09-XI-2006.
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Last night Go called saying she got the job at that big gaming company in Orlando. We scheduled the move for today.
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10:58
Got on the bike (the one which will go as a present to Florida) and drove to the nearest U-haul. Took a truck, pre-paid for a thousand miles, then went home to get some stuff and say 'bye (Lena was at school). Then drove it all the way to DC, where Go and Ricardo were (at his Jose's place). Loaded all of their stuff, and took south. In Richmond there was this odd moment when I should NOT take to the I-64, but stick to I-95 all the way.
I've had this before, when I'd drive the same route multiple times, and would just automatically go that way when the route changed - creature of habit, as it were. Over time I trained myself so it happened rarely, and this was one deja vu moment, when I had a hunch I should take a right lane to get to the exit, and then concentrated a bit on not taking it.
15:10
Not the first time to drive a truck like this, and this actually was a brand new one, with all automatic, radio catching somewhat bearable music or at least something that doesn't shout ads at me. Parked an empty soda can as an ashtray and a pack of cigarettes at hand (Smokin' Joes, IIRC) and drove and drove and drove. There was very little traffic, and if it weren't for take-a-leak and fill-the-tank stops, it would have been almost hypnotizing. Add the automatic transmission to that, and I actually had very little work to do, and amazingly wasn't sleepy at all until almost midnight.
At 22:20 I had to take a detour and fill the tank. These trucks don't run on diesel, it's just the regular, as american diesel is dirty, they never went into refining it much.
1:08
Somewhere in NC, ahem, south of the border, we found a restarea where I caught a dozen minutes of sleep back in the box. Midnight probably happened when we were nearing SC. South Carolina is so boring to drive through, it's almost empty, just forest everywhere. One of those teleport states, nothing to see here, zap through. It was visible by the motel prices - as we drove south, it fell from 35$ to 30$ to 25$... which eventually started looking rather attractive. Come to think of it, I was on the move for some fourteen hours, so... we took a room in one of those motels and I got asleep before my head hit the pillow. It was 2:30.
Mentions: Gorana Sredljević (Go), Jelena Sredljević (Lena), Jose Bariero, Ricardo Manuel Bariero (Ricardo), in serbian