My Time at Grandma's

This is the bus as I parked it at my grandmother's house. I was there for two weeks, visiting with my 86 year old grandmother who is in surprisingly great shape. She is out and about feeding chickens, driving the golf cart to visit nearby relatives, and counseling her grandson on the merits of 'settling down'.



I was not allowed to photograph grandma but she did provide me with a pre-approved photo she had of her and my grand-dad (he passed away 2 years ago). I guess grandma doesn't want her image tarnished with unprofessional pictures of her. Good PR work grandma! As soon as I get to a scanner I will put the picture on here.
I decided to go ahead and jump to where I am currently in bus construction because so much has happened in the past few months that it would take too long to ever catch up. I will sprinkle parts in as I can.

Here is a picture of the bus as it looked when I arrived at grandma's.


As you can see it would be nearly impossible for me to get any work done in such tight confines with all my stuff in the way. So I had to go somewhere where I could unload it while I built bed frame and cabinets.

Here is a picture of my stuff outside the bus. Under a tree, under a tent, under tarps. I was dodging rain every afternoon. It threatened to rain everyday but only rained less than half the time. In any case I was running around at the first sound of thunder pulling tarps over everything and putting electrical tools back on the bus.

I did alot of interior work at night when it was cooler, I did all my cutting in the daytime outside. The first thing I tackled was the bed frame. I took the old flimsy box spring and used the wood from it for cabinets later. I built a sturdy bed frame out of 2x4's. Here is a picture of completed picture.

Working outside at night in the country was an interesting experience. Besides protecting myself from getting malaria from the teradactyl sized mosquitos I had to be careful of the giant spiders that worked overtime to feast on the same mosquitos. And they center their webs right at head level just to freak me out.

Every little branch that brushed my hair at night had me flailing my hands over my head like a Pentacostal on Meth. I wore my headlamp religiously. Speaking of religion, one of my grandmother's conditions was that I not work on the Lord's day, which was scaled back by my second Sunday there to 'don't work where the neighbor's will know' on the Lord's day.

I had my own fan club out in God's country. Seems the closest neighbor's, who lived a couple hundred yards away, had three kids who monitored my daily work. Justin who was 10, stopped by first and said whatcha doin'? Pretty soon, Morgan and Tricia, 5 and 18, respectively, came by for a visit. I enjoyed the company, but grandma felt that 18 year old Tricia might be a little too interested in the going's on at the Bordeaux manor. True, they made a point of constantly riding bikes by and calling out Hey an awful lot. Here is a picture of the three of them.


One rainy evening I caught my beefy cat, Oscar contemplating ending his misery due to the near heat stroke inducing weather by huffing silicone caulk. Fortunately he thought better of it.
After finishing the bed frame, my next project was to build up the kichen area. I was getting tired of fishing in totes for food and then hunt for a pot or pan to cook it.




You may have noticed the flooring. The linoleum is compliments of Uncle Donald and Aunt Debbie. They were awesome and some of the most supportive people of my endeavor. They are themselves Motorhome owners and they gave me all kinds of valuable advice as well some nice treats like carbon monoxide detector (invaluable when you run a combustible engine to get your air conditioning and basic electricity), all essential velcro strips, books and magazines on fulltime RV'ing, ironing board, dry food goods and a tour of a real factory made Motorhome. Unfortunately I don't have photos of them. I was so busy working I didn't take many pics when people were around. Aunt Linda and Uncle Wendle were also very generous. Aunt Linda brought me home cooked chicken pot pie. Uncle Wendle owns a hardware store and gave me carpet remnants and hooked me up with plumbing supplies to build my laptop mount. My laptop is my GPS and Radio when driving.

Laptop mount acts as drink holder when I am not driving.

Quck Recap-prelude to a bus conversion

I noticed that I had not included pics of me removing the seats from the bus the first night I got it home. That freed up much needed space for my Sanford & Son impersonation. Although I have read online all the nightmare stories of break out the grinder and cutting bolts off my seats came up relatively easy. And I didn't have to go under the bus to loosen any bolts because the seats were screwed down along the aisle with thick coarse threaded screws. Under the windows they were bolted to a rail about 10 inches off the floor against the wall.

Here is a picture with a couple of seats removed from right side.



















Here is with all seats removed except for three that I hoped to use later (possibly for a dinette). Notice my ipod stereo on rear seats, a man must have his musical motivation.

Leaving my permanent residence-Part 1

After I had everything that I could fit on the bus I drove over to a friend of mines with every intention of staying there a month or two while I converted the bus. The time frame is the end of April. This friend was someone I dated many years ago but we had remained good friends afterwards. She had an unusually long driveway where I could park the bus and no homeowners association forbidding Recreation Vehicles prominently displayed. Ironically, she lived in the historic district of downtown Greenville. I like to believe my bus only enhanced the historical atmosphere of the neighborhood.
My friend, insisted I stay with her. I was hesitant because, while we were good friends, there was still a reason we didn't hang out 24/7. But I had a backup plan, head to my grandmother's and do the construction there if things didn't work out at my friend's place.
I was at my friend's for about 3 days and I decided it was best to head out. As I was backing out of her driving, which took about a full two minutes stopping both lanes of traffic while I demonstrated my inexperience in backing a bus in a downtown neighborhood. My frustration level grew and the already difficult, unfamiliar gearshift was put into first gear. Breaking a cardinal rule I had been warned about for this bus. First gear is a 'granny' gear reserved only for the steepest of inclines and can be shifted out of only after I come to a dead stop. Normal operation of the bus from a stop typically starts from second gear. If no stop is made before shifting out of first gear the bus transmission becomes locked in first. The only way to unlock it is to access the transmission from a removable plate in the floor at the back of the bus. Well I tried to shift, not knowing I was in first, due to my haste to get traffic flowing again. I immediately realized what I had done after trying unsuccessfully to shift into second three or four times. Prior to this I had a mantra "Don't use first, don't use first" I still have that mantra. In first gear the bus cruises along at about 3mph. This is embarrassing. It is midnight on a friday night and there is a good deal of traffic. I put on my hazard lights and pick up my cell phone. I don't know where I am going because my plans were to hit the flea market the next day and sell off what I could of my un-needed stuff. I needed a place to park a bus. But I also needed to find out how to fix the transmission. I called the pastor of the church that I bought the bus from and left a message. (I guess pastors aren't one of the people up at midnight on Friday night). I then called the only person I could think of that had space for me to temporarily park the bus, Bronson, the guy who was to guide me in my jeep painting ordeal. He was a referred friend of a friend person that I happened to have programmed into my phone. He typically worked late nights at his body shop because it isn't as hot then. He answered his phone and I think I surprised him with alot of information. He had only known me as a guy wanting to paint his jeep, now I was calling saying I had a bus, that it was stuck in first gear and that I needed a place to park it for the night. His first question was "you have a bus?" After a quick explanation and reassurances that this was only temporarily and that I desperately needed a place to stay so I could sell my stuff and hit the road, he conceded sure I could park it around back.
After my call I was about half a mile away from Bronson's and there is a fairly steep decline before an equally steep incline. I decided I needed to boost my speed so I pushed the clutch down in order to coast faster down the quarter mile length of decline. After reaching speeds in excess of 10mph my clutch plates inexplicably went from neutral back to first gear causing a slamming on the brakes effect that included squealling tires and objects to come flying forward. Me and the pets nearly soiled ourselves. The bus was stilling running in first gear but now the clutch failed to disengage when I pressed it to the floor. This was very very bad. It would mean I wouldn't be able to come to a stop and start going again. Where I stopped was where I was until the problem was fixed. Luckily there were no more stops before I got to Bronson's. I pulled into the lot trying to shout out the window to Bronson as he was driving towards me in his car with his window down trying to shout something at me. He was trying to tell me where to park (and not run into his car), I was telling him I don't have a clutch and where I stop is where I will be. He didn't get all that because things had changed since I hung up the phone with him and the last thing he expected was additional bus problems plus the diesel engine is loud and we were both moving in opposite directions. I picked as good a place as any and stopped the bus.
The photo is the bus at Bronson's.
I also had not fully planned all the logistics for how to retrieve my jeep and remaining stuff from my other friend's house and get to my grandmother's house with the jeep. I simply thought I would fix it up in a few days, sell it or tow it. This became critical for my immediate future. But like so many things I was to learn, I learned my best lessons from making a few mistakes in calculations.

Catching Up

Ok, blogging is tougher for me than journaling. Besides disciplining myself, making the time to do it, the basic difference is accessing the internet in order to blog. Wi-Fi is one of the many things that I use to take for granted that I now consider a luxury. In my current position I find it more important than a cell phone. I find things on craigslist for sale, research how to convert the bus whenever I get stuck on a particular project, check the weather forecast, search for future locations to visit, browse potential employers, and keep in touch with others through email.

So I will be bringing my blog up to date over the next few days while I am visiting my grandmother. I have been here a week now and have gotten several things accomplished, but it will be only the tip of the iceberg in 'my bus experience'.