Category Archives: WFPB

Posts related to our Whole-Foods Plant-Based approach to healthy eating. We became vegetarians in 2000 and transitioned to being vegans in 2011. We discovered the WFPB concept in 2012.

2015/09/19 (S) Rally Wrap Up

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Today was the last full day of the FMCA Great Lakes Converted Coaches (GLCC) annual Surplus and Salvage Rally. It started with strong storms overnight but they had dissipated by breakfast time. The skies eventually cleared on brisk winds with a chilly northerly component and the high was forecasted to be 67 with some clouds. The clouds turned out to be white, scattered, and fast moving and it turned out to be a lovely late summer day with a hint of fall in the air.

The breakfast provided as part of the rally was pancakes and sausage but Linda and I had our granola and finished up the berries. We decided to stay around the campground and have an easy day. Initially, however, we had some post-breakfast excitement.

Juniper caught another mouse. It was another very small dark gray house mouse, obviously very young but old enough to wander away from a nest in search of food and water. I got it away from her and into the paper cup that we kept for this purpose and put the paper bowl on top. Linda took it back to the woods and set it free.

Even after catching two mice in the last 16 hours the cats continued to show great interest in the base of the bathroom sink cabinet. The front of the toe kick space has one of the many brass colored expanded metal screens for the OTR HVAC ducts and several things were becoming clear to me at this point. 1) We had a nest somewhere in the bus; 2) the nest was likely in the base of this cabinet, or accessible from there, and 3) the baby mice were apparently small enough to get through the expanded metal grate. I also suspected that something had happened to the mother mouse which is why the babies were leaving the nest.

Some of this was confirmed when I got down on the bathroom floor with a flashlight and was looking through the grate when a small mouse came out of the 4″ flexible duct. I tapped on the grate and got it to turn around and go back. I measured the rectangular opening. Linda cut a piece of cardboard about 1″ larger in width and length and I taped it over the opening.

We were away from the coach visiting with Scott Crosby of http://BusGreaseMonkey.com and others before Scott left for home. Scott and Tami Bruner came over too, followed by their friends/neighbors Misty and Gary who brought their GM3751 Silversides to the rally. When we returned to our motorcoach it was immediately obvious that Juniper had caught, or at least cornered, something, probably another mouse. Her posture and vocalizations are distinctive in the presence of prey. What was odd was she was by the front of the new built-in sofa rather than in the bathroom.

I shushed her away and she left the area without much protest. I did not see a mouse and walked to the bathroom to make sure our cardboard cover was still in place. It was, so if there was another mouse it must have gotten into the living area of the bus through some other opening, perhaps the OTR HVAC air return under the sofa. When I returned to the living room the mouse was climbing up onto the top edge of my slippers. I did not see exactly where it came from but it could have been inside one of them to escape the cats. I got the paper cup and bowl and caught it fairly easily.

I put on my Crocs, which we use as easy on/off camp shoes, walked back to the woods at the southern boundary of the campground, and set the mouse free. It scampered under some leaves but its odds of survival were probably as small as it was. The temperature was forecast to drop into the upper 40’s tonight and I heard a Great Horned Owl off in the distance. Still, its survival odds in the bus were probably worse. We had live trapped an adult house mouse under the kitchen sink when the bus was still at home, but that was a couple of weeks ago so there is no way it could have been the mother of these current juvenile mice unless it found its way back into the bus. My assumption was that the mother was not around and the young mice were desperately trying to find food and water. These circumstances made me a bit sad, but we simply cannot have mice getting into the living area and becoming play toys for our cats. Ultimately we need to find a way to keep them out of the bus altogether but so far a solution to that problem has proven to be elusive.

The official rally lunch was leftovers after which folks divided up whatever was left. Linda split the remaining salad lettuce with Vickie and took some bell peppers, onions, mushrooms, and bottled water. I grabbed a mostly full 2 L bottle of diet Coke.

Marty Caverly stopped by to see the bus remodeling and stayed to chat a while. Marty had spent the better part of a day at the Back-to-the-Bricks Rally last month getting Pat and Vickie’s cruise control to finally work reliably. He spent most of this morning getting their air leveling system to work reliably. Marty is an electrician who did a lot of work with electronics in his 40 years with General Motors and is the “go to” guy in our club for most electrical issues.

There was a lull in our social activities and Linda settled in to read while I worked at my computer transferring drafts of blog posts from e-mail to Word. I edited a week’s worth from the third week of July and got them ready to upload but did not post them. I will do that when we get home. I used the MCD day shade while sitting at the desk to cut down the light while still affording me a view. Linda forgot her iPad and was using mine to read one of the latest novels in Nick Russell’s Big Lake series. She went for a walk which gave me an opportunity to work on this post as I write them using the Note app on my iPad.

We saw Pat and Vickie walking towards the office and figured they were making arrangements for next year’s Surplus and Salvage Rally. They stopped at our coach on the way back with the signed contract. The dates are September 21 to 25, 2016 and the nightly camping rate is $35 plus tax for 50A full hookup sites. It’s pricey, but the campground is conveniently located in the heart of the Elkhart area with convenient access to many RV surplus businesses. We also get the exclusive use of a meeting room with a full kitchen, and they always reserve sites for us that are close to the meeting room. It should be a lovely time of year to have the rally, being the first five days of fall. Unfortunately we will probably not be attending as we do not plan to be back from New England by then.

Meals for this rally usually include dinner on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, with Friday also being a business meeting, and breakfast on Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. The only lunch is the “must goes” on Saturday. Saturday dinner is traditionally out at a restaurant and the choice this year was McCarthy’s on the Riverwalk. The Elkhart River splits as it comes into the city, joins back up with itself and eventually flows into the much larger St. Joseph River at two points. McCarthy’s features some very interesting Irish fare but the ambiance is slightly upscale restaurant rather than an Irish pub feel. Our food choices were very limited, of course, but we knew that before signed up to go.

We rode over with Pat and Vickie and sat with them at one end of the table. I think we had 13 of the 23 attendees at dinner. Linda had a Guinness and I had a lighter beer that had “cider” in the name. We each had a house salad with a very nice balsamic vinegar dressing but no cheese and an order of French fries. The service was OK but not outstanding. I asked for Tabasco sauce and Vickie had to remind the waitress to get it. I was over half done with my fries by the time it arrived. The serving was small but the fries were good and we did not leave hungry.

Most of us went for a walk along the river after dinner. The sun was already below the downtown skyline, however, and it was chilly. None of us brought jackets so it was a shorter walk than it might otherwise have been.

Back at the campground Scott and Tami started a campfire in the fire pit by their rig. Linda and I brought over our chairs, blankets, a bowl of grapes, and our glasses of wine. Vickie brought her chair, popcorn, and a popcorn skillet designed for popping corn over an open fire. Dan brought his chair and joined us. It was a clear, crisp evening but the fire (and blankets) made it comfortable, the popcorn and grapes made it yummy, and company made it worthwhile.

Although relaxing in some ways, rallies are intense in other ways. We have only been here 3-1/2 days but we arrived tired, ran around taking care of things, and when we finally relaxed the tiredness washed over us. We gathered up our things and went back to the coach at 10 PM where we watched an episode of Grantchester on the local PBS affiliate, went to bed, and fell asleep.

2015/09/14 (M) Final Prep (for now)

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We were up at 8 AM and had breakfast but I did not take the time to make coffee. I gathered up the laundry and started a load. I then headed to Lowe’s to buy an outlet strip that I could easily hardwire. I looked at angle iron to support the upper back edge of the interpedestal desk cover at the wall but did not buy any. The iron has holes and slots manufactured into it that I thought might allow me to adjust its location vertically without having to move the location of the screws. Alas, the slotted openings were horizontal rather than vertical.

Linda was cooking a batch of granola when I got home and made a pot of coffee. I decided to tend to some travel preparation items before getting back to work on the remodeling project. I wanted to check/adjust the tire pressures while it was still cool. The tires were all down about 1.5 PSI, which was very good given how long it has been sitting. I used the new 6-gallon air-compressor to bring them up to the pressures I like to run and it worked OK. I will have to pause a little more often while it re-pressurizes but it is less than half the size of the 15-gallon DeWalt and will travel with much more easily.

My next task was to unload the front bay which I did while Linda continued to work on our food for the week. We find it much easier to deal with food at rallies if she “cooks ahead” and “reheats to serve.” I set everything in the driveway in front of the bus and tried to sort it into two groups; things were staying home for this trip and things that were going with us.

I then opened the drain valve on the fresh water tank, which goes through the floor of the water bay, and let the water run onto a container lid so it wouldn’t dig a hole in the gravel driveway. I was getting ready to deploy the fresh water hose(s) when I noticed that they were in need of some serious cleaning. Linda agreed to take care of that and cleaned their storage tub too. Ditto for the waste water (sewage) hoses and their storage tub. Her taking on this task allowed me to return to working on the installation of the desk.

I had a 12″ long piece of 1/8″ aluminum angle and decided to use it to support the upper back edge of the interpedestal shelf/cover. I drilled and countersunk five holes in one of the flanges. Linda finished cleaning the hoses and then got our wireless thermometer from the house. It has a base thermometer and two wireless remotes so she put one remote in the freezer and the other one in the fresh food compartment. We wanted to monitor the temperature and dial it in to where we needed it before loading the refrigerator with food.

The stacked mending plates used to create a tongue-&-groove alignment system between the center cover and both the left and right desk pedestals/bases.

I removed the interpedestal cover and set the left pedestal aside so I could complete the AC wiring connections. I mounted the outlet strip to the wall centered between the two pedestals and about two inches below the level of the underside of the plywood that will support the Corian top. The outlet strip had a 15 foot cord. I determined how much of that length I needed to get through the right pedestal and forward along the wiring chase to where the other wires were located. I cut off the extra length, routed the power cord into the right pedestal at the left upper rear corner, down the inside left rear corner, and out the left end of the upper base. From there it ran forward to the other wires where I connected them. I turned on the circuit breaker and then turned on the outlet strip. The switch lit up, indicating the presence of 120V AC. I used my Etcon tester to check the duplex outlet by the passenger seat. It also had power so the wiring was good.

I set the interpedestal shelf/cover back in place, aligned with the right base, and then aligned the left base to it. I checked the distance from each end of the base to the HVAC duct and adjusted it to be the same. We then adjusted the position of the left pedestal until we were satisfied with the alignment with the interpedestal cover. We checked the alignment of the front top edges of the pedestals with a 6′ metal ruler. Everything looked OK so I secured the pedestal to the base using two screws that will be hidden by the laser printer in normal use.

I needed to screw the pedestal to the wall in the two upper corners to minimize the visibility of those screws. It was not flush to the wall at those points so I used a shim in the upper right. We will have to cover the vertical gap at the left rear with molding.

Bruce finds the center of a drawer front by finding the point where the diagonals of the face intersect. The handle mounting holes were located horizontally 1-1/2” to either side of this center point.

We put the removable plates back in the bottom of each pedestal. I drilled the holes for the pulls in the four desk drawers, installed the pulls, and put the drawers back in the desk. To find the correct location for the holes Linda suggested that we put a piece of painter’s tape in the center of the face and then draw a small segment of the two diagonals to find their intersection. For the two small drawers that was all we needed as they got single knob style pulls. For the two larger drawers we needed to locate the holes 1-1/2″ to either side of the center on a line through the center parallel to the top and bottom edges. I measured carefully and I think we did a pretty good job.

Sometime during the morning I texted Jarel the dimensions for a 3/4″ thick piece of walnut 1-7/8″ high by 34″ long to use as a face for the edges of the three layers of plywood under the refrigerator. He texted back and said “no problem” which lead to an exchange of a dozen e-mails clarifying just exactly what I wanted. I did not mind, better that than assumptions that result in wasted time making parts that don’t fit. Jarel is an experienced cabinet maker and is meticulous in his work. He knows all the questions to ask about things I did not specify and does so before cutting any wood.

Our last construction task before departure tomorrow was rehanging the bathroom door. I measured the distance from the bottom hinge to the bottom edge of the door and compared it to the distance from the hinge in the door frame to the floor. It looked like it should fit without rubbing so we hung the door. (The old ceramic tile rubbed as the door was swung to its fully open position, but the thickness of the underlayment and vinyl tile is less than the ceramic and thinset, at least in that area.)

Linda was still trying to prepare our food for the rally as there will be very little of the included food that we can eat. She made a grocery run while I returned to emptying out the front bay of the bus. I plan to leave most of the stuff that was stored in that bay at home so Josh has access to the ceiling to see if we can through-bolt mount the two captain’s chairs in the living room. I might also store all of the GLCC stuff down there as Linda will be coming down on Wednesday in the car with the cats and we want to minimize the amount of other stuff in the car.

I thought about sanitizing the fresh water system by using the 12V DC water pump and the winterizing valves/tubes to draw a dilute chlorine solution from a bucket and pump it through the fresh water pipes. I decided against it based on available time and higher priority items that needed to be done. I connected the clean fresh water hoses to the coach and started filling the tank. I checked that the fuel polishing pump was off and checked the air springs and latch on the generator. I made a mental note that the aft air springs (front of the Yanmar diesel engine) needed air and made sure the slide tray was latched in place. I was going to start the generator and let it power the air conditioners but decided to forego for now that as well.

We had unlatched and removed the towbar from the bus receiver earlier in the summer. I used one of our hand trucks to move it over by the car. I put the passenger side rear seat down and loaded the towbar in behind it along with the bag that holds all of the other pieces. That left plenty of room for the two cat carriers, litter tray, and any miscellaneous things she may bring along on Wednesday.

We put the mattress back onboard and Linda made the bed, but forgot the electric heating pad. Linda did some cleaning and then we loaded clothing and food. Computers, cameras, and other technology will go on first thing tomorrow morning. We then got the various GLCC items out of the garage and staged them by the passenger side of the bus. I loaded our personal items onto the driver’s side half of the slide tray and loaded the GLCC stuff onto passenger side half.

Our goal was to be done by 5 PM but it was 6 PM when I finally had the pressure washer ready to use. It took me a little over an hour to spray the car and the coach and I wrapped up for the day at 7:30 PM. We had seitan stroganoff for dinner with the 2013 Egri Merlot and had watermelon for dessert. It was another long day but we got a lot accomplished and most it did not require me to work on my hands and knees, for which I was grateful.

2015/09/13 (N) Club Business

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Linda is still fighting her cold and I was up way too late last night so we slept until 9 AM this morning. Because we were getting a late start, and neither of us was hungry, I made coffee but we skipped breakfast.

It was 51 degrees F in the bus so I turned on all three electric toe kick heaters and put on my zip front sweatshirt that I use to work in cool situations. We took all of the freezer packs out of the house refrigerator freezer compartment and moved them to the freezer compartment in the bus fridge. Linda also filled four large containers with water and snapped the lids on. We put those in the refrigerator compartment on the bus, turned on the power, and put the wireless remote thermometer in the freezer compartment.

I was going to raise the front of the refrigerator until the top hinge for the freezer door just touched the ceiling of the alcove but our relatively inexpensive model apparently lacks that adjustment. Linda was also concerned about how we will latch the doors for travel. She remembered seeing a very clever latch for a fridge with doors like ours at the GLAMARAMA rally in early June and found a picture of it on her phone. It is actually fairly simple and if custom made could be installed using the holes for the center hinge (between the doors) on the handle side (right side) of the fridge.

(I still like Scott Bruner’s solution best. He devised an electromagnet system that is activated by turning the ignition on but has an override switch. He and Tami have a cafe door, bottom freezer drawer unit. One electromagnet holds plates on top of the cafe doors where they meet at the center of the fridge. A second electromagnet is mounted on the right side of the lower case and holds a plate on the side edge of the freezer drawer front. Very clever, and very fail safe.)

Bruce installs the fixed side of the piano hinge to the top of the wiring chase above the OTR HVAC duct.

Our first construction task for today was to finish installing the built-in sofa. This was a semi-permanent installation with everything in its final place and screwed in. We will have to disassemble it once to finish cutting it and screening off the openings in the OTR HVAC duct and to drill the 4″ diameter holes in the vertical front panel for the circular registers. We also need to find a pair of suitable length lifts to support the seat in the open position. Finally, we need to find and mount some 12V DC LED lights and replace the momentary contact switches in the aft end cabinet with on-off versions.

It took us until 12:25 PM to finish the sofa (for now). We took a brief break and had an apple for a snack. Our next task was to put the plywood bed platform back in the coach. That sounds simple enough but we knew from taking it out that it would be difficult to put back in. The platform is the size of a queen size mattress, in two sections joined by a piano hinge. It’s big, bulky, and very heavy, with no good handholds but we managed to get it into the bedroom and setting flat on the storage box base.

The physically hard part was behind us but now we had to get the fixed part of the platform screwed back down to the base, requiring us to put 18 screws back in the holes they came out of. I rewired the aisle lights before we did that as I was easier to get to the wires. We used two screws to index the location, checked the reveal along the length of each side, and screwed it down. I then reconnected the two gas springs while Linda held the platform up. I also connected the wiring for the two cargo lights but they did not come on. I will have to change the bulbs and see if that’s the problem but for now we had more pressing tasks.

A view from near the co-pilot/navigator seat of the built-in sofa with the hinged seat base lifted up to reveal internal pieces and storage space.

We went inside, each had an apple, and then returned to the bus. I had planned to temporarily mount two 12V DC switches but did not have time to fabricate a temporary mounting plate. We needed the switches hooked up so I just reconnected the female spade connectors on the cable to the spade lugs on the switches and draped the wires over the arm of the passenger chair.

Our next task was to temporarily install the desk. The installation was only temporary in the sense that we would need to disassemble it to get the Aqua-Hot fan-coil heat exchangers installed in the bases. My preference was to get the heating system configured as part of the desk installation but we ran out of time before our appointment at Coach Supply Direct.

Our first sub-task was to cut the 1/4″ Baltic birch plywood spacer to fit on the right side of the right pedestal/base. I cut it to be shorter than the desk and not as deep as the base, which is recessed at the front to create a toe kick space. I cut the lower back corner out so the space would fit around the HVAC duct / wiring chase. We peeled off some clear tape from the mirrors in the right rear corner down below the level of the top of the desk and set the spacer in place.

Our next task was to redo some AC wiring to get power to the space between the pedestals and reconnect the passenger side front duplex outlet. To get power to the interpedestal space I decided to run 2C+G (Romex) cable from the wiring chase through a hole in the bottom of the pedestal, up the inside rear left, and out through a hole in the upper rear left side. This hole and cable will not be visible unless someone crawls under the center of the desk.

In order to get the cover/shelf in the foot well aligned with the left and right pedestal/base components I decided to use mending plates attached to the back side of the bases and pedestals. We started with the right hand components. I attached a plate to the back side of the left rear base projection and one to the underside of the left end of the upper bottom section of the pedestal. We set the base in place, put the pedestal on top of it, and set the cover/shelf in place.

We carefully shifted the components until we had them aligned the way we wanted. I then secured the pedestal to the wall (which is 5/8” or 3/4″ plywood not sure which) with a single screw through the back panel centered from side-to-side and a couple of inches down from the top edge. We double-checked the alignment of the pieces and then secured the pedestal to the base with three screws. The base is not screwed to the floor or anything else except the pedestal.

We set the left base and pedestal in place and fussed with the alignment for but it was already 4:15 PM. We had planned to quit working at 4 PM to get cleaned up for our SLAARC meeting and have dinner. We still have a lot to do tomorrow for me to be ready to leave on Tuesday morning, but it should be manageable.

We went to Panera in Brighton for dinner and both had the Edamame Soba Noodle Bowl. It was a generous serving that was tasty and filling even though it was only 390 calories. It was very high in sodium, a common but unfortunate problem with most of Panera’s food, so not something we would eat often.

We arrived at the South Lyon Witches Hat Depot Freight House at 6:30 PM for the monthly meeting of the South Lyon Area Amateur Radio Club (SLAARC). We had a larger group than usual, at least 30 people. The business meeting was brief and followed by a program by Steve (N8AR) on the Yaesu Fusion technology. Steve and several other club members brought different radios to demonstrate and let the attendees try.

We left in time to get home by 9 PM and watch an episode of Sherlock on Detroit PBS, followed by Rick Steve’s Europe and then Music Voyager. We’ve been working long, hard hours and it was nice to take an evening to relax and do something other than work on the bus.

2015/09/10 (R) Illuminating

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Linda had to go to the bakery today so she was up at 5:45 AM and out the door by 6:15. I was vaguely aware of the activity but fell back asleep and finally woke up a little before 8 AM. I skipped breakfast save for a glass of juice to wash down my vitamin and allergy pill. I spent time finishing yesterday’s blog post and thinking about what I absolutely had to get done in next four days.

I was working at the dining room table instead of in the living room so I got to watch a Red squirrel dart back and forth across the deck all morning. It was gathering walnuts from the tree northeast of our house and taking them somewhere west of our upper deck. It would run (hop) across the deck with a giant walnut in its mouth and then return by way of the deck railing. While it was gathering another walnut I moved to our library where I had a good view of our lower deck. It came down the stairs from the upper deck and disappeared behind the grill. It may be storing them under the deck or under the cover on the grill, in which case we will have to move them.

The main pieces of the desk set in place but not yet assembled or secured, and without the temporary plywood top or permanent Corian countertop.

Once I was in the bus I continued pondering how to get the desk installed so that everything would line up. Built-in furniture is just that, and I had not spent a lot of time in advance figuring out how I was going to fasten pieces together and secure them to the coach. I retrieved the piece of 1/4″ Baltic birch plywood from the garage to use as a spacer at the right end and just slid it in place temporarily. I decided I would use mending plates attached to the back and underside of the left and right bases and pedestals to align the center cover. I also decided to use a length of angle against the wall to support and align the pedestals and cover. Along the same lines I decided to use smaller angle brackets to attach the vertical front panel of the built-in sofa to the two plenum/support boxes and the air return shelf, and to attach the plenum boxes and shelf to the HVAC/wiring chase.

One of the original living room AC light fixtures. These were no doubt high-end fixtures but no longer worked in our remodeled interior.

Feeling like I should get something tangible accomplished I decided to re-install the AC light fixture and the three DC reading lights under the overhead cabinets above the desk. Linda and I agreed last night that we needed to replace the three 120V AC light fixtures in the front of the coach so I turned my attention to that issue. I removed the fixture on the driver’s side by the kitchen end of the sofa alcove and removed the mounting ring. I also measured the size of the base and the overall size of the fixture and wrote them down. Ideally I will find a fixture that has a similar size base but with most of the light fixture above the center point. One of the problems with the current fixtures is that they hang down far enough that a person sitting on the sofa would bump them with their head and probably break them as they are made of glass rods.

I headed towards The Home Depot in Howell and stopped at McDonald’s first for French fries and a soda beverage. I looked at all of their wall sconce light fixtures. They had two different ones that I thought might work but deferred a purchase until I had checked at Lowe’s. THD had 72″ piano (continuous) hinges, however, so I bought one. I also looked at PEX plumbing parts as Butch mentioned last night that I could use them to plumb the fan-coil heat exchangers.

Lowe’s had a wall sconce that was a little more to my liking. I needed three but they only had one in stock, which I bought. The Associate checked inventory at other stores and indicated that there were two more in stock in New Hudson. He wrote down the Model number and the phone number for the store and said I could call and they would hold the items for me. I picked up a couple of 75W GE Reveal light bulbs, the mending plates, angle brackets, and two different pieces of aluminum angle while I was there. I looked for pieces of felt but all they had were very thick furniture pads which was not what I needed.

The new living room light fixture. The color, style, and fit are a better match to the remodeled interior.

I was going to stop at O’Reilly’s Auto Parts to check on heater hose, fittings, and band clamps but decided to skip that stop in favor of getting home and installing the new wall sconce light fixture. It installed without too much difficulty and I liked the look. The fixture, however, was rated for a maximum 60W bulb.

I closed up the house and bus and drove to the Lowe’s in New Hudson. They did indeed have two more of the wall sconce light fixtures that I needed so I bought them. I also picked up three 60W (equivalent, 8.5W actual) 800 lumens dimmable LED warm white light bulbs. Linda texted me while I was at the store to let me know she was leaving the bakery and heading home.

I stopped at Michael’s Arts and Crafts in Brighton and bought a 36″ x 36″ piece of walnut brown felt. I plan to use the felt underneath all of the pieces of the desk and sofa that contact the floor, and possibly in some other areas as well, to keep the wood from marring the tile.

When I got home I called Elkhart Campground to make a reservation for the GLCC rally next week. I also called A-1 Upholstery in Elkhart, Indiana to check on our sofa cushions. Terry said they were almost done and we could pick them up on Monday. I then sent several text messages to Jarel with photos attached of the desk and sofa in place on the bus and indicated I had some questions and would call him later.

I was getting ready to install the other two light fixtures when Linda got home. The timing was good as she got to see the first one and approve it before I installed the other two. We discussed the covering up of the mirror strips in the corner and decided we would leave them for now. We can cover them up later if desired. Linda went in the house to fix dinner. I got the second sconce installed and went inside.

I had a few minutes until dinner was ready and used it to send an e-mail to Jarel. Dinner was couscous on power greens and small slices of bread from a baguette Linda bought the other day. I also had the leftover corn on the cob.

After dinner I called Jarel. We had a long chat and it was 8 PM by the time we finished. Linda headed to bed and I went back to the bus to install the third/final light fixture. I also installed four small frosted bulbs in the light fixture under the overhead cabinets above the desk, replacing the clear bulbs that were there. This light fixture is part of the same collection as the ones I removed from the living room walls but its design and location do interfere with anything. We might replace it someday, if we find something we like better for use over the desk that is the right size and shape, but for now it will remain in place. I locked up the bus, closed up the garage, and headed to my office.

I dealt with some BCM-related e-mail and then off-loaded today’s photos from the Sony a-100 DSLR. I went through all of the photos from September, selected about a dozen, and processed them into 300×200 pixel size images so I could share them with friends and family via e-mail. I have written extensive blog posts everyday but last posted to the website in mid-July. I don’t like being that far behind but getting the posts uploaded is just not as important as other things I have to do at this time.

I was heading to bed when I decided to replace the two light bulbs in our home kitchen that were burned out. I had the two 75W GE Reveal bulbs that I could not use in the bus, so I installed them in the kitchen downlights, and that really brightened things up.

I got to bed just before midnight. It had been a beautiful day, weather wise, and a cool night was in store portending good sleep. But first I had to capture the details of today’s work for this post.

2015/09/07 (M) Grouted

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Linda got up at 6:45 AM to get a shower before Madeline woke up. She peeked in the bedroom at 7:30 and there was no Madeline to be seen! She pushed the door open a little farther and felt some resistance. She looked behind the door and there was Ms. M, playing hide and seek with Grandma Linda. 🙂 Madeline was not fully awake, however, and sat with Linda on the living room sofa and read stories for a while.

All of this was retold to me as I was up late last night working on yesterday’s blog post and did not get up this morning until 8 AM, just in time for breakfast. Breakfast was gluten-free toaster waffles with real maple syrup and mixed berries on the side (blackberries, blueberries, raspberries, and strawberries); simple but delicious.

After breakfast Linda took Madeline to the Brighton Mill Pond Imagination Station Playscape. They needed to return a book to the lending library and Linda wanted to make sure Ms. M had an active morning so she would be tired enough to lie down for her nap at 1 PM.

Bruce grouting the tiles in the hallway by the new bus refrigerator.

I got back to work on the grout immediately after breakfast. My goal was to be done by noon as it needed to cure, undisturbed, for 24 hours before we could clean it and resume working inside the bus. I picked up where I left off last night with the area in front of the refrigerator where the kitchen blends into the hallway. I was now out into the front half of the bus which is much more open than the hallway, bathroom, and bedroom. Also, most of the tiles in this area are full 16 inch squares so I thought I might be able to work faster. That was optimistic to say the least.

It was forecast to be hot today with a high near 90 degrees F and elevated relative humidity. I turned on the front and middle air-conditioners initially but eventually had to turn off the middle unit when I got to the point where I would no longer be able to reach it. I was a bit surprised that the front A-C alone kept the coach comfortable but we are approaching the autumnal Equinox so the transit of the sun is enough lower in the southern sky that the coach is in shade for most of the day.

It felt like I was moving right along but by noon it was obvious that this was going to be an all-day task so I stopped to have lunch. Linda served vegan hotdogs with pickle relish and onions and set out a large bunch of grapes. After lunch I resumed the grouting while Linda and Madeline watched a video. Madeline laid down for her nap right on schedule. Linda then took a few minutes to help me move the Aqua-Hot fan-coil heat exchangers so I could grout the area where they had been sitting on the floor. Linda cleaned up the kitchen and then had some well-deserved and needed quiet time.

I had a call from Butch around 1:30 PM. I was in the middle of applying grout and said I would call him back later. They left on Saturday for the southwest U.S. and were planning to spend this evening at a Walmart near Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. By 5:25 PM I had one small set of inter tile spaces to grout when Linda and Madeline came out to tell me that dinner was ready. I had just finished a section so I had already cleaned my tools. I put the lid back on the grout container and went inside to eat.

Dinner was mock chicken tenders (vegan), green beans, kale chips, sliced plums, and grapes. There was a little left over “gravy” (vegan) from last night so I had that on my chicken. Madeline helped make the kale chips and really liked them. As soon as I was done eating I excused myself from the table and went back to the bus.

I finished grouting the last four grout spaces and then cleaned up the tools and put them away. I also cleaned up the cockpit area of the bus which is where everything ended up as I worked my way out of the living area. I turned off the front A-C and locked the bus. While I did that Linda cleaned up the kitchen and then gathered up all of Madeline’s things.

When I was done with my chores I cleaned up and changed clothes. The three of us then loaded all of Madeline’s things into Linda’s car which has had the car seat in it all weekend. We closed up the house and headed for Ann Arbor. Linda drove so that I could return Butch’s phone call.

Butch had a possible issue with his house battery bank and wanted to discuss it. He bought eight AGM batteries last winter in Quartzsite, Arizona and finally installed them over the summer. They are 12V DC batteries and he has them in a series-parallel configuration to make a 24V DC battery pack with a 12V DC center tap. A 24V Magnum 4024 inverter/charger is connected to the +24V and DC ground and a Vanner Equalizer is connected to those same points and to the 12V center tap, which is where 12V DC loads, like the water pump, draw their power. In addition, Butch wired three LED display voltmeters to the battery pack; one for the lower 12V bank, one for the upper 12V bank, and one for the overall 24V bank.

His issue/concern was that the upper and lower 12V banks were not reading the same voltage. They were different by one volt, which is a lot, and the upper bank had the lower voltage, which I agreed was an odd situation. Without the Vanner Equalizer 12V loads would draw their energy from the lower 12 V bank and as the charge in that bank got depleted the voltage would drop. The Vanner Equalizer’s purpose in the system is to draw charge from the upper battery bank to make up for this depletion and keep the voltage the same, or equalized, on both banks. I presumed that all three voltmeters were accurate and that the Vanner was connected correctly, all of which would be easy enough to check.

After talking about all of this his plan was to temporarily disable the Vanner by removing its connection to battery ground and see what affect that had. He also thought the Vanner might have a circuit breaker and would check to see if it had tripped. I could not confirm or deny whether this would work. I have looked for information on how the Vanner does what it does and not found much although I have found circuit diagrams for other battery equalizers. My presumption is that it is a small inverter/charger, taking DC power from the upper 12V bank, creating some sort of AC waveform, and applying it to one side of a 1:1 transformer. The other side of the transformer sees the same AC waveform, converts it back to 12V DC, and applies it to the lower battery. The transformer is the key as it isolates the two banks relative to ground. I wrapped up the call a few minutes before we got to our destination.

We arrived at Brendan and Shawna’s house at 7:45 PM. They had pulled up just minutes before us and were unloading their car. They had not dropped Jorge at his home yet so we got to visit with him too. Madeline had me read her a book about what happens if you give a cat a cupcake. We stayed until 8:15 PM and offered to drive Jorge home as Brendan and Shawna had to get Madeline to bed and then eat something for dinner. Madeline got out the cupcakes she helped make and offered those for their evening meal. Tomorrow is a work day for her parents and she has to go to her new school. Jorge is also starting a new job as the wine department manager at the new Plum Market on the northeast side of Ann Arbor, so everyone needed their rest this evening.

We were going to stop at Meijer’s supermarket on the way home but encountered rain before we got to the Brighton exit. We stopped at the Shell station instead, filled up the gas tank, and bought two large decaf coffees at the Dunkin Donuts co-located with the station. Back at the house we each had a vegan cupcake and then sat quietly in the living room working on our iPads while enjoying our brew and the company of our cats. By 10 PM Linda was sleepy and went to bed. I was also tired but stayed up longer to finish this post. Scattered thunderstorms were forecast over a several hour period starting at 11:30 PM. That is when I turned off the light but they had not yet started. We could use a good soaking rain so I hope we get one overnight.

2015/09/06 (N) Grouting

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We got up quietly at 7:30 AM as Madeline was still sound asleep. Linda did not want to let her sleep too long and get off schedule so I got the “all clear” to grind the coffee beans just before 8 AM. I made the Costa Rican half-caff because I am trying to use it up so we can replace it with something we like better. Madeline emerged with Grandma Linda a few minutes later. After stretching they decided to sit quietly on the living room sofa and read stories while everyone woke up and the adults enjoyed our coffee.

Sometime between 9:30 and 10 AM we left for the Howell Farmers Market. We walked from one end to the other, with Madeline in her stroller, scoping out this week’s bounty. We then walked back through and Linda bought a few things including hard stem garlic which we had never seen before. We stopped and chatted with our favorite vendor, Marjorie.

When we got home and put the produce away Linda prepared a snack lunch for herself and Madeline. The two of them then went on an outing to the farm at Kensington Metropark (KMP) while I stayed behind to work on bus projects. I decided to start by finishing the assembly of the pieces for the built-in sofa. I attached the center support for the return air shelf as follows:

I determined the center of the long edges of the shelf and drew a line between them.
I carried these center marks to the other side and then measured 3/8″ to either side.
I connected corresponding marks to create a pair of parallel lines 3/4″ apart and centered on the underside of the shelf.
I placed the support in position, determined its fore-aft position, and marked the ends.
I then marked a piece of scrap wood, cut it into four pieces, and used them to hold the support in place; two long pieces the same length as the support, and two short pieces across the ends.
This allowed me to turn the shelf right side up with the center support held in the correct place and then mark and drill countersunk pilot holes for the screws.
I removed the support piece, sanded off any rough spots, put Titebond II wood glue on the edge, and replaced it between the temporary blocking.
I stood on the shelf to force the pieces together and ran all the screws down tight.
I then removed the temporary blocking.

After sleeping on it last night I decided I would attach the plenum/support boxes to the vertical front panel and the wood wire chase on top of the HVAC chase rather than to the adjacent cabinets or to the floor. That meant I could go ahead and assemble them as complete, single units. Easier said than done.

Even though I used right angle corner clamps the two halves I built for each box did not want to go together perfectly. I managed to get one of them assembled but could not complete the other one by myself. The problem was that I needed both hands to pull the pieces into alignment and two more hands to operate the drill and screw gun.

By now it was 1 PM, which is Madeline’s normal nap time, but they were not back from the Metropark yet so I gathered up all of the tools and materials I needed to grout the floor tiles in the bus. That included the special Armstrong S-288 Glacier White sanded vinyl grout, a flat blade screwdriver, the 4″x8″ hard edge float, the smaller margin trowel, the 2″ putty knife (wall scraper), the ScotchBrite sponges, the Revel scrubber, two large buckets for rinse water, paper towels, a large cloth towel, and paper bags.

Madeline pets one of the sheep at the Kensington Metropark animal farm.

Since Linda and Madeline had still not returned I had a few pretzels with hummus. They finally got home around 1:30 PM and I heard all about the farm and the animals Ms. M got to see and touch. The 2-day old piglets were apparently a big hit but so was the playroom. It was a good outing and I wish I could have gone but I got stuff done that needed to be done.

Madeline finally laid down for her nap at 2 PM but Linda could not help me with the tile grouting as she needed to be within earshot of Madeline’s bedroom. I decided that we could not afford any further delay for this aspect of the interior remodeling project and resolved to do it by myself. Without Linda to walk me through the steps, have materials ready, and clean the tools, I needed to be very clear about the steps and their timing. I must have read the directions on the container of grout a dozen times in an attempt to internalize them but they just would not stick with me. I needed a spray bottle for water so Linda found one for me.

The afternoon was very warm so I turned off the air-conditioning in our home library, closed up the coach, and turned on two of the three air-conditioners, making sure they were on opposite legs of the electrical service. I staged all of the stuff in the bedroom storage box as I planned to start on the back side of the bed in the driver side corner by the head of the bed and work my way out.

I finally got started at 2:30 PM. The grouting involved a specific set of steps that got repeated many times as the directions said to only do 6 – 10 sq. ft. at a time. That range had to do with the time required to apply and strike the grout, setup time (3 – 8 minutes), misting with water, waiting 20-30 seconds, scrubbing, and finally wiping with a square edged cellulose sponge. I had to divide the U-shaped bedroom floor into six sections and it took me until 5:30 PM to do that much so my average time was 30 minutes per section, each of which was smaller than 6 square feet.

I took a short break, had something to drink, and checked with Linda on the timing of dinner. We settled on 6:30 PM and I returned to my grouting. I had to do the bathroom floor in two sections, which got me into the hallway and joined up with the work from the bedroom. I went in to clean up for dinner and was greeted by the smell of something baking. Madeline wanted to make cupcakes so Linda assembled the ingredients and walked her through the steps, letting her do as much of the work as possible. For not even being three years old yet she is very interested in cooking, but only if it is something she will get to eat! 🙂

Dinner was vegan cheeseburgers, corn-on-the-cob (from the Farmers Market), left over black beans and edamame, and sliced pears. I worked in the bus from 7 to 8 PM and finished the hallway as far as the bend that transitions into the kitchen. I cleaned all of the tools and sealed the grout container using Cling-Wrap pressed down onto the surface of the grout to keep air away from it, and locked up the bus.

I washed up and turned on the Yaesu FTM-400 2m/70cm radio in the ham shack while Linda helped Madeline take a bath. Steve, N8AR, was serving as net control for the weekly SLAARC information net and had already started the net but not yet called for check-ins so I got to participate in the entire net. We had a small group this evening, most likely due to it being a holiday weekend, but it was still a good net.

I came upstairs to have dessert with Linda and Madeline; chocolate cupcakes (vegan) with sprinkles. Yum. I then returned to my office to re-read an article I wrote about replacing the speedometer in the bus and editing it to indicate where the pictures should be placed. I dealt with several BCM related e-mails and then came upstairs.

Madeline was in her pajamas and sitting in her portable bed while Linda read a story. She decided that she wanted me to read a couple stories too, so I did. We got her tucked in with her stuffed animals arranged at the four corners of her bed, turned on the night light, and left her to fall asleep.

I opened the bottle of Apricot wine that Brendan and Shawna picked up from Leelenau Cellars and we each had a small glass. I worked on this post while Linda cleaned up the kitchen. It had been a long and very tiring day for both of us but a very satisfying and productive day as well. We don’t mind that kind of tired.

2015/09/05 (S) Building the Built-in

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We set the alarm for 7 AM as we had to return the 100 pound floor roller to The Home Depot by 8:08 AM. We got the roller out of the bus, reattached the transport wheels, and loaded it into the back of my car. We positioned it so that Linda could hold on to the handle while I drove. One-hundred pounds that is designed to roll is not something you want loose in your car. We got to the store at 7:40 AM but the associate was busy renting a ditch digging machine to someone. We had to wait 15 minutes but that was OK. After returning the roller we drove back to the house so Linda could get her car and our iPads and then drove separately to Panera in Brighton.

Linda had her usual Everything bagel and I had my usual Cinnamon Swirl & Raisin bagel, both sliced and toasted with nothing on them. Two large coffees rounded out the order. The coffee was hot and did not have grounds in it (for a change). For some reason we got an extra Everything bagel that we did not order so which we split it.

Linda left at 9 AM to drive to Ann Arbor to pick up grand-daughter Madeline who will be with us until sometime on Monday. Her mom and dad are attending a wedding on Sunday in Madison, Wisconsin so they are driving over today and driving back on Monday. I stayed at Panera getting my money’s worth of coffee while finishing yesterday’s blog post and starting on today’s missive.

I left Panera at 9:45 and stopped for gasoline at the Shell station on the way home. $2.29/gallon. I would love to see $2/gallon gasoline again. Better yet, I would love to see $2/gallon diesel fuel. Linda planned to stop at the grocery store on the way back but I wanted to start a load of laundry and be home when Linda got back to the house with Madeline.

I got the laundry sorted and the first load started and then spent a little time at my desk. I had to reset a password for someone on the SLAARC website and I logged in I was reminded that WordPress 4.3 was now available. There were seven other updates available as well; three plug-ins and four themes. I don’t use any of those themes and should probably delete them, but for now I just updated WP and then updated everything else. I then logged in to our personal website, the FMCA-GLCC website, and the FMCA Freethinkers website and did the same updates.

While I was in our personal website I cleared out the 104 spam comments that had accumulated since my last house cleaning. In the Freethinkers website I activated all of the plug-ins except Wordfence. I have problems with this website and tech support at iPower says it is the Wordfence plug-in that is at fault. They ask for permission to deactivate it and I give them permission but ask that they only disable that one plug-in. Instead they disable ALL of them; every time. I would really like to move this website to QTH.com and I may just do that as an add-on domain to our account. Unfortunately our e-mail reflectors are set up on through the iPower account and I doubt that the club will want to pay for two different web hosting services.

It was a nicer day than we have had for most of the week, cooler with clearer skies and a nice breeze, so I opened up the windows in the motorcoach and turned on all three ceiling exhaust fans to air out the interior and get rid of the lingering smell from the floor tile adhesive. (Yes, that is one, long sentence, but since I have added this one, it is now a proper paragraph rather than a single sentence paragraph.)

Linda and Madeline stopped at the Whole Foods Market in Ann Arbor, which is not far from our son and daughter-in-law’s house, and got to our house at 11 AM. Madeline and I helped Grandma Linda unload the groceries and put them away. I moved a few things from the front hallway into the library where Linda put most of the bus drawers last night (three of them are in our bedroom). Madeline wanted her inflatable porta-bed set up so Linda took care of that. Once her bedroom was arranged we got out her toy box and started playing with things. She also had a couple of bags of things she brought with her and got a small soccer ball out of one of them. We had a great time throwing and rolling it around the living room. It is always wonderful to see the pure joy of a young child at play doing something as simple as this.

By 12:30 PM Madeline was ready for lunch so Linda made a PB&J sandwich and washed some green grapes. She washed some black organic grapes for us and I had a few pretzels dipped I Sabra Roasted Red Pepper Hummus. It’s my favorite hummus from them, or pretty much anyone else.

After Madeline laid down for her afternoon nap at 1 PM Linda and I both got busy with chores. As much as I would like to have taken today off, at least from hands and knees work, we only had eight days left to get some significant tasks accomplished on the bus. In terms of a critical path view of the overall project the critical task is grouting the floor tile that we finished installing at 9 PM last night. Not only will it take some time to do but once it is done it cannot be walked on for 24 hours. As much as it needed to be done, however, I needed a day of not being on my hands and knees. If I get it done on Sunday I can resume work inside the coach on Monday.

While Linda made a batch of granola I worked on assembling some of the pieces for the built-in sofa. My plan was to fully assemble the two plenum boxes that will support the ends of the plywood seat, and I intended to do that by gluing and screwing the four pieces together for each. In order to do that I needed screws of the appropriate type (#6 SR) and length (1-1/4″) so I went to Lowe’s to get them. While I was there I looked at continuous hinges and angle brackets but did not buy any. I need a 72″ hinge but all they had were 48″, 30″, and 12″. I may be able to use two 30″ and one 12″ but I need to check the actual dimension. I also needed a #6 drill but with an integral countersink but Lowe’s did not seem to have what I needed so I went to The Home Depot and found something there.

I think this marking scribe belonged to my mother’s father and is at least 100 years old.

Back home I was getting all of my tools and supplies ready when I realized that I would not be able to attach the plenum/support boxes to the adjacent cabinets if they were fully assembled. This was an example of incomplete design; either I have forgotten how I planned to anchor these boxes, changed my thinking about this in the time since I did the design work, or never figured out this detail in the first place.

Ideally I could anchor them in a way that does not destroy the cabinets or the floor. One way to accomplish that would be to attach them to the HVAC plenum at the back and the vertical front support board using angle brackets, and to the top of the wiring chase above the HVAC plenum via the two filler strips on either side of the seat. If I do that I can fully assemble the two plenum/support boxes before installing them.

For now I only assembled half-boxes with one side piece attached to the bottom piece and the other side piece attached to the top piece. I built one of them for the left end and the other one for the right end. What this leaves open as an option is screwing the side/bottom assembly to its adjacent cabinet and then screwing the other assembly to the first one without using any glue. The dry assembly would allow everything to be disassembled later if needed.

Madeline was up by this time and helped Grandma Linda put the new seed block in the bird feeder. They then walked around to the front of the garage to see what Grandpa Bruce was doing. I showed them my tools and the pieces of wood and explained how everything was going to work and fit together.

Two pieces of one of the plenum boxes held at right angles for gluing and screwing.

I aligned the pieces being joined, which are all 3/4″ cabinet grade 13 ply plywood, using two corner clamps. I then scribed a line 3/8″ from the edge of the piece that was sitting on the edge of the other piece. I marked screw locations every two inches with the spacing centered along the line. I drilled pilot holes with countersinking to ensure the screw heads would be below the surface of the wood. I disassembled the two pieces, leaving the piece that the screws would go in first in the clamps, and sanded off any rough edges. I ran screws part way into each hole so the tips protruded just enough to put the two pieces back into alignment when they were rejoined. I applied Titebond II wood glue to the edge piece spread it out, and wiped off my finger with a wet cloth. I inserted the edge piece back into the clamps, used the screws to make sure it was aligned, tightened the clamps, and ran the screws most of the way down. I then loosened the clamps holding the edge piece and drew it up tight by running the screws all the way down. I used a wet towel to wipe off the excess glue that was squeezed from the joint and set it aside to dry. I took a lot of pictures too.

The center portion of the storage space under the seat will have an elevated platform with closed ends to create a plenum for the OTR HVAC return air. I assembled the two end pieces to the ends of the platform using the same method I used for the plenum/support boxes. There is also a support piece for the middle of the platform but I cannot use the clamps to hold it in position relative to the platform so I will have to do something else. I was thinking that I did not feel like tackling that task when Linda and Madeline came back to the garage to let me know it was almost time for dinner. Saved by the food bell, I closed up the garage and went inside to eat.

Linda set out some carrot slivers, diced peaches, and home grown cherry tomatoes. She cooked some mock chicken patties and heated up some vegan gravy to go with them as a main course. For sides she heated black beans, edamame, and vegan Mac-n-cheese. We all enjoyed our meal.

Madeline really enjoys the swings at the Brighton Mill Pond Imagination Station Playscape.

Our son let Linda know that Madeline had not been sleeping through the night recently and had developed a sensitivity to noises. Linda figured Madeline might sleep better if she engaged in some vigorous play after dinner and suggested that we go to the Brighton Mill Pond Imagination Station Playscape. Ms. M liked the idea but wanted to make sure I was coming too. I found a reasonably good parking spot and pushed her over in the stroller because she does not like to walk for the sake of walking. But once we got to the playscape she was in “go mode.” As the sun set and the light faded we strollered her over to Jack’s for a scoop of vanilla ice cream with sprinklers. We then strollered her back to the car and drove home.

Linda had promised Madeline that she could watch a video before she went to bed. She had selected an episode of Daniel Tiger, an animated children’s program based on the Daniel Striped Tiger character from the old Mr. Rogers TV program. We had Shawna’s iPad with access to her Netflix account but the program was downloading slower than molasses poured on a cold day. We had problems with video, then audio, but eventually got it to work after I turned off the Wi-Fi transceiver on my smartphone. Linda got Madeline ready for bed while fiddled with the technology.

After the video Grandma Linda carried Ms. M around to look at all her favorite artwork, a bedtime ritual that goes back to the first time she ever stayed at our house overnight.

2015/09/01 (T) Tiling Kate

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We both slept until 8 AM this morning and even then got up slowly and reluctantly. We probably need a day off to rest, relax, and catch up on some not-so-physical tasks, but now is not the time. There is too much to do and time is slipping by. The fact that hot weather, muggy weather is forecast for the rest of the week probably had some effect on our enthusiasm for getting back to work. We should probably get up at 6 AM and quit working by early afternoon, but I am not on a sleep schedule that accommodates those hours.

We had our usual homemade granola with blueberries, split a banana, and had OJ/GFJ to wash down our vitamins. I made Ethiopian Yirgacheffe half-caff coffee, but not as much as usual. We enjoyed our coffee in the living room with our cats and finally got back to work at 10 AM.

Dry fit of Armstrong Alterna floor tiles. The starting point was where the kitchen was where the kitchen transitions into the hallway.

Today was one of the milestone days we have been working towards all summer; we (finally) started laying out (dry fitting) the new floor tiles. I had done two layouts on 1/4″ grid paper back in early June; one with the sides of the tiles parallel and perpendicular to the centerline of the bus floor, the other with the sides turned 45 degrees. We both liked the turned layout better so I used it to estimate the number of tiles we needed and placed the order back in mid-June. They took a few weeks to arrive but they have been sitting flat in their boxes since early July waiting to be installed.

My original drawing has tiles lined up with opposite corners on the centerline of the floor, although it looks good on paper there was no way I could draw it at a scale that allowed me to accurately account for the 1/8″ grout spacing. The drawing was just a “proof of concept” and a starting point for the actual layout.

We laid tiles out according to the plan from a starting point in front of the refrigerator that would allow one of the grout lines to go down the center of the hallway in front of the pantry. Unfortunately that did not allow the tiles to reach the front edge of the floor by the cockpit or work out well for the toe kick space under the kitchen base cabinets or hallway running back to the bathroom and bedroom.

A famous problem in mathematics is finding convex polygons that can “tile the plane.” What this means is that the polygon can fit together with itself perfectly so that there are no gaps. Some of Escher’s artwork was based on the use of such polygons and that is the context in which most people would be familiar with this concept. Among “regular” polygons, which are equilateral and equiangular, triangles, squares, and pentagons can tile the plane. So can right triangles and parallelograms, which includes the rhombus. Beyond that it gets a bit tricky and someone just recently discovered a previously unknown irregular pentagon using a computer program to systematically examine a very large number of possibilities.

What does that have to do with our bus remodeling project? Not much, really, beyond the obvious fact that the new vinyl floor tiles for our motorcoach are squares with an edge length of 16 inches. Floor tiles are almost universally square in shape because they are easy to manufacture and can be laid out on a floor in several different ways. Finding a way that fits a particular space in a balanced way is the tricky part, however, and more so in this case because the tiles need to form a continuous pattern of grout lines (if possible) while working their way down the hall and into the bathroom and bedroom.

We shifted the string of tiles running down the centerline towards the kitchen cabinets on the driver’s side of the bus so the corners just reached the recessed base. We then shifted them towards the rear of the coach to get reasonable size pieces at the front edge by the cockpit. We filled in some tiles to either side of the main fore-aft string to make sure they would make it to the edges with reasonable size pieces. When it was clear that this positioning was going to provide a balanced installation in the kitchen and living room we started working our way down the hallway and into the bathroom.

The tiles continued to fall into place and fit well in the bathroom but did not flow into the bedroom quite the way we wanted. We may have to offset a grout line as we transition from the hallway to the bedroom but were otherwise satisfied with our dry fitting. We returned to the front of the coach and placed every full tile that we could. We then started trimming tiles to fill in smaller pieces. We limited ourselves to pieces that had one or two straight cuts and no notches or tabs.

It was 4:30 PM by the time we got to the door of the bathroom and bedroom threshold, where a critical decision would need to be made regarding the offsetting of a grout line. We have learned that the end of the work day is not a good time to make critical decisions. With company coming in a couple of hours we quit working and got cleaned up.

I sat in the living room and worked on this post. Kate sent a text message at 5:30 PM that she was leaving Wayne RESA and heading our way. We figured she would get here at 6:30 and that is when she arrived. She brought a dip that she made from cannelloni beans, garlic, and lemon juice, some baby carrots, and some pretzel chips. We enjoyed the appetizers with some Bell’s Oberon beer while we chatted about work, travel, and family. Kate travels every chance she gets, usually with her S.O. Brian but sometimes by herself. Europe is a favorite destination but she frequently visits family members all across the U.S.A. and sometimes overseas.

After catching up a bit we gave Kate a tour of the bus interior. She liked the new floor tiles and our choice of seat fabric but was suitably impressed with the pull-out pantry which pleased us. I turned off the three residential air-conditioners as we exited the bus. Linda then got busy preparing dinner while I showed Kate the pieces of the custom desk and built-in sofa. I turned on the A-C in the library (where the desk and sofa pieces are stored) to cool it off and lower the humidity. It had been off all day since we were running the main house A-C plus the three A-C units in the coach.

Dinner was ready at 8:30 PM, a simple but tasty meal of burgers and fries with a second round of Bell’s Oberon beer. (Linda bought a real beef patty and got a slice of real cheddar cheese for Kate.) We had fresh strawberries and Coconut Bliss non-dairy ice cream for dessert and then continued to chat about photography, cameras, travel, and the low power Radio station, AM 1700, that Brian runs in Ypsilanti. A local blogger does a weekly interview show that Brian then podcasts. The most recent one was an interview with a professor from U of M Ann Arbor who wrote a book that was recently made into a movie (Diary of a Young Girl). The podcast was “liked” by Sarah Vowel, who is sometimes featured on “This American Life.” Very cool.

Kate had to go to work in the morning and left around 10:15 PM. Linda went straight to bed but I had a couple of things to take care of first. I had initiated the download of an updated NVidia GeForce driver for my ASUS laptop computer. I e-mailed several documents to my sister Patty, and then downloaded the final draft of the August/September Bus Conversion Magazine, proofread my two articles, and e-mailed a couple corrections to the publisher. I installed the driver update and then went to bed. I wrote for a while and finally turned out the light at midnight and fell asleep.

2015/08/31 (M) A Major Sub-Project Done

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We both took Advil PM before bed last night as both of us were sore and tired from a long day of work and needed a good night’s sleep. We awoke at 8 AM to dense fog but it was not unexpected as I saw the advisory on the weather forecast before I went to sleep last night. I made a pot of the Costa Rican half-caff coffee while Linda washed blueberries and got our granola ready. We enjoyed our coffee in the living room with the cats on our laps and listened to Dr. Michael Greger’s daily research summary on NutrionFacts.org.

We were still a bit tired and sore but finally got back to work on the bus at 10:30 AM just as Keith showed up to mow the grass. After opening up the bus and the “workshop”(garage), and getting out the air-compressor and hooking it up, we got the piece of underlayment out of the bedroom that we cut last night but still needed to trim. I cut about 1/8″ off of the passenger side end and cut off the front corner on that end so it would clear the piece of vertical trim. With those adjustments it dropped into place and I stapled most of it to the subfloor. I would have stapled the whole piece but we ran out of staples.

We had already measured and drawn the second piece for the bedroom but without staples we were at a standstill. Linda needed to pick up a few things at the grocery store, so we closed up the house and bus and made an errand run. I dropped her at Meijer’s and drove across the street to Lowe’s. I bought another pack of 1,000 #18 staples, 3/4″ with 1/4” crown because that was the smallest quantity they sell. I also picked up a small bottle of pneumatic tool oil. I drove back to Meijer’s and waited in the parking lot for Linda to emerge. When she did she had eight grocery bags. I guess “a few things” is relative. She got a real hamburger patty and one slice of real cheese from the deli to serve to Kate tomorrow night.

Once we had the groceries unloaded and put away we got back to work on the underlayment. I laid out the next piece for the bedroom which had 11 angles. Even though I worked from a consistent reference point the numbers did not quite work out so I took additional measurements and made adjustments accordingly. When I was satisfied that the layout was close to correct we cut the piece out of the partial panel. I then cut it in half crossways to create two pieces each of which could be installed. We started with the half piece closest to the driver side.

Keith finished cutting the grass and came to get his check so we gave him the inside tour of the bus. He had seen the front part before but never been all the way to the back. He recognized that it was an ambitious project.

The other half of the back bedroom piece, towards the passenger side, took some tweaking but we finally got it in and stapled. The last piece for the bedroom should have been the easiest, a 42″ x 18″ rectangle for the aisle at the foot of the bed/storage box. It wasn’t a perfect rectangle, of course, so it also required adjustments. Things that should be at right angles rarely are and the flanges on the bottom of the HVAC chases do not have straight edges as I assumed they would. The adjustments are usually small but necessary to get the pieces to fit. So it was with the last piece for the main floor.

We thought we were done when Linda noticed a small “L” shaped area around the media cabinet behind the driver’s seat. We still had pieces of underlayment left over that were big enough to cut this piece. After measuring carefully and laying it out the numbers were once again not adding up. We still had the piece of art board that I used to create the templates for the base of the refrigerator alcove so I laid out the “L” shape on that but made it larger than needed. We positioned the template in the bus, trimmed the inside corner (not 90 degrees) and then marked where all the edges needed to be by tracing from underneath. I trimmed the template down and checked the fit. It looked good so I transferred it to the underlayment and we cut it.

We were finally done with the main floor underlayment so we cleaned up the bus by moving stuff to the garage/workshop. I disconnected the DeWalt 15 gallon air-compressor, moved it to the driveway by the garage, and opened the drain valve on the bottom, it had a LOT of water inside which reminded me that I really need to set up a water separator and inline oiler for use with this thing. Linda coiled up the power cord while I coiled up the air hose and stored it with the air-compressor in the front corner of the garage.

Somewhere in the middle of all this work we stopped and had lunch around 3 PM. It was now 6 PM, too early for dinner, so we decided to get cleaned up and go to Lowe’s to look for metal tile edging. As long as we were going to be out I thought we might drive over to Chuck’s shop in Novi to look at the air ride seat base. I called Chuck to see if that would work and he was headed that way anyway, so that is what we did. The Lowe’s in New Hudson did not have what we were looking for but the associate suggested that we try Blakely’s on West Road near Beck Road in Wixom. Chuck was still at his shop when we arrived so we had a nice chat, got the air ride base, and then went our separate ways.

It was 8:30 PM by the time we got home. I spent a few minutes checking e-mails and then we sat down to dinner at 9:15, a simple meal of mock fish fillets with vegan tartar sauce and fresh steamed Brussels sprouts.

I continued checking and responding to e-mails after dinner and then checked into RVillage. I posted a comment on a new topic in the Friends of Curtis YAY! group and a few minutes later got a call from Curtis. After catching up on each other’s activities and whereabouts he e-mailed me a couple of things to read and react to. When we concluded our chat I watched the 3rd installment of the video update series from Technomadia about the renovation of their vintage GM4106 bus conversion at MasterTech in Elkhart, Indiana. I sent them an e-mail regarding a pet friendly hotel that we used years ago when our Golden Retriever (Einstein) was still alive and went with us on a week-long visit to Elkhart to tour motorhome factories. (Einstein’s AKC name was Karie Jame Ricky Ricardo. We got him from the Karie Jame breeders and he was from the Latin Lovers litter.) It was then off to bed to write for a while before going to sleep.

2015/08/30 (N) A Day of Rest (NOT)

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We had closed up the house and turned on the air-conditioning before going to bed last night and had it set at 72 degrees F to make sure it ran long enough to pull some of the humidity out of the air. I awoke at 7:30 AM on this penultimate day of August hoping to be able to open up the house, which Linda prefers in almost any weather, but was greeted with fog and temperatures in the mid-60’s so I turned the A-C back to 70 to make it run for a while and move the air around.

Sunday is supposed to be a day of rest but not for us, at least not today. I gathered up the laundry and started a load in the washing machine and was just starting to prepare our morning coffee, Kenya AA (not decaf), when Linda emerged. She washed off some fresh blueberries and got our granola ready. We were both dressed to work but enjoyed our coffee in the living room from 8:30 until 9 AM.

Our first bus project task was to trim the passenger side front piece of underlayment that we cut last night. With that done I rolled the air-compressor out by the entrance door, uncoiled the air hose and connected it, unrolled the extension cord and plugged it in, oiled the air stapler, and connected it to the air hose. I loaded the staples and, with Linda standing on the pieces to hold them flat, stapled them down.

The next piece of underlayment, which would finish the hallway, was a very tricky piece with lots of angles. The problem in measuring a piece like this, in which sides may not be exactly parallel and angles not exactly 45 degrees, is finding a reference corner with two factory edges from which to measure everything. I take the time to make and check the measurements by making a small, approximately to scale, drawing.

The cutting of these pieces involved a 7-1/4″ circular saw and a saber saw. When using the circular saw we usually clamp a saw guide to the panel, allowing us to get a clean, straight cut that is almost as good as a table saw. For shorter cuts on edges that will not abut other panels I use the saber saw without a guide and just follow the pencil line as carefully as my skill and eyesight allow. I also have to use the saber saw for blind stop cuts, such as notches and tabs.

We took a break to have PB&J on whole grain bread and fresh apple slices for lunch. As we were finishing lunch I exchanged TXT messages with Chuck. He wanted to chat and called about 5 minutes later. It turns out that he has an air suspension seat base and thought I might want it. After getting a better understanding of what it is, and isn’t, I agreed that I wanted to see it. It would be very cool if I could use it to replace the driver seat pedestal in the bus as part of putting in the new Flexsteel seat but I will have to check with Josh to see if that is possible.

The bathroom underlayment was next. We considered various ways to install it and came to the conclusion that it would take three separate pieces for this small space. The reason was deep toe kick spaces on opposing walls, angles and notches, and a drain pipe and water supply pipe for the toilet that project out at least eight inches from a third wall just an inch above the floor. Those features made it impossible to get a single piece installed. We might have done it in two pieces but I did not like the way I would have had to cut them. These three pieces took quite a while to lay out, cut, trim, and staple down.

The bedroom was the next/last piece of the main floor jigsaw puzzle. It was after 6 PM by this point. We knew we would not get the bedroom done today but decided to try and get one more piece installed. Most of the bedroom floor is taken up by the storage box that serves as the base for the plywood bed platform. This box goes all the way to the driver side wall and has small Isles on the other three sides. If not for end cabinets by the head of the bed and deep toe kick spaces in the cabinetry to the rear of the coach the underlayment would be a simple “U” shape. The actuality it will take four pieces to complete this space.

The first piece was a simple shape, a rectangle with a large piece of one corner cut out. As I have for every other piece I took the initial measurements but noted them on a freehand sketch rather than a scale drawing. When I laid out the actual panel the numbers were not quite working out so I rechecked my measurements. They appeared to be correct, which meant some of the right angles must be off slightly. I modified the layout to make the panel a little longer than I thought it needed to be and made the cuts. Inside the coach we were not able to get the panel positioned because of interference from a 4″ round HVAC duct and a door and handle on a lower cabinet (the end table). I removed the HVAC register, which helped and then discovered a piece of vertical trim in the passenger side front corner. The bedroom has less natural and artificial lighting than the rest of the coach and I had not noticed it before now.

Tired and a bit frustrated by this latest turn of events we decided to wrap up our work for the day and have dinner. We accomplished a lot today but I had hoped (expected) to have all of the main floor underlayment done. We will finish the bedroom first thing tomorrow. That will leave only the entryway/cockpit to do and we will defer that work so I can start laying the new tile floor.

While Linda prepared dinner I checked my e-mail and then checked in to the South Lyon Area Amateur Radio Club information net at 8 PM. I was just completing my second turn when Linda called me to dinner. She made her own version of red beans and rice and served it with a glass of Cupcake Black Forest Decadent Red wine and a large piece of honeydew melon on the side. The main dish was excellent, the wine was OK (a little dry for me), and the melon was not as ripe as we would have liked it to be. Still, it was a nice meal.

We watched an episode (rerun) of Sherlock at 9 PM and then went to bed. Linda played Scrabble while I worked on this post before falling asleep.

2015/08/29 (S) Up and Down

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When we arrived at the South Lyon Senate Coney Island just before 8 AM there were only five other SLAARC members there but we had 16 by the time the last two people showed up. Linda (K8LMF) got to sit next to Linda (NF8C) for the first time in quite a while and they had a long chat. All but one person stayed until 9:45 when we got up to leave and everyone else followed suit.

We were back home by 10:15 AM, changed into our work clothes, and got back to work on the bus remodeling project. It was a very overcast and cloudy day with a high probability of rain that was forecast to be an all-day event. That altered our plans a little in that we did not want the pieces of underlayment to get wet and our air-compressor could not be out in the rain as it has an electric motor.

Yesterday we marked and cut the underlayment panels in the driveway, laying them across 2x4s to create space for the circular saw blade. In order to keep the project moving forward we decided to use the temporary “workbench” in the garage for this work. Since the workbench was covered with drawer fronts that had to be moved we decided to take a little time to put the new handles on them and reattach them to the drawer boxes. Sometimes it’s true that “there’s no time like the present” to get something done.

Linda has worked hard on cleaning and waxing the walnut drawer fronts and fixed cabinetry in our motorcoach. The results so far are amazing and we are feeling like all of our work will be worthwhile as the interior of the coach is going to look very nice when we are done with this project.

We had cut the piece of underlayment for part of the hallway last night but needed to trim it to get it to fit correctly. I think we took it out of, and back into, the bus at least four times, each trip requiring us to go up and down the seven steps in the entryway/cockpit plus the stool outside the door. I do not know how many times we went up and down those steps today but it was a quite a few. To add to our enjoyment and bus conversion physical fitness program we were usually carrying something and it was often heavy and/or large.

The next pieces of underlayment to be cut would fill out most of the living room. I had planned to cut them a certain way but changed my mind after talking it through with Linda. We took measurements and I made drawings that were close to scale. We ended up using the full 48″ width of a 4’x8′ sheet and about 86″ of its length for the piece that fills the alcove where the built-in sofa and storage base will go. It had two large corner cutouts, one to make it fit with two other installed pieces and the other to go around the base of the media cabinet that doubles as an end table for the forward end of the sofa. After test fitting it we had to trim a couple inches off of a back corner because of a wire bundle and create a notch for several wires that ran through the floor just in front of the driver’s side HVAC chase. We waited for a lull in the rain and took it back into the coach.

It fit just right but unfortunately there were defects in the subfloor, such as small gouges and depressed screw heads, that needed to be repaired. Since we could not use the air-stapler today I did not have a good excuse for not patching the floor correctly so I worked on that while Linda resumed working on the woodwork. The quart of “ready to use” floor patch was not as ready to use as I would have liked. The directions said to stir thoroughly and when I opened the container there was a half inch of milky white liquid on top of somewhat drier and stiffer material with the consistency of fine wet sand. The directions also said the open (working) time was about 15 minutes.

I set the timer on the microwave for 20 minutes, spent five of those trying to stir and mix the floor patch ingredients, and then tried to patch everything that really needed it in the allotted time. I did not care for this material and wish I had used the Universal Patch and Skimcoat that I used everywhere else. It was gritty and did not feather out or finish as smoothly as I wanted, but there was nothing to do now but wait for it to dry which would take three hours.

Linda decided to work in the house and eventually fix dinner while I worked in the bedroom (of the bus) trying to remove very old masking tape from the subfloor using a 1.25″ putty knife. After an hour I had about half of it off but called it quits as my hands were sore.

For dinner Linda cooked a couple of ears of corn-on-the-cob, heated some vegetarian (vegan) baked beans, and cooked two vegan “burgers” topped with vegan cheese. Mustard, ketchup, pickle relish, and four large leaves of romaine lettuce made for a tasty sandwich. We each had a glass of the Cupcake Black Forest Decadent Red wine with the meal. Dessert was fresh sliced strawberries with non-dairy (vegan) peach mango “yogurt.” It was a tasty summertime meal.

After dinner I tried sanding the floor patches even though the directions said not to sand the dried material. I used a very old piece of 120 grit sandpaper in my orbital sander and went over the entire area. I vacuumed the whole area but I could still feel a residual grit on the floor. I got Linda’s vacuum from the house and tried that. I then got the Revel wet/dry mop and tried wet moping the area, but it was still gritty. I was preparing to go over the entire area with the new 80 grit sandpaper but Linda managed to get it clean using the brush attachment on the house vacuum cleaner.

With the area cleaned up we put the piece of underlayment for the sofa nook in place and it fit very nicely but we did not staple it. We redid our measurements for the passenger side front piece and made some minor adjustments to the dimensions on the drawing. What I have tried to do wherever possible is to keep at least two factory edges with a common vertex (corner) and use that point and those sides as the basis for my measurements.

It looked like heavy rain was going to hit us from the west but must have tracked north of us. We continued to get rain, off and on, but nothing heavy every materialized. Working in the garage we measured and cut the last piece for today. We made extensive use of the circular saw running it along a saw guide. By the time we had the sheet cut there was a lull in the rain so we took it to the bus to test fit it. The fit was close but needed minor trimming in the front outside corner. By now it was 8:30 PM and we did not want to haul the sheet back out of the bus and into the garage to work on it. That will be our first task tomorrow followed by stapling the three pieces that we cut today, weather permitting.

We turned in at 10 PM. There wasn’t anything on TV that interested us, so Linda read for few minutes before falling asleep and I wrote until 11:30.

2015/08/28 (F) Bye Bye Fridge

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The DTE Energy appliance recycling program called yesterday and left a message indicating that they would pick up our old refrigerator between 8 AM and noon today so we got up at 7:30 AM to make sure we were ready if they arrived early. I was cold last night so I put on my sweats when I got up. For breakfast we had our usual granola with fresh blueberries and split a banana, had a little glass of juice to wash down the vitamins, and then had coffee in the living room. I turned on the gas fireplace to chase away the morning chill while I put the finishing touches on yesterday’s post and Linda did her morning check-in with the world beyond our immediate boundaries (and concerns).

The DTE Energy pickup truck called at 9 AM to let us know they would be here around 9:30. We finished our coffee, got dressed, and awaited their arrival. Ever since a delivery truck almost took out the telephone trunk line over our driveway last August I try to be in the driveway anytime a truck is headed our way.

Two guys showed up in an Enterprise truck. Our new refrigerator for the bus was delivered by two guys in an Enterprise truck. It must make more sense than buying one. When they opened the back it already had used appliances in it. The guy handling the paperwork said they usually pick up 30 appliances a day but were scheduled for 32 today. I signed the acknowledgments and releases on his cell phone and they then unplugged it, cut off the power cord, stuck a hand truck under it, rolled it onto their lift, raised it up and rolled it in next to another side-by-side fridge that was very similar to ours. They closed the rear cover and were on their way. I don’t think they were here more than 15 minutes. It’s nice to have it out of the garage and to know that it will be recycled. We will also receive a check for $50 in 4 to 6 weeks which beats having to pay someone to haul it away.

Linda picked up where she left off on Wednesday with the woodwork in the bedroom of the bus while I got the tools and supplies ready that we needed to install the Patriot Lumber SurePly underlayment on the floor. That included getting out the 15 gallon air-compressor, 60 foot air hose, Butch’s Central Pneumatic air stapler/nailer (that I borrowed on our most recent visit to Indiana), and a package of #18 1/4″ crown 3/4″ long staples

Linda finished wiping off the residual Touch of Beeswax from the bedroom woodwork and then helped me get the 4’x8′ sheet of underlayment out of the bus and over to the driveway. We put this sheet in the bus yesterday so I could determine where to make needed cuts. I had marked several places where I needed to make notches or take some material off of part of an edge. I did not want to do the cutting in the bus, however, because we need to keep the floors clean and avoid airborne dust. I made the cuts and then we moved the sheet back into the bus.

Bruce positions the second piece of underlayment.

Per the instructions, we positioned the sheet of underlayment in the corner across from the kitchen sink with the long dimension running fore and aft across the floor joists. It fit nicely so I connected the air hose to the air stapler and inserted a set of 3/4″ staples. The instructions for the pneumatic stapler indicated a working pressure range of 70 – 100 PSI, with the pressure controlling the depth of drive, and suggested adjusting it on some scrap material. It turned out that I had to set the regulator on the air compressor to 100 PSI to get the right depth of drive.

The instructions for the underlayment were very clear about the order in which the sheet should be stapled so that’s what we did. Linda stood on the sheet to keep it flat while I stapled and we both wore proper safety glasses, of course. From the corner I put a staple every two inches along the edge by the HVAC duct. Working out from the same starting corner I then put one every two inches along the short edge. Working out from the same starting corner I stapled it along the diagonal to the opposite corner. Again working from the starting corner I stapled the “field” on either side of the diagonal. The last staples were 2″ apart along the other short edge and up the other long edge.

A week and a half ago we had this same sheet of underlayment in the bus and I screwed it down temporarily with a dozen screws to see how it felt. I counted the number of fasteners needed for one full sheet and I think it was 352. That’s when I decided I would staple them. After installing the first sheet I think it was the right choice.

Bruce staples the second piece of underlayment.

I got a phone call from my sister so we took a break and while I talked to her Linda started preparing lunch. She made grilled cheese, with mock turkey, onions, and greens on rye, all vegan of course. We each had a deliciously ripe fresh pear. Yum.

The next piece of underlayment to go in filled in the space between the first sheet and the base of the kitchen cabinets. But first we had to remove the painter’s tape we had put on the base to protect it. It turned out to be cemented on from the floor leveling compound so I had to chisel it loose. Linda vacuumed up the debris and then I went over the area with 120 grit sandpaper on the oscillating sander. Things like this are what cause project timelines to stretch out; when we put the painter’s tape on we assumed we would be able just peel it off.

This second piece was less than half the width of a full sheet and involved a tricky angle cut and a notch so I measured carefully, made a drawing (not to scale), and rechecked the dimensions with Linda verifying them. We cut the piece outside and brought it in. It was a very good fit so we stapled it down.

A detailed view of the bottom front end of the pantry and refrigerator showing the aluminum angle that keeps the fridge from shifting to the left into the pantry.

The third piece was much more difficult to figure out and will probably prove to be the trickiest piece overall once we are done. It was essentially a big triangle with two corners cut off and complex notches along the hypotenuse. I took a lot of measurements with Linda’s help and made a diagram. When I laid it out on the underlayment things did not quite line up. I figured out and corrected one problem but had to go back in the coach and make two more measurements.

At the point where it was close, but not close enough, I decided to cut along the hypotenuse, trim off the two corners, and take it back in the bus to mark the locations of two notches. With the notches marked we took it back outside and I finished cutting it. We took it back inside and set it in place. It was as good a fit as could have hoped for so we stapled it. Although we had worked for most of the day and only gotten three pieces installed our careful work had paid off and we were very satisfied with what we had accomplished. It was 5 PM, we were tired, and we were getting hungry so we decided to quit while we were ahead.

I took a shower while Linda prepared dinner. She made a very tasty whole grain rotini pasta dish with garlic, onion, olive oil, broccoli, sun-dried tomatoes, carrots, mushrooms, and greens. Now that, Alton Brown, is “good eats.” We had nice big wedges of fresh watermelon for dessert.

After dinner we went to Lowe’s to buy three more sheets of underlayment and some wallpaper stripping spray. By the time we got home it was after 8 PM and we settled into the living room to read and write, much the way our day began, minus the coffee.

2015/08/25 (T) Turning The Corner

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It got pleasantly cool overnight and with the bedroom doorwall open it made for nice sleeping conditions. Between being up a bit late last night and not wanting to get out from under the warm covers we slept in a few minutes longer than usual. I put on my sweats, which I find very comfortable on a cool (or cold) morning, and made a pot of Costa Rican decaf coffee. We had our usual granola for breakfast, took a few minutes to enjoy our coffee in the living room without our cats, who were off somewhere and probably up to no good, and then got to work.

In order to install the new seats in September we need to have the desk installed and in order to install the desk we need to have the floor installed and in order to install the floor we need to have the underlayment installed and in order to install the underlayment we need to have several things done. First and foremost was finishing the patching and leveling of the subfloor, so that was my first task today. While I pursued that Linda continued working on cleaning and waxing the walnut drawer fronts. Given the limited work surface in the garage Linda can only work on three to six drawer fronts at a time depending on their size. When she reached a stopping point with those and started working on the woodwork in the bedroom.

I have spent the last week patching, skimcoating, and sanding the entire area where the old tile was installed which I estimate to be about 80 square feet. I went over it one more time this morning with 80 grit sandpaper on the orbital sander. The sander has an integral dust collection bag so it did not get the coach too dusty. I was satisfied with most of the job but still had some unevenness along the edges by the walls and especially in the toe kick spaces extending out about three inches from the cabinet bases. That is because I did not get the last skimcoat as smooth as I needed to in those areas and the orbital sander cannot reach them.

I figured I would need to do one more application of floor leveling compound but did not want to open the second bag of mix for such a small job. I decided to go the Lowe’s and buy a small pail of pre-mixed floor patching compound and the 3/4″ #8-32 machine screws we needed to install the new handles. While I was there I noticed that they had 50 grit hook and loop sandpaper triangles designed to fit our Porter-Cable oscillating saw. I was aware that we had a sanding pad attachment for the tool but had not considered using it until I saw the 50 grit paper. I bought a pack and picked up some 120 grit as well. I would also have bought 80 grit but they were out. I had to go to The Home Depot for the machine screws as I wanted the same brass ones we had already purchased.

Back at the bus I decided to try sanding out the imperfections rather than filling them in with another round of patching and sanding. I was, admittedly, tired of this phase of the work and anxious to be done with it so I could move on to next step. August is slipping away and I am very aware of the date. I was also not keen on creating more sanding dust inside the coach.

I don’t know why I did not try this tool sooner. The design of the tool and shape of the sanding pad allowed me to work in the all of the areas the orbital sander could not reach and it worked very well with the 50 grit sandpaper. The circular air sander can also reach these areas, and was the right tool for grinding down the old thinset and mastic, but the oscillating tool was the right one for this final smoothing.

When I thought I was done I vacuumed the floor and used the Revel Damp Mop to pick up any residual dust. We then went inside to have lunch while the floor dried. Linda heated up a can of Amy’s vegetable soup, made roll-up sandwiches, and served fresh black grapes and plums. It beats fast food hands down.

After lunch I inspected the floor carefully and decided that the patching and leveling was done. Although it was one task out of many, and there was no fanfare attached to the moment, I was very much aware that we had finally turned the corner. We still have some minor disassembly to do, but from this point forward most of our tasks will involve putting the interior back together and installing new things. All things being equal (which they never are) the building work should be more fun than the deconstruction work.

The major exception is the wallpaper. We still need to remove the old paper, much of which is stained from old water leaks, and install the new paper, which Linda will be ordering tomorrow from Delux Drapery and Shades in Ann Arbor. The critical pieces are the ones that go behind the desk and the built-in sofa. Most of the rest of it can be finished later but we would prefer to have it all done by September 12th if possible. The more stuff that gets installed the more awkward it will be to work on the walls.

With the floor leveling done the next impediment to installing the underlayment was getting the refrigerator out of the living room and into its alcove. That, however, required three other things to be done. First I needed to replace the electrical outlet with a recessed one. Second, we needed to build up the base of the alcove and finally, we needed to install the pantry as we cannot get to the slides to mount them to the side of the alcove with the refrigerator in place.

The electrical outlet only took a few minutes to change. With Linda’s help I used the template I made last Thursday to cut the base pieces from the 4′ x 8′ sheet of 3/4″ plywood we bought on Tuesday. The bottom piece was the full width of the refrigerator alcove (34″ wide at the front and 33.75″ wide at the back) and 25.75″ deep. We set it in place, checked the front setback, and screwed it to the subfloor. The next piece was the same width as the first but 1/2″ deeper (26.25″). We set it in place on top of the first piece and made sure the front edges were flush with the back edge extending 1/2″ farther back. I used longer screws to go all the way through both pieces into the subfloor.

I was not happy with the way my circular saw blade was cutting and a few raindrops gave us an excuse to take a break. We were working just outside the small garage bay and moved everything into the garage to keep it from getting wet. I went to Lowe’s and bought a new 7.25″ blade with 60 teeth, which should give a very clean cut through plywood but still work on 2x4s and trim boards. While I was there I checked their selection of driver bits again. I was looking for a 3″ long No. 1 SR (square recessed) bit but they did not have any that long. I found a 2″ bit for $2.48 but then I spotted a pack of seven 2″ long bits for under $4. It had two #1, three #2 (the most common size), and two #3 bits from the same manufacturer as the single bit. Can someone explain that pricing structure to me? Apparently most of the cost is retail packaging.

Linda prepared large, wonderful salads for dinner. She made her own dressing using balsamic vinegar, walnuts, raisins, garlic, and seasonings, and it was very good. We finished the Pinot Grigio with the meal and then resumed our work.

I changed the blade on my saw and then we moved the wood and 2×4 supports back out into the driveway. The new blade made very clean cuts confirming that changing it was long overdue. The third piece of the alcove base was not as wide as the first two, measuring 28.25″ across the front and 28″ across the back. (The alcove tapers in 1/4″ from front to rear along the right side.) The depth was 26.75″ to match the refrigerator base depth, and a half inch deeper than the second piece. I set it in place, snug to the right side of the alcove and flush with the front edge of the other two pieces, and checked for an even reveal along the left side of 5.75″. Everything looked good so I screwed it down.

There are several reasons for this design/construction. First, there is a large bundle of wires and two air lines that run across the floor of the alcove at the rear wall. Using three layers of plywood allowed the top layer to be high enough for the base of the refrigerator to extend over the wire bundle and have its back about 1″ from the back wall (thus the reason for the recessed electrical outlet). It will also leave about 1″ of clearance above the fridge, which is enough. The second reason is that the 5.75″ width at the left, with only two pieces of plywood under it, is where the pull-out pantry will go. But third, I will install a 24″ long 2″ x 2″ angle (steel or aluminum) on the middle sheet against the left edge of the top sheet to prevent the refrigerator from shifting to the left. The front edges of the plywood base pieces will be covered (eventually) by a something, probably a piece of 3/4″ thick walnut hardwood, that will stick up above the top surface of the top piece just enough to keep the fridge from rolling out. That piece, however, will have to be removable so I am still thinking about just how I want to secure the refrigerator case in the alcove.

Linda does her Vanna White impersonation, highlighting how the new pull-out pantry will look when it is installed. The pantry is in its extended position revealing the slides sections that will mount on the cabinet wall. The refrigerator is out so we can work in the alcove.

We still had some light but with the heavy cloud cover it was darker than usual in the coach for this time of day (6:30 PM). We rigged up a piece of twine to hang the work light and turned on as many interior lights as we could. We then carried the pull-out pantry from the library (in the house) to the bus. We brought all of the slides in as well, along with two pieces of 3/4″ plywood and a 4′ length of 2×4.

We set the two pieces of 3/4″ plywood in front of the left edge of the alcove flush with the two bottom base pieces. We then set the 2×4 on flat (3.5″ side down) spanning the plywood inside and outside the alcove. We installed the cabinet halves of the nine slides onto the pieces attached to the pantry and then set the unit in place with the bottom resting on the 2×4. We moved the pantry in and out checking its position and considering where the slides needed to be attached to the alcove wall and exactly how we would do that so the front has an even reveal relative to the vertical front trim of the left alcove wall.

By this point it was after 8 PM, it was getting dark, and we were too tired to start something as critical as attaching the slides to the alcove wall. We are behind schedule, but had enough sense to not push beyond our limits. We closed up the bus, relaxed on the couch for a bit with our kitty cats, took some Advil PM, and went to bed at 9 PM.

2015/08/24 (M) Skimcoating

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For a change of pace we had granola with vegan yogurt for breakfast. I made seven cups of the Cafe Europe / Columbian decaf blend but Linda only had one mug as she was meeting Diane at Kensington Metropark at 9 AM to walk. After she left I gathered up the laundry, sorted it, and started the first load. I then turned my attention to the bus.

My first task was to cut one of the 8″x8″ sheets of #80 sandpaper in half, put it on the orbital pad sander, and go over all of the Universal Patch and Skimcoat (UPS) that I applied yesterday. The 80 grit worked well and I only needed the one half sheet. I swept the floor clean of loose debris and then assembled my tools and materials to patch a few gouges I missed yesterday and then skimcoat the entire portion of the floor that used to have ceramic tile on it. I mixed 24 ounces (by volume) with 12 ounces of water (by volume), half as much UPS as I did yesterday. I tried to work more quickly and got most of it applied. I cleaned up my tools and let them dry while the compound cured. That also gave me an opportunity to move laundry from the washer to the dryer and start another load in the washing machine.

I had a call from Chuck so I took a break to chat with him. He and Barbara spent the weekend racing at the old Air Force base in Oscoda, Michigan. Their bus and race car both ran well and he turned in some very good times. He had installed a new turbo boost gauge in the bus and based on my experience had selected a 0 to 15, PSI VDO unit. Apparently 15 PSI is not high enough for his engine. I have seen the boost on my gauge, which is a 0 to 30 PSI model, go as high as 17, but not often. For most of our trip to Arizona and back this past winter it did not go over 15 PSI.

The only issue they have with their coach at the moment is their old Amana residential refrigerator. The freezer is apparently not keeping things as cold as it should and the ice maker is not working. They use a lot of ice and generally have the freezer stocked, so those are problems. They bought a bag of ice for the weekend but it appeared to get warm enough to develop surface moisture and then refroze into large chunks, inconvenient at best. I think they have decided to replace it and want to do so before they leave for the winter and while they still have the shop and the forklift.

Chuck is also going to contact the glass installer and see if he would be willing to install bus windshields. Both of his lower windshields need to be replaced as do both of ours. We have five replacements at his shop, two for him and three for me. I also have new gaskets but he needs to get two sets. We discussed late September as the best time for me and he will see if the windshield guy will do all four of them on the same day.

I mixed the remaining USP, about 12 ounces (by volume) with 6 ounces of water (by volume) and finished the skimcoating of the bus floor. I used the last little bit of compound to patch some screw holes and small gouges in the living room floor where carpet had been installed. There may be a few more but instead of opening another bag of UPS I will probably return it and buy a quart of the premixed compound. I then cleaned up my tools again and left them in the sun to dry.

Linda got home about this time. It was just after noon, so we had a light lunch of vegan deli slices with lettuce, onion, and Daiya non-dairy cheese, on thin buns. A pluot provided a nice, sweet finish to lunch.

We measured for wallpaper the other day so I took the notes and created an Excel spreadsheet to figure out how many rolls of wallpaper to order. While I did that Linda worked on cleaning and reconditioning drawer fronts with Touch of Oranges and Touch of Beeswax. After examining the wallpaper in the bathroom (of the bus) I think we need to replace it too. We took a few minutes to get those measurements and I added them to the spreadsheet.

The wallpaper we have selected is the Lamar (#699-3377R) from the Just Textures collection of Sellars and Josephson. It is an off-white color with a small texture pattern designed for reverse hang, random match installation. It is only sold in 2-roll bolts 27″ wide and 4.5 yards long. We will need more than six rolls to replace all of the wallpaper so we will have to order eight rolls even though we may defer doing part of the hallway and the bathroom for a while. Fortunately it is not too expensive (as wallpapers go) and is scrubable, which was one of our requirements for use in the bus. Linda will return the sample books to Delux Drapery and Shade Company in Ann Arbor on Wednesday morning and place the order.

Linda reheated the leftover fajita veggies from last night and fixed some white rice to go with them. We had fresh strawberries and a little Coconut Bliss non-dairy ice cream for dessert. Coconut Bliss ice creams are not too coconuty, and are appropriately named. They are as good as I remember Hagan-Daas being.

I took a little time to add lines to my floor tile layout drawing showing the location of the underlayment sheets. It looks like I may need at least eight sheets. I have four sheets in the garage and will install those before buying more. I spent the rest of the evening working on the article for Bus Conversion Magazine about Larry and Carol Hall’s GM4106 bus conversion and finished it around 10 PM. I spent another 1.5 hours catching up on e-mail and checking in on the status of Technomadia’s bus renovation project at MasterTech in Elkhart, Indiana. The weather has turned cool and should be perfect for working on the bus tomorrow. We need to have long, productive days, so I had a snack and got to bed at midnight, played a few games, and went to sleep.

2015/08/22 (S) Clean and Level

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We arrived at the SLAARC breakfast just before 8 AM. We took the last two seats at the end of the long row of tables, but had to add another one as six more people came in after us. We had a lively chat that lasted until almost 9:30. After breakfast we stopped at the Tractor Supply Company store in New Hudson to get a couple more deer blocks and then headed for home.

We took a few minutes to put away tools and straighten up the garage enough that we could set up a work surface for Linda to use for cleaning the walnut drawer fronts for all of the bus drawers. We set up the two sawhorses we got at Lowe’s yesterday, set two 8-foot 2x4s in the provided grooves, and set a 4’x8′ piece of 2″ rigid foam insulation across them to use as the work surface. I found an old package of 4/0 steel wool and Linda found some old terry cloth towels.

Foam insulation work surface in garage with walnut drawer fronts laid out for cleaning with Touch of Oranges.

Linda removed the drawer fronts from seven of the drawer boxes and tagged them so they could be reunited later as each front is uniquely paired with its box. She then removed the handles from the drawer fronts and set them aside as they will be replaced with new ones once the cleaning is done. She started with the back sides of the drawer fronts. Following the directions she sprayed them liberally with Touch of Oranges wood cleaner, let them sit for 10 minutes, sprayed them again lightly, and rubbed them with the 4/0 steel wool. She then wiped them off with a terry cloth towel and applied Touch of Beeswax using 4/0 steel wool, always working with the grain, of course. The wax will have at least 24 hours to soak in before being wiped off. Once that is done she will flip them over and repeat the process on the front side.

While Linda was doing all of that I hauled the 15 gallon DeWalt portable air compressor out by the bus, plugged it in, and connected the air hose. I used the 4″ circular pneumatic sander on a few remaining high spots and decided I was done with it. I had found some old packs of 80 grit half sheets and tried using them on my orbital sander but the grit disappeared very quickly and the sheets snagged and tore on splinters in the plywood. I spent more time changing sheets than I did sanding with them so I abandoned this approach after the fifth sheet. I did, however, find a half dozen splintered areas and prepared those by making stop cuts with a utility knife and then peeling the splinter free with a putty knife, creating voids that will be filled with leveling compound.

I was tired of sanding and was clearly not going to get the floor back down to bare wood. I decided that the floor was as sanded and smooth as it was going to get and it was time to move to the next process; patching and leveling. Before I could do that, however, I needed to clean the coach. I vacuumed the floor three times and vacuumed all of the woodwork and wallpaper. As I worked from the bedroom forward Linda followed behind with a microfiber cloth wiping down all of the woodwork.

I assembled the tools I needed to apply the Universal Patch and Skimcoat; a 3″ putty knife, a 5″ putty knife, a combination smooth and toothed rectangular trowel, a mixing bucket, and a 2 foot long wooden stir stick and a mixing paddle designed to go in a drill. Each bag of UPS weighs 7 pounds and gets mixed with 1.75 quarts of water, which works out to 1 part water to 2 parts UPS.

The directions on the bag indicated that a full bag of UPS, properly mixed, would cover 20 to 25 square feet 1/8″ thick. That’s only a 5’x5′ area, but I only had a few gouges that were 1/8″ deep, so an entire bag was going to cover a lot more than 25 square feet when applied as a skim coat. Not having worked with this material before I had no idea how much working time I would have so I decided to mix half a bag. The recommended mixing method using a paddle in an electric drill turned out to be a bad idea so used the 2-foot long wooden stir stick to mix the compound.

TEC Universal Patch and Skimcoat applied to the floor in that hallway.

I started in the bathroom patching small depressions and then working out from the baseboards. By the time I got out into the hallway I had not even used half the compound and it was starting to set up. I hurried to use as much of it as I could, and tried adding a little extra water to extend its workability, but was only able to use about 60% of it before it was too stiff to spread and trowel off smoothly. I could have waited 1 hour and then mixed and applied more compound but I did not want to risk disturbing what I had already done and it has to set for 24 hours before I can sand it, which I will have to do.

Cleanup required warm soapy water for the tools. I then poured it into the 5 gallon compound bucket, topped it up with water, stirred it to dissolve the compound as much as possible, and let it sit.

For dinner Linda made Farro with mushrooms, onions garlic, glazed snow peas, and grated carrots. She needed some dry white wine for the Farro dish and opened a bottle of Pinot Grigio, so we had a glass with the meal. As rule if a wine is used in a dish it is also a good choice to drink with that meal.

After dinner I went to Lowe’s and got some more 4/0 steel wool and some 80 grit sandpaper sheets. I stopped at O’Reilly’s for a battery disconnect switch for the lawn tractor but they did not have one. I tried the Howell Tractor Supply Company but they did not have one either. I drove to the Brighton Shell station, topped off the fuel in the Element, and went home. We turned in at 9 PM and watched a 007 movie before going to sleep.

2015/08/21 (F) Have Fridge Will Travel

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I was up at 7:40 AM and made a pot of Costa Rican half-caff coffee. Linda was up just before 8 AM and washed off some fresh blueberries to put on our breakfast granola. The Costa Rican is definitely not our favorite coffee and I brewed it with a little too much water which did not improve matters. But we bought a pound of beans and are not going to throw them out so the sooner we use them up the sooner we can get something that we like.

Harvey Carter (AC8NO), the current President of our South Lyon Area Amateur Radio Club, agreed to help us move the old bus refrigerator from Chuck’s shop in Novi to our house this morning using his cargo van. He pulled into the parking lot of the shop right behind us at 10 AM. Chuck and Barb had already left for Oscoda in their bus with their race car trailer in tow.

After opening the shop we had Harvey back his van up to the overhead door. We brought several lengths of 2x4s planning to use them under the back of the refrigerator but Harvey had two ramps made from 2x12s with a cross piece that spanned the rear bumper. That looked like a much better alternative to us. He also had a good hand truck and a ratchet strap.

We decided to truck the unit from the left side because the refrigerant and water lines protrude beyond the back of the case. We removed all of the trays from the doors and cabinet but left the shelves in place. We slid the hand truck under the left side of the cabinet and secured it with the ratchet strap. With Harvey on the hand truck we tilted it back and rolled it out to the ramps. We adjusted the ramps so the hand truck wheels would be centered on them. Harvey then pulled the hand truck up the ramp backwards as Linda and I pushed from the bottom, eventually lowering it all the way down as we slid it fully into the van. I then closed up the shop.

I rode with Harvey in the van and Linda followed us in the car for the trip back to our house where I had Harvey back his van up to the small garage door. Reversing our procedure from earlier we unloaded the fridge by rolling the hand truck down the pair of ramps and put it just inside the small garage bay near the door. We plugged it in and it started running so at least we did not break it.

We wanted to put the drawers and door bins back in but could not get the fresh food compartment door open more than a few inches. I was able to open it just enough to see inside and determine that at least two shelves had come loose and wedged into positions that prevented the door from opening. The solution was to remove the door. I undid the three screws that attach the top hinge to the cabinet and removed it, allowing Harvey to lift the door off of the bottom hinge. I reattached the two shelves to the mounting rails at the rear of the cabinet. Harvey then set the bottom door hinge pin back in the lower bracket and held the door while I reinstalled the top hinge. We will plug it in later next week and let it cool off as it has to be running and cold when DTE Energy comes on Friday to pick it up.

While Linda unloaded the drawers and bins from the car and put them back in the refrigerator I gave Harvey the ham radio tour. We looked at the antennas on the tower, the cable entry box, and the ham shack with the multiple monitor wall mounted track system we installed. I then gave him a tour of the bus interior. Linda was getting ready to go for a walk but I suggested we take Harvey to lunch and agreed to go. He lives in Green Oak Township southeast of Brighton so we went to the Panera on Grand River Avenue at I-96 as it was in the direction of his house and we all like their food.

After lunch we drove to the frame shop in Howell and picked up the last of four paintings we had framed. We were pleased with our choice of framing material and the owner, Rick, did a nice job assembling it. We headed back to Lowe’s and looked at thin paneling materials. Linda got a shield for the bird feeder that is supposed to keep the squirrels from getting to the seed block and I got a recessed outlet that I am considering using for the refrigerator in the bus. We stopped at the Walmart adjacent to the Lowe’s but did not find the peanut butter filled pretzels we were looking far. I needed a battery disconnect for the lawn tractor battery but we did not feel like doing anymore shopping today and returned home.

It was late enough in the afternoon that I did not feel like getting the air compressor out and working on the floor of the bus so I went to my office while Linda went for a walk. I was going to upload a few blog posts but decided to work on an article for Bus Conversion Magazine instead.

I took photographs of two buses at a pair of converted bus gatherings in Quartzite back in January of this year. Larry and Carol Hall had a very nice GM4106 at the FMCA Western G.M. Coach rally while Byron and Betty Pigg had a gorgeous Model 15 Eagle at the Eagle International converted bus rally. Larry and Byron are the presidents of their respective groups and the rallies took place at the same time in adjacent sections of the Quartzsite Marketplace dry camp area. This campground is near the epicenter of RV vendor activities and only a mile from where we were camped. Gary Hatt, the owner/publisher of BCM, brought his newly acquired Eagle conversion and had his mobile mechanic drive his MC-9 Moose Creek Motor Cabin, which was for sale. He invited me over so we could finally meet in person, I could meet a few folks, and photograph the buses. He knew, in particular, that Larry and Byron were interested in having their buses featured in the magazine and figured I could help make that happen.

I had started articles on both buses right after I photographed them and worked on them a bit back in February but I did not get them finished before we had to leave Quartzsite in early March. Once we pulled up stakes we were on the move and very busy and I did not get back to them before we got home. Of course, we got even busier once we got home so new articles for BCM were on the back burner with the gas turned off. But magazines have lead times with deadlines for each issue, and Gary very much wanted to feature both of these buses before 2016 arrived, so I dusted them off and decided to work on the article about the Hall’s GM4106.

Larry had sent me a brief narrative some months ago and I had started filling in the detailed specifications about the bus and conversion. I had already selected possible photos for the cover and centerfold as well as the article and post processed some, but not all, of them. I massaged Larry’s narrative, added an introduction of my own, extracted some additional specifications, and then focused my efforts on completing the post-processing of the photos.

I took a break for dinner and afterwards completed the photo processing. I then started inserting the thumbnail versions of the images into the Word document and writing captions. There isn’t really any magic to writing an article; it’s just a specific kind of work. You string words together into sentences, organized by paragraphs, that tell a short story about something interesting and you illustrate it with captioned photos that are hopefully relevant and technically adequate. It takes time and energy to do this well, however, and I ran out of both around 10 PM.

2015/08/18 (T) Walking Grind

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We were up at 8 AM and I made a pot of Ethiopian Yirgacheffe half-caff coffee while Linda got breakfast ready. She made a batch of granola yesterday so we had some with fresh blueberries and unsweetened soy milk. It’s our standard breakfast, but that’s because we like it so much. She had an e-mail from Robin at the bakery and had to deal with some issues related to the bakery’s new account, The University of Michigan Ann Arbor. As I do most mornings I sat in the living room working on my iPad, drinking my coffee, and paying attention to our two cats.

Being Tuesday Linda had a date with Diane to walk at 10 AM and left at 9:30 for Kensington Metropark. I continued working on my iPad for a while and enjoying my coffee. At 10:15 AM I called the Livingston County Sheriff and reported the mailbox incident from late Friday evening /early Saturday morning. Shelby took the call, was very nice, said she was not aware of any other mailbox reports, but would pass the info along to the Desk Sargent. I checked my e-mail and confirmed with Harvey for Friday at 10 AM to move the old bus refrigerator. I finally went out to work on the floor of the bus at 11 AM, by which time the outside air temperature was already in the 80’s.

I leave three of the awning style windows in the bus open a few inches so it doesn’t get too hot inside. I opened all three roof vents, turned on their ceiling fans, and set them to exhaust air rather than draw it in. I also left the entrance door open to allow more air to flow through the inside of the coach. I then sanded and vacuumed until about 1 PM. When I came back in the house I had two missed calls from Michele Henry of Phoenix Paint so I called her back. I was on the phone with her when Linda got back from her walk.

Once I wrapped up the call with Michele we had a light lunch of hummus with pita chips and both black and red grapes. While we were eating we were entertained by a gray squirrel who had gotten onto the bird feeder and was hanging upside down by its hind legs. It would curl its body to bring its mouth up to the bottom of the feeder, emancipate some seed, and then uncurl to the more relaxed stretched out position and eat it. All of this was also being watched with both interest and considerable skepticism by three crows who were hanging around on the ground under the feeder. They grabbed seeds that the squirrel dropped but seemed very wary of it, which surprised us. I speculated that perhaps they had never seen a squirrel behave in this way and were, therefore, understandably and appropriately cautious; crows are very smart, after all.

After lunch we took the three wallpaper sample books to the bus to look at them with the woodwork. Before we could do that, however, we discovered a small bird trapped in the coach and had to deal with it. I say “trapped” because it was up on the dashboard and obviously confused by the windshields as it kept trying to fly out through them. It did not realize it could get out the same way it came in, through the open door.

The bird seemed small and I think it was an immature sparrow but I’m not sure. It was seeking safe shelter in the space between the dashboard cover and the lower driver side windshield. I used a broom to try to gently encourage it to fly towards the door but it was understandably suspicious of my good intentions. I put on a pair of canvas work gloves and it allowed me to gently pick it up. I tried to release it at the door opening and it flew into the door causing Linda to make a comment about why we use the phrase “bird-brained.” I caught it again, got outside the bus clear of the door, and tossed it gently away from the bus. It immediately took flight and flew off to the southwest, apparently none the worse for its ordeal. I can only image the story it told the other birds.

I got a piece of the Armstrong Alterna Luxury Vinyl floor tile from the garage. Many of the wallpapers that we thought would look good with the floor tile turned out to be too yellow, and most of the ones with good color tone were too dark, but we found a few that we liked. Those tended to be lighter without a lot of pattern and a neutral, off-white color. We are, however, far from a final choice as we do not currently have a sample of the Lambright Notion Linen upholstery fabric or the MCD night shade material and the wallpaper has to work with all of these simultaneously.

We measured the areas that need to be repapered and in the process decided that we would leave the old wallpaper on the inner wall of the hallway, at least for now. (The paper in the bathroom, which is different from the rest of the coach, is generally in good condition and we are not currently planning on replacing it as part of this project.) The existing wallpaper in most of the coach is a string cloth with a beige base but distinct vertical threads that contain a noticeable amount of grey and a more subtle herringbone pattern. It looks good with the walnut woodwork and worked well with the old white carpet, black ceramic floor tile, and bone leather upholstery, so we think it will continue to look good with the new floor tile.

If Josh is at his shop tomorrow we will try to stop and pick up the Lambright Notion Linen sample as whatever wallpaper we choose has to work well with the furniture fabric. On Thursday we will revisit the papers in the three books we currently have with an eye towards something that has some grey in it.

It was another warm, humid day and I was done sanding so I closed up the roof vents, locked up the coach, and went inside. Linda prepared a pizza using the gluten-free crust recipe she got from Mara. Yum.

After dinner I went to Lowe’s and bought two bags of TEC Skill Set Universal Floor Patch and Skim Coat, a mixing bucket, two bags of tile spacers, and three 4’x8′ sheets of 1/4″ SurePly underlayment. I meant to buy a folding metal sawhorse but left it somewhere in the store. I was going to buy premixed floor leveling compound but they only had 1-quart containers for $10 each and the directions said it would only cover 1.5 square feet. I have about 80 square feet of floor to patch and level, so that clearly was not a good solution.

The Universal Floor Patch is a powder that has to be mixed with water, but each bag will cover 20 – 25 square feet at 1/8″ thickness and costs $13; much better than the premixed stuff. I have a few areas to patch that are deeper than 1/8″ but the material can be applied up to 1/2″ thick per coat, and most of the area just needs a much thinner skimcoat. It can also be sanded within 24 hours which will allow me to make it very smooth and keep the work moving along. My goal is to have the floor leveled and sanded smooth by bedtime on Saturday so I can install the 1/4″ underlayment on Sunday and start laying tile on Monday or Tuesday next week.

I stopped at Teeko’s Coffee and Teas to get some more of the Cafe Europe half-caff blend. They had the regular blend but not the decaf blend so I had Roger use the Columbian decaf instead. He roasted the beans for me while I waited and Jeff showed up along with his wife as I was leaving. They were married last September and are expecting their first child late next month. Jeff was wearing his Pepsi delivery shirt, confirming what the woman at the Kahuna Coffee Shop told us last Friday.

We turned in early as we will be getting up very early tomorrow to drive to Indiana again. Linda watched an episode of NCIS after which I watched a PBS special on the origins and evolution of the Navy Seals.

2015/08/17 (M) Wallpaper Search

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We awoke this morning to find wild turkeys in the yard behind our bedroom. The deer feed block and natural mineral rock initially attracted a doe and her faun but has been a much stronger attraction for the wild turkeys and crows. Both the turkeys and crows also like to clean up the bird seed that falls to the ground under the seed block that Linda hung from a branch on one of our White Pine trees. The turkeys eventually moved on and we sat down to a breakfast of fresh mixed berries, juice, and coffee, which we took to the living room while we used our iPads to read, write, or play a few games, as is our morning habit.

I had a text message exchange with Chuck regarding the moving of our old bus refrigerator out of his shop. He and Barbara are headed off to Oscoda on Friday with their race car so I e-mailed Harvey (AC8NO) from our SLAARC ham radio club to see if he could help us move the refrigerator on Friday.

We had quite a few downed branches, and a couple of downed trees, scattered about the property as a result of winter snows, spring/summer storms, poor drainage, and age. With Keith coming this morning to mow the grass I decided I should pick up as many of them as I could. When I started at 9:30 AM it was already warm and muggy. Keith showed up at 10 AM and got right to work but I managed to stay ahead of him and got everything of any size picked up except for one tree. It was at least 8″ in diameter at the base and at least 30′ long so I will have to de-limb it, cut up the trunk with a chain saw, and haul the pieces away using the lawn tractor and utility dump trailer. That, however, won’t happen anytime soon.

We skipped last week’s mowing because it had been dry and the grass had not grown noticeably, but we got rain during the past week and the grass responded accordingly. The yard looked good when Keith was done and the timing of his visit was fortuitous as there is rain in the forecast for the next few days with slightly cooler temperatures.

We had a light lunch and then Linda settled in to work at her desk while I worked in the bus. I spent a couple of hours using the belt sander to grind down the residual thinset and mastic on the floor. I wear a dust mask, hearing protector, and safety glasses when sanding, which is even less comfortable than normal when the temperature and humidity are elevated. But I needed to have the floor prep finished by the end of this week, and the new floor installed by the end of next week, or I risked not being ready for the installation of the new seating on September 14 and 15.

I suggested to Linda that we go to Ann Arbor to look at wallpaper, visit Brendan, Shawna, and Madeline and then pick up some things at the Whole Foods Market that we cannot get locally. Linda researched wallpaper stores and made arrangements with our son while I took a shower and got dressed for visiting.

We left around 3:30 PM and drove down US-23 to the Washtenaw Road exit. If we had put the address in the GPS sooner we would have taken M-14 west instead of staying on US-23 as the Delux Drapery and Shade Co. is on West Stadium Boulevard. Still, we got there in a reasonable amount of time. We told the sales associate that we were looking for something that would stand up to use in a motorhome, preferably something that could be wiped, washed, or scrubbed. We wanted something light and neutral (off white) without a pattern that had to be matched, but with some texture. She pulled out several sample books and we looked through them. We ended up signing out three books each of which had one or two papers that we liked and thought might work well with our woodwork, floor tiles, and upholstery.

We drove back across town to our son and daughter-in-law’s house. Our daughter’s car was also there but no one was around so Linda called Brendan. As we suspected they were at Burns Park so we walked over there and found them. Madeline was very excited to see her Grandma Linda and ran over to give her a hug. As we were heading towards the park exit that most directly leads back to their house we spotted Madeline’s friend Maya and her dad Jason. That unplanned encounter resulted in 20 minutes of child play and adult socializing before we finally resumed our homeward trek.

Back at the house we continued to visit until dinner time. Meghan left to go fix dinner for herself and Chris. Madeline had her dinner and then let her dad read a Curious George story. Brendan and Shawna had packing to do for their flight tomorrow so we took our leave. The three of them are flying to Denver to visit Shawna’s mom (Carol) and her husband (Cliff), who live nearby in Golden, Colorado. Madeline is well-traveled for a 30 month old child.

We stopped at the Whole Foods Market on Washtenaw Avenue, which is close to their house and conveniently located on our route out of town. The main item on our list was plain soy creamer. We used to be able to get this at both the Meijer’s and Kroger stores near our house but they are only carrying the vanilla flavored version which I do not like. We picked up a bag of sauerkraut to go with the vegan beer brats, six bottles of wine, because you get a 10% discount on six or more bottles (mix and match), two pieces of vegan cake, and some other stuff. It’s probably a good thing that we do not have a Whole Foods closer to our house.

By the time we got home it was 7:45 PM. Linda heated the sauerkraut and the vegan beer brats and served them open-faced on hot dog buns with mustard, of course. Black grapes provided a sweet contrast to the savory main dish. We sat for a while in the living room, playing iPad games and writing blog posts while we had some of the vegan cakes, before turning in. I continued to write while we watched a TV program and then went to sleep.

2015/08/16 (N) A Send Off For Katie

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We had a light breakfast and enjoyed our morning coffee. With company due at noon we were not inclined to do any overly physical work this morning. Linda made a quick run to the supermarket and then spent the late morning finishing food preparations. I worked in my office installing operating system updates, updating the BCM page on our website, and editing/uploading blog posts.

Our step-granddaughter, Katie Bortz, is leaving for college in a few days so Linda arranged to have her over for lunch along with our daughter, Meghan, and son-in-law, Chris (Katie’s dad). They arrived around noon and stayed until almost 5 PM, a longer visit than usual. For lunch we had chickpea salad, corn-on-the-cob, collard greens cole slaw, and potato salad. Meghan made two desserts at home and brought them: cheesecake and vegan oatmeal bars.

Grand-daughter Katie (L) waiting for a slice of cake baked by her step-mom (our daughter, Meghan, on right).

Katie got a head start on college while still in high school and took several AP classes. She also tested out of some basic classes so she will hit the ground running with at least some courses that are directly related to her interests (biology, specifically animals), and major (wildlife and fisheries). She will be moving into one of the dorms and paired up with another freshman girl during orientation. They have the room arrangement worked out, at least on paper, and I expect that everything will fall into place.

For dinner we had leftovers from yesterday’s meal after which I chatted with Chuck for a while on the phone about refrigerators in buses. I worked on blog posts after that and was going to participate in the SLAARC info net at 8 PM. Linda noticed that there was a program about the Real Scotland Yard on Lansing PBS at that time, followed by an episode (rerun) of Sherlock. Harvey (AC8NO) was the net control operator for the info net and as soon as he called for check-ins I did an “in and out.” Once he acknowledged that he had received my check-in I settled in to watch the programs. After that it was off to bed to play a few iPad games before going to sleep.

2015/08/15 (S) Steve and Karen

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As we were backing out of the driveway to go to our weekly ham radio breakfast we noticed a large mailbox sitting on the ground next to ours. It was still attached to the upper half of its wood support structure. The number was 593, which is not an address that occurs on our street. We left it there and went to breakfast.

We had a mid-sized group of 15 people at our SLAARC breakfast this morning. On the drive into breakfast we lost power to our GPS every time I transmitted on the 2m ham band. The GPS and cellular booster worked fine all day yesterday with the new 12VDC extension splitter, but I did not use the mobile ham radio.

After breakfast we went directly to Chuck’s shop in Novi to see if we could retrieve the old refrigerator using our car. A measuring tape quickly revealed that the fridge would not fit without removing the seats. Even then it would be too long to close the rear gate and hatch on the Element. At breakfast Harvey (AC8NO) offered the use of his van and labor to help move the fridge and I will probably take him up on it.

On the drive home I chatted with John (NU8M) on the South Lyon 2m repeater and we were joined by Mike (W8XH). After John signed and dropped off Linda tried different combinations of power connections while I talked with Mike. Based on that test the splitter appears to be the problem but we could not determine if it was a voltage drop issue or some form of RFI.

I stopped on the way home to fill the gas tank in my car. When we got home I put the mailbox in the back of my car and we drove to the end of the street but it clearly did not come from one of our neighbor’s yards. When we got back to the house we also noticed that there was a footprint on the side of our mailbox. Closer inspection revealed that the post was slightly loose in the ground and the box was leaning (bent) slightly to one side. Clearly someone had tried to kick it over (and failed) and there was a very high probability that it was the same person(s) who probably broke the other mailbox and left it on the ground next to ours. We discussed whether we should report it to the Livingston County Sheriff Department but did not take the time right then to do so.

Linda needed to make a grocery store run and then prep the food for dinner and pick up the house. With company coming later I did not want to get all sweaty working in the bus and garage so I worked in my office editing and uploading blog posts. I quit around 3:30 and was writing blog posts when Steve and Karen Limkemann arrived at 4 PM.

We always have a nice visit with Steve and Karen and they are good sports about eating the vegan food that Linda prepares. Linda made a sweet and sour collard greens cole slaw and vegan potato salad ahead of time. She cooked corn-on-the-cob on the stovetop and heated vegan beer brats on the grill along with onions and green peppers. Steve and Karen brought a Malbec wine which we enjoyed before, during and after the meal. Dessert was fresh strawberries with cashew milk snickerdoodle ice cream. Really, what’s not to like?

Steve and Karen have rented a house trailer in a trailer park near Venice, Florida for the last few winters. I think they rented it for January, February, and March and split the time with another couple, but I may not have my facts completely straight. The owners of the trailer are from England and decided after this last winter that they want to start using it during the winter so Steve and Karen lost the use of it. They really liked the park and its location so they bought a trailer that was for sale and already set up. We visited them two winters ago, but we were several hours north of them. This coming winter we will be much closer to them while we are in Arcadia during January and February and plan to see them more often. Venice is a very upscale place and there is an excellent vegan restaurant within easy walking distance (a mile) from their trailer park.

We talked about trying to catch the tail end of the Perseids Meteor Shower but the peak was earlier in the week, they would not be visible at our location until midnight, and then only low in the northeast sky, which is not an ideal viewing direction from our yard. Steve and Karen had a 45 minute drive to get home and left around 10:30 PM. By that point it had been a long but very satisfying day for us and we were straight away to bed once they were safely on their way.

2015/08/14 (F) Back-to-the-Bricks (Again)

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I was up late last night and thought I would sleep in this morning but the alarm on Linda’s iPad had other ideas and woke me up at 7:15 AM. I got dressed and while Linda was getting ready I started downloading an update for Photoshop CC 2015 on my ASUS laptop. These Adobe downloads are very large and very slow so I left it to run.

We did not have breakfast or coffee at home. Linda made PB&J sandwiches and packed a bag of pretzel crackers, some fresh fruit, and some water in a cooler bag with some freezer packs. The forecast was for very warm, very humid conditions so we closed up the house and turned on the air-conditioning. We loaded the camera, raincoats, hats, folding camp chairs, an iPad, and some GLCC T-shirts and flags into the car and left around 8 AM for the GLCC/CCO Back-to-the-Bricks rally at the Fireman’s Park in Clio, Michigan.

We took Hacker Road to M-59 east to Old US-23 and stopped at the Kahuna Coffee shop. We had seen the sign for this place but had never been there. The owner was there and she was very nice. She has a smaller version of the JavaMaster hot air coffee bean roaster that Jeff has at Teeko’s. Her selection of green beans, however, was very different from Teeko’s with lots of flavored beans but none of the ones we usually buy. Knowing that she gets her beans from the same place as Jeff, however, means we could probably order the ones we like if Teeko’s disappears. She is friends with Jeff and is well aware of the probable impact of the Panera opening up across the intersection from Teeko’s. But I digress.

This morning we were interested in coffee and bagels to go. Kahuna had a better selection of bagels than Teeko’s but we got our usual choices; “everything” for Linda and cinnamon raisin for me, toasted with nothing on them. They had Swiss Chocolate Almond coffee brewed so we tasted a sample. It was very smooth, with no bitterness and just a hint of the named flavors, so we got two large ones to go.

We got back on M-59 eastbound and 100 yards later took the entrance ramp to northbound US-23. US-23 merges with I-75 at the southwest corner of Flint and we continued north on the combined road until we exited at M-57 and headed east through Clio to M-54 and turned south. A few miles later we turned into the Fireman’s Park on the east side of the highway. It was 9:15 AM as I parked the car.

When I talked to rally co-host Marty Caverly last week only 14 rigs had RSVP’d for the rally. There were over 20 rigs there when we arrived and five more showed up during the day. A guy also brought a Country Coach Prevost XL conversion down from Saginaw for the afternoon. He is trying to sell it and wanted to let the rally attendees check it out.

We made the rounds and said our “hello”s to everyone. As has happened at past rallies where we have dropped in for a day many of the ladies took off to check out local garage sales. Bill and Karen Gerrie were just pulling out but stopped to chat briefly. Frank and Sandy Griswold’s Featherlite H3-45 conversion has windows that slide open rather than swing out like our awning windows so I asked Frank and several other people about screens for these. Everyone had the same suggestion; that any local window and door business should be able to make them. I was trying to get useful information for someone who had e-mailed me as a result of an article in BCM.

The roundtable discussion started at 2 PM and most of the rally attendees were back by then. Pat Lintner, our GLCC national director, gave a pitch for the FMCAssist program, which is included as part of the annual FMCA membership and more than worth the annual cost of $40. I announced that we had GLCC T-shirts and a few flags with us if anyone wanted to buy them. I also announced that the Arcadia Rally website had disappeared but that Bill and Brenda Phelan are working to fix the problem and the rally is still on for December 26-31, 2015 with departure on January 1, 2016.

Ed Roelle had two topics for the roundtable: 1) “towing insurance” for our bus conversions, and; 2) causes and cures for hard water deposit buildup in the fresh water plumbing associated with an Aqua-Hot (Webasto diesel burner) heating and domestic hot water systems. Most of us use, or have used, Coach-Net for our “emergency roadside assistance” coverage. The plan includes towing but many of our members have switched to one of the three Good Sam ERS plans. The top (platinum) plan is ~$140/year.

A couple of years ago Coach-Net decided they would not cover bus conversions more than 40 years old and alienated quite a few folks in the converted coach community. They eventually reversed that position but the damage was done. Others who stayed with them have had issues getting service or being charged ridiculous sums of money for simple things. Coach-Net was officially endorsed by FMCA until recently, and is still endorsed by The Escapees RV Club, but FMCA has found a different provider for this important service.

We stuck around after the roundtable and continued chatting with folks in constantly shifting groupings. The dinner meal was planned for 6 PM, and by 5:30 preparations were well under way, so we started saying our “goodbyes.” We finally got our chairs back in the car at 5:50 PM and pulled out at 5:55. There were very ominous clouds moving towards the rally site from the north as we started for home and a severe weather watch had been posted.

To get home we reversed our route taking M-54 north to M-57 west through Clio to I-75/US-23 south. We stayed on southbound US-23 at the split with I-75 southwest of Flint and eventually exited onto M-59. Instead of going west towards home we headed east and pulled into the Hartland Meijer’s to pick up something for dinner and get fresh ingredients for tomorrow’s dinner with Steve and Karen.

The weather we saw approaching Clio from the north was just moving into Hartland as we left the Meijer’s, so it was a rapidly moving system. The storm clouds were very dramatic but we got back to the house and got the car unloaded before the rain came. The wind gusted strongly for a while but in the end we did not get as much precipitation as we needed or thought we would.

For dinner we had vegan burgers with all the fixin’s, oven-baked French fries, and fresh strawberries. It was 9 PM by the time we were done eating. We were both tired from our long, but very enjoyable, day so we went to bed earlier than usual.

2015/08/13 (R) Sanding Success

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Linda was scheduled to go into the bakery today but knew before we went to bed last night that the visit was postponed. That was just as well; we were very tired from our long day yesterday and slept in this morning.

Before I even had a chance to make coffee I spotted wild turkeys by the road in our easternmost driveway entrance. They walked past the east end of the house into our backyard. They hung around by the deer block for quite a while so we had a good long look at them and I took a few pictures. There was a big tom, a younger/smaller tom, and a half-dozen hens, one with a surprisingly small chick for this late in the season. The turkeys eventually moved on and we got back to our normal routine. While I made the coffee Linda made her own version of raisin, date, walnut oatmeal with some quick oats that she had in the pantry. It was very good.

We read for a bit but I needed to finish the blog posts for the last several days and Linda needed to return some items to the Howell Library and run a couple other errands. While working on the blog post for yesterday I realized that we had not loaded all of the pieces for the built-in sofa. I checked the pieces we had against the drawings, which we should have done yesterday, and confirmed that we were missing the two top pieces (E) for the support boxes (HVAC plenums) and the top piece (H) for the return air plenum. I texted Jarel and he replied quickly that he would try to take care of it in time for me to drive back down on Wednesday to pick up them up. It’s a 12-17 hour, 550 mile day, for me and costs about $60 in gasoline, so hopefully he will have the pantry done by then as well.

Linda got word from our son via TXT message that Shawna’s father, Mick, had passed away. He had an aggressive but non-cancerous brain tumor that did respond to two separate surgeries and was moved to hospice care about two weeks ago. Brendan, Shawna, and Madeline are cutting their vacation short by a day to head to the Grand Rapids area but are still leaving Tuesday to fly to Denver to visit Shawna’s mother, Carol, and her husband, Cliff. It appears that a memorial service may be in the works for the weekend of the 22nd and 23rd, in which case we will probably drive over.

My sister tried to call me today. Linda was on the house phone quite a bit today with bakery-related business so Patty tried my cell phone but did not leave a message. I was working in the bus at the time, did not have it with me, and Linda could not find it in time when it was ringing. Being deaf in one ear she cannot locate where sounds are coming from. She does a little better when she uses her BAHA, but rarely wears it around the house. I called my sister back and left a message and she eventually called me back and we got to talk.

Our father, who is 90, had been admitted to a hospital near where he lives. The staff said he appeared to have severe dementia, but he was fine (for his age) just a couple of weeks ago, so I suspected a stroke or some other sudden change. Patty sent me a text latter that the CAT scan of his brain revealed two recent lesions (last few weeks), the telltale sign of two strokes. She also said he was being transferred to Missouri Baptist Hospital, which is much closer to where she lives, for further care.

Those two pieces of news certainly put a damper on the day, and may cause an adjustment in my plans if I have to travel to St. Louis. In the meantime there is stuff that has to get done, so even though it was warm today and I wasn’t really in the humor, I kept working in the bus, off and on. I vacuumed up loose material, including inside the bases of cabinets, and then cleaned the wiring in the refrigerator alcove with Lysol. I decided to make a template for the refrigerator alcove plywood base filler panels so I could cut them the right size/shape on the first try. I then used one of the new ceramic sanding belts on the residual thin-set and mastic, and it worked! My sense of hope was renewed that I will be able to install the new floor correctly.

By 7 PM I was feeling drained so I wrapped up my work and took a shower. For dinner Linda made pan-grilled BBQ tofu with caramelized onions and served it open faced on a hamburger bun with a side of fresh steamed asparagus. It was delicious.

After dinner I went to Lowe’s and The Home Depot in search of several items but only ended up buying another 36 grit sanding belt. I needed floor leveling compound but was not prepared to choose between their limited options. I also needed a self-centering drill bit but neither store had them. Lowe’s and THD really are focused on the tools and materials one needs to work on a house and its surrounding property. Things like self-centering drill bits, though useful for things like drilling holes for door hinges, are really cabinet-making tools. As big as these stores are they can’t, and don’t, sell everything.

I talked to Butch on the drive home. The self-centering drill bit that Jarel recommended for installing the pull-out pantry slides is a Vix and Butch suggested four places where I could buy it: Rockler, Custom Service Hardware, McFeeley’s, and Grizzly’s. Before ordering one I need to e-mail or text Jarel and ask him what size screw I need to mount the pull-out pantry extension slides.

Back home I thought of four other things I could have bought while I was out so I added them to my list. I then went to my office and worked on blog posts, updated the BCM Group page on RVillage, e-mailed Gary Hatt at BCM, responded to an e-mail from Howard (PlayaDog) re: screens for sliding bus windows, and started downloading Adobe Creative Cloud 2015 updates. Jack Conrad had responded to my earlier e-mail asking if he knew what was going on with the Arcadia rally and I sent him a reply. By the time I dealt with all that I was ready to recline and rest.

2015/08/11 (T) Sanding Prep

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Our day started with our usual morning routine. We were out of Linda’s homemade granola, so she made Quaker brand Raisins, Dates, and Walnuts instant oatmeal. This has long been my favorite oatmeal and I still like the taste and texture.

After breakfast we removed the containers of water from the bus fridge, rolled it out of the alcove, and unplugged it. We then moved it farther up into the coach, behind the front passenger seat, so I could work in the alcove and on the floor. We then got the Shop Vac up into the coach.

Linda left around 9:30 AM to meet Diane at Kensington Metropark. They decided they want to get together and walk once a week and the Metropark, which is about half way between their houses, has as an extensive trail system.

While Linda was away I went to the FedEx Office store in Brighton and got a copy of the 11″ x 17″ sheet with the drawings of the seat and back cushions for the built-in sofa. I stopped at the Shell station and filled the tank as we would be leaving very early in the morning for Indiana.

Back at the house I vacuumed up as much loose debris as I could inside the coach. After checking my pantry drawings I decided I could stack at least two pieces of 3/4″ plywood, one atop the other, to get the base of the refrigerator high enough to allow the back to go over the bundle of wires that run along the junction of the floor and back wall without interfering with the pull-out pantry. This will allow the refrigerator to go into the alcove far enough that we can open the kitchen cabinet drawers under the counter to the left of the sink.

Linda got back around 12:30 PM. After lunch we were going to mask off the inside of the coach with painter’s plastic and tape. Our goal was to upkeep the dust that resulted from sanding the thinset and mastic out of cabinets and off of counters and woodwork. We planned to run the Shop Vac while sanding but knew, a priori, that it won’t suck up all of the dust.

After considering what would be involved in masking off the inside of the coach we decided instead to wrap the refrigerator in plastic to protect it and then tried using the belt sander on the residual thin-set from the old ceramic tiles. The old aluminum oxide belts failed fairly quickly, which was discouraging, but the sanding did generate a lot of airborne dust, which was encouraging as it indicated the sanding was actually removing material. Our Craftsman belt sander has a built-in dust collection bag and Linda was running the vacuum so both of those things helped.

Late afternoon we went to Lowe’s and bought a 4′ x 8′ sheet of 3/4″ (nominal) maple veneered plywood and a 4′ x 8′ sheet of 1/4″ SurePly underlayment plywood. We also got two #36 (very coarse) 4″ x 24″ ceramic particle sanding belts and a box of 200 3/4″ self-drilling screws.

Back home we unloaded everything and I then called Josh to confirm that he could still meet us at the Martin’s supermarket in Elkhart in the morning. I also called Butch to remind him that we were still coming down. The rest of the evening is lost to me, as I did not record our activities soon enough, but they probably involved e-mails, computer updates, and iPads.

2015/08/10 (M) Keep on Buss’in

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We have a doe and her spotted faun that have been coming in the early morning to the deer block we set in our back yard the other day. They were there again this morning and the block is close enough to the house that we got a good look at them through the bedroom doorwall. They must be comfortable with the setting as the faun wandered off towards the western part of our property and the doe let it go while she continued to lick the block. Eventually, however, the faun was out of sight and the doe headed off in that direction to find it.

We had cinnamon raisin toast and soy yogurt for breakfast, with orange-grapefruit juice to wash down the vitamins. I used up the last of the Sweet Seattle Dreams half-caff coffee beans for our pot of morning coffee. Keith usually mows our grass on Mondays and he came to the front door around 9:30 AM to ask if we wanted it cut this week. That’s the first time he has done that this summer but it was an appropriate and timely question. We have had very little rain the last couple of weeks so the grass had not gown much since last Monday and was a little brown in places. We agreed to skip this week, which I think was what Keith was hoping I would say. There was a high probability of rain starting around noon and I suspect he had another yard he wanted to cut before it started.

We have been very busy the last few days and I have not had time to do more than outline my blog posts. Linda needed to work on an analysis for the bakery so I spent much of the day filling in the details of my recent posts. Our days are very full and if I wait too long I cannot capture them accurately.

Linda looked up the information on the DTE Energy “Energy Efficiency” appliance recycling program. I called the 866 number and was assisted by Reginald. The earliest available pickup date was Friday, August 28 so I took that. It took quite a while to arrange the pickup but Reginald appeared to get all the pertinent information and give me a confirmation code and a phone number to reach the truck on pickup day.

Once the refrigerator pickup was arranged I texted Chuck to let him know the details. That prompted a return phone call and a conversation about refrigerators. Having seen how our swap went on Saturday he and Barb are also thinking very seriously about replacing the refrigerator in their bus. The rationale is the same as ours; the fridge is old, so it is noisier and less efficient than newer ones, and having it break on the road would be more than inconvenient.

Replacing a refrigerator in an RV, especially a residential unit in a bus conversion, is not like replacing one in a home. Access is a major problem and there is not a lot of space to maneuver it or get more than two pairs of hands on it. If they replace theirs here (in Michigan) their bus will be inside their garage/shop, the forklift will be available to do the heavy lifting, and trusted friends and family will be available to help. And, most importantly, they won’t be living in it and dependent on the fridge for preserving their food.

Before the day got away from me I pulled up the PDF of the manual for the wireless keypad for the large garage door. When I installed the new opener for the small garage door and reprogrammed the wireless remotes for our cars I inadvertently rendered the keypad inoperable. Reprogramming it was simple enough once I had the procedure. It’s the small, simple tasks like this one that become big burdens if not taken care of in a timely manner.

The predicted rain started around noon and was steady until 3 PM. It was just the kind of rain we needed; gentle enough to give it a chance to soak in but hard enough to provide a useful quantity of moisture to the ground. Six to 10 hours of this would have been even better but we were glad for what we got.

I had thought that we might mask off the inside of the coach today with painter’s plastic but with the rain and humidity, and plenty of other things to do, I decided to defer that until tomorrow. During the afternoon Jarel texted me a couple of pictures and a brief status update on our custom woodworking projects. Not surprisingly he is already well along on the construction of the pull-out pantry and has spray lacquered the pieces for the built-in sofa.

One of the photos showed one of the 1/8″ thick aluminum plates that will form the side rails for each shelf in the pantry. He applied a brushed finish to the plate and countersunk the screw holes so the heads would not protrude beyond the surface. Jarel did metal work at one time before he became a cabinet maker so he knows how to do this kind of stuff. He is also meticulous and takes great pride in his work. Given a choice I would always prefer to hire a craftsman who cares as much, or more, about the quality of their work as I do.

When I know I am going to have a long full day, such as this coming Wednesday, I will try to “write ahead” on my blog, basically outlining the plan for the day but obviously not filling in the details of things that have not yet happened. Along the same lines, I often use future blog posts as a planning tool. As things occur to me that I need to do I will note them in the draft of a future post. If the thing actually gets done on that date I flesh out the details, and if not, I move it to a new date.

I think I did several loads of laundry today and spent some time editing and uploading blog posts during the evening, but as I am finishing this post later in the week I have lost the details and will just end here.

2015/08/09 (N) Sounds of Silence

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Sunday usually means a trip to the Howell Farmers Market if the weather is nice. The weather was OK but Linda did some major grocery shopping last night and did not need anything from the market so we did not go. We were both tired from yesterday’s refrigerator swap, physically and emotionally, and wanted to take it easy today. I brewed a pot of Ethiopian Yirgacheffe half-caff coffee and we enjoyed that while reading in the living room. We eventually ate breakfast and then got ready for the rest of our day. For me that meant doing three loads of laundry.

I put the first load of laundry in the washer and then drove to The Home Depot to get two more drawer pulls. We also wanted to look at wall paper but they do not stock any. Lowe’s had a very limited selection of wallpapers, but we thought a couple of them might work if we could not find anything else. One, in particular, was scrubable and another was paintable. We also found one that we liked in a book of Allen-Roth samples. This was not something we needed to decide on the spot but it is something we need to get settled sooner rather than later.

When we got home we pulled the new refrigerator out of its alcove and plugged it in. I set the freezer and fresh food compartment controls to the “normal” mark. Linda filled containers with water and placed them in both compartments. I found the remote thermometer for the unit that is still mounted on the wall next to the alcove and set it in the fresh food compartment. The two thermometers are off by a couple of degrees in opposite directions, but close enough for what I needed to do as it will allow me to monitor the temperature without opening the door. The new refrigerator was much quieter than the old one, which was one of the improvements we were looking for in a new unit.

New fridge in alcove. Kitchen drawers removed. Floor being prepped.

When we got home we had a phone message from Jim, N8KUE, regarding motorhomes. Jim plans to retire from the Ford Research Labs in March. He and Pam are seriously considering getting a motorhome and are starting to research the market. We’ve said for a while that we would be glad to meet for coffee and talk motorhomes, bus conversions, and the RV lifestyle. I called Jim back, suggested that we meet them at the Biggby’s Coffee in South Lyon at 4:30 PM, and they agreed.

Linda tried to pull up the Arcadia Bus Rally website to get the registration form but the domain name appeared to be for sale. I e-mailed Brenda Phelan to find out what is going on. She and her husband, Bill, operate the rally. I then worked on the drawings for the built-in sofa cushions.

We had an early dinner at 3:30 PM and left for South Lyon at 4 PM and got to Biggby’s Coffee just after 4:30 PM. Jim, Pam, and their son Adam, were already there. We talked until after 6:30 PM and then drove the short distance to the Witch’s Hat Depot in the South Lyon Historic Village where our South Lyon Area Amateur Radio Club (SLAARC) holds its monthly business meeting and program. One of the members, John (NU8M), a materials science engineer who works for Bosch, gave a very interesting presentation on the various processes that affect electronics as they age and can ultimately cause them to fail. It was a pleasant evening, weather-wise, and some of us lingered in conversation for a while after the meeting before heading home.

We arrived home hungry and had some hummus with sourdough pretzel nibblers and pita chips and a small piece of watermelon. I checked the bus refrigerator and the fresh food compartment was down to 34.4 degrees F indicated. The remote thermometer is off by about 2 degrees F but I don’t recall in which direction. I turned the thermostat to a warmer setting and will check it again tomorrow. We turned in for the night and Linda read while I wrote for a while before turning off the lights.

2015/08/07 (F) Arrangements

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We had our usual, but never boring, homemade granola with fresh blueberries for breakfast. I brewed a pot of the Costa Rican half-caff coffee we bought yesterday without tasting it first. We found it to be somewhat bitter, which is not our taste in coffee, so we probably will not buy more after this batch is gone.

We spent a good part of the morning researching cabinet pulls on the Cabinet Service Hardware (CSH) website. We found a pull on the CSH website that appeared to be identical to the one from The Home Depot, which is a Rockefeller Antique Brass from Liberty Hardware. The one from CSH was a Belwith Keeler HH.P135-AB for $2.47 each. The one from The Home Depot was $2.48 plus tax but no S&H. Since we have the one from THD in hand and like how it looks we will probably buy them locally.

Many of the drawers in the bus have the pulls attached to the walnut face and then the face attached to the front of the drawer box. Thus, the only way to remove the pulls is to first unscrew the box from the face. I took the face off of one drawer and installed the new pull. It fit perfectly, confirming that the mounting hole spacing is 3″ center-to-center. The one from THD comes with 1″ and 1.5″ #8-32 machine screws but it looks like we will need something shorter than 1″ for the framed drawers and shorter than 1.5″ for the solid drawers. The cabinet doors have 3/4″ thick frames so the 1″ machine screws may work for those. Thus we should be able to use some of the machine screws that come with the pulls from THD but will have to buy some as well. The pulls from CSH do not come with screws so we would have to buy those anyway.

Linda left around noon to meet Diane in Livonia to see a movie (Ricki and the Flash) starring Meryl Streep, Kevin Kline, and Rick Springfield. I went on an errand run while she was away. At The Home Depot in Howell I found 10 packs of the drawer pull we like so the price came out to under $2 per pull compared to $2.48 when purchased individually. We need 58 to replace all the ones in the coach plus at least four for the new desk drawers so I bought six 10-packs. We have not decided if we will replace the single screw round pulls on the two TV cabinet doors with the double screw pulls. If we do we will need a couple more pulls. If not, we will need two round pulls in the same style and finish, which THD also carries. I bought small packs of #8-32×3/4″ and #8-32×1-1/4″ lengths so I can figure out what lengths work best in each location.

Jarel called while at was THD. The plans for the built-in sofa had arrived in today’s mail and he had a few questions. We talked through the issues and came to the conclusion that it would be better for us to come down on Wednesday instead of Tuesday to pick up the desk. That will give him time to cut the sofa pieces and do some minor assembly and finishing. The plywood seat and side pieces need to be stained to resemble the walnut hardwood and a 3/4″x3/4″ piece of walnut hardwood needs to be attached to the front edge. He also needs to cut the piece of walnut veneered plywood for the front and then spray everything with the same lacquer he has used on all of the walnut desk pieces.

As I was finishing up at THD I also got a call from Chuck letting me know that everything was on track for the refrigerator swap tomorrow. My next stop was at the Howell Lowe’s for a 4′ x 4′ sheet of 3/4″ plywood but I did not like their selection any better than THD. I ended up buying two quarter sheets (24″ x 48″) of birch plywood. This plywood has a lot of thin layers, so it is very flat and dimensionally stable, with defect free surfaces that are sanded smooth and very clean edges. These sheets will go on the bottom of the refrigerator alcove in the bus to elevate the new refrigerator above the new vinyl tile floor.

Back home I texted Josh at Coach Supply Direct, called Terry at A-1 Upholstery, and called Butch regarding the change in our visit date for next week. Linda got home shortly thereafter and helped me reattach the edge trim to the two doors of the old refrigerator and load them into the back of my car. We covered everything with blankets and then loaded all of the drawers, shelves, racks, and bins. Once the old fridge is out of the bus we will clean it, reassemble it, plug it in, and make sure it is cooling. We will then call DTE Energy to arrange pick up through their recycling program.

Loading pieces of the old refrigerator into the back of the Element to take to Chuck’s shop.

Linda bought an Amy’s Roasted Vegetable Pizza while she was out and cooked it for dinner. It is our favorite store bought pizza, and much better (for us) than what we can usually get at restaurants and pizzerias (with the exception of Satchel’s in Gainesville, Florida), but not as good as the pizza we had while Mara was here. That pizza was memorable.

After dinner I got a shower and then worked on the design/drawings for the seat and back cushions for the built-in sofa for the bus. I started editing blog posts for July but did feel like uploading them. We went to bed earlier than usual as we had to up at 7 AM tomorrow to go to our weekly ham radio club breakfast.

2015/08/06 (R) Three Quarters Framed

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As usual, we started the day with breakfast and then enjoyed our coffee while reading and writing. Best Pest Control showed up mid-morning to apply the second treatment for hornets, wasps, etc. so we closed up all of the windows and doorwalls while they sprayed.

We located a Wayne-Dalton facility in Livonia so I called them. As I suspected they were the factory distribution center and would not sell to us directly. They did, however, give me the name of one of their customers, a business in Milford named The Door Doctor that had a retail store front. I called them and they had a 12 foot length of the required D-channel bottom weather seal for our small (8′) garage door. It turned out that they were not actually in downtown Milford but were more conveniently located near the Milford Road exit of I-96. When the pest control guys were done and gone I drove over and bought the seal.

Back home Linda made quesadillas for lunch and set out some yummy black grapes. We then made an errand run to Howell. Our first stop was at Teeko’s Coffee and Tea where we ordered a pound each of fresh roasted Ethiopian Yirgacheffe half-caff and Costa Rican half-caff beans. The Yirgacheffe is one of our favorites. The Costa Rican is something new for us.

Our next stop was The Home Depot for a half sheet (4′ x 4′) of 3/4″ plywood. They only had one type in a 4′ x 4′ size and I did not like it so we did not buy it. They had nicer plywood in full sheets (4′ x 8′) but I did not need that much and did not want to fuss with something that size. We did, however, find a drawer/cabinet pull that we liked and bought one to try out with our bus cabinets. It’s a Rockefeller style from Liberty in an antique brass finish for a 3″ center-to-center hole spacing. They also had a matching single screw knob in case we need it.

Our next stop was the Howell Art and Frame shop in downtown Howell to pick up three of our four pieces of artwork. The owner, Rick, had ordered the fourth frame the wrong size and had to reorder it. The three that were finished looked very nice and I would like to think that the artist, Ann Metzger, would have been pleased with our choices. Ann was married to my mother’s cousin and took up painting as rehabilitation therapy for breast cancer surgery in her early 40’s. She turned out to be quite good and was active in the St. Louis artist’s guild for many years. We have collected many of her works over the last 44 years.

We stopped at Lowe’s to look at their drawer pulls but they did not have anything similar to the one we got at The Home Depot. We stopped back at Teeko’s to pick up our coffee order and then headed home.

Back home we moved the paintings to the library and turned our attention to installing the seal on the 8 foot wide garage door. With the door all the way up we were able to slide the old seal out towards the larger door. I thought we could install the new one with the door in the same position without removing the track from the bottom of the door. That was, indeed, the case but it did not go in easily. I trimmed the ends and ran the door up and down a few times and made minor adjustments on each end until it worked properly. We still need to redo the side and top seals for both doors.

I tried programming the garage door remote control in my car the day we installed the new opener on the small garage door but wasn’t able to. At the suggestion of the woman at The Door Doctor, I Googled the model numbers of our various remotes and found the manuals. I had forgotten that the four 3-button remotes we bought a couple of years ago had to be configured before they could be paired with the openers. Once I knew how to do that I was able to program mine and Linda’s to work with both doors. Each of our children also have one and I will have to re-program those the next time they are here.

I exchanged e-mails with Josh at Coach Supply Direct about picking up the extra fabric we ordered, perhaps next Tuesday. I also e-mailed and texted with Jarel about picking up the desk pieces next Tuesday and possibly the pieces for the built-in sofa. He did not, however, receive the mailing tube with the drawings and cut sheet today, so we will see if that works out. I suggested he defer work on the pull-out pantry in favor of the sofa pieces as that will allow me to keep working while he is on vacation at the end of this month. He still owes us a price estimate for the pantry but at this point it almost doesn’t matter as he will be the one building it regardless of the number.

I talked to Terry at A-1 Upholstery in Elkhart regarding the sofa cushions. She and her mom, Lou, run the business. I last talked to Terry in early June and she remembered the conversation. I described once again what we were looking for and she gave me a rough estimate of the cost. She said we could stop by Tuesday morning to drop off the fabric and discuss the job and thought they could have it finished by the end of August. That would be great timing for us. We are starting to feel like this whole project will come together nicely once we get the refrigerators swapped and can finely get back to work on the floor of the bus.

I installed the new Morgan M-302N I.C.E. style lightning arrestor and connected the radio and antenna cables. I had a short QSO with Mike (W8XH) via the South Lyon 2m repeater and had no issues on transmit or receive. I started working on a gallery post of 45 photos from the ARRL Field Day event at the end of June but only got half of it done before dinner.

Linda made a delicious zoodles dish for dinner. Zoodles are zucchini noodles that she cuts with her SpiraLife slicer and uses in place of grain or rice pasta. The dish had the usual garlic, onion, olive oil base but also had shallots, mushrooms, kale, and sun-dried tomatoes. We had fresh watermelon later for dessert.

After dinner I finished the gallery post while monitoring the Novi and South Lyon repeaters. I then had a long QSO with Mike (W8XH) and Steve (N8AR) that gave me a chance to test the M-302N lightning arrestor on both VHF and UHF at three different power levels. We continued to have the minor problem with quick, apparently random, audio dropouts on our Yaesu FTM-400 dual band radios. The apparent randomness has made it difficult to puzzle out what might be causing this and we all agreed that we need to set aside time to plan and execute a systematic test and record the results for analysis.

Butch called to chat about house (bus) battery cabling and other things. I mentioned that we would be coming down on Tuesday and would try to arrange our timing so we can stop and visit over dinner. We then watched The Princess Bride on DVD. It’s our all-time favorite movie and I long ago lost count of how many times we have seen it.

2015/08/02 (N) No Swap Sunday

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The forecast for today was for warm, humid weather so we closed up the house and turned on the air-conditioners as soon as we got up. We left around 9 AM for the Howell Farmers Market so I did not make coffee and we did not have breakfast. At the market Linda bought a nice assortment of fresh vegetables. I bought a bag of Kenya AA coffee beans from Teeko’s and some apricot and raspberry Rohlicky from the Czech Bakery. It turns out they are not vegan so I won’t buy them again.

We decided to see if John and Diane were available for dinner. We had no sooner made these arrangements when I got a text message from Chuck indicating that the coast was clear at his shop in Novi and we were good to go on the refrigerator swap. I talked to him shortly thereafter and indicated that we had assumed it would not be today so I had not yet cut the support 2x4s or found the additional help that we would need and, in light of that, had made other plans. That was fine with him and we agreed to aim for next weekend.

Linda surveyed her inventory of ingredients and decided that the warm Farro with dried cranberries and nuts would be a good dish to have Diane help make. Diane retired at the end of the school year in June and had asked Linda if she would show her some of the ingredients and prep/cooking methods she uses. Linda likes working with friends in the kitchen, sharing what she has learned and learning new things herself in the process. Diane is her longest term, non-family friend. As an English teacher she had lessons to prepare and papers to grade almost every evening. As a result John, who has worked most of his adult life as a framing carpenter, took care of preparing their evening meals. Now that Diane is free of her teaching obligations she would like to learn more about cooking.

Linda wanted some non-dairy ice cream for dessert so I was sent to get it. I went to the Home Depot in Brighton first where I bought some thin (1/8th inch thick) rubber sheet material, a small tool pouch, and 2-person forearm lift strap. The rubber material will be for the edges of the plywood in the new built-in sofa, cushioning the seat when it is closed. The tool pouch is for working on the tower (my carpenter’s tool belt is too big) and the lift strap is to help with the refrigerators and anything else heavy we might need to move.

The only place within a seven mile radius of our house that consistently has the non-diary “ice cream” we like is the Kroger on M-59 at Old US-23, so that’s where I headed next. In addition to the Coconut Bliss they had a cashew milk based product so I bought some of each. I bought vanilla and salted caramel in the CB brand and snickerdoodle in the cashew product. By the time I got home I only had a couple of hours left before John and Diane were due to arrive so I worked in my office and uploaded blog posts for June 16 – 20.

John and Diane arrived right on time at 4 PM. I opened our bottle of Viva La Roja from Heart of the Desert Winery in Alamogordo, New Mexico and we settled in to easy conversation. I found this red table wine particularly to my liking; very smooth with a hint of sweetness and no tannin.

Linda and Diane eventually started preparing dinner. John and took that as an opportunity to go look at the bus project. The ladies made a mixed greens salad with dried cranberries and other add-ins and put out a choice of dressings and sliced a loaf of Italian bread that they brought, along with a bottle of Pinot Grigio that we opened to have with the meal. The main dish was Farro with dried cranberries, almonds, onions, garlic, and kale. It was all very tasty and well received.

By the end of the meal it had cooled off enough to sit on the deck comfortably. Linda served the cashew milk snickerdoodle non-dairy ice cream with fresh sliced strawberries and it was very good. I showed them what we had done with antennas on the tower and the cable entrance box and then we went back inside. John still works full-time so they left around 9 PM as it takes at least 30 minutes to get back to their house in Farmington Hills which is about a mile from our old house.

2015/08/01 (S) Refrigerator Swapping (NOT)

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We had a good crowd for our weekly SLAARC breakfast. We sat across from Mike (W8XH) and had a chance to discuss what to do about the ‘extra’ user accounts on our computers. We also discussed the release of Windows 10 that occurred on the 29th of July and all came to the conclusion that we would not be upgrading anytime soon.

When we got home I talked to Chuck on the phone. He said the sun room company was still moving out of the building in front of his shop and that there was still too much stuff in the way to be able to move our buses around. Given the circumstances we agreed that we would not do the refrigerator swap today and probably not tomorrow.

At breakfast Mike suggested that we look in the Users folder on our computers to see what files were associated with each of these previously unknown users and then delete the User accounts. It turned out that these users did not exist, or at least had no folders or files associated with them that we could find. Linda’s computer did, however, have a couple more folders in the Users folder that did not have User accounts associated with them. When we deleted each of the phantom accounts we were given the option of saving any associated files in a folder on the desktop. We selected that option each time but no such folders ever got created, confirming (I suppose) that there were no files associated with that account.

Bill, who takes care of the computers and software for the bakery, installed software on our machines when we first got them and Linda speculated as to whether these phantom accounts might have been inadvertently created at that time. At this point we will probably never know. We have strong security systems in place and are reasonably careful in how we interact with the online world, but it was a bit unnerving to find these accounts on our machines.

We were on tap for another warm, humid day and I elected not to do any work on the bus or in the garage. With the phantom User accounts taken care of I transferred the photos that I received of the custom walnut desk from Jarel from my SG3 phone to my laptop computer and edited them for use on our blog. I copied recent photos from my DSLR camera to my computer and then settled in to copy blog post drafts from e-mails into Word and edit them.

In the course of the day I did a couple of loads of laundry, worked on the sofa design/drawings, chatted on the ham radio, and took time out to have lunch and dinner, which was the left over Pad Thai. Having sat for a day or two the dish had absorbed the liquid and, although Linda thought the broccoli was now too soft, I liked it better than when it was freshly made. I also got to add a generous amount of peanuts, which is how I remember Pad Thai being served in restaurants. After dinner I started reading “Number Theory and Its History” by Oystein Ore.

2015/07/31 (F) A Blue Moon Family Gathering

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As soon as Linda got up this morning she busied herself making collard greens cole slaw while I made our morning coffee. Once the cole slaw was assembled and in the refrigerator we had breakfast. We were due at our daughter and son-in-law’s house later in the afternoon for a family gathering so we decided not to take on any overtly physical tasks today. We both got cleaned up instead and settled in to more sedentary tasks.

Linda has been getting somewhat regular text messages from Mara apprising us of her travels and I have been getting text messages from Jarel with photographs of the progress on the construction of our custom walnut desk/workstation for the bus. Linda worked at her desk and I worked in my office transferring the photos from my phone to my computer and working on the design/drawings for the built-in sofa.

Linda restarted her Samsung laptop computer (for some reason that I do not recall) and was presented with a choice of four user profiles for logging in. One was hers, one was named ‘Diane,’ and two of them where random letters. Until that moment we were unaware that these other accounts existed on her machine. She selected her usual account and logged in. I checked my ASUS laptop computer and discovered that I also had a user profile named ‘John’ of which I was unaware. We noted that we have, coincidentally, been good friends with a couple named John and Diane for 36 years.

I e-mailed Mike (W8XH) to ask him about this situation. He is a friend from our local SLAARC ham radio club who works part time as an independent computer service provider and has become our ‘go to’ guy for computer issues that do not involve the bakery software or VPN. Because he is often working during the day I do not always hear back from him immediately, but we knew we would see him at breakfast tomorrow and decided not to do anything until we had talked to him.

We plinked away at our tasks until it was time to get ready to go to the family gathering. Brendan and Shawna were headed ‘up north’ and needed to borrow a few things. We had previously gathered up our portable induction cooker and battery powered camp lantern and loaded these in the Element along with the Thule car top carrier. We loaded the cole slaw, a bottle of wine for dinner, and a bag with a couple of gift bottles of wine and cards for Brendan and Shawna’s upcoming birthdays, and headed for Dexter.

Meghan and Chris are very interested in professional sports and today at 4 PM EDT was the trading deadline for 2015 Major League Baseball season. That’s a big deal if you are really into professional baseball. They had the radio on when we arrived and were following the trading action closely.

Meghan had obviously been hard at work on dinner preparations long before we arrived. She and Chris had acquired a Sous Vide, a countertop appliance for cooking foods in sealed bags immersed in hot water, and she was cooking country style pork ribs with two different sauces. The bags had been in the Sous Vide for over 24 hours and from comments during dinner the meat was obviously very moist, tender, and tasty. Meghan had also prepared tempeh for us. She had soaked it and then pan grilled it with the same two sauces; a classic bar-b-que and a mustard. Except for the meat everything else was vegan; collard greens cole slaw, corn-on-the-cob, potato salad. Meghan had a pudding bar for dessert that included vegan tapioca and chocolate puddings in addition to regular chocolate pudding, and lots of toppings.

Before dinner Brendan and I tried to figure out a way to mount the Thule car top carrier on their Subaru Outback but it became clear fairly quickly that we did not have the correct adapters and could not engineer a way around that. There was no possibility of buying them at this point so we put it back in our car to take home.

Grand-daughter Katie and boyfriend Josh arrived late having run into traffic on their drive back from Iowa. Brendan, Shawna, and Madeline were still there but getting ready to leave. After introductions Katie and Josh had dinner. Meghan then got out the “Ticket To Ride” board game. We played one complete game with me and Linda working as a team. This is Katie’s favorite game and she came in first. Katie is very bright but is also, apparently, very competitive. This was a side of her we had not seen previously.

By the time we were done it was dark so we all gathered up our things and bid each other fair well. It was a clear night and the full moon had just risen and now shone brightly over the land. It was a Blue Moon, the second full moon of the month, and the kind of evening that you could see well enough to go for a midnight hike in the woods. The next Blue Moon will be in January 2018, so that are not common events.

2015/07/30 (R) Number Theory

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We awoke to a decidedly different air mass than we have been experiencing the last week or so; cool with noticeably lower humidity. Linda turned off the air-conditioning and we opened up the house for the first time in a week. We had a light breakfast of grapefruit and cinnamon raisin toast and then spent an hour enjoying our coffee. I finished the little treatise on cryptology yesterday at Panera and started reading Oystein Ore’s “Invitation to Number Theory.”

Linda needed to make a quick grocery run for miso so I worked for a while on the sofa design, laying out the pieces that will be cut from a 48″ x 96″ sheet of 3/4″ plywood. When she returned from her errand she went for her daily walk while it was still cool. After her walk she made a cold black bean salad and then made roll up sandwiches using multigrain pita bread. It was delicious and healthy; the bread alone had nine grams of protein. After lunch Linda attended to some nutritional calculations related to the dinner she planned to fix and I gathered up the tools I thought we would need to take care of some things in the bus. That included some small zip lock bags for small parts.

My first task was to remove the screws that secure the shorter head end of the bed platform to the foundation. The platform is in two pieces joined by a piano (continuous) hinge. After doing this I lifted the other end and was reminded that I had already disconnected the two gas springs that normally hold it open. I also realized that the wires which supply 12VDC power to the two compartment lights on the underside of the platform were routed under a fixed cross member and cable-clamped to the other piece of the platform. I already knew, or assumed, that they were hard-wired and had spade lug crimp connectors ready to go.

\With Linda’s help I was able to detach the wire loom at several points to create some slack. The +12VDC wire was connected to a microswitch with a spade lug so it was easy to unplug. I clipped the neutral wire, stripped both free ends, and attached an insulated male spade connector to one and an insulated female spade connector to the other. With that the entire platform could now be removed from the bus to get it out of the way while we install the new floor tiles.

In the kitchen area of the bus we unscrewed and removed the walnut trim around the fixed window on the passenger side. I reinstalled all of the screws so we would not misplace them while Linda took the trim to the garage to store it. I removed the screws that held each of the three reading lights to underside of the upper cabinet in front of the fixed window. They were wired with very clever little insulated terminal strips which made them easy to disconnect and will make them equally easy to reconnect. Linda bagged each fixture and its parts separately in one gallon zip lock bags.

The AC light fixture was trickier to remove. First I turned off the circuit breaker on the inverter sub-panel and verified that the light no longer came on. By lifting the false bottom of the cabinet I could see that the fixture was installed onto a ceiling junction box. That meant there was probably a post threaded into a cross bracket with the post protruding down through the center/mounting hole in the fixture and held in place by the decorative nut.

I was not able to turn the decorative nut by hand so I got the faucet wrench. I have had this unique and specialized tool for a very long time. It is designed to reach up behind a sink and grab the retaining nut on the underside of a faucet 12 inches away. The head is spring loaded and flips over to allow the wrench to be used to tighten or loosen the nut. Occasionally, like today, it finds an alternate use. I like it when that happens.

\With the fixture loose I was able to color code the neutral wires with white tape, untwist the wire nuts, and then put the wire nuts back on the two supply wires. Linda took the fixture to the garage and figured out way to store it safely using an unused waste basket. We talked about the built-in sofa and some HVAC details for the passenger side of the cockpit before wrapping up our bus work for today.

While I put the tools away Linda started working on dinner. Tonight’s special creation was vegan Pad Thai. Regular Pad Thai was a favorite of ours for many years even after we switched to a vegetarian diet as we were still eating eggs. The dish has a lot of ingredients, so it is a lot of work, and a good vegan version is a real challenge, but Linda executed the dish quite well. We finished up the watermelon for dessert, which was sweet but light and refreshing.

I try to write every day while the sequence and details of the day’s events are still clear and my thoughts and feelings about them are somewhat “in the moment.” But I don’t usually finish a post and upload it the same day. I often finish it the next morning which means I have a chance to sleep on in it. We have been so busy with the bus remodeling project that I have barely had time to write the drafts of my posts and I have not had the time to transfer them, edit them, select photos and post-process them, and upload everything to the blog. I don’t like getting so far behind, but there are only so many hours in a day and I do need at least seven hours sleep a night.

After dinner I e-mailed Josh to see when we might get the extra fabric we ordered to make seat and back cushions for the sofa I am designing for the bus. I then settled in to read about number theory before drifting off to sleep.

The Phase Place

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Category Archives: WFPB

2015/09/19 (S) Rally Wrap Up

2015/09/14 (M) Final Prep (for now)

2015/09/13 (N) Club Business

2015/09/10 (R) Illuminating

2015/09/07 (M) Grouted

2015/09/06 (N) Grouting

2015/09/05 (S) Building the Built-in

2015/09/01 (T) Tiling Kate

2015/08/31 (M) A Major Sub-Project Done

2015/08/30 (N) A Day of Rest (NOT)

2015/08/29 (S) Up and Down

2015/08/28 (F) Bye Bye Fridge

2015/08/25 (T) Turning The Corner

2015/08/24 (M) Skimcoating

2015/08/22 (S) Clean and Level

2015/08/21 (F) Have Fridge Will Travel

2015/08/18 (T) Walking Grind

2015/08/17 (M) Wallpaper Search

2015/08/16 (N) A Send Off For Katie

2015/08/15 (S) Steve and Karen

2015/08/14 (F) Back-to-the-Bricks (Again)

2015/08/13 (R) Sanding Success

2015/08/11 (T) Sanding Prep

2015/08/10 (M) Keep on Buss’in

2015/08/09 (N) Sounds of Silence

2015/08/07 (F) Arrangements

2015/08/06 (R) Three Quarters Framed

2015/08/02 (N) No Swap Sunday

2015/08/01 (S) Refrigerator Swapping (NOT)

2015/07/31 (F) A Blue Moon Family Gathering

2015/07/30 (R) Number Theory