Two Weeks Into RV Living: Report

We’ve been really busy settling in.  When we weren’t really busy, we were busy taking necessary mental health breaks.  Since the move, we have had a lot of surprises, which we’d like to share.

Good surprises include the fact that we were very quick to become adjusted to the new space.  While we are of course, still able to enjoy the smaller space while we are both together at the same time, we’re also still able to occasionally keep drastically different waking hours without offense to one another.  With the smaller space, we were worried about this, going into this move.

This is great because neither of us has to lose that time we take to ourselves to meditate and ruminate alone.  It’s also good because it helps build the perception that there is plenty of closeness and yet also plenty of space – with a little strategy.  It’s actually a really great thing.

We also have neighbors with humanity that are open, caring and helpful.  We won’t share more about them to protect everyone’s privacy.  But we like everyone we’ve met in the neighborhood.

Those are some really good surprises that have persisted in my mind tonight as I write this report.  Bad surprises outnumber, but don’t even come close to outweighing the good.

This is been a great experience so far, but there is much to learn from our experience of the unexpected.  But chronicling our challenges is a major function of this blog post series, but I’m in a good mood tonight so I’ll share just one of those:

We did a lot of research on closet sized washing machines.  We came to a careful conclusion to buy the Magic Chef 1.6 cu ft. model listed at Wal Mart here, despite our year long total boycott of Wal Mart.  Their price was 25% better than anywhere else, even if we shipped it.  Plus the warranty of the unit required you to return the entire unit if something went wrong.  There really was no choice in this matter.  We had to buy from Wal Mart or pay exorbitant costs to acquire the washer.  In this case, the free market provided a solution compelling enough to spite my philosophical objections to patronizing this establishment.

Despite the technical specifications, listed as:

When we got the unit, we learned that they did not include the side drain pipe or the rear water line pipes in their measurement.  This is a big problem for us.  This added an extra 1 1/2 and 5 inches, respectively.  Unfortunately, with the added inches, the unit did not fit properly in the closet.  I wish they were more accurate with their measurements, and I will probably contact Magic Chef to point this out.

Fortunately, we did figure out a way to fit the unit in the closet.  But we had to turn it sideways and hold the door shut with a string.  Eventually, we upgraded the piece of string to a set of Command hooks and hair ties, which is an ingenious solution and works more effortlessly.

The machine is awesome, by the way.  First impression:  It’s super quiet during all cycles.  It washes a surprising amount of clothes at once and doesn’t use obnoxious amounts of water.

The next surprise is the air conditioner.  This comes with good and bad aspects as well.  That post will be written another night.  Peace, friends.