Temperatures early in the AM dropped below freezing (about 28) but between the furnace and the two electric heaters we have we were quite cozy. Peg and I watched the Rose Parade from 9 to 11 AM MDT and then went to Sweet Darlene’s restaurant for food around 12:30. Sweet Darlene’s is a grubby little joint where the chefs have figured out a way to render perfectly acceptable food totally tasteless. I had a chicken-fried steak with vegetables and mashed potatoes and gravy and Peg had a chicken cordon bleu burger with baked beans. My chicken-fried steak had lots of chicken-fried but scant amounts of steak coupled with a bowl of corn mixed with some red and green unrecognizable things and also some watery mashed potatoes cooked recently but certainly not today. Peg’s chicken cordon bleu burger was a pre-formed alleged chicken patty with some ham-appearing stuff on it along with a tiny little cup of beans cooked apparently in ketchup.

Service staff at this eatery is two quite ancient ladies that seem wholly inadequate for the task assigned to them. It isn’t that there are too many patrons for the available staff – the staff is just not suited to the task considering their abilities. One waitress told us that she wore a pedometer one day at work and, according to her reading of the pedometer, she puts in 60 miles a day. Using some fairly simple math I calculated that she would be required to move along at some 7.5 miles per hour for eight hours to reach this figure and, based on my observations it seemed she would not be capable of maintaining this speed.

We will endeavor to skip Sweet Darlene’s on any future visits.

We drove around a bit checking out the finer aspects of Quartzsite. The place seems to be an enormous swap meet with bleak desert on all sides but the vistas to the surrounding mountains are wonderful.

Weather cleared up but was still pretty cold today. We bought diesel today for $2.999 here which is the cheapest I have ever purchased. We will depart tomorrow for points east.