Livingston, Texas

Here we are, in our domicile of Livingston, Texas.  We've been here for about a week and a half. (Beautiful sign made by Michael!)

Before we departed Cape Cod for full-timing in our teardrop, we researched establishing a domicile and mail forwarding services.  Because we don't own a sticks and bricks home (residence), we needed to establish a domicile (meaning you have intentions to settle in a particular state).  For full-time RV'ers, Texas, Florida, and S. Dakota are the three states most often considered, as they allow for easily establishing a domicile, and these states have had decent health insurance plans for full-timers.  We learned about the RV club called Escapees, when we were researching mail forwarding services.  Long story short, we joined Escapees and signed up for their mail forwarding service.  By doing so, Escapees gave us a physical street address, the starting point for establishing a domicile.  We selected Texas as Escapees has a large campground we can use as a home base when we need to do tasks related to "home".  To show "intent to settle here", we registered to vote, had our car and trailer inspected and registered here, found a primary care physician, and opened a bank account.  So, here we are, at the Escapees campground, in Livingston, as Texans!

And although last year I had great health insurance coverage with Blue Cross Blue Shield Texas (a PPO), this year BCBSTX dropped the PPO, and only offers a HMO.  So, coverage isn't as broad as I'd like it, but I am hoping it all works out in the long run.  Michael is on Medicare, so he is set.

As you can see, Katie is a tiny trailer next to all of these bus-style RV's, known as class A's.  We set up our tent as our living room, and are settled in for the month.  Although not our favorite camping experience, in an RV park, it is nice and comfortable, and folks here are very friendly.  The bathroom and shower are nice and located near us, as is the laundry room.  We can check our mail everyday while we are here, and not have to make arrangements for it to be forwarded, and they're showing the movie "A Walk In the Woods" tomorrow night, for free!  But, we both look forward to being on the road again in February when we head into Arizona for the month.