Moving Part One

I have kind of been putting of writing a blog post about our move from Columbus, GA to Phoenix, AZ because I am not sure I am capable of writing the words to express every thing that happened.  When I tell the stories to friends and family, I don’t ever feel like I am able to convey exactly how much of a crazy whirl-wind the whole thing was.  And I can only guess that will be down played a little more when you can see all my crazy hand motions and expressions.  I have never considered myself to be a gifted writer, but I do enjoy trying!  So here I go, but please feel free to add in your own adjectives when needed. 

Day -1  Loading:

    We loaded the truck.  This did not begin the way I was hoping in that we did not get the truck to our home until after noon, but all in all, the loading went much better than I had expected. 

Day 1 (I feel like there should be a day 0?!?!?) Cleaning and Driving:

    We got up early threw all the extra things into the truck and cleaned and cleaned!  The Realtor came over and we did the final inspection and signed the paperwork.  Although, this reminds me, I still need to call and schedule the fumigation and carpet cleaning.  Sigh, someone remind me to do that!  Anyhow, we then loaded up in the car and set off driving.  We left about the time I was expecting to so that was nice.  The first day driving was actually not too bad.  Really it mostly served to give me a false sense of hope that the rest of the driving would go just as well.  We did have a few minor issues.  One being that Jonathan (thanks to my suggestion) drove the huge moving truck pulling the Honda into a hotel parking lot to turn around.  I thought for sure that they would have some place to do a big u-turn, not so much.  They had a tiny, skinny little parking lot.  After a lot of forward-reverse we ended up have to take the Honda off the dolly, unhook the dolly from the truck, turn the truck around, put the dolly back on and then put the Honda back on.  In my husband defense, he would have gotten it, if it had not been for these landscaping things that jutted out into the parking lot and was filled with trees.  I also learned that Buddy has some stinky feet, bad enough that I could tell when he took of his shoes from the front seat.  But all in all, the first day was considered a success in my book!  We drove from Columbus, GA to Vicksburg, MS.

Day 2  Naked = NOT OK:

    Day two was...it was...long.  I only say long because I am not sure I can really do it justice in one word.  It started off ok.  We got out of the hotel a little later than I was hoping for considering that we had over 9 hours to drive that day, but worse things can happen.  We drove and drove and Lanna peed through her diaper on her shorts, twice, but we kept going.  Then we drove through the Dallas/Fort Worth area.  I was kinda zoning out a little.  Just in my driving groove.  Making sure a huge yellow Penske truck was in front of me, making sure that said truck still had a green Honda Civic attached to the back, making sure the kids were doing ok, just doing what I had done all day and the day before.  Then up ahead I noticed a guy walking along the side of the road.  A little weird since most people don’t consider it a good idea to walk along the side of an interstate.  With lots of cars moving fast, it’s generally not one’s first choice for walking.  As we got closer, I noticed that he was not wearing a shirt, or shoes, or anything for that matter.  Yep, some big (and by that I mean well into the obese category) dude was walking along I-20 in nothing but his birthday suit, just hanging out, literally.  Poor Lanna, she is scarred for life, and at such an early age!  Actually, I think she was looking at one of the toys in her lap, I hope she was, I pray she was.  Anyhow, naked dudes = not ok, I should have realized at this point that it was a sign of bad things to come, but instead I just tried to erase the picture from my memory as we drove on toward Abilene. 

    We got to Abilene and ate dinner, then went to check in at the hotel.  I drove into the hotel and drove all the way around to make sure that the parking lot made a full loop (I was pretty distrustful of parking lots at this point) while Jonathan checked in.  When I got back he was inside getting the keys.  It was not until we got back outside that we realized we may be in trouble.  In Jonathan’s defense, he was not exactly used to driving around a vehicle well over 12 feet.  Needless to say, the over hang of the hotel had a mere 12 foot clearance.  To make a long and very painful story short: we did some damage to that over hang.  Pictures were taken, insurance info was given, police were called, reports were filled, it was a REALLY late night.  We ended up have to take the Honda off the dolly yet again to try and back the truck out.  But....the insurance we got on the moving truck paid for it.  Score one for us.  Another positive...the truck was just fine!!  The truck fought the roof and the truck won. 

Day 3?!?!? to be continued...