Sat - 8 Feb/14

As predicted - we skipped the pancake breakfast. We were up on time; however, the dreary overcast weather with continuous rain kept us in the RV.

COLD DAMP!

Florida "cuss words" for a miserable day. Heavy rain in the morning - as predicted and temps in the low 50's F . The local news stations track the rain by the minute. They give the time for the heavy rains for each city in the area. The rain started close to the time predicted with the heaviest downpour about 10 minutes later. In the last 6 hours there has been a little over 1 inch of rain. The bonus of Florida is that the sandy soil absorbs it really well.

A good day to relax. Charlotte knitted while the Olympics were on TV. I surfed the net looking for interesting things to add to my list  (mostly restaurants - grin). I also automated a few more tasks on the database program I have been designing. Still having a problem with a lot of listings in The Villages, FL. The USPS created a new postal code and the most up to date mapping programs do not have the newly developed streets. "Current" maps really means they are usually at least 2 years behind the construction or changes.

The rain lessened in the late afternoon. Just a few drops on the way to the Valentine's Day Dance in the Rec Hall. Tomorrow should be better with only a 30% chance of rain and temps in the mid-70's.

OMS (Olde Mill Stream RV Resort) is having it's Valentine's Day dance tonight. I don't know why they didn't have it next Friday, which is Valentine's Day. Regular Bingo must be "sacred" - it would have had to be cancelled to have the dance on the 14th.

The hall was packed as usual - 45 minutes before the start! As I have said before about RV park events; "If you are a half hour early - you're 15 minutes late!"

The band this evening was "Feels So Right - John and Donna. Their 30 years of performing and the quality of their sound made the duo sound like a five piece group. Specializing in 50′s and 60′s, Big Band, Country Standards, and “Easy Listening” meant there was something for everyone - especially since they so readily took requests (even doing a Polka). Brochures on the tables listing a few hundred of their 500 song repertoire making it easy to find a favourite to request.

The evening had the usual 50-50 draw with 5 prize winners sharing the booty equally. The band even threw in a few of their CD's for good measure.

A special treat was the Crowning of the OMS (Olde Mill Stream) King and Queen by last years Royalty. Neat!

Another Special Treat, as always, were the folks we met. Tonight, we met three wonderful couples at our table who, coincidentally, were all from Canada. RVers are a different lot - friendly to a fault. Go into any public place and sit down, introduce yourself and try and have a conversation with a stranger - I wish you luck! In an RV Park the folks are super friendly and helpful.

Of the 3 couples, the first folks, from Ontario, are actually staying on the site next to ours. We "waved" previously (another RV park trait); but hadn't had the opportunity for a long conversation. We now found out they lived a short (RVer) distance west of our home.

The second couple were from Quebec. They live in the same town as a relative (on my wife's side). He also knew Domtar in Cornwall, ON. His firm engineered a paper machine that I helped assemble (summer job) when I was in High School. We also had an appreciation of the time the new AutoRoute 30 Bridge (in QC) saves in our travels.

...and the third, also from Ontario, remembers visiting Long Sault (our home town), taking the "Lost Villages" Tour and attending "Afternoon Tea" in Ingleside, ON. "Tea" was in the largest wooden structure (built circa 1880) to be moved from the "Lost Villages" prior to the flooding of the St. Lawrence Seaway (1950's).

Amazingly, all 3 couples confirmed my "Six Degrees of RVers" Theory.

Based on the "Six Degrees of Separation Theory" or "Small World Phenomenon". This theory contends that everyone and everything is six or fewer steps away, by way of introduction, from any other person in the world, so that a chain of "a friend of a friend" statements can be made to connect any two people in a maximum of six steps.

This theory was originally set out by Frigyes Karinthy,  popularized by a play written by John Guare and eventually morphed into "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon". Do you remember this from seeing Kevin Bacon on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno years ago? Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon is a parlour game based on the aforementioned "Six Degrees of Separation" concept, which postulates that any two people on Earth are six or fewer acquaintance links apart. That idea eventually morphed into this parlor game, wherein the challenge is to find the shortest path between an arbitrary actor and venerated Kevin Bacon (of course, in 6 steps or less).

My variation is that any 2 RVers, in six steps or less, have been to, know of, have a friend who visited or can connect with something in common within the realm of RVing, Travels or Home Towns.

That's My Theory...and I'm Sticking To It!

A little Olympics TV before bed. A great start with Justine and sister Chloe Dufour-Lapointe winning Gold and Silver in Women's Moguls and Mark McMorris a Bronze in Snowboard Slopestyle (not bad for competing with a broken rib).

GO CANADA!