uh oh.....van is dying rapidly.....

Uh oh, the van is dying rapidly. I've got work lined up, but it requires that I have transportation. Scary thing with the van is that when I look at how much money the people I bought it from put into it, it makes me worry....can you say money pit?

So now, it just loses all power and the throttle goes dead. It always restarts and after stalling and starting for an hour or so, it begins to run perfectly.

Yesterday, I woke up with one of those hangovers that says "I'm going to give up drinking once and for all" OUCH! I bailed from Waikiki where I was parking next to the zoo and drove around the south shore. Past Hanauma Bay, the van stopped stalling. Words can't emphasize how shitty I felt. If you've been there, you know.

So anyway, I just wanted to find a quiet and uncrowded beach park to make coffee in, set up my hammock, have a swim, and sleep it off. Sundays are crowded. Even at usually uncrowded spots like Wamimanalo and Bellows Beach. So I continued driving up the beach to my old haunt of Punaluu. I picked up a hitchhiker who smoked a bowl with me and then parked and made coffee near Chinamans Hat on the windward side.

I went to Laie, the mormon enclave of Oahu to buy a steak, but everything is closed on Sunday there. Finally found a steak and drove back to Kahana Bay where I napped and then barbecues a steak and some potatos with garlic. Yum. I was starting to feel a bit better.

Night before last I made Hobo Packets....here's the recipe...

Ingredients
1 pound ground pork
2 medium potatoes skinned and sliced
1 sweet potato, skinned and sliced
2 medium onions, sliced
salt and pepper to taste
lots of garlic, peeled and sliced
lemon juice
soy sauce


Directions
Form ground beef into patties and place each on a square of aluminum foil. Divide potatoes, garlic, and onions equally and arrange on top of patties. Add salt and pepper to taste. Place lemon and soy on top of vegetables. Seal foil tightly and place on grill or directly on coals for about 45 minutes to an hour. Can also be cooked in the oven at 350 degrees F. for 45 minutes. Delicious and easy


That made enough to feed my friend Steve and myself. Plus there was a third packet in case someone came along. I had it for breakfast yesterday.

So anyway, back to Kahana Bay where it began to get dark and I lit a fire. I was just chillin by myself and a Hawaiian guy came along. I invited him to sit. He offered to smoke a joint. Why not. Then he offered me some ice (it's like crack but made form crystal meth instead of coke) I declined so he smoked some himself. Then he offered me cigarettes (I also declined...almost two months smoke free), candy, and we talked about life. When I told him I was worried about money, he insisted on giving me five bucks. I told him I was okay and he refused to take it back. Crackheads can be really nice people. He was.

None the less, I didn't feel comfortable sleeping there (ice does strange things to people) so I drove back down to Chinamans Hat and slept until this AM. STill feeling slightly wretched. Now I'm here in the library working on my novel and doing a little promotion for Rough Living.

BTW, I will be doing a new edition of Rough Living very soon. If you have any good Tips you'd like to share please email them to rough_living@yahoo.com

chris damitio
www.geocities.com/rough_living

Signed Copy of Rough Living on EBAY!

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Living Rough Again

Alright...I can't resist. I'm living in a van again. This time on the island of Oahu. I got the van for $175. It's a plymouth voyager and it seems to have fuel injection problems. It gets me where I need to go though, so far. I'm having a hard time sleeping at night. maybe because it's an island, it's a littel different than my old VW days. The main annoyances....

1) there are no parking signs everywhere mostly 10PM to 7AM etc

2) Hawaiians love to play loud music and have impromptu parties in Marinas and parks without no parking signs. I tend to avoid drunken gatherings of big Samoans, Hawaiians, Tongans, and Filipinos

3) People in neighborhoods are so f#*(ing healthy, they wake up at 5AM and start raking leaves, running, watering plants, etc

4) People actually know each other in neighborhoods here, I stand out...people look and say "who is that guy in the van?" not like the mainland where no one knows anyone else.

Despite all of that, I'm figuring it out. I generally sleep in two stages, moving at least once during the night. In the day, I make coffee in the van, swim, shower at the beach, go for a sunrise run (yeah, I'm healthy too!), read for a while, then go to the library where I work on my novel.

One very cool thing is wifi...ci can use peoples internet from my van with my laptop. Very cool.

I usually buy what I want to eat and then cook it. Why have extra. All in all. Life is pretty good. Hopefully, I can get my van fixed soon, the fuel injectors seem to be going out...crapola.

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