We are on our way, sort of. On Tuesday, Sue finished packing up the house and we packed our stuff in the car and drove up to my son’s (and his wife’s and daughter’s) house which is about 30 minutes. All the boxes were packed and labeled, our clothes sorted in the appropriate suitcases and our carry-on stuff in the carry-on bags.

Thursday morning the movers arrived not quite bright and early (they were about 45 minutes late), but they moved quickly and efficiently to take all our stuff and put it in the truck. Sue stayed behind and gave the house a final clean while I accompanied the movers to the storage locker. Due to some scheduling difficulties, they lost one of their crew members and so I appointed myself chief elevator operator and rolled the handtrucks, carts and dolly’s onto the elevator, took them up a flight then rolled them off. The real movers did all the hard work of taking everything off the truck and packing it into the locker. We were quite lucky with the weather as it was relatively cool (low 80s) and nice and dry. It was all done and dusted after only 5 hours and I met Sue back at Josh, Liz & Hannah’s.

My son, ever the wise child decided that he needed to provide us some rules for traveling abroad on our own. After giving careful consideration to our itinerary and the way Sue and I behave, Josh locked our eyes with his dreaded, “this is important” stare, cleared this throat and said: “Dad, just don’t do anything that will get you arrested.” He then thought for a second and said. “Actually, don’t do anything where you think to yourself, ‘If someone sees me doing this, could I get arrested.’ You don’t want to spend any time in a French prison.” I looked up from my book “Instructions for how to steal from the French Central Bank” and said. “Huh? Me? What do you mean?” 😉

Sometimes we wonder what Josh thinks we get up to…

Today I set up a laptop in Josh’s house which should serve as our remote desktop site so that we can stream Netflix, MLB, Amazon, etc. from a US IP address while we are away. I am a bit worried that there might be a lag between the video and sound, but if there is we will deal with it then. Steven always needs something to worry about. Let it always be something this small.

We have also been dealing with some last minute technical issues. While packing the house, Sue misplaced her headphones and so we needed to get her a replacement set. She selected a pair of Jabra 85ts (at Steven’s recommendation). At just about the same time, my headphones, a pair of Jabra 75ts started to misbehave. The sound kept dropping from the right earbud. I contacted Jabra and they offered a replacement. I dutifully returned the broken pair and anxiously waited for the replacement. On Wednesday, I heard from them the replacement would not ship before we left so I ordered a pair of the Bose QuietComfort ear buds. They were scheduled to arrive on the same day. Wednesday came and went – no headphones; Thursday, same thing. On Friday, I cancelled the order and went to a store and bought a pair. When I got them home, Sue tried them and loved them. So, we returned her 85ts (which she was having trouble keeping in her ears – apparently my ears are not earbud-shaped) and bought another pair of the Bose. Last night after we arrived home from dinner, what was on the front step? My replacement Jabras! Oh well, guess I have a spare pair of headphones.  

We headed to Judie’s on Tuesday to have a few days with my sister, her family and my mother. We will spend a bit of time getting our cars ready for storage (disconnecting the batteries, treating the gas, etc.) and then putting them away for a few months. (Anyone want to buy a low-mileage but slightly dinged up 2010 Prius? It has a sunroof and leather seats!) We also need to do a bit of last minute organizing of our suitcases. We want some toiletries and a change of clothes in our carry-ons for when arrive in Paris – on Wednesday!