Forms, Friends, and Forehead Injuries
Chapter 166: Laundry, Dogs, and the Thin Line Between Adventure and Homelessness
After our Dallas adventure, we made it back to Roaring River just before dark. The campground looked like it had survived a minor apocalypse. Dirt, branches, and random debris were scattered everywhere. Apparently the river had come dangerously close to flooding a few days earlier, and staff had even prepared for potential evacuations. Looking at the mess, I couldn't help wondering whether a few confused trout had briefly found themselves on dry land.
The muddy river meant fishing was pretty much impossible, which turned out to be a blessing in disguise. After several days of museums, sushi, traffic, and Dallas-sized excitement, both Nelson and I were happy to slow down.
Wednesday was laundry day, one of my favorite rituals of vanlife. There is something deeply satisfying about turning a pile of questionable-smelling clothes into neat, warm stacks of cleanliness.
This week's laundry session came with unexpected emotional complexity.
When I walked into the laundry room, I found a stylish woman and her two teenage boys conducting what can only be described as an industrial-scale laundering operation. Piles and piles of clothes on tables and chairs. Laptops on every surface. Water bottles lined up next to the sink. Every machine was running. They looked exhausted. At first I was mostly concerned about whether I would ever get access to a dryer. But the longer I watched them, the more something felt off.
After nearly a year of campground life, you become surprisingly sensitive to road vibes. These weren't relaxed campers enjoying summer vacation. They looked like people trying very hard to hold everything together. Later I learned they were living in a tent and going through a difficult period, though thankfully things eventually improved for them.
The encounter stayed with me. People sometimes joke that Nelson and I are homeless. Friends occasionally question our life choices. Others assume we must be struggling financially because we live in a van. The reality is that we chose this life. We have a house being built. We have plans and options and privileges. Yet there are moments... when we're parking somewhere late at night, showering at gyms, or waiting out storms in campgrounds, when I do feel a little untethered. A little in-between. Seeing people who were dealing with the real thing reminded me how thin that line can be, and how quickly life can change for anyone.
That evening, I called my mom from my usual spot near the laundry room. Halfway through our conversation, a dog named Amigo decided we were best friends. After about thirty seconds of pats, Amigo climbed directly onto my lap and settled in as if he had known me his entire life. Mom was delighted and immediately suggested I put my headset on the dog so she could talk to him. I declined on behalf of both myself and Amigo. However, apparently his owners believed he would have tolerated this arrangement just fine.
Chapter 167: The Great Shore Power Heist
Thursday morning began with a mystery.
I pulled back into Blowing Springs after dropping Nelson at work and immediately noticed something was missing. Actually, three somethings. Our shore power cord was gone. Our surge protector was gone. Our water filter was gone.
For a brief, hopeful moment, I convinced myself campground staff must have collected them for safekeeping. But nope. Someone had stolen them in broad daylight, within about forty minutes.
I was annoyed, but mostly I was surprised. Campgrounds generally feel safe. People wave at each other. They lend tools. They help back trailers into impossible spots. I tried not to dwell on the theft and started researching replacement parts.
Before heading to the store to shop for replacement parts though, I headed over to our construction site to meet with Dewayne and nearly drove past it.
Because it finally looked like a HOUSE. It's 3D! Five trucks (a record at this point) lined up the dirt road. Workers (both boys and girls) sawing wood and welding hammers. Walls standing up. Music blasting from a boombox. Someone had even brought a giant cooler. It looked less like a construction site and more like a tailgate party that accidentally started building a home.
For the first time, I could actually visualize rooms. I could stand somewhere and think: "Okay, this is where we'll cook." "This is where we'll sleep." The excitement completely changed my mood.
Then I set off on my quest to replace the stolen power cord, which turned into its own heroic saga. Moix had one. But it was bright yellow. I stared at it in disbelief. My previous cord had literally just been stolen and their proposed solution was essentially: "Would you like the thief to spot the replacement from space?" The staff were wonderfully understanding though, and one even admitted they needed to start stocking black cords.
After visiting Walmart, Home Depot, Lowe's, and slowly losing my grip on reality among endless adapters and extension cords, I finally ended up at Camping World. Which, according to RV folklore, is roughly equivalent to entering Mordor. To my surprise, everyone there was incredibly helpful. Not only did they have black power cords, they also had staff who actively talked me out of spending extra money.
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| Interesting detour at Walmart LOL |
One employee inspected my new-to-me surge protector and explained I didn't need the expensive locking housing I was considering. All I needed was a cheap bicycle lock from Walmart.
I left with a new cord, useful advice, and a renewed appreciation that sometimes reputations aren't entirely fair.
Back at camp I made beef stew and pickled cucumber.
A stolen power cord wasn't going to defeat me.
Chapter 168: Framing Dreams and Defeating the DMV
By Friday, my mood had improved dramatically. Mostly because the house looked different again. Only twenty-four hours had passed, yet the framing crew had already transformed huge sections of the structure. The future bedroom and kitchen were taking shape, and the enormous rear wall that would eventually hold nineteen feet of floor-to-ceiling windows was rising into place.
At this stage it looked less like a cabin and more like an outdoor cinema screen.
I loved it.
Feeling productive, I decided to tackle several bureaucratic tasks. This was my first mistake. I needed to pay property taxes and renew our vehicle registration. Simple, right? Absolutely not. Arkansas apparently believes government services should double as an escape-room experience.
First I had to get my property assessed. Then pay taxes at another counter. Then obtain a magical stamp. Then take the stamped paperwork next door to another office. Only then could I buy a registration sticker. Three lines. Two offices. One increasingly confused woman.
By the time I reached the DMV it was 4:10pm. The office closed at 4:30pm. The virtual queue estimated a seventy-five minute wait. And the waiting room looked like a music festival. At least a hundred people were already there, so I sat down and accepted defeat. There was simply no way this was happening today. I might as well make an appointment online for next week while I was here.
I got to the appointment page online and saw that the ‘next appointment available’ was at 4:20pm, in 10 minutes? Thinking this must have been a mistake but worth trying anyway, I clicked on the 4:20 and got a confirmation message. Next thing I know I could see my name on the office monitor. My name was called promptly at 4:20 and I paid my $30 and got my sticker and I was out of the door by 4:25pm while the one hundred people were still waiting. I don’t understand! I refuse to believe all those people were just… dumb? But there was no obvious alternative way to explain this bizarre situation.
Chapter 169: Curry, Civet Coffee, and a Forehead-Shaped Lesson in Teamwork
Feeling extremely pleased with myself after surviving the DMV gauntlet, I headed to Nelson's office to pick him up. We had dinner plans at one of his colleague's houses that evening, which felt surprisingly exciting. Social events had become a bit of a novelty these days. When you're new in town and living in a van, opportunities to meet people don't exactly fall into your lap.
That said, I was also carrying a very specific anxiety.
The hosts were Indian.
And I am, by all reasonable standards, spectacularly bad at spicy food.
Normally this would not be a major concern. You eat the food, suffer slightly, and go home. But "home" for us was going to be a campground later that night, and the nearest bathroom would involve putting on shoes and walking through the darkness. This elevated the stakes considerably.
To prepare, I devised a brilliant strategy. At 3pm I ate a large Panda Express lunch. My logic was simple: if I was already full, I couldn't accidentally consume dangerous quantities of curry. It was essentially a defensive eating maneuver. We arrived at Rohit and Puna's home at around 7pm. The house was enormous... a proper mansion tucked away inside a gated community. As we walked in, I briefly wondered if we should have brought a bigger dessert.
The evening started with mimosas, chips, and some genuinely fantastic chai. The mimosa, importantly, was not spicy. This felt like an encouraging sign. Rohit and Puna were warm and welcoming hosts, and their two children were hilarious. I don't often describe children as entertaining, but these two genuinely were. Another of Nelson's colleagues, Satish, was there as well, and conversation flowed easily.
The only thing missing was... dinner. Eight o'clock came and went. Eight-thirty came and went. By this point I was quietly calculating how long it would take us to drive through the Ozarks in complete darkness.
At some stage approaching 9pm, I leaned over to Nelson and whispered, "Should we leave?" He looked at me as if I'd suggested abandoning civilization. "No. Relax." So I did. And thankfully dinner started shortly afterwards. To my immense relief, the food was absolutely delicious and nowhere near as spicy as I had feared. The chicken curry was outstanding. The naan was even better. Everything was flavorful without trying to kill me.
In hindsight, I shouldn't have worried. I was also grateful for my tactical Panda Express lunch because I had never in my life become accustomed to eating dinner after 9pm.
Afterward we migrated to the family room for dessert. I had brought a chocolate mousse cake from The Fresh Market and spent the entire drive worrying it would emerge from our tiny fridge looking like a crime scene. Miraculously, it survived intact. The conversation drifted toward coffee, eventually landing on Kopi Luwak, the famously expensive coffee made from coffee cherries that have passed through the digestive system of a civet. This naturally led to someone suggesting we use six-year-old Mikki as the raw material for a competing product. The proposed brand name was Mikki Blend. Poor Mikki was horrified. But the rest of us thought it was one of the funniest business ideas we'd ever heard.
By the time we finally said our goodbyes, it was close to 11pm. The drive to the campground was slow and careful. Mountain roads in complete darkness always make me nervous. Not because of other drivers, but because every shadow looks vaguely deer-shaped. The upside was that there was almost nobody else on the road.
Just after midnight we rolled into our campsite. Nobody was camped nearby, so we didn't have to worry about blinding anyone with our headlights while parking. We plugged in, looked at the slightly sloped site, and collectively decided that after nearly a year of vanlife we had developed enough slope tolerance to not bother with leveling blocks.
We fell asleep almost instantly after such a fun evening.
The next day was gloriously uneventful.
The weather was hot and wet, neither of which inspired fishing. So we stayed put and embraced a weekend built around eating rather than catching. I made pancakes for breakfast. Stir-fry for dinner. Cold noodles for lunch. My stomach behaved itself, which honestly felt like a bigger achievement than any of the cooking.
Soon enough checkout time arrived. At the dump station, Nelson and I divided responsibilities. He would dump the grey water. And I would fill the fresh water tank. A perfectly efficient system. Unfortunately Nelson believes deeply in teamwork. I believe deeply in everyone staying in their assigned lane.
He finished his task first and wandered over to "help." And this is generally where problems begin. Because it was warm outside, he decided to shut one of the rear doors to keep the cool air from the air conditioner inside the van. Unfortunately he neglected to tell me. Meanwhile I was walking around the back of the van unscrewing the fresh water hose. The collision was immediate. And my forehead connected directly with the metal latch on the closed door.
I remember feeling annoyed more than anything. Then I wiped my forehead. The wetness on my hand was not sweat. It was blood. A lot of blood. The ground suddenly had blood on it. The passenger seat had blood on it.
Nelson took one look at me and entered full panic mode. I grabbed paper towels and inspected the damage. There was a surprisingly deep gash near my hairline. The strange thing was that it barely hurt, which somehow made it even more alarming. Nelson apologized repeatedly. I was not especially receptive, partly because I was bleeding, partly because only a week earlier he had attempted to "help" with the water hose by lifting one end to drain it, not realizing I still had the other end inside the van. The result had been several gallons of water sprayed into the back of the Don Don Van.
Now, only days later, his enthusiasm for teamwork had literally resulted in me busting my head open. I informed him, perhaps more forcefully than necessary, that this was exactly why I preferred clearly assigned responsibilities.
One person. One job.
No cross-functional collaboration.
No synergy.
No teamwork initiatives.
Just lanes. Stay in them.
To be fair, poor Nelson looked genuinely devastated, and after the initial shock wore off I couldn't stay angry for long.Still, if there was ever a case study supporting my management philosophy, standing in a campground dump station covered in blood because somebody wanted to "help" was a pretty compelling one.
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