Another outing with Birds of a Feather--Part II

Our meeting with the Birds continued through the weekend. The afternoon Saturday was spent watching our Oklahoma State Cowboys beat up on Iowa State.

During the evening we had our annual, end of the season combination Thanksgiving/Christmas pot luck dinner. As is normal in these affairs the food was plentiful and fantastic. After dinner we had our annual gift exchange. Of course, we do ours with a good round of Dirty Santa. Was not as lively this year as in the past since the guy we usually pick on did not get his number called until towards the end. After dinner and festivities we all adjourned to watch the Oklahoma Sooners get mauled by the Nebraska Cornhuskers.

Sunday morning was time to break camp and head for home. Spent Sunday afternoon winterizing the coach and it is now put away in the storage lot for the winter.

Another outing with Birds of a Feather

We are out in the coach for, apparently, the last time this year. Our local RV club is having it's final 2009 meet this weekend. We locked up the house and came over to the Twin Fountains RV Park on the east side of Oklahoma City this past Wednesday. The rest of the club came in on Thursday. Today the group decided to visit the new Oklahoma History Center that is located over by the State Capitol Building. This is a great facility with many displays on the different aspects of the development of Oklahoma and on the Oklahoma people who have made this a great state. One very nice exhibit is a replica of the Winnie Mae, the famous plane that Wiley Post flew around the world. (The real Winnie Mae is in the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C.)

The front of the History Center faces the Capitol Building. The Oklahoma State Capitol Building was built in the 1920's and 1930's. At the time they ran out of money and were not able to include the dome that was in the original design. For many years the building, which was built from native stone brought in from quarries in the southwestern part of the state, sat without a dome. Over the years there were many movements to add a dome but they never seemed to get off the ground. Finally, in the 1990's, we got a Governor who made up his mind this was going to happen during his term. The building now has the dome that was in the original plans.

Back at the campground our club has eight members coaches here this weekend. The park requires us to have at least 10 coaches to be able to use their rally room without charge. Since we only had eight we were going to have to pay $50.00 per day to be able to use the room after 7:00pm. Jo and I have an RV friend, through the Monaco groups, that just happens to be on his way from California back down to Florida, where he spends his winters. He also had a traveling companion who is in her own coach. They were planning to stay here at the same park this weekend while they do a little sightseeing in Oklahoma City. Soooo, we just added them to our club for the weekend and now have our required ten coaches. We are not only enjoying our visit with Fred White and Pat, his travel buddy, but have included them in our group. Tonight we all went down to Bricktown, the downtown OKC entertainment district, for dinner at Toby Keith's I Love This Bar and Grill for dinner. The seats in the waiting area are Ford pickup truck tail gates. Fred, Pat and Joanne tried one out while we waited for our table. With the campers plus another couple of visitors for the evening we had 17 all total in the group for dinner. Hope Toby appreciates our business tonight.

Tea Party Express II comes to Oklahoma City

We had the privilege of attending the Oklahoma City stop of the Tea Party Express II this evening. The original Tea Party Express covered much of the country this past summer. Tea Party Express II is going to all the states that were missed the first time around. The OKC stop was held on the north steps of the State Capitol Building. The local activities started around 5:00 pm with a kind of an open mic for local people to speak. The Tea Party Express II buses were scheduled to be in town in time for them to start their program by 6:00pm. They were coming from Wichita, Kansas, where they had done a 1:00pm program so they were running late. It was close to 7:00pm before the national group got started.

All the people who are traveling with the Tea Party Express are volunteers. They have taken time away from their normal lives and jobs to spend several weeks on a bus, performing several times per day. As stated, they were in Wichita at 1:00pm and then came on to Oklahoma City. After the performance here they will leave for Amarillo, Texas, where they'll spend the night and do a show tomorrow morning. These are dedicated Patriots speaking out with their conservative beliefs. The crowd turnout here in Oklahoma City was tremendous, as they have seen in most of the cities where they have been. It was hard to estimate how many people turned out but the North Capitol Plaza was packed with people spreading out in several directions. There were several hundred people out there tonight.

Not only do we agree with what the Tea Party people have to say we also went to see our good friends, Ron & Kay Rivoli. As I have posted in previous entries Ron & Kay perform their Rivoli RV Revue throughout the country. They have performed at many of our Monaco America rallies, including the one last month in Gulf Shores, Alabama. They will also be performing at the Monaco America rally in Hutchinson, Kansas, in May 2010. We really enjoy their music and are glad to be able to call them our friends.