Sheep Guarding Llama

Sunday. Another long day of packing up the truck. We did a lot yesterday, but there is still so much to be done. So we got up and got to it today.

I had to do some actual office work today, too. Which was kind of nice, a bit of a break from lifting so many heavy boxes.

Yesterday Dustin came to visit and help out, he just drove down from Rochester. Today Travis drove in from around Canton, Ohio to visit and help with some packing.

We went out to a late lunch with Travis to a mac and cheese restaurant up in LeRoy that my dad had told us about. The food ended up being completely amazing, I want to go there and try more different kinds of mac and cheese in the future. We had a really nice time having lunch there.

Travis was not able to stay long, he had a lot of driving to do to get back to Ohio.

We packed until about nine at night. Then early bed time. We are just all so tired from all of the packing.

Tonight I helped dad check out Fedora Linux with Cinnamon. He is thinking about making the plunge and moving over from Windows. But only a demo now. If he is going to try it out for real, it will likely not be until next month.

Saturday. Today begins our big day of loading up the truck. It is so cold, too. It was sixteen below when Paul picked up the truck this morning. We have a twenty four foot box truck to fill with stuff to take to Texas.

Jeremy was supposed to come down to help with the moving today as there is so much heavy stuff to move onto the truck from the barn storage unit. But he ended up not making it, so we were short someone to help me lift the big stuff onto the truck. Making this an extra hard day for me.

We were really thankful that Dustin came down from Rochester and helped with a lot of the truck loading. We would have been in terrible shape without his help today. He also loaded up his car with servers that we were “donating” and that helped to clear a lot of heavy stuff out of the barn. He brought his significant other and baby with him, so we got to meet them for the first time. They also gave Liesl a birthday present while there!

We worked on loaded the truck all day. The big furniture was done with Dustin there, but there is so much to do to load a truck of that size and we need every inch of it. Today went really well and we are anticipating being able to finish it all up tomorrow. It was a very long day of moving. The storage unit is really getting thin, though. We are in good shape.

Dinner was grilled cheese and tomato soup.

One project that I worked on today as well was finding and identifying working VoIP phones that we can use. I have been setting up and testing phone after phone today. We have been needing some phones for a while, now we have a surplus of them. Bins of them!

It is exciting to find so much stuff. The DVDs and the CDs and the Laserdiscs are all loaded up. The bit white couch, the super heavy black couch. Much of our wedding furniture. It is mind boggling how much stuff we have had stored up here for so long. How is it possible that we even own so much stuff?

Friday. Paul and I have to work down in Big Flats for the entire day, so Dominica and the girls are hanging out with dad today. We have a long day ahead of us, so we had to be up really early and drive all morning, again.

We made good time down, so stopped in Bath to get breakfast. We decided to go to Dunkin Donuts, we got coffees, donuts, and breakfast sandwiches. We ate there as we were pretty early. It was a cold, but bright and sunny morning.

We got to the factory in Big Flats and got right to work. It was a long day of running all over the factory. It was a very busy day for us. So much to do.

For a late lunch Paul ran out and picked up Burger King sandwiches. We worked until late, but we got everything that we needed to do done. Very productive and they are happy with our work. An exhausting day, though. Especially after so much work being done.

So it was very late evening when we finally got back to dad’s house.

Thursday. Happy Thanksgiving. This morning we started the day at thirteen degrees below zero! This is pretty surprising for us Texans, we are not used to this.

For the holiday meal we went to Aunt Sharon’s and Uncle Leo’s. Got to see Jeremy and his family, Sara and her family and had a lot of fun. Paul joined us. The girls had a lot of fun playing with their cousin Olivia, and with the Richardsons’ cats.

We went back to dad’s after the meal and spent the evening there. Then tonight, for the first time in many years, I actually got a chance to go to the annual (twenty third annual, in fact) Thanksgiving Night dinner at Nick Tahou’s in Rochester!

I used to go every year, long ago. Our Nick Tahou’s Thanksgiving Tradition even predates SGL, and that is really something! We have been going ever since Joe and I were in college together at Robert’s Wesleyan back in the 1990s.

All five of us went since the kids have never managed to make it to Nick Tahou’s for this. This is especially cool to get to bring them and have them meet everyone. Paul drove and Dominica came along as well. We had called Nate ahead of time to make sure that no one would be showing up that should not be there given things that have been found out this past year. But we were safe, they would not be there.

Nearly all the old guard was there. Jeff, Joe, Nate and his family. We spent the whole time catching up, it has been forever since we were all together. And this past year has given us a lot to be catching up on.

Wednesday. At dad’s today after being gone all day yesterday in Big Flats working there. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, so today is super slow at work.

After work we all played Clue for the first time. The girls have never played it, in fact they have played very few board games, it just isn’t a thing that we do all that much – mostly because most board games aren’t really games and are just a silly way to randomize events. But Clue is a real game with actual strategy and skill involved and a lot more fun than normal board games. We had a really fun time teaching them how to play. Liesl played on her own and Luciana played on a team with me.

It was super cold here today. As low as a negative seven Fahrenheit during the day and ten below at night.