home.

well... we're finally settled into the house (read: the sofa does not have plastic on it, the computer network is set up, one room is painted, the swing set is up, the cats are alive... but there are still 150 boxes that need unpacking)

i don't remember much from the past 4 days. here's what I remember.

Thursday - The wife took the kids down the Cinci to stay the night. This left me to pack the rest of the house which I thought would be easy peasy. Dad came into town to finish cleaning up the back lot. Finished packing the garage around 5:30pm. Dad and I ordered 'The Meats' pizza from Papa John's and watched a couple of episode of MASH. It's still a good show. I started packing the rest of the house. Again, I thought it would be easy peasy. I called no friends in for support for this reason. About 10:30pm I realized my mistake. I had to call it an evening at 2:30am. I still was not done packing.

Friday - Woke up around 7am or so. Continued packing crap. Tom showed up at noon as requested by me the night before (in a panic of course) Originally he was going to show up at 2:15ish to pick up the cats and take them back to his house until we were done with closing. Anyways, Tom showed up at noon to start tearing down the computers and get them packed into my car. Maryann showed up around 12:30pm-ish after leaving the kids with a set of grandparents. We packed up her van as fast as we could. The movers were showing up at 1pm. However, by 1:30, we STILL didn't have my car packed _and_ the movers weren't at the house yet. Closing for the soon-to-be-old house was at 3pm; new owners to take possession IMMEDIATELY after closing. Oh, and btw, I still didn't have my final 'numbers' for the closing of the new house (in other words, I still didn't know how much to make the check for, so obv I still needed to go to the bank). Maryann called the movers. They'd be there in 10 minutes which was accurate. At 2pm I FINALLY got my final number. By the time Tom and I finished loading the car, it was 2:15 and I was sweaty and prolly smelled like a homeless person. However, there was going to be no time to take a shower as I still had to make my way to the bank and then to the office up on 23 by 2:45.

(I'm gonna start chopping this story down from here on out as this post was left unedited for the past 3 days)
So I hopped in the car, drove to the bank. They handed me the check. It had my name misspelled. They give me another check. It's correct. Thanks. I then hope into the car, still gross and sweaty, and drive to the realty office. My agent is already there in the parking lot. I say 'Hi' and then whip off my t-shirt in front of her. She's like 70. I say 'Sorry, but I'm really sweaty and gross, and I'm pretty sure you've seen all this before.' I put on some deoderant and wait for my wife to arrive, which she did about 5 minutes later. We hope into the agent's car and drive to the title agency to get down with some paperwork. We meet the early-20-something girlfriend of the guy who is buying the house. Up to this point, we thought that the people who were buying the house were in their thirties and had two kids and the wife worked at OSU. We're still not sure where that information came from. Anyhoo... we get through both closings in about an hour and a half.

Back in the parking lot, I call Tom to tell him that we're done and ask if he needs any help getting the cats back in the carrier. There is a pause and he tells me to 'come on home' cause the movers are still packing. We get back to the house and sure enough they are still packing. Luckily, the new owners were planning on catching some dinner and then painting later that night. Anyways, the truck is pretty much full when we get there. I'm glad we didn't get the U Haul. Those guys packed that 26 ft truck (which is about 2 feet taller than a U Haul 26 footer), top to bottom, front to back. There is no way me and my peeps would have made it fit. No way, no how. It was funny to watch them pack the last 5 or 6 things. They would pick up the item, look at the truck, look at the item, look at the truck... repeat until someone points to a crevice of space in the truck. The only thing that I had to leave behind was the snow blower, and that fucker hasn't worked right for the past three years, so fuck it. I left it on the curb. Good luck to whoever picked it up.

So, at 5:15 the posse of 3 cars and 1 truck started rolling. I knew we were in trouble the minute we got to the 270 exit. You could see that it was backed up. Long story made short, it took about 45 minutes to get from the Sawmill exit to the 33/161 exit. All the while, I was praying that movers would cut me some slack seeing as how they are getting paid hourly. After finally getting to the exit ramp for 33 (which leads to Marysville), we see the problem and the cause for the back up. A school bus had broken down and all the kiddie-football-jocks were sitting in the grass. Everyone was rubbernecking to see what was going on. Once you got past the school bus, it was 55 miles and hour. I hate gawkers. Stupid people.

So, we finally get to Marysville around 6:30. The truck shows up about 15 - 30 minutes later. I think they may have had to stop for gas and maybe a bite to eat. Anyways, the clouds started looming overhead. And at 8pm, it started raining. But the movers kept moving, just like should. Just like the load in, the load out had them moving the big furniture wherever it needed to go and the boxes were placed in the garage. While they were doing that, Tom, Maryann and I were moving boxes out of the garage to wherever we thought they should go. Tom's wife, Amy, was also at the house and was watching her kiddos play in the kitchen (as everywhere else was sea of movement). The movers finished up around 9:30. I paid them and they (and Tom) went on their way. The plan was to start painting lil N's room, but we were both tired, so we opted for sleep. It was a bit odd sleeping in the new house and not having the kids around.

Saturday - My wife's family, my wife's family friends, and cousins of my wife's family friends showed up to help us get moved in. And they all did a great job. There was the debacle of painting N's room. They started putting the primer on but it kept pulling off the walls. We ended up having to switch the primer. So a job that probably should have taken only 6 - 8 hours, ended up taking 2 days.

I don't remember much of Saturday. It was all a big blur. I can recall doing the following: installing the washer and dryer, helping the cable guy get the cable hooked up, putting together the swingset, putting together the swingset, getting my computer and the wireless network hooked up, and putting together the trampoline. About 4 or so, I got a migraine and took a 'nap' for 3 hours which didn't get rid of all the headache, but after a second dose of Imitrex, it finally went away. We had White Castles for dinner in honor of her family friend's dad who loved White Castles (it was the anniversary of his passing).

Sunday - Well, it was a blur as well. I had poop issues all day. It sucked. Too much stress from the past week, I'm guessing. The friends finished up painting N's room. I think it was mostly a day of unpacking and whatnot.

And that's pretty much where we are at. Still unpacking boxes. I've gotten a couple of gates installed. I need to redo the one upstairs. It's fine closing, but when opening it back up, it's sticking. I just need to move the wall mounts up just a smidge and it'll all be okay. Maybe back a little too. Who knows. It'll be the one that gets used the most so I want to make sure it's done right.

Anyhoooooooooo.... we're moved in and we're happy. Yay!