Day Six (Friday, August 4, 2006) found me very sleepy and unwilling to get out of bed. However, I had already scheduled movers to meet me at storage in St. Pete, so there was actually a deadline for my arrival. Believe it or not, I left the Red Roof Inn without getting in the pool. The previous evening I was just too tired, and in the morning I was too lazy to go swimming and then shower again. Loaded up the truck, checked out, filled up on gas (and picked up orange juice and a pop tart for breakfast) and got ready for the day. Opened the orange juice and promptly spilled all over myself, drivers seat and drivers side door. And the truck wasn’t even moving.
Traffic was heavier this last stretch, but the billboards were more entertaining. While I managed to get a picture of a store sign advertising “Guns and Jewelry”, I wasn’t quick enough to take a picture of the most stunning billboard. On the right side of black background there was a white silhouette of the state of Florida layered onto the red silhouette of a handgun. Across the top, left and center, was the word WARNING in white, split horizontally – perhaps to imply a bullet going through it? Directly underneath in smaller white letters were the words “to visitors”. Below that, in red, “Florida residents use deadly force”. And that was it. !!!
I did hit a traffic jam with stop and go traffic while still on a six lane freeway (three lanes each direction - I’m never sure how to accurately describe that – whether it should be three lane or six lane). For a long time I was fearing a horrific accident, but in the end, what actually caused the slowdown was entirely unclear. There were several trucks pulled onto the right shoulder, but none seemed to have been damaged. There was a mess of what may have been dropped cargo, but the mess seemed to be completely on the shoulder, as opposed to having been removed from the center of the road. Either way this slowed me down, as did missing an exit for 301. Luckily, time isn’t generally a stress factor for me, so neither of these delays bothered me much. They did, however, rearrange my arrival schedule. Instead of dropping Mister off at Kitty’s house (my temporary abode) and then heading to storage, I went directly to Public Storage.
The movers were already there, ten minutes early. That was a pleasant surprise.
Went into the office to fill out paperwork and learn the exact location of my storage space. Convinced the PS employee to let me bring Mister (in his carrier) into the air conditioned office instead of having him bake in the truck. Received storage space that is easily twice as large was what I need, but the only available size that would work. Movers offered to unload the truck while I was filling out paperwork (nope, hadn’t done it yet). Since I knew there were things that I’d want to go to Kitty’s, but weren’t exactly organized, the movers said they would stack everything around the sides of the unit so I could get to everything. Forty minutes later the movers were done, the paperwork was NOT done, and Mister was getting antsy. Paid the movers, and tipped them (which, in retrospect was completely unnecessary for several reasons). Another twenty minutes later the paperwork was finally done. Went back to the unit and found that the movers hadn’t exactly done what they said. For instance front and dead center was the sofa. Things were not piled around the perimeter, they were simply piled in front to back. I then began moving things and working my way through an obstacle course (sofa arm, balance on this box, teeter on triangle end-table, jump over pile of sheets – pile of sheets? I KNOW those were originally in a bag). And the back wall of the storage unit wasn’t even packed tightly – it was bare. The dining room tables had all been stacked separately (as opposed to one on top of another, which is how they had been packed into the truck). There was a single stuffed animal on the floor of the unit… argh.
Finally got everything I could think of and headed to Kitty’s place. Unloaded Mister, then sat on the front porch for an afternoon thunderstorm – gorgeous. Took everything out of the truck and filled Kitty’s front bedroom with just enough room remaining for the air mattress. Showered, found a grocery store to buy orange juice and Gatorade, watched television for about an hour and collapsed in bed. I’m here – but do I know it yet ?
1551 miles - holy crap.
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