Okay, it was our first day of retirement, and we slept in, since obviously we didn't need to get up early to beat the traffic. I went for a 2.5 hour bike ride, Mrs. Dirtbagger went for a jog. We took the dog for a walk.
New IGo power adapter showed up from www.buy.com. Got it for 60 bucks below regular retail. Go www.cnet.com, the list all the suppliers so you can pick the lowest price with best reputation.
Hell, I'm already relaxed and this is the first day.
OK, so it was kinda surreal today. Today was the last day of our employment. So tomorrow we get up, for...uh nothing.
Wow, I'm already bored. Maybe I'll go find a job.
Here is a pic of the new super fly ultra cool laptop I purchased for the road trip. True, I took 20 hours to decide which model, but I'm really happy with it, and the price I paid.
I was so excited this morning. Today we had fog. So I drove down the road with my new fog lamps on. I'm such a redneck. Anyhow, we've tons of places to visit lined up. Here is how it's looking:
So I have to purchase a new personal computer. If we're gonna keep some sort of log of our travels, and keep a buh-zillion pictures, gotta have a lame excuse to buy a new PC. Isn't THAT exciting? Well actually it is. Here visibility to my personal hell aka my own private Idaho.
Spend oh, 10 hours determining who are the major players in the laptop market. Spend another 10+ hours figuring out which retailer has what PC at what price. Who will sell the EXACT same PC with the EXACT same configuration, for the lowest cost? www.newegg.com.
So the dilema? I bitch about spending money. I just bought a 1500 dollar laptop. I complain that I don't have time. I just spent 20 hours picking out a PC. The new PC better be cool or I'm throwing it into the lake, or even better, burn a hole in it with my new fog lamps.
The aroma of Tacoma drew us in. Yep, that is right. Mrs DirtBagger and I in our preparation efforts spent nearly 500 dollars on random crap for our new trailer. What might you ask? Things like plastic wheel chocks and 4.99 each (gotta have 4 of them bastards) and a Woodalls camping guide at 12 bucks, a BBQ'er @ 100 dollars, special toilet chemicals, special toilet paper, special this, special that. Christ. Seems like in our feeble attempt to downsize and simplify our lives, we've just added another mechanism of complication.
Oh well, it's not the destination, but the journey, and we'll have tons of crap to leave as breadcrumbs for the return trip home. Breadcrumbs....Didn't Hanzel and Gretel get eaten by the witch?
OK, so I decided to spend my Saturday putting the new PIAA foglamps installed in my truck. These are not some cheesy Shucks Auto Supply pieces o' crap. These babies are high intensity, halogen retina burners! All the kids have them, and I gotta have mine too!
Beauty was, it only took two trips to my local Ace Hardware store. Once to get the parts, and trip two was to replace all the fuses I blew installing parts from the first trip. The rules of home improvement also apply to cars too.
So here is a photo of the finished product, my awesome ARB Sahara bar and PIAA fog lamps. Now, all I have to do is sit patiently in the cab of my truck and wait for some fog.....
My local UHaul installed my brake controller, and heavy duty class III hitch with the weight distribution components yesterday. How Bitchin' I'm ready for some super duty hitchin!
Today we dropped off the truck @ a local Uhaul dealer to have the class III receiver, weight distribution hitch, and electronic brake controller installed. It was done in less than 3 hours. Looks like the only thing I need to do is have the oil transmission cooler installed. Can't imagine blasting down the freeway to have my tranny overheat and blow tranny fluid all over I5. What a site that would be. We're about 3+ weeks away from trailer pickup.
Our route to Tucson and back via the land of fruits and nuts (California) is over 4300 miles long. Hope I have damned good map.
Looks like folks have organized a little get together for me @ work. Should be fun. Get to hang out and look @ the expressions on people's faces as I tell everyone why I'm quitting work and have decided to travel travel around in the US of A. Some call it a walkabout. I call it bliss.
Quartzite AZ, here we come!
Fabien has a BLOG - http://neibaf.blogspot.com
Michelle has a BLOG - http://maislen.blogspot.com
Man, I'm really behind on this thing. Here are two of my best friends pouring out their deepest feelings in their weblogs, and Mrs. Dirtbagger and I are detailing modifications to my truck to pull our trailer. God, I am so shallow. Oh well slow and shallow like a pond always returns to it's calm state more quickly than the ocean. Am I serious?
Time to go. Gotta go get a botox injection in my butt.
Today I gave notice I was leaving my job. After 16 years of working, and 10 of those years for the same company. We've decided it's time to go do something new and live a little. Life is too short to save up for "someday." What if someday never comes? For some it never does...
I'm just waiting for my prince charming...
Today we made a downpayment on the travel trailer we're gonna buy. Now we need to quit our jobs and road trip to Tucson AZ to go and get it.
Clearly our first quality step to some good white trash living!
Our History: After countless years in the corporate world, it's time to say the hell with it. It's a new year, and time to do some new things, so we are quitting our high paying, high tech, high stress jobs on January 31st, 2005.
Our Title: It's a combination of a midlife crisis and living cheaply. Yea, we're over 30, and dirt bagging is a term borrowed from the rock and mountain climbing hippies. Work a job, save up enough money and go live off that money in a low or no cost, minimalistic style. This life is generally frowned upon in today's materialistic society. It should be fun. I mean who doesn't enjoy a road trip? It's a total piece of americana.
Our Plan: Buy a good cheap travel trailer, and travel throughout the western United States going on 2-3 week road trips, come home for a while and then take off again. Yep, this is good white trash living @ it's finest.
Our Crew: Mr Dirtbagger, Mrs Dirtbagger, our Chesapeake Bay Retriever, Kuri, aka KurDog, aka Missy, aka Brown Dog, aka Fish Sauce, aka Woo McGoo AND a fat black cat named Spookamo, aka Dorkmier, aka Dorkmeer, aka Hootie, aka Hootie Dootie, aka Jabba the Butt, aka Sphincter Boy, aka Buttmier.
Here is Eilie, Nathan and Mr Dirtbagger during Christmas. They are such good kids and so fun to be around.
So here we are @ the holidays, ready to take on the world, as a couple of unemployed fools...
Front view of new house on the other side of the state. Unlike my "other" house that has wheels this one won't move around. Nieces call this one casa grande!
So guess what's new? Everything?
In light of recent developments and due to an urge to try somethingnew....we have decided to retire. Yes, that is correct, Brad can't bethe only one to attempt this! We are officially quitting our jobs, selling everything, downsizing and moving to a new location in Washington. See new house photos attached.
What you say? And When? Well, officially end of January we will beamong the unemployed. We are buying a new travel trailer and will betooling around the North American continent visiting parks and such. When we get bored we might start a business of our own. I think it's called dirt-baggin', but whatever it is, we're doin' it.
Our furry children will not be requiring a college education (Kuri is a bright girl but home-schooled, Spookamo is a 'tard and ain't got no schoolin', but we love him). So we have no obligations and have decided on a new life style far from the elegant ivory towers, internationaltravel in business class seats, 5-star lunchrooms, corporate phones/cars/pagers and let us not forget the back stabbing, gossip mongering, brown nosers, clueless managers, 60 hour work weeks, endless meetings and thousands of emails.
We are joining the ranks of the "We live on a fixed income, subscribe to AARP and Trailer Life Magazine" retired. No more fancy Christmas gifts or Birthday gifts from us so please reset your expectations. When we visit we will not be arriving in an airplane, instead look for us to pull up in your driveway in our trailer - hope you have hook-ups, especially the sewer! Yes it's shocking and daring but we have been fortunate to have just enough investments to get by, supportive friends and family and a new outlook on life in general. We are going for the gusto!
Mrs Dirtbagger looking hip to be dirtbaggin somewhere in Hong Kong on her last business trip. What a cool chick. She is gonna be my travel partner for the next 24 months. Hope she doesn't divorce me as a result. If she does, she gets custody of the cat.
