A Long Day of Commitments Elsewhere

Today was a long day. By long, I mean it's one in the morning, and I'm just new getting to a place where I can catch you up a little bit.

We had a huge (by our standards) rain storm here two nights ago. It was pouring for over an hour. In spite of the lightning and thunder's magnificent attempt to entertain us and frighten Dog, it exposed a weakness in the trailer. The pvc poster I made and had on our wall in Ketchikan is  duct-taped to the outside of the front window. It's been like that since just north of Casper, Wyoming, the unofficial capital of the most inconveniently politically conservative and unfortunately unlucky state I've had the privilege to travel through.

Anyway, that leaked pretty well. I'd say we would bring in about a gallon an hour. We wedged towels in there and everything. Hardcore. But Little Girl slept through it all.

The overall state of things... shelter is good. It's not insulated well, and our swamp cooler has a difficult time keeping up, but cooler weather is just around the corner. Electricity has only failed when power in town fails, which has only happened twice since we moved here.

Water is tricky and the system is constantly getting refined. Currently, we have a small camping porta-potty for the toilet. Those things are fantastic, by the way, for those of you who road trip with families. For water storage, we have two big 7 gallon cube containers with taps outside on my makeshift table. We also have another seven gallon jerry-can shaped container as a back up. The trailer itself has plumbing, but it's leaky, dirty, and basically needs to be replaced, so this is the temporary solution. We have a few big jugs we fill with water for use inside, and I just hooked up a couple of 42 cup coffee pots, one by the kitchen sink, the other on the roof above the shower. I'm hoping that it'll let us do dishes and take hot or at least warm showers without the hassle of boiling water on the stove.

Since all of that is gray water, we just let it fall into the yard into the garden. We're using the fancy, multi-purpose soaps from the organic food store. I'm planing to build a filter system for it, basically a ditch leading to the garden that has gravel that gets smaller until it's fine sand.

Anyway, that's where we are with the trailer at this point. The yard is slowly coming asking. Hetero Life Mate has been working on a path system through the yard. She connected our makeshift pallet deck to the old brick path Mom built years and years ago by framing a dirt path with wood she found elsewhere in the yard. She cleaned up that old brick path, and made another path from the back porch of the Big House to what's left of the old gate on the back wall of the old basketball court/future patio.

Lots done, but lots to do yet. Every day is an adventure. Stay tuned. This was extra long tonight!

TUESDAY UPDATE: The BattleStation

I figured I'd show you guys some of what we're getting into.  These top two pictures are the inside of the tiny bathroom in the back of the trailer.  Everything works,so we'll be moving in and re-modelling shortly thereafter. The bathroom floor will be replaced, a small electric heater added, and the cabinet and sink will be replaced.

Here is the interior.  The first thing we did after cleaning is take down all of those gaudy drapes.  Yuck.  Feels way better in there now, but work to do all around.

This is the outside.  1971 22' RoadRunner, apparently built in Utah.  The Woman looks like a boss, locking it with authority and pizaz.

Here's the kitchen area.  Counter tops will eventually be replaced.  We haven't decided what the counters are going to be made out of, although I am leaning heavily towards making it all a usable butcher block.  The fridge is plenty huge.  The furnace works, and the stove is all gas.  On one of our window shopping expeditions, The Woman picked out a back-splash/wall treatment that looks like the pounded copper in old-timey saloons.  I'm totally fine with that.  

Here's a better overview.  The dinette will likely be taken out and replaced with a couple of simple, folding barstools and a table that folds down and out of the way, creating much more usable space for kiddos to run around and get into no good.  We won't only be living in here with The Princess, but The Prince will be staying with us occasionally, too, as well as The Duke, a little boy whose parents we trade babysitting with.  The dinette will be the big project, however, afterwards, between where it is now and the bed/couch, I'd like to install a small office table to have a place to design or work on projects inside.  I feel like it's crucial to be able to stay inside, as the high today was 5 degrees here in Bozeman.

That's your sneak peak.  I'll let you know when there is more.  Our target date for move-in is January 1st.  We'll be throwing more pictures up as things progress!

TUESDAY UPDATE: New Job, New Goals

I started an overnight job at a group home for teens.  We have eight kids in the house, coming from all over the state of Montana.  My job is to make sure they don't sneak out, hurt themselves or each other, and stuff like that through the night.  In the morning, I get them up, make sure they've taken their meds, etc.  I may even make them breakfast one of these mornings, just because I can.  ;-)

Talking about goals, the Hetero Life Mate and I have decided to return to the roots of the BattleWagon Chronicles.  We're looking for a trailer that we can pull with our Suburban and park somewhere instead of paying as much rent for this apartment we're in.  I've talked to a guy here in Bozeman who has an organic farm and orchard, and we may be able to park the trailer there relatively inexpensively in exchange for some work on the farm.  Bonus points for fresh, organic food if that's the route we go.  Other options include renting a spot at a long term campground/RV park like a KOA.

First thing is first, though... we need to find a trailer.  We're looking for something in the 20-30 foot range.  We'd prefer a bumper-pull trailer, but we'd settle for a motorhome.  As long as it has a somewhat functional bathroom, kitchen, furnace, a bed big enough for the HLM and me (and the Baby on and off), and a separate bunk or bed for Baby and/or Little Man, we'll jump on it.

It's the time to shed the bondage of debts and paycheck-to-paycheck living.  Like so many lower-middle class Americans, we make too much money to qualify for most assistance, but not nearly enough to survive.  Society wants us to buy into this by being lemmings, pushing the idea that we must live in a nice apartment or house that we really can't afford.  Breaking these bonds are how we thrive.  We're going to live in a trailer.  We're going to have it paid for in three-months rent.  We're going to own a house, and we're going to have the ability to take it wherever we please. Life is good.