Picture This

It's midnight and my flight has just landed in Boston, two hours behind schedule. I step out into a crisp September night; the air never tastes like this in California. It's refreshing, but despite it only being 9 PM on the coast that I left from, I'm exhausted. It's been a tiring few days of tying up loose ends before the trip, and staring at a dim screen on a dark plane wasn't exactly conducive to sustaining my consciousness. After counting out 27 complete revolutions of the baggage return carousel, I find my suitcase. I try my best to muster a smile at the rental car kiosk, but the attendant's reaction makes it clear I didn't exactly sell it. The car keys dangling from my index finger, I heave my bag onto the backseat. All that stands between me and sleep is a 100 mile drive down a deserted highway. I sync the car to my phone over Bluetooth, and throw on a playlist. I opt for a "noise rap" playlist, that should keep me awake. A few tolls and I'm on the Pike.

It's 1:30 AM at this point, I hop in the left lane and punch it. Looking outside into the darkness, the only indication that I'm even moving is the steady vibration of the engine and the cracks in the road that whip past my headlights. If I keep a steady speed, I'll probably make it back b—blue lights go on behind me. Ugh. This isn't my first rodeo, though, I've got this down. Blinker on. Lane shift. Blinker on. Lane shift. Blinker on. Lane shift. Car in park. Hazards on. Roll down window. Shut off car. Keys on dash. Hands at 10 and 2. Sit there and wait. I'm pretty sure I was going 85 mph, so I'll just admit my mistake, apologize, and hopefully be on my way. The speed limit is 65, and the fine is $10 per mile over the speed limit, so I'm looking at a $200 fine. Not the best, but not the worst, and it is entirely my fault after all. With any luck he'll let me off with a warning.

"You know you were going 97?"

97?! I thought th—

"License and rental agreement please"

He retires to his car to decide my fate. Twenty minutes go by, I realize it's highly unlikely he's writing me a love letter in there. My corneas are searing, they aren't enjoying the sunbath from his face-melting-ly bright spotlight. The light swerves briefly as he opens and closes the cruiser door.

"Have a nice night."

Accepting my fate

The ticket was for a cool $470 (ouch). My theory is that he saw I had an out-of-state (California) license and really laid on the fines, knowing I'd be unlikely to appeal it. The more likely scenario is that I'm just being bitter: blaming others is easier than admitting character faults. The final charges were as follows:

1. Speeding. Because I was speeding.
2. Reckless Driving. Also because I was speeding.
3. Failure to keep right. I was in the left lane, after all.

Brandon, this just seems like a normal speeding ticket, and you totally deserved it. How is any of this truck-related?

We're getting there, but for now just know that I paid the ticket and didn't think much more of it.

Fast-forward a month

It's a Friday like any other and I'm heading to my private mailbox to pick up my mail. I've got a few credit card promotions, which I immediately toss. More interesting, I've got two letters from the DMV. I open one, and it reads as follows:

OCT 15, 2015

DEAR CALIFORNIA DRIVER,

DUE TO THE LATEST ENTRIES TO YOUR DRIVER RECORD (SEE BELOW), YOU ARE NOW AMONG CALIFORNIA'S WORST DRIVERS, ONE OF THOSE WHO CAUSE THE MOST CRASHES, INJURIES, AND DEATHS.

ONE MORE POINT ADDED TO YOUR ALREADY POOR DRIVING RECORD AND YOU WILL MEET THE LEGAL DEFINITION OF A NEGLIGENT-OPERATOR. IF THAT HAPPENS, YOUR DRIVING PRIVILEGE WILL BE IN JEOPARDY.

[…]

Jeez, that doesn't sound good. What is all of this about though? Other than that speeding ticket in Boston, I hadn't gotten a ticket in over three years. I look at my attached driving record, which contains the following very helpful table:

Oh god, I see what's going on here. They're counting each offense as a separate citation against me, this isn't promising. Heart racing, I open the second DMV letter:

OCT 15, 2015

YOUR DRIVING PRIVILEGE IS SUSPENDED AS OF NOV 18, 2015 AS A CONDITION OF PROBATION AND CANNOT BE REINSTATED BEFORE MAY 17, 2016

[…]

I'm not normally one for panicking, but I'm definitely struggling to keep calm at this point. This letter clearly states that I'm losing my license for 6 months. Plain and simple. In between bouts of freaking out, I pull myself together for just long enough to muse on the wording of the letters. California's worst drivers? Poor driving record? Most crashes, injuries, and deaths? Calm down DMV, I was the only car on a five lane highway at two in the morning, it's not like I drove clean through a shopping mall on Black Friday.

Gathering My Thoughts

This wasn't a contingency I was prepared for. It had never even crossed my mind. I can live without having a car for transportation, that's not a big deal. But what am I supposed to do, just find a spot where I can leave it for six months? And did the cop who wrote my ticket know he was taking away my license by piling on those charges? The letters made it incredibly clear what the consequences of driving without a license were:

IF YOU DRIVE WITHOUT A VALID LICENSE, YOU CAN BE ARRESTED. YOUR CAR CAN BE IMPOUNDED AND SOLD.

So not only can I be arrested, but my car can literally be sold at auction? That kind of raises the stakes, you know, because I live in my car. Driving without a license could literally make me homeless, and not in the fun, cushy, voluntary way that I'm currently homeless.

At the bottom of the letter, it says I can schedule a hearing, which I resolve to do first thing Monday morning.

Here Goes Everything

Five minutes before my scheduled phone hearing (I didn't even know that was a thing), I get a call from who I presume to be the DMV:

Hi, is this Brandon? We took a look at your case and are calling to tell you we cancelled the hearing, your license is not being suspended. We'll send you a letter confirming this. Have a great day!

-Overly Cheerful DMV Lady

Well then, that was anticlimactic. I don't know whether it was a computer glitch or just miscommunication between the states involved, but it's over. I would much preferred if it had not happened in the first place, because I spent the whole weekend having a perpetual stress-induced aneurysm, but that's just life I guess. Luckily, I don't have to worry about any speeding tickets in the near future…the truck doesn't even go that fast.

I promised a mega Q&A, I'm delivering a mega Q&A. I had upwards of 750 questions, so I took some of the most popular (and least creepy) ones, scrubbed out the personal info, fixed some spelling, did a bit of rephrasing, and tossed them up here.

Bring In The Questions

Why don't you have ads? / Why don't you monetize the blog? / Have you considered selling your soul to the highest bidder?

As much as I love the tagline "This truck lifestyle brought to you by Home Depot", I honestly have no intentions of making money off this blog. This is a hobby for me, a vehicle for catharsis and documentation, so that when I'm 65 and (probably) a well-adjusted member of society, I can look back at this blog and laugh at my past antics. I have the attention-span of a small child, and my memory is abnormally bad for someone my age, so this blog takes the place of my seriously-lacking long-term memory capabilities. As an aside, thank you to the guy who estimated my server costs and sent me an anonymous tip, you totally didn't have to do that and I appreciate the gesture. If I were better at managing Datastore queries, your estimate would have been pretty close, but that's a story for a future post.

Why don't you live in an RV or a camper | trailer or housecar | motor home or conversion van | white or brown rice | black or pinto beans?

This was probably the most common question I got asked (not the Chipotle part), aside from "Where do I go to the bathroom?", which I answered here a few months ago. I know I've totally blown the whole "low profile" thing, but one big reason I got a truck was because it's much less conspicuous than an RV. If you see an RV in a corporate parking lot, your reaction is "Someone definitely lives there. Like, that's totally someone's home". In a corporate setting, large white box trucks are moving around constantly, and you develop a sort of selective blindness towards them. The other big reason I got a truck, decidedly less comfortable than an RV, is because I don't want to be comfortable. Affording myself cushy modern comforts means I'd likely get comfortable just hanging out, and not doing anything enriching or productive or fun. The truck isn't comfortable: it's unbearably hot (over 100° F) between the hours of 11-5 PM, it doesn't have a bathroom or windows, in fact, it barely has anything at all. That's a good thing. It keeps me out of it during the day, it's hard to sleep in and laze around when you're borderline being cooked alive. It forces me to go out and explore the area around me: I go on long bike rides or explore San Francisco, or maybe I'll grab my Kindle and read some travel books in a quaint cafe. I was well-aware of how uncomfortable a truck would be when I bought it, the discomfort is a tool to save me from myself. I've said it before and I'll say it again: if you're spending a lot of time in a small box (literally or metaphorically), you're doing it wrong.

Why don't you include Commuting Costs | Truck Resale Value | Food | Electricity | Hot Water | Other Utilities | Car Insurance | Postage | The Price of Tea in China in the savings calculator formula?

The savings calculator is meant to be a conservative rough estimate of how much money I've currently saved over renting. I'm not including the potential future money I'd get from selling the truck, because that's not liquid cash I have available to me. That said, I will update the clock soon (with an accompanying post), because my insurance did go up ever so slightly. It didn't go up nearly as much as I deserved, which I thought was pretty sweet.

Do you have a Facebook | Instagram | Snapchat | mailing list? / What do you look like? / What is your blood type? / What are your exact GPS coordinates? / Why don't you love me? / Are you even listening to me??

I do have a Facebook and a Snapchat, but those aren't for consumption by the Internet, they're for my own personal social-ification. As for what I look like: two eyes, one nose (on the larger side), a mouth, hair in all the places you'd expect. I've been told I have a very punchable face, so there's that. Blood type is O+, which makes me a good donor candidate.

What are you going to do when winter comes? / Are you aware that winter is a season? / I've heard cold air causes cancer, do you want cancer?

This is definitely on my radar, and I'm very aware that the Earth is tilted at approximately 23° and this causes seasons for most of the planet. Hold tight, I'm dedicating a full future post to the inevitable but temporary heat-death of the universe.

What's the login button for?

Valid question. It serves no purpose for anyone other than me. When I log in, the options at the top of the screen change, and that's how I write my posts. I'll hide it somewhere less obnoxious eventually, but for now, don't worry about it too much.

Have you heard of Mr. Money Mustache | ERE | my uncle Greg?

I actually had not heard of these places, but now that I have, expect a future post about how I'm applying their advice to box life.

I've been reading these posts in chronological order. Some ways through, I got a sinking feeling: is this what it's like to watch a person go mad bit by bit?

Having never watched someone go insane bit by bit firsthand, I'm not sure I can answer this one with any degree of confidence. That said, as a human being whose thoughts and opinions are shaped by his experiences, living in a truck has certainly changed my perception of a lot of things: homelessness, happiness, money, human nature; you name it. Personally, I don't think my ideas are tending toward derangement, but that's just my unbiased opinion.

Do you need a special driver's license to operate the truck?

Terrifyingly enough, no. Like some types of RVs, any pasty-faced teenager with a freshly minted license, no special training, and minimal real-world driving experience could hop behind the wheel. I have my CDL license, which is why I'd even considered getting something this large in the first place. The box truck is really just a decommissioned 16' Budget truck.

Where do you have stuff shipped to?

Sometimes my private mailbox, but most of the time I have it shipped directly to work. They bring packages right to your desk, which is unbelievably convenient.

Have you planned how long will you live in the truck?

I have not. It's hard to say, too. Certainly I could hop onto Craigslist and find an apartment/sell the truck in one fell swoop. The answer I always give people is that I'll stop living in a truck when it's no longer a reasonable solution for me. As of right now, and for the foreseeable future, I'm perfectly contented sleeping in the truck, and I wouldn't even be any happier in an apartment.

I thought I'd check out your blog, but now I see you use the modifier "super-" I'm outta here.

I'm so stupendously super sorry, seriously.

What's wrong with peeing in the woods?

If you're camping, nothing at all. If you're twenty feet from your office, everything.

Do you give box tours?

If you're in the area, and can convince me you have no intention of chopping me up into little pieces and feeding me to your multiple pet ferrets, totally!

As for everyone who emailed and commented with words of encouragement, links to similar blogs, or tips on how to improve my setup, thank you! I'm still digesting the enormous wealth of information, but over the next few weeks I'll be translating it into "Home Improvement" posts and everything like such as.

Note: Throughout this post, I use phrases like "yesterday" and "last night". In reality, it was two nights ago, but I'm slow to get my thoughts onto (digital) paper.

The Bay Area is a fairly dry place. In the past six months of my living out here, it has only "rained" a handful of times. I use the term rain lightly, because it's barely ever more than a passing drizzle. In spite of the precipitation's timidity, people have become so adjusted to the area's micro-climate that they act (and drive) like it's a flash flood. Yesterday, it rained. But it didn't "rain", no, this wasn't Your Dad's Rain™ at all. Yesterday, I experienced my first Californian downpour.

A Rude Awakening

Falling asleep to the sounds of a light drizzle has actually proved fairly relaxing. The measured, metallic taps of gentle raindrops on the thin box roof haven't been cause for much concern. Unfortunately, that doesn't hold true when showers become full-on rainstorms, a la last night. The metallic taps turn into a two-year old's one-man pot-and-pan all-percussion band, a perfect maelstrom of discordant tones. It was more than enough to wake me up a few times over the course of the night: groggy, confused, and wondering if my life was in danger at the hands of the monsters pounding on my walls.

The Problem

I've mentioned "The Hole" before, a looming Home Improvement project I've been trying (lackadaisically) to figure out how to address. It hasn't really been an issue, the pecking crows I get every so often aren't a big deal, and the few sporadic spurts of rainfall I've seen so far never let more than a few drops of water inside. Last night, my relationship with rain took a turn for the worse. Dwarfed by the din of rain using my roof as a bongo drum, I could faintly hear a metered drip sound, maybe once every few seconds. This is a Bad Thing™: a drip every few minutes I can ignore, but at this frequency, I'm dealing with a pretty substantial amount of water. Too much water potentially means mold or mildew, or rotting away the wood, or making the truck extra humid during the day, which in turn makes it a breeding ground for sadness (read: bugs). So I begrudgingly rolled out of bed (at 3:26 AM) and took a look at the situation. Sure enough, the area around the hole was providing a slow, but steady stream of water droplets, and aggressively placing them on my floor. Time to spring into action.

The (Very Temporary) Solution

I'm no stranger to leaky roofs; my childhood home had its fair share of drip spots. The living room and my bedroom were particularly bad offenders, but we'd just grab a few pots from the kitchen, gingerly place them on the carpet, and not think much more of it. As it turns out, I don't have many pots in the truck. I did however, have an empty tub of protein powder that I hadn't had a chance to throw away yet. But alas, the drip was in the corner of the truck, and water was splashing all over the wooden railings before it hit the ground. I first attempted to tape the tub to the wall/ceiling, but all I had was carpenter's tape and the angle was all wrong anyway. I needed a way to divert the water away from the wall, and funnel it down into the tub.

Then I remembered about the new clothes rack I've yet to finish. The hollow metal rod is ever so slightly longer than the width of the truck, and I've been taking my sweet time cutting it with a hack saw (which takes forever). As a result, it's been sitting on the ground for approximately two months, clanging obnoxiously to remind me of its presence anytime I drive anywhere. Anyway, I maneuvered one end of the rod up to the leak, jammed the other end into the tub, and then used a bin full of random stuff to hold it in place. The end result is pictured above, and I like to think that MacGyver would be proud.

It was still raining when I woke up again at 5:30 AM, and the makeshift bucket had actually collected a fairly impressive amount of water. Was the stopgap a success? I like to think so.

The Longer-Term Solution

Even though it doesn't rain here much, fixing the leak is a much more attractive option than just managing the leak. Theoretically, I could just rig up the pipe/tub combination every time it started raining, but that's more of a cop-out than anything else. What happens if I'm away for a few days and it rains? I can't keep the pipe there all the time, it's not stable enough to stay in place while I'm driving. Plus, do I really want to keep an empty tub around all the time? That's just clutter, and I'm not one for clutter.

The issue is that the damaged area isn't just one material. The outside looks like sheet metal, and the inside is some sort of fiberglass composite. I could just throw some epoxy putty over the wound, but I have my doubts about how well that would hold/keep out water. I'll have to call a few different places (mechanics, glass companies, Ford-certified maintenance centers, etc) and see if anyone can fix the whole thing at once. And if it takes them more than a day to do it, I have to find a place to stay. Not a big deal, but the combination of all the aforementioned obstacles probably explains why, after six months of owning the truck, the damned hole is still there.

Insurance.

I've ducked and dodged dependence on electricity and other utilities, and I definitely don't have a home phone or Internet service. Insurance is the one recurring truck-related expense I'm stuck with.* Given how little I drive the truck and my squeaky-clean, accident-free track-record, I would totally ditch that too if it weren't mandatory in California.** And while I may have dodged a bullet with the license situation, that frosty Boston speeding ticket was still looming overhead. So naturally I wasn't ecstatic when I got a letter stating it's time to renew my insurance policy, until I took a good look at my old policy.

Some Backstory: May 20^th, 2015

This was the day I drove my current home off the lot. I was pretty anxious during the purchase, I've never before had to put on a pokerface that says, "Trust me, it's normal that a 22-year old guy is independently buying this decommissioned Budget truck, and I definitely, definitely have no intention of living in it." By hour 4 of negotiating and signing papers, I was itching to leave. To speed up the process, I pretty much accepted all of the defaults for the insurance policy with very little resistance. One of the things I didn't check carefully enough was the "Current Estimated Annual Miles" section, and here's where the fun begins.

The "Current Estimated Annual Miles" field on my insurance policy was entered as 8,000 miles, which I couldn't help but laugh at. I know some of my decisions could be considered questionable, but the idea of driving that rusty, screaming metal death trap for 8,000 miles a year is downright suicidal. It's already been around the block over 158,000 times (assuming "the block" has a circumference of one mile), driving it any more than I need to is like poking an unstable, already-ticking time-bomb. As with all vehicles that are quite literally powered by explosions, it's not a matter of if it'll break down, but when it'll break down. And who knows how catastrophic the breakage will be? Maybe I'll be lucky enough to experience a simple tire blowout or a quaint engine fire, but what if the back gate just falls off and strews my few possessions all over the road for terrified commuters to run over? I'm not trying to re-create a scene from Final Destination, so I drive only when totally necessary. Plus, you can practically hear the screams of future generations coming out of the exhaust pipe as I idle in traffic, getting 8 miles per gallon while I star in Al Gore's nightmares. An estimate of 8,000 miles a year was clearly too high, but how much had I actually driven in the past six months of owning this thing?

Digging out the paperwork from when I bought the truck, I could see that the odometer reading was 157,500 miles at the time of purchase. Taking a quick look at the dashboard on my way out this morning, I saw that I was sitting at a cool 158,514 miles. Putting my engineering degree to work here: 158,514 - 157,500 = 1,014 miles. That's for six months though, so my yearly mileage estimate is ~2,000 miles, give or take a trip to San Francisco. But that's pretty good! Certainly better than the 8,000 estimated miles I'm currently paying for. And fewer miles means less driving, which means spending less time on the road, which (hopefully) means fewer accidents, which (hopefully) means lower insurance premiums! After a (surprisingly quick) call to my insurance agent, I found out that I could bring in the truck, show them the odometer and truck-sale-paperwork, and get an updated quote on my renewal. Sounded good to me

The Trip

We've talked about how traffic is everything bad about the world, right? Like, how cars idling on a long stretch of highway are the physical manifestation of evil? Well I let out my dark side today by leaving work at the height of rush hour and sitting idly on the 101, which I would classify as a Bad Move™. Instead of a reasonable 15 minutes, which is what the drive would normally have taken, I had 55 glorious minutes to lament over what a terrible invention the automobile is while repeatedly bashing my head against the steering wheel to pass the time. Seriously, I don't understand how people can commute like that every day and still claim to have a soul. Anyway, I eventually arrived at the insurance place, where they took pictures of my odometer and bestowed the new quote upon me. As a reminder, my payment for the past six months was $727.88, or ~$121 a month. Taking into account the freshly-minted speeding ticket on my record, I wasn't sure what to expect. Drum roll please:

… drum roll sounds …

$421.88!

That there is downright reasonable. My monthly "rent" for the next six months is going to be ~$70, a pleasant 40% reduction from the past six months. Plus, because I showed up two weeks before my policy needed to be renewed, they're going to refund me the difference on my current policy, prorated for these next two weeks. That adds another $26 to my rent-savings, making my monthly bill ~$116 a month for the past six months. I'll update the savings calculator formula once I get the exact numbers in the mail, and I have a new algorithm that can handle my changing insurance costs, which I'll upload soon. I have a few other fancy-shmancy updates (like working search functionality) on the way as well, so watch out for those.

But Brandon, you got a speeding ticket, shouldn't that have made your insurance, like, a BILLION DOLLARS?

I would have thought so too, but then I remembered a speeding ticket I got about three years ago. It was two years and nine months old when I started my policy six months ago, which means that it still counted against me and drove up the rate on my original policy. But tickets only count against you for three years apparently, so it "expired" about three months ago. And if I hadn't promptly replaced it with a new speeding ticket, it's very likely my new policy quote would have been even lower. There are other factors too, my age and marital status makes insurance more expensive, but my Good Driver discount (that I somehow get???) and Science Degree discount (I love how that's a thing) help to balance it out. In any case: 55 minutes could save you 40% or more on car insurance.***

_{*I do have a music streaming subscription and some monthly server costs, but since those aren't truck or house-related expenses, I didn't feel the need to mention them.}

_{**It's mandatory in 47 other states too, with the mavericks being New Hampshire and Virginia.}

_{***Or however that jingle goes.}

I'd like to start with a eulogy.

We're gathered here today to mourn the loss of a close friend. His duration in our lives was swift and fleeting, almost ephemeral. His presence was electric, his absence left a hole in my heart, not to mention a deficit in my transportation abilities. Yes, I'm talking about the passing of our beloved friend, my corporate Specialized Turbo.

Before I say anything else, let me just acknowledge that this was entirely my fault. Okay, so remember that awesome electric bike I got through a company pilot program? It turns out that a big stipulation of the program is that the main usage of the bike has to be commuting. Naturally, living on campus, my "commute" doesn't quite qualify, and so I, with a heavy heart, had to return the bike. In my defense, I was "commuting" to my mailbox (~10 miles away) 3-4 times a week, but that's still not quite in the spirit of the program.

What Now?

I was just starting to explore the immense mobility the bike provided me. It liberated me from two equally-unpleasant travelling options: spend all my time walking or drive my clunky, inefficient house (it's barely a car, as far as I'm concerned) around. I had bought a really nice helmet for use with the electric bike, which I'd hate to see sitting around the truck, going to waste. I knew I couldn't go back to my old life Before Cycling (BC for short). I also knew I wasn't going to spend $3,000+ on a fancy, brand new electric bicycle. My current priorities dictate that I split that money between my remaining student loans and my fancy new investment portfolio (to be detailed in a future post). So I started looking around for gently-worn, non-electric road bikes.

The Haggle Battle

I was raised Jewish, though I haven't regularly attended services in nearly a decade. It follows that, if you believe in stereotypes, I should theoretically be good at haggling. But experience has shown that I'm just not good at it. In fact, I'd go as far as saying I'm flat out bad at it, somehow forking over more cash than if I had said nothing at all.

But Brandon, what does your inconsistent, lackadaisical approach to Judaism have to do with bicycles?

Well impatient reader, allow me to explain. On this past Monday evening, I sauntered into a quaint used bike shop in Palo Alto, and casually laid down my demand.

"I'm looking for a used road bike", I said, "Nothing fancy, just to get around town. My budget is $300." Notice that I didn't say "about $300" or "around $300". This is important because 1) I'm usually a huge, subconscious advocate for that type of imprecise language and 2) it sets the groundwork for what took place next.

The bike shop salesperson grabs two bikes for me to try out outside. The first one is a "vintage" bike, which is just bike-speak for "really old". I get on it and it starts to spasmodically shift gears without any input from me. Assuming demonic possession, I bring that bike inside and grab the next one. This one doesn't appear to need an exorcism, but I'm not particularly wowed either. It's a bit rusty, and I feel like I'm putting in a disproportionate amount of effort for the snails' pace that I'm moving at. Those bikes were $250 and $300 respectively. I go back inside, and the salesperson says to me, "Here, try this one out, I think you might like it." It feels like that scene in Harry Potter where he's picking out his first wand and he finds the perfect match in the pair wand to Voldemort's. I get on and it just feels right. Taking it out for a spin, it's smooth and the gears shift nicely. This is the one, I know it. I bring it back inside, the smile on my face lets the salesperson know I've found my bike.

"This one", he says, "is $400."

My heart sinks a bit: though my $300 limit was arbitrary, he doesn't know that, and I intend to stick with it. I let out a sigh, "that's really unfortunate. I like the bike, but $300 is my limit here."

He furrows his brow a bit, "I can probably do $350".

At this point, I realize that my first successful haggle is underway, and I stand firm, "Sorry man, I set aside $300 to get a bike, I really can't go over that." Sure it's not entirely truthful, but $300 is my target.

"It's only a year old and was hardly used. If it were brand new, this bike would cost…", he pauses for a second to look it up, "over $500. The best I can do is $320." It's pretty close to what I wanted and he seems serious, I should take it. It's a great bike and my past day's research says this is a good deal. But I keep pushing.

"That's too bad, I was hoping to take this bike home today. Do you have any other bikes in my price range I could look at?"

He cracks. "You know what, I'll give it to ya for $300".

I take him up on the offer immediately, and I buy a $50 lock too, because I feel bad for subjecting him to my games and appreciate his flexibility. I also genuinely needed a lock. He throws in a kickstand, and attaches the bike lock for me as well. The total, with tax, comes to ~$390. Not bad, not bad at all.

I load it into the back of the truck, and secure it to the bike rack I had built for the electric bike. Because this bike is so much lighter (20 pounds versus 50 pounds), it feels much more stable.

Quality Time with the Bike

Hagglefest 2015 was last Monday, so I've had almost a week to get familiar with my new fat-powered race car. I didn't do much riding until yesterday, mostly just short trips into town, which the bike complied with handily, without question. Yesterday however, I did something crazy.

The Big Ride

My cardio is generally awful, as I've mentioned before. Jogging a mile requires an act of divine intervention, and I've never cycled more than ~20 miles at once. Even when I did, those 20 mile trips were on the electric bike which, on "full power" mode (the default setting), does most of the work for me. But I'd really been enjoying the bike so far, and I was itching to take it on a real ride. It just so happened that there was a truck-people meetup happening in Oakland on Saturday (which will definitely get its own post). So I resolved to bike to Oakland, a ~50 mile, four hour odyssey from where my box-truck home is parked. I had no idea what I was getting into.

This post is already getting pretty long, so I'll skip most of the tiny, inconsequential details that I love to ramble on about (like how I still had two hours to go when I thought I was "almost there"). The gist is that the ride was punishing, but beautiful. I rode across long swaths of the Bay Trail, crossed over the Dumbarton Bridge, and saw plenty of gorgeous, sprawling land and seascapes. It was well-worth the chapped lips, sweat-soaked clothing, and sore, bruised butt bones (which I now know are called ischial tuberosities). Plus, it's gratifying to know that I biked a distance that's likely distinguishable from space. I still can't feel my legs, but that'll probably get better (right?). I'll definitely do similar rides in the future, once my body forgives me.

One last note that I thought was interesting: If I had still had the electric bike, it's very likely I wouldn't have biked the distance. The battery range is only 25-30 miles, so 60% of the way through my trip, the bike would have died and I'd be left with a 50 pound bike and 20+ miles to go. Not ideal. I would have had to either drive (environmental homicide/generally awful) or Caltrain/BART (lame and inconvenient). So I'm actually getting more use out of a less-fancy bicycle. Life is all about your willingness to make lemonade.