Bucket Buying

How difficult is it to buy a bucket?  Not that complex, you would think?

Well, you have to consider what you are going to use the bucket for and where you are going to store it.  It will after all, have to be multi-functional, and go everywhere we go.  We have to take into consideration the amount of space and weight it will take up as we tour the byways and highways within strict weight limits, while trying all the while to ensure that it looks good. 

NB – Our 5th wheel’s name has changed from the Sundance Kid, to the Jet.  As suggested by two of the blog’s followers whose favorite musical period was the ‘70’s, Benny and the Jet has a nice ring to it, and makes an interesting conversation piece for cousins telling their friends that we are visiting: “Oh, here come Richard and Saskia with Benny and the Jet.”

As the Jet is going to be our home for the foreseeable future, I, of course, am concerned with the aesthetic, whilst Richard concerns himself with the use of the bucket.

These two overriding qualities have been the determining factors accompanying us in over 15 shopping trips as we attempt to kit out the RV.  Well, after all, what else do retirees do all day?

Oh – no, I forgot to say that we have been busy signing up with doctors, arranging for medical, dental, truck and trailer warranties and insurances.  We are also waiting to apply to the driving licence authorities – yes we will have to take a driving test within 90 days of arriving in the USA, but so far it has taken five weeks to get a social security number which I need in order to do anything remotely related to bureaucratic application for anything at all…

And of course, whilst we have gone on our shopping/bureaucratic forays, we have enjoyed spending time with our hosts, Richard’s cousin Lee, and his lovely wife Carolyn in their self built South West style rustic ranch house.  Carolyn loves to shop for antiques and they are a feature of her beautiful home. 

The decor bar is set very high and I have no hope of competing with such style.  But Carolyn and Lee are RVers too, and know the limitations of decor enhancement for RV's.

The other thing we have been doing is practicing towing and reversing.  Rather than using Jet (our 12’ high, 36’ long 5^thwheel) to practice with, Lee has allowed us to borrow his 32’ flatbed trailer. The hitch is similar, so we can practice hitching and unhitching, and getting used to the strange sensation of unlearning our normal reversing habits.  Using only our side mirrors, we lose total sense of the steering wheel and the direction of our front tires as we do the exact opposite of normal reversal techniques, and try to aim the back of the trailer into a narrow area.  Not as easy as it looks.  Richard is beginning to get the hang of it but there will be more sweat and tears before I become comfortable with it.

Back to kitting out the Jet, with all that brown décor - woodwork, seating and carpets – bringing some color into our surroundings was top of the list for me.  Having fallen in love with the cushion I saw in one of the first shops Carolyn took me to, I decided that lime green, red and yellow would brighten the living/kitchen/bathroom areas no end. 

The bedroom proved a challenge.  Duvets are not really the norm here in the USA.  Bedding sets tend to consist of sheets, pillows and a co-ordinating bedspread, or else you buy a quilt to put on top of sheets.  The king size bed basically fills the bedroom, so there really isn’t any space for any other colorful accessories !  So, as the only king size bed duvet cover we could find was in blue, the bedroom color scheme is… blue. 

Can anyone tell me if there is a scientific term (you know, like Sod’s Law) that describes the phenomena that when you go into a store/shop for one thing you come out with a dozen more?  Well that is what has been happening to us.  For example, on a trip to get spare keys cut for the Jet, we come back with a compact (red) vacuum cleaner, polish, glass cleaner, a doormat (the same color as the carpet), various cleaning cloths (red, green and yellow) and a plethora of other things that will help Richard do wondrous cleaning things to both Benny and the Jet.  But the only buckets we found are too big.  Industrial sized in fact.  As we have discovered, most things come in huge sizes - which is fine when you have a house with storage capacity such as Carolyn and Lee’s!  Even after another trip looking for a bucket that was the right size (when we ended up buying rubber boots, aka wellingtons), 

Richard continued to use Lee’s bucket to clean Benny after 2 inches of rain turned parts of the dirt road leading from the highway to Lee’s house into a quagmire that splattered our white truck and its chrome running boards a lovely shade of yellowy orange.  The color looked OK to me, but Richard decided we needed mud flaps.  (By the look on Lee’s face this might be a sissy thing to have in Texas where mud splatter is the natural accoutrement of a truck).

Three weeks later, having visited every Wal-Mart in the area, we finally found the very thing in the local grocery store (which we have visited at least twice a week for food shopping).  We came away with the right size bucket, and it fits nicely into the storage facility in the underbelly of the Jet and holds most of the cleaning equipment.

Richard is sighing with contentment, planning his next car wash.   

I’m happy too.  The green and red patterned crockery has been delivered. The lime green throw hangs tastefully over the back of the recliner (armchair) The Jet is beginning to look homely.   We are ready to move in...

Oh! Did I mention the bucket was red?