Thanksgiving! Yay! Food, family, fat-pants! And I’m already itching to get on the road again. But this layover is necessary for more than Thanksgiving reasons. We needed to address all the issues that our shakedown cruise has shaken loose.
Like the hose for the power steering fluid that was too long and rubbed a hole in its side making the power steering in the van go out in the middle of the Los Angeles freeways. Ugh. Continue reading “Too much stuff”
Down we drove with the winter storms behind us, through Reno and further hoping to reach our planned campground for the night at Glass Creek Campground near Mammoth Lakes, CA. This was an area that I knew very well as my family had camped and condo’d at Mammoth every Summer for my entire childhood.
I babbled on and on to Jaime about the bears and horseback riding while we tried not to stress about gas. I hadn’t had much chance to work the previous days and registering the van Continue reading “Vanlife Maiden Voyage Pt. 3”
As we moved south into California with the goal to reach my parents house in time to celebrate an early Thanksgiving before my Mother left on a vacation, we found ourselves concerned about gas and weather. Winter has been at a slow creep on the west coast of late and we had been fortunate to leave Christmas Valley when it was still relatively warm, however, as we moved down the 395 we started to see winter gathering in the mountains and chasing our tail.
This past week our life on the road began. In our newly purchased 1989 Chevrolet Astro Van we undertook the shake-down cruise of the century driving from Christmas Valley, Oregon to Los Angeles, California.
Our goal was to survive our trip down to my parent’s place with our every belonging, two humans and two huskies in our unmodified van. Well we made it, arriving yesterday, and boy was that an educational trip. Continue reading “Vanlife Maiden Voyage Pt. 1”
I’m sitting here now in a state of anxiety because 1.) its election day, and 2.) tomorrow I plan to purchase my first real vehicle of my own. Tomorrow, Jaime (my boyfriend shaped companion) and I will be meeting with a man about a van. If that doesn’t work, we will be checking out some other possibilities, but honestly? I really want this van.
A van will mean we start out with a roof on our annoyingly delayed nomadic life. A van will mean more comfort than the alternatives while we save up for an eventual truck/trailer combo. So I sit here wallowing in anxiety.
Jaime and I have taken up the battle cry of “We gonna diiiie” regularly now, but we are hopeful about the future. A slow crawl down the west coast to my family in L.A., then, slowly onward across the country eventually to meet Jaime’s mother in New York. Exciting? yes. Terrifying? completely. But waiting to set out has been torture! I hate waiting.
But if things go alright tomorrow then we will be on our way in a day or two and it will be the beginning of our adventure. And it’s about time. My Goblins haven’t invaded anything in far too long.
In the middle of May, I had to leave my parent’s home in Pasadena, CA and head north to the Oregon Outback. This was the beginning of the scariest, weirdest portion of my life thus far and I owe my completely unlikely survival to Trump.
Not the guy on TV. Trump, the tent.
It’s a freaking miracle.
In a lot of ways.
So, since I last shared with the world, I was rescued from Pasadena, CA by a good friend and her three huskies, taken north to the Oregon Outback where I have been camping in the desert for a few months.
This has been the weirdest couple months of my life and I’ve learned a lot about who I am and the kinds of people that are worth my effort.
Why is it that the people with the most in life give so little, but the people who have nothing will give it all? They have nothing because they DO give it all to help others and I find that now when I have nothing, I feel richer than when I had it all?
Life is friggin weird, yo.
I stopped wearing makeup and dressing up and worrying about how people saw me and immediately found people who liked me anyways (wtf?)
I have no money to give but my willingness to help others has made me more friends than money ever has.
I stopped caring about my weight and immediately lost a ton of it.
I’ve learned that 99% of what people have is unnecessary.
I’ve learned how to milk a cow and more about recreational and medical pot use than any other non-pot user.
Oh and Goats are assholes.
Also….My tent. I have found the most badass tent in the universe. More about that later.
I’m moving closer to my goals of travel but now its less about running and more about exploring and that just feels better.
And the sky here. Cloud Porn. Pure and Simple.
Two years ago on this day, I got on a plane to Portland, Oregon. I had just been laid off of my job of the previous 4 years and had taken my severance package, my unwisely cashed out 401k and moved to a city I’d chosen nearly at random. I had no family or friends there. I had a been there for a mere weekend a month before with my grudgingly supportive parents to choose a place to rent, and that was the extent of my knowledge.
Now, two years and a lot of mistakes and shitty luck later, I’m back in California planning a new exit. Continue reading “Minimizing the Minimum”
Okay this one was one of the tastier things I’ve made. I don’t understand why it turned out so good since I was winging it the entire time, but I don’t think I would change a damn thing next time around which is weird for me. Usually it takes me a few trials and many errors to decide I’m happy with a recipe. Continue reading “Foodsperiments: Mini Pizza Pies”
The necessity of walking to an interview for a dog-sitting job came up, prompting me to revisit the concept of Urban hiking again. I feel that the first attempt I made with my dogs was not as successful as it could have been and I hate leaving things half done. Continue reading “Urban Hiking: The Revenge”
roadgoblins 