Today's Errands 09/04/2018

A couple days ago, I signed up for a membership at Midtown Fitness in Woodsfield of Monroe County.  Today, I canceled my membership at the YMCA in Marietta of Washington County.  While I was in the area, I purchased a used microwave on the Facebook Marketplace for $10.

I got some cleaning supplies and a case/ Bluetooth keyboard for my tablet.  Since the Verizon Wireless, mobile hotspot that I'm using to send an Wi-Fi Internet signal has a 15GB limit, I'm planning on using the tablet now for Internet communications and entrainment like Pandora, or YouTube.  If the data is used on my the tablet or smartphone only, then those have unlimited data.

My front overhead cabinets were screwed into the ceiling.  But as I was driving my motorhome to this area, I heard what sounded like "broken glass."  The windows are still in fine shape, but the top screws to this overhead cabinet stripped out of the ceiling.  I got two pieces of 1/4in wooden molding strips.  And I'm going to Gorilla glue them into place.  I'll then screw those away from the stripped out holes, then rock the cabinet back and screw them into the strip.

While I was at the home improvement store, I purchased six bags of gravel to help level the motorhome's right side in my oil and gas campsite.  About a week ago, I got my Rhino ramps out of storage and was going to use those to level the right rear duallies, but the gravel under the wheels isn't very good.  I have leveling blocks back there now, but one on one tire.  I didn't have enough blocks to level both on the right side duallies and the front tire.  And with the air conditioning having been run for two months, all the water goes off to that side and has made it muddy at times.  I felt that parking those wheels on bags of gravel was the best solution since that side of the motorhome needs to come up by a lot.

I was ahead of schedule today and was about to go out to eat when I realized that I could make the post office in Woodsfield of Monroe County in time to open a new PO Box.  I zipped across the backcountry and got there in more than enough time.  Because I've been through two of these in the recent past, I filled out two change of address forms.  And for Adventurer's Project, I found out that this post office does in deed have a community cork board and I made a record of it.  Before, I eliminated this location because I thought that it doesn't have one?  The post office in Woodsfield is a general delivery location, but it's way off of the Road Fork Section - Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent).

Now that I have a local PO Box, I can now order two new RV electrical outlets.  These have special plastic backplates that fasten on to it.  My guess is so something in the wall doesn't touch the wires in the backside and catch the motorhome on fire?  Either that, or these don't need mounting plates, which could require more depth than a RV wall can accommodate?

Also, I need a new box of 20lb paper.  The office supply stores around here are distant, like an hour in every direction.  Out here, I'd rather make an Internet order and have it shipped.  After I was at the post office, I had dinner at a nearby restaurant called "Traditions."  It's an Ohio State Buckeyes themed restaurant.  Then I went to the gym and got all my seating and equipment positions recorded in my workout spreadsheet on my smartphone.  In recent years, I've worked on on weight machines, so getting the correct postures and proper range of motion is very essential to them working right.

Motorhome Air Conditioner

I'm unsure what the temperature was inside the motorhome today.  But I'm in a gravel pit, oil & gas campsite in Far SE Ohio.  There aren't any trees around it, so it's constantly exposed to the sun.  The outdoor temperature today was about 91°F and the UV index was very high at 8 out of 11+.  Under these conditions, the air conditioner wasn't really keeping up.  I applied antiperspirant and still my arm pits were sweating.  When the outdoor temperature dropped to 88°F, the motorhome became more comfortable.

Trail Promotion Flier Routes

Adventurer's Project's trail promotion flier strategy consists of three loops, three areas and six routes covering about 13 of it's 14 counties.  The remaining county is where only 3/4ths of one township is closer to the Whipple Section, which is covered by the project.  For the most part, it's been seeded to Little Cities of the Forest Chapter of the Buckeye Trail Association.

The bad news is that I went through the post office lobby and library hours and determined a "least common denominator" as far as what days they're not open.  Until things change (like if these least common denominator locations is eliminated due to lack of flier support), two of those routes can only be executed on Monday's only.

Laptop Hard Disk Space

I wanted to resume work on my trail promotion routes for Adventurer's Project, but I noticed that my hard disk drive was almost full.  So, I got a pie chart and there was 500GB of back-up files on there.  Apparently, some must have made their way over from The Robot, or my back-up location.  I deleted them and I hope that the laptop's on-board software aren't installing them there?

Digital Mapping

One things that Adventurer's Project does is supports the Buckeye Trail Association.  The chapters are requested to take on the mission of the BTA with providing outdoor recreation, education and access to the varied natural resources according to http://www.buckeyetrail.org/chapters.php.

I interpret that as the chapters could appoint a digital cartographer to be a liaison to the Digital Mapping Subcommittee. In our efforts, I would appoint myself at the moment.  Our digital cartography is already pretty far along.

One of the things that I'm working on is getting waypoints for everything mentioned in the Road Fork Section - Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent) map & guides.  When they were published in those paper documents, their distances mentioned were measured by a surveyor's wheel. As I understand, there's no digital equivalent for their positions yet.  Whipple's are already done.

I used Google Earth Pro's internet search and satellite imagery to plot as many places as I could find from the desk.  Then I made a list of the ones that I didn't find so that later, I could go down trail and waypoint them in person with a dedicated GPS.

Adventurer's Project's Facebook Page

The Facebook pages for the Buckeye, North Country and American Discovery Trails are set up to appear on 4th, 11th and 18th of every month on Adventurer's Project's Facebook page.

USB Keyboard, Mobile Hotspot, Motorhome Needs, Weed Whacker Retrofit, Maintenance Day at the Ring Mill

I found the USB fob for my wireless keyboard and touchpad.  Normally, I wrap cling wrap around it and use this for automotive reasons when my hands get dirty.  But if all goes right, this should work with my tablet when I get a tether cable for it?  I'm really glad that I found it.  This should save some money?  I can't order that until I get my PO box changed to my local post office.  Tomorrow being Sunday, Monday is Labor Day, so, changing it will have to wait until Tuesday.

A few days ago, I got a warning that my 15GB allotment for mobile hotspot (using my cellular devices for an Internet connection to my laptop) was down to 10% and wont recycle for another 5 days from now.  I figured that I could stop listening to YouTube videos on my laptop when I'm doing computer work.  Instead, I can listen to them and do most of my communications on the tablet, which has an unlimited connection.

I don't have a coffee shop anywhere within 30 miles of where I live.  And I needed to do some GPS mapping work on Google Earth, which needs an Internet connection to be fully functional.  So, I went to my local McDonald's, but there's something odd on their server that was kicking out an erroneous certificate.  Turns out that I just had to use that 10% of hotspot that I had left.

I might as well spend Tuesday in the Marietta area.  I need about 3 bags of gravel to help stabilize my motorhome here in my oil & gas campsite.  The ground underneath it needs gravel and has sunk my rear wheels stabilizing blocks into the mud.  I have two of my automotive ramps here, but the mud is just going to sink those, too.  It would take a heavy steel plate under those, which could be pricey?  The right side needs to come up a lot.  So, I'm just going to run the right side duallies right up on the bags and see what that does?

My back problems are muscle related.  And my doctors have been wanting me to strengthen it with a back machine at a gym for years.  Considering how maintenance has gone so far, I'm going to take them up on it.  Since I'm pretty much settled in Woodsfield, I joined the local Midtown Gym, which is in walking distance from where I live, but so is any place in Woodsfield :-)).

I retrofitted my personally owned professional weed whacker.  Many weed whackers on the Buckeye
Trail are property of the BTA, so I make sure that I state this clearly so some people don't get any funny ideas.  It has bicycle handles on it for greater swinging ability.  But I added a residential handle to it to improve my stability when walking down trail steeply.  I believe that my other hand could be used for stability because there's some places where the Whipple and Road Fork Section's off-road could get treacherous for someone carrying a weed whacker?

I purchased a new outlet for the motorhome's bedroom.  I wanted to replace the one next to the sink, but the RV store didn't have another one in stock.  But I might get lucky like I did the last time where if I replace one, the other two will come on.

At the hardware store, I purchased 28 snap fasteners for the overhead bunk curtains that I'm making out of the surplus felt, which I used to make my trail promotion backdrop.  I really need 48 for this project, but I'll have to make due for now.  Two of the overhead bunk windows are oddly shaped.
The remaining two are at an angle.  My walls were replaced with pitted hard plastic, so stick on Velcro is out of consideration.   The male end of the snap fasteners will screw in.

The maintenance event at the Ring Mill failed as nobody showed up.  But if there's lessons to be learned, one might be to get in contact with the land owner on the north east side of OH-26 and Jericho Low Gap Road (I believe that it's in Benton Township of Monroe County).  The weeds were so tall on that corner that it was blocking Jericho Low Gap's sign.  Many people in Monroe County are unfamiliar with where the trail is in it's south.


There's a ford on Jericho Low Gap that could get too flooded for cars with a lower suspension.  Honestly, having the event at the Lamping Homestead Recreation Area would have been better had the highway between there and OH-26 not been shut down for so long.  There just wasn't a good alternate way for most people from most of Monroe County to get there and Lamping just wasn't an option.  But for a hike, it is now.