maria Langer

Some answers for a reader.

It’s that time of year again: the time of year when my blog post titled “Prepping My RV for Winter Living” get a bunch of hits every day.

One of the readers — I’ll call her C — went the next step and emailed me. Here’s her message:

Hello! Write me back or don’t. Its ok. I understand being busy. It won’t ruin my day if you don’t.
I stumbled upon your blog when I was looking for advice RE: living in an RV in winter. I am thinking about purchasing one to live in while I try to save my family’s 3rd generation ranch house. It could take a while!
I found all your info quite helpful and was tickled to see that you had a small dog (me too) and a parrot (me too).
I did wonder about gas appliances in an RV and the risk to my cockatoo. Since I got her in 1992 I have avoided rentals with a gas stove, etc.
I don’t know if you have any gas/propane appliances in the RV or if you felt this was a legitimate worry.
Also, I wondered where you placed your parrot in the RV. Have you ever thought about hanging the cage?
Do you feel it stays warm enough in the winter for your parrot? That was another worry. Molly is not the hot house flower some birds are, but I would hate for her to be uncomfortable.
Great Blog! We must encourage other women to be do it yourselfers. As you wrote it is fulfilling and empowering in so many ways!

That first paragraph is likely in response to me saying, on my contact form, that I don’t always respond to email from readers. Why don’t I? Well, I really do prefer blog comments so we can get a conversation going. I will send C a link to this blog post as my response. I hope she uses the comment form for any follow-up questions. (Hint, hint.)

Living in an RV while working on a home is a great solution to a problem. You can be there every day to work or supervise and you can really get a feel for the property. I did it when I worked on a cabin I once owned in Northern Arizona and, of course, I lived in my big fifth wheel while building my home here in Washington State.

RVs, in general, have really poor insulation. The walls are thin and it’s sometimes impossible to keep the heat in. I found that with my Montana Mountaineer — a high mid-range model by Keystone — once the temperature got below 20°F, I could run heaters full blast all night and not get the temperature above 50°F. For that reason, I don’t recommend living in a typical RV outdoors in an area where temperatures get much lower than freezing.

I was fortunate. The first winter I was on the property, before my home was built, I got a housesitting gig about 2 miles away. That lasted until I headed down to California with the RV for my late winter work. The second winter, although my building was built, my living space was barely started. I was able to bring the RV into the building’s garage and live in there. Not ideal, but the “outside” temperature in the building never got lower than about 35 so I had no trouble keeping the RV warm.

Of course, not all RVs are like this. Some are set up with great insulation because they’re designed for winter use. If C’s RV is like one of these, she’s in good shape to stay warm.

I no longer have a parrot. Alex the Bird went a new home in early 2013. I do still have a dog. I never did worry about propane appliances. My RV — which I sold just last week — had carbon monoxide detectors. Make sure yours has one and that it’s working! In addition to that, I always left one or two windows cracked open when using the propane heater. I actually preferred electric heaters in my RV because they’re quieter and electricity is cheap here. I used the ones that look like radiators and had one in the living room and one in the bedroom.

Alex the Bird had a large corner cage. My RV was spacious and I removed one of the La-Z-Boy recliners to accommodate the cage. It was on the far end of the RV, away from the kitchen. I’d be careful about hanging anything from an RV’s ceiling. You’d likely be better off putting the cage on a small table or stool. Or cage stand. Alex was never in the RV over the winter, which is a good thing. I don’t think I could have kept it warm enough for her.

In summary, I should say this: Some RVs are better than others for winter living. If the temperature gets below freezing, you need to take steps to keep your water source and interior pipes ice-free. That can be a challenge in itself; my prepping blog post explained how I did it. Think about the possibilities and prepare for them. Good luck!

As for encouraging women to do it themselves, I’m all for that. Actually, I’m all for encouraging everyone to do it themselves. There’s no better feeling of satisfaction than tackling a task you weren’t sure you could do and getting the job done.

The Mobile Mansion is Gone

Posted on September 16, 2016 by Maria Langer

Another chapter of my old life ends.

On Monday, I delivered my 36-foot fifth wheel Montana Mountaineer RV, affectionately nicknamed “the Mobile Mansion” to its new owners. Yesterday, I met them at the bank to have the paperwork notarized and get my check.

Early Life of the Mobile Mansion

I bought the Mobile Mansion brand new back in 2010 in Quartzite, AZ. I got a great deal on it. The Great Recession was killing RV manufacturers and dealers; by January 2010, Quartzite dealers were desperate to unload brand new RVs.

Here’s the Mobile Mansion parked at the golf course I stayed at in Quincy, WA, for about two months each summer. (I now hire pilots to work my Quincy contracts.)

It was the second — well, fourth if you count the popup camper and horse trailer with living quarters — in a line of RVs I’d owned since the early 2000s. Like its predecessor, a Starcraft hard-sided camper with pop-out beds, It was a business asset for Flying M Air: I bought it as a place to live when I traveled for my flying work. I’d begun working in Washington every summer in 2008 and wanted an affordable and comfortable place to live while I was there. The Starcraft was affordable but not comfortable. The Montana was very comfortable mostly because it was very large. I got a big one because I expected that I’d be living in it for four to six months a year with the man I was married to and our mid-sized dog. I wanted us to have plenty of space. I wanted it to be a true home away from home. When I bought it, I blogged that it was the “perfect” RV.

A Temporary Home for the Homeless

When my marriage fell apart in June 2012, I was living in the Mobile Mansion in Washington State, where I was working for the fifth summer in a row. I didn’t bother bringing the Mobile Mansion back home to Arizona at the end of the summer. Instead, I stored it in a friend’s garage, along with my boat. I’d need it in Washington the following year no matter what happened, so it made no sense to bring it home.

I did move it down to California in February 2013 for the frost control work I started there that year. It was a lot of fun to live part time at an airport with my helicopter parked a few hundred feet away.

The Mobile Mansion parked alongside a hangar in the Sacramento area. You can see my helicopter parked on the ramp at the left side of the photo.

In May 2013 when the court stuff was finally done and my wasband finally agreed to a division of personal assets in our Wickenburg house and Phoenix condo, I moved out of Wickenburg permanently. By that time, the Mobile Mansion was back in Washington, settled in for my summer work, and I moved right back into it.

I lived in it for most of the next two years. I traveled a bunch in the winter, as I usually do, and had a three-month housesitting job during the coldest months of the winter of 2013/14 when living in the Mobile Mansion parked outdoors would have been tough. The following winter, the shell of my new home was finished and, when I wasn’t in Arizona or California, I lived in the Mobile Mansion inside the RV garage. I had a full hookup in there: 30 amp power, water, and sewer. It was comfortable, but cave-like — sort of like that Phoenix condo I’d hated so much — and it really motivated me to finish up my living space upstairs.

The Mobile Mansion was my home and base of operations while my new home was being built. I even set up a time-lapse camera on one of the slides to record the whole building process.

In early April 2015, I moved upstairs, sleeping on an air mattress on the bedroom floor. The shower wasn’t done yet, so I still showered down in the Mobile Mansion in the garage. But by the end of the month I was mostly moved in, with my furniture in place. Although my home wasn’t 100% complete, I was done living in the Mobile Mansion.

Or so I thought.

The Mobile Mansion stayed in the RV garage until July. I’d been playing around with AirBnB, using the full hookup campsite at the edge of my driveway as a rental and getting some activity. But in July, I moved the Mobile Mansion back outside and parked it near where it used to be. I pulled all of my personal items out of it, leaving only what was needed for guests. And then I put it on AirBnB. Amazingly, I was able to rent it almost every weekend right into October, getting $80/night with a two night minimum.

People paid $160/weekend to live in the Mobile Mansion with it parked right where it is in this photo. (And no, the helicopter usually wasn’t parked in the side yard.)

(I could probably write a whole blog post about squeezing money out of assets without a lot of headaches. I’ve gotten pretty good at it.)

Mobile Mansion for Sale

By September, I had decided I definitely wanted to sell the Mobile Mansion. I wanted to travel for the winter but I wanted a smaller rig. I’d already started shopping for one. At the time, I was thinking of a much smaller bumper pull. I listed the Mobile Mansion in various places, hoping to sell the truck with it.

After that last AirBnB rental, I took everything out of the Mobile Mansion, gave it a good cleaning, and dropped it off at an RV sale lot in East Wenatchee. The folks there were pretty confident they could get my price.

They came in with two offers, both of them very low. Bargain hunters looking for “motivated” (read that desperate sellers.) I didn’t have to sell the Mobile Mansion. It was fully paid for and not costing me a thing to keep. I’d even made nearly $2K using it as a rental for part of the summer.

By December, I’d decided to go south for the winter. My friends were camping out in the Colorado River backwaters and I wanted to join them. I figured I’d sell the Mobile Mansion while I was away and come home with a different rig. So after my Christmas skiing trip, I went to the sale lot with all the gear I’d need for the winter, packed up the Mobile Mansion, hooked it up to my truck, and headed south on what was supposed to be a three-month trip.

The last of the snow melted off the roof when I reached Blythe, CA.

Despite the in-transit trials, I had a great time. It was good living off the grid with my friends, soaking up the sun, fishing, paddling, horseback riding, and shopping for deals in Quartzsite. I almost sold the Mobile Mansion once — I had a decent deal to trade it for a truck camper and still get cash in hand. But I wasn’t mentally ready for such a huge downsizing. I made some improvements to the Mobile Mansion, thinking I might keep it after all.

Living in Arizona along the Colorado River in the Mobile Mansion last winter was tough. Not.

I regretted not taking that offer when I left Arizona in February and started my trip to California for my frost control work there. Truck trouble stranded my truck and the Mobile Mansion in southern California, really screwing up my plans. I went home, fetched the helicopter for my contract, and spent some time in the Sacramento area with it. But without the Mobile Mansion to live in, I didn’t want to be there. I went home, leaving the helicopter, my new used truck, and the Mobile Mansion scattered around California. It wasn’t until April that I was able to fetch everything and bring it home.

After cleaning the Mobile Mansion out yet again, I brought it right to a sale lot in North Wenatchee. Once again, the sales guy told me how sure he was that he’d sell it — possibly even within a few weeks.

But I didn’t wait for the Mobile Mansion to sell before getting on with my plans. (I am so done waiting for someone else to do something to move forward with my life.) I bought a truck camper to replace it and almost immediately put it to use. After an overnight “shakedown tour,” I put it to work housing one of the pilots who worked for me in Quincy. (I suspect he would have been more comfortable in the Mobile Mansion. Oh, well.)

The sales lot guy was unable to sell it. I think it’s because he was asking so much more than it was worth, hoping to turn a tidy profit on my rig. And the fact that when he didn’t feel like coming to work, he didn’t — so the lot was closed more often than it was open. (Needless to say, he won’t be seeing me again.)

It Pays to Wait

Fortunately, I hadn’t stopped telling the people I know about it. And two of them were interested — but not for the price the guy on the lot was asking.

We agreed on a price. Ironically, it was more than the price my wasband had accepted on our jointly owned 40-acres of vacation property in Northern Arizona the month before. (Desperate sellers will take anything. Yes, I accepted the low offer, too, but the only thing I was desperate about was finally ending any ties I had to the sad sack old man I’d married 10 years before. The money was nothing. Almost literally.)

And I didn’t have to split the proceeds with anyone.

I delivered the RV to the new owners on Monday. I let one of them use my truck to back it into their hangar, which was just deep enough for him to back it in. I showed them how to unhook it. I gave them the full tour, including the “secrets” I’d learned about it in the five years I’d spent so much time in it. That took nearly an hour. I had mixed feelings as I was doing it, but I think the overwhelming feeling was that of relief.

Yesterday, I met them at the bank where we signed and notarized the title and other papers and I got my check. After handshakes and even a hug, I left them and went right to the bank to drop off the check.

Although I’m a tiny bit sad about closing the Mobile Mansion’s chapter in my life, I’m also very happy to do it. To me, the Mobile Mansion was a constant reminder of broken promises, miscommunication, and lies. Although I’ll miss its spacious comfort when I travel, I’m very glad it’s gone.

The First Mushroom Hunt of Autumn 2016

Posted on September 14, 2016 by Maria Langer

Limited success and a bunch of new mushrooming resources.

Cooler weather is upon us and that means the chanterelle mushrooms are coming into season.

Last Friday morning I went out for a hike/mushroom hunt with my hiking friend, Sue. Sue knows all kinds of things about plants and animals and even rocks, so going on a hike with her is a great learning experience. And although she doesn’t eat mushrooms, her husband does and she’s always game to go hunting with me.

The Hike

We chose a trail we both like up Icicle Creek beyond Leavenworth, WA. It’s a bit of a drive — about 50 miles from my home, including more than 10 on gravel. Another mushrooming friend of mine claimed she’d found chanterelles right on the trail. I was doubtful and I think Sue was, too. So as we hiked, we took occasional forays into the forest on one side of the trail or the other, right where we thought chanterelles might grow. I did find a very nice coral-type fungus that we believe is edible; I took it with me to examine more closely later.

Then it happened: Sue found a golden chanterelle mushroom growing right alongside the trail. While she harvested it, I combed the area looking for more. She joined me. We came up empty.

I should mention here that chanterelles are pretty easy to identify. They normally have sort of misshapen caps and the gills on the underside are more like ridges or wrinkles than regular mushroom gills. They normally extend down the mushroom’s stem. You can find photos on WikiMedia. There are some “false” chanterelles and a similar looking poisonous variety called Jack O’Lantern, but it’s pretty easy to distinguish these from real chanterelles, which are prized as tasty mushrooms. If you’re interested in hunting for chanterelles, study up first and make sure you know what you’re looking for and where you might find them.

We got to a point in the trail where we were within a quarter mile of a place I’d found chanterelles the previous year and took a little detour to check it out. I walked us over to where I found them and we searched the ground. It seemed too dry. I gave up quickly and moved off to another nearby spot, but Sue stuck with it. Soon she called out “I found one!”

I hurried back. She pointed it out and I took a photo. Then we saw one nearby that was just poking out of the forest duff.

And that’s when I started seeing little mounds all over the place. Lots of young chanterelles just popping out of the ground.

A young chanterelle mushroom, just poking out of the ground.

I used my new pocketknife — I bought one with a bright orange handle so I wouldn’t lose it while mushroom hunting — to dig a few out and put them in my bag. They were all a yellowish white color with a relatively regular looking cap. I showed one to Sue and she confirmed that they were chanterelles.

We continued to hunt in that area before getting back on the trail. Sue found some other mushrooms in various stages of decay — russulas. None of them were worth keeping, even if they were of edible varieties.

We finished our hike and headed home, stopping in Leavenworth for lunch and to buy smoked meats (Cured), wine (Ryan Patrick), and cheese (Cheesemonger).

Uncertainty

If there’s a golden rule to hunting for edible mushrooms, it’s this: never eat a mushroom you find unless you are certain that it’s edible.

Several views of one of the mushrooms I harvested on Friday. When trying to get help with identification, it’s important to show as much detail as possible.

When I got home, I took a closer look at the five chanterelles I’d found. They were all smaller and much more “perfect” looking than any chanterelle I’d ever seen. What if Sue was wrong? What if they weren’t chanterelles and I ate them?

I combed through my mushroom books. None of the pictures matched what I had. I started to write Sue a warning email.

I posted some photos on Facebook, trying to see if any of my friends could advise me. Then I looked for and found three different mushroom identification groups on Facebook and signed up for each of them. I couldn’t post photos until I was approved for membership, though.

Then, as usual, I got sidetracked by something else and didn’t give it another thought until morning.

On Saturday morning, I was thinking about a chanterelle mushroom omelet. So I took my morning coffee to the computer and began searching the internet. I knew there was something called a false chanterelle, and I looked it up. That’s where I learned that false chanterelles have normal fin-like gills while real chanterelles have the wrinkle- or ridge-like gills. There was another chanterelle look-alike called a jack o’lantern that was definitely poisonous, but what I’d picked had very little in common with that. (Keep in mind that although I’m linking primarily to Wikipedia articles here, I consulted many sources.)

I finished the email to Sue and sent it. Then I kept researching. I wanted so badly to eat my mushrooms but I didn’t want to get sick. I’d been approved for all three mushroom identification groups on Facebook so I took and sent photos, including the ones you see here. I kept researching while I waited to hear back.

Around that time, I found a trio of photos on the Mushroom Forager website’s page about Hedgehog Mushrooms. It illustrated three similar mushrooms. The middle photo was almost identical to what I had.

This image, which can be found at The Mushroom Forager website, helped convince me I had chanterelles.

I started cutting up my chanterelles for an omelet.

Then I checked back with Facebook. The mushroom identification group members were starting to chime in. The first few were pretty sure that it wasn’t chanterelles. I put the mushrooms away in a container in the fridge and had an omelet without mushrooms.

Throughout the day, more responses trickled in. And this is where the group dynamics really come into play. Some were sure that they weren’t chanterelles. Some were sure that they were. So I really wasn’t any better off than I’d been before consulting the groups.

Finally, late in the day, some folks who obviously knew a lot about mushrooms started responding. They identified the type of chanterelle with its genius and species: cantharellus subalbidus. While some group members argued with them, they were firm. They provided additional information about the area in which they grow: old growth forests like the one I’d been in. One even provided a link to a page that illustrated it.

I should mention here that of the three groups I joined, the Mushroom Identification Page group seemed to have the most knowledgeable participants, although none of them were free of people who offered incorrect information based on limited facts. (I really need to do a blog post about Facebook group dynamics.)

I should mention that by this time, Sue had also responded to my email. She was certain it was a cantharellus subalbidus, too. She has some resources where she looked them up. I guess she didn’t want to poison her husband!

Feasting on My Find

That evening, I sautéed some thinly sliced veal and prepared a chanterelle cream sauce for it. I had it with a side of fresh steamed green beans from my garden and glass of sauvignon blanc. Delicious.

I finished up the mushrooms the next day by cooking them into an omelet with some scallions and buckboard bacon. Very tasty.

This was my fourth mushroom hunting trip and the second for chanterelles. (I hunted twice for morels this spring.) I marked the GPS coordinates for my find and plan to return this week. Although it hasn’t rained, I’m hoping that cool, shady area of the forest is damp enough for the chanterelles to grow.

I really enjoy collecting my own food, whether it’s foraging in the forest for seasonal mushrooms, gleaning from an orchard after harvest, tending my own garden, or collecting eggs from my chickens. There’s something very special about having that kind of connection with your food.

But best of all, you can’t beat it for freshness.

The Bighorn Sheep in My Yard

Posted on September 10, 2016 by Maria Langer

Wild Kingdom* out my window.

There are bighorn sheep in the cliffs across the road from my home. I often hear them clattering around in the rocks, creating mini landslides. I’ve also seen them quite often.

Last year, they’d show up pretty regularly across the street in my neighbor’s yard. By regularly, I mean around midday every day. For weeks. I even had the misfortune of seeing my neighbor outside, buck naked, taking photos of them when I was watching them through binoculars and movement caught my eye.

They were gone for quite a while. Sure, I’d hear them up in the cliffs and the sound would often get Penny all worked up. Despite numerous helicopter rides with me, her hearing remains excellent and she often hears them before I do.

A few weeks ago, they started showing up again. A pretty big herd of mostly females. One time, they even put on quite a show for some weekend guests who’d come with their RV. We sat up on the deck having a late breakfast while they grazed on weeds in my neighbor’s yard.

It wasn’t easy to take photos of the sheep at the road; the sun was right behind them.

The other day, they were on my side of the road. I watched them, fearing that they might start grazing on the willow trees I’d planted alongside the road last year. But they seemed more interested in the weeds than the trees. Good.

A cropped cell phone picture of Penny facing off with one of the sheep.

On Thursday, I was working on some shelves in my garage when Penny started barking at something. Turned out that she was near the end of the driveway, facing off with one of the bighorn sheep. I managed to get a photo with my phone before the sheep bounded off. I mean that quite literally — it ran off with a hopping motion that was actually quite funny to see. But what really surprised both Penny and me was that the sheep wasn’t alone — are they ever? There were at least a dozen more in my front yard, hidden from view by the tall weeds and my shed. They took off after their friend, running across the road.

I took a break and went upstairs for some lunch. I ate out on the deck. The sheep had moved into the road about halfway down my property line. Some of them were actually lying down in the road. I live on a dead end road and there are only three occupied homes beyond mine, so there isn’t much traffic.

Seriously? Lying down in the road?

Eventually, however, one of my neighbors went out. Even though they obviously saw the sheep — how could you possibly miss a herd right in the road? — and they drove slowly, the sheep moved.

Into my yard.

As I watched, they came closer and closer to my home. I know they saw me up on the deck watching, but they didn’t seem too interested. They came to the north side of my place, the side that faces the Columbia River and Wenatchee Valley. They were nibbling on the tops of the native grass and weeds that grow wild there. (I have 10 acres and the vast majority of it has “nature’s landscaping.”) They came closer and closer. At one point, one of them was right at the edge of the gravel drive, not 100 feet from where I watched from the deck.

My Nikon was handy and I’d popped the 70-300mm lens on it when they first came into the yard. They were so close that I had to zoom all the way out to capture this group of the herd. This is 70mm from my deck, uncropped. A handful of others didn’t fit in the frame.

They were beautiful. And healthy. Adult females mostly, with a few youngsters.

Another shot from my deck. This was shot at 300mm and is not cropped. They were close!

This is the video I Periscoped. It’s a shame it saves a downsampled version of the video.

I took pictures, of course. Lots of pictures. And video. I did a live broadcast on Periscope and another on Facebook. I wanted to share my experience with my friends. (I guess that’s what this blog post is about.)

I’d left the door open and when I saw them looking down at something, I followed their glance. Penny was out there, sizing them up. I didn’t want her scaring them off so I called her, softly. She seemed to debate whether she should come. But then she trotted back into the house and up the stairs. She joined me on the deck to watch them and stayed quiet.

And then they just left. After about 20 minutes grazing in my side yard, one of them headed off purposefully and the others followed. I watched them go. They crossed my driveway and then the road and headed back up toward the cliffs.

Did they come back yesterday when I was out hiking and hunting for mushrooms with a friend? I don’t know, but I bet they did. And I bet they came back today when I was out doing helicopter rides in Quincy. Tomorrow, I plan to get some work done at home. Maybe I’ll see them again.

I hope so.

—
* Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom was a television show about animals that originally aired from 1963 until 1988. I grew up watching this show. A new version began airing on Animal Planet in 2002. Learn more here and here.

The “Million Dollar View”

Posted on September 8, 2016 by Maria Langer

A friend reminds me about what I now take for granted.

Not sure if anyone is noticing, but I’m doing my best to blog every morning these days. That means keeping them short when I have other stuff to do. And believe me, I have a lot of other stuff to do.

I’m ready to declare email bankruptcy and just clear all of this out.

After spending about an hour with my coffee and nightmarish email inbox, I looked up and realized that the sun had come up. I looked out my side windows — the ones facing the Wenatchee Valley and Columbia River — and was instantly rewarded with the amazing view I’ve come to take for granted.

Here’s what I see most mornings, right from my windows. Not too shabby, eh? Click the photo to view a much larger version where you can see the detail — including my “Lookout Point” bench in the bottom right.

I had a friend over for dinner last night. As the sun was setting, she remarked that I had a “million dollar view.” I looked out and agreed that it was beautiful. (I didn’t mention that it so often looked better.) I told her that it looked best in the morning in the golden hour light, when the low-lying sun cast deep shadows that bought out the texture of the mountains and hillsides. Like in the photo above. Same in the afternoon, when the cliffs across the river were illuminated just right. (Note to self: add photo of that.)

I’m a view person, as I’ve mentioned elsewhere in this blog. Looking out and seeing the world around me energizes me and puts me at peace — at the same time. Yes, I like tall pine trees and forests and canyons, but being surrounded by those things in tight quarters would stifle me, making me feel closed in and possibly smothered. Being able to look out and see for miles and miles makes me feel good about myself and my world.

The seasons are changing now; autumn is coming. The view changes with the seasons. Right now, the cherry orchard on the right has irrigation turned off and is being allowed to die; I suspect that when apple harvest is done, they’ll tear out those trees. Will they get new ones in before winter? Probably not; it’ll be a project I can watch in the spring. There’s still a tiny bit of snow up in the Enchantments, which are hidden in this photo by the low clouds on the left. The river bends as it makes its way into Wenatchee; in the evening, it reflects the changing color of the sky.

So much to see, right from my windows. Like an ever-changing series of paintings, a triptych with more than just three panels, separated by a few inches of wall between each view.

I cannot express how glad I am that my life took the turn it did back in 2012 when I became free to make all of my life decisions. That freedom made it possible to buy 10 acres of undeveloped land high on a cliffside shelf overlooking an amazingly beautiful valley. It made it possible for me to plan and build the home I wanted, a home that would meet my needs and bring this view into every room.

A “million dollar view”? That’s a bit of an exaggeration. But it’s priceless to me.

An Eclectic Mind

Web site and blog for Maria Langer, writer, video producer, jewelry artist, boat captain, and helicopter pilot. Blogging since 2004.

Category Archives: Days in My Life