Fire extinguisher nirvana

Another chilly night—though not quite as chilly as the one before. I awoke to an inside temperature of 52° F. and climbed down to turn on the catalytic heater. I placed the new portable fan about a foot and a half in front of it and set it to low, then went back to bed for half an hour to see how well it would do at spreading the heat around. Not very well, as it turned out—the temperature was only about two degrees higher when I got up again. So I turned on the furnace, which raised the temperature by five degrees in about ten minutes. Ah, well. I'm not sorry I bought the fan—its quiet cooling ability is wonderful to have, so I'll certainly get plenty of use out of it in warm weather.

I was planning to get over to the Farmer's Daughter this morning and try their "biscuits and bear gravy" breakfast...but I slept so late and dallied so long over my email that I missed their morning hours (7:00 to 9:00) by an hour. My first and only seminar of the day was at 10:30, so I headed out with only a cup of tea in my stomach, figuring I'd make up for it at lunchtime.

The seminar, by Charles Martin, was on self protection. I was interested to hear what he had to say, because I had been reading on this topic lately—both in fulltime RVer Dave Baleria's weekly journals, and in Bo Hardy's excellent book "Defensive Living," which Dick had recommended. But Martin's talk proved to be a disappointment.

It wasn't that he said anything obviously wrong. The problem was that his whole emphasis was on weapons and personal combat. Baleria and Hardy say—and I believe them—that getting into physical combat with someone is the last thing you want, and more important, that you can generally avoid it if you use your head. No matter how well trained you are or how well armed, it is always safer not to be attacked in the first place than to have to fight and risk losing.

By contrast, Martin devoted a token five minutes at the beginning of his talk to "situational awareness"—spotting trouble before it happens—but then went on to spend ninety minutes describing how to "take out" an assailant with a wide array of weapons. If Bo Hardy had been teaching this seminar, he would have spent eighty minutes on awareness—how not to look like a victim, bluffing strategies and deceptions you can use against a would-be assailant, and so forth—and maybe fifteen minutes on weapons, mainly pepper spray.

In short, what Martin almost entirely glossed over was how to use your brain—your very best weapon—to avoid a physical struggle in the first place. What he said was pretty much accurate as far as it went...but what he omitted was so much more important that I gave the talk a "poor" rating on the feedback form.

The talk wasn't a complete loss, however, because a woman sat down next to me whom I'd been planning to get together with at this Escapade. In the past few weeks I had exchanged messages with a would-be Lazy Daze owner named Shirley Fritz, who is looking to upgrade from an older Itasca motorhome that has reached the point where, as she puts it, "I wouldn't feel safe traveling without a mechanic on board." She lives in Ohio and had come to the Escapade hoping to see a real live Lazy Daze or two. As it turned out, she sat next to me, recognized me from the pictures on this website and introduced herself.

After the seminar, Shirley and I chatted awhile over turkey sandwiches (cheap at $2) served by SKP volunteers in the Farmer's Daughter. Shirley has extensive experience tent camping, RVing and backpacking—she puts me to shame, that's for sure! Like many people, she had gotten the impression from my posts to the Lazy Daze group online that I had many years of RVing experience, so I had to explain that I've only owned Gertie for a year and a half. I sometimes come off as more experienced than I am, when in fact I have a lot of knowledge but not a lot of experience.

It turns out that the Escapees' Lazy Daze "Birds of a Feather" or BoF group (that's the same as a SIG, for you computer folks) is going to meet tomorrow evening at 6:00 at the rig of one of its members, Judy Louks, whom Shirley had already run into. Of course I'll be there! It'll be my first chance to see a relatively new Lazy Daze. (Remember, Gertie is 17 years old, and LDs are scarce on the east coast.)

Shirley went off to find her granddaughter (not trusting the Itasca, they had come in their Toyota van and were sleeping in the back) and I headed for the vendors' building. I had two errands there: to get my final time and place for Gertie's weighing on Thursday, and to buy a bunch of foam fire extinguishers from Mac McCoy's company.

I talked with Mac for about twenty minutes about my current extinguishers (two A:B units and two of the toxic/corrosive A:B:C types). Mac tried to save me money by proposing a minimal set of small foam extinguishers. In retrospect, this may have had something to do with the fact that I was wearing my most faded jeans and my shabbiest shirt at the time, so I probably looked as if I couldn't afford much!

But I don't do things by halves when it comes to safety. I bought two $85 kits—one for Gertie and one for home—each consisting of one medium-sized Kidde #466620 foam extinguisher (rated 8A:70B) and three small Hawk foam "fire suppressants" (no listed rating, but Mac said they were about equivalent to 2A:10B extinguishers).

I staggered out of the vendor building toting two heavy bags of fire prevention stuff, feeling much better. Back here in Gertie, I placed the extinguishers as described, and used a black marker to make a small but noticeable arrow on the lip of Gertie's hood, pointing to the secondary hood release—this is to minimize fumbling in case of an engine fire.

So Gertie now has eight fire extinguishers—and that's not counting the four extras I'm taking home for my apartment! That may sound excessive, and in truth I would not have bought that many if I were starting from scratch, but Mac advised me to hold onto my current B:C and A:B:C dry-chemical extinguishers, even though they have drawbacks compared to the new aqueous foam extinguishers he sold me.

Here's how I've placed them:

• One large foam extinguisher behind the driver's seat, along with a pair of heavy work gloves. (This outfit is for engine fires.)
• One small foam extinguisher at the head of the bed; one in the rear lounge; and one in the outside propane compartment (Gertie's only unlocked exterior compartment—this is very important, because you don't want to be fumbling for your keys if a fire starts while you're outside the rig).
• One A:B:C dry-chemical extinguisher in each rear exterior compartment. These toxic/corrosive extinguishers should never be used indoors—I wouldn't have bought them if I'd known that—but Mac advises that they can still be a last resort for an engine or outside fire.
• One B:C dry-chemical extinguisher on the wall in the kitchen. It's messy, but it's just baking soda, so it isn't toxic. The foam extinguisher is still preferred, however, especially for grease fires. Dry-chemical extinguishers, I learned in yesterday's demo, can splash burning liquids around (they shoot powder at 60 mph); and they do not prevent reignition of the flammable liquid after it has initially been extinguished. The new aqueous foams don't cause splashing, and they absolutely prevent reignition by emulsifying as well as cooling the flammable liquid, rendering it unburnable.
• One B:C extinguisher in the storage cabinet at the head of the bed. Not really necessary, since I now have a foam extinguisher within arm's reach on the bedroom ceiling...but I already had it there, so I just left it.

The bedroom ceiling looks a little cluttered in this photo, but it's a very practical arrangement, considering I have no bedside table to put things on! I can reach up with my right hand—even in the dark—and grab the extinguisher; I can reach up with my left hand and grab the pepper spray, also by feel alone if necessary. The digital clock/calendar/thermometer over my face tells me everything I need to know at a glance (like "It's too damn cold to get out of bed!"), and the new reading lamp on the wall behind my head gives me a just-right source of illumination. I ought to put a Kleenex box up on the ceiling too. I think I will.

I also bought from Mac a $21 Firex #4651 RV-certified smoke detector (it meets some ANSI standard; I forget the number) and mounted it over the head of the "upstairs" bed. It should avoid the incessant chirping I was having with the two different generic-brand detectors I had tried in the lounge area. (As soon as I'd install one it would start periodically chirping as if its battery were low, and I'd have to disconnect it to keep from going crazy.)

You see, I had learned from Mac's seminar that the RV-certified smoke detectors have circuit boards that are potted (dipped in plastic) to prevent them from being influenced by moisture and to lessen the effects of vibration. That's why the cheap ones you buy at Wal-Mart are fine for homes, but don't work so well in RVs, as I had already found out! The RV rating, by the way, is not even mentioned on the box; it's hidden inside the case in fine print.

You're probably getting tired of hearing me lecture about fire safety, but if you think the type of extinguisher you have is unimportant, please read Jane Young's story of how she used a foam extinguisher to stop another full-time RVer's rig from burning after several people had tried in vain with dry powder extinguishers.

I want to mention one more important fact: if you have a dry-chemical extinguisher that hasn't been shaken or inverted a few times once a month or so, it may not work at all when you need it. That's because the dry chemicals pack down and become unusable unless you periodically loosen them.

I had been telling myself that in Gertie's case, traveling down the road would keep them loose, but it turns out that it's just the opposite: the vibration tamps down the powder even faster, until it turns into a solid mass that won't spray. (It works just like a vibrating cement tamper.) All of this is not a problem with the new foam types, of course!

After mounting the new extinguishers, I did a little reorganizing in my curbside storage locker. In addition to rearranging things into a more logical order (seldom-used stuff in back), I also used a broom clip to mount the folding shovel to the "ceiling" of that storage space, handy but out of the way. I'm always looking for ways to put unused space to use!

Then I made a small improvement that was very easy, but tremendously satisfying. The screen door on Gertie has always been problematic. I don't mean that it doesn't work as intended, it's just that it's confusing and awkward. There are no handles, so you have to fiddle with the sliding plastic panel (which sticks, no matter how I lubricate it) to reach through and open the door. And there are no handles to make it easy to pull closed. It's a small but constant nuisance.

What I did was to take a couple of 3/8" BX clamps (for armored electrical cable)—sort of question-mark-shaped pieces of bent metal—slightly unbend them, and fasten one to each side of the door using the existing screws. It was easier to do it than describe it. The result is a finger loop on either side of the screen door, perfect for inserting an index finger (which is all it really takes) to pull the door open or closed. What a difference from all that fumbling!

As I was working on this, my neighbor in the Airstream next door, Howard Replogle, returned from the rehearsal for tomorrow's Ham-O-Rama, and I struck up a conversation with him. It turns out that he was the one playing the blues harp solo at the jam session last night—I should have known. He says that he's played that tune—Little Walter's "Juke"—at other escapade Ham-O-Ramas; he described it as "practically the national anthem of the blues." I have to agree that it's one of the blues best tracks ever laid down, and one of my favorites. I have it on an LP, but not on my iPod—too bad, because after last night's taste of it, I was itching to listen to the original. Guess I'll just have to digitize the rest of my LPs and transfer them to the iPod.

Anyhow, I learned that Howard is an itinerant RV repairman—his Dodge pickup is loaded with tools and hardware. He was kind enough to lend me a couple of stone grinding cones for my power drill, so that I could grind down the edges of a hole in the driver's-side door before patching it with epoxy putty. He handed me the grindstones and went off to walk his dog while I worked.

At that point I very nearly committed the unpardonable sin of losing one of his tools, because just as Howard walked off, a twin-engine ultralight aircraft buzzed into view, flying low over the boondocking parking area. I dashed inside for my camera and got several good shots...but I lost track of the smaller grinding cone. The twin ultralight was followed by a hot-air balloon and then a parasail—a parachute-like fabric airfoil below which dangled a man with an engine and propeller essentially strapped to his back. He was really having fun, swooping back and forth over the field where we were parked. I kept photographing until all three were out of sight, then turned back to my work.

But by that time I hadn't a clue where the smaller grinding cone (which I wasn't using) had gotten to—couldn't remember whether I'd put it down or dropped it in the grass or what. I was dreading having to apologize to Howard—losing a loaned tool, even a minor one, is a lousy way to start an acquaintance—but after ten minutes of searching I found it: it had rolled most of the way under the microwave oven when I'd set it down on that counter while getting the camera.

I really am having more trouble remembering things short-term these days. Sometimes I can't remember the names of things (anomie) like the uh...uh...jam session last night. It's occasionally annoying, but I deal with it.

Anyway, I returned the grinders to Howard and chatted with him a bit more. He told me he had made many improvements to his rig (not surprising considering his trade) and I told him about a few of mine. When the discussion turned to flooring I offered to show him Gertie's new rug, but he politely declined. He explained that he's "a bit of a hermit"—he's been on the road solo (with his dog) for four years, and one of these Escapades kind of overloads him with noise and people—so he really needed to be by himself and unwind tonight. I could understand that; sometimes I feel that way myself.

I did get Howard to take my picture, standing in front of Gertie and holding the commemorative Van Wert County Fairgrounds flyswatter. And while we were talking about digital cameras, I snapped a waist-level shot of him (above)—I don't know whether he noticed or not.

Back inside Gertie, I prepared to bake some blueberry biscuits using a slightly altered version of my baking soda biscuit recipe, plus the leftover blueberries from last week. Unfortunately, the experience confirmed what I've suspected for some time: Gertie's oven thermostat is not working. When the oven is on, its main burner runs full blast, full time—regardless of where you set the knob!--and the temperature just goes up and up. The only way to control the temperature at all is to open the door from time to time and let some heat out.

The resulting biscuits were burned on the bottom and doughy on top. I won't be baking any apple pies in this oven until it's fixed or replaced! But when I brewed a cup of tea and tried a biscuit, it really tasted pretty good. Of course by that time it was 7:00 and I hadn't eaten anything except a few celery sticks with peanut butter since lunch!

Well, tomorrow is a (relatively) busy day, so I'd better get to bed. I'm looking forward to the Ham-O-Rama (Howard is the last act)...and to meeting the other LD owners here!