Sheep Guarding Llama

Today is the big packing day up here in Peekskill.  I was up by eight this morning having gotten practically no sleep.  Jen slept in a few hours longer which was pretty amazing as she was sleeping on the love seat in the living room with me going all over the house cleaning and packing to get ready for the house showing that was going on later today!

We had to be out of the house by around a quarter to eleven.  We waited until the last minute then went to the Westchester Diner for some lunch and to wait out the showing.  After lunch we drove down to the storage unit just to assess the situation and get a feel for how much work there was going to be in packing it all up.  Then back to the house to meet Brian who had arrived with his Trailblazer while we had been at the storage unit.

We were only at the house for a few minutes before we had to drive down to White Plains to the UHaul location there to pick up our trailer.  We got one of those massive 6’x12′ trailers with the double axle.  This is not a fooling around trailer.  This thing is a lot wider than the Trailblazer and no fun at all to drive around Westchester’s narrow streets.

We got to the storage unit and got straight into the crazy packing frenzy.  It actually went very well and before long the storage unit was actually empty!  We had not really been sure if that was going to be possible or not but there it is, completely empty.  Not only was it empty but there was a bit of room left that we needed to fill in the trailer so that it would be stable for the long drive down to Texas.  So we parked the trailer in the parking lot of the storage unit and drove back up to the house with the X3 and the PR5 to load up on new stuff to put into the trailer.

We did a bit of packing from the house getting all of the kitchen stuff out and miscellaneous large items from around the house like the one remaining SunFire V240 server, several plastic drawer systems, the printer, the last of Liesl’s toys, etc.  Now there is really nothing left in that house.  I can’t believe how bare it is.

We drove down and got Brian all packed up and from there he went straight out towards Philadelphia.  Jen and I returned to the house to get the last load into the cars and to lock everything up so that it is ready to be left again.

There really was very little for us to get in this last load.  We had left a few fragile items behind that we didn’t want to ship in the bumping trailer like all of the remaining monitors.  Those all went on car seats and then Jen and I left Peekskill to drive down to Philadelphia in our separate cars.

It was almost midnight when we arrived down at Tara’s house in Chalfont, PA.  Another really long day.  We are all very exhausted.  It was straight off to bed.  Tomorrow is a big travel day.  Driving from Philadelphia to Nashville, we hope.  Brian is not coming for another week with the trailer.  It is just Jen and I driving this leg of the trip.

I slept in a little too much this morning but I desperately needed to play a little catch up on my sleep.  Once I was up we were out the door pretty quickly and down to Brian’s USA Diner in Mt. Morris for some breakfast before really getting onto the road.  Brian, Jen and I ate and while we were there Mark and Rhonda Popp stopped by to say hello.

From Mt. Morris it was down 390 to 84 and over to Ithaca.  I haven’t been in Ithaca in quite a while.  I really miss that town.  I love Ithaca.  Such a great city.

We went straight to Autoworks so that we could get the Mazda PR5 and the BMW X3 both inspected since that was the primary reason for the entire trip.  We dare not miss that!  They got us in straight away and it really did not take too long.  I took Jen around and made introductions while we had some time.

Once the cars were finished we drove up the street to Lifestyle Properties but were not able to find anyone there.  We waited a little while and then gave up and drove down to Boynton Middle School to hang out with Nate.  School was just ending at this point (boy schools get done early) and Nate was free to hang out.  Bob was not around as he was in Westchester for a funeral so we did not get to see him.

We hung out at the school for a little while then we all went down to the Ithaca Bakery and had lunch.  I have not had Ithaca Bakery / Collegetown Bagels in so long I can’t believe it.  That was some awesome food.  I had to get two sandwiches just because I missed it to much.  Collegetown Bagels up at Triphammer was the staple of my diet when I first moved to Ithaca in 2000.  I ate there several times a week when we lived at Gaslight Village Apartments right up the road.  Good times.

After lunch Jen and I went downtown to see a client of hers that was not expecting her.  Always nice to surprise people halfway across the country.

From there we dropped off her car, the Mazda, and drove up to the Lucente’s home to see if we could track down Steve and Pat.  It took a while of ringing the doorbell before Max opened the door and did a search for us to see if anyone was home.  No one was.  He said that Steve had mentioned heading off to Barangus in Ulysses so we said that we would head out there to find him.

I haven’t been to Barangus in years.  Not the kind of place that you make a point of stopping into when you are visiting from across the country.  I’ve been there with Steve in the past.

Steve is always unmistakable, even from quite a distance.  We found him at the bar with two friends – the bar otherwise empty.  I came up behind him and slapped him on the back and gave him rather a surprise.  We haven’t seen each other since Max’s bar mitzvah three years ago!

Jen and I hung out with Steve at Barangus for several hours.  The place when from empty to pretty busy.  Then around nine we hit the road.  Back down to Ithaca, picked up the other car then down to Binghamton to meet up with John Stephens in Vestal at a diner there.

We had a light dinner and Jen and John got a chance to meet which was handy.  I haven’t seen John in quite some time either.  We did not stay too long as it was getting late.  From there it was on to the road down to Peekskill.

It is a little over two hours from Binghamton to Peekskill.  We got into town and I got to see my house for the first time in more than three months.  What a weird feeling that is.  I’m always awed by the sensation of going to a house that I own after having been away for months.  It is just so weird.

The house was left unlocked – just great.  Not what I wanted to discover when I arrived.  But nothing was touched in the house – not that there is anything at all worth taking.  The place is down to miscellaneous cleaning supplies and the furniture that we are leaving behind.  Everything of value was already removed.

I discovered a lot of spoiled food in the fridge and three dead plants upstairs.  Just what we wanted in the house that is being shown for sale and rent.  Ugh.  I will need to deal with all of that tomorrow.  I was hoping to find that nothing was wrong but apparently leaving things to be done after we aren’t there to supervise doesn’t work very well.

We were pretty wired from the busy day and all of the driving.  It didn’t take long to discover that there is absolutely nothing to do in that house.  No Internet, no television, no books, no nothing.  There is some wine still in the house but it is all wine that has gone to vinegar that we plan to throw out when we move out.

We were bored and had just nothing to do but I discovered that there were fake fireplace logs still there and it was just a little cool outside so I started a fire in the fireplace and opened a bottle of spoiled wine.  Of course, there is no corkscrew in the house.  So I tried several things before I figured out that I could open the wine by drilling it out with my drill – one of the very few items left in the house.  Just working that hard to open bad wine was enough entertainment for us!  The wine was definitely turned and corked though.  About as bad as wine gets I guess.

Today, finally, I was able to buckle down and really focus on my class all day without any real interruptions.  It turns out that today, not tomorrow, is the final day of my class.  It was an accident that they had told us that the class was going to run an extra day.  So surprise, I have tomorrow “off” in a way.  That works out perfectly, actually.  Not that a day off ever goes amiss but this week I really need it.

I worked all day on my Red Hat training.  The class was good and I am very glad that I got a chance to take it.  I learned a bit and will learn more when I take the time to go back through the material again and try it all out on my own servers.

The plan was for Brian and I to drive Jen up to Croton-on-Hudson early tomorrow morning so that she could catch the Amtrak train, Maple Leaf or Lake Shore Limited, up to Rochester as she is picking up the Mazda PR5 up there.  We bought the train tickets at the end of the day and just minutes after getting the tickets we realized that the Mazda needs a New York State inspection which causes all kinds of issues.  We did some brainstorming and the only thing that we could come up with was that a trip to Rochester was absolutely necessary.

We called Amtrak and cancelled the tickets.  Thank goodness for Amtrak.  They are so awesome.  No charge to us to cancel the tickets.  You never get that from your airline!  Amtrak rocks.

Jen and I quickly started packing the X3 to prepare to depart.  No sooner than we took out the first load than the door closed and locked us out.  Oops.  We had to wait for Brian and Tara to return from the chiropractor to let us back in so that we could keep packing.

We were out the door and on the road from Chalfont, Pennsylvania up to Pavilion, New York by around five.  We wound through the backroads of northwester Philadelphia which was a little interesting.  We found our way to the Northeast Turnpike Extension and drove up to Clark’s Summit where we stopped to get dinner at Damien’s.

The drive up to Pavilion went just fine.  We made good time and this trip was trivial compared to all of the driving that I have been doing so I didn’t mind the extra miles at all.  Going from Philly to Pavilion is little different, but much more interesting, than going from Dallas to Houston.

We got up to dad’s place around eleven thirty or just a little after.  We hung out for just a little while and then it was off to sleep.  This is the earliest that we managed to get to bed all week!  Who would have thought that an extra trip to Rochester would result in extra free time?

It was nice that this gave me at least a little bit of time to go see dad.  I haven’t seen him since December and with his shoulder bothering him it is pretty much impossible for him to get down to Texas to see us.

Tomorrow morning we have to be up and on the road pretty early.  We start driving separately as of tomorrow.  Now the trips start getting very lonely very quickly.

Today is the big day, the day that justifies all of the driving necessary to get up to Philadelphia.  I got up this morning and took my class as long as I could.  There was not a lot of free time, though, before I needed to get all suited up in my brand new, never before worn charcoal grey suit, red power tie and brand new shoes.  I even had a new shirt and only worn once braces.  I looked pretty snappy if I do say so myself.

We left pretty early to drive over to Downingtown which sits west of Philly between Philly, Reading and Lancaster.  It was a bit of a drive, almost an hour to get there.  The meeting there went really well – better than we had expected.  We had the whole crew there, Brian, Jen, Jeff and I.  We overwhelmed them, I think.

After the meeting and tour of the facility in Downingtown we all went out for lunch at Chili’s with the folks with whom we were having the meeting.  Lunch was good and Jeff cut out from there to go celebrate his anniversary.

Brian, Jen and I rushed back to Chalfont so that I could get back to my class.  I signed back in and worked on that for the rest of the day.

After class was over, Jen and I decided that Brian and Tara needed some alone time as they have been stuck entertaining us since the moment we got up from Texas.  So we sent them out to dinner and we just went to Wawa and got sandwiches and hung out at the house watching “television” on Netflix.

We were all out way too late last night.  We were pretty much exhausted this morning.  I was the first one up since I had to get up so that I could get started on my class work with Red Hat.  Most everyone did some sleeping in today.

We were supposed to have a very early morning meeting this morning but that was canceled, thankfully.  Otherwise we would have all had to have been awake at six or seven in the morning.  But because it was canceled I was able to sleep in until five minutes to nine when I jumped out of bed and ran down to get into the class.  Luckily I can just wear pajamas for this.

a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/sheepguardingllama/4457632151/” title=”Getting Ready for Spicecorps Philly by SheepGuardingLlama, on Flickr”>

I spent the morning just doing my class.  Then during lunch I showered and got dressed as we have a busy afternoon.  I did my class right up to the last second and then we ran out to meet up with DevonIT, a thin client manufacturer in the Philly region.  That was a good talk and we got to sit with the CTO and get his thoughts on the future of desktop virtualization which was very interesting.

From there it was over to Blue Bell, PA to go to SpiceCorps Philadelphia.  This was our fourth meeting which is a pretty major milestone.  We met the posted requirements from SpiceWorks for our anniversary but they decided to add in new requirements that were not listed so this doesn’t count for us.

We had a really good turn out this time.  About a dozen people.  It was a really good group and we had a really good and diverse discussion.  The meeting ran for a few hours and then several of us went out for dinner at a local diner afterwards.  We ended up being out quite late until around two in the morning.  Jeff bailed on us and just went home after the meeting.  Tomorrow is our big day so we all need to get some sleep tonight.