Tag Archives: John Palmer Energy Systems (Mayo FL)

2015/11/30 (M) Palmer Energy Systems

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I was up at 6:45 AM and wandered over to John’s trailer compound around 7:10.  He was outside talking to someone on his cell phone and we finally left at 7:20 for breakfast in Mayo.  We went to a small, unassuming diner and waited in the car until Dale showed up.  We ordered at the counter, selected ceramic mugs from a basket, and then took a table in the back.  I had a version of my usual breakfast out; dry toast with Smucker’s Strawberry Jam and coffee.

We were done by 8:15 and stopped at the NAPA store headed east out of town on US-27.  They had a good supply of Group 31 commercial batteries and gave me a good price based on my AITA/NAPA discount card and waved the core charge if I returned the old batteries.

We returned to John’s and I got busy removing the old batteries, which was a bigger project than it sounds.  I had to get all four of my tool boxes out plus our Little Giant ladder, nitrile gloves, and paper towels.  I also had to disconnect the car from the bus.

The four batteries were lined up, sitting crosswise, in a tray above the passenger side tag axle.  Being that far off the ground I found it easier to work from the Little Giant ladder configured as a short step ladder.

My first step was to make a diagram of the physical location of the batteries with the positive and negative terminals marked and lines for the main cables attached to each one.  I assigned the numbers 1 through 8 to the terminals and then used green Frog Tape to label each cable with the number of the terminal it was connected to.  At Linda’s suggestion I used my iPad to take a photo of the batteries with the labeled cables.

My next step was to remove all of the cables from the batteries, being careful not to allow the exposed lugs on the ends to come in contact with anything they should not touch.  Some of the cables were jumpers, which I removed and set aside, while others were captive and had to hang down next to the forward side of the tray.  The cables were secured with a lock washer and nut at each terminal which I set aside as I removed them.

With all of the cables removed I proceeded to remove the large nut that secured the retaining bracket that held the batteries and remove it.  I started with the battery farthest to the outside as it was the easiest to lift out from atop the ladder.  Paul, one of the owners of the Entegra Aspire motorhome parked behind us, had come over to see what I was doing and offered to help.  I gladly accepted his assistance and he helped me lift the old batteries out of the tray and get them on the ground.  Each one weighs about 80 pounds.

I emptied out part of the driver’s side rear of our Honda Element, loaded the four used batteries in there, and took off for Mayo.  The associate at the NAPA store unloaded the old ones for me and loaded the four new ones, which I appreciated.  He pulled eight new lock washers for the terminals and a larger one for the hold down bracket, got a 1/8″ brass pipe thread plug, and helped me select at spray lubricant for the tray slides and a grease to coat the connections after they were made to protect them against corrosion.

As best I recall I was back at camp by 9:30 AM and backed the car into position by the passenger side rear of the bus.  I used the silicon spray to lubricate the slide tracks.  I then moved each battery in turn from the car to the ladder, setting it up one step at a time until I could lift it into the tray and slide it into position.  I was careful to use my legs and protect my back muscles.

With the batteries physically in place and oriented correctly I reinstalled the hold down clamp.  I then got Linda to help me reattach the cables.  I cleaned the ends to remove previous grease and wrapped several of them in electrical tape to ensure they did not short out to the tie down bracket.  I put No-Ox electrical connection anti-oxidant on each terminal.  We then put the cables back on using the new lock washers and the old nuts.  I torqued the nuts tight and we double checked the connections against the diagram.  We finished at 12:30 PM, so I felt we had accomplished the battery replacement in a very good amount of time.

I turned on the generator and then turned on the circuit breaker for the maintenance chargers.  As I expected the new batteries were not fully charged but the maintenance chargers indicated at least a 75% SOC and we slid the battery tray back in to its compartment.  I repacked the tool boxes and Linda loaded them back into the battery bay.  We put the ladder back in the front bay and the things I had removed from the car back in there.

This old building seemed to be full of stuff but no longer actively used. Our bus was parked pointing directly at it.

This old building seemed to be full of stuff but no longer actively used. Our bus was parked pointing directly at it.

At 1 PM we decided to go for a walk in the woods.  I turned off the genset, put on my hiking boots, and got the Sony a99 camera.  It was a lovely day for a walk with the air temperature at 80 degrees F but shaded from direct sunlight by the forest.  I took a couple of dozen photos along the way.  We were back by 2 PM and decided to drive into Mayo to see it and buy some groceries.  When we got back we had vegan cold cut sandwiches for lunch and then sat outside for a while.  Paul came over to chat followed by Euginia.  Doc (the retired veterinarian who owns the property) stopped by and then John drove up to see if we were interested in a campfire.  That sounded great so John said he would start one.

Linda sits in a tree swing in one of the areas that John has “improved” on the property.

Linda sits in a tree swing in one of the areas that John has “improved” on the property.

We took our chairs over to the fire ring and sat for a long time having a nice conversation.  Kathleen arrived in a car and joined the group.  We never learned who she was but we did learn that she was there to meet up with folks driving down from Atlanta.  On the short walk back to our coach we paused to marvel at the night sky.  It is very dark here at night and there were no clouds this evening.

For dinner Linda made linguine with mushrooms, sun-dried tomatoes, garlic, and olive oil.  It was very good.  She used the induction cooker and we operated off of the batteries/inverter so they got quite a workout.  After dinner I used www.antennapoint.com to locate the TV towers around us.  I managed to tune in a CBS affiliate so we were able to watch our usual Monday evening TV programs.  I worked at my computer off-loading photos from the camera and copying them to the NAS.  I e-mailed Butch and texted Chuck regarding the battery replacement.

Linda sits in a tree swing in one of the areas that John has “improved” on the property.

Our bus boondocked at John Palmer Energy Systems shaded from the late afternoon sun.

John suggested that we operate off of the inverter and batteries and run them down to 24.0 VDC which is approximately a 50% SOC, so I agreed to try it.  We had issues with the system during the evening.  The power was flickering, causing the APC UPS to switch to batteries briefly and the lights to flicker.  The TV even turned off once.  This has never happened before and I did not know what was causing it, but suspected that we might be using too little power and/or that the inverter had overheated (although I considered that rather unlikely).  I ended up turning off the NAS and the Amped Wireless router, which were plugged in to the UPS, and then shut off and unplugged the UPS.  My laptop runs on its own battery, of course, but I had already checked my e-mail, off-loaded photos from the camera, and backed up photo files to the NAS, so I turned it off as well.

I also turned off the Search Watts feature on the inverter, which was set to 5 Watts.  My understanding is that this feature turns off the inverter when there is no load and turns it back on when a load of at least 5 Watts tries to draw current.  Five Watts on a 120 V AC system is 5/120 = 1/24 Amp or slightly more than 40 mA; not very much.  On a 24 V DC battery bank the required draw from the batteries, ignoring inverter inefficiency, would be five times that (120/24 = 5) or 200 mA = 0.2 A.  The Magnum remote was showing that we were drawing at least 6 A, so that should not have been a problem, but I did not know what else to do and I certainly was not going to bother John at this late hour.

John also suggested that I equalize the batteries and told me how to activate that function on the Magnum 4024 by holding down the button on the unit for at least 25 seconds.  The equalizing charge is a 4 hour cycle and he suggested I run it twice, back-to-back once the batteries were fully recharged and the charger was in float mode showing zero Amps.  He told me to run the equalizing charge once every six months.   I have always read that you should NOT apply an equalizing charge to AGM batteries but John said that the two guys who own Lifeline Batteries now recommend this.

We went to bed a little after 11 PM.  Linda fell asleep almost immediately but I was awake until 1 AM working on this post and listening to the sounds of the coach.

 

2015/11/29 (N) Cartersville to Mayo

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I got up at 6 AM, fed the cats, turned on the engine block heater and the Aqua-Hot electric heating element, and then sat on the sofa with the heater pad on my back until 7:20 when I got dressed.  Linda was awake at 6 but fell back asleep and did not get up until after 7:30 AM.  We had toast and bananas for breakfast but no coffee or tea.

We had 342 miles to travel today to get to John Palmer’s place northeast of Mayo, Florida.  He operates Palmer Energy Systems (http://palmerenergysystems.com).  We had already driven almost 700 miles, not all of it due south, of course, so we estimated that we were at least 600 miles farther south than our house.  It may not seem like that much on a planet with a 24,000 mile circumference but it’s enough to make a big difference in the climate and weather.  I was going to check/adjust all of the tires before we left this morning but the temperature was only slightly warmer than when we left home.  The TireTraker TPMS seemed to indicate that the tires were OK (although I do not trust the readings I am getting) so I just inspected them visually.

Once again we targeted an 8:30 AM departure time and actually pulled out of our site at 8:35.  As soon as we pulled onto I-75 southbound we were in heavier traffic than I expected and it only got worse the farther south we went.  It was reasonably smooth sailing all things considered, those things being:  construction zones, dense traffic, sunshine (we were driving south, more or less), and drivers who didn’t know how to use an entrance ramp to merge onto a freeway.  The last one is one of the banes of my bus driving experience.

We only stopped twice.  The first stop was around 11 AM at the rest area near MM179 (south of Atlanta) to use the bathroom and give the cats a chance to do the same.  The second stop was at the rest area near MM59 around 12:30 PM.  We stopped long enough to have a snack of sliced apples, have something to drink, and use the bathroom.  It also gave the cats a chance to eat, drink, and use the litter tray.  I called John to get final instructions on how to get into his place.  That turned out to be a useful call; he confirmed that we would not have any problem with US-129/FL-51 traffic circle in Live Oak, Florida.  He also gave a specific tip to “pull off the road into the ditch (on the right) to swing wide enough to make the turn (to the left) onto his street from the county road.”

Because we were stopping for more than a few minutes I shut off the engine.  The Battery Balance light came on as I was pulling into the rest stop.  This light does not come on very often and usually only stays on for a few seconds and then goes off and stays off.  When I first turned the ignition switch on in Berea it came on and stayed on for several minutes but then turned off and stayed off.  It did not come on this morning when I first turned the ignition switch on in Cartersville, so I thought we might be OK (although I did not really believe that).  With the engine off (alternator not running), but the ignition switch on, the 24V and 12V gauges indicated less than full charge voltages.  I did not recall having ever seen that condition before.

We were back on the road by 1 PM with the OTR A-C turned on.  As always the A-C Low Pressure warning light came on occasionally but it always went off after a relatively short time.  Of more concern was the Battery Balance light, which went on and off for the next 40 miles.  Sometimes it would flicker but other times it would stay on for a long time.  Not good.

Caution and warning lights always add an element of stress to driving the bus, but Linda experiences it too from the co-pilot/navigator seat.  She knows that it stresses me and she can see the lights from her seat, so she knows what is going on at the same time I do.  In spite of the warning light the rest of the trip was smooth and uneventful.  We had much less traffic as soon as we exited I-75 onto US-129 in Florida.  We encountered a bit more traffic and had a slow roll through Live Oak, Florida.  Once we were on FL-51 headed south towards Mayo, Florida we had almost no traffic.  We crossed the Suwannee River twice, the second time just north of Mayo, and shortly thereafter made our turn onto CR-354 and headed east parallel to the river.

We found John’s street and followed his advice on how to get the bus in.  The problem was that the County Road was not that wide and John’s street was even narrower.  It also had signs on posts on each side right at the shoulder of the County Road.  That geometry meant that a long vehicle could not cut the corners and had to pass fairly straight between the sign posts.  The grassy shoulder was wide enough, before dropping off slightly into a drainage ditch, that I was able to get the passenger side tires well off the road and the driver side tires to the edge of the pavement.  It was also firm enough that I was not concerned about the passenger side tires getting stuck in soft soil.  I stopped and lifted the tag axles, to shorten the turning radius, and then pulled forward until I was looking down the road out my side window.  I then turned the front wheels to the left all the way to the stops and slowly made the turn.  I judged it just right, something I have gotten better at doing with experience, and we made it in without difficulty.  That was good because we had the car in tow behind the bus and could not back up.  If I had not made the turn we would have blocked the County Road for at least 10 minutes while we unhooked the car.  We slowly worked our way up to the buildings at the end of the road and I left the bus running while I went to find John.

John was in his trailer but heard me calling and came out.  He drove me through the parking approach in his Kubota utility cart and dropped me back at the coach.  I got it parked in a spot that had afternoon shade, leveled it, and shut the engine off while Linda opened a couple of windows and a roof vent.  John wanted to give us a tour of the property so I did not turn off the chassis batteries or close the air valves the way I normally would on arrival, but took care of that when we got back from our tour.

John is the caretaker for 400 acres of plantation pine woodland with a 25 year lease on 70 of the acres.  The owners still live on the property but are in their 80’s and one of their three children has a house on some of the acres.  John’s son, Pat, also has a trailer here and works with his dad.  There is a third guy here named Terry who works with John and also has a trailer.

Besides taking care of the property John has a solar energy business and a canopy business, all operated out of trailers that can be moved if/when needed.  He has been here for six years.  In that time he has created over six miles of trails through the woods and along the high south bank of the Suwannee River and cleared small areas for tents and a couple larger areas for RVs.  He does not run a campground or charge fees; the space is for friends and customers to use while they are here.  It’s a pretty neat place, kind of like a private state park, with access to the Suwannee River.

Back at the coach we talked about a solar installation for the bus and then John gave me a tour of his workshop and inventory trailers.  We probably won’t do anything relative to solar while we are here but I wanted to get John’s opinion on some things, which I did.  John knows what he knows and doesn’t pull any punches.  He has lived an off-grid, solar lifestyle for over a quarter century and he thinks solar systems on bus conversions are a waste of money as buses require substantial AC electrical power from a shoreline or Genset to really function fully and properly.  I concede that he is basically correct (unless you spend a lot of time in the southwest) but his utilitarian logic does not place any value on the “I want it because it’s cool” factor.

When I was done talking to John about solar stuff I opened the tray with the battery disconnect switches and the Vanner Equalizers (the coach has two of them operating in parallel) and checked to make sure the circuit breakers had not popped.  I had no way of knowing if they were operating correctly but I ruled out their shutting off as the cause of the chassis battery balance situation.  There was some corrosion on the terminals but not enough to cause a problem.  When I finally started the generator at 4:30 PM the maintenance charger for the upper 12V strand of the 24V chassis battery bank showed 25% SOC.  That was definitely not good and suggested that one or both of the upper 12V batteries had failed.  They are 5-to-6 years old so that would not come as a surprise.

I texted Chuck, described what I had found, and indicated that I planned to go buy four batteries tomorrow.  He asked if I still had my American Independent Trucker Association (AITA) NAPA Discount Card that we got through Prevost Community.  I did, and it did not expire until the end of the month, so tomorrow I will see if there is a NAPA store nearby with batteries I need in stock.

I set up the Amped Wireless router, the NAS, and my computer AC power adapter and connected the NAS and computer to the router with network cables.  I powered all of them up, turned on the Verizon Mi-Fi, and got the WiFiRanger connected to the Mi-Fi.  The Amped Wireless router connected to the WiFiRanger and everything worked as intended.  We were online so I checked e-mail.

Linda heated up a can of Amy’s chili for dinner, which we had with Saltine crackers and a little vegan “butter.”  I sliced up an apple later for dessert.

I tried calling Butch but did not reach him so I tuned in a TV station and worked on this post.  I tried Butch again later and finally got through to him.  We had not talked in several weeks so we had a nice chat.  Butch thought our batteries should have lasted seven years, given the way I use and maintain them, but conceded that five years is a typical lifespan.  He also mentioned that Nick Russell had used the picture I sent of our bus covered in snow in his blog.  I have not had a chance to check Nick’s blog in a while so I found the post when I was done talking to Butch.

By now it was 10:30 PM and I needed to get to bed.  John was leaving for breakfast at 7:15 AM and I had indicated that I would go with him so I did not want to be up too late and risk oversleeping.

 

2015/11/28 (S) Berea to Cartersville

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I did not take any Ibuprofen before I went to bed last night as I felt OK.  I was also very tired and fell asleep without difficulty around 9:30 PM.  Under the best of circumstances I was going to be awake between 4:30 and 5:30 AM and that was the case this morning.  During that hour the cats prowled around the bed, got some attention from me, and looked out the windows.  What they really wanted, however, was food.

The pickup truck / 5th wheel combination that pulled in on our passenger side last night well after sunset was making departure preparations this morning at 5:30.  The strained muscle(s) in my lower right back were nagging at me and, unable to find a comfortable position, I finally got up at 6 AM as the neighbors were pulling out.  I sat on the sofa with the heater pad on my back and worked on my iPad.

The cats still had food and water but wanted fresh kibble, as they do every morning and evening.  It was in the bathroom closet, where it always is, but took me a while to find as it was hiding in plain sight behind the lower rack of hanging clothes.  Linda finally got up at 6:30 AM.  She rarely sleeps 10 or more hours but she was very tired when she went to bed at 8 PM last night and immediately fell asleep.  She also appears to be coming down with yet another cold.  For someone who rarely gets sick she has suffered with colds this fall.

We only had 300 miles to travel today, all on I-75, between Berea, Kentucky and Cartersville, Georgia.  With a fuel stop somewhere along the way it should only be a six hour day.  We got online and checked the weather.  Rain was forecast to start in Berea around 10 AM so we targeted 8:30 to 9 AM as our departure window and decided to have coffee and breakfast.  The cold front was sitting to our west running from southwest to northeast.  It was moving slowly southeast but the precipitation (mostly rain but with some ice and snow) was along the front and sliding northeast.  Based on how it was moving we figured we would probably have rain between Berea and Knoxville and then dry conditions from there to Cartersville where the chance of rain for today was 0%.

I had the engine running at 8:30 AM.  The battery balance light came on and stayed on for quite a while but eventually turned off and did not come back on.  That may just mean the Vanner equalizer was just doing its job.  However, with the upper and lower banks of the chassis batteries on maintenance chargers since we got here yesterday that just begs the question why they were out of balance.  We may be replacing the batteries and/or the Vanner equalizer this winter.

We pulled out of our site at 8:3 AM.  I-75 through southern Kentucky and northern Tennessee was very hilly but the highway was in excellent condition and it was a scenic and pleasurable drive.  Traffic started to get heavy as we approached Knoxville, Tennessee where there was apparently a college football game being played today.  Traffic remained heavy from there to our destination, which made the driving a little more work and a little less fun, but it was still OK.

The bus ran strong all day and I was able to climb the grade at Jellico, Tennessee in 4th gear without dropping below 50 MPH or getting the engine temperature above 200 degrees F (as best I could tell from the gauge) and the exhaust manifold pyrometers not exceeding 800 degrees F.  That was a big improvement over two years ago when I recall climbing up the mountain in the right lane behind slow trucks in a lower gear and worrying about the engine temperature.

Even though I had the cruise control on for most of the drive I did well using downhill speed to go up the other side and getting on the accelerator early to get the RPMs and turbo boost up and keep them there.  I typically saw 15 PSI boost at 2000 RPM but occasionally 16 or 17 PSI.  We really need a 0-20 boost gauge for this engine but I could not find one and doubt that they exist.  Besides, the new 0-30 gauge is working for me and I have other things that need to be fixed/replaced, such as the twin pyrometer gauge.  The left needle used to stick at the bottom of the scale but now the right needle is doing that.  Tapping on the face of the gauge usually frees it up, but not always.  When the needles are both working, however, they are showing the same temperature within 50 degrees F, which is comforting.  I used to think the bus (and me) liked to run at 62 MPH but I have come to the conclusion that it likes to run 65 to 68 MPH, and I am comfortable with that.

We stopped at the rest area about 41 miles north of the Georgia border where I replied to a text from Kristine and then called John Palmer.  He answered this time, said he was glad to have us visit, and gave me the address.  He said he will have customers there but there was plenty of room and we would not have a problem getting our bus in and out.  (Note:  We are also customers, albeit from a few years ago, but this is primarily a social visit and a place to stop for two nights.)  Rather than take time to eat while sitting still we had some pretzel and peanut snacks as we finished our drive to our destination for the day.

We arrived at exit 296 in Georgia around 1:45 PM and pulled into the Pilot Travel Center just southeast of the exit with the fuel gauge sitting at 1/4.  We picked this place to refuel because it is just on the other side of I-75 from our campground for tonight and I wanted to use as much of the fuel in the tank as I could without risking sucking dirt off the bottom or running out.

I figured we would take on 150 gallons of diesel fuel so I added 2 ounces of Racor Biocide, three 16 ounce bottles of Stanadyne Performance Formula diesel fuel treatment, and three 16 ounce bottles of Stanadyne Lubricity Formula.  The PF additive treats 60 gallons of fuel per bottle and I add it to the tank before each fill up in proportion to the amount of fuel I think I will add.  The directions for the LF additive say to “use it 4 to 6 times per year” but that is presumably based on an engine operating in a tractor-trailer or other commercial / industrial use.  Still, I only added one bottle last time when I should have added three, so I added three this time.  We ended up only adding 142 gallons but the extra additive won’t hurt anything.

I reset the trip odometer before we pulled out, which I forgot to do when I filled up at home.  We used to record our mileage and fuel purchases to get an idea of our fuel efficiency in miles per gallon but have never really had an accurate figure for a couple of reasons.  One was that the speedometer/odometer was not working correctly, or at all, and only got replaced in fall 2014.  The other is that the Aqua-Hot and auxiliary power plant both burn fuel from the same tank as the main engine.  Consequently, we can get an approximate idea of fuel consumption if we fill up at the beginning of a long day’s drive and then fill up again at the end before parking for the night, or if we know for sure that we are not going to use the Aqua-Hot or Genset prior to refueling.  Since we will be boondocking from tomorrow afternoon until Tuesday morning we will definitely be running the Genset and probably using the Aqua-Hot.

Our next fill up will probably be on the drive from Williston to Arcadia in late December and the only reason for topping up then is to make sure we pull into Big Tree RV Resort in Arcadia with a nearly full tank to minimize condensation while the bus sits there until early March.  This is one of the reasons I wanted to get all of the additives in the tank today.  We will have full hookups at Big Tree and do not expect to have to run the Aqua-Hot for space heating.  Even though we will have metered electric, we will use the electric heating element in the Aqua-Hot for domestic hot water except possibly for showering.  If the resort has a bath/shower house we might use it if convenient.

From the Pilot station I drove to the KOA about 3/10ths of a mile on the other side of I-75 and pulled up to the office at 2:10 PM.  The KOA is near Cartersville, Georgia.  It is a nice enough place with easy access but the facilities are not as extensive (read that as kid/family magnet) as some KOAs.  Linda got us registered and the woman in the office used a golf cart to lead us to our site.  We got a very convenient 50A FHU pull through site so getting in was easy and getting out tomorrow morning should be equally easy.

We leveled the coach and went through our arrival routine, minus the water and sewer connections.  It was 71 degrees F outside with low afternoon sun was just warm enough in the coach that Linda opened several windows and I put the screen in the door window.  We then went for a walk around the campground.  The place was almost full and seemed to have a lot of rigs that appeared to be set up for long-term stays.  The woman in the office confirmed later that they were fully booked for this evening and that 2/3rds of the campground was in use by extended stay visitors, many of whom were doing work in the area for Georgia Power.  That was certainly not the case when we were here two years ago on December 22nd, so that may have just been a matter of timing.

Back at the coach it was warm enough that we opened two of the ceiling vents and turned the fans on to exhaust air from the coach.  I went to put on a pair of shorts and discovered that we had failed to pack any.  I did bring my two pairs of convertible hiking slacks so I unzipped the lower portion of the legs on one pair and made them into shorts.  Much more comfortable.  I will be doing some shopping once we get settled.

I sent a slightly more detailed text message to Kristine and a daily update text message to Chuck which drew a reply and another text from me.  Linda got our WiFiRanger connected to the KOA Wi-Fi and then logged-in to RVillage.  She changed our location for last night to the Oh Kentucky Campground in Berea, KY and then changed it again for today to the Cartersville KOA.  We were apparently the only RVillage members at either campground.

We were a little hungry so Linda walked to the office to see if they had any hotdog buns, as we left ours behind along with a loaf of raisin bread.  They did not have hotdog buns so she cooked a couple of vegan hotdogs and served them on bread.  We also forgot to unplug the Insta-Hot in the kitchen so she texted the kids and asked them to unplug it and remove the bread products when they were next at the house.

We will be boondocking Sunday and Monday nights so Linda availed herself of the showers at the campground.  I worked for a while on this post and then went over to get a shower.  Linda warned me that it took a while to get hot water so I let the hot water run for at least five minutes but it never got warm enough to shower comfortably.  The men’s bath/shower room was also quite chilly so I took a really quick shower, dried off, and got dressed.  The office had free coffee available so I had some to warm up and mentioned the lack of usable hot water to the woman at the desk.  She seemed surprised but then asked if I let it run a long time, so they know there is an issue.  She said she would mention it to the manager.

Around 6 PM Linda heated up a couple of Amy’s brand Vegetable Korma meals.  As with all Amy’s products they were vegan and tasty, as well as quick and easy, so the quality to efficiency ratio was fairly high.

The antennapoint.com website indicated that we should be able to pick up a few OTA TV stations.  We managed to tune in the ION and PBS affiliates whose towers were NNE of our location and watched a few shows.  Linda read for a while and I checked e-mail and played games on my iPad, which is what I do to relax and/or fill time when

I don’t feel like doing anything else.  Linda was going to make an Apple crisp but did not have enough cinnamon so she added that to her grocery list and cut up an apple to eat.  Around 8 PM she popped the last of the popcorn and added that to her grocery list too.

Around 9:30 PM I closed the ceiling vents in the bedroom and bathroom and took the screen out of the entry door window and closed it.  Linda has had a cough for a few days and has been a bit congested so she went to bed at 10 PM.  I called Butch at 10:15 PM (8:15 MST) but he did not answer.  He does not have a voice mailbox and does not respond to text messages on his phone, so I went to bed.

 

2015/11/22 (N) Repackaging

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My lower back bothered me all night, so I did not sleep well, but we both got up at 8:15 AM, took showers, and got dressed.  My right lower back seemed to have gotten worse overnight.  I pulled a muscle yesterday and they tend to take quite a while to heal.  Not good.

The view of our rear deck from our dining room the morning after our major snowstorm. It’s pretty if you don’t have to go outside to pack a bus or drive in it.

The view of our rear deck from our dining room the morning after our major snowstorm. It’s pretty if you don’t have to go outside to pack a bus or drive in it.

According to the National Weather Service newsfeed on The Weather Channel iPad app Howell, Michigan got 16.5 inches of snow from yesterday’s winter storm, the highest in Michigan.  The highest accumulation in the country was 18 inches somewhere in South Dakota, so we were very close to that.  The official amount was no doubt recorded at the Livingston County Airport about 11 miles west of us on the west side of Howell, but based on what we see on our deck we got at least a foot of snow here at the house.  It was sunny but only 25 degrees F when we got up.  The high temperature was forecast to only reach 30 and the low tonight is forecast to be 18.

Linda made vegan pancakes for breakfast.  She cooked blueberries into hers but I had mine on the side.  I think the blueberries add additional liquid to the batter and keep the pancakes from cooking properly, but Linda likes the way they turn out.  I made a pot of coffee with the last of our Ethiopian Yirgacheffe beans.  I took some Ibuprofen along with my usual morning pills.  Linda got the heating pad out and I sat with it against my lower right back on the living room sofa while we drank our coffee.  In spite of having a lot to do between now and Thanksgiving Day, we got a slow start to our day.

Linda cleared our front sidewalk so she could get to the front door of the bus.  She also shoveled a path to my car, which I parked behind the bus yesterday, and cleared the snow off of it.  She checked the snow depth with a ruler at several places on our rear deck.  It was 13 inches.  Not 16.5 inches, but it’s still a lot of snow, and it could certainly have been deeper out in the yard.

Her agenda for the day was to vacuum the inside of all the cabinets in the bus, dust the woodwork, and clean the counters and mirrors.  I exchanged some text messages with Chuck including a couple of photos.  I sent one of our bus buried in snow and he sent one of the palm trees and lush vegetation on the unoccupied lot next to theirs at Pelican Lake Motorcoach Resort.  Chuck said it has been too warm to play golf.  I did not know that was even possible but I did not feel too sorry for him.  I sent an e-mail to Butch to let him know I had delivered the antique SUN Electric distributor tester to Bill a week ago Friday.

I resumed working in the garage and spent most of the day repacking my tool boxes.  My objective was to reduce the number of boxes from five to four while maintaining some sort of reasonable logic to how they were organized.  I took short breaks throughout the day to get off my feet and had a few pretzels with hummus for lunch.

Sometime during the afternoon Kerry showed up and plowed as much of the concrete driveway as he could.  Linda must have been vacuuming in the back of the bus and I was working in the garage (with doors closed) so neither of us realized he was there until after he was gone.

I decided that I needed some additional storage boxes for organizing small parts so I drove to Lowe’s hoping to find the Stanley boxes I already have.  They had similar boxes from a different manufacturer but not the exact ones.  I tried The Home Depot but liked the boxes at Lowe’s better so I went back there and bought six, three with 10 deep bins and three with 17 medium bins.  I stopped at Meijer’s for orange juice and picked up a few other things.

When Linda was done cleaning the bus she started loading the things onboard that she had ready.  She got almost everything on board that was staged in the middle bedroom and the kitchen.  She then made three more batches of granola.  That made nine batches since Friday evening, eight of which are in the freezer.  Linda thinks a batch will last at least two weeks if have granola every other day.  If that proves to be true we should have enough granola with us in the bus to get through the end of March.

By 5:30 PM we were both ready to stop for the day.  I changed into my robe and sat on the living room sofa with the heating pad on my lower right back.  We spent 45 minutes considering possible waypoints between here and Williston, Florida.  We did not come a decision but it is very likely we will stop at two of the same places we used two years ago, the Oh Kentucky campground in Berea, Kentucky and the KOA near Cartersville, Georgia.

The Oh Kentucky RV Park in Berea is just west of I-75 at an interchange.  It wasn’t fancy but provided easy in/out access and would allow us to plug in for the night.  Just east of the Interstate at the same exit is a Walmart where our friends, Chuck and Barbara, stayed on their way south a few weeks ago.  The RV park options north of Atlanta, Georgia are surprisingly limited.  The Cartersville Castle-White KOA is convenient to an exit off of I-75 and also provided easy in/out access.  Staying there Saturday night means we can drive around Atlanta on I-285 on Sunday morning, our favorite time to bypass major cities.

Our final waypoint before going into Williston Crossings on Tuesday, December 1st will probably be Mayo, Florida where we can boondocks for two nights at John Palmer’s place.  This itinerary would have us traveling about 400 miles on Friday, 300 miles on Saturday, 340 miles on Sunday, and 75 miles on Tuesday.  Friday would be a longer drive by about 2 hours than we normally plan, but very doable.  Also, this time of year we like to get as far south as quickly as possible.

Linda opened a bottle of Leelanau Cellars Mixed Berry Winter White wine to have before, during, and after dinner.  For dinner Linda cooked a squash and heated up some frozen corn and mock chicken tenders (vegan).  After dinner I tried to check my e-mail but our Internet connection had slowed to an unusably slow speed.  At 8 PM I participated in the SLAARC Information Net and then came back upstairs and went to bed.  We both took some Tylenol PM at 11:30 and then turned out the lights.