Day 5 - still alive.

Well, the early morning wake-ups have ceased. I think it's b/c there's less to stress about now that I'm near the end, or so I thought. My sister and I still woke up a bit earlier than we needed to (the truck rental place was expecting us at 10am) so we went out to Boom Restaurant for one of the best breakfasts that TO has to offer. The Boom Power Breakfast did not dissapoint, and my sister's shrimp and spinach fritatta was also a hit. On our way back to the Manor, we hit Walmart one last time for 'two more' storage bins -bringing the total up to 6 new LARGE bins in the last three days. I tell ya, stuff just keeps on coming out of their hiding spaces....

Picking up the moving truck was a bit of an adventure. My roommate was good enought to drive me down to pick it up for 10am. Three groups ahead of me in line + one guy working the counter = 1 hour of wait time. The truck that I rented was a 10foot cube van from U Haul. At first, I was a bit nervous about driving such a large truck, and was constantly afraid that I was rip off the extended side view mirrors. I eventually found the corners and was driving it erratically like a seasoned pro.

Back at the Manor shortly after 11am. I was in for the shock of my life as we started packing the truck, and the van almost packed up full in no time at all (!) ... and there were still plenty of boxes left in the Manor. In the end, everything did make it's way into the van, with just barely enough room for the last remaining boxes and odds and sods. (I'm now (it's Tues as I write this) kicking myself for not taking a picture of the packed truck - me, of all people!!) 2pm - the truck was packed and we were ready to hit the open road. Traffic was light, and the construction road crews were largely absent from the major arteries out of the city. I was doing fine for the first half hour, and then it hit me - the fatigue from heavy lifting of the morning combined with the gentle rocking motion of the van on the highway forced us to make a rest stop just outside of TO to catch a power nap before continuing on to Ottawa. Not knowing whether I was a 'truck' or a 'car', I pulled into the truck rest area, only to be dwarfed by the forest of big 18 wheelers.

We rolled into Ottawa at about 8pm - 6 hours after our departure. All in all, not bad time considering the various rest stops along the way. Unloading was not going to be pleasant, but would you know it, my sister's neighbour used to be in the furniture moving business, and came out to help. What a great guy ... so great in fact, he got his son to come out and help as well! One hour later, and all the boxes were safely tucked away in my sister's place.