Hi there! I'm Cat, a very nerdy single mom to two teens and some cats, and despite my best efforts I need your help.

Thanks to a series of unfortunate events -- losing my job as a government contractor, a nearly nonexistent job market for the last year, hamstrung by the widespread replacement of skilled work with AI, and local events that will result in what is functionally a Cardassian/Breen alliance a mile away from me -- it's gotten very clear that to avoid being on the street we need to go full-on digital nomad, shift everything to an appropriate RV, put what we need/want to keep into a POD, and get a used heavy truck to haul said RV.

Without this, through no fault of our own, the kids, the cats, and I will be on the street, literally, in a month. My car was just repossessed, so I have no way to try to offset the cost of a truck. Right now even groceries are tight; at the moment I'm writing this, we're out of milk, cat food, any kind of fruits or vegetables, and on the last of some soup that I made from odds and ends. I haven't been able to get refills on needed medications for almost a year now so our health is suffering. We're fortunate that none of us is diabetic.

I have been trying desperately for a year, fighting through hopelessness and medical issues, and have gotten nowhere while everything keeps piling up. My savings were wiped out during a previous sudden job loss when a government contract job restructured in 2022, and I was just starting to recover when things went to pieces a year ago. Now I'm about to lose the house and we will have nowhere to go but the street. We can't even get to Tatooine to hunt down wamprats.

If we can get the things needed -- that truck (an old but functional 3500), RV, and POD -- we can survive; there's a small stipend (from my former partner; he passed away several years ago) that comes in once a month that will cover payments on an RV and vehicle insurance, storage, and basic living. Unfortunately, it isn't coming close to covering what's needed to stay where we are and isn't enough to get from "here" to "there".

Once on the road the kids will be enrolled in online school and I can work remotely in a much-lower-paying job and do freelance work that will cover anything extra needed. This will let us continue our mission: to seek out a new life and new civilizations, and boldly go where none of us has gone before while avoiding wretched hives of scum and villainy.

Things needed:

I've sourced a truck and know the RV we want, though not the down payment yet.

I'm going to sell my beloved car and use what I have after the loan is cleared to buy a old used GMC 3500 truck; the seller even reduced the price a bit for me, so after selling the car I'll be just $3300 short of what I need to get the truck and do the title/taxes/tags tango. That really needs to happen immediately; I can't sell the car until I have the money to cover the gap to get the truck, because that's the only transportation I have. UPDATE: My car was just repossessed, so I no longer have any transportation or way to offset the cost of a truck. The truck I originally intended to get is no longer available, but there are others. I just need considerably more money to get one.

The POD will be about $200 a month, with the initial due the day before they drop it off to be filled.

The RV is the unknown in this case. The logical choice is financing one, and we're a bit limited in options because we need one that has room for all three humans and the cats and isn't too old. (A lot of RV parks won't allow older ones out of breakdown concerns; older codes do not, in fact, check out.) We found a perfect model, discounted some because it's not the latest model year and they want it off the lot, so I need to see what the down payment will be. (Unless someone wants to donate a Keystone Avalanche 390DS or an Alliance Paradigm 395DS.)

Ideally there will be a bit of spare cash to get official lessons in how to maneuver the entire rig; no special driver's license is required, but it's definitely on the "special helm skills needed" side!

Could you be our Obi-Wan? You're my only hope. My kids don't deserve to be homeless, nor do our four-footed family of cats. I need your help to keep them safe.

I did say "nerdy", didn't I? Throw a few spare credits our way, share this with everyone you know if only to figure out how many fandoms I referenced, and stay tuned for future episodes!

PaLL