First week summary...

One week in and all is well. Really, this is easier than even I thought it would be. I am getting in the best sleeps of the summer. I am waking early morning, running to work, having a swim at Southbank on the way past, and am getting through the working day fine. I should have started this much earlier.

My plan in the past week was to get some early runs on the board to prove the concept and make my decisions from there. I won’t have to do another 7 night stint so it is essentially all downhill from here. Or to stick with the cricketing analogy, now I have my eye in, I can start tonking the willow in a cavalier fashion knowing I have this thing covered.

Some people have asked me how I work out a suitable location for the night. There are a few issues to take into count:
• Is it raining?
• Is there noise (train lines, busy roads, nearby hotels, flightpaths etc)?
• Is it a busy / quiet area at night and / or in the morning?
• Do trees / bushes help conceal by entry / exit from the tray?
• How much does the road taper to the gutter?
• Is it garbage night?

One of the things I discovered on my first night, was that if it is raining, I need to park on a slight slope. This helps ensure the rainwater runs off the back of the tonneu cover or off the end of the tray. In a later discovery, I have realised it is a fine line, as a slope too steep will cause me to slide towards the back of the tray everytime I move.

The hardest thing to get right is the balance between a location that is busy yet also quiet. Pulling up in a quiet residential street late at night will rouse suspicion and could result in nosey neighbours calling the cops or investigating themselves. A busier location, around apartment buildings, will not raise this suspicion as easily, but will increase the risk of someone seeing me get in or out of the tray and potentially calling the cops as well. Parking in a non residential area increases my vulnerability. It looks a bit suss for security patrols and coppers to see a ute in the middle of nowhere on its own, and it does stand out. It also increases the risk of undesirables coming in for a look. These non residential areas also get quite busy early morning and might disrupt my blissful sleep.