Ah! The anxieties of the final hours before a major move! God! I’m glad we’re not going through this right now!!!
30 Hours and Counting
This is just going to be short update tonight. So much going on.
Today was full of final packing, praying that my dishes will make it unscathed, much uncertainty about the big loading the truck thing tomorrow, giving the beagle his bath so he’ll smell halfway decent in the confines of the car, ironing out final wrinkles and nailing down final details.
Between my last post and this one, there has been a lot of heavy lifting and running around, burned fingers, scraped knuckles and punctured thumbs, some angst and anxiety and realization that we’re not going to be able to do everything we wanted to before departure (i.e., touristy things around San Francisco-although we did do quite a bit of them). There’s been beagle angst (a very uncharacteristic and unnerving potty incident in the living room floor); I witnessed a woman run a red light and plow into two cars at one of the city’s notorious intersections that has always scared the heck out of me for four-and-a-half years; a final trip to Andronico’s to get a box of Krispy Kremes; last beagle walks in Golden Gate Park; final dinners with friends; and not a whole lot of sleep.
The farewell with friends have tended to be more ‘see ya laters!’ than tearful goodbyes, which is a good thing. Friends are, of course, the number one thing we’ll miss, with the fog/climate a close second. The weather has been beautiful the last two days and the fog is just beginning to make an appearance. I’m hoping it’s there to say goodbye to me as I leave Thursday morning.
The itinerary is set, the hotel reservations are made, the utilities in Ann Arbor are reserved, the check is ready to give to the landlord, affairs are wrapped up here and tomorrow (or rather today as I write this) begins the final big physical push of bringing my stuff down from the fifth floor to the rental truck on the street, followed by a trip to Oakland, where we will load all of our stuff on the cross-country trailer.
A sense of relief will come when the trailer is loaded and the rental truck is returned at 17:00 PST. Then I can relax and load the Jeep and be outta here bright and early at 6 a.m. Thursday.
I entered San Francisco for the first time at 2 a.m. one fine morning in late April of 1994, having just driven 30 hours non-stop from Dallas with David. My what the last nine-and-a-half years, seven of them here in the Bay Area, have brought many wild changes. I’ll be reflecting on them over the next nine days right here.
Meanwhile, I drew up a budget; it calls for the move to cost $3,112, which includes transporting goods and food, hotels, gas, etc., for the trip. There is an additional $2,561.44 for move-in expenses for the townhouse, meaning the whole grand cross-country adventure comes with about a $5,700 price tag. We’ll follow along with expenses in this ‘blog as we come to them each day.
But for now, no new pics (althought I have tons to post), it’s off to bed for a few hours. Awake time is 07:30 PST, so I better get to snoozing; that’s only 5 hours from now, yikes.
More later …
—Posted by Steve at 02:23 | 13-Aug-03
