the move is over...almost...sort of.
FYI...this is long.
Well, we finally made it. Marcie and I moved up to Austin, MN as she got hired as a first grade teacher. Myself, I dont have a job yet, but according to her and the some people at the personell office, I can substitute every day if I want...so I will be doing that. I was hoping to have some time to look for any late minute openings up here for regular positions, but I havent had the time as Ive been unpacking boxes and bags...trying to get things squirt away. Only problem is that we dont have nearly the space or storage as we did in our previous apartment.
Marcie took off on the road 8 days before I did...she got hired on a Thursday and left that next tuesday morning in my car and with her stuff...hauling my motorcycle. She got up to MN 3 days later, pretty much on schedule as that is how long it normally takes. It took her a little longer because she took a more southern route so she didnt have to drive through the rockies and all...especially with my bike in a trailer. She hauled my new Goldwing on a trailer and all together, I guess-timate it was about right around 2,200 pounds she was hauling...the trailer being 1200 and the bike, 900 and she hauled some of her stuff in the trailer as well. We got it up on the trailer fine but I realized she wouldnt be able to get it off by herself, so I called my brother in Cedar Rapids, IA and asked him if he could help. He did and the bike is parked in his garage until I pick it up and bring it back here.
Unfortunately, we didnt really have any other affordable option to get the bike up there other than to haul it behind my car. I got some flak on this previously on the posts where I was updating her whereabouts and all. She used my 96 Lumina car (there is a van version which doesnt make sense so i need to specify). It has a 3.1 V6 also known as a squirrel in a cage. Its not meant to haul stuff...as are most cars on the road today. But...like many cars...it CAN tow, if needed. Last year, for the move to Vegas, I had them install a Stealth hitch...I forgot the rating, at U-Haul. I'd never seen a hitch like that before as hitch frame bolts to the frame of the car...points down and back behind the bumper. The hitch then can go down and under the bumper...then arches back up into the reciever frame. So, if I wanted, I could take the hitch off and you couldnt tell I had a hitch on there. Anywho...it worked pretty slick on the way over to Vegas last year and it was hotter then, compared to this most recent move. No issues other than it wouldnt go too fast (over 65-70) and would start to overheat.
However, this time...it had a harder time and Im not too sure why. The route we took was much flatter than the rockies route...it was cooler as well...but she had more of a problem with it overheating...kept dumping coolant when she pulled over. I myself couldnt figure this one out so I called around and from what it sounded like...she just stopped and shut the car off...the coolant stops moving and overheats in the hot hot engine and just then dumps out. I also had all the fluids completely changed before she left so Im also thinking they overfilled the overflow reservoir. Outside of that...everything went well for her.
As for me...while she was driving and finding a place in Austin...I was back in Vegas packing up the place and getting a rental truck. I originally had a truck scheduled for Uhaul...but then did some research and quickly changed to Penske. There is not one single reason I would ever rent from Uhaul outside of a need for a trailer...if Penske didnt already have one. Penske has brand new trucks...never older than 3.5 years...they maintain them like crazy (mine had a maintenance done on it the morning I picked it up at 7am), replace them at 85,000 miles, are cheaper, and provide a 10% discount for reserving online. Lets see...2000 bucks for Uhaul where I dont know what the heck Im getting...or 1100 bucks for Penske...where I get a brand new truck. Tough choice there. I ended up getting a 26 foot Penske truck with a tow dolly to haul Marcies car. The truck was made last year and the box part was made this year so it was pretty spankin new...only 10,000 miles on it which I figured was pretty good. Ran like a charm. Big Ol Diesel engine...I figured I was going to spend 900 bucks on diesel on the way up...but I spent 773.33 on fuel and another 90 bucks on two hotel stays. Didnt take into account of how gas would get cheaper on the way east. went from 3.10/ gal in Vegas to 2.56 in Austin. Earlier, I was saying how diesel has more power than gas...I dont know why I thought that, they both put out the same amount of power...but with diesel, you get more bang for your buck. Diesels are more fuel efficient than gasoline engines.
Unfortunately for me as well, I had some issues while driving. While on the interstate...a truck in front of me flew up a rock and it smacked the windshield. I didnt see the rock...but heard the sound. A few hours later, I saw a crack in the windshield and figured it must have been from the rock. So I have to call Penske and file a claim for that. Hopefully I wont end up paying for that as it was out of my control.
I also loaded my older Goldwing into the truck (which yes...Im aware of the fact that this isnt recommended at all, or really allowed from Penske, again...no other choice). We pushed it forward and all, strapped it down tight and took the truck for a drive. When we stopped and looked in the truck...it had fallen over (the bike, when it falls doesnt really fall that far). So we re-did the straps and loaded stuff around it like crazy and the bike survived the trip north.
However, there were some problems. The bikes weight, along with bouncing up and down and probably also being impacted by the weight of stuff around it...casued it to rip one of the wooden bars from the side of the wall of the truck. It didnt rip the bar off completley....but the bar is connected by many bolts to the wall and it pulled out 3 bolts from the wall. The bar itself was fine and held the load otherwise. I dont suspect this to be a major thing as the truck wasnt damaged...just needs to have those bolts put back in. Just sort of popped the connectors off. One section of our sectional set was damaged and needs to go to an upholster. My bike also had a plastic piece crack in half as well as a good amount of scratching on the windshield. Im hoping to sell it before winter comes but as we just moved, I dont have everything handy that Id like to sell along with the bike (highway boards, backrest parts...the bike itself up and running...etc).
Enough about the move.
Marcie found us a smaller sized apartment compared to our Vegas one. It is in older house in the middle of town. I dont know the age of the house...but it is an older one. The house was, at some point in the past 30-40 years, modified to handle two familes or whatever. One downstairs and on upstairs. If you look at the house, you can tell where they added on the staircase to the side of the house and extended the roof to enclose that part. We go through a door, go upstairs, do a little U-turn and up a couple more steps, to the right, is our place. As soon as you walk in, you enter the living room. the bathroom is on the immediate right. If you walked through the living room and straight, youd enter my room which right now has my small bed and our computers so it will double as an office. If you walked and angled right, youd enter the rest of the apartment. In there is the dining room, kitchen, and Marcies room. Marcies room is rather small...and add to that her big ass queen sized bed...there is no room for anything else. Over the past year, Ive been sleeping on her bed as my room was the larger one so she slept in my single bed in her smaller room. Now at this place...I once again have the big room, only with my small bed. The downfall is that Marcie has once again gotten the small room and has room for nothing else because I wanted her to have her big bed (not knowing before I got up here the size of the room). I had told her that I wanted her to have the big room and her bed...some how I get the big room again, dont know how that happened.
The place isnt that bad at all. I thought I wasnt going to like it...but Im starting to like it more. However, it is smaller than our old place and since it is older, there arent as many places for storage as the old place. We have lots of smaller things that we used to put in two different closets and cabinets. We have very limited storage here. Also...the kitchen is very recently remodeled, but has a grand total of 5 cabinet doors so very very limited storage. In Las vegas, we had 14 cabinets...so it is going to be interesting to see what we do here with the space.
With the smaller apartment, we have less room for our furniture and stuff so we had to find a place to house it all. We found a place in Austin and when we got there, we found the guy was shortchanging us for space. We signed up for a 14x20 place, but when we opened the door, it was a square and not a rectangle so we knew it wasnt the right size. I measured and it was 14x16. I checked our reciept and it said 14x16. I checked the contract and it said 14x20. So we went back in and talked to them and she didnt believe me, so I showed her the reciepts and contract and then she looked at them and said 'I dont know why they put 14x16 down as we dont have them.' Well forget them. Their place also had lots of holes and 3 rat poison traps so we figured that wasnt a good place.
We found a storage unit in Albert Lea. Brand new and its huge and holds everything we need it to.
Now that we are settling down here in town...we are trying to close all of our stuff down back in Vegas such as our bills and memberships. We had a membership to an athletic club which wants us to pay them 50 bucks each PLUS provide two proofs of our new address. This really sucks because I thought if we moved; that and I dont have any proofs of a new address because everything is in Marcies name.
I guess all in all, Im starting to like Austin more and more. I think Marcie feels sad or something because Im so worried or a little depressed. Im not mad at her for moving up here and I dont really know how to explain how I feel. I guess Im just worried about finances as far as...I dont have a job. Im subbing...but that doesnt get me much. I wouldnt mind doing something else....but if I do something else, thats going to hurt my chances for getting hired next year as I only have one year of teaching experience and then already took a year off. My concern is just not having a steady income. I have bills myself to pay for and I want to be able to take care of them myself with out Marcies help as they simply are not hers.
Oh well, enough for now.