Thursday Jan 3

We got up this morning at 5:30. Got everyone dressed, packed up what was left (including toiletries and food stuff), and went to Mildenhall. Dropped off the Honda at the rental place, drove out to Cheveley in the rental. Unloaded into the house and finished the inventory. Then Bob took the rental back to Mildenhall to be there by 9am. Got it turned in and paid for, then drove his car back to the house. We’ve got everything as unpacked as we can, I’ve done a load of laundry, and here we sit at 11am with no movers in sight. They have “from 8-5” to show up, but with the pile of stuff we have, we’d figured they’d want an early start. Guess not. I hope there wasn’t a problem, since there is no way to get in touch with us.

Ella is asleep on Bob’s chest, snoring away. She still doesn’t feel well.

Time for lunch.

Thursday pt 2

After lunch we started to suspect something wasn’t right.

(background: Dec 22 I’d called AT&T to get my cell phone unlocked so we could get a SIM card and use it here. They said I’d get an email by the 31^st with the code. The night of the 2^nd (Wednesday) I called again and asked if they had it yet. After a while I got the code, then transferred to tech support to hear how to put it in. Turns out we have to put in the new SIM card first, then push a sequence of keys, then enter the code. They emailed me the sequence.)

So, Bob went to Newmarket to buy a SIM card so we could call to find out about the movers. Got a card and came back. In order to insert the SIM, I first had to take off the back of my phone and take out the battery. Hahaha. We pushed and pried on that thing! Bob finally got out the butcher knife and pried on that awhile before it finally came off. Got the new SIM in, turned it on, and realized that the key sequence was online and we had no internet. After about 5 tries I got it. Entered the code, and it was wrong. Tried twice more; still wrong. I was laughing, as there was nothing else to do, when Bob says, “Try my phone.” His battery comes off all the time, so that was easy. No key code required, that is easy. The code to unlock that was supposed to be for my phone worked on his. Yay!

Now we discover that the 1GBP worth of minutes included is only to activate; we have to “top up” to make a call. So he went to the post office in Cheveley to top up. THEN he was able to call TMO (Traffic Management Office) – 2pm by now- and they said somehow we didn’t get in the schedule. After some thinking they said the movers would come out tonight and just set up the beds, and then do the rest Friday. Oh, sure.

So I go to make supper, and had it just finished when the movers show up. Of course all the bed pieces are scattered throughout the 6 crates, so they just brought it all in. Wrapped in packing paper so that nothing was recognizable, all these bundles and packages were quickly stacked in the living room, hall, and bedrooms. The mattresses were hard to miss, so they were placed on the floor (some in the wrong room), and the guys said they’d be back about noon Friday.

We had our dinner and started “opening presents.” By bedtime our second living room was knee deep with paper, and there was stuff all over. So to bed.