PHL to ROA

In a nutshell, we moved. We're not in Chapel Hill yet, but are several large steps closer to being there.

Here is a brief synopsis of the past few days. On Wednesday some great friends helped me move us out of our house. Then Thursday we had the settlement on our house then drove from Philly to Roanoke, VA. Yesterday we unloaded the truck. Today, we're relaxing.

Now here are some details:
Our house sold in an extremely sluggish housing market. It only took 45 days to sell, and considering the market, that's amazing. At the settelment on Thursday, we ended up making a little money on our house. And by 'a little', I really mean a little. I was handed a check for $6.14. Yes, you read that correctly. We'll end up getting some money back from escrow, which will be about $300, but the profit was only $6.14. The fantastic thing is that we didn't lose any money.

After the settlement on Thursday, we left Philly to come to Roanoke. As soon as we hit the expressway, I realized that the rental truck was painfully slow. I called Jo and said, "This is going to be a long trip." On the whole way down, it never got above 61 or 62 MPH (going downhill) and usually stayed at about 55 MPH, and that was with the pedal floored. We left Philly around 1:40 pm and arrived here at 11pm. So a 6.5 - 7 hour drive took 9 1/4 hours. Hurt me! I was getting passed by everyone, and I mean everyone because the speed limit the whole way was either 65 or 70. So I was 'that driver' - the one going so painfully slow that other drivers zip by like they're standing still.

Since we're staying here in Roanoke with Jo's parents until I can find a job and we can find a place to live in Chapel Hill, we brought all of our stuff here to store. Unloading the truck yesterday was so much easier than loading it. They have a huge garage and a huge walk in basement, so the unloading was rather painless. No stairs to climb or descend. No moving stuff out of attics or up basement stairs. Just right into the garage or right into the walk-in basement.

Last night, after the truck was unloaded, I was going to move the truck from the driveway to the street and it wouldn't stay cranked. I tried several times, but it would not keep running. I did manage to get it down to the street and kind of park it before it died. It didn't need to be back until this morning, so I didn't worry about it too much. I just planned to get up this morning and try to crank it again. And this morning, it wouldn't crank at all. So I called Budget and to explain the situation (they were very helpful). About 2 hours or so later, a mechanic came out to try to fix it. He was a real country boy and it took my ears a minute to get used to his drawl (I'm from the South, but my ears are used to hearing East Coast speak). Long story short, he couldn't get it to run either. He told me, in his mountain man/ mouth full of chewing tobacco speak - "You ain't gotta worry 'bout this truck no more." And about an hour after he left, a tow truck came and got it.

On the trip down I had these terrifying visions of a breakdown or a crash where all of our stuff would either have to be unloaded from a broke down truck onto another, or strewn all over the interstate because of an accident. But neither of those happened. How awesome though that the truck didn't break down on the drive from Philly! And as a bonus, I didn't even have to return the truck, a sweet deal if I ever heard of one.

Now we're just relaxing, trying to rest up and enjoy a few days break. I don't have a job right now and that's okay. Being here in VA will be like an extended holiday. So we're here, about 4 big steps closer to being in Chapel Hill. The great thing is that CH is only 3 hours away from Roanoke, which makes job hunting and apartment/ house hunting much easier.