A long and winding road!
on 3/11/18 11:47 pm, edited 3/11/18 11:55 pm
Hello my fellow RnYers!
It's been a bit since I checked in. Things got flat out nuts over the last few weeks in California! I had tons of packing to do, tons of ongoing normal work, and in general I reached critical mass about a month ago! The movers came and did a fantastic job of loading. They told me (as did my brother) that they believed what i wanted to take would weigh at least an additional 1,000-1500 pounds more than the original estimate, or around $1000-$1200 more than anticipated. But when all was said and done and the truck was weighed, I was only $40 over in weight, hurray!
But I achieved that lean weight by leaving SO much behind. Honestly, it was painful. I didn't take approximately 2,000 books, and left with only 4 boxes of the ones I loved the most. I didn't take my beautiful outdoor furniture. I didn't take my couch. I didn't take a ton of truly beautiful things I had collected because I loved and enjoyed them. But I took the most emotionally significant pieces, with the exception of my piano (which I cried over), and my work stuff, and tables and lamps and chairs, and my bedroom stuff, and a beautiful antique bookcase from my childhood home (after having sold 7 other bookcases). I took the best and most valuable rug. And of course I took my clothes, art supplies, paintings and several prints, jewelry, etc. And family photos, of course, and the computer and peripherals. Not to mention my cats!
I got my car roadworthy: New tires, oil change, spark plugs, and new belts. I upgraded my AAA membership. I held a week-long yard sale, letting treasures go for next to nothing. Paring down sucks! But I simply couldn't afford to take it all. It was intense and crazy and I'm glad it's over! Finally, I loaded up my car, which my engineer brother promptly undid and brilliantly re-packed. I had purchased "the Whistler", a soft heavy duty plastic bag to go on top of the car, which gave me an extra 15 cubic feet of room, and which performed like an Olympian! My brother thought it was a piece of junk that I would end up rueing having trusted - but for once he was incorrect, thank goodness! Then, finally, I was off!
The kitties were in a sort of pop-up tent as big as, and secured to, the back seat. One side had a comfy sherpa bed for them to share, the other a litter box. I gave them food and water whenever we stopped. Heres how their little Pop-up tent looks, except mine is a leopard print:
I only made it to Santa Rosa the first day, then took them into the motel room with me at night. The next day by 3 PM or so I was having the single worst hamburger (no bun, or course) of my life at a Denny's in Eureka, a coastal Northern California town best known for pot grows and methamphetamine abuse. It started to rain. I had decided to go up the 101 because i-5, otherwise a faster route, would go straight through the Siskiyou Mountains at the California-Oregon border and the Siskiyou Pass, which had received 10 inches of snow over the past couple of days, was slated to receive more that night and the next. I didn't want to be driving my overloaded old car on blac**** through a snowstorm, surrounded by half of the semis in existence, snow chains or not! Thus, Route 101. So off I went, aiming to get to Coos Bay, Oregon before I quit for the night.
Those of you who have driven the 101 through northernmost California and into southern Oregon already know this, but I did not. Down in Santa Barbara, the 101 is a huge freeway with a minimum of 4-5 lanes in each direction. But up past Eureka, as I discovered as night fell, the 101 narrows to just one lane in either direction, and is nothing but tight, dangerous hairpin curves and switchbacks. And it's so, so dark! No light on the road at all, which snakes through beautiful, towering redwoods. The entire forest there is incredibly tall. It must be an amazingly beautiful ride in the summer. On a very sunny day. At high noon. But that February night it quickly became the single most horrible driving experience of my life! The cold grey drizzle overcame it's shyness and strengthened into an unstinting deluge. Then, not to be outdone, the fog made an appearance, beginning with a flirtatious, peek-a-boo mist, and finally settling upon complete and utter impenetrability. I literally couldn't see more than a few feet in front of me. The forest came right down to the edge of the road, though half the time either seawater or brackish water of unknown depth replaced it on one side or the other. I am not exaggerating when I say that it was the worst, most harrowing driving experience of my life, and it just went on, and on, and on, for hours. Meanwhile, the forward strap from the Whistler bag atop my car became so saturated that it kept dripping cold water in me. It was the ride from hell! Plus my location was so remote and so far from a cell signal that all of my calls dropped. I couldn't even call ahead for a reservation, and just had to hope that by the time I emerged from that hellish drive there would be a bed left for me somewhere in Coos Bay!
Anyway, I survived, as did the cats and the car. I finally made it to Coos Bay in the driving rain, and miracle of miracles, there was room at the inn! I got the kitties up to the room, along with their food and litter box, getting utterly soaked in the process. But it was indescribably wonderful to fall asleep in a clean, warm bed!
The next morning, I took the cat bed, food, and litter box down to the car, then came back up for one cat (I'd only brought one carrier, so had to move them one at a time). Then I went back up to the room for my other cat. She was nowhere to be found! She wasn't on the beds, under the bedding, on the floor, or in the bathroom. I was reasonably sure she hadn't slipped out when is been taking things down. By i called outside anyway, to no avail. So I checked under the beds again, and saw that under one of them, the fabric wrapped around the box springs was torn. I thought that Kai must have worked her way up into there. So I up-ended the mattress, then up-ended the box springs. Couldn't see anything inside it, so I ran down to the car for a flashlight, or course getting soaked anew in the process. Ran back up, and shone the light into the box springs: no cat. So I repeated the whole process with the other bed. No cat! At this point I was really upset. I walked into the bathroom again just in case she had emerged while I was getting the flashlight, and lo and behold there she was, huddled on the floor behind the toilet, trying to make herself as small and inconspicuous as possible. I picked her up. She was trembling, and was afraid I'd be angry with her. But I was so happy to have found her that I wasn't angry at all, just grateful. The little brat! Anyway, I put her into the carrier and righted the beds, then went down to the car where her sister Mia was meowing loudly (as only a Siamese can), and off we went!
Driving was so much easier in the daylight, and the road had become much less twisty and much less remote. I stopped to have my windshield wipers replaced (just $21! Would have been at least twice that in Santa Barbara. Go Oregon!) and got good directions about how to cut over to i-5. At this point I was past the snow elevations and also very, very over 101's scenic charms! After that it was a quick few hours to Seattle! I spent the night at my son and daughter-in-law's house, which was wonderful. In the morning I loaded up the cats again and I was off to my new home!
I arrived after stopping to pick up groceries and cat food. It is a beautiful, wonderful, large, comfortable, woodsy-Pacific NorthWest kind of house with a very long deep yard which ends in a beautiful lake. I'm on an island about an hour North of Seattle, surrounded by beautiful Puget Sound. The great thing is that the island is linked to the mainland by a bridge, so I don't have to rely on the ferry.
I've been here since 3/1! The movers, who were supposed to be here that same day, still have not made an appearance. Tomorrow I am going to read them the riot act! I cannot wor****il they arrive because they have all of my work stuff. Worse perhaps, I packed my food scale and the scale i weigh myself on, so I hadn't weighed myself for weeks. That was stupid of me! But I have been very careful and have kept to be plan, so hopefully when everything finally arrives, I will be happy with my progress.
Anyway - Washington is gorgeous! Santa Barbara is too, or course! But they're very different. Everything here is green and blue and there is just so much water everywhere! And the stunning, snowy Cascades and the Olympic Mountains are magnificent! It has been so clear that I have been able to see incredible Mount Baker at the Canadian border (to which I'm very close!). It is much colder up here than on California's beautiful central coast, too. It's a good thing I tend to run hot! But I've been wearing tights, boots, and a fleece jacket - fun! I don't think I ever wore tights at all while I lived in CA!
Anyway, for those of you who managed to keep reading through this saga - thank you for sticking with me! I still can't weigh myself and basically have nowhere to sit, but I am very happy to be in my new place and to begin my new life!
Wishing you all much happiness and success,
Cara
on 3/12/18 10:34 am
Thank you! I'm sure someone knows where my things are, just not me! I raised my pitch with Colonial Van Lines this morning. It's simply unacceptable to make me wait so long, all the while causing me to lose income every single day! The last lady I spoke with put me on hold and supposedly contacted the dispatcher, who supposedly expressed surprise that my stuff hadn't been delivered over the weekend. I'm cynical at this point! She told me that I should have received my shipment this past Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. Honestly, it's all baloney! I suspect that this is what they are doing: because my location is a bit off the beaten track, they are waiting until they have more deliveries in my neck of the woods, to make the run more profitable for them. This is according to a friend whose ex owned a moving company. At any rate, the latest was "possible delivery today" which I am afraid is just more BS. If they really intended to deliver today, I would have received a call from the dispatcher or the driver giving me a window timeframe, letting me know where they were and how many deliveries they had before mine, etc. It is very frustrating. I will call back by 2 if I haven't heard anything further, and will ask to speak to the manager.
wonderful story - and I'm so glad you love your new location! 101 sounds awful!! I used to live in mountains, so I do know how they can be to drive in - esp in the dark and esp in the winter!!!
I have that same cat thing - only mine is solid blue. I got it back when we were showing cats. Now it comes in handy when someone is sick or has had surgery and needs to be isolated or isn't allowed to be running/jumping around. It's a nice size and I can get their food/water and a small litter box in there. It's great!
RNY 06/03/15 by Michael Garren (Madison, WI)
HW: 373 SW: 316 GW: 150 LW: 138 CW: 163
on 3/12/18 10:43 am
That road that night was a living nightmare! But I had it, so all is well.
I originally got that cat thing for my move from Dallas (where I'd lived for 6 years) to CA, so this is their second days-long move in it. I too have used it as you described, when one of the kitties is recuperating, or needs to have eye drops or other medicine she is determined not to receive, etc. It's a great thing to have!
