Life Update

It’s no Arizona sunset, but outside the southwest, have you ever noticed that the best sunsets usually occur in grocery store parking lots? This seems to be a universal constant, no matter where I am.

An update is in order since I haven’t written anything here for an entire month. We’re still alive. It’s June, and I’ve put the air conditioner back in the van. We’ve been using it more to reduce humidity than to stay cool so far, though I know that will change. We’ve had a few nasty storms come through the area. One of them even brought some tornadoes a bit too close for comfort, about half an hour away. But the hills where we live tend to break up the conditions that cause tornadoes, so while we did get some strong straight-line winds, we came out unscathed. Flooding eroded part of the driveway away, but the neighbor used his tractor to rebuild it, since he shares the driveway with us and had the equipment.

I’ve been working a lot more lately. I am now a News Writer for Jalopnik, in addition to all the other writing and editing work I was already doing. I’m still settling into the new routine, figuring out how to manage my time and workload, but it’s going well so far. I did this partly because the company Melissa worked for suddenly shut down, leaving her without work. Not one to sit around and do nothing, she’s not only already taken some classes to start her own business, but is also about to start a new part-time job while she works on getting that going. We’re still getting over the hump until payment from all the new gigs kicks in, but we’re doing okay.

Working more also means I don’t have as much time to get out and ride, but I did get out to try the Jasper Disaster last weekend while Melissa was taking a class. It includes 316 turns in 56 miles. That’s about the same number of turns as the Tail of the Dragon, though over a greater distance. It was fun, scenic, and definitely a route I want to take Melissa on at some point.

We have no travel plans at this time. The van is doing well, but has remained parked since our last trip to Texas to visit Melissa’s family. The only change is that we upgraded my DVD player to a Blu-Ray player, unlocking access to Melissa’s vast movie collection inside the van. We were on a bit of a disaster movie kick, but then the storms that brought tornadoes closer than we wanted slowed that down a bit.

There has been no tiny house progress. More pressing emergencies, both with jobs and with the existing house, plus a lack of time, have left us unable to start moving forward with it. At this point, I think it’s unlikely that we will be living in a tiny house before winter. We still plan to follow through with this plan, but as with most projects, it’s going to take longer than we’d hoped.

If you’ve made it this far, you deserve a cat picture. Lister and all the other critters are doing well, even through the storms early last month. He’s settled comfortably into the role of the grumpy old man, yelling at all the young whippersnappers to get off his lawn while secretly loving them. They spend most of their time hanging out under the carport.

That’s really about it. Life’s been busy, but nothing related to van life. Just know I’m still here, still kicking, and still enjoying life in the Ozarks.