A Tale of Two Pinkies - part two

Finally, here is the second half of the moving adventure story. I hope you enjoy it.

So, it was an early morning in Louisville. I was not ready to be awake, but I had little choice in the matter. Molly had been sedated, but it takes a while to kick in, so I started taking care of other things like preparing her litter box and other things associated with the move. Dad arrived and began helping. Things were in a bit of a rush because we wanted to get on the road.

Finally, we got molly in the cage and got on the road. I almost immediately realized I forgot my sunglasses, but just let it go because I didn't want to turn around. I am not sure anymore the exact time we hit the road, but I think it was around 7:30 AM. Molly was not super thrilled to be moving, but the sedative was doing its work making her calmer than she would have been otherwise.

When we got close to Scottsburg, IN Molly began freaking out. She got up, meowed a lot, and started scratching intensely at the bottom and the bars of her cage. I tried to talk to her calmly and pet her through the bars of the cage. She calmed down briefly, but then got started again. While watching the road, I reached over to pet her again and left my hand there to hopefully comfort her. Well, she didn't mean to (at least, I don't think she meant to) but she grabbed one of my fingers (the pinky) with her paw and proceeded to rip a hole in it. It was quite painful and I radioed for Darrell to pull over and get me a bandaid. The bandaid wouldn't hold, so I secured it was some ducttape.

With one pinky down, I continued the drive. Our next stop would be north of Indianapolis where I took the opportunity to go ahead and put some diesel in the truck and get a snack. Before getting there though, Molly freaked out again and did the whole scratching at her cage bit again. This time it was more humorous (ok, I was sad at the time) because she was feeling more of the sedative and would sort of just pass out mid freak out. At one point, she was biting the bars and she just sort of closed her eyes and layed there in the cage all crooked with her back leg on the box inside the cage and her front paw gripping the cage above her head. I tried to make sure that she wasn't in pain, and after a few minutes, she got up, crawled into her box with the blanket, and went to sleep.

Molly was pretty calm for the remainder of the trip. She was "peaking" on her sedative at this point and so she pretty much just laid there and slept.

Our last stop on the trip up was the Flying J at exit 240 on I-65. I always like to stop here before going into the city to fill up with fuel because filling up in the city is so much more expensive. After talking to Darrell, he agreed to go on ahead while some of us ate some lunch and discussed the game plan. Back on the road, we followed the route I had planned around the construction north of I-80/94 on I-65 and then made it back to the skyway for our entrance to the city. The I-PASSes made it a lot easier.

With no issues, we made it to the new apartment and I got the truck backed into position.

The first order of business was to unload molly and her supplies. I prepared the litter box while everyone else started working. We developed a bit of a system where a couple of us remained downstairs by the truck, a couple of people upstairs to move boxes and stuff, and then a couple of floaters to help move things up and down the service elevator. This system worked well, but we could have used 1-3 more people I think. If you have read the post I wrote the other day titled Intermission, you will recall that I had to move the truck a couple of times. Well, right before that happend is when i sliced my other pinky. I was moving my dining room table and it had a staple on the bottom of it that had left a sharp point. Of all the times I moved it, now is when I cut myself. So, not only was that woman rude, but she had terrible timing with my finger hurting.

In 2-3 hours, the truck was unloaded, despite my two pinky fingers hurting like hell. It was now time to take the truck back. Fortunatly, Merle agreed to follow Robbie and I as we sought out a place to get diesel and then returned the truck. Getting diesel was a whole adventure on its own. I am used to seeing diesel everywhere, but this is apparently not the case in the city. We drove to nearly the interstate on Irving Park Rd before we found a station with diesel. Getting into it was difficult, but I made it ok. Getting out was equally a pain, but when you are driving a big truck, people tend to get the hell out of your way once you decide to move.

I had called the return place since they had a note about a special drop off location during Cubs games, which I had found out beforehand would be going on the day of the move. The drop off was fortunately off Irving Park road, so that was a little bit of good luck. Merle picked us up and then drove as close as he could get to Clark street right across from Wrigley Field. He dropped Robbie and I off and we turned in the keys. Merle picked us up on Racine a block or so away.

On the way back, Merle was kind enough to purchase some chicken from El Pollo Loco on Wilson. This made a great dinnertime snack.

Finally, the move was complete and the great unpacking could begin.