All posts by Duf

Of course I knew that moving was going to be crazy but yesterday was a testament to what I can expect for the next week or so. I am going to be utilizing the garage at the new place heavily to accommodate a lot of things. For this reason I needed to make sure that things that I don’t want or need are not in there. The old home owners left some old building supplies, plywood window covering and a garage fridge for me. It all needed to go.

I figured the quickest way to do this would be to list them on FB Marketplace, for free. Easy is relative because doing so opens the floodgates from both real and imaginary “buyers”. In total I have no doubt that I received over 50 inquiries. The good news is both the fridge and the huge pile of plywood were picked up by the end of the day. Being only 10 minutes away made it easy for me to run over there to facilitate the transfer.

The guys that picked up the wood did me a favor and helped me load the existing washer and dryer into the back of my truck since I am swapping units between homes. I probably gave them at least $500 worth of plywood. My plan is to get conventional hurricane window covers installed which are light and easily stored metal panels.

So last night my goal was to swap washer dryer sets. I can be stubborn and/or stupid at any given moment. I demonstrated both qualities during this process. I was too stubborn to ask fro help unloading the washer/dryer from my truck. Instead I used a motorcycle ramp to do it. I precariously balanced each unit on the ramp and slid them down, praying the ramp would not slip off the tailgate, which it almost did. Somehow I got them off in one piece.

So next I had to disconnect and pull out my Samsung units. I grabbed my slip joint pliers to disconnect the water lines. I first removed the hot line and moved to the cold side. This connection was more stubborn so I squeezed and turned harder. Then I heard it, CRACK, followed by the sound of rushing water, I had broken the feed pipe… I hauled ass outside and turned off the water to the house to stop the flow probably within 60 seconds. I was so pissed. I guess I should have held the fixture to provide some strain relief while cranking on it, I just never expected it to snap.

So now I had to find an emergency plumber. I made three calls before I found a place that was able to send someone out ASAP. The guy had to cut out a section of drywall to get to the damaged area. All he could do last night was plug the broken line so I could get water flowing again in the rest of the house. Someone will be coming back Friday to do a permanent repair, joy. It was quite the day/night already, but I was not done.

I had my neighbor help me load my Samsung units in my truck. I felt compelled to get them dropped off at the new place because I needed the bed of the truck empty to transport my 70 inch tv today. I only left my place a little before 9PM.

When I got to the new house my plan was to again try to muscle the washer/dryer off the truck myself. Luckily for me one of the neighbors saw me getting ready to attempt this lunacy and offered to help me lift them off which was awesome. His name was Randy, he and his wife live a couple doors down from me.

While I worked on getting the units hooked back up he gave me a lowdown about the community. He said they have lived there a couple years and have loved it. There are mostly retired people around us so it’s quiet most of the time. He invited me to a block party they are hosting at the end of the month which was nice. I’ll do my best to attend.

After hooking up power and water I fired up both units just to make sure they survived the trip which they did, thankfully. I looked at my watch and realized that if I hustled I could get to Home Depot before they closed at 10PM to grab some installation hardware I need for the TV. I can’t say I have ever been at Home Depot before when the store is closing in 5 minutes announcement came over the PA.

I collapsed into bed about 11PM, sore and tired, knowing I will be rinsing and repeating these crazy days for a little while. It’s coming together, slowly.

In anticipation for closing on the house Monday I loaded up the Tesla with crates to dump at the new place. With the rear seats folded down it can haul a decent amount of cargo. At noon we had the walk through of the new place. The sellers had only totally vacated earlier that morning so it was cutting it close.

It was weird walking into an empty home. Pulling everything out revealed a lot of patching/touch up painting that eventually will need to be done as there are dozens of holes in the walls where things used to be. That was one good thing about the way my place was done. Everything on the walls was pulled and holes patched before the painting was done, for this very reason.

The other good thing was to see the garage without it being stuffed with things. It allowed me to visualize the space better. There is a fridge and a huge collection of plywood and other scraps that they used as storm shutters. I plan to give all of that away to clear wall space. Otherwise everything about the place seemed as I remembered.

The closing on the house was at 2:30, right across the street from my office which was convenient. I was surprised so much “wet” signatures were still required in 2023 but I was signing documents for close to a half hour. Once it was done I headed back to the house to unload the Tesla. When I got there the realtor for the seller was there. When I was there earlier we noticed the garage door would not close unless you held the button down. My realtor contacted the sellers realtor and she had arranged to have a company come out to fix it, which was nice. The guy arrived while I was still unloading. He replaced both electric eyes and things were good to go. Since I have cleaners arriving this morning the stuff that I brought just stayed in the garage for now so they can clean out the cabinets and drawers before they are loaded up with things.

After work I ran home and immediately loaded up the truck with more of the storage containers that were filled over the weekend. I also loaded up Elsa, wanting to expose her to the new home for the first time. Once we got there I walked through the house and out into the back yard where she dropped her first deuce. She was nervous, as I would expect. Once we went back outside she immediately hopped back in the truck as I finished up with unloading. It will take her awhile to get adjusted.

After unloading we drove the 23 miles back and I loaded up more stuff but this time I left Elsa at home. I didn’t need to stress her out more. When I got back to the new place I unloaded and then handled a few housekeeping issues in the garage. I moved all of the spare wood together and put away spare shingles and ceramic tile which could be useful down the road. I am trying to clear as much of the perimeter walls as possible to allow me to bring in shelving and work benches where I can.

I was at the new place until about 9:30 putzing around. There will be countless putzing to come but I look forward to the end result.

Wow, what a weekend this was.

Saturday morning I weed whacked and mowed the property for the FINAL time. Man did that feel strange. There have been so many tasks that have become reflex actions for me, yard maintenance is definitely one of them. I also boxed up the behemoth V13 and dropped it off at FedEx to be shipped to it’s next destination. I wanted to get these items checked off before I started on what I knew would more or less consume the rest of my weekend, packing.

My loose goal was to try to focus on one area at a time, clearing out cabinets, closets and corners. Doing this spurred another round of mass curbing of items that I just can’t see having the use or space for at the new place. I have a bunch of empty storage bins from my first round of purging so I used these bins primarily to hold the stuff I was taking. My plan is to take the bins to the new place, unpack them, and then reuse them to grab more stuff at my old house.

My brain is always planning ahead so it was choking on trying to come up with a logistics to handle everything that needs to be handled. I think the reality of trying to get a much bigger home with three external storage buildings into my new place with zero additional storage is going to be more challenging than I expected, even with the incredible amount of stuff that I have thrown/given away. I now have included in my possible scenarios having to rent a small storage space until I get a good handle on what I want to do. I do not want the new place to be stuffed with things. In addition to less space I also will have less furniture to put things in, compounding the challenge.

I kept working diligently but as the title implies, it felt like I was taking tiny bite size chunks out of a mountainous task. However I have come up against similar scenarios before and I always prevail, determination is something I do not lack.

I was exhausted by the end of Saturday, I slept like a rock, almost too much so. When I woke up and saw the clock said 8:45 I freaked out a bit, forgetting that daylight savings kicked in, bumping the clocks forward an hour. Regardless I had to hustle because the buyers for my house were scheduled to come do a walk through at 10. I literally pulled back in the driveway the same time as them with my Dunkin Donuts coffee.

I took close to an hour walking them through the property explaining whatever I could. They told me about their two wolfhound dogs, one weighing 135lbs and the other 185lbs, wow. They told me that they actually had possible plans to actually raise chickens and even add goats to the mix which would be awesome as long as they are ok with the associated work. Even taking as much time as I did there were a few things I forgot to tell them which I will try to include in a letter later. It was nice to meet the buyers, I am not sure if I will actually come face to face with the sellers of the home I am buying.

Once they left it was an all day grind-fest. I popped two sets of Advil along the way. I brought the various things that were boxed up already in the sheds up to the garage with more curbing of things that had survived round one of the purge. The overarching feeling of I need to take less with me drove me all day. Even so I still worry I just have too much. I pushed all day, finally calling it quits around 6:30 when I took my S22 to grab some coffee.

I have often mentioned how I prefer things to be orderly. I don’t like feeling things are in a chaotic state. Unfortunately with moving there is just no way to avoid that feeling. I have absolutely no desire to move again any time soon.

Today I do a final walk through of the new house at noon. I hope to find nothing significant has changed since I last saw it except for the garage being emptied out. I then have the closing on the transaction at 2:30. Assuming all goes as planned I then will start executing the migration plan, whatever part of it is actually formed in my head. I put the first set of containers in the Tesla last night and will likely drop them off at the new house later. I have a cleaning crew coming in tomorrow to get things bright and shiny as well.

My plan is to be running things back and forth between the two places during the week with the Tacoma as much as possible. My pie in the sky idea is to be sleeping there this Saturday night. Wish me luck, I’ll need it.

Some of my friends in LA made this “moving” tribute for me. It was cute.

So for awhile I have been getting warnings from GoDaddy that the version of PHP that was running on my WordPress sites was officially out of support range and was a potential security threat. Well no one wants that so as soon as I saw the message I tried to update my site to PHP 8 which is as easy as clicking a button in the GoDaddy console. However after clicking the button it caused my site to immediately crash and burn. I was able to push the button again to revert the change and all was well again, albeit with an outdated version of PHP up and running. I tried this upgrade several times and had the same results so I put it off, until yesterday.

So yesterday I was determined to figure out what the deal was. One of my sites was corrected by me disabling all plug ins, doing the PHP upgrade, and then reenabling the plug ins I needed. However this blog site still would crash when running PHP 8, even with all plug ins disabled. I placed a call with GoDaddy support to assist my troubleshooting. After some trial and error it was determined that the theme I was using for the blog was causing the crash. I probably should have been able to figure that one out on my own considering this theme is very old and has not been updated for around a half decade.

So now that I knew the problem I had to find another theme. I did not take tons of time to do this, I just wanted to find something that worked, which is what you are looking at currently. It’s a fresher, more modern look but has some bugs for me to still work out. One annoying bug for me is it appears the classic editor does not play nicely with this theme so I have been forced to write entries with the “block” editor which I have avoided up until this point despite it being out for years. It may grow on me.

So don’t be surprised if you tune in here and see a different theme in the future in case I decide I am not set on this one. In a way it’s appropriate that the look and feel of the blog changes after such a long time, considering all the other upheaval going on in my life right now.

Last night I had my last live stream ever in my current house. I talked about PEV things, the house transition and life in general. I had good audience participation that stretched the stream out to almost 3 hours. It will be interesting to see how/where streaming will take place at the new house.

Speaking of the new house, yesterday I contacted a lawn service that apparently services other homes in the area I will be living. I asked for a quote to maintain my yard. I was very pleased with the answer. For $160 a month they will come weekly to mow, weed whack, and trim bushes as needed. I instantly hired them. Not having to worry about keeping the yard in order is worth $40 a week to me, easily. It also dramatically reduces my need to keep anything other than simple yard maintenance equipment, a good thing with my new less spacious arrangements.

Last night I had my 5th consecutive week of volleyball.  I didn’t play as well as I could/should have making far too many errors passing the ball.  I found myself getting genuinely angry at myself.  Ironically the anger turned into some better play towards the end when our team of four beat a team of four much younger guys that had some decent skills.  The most important part of the night was I got to keep building on my sand volleyball strength and endurance while managing to escape once again without any significant injury. It’s a good thing I’m not hurt because it looks like I will be playing pickleball three times this week as well.

I think this weekend I will start doing some packing in earnest.  I also think I will mow/weed whack the property for the FINAL time before the sale closes on the 24th.  Man that sounds weird, but in a good way.  I will be leaving a lot of my yard equipment for the new owners.  At the new place I plan to rely just on my electric weed whacker and if I get a mower it would likely be an electric variety as well, if I don’t just pay for a lawn service.

This transition is coming, fast.

Yesterday I scheduled my final walk through of the new house I am buying.  Originally it was going to be on Sunday as the current owners were supposedly moving Friday.  I got word that their plans have changed and now they don’t plan to actually vacate until Monday morning which I thought was a bit odd since we are supposed to close on the sale Monday afternoon.  Talk about waiting to the last minute.  The purpose of the walk through is to make sure nothing significantly has changed since the sales contract was signed.  I am sure it will be fine but better safe than sorry I suppose.

I also am supposed to be meeting with the people that are buying my house this weekend for basically a show and tell session.  There are lots of things that the new homeowners will want to know in regards to how the house works.  I want them to enjoy the house so I will do my best to fully educate them.

Last night I shot what should be my final video with the V13 where I gave my feelings about the wheel which were overwhelmingly positive.  I then compared it to another wheel in the same category, the Sherman S, which I already own.  I think the video turned out well.  The difference with me compared to a lot of influencers that get sent wheels by dealers is I will do more content on a wheel.  Many of them just do one video, I typically will do a half dozen or more.  With the V13 that number worked out to be 7.  I’m hoping to be sent another wheel on the demo circuit, the EX30 but we will see if that works out or not.

Tonight I am planning to hit the sand volleyball court for the 5th consecutive week.  It’s been one change in my routine which I have enjoyed.  There is going to be truckloads of change coming my way so I may as well get used to it.

Saturday morning I hopped on the V13 and took it into the swamp, a staple of testing that I do with wheels.  Since we are in the midst of dry season I hoped the path would be muck free, it was thankfully.  The parking lot was jammed with spillover parking in the roadway.  I saw two gators in the first couple minutes, just hanging in the water like statues, as they often do.  As I continued riding I got reports from two different groups of an “agitated” gator on the path.  I never had that description told to me before about alligators in the swamp, although they obviously can be aggressive.  The second group that told me about it said they turned around because the gator started walking at them which freaked them out.  I was intrigued.

So as I rode a bit further I saw it, a gator walking right down the middle of the path.  I never saw one walking casually like this.  I got closer.  As I was about 40 feet away from him he suddenly flopped back down and laid there, looking at me.  I have ridden past a ton of gators on my wheels, but they are always already laying still, not moving towards me.  I nudged myself even closer which verified this was a young gator, he was probably only 6 feet long nose to tail.  After some inner discussion I decided to just go for it.  Just as I mounted the wheel the gator stood up and started walking towards me again.  I was committed at this point and rolled by him without incident but it surely spiked my adrenaline as I was not quite sure what was going to happen.

Later in the ride I had another first when I smelled/saw a dead gator floating in the swamp.  It’s carcass was pretty decomposed already with a dozen buzzards feasting on it.  It was right about that point where I decided I had enough and turned around.  Some people that saw the video were in disbelief that I rode past an advancing gator.  Sometimes you just have to take a leap of faith/stupidity.

Saturday night I decided to go see the new Ant Man movie solo at Silverspot.  I was a back and forth if I wanted to go or not for two reasons.  I have heard several reports that the movie was not very good and second, going to a movie yourself is kind of depressing, although I have done it a few times since I became single.  I decided to pull the trigger and go last second.  I wish I hadn’t made that decision.

The movie was not great, despite it’s over the top usage of crazy CG.  I could only give it a B and wished I just waited to see it on Disney+ instead of wasting 40 bucks on a ticket/food. The multiverse story line Marvel is running with now takes away from the importance of most plots IMO because if you beat one arch villain there are thousands of other versions of him still in the multiverse, it’s dumb.   I also may discontinue going to movies myself, it just feels like that is something that needs to be shared with someone. Weird, I know.

Sunday morning I got up and out early to do a range test on the V13, the second time I attempted to do so.  The first run I developed that weird tapping sound that cut the ride short.  For some reason, me taking the wheel apart, twice, seems to have minimized the tapping sound, despite me not really seeing anything obviously wrong.  The ride went well with me covering almost 53 miles before I ran out of juice.

There was a funny moment during the ride.  I mounted the wheel in a pavilion out at Aver Maria after taking a quick break.  When I did so I was next a metal picnic bench.  My balance was off and I shifted to the left, there was no room to go that way.  The end result was me diving off the wheel onto the bench.  As I fell I pinned my selfie stick under me, bending it.  I also smacked my face on the hard surface, thankfully my full face helmet prevented knocking out any teeth. It was ridiculous.

On Sunday afternoon I started working on clearing out more stuff in advance of moving.  I took a bunch more items down to the curb with the majority of it being scooped up by people before dark.

I talked last week about my strategy of how to get rid of the furniture items I don’t want/need.  An idea struck me during the day, maybe the new owners want this stuff?  So I took a picture of each item and sent them to the buyers realtor, telling her I was going to get rid of these things but if the new owners wanted it, they were welcome to have it.  She responded later that they actually want the items, all of them.  That is fantastic, greatly simplifying my requirements.  I went through and cleaned out all of the unwanted stuff in each of those pieces of furniture.

I may even be offering them my 70 inch TV as I have no real spot to use it at the new house until some remodeling is performed.  The TV is something like 6 years old at this point so I would be just as happy getting the latest and greatest for my new house when the time comes.

My buddy Don texted me during the afternoon asking if I wanted to grab dinner, I said sure, knowing he is still working through the difficulty of losing his dog a couple weeks ago.  We met up at the Yard House, a bar I went to with him once before.  I was thirsty and finished my first 23 ounce Miller Lite very quickly, putting me into my friendly and talkative drunk state pretty quickly.  I had an Ahi Tuna sandwich which was really good.  Don and I had a good time just talking about whatever came to mind, similar to when we met up the week prior.  It was a good way to wind up a busy weekend.  They only will get busier from here.

Last night when I got home I did another quick century circuit in the backyard.  I am going to have to decide if I want to erect a pull up bar at my new place.  I don’t know that I would go through the hassle of building a free standing set up with 4″ x 6″ like I have now.  A simple wall mounted bar might suffice, I’ll have to think about it.

I headed out on the V13 last night for a quick ride around the park to shoot a video about five things that I love about this wheel.  As much as I like the V13 I am still glad that I bought a Sherman S for myself, it’s an all around better fit for my needs.

This morning I was back at the dermatologist office having my latest set of stitches removed, a 5 minute job that was a little more uncomfortable the normal because a lot of stitches were used to close the area which was stretched pretty tight.  As always I am hoping to not revisit the scalpel for at least a little while.  I think since my late 30’s I have not been able to go more than a couple years without getting cut into.

Yesterday I officially got a closing date of March 13th for the house I am buying, a scarce 10 days away.  I need to start making some decisions in earnest regarding what will and will not be making the trip with me 25 miles away.  There are a number of furniture items still in the house that either I don’t need or don’t have practical space for at the new place.  Sure I could get everything jammed in there if I wanted to but the truth is that would run counter to my mindset of having just enough instead of too much.

I also had concerns about if I don’t want something, how was I going to get rid of it.  Selling on Facebook marketplace can be a royal PIA with the tidal wave of scammers that contact you and then trying to organize and schedule legitimate buyers.  My buddy Don suggested a much cleaner solution is to contact a charity like St Matthews house, they will actually come and pick up furniture you want to donate.  I believe that is the route I will go.  So one of my goals this weekend is to make a firm stay/go decision on furniture that remains.

I also need to start doing some packing which will once again include more decisions as I clean out cabinets and counters.  I am sure the trash can will be pretty full by the end of the weekend. I’ve taken several days off around my moving date of March 18th to try to get a handle on the countless tasks that will surround relocating my life.  It’s a big hill in front of me but it sure will be nice to coast down the other side.

This weekend I plan to also wrap up my testing of the V13, not because I want to but because I pretty much have to.  I am just not going to have much spare time for the rest of the month to focus on much else but moving.

Yesterday at lunch I played pickleball.  A month ago the idea of playing pickleball the day after playing volleyball would have been something I never would have entertained.  The toll it would potentially place on my body would be more than I could pay.  However fast forward a month and it was no big deal.  In fact I played some of the best doubles I have in a very long time, I just felt like I was in sync and on point, it’s a good feeling.

Last night I helped a friend move some stuff. When you have a pickup truck this makes you a popular person at times like that.  Having a knack for grinding through physical labor is a sought after talent as well.  It went fine and we grabbed dinner in the midst of it. It was a good warm up for the endless moving that I will be digging into in the very near future.

Elsa has been very cute lately.  She has been much more excited and animated when I get home the last few days.  I’m not sure what has spurred the change but I welcome it.  There is nothing better than having another living being thrilled just because you showed up. It makes you feel like a super hero.

Last night marked a month since my return to playing semi-organized volleyball. I got to play with the same woman I did last week.  We both appreciate that the other has basic volleyball skills so we want to stick together.  Again last night we played a number of formats ranging from 5’s to 3’s.  I felt more rust falling off my game as I am passing and setting better with an occasional hit mixed in there.  My serve for whatever reason has been good and getting better since day 1.

I also find myself being the most sandy player on the court.  I am hustling and diving throughout the two hour session.  It feels good to do so even after some of the impacts take me a few extra seconds to recover from than they may have in the past.  Again despite putting myself through some pretty tough play I found my body survived without major impact which is great news.  The ability for me to physically survive beach volleyball is also good for me mentally.  It’s just one of what I am expecting to be a long list of changes/improvements 2023 is going to hold for me.