Coming Home

Today most of the fam has returned to Nashville from their trips. Steve and Sam got in just after lunch and Maribeth, Everley, and Emmatha got in just after dinner. Lynnette and Lindley won't be back until Sunday. Steve stayed long enough to unload his suitcase and pack another to head to Columbus to spend the weekend with GDizzle.

Sam and Lindley recently moved into a house. Lindley wanted a loft bed for her new bedroom, so she and I found one she liked that could be delivered before December. And so it was scheduled to be delivered today. The only deal was that somebody had to be at the house to sign for it. Because it weighed 380 pounds.

Anyhow, since Sam and Steve would be arriving at the airport during the appointed delivery window, I made arrangements with Molly about picking them up. However, around noon (the delivery window was 1-5pm), Sam called (he was in the Denver airport at the time) and said the delivery person had called and said he would be at the house in 30 minutes. This was good, since I would be able to be at the house, sign for the delivery, and still pick up Sam and Steve.

So I headed to the house and went inside to wait. I heard the truck and went outside - to see the truck parked at the bottom of the driveway. And by bottom, I mean at the bottom, because the house is on a hill. The photo does not do the elevation of the hill justice - I would tell you the angle of the hill, but geometry was not my fave subject. Let's just say it is a steep hill. Anyway, back to the delivery.

I looked outside and saw the truck - wait, I already said that. Here's some delivery background. Basically, when I ordered the bed, you could select several different delivery options. The first option was delivery at curbside, which was a no-brainer since the curb was essentially at the bottom of a mountain. The second option, which I chose, was delivery to the door. There was a third option which was delivery to the room where the furniture was going to live, but the price for that was more than I wanted to spend. So the deal is that all 380 pounds of bed was going to get put on the porch by the front door. Back to the truck at the bottom of Everest ...

I looked out and saw the delivery person. At first I thought it was a female, because of the long braids/cornrows the person had. Also, the person was of a slight build. I know, that is sexist, but my eyesight isn't quite what it used to be. Anyhow, I rappelled down the mountain a bit and started talking to the delivery person, which I quickly determined to be a dude. I inquired as to whether he was going to pull the truck up the mountain, and he said he didn't think so because he would probably break a lot of the limbs on the trees (the truck was the size of a big U-Haul truck). I looked in the truck and saw the bed - all 380 pounds of it in seven boxes all shrink-wrapped onto a wood pallet.

I then asked if he thought it would be a good idea if I got my car (the roller skate baby Prius) and drove it down the driveway, and then we'd put the boxes in the car and I'd drive it back up the driveway. He seemed to think it was a better idea than putting each of the seven boxes on a dolly and hoisting them up the mountain. So I got the car, drove it down, he cut the wrap off the boxes, and we started loading the boxes in. I wish I had taken a photo - the first load we got five of the boxes in, the back gate of my car was open because one was too long for it to fit in, and delivery dude was somehow propped on the back holding everything in.

Once we had gotten to the front sidewalk, he asked if we were going to put this in the garage. To which I replied no, we were going up the slight incline of the sidewalk to the front door, which was on the top of about eight steps. At that point, I offered him $20 if he would, when he got the boxes to the front of the steps, take another three steps and unload the boxes inside the house. To which he replied, "Sure." It had gotten quite warm by this point, since it was noon and all, so he might have responded out of heatstroke. At any rate, we got the five boxes out of the car, up the sidewalk, up the steps, and into the house.

Then we headed back down for the remaining two boxes. Only one would fit in the car - the other one was way too big. So we loaded the box that fit into the car and dude said he would put the other box on the dolly and bring it up the mountain, because it wasn't that heavy, just large.

I putted up the mountain once more with box #6 and soon dude was headed up with the final box. We got all the boxes in the house, I gave the delivery dude his much-deserved tip and a bottle of Gatorade, and we parted ways. By this time Molly had arrived with lunch, so she and I had a bite to eat while I mopped the sweat that was gushing from every pore in my body. When I ordered the bed and knew that Sam was going to be out of town when it was delivered, I had offered to assemble the thing. After seeing all the boxes, I am glad that cray-cray offer was rescinded last week before delivery.

Once the delivery task was complete, I had time to return home for a quick power nap before picking up Steve and Sam. Several hours later, Mathieu picked up Maribeth and the girls, they picked up dinner, and ate at the Doik. Mainly because Everley had decided that she wanted to spend the night tonight at my house. Which she did.

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Blessings today include: clean cars and Kroger discounts on gas; nice delivery dude and getting everything inside; Molly bringing lunch; safe travel home for Steve, Sam, Maribeth, Emmatha, and Everley; dinner with Molly (our dinner) and Mathieu, Maribeth, Everley, and Emmatha (their dinner); package in the mail from LaLa2 (to be stuffed in my backpack for my August Extravaganza); sleep buddy Everley for the night