Tag Archives: Kate

2013_11-16_12-06 Time Flies

It’s been three weeks since my last post. We have been incredibly busy, but that doesn’t mean I have much to write about. Sometimes busy is just busy. For my part, I’ve been neglecting our website and this blog in favor of designing, testing, and vetting three other WordPress-based websites; two for RV clubs and one for our local ham radio club. That has taken a lot of my time, but I don’t mind. It’s very interesting work that I chose to take on, and I’m learning a lot, which I enjoy. But it isn’t necessarily all that interesting to write about.

I continue to discover useful WordPress plug-ins and learn how to use them. I am using Participants-Database to create online member directories, WP-Members to block them from public view and require a username and password to view them, and Exclude-Pages to create web-pages that do not appear anywhere in the WordPress menu structure. I am also using Meteor-Slides to create automated slide shows. After a long and frustrating search for a good photo album / image gallery plug-in, I finally figured out how to create galleries using the native WordPress gallery function. That was a major victory and I was so glad I persisted in my search instead of buying one. I have also installed WP-Backup-2-Dropbox, which is automatically doing a weekly backup of all four of the sites to my personal Dropbox account.

Steve was over several times to work on the Linux box and we finally got one of the WordPress websites ported over and working! We had to edit a few pointers in the wp-config.php file and set the permalinks back to default, but that did the trick! Porting over the other three sites will have to wait, but eventually I will be able to install and test new plug-ins on my own local web-server and even develop content which I can then upload to the live site. Working on the local web-server instead of the live web-host has a number of advantages. For one, the system will respond more quickly. But most importantly I won’t inadvertently take down one of my live sites.

Bus Conversions Magazine ran another one of my articles in the December 2013 issue. This one was on the construction and installation of the new auxiliary air panel. You can read more about it on our BCM page.

The new owner of BCM, Gary Hall, has faced and met a whole string of challenges since buying the magazine, but I remain confident that he is on the path to saving the magazine and not just making it viable, but making it better than it has ever been. BCM remains a unique resource for the non-commercial bus converter and I am doing what I can to help keep it in business by subscribing and submitting articles. It’s pretty simple really; the magazine needs subscribers, authors, and advertisers. The problem is that each one of those groups wants the other two groups to be in place before they make a commitment. No one wants to read a magazine with no content (articles and advertisements). Authors don’t want to write for a magazine that no one reads and advertisers don’t support. And advertisers don’t want to spend money placing ads in magazines with no content that no one reads. Fortunately BCM has advertisers, authors, and subscribers, but they could use more of each.

If you are reading this blog post and you own a converted bus, are converting a bus, are thinking about converting a bus, or have a business that sells things that might be useful to people with converted buses, please consider subscribing to or advertising in Bus Conversions Magazine. And if you are specifically converting a bus or working on one that is already converted, please consider writing one or more articles about the work you are doing, and take a lot of pictures to go with it. You do not have to be a great writer or photographer. If you provide them with a starting point the folks at BCM will work with you to turn it into a nice article. And I can tell you from personal experience this past year that it is fun to see your articles in print. In fact, your bus could be the “cover” and “centerfold.” Now really, haven’t you always dreamed of that? 🙂

Starting with the January 2014 issue of BCM there will be another staffing change. It appears that they are going to use my article on the FMCA GLAMARAMA 2013 rally that was held in Goshen, Indiana back in September 2013. While the article is specifically about that rally, it is more generally about the experience of attending an RV rally put on by one of the large RV organizations. Assuming the article runs, it will be my seventh article in 12 months and my third cover article. Not bad for a beginner. I have also agreed to “cover” the Arcadia 2014 Rally in Arcadia, Florida December 29-31. It’s called the 2014 rally because it runs through New Year’s Eve with everyone departing on New Year’s Day. This is one of the largest gatherings of converted buses currently taking place in the country, and it will be the first time Linda and I have attended.

Applying putty to base of Searchlight

The 19^th, 20^th, and 21^st of November saw me back at Phoenix Paint in Edwardsburg, Michigan working on the bus and consulting with Michele Henry on the repair of the body panels and rear bumper fascia. I was invited to spend the night at the house of fellow GLCC members Pat & Vickie’s nearby which saved me the cost of a motel and provide dinner and conversation. Thank you both.

WiFiRanger MT permanent mount

We We managed to fix the front roof-mounted remote-controlled searchlight and get it re-attached to the roof. We also undid the temporary mounting (zip ties) of the WiFiRanger-MT (mobile titanium) and mounted it behind the front TV antenna to the driver’s side using the permanent roof-mount bracketing. I removed the covers from the front and rear over-the-air TV antennas and was finally able to determine and map the direction they point to the numbers on the controller box. That will finally allow us to know where we are aiming the antennas.

Access hole in utility bay floor

My last little project was to install the Critter-Guard. There is a hole in the floor of the utility bay with a ring installed around it that is threaded to accept a screw-in cover. The Critter-Guard consists of a circular piece of high-density foam, a two-piece plastic cover, and small latches to hold the cover in place. I was not able to remove the old screws that secure the ring, so I drilled holes for new ones halfway in-between the old ones. The product came with two sets of slightly different latches to accommodate just this situation.

Critter-Guard parts and instructions

Critter-Guard installed

With the latches installed, the electrical shoreline and fresh water hose were routed into the bay through the hole in the floor. The foam is split along most of a diameter and has two holes in it (along the diameter line), one for the electrical shoreline, and the other for the fresh water hose. The foam fits snuggly around these lines and into the hole in the floor. The two-piece Critter-Guard cover plate is also split along a diameter and has two holes to match the holes in the foam. The plate has a tongue on one piece and a groove on the other. It is fitted around the shorelines on top of the foam and the latches are turned to hold it in place. The net result is that “critters” cannot get into the bay through the utility line access hole. I plan to submit this little project to Bus Conversions Magazine as a short article / product review.

As long as I’m talking about buses, I found a major air leak in Chuck’s Prevost H3-40 Liberty conversion. As with all older buses, he has been plagued with air leaks. Our mobile mechanic, Joe Cannarozzi, has fixed a lot of them by replacing air valves and tightening air lines, but leaks remain, and Chuck’s auxiliary air compressor was still running more often than it should while parked. I was poking around in the bay under the driver’s seat—looking for the check valve that is usually installed in the air line from the auxiliary air compressor to the air system—when I heard a distinct hissing noise. I heard it clearly, but it was at a frequency that Chuck did not hear. He had a plastic tube stethoscope and I used it to clearly locate the leak as coming from the pressure control switch. This switch (also known as a well pump switch when used in a water system) monitors the pressure in the auxiliary air system and turns the auxiliary air compressor on and off as needed to maintain the pressure between two set point limits. Once I was able to place the stethoscope at the loudest point, Chuck was also able to hear it clearly. He removed the old pressure switch, got the specs off of it, and I found an exact replacement in stock at Northwest Plumping Supply in Howell, not far from my house. Chuck picked it up, installed it, and … no more air leak, at least not there. The auxiliary air pressure is holding much better than it was before so the auxiliary air compressor is running much less frequently and Chuck (and Barbara) are much happier. They things that make “bus people” happy are different from what makes most people happy. You would probably have to try living in an RV to fully understand.

When Linda went in for her annual physical exam in early November she was able to talk to the nurse and find an opening for me. I was able to get my lab work done a few days in advance, and the results were available in the Henry Ford Health System MyChart website that same afternoon. I like having the lab work done in advance so that I can discuss the results with our doctor. Everything was within the normal range, so I was pleased. I got a new prescription for my nasal allergy medication and had to mail it in to our mail order pharmacy provider as this was the first prescription either of us has had filled since we switched our health coverage to the Michigan Public School Employees Retirement System on July 1^st.

The Thanksgiving Spread

We went to our daughter’s house for Thanksgiving with family. Linda and the two kids did all the cooking and we had a nice assortment of dishes, many vegan-friendly. We got a Tofurkey for the two of us and it was very good. (Everyone else had real turkey; boo.) We had fresh grapes, fresh cranberry-orange salad, roasted Brussels sprouts, candied sweet potatoes, regular mashed potatoes, home make Parker House rolls (thanks Meghan!), some yummy cookies, some nice wine, and other things I can’t remember. Both of our grand-daughters were there. It was nice.

My friend and former co-worker, Kate, got back from a week+ trip to Berlin, Germany just in time for us to take her out for a birthday dinner; not exactly on her birthday, but close. We went to Nirmal in Ypsilanti, an Indian restaurant with a health conscious attitude. They had a buffet style setup designed for carryout, but you could also have it dine-in, which is what we did. Linda and I got two vegan entrees (green beans and okra), yellow rice, garlic naan bread, and a small dessert for $5 each plus tea. Kate ordered Makhani with chicken off the menu. We adjourned to the closest Starbucks for coffee, photo viewing (on an iPad, of course), and conversation. Kate had selected 30 photographs to show us, and they were wonderful, as usual.

2013_11_08-15 (F-R) Another Busy Week

Leave a reply

The second week of November was another one of those weeks where we were busy every day from the time I got up until the time we went to bed, but I don’t have a clear recollection of what I was doing each day as I did not always mark it on my calendar. I think that is because I spent a lot of time at my computers working on WordPress websites and installing packages/updates. Some days are very clear, however.

2013-11-08 (F) The “Eyes” Have It

We had managed to snag a couple of appointment times this morning to have our eyes checked by our long-standing optometrist at the Farmington Vision Clinic. Linda’s eyes had not changed very much, but it had been a couple of years since she got new glasses, so she decided to get a pair. I had been experiencing intermittent “wavy” patterns and was a bit concerned about that. The exam did not indicate any issues with diabetes or glaucoma, so that was a relief. The tentative diagnosis was “pre-migraine ocular disturbance” which was interesting because I was not experiencing any headaches, and rarely do. The trigger may be something that I eat, perhaps caffeine or wine, so I may need to keep a food log. Ugh. I like writing about the dishes Linda prepares, but I don’t like “logging” my food intake.

Chuck is in the process of prepping their bus for southbound travel, so I met up with him for lunch. He had also gotten connected to a guy in California whose older brother was living in Michigan when he passed away back in June. The older brother was well known in the Prevost bus community, and had a converted coach stored in the N.E. suburbs of the Detroit Metro Area. The surviving brother needed to deal with as part of his brother’s affairs, and Chuck had offered our assistance on Sunday.

2013_11_09 (S) Schramm’s Mead

But first we had to deal with Saturday, which started with our usual ham radio club breakfast in South Lyon, Michigan. Attendance varies, but we had a big crowd of at least 20 people. After breakfast we decided to drive over to Ferndale and find Schramm’s Mead. I worked with Ken Schramm before I retired from Wayne RESA. He’s still the TV / Multi-media Production Manager there, but outside of normal business hours he is a well-known expert on the subject of mead, having written a well-respected book on the subject, and speaking at international conventions. He and his wife Jean and their daughter Alison have been working for over a year to get Schramm’s Mead open, and that finally happened about 6 weeks ago. They are at 327 W. 9 Mile Rd. in Ferndale, Michigan. The meadery is located in a very “happening” part of town just a short walk west of the intersection of 9 Mile Rd. and Woodward Avenue and should be a good location for them. Parking was plentiful, with both paid and free options. We sampled their complete line of currently available mead products and bought three bottles. I have added a section to the Health & Food tab of this website on Wine & Mead and refer you there for more information about mead and the offerings from Schramm’s Mead. Let me just say here “this is good stuff.”

2013_11_10 (N) Buses & Ham Radio

Sunday found me headed to Chuck’s house near South Lyon bright and early, or at least early. We needed to meet the guy from California at the RV storage lot in Shelby Township, so it took an hour to get there. He was waiting for us, let us in, and led us to the bus. It was a 1997 (~) Prevost XL (40’) Royale Coach conversion with a Detroit Diesel Series 60 engine and 6-speed automatic transmission. It appeared to be in good shape and Chuck and I set about figuring out its state. The chassis batteries had been left “on” and were drained. The house and generator batteries were also “on” but appeared to be in better shape. It did not appear to have much fuel in the tank, but with the chassis batteries drained we couldn’t get accurate readings from any of the gauges. We got the generator started, plugged in the 24V emergency chassis battery charger, turned the house batter chargers on, and set about finding the circuit breakers and switches seeing what worked.

After letting the generator/24V charger run for several hours the chassis batteries showed no sign of coming back to life. We still had enough hours of daylight to do something about it. We located a NAPA Auto Parts Store less than 2.5 miles from the storage yard and gave them a call. They had 8 of the type battery we needed (12V Group 31). We only needed four. We pulled the old ones out of the bus and headed over. By taking the old ones we did not have worry about disposal/recycling of them and avoided a “core charge.” We installed the new batteries and the DD-60S fired right up. That’s was a beautiful thing to hear. The chassis and brake systems aired-up correctly and the gauges all came to life. That’s was a beautiful thing to see.

The bus had about ¼ tank of fuel indicated, or about 40+ gallons, so we decided we did NOT need to drive it someplace to fuel it right that minute. The bus was headed to Staley Coach in Nashville, TN at the end of the week and could stop for fuel early in the trip.

I had a ham radio club meeting at 6:30 PM, and needed to get dinner, so Chuck and I made our exit and headed back to his house. I got home in time to change clothes but not sit down and eat. Linda made sandwiches for us to eat as we drove to the meeting.

Our November ham radio club meeting is a significant one as we elect officers for the coming year. Mike (W8XH) agreed to run for a 2^nd term as president, Paul (N8BHT) agreed to run again for Treasurer, and I (K8BRF) agreed to run again for Vice-President. Marty (KB8JIU) did not wish to run again as Secretary, and Harvey (AC8NO) agreed to run for that position, which he has held in the past. There being only one candidate for each officer, the slate was declared elected. The program for the evening was put on by Mike (W8XH) and Steve (N8AR). They demonstrated the use of Mike’s Vector Network Analyzer (VNA) to examine the characteristics of an antenna by calibrating out the effects of the transmission line.

Technical note: Transmission lines have losses, i.e., they inherently dissipate as heat some of the energy they are trying to transfer from a radio transmitter to an antenna. The losses depend on frequency, and if the transmission line is of low quality it will dissipate more energy per linear foot than a higher quality one at any particular frequency. How much energy it dissipates thus depends on the inherent loss, the length, and the frequency of the signal. When a transmitter sends energy through a transmission line it would ideally like all of the energy to reach the antenna, be transferred into the antenna, and cause it to resonate, producing electromagnetic radiation. It never works quite that well in practice. If there is a mismatch between the transmission line and the antenna, some of the energy will be “reflected” back down the transmission line towards the transmitter. However, if there are sufficient losses in the transmission line the reflected energy never makes it back to the radio, which makes the radio think everything is just fine when in fact very little of the energy the radio produces may get turned into useful RF EM radiation. Mike’s VNA allows the user to “calibrate out” the effect of the transmission line and “see” what is actually happening at the antenna. That’s cool, and that’s a good thing to be able to do.

2013_11_11 (M) Odds ‘n’ Ends

Monday was a catch-all day for me while Linda went to Ann Arbor for her regular Monday babysitting duty. I talked to Michele and she was encouraged that she would be able to fix the two expensive body panels that I crunched. I called Prevost and ordered the 3^rd panel that she would not be able to fix. It would ship via UPS and arrive on Wednesday. I updated my LinkedIn account and added all three of our phone numbers to the Federal DO NOT CALL LIST, a long overdue chore. I called Adams Well Drilling and Water Treatment to get new whole-house sediment filters and chlorine tablets for the carbon filter unit. We have a sediment filter housing that takes 10” long large-diameter filter elements. They are a spun polypropylene with a dual micron rating; 50 microns on the outside and 5 microns on the inside. It’s like having two filters in one! The 50 micron portion removes the larger sediment that can quickly plug and filter and render it useless, leaving the 5 micron filter to remove only smaller particles. The flow rate through this filter is excellent, and it’s easy to change thanks to the pre- & post-filter shutoff valves Adam’s installed, and the pressure relief button on top of the housing.

We had previously arranged to meet Kate for dinner. Having just seen her in Ypsilanti, we agree to meet at the Zukey Lake Tavern in Pinckney, Michigan. Linda and I wanted to check it out as our ham radio club had decided to go there for our December holiday meeting/dinner. They have a very average salad bar, but I was able to get plenty to eat at it. Linda had a veggie burger. Not a great choice for us as restaurants go, but it will work well for the club.

2013_11_12 (T) Madeline Comes To Visit

Linda had agreed to babysit our grand-daughter on Tuesday so our son could continue working on a presentation for his department at the University of Michigan Ann Arbor. I don’t get to see Madeline as much as Linda does, so our son offered to bring her to our house and work there while Linda and I handled baby duties. Madeline is a busy little girl. She is an accomplished crawler and is working on standing up and walking. She loves her books and toys, and grandma bought some new ones to have at our house for her. She kept us both busy while her dad worked on his computer. He brought her Pack-n-Play and set it up in the bedroom that we have designated for her. She went down for nap right on schedule at 2 PM and slept for ~90 minutes. We got to play with her until sometime after 5 PM when it was time to leave.

2013_11_13 (W) & _14 (R)

Linda had called a couple of weeks ago and managed to get an appointment with our primary care physician for her annual physical due to a cancellation. Her total cholesterol had risen a little from the last visit, which annoyed her given the way we eat, but her HDL, LDL, and triglyceride numbers all looked really good. She was also able to talk to the nurse and find me an appointment time later in the month. I really did not want to wait until late April or May for my next physical.

Thursday morning I went to Chuck’s bus garage to chat with him and our mobile Mechanic, Joe Cannarozzi, who had come in from Chicago to complete some work on Chuck’s coach. Joe had also been engaged by the guy from California to drive the bus to Staley Coach near Nashville, Tennessee on Friday morning and bring the guy back to the Detroit area. It turned out that Chuck needed new brake pads for his tag axle wheels. We were sitting around wringing our hands about how to get those in time for Joe to finish the brake job when I realized that Joe was going to Nashville where Prevost has one of their major factory parts and service centers! Phone calls were made, parts were ordered and put on account for will call, and it was agreed that Joe would pick them up on Friday and bring them back with him. Sometimes bus stories do have happy endings.

I spent Wednesday and part of Thursday working at my computers. Larry (K8UT) is a member of our ham radio club and a very accomplished web designer. He had given me the “key” to getting a local web-server running: LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, and phpMyAdmin). I got MySQL and phpMyAdmin installed on the Linux box but was unable to create the databases I needed in spite of spending time with the documentation. By Thursday evening I still did not have WordPress running on our local web-server, but I was clearly making progress in that direction. Sometimes computer stories have happy endings too.

2013_11_01-07 (F-R)A Busy Week

Leave a reply

The first week of November was very busy, enough so that I was unable (unwilling) to do daily blog posts. Covering the whole week in one post makes for a longer post, but probably shorter than seven separate ones.

2013-11-01 (F)

We were supposed to get our bus back from the shop on Friday, November 1. We didn’t. That meant I could not take it to Phoenix Paint in Edwardsburg, Michigan on Monday the 4^th. I was reminded yet again that a true traveler has no fixed plan. With that off the table temporarily, we turned out attention to other things; Ham Radio Breakfast on Saturday, for instance. It was good conversation, as usual, and we finally arranged to have one couple over for dinner in a few weeks.

2013_11_02 (S)

Saturday afternoon Steve and Karen came over to visit and have dinner. They were not able to attend our open house/warming because they were in Arizona where Steve had made arrangements to hike to the bottom of the Grand Canyon from the south rim and back up to the north rim. Alas, the park was closed and they had to adjust their plans and find other things to do; which they did (true travelers have no fixed plan). We don’t see them very often, so when we do we have a great, long visit. We had a wonderful dinner of enchiladas and Mexican rice, finished off by chocolate cake with raspberry topping made from raspberries that Linda and I picked ourselves at the Middleton Berry Farm back in September. All vegan, of course.

After dinner we looked at some of their photographs (digital) and they looked at some of ours (also digital). Steve brought along a Raspberry Pi computer. It was slightly larger than a deck of cards and had a 16 GB SD Card that served as its solid state hard drive. It had a couple of USB ports, an HDMI port, and some other connections. Steve had a wireless network adapter in one of the USB ports and a wireless keyboard transceiver (Bluetooth, I presume) in the other. We already had an HDMI cable on the TV so he hooked up to that and voila, pictures. He was even able to control the Raspberry Pi using our TV remote! Now you have to admit, that’s pretty cool. We were also delighted to find out that they have spent part of the last few winters in the Venice, Florida area and are returning again this year. We shared our Florida plans and agreed that we would get together.

2013_11_03 (N)

Sunday we worked around the house and on our computers until late in the afternoon when Chuck and Barbara, our friends and fellow Prevost H3-40 converted coach owners, showed up to visit and have dinner. Although they did make it to our open house/warming we did not get to visit with them very much that day. We talked buses, of course, but we discussed a lot of other things too, including Florida, where they have spent the last six or seven winters, most recently in the Naples area. Again, plans were made to meet while there.

As long as I am on the subject of Florida, we started thinking about extending our stay for at least another month because of potential problems with “seasonal weight restrictions” on the roads around our house. I found out from Phil (of the pull-though driveway) that the restrictions usually go up March 1 and stay up until April 15. Most of the roads in our county, and all of the roads we would have to use to get to our house, are subject to these seasonal weight restrictions but the signs never say what that means. As it turns out, it means a weight limit of 8,400 pounds per axle. Our drive axle (four tires) weighs 20,000 pounds and we have over 7,000 pounds on each of the front/steer tires, so there’s actually no legal way for us to get the bus to our house during that 45-day window. What to do? Stay in Florida for another month! Problem solved. New problem: where to stay? New solution: the same place we are already staying, if they will let us extend our reservation.

2013_11_04 (M)

Monday came and went without the bus being ready. While this delayed my plans yet again, it also provided more time to work on WordPress projects. I checked on the WordPress Backup To Dropbox (wpb2d) plug-in and it appeared to be correctly backing up all four of the sites I am working on to our personal Dropbox account. That was good to see. I also started soliciting “beta testers” for each of the sites. I continued working with the WP-Members plug-in and it appeared to be functioning correctly to block access to selected pages/posts behind a user login. Given that, I started generating user lists for each of the sites to generate usernames and passwords and keep track of when I have created those in WP and provided them to each user.

2013_11_05 (T)

On Tuesday Linda was able to extend our stay at Williston Crossings RV Resort until April 1^st (no fooling). We will figure out later how to manage our trip back to Michigan so that we do not arrive before April 16. Sometime during the week I received an e-mail from the Prevost Owners Group, to which we belong, that the Prevost Motorcoach Show would take place in Tampa, Florida on January 13 and 14, with a reception hosted by Prevost Car Inc. the evening of the 13^th. That sounded like an opportunity to finally meet some folks from Prevost in person, and to admire brand new conversions (that we will never buy) from the likes of Marathon, Millennium, Liberty, Parliament, and Vantare. Sometime during the week it also came to our attention that the Prevost Community group we belong to is planning a rally for the first week of April 2014 at LazyDays RV Dealership in Seffner, Florida! Well Bob’s your uncle. It looks like delaying our return until at least April 16 won’t be that difficult at all.

I needed to make an appointment for my annual physical, so I got on the Henry Ford Health System website. They have a new “feature” called MyChart. When fully functional, which it is not yet, you are supposed to be able to directly book an appointment, and see all of your lab results. But first you have to set up your account. I called the number and got an activation code which I then used to create a Username and Password, and was finally able to log in. The direct scheduling feature wasn’t available for my primary care physician, but there was a “Request An Appointment” page. So I did. I asked for an Adult Physical on Mon., Tue., Wed., or Thu. afternoon between Monday November 25, 2013 and Friday December 6, 2013. Less than 24 hours later I received an e-mail informing me that I had been scheduled for a 1:00 PM appointment for an Office Visit on January 15, 2014. Huh???

I used to program computers for a living, and I used to do systems engineering, and I used to do sales and marketing of these things, and I ended my career as a consultant. This didn’t strike me as bad programming; it struck me as bad policy that got translated into a bad systems specification. So I wrote back to HFHS customer service and told them, as politely as I could, that their system was stupid, that is to say, the policies behind the implementation of their system were not “customer-centric.” If I had wanted an appointment in mid-January I would have requested one. So as of now, I do not have said appointment.

The bus was ready to pick up on Tuesday, so Chuck drove me down to W. W. Williams to get it. I took care of the paperwork and left with Chuck following me in his truck. I no sooner hit the highway than I got a Check Engine Light. It came on and stayed on, so I phoned Chuck and let him know that I needed to turn around and take it back if he was willing to follow me and take me back home. He was, so this we did; my plans further delayed. There are worse things that can happen on this bus; the Stop Engine Light, for instance. This light means exactly what it says, the engine is going to stop and you need to get to the side of the road, now, before it does. I’ve only seen that once, shortly after we bought it. We took care of some key maintenance issues and have never seen it again (and I hope that we never do). I figured I wouldn’t get the bus back from W. W. Williams until Wednesday afternoon at best, so any trip to Edwardsburg was now delayed until Thursday. I called Michele to let her know. She had Pato and Tommy lined up to look at it on Friday, so I was getting anxious to get it down there. But there’s nothing you can do until the mechanics (they are now called technicians) are ready to give it back to you. And frankly, you really don’t want it back until they are sure it is fixed.

While I was gone dealing with the bus, we got a call from Steve (mentioned earlier) wondering if he had left his Raspberry Pi computer here on Saturday. We checked. Yup, it was here. Rather than meet him somewhere, we agreed that he would come back to the house on Wednesday to get it and do some work on our computers while he was here.

2013_11_06 (W)

Steve arrived late Wednesday morning, Linux “tools” in hand. The principle target of the work was to install Linux on one of our machines and then install/configure the Apache web-server program. This would allow us to have a “virtual web-server” that I could use to build duplicate installations of my WordPress sites, allowing me to develop and test them before making the same changes to the live sites. That sounded cool. Steve has been trying to get me interested in Linux for 10 years but I never saw a real need for it until now. It turned in to an all-day project (of course, don’t they all?) due to the age of the machine we decided to use, but that was the machine I wasn’t using for much of anything else, so that’s where it needed to go. Steve got Linux installed and then installed Apache2. We ran out of time to configure the Apache2 program, but that was OK as it will give Steve a reason to come back.

While we were working on the computers we talked some more about Florida. It turns out that the Capitol Steps are scheduled to appear at the Venice Stage Theater in Venice, Florida at the end of January. Our annual get-together with Steve and Karen has often involved dinner and a performance by this group, which specializes in political satire, much of it musical. They said we could stay overnight at the place they rent for winter in Venice if we wanted to go to the performance, which is at 8:00 PM on a Monday evening. The nice thing about traveling with cats is that you can leave them for 24 hours and they are fine. They sleep for 20 of those anyway.

I checked Wednesday afternoon and the bus was reported as “ready to go.” I decided to pick it up early Thursday morning and head directly to Edwardsburg. That meant towing the car so I had a way home, but it also meant that Linda did not have to drive me to W. W. Williams. That worked out well as she had to head in to the bakery on Thursday anyway.

I sometimes get a bit anxious the night before I am going to drive the bus as I don’t drive it every day and we are still finding a fixing “issues.” I used to experience the same thing when we would book one of the Southgate Flying Club airplanes and go flying. Again, I didn’t fly every day. Does this ever happen to you? As I was drifting off to sleep I suddenly remembered that I had planned to fill the fuel tank at the Mobil Truck Stop on I-96 between Howell and Lansing. But that was based on leaving from home. Now wide awake, I got my iPad, pulled up the map application, and zoomed in on the I-94 Baker Road interchange west of Ann Arbor. There are three truck stops there, two Pilots and one Travel America. I was able to examine each one carefully, checking in/out access and pump locations. I decided the Pilot station on the north side of the highway was my best option. I knew I had enough fuel in the tank to get that far easily, so I was then able to go back to bed and finally fall asleep.

2013_11_07 (R)

I must have been sleeping lightly because around 4 AM I was awakened by the faint sound of running water. That’s another one of those sounds that will jolt you awake once you become aware of it. The new flapper in the master bedroom toilet wasn’t quite sealed and the water was running ever so slowly trying to keep the tank full. I was finally able to adjust the flapper a couple of days later and get it to seal, but between the truck stop research and the running water, it turned out to be a short, fitful night’s sleep. Not good preparation for a long day of driving.

I would like to say that the trip from W. W. Williams to Phoenix Paint was uneventful, but Check Engine Lights are definitely an event, and I saw ours come on four times. It eventually went off each time, finally staying off after the 4^th time; once it’s come on I tend to be a bit on edge wondering when I will see it again (or worse).

I stopped for fuel at the aforementioned Pilot truck stop on the north side of I-94 at Baker Road and pulled in behind a truck at the last pump, or so I thought. I sat there for a while until the driver came out and moved it, at which point I pulled up only to discover that there wasn’t a pump at that position. So I pulled out of the truck stop onto Baker Road, came back in the entrance, and got in line behind a truck that was putting fuel in its tanks. That truck finally moved and I was able to pull up to the pump.

Getting fuel at a truck stop isn’t like putting fuel in your car. The gallons and dollars involved are usually an order of magnitude larger and you usually cannot run a credit card at the pump. I went inside, waited in line, and was finally waited on by a nice woman. I told her I probably needed 150 gallons and I failed to recognize that she ran my credit card for $150. I was only half done washing the windshields (the bus has four) when the pump shut off. It had put in 37.9 gallons for exactly $150. So I went back inside, stood in line again, and had her run the card for another $350. Back outside, I restarted the pump, waited for it to finish, then went back inside, got back in line, and got not one, but two, receipts with the dollars and gallons on them. By the time I got back on the highway the fuel stop had taken about one hour. More delay.

No sooner was I on the road then I got a call from Chuck checking on how my trip was going. That was both thoughtful and reassuring; it’s comforting to know folks are aware of you and concerned for your well-being. In some ways, owning a converted coach makes you part of a “fraternity”, if you care to join. While we were on the phone the Check Engine Light came on for the 3^rd time since I had left W. W. Williams. It went off and came on again. I discussed it with Chuck and decided to pull off at MY FAVORITE REST AREA to check the coolant level in the overflow reservoir. (I talked about this rest area in my article in the February 2013 issue of Bus Conversions Magazine. This is the same rest area where I was stranded while Linda and I repaired the patio awning that came loose a few miles earlier on westbound I-94. Ironically, I was on my way to Phoenix Paint at that time as well. I’m not superstitious, but I don’t like unlikely coincidences.)

The rest stop in question is near Grass Lake, Michigan, about 12 miles east of Jackson, Michigan. It’s a very nice rest stop; I just seem to end up stopping here for less than nice reasons. I popped the rear engine hatch, improvised a dip stick, and checked the level in the overflow reservoir. It was up to the bottom edge of the filler tube, so no obvious problem there. I looked around the engine bay for any sign of a coolant leak, but everything looked dry. I took some comfort in the fact that Bob, the service manager at W. W. Williams (Dearborn) had told me that he and the technicians were very impressed with the condition of our engine; that it sounded good and ran well. They’re real experts, so that’s no small thing.

The rest of the trip really was uneventful. The Check Engine Light did not come on again, the transmission shifted well, the cruise control worked properly (as it always has), the engine coolant and oil temperatures ran normal, and the speedometer suddenly decided to work again! I took I-94 W to I-69 S to M-60 W to M-40 S to US-12 W to M-205 W and pulled into Phoenix Paint just a mile north of the Indiana border around 1:00 PM. I’ve done this trip many times, but it was a very pleasant drive with fall colors still in evidence, light traffic, and nice weather.

Michele got me into the building and parked and had me air up the suspension so they could have easier access to the inside of the wheel wells. She and Pato got right to work removing the damaged panels while I hooked up the electrical shoreline, got the house battery charger turned back on, and activated some circuits for the inside of the bus including the auxiliary air compressor. I stopped to look at things and answer questions as I unloaded some items from the car, and then moved stuff from the bus to car that had to return home with me. What started out as a trip to have paint scratches buffed out had become a trip to also find and seal roof leaks and repair/repaint damaged body panels, so Michele and I looked the coach over and discussed the work to be done. I was there about 90 minutes—a really short visit for me and Michele—and got back on the road for home around 2:30 PM.

I had originally planned to spend a few days at her shop working on some small projects of my own, but that was based on a Monday arrival. We had plans to meet up with our friend Kate in Ypsilanti on Thursday evening to see Roy Blount, Jr. at Eastern Michigan University’s Pease Auditorium. I made it home with just enough time to change clothes, but not to eat, and we headed off to Ypsi. We got there just as Kate and her friend Teresa were arriving and got four seats together. RBJr was very interesting to listen too when we could hear him and understand what he was saying. He speaks somewhat softly, and the PA system for the auditorium was not adjusted properly to compensate for that.

After the event we headed over to the Sweetwater Café, just a short walk from the auditorium, for coffee. They had some nice looking veggie rollup sandwiches, so Linda and I had a late/light dinner. We finally got home around 11 PM, a long day for me.

Although my health is better than it has been for the last couple of decades, I do not pretend that I am not in my 6^th decade. I can still do the all-day-drive thing, but I am much more tired at the end of it, and it takes me multiple days to recover from it.

2013_09_01-04 Driveway Success, Raspberries, And Old Friends

1 Reply

Sunday September 1^st found us at our son and daughter-in-law’s house for a Labor Day family pot luck along with our daughter, son-in-law, and step-grand-daughter. Grand-daughter Madeline handled the crowd pretty well, but still was still wary of Grandpa Bruce, so I had to be content with mutual admiration from a distance. She is starting to crawl and pull herself up to a standing position, and is fascinated by books, especially ones she can try to eat.

We awoke Monday morning (Labor Day) to overcast skies and the threat of rain. We had planned to drive to Middleton Berry Farm near Ortonville to pick raspberries and decided to go in spite of the weather. Ed and Betty, our RV friends, were working/staying there and we had said we would try to stop by. The rain never materialized and the overcast skies made the picking experience more pleasant.

Neither of us had ever picked raspberries, or anything else other than apples, pumpkins, and Christmas trees. We enjoyed the experience, collecting 12 pints of fruit between us. At $4.00/pint it seemed expensive until we checked raspberry prices at the grocery store and Door-to-Door Organics and saw them ranging from $5 – $6 for 6 ounces. We didn’t weigh our pints, but Linda estimated that it would take three of the 6 ounce contains to match one of our pints.

It seemed appropriate that we were laboring on Labor Day, even though this is the one day of the year that labor typically doesn’t labor, but rather relaxes and celebrates importance those who labor and the work they do. Although we have been sourcing fresh fruits and vegetables from local farmers markets when we can, it was very satisfying to personally harvest even a small portion of our own food from a living plant. It also gave us an appreciation for those who do this kind of work for a living. As we were checking out we also bought a fresh pepper and tomato.

When we got back to the house Linda washed, dried, and froze all put three of the pints of raspberries. With that task initiated, we turned our attention to the pull-through driveway. It had not rained for the past several days, and it was time for the BIG TEST. We unplugged the electrical power from the bus, pulled the chocks, fired it up, and backed it out of the driveway and down the street, positioning it to drive in to the pull-through driveway. Linda watched the tires as I drove in, and seeing nothing more than tread marks I brought in, across the pad, and out the other side, back on to the concrete driveway. Success!!!

We inspected the pull-through driveway. In some places there was no evidence that the bus had just been there, in others only tread marks, and in a few spots a slight channel of not more than 0.5 inches. Phil had told me previously that compaction of up to 1 inch might be possible but would indicate that the driveway was finally locking together, so we were very pleased with the result. I pulled the bus out and around again, but this time I tried to go back and forth over slightly different paths on the approach and then again on the parking pad area. I did not pull the bus all the way this time, but got it lined up on the pad with Linda’s help and parked it with the entrance door opposite the front door of the house.

I e-mailed Phil Jarrell (Precision Grading) to give him the good news. Phil has been an absolutely outstanding guy to work with, standing behind his work, and doing what was needed to fix what turned out to be a problem with the load of 21AA road gravel used in the project. Besides building this pull-through driveway for us, he dug up and repaired our septic tanks and regarded an area in the back yard to help move water away from the area outside out basement doorwall. We plan to eventually put up a bus barn to house the motorhome, and we plan to have Phil do the site prep, driveway(s), and final grading.

Linda spent Tuesday baby-sitting Madeline while I worked around the house, trying to clean up and arrange the ham shack/office and get all of the technology hooked up and working. I made good progress, but I didn’t get it done. It’s never done. I took time out to have a long chat with my best friend from high school. J. C. has lived in Olympia, Washington for years with his wife, Julie and their three girls, but we have managed to stay in touch. He was my best man at our wedding and I was his best man at theirs. In the early years we corresponded by letter with an occasional phone call, but that was in the days before cell phones and “unlimited local and long distance” plans. Eventually it was by e-mail. We tried instant messaging, but it doesn’t work well for me. We’ve even Skyped once or twice, but it requires broadband to work well, and we don’t have that at the new house. We’ve even had an occasional but all-too-rare face-to-face visit. I drove to Ypsilanti to meet up with Linda and our good friend Kate de Fuccio for dinner. Kate is a former colleague from my educational service agency days, the graphics designer for the agency and a very talented photographer. She is also a kindred spirit traveler, excellent researcher, and perhaps the most considerate person I know. We don’t see her enough.

Kate had suggested Nirmal Indian Cuisine in Ypsilanti and Linda had checked out their menu online, which has become standard practice for us. Nirmal has several vegan dishes, and others that can be made vegan, so we agreed to give it a try. They also serve chicken, but their specialty appears to be goat. They place is a bit “preachy” about the health benefits of Indian food, but the way they do it is kind of innocently cute and we enjoyed that aspect of the place; it’s true after all, and we are sympathetic to the sentiment. Most importantly, the food was excellent, and the staff was very attentive. We had a leisurely dinner which was fine with us as it gave us lots of time to talk. We adjourned to the Starbucks just up the street and continued our conversation.

Wednesday was errand day for us. We picked out stain and paint colors for the rear deck, which Jim Pipoly is going to redo later this month. Jim did all of the painting on our old house and new house. He’s the only guy we use, and friends and family use him too. When you find a good contractor you stick with them. We dropped off old prescription and over-the-counter drugs at the Livingston County jail, where they have a special “no questions asked” collection barrel. The Howell Recycling Center is only open on Wednesdays and Saturdays, so we stopped there. We don’t have curbside recycling like we did in Farmington Hills. We’ve been recycling for so long that it doesn’t feel right to throw things in the trash that can be recycled so we gladly paid the $22 annual membership fee. We picked up some drawer cabinets for the office, a free-standing cabinet for the basement bathroom (which has no other storage), and unpacked the wine refrigerator and plugged it in. We always seem to have just enough bottles of wine that they can’t all go in the regular refrigerator so they end up in the pantry where they take up space we need for other things. They are not cooled, which is bad for storage, but even worse in terms of limiting our choices when we decide we want to open a bottle. It’s one of those things I’ve always wanted and it just wasn’t that expensive. I am now trying to figure out where the popcorn machine will go in the basement rec room. After dinner Linda continued to work on finding an RV park/campground where we can meet up with her brother and his wife in October and I worked on configuring our e-mail SpamExperts and updating this blog.

The Phase Place

Welcome to the next phase (hosted by QTH.com)

Tag Archives: Kate

2013_11-16_12-06 Time Flies

2013_11_08-15 (F-R) Another Busy Week

2013_11_01-07 (F-R)A Busy Week

2013_09_01-04 Driveway Success, Raspberries, And Old Friends