Tulsa, OK: Camping At The Expo Center

Yesterday we moved from Rogers, Arkansas/Beaver Lake to a campground in Tulsa, OK. Our oldest son, Christopher, gets married to Rachael on Saturday. For the last two Sundays we have attended the church where he leads the music ministries and then were able to relax back at the lake in the RV. It was great to spend time with the two of them after church at Beaver Lake.

Last night we went over and joined them for a late meal of Chinese food from Takie - Outie. My first experience with a Chinese food chain and some of the dishes were pretty good. Overall, the best part was just to be only 15 minutes away from Christopher and Rachael; the food was secondary.

One thing that happened was too funny. Rachael had purchased a set of sunglasses at T.J.Maxx on Sunday and mistakenly picked up MLA's Maui Jim's instead of the sunglasses she had purchased. On Monday, finding that the sunglasses were too big she returned them to the store for a refund. By the time we figured out what had happened TJ Maxx was closed for the night.

We were at the store first thing Tuesday morning when they opened, searching through a surprisingly large rack of sunglasses. Fortunately we found them, complete with a price tag for $14.99. We immediately bought the Maui Jim's back. Rachael really felt bad over the confusion so both she and MLA were relieved to find them. The lady at the returns desk was so confused, first she was going to refund us the $14.99. We explained several times we owed her for the sunglasses; she finally threw her hands up and told her associate to ring up the sunglasses as a sale, muttering to herself as she walked away.

Here in Oklahoma, when a couple is getting married, they throw wedding showers for the bride-to-be; just like everywhere else in the good 'ol USA. However they also throw a tool party for the groom-to-be. I don't know where else this tradition occurs however it seems like a great idea.

So tonight I attended my first tool party. About 15 guys eating hamburgers & hot dogs, swimming in the pool and oh yeah, there were gifts of tools. For guys it was an excuse to hang out with good friends and, oh yeah, here are some tools to get you started as a husband.

I told MLA it's not like a shower for the woman who's getting married. Only one gift was wrapped, two were in gift bags and all the rest were in home depot bags or wrapped in a bundle with duct tape. And nobody cared. Turns out the gift that was wrapped was only wrapped when the man's wife insisted a gift had to be wrapped. I always get a kick out of the differences in how men and women do essentially the same task or activity, or in this case throw a shower.

We drove over to Tulsa during the week to look at campgrounds in and around Tulsa. Unless you stay outside of Tulsa, the campgrounds are mostly mobile home parks that will rent you a site overnight when they have a vacancy. As a rule they tended to be locations with small sites, run down, unkempt, and pretty depressing.

The only nice campgrounds were too far away given all the activities that will occur this week. We have people flying into town that we need to pick up, several dinners/rehearsals to attend and of course, spending time with friends and family.

We are staying in downtown Tulsa at the Expo Center next to the fairgrounds. A convenient location but really it's just the corner of a large parking lot where they have installed some RV utilities for exhibitors at the various fairs and expositions.

On the plus side the expo center location offers triple A baseball games, a Palomino Horse Show, A Dog Show, Horse races, and a Bad Boyz Motorcycle Stunt Riding exhibition. Plus a free fair thrown in for, well, free.

We expect the temperatures over 100 with high humidity every day this week. Take the (hot) weather forecast, the parking lot camping location, mix in all the horse and livestock kept at the fairgrounds and I thought we would have an explosion of the olfactory system. Sights and smells to please and tease.

Turns out that has not been the case at all. Lots of heat however the smells have not been bad at all. Thank goodness!

See Ya!