Would I have Another?

Posted on by September 14, 2017

I owned 3 VW vans.

I owned them at different times in my life.

I had a ’72 with the pancake engine.

That was the first car that I owned.

It was kind of a turd of a car.

I owned a 1967 split window….and a ’68.

Now I couldn’t afford one of these vans.

I couldn’t afford one…and that’s pretty good, because it keeps me from getting one.

I don’t know that I’d have another one….but….that being said, they are kind of cool.

They were more cool when they weren’t so “cool”, though.

They were cool when I could buy them for $500.

They aren’t so cool when they’re $10,000 dollars.

I guess that even if something is a turd of a car, if it’s “your turd” and you know and love it….with all its quirks and foibles, you still love it….then, to you at least, it’s cool.

Cool is what you know.

Why’d these buses have to get so expensive?

Dylan Magaster’s Van…

Posted on by September 28, 2017

You learn by doing.

When you live in your van, you figure it out.

Or….maybe you just watch a bunch of videos and imagine that you know what you’re doing when you finally get around to doing something a little more life affirming than writing about what other people are doing.

There are “doers”….and there are “watchers”.

I’m a “dowatcher”.

I “do”….sometimes.

I like seeing these videos.

They inspire me a whole lot more than something like “Dancing with the Stars”.

Video by Forrest Stevens…more of his stuff here.

a whole apartment in a van….

Posted on by September 14, 2017

Here’s a Dylan Magaster profile of a couple from New Orleans who traded a big apartment in New Orleans for life in a VW Westphalia.

“A whole apartment in a van” isn’t really accurate.

Who could do that?

These guys say that what they started out with morphed into what they came to realize they really needed for their new lifestyle.

They say that you really need to just get out and do it…and figure out how to do it as you go along.

You can’t plan for everything.

Check out Dylan Magaster’s channel on YouTube.

He does good work.

Another Van…

Posted on by September 11, 2017

Here’s another “van tour”…this time with Cyrus Sutton,filmmaker and founder of the website Korduroy.tv .

I think about these kind of vans a lot.

What would it take to accommodate a big family in one of these things?

A box truck?

Maybe just a camper?

And if you had one….where would you store it?

We have a property now that would accommodate something like a big camper….but you really do need some space for big things.

I know that a person can make a living doing creative things.

It takes some fearlessness to step off the curb and do it, though.

business and passion

Posted on by September 11, 2017

What would we be able to accomplish if every thing we did had a measure of passion attached to our efforts?

Could we turn a passion into a business?

Here’s a short film with Cyrus Sutton where he talks about how to make money with photography and filmaking.

It’s good advice that doesn’t only apply to visual disciplines.

Here’s a link to the website Cyrus founded a while back…. Korduroy.tv .

Korduroy is a collection of videos about surfers and the active lifestyle.

Good stuff.

ferris wheel in a hurricane

Posted on by September 10, 2017

There’s no hurricane where I am.

There’s no ferris wheel, either.

I’m afraid of heights….so a ferris wheel isn’t a joyride for me….but it would really stink to be one of the forgotten up on the high part of the arc, screaming to be let down….”LET ME DOWN!! LET ME DOWN!!….while the wind whipped the giant erector set back and forth….me, alone, while the birds hid from a sky too dangerous to insinuate themselves into.

That would really stink to be on a ferris wheel.

It would stink more than it usually stinks to be on a ferris wheel.

There’s no ferris wheel here.

But…we went to Carowinds on Saturday to celebrate my youngest son’s eighth birthday and the hotel is full of refugees this Sunday morning…..people from the coast of South Carolina….even some from Florida…racing away from the path of the unknown….racing towards sanctuary.

The path of the hurricane changed….moving from the heart of Miami to blowing through the center of Tampa…and I’m up early…sitting in the lobby of the hotel….drinking coffee…watching TV…typing.

I’m doing what I’d be doing at home!

What a creature of habit.

I guess that the only difference is that I can make even less noise up in the hotel room than I do  in the mountains where we live….so I couldn’t shave or even find my glasses…. I’m scruffy and blind and, like most days for some reason, up way too early.

I have it pretty easy, though.

Heavy rain is forecasted for Monday and I expect a hard day of work at the Post Office, but, compared to most of these refugees, the day should be fairly uneventful.

Heavy rain and relatively light wind isn’t something that I haven’t dealt with before.

I guess that in some ways I am a refugee, though.

While the other people in my family sleep upstairs in our hotel room, crammed into a space about the size of our bedroom at home, I’m excommunicated….caffeinated….alone except for the hotel staff and the people coming through for a very early check-out.

I am separate…and surrounded by other people.

That’s how I roll.

I don’t know which way the wind blows.

When nature puts her hard finger down to stir the pot, I don’t know what the final result is going to be.

What’s nature going to cook up next for us?

 

 

 

Blue Ox

Posted on by September 6, 2017

This is a short documentary about the Blue Ox Millworks woodworking shop out in Eureka, CA.

Eric Hollenbeck is the man who runs the shop.

This is 10 minutes long.

This is 10 minutes of wisdom and possibility….and it’s one of the good movies I’ve posted on here.

Eric Hollenbeck and his wife, Viviana, also run a school that serves kids who aren’t excelling in a normal school setting.

Here’s another short film that tells the history of Blue Ox.

He’s an interesting man with an interesting story….doing good work.

Awwww….what the heck?

This is overload….who’s going to want to watch 3 documentaries about Eric Hollenbeck and the Blue Ox story?

Me, for one.

This is some good stuff.

Thanks for being in the world, Eric Hollenbeck!

Robots Do It.

Posted on by September 6, 2017

We have robots doing it now.

You design it with CAD….and then have a robot build it.

That’s how you roll now if you’re going to build anything that requires precision.

This is a black and white documentary about how it used to be done….back in 1936.

I love seeing this….

I don’t know if we’ll ever go back to this way of manufacturing, though.

In fact, I don’t know if the Chinese will ever go back to this kind of manufacturing.

We do it different now.

Robots do it.