I'm sitting at the airport in Las Vegas waiting for my connection to San Jose with Tchaikovsky playing in my earbuds to try to drown out the noise here. This is one of my least favorite airports, but it's been almost a month since I've seen Reid so I dropped the Navi off at the St. Louis airport this morning and I'm headed to Mountain View this evening.

I spent the past week at an RV maintenance class in Whittington, IL. $1640 seemed like a lot for the 5 day class so I wasn't sure if I'd feel that I got my money's worth.  I'm so glad I decided to participate. It was a small class with me and 3 other guys. I've seen a lot of training in my day and this was one of the best.

It could be that I was motivated given the fact that I've already had a number of maintenance issues on the Navi even though I've only been on my journey for 2 months. But mostly it was the instructor—Terry Cooper or Coop (the Texas RV professor) who made what could have been a very boring and complex topic interesting and understandable. I actually got excited about reading my RV user's guide.  I don't know if I'll be able to maintain or repair everything that comes my way but at least I have the confidence to give it a try and the knowledge to explain what's going on. Terry Cooper and Steve Anderson started an RV Inspector program and I wish I would have known about the program before I bought my RV. I got lucky and it seems to the Navi is fairly solid for her age but she could have turned out to be a lemon.  What they're offering is similar to the home inspection business only for RV (or potential RV owners).

While I could go on for more training and potentially become an inspector to help others enjoy the RV living/lifestyle and make a little money, I think I'd rather help them market their quality program.

Steve runs the Workamper program which matches RVr's with employers (usually campgrounds) and work opportunities. Combining Terry's 40 years of RV maintenance and teaching experience with the Workamper program seems an excellent match. I found them both to be energetic, professional, highly competent and exceptionally caring. One of the guys in the program was 79 years old and his AC did not work in his Roadtrek.  Even though the training was over for the day, Terry spent extra time with Ralph to see if he could help him resolve his issue.  It turned out to be an easy fix and I was impressed with his thoughtfulness.  We all had some little issue and in addition to covering the prescribed material and hands on practice, Terry helped us either fix or troubleshoot each of our issues.  I really like these guys and will do what I can to help them promote the RV inspection business.  And, I'd say I got more than my money's worth with the increased confidence in handling and maintaining my own RV.

So, I'm off to California for a week to help Reid find a house there. We plan to make a quick trip to Houston over the 4^th and then I fly back to St. Louis to pick up where I left off with a visit to the Dancing Rabbit eco-village in Rutledge, MO and then the Abundant Life eco-village in Fairfield, Iowa, followed by a Winnebago factory tour in Forest City, Iowa which should be a good accoutrement to the RV maintenance training.