Quietly Celebrating

I don't want to get too excited because we could still run into trouble tomorrow.

Today we picked up my new car.  It's a 2001 Toyota Sienna (see it here), and we got a really good deal on it.  Dan and I got up relatively early, ate breakfast at IHOP (Dan is loving the Minion-ade) and went to the dealer.  We finished asked them to give the car the once-over, checking fluids and belts and such to make sure it was OK for the drive to CT (we bought it wholesale, so that stuff hadn't been done yet.)  While they worked on it, Dan and I went to the bank to get a cashier's check for the balance.  After the car was officially mine, Dan got to bang a huge Chinese gong and everyone applauded.

Next up was to take the car to a car audio place to have the XM installed.  (I will not under any circumstances drove cross-country without my XM (and AC, but that's another story).  The car would not have been ready until 7, and I had other things to do, so I plan to show up first thing tomorrow morning and hopefully be out of there fairly early.  We have no stops to make, so as long as we make Dodge City by bedtime, I'll be happy; it could take until 2 and we'd still be OK.

Next up was the U-Haul place.  I need a trailer because the Sienna's interior volume is less than that of the Previa.  They had the trailer I'd reserved, but didn't have the right size thingy that holds the ball that goes into the square part of the hitch on the car.  Dan and I went across town to pick up the thingy and the ball.  We hit Sonic afterwards, then headed back to U-Haul.  The young man went to hitch up the trailer and found that there was no electrical hook up for the lights on the trailer, and it's illegal to tow a trailer without it.  The good news, he was able to install that and had the parts.  The other gentleman told me I was lucky the younger guy was there, because we wouldn't have been able to get it done at any of the U-Haul places (I guess the kid was the only one in the whole city working today that could do it?)

Dan and I climbed up on a pile of boxes to wait, me knitting and he reading his summer reading book, to wait.  Less than an hour later we were on our way back to the dealership with the trailer in tow.  My old car was in a service bay since it was incapable of being moved, and they drove my new car and trailer into the bay area so Dan and I could transfer my belongings.

We got most everything into the trailer, leaving the car for our day-to-day luggage, and double and triple checked to old car to make sure we had everything.  Even so, I almost left my garage door opener on the visor.  We're both hot and sticky, but it's done!  Dan cleaned up a bit and is going to jump in the pool for a bit.  I plan to shower and change into my jammies after his swim.  The audio place opens at 9, so we're going to leave here no later than 8.  I plan to be first on line.