Back to Work - Amazon

Oct. 22 -  home again, spent this day doing laundry and getting ready for going back to work. Emptied suitcases, putting the summer clothing in them before stowing them away.  We got out of the house for a little while to walk on the trails at the nearby park.  We also drove up the hill by the stadium to find spider balls.

In driving around in this area when we arrived, we saw trees that had grapefruit looking balls on them.  A couple of weeks ago we found a tree by the stadium full of the balls, but only a few had dropped.  We were surprised to find out that spider balls, as we know them from buying them in the stores at home, grew on these trees.  The tree is called an Osage Orange tree. You may know the bumpy fruit of the Osage Orange tree by one of its many nicknames including "Hedge Apple", "Horse Apple", "Mock Orange" or "Spider Ball".  The wrinkled skin of its softball-sized fruit is light green in color and gives off an aroma that smells like an orange.  Because of their long sharp thorns, Osage Orange trees were planted and used as fences to keep livestock from straying.  The early settlers would plant rows of these trees which grew so thick a cow or pig could not get through.  We picked up 1/2 dozen of the balls to put in the lower bays of the motorhome to keep spiders away.

Osage Orange tree - most of the leaves had dropped

Still a few balls hanging up high 

Spider balls 

Wed - Sat.  - back to work.  We are still stowing product.  Gary and I were in different areas a couple days, he was opening cartons and stowing cases of product.  I was working with carts and totes of product, seems like I was on my knees a lot putting items on lower shelves.  My body handled it pretty well, I could tell more by the dirt stains on my jeans.  A lot of the guys and gals are wearing shorts and capris with t-shirts, it does get warm in many areas during the day, but we don't want to bend down on the cement floor with bare knees.
Friday night we ordered a pizza and cheese bread from Casey's, the first pizza we have had in over a month.  It was great, enough for leftovers to enjoy.  There is a Pizza Hut in town too, but we were told Casey's was the best.

Saturday, the owners of Buckeye RV Park where we are staying had their annual picnic for the residents.  They have a chili and dessert competition we could enter and then they provide hamburgers and hotdogs for everyone.  We were to each bring a dish to share.  The time frame was 11:00 AM to 6:30 PM, this allowed us to attend after we got off work at 5:00.  I made a box brownie mix, I've realized it is cheaper and easier this way then trying to make something from scratch.
We had some of the winning chili, but the winning dessert was gone and we never did find out what it was.  The weather was cool but sunny, we had a nice visit with with owner and his wife while we ate. There were not a lot of people there by that time, so we were home by 6:30.  It really cools down quickly after 5:00 this week.   Showers and relaxing before heading to bed.  A long 40 hours, but we are feeling better each day after the 10 hour days.