Blake, I have been through the basic survival mode. Go, Man, Go!

I spent the last year sleeping on a Walmart Camping Air Mattress. Best sleep
I have had in years. I have some back trouble and it saved my life. I wore it
out....they were not designed for that kind of continued use....and I will
get a new one this week. Give it a try. They are good. Not terribly
expensive.....I think $24.95. Cheap enough to be a throw-away, really. Made
from heavy vinyl, don't immediately get mishappened, you can adjust the
hardness for your sleep style by adjusting the amount of air in it. They have
a velvet finish on the upper side. They come in  several sizes from cot size
to king size. I bought a queensize, put a fitted cotton mattress pad on top,
and fitted sheets and bed covers. It was heavenly. Like I said, best sleep in
years.

One thing, it is vinyl, and snagging it on something with puncture it.

Good luck,

John Rodgers
"88 GL Driver

"Blake C. Thornton" wrote:

> So, mostly this is a follow up on getting rear ended a couple days ago.
> Here is what happened.
>
> For various reasons (mostly because of preference) I have been sleeping
> in my van's bed for almost 6 months.  I told the insurance adjuster (of
> the company of the guy who hit me) that I expected a rental car.  That
> was absolutely no problem.  He was all ready to give me a car before I
> even asked.  We then worked out some details and I told him:
>
> "well, I'm not sure how to bring this up, but not only did I lose my car,
> but I also lost my bedroom.  I sleep in my van and now I dont have
> anywhere to sleep" (which was not entirely true).
>
> He was left pretty speechles and finally offered to give me a rental van
> and I could "lay my matress out in back".  This seemed like a reasonable
> offer and I of course accepted.
>
> I took my van to the shop and picked up my rental van (chevy astro - I
> had to remove one of the back seats).
>
> The shop and the insurance people fought over repair bills and finally
> came to the price of $2000 (or thereabouts) and that is what they will
> fix it for unless they find some hidden problems (which the shop didn't
> think would happen).  The shop was recommended to me by the local shop
> here in salt lake that I really like, so I think they are probably ok.
>
> So, things are looking fairly good.
>
> On a side note, I slept in the astro last night, and will probably sleep
> there tonight too.  It was not very comfortable, at least not as comfy as
> the westy, but nothing is.  I slept in a parking lot and the windows were
> tinted, but no curtains.  By the time I woke up and got going this
> morning, the parking lot was full.  So, my comment on stealth camping is
> that I am quite sure that my westy with curtains pulled is much more
> suspicious looking then this astro with tint.  If you look at the astro,
> you can see inside if you look, but who's going to look -- its an
> innocent looking van.
>
> So, I had this thought.  I remember we had a full size ford van as a kid
> and my dad built some sort of bed in the back you could sleep ON and
> store stuff UNDER.  What I was thinking was that if you slept underneath,
> no one would ever know you were inside.  I'm not sure who this appeals
> to, but if you've been woken by the police a few times, you could surely
> appreciate this idea.
>
> Anyhow, that was my thought.  I will never emply it because I like my
> vanagon and dont think that I will ever own a different van (but hey, who
> knows?).
>
> Thanks to all the suggestions that I recieved on my first post.
>
> Blake
> 84 westy,
> SLC UT