Gone in an Instant

First let me apologize for my lack of posts recently.  The reason is understandable. You see on Aug. 8th, I lost Uncle Twinkie in a horrible auto accident.  This on top of losing my Mother in April.  Just a mere 5 months apart and the day after what would have been my Mother's 70th birthday.  I can't bring myself to write any details on the accident except that horrible is a mild word to describe it. Instead I would like to use this small space to tell you a bit about a Sister and Brother.  My Mother and Uncle were very close. My mother as the oldest helped with the raising of the two younger siblings, which made them more like her children than her brothers. Me being the oldest of the next generation and a mere 10 years younger. Made them more like my big brothers than my uncles. We had time to prepare for my Mothers passing but I know my uncle regretted not saying the words "I love you" to her. But you see my uncle was always upbeat and happy, that was the way he tried to leave people. When he went through a check out line the cashier was left laughing and happy, no matter how bad their day had been before. He never met a stranger and never passed anyone that needed help. And the times that help was taken advantage of, his reply was "It's ok, it will be alright"  or "It doesn't matter".  He touched so many lives in small and unassuming ways. Even unknowing to many the world dimmed a bit on Aug 8.  My one consolation is that I know my Mother and Uncle are together now. And he got the chance to tell her he loved her, although she always knew it.

May I Have a Little Wine, Please?

Aaahhmm make that whine.... oh gosh, I hurt.  All over more than anywhere else. Moving around will be a sad process for me today.  Ok whine over, on to what I am thinking about today.

Remember a few posts back when I said I had the power.  I still do, actually I have more.  I had to ask for that second Trojan 4D.  I could not stand the thought that it would probably get shuffled into a corner somewhere and ruin. Uncle L had already told me he had no use for it. So now I have the equivalent of a full time passenger on that side.  Those batteries weight 115 lbs each for a combined weight of 230 lbs.  That is the negative, the positive is that I have 330 amp hours available. Since I only want to use the top half of those hours.  I need to find a way to keep the batteries charged. I want solar but I don't think I have enough roof space for the amount of panels I need to keep those "bad boys" charged.  I think it will have to be a combined system of solar and alternator. I was really trying to avoid that.  I think the alternator is one of the few things on Gypsy that has not been replaced over the years.

When I was playing with the refrigerators I messed up and ran one of those batteries almost completely dead.  Although it was not all my fault.  The charger I had purchased to keep the batteries charged was defective.  Remember only a dummy buys a charger with dummy lights instead of a gauge.  I knew that, I just chose to overlook it at the time. Anyway once all of the return and replacement of the charger was done, I had to charge that battery back to full capacity. Let me tell you, that was a chore.  After a day on trickle charge (2amp) my inverter was still giving me a low voltage squeal.  It actually took another day at medium (6amp) to get that thing back to full capacity.  I really don't want to do that again.

Truthfully, I know enough about batteries, solar, etc. to be dangerous. I know the equations for converting amps to watts, visa versa and ect.  I also know all the pieces needed to tie it all together.  But I don't think I have the physical capabilities or complete knowledge to do it myself.  I think I am going to have to have help on this one.

Humpty Dumpty Sat On A Wall

Well you know what happened .... he fell off.  Humpty and I have something in common today.  I try not to complain or even mention my inabilities. Therefore most people think I don't really have them.  I actually have a list but I promise not to list them for you. There is nothing worse than someone who sits around all the time complaining about what they can't do and why. Don't get me wrong there is nothing wrong with saying you can't do something because....but make it short.  I'd rather concentrate on the few things left I can do. Anyway, about my fall today. I was coming down the back steps of my Mothers house and got almost to the bottom when the world turned upside down. I am not talking a short set of steps. As I mentioned before my Mothers house was built in 1843. The house itself is actually on the upper floor, the ground floor is an equivalent size basement of rooms. Fortunately, I was almost to the bottom or I would be in the hospital or worse right now.  As I lay there looking at the sky, I took inventory of the damage. I never move until I do this. I could tell my right knee and left hand took most of the impact. I don't know why but my right knee always seems to be the one that gets it.  I have trouble with it because of that. The outer damage is not to terrible, one scraped up right knee.  It is the inner damage that is going to give me problems for the next few days. You see, my spine is deteriorating from top to bottom. So for the next few days at least, I will be here on the internet. I have no idea what I will blog about since I won't be able to do anything on Gypsy. I guess I will know when the idea hits me and I post it.

Sustenance and Such

The amount of food you eat depends on your body's requirements. I am what you call a grazer.  Instead of the standard three squares a day, I eat five or six small meals. Most of the time these are simple meals, some fruit with crackers and cheese, a salad, or fold over sandwich.  I guess I eat more times because I simply don't eat much at a sitting. Also I like a lot of fruit and vegetables which have a faster digestion rate.  I don't watch fat counts, calories or pay close attention to what is good/bad for me.  I eat what I like, just not much of it per sitting. One thing I naturally don't eat much is deep fried foods. Again not because it's bad for you but because I just don't care for it.

I guess my eating habits would be suited to this lifestyle if I could find a fridge that would work in the van.  I have tried a 2.5 cu ft refrigerator and a thermoelectric cooler.  Neither worked, my 1000w inverter would not start the refrigerator.  It supposedly ran on 1.5amp with a 6.3amp start up. This calculates to a 725 watts start up and 173 watts to run... the inverter just squealed on start up.  So next I tried the 12v cooler. These things might work in a milder climate, but not here.  Even at night when temperatures ranged in the high 70's, nothing in the cooler was really any cooler than the ambient temperature.  So it's back to the drawing board for refrigeration. Somehow there has to be a solution that doesn't cost 6-9 hundred dollars.

Camping Out

No I haven't been able to leave yet, although I did stay in Gypsy last night. We have an extreme heat wave going on here. The temperatures have been well over 100 degrees during the day. Even at night it has been way too hot.  As I have for the past week, I sat at my computer dripping sweat as the air conditioner labored to do nothing. Understand this was all taking place at around 9pm. I finally gave up, if I was going to sweat anyway, I might as well do something.  First in the order though was a cold bath to cool down. After that I put the portable AC in Gypsy so I could have some relief from the heat.  The job for tonight was to cut down some of those silver folding sun screens that go in the front windshield. I wanted them for the back and side glasses too. I thought if the front one made such a difference... then all the way around should be wonderful.  When they are not needed I can fold them away. After about 30 minutes of working on the one for the rear window I realized.. this is as cool as I have been all day.  After a bit I decided it was going to be more comfortable to stay in Gypsy tonight. Unfortunately, finally getting cool caused me to abandon the window screen project with only two of them done.

I guess I need to take a moment to explain why the house is so hard to cool.  This house belonged to my Mother. She absolutely loved it. It made her happy and that was all that mattered. But this house was build in 1843. It is the oldest house in the area.  It was not designed for AC.  It has 15 foot ceilings, hand hewn wood floors and all slave-made brick walls.  When the weather is reasonable, AC is almost not needed.  You can open the front and back doors to a constant breeze. In this kind of heat though, it is a job to keep it cool. I hope we can find a buyer that will love it as much as my Mother.  This house was her dream, mine is to travel slow and light.

Ok, back to the subject at hand.  It is now noon the next day.  I am still in Gypsy, although she is starting to get a bit warmer.  If I had finished the screens she would probably still be cool.  The sun is bearing down on the passenger side windows at the moment, and they are without screens.  I leave everything on the drivers side in place because I don't use those windows when I drive.  But passenger and rear window stuff is designed to be stowed when I drive.

Here is Gypsy with AC installed

Here is another of Gypsy in camping mode

If you notice, I try to do all of Gypsy's modification in a way that will not alter her permanently.  If I stripped her back down to a plain minivan conversion, all you would see are some very tiny holes where I installed the small eye hooks to hold the curtains.  So far that is the only permanent alteration that has been made.

Now That's Entertainment

When you are living small, You need to consider how to reduce everything to the smallest amount of space required. Fortunately with today's technology you have many options.  But some of those options can cost big bucks.  My solution is a bit simpler and cheaper. I have a standard laptop.  But its a little uncomfortable to curl up with your laptop and read a good book. Yes I know they make e-readers now, I actually have one but never use the thing.  I have a better solution that covers all the things I like in one small device.  I like to read mostly, watch an occasional movie, and listen to some music. On very very rare occasion I will play a video game. To do this I use a PSP (playstation portable) that has been modified so that I may read on it also.  I won't go into how to mod a PSP here, there are plenty of website that can supply that information. But I will forget my phone before I forget my PSP. It is that useful.  I have about 125 books, 10 movies, 100 songs and a couple of games on an 8 gig card. I also have a 16 gig card that has about 25 movies and an 8 gig card that is free for more movies, books or music. When I get tired of the data on those cards then I just switch it out on the computer.... no need for an android, mp3 player, ebook reader, etc. Oh, and did I mention it is wifi capable. Now why would I want to spend a few hundred on a android table. Especially when these can be picked up in most any pawn shop for 75-100 dollars

Here is a pic in e-reader mode. As you can tell my PSP is well loved (indicated by scratches).  This will read txt. rtf. pdf. html.  If you get your books in a propitiatory format such as epub, lit, mobi, etc... they are easily converted with a free software called Calibre.  You can get it here.  If you don't like the white on black, it can be reversed or actually adjusted to about any color scheme you want. This just happens to be my preference.

One word of caution about modding a PSP.  If you do this (or have it done) don't go to Sony and expect an update. It will render your PSP unusable. At least till you find someone who can "unbrick" it.  As with most corporations now days, Sony frowns on modifications to it's products. Naturally they would rather sell it to you again. My answer to that is "Would you buy a new car because you didn't like the wheels"?   No, you would modify the car by buying new wheels.  I paid for this, I now own it .... if I want to "change the wheels" so to speak. I will!