On The Road...

Man...what a week! Of all the moves we've gone through with the Army, we were clearly not as prepared for this one. We ended up spending Livy's 9 month Angelversary preparing for the movers and packing everything up for our drive! Luckily, it all worked out -- for the most part. Spending 3 days with the movers was just a bit stressful, as we watched them pack our stuff and load it onto the truck. Their packing methods weren't as good as we've seen in the past, and one of the packers tried to argue whenever we made a specific request...yeah that was fun. On the last day, one of them busted a set of blinds in the guest bedroom. Of course, no one would fess up so I guess I'll be taking that up with the moving company! Good times. I'm so glad the first half of the move is over. Now that our HHG's are on the truck, we don't have to stress about the condition of our household goods again until we arrive at Ft. Benning...so until then...out of sight, out of mind, right?

After we finished with the movers, cleaned up the house and cleared it with the owner, we headed over to our friends' house for the night. They were sweet enough to offer us their guest bedroom rather than staying in a hotel. It was a great opportunity for us to spend one last evening with them before we headed out, so I was glad for that! With such good company, we weren't really in a rush to head out, so we ended up getting a late start on the big drive. I guess with no agenda on this road trip, that wasn't really an issue though.

I'm so glad we are in no rush! With almost a month between leaving Ft. Lewis and having to report to Ft. Benning, we can take our time this time around. With previous moves, the only time we stopped was for a restroom or gas station, but this one is going to be much different. We plan to stop whenever we pass something of interest. In fact, we ran across our first detour just 2 hours into our drive today. After visiting my good friend, Cara, in Portland, we made sure to grab some Voodoo Donuts! We knew this was going to be the last time for a long time that we'll be in that area, so we better indulge. As luck may have it, we ended up witnessing one of the famous Voodoo Donuts weddings, too! We had heard about them, so it was fun seeing one firsthand today. I must say....it's definitely an interesting option! The "priest" determined the couple's spirit animals (ended up being a squirrel and a monkey), the couple had candy bouquets and boutonnieres, and before tying the knot, they had to get the approval of Kenny Rogers (there was a painting of him above the cash register) before saying "I do." Yeah...definitely unique! It was fun though, and they got everyone involved in it.

So even though that ended up cutting into our driving time, we weren't too bummed. Our goal was to make it to San Fransisco before the end of the night, but that definitely didn't happen! Oh well...we'll get there at some point tomorrow. Here's hoping the weather clears up and we can enjoy the city without the rain/fog that covered the entire PNW today!

Below are some pictures I just now got loaded up from the last week...

Oba watching the movers with much hesitation...

When one of the movers started packing up Liv's room, Oba took it upon himself to guard the door. He laid there crying the entire time she was in there -- Poor Oba had a rough time with all of this...

After the first day of packing, Obadiah decided to hang out in between our coffee table and end tables. It looked like he was in jail...

By the third day, he was comfortable with the idea of strange people coming in and packing up everything. Because of that, there were no more whines or cries, but he did try to make a run for it. After one of the movers chased him down for us, he lost all privileges and spent the rest of the day in the backyard -- left to cry and let everyone know the horrid abuse that he was experiencing!

Then fast forwarding to the delicious Voodoo Donuts...Man...I could live on those things! Since it was our last trip there, we each grabbed 2 for the drive. By the time we stopped for dinner, all I wanted was a salad...wayyyy too much sugar for one day -- but sooo worth it!

Oba was, of course, left to sniff but that's it. No donuts for the basset...

As we got closer to Grant's Pass, OR, we didn't deal with as much rain, but definitely drove into crazy amounts of fog at various points. This was just the beginning...

Best of all...we drove past a beautiful rainbow at one point...

For those of you that ever watch Tosh.0, you might remember the Web Redemption video with the guy that expressed a lot of emotion while recording a rainbow from his porch. As we drove past this one, James kept imitating what that guy said, ha.

Well, off to bed before another day on the road. Here's hoping it's clear skies and no traffic on our way to San Fransisco!!