Hubby and I have talked about making a written check list. You know, the kind of list pilots use. After almost a year of full-time RVing, we still haven’t made that list; a take off list so to speak, a list to review before hitting the road.
Knowing Al and I, we’d probably forget to use the list anyway. And speaking of forgetting; check out the photo of us visiting the dump station at the Fruita visitor center. The visitor center is located just west of Grand Junction, Colorado, in the town of Fruita and is a great place to stop, relax, and pick up all kinds of info on the beautiful state of Colorado.
Looks like someone forgot to lower the TV antenna. The helicopter is part of a lovely Vietnam War Memorial and the rugged terrain of the Colorado National Monument can be seen in the distance. We always enjoy our time hanging around the quaint little town of Fruita…. gateway to the Colorado National Monument and nearby world renowned biking trails.
While staying in my brother and sister-in-laws driveway, we would make a weekly visit to the Fruita visitor center to clean our tanks. We wanted to make sure our tanks didn’t come close to filling. Hmm, where’s that check list? We obviously made it to the center without a problem with the antenna in the erect position, but on the return drive we weren’t so lucky. Our TV antenna met some tree branches and after a quick altercation, the tree won.
No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t erect the antenna. It was official, our antenna was suffering from erectile dysfunction. This was a problem a blue pill couldn’t fix. The antenna was also beat up pretty bad and the mother board was even exposed.
Al and I were surprised the antenna worked at all, but it did ok by bringing in a couple of channels which allowed us a little TV viewing until we could have a new antenna delivered. We even received some reception during a heavy rainstorm which amazed us considering how damaged and exposed the antenna was.
After some research, we chose this Jack RV TV antenna that doesn’t require raising and lowering. No more need to remember to crank the antenna down. Yay!
JACK Digital HDTV Over-The-Air Antenna w/Built in Signal Finder – White
Although it was relatively easy to install the new antenna, it did take us most of the morning to complete the task.
First the old RV antenna needed to be removed and since we have a rubber roof on the 5th wheel, it was crucial we take our time and not cause any damage to the roof. Al used a blow dryer to heat up the old caulk and with a PLASTIC putty knife he gently lifted it to remove. A metal putty knife could easily rip the rubber roof membrane.
Once the old antenna was removed, we set about installing the new one. Once Al had everything hooked up and fastened with screws, I set about with the caulking. I used a special RV roof sealant that has a rubber consistency once dried.
Geocel 56801 White Advanced RV EPDM Roof Sealant
We’ve been enjoying our new antenna for about a week now and are very pleased. We seem to get better reception and the colors appear to be more vibrant…… better yet, we don’t need to remember to lower the antenna before hitting the road.
A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty – Winston Churchill
Live Laugh RV 
With the antenna suffering from erectile dysfunction, it probably just choosing channels and TV programs that can be pornographic. Ahihihi 😀
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Ah, you are a bad boy LOL. 🙂
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That looks like a great fix you two did!!! I love it when a plan comes together…(and no “goddammit Donna)’s are muttered!!!!!
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Funny I actually wrote a checklist, it’s saved in my laptop and we’ve never used it! Hector wouldn’t use it anyway, but maybe writing it down helped me retain everything. Glad you wound up with an improved antenna out of this little incident, we have the same one.
Brenda
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So many things to remember, Ingrid. You look quite dangerous, wielding that antenna. 🙂
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Ahh the list. We don’t have a written one either. Also talked about it but no. I just always maintain an ordered procedure and if interupted, start over checking things off. Great antenna choice.
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Over the winter I installed the Jack antenna as well. Works great, all HD reception now.
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Could explain the improved color. Thus far we’re pretty pleased with it 🙂
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You travel with an HD TV, yes?
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Our friends put that exact antenna on their motorhome and love it. Good luck!
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It’s working great so far, so no complaints. We would have eventually installed this one but the tree made it happen sooner rather than later LOL.
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We have made the same mistake. The trees win every time!
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Those darn trees 🙂
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now you’ll get to see the Broncos and Rockies in much more vivid color….you are right, there is ALWAYS something to do. Sometimes it’s a have to do, or a need to do, or the occasional want to do that i get to do. Have a great weekend.
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Yep, whether it’s a house or RV there’s always chores. We would enjoy a good game between the Broncos and Bears… hmm, who to root for?
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I’d have to make a check list or I’d be forgetting everything. I didn’t know there were so many things to RVing.
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Yep, there’s lots to think about as well as a fair amount of maintenance regarding RVing. So whether one owns a house or an RV there’s always chores!
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We have a check list on our iPhones, but despite that we drove off one time with the door wide open, and the stairs and handrail down. So embarrassing. Luckily hubby finally noticed once we were on the highway. We only lost the latch that holds the door open. I guess that’s not too bad after three years. Now we both do a walk around in opposite directions and give each other a high five when we both feel confident that we’ve done everything.
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Lucky that you didn’t do more damage to the RV. These things are definitely embarrassing. I guess each incident is a learning experience…..gotta look on the bright side! I like that – walk around in opposite directions with a high five. We’ll need to implement that 🙂
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Put that on your check list 🙂
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We don’t have a checklist, but we do each have our own chores so we know who to blame when something is forgotten 🙂 We’ve talked about replacing our antenna with the kind that you don’t have to raise and lower. It’s so easy to forget about, it shades one our solar panels, and it’s ugly! Happy to see that with a little elbow grease it’s a project we could tackle ourselves.
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Well, I thought we each had our own chores, but it appears there’s an overlap or lack there of LOL. You guys wouldn’t have any trouble changing out the antenna. It was actually pretty easy. Dealing with the rubber roof was our biggest concern so once the old one was removed the install of the new one went fast.
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Mike and I are checklist people. We have a Departure list and an Arrival list. We use them EVERY TIME. They are very detailed. I will email them to you. We had a pre-departure checklist when we were living on the boat, too. On the boat, it’s so important for safety reasons. So it’s like second nature now. On the RV, the motivation is more based on damage-control!
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Yep, it’s all about ‘damage control’ and safety. I’ll remind the Captain of that 😉 I look forward to your email 🙂
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Those darn “attack trees”! We’ve been involved with one or two of them ourselves. Nice job installing the new antenna!
Nina
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We usually like tackling repairs ourselves so we better understand the ins and outs of the RV. The install turned out to be easier than we thought. And as for those trees…..yep, they do like to attack and provide unwanted pinstriping 🙂
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Just in the past two months we have left 11′ vertical ham radio antenna up (bridge sheared off top 7′); left rear awning pulled out (it survived intact); driven 1/2 day with neither breakaway nor 7 pin connector hooked to truck. Alarmingly, these have suddenly become both more frequent (instead of once in a blue moon), and these incidents have been on the heels of one another.
A pilot friend advised starting the pre-flight check at 50′ away from rig, looking at the entire structure. This advice was just after we carefully did two 360’s before pulling away and killing ham radio antenna. We had neither one looked UP that morning. And I since also have added a warning sign at the trailer’ ham radio station that posts the antenna status.
Two years ago, on Top of the World Highway between Dawson City YT and Chicken AK we had left both fantastic fans open and one running high speed, AND left the water pump switch turned on. The latter was, at the time, normal for us, but not now.
We stopped an hour into the trip and found water running out of the trailer at all points. The lav faucet had bounced open and the corresponding drain had popped closed. 20 gallons of fresh water was sloshing around in our trailer’s 23′ cabin, trying to find ground. If we had not left the water pump switch “on” . . .
The road was incredibly dry and so very dusty. We had pumped, with the high speed fantastic fan, 10#s of dirt from the road dust into our cabin. The cabin with 20 gallons of water sloshing around.
We spent our wedding anniversary, in Chicken AK, emptying all compartments, sweeping, vacuuming, mopping, drying, and wryly laughing at ourselves. No one else to blame, and no real harm done that time.
BTW, we installed the same Jack antenna but in a retrofit pkg. Like you, we r very happy with how sharp it is. Ours bolted to the Winegard parallelogram arms so it gets altitude to see over tall fifth wheels next to us and was a ten minute replacement job. And lowering it will be item two on checklist, immed below ham radio antenna item.
Today we accept your reminder — today we make a checklist we can use before tomorrow’s trip from Adel IA to Beresford SD. It starts now, before we cause something we can’t fix.
Thanks for sharing.
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Oh my goodness, I had to read this one out loud to hubby. Thanks for sharing as we’ve been feeling a little stupid as of late. And hubby WAS a commercial Airline pilot….duh! Hopefully we’ve gotten all the embarrassing faux pas out of the way and our upcoming travels will be uneventful 🙂
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How many times has Al forgotten you… none… that’s what I thought, so who needs a check list??
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Not that he hasn’t wanted to forget moi a time or two LOL…..but what would he do without me? With no one to supervise or tell him where to turn, he’d be lost 🙂
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So I repeat.. who needs a check list as long as you are there… Al expects you to remember all the small things, he has the important job of listening to where you want him to go…
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I won’t ask how you tried to solve the antenna’s droopiness 🙂 I like lists and my Hubby says I need a list to remember all the lists. Love the quote at the end of the post. Brilliant!
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It was hopeless and it remained flaccid, thus a replacement was necessary 🙂 I make grocery lists all the time and then leave them on my desk….duh! Then when I get home it’s like ‘oh yeah, I needed to get that’…..oops forgot! Ah, such is life.
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Love the final quote….and of course reference to the “blue pill!”
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Thanks C…..never a dull moment 🙂
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Hilarious post, and I love the photo of you on the roof, Ingrid — is that your very own caulking gun? We have checklists, but mostly we just turn to each other and say (as we’re driving down the road)…”Didja close the vents? Didja turn off the hot water heater? Didja secure the propane tank cover?” (Ripped that off one time at 60 mph) And so on….
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But of course that’s my caulking gun. Caulking is just one of my many talents as a former licensed general contractor/home builder, but pointing my finger and giving orders is my number one talent. I have that one perfected, but not everyone listens LOL.
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Oh, of course!!! I had forgotten about your former career! (Nobody listens when I point and give orders, either.)
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I wonder when I might do that or something worse. I have a checklist too, and I am pretty faithful about using it on my departures. The arrival one not so. The good thing is it was an excuse to buy one of those new nifty ones. I hear they can pull in signals much better. Thanks for sharing though, when I make the mistakes I don’t feel so alone.
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Oh, never alone! I would think a check list is probably even more important when traveling solo, but then again we’ve managed a bunch of mishaps lately and there’s two of us 😉
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Nice job! Working on the roof is so much fun…NOT!
We solved the antenna problem by hooking a large ribbon on the handle whenever it is raised. So far we have always remembered to take it down since that ribbon is hanging down in the bedroom.
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Our handle is over my side of the bed and one of us usually cranks it down the night before we travel. Oh well, we like the new one and I always have fun climbing on the roof….hubby not so much 🙂
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The checklist was:
1. Antennae down,
2. Step up.
3. Wife in.
Now you only need 2 & 3!
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These days hubby would be content with only #2 LOL. Ah, trips to the Maroon Bells or today, Telluride, can’t help but put a smile on our faces 🙂
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Steve is a checklist kind, we have it for almost everything we do.
We also replaced our antenna long before we began full timing. Like you we forgot to take it down and luckily one of the camper flagged us and pointed at the antenna. So after that, Steve says we can’t have that mistake again 😦
Ingrid you are the loveliest assistant up there and doing a great job, but I mean both of you are doing great job.
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No you were right….I…..did a great job up there. First supervising then caulking LOL. And I can’t count how many times folks flagged us down regarding our erect antenna. You’d think we’d learn. Perhaps subconsciously we wanted the new antenna and couldn’t justify replacing a perfectly good one 🙂
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Loved your story! When I read the title, I thought if she is relating to erectile dysfunction, this is going to be a hoot…and it was. Just last fall, John left the antenna up and keeerunch ….. tree limb won! We had Camping World install ours. Wish we would have known it was so easy to install.
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We like to tackle most repairs ourselves. It helps us learn the ins and outs of the RV and online tutorials are the best info. Hubby has restrung almost all our blinds and did so after watching a you tube video. I think I need to do a post on all the fixes we’ve done….it seems to never end 🙂
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Great job you two! This is something that hasn’t happened to us yet (never say never), but I must admit to being a “list” person. I do have a checklist that I use whenever we get ready to leave a place. But then again I am one of those people who, when going through my list, if I find something I did but forgot to add to the list, I add it then cross it off. Wonder what that says about me? 😉
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You would think a former pilot would want a check list to work off of! Me? I’m always winging it. I make lists and then never use them. Hmm, wonder what that says about me LOL
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I think it best we don’t delve too deeply into what it says about us. Probably want to keep a little mystery swirling around us. 😉
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I know we were glad we changed out our antenna shortly after we headed out full time. Our reason was a bit more lazy…John didn’t like having to get up and hand turn the wheel on the ceiling! Our new antenna has a remote so he can dial in the signal from the chair…haha! Wouldn’t want the man to get up:) Good you two were able to do the task yourselves. Enjoy your new found freedom with a few extra seconds when packing up:)
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Love it….I am NOT telling hubby about your remote LOL. The new antenna is working out sweet so I guess all things happen for a reason….at least that’s what we keep telling ourselves 🙂
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