Celebrating Our Independence

As predicted, this is indeed turning into some kind of Saturday. We're getting close to wrapping up our packing and purging. We have about half of the day tomorrow, then it needs to be done. And, it will be, one way or the other.

We are so ready!

Our frenetic Friday continued into the evening. When we returned home from the vet, we had a message from a member of our HOA board. She was none too happy to see our POD sitting on our private street. And, she just had to tell us all about it. She was sure our local fire department was going to fine us $100 a night for our violation. We said we were sorry, this isn't how things were supposed to turn out, and we'd do whatever we could.

We called PODS to see if there was anything they could do, such as pick the pod up today. But, to no avail, the local site was closed for the holiday. The earliest it could be picked is Monday, our regularly scheduled time. 

Next thing we knew, the PODS people were calling us. Seems they had received nasty emails from two of our HOA board members. They asked us to assume all liability if anything happened while it was on the street. We said we would. Then, emails were flying between our HOA board and the PODS people. To say we were frustrated with the whole situation would be an understatement. 

Now, it's important to understand that our neighbors have said they are fine with this. It's the size of a car sitting on the curb. Everyone can get around just fine. (Even a fire truck!) No one has been inconvenienced in any way. In talking with the neighbors, we've learned that this is SOP for our HOA board. They love to get into everyone's business. It's obvious they have nothing better to do. Boris has started referring to them as our HOA "bored". 

With all of this correspondence flying, and the sun getting ready to set in the West, we decided we'd take a few extra steps to make our big white box on the curb look a little more visible. Though we were due at a farewell dinner in our honor, we made a trip to Home Depot and an auto parts store to pick up two bright orange cones, two reflective safety triangles and a handful of round stick-on orange reflectors. Back home, we surrounded the box with glowing orange and headed off to our dinner, nearly two hours late. 

Emails continued to fly during the evening. The president of our HOA emailed our agent! Our degree of agitation continued to boil. Afraid we weren't very good company, we excused ourselves from dinner and headed home. As we pulled onto our street in the dark, we were so pleased to see all of the day-glo orange doing its job. You can't miss this thing! 

Neither of us slept particularly well or long last night. This morning over coffee we read the latest email exchange, and it seems that the tempers of our HOA board members have cooled. Perhaps everyone has come to accept that, on this holiday weekend, the soonest this big box will be moved is Monday morning.  And, maybe our HOA board members have, at long last, decided to get a life.

Our heads are cooler today, as well. It's just one more piece of affirmation that we no longer want to be here and have far better places to go. 

We're taking a break from our last minute surge to attend our going away party. It should be a fun, informal gathering of friends. Together, we'll grill a few brats, have a beer or two, check out our motorhome, see some fireworks. In the end, we won't say goodbye. We'll simply say, see you later. 

We wish everyone a safe and happy 4th of July. It's an extra special holiday for us, as we celebrate our very soon-to-be independence.

Cheers!