Slowing down.

It's very odd to me to have nowhere to be. It's something I'd forgotten about from my first taste of living in a car three years ago. I ended up spending a lot of time at the Burbank library.

The van is technically a machine for transportation and for the last four weeks I've been too busy to have any time with no where to go. Normally when I had nowhere to go I'd go home. I might not actually have anything to do at home, but it made sense to be there when there was no where I had to be. Now, when I get into the van I sometimes have to sit and think a minute deciding where to go. It's a feeling I'll have a lot of in the next year when I get on the road, but for the next three months while I'm still working the options will be constrained by time limits.

I did a tape sync* for All Things Considered on Friday in Malibu so I had Thursday evening and Friday morning with nothing much to do but hang out. I think It was the first time I've had a couple hours off since the 4th of July. I had a nice dinner at a park near Pepperdine, (I have photos but for some reason my computer and camera aren't talking this weekend), then visited a bookstore, a pet store and a Radio Shack. (I actually had three things I wanted from the Radio Shack, but they didn't have any of them.)

The next day I didn't do much with my few hours off between the tape sync in Malibu and my normal Friday afternoon/evening job at Clear Channel. Drove up into the Santa Monica Mountains, passed a hike I haven't done in years and thought about doing it again, (even ate my lunch in the parking lot of the trailhead), then decided against it drove up Mulholland Drive and took an hour nap at a scenic overlook.

I'm afraid it is not very exciting to read about. Drove through some pretty mountains, took a nap, went to work. But it was a pleasant afternoon anyway, and I'm working on slowing down and doing nothing.

That being said I promise I'll also do some more interesting things as soon as I stop working so much. For now it's nice to just sit around.


*A tape sync is where the person they're interviewing can't (or is too big/busy to) come into a studio to record so they send someone like me with good recording equipment and do the interview over the phone. Then I send them the audio and they sync up the interviewer and interviewee in post. Basically I'm half engineer and half mic stand.

I LOVE not paying rent

In the first two weeks of this month I have spent about $350. Of that about $100 was gas and almost the same for food. I was surprised to see I'd spent so much on food, but I did go out a couple times with friends, so I was paying for the company more than the food. But I'm no longer paying rent so I can afford dinner out now days.

This has been such a busy week at work that even if I still had an apartment I wouldn't be there. It's nice not to have the first couple hours of work going to paying rent on an apartment I'm never at.

I broke the first rule of living in your van last night. I was at the Bolsa Cica state preserve (I think it's some sort of state preserve anyway), and was there after 8:00 when they technically close. 8:00 is way too early, by the way, the sun was still up. Anyway, it was 8:45, I had just finished writing in my journal and was sitting in the drivers seat of the van enjoying the birds before I drove away when the police came by. Of course he shone his flashlight in the back of the van and saw the sleeping bag. He asked me where I lived and I explained that I lived in Santa Monica but was working in Long Beach. He asked me if I was living in my van and I said I was for that week. Then he wanted my license and I gave it to him then he took it back to his car to run it and my plates.

I let him do it. And that's where I should have at least stopped and found out why he wanted to do that. Next time. I'd like to avoid it, but I have no doubt that I'll run into the police again at many points along this trip. Now I'm just worried there's some sort of record of this check.

Ahh well. I'll have to do some poking around and see if it's possible to find out what comes up with the police run your license. I've had the police wake me up plenty of times, so they may have run my plates before, but I think this is the first time they've taken my driver's license back to their car to check. But it's also the first time I've admitted to living in my van. As soon as I said it I knew I was breaking the rules, but I couldn't see how I could deny it when the sleeping bag is laid out and there's clothes hangers on the hooks above the doors.

All that being said. I love my little van. I like having as little stuff as possible. I'm looking forward to having the time to get rid of more of it.

The first two weeks.

Ok. I've been out of the apartment for two weeks and finally getting around to posting. It's been a crazy busy two weeks at work getting ready for the pledge drive at KJAZZ. So life in the van has been going well. I have found a number of things that I need do differently. For one, I had all this food at the apartment that I thought I'd be making at campgrounds in the evenings. Problem is, no campgrounds. All the campgrounds in LA county have been reserved for basically the rest of the summer. So it's urban camping for me and it's a bit hard to stay stealthy when you've got a camp stove cooking soup in the Ralphs parking lot.

So I have crazy amounts of canned soup sitting in the van that I can't really make except at work. At any rate for the first couple days the van was a bit of a mess as I had just poured the last of my stuff in the apartment into the van. Now I've got a couple drawers that make the whole place feel more organized.

The last week has been spent at work. Basically I've done nothing but work or sleep so I don't don't really feel like lately I've been actually doing much living in the van, just sleeping. That will continue for the next week. Eventually I'll get to actually doing more interesting things.

I did go to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library for the 4th of July. I'd been planning on going to the beach or hanging out at a campground relaxing, but like I said, no campgrounds. So I drove around till I thought of something to do for the fourth. They had some stuff doing on for the holiday. It was exactly the sort of thing I plan on doing for the trip. Random museums that I run into. Actually I will probably hit all presidential libraries. History is good.

And of course I'm still looking for suggestions of places to go.

Ready to get started.

Four more days until I'm homeless again. I can't wait. Mom and Dad are visiting tomorrow and we'll switch vehicles. I'm going to miss my pretty little prius, but I'm looking forward to getting the van put together. By Sunday I had basically run out of the packing that could be done before I had the van. I've been super busy with work the last couple days so no time to do anymore anyway. I just found out today that I have the fourth of July off. I never even occurred to me that I would. I haven't had the fourth of July off in years. I haven't decided yet if I want to go to a party/picnic and go see some fireworks, or if I just want to hang out on my own at the Malibu
beach campground laying in the sun and reading a good book.


A whole day off. It feels so luxurious. I like the work I'm doing, but I'm looking forward to when I get lots of time off. It's been a while.

Spontaneous order is awesome

This morning I was out and about and found myself with an extra hour and a half to kill before I had to be at work. Not enough time to go home, too much time to just get to work early, and I wasn't hungry, so no point in going out for a nice lunch, (which I wouldn't really want to spend the money on right now anyway). So I went for a drive down Mulholland Drive. Immediately upon rounding the first bend I felt a little leap of joy at a new view. Here I was only 200 yards from the freeway entrance I take a couple times a week and yet it felt completely new.

I used my extra hour an a half to drive down the section of Mullholland east of the 405, stopping at view points along the way and reading the small informational plaques, and reveling in the iconic sprawl of the city stretching out into the edge of the mountains. I love looking at Los Angeles from above. I better comprehend how it fits together nestled in the valleys, it's tiny little downtown creeping down Wilshire blvd all the way out to the ocean while the rest of the city oozes out to the mountains. Even the traffic takes on a larger than life quality when you're looking down on it. It feels like life. All these people going about their lives unconcerned about 99.999% of the other 4 million around them. But somehow they all fit together and a century of spontaneous order has created this beautiful city.

I can't wait to get out on the road and check out some other new places.

Cars, money, moving out.

Well, the van is sorted out. A bit differently than what I'd been planning, but it's good to know what's going to be happening. About a month a half ago I bought a Prius (named Edna Lee). This will not be my traveling car. I'll be trading vehicles with my dad for the trip. So I'll be living in a Pacifica.

It is not the ideal car van for living in. It's higher off the ground than a minivan or regular van, which cuts down the space inside. What will potentially be the biggest problem is that there's a big...I don't know what to call it. A big block of plastic just behind the driver and passenger seats. I'll take pictures at some point. It might end up being tricky to build around it, but it will work out and money-wise this works out pretty well for me. I could have bought a much older van (15 yrs) for a lot less and had more space, but I don't know enough about car repairs and I'd be worried about it braking down. Even if it never did I'd worry about it too much for it to be worth the savings.

The other option was to but an older van/minivan (5 yrs), and this is probably what I would have done if dad didn't offer me this trade. I was surprised at the prices of some of these though. You always hear about how driving a new car off the lot causes it to lose half it's value. Well, apparently the people selling vans on Craigslist haven't heard cause the prices for vans two or three years old were only a couple thousand less. Less, than new, but if I'm only saving that much money I'd rather buy a new one and get the warranty and knowledge that I'm the only driver. But still 5-10 years old was my best option until dad offered this trade.

The deal was though that I had to buy a new car, because he wouldn't trade his '05 Pacifica for my '93 Camry. Go figure. This means, however, that I now have my post trip car purchased. I don't need to go through the hassle of car shopping again and I don't need to try to sell my van when I'm done. I just drive back to San Diego and trade with dad.

So the car is bought. (And I love it, by the way. In the back of my head I'm trying to figure out if I can do the trip in the Prius.) I moved out of the apartment at the end of this month (less than 4 weeks!! I have less than 4 weeks and so much to do!!).

The bad news is that between spending a large amount on the Prius and a even larger amount on an investment I am now in debt with my parents. (Wonderfully kind of them to help me finance all of this, but they're also making 8% interest off me.)

The upside is that this investment will give me monthly checks that will be my main income during the trip. But I don't want to leave LA (and my various jobs) until I've payed off my parents. Based on somewhat vague guesses as to how much I'll be earning and spending while living in the van in LA I'm expecting this to be sometime around October. This actually coordinates well with the KCRW pledge drive, something I'd been planning on coming back to work on anyway.

Over the last few months I've been working on sorting though stuff, but as the move out date grows closer I find myself shifting from sorting to simply moving. Lots of things are ending up at my parents house, (did I mention how wonderful they are for supporting me on this trip?), but at the same time I'm getting rid of lots of stuff too.

I find I am a pack-rat not because I can't bear to give up my stuff, but because I just don't like throwing things away. I think I get this from mom. I can't just throw things in the trash, I have to find a home for them. Someone who can get use out of them. Not necessarily because of any sentimental feelings towards the object itself, but just because it seems more efficient. I like efficiency. And a lot of the things I have are hand me downs, so it seems strange to throw them away.

So the free bin for volunteer at KCRW which is stocked with books and cds that the station doesn't need anymore has been getting random stuff from me. A stapler, bookends, a small blow torch, (an impulse buy in Flagstaff, AZ that I've never used), also any books and cds of mine that I don't want to keep but I can't sell on Amazon. Various friends have also been getting random stuff from me since my first choice is to give it to someone I know rather than a stranger. That way if I find I do need it again I can ask them to dig it out of their closet and give it back.

My parents have been getting my furniture, (this is fair, I think, since most of it came from them in mom's own attempt to get it out of the house and somewhere it could be used and not thrown away.)

Tomorrow after work I drive down to San Diego with a table in the back and whatever else I can get packed up by then. I will sit down with dad and sort out exactly how much I owe him, and then hopefully sit down with mom and sort out some boxes of old things that aren't being used in the garage so that there'll be room for a couple of my boxes of old things that aren't being used.


Whew. So there's the big catch up blog post. Once I move out of the apartment and into the van there'll actually be adventures/disasters/musings to post about. Even if I'm not leaving LA for another 4 months it should be exciting. Can't wait.

I have begun a six week online travel writing class. It's partly to get me writing again, and partly because I'm going nuts at work with nothing to do. Work moves on as usual. Enjoying some things; looking forward to leaving others. Actually I am starting to look forward to the time when I'll be moved out of the apartment, but still around town. I miss the adventure of living in my car. I drove up to the campground I used to stay at. Got in late at night, left fairly early, but it was nice to do it again, even if it did mean sleeping in the fetal position in the back seat of my car. One of these days I'll get to a campground early enough to set up a tent. Course first I'd have to buy a tent, and since I'll soon be buying a van I probably won't bother with a tent.

At any rate, the following is an article I wrote for my travel writing class. Maybe sometime before I leave I'll have to go back to the campground, get some sound and record this piece as my first podcast.

The only bad thing about the spot is that Highway 1 is less than fifty feet away from the campground. Cars and headlights wiz by while I wrap myself up in the crocheted blanket I keep in the backseat of my car. I have a queen-sized bed in a reasonably nice apartment in Santa Monica, but here I am, ignoring the occasional car along Highway 1 and listening to the sounds of the ocean coming from the other side of the beach campground.

As a campground it’s not much. A small strip of campsites in northern Malibu about 100 feet wide and half a mile long. It’s flanked on one side by Highway 1 and on the other by the ocean. Porta-potties and a dumpster in a little shack every 10 campsites or so. Wire fence separating the highway, and a wide road running the length of the campground for both driving and parallel parking. Then sand, then rocks, then ocean expanding out to the curve of the earth.

One morning while I stayed here I woke up just at the break of dawn to get some of that good photography light as the sun crept up behind the Malibu hills. It wasn’t until that morning I remembered there isn’t much to photograph at this campground.

No, I wasn’t here for the scenery. I drove 30 miles to sleep in the back seat of my car for the sound of the rocks.

The waves crashing incessantly on the beach are soothing in their own way. But as I drift off to sleep what I love to hear are rocks that roll back and forth with the waves. The campground is sand, but the beach itself is made of rocks, different shades of speckled gray and worn smooth from the water. Forward a few feet, back a few feet. They roll against each other over and over in rhythm with the waves. A rumbling thunder that lasts a few seconds, pauses to catch its breath and then repeats.

It makes me feel old and young at the same time. It reminds me of the power of nature. Not always violent or quick like the earthquakes, mudslides and wildfires that are usually nature’s way of getting our attention here in Southern California. It reminds me of the timelessness of nature. These rocks have been rolling back and forth against each other on this beach for hundreds, maybe thousands of years. A few feet forward, a few feet back. The water flows over the rocks slowly eroding and polishing them.

The sound of those rocks rolling back and forth against each other encourages me to buckle down and start being more selfish with my time. Stop spending time with things that I don’t find interesting. When it comes down to it nature doesn’t care how I spend my time. Nature doesn’t even know I exist. Neither do most of the people on the planet. No, I need to be doing whatever I find interesting because ultimately I’m the one who will really care how I spend my time.

Right now I have my heart set on traveling. So as I plan a year long trip around the US I come here to listen to the rocks and remind myself to slow down. Most things don’t matter. The world still turns, the waves still crash, the rocks still rumble. What should matter to me is planning and doing things that I enjoy doing. I vow not to be such a work-a-holic. Not to stress out about my career. And that it’s alright to want to learn Russian and to play the violin without having actually gotten around to starting either one yet. It’s cliché. But the rocks and reminding me that it’s also true.

But I know myself. I will go back into the real world and get sucked back into my daily routine. I will get a call from my boss asking me to fill in for someone and I will take it. I will spend time doing things that I don’t really enjoy and won’t really get me any closer to the trip around the US I’m planning. But coming back here to this campground 20 feet from Highway 1 and listening to those rocks moving in the waves will remind me to live in the moment and keep my mind on what I want to do. In the next few months as I prepare for the big trip I may need the rocks again to remind me.

That’s alright. It’s easy to come back to the sound of the rocks. The campground is right next to Highway 1. Easy access for the next time I need the reminder.

Finding the smallest car that's big enough.

A few years ago I heard Click and Clack give advice on buying a car that's stuck with me. They said "Buy the smallest car that's big enough." Don't buy the Mini Cooper when you really need a sedan and don't buy the Ford Excursion when all you need is the Toyota Highlander.

So now as I go shopping for minivans I'm trying to figure out what's type of space I want to live in for a year. I've looked at a couple including the Honda Oydssey and (more seriously) at the Sienna and they seem to be al lbe the same size, a bigger than I need. But all the other's I've looked at seem too small.

I'm torn cause I don't know if I know what I need. (Isn't that always the case?)

The from their website the Dodge Caravan looks like it's about a foot and a half smaller than the Toyota and Honda so I'm going to take a look at that.

Course with all this trying to sort through size I'm beginning to wonder again if I really want to buy new or nearly new. All depends on how long I'm going to have it. But the differences in the prices between new and one up to 3/4 years old is practically non-existent. I've gone back and forth about five times today alone between new and >5 years old and I'm back to leaning towards new, (that is a new '06).

Just hoping I can still get a new '06 in three or four months when I'm actually ready to buy something.

As I'm finally at the shopping for a minivan stage I find I'm telling more and more people about my plans to take off a year. It's creeping up on me. A while ago I created an excel spreadsheet to sort through all my expected income and expenses and figure out where to where to invest my money. On Jan 1 I'm going to switch the box labeled "months till leaving" to 6. Crazy. Seems like it was just 8 months. 8 months seems further away than just 6 months plus two months. It's closer to one year than 0 years and seems so far off. In one month I'll have less than a half a year to go.

This is all an estimate anyway, I may leave earlier or later, and I just needed an estimate for all my little equations, but It's not going to be much later than that and I still have so many things to do before I leave. Mostly involving learning how to do radio pieces which has been stalled for the last 6 months by my crap computer. I can't believe how much time I've wasted trying to get that thing to work. That's over 25 weekends of 25 hours of sitting in the studios at Clear Channel without actually getting anything done. I only took that job last Feb. because I wanted the time to work on my own projects, (well, and because I needed a job.)

Alright, no more complaining about my computer. Enough of you have heard this rant in person.

As this trip approaches though I'm getting more and more concern about one thing. I feel like I don't have true plan yet of what I want to do. I don't want to plan too much, of course, but I wish I had some sort of overarching goal or idea that the trip can be semi-structured around. I guess I want to finish with some meaning attached to the trip. Something you could write a book around. If it's just a series of interesting but unrelated events then what would be the point of taking a full year off to do them?

Probably not something I need to worry about. Partly I think I feel this way because the longest trip I've ever taken on my own was a month and a half. I'm not worried about finding a year's worth of stuff to do, I'm just worried about not doing things that are worth it. Or worth reading about in a blog...

Reconnaissance

I think I'm about a year away from the trip (just fifty more weeks or so. I can handle it), but it's never to early to start doing research:

Where are you from?

When I go there what should I make sure not to miss?

What's on the tourist list there that I would do best to avoid?

Who should I interview there and why?

Where's your favorite road trip stop?