inicio mail me! sindicaci;ón

Happy Birthday to Rich

jc-birthday-cake.jpgYou’ll never guess what today is. But if you do, for bonus credit you can guess how old I am. There are subtle clues contained in this blog entry.

Eleanor made a very fine cake in the trailer, which we enjoyed last night ( a day early). Making a cake in the Airstream’s tiny oven is a significant feat in itself. First of all, it’s a small space, and RV ovens are not known for their BTU power or temperature accuracy. Also, you have to be sure the oven is perfectly level, in order to have an even cake. That may not coincide exactly with leveling the rest of the trailer. Eleanor is a master at this now and so her cake came out fine. We shared slices with some of the managers at Airstream today, which made us fairly popular.

jc-3-in-trailer.jpg

Things in the trailer have been busy each day as we work around each other in the small space. Outside the trailer things have been even busier, with meetings and such things going on all over the factory campus. We’re going to have to extend our visit into mid-day Thursday.

One of the projects took up half the day today. Brett and I were allowed into the archive room, where an absolute treasure trove of Airstream photography, films, and documents are stored. Some of this stuff hasn’t seen the light of day since it was originally produced decades ago. I was specifically looking for archive photos of the NASA astronaut transporter (the “Astro Van”) and the Mobile Quarantine Facility (MQF) used to isolate astronauts returning from Gemini and Apollo missions. We found plenty of those, and then dug into a lot of other great history.

cornelius-v-w-dorsey-connors.jpgOne find was a whole file folder containing prints of Cornelius Vanderbilt posing in front of his Airstream at the Ambassador Hotel in Chicago. This photo shows Cornelius with Dorsey Conners, a Chicago TV personality and daughter of a famous organized crime boss. I like the photo for the character, but also for the style of the times. It was probably a big deal for Cornelius Vanderbilt to come to the Ambassador in his Airstream, and even a bigger deal for the local celebrities and business heavies to get to pose with him. Cornelius had definite ideas about what “Airstreaming” meant in the 1950s, and he did a lot of it, from devastated post-war Europe to the parking lot of a Chicago hotel.

While we are here, we embarked on a project to lighten the trailer and clear up some clutter that we picked up in Vermont. We boxed a lot of books, magazines, fabric, and miscellany (like my old laser printer) to ship to Tucson via UPS. All told, we shipped 98 lbs of stuff in three boxes. It’s nice to see the unneeded weight depart, but even nicer to have the space back. Some of those items had nowhere to be in the trailer, and were starting to take over floor space.

jc-bedtime.jpg

Emma has been relocated from her bedroom at the back of the trailer to the dinette, which she finds novel. Brett has her bed while he’s visiting. That means every night we have three bedrooms set up. Walking down the hallway I feel like I am in a Pullman coach, with every berth filled with somebody reading a book before bedtime. Rather than feeling crowded, it feels exciting. It will probably be even more exciting when we get moving along I-70 tomorrow afternoon, heading to our next stops in Missouri and Kansas.

11 Responses to “Happy Birthday to Rich”

  1. Lou Woodruff Says:

    Happy Birthday, Rich! We are sorry to have not stamped up a special birthday card for your 45th! We will catch up next year! The cake looks great! Sounds like your JC visit has been hectic, exciting and fun. Hope all the meetings were worth the time and productive for you all. Safe travels on the next leg of your journey!
    Did you find time to get to the bicycle museum in New Bremen or will that have to wait for the next trip?
    Lou and Larry

  2. Bill Doyle Says:

    Happy Birthday, Rich (in words and song)!

    http://web.mac.com/wdoyle2/Site/Menu/Pages/Movie.html

  3. Forrest Says:

    Happy birthday, Rich! You’re 45? You don’t look a day over 29! It must be the Airstream lifestyle that keeps you looking so young.

  4. Karen Britting Says:

    Happy 70th, Rich! (I got my clue from the interstate number.)

    xoxo!

    Karen

  5. TomW Says:

    Your cake reminded me of a birthday-on-the-road tale Aunt Shirley, my Overlander’s previous chief cook & bottle washer, shared with me.

    Cousin Nancy would have been around your daughter’s age on one trip while the family was Airstreaming in Colorado. In preparation, Aunt Shirley had remembered to packed a box of cake mix. Having made birthday cakes every year for Nancy and each of her three other siblings, Aunt Shirley had long ago committed the directions to memory.

    But she had never made a cake in Colorado before. Ever notice the supplemental “high altitude” directions on cake mixes before? Nancy ended up getting a frosting-covered brick for a birthday cake that year.

    Happy bithday,
    Tom

  6. Rich Says:

    Thank you all for the birthday wishes. If you haven’t watched Bill Doyle’s video, you should definitely check it out. (You’ll need broadband Internet — it’s 45 megabytes.) I had a very nice 45th birthday, thanks to Eleanor, Emma, Brett, and the Wheeler family who invited us over for dinner last night.

  7. abe Says:

    Happy 45th birthday! Melissa and I wish you and your family many more happy years and miles!!!

    Abe and Melissa

  8. TomW Says:

    Bill Doyle: That was great!

    Tom

  9. Bill Doyle Says:

    Rich (and TomW), Glad you liked the “Happy Birthday to Rich” video. It’s now been resized, from 46.46 MB to 11.16 MB, so it should download easier and quicker.
    This is my first time playing uke in front of a video camera and the first time publishing video… quite a learning experience, facilitated by my 1:1 Apple session and the much appreciated phone call from Rich Charpentier.

    The video can seen at: http://web.mac.com/wdoyle2/Site/Menu/Pages/Movie.html

  10. Terry & Greg Says:

    Hey Rich…Happy BELATED birthday! Hope you had a great day and don’t really feel a year older!

  11. leigh + brian Says:

    Happiest B-day Rich!!!!!!