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The days are scintillating and bright on the lake, warm-ish in the sun but still a month or so from spring.
Bright blue skies and freezing nights, every night now a different location, place to sleep and wake every morning in a different location along the lake, this - the taste of freedom, freedom...man of the Valley, morning coffee in Kaslo, Nelson, Balfour, on mornings I don't open as far away as Rossland, and just because, just because I can.
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Today, unpacking garbage at the thrift shop, a whole selection of Tarot decks, "Healing Angels", "Healing Dolphins", a "homeopathic" remedy kit, the money people will spend to avoid a trip to the doctor, and - are they all here because she got better, or ????. What kills me is how many of these are written by "Doctors" - eg: "Doreen Virtue Ph.D." - the "credentials" apparently make for a better Tarot Deck (I rather doubt this, more convinced they make for a worse doctor...).
Anyways, from there to pack up the couch, joyous relief to the friend who gave me shelter, trying to look a bit sad, but, really, it's been too long and well overdue. I've gathered far too many "mixed media" supplies, which are all taken and packed into the locker, toiletries, prospecting supplies, clothes (too fucking many clothes!!!!) into the car, and I'm ready to begin another season. I need to find a place for my clothes, another locker even, this is ridiculous, far, far too much baggage for an adventurer such as myself. Far more than I could carry down the mountain, which is what counts anyways. But solutions will shortly present themselves, I'm sure.
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Mission #1, working, Mission #2, find a car. Recruit Chris to drive me to Kaslo, where rumour has it there's a 4X4 for $750.00.
Chat to the guy, it needs brakes, has a bent suspension rod, needs a windshield, battery. Small things, all in all, so if that's it then for $1000 I'm off and to the races.
We get there, it's in "upper Kaslo", which sounds posh - lots of beautiful, big old houses, perfectly preserved from the day when everyone had a 5 bedroom gingerbread mansion with gables and large porches and verandas...
It's quite pretty, really, spectacular even.
But ... it's in "Lower Upper Kaslo" which is the area where somewhere in the 80's or 90's people began building houses on the edges of the stately historical properties, and then began filling their yards with cars and parts cars and more parts cars...
It's nuts, really. Poor people in their vulgar shacks with their assortment of junk cars, snowmobiles, boats, motorcycles, all of which are without plates and in various states of dismantling...
This vehicle, we get out to look at it. Rusted through and through, but I don't particularly give a damn about appearances. The windshield is indeed smashed, we take it for a test drive. It needs a boost to get started. It's got lots of power, but the brakes are completely gone. Meaning that even if I had a plate there would be no driving it to Balfour, slow as we're going around the neighborhood I can't feel the shoe. And it's pulling hard to the right.
We park and give it a good look over, Chris is hum-ho - he's got a similar, lower end model, but his is in mint condition. This is not in mint condition.
Adding up the damage, $3, $4,000 to get it drivable, another month off the road, and then what? I'm trying to talk myself into it, but the abundance of "Shambala" stickers on the back of it are the final straw, I've seen, know the Shambala crowd and it's pretty unlikely they've ever maintained a vehicle in their life.
His price is dropping, $500? $400? He'll tow it to Balfour for me....
We'll think about it.
And, driving around Lower Upper Kaslo we see half a dozen better cars, some of which appear to be in great condition, all without plates, parked in the forest.
I wonder, how to make an offer on these?
***
These trips, they're expensive, having to pay Chris's time, gas, buy him lunch. $120 per failed vehicle attempt could mean I'm out of the vehicle market real quick.
***
Today, Kijiji, Facebook Marketplace, find another few vehicles. There's a serial killer styled van in good working order, Creston, $2000. Might be good, a little more room for living. But I'm kind of stuck on the four wheel drive. There's a Jeep, great condition, uphill, $5300, another one in Trail, good condition, $4200, there's a little TJ for $4500, good for the 4WD but no space for stretching out whatsoever....
And there's an old '98 Jaguar, $6500 OBO - great condition, and not at all a prospector sort of vehicle but maybe I should start driving around in something a little more befitting my station...
A Honda CRV, Thrums, $2500 - Thrums, and this is what I'm going to look at today. Having checked my bank account even this is stretching things - but - I don't want to be sleeping rough in parks anymore. Out of town is fine. My preference for Jeep is going to be swayed by finance and the likelihood that Honda probably makes a better vehicle. I'm going to be sensible for a change.
Fingers crossed.
***
And, a few hours later and I'm once again a free man. The rest of the day spent getting plates, registration, with nary a penny spare. Now some measure of freedom, to be offset by what I estimate to be approximately 2-3 months to shake the winter's debt.
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And Car Shopping, this is ridiculous, finding a decent used vehicle for under $40,000, forget Crypto people, buy a fraction of a used car, wait a year for it to appreciate and then sell it...what happened to the reasonably priced beater? I'm looking at $5,000, $6,000 dollars and more for a beat-up jeep from the late 80's with over 300,000 KM! "Only needs brakes and a transmission...." "My loss is your gain..." This is preposterous!!!
Anyways, surely it will happen and it will be the best jeep ever but - I got to say, it's not happening soon enough...
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Now this laptop, it's due dire death, overdue, nigh-on-useless, so - unfolding it at the café I'm not surprised to get the black screen of death. Not the blue screen, merely a black screen that doesn't tell me if it's on or off or what the fuck is up...
I'm ok with the computer dying, only I have a lot of documents on it. Text files. Writing. Projects. And so I need to find someway get it to work, if only to back it up...
So, troubleshooting possible problems with the internet on my phone (an infinitely more useful computer, if only it had a proper keypad...), googling "Black Screen HP Stream" and I get a few troubleshooting guides - hard reboot, (tried 5 times, no luck), unplug (tried), various other methods, all to no avail. And then the methods become preposterous - "Control-Alt-Delete", and you try it, but the screen is still blank and so I can't resort to the task-manager which would supposedly help me to cure the black screen if only I could see the task manager.
These articles, they're mostly written by tech-shamans, just propose anything and eventually if it works they can take the credit...like "hold it under running water" or "take it to an expert"...the same tech-support strategies practiced by Shaw Cable, absolute bullshit. The situation is growing desperate...
I undertake the tap, bang, nudge and shake philosophy, to no effect. The screen is still black. Increase the violence. Turn off and on again. No luck. I'm beginning to suspect a hardware failure.
Eventually I find the solution - hold down on the Windows+B key and perform a hard reboot.
This solves it. An actual tech article written by somebody who's solved the issue. This is about as rare as finding a fact on Facebook. Now to back-up my computer...