Moving Day!

As you probably know, every moving day (also know as "the big day" or "this is it" and perhaps a few others) is preceded by a good deal of work in preparation. In our case it was about 60 boxes of work!

Interestingly enough when one is packing up a small apartment a major issue becomes finding a place for packed boxes. It doesn't seem like this should be an issue - everything fits in there already all I have to do is put it into boxes, right? I guess not - so we got creative and made ever higher stacks of boxes and still managed to get space to walk around. This of course makes you wonder - will a 16 foot truck hold all this stuff that is more than filling our apartment?























It started slowly but since Dad, Mom and Mark were there to help us it was a lot easier. And since this all started happening at about 8:30 in the morning I'm sure our neighbors were happy to see us go if they weren't already!


















Eventually, things were looking pretty cleared out in good old #309...


















And things were looking quite full in the truck!


















But it turns out that you can get all of our stuff in one truck. Now for the fun part - driving!


















Thankfully, the traffic wasn't bad and after starting at about 8:30am we were ready for lunch and then hit the road at 1pm. Now, since there are strict stipulations regarding who may or may not drive the rental truck it of course came down to me to be the only driver and I had to follow the rules...

Rule #1: No drive-thru with the truck. Okay, not an issue.

Rule #2: Be sure to stop at all weigh stations or you may be ticketed. Sure, no prob...wait, what?! Quick, how may weigh stations are there? Where are they? What do you really do there? Okay, there's one in Valencia - but how does it work? Suddenly, the idea of getting weighed, never an issue to me before, was one of concern. Does this 6-ton truck make my butt look big?

Before I could even think through how I would navigate the station I accidentally drove right past it and lumbered off into the mountains. I had all my stuff loaded up and I was running from the law!

I would also like to point out that the highways are in much better shape North of the grapevine. I can safely say this because since moving trucks are actually constructed using trampolines every crack in the road creates a bounce which has about 3 to 4 aftershocks that keep you rocking for some time. I thought if I had the right rhythm in LA I was going just just bounce right over another car (or perhaps a weight station)!

Overall, the trip went well and I only cut off one car - not bad I'd say for driving an 800 cubic foot box down the road for about 4 hours. But we survived and I even managed to back the thing into our driveway without damaging/scaring/killing anything!


















We had even more help at our new house and quickly got into unloading mode. Jen got into it and armed with her tool belt I thought I was going to see Tim 'the tool man' Taylor any minute.






















I'll keep you updated on the rest and hopefully have some pictures for you when everything is unloaded! Thank everyone for your help!

A Tale Of, umm...One City

Ah, San Juan Capistrano... a strange mix of both old and new...





















If planning on traveling there be sure you know where you are going first...

















I know, it can be confusing, even shocking, but I know that you'll succeed...


















you seem skeptical, but trust me, it is a worth while trip...


















You know those places that just seem to say "stay out"...this is not one of them...



















They have much to offer including super fancy traffic lights...
























Apparently fabulous shopping...



















And lots of help and direction for visitors...


















They do have some problems though like dumping of trespassing ladders...but what great city doesn't, really...
























Overall, it is a very exciting place... to eat dessert!






















*Actual experience may vary. See visitor center for details. If taking a family potrait within city limits do not go to the mission as it will cost $1000. No, I'm not kidding. If all dressed identically while in SJC please wander around randomly eliciting strange looks from as many people as possible. This blog will not be held liable for any outbursts, stalking, or general horseplay while visiting. Mind the giant poop in the park by the stage. Desserts may not be as good or exciting as Jen indicates but should always be given a chance. I still have songs from Wicked stuck in my head. You really need to keep your face further away from your monitor, really.

Making Our Presence Known

We finally made it - our first weekend sleeping in our new house! It was an interesting weekend that provided much work, humor, and interesting happenings.

First off, we have carpet! It was installed last week but this was the first time that I got to see it. It's just how I imagined - indescribable. This is mostly because given different amounts of ambient light our carpet looks completely different. Either way, it is MUCH better than cement and is a welcome sight and feel!

Take a look for yourself:

Unfortunately, Jen's first weekend in our house was spent suffering. No, I mean suffering in a different way than what we have been doing (see previous posts, especially "pain(t)" post). Jen came down with a cold/flu thing and was feeling pretty terrible. However, shopping for lots of new items did make her feel a little bit better, if only for a little while.

Since someone took it upon themselves to relieve us of our newly repaired pool sweep, I decided it would be a good idea to "make our presence known" to those around us. I hoped to dissuade any riff raff or urchins from doing what they do best, mainly: doing what I wish I could do sometimes but am prohibited from doing by things like morality, conscience, courtesy and The Law.

This process of acheiving "presence know-age" was much easier than I had hoped it would be. Sunday morning I woke up to the sound of people rolling trash cans on concrete. It was actually, and delightfully, thunder! A big storm had moved in and bolts were coming down along with a few drops of rain. So, being the fun-loving geeky science fan that I am, I figured I would see how far away it was by counting the seconds between the bolts and the claps. To better hear the peels of thunder I opened a window...

Now, having never lived anywhere with a house alarm before it takes a bit of adjustment. My adjustment was rapidly progressed by a new, frightening, and all together far-too-obvious-to-our-neighbors experience of suddenly realizing that you had not turned the alarm off before attempting to open something.

Whoa, that was loud.

So, 7am Sunday morning: Presence = known.

Rank: Amateur.

Just to top this, I also needed to mow our lawn which is not just existing but also green! This is when I realized that our lawnmower that was gifted to us is gas-powered. I have never used a gas-powered anything in my life other than a car and I had a feeling that wouldn't help me at this point. I did use the primer button then found something that looked like a clutch/safety and pulled the rope conveniently labeled, "pull to start".

Rank: somewhat proficient (but proud!)

After sweeping up the clippings from mowing with a dreadfully small broom, I realized that I had mowed off the head of a sprinkler in our front lawn (figures). Cecil came over and helped me do a short term fix by taking a head off an unused sprinkler and swapping the two. This worked wonderfully. I had to test this to be sure since I don't want geysers in our yard overnight though.


Unfortunately, I don't know which sprinkler valve controls which sprinklers. I found out quickly when I selected the valve that had our unused sprinklers on it thus causing a geyser the height of our neighbor's chimney and about 2 feet from said chimney. He probably doesn't actually need any help cleaning out his chimney I think.

Rank: right back down to amateur

So, after a successful weekend I think it is time to stop (before I cause any more success).

5 more days until moving day!

Rejection

Well, it appears as if our apartment complex knows that we have given up on it and has decided to reject us.



For example: yesterday marked the last time we have to do laundry in a shared laundry room - yay! Normally, this would be a time of great rejoicing for me since it has been a less than spectacular experience. However, our huge laundry load was supposed to take 3 washers and 2 driers but because of things like a washer not draining, a dryer not drying, and random people coming in and stopping the driers while I was gone it actually took 4 washers and 3 dryers and a few more hours. Good times.



Oh laundry room how I will not miss thee.


Also, our hedge has been hacked back to a pitiful remnant of what it once was (please see June 6th post to compare) by the "gardeners" (I use this term loosely). As if to add insult to injury, our shower has also decided to not spray water but rather let the water casually trickle out and only in freezing or scalding temperatures which change mid-shower at random times.
















After a satisfying shower, at least we can go relax in our apartment which, despite our best efforts, will get no cooler than the low to mid 80s at any time. I've considered opening a spa with "soothing natural trickling water sounds and sauna like conditions".



All this happens as if our apartment is saying to us, "I know you don't want me anymore so I just don't want you either - get out". I have to admit, our apartment is making a convincing argument - We got the message!


So we decided to take a well-deserved break and go see a show. So we drove over to Broadway LA and saw Wicked (trust me, the irony is not lost on me).

It was amazing - and since I am totally addicted to the music now I must say that the performance given by Erin Mackey as Glinda (totally hilarious) and Teal Wicks as Elphaba (absolutely amazing) was well beyond what you may hear on the soundtrack or see in the (illegal?) recordings of Wicked on youtube.com (Act 1 & Act 2).


Only 11 more days of apartment living!

Pain(t)

As promised here are some before and after shots (and a few others).

First things first - Mark helped us remember that it was the 4th of July. That's one big man with two small flags.

I was all ready to go so I thought that I'd get a head start and put some primer on a few things ahead of time.

I did learn eventually that the cement does not need primer - oops! And of course we can't forget to mention our home away from home. We spent so much time (and money) there it might as well be our second home.

Eventually, we did get off to a good start - tackling the project little by little.

Easy with that paint boys...

You make that look like we know what we're doing!

We were also visited by some strange glowing creatures that night. I found out these things are called "fire works" and all kinds of people came out in their front yard to light them off. I will have to do some more "research" with these items now that I live in an area where they aren't illegal!

We all had to do our part cleaning up and since we really only had one big sink, and the window by it had the blinds taken down for painting it was...well, a bit blinding. Everyone dealt with it in their own ways...

Everyone worked together to get things done which really shrunk the task down!

Pretty soon we were seeing some big changes!

Once we got the Dad combo on the rollers we were really moving along!


Painting baseboards was a big project and lent itself to some different kinds of painting methods. Don't worry no one was harmed in the painting of the boards! At least, not severely...or perhaps at least not permanently anyway.


I guess it did leave some marks though...

However, I think that the results made it all worth it. Thanks everyone for your help!

In the end, we had accomplished a lot (including painting the ceilings twice - sigh) but I think Mark tells us how we all really felt about it right then - tired!