Heat of the Summer is Coming!

The Heat of an Oklahoma Summer is Coming!

Trip 4, Day 4 7/3

Well, we made it to our hotel last night, and woke up rested. We are at the SureStay Plus, by Best Western in Poteau.. We went to breakfast which was okay at best. We will head to Luba’s place today, but decided not to take Gizmo yet because we aren’t sure what condition the cats and the mobile home is in.

First stop, as it seems to be when we come here to Oklahoma, is the store. The most versatile store around here is Walmart. We bought food and supplies. We also went to our storage shed, and put a few more items into storage.

As we headed down to my sister’s house, we stopped at a few car dealers to see what the prices looked like here in Oklahoma compared to California. What we learned is that things are different. Policies and regulations in Oklahoma will take some time to learn. My understanding is that I can buy a car here in Oklahoma, with an established address, and mailing address. Before I can purchase though, I need to contact my auto insurance (in CA), and let them know I will be relocating, and buying a car in OK. Then they will cover the car so I can drive it off the lot. The car salesman also told us that once we do the paperwork, we would go to the OK DMV, with my proof of address, and register the car in Oklahoma. Nevermind, not ready to tackle all this yet….we headed to my sister’s house.

At my sister’s, we realized how warm it is getting in the mobile home and with the summer getting even warmer, the cats will not be able to survive with the minimum air circulation because the windows were closed. Opening the windows is the obvious solution, but even if the windows were opened, they have a regular window screen. If the window is opened, the cats, if they want to get out, will easily go right through the screen, therefore the windows are closed and thus no air circulation inside, and temperatures rise. This trip it was clear we needed to cover the windows with hardwire cloth to get the mobile home cooled off. Then time to tackle the windows. My sister had plenty of hard cloth, and we began covering the window with the hardcloth. With the few windows we covered, the difference was huge.

We decided the solar system set up that Will had designed was working really well, therefore he moved the panels from the top of our trailer, to the top of the roof of the mobile home. With the solar power running the fans, we set up a winning system that will keep the trailer cool through the whole summer. We were so excited by the difference that just a few windows made, my sister said go ahead and cover all the windows with the hardware cloth. Our mission for tomorrow was set.

Therefore, my first day was used to clean the animal quarters thoroughly: Changing litter, cleaning food bowls, washing and vacuuming the floor, etc. Headed to the hotel, showered, ate and called it a night…..