Good, bad and ugly things going on.

Been a busy few days again, trying to catch up on things we needed and wanted to do.
We went across town to the Mail Box place and picked up our mail. One good thing, this time when the HOA did their four sided inspection of the house they DIDN'T find any violations. I was amazed, they almost always can find something, One year they found ONE WEED that needed to be pulled. So Bill put the Jeep in the back yard again. Will take it out next week to take to welder to fix the towing apparatus.
But in picking up the mail we also discovered our health insurance company has still not reimbursed us for Bill's surgery in Mexico in January. I knew there was a letter from them so opened it first. Heart stopped -- it was a check for 7 CENTS!!! They have had all the paper work since June...So I called them. I was told...everything has been approved - but of course she didn't know for how much. She said she didn't know why the check hadn't been sent out. And she had no idea why we got a check for 7 cents - actually it is the second one we've got from them for that amount. Says something about interest paid. So I was told to wait and call them next Friday. I think they owe me more than 7 cents interest.
Then I went to print out a couple of emails that were receipts and instructions about a change on our web page and discovered I had no black ink. It must have dried up over the summer. No problem, had to go to WalMart anyway.
I also updated our Garmin. That was sure easy. Plug it in and poke the UPDATE button and it was off and running, took about 45 minutes. I checked and sure enough the new bypass - less than a year old - around Boulder City was now showing up. Coming home the GPS was freaking out while we were traveling it. Kept wanting us to turn off on dirt roads to get back onto the old road. Also checked to see if the bypass around one city in Mexico showed up - nope. Guess they don't update Mexico too much.
Then another aggravation with Dish TV.  Actually two aggravations. The first one involved the external hard drive I put a bunch of movies on before we left on vacation. I'd called Dish and asked if I moved the movies from our Hopper receiver to an external drive would we be able to watch them in our RV on our Wally receiver. The answer, after checking someone else was YES. So I spent time moving the movies - a weird thing, it didn't copy them to the hard drive it actually MOVED them, so they were no longer on the DVR. No problem. Well when I tried to use the hard drive in the RV found out it had to be activated to the tune of $40. Okay, activate. Then up pops a box on the TV - Hard drive has to be formatted to work with Dish - before I transferred the movies the hard drive WAS formatted for Dish. WHAT? Formatting it would remove everything on it. So forget it and give me my activation fee back. Oh well, when we got home I plugged it back into the DVR, up pops a message Hard Drive has to be formatted for Dish. WHAT? On the phone to Dish. Got a very knowledgeable tech person who told me I was given the wrong info to begin with - can not use same hard drive on two different receivers. Okay so where are my movies? Well when they activated it to use in the RV it erased everything on it. Dead silence on my part. So she explained again what happened. Nothing could be done about it. Will not write down my thoughts. But they will send me a new Google Remote...Thanks bye.
Yesterday I discovered Dish TV is in a dispute with Fox Sports 1 - which is the channel NASCAR is on for the trucks and for the Cup cars at the beginning of the new season. So much for watching to see who wins the truck championship. We left Direct TV because they cancelled the Bein Sports channel - soccer games. No other satellite providers so hope they settle with FS1 soon
Now I'm trying to find medical insurance for our trip to Mexico this winter. A while back I'd talked to some one who had a policy for both of us for three months that was a reasonable price. I kept her name and number - now I cannot for the life of me find that post it note. No idea what I did with it. I remember thinking I'll put it right here because this is stuff we'll be using when getting ready to leave for Mexico. No idea where it was and not sure who I was talking to. Later I remembered who I called so did finally get to the right person. However getting conflicting info from company and customers. The one thing we want is a policy that will pay the hospital directly right away so we don't have to come up with the money up front and get reimbursed after coming home. The representative said the hospital gets paid, the reviews says they had to pay up front and turn in paper work after getting home. Same way our present medical insurance works. 
But did do one enjoyable thing - I bought my new camera. It is a Sony Cybershot HX80. So far I kind of like it. But it is quite a bit heavier then my old ones. And it doesn't have as quick a recovery time between photos. It has a pop up view finder that will be nice out in the bright sun. The flash also pops up, not sure I like that. Has a 30x zoom. 

 See the tower way out there. 

And the monitor can be adjusted. Neat when trying to take a selfie or looking way up or down. Just have to remember to use it. Bill ordered me a charger and several batteries for it, should get them today. I like to have two or three extra batteries in case I go crazy taking photos. Which I do all the time. Did take a sunset shot last night - on the right setting the reds in the sky really showed up. 

I still like my OLD Sony  WX80 and will take it to Mazatlan to see if the camera repair guy there can fix its problems.
We are starting to have significant cool down here in Vegas,  and getting a lot of wind for a couple of days. 
Will eventually do a summary of our trip and finish posting about some of the places we went. 
So that is what is going on here.

Little Bighorn Part 2

The continuation of our Little Bighorn visit.
There was so much to see at Little Bighorn National Monument and so much to learn. It was hard to fathom the carnage that went on in these now peaceful hills. We left in a rather sober mood.
To continue on where I left off.

 I tried to match my photos to the pictures on the information panels.

 I know this is kind of out of place but there were bazillions of grasshoppers all over. They were so thick some of the children visiting were afraid of them.

 The Indians were by the river in the trees.

 Could not get a good picture of this one, sun was just wrong. But It shows the military on the ridge.

Just kind of makes you grind your teeth. and shake your head.

Mean while Reno was in trouble.

I know this isn't readable but it explains how the bodies of the horses were found during some construction work. Only two of Custer's horses survived the battle.

Some of the soldiers were buried here and it is now an active Veteran's Cemetery.

Waling over to a separate monument. The headstone of an Indian. More coins and pebbles on it.

Pretty much sums it up.

Tomorrow back to regular blogging

Visit to Little Bighorn National Monument Part 1

I'm going to cheat today and Post Part 1 of our visit to Little Bighorn. Tomorrow will post the rest of it. I've had them ready just didn't get around to posting them. 
We are still trying to catch up things from being gone two month. So here it is...
We stayed in Hardin, Mt so we could revisit Little Bighorn National Monument. We were there in 2003 but just for a quick visit. Turning off the highway towards the park.

A bush with prayer ribbons and pouches on it. 

The cemetery, it is a regular Veterans Cemetery. Not just for the soldiers of the battle. 

We were there early before all the traffic. So we could stop and read all the information signs. If you want to read an in depth article on Custer Click Here. It is very, very interesting. 

The area they are talking about. 

The Indians were camped down by the river.

There are white headstones scattered through out the area. Indicating where a soldier fell. 

Indian camp in the trees on the river. Notice the white markers for the soldiers. 

The markers for the Indians are a rust colored stone. Notice at the foot of the marker the items that have been left there in respect. 

Lots of coins and some plant material.

Looking towards the Indians camp down the ravine to the river.

The markers for the three soldiers mentioned above.

The ridge the Indians came down. 

It is so peaceful here now. Hard to believe or imagine what happened here.

Part of the road leaves the park and goes through private land. This is that part. 

Isn't he pretty?

Up to the last information point before turning around and heading back to Visitor Center. I'll let the signs do the talking. 

The area they are talking about. 

Heading back - They took their time crossing the road. 

First looking out over the battlefield mentioned in the above information. The it continues to pan around to see the trees and river where the Indians were camped. Continuing on around to where it began. From 400 feet. 

I will stop here until next blog on the area. Still a lot to share.