25 November 2003 (Update #52, not mailed)... Hello from San Francisco!
It's been nothing short of chaotic here in the Sunset of San Francisco as the Goosebumps crew competes with the movers for space to continue some semblance of normalcy. Boxes everywhere! If we stand still for too long at one time, we'll find yourself covered in wrapping paper and sealed in a carton. Yikes! We'll be much happier once everything is on the truck and we're on the road, racing the movers to Santa Fe, NM. Emphatically, neither of wants to ever do this again.
We hired a local moving company (Cunningham Movers) to handle both packing and moving and they sent a crew over on 3 occasions, doing 2 or 3 rooms each time. What an incredible bunch of guys: they're fast. Celia knew about them from an earlier move she'd made about 10 years ago.
Before we could have them finish the packing we had to empty 3 storerooms: one each in Redwood City, Lake Comanche and Angels Camp. They contained the Captains 'stuff' and that of his parents. I'd gone through these locations before, tossing what I could, but once it arrived and I saw the basement fill I had to get back to work throwing out all but the most insistent white elephants. One load went to the dump via a commercial service plus 6 or 7 more loads in our own Tundra. It would have been miserable without our full size pickup.
The storeroom in Angels Camp (about 150 miles from San Francisco) held all the tools (table saw, band saw, etc.) and some furniture that had been in my parents house when I sold it several years ago. I met the movers in Angels Camp and they emptied the storeroom and moved everything in a 24' bob tail. It was more economical to send it in a separate truck to Santa Fe than unload it and add it to the 45' trailer carrying everything from the house. Sadly, most things will go into another storeroom in Santa Fe where it will stay till we can build a garage and workshop.
While all this was going on, we were arranging with a realtor for the sale of Celia's house. Celia chose the same person that sold her the house many years ago. What a terrific choice in asking Peter Fong to handle the sale. He has been handling all the disagreeable stuff and made it easy for us to concentrate on getting moved. What's more he seems to have an eldless list of competent people that are taking care of all the preparation. Thanks Peter!
Today was moving day and it was every bit as chaotic as packing. It seemed like an ant hill with people going everywhere... boxes moving to first one spot only to appear moments later in another. Celia was concerned that the workers have something to eat and drink while they were there, so she made a couple runs to Dean's Deli down the street. Plus a run to the bakery for a birthday cake when she found out one of the guys was another year older that day. Little by little the volume diminished till there was nothing left but the 2 of us watching the truck pull away. We walked back into a nearly empty house with nothing but our suitcases and an Aerobed.
Tomorrow we're out of here and on our way to Santa Fe. Thanksgiving will be celebrated along the way: we'll definitely have a lot to give thanks for since we're finally on our way to whatever is next!
More when we arrive at our new house.