A Blog By Bed

You may have noticed, I've been absent from the blogosphere for the past week. It has been a wild, crazy, exhausting, exiting, five hundred mile round trip week. Since I do have so very much to blog about; experiences alone, I'm going to start my catch-up by chronicling my week based on where I've laid my weary head since it hasn't been in the same place twice.

Additionally, I'm going to start the blog with THE song of the trip: The Airstream Song by Miranda Lambert. As I said, I drove over 500 miles round trip and loved pretty much every second. I did not love when Frank the GPS would not give me proper directions on how to leave Baltimore as Boyfriend can attest. Minus those twenty minutes from hell, it was grand to be on the open road living my destined vagabond life.

Wednesday night: My Own Bed

Woke up and had breakfast with Mama and Sister 2 since they had off for Rosh Hashanah (my apologies if I butchered that spelling to any Jewish readers). We compared dog stories. Sister 2's new dog, Marge, is a shelter dog that's showing some signs of being a little kooky, yet seems to be pretty intelligent. She's also a little aggressive to other dogs...not so much a problem while she's tipping the scale at a whopping eight pounds. Banjo, on the other hand, goes against nature by being a simple Labrador. We are very interested to see an aggressive 8 pound dog with a complacent 50 pound dog.

After comparing Marge's occasionally snotty attitude to Banjo's confusion to where the sliding door goes when the curtain's are pulled, I drove to Baltimore. Having borrowed Boyfriend's EZ-pass, I was very impressed by the time saved taking toll roads (about two hours). New Jersey Smith was very happy to see me, I mean, who wouldn't be? We began packing her approximate 15,000 books and, rather quickly, felt the need to open some wine.

Thursday night: New Jersey Smith's Futon

Reaping the benefits of being in our young twenties, New Jersey Smith and I woke up fairly early and were acutely aware of how very much packing we had to do. I'm still trying to forget the experience of packing 15,000 books and hauling them and solid wood furniture down a flight of stairs and up another that was built had roughly a seventy degree angle. As it was not yet New Jersey Smith's time to die (by my strangling her for having so many books...it was a very real possibility after hauling all the books and then finding her @$%^@^% $ Kindle), our mutual and very, very, very (he just earned that last "very") dear friend, Rupert, came down from Philadelphia to help us.

With the three of us working something of a system, I packed, Rupert hauled, and NJS unpacked so boxes could be reused, we were remarkably efficient. Although we were rather punch-drunk by about eight pm, we were up well past midnight making the kind of memories that make you friends for life.

Friday night: New Jersey's Smith's bed...having to surrender the futon to Rupert

Woke up to an empty apartment at eight am. Empty of people anyway, there was still way, way too many bookshelves, tables, queen bed, etc to still move. Rupert had to work at nine in Philadelphia so NJS had to drive him to the bus station at six. Found NJS hyperventilating on the phone to Mama Smith and, somehow (still not really sure how) was able to assure both NJS and Mama Smith things were okay, we'd be out of the old apartment by five that evening.

That day is sort of a blur. I can only assume that somehow NJS and I achieved superhuman strength and were able to move the furniture by ourselves. We did acquire a U-haul van and the amusement of the wonderful, wonderful, wonderful man who worked there and found us to be the funniest women since Carol Burnett and Vicki Lawrence.



LtR: U-haul guy, New Jersey Smith, Yours Truly.

Mama Smith, knowing her daughter and possible undisguised hysteria in her daughter's friend's voice, decided to come down and assist, oh and the future SAINT Mama Smith also saw to feed us. With Mama Smith finishing packing and cleaning the old apartment, NJS and I were able to move everything up the horrible stairs of her new apartment and were, officially, out of the old apartment by five o'clock. Friday really contained a lot of memorable moment that deserve their own blog.

Despite needing sleep, we pushed and pushed ourselves to keep going until 98% of all manual labor was done before we collapsed for the night.

Saturday Night: New Jersey Smith's Bed in her NEW Apartment

On Sunday we finished putting the furniture together, including her "sentimental" wooden desk that belonged to her grandpa and weighed roughly twice what I will weigh while pregnant with septuplets. I'm really not bitter.

Once the apartment was in livable format...okay, so maybe NJS will have to live out of a few boxes for a few weeks, at least all of her furniture was assembled and moved to where she wanted it (for at least the time being). True, I did not keep any of her 15,000 books in order, but I am about as sympathetic to that as the jurors were at the Nuremberg trials. At about four thirty, five o'clock, I left NJS in her new apartment with her slightly traumatized cats and drove and hour and half to Gettysburg for an impromptu vacation.

Sunday Night: Hotel Bed in Gettysburg, PA.

I won't tell anyone what happened during my hours alone in Gettysburg, ever. They're MINE, do you hear me? Mine, mine, mine!

Then I met Rupert for a more relaxing lunch in Philadelphia. Oh, I also pumped my own gas in Gettysburg, which was a rewarding experience for a Jersey Girl. Then I went to see Boyfriend, who I had warmed up to again after much cussing him out while lugging NJS's furniture. Seriously, what is the point of dating someone my little bro refused to believe was NOT a strongman in a circus if he's not ALWAYS there to move heavy things??? Anyway, I arrived at his house before he returned from his first day of work and had a long talk about heaven only knows to his family (seriously, NO idea what I said that night). Then Boyfriend came home, happy as a clam, I think. We went to Wawa for dinner. I don't really remember anything else.

Monday Night: The Boyfriend's House

I woke up an hour and a half before I was supposed to be at a meeting. I don't know what happened at the meeting. I don't really know how I got there or how I got home, but it all happened.

Tuesday Night: My Bed.

Well, here we are. Believe it or not...I actually have to go out again...ten minutes ago.