HI, I'm Mary, the bus is Max, the dog is Cowboy, and we are Maximalist Minibus.
On this channel we go places and do things. Coming up!
OK, how is that was that? Was it like, YouTubey enough?
Somebody doesn't want to get up
Check this out, huh? We're not alone. It's the tiny-house festival.
Yup, it's the big Massachusetts tiny-house festival or the Massachusetts big tiny
house - I don't know... anyway the words Big Massachusetts
tiny house and festival are all in the sentence, and that's where we are today.
with a bunch of other skoolies, vardos, tiny homes on wheels getting ready to
show off our houses to the masses which is scary
I got into a project last night and kind of made a big mess in the bus, which is why I couldn't find Cowboy's
leash this morning but this rope's working out all right we're taking our
little morning constitutional over here by the side of the road where it gets
all woodsy. We're at the North Shore Music Theatre which is the site of the
big tiny house festival. See, I really wasn't kidding about the mess thing and
I gotta get all this taken care of before anybody shows up.
in about twohours this place is gonna be flooded with people who are here to look at all
the tiny houses and most of them I'm assuming they're gonna be people who
kind of either already have a tiny plan or already maybe are even living tiny
but didn't bring their house cause it's not on wheels or maybe they're just
weirdos who like walking through other people's houses, I don't know.
OK, so the day began with a bang - literally. We were parked like butt end
up to a big old gas generator and it just never occurred to me that was gonna
run all day but that's exactly what it's gonna do
My neighbor here, my wonderful friendly awesome neighbor who owns the
wandering stage which is like a theater on wheels, basically - he brought a stage
over here to provide us with entertainment the musical stuff all that
stuff but he needs a generator so he's gonna run this generator all day and it
is loud, OK? Really loud inside the bus so
I gotta move the bus.
okay so moving the bus is turning out to be easier said than done it was really
cold last night and I ran the heat for like three hours between last night and
this morning. My diesel heater is still hooked up to my starting battery which
obviously that's gonna have to change but typically I plug my block heater in
if I have shore power and that gets the you know gets the glow plugs warmed up
so that I can start but I didn't, I gave up my shore power because and I know
they were running low. They didn't have enough spaces with power so I said, "Oh, I
got solar no problem!" So the block heater didn't run, so the
glow plugs are cold. When the glow plugs are cold I have to crank more. When I
have to crank more if the battery gets low. OK, the thing is, my big old diesel
engine needs a lot of battery juice to crank. You'll know this if you ever get a
diesel bus. Luckily I have this amazing thing.
OK, so there's this part, right? This is the - it's basically a lithium battery
ok, and this one is this one is powerful enough to charge my crazy um
7.3 diesel. You can get a less heavy duty one but that's what I need for this and then
you've got this piece which has the, you know, clippy things. They look so wimpy on
here but trust me, they're not wimpy. These clip onto the battery like normal
then this blue thing plugs into the top of this.
and I can't do it and shoot it at the same time so I'm gonna do it right now, OK?
OK it's done. Wait till you see how fast this starts.
That is music to my ears
well I haven't moved that far, like maybe 10 feet closer into the circle but I can
already tell - it's worlds better. You can still hear the generator but now we're
closer to the stage so we're more gonna hear the music. You gotta get one. I don't
think anybody should be on the road without one. You remember how I did that
movie about my generator, how great it was to have a generator, how you got to
have a generator blah blah blah blah? well... I don't have a generator anymore and the
reason I don't is that little thing. The main reason I needed it for backup is
because I have experienced all any problem you can have with a diesel I've
experienced with this thing and generally it involves not starting. Ok, the two big
things that I live in fear of are, number one, the glow plugs being cold which was
all the time before I got a block heater. Number 2, getting water in the fuel which
was all the time before I got my fuel senders fixed. Both of those result in a
lot of excess cranking on the battery. One of the reasons I was really attached
to having the generator is I have this AC powered battery charger thingy that I
had to use when I got in those situations but now I have this thing and
it's USB and it even has a little like USB ports on it like, everything has USB
ports on it nowadays it seems but you can even charge your cell phone with it but
honestly between that and my little handheld mini solar packs
I don't feel the real need to have a gas generator anymore. So take that, smug
solar guy on Facebook. What's his name? Yeah, that guy. He's an a*****e but he's right. Anyway, problem
solved thanks to my little friend the beat it jumper. I don't know if that's the
official name but it says beat it on them anyway look in the comments, the
right name will be there. I should not be sitting down. I should finish getting
ready. People are gonna be here in like half an
hour but but I'm just a little - I had to sit down and kind of regroup because
this is the first event I've been to that the whole purpose of being here is
to show off the bus. You guys have seen Max. You've seen like every inch of Max
probably more than you even want to. You've seen the inside of my closet
which these people are not gonna see believe me. I sell at Brimfield and all
that but I go there to sell antiques and it just happens that I meet a few people
who want to see the bus. Here people are coming here just to see the
there's gonna be a lot slicker setups here. I haven't even been inside any of
the other vehicles and I know. It just makes me a little tiny bit nervous. I
don't know why. I'm gonna try to put that aside, I'm gonna assume everybody's gonna
love my bus as much as I do and get on with it.
we're just getting the doors open I decided I'm gonna make this a
promotional opportunity because why not so I have my laptop it's gonna be
running all day with my channel trailer on it so as people come in they're just
gonna be more or less forced to watch me.
I'm crammed into a corner over here because there's really no where to stand
because there are so many people in this bus
I never imagined there would ever be this many people in this bus! That's
crazy! It's exciting! I love the fact that this is living outside.
Pop open these two doors and - that's what it feels like! one thing I
have not had is a line. These guys, these bigger buses, they've had a line all day.
I'm a llittle bit jealous, I have to say. But then I remember that, OK, if you look at how
their lines are set up the people go in the door and then they come back out the
same door so it's gonna be kind of jammed up, right? I don't have that. I
have perfect flow. I have an in door in an out door, and I even have this big side
door that people can like look in through to see the whole bus anyway so
I'm just very - I am more ergonomic, right? That's why I don't have a line.
Because I'm ergonomic. Right?
GUY: But I wasn't getting out of the Navy. ME: Right.
GUY: I heard he died of Parvo disease after a while.
ME: Wow, that's - GUY:They gave him away after a while to a family with a big yard,
ME: Well at least he got that. GUY: Hey, how do you keep these books here?
I'm back in my little cocoon I'm getting tired of talking and you know oh you
guys know I like to talk so yeah that's going some when I get tired of talking
Cowboy was excited about this for like three minutes and he's just been
sleeping ever since. Guys, look! I have a line!
okay so I finally have a lull. It's been intense. It's been a really busy day. A
lot of people in and out of that door. A lot of people in that door and out this
door ,checking everything out, and I gotta say it's been an ego boost 'cause a lot of
people said how much they like the bus. A lot of people said it was their favorite.
Probably saying that to all the buses, you know - all the tiny houses. But it made me feel
good anyway and the word that keeps coming up is "homey." and you know I - I mean
it's homey to me 'cause it's my home but I didn't expect it to be homey to so
many people but yeah you know I've hesitated to take a lot of video of the
people coming in because I don't know how that all works, you know? I could have
put out a big sign that said if you come in this bus you're automatically
agreeing to have your likeness used, but - you know we used to do that in the film
industry but I don't know if that works on YouTube so I just kind of just being
just plain shy about doing all this. I didn't really shoot the people but
trust me, they've been here. Now I'm just kind of - you know, I haven't
had a break, I haven't eaten, I haven't peed, it's just been none frickin stop and -
OK, I have an old friend who's one of the musician here.
I think he might be the organizer of the music and he's on stage right now.
you know how,like when you're using - I don't know if you shoot videos, you
guys but you know how when someone's using a selfie stick they're using the
selfie camera so it's facing toward them there's a whole other camera facing the
other way and sometimes people think you're shooting them, right? So the
cameras aimed at them you must be shooting them and a lot of people get pissed off
about it but - not everybody gets pissed off. Some people do this.
I don't know maybe it's mean but when I saw this I had to turn the camera around and show you.
He's been doing that for like the last five minutes. I couldn't figure out
what he was doing because I'm sitting here talking myself and then I realize
Oh
He thinks I'm shooting him.
so, yeah, I gotta turn the camera around. That might save face, but also... it's funny.
I hope that's not mean, but...
Well, this is the end of my first tiny house festival. Yes it's the end, 'cause I
just did a little editing trick and skipped completely over Sunday day
because it's basically the same as Saturday day, right? A lot of people, four
questions: wWhere do you pee? How do you cook? Where's your bed? did you build it
yourself? Four questions, over and over again. Lots of people, a lot of people
loved the bus probably some people didn't but they kept their mouths shut
which is how I like it. So now I'm getting ready to go over to our potluck
dinner that we're having see the thing about having a potluck dinner with a
bunch of people who brought their own kitchens is they brought their own
kitchens. Tthey could make some fabulous meals - except me of course.
Do I have any food? No. I brought with me two microwave meals and two cans of dog
food. I wasn't really thinking about the group experience. It's because I'm a
novice at this whole tiny house thing so I didn't realize, you know, what a
bonding experience the whole thing was gonna be and actually day one wasn't
much of a bonding experience because everyone was so busy minding their own
house that nobody even got to talk to each other.
Not until we sat down to eat Chipotle together last night did we really even
get to chat but now - yeah, we still don't know each other at all but at least we
met. I got to interview a couple people and those interviews are gonna be posted
later as different episodes. So now if you were thinking this video was gonna be
that video that goes into all the houses and shows you what everything look like
and made you feel like you were at the tiny-house festival, yeah, I think you
figured out by now it's not that video. Sorry! Thanks for sticking around though!
oh hang on ,one more thing! I just want to give a shout-out to my girl Gina who
embarked on her own bus adventure starting today, Gina, we love
you! we're proud of you!
Go get it.