Oregon or Bust
April 1, 2015 (no fooling)
We left Oxnard at 2 pm Tuesday (March 31). Ken drove the whole way because the SUV + loaded trailer could get a little wibbly, and I have no practice in dealing with that.
We were two hours from our destination and making great time, having made our final gas/pit stop, when the left rear tire on the trailer gave up the ghost. It was 4:30 am and almost nobody was on the road, so Ken was able to get it to the shoulder safely, limp to the nearest exit, and then limp to a warehouse facility that had floodlights around it. One phone call to U-Haul and about an hour later, a repair guy came out, replaced the wheel in about ten minutes, and we were back on our way.
I will say that packing the case of toilet paper so that it was the first thing accessible in the trailer was a good idea. And I am grateful for the flashlight on my iPhone and the large rocks just off to one side of the road.
Anyway.
We got to the apartment around 8 am, I think. Ken was at work by 9, and it’s a 15-minute walk. So 17 hours on the road (including the tire issue and some very brief pit/gas stops). What follows is the ongoing blog I kept up throughout the day, because it amused me…
9 am. Ken has gone to work. I shower, set the alarm for 2 pm, slide into bed with the Kindle and read a couple of chapters of a Dresden File. Grimore finds his kitty stairs, gets on the bed, and finally, finally stops singing the Song of His People.
Somewhere between 9:15 and 10:35 am. Grimoire tries to wake me up. I pull the comforter over my head. He steps on my head with his enormous paw. I make some incoherent noise and he settles back down.
10:35 am. My mother calls. (I hadn’t muted the phone on the off chance Ken needed something.) I mumble something incoherent and hang up. I try to fall back asleep.
12:42 pm. Ken texts that he misses Grimmy and I already and wishes we could all curl up for a nap. What follows is this exact exchange:
Me: Garblzornk…
Ken: I’m too tired for Vogon poetry right now. Maybe later, my love…
Me: No tea. No milk. No will to live.
Ken: Do you have tea bags? That you can get to?
Me: i don’t know, do i?* fire bsd tree prtyy**
Understand that from my end, I have to close one eye and hold the phone approximately 6.3 millimeters from my other eye. I’m Mr. Magoo without my glasses on.
Also during this exchange, Grimoire attempted to get my attention by patting me on an exposed, sensitive portion of my anatomy. His claws need trimming. My responses was less than gentle.
A few minute later, as I am lying on the bed, having given up on falling back asleep and listening to the gentle rain on the leaves outside, I receive another text:
Ken: Come to the front door now, my love.
I wrap myself in a spare sheet, immediately turning into the female lead in a romantic comedy, and go to the front door. It’s raining and lovely. Did he tell me to look at the rain? Instructions unclear. I head back to the bedroom to find my phone and ask when the doorbell rings.
It’s Ken. He’s holding a cup of English breakfast and a small container of milk. Apparently there are tea/coffee facilities all over work (although he had to buy the milk somewhere). He tells me he loves me, kisses me, and dashes back off into the rain.
Although the tea is almost cold by the time I drink it, it’s the best-tasting tea ever.
Time to do some unpacking.
2:33 pm. Find my own tea stash. Unfortunately, have not yet found the electric kettle or a pot for boiling water. Or mugs.
2:37 pm. Do I own all these spices? When did that happen?
2:49 pm. [in Count von Count voice] Three! Three boxes unpacked! Ah ha ha!
2:52 pm. I HAVE FOUND THE ALCOHOL.
3:15 pm. Run out of boxes to unpack. Have created ongoing list of things to find in storage and things to take to storage.
3:36 pm. Sitting in bathroom, playing a game on my iPad. (Do not judge me.) Struck by the sudden realization: Oh shit, I live here now.
(I stopped blogging after that.) Ken came home, we napped, and then went to the storage unit and unpacked the trailer and SUV…in the rain. Then we came back to the apartment to unpack what needed to go into the apartment, and an incredibly wonderful young man from an apartment across the way saw us and volunteered to help. So I lay on the bedroom floor with a stressed Grimoire until they were done. We tried to take him out to dinner a few days later, but somehow he ended up taking us out to lunch. (No, I can’t quite explain how that happened.) (Which reminds me, we still owe him dinner.)
Grimoire did fantastically well, all things considered. He had his carrier to hide in, his sheepskin to lie on, and a litter box, as well as access to the front of the SUV. We did give him Kitty Xanax, which helped, although he still frequently sang us the Song of His People. Sometimes he napped on my lap or on the console between us. Sometimes he lay in the litter box. Sometimes he tried to squeeze into a hole between our stuff to get further back into the SUV, necessitating that I remove my seatbelt and dive after him before we lost him forever. It took him a few days to get acclimated to the apartment, and he still follows me from room to room, but he’s a happy boy because his people are here. 🙂
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*The depth of my exhaustion is clear from the fact that I have given up on capital letters. Normally this would appall me.
**An attempt to quote Buffy’s “Fire bad; tree pretty.”
