Well, today marks the end of our fourth full day in Atlanta (Norcross to be exact). The brief version is that things are going very well and we're looking forward to the future. For those with nothing better to do, continue reading below:
After spending what seemed like weeks packing, taking stuff to storage and throwing stuff away we finally made it to moving day. We rented a truck on November 30th and loaded it up. Brenda and I did all the loading with the exception of my computer desk and other furniture (Thanks George!). We also had to take Brenda's car to her mom's, as we decided to leave it behind for now. Even though I'd just put over $500 into it, we doubted it would make the trip. So with that, we ended up working until 12:30am.
Alarm went off at 6:30am and we still had some things to load into the truck. By the time we finished, had all the animals rounded up, stopped for coffee and hit the ATM, it was almost 9am before we got on the interstate. Much later than we'd planned. Murray rode with me in the truck and each cat had its own carrier with Brenda in the van. I think I got the better end of the deal :)
For the first couple hours we were hit with some major rain. I mean blinding, slow-down-to-twenty-five type rain. To make matters worse, I'd left Murray's window open about 5 inches. And the truck cab was too wide for me to reach over and shut it. So Murray got drenched and we both had to smell wet puppy for miles. Luckily the rain lifted and I was able to dry things off at the first rest stop.
After that, we didn't have any more rain, but high winds hit us the entire way down. That's bad enough in a minivan, but quite a battle with a fifteen-foot truck.
While it only took us about 8.5 hours to drive down last year in the van, this time it took about twelve hours. This was due to driving a big, slow truck, plus having to stop pretty often for Murray to get out. The original plan was to leave Marietta by 6 or 7am so we'd hit Atlanta by 4 or 5pm (ie, before dark). No dice. It was 9:30pm when we pulled into the complex. So I ended up having to drive that truck about four hours in the dark, which was the main thing I wanted to avoid.
All the way down we were able to talk to each other with walkie-talkies. And Brenda was able to help me change lanes from behind me. That got a LOT harder at night, as I couldn't distinguish the minivan from any other vehicle on the four-lane highway. My hands were killing me from white-knuckling the steering wheel. But no mishaps, and I'm really proud of getting everything down here by ourselves.
That first night, it was all we could do to find the energy to inflate the air mattress and pass out. But starting the next morning we we've been unpacking pretty much most of each day. Took us until Sunday to totally unload the truck, as we're on the second floor and we were doing it by ourselves. We decided early on we weren't going to rush it. Never been so happy as when I dropped off that truck Monday morning :)
So far, we've gotten quite a lot done. My office is taking shape and everything is up and running so I can start getting work done again. The kitchen is all set up and we made our first grocery run yesterday. We'd never been to a Publix store before, but it was pretty nice. Yesterday I also set up a new stand for the tv and stuff. Hopefully soon we'll be going to look at living room furniture and beds. Oh, and we actually put up a Christmas tree today.
On the job front, I'm still trying to schedule a meeting with a local firm, just hard to get times to line up. I also just got another quote request from the Parkersburg tourist bureau. Pretty cool, as they knew ahead of time I was leaving for Atlanta, and they still want me to quote the job.
Oh, and Brenda has a job interview on Friday! It's a treatment center here in Norcross. Everyone keep your fingers crossed!
I may update this post later if I realize I've left out anything newsworthy. But probably will try to stick to short updates as things come up. And as in the other post, you can
check out our photos here.
Well, it was a very busy four days, but we're back safe from Christmas in Ohio. We set out as early as possible on Saturday the 23rd, but had to drop the animals off at the vet's at 8:30. That took a while, so we didn't get on the road until almost nine (after our first brief stop at Starbucks).
Next stop was Kelly and Julie's for some pizza and cookies. Wish we could've stayed longer, but glad we had a chance to visit for a while. Then on to Brenda's mom's to crash for our first night.
Then on to Zanesville for more unwrapping and dinner, which was pretty casual, sandwiches and chili. We got some much-needed gift cards and some other stuff. Donnie and I put together his new racetrack and had a bunch of fun breaking that in. Then we spent the next two nights in Newark, with dinner Tuesday back in Zanesville after a Kohls shopping spree.
I really didn't take many photos, but you can see some here. Oh, and this year I finally got photos of Brenda's Aunt Connie's decorations, inside and out. They really are amazing.
Brenda spent almost all day today making a batch of monster cookies (hey, I made lunch).
Okay, so that phone book we get in Marietta has no right to call itself "The Big Book". Take a look at our phonebooks down here!
After two weeks of sitting on lawn chairs, sleeping on an air mattress, and endless runarounds from Bank of America (long story), we FINALLY got some furniture!
The living room furniture is nice because it's really sturdy microfiber and we paid a little more to have them stain-proofed. So it's all pretty pet-friendly. It's also a slightly smaller scale than what we had before, since we have less room.
Working on posting a full update, but in the meantime, you can see a bunch of photos on my Flickr account by going here.
It's official. The house is sold, and we'll be leaving for Atlanta December 1st. Actually, we had our first offer on the house about two weeks after listing it. We showed it several times and the first offer was from a young couple buying their first house. He is a grad student from OU and she works right across the street at the O'Neill Center. Right after that, we even accepted a backup offer. Pretty amazing.
Oh yeah, we got Salem fixed and declawed last week. What a hoot that's been. Turns out she had a one-inch cyst on an ovary, which is probably why she always seemed to be in heat. The jury is still out as to whether this will mellow her any. Let's hope so. But it sure is funny seeing her with that cone on her head :)
We're still planning on going back down to Atlanta sometime early in November to look around again and check out apartments one more time. I also will have a meeting with a guy from another web firm down there that seems fairly interested in me. Whether he wants to offer me a full-time job, freelance work, etc remains to be seen. But he's also not ruling out buying FireBox as a way to get me on board. Sounds like he's serious, but I'm keeping all doors open.
I'm including some photos of the apartment complex we looked at last year. They're soooo nice, and sooooo unlike anything we have up here. Gated community with a pool, exercise room, car wash and areas to walk dogs. We'll also be allowed to take all the pets. Each apartment has nine-foot ceilings, fireplaces and patios. We liked it a lot, but our final destination may depend on where we end up working. This place I mentioned above is in Midtown, which is under fifteen miles from Norcross, but we'll have to see what the traffic is like. The good news is that most places do 3 or 6-month leases, and there's so much new construction, there are many incentive programs. We've heard of some places offering multiple months free just to move in!
After three years of "getting around to it", we finally have a new patio. For those that don't know, when we bought this house, there was this craptastic concrete pad off the carport. It was really awful and they clearly just dumped concrete in it. Seriously, there were like bricks and branches and all kinds of things they just poured concrete over.
This is kinda old news by now, but FireBox Studios just won another design award. This is our third TIGAR award in a row, and we got this one for the site we did for the Marietta tourist bureau. Pretty cool, but most importantly I beat my old employer....again :)
Last Sunday we went with some friends to Easton in Columbus and saw "Superman Returns" in IMAX 3D. Wow.
Somehow I got roped into being a judge for the karaoke contest at this year's Wing Thing event. I don't know who else will be judging, but I hear the mayor's been asked. Should be fun, if not just a little painful.
Last August we went down to Myrtle Beach with our friends Kelly and Julie and their two kids. I hadn't been their since before Hurricane Andrew wiped out the beach house we'd been renting. It was great to be back, and I'd missed the ocean. We had a pretty good room at a nice hotel complete with a coffee bar. I even got everyone to Drunken Jack's for dinner. Still the best dining at Myrtle.
Once we got back, we finally got carpet laid in our downstairs family room and I was able to move the office downstairs. Just needed to get things set up better for clients and having Ryan come in every day. I didn't get to do much to the office until the last couple months. Brenda's dad got us some great doors to put over the extra doorways and replace the bathroom doors. Plus I got a new ceiling fan, which is great as whichever room has my computers is always the hottest room in the house. All in all, the office is shaping up, and is finally gettting to be what I wanted.
