It has taken a little while to recover from our wild weekend in London but at last it is time to chronicle the passing of a milestone for Frank – the big 60! It was his weekend to plan whatever he wanted and he wanted… records! So to the big vinyl market in Spitalfileds we went. It is held the first and third Fridays of each month so we needed to be there a few days before his birthday. No problem!

We headed down to London on Thursday night on the Caledonian sleeper. Yup, like in the old movies! We had a cabin with a double bed and a “bathroom” – a closet that doubled as a toilet and a shower. Very entertaining! We left Aberdeen at 9:45 and had some prosecco and snacks in the dining car before heading to what we expected to be a peaceful night with the gentle rocking of the train to lull us to sleep. HAH! That might have been the case if it didn’t feel like the tracks didn’t quite line up and a few of the wheels were ready to come off! The rattle of the carriage as we barrelled throught the darkness was anything but soothing. And then there was the “bathroom” door which didn’t quite shut snuggly and so knocked incessantly until we stuffed towels in the latch. So a goodnight’s sleep was not to be found – but it was an experience!

So we were a little trainlagged (?) when we arrived in London and made our way from Euston to Spitalfields where our AirBnB was located – right across the street from the market! And right upstairs from a fish and chip shop! With the front door in an alley behind rubbish bins! Yay! 🫤 But we are intrepid travellers so we dropped our backpacks and headed for the market where the next several hours was spent rifling through vinyl old and new.

We then spent the rest of the day wandering around the east end. For all the times we had been there, it was always just a stop on the way to somewhere else so to actually spend 3 days there was definitely a different experience. We were AMAZED by the street art in Shoreditch, where hipsters and vintage clothing stores are amazingly thick on the ground. Here’s just a sample. The photos don’t do justice.

To be honest, most of the weekend was spent walking around, looking for records, eating things we don’t get in Aberdeen (Peruvian, Vietnamese, etc.) and just relaxing. We spent as much time out and about as possible, avoiding the stuffiness of the flat – opening the windows during the hours that the chippy was open was not advisable! – and day drinking. They’ve elevated it to an Olympic sport in London with “happy hour” specials for the entire day on Saturday. And of course we had to join in the fun… although it actually wasn’t our idea…. really!

If you followed our adventures in Portugal on the travel blog, you may recall the Hungarian friends we made at our cooking class. Well one of them actually lives in London so Alexa met us for lunch and then suggested that we try the cool cocktail bar down the street. And everything went weird from there! It was two-for-one that afternoon so you order one drink and get two. They obviously weren’t as strong but there was no measuring going on and just lots of beverages being handed round. The crowd was quite lively. We were well into our second or third round of two fisted drinking when the bar staff started dancing on the bar and throwing ice. And so it went for the entire afternoon. Alexa headed off to meet other friends and we managed to find somewhere to eat and get back to the flat without too much mishap.

Sunday was more of the same with stops at Brick Lane Petticoat Lane market. We had covered Camden Lock the day before so we had the east end street market scene pretty much covered. So we watched Spain score against England (the only goal… ugh) and then headed one of Frank’s favorite breweries to quaff more beverages. We ended the day with an Indian on the famous Brick Lane before it was time to get ready to pack for home. We were taking the train home as well but this time NOT the sleeper but first class on one of the long distance trains. Monday was the big day itself so everyone wished Frank a happy birthday and we enjoyed the free drinks in first class all the way to Aberdeen. Now it is time to let the liver recover.

Now back to reality….

What does it mean when time speeds by? Does it mean that we are getting settled and so we don’t notice time? Or does it mean that life is still such a whirlwind that we can’t keep track of it? Regardless, here it is nearly a month into the new year so it’s time for an update.

I do think that we are adjusting albeit slowly. The flat is now feeling more like home, even though we are STILL waiting for the delivery of the rest of our belongings. Grrrr…. we got notice two weeks ago that they had landed and cleared customs. Now we just have to wait for them to get to Aberdeen. How long can that possibly take? It’s the same bloody island! I’m fairly certain we could walk faster. (Note: according to Google maps it would take 163 hours to walk to London. Depending on our level of determination, we COULD actually walk faster.) It’s not that we don’t have everything we need because technically we do. What we don’t have are the things we own that we want: pictures for the walls that mean something to us, sharp knives, hats and gloves, books, records, etc. I am very much looking forward to the day that I can actually dice tomatoes without mashing them to cook in my cast iron skillet while listening to music on vinyl. (Let’s say Ghost in the Machine or Learning to Crawl if we are looking in the “P” section). Being patient and taking lots of yoga breaths….

Work has begun to have a *bit* of a routine – although I think that will more evident starting this week now that classes are back in session. I give my first lecture this week (Eeek!) which is much earlier than expected. I’m co-teaching Data Governance and Ethics and the other lecturer has to be in Vancouver this week so I get to do the “Welcome to the module” lecture. Which will contain very little about ethics because that’s his gig. My part isn’t for another 6 weeks when I start talking about how data governance helps people to do the right thing (once the ethics stuff explains what the right thing means). I’m already planning for a bottle of prosecco and a fish supper to celebrate my first lecture on UK soil. Updates to follow.

Besides work and home, we are exploring. Our hiking boots are getting quite the workout and we are loving that! We look for opportunities to head out every weekend to wander somewhere nearby. We’ve covered quite a bit of the coast north of Aberdeen, a few kilometers in the Cairngorms, and some woodlands around castles nearby. We are now card carrying members of the National Trust for Scotland (or will be when the cards arrive!) so we will be visting lots of castes and manor houses and other historical sites. First up was Castle Fraser which has nothing to do with the characters in the Diana Gabaldon books but that didn’t stop them from capitalising on the name. The grounds were lovely (albeit very icy) and the castle was really interesting. Most NTS sites are closed until April but this one runs a “behind the scenes” tour in the winter that shows how restoration is done and how the collection is cared for. We got to see all kinds of things that are usually off limits to tourists during the summer and hear all about the ghosts. Next weekend we head north for a different kind of Scottish national touring: distillary visits!

And our diary is filling up. (Apparently we don’t use calendars, we use diaries.). We’ve already had one successful outing with friends from Edinburgh who met us halfway to spend an afternoon in Dundee. We have friends in Dundee who are heading north shortly, friends from Stirling who maybe our first overnight guests, and then we head to the west coast to visit my family. And that doesn’t include the travel we have planned over the coming months (Grand Canaria in February, Switzerland in March, Florida in April, Philly in May). Those adventures will be outlined in the travel blog so you’ll need to check that out later.

And the obligatory “photos of us having fun” to go along with the post.

And our first Christmas holiday in our new place is done. It was a crazy, challenging, joyous, amazing, frustrating, wonderful time. And now it draws to a close and we prepare to find a rhythm and routine for the new year.

After a very bad start to our stay, we seem to have turned a corner. We were able to move out of our little temporary space into our larger and cosier space the week of Christmas. Because who doesn’t flit (read: move house) 4 days before Christmas! But when you only have 6 cases worth of stuff plus a few boxes off odds and sods you have accumulated over the first month, it doesn’t take long.

What takes longer is learning new stuff all over again: how to work another microwave; which is the best setting on the washing machine; how to keep the bedroom warm; etc. Since everything is still new, we have no habits to break. And we were lucky enough to have one of our two wonderful children to visit. After many changes to plane tickets to avoid the massive winter storm in the US, Jesse arrived at our tiny Aberdeen airport just before Christmas. We had a week of eating too much, walking a lot, visiting folks, setting up the apartment, trying to cook family favourites in a still unfamiliar kitchen, and many other adventures. We ate fish and chips, take-away Chinese and Indian, several bar lunches, and entire tin of Cadbury’s Heroes.

And then after a week of endless eating, drinking, playing games and watching all the Shrek movies, we are back to being just the two of us. Now to figure out what “normal” might look like – once I actually go back to work that is. I *love* the fact that the university just closes for a fortnight so there’s no guilt about taking time off. And I might actually be a little bored by the time I get back to the office. 🙂

But for now, I share some photos of our joyful holiday and hope that you and yours had a similar wonderful time. And of course, I wish you all the happiest of new years!

Normally I would have expected the follow up to the last post to be another list of all the items we’ve managed to get accomplished since we returned from our data collecting trip. However, the powers-that-be apparently decided we needed to slow down – or at least that I did. So 3 days after landing, I tested positive for Covid for the first time. And spent the next four days capable of nothing more than lethargically laying on the couch drinking fluids and binging “Call the Midwife” {sigh}

Unfortunately, time itself didn’t stand still as well so there were still things to do. For example, we had to try to salvage something edible from the overgrown mess that used to be our vegetable garden.

Normally such a bounty would have put me over the moon but what does one do with half a dozen baseball-bat-sized cucumbers? Especially when being ravaged by the pandemic virus? Why you foist them on your husband’s co-workers of course! Frank was still negative and I was isolating so he got to play vegetable fairy and see how many people he could torment with what we had.

And I still have work to do on my course that I’m teaching this fall before we go. Nope, that didn’t happen. (Apologies in advance to the students who will not be getting my best effort on this!) I had meetings with clients, some of which I was able to pull off in between naps. And we still have to continue our preparations to move… which have now slowed to a crawl. Most of the work on our end is on hold but the buyers are moving right along and wanted to come back to the house to measure some things. So we had to continue to live like it was a show house with half our belongings hidden in places we still hadn’t completely figured out.

The most important thing in the “ready to move” category didn’t involve the house: it was my appointment with the visa processing center in Boston the week after we got back. As in one week after being hit by the Covid bus. Ugh. Unfortunately, as Rochester isn’t really the hub of the universe (shh, don’t say it too loudly as some people might be shocked to find that out!), there was no where close where I could go and submit my paperwork and do the photo and fingerprint thing. Boston seemed as logical as Long Island, the only one in NY state, and it allowed me to visit the youngest child and retrieve the dog who had been staying with them since we left. This required a six hour drive each way for a 30 minute appointment – and I have Covid. Double ugh.

But my isolation officially ended on Sunday morning so off I go, masked and ready to do not much of anything. I made it with no real trouble other than lots of rain on the boring drive and we even managed to have a lovely dinner at the Atlantic Fish Company (sans vino unfortunately, still wasn’t ready to go there.) Then a night on the air mattress and I was up and ready to go to my appointment. Which was running late because the systems were down. Of course. But everything got taken care of and I didn’t even feel too guilty because masks were required in the office so everyone was masked just in case I was still too germy.

Then I bundled the dog up and got ready to make the return trek home. Quick stop at Harvard to say goodbye and drop off the apartment keys and we were westbound. Except I forgot to actually drop off the apartment keys. And didn’t remember until about an hour into the drive when I reached for a snack in the passenger seat and the keys stabbed me in the leg. Grrrrrr. So much for the quick trip home.

Do you know how challenging it is to simply “turn around” on the Mass Pike? It took me 10 miles to get to the next exit and then another 10 miles of looping through neighborhoods to get back on. Same thing when I got close the the rest stop where we were meeting for the key handover. But they got back to their rightful owners and we only lost two hours in the process. {sigh}

So eight hours after I left Boston, I pulled into my garage to find that the buyers were still there even though they should have been long gone from their measuring spree. And I didn’t care. They have now met the dog we were trying to pretend we didn’t have – luckily Buddy didn’t try to hump them! – and I assume that we don’t even interact with them again. Regardless, everything is coming out of hiding because it’s impossible for us to live this way. Especially when there are so many things still to do.

Hopefully I’ll get at least SOME of them done now that the worst of Covid is in the rear view mirror…. I hope.

It’s been a full week in Aberdeen and it has been an interesting week. We started the same way any trip across multiple time zones begins: jet lag, confusion, and time adjustment. It didn’t take long to get over that and settle into our AirBnb to try to act like we live here. We have been only moderately successful. 🙂

We are staying in a two bedroom flat in the village of Cults (pronounced koolts not like the weird brainwashing groups) on the western edge of Aberdeen. We chose it because we thought it a likely location we would be interested in buying – partly because several faculty at RGU live here and partly because it seemed to be very similar to neighborhoods we’ve lived in before. We’re trying very hard not to just relocate our current life to a new location but it’s difficult to imagine how to translate what we think we want into what we can find. For example, Frank thinks a 2-car garage is a requirement but that is at odds with my desire to live where I can bike or bus to work. We have lots to ponder.

One thing we really thought was important was to try to spend the week doing just the things that we would do if we lived here. When we come for a visit, we go places and do things because we are on vacation. So rich meals, day drinking, staying up late, and other activities that are generally bad for one’s health when done frequently for long periods are the mainstay of most trips. We wanted to not have that mindset for this trip and set out to have a quiet time staying local and doing lots of local investigation of neighborhoods.

But that didn’t happen quite the way we hoped. We made the obligatory trip to visit Frank’s family because that is something we will do when we live here. We thought it important to figure out how the drive was so we could decide if the train was better. The idea was that we’d make the 2 hour drive down in the morning and then return in the evening. But dinner with friends and Scotland’s strict drunk driving laws meant that we ended up spending the night (and drinking until 2am… {sigh}) I swear we won’t do that regularly when we live here…. really.

And once we recovered from that, it was time to try the train option and head just a little south to Dundee for dinner with friends. But the trains were a mess because of massive flash flooding that had several stations closed. So we ended up driving and Frank took one for the team and stuck to lemonade while I enjoyed as much wine as my hangover would allow.

And while we were on the road to Dundee, the queen died. Yup, another example of how this would not be a normal week. The mood was somber in town with several shops shut out of respect but otherwise nothing major. So we did get a chance to go into the town, learning how the local buses work, and wandering all over the city to places where we could possibly decide to live but probably won’t. The weather was fine after days of rain so after an afternoon of walking in the city, we bused back to our village to walk to the local pub for dinner. That’s what locals do, right? (Dinner was excellent BTW and I’m shocked that there doesn’t seem to be a restaurant upcharge on bottles of wine. Weird but welcome.)

And the topper for the weird week occurred this morning. Locals and tourist alike turned out this morning to watch the procession of the queen’s remains from Balmoral to Edinburgh. It seemed that the entire village (and then some) turned out to pay their respects or just be part of history. It was amazing to be part of it. But really, can next week be closer to something “normal”?

It’s hard to believe more than a month as passed since we arrived in NY. We are settling in and trying to find our routine. It’s still a little tough because it’s summer and so many things have a different rhythm in the summer: churches change their service times, traffic flows are lighter without school busses, everything is under construction, etc.

But we make do. I notched day 24 at work yesterday. The job has turned out to be just what I wanted but not quite what I expected. Every institution has its quirks and this one seems to be especially quirky. Granted, I’ve had some exposure to, but haven’t really been immersed in, higher ed so I know that’s where some of the WTF moments come from. I can say that everyone I have worked with so far has expressed how glad they are that I am here. And every conversation I have had has given me more proof that they really need me. It’s a big change.

Another cultural difference that I’m slowly adjusting to is having an admin to help keep track of things. While I’m sure this would have been an option in previous positions, here it is an expectation. The first question I get when I meet someone is “who is your admin” so they know who to work with to schedule meetings and stuff. So everyone say a prayer for Tricia who is new to the position (but not the University thank goodness) and has to help me navigate the expectations the culture has for any flavor of Vice Provost. That said, the ability to wear open toed shoes is very nice and required new office appropriate sandals to things up a bit. (ICYMI – the dress code at my previous establishment did not allow open toes – peep toes were acceptable though. {sigh})

Frank is also gainfully employed outside the home – much sooner than he had planned! While we were waiting to close on the house, I saw an ad on Craigslist for a tech at a European race shop. They were looking for someone to work on Porsches, Mercedes, etc. Well say no more! He interviewed and was hired the next day. Right now he’s only part time – 3 days a week until fall – because he wants time to arrange things in the basement, drywall and equip his garage, meet with contractors for the patio, etc. In a few weeks, he moves in the race shop at The Little Speed Shop where he gets to work on project cars and make things go faster.  You can imagine how much he hates this job!

And even Buddy is adjusting – he is actually making doggie friends!  A couple of weeks ago we were hanging out in the neighbor’s pool with new acquaintances who had a dog (springer mix I believe) and the patience to help Buddy learn how to play nicely.  We think we have figured out his psyche:  he barks at you for 10 minutes and if you are patient enough to put up with that and not bite his head off, then you can be friends.  This is what happened with CJ:  he barked incessantly from the other side of the fence for a good 8-10 minutes and when we opened the gate and let him in to be near CJ, he barked a little more and then spend the next 45 minutes running all over the neighbor’s yard with his new friend.  Now if we could only figure out how to get him to be less threatening when he’s doing his “Hi I’m Buddy” bark-a-thon, we might be able to actually start taking him places!

One other difference in this move from the last one:  we are a little more realistic with our expectations.  We wanted KC to be something that it wasn’t.  Don’t get me wrong: it’s a great city and we really enjoyed living there.  But like people often do with any new relationship, you make excuses or overlook the little things that spoil the dream of perfection.  The closet door that just wouldn’t close right in the quaint little house was “charming” instead of annoying.  The rate of violent crime and homicides was a shame but happened in another part of the city so we didn’t dwell on it.  Here we are accepting the imperfections for what they are.  The landfill is closer than we realized and when there is a strong south wind, we get the aroma of rotting cheese and moldy olives.  I hate that and there are efforts underway to fix it but I’m not going to make excuses or pretend it’s any less awful than it is.

Other quirks that I should note:

• Seven digit dialing: this is just plain cute. After spending decades in dual area code regions (703/301 and 816/913), we now live somewhere with only one area code. So billboards, commercials, and even business cards only sport 7 digits.
• The hills are nothing to sneeze at: after just three weeks of trying to build my running milage back to where it was before the chaos of the move, I have developed extensor tendinitis in my right foot – something that commonly happens when running up elevations. Luckily my neighbor is a podiatrist so we were able to nip that in the bud.
• The shortage of primary care physicians is real: we cannot find anyone within 25 miles taking new patients. In fact, one of my new coworkers told me that her doctor’s office gets calls daily to see if they are taking new patients. Apparently, someone has to die so you can get their spot. Kinda like season tickets for the Packers. 🙂 Right now it’s not a problem but it’s not something that I take lightly. We have pretty much everyone we have met asking their doctors if they could possible squeeze in one more person.

Those who follow the travel blog will know that we have been abroad for a few weeks as we were in between houses.  The original plan was to pack up one house, ship the contents to the new house while we galavanted across the globe (okay, visited family) and then return to the new house.  Well, that’s not how it worked out.  Here is the transition tale of woe.

The departure from KC was more than chaotic. The closing was moved up to May 31st with a provision that we would have until 8am on June 2nd to  be out of the house.  That should have worked out perfectly as we were gettin on a plane that day.  The two PODS that we were sure would hold everything were delivered on the 30th and local movers came on the 31st to load all our stuff which didn’t actually fit. We had an enormous amount of stuff left over and needed to get it out of the house. God bless Nicole at the UHaul at 31st and Main in KC – she helped us with the rental truck to schlep stuff from the house to the two storage units we needed to hold all our crap.  It took until 9pm on Friday night for the two of us to make the final run and leave the house broom clean. All of this in 95 degree heat.  Ugh.

But it was handled and we went on our little trip.  And returned to do it all in reverse.  We needed to empty the two storage units into a 26 foot truck which Frank would drive, towing the Mercedes, while Buddy and I rode in my Hyundai.  We arranged for the same local movers to help us do the loading on Monday and we were ready to rock and roll.  Except they didn’t show up.  So the two of us loaded the enormous truck (again in 95 degree heat) and 5 hours later, we were ready to hit the road.  We had hoped to leave KC by noon and make it to Bloomington, Indiana to see some friends.  Well we finally hit the road about 4:30 so that plan went out the window but we were determined to make it to Indiana.  So rolling through traffic and across Missouri and Illinois, we eventually made it to Terra Haute about 1:30 am.  Too tired to unload anything, Buddy got to sleep in the king size bed with us and we managed about 6 hours of shut eye.

Then it was on the road again: destination Cleveland.  I had gotten lots of recommendations for things to do and see while there and the drive wasn’t going to be too bad so things were looking up.  Until I plugged in the address of the hotel we had booked and Google maps kindly informed me that parking was limited at my destination.  Oh no.  I had booked this hotel long before we realized that we would be driving a truck towing a car.  I sent out a few emails to the hotel and we got on the road.  By the time we stopped for lunch, we had gotten word from the hotel that there was no way to park the truck anywhere nearby.  So we needed to beg for a no-fee cancellation (the deadline for that had passed) and find a hotel that would have room for us to park.  Kudos to the La Quinta Inn Cleveland Airport West for coming to the rescue.  Located right across the street from the Great Northern Mall, there was lots of space for the truck and they were incredibly dog-friendly.  The clerk who checked us in had Milkbones for  Buddy so she was a friend for life! We could even leave him in the room while we went to get dinner in a restaurant across the street – something we missed the previous night as we ate Wendy’s on the grass outside the truck stop.

Decent nights sleep secured, we were ready for the final leg of the trip: a mere 4.5 hours to Rochester.  And it started to rain.  And it kept raining.  Torrential downpours from Cleveland to Erie, PA.  There were stretches of the road where Frank in the truck behind me couldn’t see my car at all.  It was a nightmare.  But we made it and managed to get to the house-that-would-be-ours to park the truck and wait for closing.

NY has an interesting approach to real estate transactions.  Apparently only attorneys can handle them and there is an absurd amount of paperwork involved.  We closed on the house on Friday morning, just me and Frank and 3 lawyers – one for us, one for the seller, and one for our lender! But lots of signatures and just 45 minutes and we had the keys.  Buddy was stupidly excited to run around his new house.  Of course he had no idea it was his house but he’ll catch on soon. We then spent the next 4 hours unloading the truck ourselves – in 75 degree heat (much more to my taste).  We spent the first night in the new house sleeping on the airbed we used for our last night in KC.

On Saturday morning the PODS arrived and on Saturday afternoon the local movers came and helped unload them.  We found that there was some substantial damage to some of the furniture as the KC movers didn’t seem to secure anything so boxes fell and furniture shifted.  I need to see what the insurance implications are but I certainly can’t say that I would recommend Ray-Mac to anyone. Nevertheless, the PODS are empty, there are boxes everywhere, and I have no idea where anything is.  But I spent last night in my own bed in my new house and that is something to be thankful for.

Some of you might be aware of my penchant for bad rhymes by which I besmirch the pseudonym of Theodore Geisel.  In honor of our departure from the middle of the map, here is another such composition.  Enjoy!

The time has come to say goodbye
Yes it’s hard to face
That years have passed – they really fly
And now we leave this place.

The adventure has been an amazing one
With many more smiles than tears
To think of all the things we’ve learned
In lo these four short years:

BBQ is more than sauce
It’s something on which to compete
Baseball goes well with BBQ
Burnt ends at the K make a game complete!

We saw the Royals lose a hard one
Then watched them win the crown
The fountains blue and a small parade too
It really took this town.

I had heard the winters were pretty bad
But that didn’t seem to show
I’m still waiting to experience
A really bad Midwest snow.

We learned how to manage a “quaint” little house
And the challenges an old place provides
But Brookside never lost its charm
Especially during Christmas tide

We even found a great church home
From two churches made to one
We laughed and prayed then laughed some more
It will be tough to be outdone.

A canine also came into our lives
Many years after one did depart
Now Buddy really rules the roost
There’s no doubt who is in charge.

And life in KC isn’t bad
Great friends and fountains and food
Can’t say much for local wines though
(They really aren’t that good)

So please consider when next you plan
To travel to the East
That Rochester is not so far
A mere thousand miles (at least)

We’ll finally have a “real” winter
And wines more to our taste
But it’s true that we’ll have left behind
A bit of our hearts in this place.

And now a final “au revior”
No “adieu” for such kind friends.
I prefer to think that it won’t be long
Until we meet again

We’ll be traveling for a few weeks before we return to the moving saga so pop over to the travel blog if you are interested in following us in Iceland and Scotland. Otherwise, see you later!

It’s official – we have two weeks left in Kansas City.  We’ve moved past the first of the “lasts” and are now well into the last of the “lasts” – last symphony, last visit to XXX restaurant, last haircut, etc.  And we’ve started saying goodbyes which is painful and a bit surreal.  The farewell open house was last Saturday and about 50 people stopped by to drink with us and help us deplete the “can’t fit this booze in the car with us” stash.  In several instances, we won’t have a chance to see them again before we go because our schedule over the next 12 days is crazy.  Wanna hear more?  Of course you do!

After spending weeks gathering moving estimates, we decided to use PODS and do a fair amount of the work ourselves.  The University is giving me a very reasonable moving budget which would be sufficient to cover the move if we were going straight from point A to point B but of course we are not. The closing date on the current house is 3 weeks earlier than the new house which means we have to find some where to store our stuff.  The full service moving companies wanted anywhere from $2K – $6K for storage!  That doesn’t work for my frugal sensibilities or our budget so we decided to go the PODS route since storage is built in to the price there.  That means coordinating all the services separately:  people to help load the PODS here in KC and people to help unload the PODS there in Fairport.  Then there’s the packing.  We had people come in and pack for us last time which was great but not efficient:  we had no incentive to actually sort through things and pack them in a way that made sense to us.  Months after we arrived, we were still finding boxes with two cup hooks and a screw wrapped securely in paper and loaded in a moving box.  The packers had no way of knowing if those things were important or not so they got packed with the same care as our glassware and china.  We want to be much more selective in how we pack this time so we need to have someone who actually knows what is important and what isn’t.  Which means that Frank is doing (nearly) all the packing.  And the sorting. And the shredding.  And the dumping. We are being far more ruthless this time than last time.  We are not keeping my father’s bronzed baby booties that were in a box with my dead parent’s tax returns from the late 90s.  Nor are we continuing to keep motorcycle parts for the bike Frank crashed on Leap Day 1996.  Or bank statements from our first joint bank account in 1988.  We’ve nearly killed the shredder trying to get rid of all these things. (Not the bronze booties – they just went straight into the trash.  Hate mail about keeping family heirlooms can be sent to dontcare@gmail.com)

For weeks we have been weeding and sorting and packing.  (And by we, I mean Frank.) Now we are getting down to the challenge of continuing to make progress in packing things up while we are still trying to live in the house.  I have 8 more days in the office and I suspect that I will be wearing the same outfit for most of them because everything else needs to be packed.  In fact, we will actually need to take apart our bed and pack up the last of the kitchen items before we are actually out of the house.  This will be interesting!

The timing of the next few weeks is slightly insane. We had a fair amount of last minute negotiations and angst over some details of the sale of our current dwelling which I will not yet detail because things could still go sideways and I don’t want to tempt fate!  But we are now scheduled to close on the current house on May 31st and the buyer will take possession on June 2nd.  Why?  Because he needs a May closing date to avoid some June bills (we think his rate lock is expiring) and we have the movers coming in on May 31 so can’t actually be out of the house on that day.  So the PODS get delivered on May 30th.  The movers come to load the PODS on May 31st and late that afternoon, we sign all the papers.  Since the PODS are loaded but not yet picked up, we are staying in the house the night of the 31st.  And all our belongings will be in the big white boxes in the driveway. So it’s an air mattress and suitcases for our last night on Dartmouth Road.  Then on June 1 the PODS get picked up, I finish retiring from the Bank, the dog goes to the vet to be boarded, the Mercedes goes to a friends garage for storage, and we head to a hotel by the airport.  Why?  Because on June 2, we get on a plane to Iceland!!!

Yes, in the midst of all this, we are going on vacation.  A real vacation and not 3 days in Kentucky where I watch Frank drink bourbon.  If we have to be homeless, we might as well do it in style!  So keep your eyes on the travel blog because that’s where we’ll be.  Five days in an AirBnB in Reykjavik before we hop back on a plane and head to Scotland.  We get the weekend in Troon visiting my side of the family (Are you ready Barghs?) before heading to Bannockburn for a full week in a cottage that is stumbling distance from the family homestead.  Jesse will be joining us for that week – Evelyn isn’t able to make it though so we’ll be a little sad.  We get a full week of visiting family and friends, lots of cups of tea and pints of cider and the odd box of curry thrown in for old times sake.

Then Frank spends father’s day on the plane back to KC where we have one more night in the airport hotel before preparing for the transition road trip. We’ll pick up the convertible and drop it off with a neighbor who is helping make sure it gets on the transporter.  Unlike other moving details, we can’t nail down the exact time that our third car gets picked up because we need to wait for a car transporter that is headed toward NY to come through KC.  It will be some time in a 5 day window but we don’t have 5 days to hang around and wait.  So we are leaving it in good hands, picking up the houseplants from the next door neighbor and the dog from the vet and then we are off.  Two cars full of vacation clothes, house plants, important booze, the dog, and a box of “stuff we need to live in the new house before the furniture arrives.” Current plan is to stop in Bloomington the first night to visit friends there (ready Pearl?).  Second night is Cleveland because it’s there.  Then we get to Fairport two days before our tentative closing date.

Tentative?  Yes, the real estate process in NY is such that we are required to allow for 60 days before closing but we cannot get a firm date because it is dependent on “attorney availability” which isn’t confirmed until 3-5 days before hand.  Yes, even with more than 2 months notice, we still aren’t sure exactly when we are closing on the house and therefore can’t schedule our furniture to be delivered yet.  Grrrr.  So we *think* we are closing on June 22 but we won’t know until a few days prior so the furniture is getting delivered on June 25.  So we might have 3 days in the house with nothing but the air mattress and coffee pot.  And the clothes we took to hike in Iceland and visit Scotland which will of course be appropriate for summer in the Finger Lakes.  But that will give us time to stock the fridge (hello Wegmans!), plan for where the furniture is going, and possibly even paint the one bedroom with the unbearable pink and brown walls – which has been dubbed the “Baskin Robbins” room!

So keep your eyes here for moving info and on the Cannon Family Travel site for vacation stuff.  There’s plenty more adventure to be had!