Friday, August 25, 2006

Home Again

Just got back home a little while ago. I've been in Gastonia, off-loading the truck and putting stuff into storage. I drank four 20 oz bottles of Dasani water while I was there. And every damned bit of it ran right back out my loose pores and soaked my shirt and my jeans. They should put a warning label on that stuff.

Most everything is in the storage building, inluding the now much-hated bedroom suite. It was funny that a truck which took two days to load only took about three hours to unload. It probably helped that I wasn't unpacking things as I took them off the truck, though. It also helped immensely that the storage facility had carts (like you see at Lowe's and Home Depot), so it cut down on the number of necessary trips. Hell, at one point I moved 18 boxes of books at once. I added that up. That's one trip with the cart versus five or six trips with the handtrucks. Yeah, buddy.

Mama didn't go with me. I was supposed to call her when I was nearly finished. No point in her standing out in the heat with me. Well, when I saw how quickly things were going, when I had about half the truck unloaded after an hour and a half or so, I called Mama to see how she was doing with the great clean-up at home. I was feeling really positive about making so much progress so quickly. Then Mama said “you aren't done yet?” Hehehe. I could've just about have cried right then, but I laughed instead. Mama truly has no idea just how much I busted my ass today. Well, she didn't until she came to pick me up and saw how soaked in sweat I was, and how much trouble I was having just walking because I was so tired.

Anyway, I told her she might as well come on over, as quickly as it was going. She could help me finish up. She got there about thirty minutes before I was finished and helped out a bit. I suspect her real motive was to get to play with the cart. It fascinated her, for some reason, and I was never lacking in help to push the empty cart back to the elevator. At one point she even insisted that I sit down on the cart, and she pushed me all the way back to the elevator. Mama's crazy.

Getting out of U-Haul was the usual nightmare. These people are a bunch of fuck-ups. Logistically speaking. It took me over an hour to pay-out for my truck. They have one guy in there on a Friday afternoon? What's wrong with these people?

Paying for the truck drove my checking account into the red. Lemme see. Checking account is $-2.98. Savings is $-9.86. I'm supposed to have $60 left on my credit card, but couldn't buy gas with it earlier. I'd say I've cut it right down to the knub, huh? Oh, well. It's back to work Monday, and I can get an advance as soon as I'm rolling. Hopefully the damages won't be too severe by then.

On the upside, when I got home I still had power. Mama has been singing the power bill lament for the last few weeks, the chorus of which is “they'll cut it off on the 25th” (sing along if you know it). But when we got back and there was still power, she tracked down the power bill to check the date. Turns out it has to be paid by the 28th, not the 25th. So, um, nevermind, she says.

On another upside, commie ninjas were not waiting in the driveway to repossess the van (although I assume they will spring out of the bushes sometime over the weekend). The plan at the moment, such as it is, is to leave the van at Mama's apartment so that the commie ninjas won't know where it is. So there. We're just trying to hang onto it until Monday so that I'll have a way to get to Greensboro to go back to work. Plus, there're still some things that need to be moved over into the storage building. We'll give it up once we're finished with it. Really. We will.

In an aside, Mama keeps trying to give everything away. I wish she'd fucking stop. Since I moved stuff over into storage, Mama took it upon herself to tell the neighbors they can have whatever they want of what's left. Whuuuut? I told Mama the least she could do is give me a chance to leave the house first. Not everything that's left in the house at the moment is junk, ya know. Hell, she'd already scheduled for someone to come get my sofa tonight. And on the way home, she said “I guess we should get that stuff out of the refrigerator.” Um. Okay. Why? “Because Mark is coming to pick it up tonight.” Arghh!

When I got home and wobbled upon unsteady feet to the door, grabbed hold of the ironwork on the porch and pulled myself up the steps, leaned on the doorknob for support and began wondering if I would ever again be able to stand fully upright, I made an official declaration; Mama, the neighbors, relatives and any commie ninjas that might be hiding in the bushes could all go take a flying leap. Anyone who knocks on my door tonight will be summarily executed.

I'm going to take a shower, curl up on a nice, not-so-hard part of the floor, and go to sleep. And I will hope that when I wake up, I will be able to move. All indications thus far do not look good for future mobility. Luckily, given my profession, if someone can just help me into the truck, I'm already bent over in just about the right position to be placed behind the wheel.

But it's done. B'god! It's done!

Well, most of it's done.

:: cries ::

It's never going to end, is it?

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