June 3rd weekend – We were supposed to move into our new home this weekend but issues with the
appraisal caused the close to be delayed.
This has been frustrating for us but at least we’re not alone in that
everyone else related to the transaction that has a profit motive (listing
agent, seller, lender, etc) wants this to go through. Thus momentum is on our side and hopefully
all issues will be resolved soon and satisfactorily.
Saturday began with me waking up and getting out of bed
around 7:00. After feeding Bella I
plopped on the couch while she headed upstairs to sleep in bed with Susan. They came trundling down the stairs around
10:30. I elected we get food outside our
home and drove us to Village Inn. I ate
my normal breakfast and Susan tried a turkey avocado sandwich which was very
tasty. As our storage unit is
essentially full and all other home-moving stuff is on hold we satisfied
ourselves by driving by the property to gaze at its splendor. Afterwards we went to a nearby American
Furniture Warehouse where we primarily looked at dressers. Then we headed home. We were initially planning on missing the
rallycross occurring on Sunday but as moving plans were pushed out we figured
we’d participate. Thus we spent the rest
of the day time preparing for the next day’s race. It was an old school effort as most of the
racing stuff we have was packed in the storage unit including things necessary
to load up the evo on the car trailer.
So we loaded the rally wheels/tires we had kept in the garage, tool bag,
and coolers full of water in the car.
The rest of the evening was spent hanging with Bella on the couch.
Sunday started with Susan’s alarm going off at 4:30. We finally rolled out of bed at 5:00 and
finished packing up for the day. Susan
convinced me that we should bring Bella (the adventure pug) so she came
along. We left home around 6:00 and
arrived at 7:15. As only a couple of
people were there not including the person who was supposed to design the day’s
course me and Will (a fellow rallycrosser) set to doing so ourselves. This took up much of my time until the
driver’s meeting around 9:30. I rambled
my way through it per usual and got to handle worker assignments as well (yes,
we were short-staffed). There was a
minor (almost major) issue in that no one received confirmation that the event
was sanctioned yet. This means that technically we didn’t know the site had
the proper insurance for the event. As
all the proper paperwork was sent in as is normal we decided to go on ahead and
start the event. I asked Susan to have
our class run in the second run group so I had time to swap out the street
tires for rally tires while the first run group drove the course. While there wasn’t universal praise for the
course I laid out most everyone seemed ok with it. By lunch time I was firmly in first place in
our class and Susan was in fifth. I
tried to make lunch short but by the time we finished rearranging the course
for the afternoon runs we were running late.
Despite this I decided we should have an extra run in the afternoon
(sometimes it’s nice to call the shots).
While the course was bumpy and several cars broke (virtually all
mechanical issues) I believe the event turned out great. The weather finally cooperated with us with
the sun shining all day and little wind to speak of. In the end I held onto first place and Susan
moved up to fourth for the day. After
the final car finished driving I rushed to swap out the rally tires and Susan
compiled the results. I got to babble
out said results before we all packed up and left the site. We would have been the last to leave except
there was an unfortunate competitor whose tow rig wouldn’t start (he did get
his issue resolved later and made it home alright). On our way home we stopped at Five Guys for
hamburgers as they have outdoor seating which accommodated for Bella’s
presence. When we finally got home Susan
applied some aloe to my burned neck (I was scorched all over) and we hung out
before I took a cold shower and went to bed.
Bella was a great companion during the day and will probably accompany
us in the future when the weather is right (not too hot). Even though we didn’t get to move into our
new home we still had a great weekend.
June 6 – We took John to a Boston concert at Fiddler’s
Green. He met us at our house right on
time at 5:30 to ride with us in Jay. We
stopped Jimmy Johns on our way for dinner (yum!). Traffic was bad but it didn’t matter much as
we were pretty early. Susan had gotten
us prepaid parking which was great as we were relatively close to the venue and
had a guaranteed spot. After we got
inside and found our seat Susan and I acquired the required nachos and Susan a
“glass” of wine. The first band was
alright and we paid attention to them a bit.
After they were done there was a long break before Boston was to go
on. Right about the time the sun was
fully below the horizon the band took the stage and began to play. They put on quite a show and sounded
fantastic. We figure they played for
around two and a half hours which in itself was a feat. The seats weren’t filled all the way and
toward the midpoint of their show some sitting around us made their way to open
rows which allowed us to spread out a bit which was nice. We left for home around 11:30 and the trip
was uneventful. Not to be outdone by the
already late weeknight Susan and I ended up staying up until past 1:00, duly
setting ourselves up for a very tired Wednesday.
June 10th weekend – This was a sad but relaxed
weekend. Sad because closing on the
Dogwood house is still up in the air which has really been demotivating. Relaxed because we didn’t really accomplish
much and instead spent an inordinate amount of time on the couch. Saturday was almost a nothing day when we
received an email saying some cell phone accessories I ordered were being
returned because the address was bad.
Whoops! Part of moving is setting
up forwarding of mail and with the delays in our close the post office was
behind on switching back our mail service to our old address. Susan called the post office and they still
had the rejected mail so we went to pick it up there. We arrived after they closed but because
Susan talked to them it was alright.
While we were out we went to Costco for some Costco stuff and had a late
lunch at Lark Burger. We were stuffed so
walked around the Southwest Plaza Mall to work off some of the good food before
heading home. I did end up cooking a
late dinner and we spent much of the evening binge watching the latest Orange
is the New Black on Netflix (it came out the day before). Sunday was the ultimate in lazy days for
us. I was wanting to go out as soon as
we finished watching the rest of the Orange show but decided at the last minute
to order Chinese delivery and just hang out for the remainder of the day. Not exactly us being our best but it was what
it was.
June 17 weekend – Word came late in the previous week that
our close would finally be happening on Monday the 19th. Thus we spent much of the weekend packing. Susan and Kari did to go to a musical on
Saturday to see Susan’s old coworker do her thing. I was told the show was great and quite
entertaining. I stayed home and packed
up this and that. Sunday was more
packing with the close the next day.
Move Week:
Monday – The close was scheduled for 12:00. I took the whole day off and Susan had a half
day at work. We met and the Egg and I
for a late breakfast around 11:00 just down the street from the title company. After a bunch of coffee and some tasty food
we sat down with the sellers, selling agent, lending agent, and title person to
sign a pile of documents. There were no
surprises and the process went as smoothly as it probably could have. Susan and I, of course, made a b-line to the
new house to soak up some of its goodness and drop off a load of stuff from the
Suburban we’d packed the night before.
Then we made three more trips to pick up our cars and other household
stuff so we could stay the night in the new house (Susan said that we should
name the new house the “Dogwood Estate” and so we shall). It wasn’t until the sun was almost down that
we were able to pack all our cars (sans Suburban) in the Dogwood Estate’s
garage for an epic picture Susan used to tell the Facebook world of our new
digs. As there is/was no central air
conditioning the house was hot except in the bedroom where I’d installed our
stand-alone air conditioning unit to its window. Bella was thoroughly confused by the house
and apprehensive about using the pads we’d laid about to do her business. It took a measure of cajoling but she did
figure it out in the end. We bought four
box fans which we mounted in windows in the kitchen and living rooms. I made the mistake of not noticing that one
of the windows did not have a screen (it was dark, sue me) and thus bugs were
blown into our faces while we sat in the kitchen on the one piece of furniture
we’d managed to bring (yep, we were right in front of the screen-less
fan).
Tuesday – This was our main moving day. We got up early enough for breakfast at our
(now) local breakfast place, Great Beginnings Café, before heading to the Dawn
house to meet John and Karen with their truck and trailer. Once they arrived we loaded up both vehicles
and trailers with virtually all of our furniture and lots of miscellaneous
stuff. I had bought many more tie-down
straps and we used every single one.
This exhausted the entirety of the morning and our caravan left for the
Dogwood Estate right around noon.
Barring a couple of stops to re-secure the loads we made the trip
without incident. We gave a brief tour
of the new abode and ordered delivery from Jimmy Johns. Kari and Alvin had a small window unit air
conditioning unit they let us borrow and I installed it almost immediately (it
was HOT outside and inside). Unloading
the goods wasn’t too bad except for the couch which was incredibly heavy and
awkward. Eventually John and I managed
to finagle it through the front door and into the living room with only a few
swear words uttered and no major damage to the house or couch. Ok, there may have been exclaimed swear words
(I can’t say for sure). Unloading and
moving things about took some time and when we were finally finished I declared
the moving portion of the day over. It
was just too dang hot out and we’d accomplished quite a bit. A Century Link installer came by to inform us
that he could not connect us to their DSL internet. It turns out the house never had phone
service. A Dish Network installer came
by and was able to install their service so at least we had something. John and Karen stayed for dinner via Perry’s
Pizza which was alright (I’d put the food a few notches below the Garlic
Knot). Susan and I were exhausted that
evening and slept hard.
Wednesday – Back on our own Susan and I made a trip to the
storage unit to load up the Suburban and trailer with stuff. We took a large chunk out of the boxes and
various other items and, after unloading everything in the Dogwood Estate
garage, made another trip. Once again it
was very hot outside (I believe we experienced record highs) so I curtailed a
final voyage to clean out the unit that day.
Instead we went to the Dawn house for a load of odds and ends we didn’t
manage to get the previous day (there will be many more such trips as it’s amazing
the amount of small things that are difficult to put in a box and thus
move). We finally came home very tired
from the long day not exactly chomping at the bit to do a whole lot more
moving. Dinner was leftover pizza and we
were satisfied and tired.
Thursday – Susan had to go to work and I got to stay home to
meet with a Cooper HVAC guy for estimates for having air conditioning
installed. This took an hour or so and I
was presented with four incredibly high (to me) estimates. I bid him good day and called another place
to schedule another consultation. I have
to admit that I didn’t accomplish a whole lot the rest of the day. The previous two days had me physically
drained though I was able to rearrange a bit in the garage and unpack tools and
whatnot. If I remember correctly dinner was
Chinese delivery. The food was alright
although the gastro-related issues I endured over the next day or so may be an
indicator that we shouldn’t order from them in the future. It was at some point in the evening when the
large garage door opener stopped working.
This was a bummer as the 12’x12’ door was stuck open and it was getting
dark. To stave off burglars and various
hoodlums for the night we zip-tied several shelves together across the opening
to block access.
Friday – Once again I had the day off and spent the morning
trying to get the garage door repaired and switching out the locks on the
house. I had an estimate from a local
place when Susan (bless her) remembered we had a home warranty which probably
covered the repair. Sure enough broken
garage doors fall under our warrantee’s purview so I scheduled a fix for the
following Monday. Unfortunately the guy
that had come out first thing to diagnose the problem was not on the list of
approved contractors so I had to cancel with him. Fortunately he was nice enough to come by
later in the day to close the door for us free of charge (yes there was a
pull-cable but, as the opener is commercial-grade, it didn’t work like the
normal pull-cables). After getting the
temporary garage door fix done we picked up Jimmy Johns on our way to see
Susan’s (and now my) favorite punk/ska band Streetlight Manifesto at the Ogden
theater downtown. We parked in Susan’s
work garage and hoofed it the few blocks to the venue. Kari was to come with us too but bailed on
account that she was wiped out from work and stuff. As the show was sold out Susan was able to
Kari’s ticket at full price to a guy standing in front of the theater (we’re
sure he later resold it for a lot more but we were satisfied with the transaction). The opening act was bizarre. The performers (there were two) sang and
played acoustic guitars while a slideshow was projected on a screen informing
us of the racial injustices Asian Americans deal with in Hollywood. It was entertaining in its own way. Next we were treated to a solo act by Jenny
Owen Youngs who was fantastic. The songs
were mostly understandable and the writing was funny and her singing chops were
great. There was a long gap after Jenny
finished her last song before Streetlight started. Their show was as amazing as always and they
played all their best songs. After the
show we walked back to Susan’s work for a pit stop before finally getting home
at midnight.
Saturday – We woke up earlyish and made our way to the
storage unit to pick up the last stuff inside which mainly consisted of tires
and wheels. We were the only ones there
which was great for us as we utilized both the carts the facility
provided. By the time we were tying down
our load there were a lot of others there and we were glad to have gotten a
slight head start on the crowd. We did
manage to get everything in this final trip and it all made the journey back to
the Dogwood Estate. After unloading we
went to Lowes to buy a mirror and BBQ.
Then we stopped at the Olive Garden on our way to the Dawn home for more
stuff. On the way home I picked up food
to BBQ for dinner. We were going to
finally drive the RS the next day for the rallycross and I went out to get the
car gassed up. On a whim I headed to the
closest auto-parts store to pick up oil for an oil-change when I say smoke
coming from under the hood. Something
was causing a LOT of oil to come out of the top of the motor. I did buy a five-quart jug of oil of which
half of which I used to refill what had leaked out. The RS made it home and we made the easy
decision to race the evo the following day instead. Thus I changed the evo’s oil and swapped out
its wheels/tires to rally-specific wheels/tires while Susan began painting her
spare bedroom (it was pink (yuck) and she was painting it blue). Not much seemed to be going my way as the
skid guard bolts were almost seized up and the oil filter was painful to remove
(so messy). Ugh. Eventually I finished up and loaded up the
Suburban with our racing gear and Susan helped me drive the evo on the
trailer. Finally done preparing for the
next day I used the BBQ for the first time to made delicious hamburgers we both
enjoyed with tasty Mimosas mixed using Champagne we’d brought with us from the
Dawn house (a leftover bottle from New Year’s).
We went to bed relatively early very tired (a theme for the week).
Sunday – We woke around 6:00 and packed up the last few
things (including Bella) for race-day. I
stopped to get ice, coffee, and donuts and we made good time down to Fountain
where the event was being held. This
particular event was actually rescheduled event #2 (weather). We arrived around 7:30 and I promptly worked
on laying out the course. There were
some serious concerns due to the copious deep ruts and we convinced the site
owners to let us utilize a new lot to avoid some of the worst obstacles. With this change the event was delayed around
30 minutes but once finished things were, once again, on track (heh). The temperature was mercifully cooler than
the previous few days which made the day better overall. It was a lightly attended event (46 entrants)
which had us a little short on workers though we made due with no real
issues. At lunch I was leading our class
with Susan sitting in third. In the end
I coned myself to second and Susan landed in fifth (only half a second from
fourth). The last runs were extra exciting
as the front tires started delaminating which resulted in chunks of rubber flying
off the tires and what was left slapping the wheel wells. We actually thought I’d had my first de-bead
the noise was so loud. The tires did
survive the event but their racing days are over. We managed to just finish racing as rain was
beginning to fall (a no-no at this site).
Several competitors helped pick up cones and load up the rallybus which
was great. Susan and I were almost the
last to leave the site at 4:30 after loading up the evo in the rain. Poor Bella was so exhausted from the day and
she slept most all of the way home.
Dinner was more BBQ’d hamburgers which, no surprise, were tasty
again. We were so so tired that the rest
of the evening was us sitting on the couch with Bella.
Last week of June – The final week of June had us busy
painting Susan’s room and unpacking. The
Dogwood Estate is beginning to feel like our home which is nice. June was a crazy month!
