Saturday night was my last real evening in my apartment. I celebrated with take-out and watching some Hulu, as my mac & futon mattress were the only things left furniture-wise for me to utilize. It was a nice little evening. I was most proud of all the #1 China buffet I had strategically packed in the to-go box they provided. I took my own small tupperware bowl for the sweet & sour sauce. I got 2 full satisfying meals out of that 8”-square box.

Sunday I tried to hit the final packing prep a little harder and fell in love with Craig’s List again for relieving me of some furniture another family failed to come to pick up. That evening was my first sushi experience with Mitch & Rick at Naked Chopstix. I tried about 7 different things: california roll, salmon roll, caterpillar roll, sunset roll, asparagus roll, and the other names escape me. I liked the caterpillar roll (minus avocado) and I think the sunset roll was my other preference, if it were the one served on a tasty sauce. Despite their mockery of my shaky hands and failed mastery of chopsticks, the guys did pretty well at explaining everything to me and they bought which was lovely :)  And the pic was Mitch’s capture of the “I just had sushi” moment. However, it was my portrayal of “I just had sushi and why are you taking my picture?”

So Monday was Phase I of moving my life across the country. It may even be safe to deem it Phase II, as getting rid of 3/4 of my belongings was quite a chore on its own. I awoke bright & early Monday morning, picked up the 10’ Uhaul and began my self-moving operation. Driving a Uhaul is way different than driving a Mini for obvious reasons. I’ve decided I should record the things I say to myself when I’m nervous…but somehow without me knowing so I wouldn’t *try* to be clever. As soon as I got in the truck to pull away, I was like “Mindy, this is such a bad idea. This is so illegal [me driving big things].” All I remember was saying things like:

“Mind the road signs. Mind the road signs. [2 ft jutting mirrors on each side]”

”[To the people behind me] I think you guys would prefer me go slow than kill you. Most people don’t like being killed.”

Then I met a fedex man. I’d never been up to their height level and for some reason I expected to get props from the dude. I made eye contact & waited. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I expected to be part of some sacred bond of folks that drive up above everyone else. It was a thrilling time. I had to back the thing down roads twice, which was mainly me frantically looking from mirror to mirror and constantly looking behind only to be disappointed that I *still* didn’t have a rear window. So like most other driving experiences, it was a leap of faith. I ended up only driving the truck a total of 5 miles haha. I didn’t have to put gas in or anything.

The dolly proved to be more trouble than it was worth so my methods consisted of stacking 2 boxes and sliding them down the 2 flights of stairs. I mean it looks like some little kid beat the shit out of me by the little bruises all over my legs, arms, & stomach but other than that it went pretty well. It took less than an hour & a half to load the truck and less than 30 minutes to unload it in to storage. The Uhaul place was super impressed that I was back so early, since I’d asked to have the truck til 6pm in case something went horribly wrong—meaning if I broke myself. But yeah, the picture is hiding the 10-12 heavy boxes of stuff that I could barely lift in to the truck.  It was a bitch but nice to not bother my friends or pay people to help. And I won’t lie, I enjoyed being up & about. I’m tired of sitting.

My afternoon errands almost took just as long: sold 3 bags of books (for $17 :), sold my 2 vintage dresses for $5 each :(, and took my recycling to different locations. It was not a profitable drive but I was rid of the stuff and kept it out of landfills. I cleaned the rest of the day. I ended up taking 2 more car loads of stuff to storage and still had to call Adam at 8:30 that night to bring his car over. I was a few items short of fitting everything left and leaving room for the dogs. Of course it was raining during the final stages and about the time I was ready to take the dogs out, there came a torrential downpour. I had to run the dogs one at a time to the car. It was an awesomely scary drive to Adam’s. It rained so much, so fast that the road was hidden, my back windows were blocked by stuff, and I had 2 petrified dogs stuffed in a tilted forward front seat. Changing lanes was a leap of faith. We arrived safely and Adam & Gary are the best hosts ever. I had turn down service, lighting options, TV channels pre-programmed for me, and my own crackling gas log. They’d also made a pen out of the kitchen so the dogs had a place to stay. I was so exhausted from the countless trips up & down the stairs that I really just crashed though.

But now I am home and shall return to Indy again on Friday for the big Margot/Bon Iver concert. In the meantime, I shall be sleeping all that I can and stalking mailmen.

One final note. Google’s April Fool’s Day joke totally got me. I rarely see Gmail’s login screen, but of course, I had to login when I was using my parent’s computer yesterday. I read about the new custom time feature, and thought “wow, that would be handy,” thinking I could schedule when emails would send in the future. Then I got to reading the details and my reaction changed more to “Oh my. Oh my. This is completely illegal. Oh my, companies will not let people use Gmail to send anything!” I walked away and later that night, I was just about to tell my mom of my outrage, when it dawned on me what day it was. I had my “ohhh shucks” moment but then I was just relieved that google wouldn’t be sued by the universe. But props to Google. It was a super clever trick and beautifully executed like everything else they do.