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So my niece Princess is moving back to Key West from North Florida. This should be an even worthy of celebration. And her living back here certainly is.
It's the process that we are going through to get her here that is driving me nuts.
Now, when she was down here a week or so ago, she was looking for a new vehicle. Why? Because her current vehicle, a 2002 Chevy S-10 pickup truck, for various legal and financial reasons around her late father's estate that are not worth going into right now, will not be hers much longer. For whatever reason, the bank is repossessing the S-10 next month, but this has nothing to do with Princess, as it is tied up in various things with said estate. (The S-10 was never in Princess's name. It is actually still in her late father's name.)
She found a pretty nifty 2000 Ford Explorer for a reasonable price with reasonable mileage that my mechanic inspected and gave the thumbs up, so she bought it.
So she has two vehicles down here, and she was going back to Lake Cit alone. Naturally she had to leave one down here. For various reasons, she left the S-10 here, and drove the Explorer north. And she goes about planning for the move. This should have been easy.
Here WAS the plan: I drive the S-10 up to Lake City Saturday, where it will stay. We rent a trailer for her furniture and stuff, and load it up on Sunday. We then tow it down behind the Explorer, with me doing the majority of the driving, since I've been driving longer than she's been alive. (She's 19.)
That WAS the plan. Here is the major snag: U-Haul has a company policy against renting trailers to people who will tow them with Ford Explorers. Apparently there have been some issues, U-Haul has been sued because of these issues, and so they no longer allow towing by Explorers. Fuck!
Plan B: Find another company that rents trailers that will allow us to tow it behind an Explorer. The problem with Plan B is that U-Haul pretty much has the market on moving trailers.
Plan C: Screw the trailer, how much more can a small moving truck be? I could certainly drive it. So I called U-Haul to find out. Answer: a lot more. More than double. Screw Plan C.
Plan D: Tow the U-Haul trailer with a U-Haul pickup truck that we pick up in Lake City and drop off in Key West. I would drive that, and Princess would drive the Explorer. The S-10 would stay in Key West...the bank can come get it here! The problem with Plan D is that U-Haul does not do one way rentals for their pickup trucks, only for their trailers.
Plan E: I rent a pickup truck from U-Haul in Key West, drive up to north Florida, and tow the U-Haul trailer back to Key West behind the U-Haul truck, with as Princess drives the Explorer. Once again, the S-10 would stay in Key West, and we would tell the bank to go piss up a rope....they can come get it. The problem with Plan E is that the U-Haul pickup truck would be about $20/day, which is perfectly reasonable, plus 59 cents a mile...which, when you are driving 1,000 miles, is absolutely ridiculous.
Plan F: I drive the S-10 up to north Florida, and tow the trailer back to Key West with it, with Princess driving the Explorer and me driving the S-10. The S-10 ends up in Key West, and once again, it's the bank's problem next month, not ours. Plan F seems very workable. The pro is that I don't put any extra mileage on my truck, just the S-10, which will be gone next month anyways. The con is I am far more comfortable in my truck, and it has more power. My mechanic says gas mileage will be about the same, so it's a coin flip. Problem: her mechanics in north Florida told her that the S-10's drive belt needs to replaced. Solution: My mechanic, who I trust implicitly, looked at it and said it would need to be replaced, if we were keeping the S-10. We're not. For the 1,000 mile trip that is planned, 500 of it towing a trailer, he said the S-10 would be perfectly fine.
Plan G: I drive the Blazer up to north Florida, and tow the trailer back to Key West with it, with Princess driving the Explorer and me driving the Blazer. The S-10 stays in Key West, and once again, it's the bank's problem next month, not ours. Plan G also seems very workable. One pro to this plan is that I get to do a trial run for towing a trailer with my truck, in preparation for my eventual move back to Arizona. Another pro is, as I mentioned above, I am far more comfortable in my truck, and I also have a lot more room for any extra stuff that might not fit in the trailer. The con is I would be putting extra mileage on my truck that I might not have to. My mechanic says gas mileage will be about the same, so it's a coin flip. Problem: I had some overheating issues with the Blazer last summer. According to my trust mechanic, towing a trailer behind it would cause more stress, potentially causing it to overheat again, and cause more damage. Solution: After I had work done on the Blazer to address the overheating, it did overheat again, when I was last in north Florida in August for the funeral. However, it did that only the one time, and since that once did not cause any issues, including on my road trip to Fort Myers Beach in October. My mechanic says that if it did not have any further trouble, it was probably just a one-time air pocket that built up, and I should be fine. I should point out that in August it didn't actually fully overheat, so much as get dangerously hot before I pulled over and let it cool down. I never let it get to the danger zone.
Plan H: Budget Rental Trucks have a small moving truck that would be comparable in capacity to the trailer Princess was going to rent. And the price of the truck would be only a little more than the price of the trailer. So I would drive the S-10 up, leave it in north Florida, and drive the moving truck back to Key West while Princess drove the Explorer back. Pros: The S-10 gets back where the bank expects it to be, and out of our hair, and I drive a single unit, rather than a truck with a trailer...frankly I think I would be more comfortable with the one truck, and not worrying about a potential overheat or drive belt. Also, Princess could start loading the truck on Saturday before I even got there, and if I got there early enough, I could do some loading of the truck too, potentially getting it all done Saturday so that on Sunday, instead of just taking one four hour break to watch one football game, we could be done by football on Sunday, and I could watch all the games, and Princess's Uncle Jester would be in a far better mood come Monday since his entire weekend wasn't shot. Cons: The mileage on the moving truck could be ridiculous, as could the cost to fill its massive 35-gallon gas tank. Also, it would have to be picked up on Saturday, as the outlet is closed on Sunday, and if I don't get to north Florida early enough, Princess, while she could probably get a ride to the outlet from a friend, is not sure she would be able to drive the moving truck the 9 miles back to her home from there. Plan H is very workable, but has some kinks, obviously. (And I don't get to put the Blazer through the trial run.)
Plan I (are we running out of letters yet?): I stop being such a damn good uncle, and tell Princess to find a way to get this shit done herself, while I go off to the bar on Sunday to enjoy football and beer, and say screw this shit, I don't need it. Pros: I enjoy my weekend, and don't have to drive a thousand miles on Chrismas weekend, freeze my tail off in north Florida, and deal with idiot drivers up and down this stupid state. Cons: I would have to shoot myself in the head, since I cannot stop being such a damn good uncle. Plan I is probably not going to work all that well.
I can hear what you're thinking. "Jester, this could have all been avoided if Princess had checked with U-Haul first, and driven the S-10 up to north Florida and left her shiny new Explorer in Key West." There are two problems with that. First, who would ever think that U-Haul would have an issue with one of the most common SUV's on the market? Seriously, who knew? Even my mechanic was astounded by this! Secondly, I would have still had to have driven up to north Florida in the Explorer to drive the S-10 and trailer back here, as no one is comfortable with Princess driving a vehicle and a trailer, and she still would need help loading some of the larger furniture items. And hindsight is 20/20, but does exactly nothing for us now.
So as you can see, this is turning into one great big clusterfuck. If a bunch of idiot Explorer owners hadn't screwed this whole thing up for us, I would be driving the Explorer, towing the trailer, back to Key West on Monday, with the lovely luxury of having a potential second driver for when I got tired. No, I would not have let her drive it on the freeway, but through the Keys, at the lower speed limits, with less traffic, at a time when I would probably be getting very tired and cranky? Yeah, I would have let her, and we had talked about that, as she did want some experience driving that. And even though it is her truck and her rental trailer, she agreed that if I did let her drive it some, I still had veto power: if I told her to pull over and relinquish control, she would have.
So, any comments? Suggestions? Brilliant ideas? More alphabetical plans? Heavy tranquilizers?
It's the process that we are going through to get her here that is driving me nuts.
Now, when she was down here a week or so ago, she was looking for a new vehicle. Why? Because her current vehicle, a 2002 Chevy S-10 pickup truck, for various legal and financial reasons around her late father's estate that are not worth going into right now, will not be hers much longer. For whatever reason, the bank is repossessing the S-10 next month, but this has nothing to do with Princess, as it is tied up in various things with said estate. (The S-10 was never in Princess's name. It is actually still in her late father's name.)
She found a pretty nifty 2000 Ford Explorer for a reasonable price with reasonable mileage that my mechanic inspected and gave the thumbs up, so she bought it.
So she has two vehicles down here, and she was going back to Lake Cit alone. Naturally she had to leave one down here. For various reasons, she left the S-10 here, and drove the Explorer north. And she goes about planning for the move. This should have been easy.
Here WAS the plan: I drive the S-10 up to Lake City Saturday, where it will stay. We rent a trailer for her furniture and stuff, and load it up on Sunday. We then tow it down behind the Explorer, with me doing the majority of the driving, since I've been driving longer than she's been alive. (She's 19.)
That WAS the plan. Here is the major snag: U-Haul has a company policy against renting trailers to people who will tow them with Ford Explorers. Apparently there have been some issues, U-Haul has been sued because of these issues, and so they no longer allow towing by Explorers. Fuck!
Plan B: Find another company that rents trailers that will allow us to tow it behind an Explorer. The problem with Plan B is that U-Haul pretty much has the market on moving trailers.
Plan C: Screw the trailer, how much more can a small moving truck be? I could certainly drive it. So I called U-Haul to find out. Answer: a lot more. More than double. Screw Plan C.
Plan D: Tow the U-Haul trailer with a U-Haul pickup truck that we pick up in Lake City and drop off in Key West. I would drive that, and Princess would drive the Explorer. The S-10 would stay in Key West...the bank can come get it here! The problem with Plan D is that U-Haul does not do one way rentals for their pickup trucks, only for their trailers.
Plan E: I rent a pickup truck from U-Haul in Key West, drive up to north Florida, and tow the U-Haul trailer back to Key West behind the U-Haul truck, with as Princess drives the Explorer. Once again, the S-10 would stay in Key West, and we would tell the bank to go piss up a rope....they can come get it. The problem with Plan E is that the U-Haul pickup truck would be about $20/day, which is perfectly reasonable, plus 59 cents a mile...which, when you are driving 1,000 miles, is absolutely ridiculous.
Plan F: I drive the S-10 up to north Florida, and tow the trailer back to Key West with it, with Princess driving the Explorer and me driving the S-10. The S-10 ends up in Key West, and once again, it's the bank's problem next month, not ours. Plan F seems very workable. The pro is that I don't put any extra mileage on my truck, just the S-10, which will be gone next month anyways. The con is I am far more comfortable in my truck, and it has more power. My mechanic says gas mileage will be about the same, so it's a coin flip. Problem: her mechanics in north Florida told her that the S-10's drive belt needs to replaced. Solution: My mechanic, who I trust implicitly, looked at it and said it would need to be replaced, if we were keeping the S-10. We're not. For the 1,000 mile trip that is planned, 500 of it towing a trailer, he said the S-10 would be perfectly fine.
Plan G: I drive the Blazer up to north Florida, and tow the trailer back to Key West with it, with Princess driving the Explorer and me driving the Blazer. The S-10 stays in Key West, and once again, it's the bank's problem next month, not ours. Plan G also seems very workable. One pro to this plan is that I get to do a trial run for towing a trailer with my truck, in preparation for my eventual move back to Arizona. Another pro is, as I mentioned above, I am far more comfortable in my truck, and I also have a lot more room for any extra stuff that might not fit in the trailer. The con is I would be putting extra mileage on my truck that I might not have to. My mechanic says gas mileage will be about the same, so it's a coin flip. Problem: I had some overheating issues with the Blazer last summer. According to my trust mechanic, towing a trailer behind it would cause more stress, potentially causing it to overheat again, and cause more damage. Solution: After I had work done on the Blazer to address the overheating, it did overheat again, when I was last in north Florida in August for the funeral. However, it did that only the one time, and since that once did not cause any issues, including on my road trip to Fort Myers Beach in October. My mechanic says that if it did not have any further trouble, it was probably just a one-time air pocket that built up, and I should be fine. I should point out that in August it didn't actually fully overheat, so much as get dangerously hot before I pulled over and let it cool down. I never let it get to the danger zone.
Plan H: Budget Rental Trucks have a small moving truck that would be comparable in capacity to the trailer Princess was going to rent. And the price of the truck would be only a little more than the price of the trailer. So I would drive the S-10 up, leave it in north Florida, and drive the moving truck back to Key West while Princess drove the Explorer back. Pros: The S-10 gets back where the bank expects it to be, and out of our hair, and I drive a single unit, rather than a truck with a trailer...frankly I think I would be more comfortable with the one truck, and not worrying about a potential overheat or drive belt. Also, Princess could start loading the truck on Saturday before I even got there, and if I got there early enough, I could do some loading of the truck too, potentially getting it all done Saturday so that on Sunday, instead of just taking one four hour break to watch one football game, we could be done by football on Sunday, and I could watch all the games, and Princess's Uncle Jester would be in a far better mood come Monday since his entire weekend wasn't shot. Cons: The mileage on the moving truck could be ridiculous, as could the cost to fill its massive 35-gallon gas tank. Also, it would have to be picked up on Saturday, as the outlet is closed on Sunday, and if I don't get to north Florida early enough, Princess, while she could probably get a ride to the outlet from a friend, is not sure she would be able to drive the moving truck the 9 miles back to her home from there. Plan H is very workable, but has some kinks, obviously. (And I don't get to put the Blazer through the trial run.)
Plan I (are we running out of letters yet?): I stop being such a damn good uncle, and tell Princess to find a way to get this shit done herself, while I go off to the bar on Sunday to enjoy football and beer, and say screw this shit, I don't need it. Pros: I enjoy my weekend, and don't have to drive a thousand miles on Chrismas weekend, freeze my tail off in north Florida, and deal with idiot drivers up and down this stupid state. Cons: I would have to shoot myself in the head, since I cannot stop being such a damn good uncle. Plan I is probably not going to work all that well.
I can hear what you're thinking. "Jester, this could have all been avoided if Princess had checked with U-Haul first, and driven the S-10 up to north Florida and left her shiny new Explorer in Key West." There are two problems with that. First, who would ever think that U-Haul would have an issue with one of the most common SUV's on the market? Seriously, who knew? Even my mechanic was astounded by this! Secondly, I would have still had to have driven up to north Florida in the Explorer to drive the S-10 and trailer back here, as no one is comfortable with Princess driving a vehicle and a trailer, and she still would need help loading some of the larger furniture items. And hindsight is 20/20, but does exactly nothing for us now.
So as you can see, this is turning into one great big clusterfuck. If a bunch of idiot Explorer owners hadn't screwed this whole thing up for us, I would be driving the Explorer, towing the trailer, back to Key West on Monday, with the lovely luxury of having a potential second driver for when I got tired. No, I would not have let her drive it on the freeway, but through the Keys, at the lower speed limits, with less traffic, at a time when I would probably be getting very tired and cranky? Yeah, I would have let her, and we had talked about that, as she did want some experience driving that. And even though it is her truck and her rental trailer, she agreed that if I did let her drive it some, I still had veto power: if I told her to pull over and relinquish control, she would have.
So, any comments? Suggestions? Brilliant ideas? More alphabetical plans? Heavy tranquilizers?
8 years. Wowzers, um, anyway - when my parents moved they got a truck from Penske.
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