Moving Story

Parents Forum
1

<p>Hey , folks. Did 700 miles on the bike this weekend. Didn’t go anywhere but it’s pretty hot. Cooper’s BBQ in Llano should be illegal. I need mortgage financing to eat there. </p>

<p>O.K… Someone wanted a moving story or at least a story about moving in. :wink: Some may remember our move-in extravaganza last year with the borrowed 4 x4 long bed extended cab truck with twenty-two’s and Pamela Sue Anderson mudflaps - yeehaw!! Every time the wheels made the trip over one of Rhodes’ 30,000 speedbumps you could hear a redneck get his wings. Ca-dingle-dingle-dingle. </p>

<p>Left us stranded in the middle of Union. It appears ca-dingle was Dodge for “Get me to a doctor. I’m about to lock-up on you in the middle of Union”. I’m sure no one thought that this years edition could top it. </p>

<p>Au contraire. </p>

<p>Like D’s air conditioner in her Xterra this story will come in fits and starts. </p>

<p>Before we leave.</p>

<p>The bags are packed we’re ready to go. I’m standing here outside the door . Already I’m so lonesome…I could cry. And I did. Inside and a little outside. It isn’t any better this year than last.</p>

<p>In fact it may be worse as D and I had both realized that this summer was her last extended time with us until we move into her Doctor’s condo after her surgical residency. D was thinking even longer term than that. :(</p>

<p>Taking her car.</p>

<p>D felt that taking her construction yellow Xterra was appropriate this year. Mind you she has never driven to Dallas from home, but hey - how hard can it be? What can possibly go wrong? We already have the vehicle, right? </p>

<p>Well like any good dad I took said Xterra to the friendly neighborhood pirate ship. I told the junior pirate in charge (One less neck-chain and smaller nugget jewelry. Easy to spot when you are experienced. ) "Look. Replace anything that is worn , leaking, cracked, or looks like it may get to be worn leaking or cracked. " I took it away from him at $1600. :eek: Well at least the A/C will work all the time, not intermittently. New tires, another $600 - why not? Safety first. </p>

<p>So we go home and load D’s Xterra and put a few things in the new truck. About a week old at the time. The old one shelled its rear-end at 99,000 and remains in the shop today (another $1600) . No one wants a repeat of last year. So , new truck it is . Same as the old truck, color, interior , everything . Just brand spankin’ 60 payment new. </p>

<p>I get online because I’m afraid that since Elvis week starts Sunday there may be a lack of hotels on Friday. After a couple of missteps, I see a decent price on a Hyatt property in a nice part of Memphis. I get to thinking? Gold Passport? Didn’t I have an account? I DID. I saved $89.00. We danced and we danced. Life was good. Something had broke my way. Surely it was a sign. A portend of things to come. Fat chance. </p>

<p>D drives the new truck over at dark thirty to say good-bye to her bestie . Obviously in a hurry , she snags the passenger mirror on the front gate as it was opening and proceeds to pull it loose from the truck. Literally hanging by a thread. A few nicks and scratches on bumpers and doors. Green transfer on white. Nothing $1600 won’t cure . My pillow heard my whimpers but it’s not telling and neither am I. </p>

<p>Stay calm. Chill. Relax. </p>

<p>We have no way to fix it , and we have to leave in the a.m… “D - take your truck to Bestie’s. I’ll duct tape the large trailer mirror apparatus to the paper plated new truck by way of a duct tape flying buttress support structure of PVC pipe, and then use clear packing tape to hold the shards of mirror in the mirror holding spot so we don’t die on the Trucker’s Graveyard - I-40. We’ll be O.K.”</p>

<p>Ring!!!Ring!!!Uhhh. Dad. The A/C stopped working in the Xterra. “What time is it dear?” About midnight, Dad. “And what time are we leaving?” Uhhh- 5 a.m.? “Just get it home and we’ll get it down to the pirate’s before we set sail.”</p>

<p>6:30 before anyone shows at the pirate ship. And he’s the Paint and Body guy. Wait, wait, wait. 7:30. A/C guy shows. Well let’s try this relay. If that doesn’t fix it, it’s the (word for big expensive thing in the dash switching area). Huh, A/C works!!! </p>

<p>And we are off. And only 3 hours behind schedule. D and W in the Xterra. Dad alone with his invoices in the “new truck”. Time passes . The new truck has satellite radio and I’m listening to Blue Collar comedy. Some of it is pretty good. Making good time. We are in Central Arkansas . I notice the outside temp was 103. I realize how thankful I am that we are over our troubles. At one heartbeat past that precise moment the cell phone rings.- Dad, the A/C quit working. - The outside temperature is now 106. Up 3 degrees in 3 seconds. Dad, are you there? If ever I had thought about abandoning it all for a life as a hobo, that was the moment. Me and my duct tape truck. Setting out for unknown lands. "Yes, Honey. I’m here. I’ll drive the Xterra. Y’all pull over. "</p>

<p>I’m sure most of you have heard me describe my physique before. Gone to seed is not even close. I wore the Xterra like a mohair sweater vest. I was dying and I don’t mean someday. The Xterra was about empty so I stopped just east of Little Rock . I was in the lead by a substantial amount as I had adopted a Nascar attitude and I appeared to be trying to get my lap back. </p>

<p>I really needed gas. It was one of those 16 pump stations where you walk a football field to the cashier and all the pumps were full. I positioned myself behind a likely candidate. No one in the car. Must be inside paying. 5 minutes later still no sign of the driver . 5 more minutes . Sweat pouring salt rivers into my eyes. THAT’S IT. WHAT KINDA INCONSIDERATE FOOL - GRRRRR. </p>

<p>I decided to be mature. D and W were watching me and well , they were watching me. They could sense I needed to leave before bad things happened. I did the only mature thing I could think of. I left. As I sped past 5 feet from his hood I did accidentally spit on his car. It appears that I had misjudged both windage and elevation. My bad.</p>

2

<p>I can’t wait for the next installment! thanks for sharing, cur!</p>

3

<p>Oh brother, Cur. I just hope your trip is the capper on these moving trips. We set out for our drive from CT to NC…the AC better work!!!</p>

4

<p>

LOL!!! Only a devoted dad & a true gentleman would swap to a car w/o AC when the temp was 106.</p>

1 Like
5

<p>LOL, cur. Like oakland mom, I can not wait for the next chapter of your moving story. I have not laughed like this in a long time, LOL!!!</p>

6

<p>My daughter and my wife dang near dis-owned me on the spot. There were “how could you” and “did you really” shrieks that I kept trying to get under control as I had only moved to the station across the street . Those two when excited have high pitched mountain voices , capable of calling their men home from the holler two mountains over. I didn’t seek attention at that time.</p>

7

<p>C, I just love reading your posts. Welcome back. You’re being paged in the Cafe lol.</p>

8

<p>More, more! I’m going to print out the whole story so that next week when we’re stuck on either the NJ Turnpike or I-95 while moving our D, I can read this out loud to pass the time and improve the mood. Please do finish up by Tuesday morning. :)</p>

9

<p>Roflol!! Just trying to picture my H in our xterra, would not be pretty!! can’t wait for more.</p>

10

<p>Curm,
Someday you are going to put all of this together into a book and it will sell tons of copies. You have such a way with understatement!!</p>

11

<p>hehehe…Elvis Week in Memphis. Brings back memories of last year when we took the ‘north route’ to Chapel Hill…only we didn’t know there WAS an Elvis Week. Hit Memphis at 11 at night and after checking out Graceland and the Lisa Marie, we finally found a hotel full of ‘ladies’ (some weren’t) with Priscilla beehives. ldgirl and I had never laughed so hard in our lives.</p>

<p>Curm - I’m with you…it isn’t any easier the second year. I’ve wanted to talk to ldgirl a dozen times a day since we parted…but she’s flitted off to do her college thing and hasn’t returned my calls…sigh.</p>

12

<p>Soldiering on.</p>

<p>The problem with the A/C (based on the near constant telephone contact I had with the junior pirate and the conversation he was having with a tame Nissan dealer’s service writer) was supposedly in the thermostat. The darn thing thought it was the temp to turn off so it did. I managed to get the A/C to come on once or twice by turning the thermostat back and forth violently (an emotion that was not hard to muster) and about an hour east I had the dang thing working. We never shut the Xterra off again until we got it safely to Blues City. </p>

<p>D and W wanted to change to the Xterra as D didn’t want to drive in Memphis in the big truck with the wide mirrors. I mean mirror. The other side , with the duct taped pvc holding up the clear packing taped together shards of mirror, produced what in my opinion were some of the most amazing Cubist visuals since Les Mademoiselles d’ Avignon. Looking at it directly and close-up it was as if Picasso himself had come back and painted my portrait. I felt truly blessed. </p>

<p>On I-40 it was much better just to signal , close my eyes and turn to the right after a beat or two. </p>

<p>Memphis, we are back, baby.</p>

<p>We took the 240 , I think it is , around the south of Memphis. Me leading as I had glanced at a Mapquest mini-map of the hotel location a day before so therefore I was the navigator. D was doing her best to keep proper surveillance distance between us so that there was no-way-I-could-determine-she-was-behind-me-at-any-time. In rush hour traffic that produced two instances where I called her phone to find she had passed me unknowingly . I had slowed down to a crawl because I couldn’t see her. But thankfully she was right behind me when she got all Joey Chitwood on her left side wheels, only. She had yanked her wheel to the left across the speed bumps when she realized she was about to accidentally exit to a well-marked Toll Road that had been advertised for the last ten exits. I wouldn’t have wanted to miss that. :eek: </p>

<p>There was another phone call between us that I hope, with time, the counselor can peel out of her brain and then …merciful God, we are at the hotel.</p>

<p>Check-in went perfect. For some reason I couldn’t pay cash in advance and leave a credit card up for incidentals like I have in every hotel room in the last twenty years. But I could pay cash when I checked out. Huh? Only two managers and a phone call later , we were whisked to our room in record time.</p>

13

<p>Reads like a good road movie…</p>

14

<p>LOL!!! great, great,…keep it coming, cur! :)</p>

15

<p>Great writing! </p>

<p>I told kids they could go West or North but not South. The cross to Staten Island and then another bridge to NJ is one circle Dante forgot to describe. North is great: we get a ferry! Yeah! No NYC bridge traffic. Kids knew my geographic tyranny was a joke, but just barely.</p>

1 Like
16

<p>The bed was very comfortable. The rate was great. $89.00 AARP, AAA. And I did I tell you about my free night? We’ll stay at the Hyatt Place again. It’s a straight shot down Poplar to midtown, and I know my way around midtown. </p>

<p>The next morning D and I let mom sleep and we went to the storage facility to retrieve her stuff. The stuff was divided into two categories. Clothes that went to the hotel to be tried on for fit and fashion and regular dorm stuff. We packed it all into the truck. Octopus lamp rocking back and forth like a tapped and spent beer keg. We went back to the hotel, off-loaded the clothes packed in those giant tupperware-like clear containers . We used our own handtruck. Tres cool, I know. As D and I were bringing in the first of two large loads , the hotel staff was goggle eyed thinking we were moving in. </p>

<p>She tried on the clothes. It sounded like I imagine the Wailing Wall sounding. We then moved the clothes that were staying with her back to the new truck. </p>

<p>D and W got into the Xterra and …the A/C worked. YES! We traveled to the school but had to park the Xterra off campus until D covered her Greek affiliation stickers with postcards . D found a spot on the street and we pulled up as close to her as we could. </p>

<p>The new truck had very little space left in the cab, but there was enough for her to ooch in with her mom. The day was already hot and I made a big deal about D riding in the truck rather than walking the block to campus and then across to her dorm. D insisted that riding in her mom’s lap would be too embarassing. Before I knew it the little weasel had already started walking to the security shack at the entry gate. I followed after her in the truck with the window down and once we were within earshot of the folks around the entrance started yelling “D. Hey, D. Ride with us. I got your lawn chair. We’ll put it in the back of the truck like we were back home. A lawn chair. In the back. Like back home.” I have never seen her move with such speed but I have to admit that the look of horror - well, I’ve put that on her face before. She jumps on her mom’s lap , starts laughing after trying to act mad and we head to the dorm. </p>

<p>Which is of course the least accessible point on campus. No elevator, either. I unloaded the stuff. D and W carried load one and two to the room. W stays and starts unpacking. D comes down to get the next load. Once I unpack the truck, I attempt to take items to the room on the handtruck. I do believe I was passed by a sloth with a motor deficit. I do finally make it to the room. 3 flights of stairs but we are on floor two. How does that work? People are following me with the portable crash paddles at the ready. I weakly wave them on wondering silently what the payments would be. </p>

<p>W and D are very efficient and before long we are ready to remove our 15 large containers with tops and an item or two that wouldn’t fit in the room. I had the fifteen lids. As we start down , mom drops a container and it tumbles the last flight of stairs and D shushs her. As in “You are making too much noise.” I’m at the top of the three flights with the lids. I’m laughing pretty hard as is my W. One lid accidentally slips and slides noisily down each of the 3 flights and then across the concrete floor. The noise in the enclosed stairwell is pretty dang loud. D shushs me. D realizes too late what she has done. :wink: 14 lids are simultaneously released all blowing past D as she is frantically trying to catch them about midway down as she is coming up to meet them. They are past her like they’ve been shot out a cannon. </p>

<p>Finally she starts laughing. Gathering everything up my little family makes about as much noise as a Stomp show . Fait accompli.</p>

17

<p>ROTFL! Excellent storytelling, Cur, and great imagery!</p>

<p>Glad your D is all settled in for the year too, after that adventure!</p>

18

<p>I loved it!!! You have to tell us about the trip back home. If you started your own blog, I would be a regular reader!</p>

19

<p>That…was the best thing I have ever read on CC.</p>

<p>I am banging my head on my keyboard, wondering if I should just quit the dang novel now, or if I can steal lines from you without breaking any copyright laws.</p>

<p>Seriously, great story, and great story telling!!!</p>

20

<p>How can anyone top this???</p>