Do you have what it takes to be a NOMAD

hey y'all got a good show for you today i'm going to compare two different types of chill pads um i got my other chill pad it's called aqua snap and i'm going to compare it with the chill pad i'm also going to answer some questions i got such a big response um from the last video that you put together some questions you wanted to ask me and i got so many i'll handle two and then on the next uh videos i'll i'll deal with some more of them thank you so much and continue doing it i'll answer your questions i also want to talk about what a nomad is and what the characteristics of a nomad are you do you have the potential to be a nomad if you're not yet and what skill sets are really good to have while you're out here it can make the nomad life so much easier you don't have to have them but if you do yay i'm also going to give you an update on a couple of other gadgets that i've gotten um recently and i'll show what those are and i'll give you a little tip on mosquitoes how to keep them away the first time i boondocked um is during the first rtr that i went to and i was letting my daughter know you know day by day like what it was like out here and she was mom it's like you've become teenagers and she said it in a good way it's almost as if you guys ever have gone back to being teenagers you meet somebody and go oh let's park together let's hang out today let's exchange phone numbers it is kind of funny and i have noticed that one thing that i did notice this year um in courtside boondocking i had my friends close to me but there were days when the wind was so fierce we all had to go inside our rigs we were texting each other how you doing what are you doing right now well i'm doing i'm serious and i thought yes that is so true it's like we're teenagers again it's a fun life i know a lot of you are still in your house and you're watching uh nomad channels especially mine and you're thinking about doing this lifestyle well it's a lot of fun come be a teenager with us yes it is like being uh younger again i think it makes you young it makes us younger and there's more of a community out here when you're in a house there's not much of a community i imagine there are some neighborhoods that might be more of a community but they can be few and far between a lot of people don't even know their neighbors anymore so what are the characteristics of a nomad i thought about this i've looked it up i've done some research in my opinion the number one characteristic of a nomad is independence we are fiercely independent sometimes it's hard to bring nomads together if you're not boondocking and then you want to follow each other like well where are you going to go now what state are you going to go to it's so hard to get everybody together if you like to be alone a lot of the time you just might be in no man yeah yeah that jeff foxworthy you just might be if you're independent you just might be ready to be a nomad are you frugal well i'm very frugal i fit right in i was frugal when i lived in a house and now that i'm a nomad yeah i'm frugal i don't like to spend money unless i really need to you're a minimalist you have to be if you're a nomad living in a small rig especially a minivan or an suv or even a high top a converted commercial van now if you are living in a class a reg well boy you can really carry a lot but even so you kind of have to be a minimalist you love to be off grid and you were you were hoping to be an off-grid prepper that was kind of me i was a prepper when i lived in my house i had to get rid of a lot of things that i was um storing away for you know the [ __ ] hit the fan kind of a scenario but i do like living upgrade and i am off grid you know a lot of us say that we're off grid but that's not entirely the truth totally we still need gasoline and that takes electricity we still go to grocery stores that takes a lot uh electricity so uh we're not totally off the grid but for the most part 90 yeah we are we're an adventurer we like to go on adventures are you an adventurer you just might be a nomad you're ready to start a new life maybe you're a new college graduate or maybe you're a college student actually i told a story once way back on my one of my videos and i remember reading about him he was a u of a college student and this is before i even knew about the nomad life he bought himself a commercial van he rented a prime college parking spot they're not cheap no but he bought one every every semester he renew it he lived in his van he didn't tell anybody he did he studied in there he didn't party much at all he kept all of his expenses down and yeah he lived in his van after he graduated zero student debt he didn't party a lot and drink a lot either um he got done within four years because he really didn't party and had time to study could take a heavier uh workload so afterwards uh he admitted that he was in that he lived in that parking spot and he got interviewed it was interesting so even if you're uh still in college yeah um you might be a divorcee or a widow a new widow or widower you want to start a new life you're a new retiree also and it's like you want something different you don't want to just live in one particular house you want to go travel you want to see things you want to go see the parks the national parks you want to go meet people it's a good way to meet people out here i've met more people out um as a nomad than i would have just stuck him inside of my house there are characteristics of a nomad you might be running from authorities you know i've mentioned that before won't go into it you can figure that one out but you might actually be running from an abusive person whether it's boyfriend husband or even wife i mean they can become very abusive yes uh women i've noticed um over the past 10 20 years they can be quite vicious they show their viciousness yeah you love to travel one characteristics of a nomad actually it's a requirement you really do need to like to travel and you must love to drive yes because you're going to be driving a lot you might have low income low social security and you're tired of spending your money on rent you might not be so low income but you are really tired of spending your money on your mortgage and what's it getting you all the property tax i mean i imagine that there's a lot of livid uh property owners who are paying all this property tax that go to schools and children aren't even in school yet i mean they're not even in school you do need to be a self-starter another requirement would be that you're fairly healthy you don't want to be unhealthy living and traveling in your minivan now i do know that there are some a handicapped people who live in uh bigger vans not so much a minivan but they have their their high top converted or their classy converted for uh their handicap but they're still fairly healthy if you're unhealthy and you're on a lot of medications and you don't move around too well i don't know about that being handicapped and being healthy are two different uh it's like apples and oranges and you're very resourceful well if you're not resourceful i once you become a nomad you will learn to be resourceful i believe i have this my own theory that once you become a nomad you actually increase your iq uh greatly because you have to figure things out where things go how to bungee things how to how to adapt certain objects to fit or or you be more useful so yeah resourcefulness it's useful to have a set of skills a skill set as a nomad it's going to make your life that much easier and it's going to make the lives of those around you easier if you boondock with them so one of the first skill sets to have that is so useful is mechanical engineering and that's i'm gonna have that entail quite a bit to be mechanically minded you can fix and alter all kinds of things things that a normal person can't do and that goes for guys and girls some girls are mechanical mechanically inclined and some guys are not you know like i don't know how to do that though i don't know we kind of assume that men can fix things but that's really no longer the case there's a lot of men that don't know anything about mechanical engineering or doing anything mechanically but that is really a good skill set i parked often with um robert i've mentioned him before hey robert if you're watching um he was a mechanical engineer he could fix anything he could figure out anything mechanically and that goes with um bungees or putting something together or how to make this work putting this with next item might be something that would should be listed more in the cat in the um characterization of a nomad but i think this is a skill and it's organizational knowledge knowing how to organize knowing how to group objects together you think well we learned that in kindergarten knowing well what what or like on sesame street one what doesn't fit in here which one of these things doesn't fit i have met people that have almost zero organizational skills they don't know how to group things or maybe they do but they don't care and they just kind of throw a whole bunch of things together in a bit um that is a if you're gonna live a minimalist life in your rig a small rig especially a minivan an suv a commercial van you better have good organizational skills or your life is going to be miserable map reading and that even goes for google maps uh the skill of reading a map another great skill set is solar knowledge solar experience knowing how to put solar together to support yourself if you do and you have this knowledge you can charge other nomads um and teaching them or doing it for them putting solar up on their roof or in and inside the rig that is a really great skill set to have having craft and carpentry oh my gosh yes if you know how to build things if you know how to put things together and do build outs for people and then or improve their build outs that is a great skill to have and even if you don't want to do it for other people you can do it for yourself automobile technical knowledge omg yeah if you can fix your own vehicle and you have even even us you know limited knowledge but you know how to do these things for your vehicle or you can check out another nomads vehicle to say hey i'm having trouble with this um i got my engine light on how you know and then they can kind of look and see what's going on with that uh that's a great skill set to have out there and then the last one i put down is survival out woods knowledge yes if you're out boondocking or even if you're traveling i mean if you got stuck somewhere to have that knowledge of survival while you're a nomad perfect here's a tip somebody asked me about mosquitoes what can they do to keep mosquitoes away because a lot of times we're out boondocking or we're in the park if we're in the city well i just found out recently that avon skin so soft will keep mosquitoes away and i looked on amazon and they sell it the original skin so soft i got my chill pad bed i showed it to you last video but i also got my aqua snap eyelid snap um it's like a chill pad so i'm gonna do a little comparison here it says here how to start pull out of packet and get it wet okay pull it out wring it out and then begin using it now how to finish roll up with snap buttons on the outside and snap the buttons together to bag lube or any desired location the bag loop oh there must be a bag in here so we'll see i love this i wrote yesterday and i was on my laptop and i laid it across on my legs it was perfect i wet it and then uh last night oh it was warm in here last night sleeping i had a sheet handy and i didn't even pull the sheet over over me even just a very thin sheet on some microfiber sheet until probably around like two in the morning this is the chill pad now when it dries it's funny it feels funny it's like a hard plastic it's it's yeah okay so we'll do a comparison on this first let me get everything's blue it's blue it's a blue day blue blue my world is blue blue is my word yeah there you go my blue bucket i got a little bit of water in here i got to get some water from there but this will be enough i think yeah there we go i got my chill pal on it's not wet these are great too if you forget to put a mask on that you can put it up when you go into a store it's kind of fancy there you go okay i've got water in my bucket aqua snap oh i don't need that good so i would hate to take scissors to this and cut it you need to be super strong for this one there you go here we go aqua snap oh yeah there's a snap oh look at this yeah this is odd material i want to look up to see what these are this is a new material they've come out with there we go there we go one more yeah where's really stuck together okay okay so there's a snap on each corner no there's no snap on that one i wonder why did they forget the snap i have no idea i wonder why there's no snap on this one okay so see how it feels thickness wise this is a little bit thicker i think this one is probably i like the color this is aqua cool blue aqua okay okay let's get this wet so so it's wet how's it feel i'm still confused why there isn't a snap there why why why okay snap this there whoops didn't hold oh so this okay it'd be nice if it had another snap on there maybe i won't be able to recommend it i'm gonna see see if the snaps even hold okay okay there looks like a looks like a collar yeah yeah what you could do probably is fold it over yeah maybe they want you to maybe it was supposed to be left fold it over okay okay so i guess the snap is uh the snap is the only thing that's really different about this okay okay now now i'm gonna wet this one do a little compare okay this is a chill pal okay it's wet this one has those little bumps on it this one there's no bumps on it i like the color of this so yeah this is a this is an unusual new material bumps yeah these feel the same yeah just got that so let me put this over here feels about the same i like this one better i mean just because i think it can hold more moisture the only thing that this had going for it the reason i wanted it was because of the snaps but i don't know summer it's important to have as many things as you can use to keep cool if you don't have air conditioning going on and actually i do have air conditioning because i can turn on my vehicle i can turn on my minivan and use it i've been using this the giniani daniani humidifier i like it a lot there we go i like it it has to be plugged in there's no battery in here and i like that i don't want yeah i don't need a battery i'll just keep it plugged in yeah the only problem they do give you a long cord but the only problem you have to have a power um source pretty close by yeah okay stop and then you lawn proceed it's got a night light [Music] okay okay now my fairy lights do i like them i don't know the batteries aren't working in it i don't know if it's the batteries i have to do a little test on it i don't know if it's the batteries that aren't working or if it's the actual um device that isn't working with the batteries i do have it plugged in i do have them on yeah so i like them i just keep it there and uh yeah like i said the main feature that i liked about these um fairy lights was the fact that it did have a nice cord to it and it wasn't using uh it wasn't using this this comes off easy and i have to tape this so this doesn't break so so there you go okay on my last video i encouraged everyone to make a list of questions and i'll do a shout out for you well a lot of you did so i'm going over the course of the next few videos i'm going to answer your questions and give you a shout out i'll do two today and so if you still want to do it i mean go ahead and do it on this on comments on this video also and i'll keep it and i will eventually do it yes i will answer your questions i will give you a shout out so the first one is for rv lucky hey are we lucky uh you comment a lot thank you your first question was you have two questions the first one is where do nomads typically go in the summer i'm not really sure well i'll give you uh where um i think that most of them go a lot of them go up to oregon or washington state for the summer it's cooler it's a little bit higher elevation and there's a lot of trees etc etc um you can go up in a colorado also you got to look for elevation if you want it to be cool you can't just say i'm going to go up north you have to go with elevation because if you look at like uh south dakota or even idaho uh really in the summer it's hot it's hot there so yeah now a lot of nomads in the summer go to their hometown they want to visit their family a lot of times they can park there with their family use their facilities their air conditioning things like that a lot of people do that what else do they do in the summer or where do they go they might go um i go to reno a lot you know in the summer it's a it's about 4500 elevation so it does still get kind of warm but not that often like late in august or mid august it might get up to like uh maybe 100 for a couple days and that's about it uh flagstaff the grand canyon you know just look for elevation that's where nomads go in the summer either higher elevation or they go home to see their families what else did you ask oh do i intend to have a home one of these days i don't know i mean probably eventually at some point i don't know you know um i i really don't know i plan on living a very long long long long time yes i mean unless you know the world ends or something you know uh jesus takes me up yeah i i plan well then i'll still live a long long time i plan on living a long time i imagine and being very healthy in fact i know this for fact so we shall see i don't know i mean i talk about creating our own future i can create whatever future i want right so can you so can you i you know we think about oh wow you know yeah um i will think about that and i'll visualize a home on the mediterranean sea yeah beautiful home you know um in a couple different rigs that i can why not hey if we can hold it in our head we can hold it in our hand thank you for those questions rv lucky my next shout out is for dylan dakote i think that's how you pronounce your last name hi dylan how are you thank you for your questions and i will answer them you had a little bit you had like five or six of them so let's get started let's see what did you ask oh what kind of jobs have i had oh yeah i've had quite a few the one i talk about the most the one i talk about the most is when i work for an architect i was a project manager and i learned a lot of good skill sets talking about skill sets i learned a lot of carpentry and putting things together and fixing things that was that was fun um organizational skills things like that yeah i mean you have to be like a uh all-in-one if you're going to do uh project management of uh remodeling for architecture things like that yeah um another job i will mention this was way back this was after i returned from living in germany was i was an engineering secretary i worked for bechtel international corporation i worked there for a couple years and it was cool it was fun had a great boss he was one of the upper upper guys um head of a department and i worked for him uh you just pick up pick up skills as you go when i was in high school i wanted to go to college and i they always do those assessment tests when you're in high school and i tested very high for college but um only had one brother and uh back then it was like well he's going to go to college we can only afford to put him through college not the rescue girls and you're all probably going to get married and be secretaries yeah i know i know well you know that was back in the early 60s so that's what i did i later went to college and got my degree on my own i paid for it myself so but that's another odd job and then there's all kinds of another job i talk about this was way later um was i only had one child left was i worked at a convenience store back east they call them gas stations here it was at circle k i worked that was a fun job oh my gosh that was so fun it was like and i worked at a really cool one where there were all kinds of people there was a fourth avenue so you got the hippies it was sort of near uh i-10 so you had a lot of people coming in they would come in all dressed up they were um well uh john mccain um not really a fan but you know he came in one time you know him and his wife and cindy came in and because they needed to stop and get something there were homeless people that came in there was it was everybody that came in and we had so much fun there it was it was a blast um we were all uh it was it was a popular store in tucson and we were all very popular with the with the neighborhood and they some people just come in and to talk you know just to chat um it was a lot of fun so that was another one but to list all of them i'll save it for another question what else did you ask dylan okay you asked how many pairs of sunglasses do i have before i answered that before i left my minivan i have 12. i might have a couple more stacks here and there but i have like 12. one of my pairs just broke yesterday yeah so i had to throw them away what else um do i follow other van dwellers on youtube no i don't sorry i don't sorry vandwell uh you uh nomad youtubers i really don't um i like to be original i just like to do my thing and honestly i don't really have the time will i always have a minivan i don't know probably yeah i probably will i like the stealthiness of it i don't require a lot more space yeah i could get more space and then i would just fill it up with things i'm pretty happy with the things that i have i am a bit of a minimalist oh you asked me now i like this card what kind of music do i like you know i say it all time i love music i love it well probably my favorite music is the new electronic music so many people are creating really good electronic music a lot of it i use on my videos i mean don't like it all you know i like it to be uh i like a good beat so i can dance to it yeah i like to dance you know like on an american bandstand you know i give it a 10 for ability to dance to it i do like um fast-paced music with a good beat it's got to have a good beat i know um but i wanted to mention to you that i have a playlist that is public it's called minivans music and on youtube and you can watch the you the youtube the videos of the music i've got like almost four or five hundred songs on there i keep adding songs i really probably do need to kind of break them up a little bit into smaller playlists but this is music that i like and it's everything it is um 50s 60s 70s 80s 90s the current i like to stay current with my music i like to know what's going on and then i like to pick i don't like it all but i like to pick what i like of it and of course it's going to be music uh a contemporary music that you like um there's only so many musical notes right it's just a matter of the pace that we put them at and um how we put them all together yeah so i tend to be when it comes to music i've been asked this when it comes to music i will um maybe share a song with somebody and then they'll think about and they'll go well well lee does this have any um message for me personally that you wanted to give me this music and not really i am more of a melody person than lyrics i do like the lyrics like um i there are still some songs and i don't even know what the words are and i and i i will sing them and i really don't know all the right words to it so yeah i'm more of a melody i like the melody of the music i will tell you that um i did have when i was young all of us in our family we had piano lessons we had a piano so we had to take piano lessons we you know like maybe on a tuesday and thursday after school i had to go to uh my p i had to walk to uh in the neighborhood my piano teacher yeah um so i have had piano i don't play really well but i do know where the keys are and they say that if you've had piano lessons in your life as a young as a youngster it really does increase one thing it does increase is your i don't know why but the studies indicate that increases your math ability so i always try to let my children know that to get a piano or some keyboard even for my grandkids um it'll increase their math but i'm you know a lot of people say oh i'm so bad at math i'm actually really good at math yeah i mean i'm really good at math i i scored very high you know if you have your uh college if you have a college degree you had to pass um college algebra at least or beyond you know trigonometry um calculus but um i i scored very well in math in college and also in high school so good at math and i think a lot of people if they a lot of people say i'm not good at math well then you're not going to be good at math are you i have a really bad memory well then you're not going to have a good memory are you i hear so many people say oh i don't i'm not very good at remembering names well duh um start saying you do and start paying attention to what people's names are it doesn't take much and you can remember people's names and i don't know how i got on this subject but it is worthy of discussing that it is it makes a person feel um special if you can remember their name if you want to win friends and be successful remember people's names there you go thank you dylan so much for your questions have a great day dylan you two are be lucky hope you enjoyed the show today i appreciate you guys so much please subscribe if you haven't already subscribe give me a thumbs up thanks for watching it all the way through it was kind of long today but i had so much to show you so i hope you guys have a really good weekend and i love you bye you

Channel: The Minivan Lee Show

Views: 6,026

Keywords: minivan lee, van life, living In a van, minivan conversion, no build out minivan, best no build minivan, how to live in a minivan, rv living, motorhome, living on the road, camper van conversion, walmart, amazon, van tour, cooking in a van, home on wheels, blm land, boondocking, city life in a van, how to van life, van life tips, nomad life, how to live in a car, evicted from my home, sleeping in my van, where to park, the minivan lee show

Id: ZwHkBqYLePg

Length: 40min 38sec (2438 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 16 2021