Our family was so helpful in getting us ready to move. My sister came and helped clean our old apartment. Dan's parents brought dinner over for us on the big packing night. My brother Jon basically loaded the truck by himself. My brother-in-law Tyler came and helped pack, as well as my sis-in-law Mia. Everyone really put forth the effort and to all of you who asked if you could help and I turned you down you can see why. We had so much help! It really was an overwhelming/emotional time for me because I realized how much family really means to me. Our family was so wonderful and really they were the ones that got us on our way. So thank you to everyone for all your help!
After pulling several late nights, and family working so hard with us, we were ready. The 26 foot big Penske truck was loaded and the next thing I knew we were making our journey for the long drive in the truck. Dan's brother Eric was so nice and drove down with us! We left at about 5:00pm on Tuesday the 30th after cleaning our old apartment all day and saying goodbye to some family. It was hilarious because we sat all 3 of us in the front. I know we looked like hillbillies. We pulled into The Sands Hotel in Reno at 1:30 am. It was a good idea that we slept overnight there because we were all so exhausted. After a pretty good nights sleep (basically it was a $30 hotel), we ate a great breakfast at Mel's diner located in the casino/hotel, and then went on our way to San Francisco.
The drive was very familiar to Dan and I since we had just done it about 2 weeks earlier on our trip to find our apartment, but I still love the 2nd half of that drive. It is probably because we get to go through Northern California were I lived for part of my growing up years. It is sort of nostalgic for me.
We arrived in the city at about 1:00 pm and made our way in our HUGE truck up and down the big hills to our apartment. When we got there, we knew it was go time. There is something about this city, for those of you who don't know. "The side of the road" does not exist. You can't park "on the side of the road" because it is already jam packed with cars that are parking there. So what you have to do if you are driving a big truck is park in the lane of traffic. The street that we live on, Taylor Street, is a 2 lane road, so pretty much we took 1.25 lanes in our huge truck. Nevertheless, we put on the flashers, all said a prayer in our hearts, and got unpacking.
This is how our system went. We had 3 people: Dan, Eric, and me. So what we decided we would do is Dan and Eric would take in the big heavy stuff and then I would take everything else and put it inside the lobby. That way, I would be able to keep my eye on the truck and my eye on the lobby (since technically we shouldn't have left either alone). Well, it was crazy. I was literally running back and forth between the lobby and the truck the whole time. I was really scared that when my back was turned someone was just going to help themselves. There were all of these people walking by and I was of course I had an audience of old Chinese men to laugh at me. But luckily no one stole anything.
After we unloaded the truck completely, we locked it up and left it in the road while we moved to the stuff in the lobby. We then just started making trips of our stuff in the elevator. We actually put so much stuff in the elevator that we sent it up to the floor on it's own and ran up the stairs to catch it. I laughed so hard thinking of what would happen if we didn't catch it soon enough and someone went to call the elevator and found it full of our stuff.
But after 4 hours we did it all! And we made great time! I just have to give a huge shout out to Eric because honestly, I have no idea how Dan and I would have done it without him. Just like Dan said, Eric will just throw a couch on his back and take it up the stairs. He was a surge of energy that Dan and I needed for sure. So thank you times a million Eric. I am so grateful for your help.
Well our day wasn't over yet. We still had the truck in the middle of the road. So we returned the truck to a place that was about 1/2 hour away and we somehow made our way to some public transportation that could take us to find lunch/dinner (since the last time we had eaten was 7:00 AM and it was now 5:00 PM).
It was an insane day and I can't hardly believe we did it. That night, we walked home from dinner up huge hills and when we made it inside our new apartment that was full of boxes. It was hard to think that this was "home." Eric crashed on the couch and we just managed to find a blanket and put it on top of our mattress. I can't even remember if we had pillows or not.
What a day!
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