BTW, if your travels bring you through the Denver area, be sure to give me a heads-up and stop by for a solid home cooked meal for you and your mate there!
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Great Story, Safe Travels. How do you have the glowforge secured from bumps in the road etc.
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This is amazing.
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I really wanted to do that from a sailboat but it is now too late in life for my body to manage it. There was a 60foot trimaran that I think finally sold for $45k but I could not swing that sort of cash at that time. I think you could play football on the deck, and it was rigged for single handing and way better shape than the price would indicate
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This is SO cool, JB. What a great life-change. If I were younger and more agile, Iād be envious. Very happy for you both!
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Yāall always have the most overwhelming responses to thingsā¦ this is a heck of a community!
Offers like these are just amazing and show what this community really is. I slept at a gas station in Lebanon, MO on my way back from a Minnesota ice-fishing trip; you offered then as well, which is just awesome. Itās a good thing I didnāt take you up on it at the time, since I came down with the flu the moment I got home. I love that area of MO down through the Ozarks and into Northern and Central Arkansas. At some point, I will definitely be back that way to explore some more.
As for Denver, I have a feeling that Iāll be going through at some pointā¦ that area has so much to offer and Iāve spent very little time in CO compared to the surrounding states.
Slow is definitely good; Iāve done a lot of trips before this but they were really run and gun, as I was a lot more mobile just with the truck and a tent. The advantage is that I was a lot more mobile, the disadvantage is also that I was a lot more mobile, so I didnāt take full advantage of the places I was at.
I know a lot of people follow the craft circuit around - how cool would it be for a maker to be able to do that with the level of customization that the Glowforge allows for? The filter will definitely open up some possibilities for that type of environment; I wonder though, since youāre fully self-contained (Iām guessing), if you couldnāt have your booth and park nearby - and just ferry the finished pieces back to the booth for customers. Schedule an āorder readyā/pickup time. Not sure if that would damper the immediate gratification thing and discourage sales or not?
WIth the Snapmarks, Iāve started engraving little quips, quotes, etc. on the back of the some of the specialty piecesā¦ one of them that I use, if I have a cat piece, is āThe cat does not offer services. The cat offers itself.ā Not sure how it goes over with cat lovers, but I think itās true enough 
When I moved up this way from Houston, I rented the biggest UHaul truck they had and it was packed as tight as could beā¦ and that was just for me. I told more of a story hereā¦ but the reality is, I sold a good portion of those things that were āweighing me down.ā Granted, I have a storage unitā¦but Iām working at reducing the stuff that is in there as well. Which is hard - I hold onto a lot of sentimental type stuffā¦ and letās be honest, non-sentimental stuff as well (a good chance youāre going to need it at some point, right!?). But, I started going through clothes to sell and give awayā¦ a lot of them still had dry cleaning tags on them from before I even made the last move up to Wimberley (over 18 months). It feels good to get rid of a lot of that stuffā¦
My original plan was to get a ātoy haulerā style, since they have garages (that is mostly meant for hauling toys - motorcycles, ATVās, etc.) but I just couldnāt swing it with what I had budgeted. They seem to be in fairly short supply, with a fair amount of demand, so they really pull a premium on them that I wasnāt willing to pay. The toy hauler route would have been much easier to make this work, and I could see someone being able to set up a pretty complete workshop in one of them. Iāll probably try to upgrade to one in a few years. Basically, youāre putting a shop into a ~10x8ā area (but, the rear door can often act as a platform [they call it a party patio, I see workspace]ā¦ so you could have another 8x8ā that you could pull mobile workspaces out onto)
I went the rear bunkhouse layoutā¦ so, the back is basically a slideout with a bunk area. I pulled out the furniture (mattresses, a sleeper sofa) and then just utilized the bunk structure and the open area with the sofa gone. Itās tight thoughā¦ and my workflow is more methodical now. Before, I had the room to just work on things as I pleased. With things being tighter, I find myself moving equipment around to the work area, which makes me work more in stages: print everything, trim everything, etc.
No satellite right now. Iāll see if itās something that I really, really need. Also, no generator at this point, so Iāll be sticking to pretty established campgrounds rather than boondocking. Iāll just have to be a little more choosy about where I stay and make sure that it has some type of connectivity. I picked up a Verizon Jetpack to supplement my data and make it to where I didnāt have to reconfigure devices as often (it also acts as a router, so I can send stuff to the printers, etc). I plugged it in the first day and blew through the 15GB 4G data allotment, so now Iām at 600KB/s for the rest of the monthā¦ I did bring along the XBOX (for streaming on one of the TVās and the occasional game if Iām really bored). Apparently, when I hooked the XBOX up to the jetpack, it decided to update everything that hadnāt been updated in the past month. Lesson learned
I thought about a blog. I really donāt know what āvoiceā I want to put with it though. There are a lot of travel type blogs out there that are chock full of good info. I donāt really know what I could offer above and beyond whatās out there (thatās partly a problem with the way that I think ā if I canāt offer something betterā¦ then why do it? Which is probably not a great way to think about it, since the info could still be useful to someone.) And I would have to name it too! Thatās always the really stinkinā hard partā¦ Ridinā with Rio? Down Rio (River)?
Iāve had a couple of people use that wordā¦ courage. I appreciate it, but donāt know that I fully get it. Itās definitely not normal (I get that lol). But, I donāt know about courageous. I hope to hell it works out, but if it doesnāt, whatās the worst that can happen, ya know? (Have I convinced you to do the same now? haha)
Iām using the Glowforge packaging. I kind of wish I had a better solution because itās a BIG box in a little space and I havenāt found a good place for it yet when the laser is setup. But, itās also a box that I have to bring along, if I ever need to send it in for work.
Thanks to you and your team. You bringing your vision to fruition is what really makes something like this possible (at least much less painful than other solutions). The form factor - a self-contained, fairly mobile/lightweight unit, took a lot of the potential frustration out of making it happen.
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While youāre at it, you could start writing a book about your adventures. Seriously.
For reference, one of my favorite books of all time is āThe Art of Racing In The Rainā by Garth Stein.
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Thatās one of my favorites as well! Would you happen to be a ghost writer?
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If you find yourself in the greater Sacramento area I would be happy to host you and Rio. It would be street parking, but itās a quiet, level, pull-through street.
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Happy cake day!
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What an amazing adventure! Very happy for you! (And Rio!)
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"Glow-mad: Nomadic life with a laser, a camera, and a dog. "
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Your perspective is always going to be different than anyone elseās. Youāre an amazing photographer and youāre traveling around with a Glowforge, a serious printer, and a cute dog. Pretty sure whatever you put up is going to be fun, interesting, and unique. Iāve been running a blogging group for nearly a decade and I think a lot of people feel the way you do, but some of the very best blogs werenāt written for the audience, so much as a way for the blogger to journal and capture memories. Iād follow your blog, so I hope you do it. 
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Exactly. 
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Iād read it!
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Just jump into a blog. Let it find its own voice unless you have a particular message you really want to put out, but then it usually has a voice previous to the start anyway and it wouldnāt be an issue.
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I for one would definitely read the wandering meanderings of a Glow-mad!!
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Ha! I like that! I went ahead and made one last night sittinā around the campfire though. Ridinā with Rio.
As-is. No warranties. No guarantees. Likely to not be kid-friendly, depending on if/when things go badly.
Cc: @sailbyc @ChristyM @geek2nurse @smcgathyfay
Nowā¦ I have to see if my frozen pizza will actually fit in my oven. Things could go badly.
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You can always try heating it up in the glowforge LOL ā¦not
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Following.
(also living vicariously, so please hit up Idaho, Montana, Colorado and Utah)
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