what is the best life advice you have learned on a bus?

[wonderkaty]

hello all!
my life has been slightly crazy recently.... just finished decorating fake christmas trees in colorado (still wondering at what point I will be forced into getting a 'real' job...) <-- it was great to see colorado, as it was the one state west of the mississippi we had to avoid on our trip (as our e-brake wasn't too strong and our bus leaked a little something or other and we thought the hills wouldn't be great for for the bus). anyway, as I haven't posted in a while, my question de jour is the following:

what is the best (or your favorite) lesson/life advice you received whilst traversing/building your bus?

I will answer first:

we had a guest book on our bus, for visitors to sign (I highly recommend this if you are heading out on a journey, as a lot of people will want to view your bus and it is fun to track who/what/when/where and why), we asked people to put down their names, where they were from, and life advice. some were serious (think 'follow your heart' type entries) some were well worth considering (think 'never eat at a chinese restaurant in texas') and some included invitations to stay with people down the road (which we, of course, accepted).

but my all time favorite, as written by a 6 year-old boy who was so fascinated by our bus that he dropped his bike in the middle of the road and climbed aboard for a look (much to the horror of his mother <-- and the horror of us, because we were convinced his mother thought we were trying to kidknap her son) his advice:

"never eat a hamburger in a pack of hungry wolves"

now that, in my opinion, is advice to live by! :wink:

 

[Demonknight]

*S* how about..no matter how well you plan, it will always cost five times as much as expected.

 

[captainkf]

Three times as much, three times as long and it's amazing how little it takes to live comfortably (even with two dogs and a wife - How lucky am I?).

-Richard

 

[Eric von Kleist]

Amen. Less is more. Watch out for the "oh, yeahs", as that's where the real money starts adding up.

 

[PRyberg]

And then there is the very expensive: "While we're at it, why don't we....."

 

[Eric von Kleist]

 

[lapeer20m]

Plenty will say "it can't be done"

all it takes is a little inginuety, some money, and a lot of work to prove them wrong.......and maybe a few scrapped knuckles.

 

[Zen Ken]

This is a difficult thread for me to respond to as most of the great "life advice" and other profound stuff I've ever learned on a bus has occured while in an altered state. It's kind of like, "If you can remember the Sixties, you weren't really there." But I CAN relate to you the best advise I ever received about converting a bus. In particular, about building the interior in a bus. This advice came to me first hand at a Rainbow Gathering in Colorado in the early Nineties from that guy with all the bicycles piled on top of his bus. He said, "Whenever possible, use rivets and bolts instead of nails and screws to hold things together on your rig. The bus frame twists and flexes more than people realize so nails and screws will eventually work loose." I took his words to heart and wherever possible I bolted all the framing in my bus interior to the bus and to itself. This allowed the framing to move in unison with the bus as I'm known for taking my skoolie where no skoolie has gone before (ya gotta love granny low!). Using this method, I was able to use thinner lumber and save weight. The largest framing lumber I used were 2x2's. The ceiling rafters were 1x4's. I also used a lot of 1x2 furring strips. I designed things to operate as seperate components. For instance I would not connect a shelf to the cabinets that were on either side of it as you would in a house. I would leave an 1/8" gap between them (wiggle room) so they could all move independently of each other yet visually it all looked like one unit. The 1/8" and 1/4" luan sheet walls were glued, screwed or stapled and they just kind of "floated" on the framing as it moved and twisted with the bus. I never had anything come apart or crack in the 15 or so years that I had the interior finished out. I know Michael (Soused Moose) has had good luck using 3" drywall screws and I used some of those as well. It just goes to show that for any given problem, there are probably 2 or 3 different solutions that work equally well. It comes down to choice. Well, gee, I guess there's a life lesson I learned in a bus. As with so many things in life, there is not so much a "wrong" way or a "right" way. As long as the job gets done, it just comes down to which way you choose to use.

 

[wonderkaty]

Plenty will say "it can't be done"

yeah, why do people always say that? we've landed on the moon, invented romote control vacuum cleaners and created devices that can start car engines while you stay warm inside (important if you have ever lived in minnesota).

perhaps we, as busers, come from a breed of optimism.....

I like that.

now if only I could bottle it and sell it on e-bay...


ps. happy holidays all!