10 states in 29 hours!

We're back from a last-minute trip from Maine to Tennessee. (One of the advantages of Empty Nest Life is that one can get away more easily to go on such last-minute adventures.)

Deb's college housing arrangement in a furnished apartment wasn't working out--the landlady didn't like her having other students over for meals and she didn't like the landlady's not keeping her agreement to refrain from smoking indoors. The landlady objected to "strangers in my house" and gave her just 4 days to be out of the apartment!!!

Needless to say, Deb immediately got busy making inquiries and phone calls in search of a new place to live.

Anyway, with the decision to head south made only a day before departure, the OC arranged to take some vacation days now instead of later and I got busy canceling commitments, doing laundry, making bread and packing. We then stuffed the van with her bed and bedding, dresser, card table with chairs, bookcase, a collapsible living room chair donated by a thoughtful sister and several other items she'd requested and headed south. We made all our stops along the way as brief as we could to keep the wheels rolling as much as possible each day. A late night motel stop 5 hours or so from our destination had us far enough south to reach our motel and then her university by early to mid-afternoon.

We met up with Deb at the office of the housing director where she picked up the key to a university-owned apartment which had just become available that very week (God's timing, once again proving to be perfect)! We went right over to check it out and unload the van. Then off to her old apartment to work together stuffing her belongings into the duffels and boxes we'd brought along and ferrying it all over and piling it up at her new place.

That night, she slept in her own bed in her new apartment. Well, not precisely "new" as it's in the basement of a house that must be at least 50 years old. But the young lady with whom she's sharing the apartment seems very congenial and this apartment is close enough to campus for her friends to walk or bike over for visits.

Speaking of visiting with friends, I have to tell you about the wonderful gift given her by some friends of ours who moved from here to there a couple of years ago. We spent a lovely afternoon with them and, when they they discovered that she needed a dining table gave her one...complete with four chairs! So now she can have dorm-weary friends over for all the "potluck" dinners she wants!

The OC was please to get in a day of remote work thus saving a vacation day and, after taking a day off for a delightful Sabbath rest, we repeated the 21-hours-of-driving "10 states in 29 hours" dash back home again.

On the off chance that you might have been curious, we drove through: Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia, Virginia and Tennessee.