We attended two seminars this morning, both by Shawn Loring.  One was on Investing For RVers and the other was on Domicile and Estate Planning issues.  Shawn is an attorney licensed to practice in TX and CA, as well as a licensed financial planner.  He resides in Livingston, Texas and is the corporate attorney for The Escapees RV Club.  He is also a member of the CARE Board of Directors.  Both presentations were standing room only and were excellent, providing good overviews of the topics with considerable depth at selected points.

I mentioned yesterday that we had picked up literature and an application form for the B. P. O. Elks because they are letting SKPs attending Escapade to join the local Gillette chapter.  After reading through their Guidebook For Members last night, we decided that the Elks where not a good fit for us.  Not having access to camping at Elk Lodges does not diminish our RVing experience in any way, and it seems to me that joining only for access to overnight RV parking is hardly in the spirit of the Elks organization.

We took a pass on the afternoon seminars and did some grocery shopping instead.  When we got back we had a card in our door handle from Black Hills Pro Wash.  We thought it was a reminder about our appointment at 8:00 AM tomorrow to have our rig washed.  A bit later, however, I got a call from Trevin informing me that they would not be able to clean our rig, or anybody else’s, as the Escapade had given exclusive washing rights to All-Brite.  In spite of Pro Wash having tried to register as a vendor, and being more than willing to pay the Escapade vendor fee, they were denied.  There are multiple vendors here selling things like LED light bulbs, and there are more rigs here than one company could wash, so having an exclusive arrangement with one company only served to penalize attendees, especially if they did not want to use the sole source vendor.  Limiting my choices does me a disservice as a member of the club.

We went over to the Wyoming Center at 7:00 PM for the nightly door prize drawing.  The Escapade was successful in obtaining a lot of door prizes from rally vendors and local merchants, and the drawing went on for 45 minutes.

Ventriloquist Patty Davidson performed.  She is very talented, but the acoustics of Spirit Hall in the Wyoming Center were not adequate for what she does and it was difficult to understand much of what she (and the dummies) said.  She did the old Abbott & Costello “Who’s on first?” routine with two dummies, and it was impressive.  She also had her brother-in-law, a singer/song-writer/guitarist, perform between sets.  He was also very good, and better suited to the acoustics of the venue.