(written on the 7th)
Not really all that much happened today. It was the second day of conference, So I listened to both sessions.
I did a little just answer work, which, was a little iffy, if I’m going to be turning back toward God yet again. 😅
Fixed my rear door while listening to conference (happy from one of my sisters, as they announced a temple in Rapid City 🥳). Tried to clean up the front section where the top extension screws onto the van itself. I cleaned off the rest dissolving goo that I put on last time and put some more goo on after scraping it all down with a screwdriver and a wire brush again.
Probably not really doing anything useful, but… I figure I had probably at least give it a reasonable go if I hope to have the van last as long as possible.
Stayed and chatted with Richard and family and some other visitors that were at the house. Ate dinner, chatted some more. My mom came over, as did Jack’s girlfriend and whatnot.
Headed over to Jared’s place after that, unloading the mattress that I bought from him a year and a half ago, as well as some books that I had also brought from Arkansas to him for my mom.
That gave me a little bit more space to work with inside. I’m super cramped right now because I’ve got three extra tires, solar panels, and I still have my keyboard, and monitor that I haven’t sold yet.
Need to list stuff for sale. I listed the keyboard for sale, but I’m thinking that, even though it was a pretty penny when I bought it, it’s just not what people want these days. Or they just want to pay a lot less for it.
I think I paid over $500 for it, and they still sell for $500 plus tax new. I have it listed for $275, and I got one nibble once, somebody offering $200, but then they didn’t respond after that.
Anyway, had a super challenging time trying to get the mattress cover back on the mattress. I had washed it in preparation for giving it back to jared, but the design was such that it only unzips halfway, so it’s a pretty massive ordeal to take the mattress cover on and off.
Gratefully, though Jared wasn’t home, his neighbor across the street saw me fighting with the cover and came over and helped me get it back on. Definitely took the two of us to have even a prayer of getting it done reasonably.
Even with two of us, it was brutal.
Jared and Cortney got home probably about 5 or 10 minutes after we finished getting the mattress cover put on and after the neighbor had already left.
I hung out and chatted with Jared and Cortney for probably about an hour or two before heading out to put everything back in my van that I had pulled out to get the mattress out.
From there, I headed back up to the salt lake valley, not sure where I was going to stay the night, but pulling into the Walmart on 114th South. I wasn’t able to stay the night there, because Walmart in Utah has decided to stop allowing people to camp overnight in their parking lots.
One more casualty of covid, I think. They stopped being open 24 hours, and I guess most of them stopped allowing people to stay the night.
Anyway, I decided that was a good place to try and work on my exhaust system to try and diagnose exactly what part of the exhaust system was clogged up.
So I spent the next probably hour to hour and a half fighting with the system, using my angle grinder, my ratchets and sockets, and whatever else to cut off the bolts that were badly rusted on that connected me downstream catalytic converter to the rest of the exhaust system out the back.
In an effort to avoid people thinking I was stealing the catalytic converter, I popped my hood and left the doors open.
Seemed like it worked, as no one gave me any grief for what I was doing. 🎉
Unfortunately, after disconnecting that section of the exhaust system, there was still almost no exhaust pressure, which means either one or both of the upstream catalytic converters must be plugged up.
Ugh.
That means I’m going to have to either put a borescope through the O2 sensor holes or up the exhaust pipe to try and see where the clog is, or I’m going to have to remove the upper catalytic converters.
Ugh. 🙄
I would so much rather just replace a starter or an alternator or maybe even a water pump. Rusty exhaust systems are brutal.
Anyway, I got the exhaust pipe tied up so that it wouldn’t fall, as now it was no longer bolted together properly and was just dangling.
Headed over to the WinCo in midvale, hoping maybe to stay the night because it’s a 24-hour store, and also hoping to grab some groceries.
There was a little bit of sticker shock, as it’s more expensive than walmart now.
Oh well. It’s open 24, and Walmart isn’t anymore, and I think it was maybe 1 ish in the morning at that point?
Only managed maybe an hour or two in Rover before the WinCo security knocked on the door and told me I couldn’t stay there.
Bummer. The young security guard was really nice about it, which was nice.
I thought about staying at the St Mark’s hospital, a place I had stayed at in years past when I was in my prism, but now being in Rover, I’m quite conspicuous everywhere I go. 🙃
So I just headed over to my friend Cory’s place, getting there around 2:00 in the morning, I think, and crashed for the night.
Unfortunately, the road is super banked right there by his house, so my bed was tilted pretty significantly, but… whatever.
I also noticed that Cory’s Suburban wasn’t there, so I wondered if he was even there. 😅
Gratitude:
- And grateful for what I heard during Conference, specifically one of the talks from one of the ladies and the morning session I think it was.
- I’m grateful to be able to spend time with family here
- I’m grateful that I decided to pick up trash in Moab. Along one of the turnouts where there was a beautiful view, there was trash absolutely everywhere, so I grabbed a couple of grocery bags and started picking up trash. Included in the trash that I was picking up were several strands of shredded tire, and it was those strands of tire that I was able to use to tie up my exhaust system. 🥳
- I’m grateful to have been able to catch up with Jared and Cortney a bit.
- I’m grateful to hear of positive family news in multiple different siblings’ families. 🥰
Success:
- I was a lot better today with language. Probably has something to do with the god stuff. I feel… better inside.
Improvement:
- Working on Sunday…
Loves and hugs.
Lift the world.
~ stephen
Lift the World 