Home at last.

Thursday, 7/15/2010 - Visited Ohio Caverns, which has rust stalactites along with the standard limestone/gypsum formations. Took lots of pictures, which are forthcoming. (Live caves are wet, which meant that the new water-resistant point-and-click camera came in handy.) Afterwards, had dinner with my aunt and uncle, and briefly visited my grandmother. She'd just had foot surgery, so wasn't up to much, but she looked a lot better than last time I'd seen her - which, to be fair, had been right after a round of chemotherapy.

Friday, 7/16/2010 - Early morning, dragged into a campsite near Lake Erie, still in Ohio. There were no government-run campgrounds along that part of our route, and it turns out that private campgrounds nearly always lock their driveways against after-hours arrivals. (Oh noes, people might drive in and then leave before the office opens! That means they'd have had something free!) We slept, showered, paid, and left. A day of driving followed, and we arrived (too late for Shabbat candles) at Fair Haven Beach State Park, NY, on the shore of Lake Ontario. The last person to leave the park ranger station showed us to an overflow campsite, which would've been all but impossible to find in the dark. While we were setting up for a dinner of garlic bread and cheese, we happened to leave the table unattended and a critter (probably a raccoon) took a bite out of our loaf of bread, through two layers of plastic. We had to discard half of it, but still had a decent dinner.

Saturday, 7/17/2010 - Campground check-out was at noon, and they were expensive enough that we didn't want to pay for an additional day when we weren't going to stay the night, so off we went in spite of Shabbat. While blundering around looking for a gas station, we started seeing signs for a renaissance faire, and I figured, why not? So the Sterling Renaissance Festival was zeightyfiv's first. Coolest artisan would have to be the maker of bronze statues, but the glassblower and weaver were close runners-up. I acquired a pair of comfy shoes along the way.

Sunday, 7/18/2010 - 02:00 saw us arriving at Caroga Lake Campground, in Adirondack State Park, NY. That particular campground is standard for car-campers, but the region itself is interesting enough to merit a possible return trip. The rest of the way home was uneventful, except for passing under the Appalachian Trail. We arrived in Somerville around 22:30, and spent half an hour figuring out where to park a massive truck. Then took the easiest stuff inside and fell over in bed.

Monday, 7/19/2010 - Truck was due back around 14:00, so we rush-unloaded onto the covered porch. Then zeightyfiv went off to return the vehicle, which turned out to involve a lot of standing in line (unexpected wait causing him to miss an appointment). The rest of the day was taken up by moving boxes into the basement. Around 21:30, zeightyfiv and I fell asleep on the couch on the porch, while waiting for a thunderstorm to pass. Woke up around midnight due to other people arriving home.

Tuesday, 7/20/2010 - ~02:30 Last gasp of effort was us and a housemate dragging the matress inside and up the stairs (no space for it on the bottom floors) before substantial amounts of dew could condense on it. The box spring and couch are still down there, taking up space that belongs to the downstairs tenants, but are at least less suceptible to moisture damage. Tish'a B'av started at sunset, but we're not observing this year, due to the need to move furniture and utter stupidity of fasting while doing so. Sleep is in the near future, and figuring out how to get the couch and bed into our limited space will follow.

Afterwards? I'm planning several days of recovery.

Done moving furniture!

Sometimes having many housemates is great. Different individuals were available to help us with the mattress, couch, and box spring, so we didn't impose too much on any one person.

Now that it's set up, the queen-size bed dominates the room. Less so than some others I've lived in with it, though. There's some work yet on how to rearrange the vertical storage units that the couch displaced, but that can be done slowly over the next several days.

As for getting it all out when the lease ends on September 1st? Suffice it to say that there are enough of us moving (and to the same destination) to share the cost of hiring movers.