Space Exploration

          So Don, when you’re not traveling around what do you do to keep yourself busy?

                             I’m glad you asked that my Inquiring Friends!

                   Actually, as I look back on my working days I wonder where I found the time to show up for my job! “Retirement” I have found out, is only applicable to the art of “Gainful Employment” because I am as busy as I’ve ever been and that suits me just fine!

                        That’s all well and good Don, but you haven’t answered our question.

                             Right. Ok then, I spend most of my time trying to figure out where we can stuff extra “acquiring’s” into the very finite space of the motorhome. This somewhat of a “negative” was turned into somewhat of a “positive” on the Global Voyage. Racked with guilt about not buying Exquisite Souvenirs at every Port of Call, we found that the Reality Check of having absolutely nowhere to display, or store, said souvenirs was our only solace. This fact probably saved us millions of dollars of unnecessary chachkies. Well, it saved me that because Paula is definitely the more thriftier of us and doesn’t (thankfully) hesitate to say No when it is required (which in trying to counter my spending habits is most of the time!)

                             This Space Exploration began as soon as we acquired the motorhome because downsizing from an entire house full of “stuff” and an additional two and a half car garage full of Very Important Stuff, was quite daunting. We were successful on so many levels but trying to jam the items that we deemed to be the Ultimate Items Needed For Survival still required some heavy-duty thought.

                             That’s where all of the sleepless nights spent conjuring up Plans For Extra Storage Space proved valuable.  Adding onto a motorhome is not possible unless you drag a trailer behind you, and that is not practical. The next best solution is to look around inside and try and find places that the engineers missed that can be turned into Storage. On this subject we have been moderately successful because most of the places inside are already in the Used-Up mode.

                             The first thing that we did was to take out the bunk beds and make that entire area into a Hobby Center (admittedly mostly for me) but we also worked into this plan two small filing cabinets that hold Important Papers and one was modified by removing one of the drawers and making a nice shelf for our printer to live. Many items get repaired here and the space has proved valuable if only to help keep me occupied.

                             That project was about the extent of what we were able to do until just recently. Finding that there were more opportunities for “improvements” took awhile as the flaws of the Initial Design needed to be exposed. Take for example the two large cabinets that hang above the windshield. They are fairly cavernous by design but lack any kind of ability to have items stay stable during transport.

You know the old saying, “Be careful when opening overhead compartments as items may have shifted during flight.”  We never open these guys when we are driving, lest the landslide of maps, Cd’s, hats, and such come tumbling forth and bury the driver. The design works well if all you store up there are folded bath towels as stacking things is impossible. So, a few days ago I procured some small pieces of quarter-inch plywood and a length of 1×6 to make three sets of shelves that span the width of the cabinets. Now we can stack to our hearts content and not only have a more practical storage area, but we have negated the questionable practice of opening them during flight!

                             Still needing some extra space for our Memories Books, I scoured any and all possible locations seeking “voids” that hereto for went unnoticed and hence, unused. Behind the large TV there is a wall/cabinet that is accessed through the smaller of the two bathrooms.

This cabinet is where the towels, toilet paper, paper towels, and some cleaning supplies call home. But…. it only extends about two-thirds of the length of the wall that holds the TV. This is practical because it would be impossible to reach that far back into it even if it were available. Looking closely, I determined that if the correct size hole were cut into the face of this wall/cabinet that there would be enough room to install two shelves that could store anything, especially books.

                             Waiting for Paula to exit the state and be in Vermont to visit with Barb her sister, I hastily went to Lowes and procured the necessary items needed for this project. It took a bit of finagling but finally it all came together, and the end result was exactly how I had envisioned it! Better yet, it is all finished, and the workspace is cleaned up and tools are put away, long before Paula gets home!

                             Speaking of tools, keeping them organized and accessible at the same time is another quandary that needed to be dealt with. The “Basement” as it is called, is quite large but it is also quite deep which means that things need to be extracted with a certain amount of effort, as only some things are front and center. I solved some of this issue when I had to open up numerous cases in search of the one tool that I was needing at the time. Looking around I determined that the inside of the large cargo doors would make a nifty spot  for some tools that would be readily accessible. This modification has been incredibly successful!

                             So, that’s what I do when we’re not traveling around!

                   My problem is that we have now definitely run out of possible voids in the woodwork and further Space Exploration will need to be confined to the astronomical kind!