Whew!

 I didn't fall off the earth,

rather, I drove across it!

In a marathon of driving.

My driving companion was Beau.

\\

He eventually figured out there were blankets in the

backseat as well, so he split his time between

the front and the back of the truck.

And sometimes he perched on the 

center armrest/console just for variety.

My view was the back of Kyle's truck

pulling a trailer with his Cat onboard.

On the way out, I wagged the tail.

Rod led, pulling a car trailer with Kyle's Gulf,

 Jim followed in the U-Haul 

pulling a trailer with my Trooper,

then Kyle with his Cat

and finally me.

With no trailer, cuz I'm a pansy.

We took nearly EVERYTHING we own

out to Kansas.

Rod also had Kyle's rottweiler, Luna, in

a crate in the back of his truck,

since he has a big topper.

Because of the value of the stuff,

and because of the two dogs, 

we decided to just sleep in our trucks.

We pulled into truck stops each evening,

covered as many windows as possible with

window shades / blankets / etc 

and curled up with a pillow and a 

blanket (and in my case, a dog)

and went to sleep.

And when the sun came up, 

we took the covers down and

hit the road again.

We didn't run hard.

Took lots of breaks to fill the gastanks,

(HOLY TOLEDO!)

and let the dogs and people out to

stretch their legs.

Luna did NOT love the idea of getting

back into the crate in the back

of the truck and it took all 3 men

to put her back in there.

(By the end of the trip she had

accepted her fate and all we had

to do was toss in an empty water bottle

for her to play with and she hopped

up into the truck and into the crate

all on her own... thank heavens!!)

It was a little brisk!

We arrived in Kansas on November 1.

We have to pass by the ranch so we stopped there

first and checked on the state of

Kyle's house.

It looked just as he left it.

There were several good hail / wind

storms last month and he was a little

concerned whether it would survive.

But he's a good builder.

Then on to Hill City to check out the

little house on Walnut Street.

WHOA.

It was HORRIBLE.

There were inspection stickers dated 2022 on

EVERYTHING from the faucets to the

toilet, bathtub, thermostat, stating

they were not in working condition.

EVERY window was broken in some manner.

The sliding glass doors not only had broken

glass, but they would neither open nor completely close.

The bedrooms were DISGUSTING.

And even if they weren't, one was painted

a horrible combination of BLACK and DARK RED

with NIKE all over the place.

This was going to be a tear-down and start over,

not "a little rough" as it was presented to us.

The agent sent us some VERY carefully angled

photos that showed a rough, older home that

would need some paint and floor covering.

The story was a man bought the house,

started to renovate it, but was killed in a car accident

and his estate was just trying to get rid of it.

The REAL story was it was a literal crack house.

They were dealing drugs out of the house.

(Right across the street from the local

Southern Baptist church and next door 

to the pastor... cheeky!)

The police raided it, he took off, a chase

ensued, and he was killed when he wrecked his car.

Same story, just a little more detail.

Thankfully we had NOT closed on the house,

we contacted the agent and told him NO.

He came to talk to us and you could tell

he knew he had taken advantage of us.

And he wasn't sorry and would do the same

to the next family who came along.

We will be filing complaints against him

with both Zillow and the Kansas Realtor Board.

Meanwhile, we had already rented a 2nd storage

building in the same facility where Kyle is storing

his tractor, so we unloaded everything from the

U-Haul, there was plenty of room, so we put

the Trooper in one of them as well.

And then headed back to the ranch to

spend the night in our trucks one more time.

Thursday morning we got up, headed into Hays

and returned the U-Haul and one of the car trailers.

Then back to the ranch to say Goodbye and

THANK YOU to Jim for his help.

He and Kyle headed off to Denver in the

Ranger so he could fly back to Florida on Friday.

Kyle thought about staying the night with Jim,

but he said Denver is HORRIBLE.

There are homeless everywhere,

the streets are covered in trash and there are

tents and panhandlers and .... he just didn't

feel safe leaving the truck there.

So he hung out for a bit and then hit the road again.

Stopped at a rest area around dark and slept

for a few hours and then headed on to the

ranch, arriving at 3:30 in the morning.

While he was gone, Rod and I drove around the

next little town called WaKeeney and absolutely

fell in love with the town.

We found an adorable little house in an

older, friendly neighborhood.

Met with a new (wonderful) realtor,

toured the house and put in an offer.

(which they did not accept...)

We hoped to move me in right away,

and then Rod and Kyle would go back to Florida

and finish getting the house ready to sell,

and then they would join me there.

But the offer wasn't accepted.

So when Kyle got back, we loaded up again

and headed home.

I'm hoping the little house doesn't sell.

Because I LOVE it.

But I don't feel like we can buy it until

we sell the Florida house, and I don't

want to try to drive back out there 

again this winter.

The weather will only get more wintery.

So the plan is to stay here,

work on the house,

work at our jobs,

and prepare to move in the spring.

Which was the original plan anyway.

Except now here we are with 90% of our stuff

in Kansas.

We have living room furniture (mostly, we left the

end tables Kyle made us out there.... but we

are using a filing cabinet and an end table

from the bedroom I was going to get rid of...)

I had left minimal stuff in the kitchen because

I knew Rod was coming back, so we have

"some" dishes, had to buy a pot, frying pan,

and some spatulas... but I've been thinking

about living minimally. Now's my chance!

Hahahahahaha.

Been getting lots of Amazon deliveries.

For essentials, like a rice cooker (they didn't

have any at WalMart), and t-shirts and a

couple of teaching shirts and a skirt for church.

It will be fun.

(ask me again in the spring... lol)

Anyhow.

That's a short, update on the state of affairs.

I'm teaching zoom and subbing in West Palm Beach

in Nov and Dec. We will just take it a day at a time.

Thank you to ALL OF YOU for your prayers

of support and safety. We really felt the hand

of the Lord in this adventure.

We are simply putting our trust in Him and His 

timeline, knowing this is the right thing, we

just got the timing wrong.